Glass Cutter Feedback

[Kacpert25]

First, increased damage against weaker shadow creatures. It's a cool ability, but a 25% multiplier is a bit excessive. 
This means that weapons available from the start deal more damage than weapons that require a lot of steps to acquire, which is simply stupid. 

Spoiler

Spoiler

A 10% multiplier instead of 25% would be better here. 
Additionally, maybe instead of dealing more damage only to weaker shadow creatures, glass cutter could deal more damage to all weaker creatures that are shadow aligned? Like damaged clockworks or shadow merms not buffed by pure horror.

Another issue is crafting. It's simply too cheap. I don't understand why the devs decided to give 1 log instead 1 desk. Logs are much, much more common than, say, living logs. The amount of moon glass required is also a bit too small. 

Spoiler

In my opinion, crafting should require 1 desk and 4 moon glass. Or 1 log and 5 moon glass (crafting would then be similar to crafting a dark sword, which requires 1 living log and 5 nightmare fuel).

And finally, there are some proposed ideas for implementation related to the glass cutter.
- As I mentioned earlier, glass cutter could deal more damage against weaker shadow aligned creatures. Dark Sword could be similar. It would deal more damage against weaker gestalt creatures and weaker lunar aligned creatures. For example, Greater Gestalts, Mush Gnomes, Sentrypedes, Dust Moths, etc., etc..
- Since the Glass Cutter has 100% more uses when hitting shadow creatures, perhaps it could have 33% more uses when hitting shadow aligned creatures? This would be a nice refresh of its mechanic.
Similarly, it could work with damage. Meaning, it would deal 10% more damage to weaker shadow creatures, and 5% more damage to weaker shadow aligned creatures.
- It would be useful to add information about the glass cutter's abilities to the scrapbook.

Spoiler

Edited July 26, 2025 by Kacpert25

[ThePolana]

it should deal bonus damage after beating fuealweaver

[Maxil20]

2 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

It's a cool ability, but a 25% multiplier is a bit excessive. 

If this applied to more monsters I would agree more, but the only monsters this applies to are crawling horrors, terrorbeaks (and both of their ruins variants) and the lurking nightmare. For the former two with default characters, this essentially only shaves off a hit against them, which isn't a lot. Comparatively, 6.8 extra damage would effectively add very little to the Horror/Terrorbeak as you would still kill them in the same number of hits unless you also stacked the alignment perks. The only one that feels a bit wacky is the lurking nightmare since you can genuinely kill it at a noticeable speed (10 hits with the cutter compared to 13 for the dark sword), though I feel omitting it from the list would probably be more preferable, especially since the latter isn't exactly a "weaker" shadow mob...

 

2 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

Another issue is crafting. It's simply too cheap.

Glass is only common in the early game/lategame. Once you cross into the midgame gap, your sources of glass are either options you need to go out of your way for or wait excessive amounts of time/do character specific crafts. Living logs are not that rare, and sources of fuel/living logs don't dry out to the point you need to seek alternative sources to maintain your weapons. I personally think it's in an okay stake with crafting options like the mentioned dark sword/hambats.
 

 

2 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

- As I mentioned earlier, glass cutter could deal more damage against weaker shadow aligned creatures. Dark Sword could be similar. It would deal more damage against weaker gestalt creatures and weaker lunar aligned creatures. For example, Greater Gestalts, Mush Gnomes, Sentrypedes, Dust Moths, etc., etc..
- Since the Glass Cutter has 100% more uses when hitting shadow creatures, perhaps it could have 33% more uses when hitting shadow aligned creatures? This would be a nice refresh of its mechanic.

These in general are pretty neat ideas, always did find it strange the cutter is either 0-100 with its durability gimmick and I think an inbetween would be nice, alongside tweaks to the dark sword being better for early lunar mobs.
 

Edited July 26, 2025 by Maxil20

[Dyzrespect]

5 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

First, increased damage against weaker shadow creatures. It's a cool ability, but a 25% multiplier is a bit excessive. 
This means that weapons available from the start deal more damage than weapons that require a lot of steps to acquire, which is simply stupid. 

There is still significant investment to crafting these Glass Cutters, so a benefit of helping fight shadow creatures seems like a good incentive to go for it, as otherwise Dark Swords and Ham Bats are still way cheaper, and the former actively replenishes their own crafting materials by making you fight more nightmare creatures. Living logs are a pretty equivalent investment as going to mine Moon Glass on lunar or the grotto (and hey, you can get living logs while you're doing either of those too!)

 

5 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

Another issue is crafting. It's simply too cheap. I don't understand why the devs decided to give 1 log instead 1 desk. Logs are much, much more common than, say, living logs. The amount of moon glass required is also a bit too small. 

Where is the reasoning, other than "vibes"? In the portion of the game where Glass Cutters are relevant (pre rift), moon glass isn't really that plentiful. You get what you get from Lunar, and then you have to go every once in a while to Grotto if you want more. Considering there are more sinks for moon glass now, including TINGLE node and Walter's Moonshots, etc, I think it's reasonable that they tone down the cost, as the cost is meaningless post rift because you will never craft one again.

[Cassielu]

15 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

This means that weapons available from the start deal more damage than weapons that require a lot of steps to acquire, which is simply stupid. 

I think this is great, making the Glass Cutter kinda worthy of use in the later game instead of being completely phased out by the BS sword.

[GrapeVruit]

After playing around with the new changes, I think having it be this cheap and accessible is actually a good thing when it comes to making it viable for everyday use. While it was good for dealing with bosses such as the shadow pieces and FW, I never used them outside of that due to their reduced durability and needing to sail to the altars in order craft more. Later on in the game, it'd be more efficient to just craft dark swords and hambats as they're able to be prototyped and don't require you to go out of your way to get them. Its kind of ironic when people say prototyping the cutter would make it too strong when those 2 weapons exist. I believe these changes were made to make the cutter more viable for day-to-day use, instead of a weapon you'd only use in 2 boss fights. While it's not a straight upgrade, as moon glass takes a while to farm long term pre-rifts, and has 25 less uses against normal mobs, it allows you to have a little more weapon variety than you did before. I think the price and orb crafting should stay.

[Mike23Ua]

Unpopular opinion: but one of the best things about owning single player Don’t Starve + It’s DLCs was the DLC Compatibility outside of the DLC itself. 
Yes I totally went around using Shipwreckeds Machete in base game DS.

And what does this have to do with DST? Because to me it’s not much different from that. Having more weapon variety doesn’t hurt the game.

And on that note: Please Klei buff the Fencing Sword, I mean it literally requires a Spear in its crafting cost..

[Sofy Happy]

The current changes are well-balanced and require no nerfs or buffs. If you're unhappy with the game's numerical design, you should first address Wolfgang's absurd 260% damage multiplier that's completely out of line.

Edited July 27, 2025 by Sofy Happy

[WhackE]

I think the recipe should be reverted, it's absurdly cheap now for no reason? On top of all the other buffs it got now, the bonus damage can stay. Others have complained about it being an always available orb craft since that gives less incentive to go to lunar which I agree with.

I think some buffs are fine but it seems like Klei over compensated with the buffs

[Radicaljoe]

41 minutes ago, WhackE said:

I think some buffs are fine but it seems like Klei over compensated with the buffs

I imagine it's an attempt to get people to actually use it. I've never personally seen anyone go out of their way to obtain a glass cutter unless it was a quick "oh hey I'm already at lunar, let me grab some for fun"

I think being available from home + the cheap cost is a bit much. But if one has to go I'd rather the cost be upped to 5 glass. Having to sail all the way to lunar for the sword is what was really killing the usability of it imo.

[nicolas103]

I do think these are a too cheap now, and the damage bonus is excessive, and unnecessary.

 

I normally go to the lunar island within the 1st 5-10 days, and usually craft a lot, but with these now being more accessible from home i really dont see myself using any other melee weapons, and i say this as someone who regulary uses Morning Stars.

I genuinely believe just being more accessible is enough due to "slight" timegating, and as Moon Glass is absurdly abundant, and locating the Lunar Island, or Grotto is guaranteed if you know how world gen works.

[reddocc]

This weapon won't be used as long as it can't be prototyped, I don't know why klei is so afraid of having more tiers of science, everything now days has to be blueprints why not having the lunar altar as the alternative shadow manipulator, maybe we'll finally get more opal uses if klei decides that survivors can understand lunar magic intead of just shadow magic

[Dyzrespect]

1 hour ago, nicolas103 said:

I do think these are a too cheap now, and the damage bonus is excessive, and unnecessary.

 

I normally go to the lunar island within the 1st 5-10 days, and usually craft a lot, but with these now being more accessible from home i really dont see myself using any other melee weapons, and i say this as someone who regulary uses Morning Stars.

I genuinely believe just being more accessible is enough due to "slight" timegating, and as Moon Glass is absurdly abundant, and locating the Lunar Island, or Grotto is guaranteed if you know how world gen works.

Dude what are you talking about, they're literally dark swords with less durability. Everything you just said already applies to dark swords 2 fold. Unless you're heavily struggling against nightmare creatures they're strictly just a harder to craft dark sword with less durability, both because you can't prototype them and because nightmare fuel is 500x easier to amass than moon glass at the point of the game where they're relevant.

[Walrusst]

On 7/26/2025 at 10:06 PM, Mike23Ua said:

Unpopular opinion: but one of the best things about owning single player Don’t Starve + It’s DLCs was the DLC Compatibility outside of the DLC itself. 
Yes I totally went around using Shipwreckeds Machete in base game DS.

And what does this have to do with DST? Because to me it’s not much different from that. Having more weapon variety doesn’t hurt the game.

And on that note: Please Klei buff the Fencing Sword, I mean it literally requires a Spear in its crafting cost..

It would be nice if fencing swords had a third of the reach bonus of whips so their stab animation being slow is at least compensated.

That way we actually have room for three animation classes on weapons.

• Standard bashers.
• Cork bat speed weapons. (Heavy slow weapons not suited for combat but can be useful with knowledge of specific hunting tasks. Possibly a few specialized low durability bashing weapons that leave you vulnerable but have valuable special effects.)
• Fencing sword alikes (Strafing weapons that aren't as overpowered as a sufficiently damaging whip.)

Over flooding the standard don't starve animation weapons is fine, but its sustainability as a source of engagement is probably limited, there is only so much gameplay we can have on the standard Ryhthm before people burn out..

[nicolas103]

1 hour ago, Dyzrespect said:

Dude what are you talking about, they're literally dark swords with less durability. Everything you just said already applies to dark swords 2 fold. Unless you're heavily struggling against nightmare creatures they're strictly just a harder to craft dark sword with less durability, both because you can't prototype them and because nightmare fuel is 500x easier to amass than moon glass at the point of the game where they're relevant.

I understand you can sort of speedrun your way to any weapon, resource, armor type and amass a lot assuming youd want to in a very short amount of time, but thats not my point.

 

These weapons will quite literally be way superior to almost every weapon for me, hurting the already sort of limited variety.

 

Getting these weapons only cost: Moon Glass, and Wood.

 

Getting a Darksword requires Living Logs, and Nightmare Fuel, at least in this case your skill, or setup depends on how much of it you can aquire.

 

But now these weapons will be even cheaper, and more accesible than they are now, with an even higher damage than the Darksword against Shadows, with the orignal bonus of being more durable than the Darksword against Shadows.

 

All at the cost of 25 less hits than its counterpart against other creatures.

I'd also disagree that not being able to Prototype would be a serious factor here due to low cost. I already hold 1-2 weapons, which switches to a Weapon and Repair Kits.

 

I should also add that im probably the outlier in this.

I normally have Celestial Champion dead around day 50-70. Meaning the 50 days are usually spent using weapons that can last that long, or are very cheap.

 

To end it off I just want variety, but with all these changes at once its quite clear these will be very effective going forward, hurting variety as i said.

[Well-met]

glass cutters also dont drain your sanity unlike dark swords.

people love to compare those two with eachother well then you'll be saddened to know glasscutter is currently a straight upgrade in every. possible. way.

[Dyzrespect]

8 minutes ago, Well-met said:

glass cutters also dont drain your sanity unlike dark swords.

people love to compare those two with eachother well then you'll be saddened to know glasscutter is currently a straight upgrade in every. possible. way.

You immediately invalidate your own argument about exaggerated comparisons by making an exaggerated comparison. Dark Swords benefit you fighting in enlightenment heavily with their sanity drain, as well as help you collect more nightmare fuel by lowering your sanity outside of enlightenment. Making a Crawling Horror take 1 less hit to kill isn't really that crazy of a benefit, but getting a good durability boost when fighting powerful Shadow enemies is a nice contrast to the Dark Sword's sanity benefit vs powerful Lunar enemies. Moon Glass is also much less plentiful than living logs and nightmare fuel in the section of the game where either are relevant (Lunar Island and Grotto and tiny bit from Pearl's Island).

They only now, after the change, have an interesting balance with Dark Swords to make you consider using them. However if you can only craft 3 of them after your friends just set up 50 tingle nodes around your Tallbird Torture chamber, then you're just going to end up using Dark Swords or Ham Bats anyways until you get a rift open and they're both useless.

25 minutes ago, nicolas103 said:

I should also add that im probably the outlier in this.

I normally have Celestial Champion dead around day 50-70. Meaning the 50 days are usually spent using weapons that can last that long, or are very cheap.

 

To end it off I just want variety, but with all these changes at once its quite clear these will be very effective going forward, hurting variety as i said.

I'm not gonna shame you for having a slow CC kill time (joking), but there is 0 damage to "variety" here no matter what you're trying to argue. Even if you completely replace Dark Swords with Glass Cutters, that is a 1:1 trade and you come out even, as before Glass Cutters were not on the table outside of your first return from Lunar. Glass cutters are a far inferior weapon against CC itself as well, so eschewing Dark Swords just because you're missing Living Logs or Nightmare fuel isn't the fault of Glass Cutters costing 3 less moon shards. No matter what though in a pure "speed" mindset, just using Hambats has always been the killer of variety so I'm not sure where you're coming from tbh.

I also implore you to do a run with this change and really feel how inconvenient running back to the Celestial Orb is every time you need new weapons really is. Hambats and Dark Swords are still vastly more convenient in a "rush" playstyle, and until Glass Cutters are prototypable it will stay that way, unless you want to lug around the Orb I guess (which in all honesty just occurred to me, but you can't take it to the caves which hurts that play.)

Just because we are used to something being one way doesn't mean a change will always be for the worse.

[Jakepeng99]

On 7/26/2025 at 2:18 PM, Kacpert25 said:

First, increased damage against weaker shadow creatures. It's a cool ability, but a 25% multiplier is a bit excessive. 
This means that weapons available from the start deal more damage than weapons that require a lot of steps to acquire, which is simply stupid. 

 

Also I disagree with this. This is the reason why I don’t like planar stuff, it tramples the genius durability system DST has which made all weapons and armour somewhat viable at all stages.

[nicolas103]

2 hours ago, Dyzrespect said:

You immediately invalidate your own argument about exaggerated comparisons by making an exaggerated comparison. Dark Swords benefit you fighting in enlightenment heavily with their sanity drain, as well as help you collect more nightmare fuel by lowering your sanity outside of enlightenment. Making a Crawling Horror take 1 less hit to kill isn't really that crazy of a benefit, but getting a good durability boost when fighting powerful Shadow enemies is a nice contrast to the Dark Sword's sanity benefit vs powerful Lunar enemies. Moon Glass is also much less plentiful than living logs and nightmare fuel in the section of the game where either are relevant (Lunar Island and Grotto and tiny bit from Pearl's Island).

They only now, after the change, have an interesting balance with Dark Swords to make you consider using them. However if you can only craft 3 of them after your friends just set up 50 tingle nodes around your Tallbird Torture chamber, then you're just going to end up using Dark Swords or Ham Bats anyways until you get a rift open and they're both useless.

I'm not gonna shame you for having a slow CC kill time (joking), but there is 0 damage to "variety" here no matter what you're trying to argue. Even if you completely replace Dark Swords with Glass Cutters, that is a 1:1 trade and you come out even, as before Glass Cutters were not on the table outside of your first return from Lunar. Glass cutters are a far inferior weapon against CC itself as well, so eschewing Dark Swords just because you're missing Living Logs or Nightmare fuel isn't the fault of Glass Cutters costing 3 less moon shards. No matter what though in a pure "speed" mindset, just using Hambats has always been the killer of variety so I'm not sure where you're coming from tbh.

I also implore you to do a run with this change and really feel how inconvenient running back to the Celestial Orb is every time you need new weapons really is. Hambats and Dark Swords are still vastly more convenient in a "rush" playstyle, and until Glass Cutters are prototypable it will stay that way, unless you want to lug around the Orb I guess (which in all honesty just occurred to me, but you can't take it to the caves which hurts that play.)

Just because we are used to something being one way doesn't mean a change will always be for the worse.

Lol, well, its the time ive gotten comfortable with, and feels most natural, without feeling like im rushing, or have to get everything lined up perfectly, but enough of that.

Also, didnt realize i could just take the orb, lol.

 

Yes, exactly, variety is already so limited, but limiting it even more is a genuine problem, and i just dont want that gap between ALL weapons getting further and further.

 

Imo, its just an over buff. Just making them more accesible is more than enough.

[Walrusst]

One data point we could use for the glass cutter if it ends up being overtuned in real gameplay data instead of just our arguments is 50 durability versus normal/150 durability versus shadow aligned.

That way its much more of a niche pick/precursor weapon prior to you switching to your primary weapon in most matchups, but it is the ultimate weapon for people who wait out the orbs random spawn chance and take the world slow in ruins expeditions. Since its value is only accessible if you wait for the orb or sail (Unless you get a gliched world where lunar island bridges to the mainland,) so its more work to route to, so the idea that the longer route to ancient guardian/nightmare is lower resistance due to the high probability that its slower is extremely fair.

Since like, if you want dark swords you can just hold a darksword and go crazy since its really rare for a server to lack a wormwood in my experience, those things grow on players so you seldom even need to go through the work of even cutting down a tree for them.

Edited July 30, 2025 by Walrusst

[cybers2001]

This seems really hypothetical. People are already writing off dark swords so quickly? When's the best time to have glass cutters? Most likely when you're in the ruins. But if you're doing an autumn ruins rush, are you going to have glass cutters? Probably not.

Let's say mid-game. You're doing a ruins clear at a more relaxed pace, or maybe its your 2nd or 3rd clear. Maybe you don't have rifts active yet. Maybe now is a good time for glass cutters? Well, inventory management is still a thing. If you're using glass cutters, you now have to allocate 2 inventory slots for glass and logs. Every slot matters in a ruins run. Conversely, dark swords still only require you to bring a stack of living logs, and the nm fuel supplies itself. Then you can also use living logs to craft staves while you're there.

In fact, I'd say this is a big reason why brightshade swords are so good in the ruins. It's not because of the bonus damage vs shadows, it's because of the much slimmer inventory space demands. Instead of carrying living logs + nm fuel + twigs + gold for weapons and tools, all you need is brightshade repair kits.

Edited July 30, 2025 by cybers2001

[Hungry French]

I believe' that the glass cutter is too cheap at the moment. To become a real alternative to the shadow sword, it must have 1 living log and 6 moon glass. Then he will be. It is approximately similar in price and efficiency. It will still be many times more popular than the Thulecute bat.

[Dingle]

Seems fine from actual playtesting.

I still only really use them for a brief period: After CC dies (which gives a lot of glass), to before you can finally get the Brightshade stuff well after rifts open.

Glass collection before then is still a distraction and they're just expensive enough to be a hassle. Afterwards, the Brightshade sword of course takes over completely.

Before then, it's ham bat all the way or dark swords if I get a treeguard setpiece or lucky early treeguards.

If Deadly Brightshades didn't take so long to spawn (still bizarre how long it takes after CC dies), I probably would not use glass cutters at all.

One day we'll maybe have an early game alternative to ham bats or dark swords. And then people will get whatever that is nerfed before the beta for it is over.

[WendyHater9000]

On 8/23/2025 at 4:12 AM, Dingle said:

Seems fine from actual playtesting.

I still only really use them for a brief period: After CC dies (which gives a lot of glass), to before you can finally get the Brightshade stuff well after rifts open.

Glass collection before then is still a distraction and they're just expensive enough to be a hassle. Afterwards, the Brightshade sword of course takes over completely.

Before then, it's ham bat all the way or dark swords if I get a treeguard setpiece or lucky early treeguards.

If Deadly Brightshades didn't take so long to spawn (still bizarre how long it takes after CC dies), I probably would not use glass cutters at all.

One day we'll maybe have an early game alternative to ham bats or dark swords. And then people will get whatever that is nerfed before the beta for it is over.

From my observation in pub server called meow server, it's actually pretty good for players that aren't able to beat cc or even easier boss like klaus, but love to sail.

I think veterans like us usually ignore those players that can't beat cc, but able to find lunar island exist

Edited August 25, 2025 by kevindaze

[Auhrer]

I don't even use that melee weapon, and I hardly ever see anyone using it, and you want to nerf it, lol
Because of weak Shadows of Insanity? lol