The change in lunar hail should be reversed

[Kacpert25]

Lunar hail was a good mechanic. Removing it was unnecessary in my opinion.
Did Klei simply not know how to implement structure to protect against lunar hail (which, as a reminder, they wrote they would add in the future), so they simply removed it?
Besides, the fact that birds can take damage from lunar hail, and player doesn't take damage anymore doesn't make much sense.

[SpookyXy]

I liked the danger the Lunar hail provided. Glass falling from the sky and not hurting you is weird.

[Radicaljoe]

Idk, I don't think standing still under a tree for 3 minutes was a good mechanic? 

Such an oddly designed punishment that it had to rely on shadow rifts to carry the weight of fixing the mistakes. 

Like, I understand if lunar and shadow have stuff that help the other rift, like the bshade staff is re good against the inkblights. But it's not required. Hail required the umbralla unless you stood motionless under a tree. 

Yes I'm aware about fig trees, and that's still not a good example, you're still waiting under that canopy to do something else.

That being said, I do hope they add some other dangers to the hail buildup mechanic.

[Electroely]

I think the new lunar hail is a lot more interesting. The "danger" in the old lunar hail was solved by either having an Umbralla or standing under a tree a while... it didn't lead to any particularly new or interesting gameplay. I do think it could use some danger, but I definitely don't want to see it reverted to what it was before.

[Well-met]

Bring back the hazard

[Dingle]

41 minutes ago, Electroely said:

I think the new lunar hail is a lot more interesting. The "danger" in the old lunar hail was solved by either having an Umbralla or standing under a tree a while... it didn't lead to any particularly new or interesting gameplay. I do think it could use some danger, but I definitely don't want to see it reverted to what it was before.

The old hail wasn't interesting at all. I will sort of miss the excuse to put above average trees in the main base, though.

[Radicaljoe]

10 minutes ago, Dingle said:

The old hail wasn't interesting at all. I will sort of miss the excuse to put above average trees in the main base, though.

I do it for decorations, also figs are tasty. They're still helpful for summer too.

[ansuman]

I would say hail needs additional hazard mechanics; the debris falling should be one aspect of it randomly. I disagree with removing it entirely

[Feything]

The old hail was actually hail. The changes they made to it, turns it into something completely different. If worry was that it was too easy to avoid and you can just use a normal umbrella or stand under a tree, then it could had been tweaked to shred through the umbrella quickly because it is glass, and after some time make it bypass trees if you stand under there too long.

Klei could had really leaned in on the fact it's literally giant balls of glass falling down into the world, and even still kept some glass pile up and added floor hazards formed by it in the process. Hail made of glass is a weather phenomenon that is super interesting and even occurs on entirely different planets irl and it was fun to see it depicted in a fantasy fashion here.

[Dyzrespect]

I think the lethality and actual threat of the hail is being vastly exaggerated. Lunar Hail essentially was a 90 second long earthquake that would at best chip your health if you were too lazy to find cover. I'd argue the buildup on trees and structures now is a way bigger impact, and less annoying to benefit from since you don't have to run around chasing moon glass before it disappears.

I understand the sentiment of wanting it to be a thrilling or dangerous event, but its previous implementation was definitely not that, and if you really want it to be better you would be excited that they're visiting it again, because it was very underwhelming.

Edited July 26, 2025 by Dyzrespect
grammar

[DVGMedia]

I say keep the danger we need more danger I havent been able to see it though 

[Feything]

Just cause it was underwhelming before, doesn't mean it should be turned into something that gives free resources without obstacles. It should be fixed to be a better threat instead of instead of just saying it was an underwhelming 90 second earthquake. There are tons of ways to fix it to make it dangerous and rewarding, and at the same to keep it's identity as hail. It's late game stuff.

[Popian]

3 hours ago, Radicaljoe said:

I don't think standing still under a tree for 3 minutes was a good mechanic?

Can't resist this set up:

40 minutes ago, Dyzrespect said:

I think the lethality and actual threat of the hail is being vastly exaggerated.

Would be less common for those commenting here to die to it, but you do see the deaths...

[Dyzrespect]

1 hour ago, Feything said:

Just cause it was underwhelming before, doesn't mean it should be turned into something that gives free resources without obstacles. It should be fixed to be a better threat instead of instead of just saying it was an underwhelming 90 second earthquake. There are tons of ways to fix it to make it dangerous and rewarding, and at the same to keep it's identity as hail. It's late game stuff.

Acid rain provides its own flavor to the caves, but just mirroring that effect to the lunar version just makes an umbralla a permanent requirement. Making Lunar Hail a unique and interesting mechanic, over just a random source of chip damage, would be more interesting imo. I doubt they're finished with the new implementation, if it builds up on structures I imagine it's going to build up on us, and maybe slow us down, or cause lunar entities to spawn in places or other things, maybe related to the new birds.

Immediately rallying for a complete reversion before we see the vision is a shame in my opinion, because it really wasn't anything interesting before.

Edited July 26, 2025 by Dyzrespect

[hoxi]

6 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

Did Klei simply not know how to implement structure to protect against lunar hail, so they simply removed it?

On the specific thing you're saying, this is pretty insulting given that they've been implementing things that are way more complex than a shelter mechanic which is already in the game and would just need to be expanded a bit..

6 hours ago, Kacpert25 said:

(which, as a reminder, they wrote they would add in the future)

I honestly don't remember if they stated so, but I know that something they wanted to do was making creatures be able to be damaged (only players taking damage was a temporary measure), but giving them behaviors and features to take shelter from it.

Thing is, this update already did something around that scale, with all the shock states and electric fence/tingle node shock behavior. If anything, this would be even bigger because of the nature of it and how it'd differ for many creatures.

While I was hoping they'd go for it too, I figured it'd be too much to add onto these already massive updates. Maybe they still could if they delay things a bit more or leave it for later but, dunno. Inimical Gestalts will get revised later so, could look into both things then maybe?

 

1 hour ago, Dyzrespect said:

Immediately rallying for a complete reversion before we see the vision is a shame in my opinion, because it really wasn't anything interesting before.

I agree.

As many others have said, old hail could just be countered by sitting under a tree (which is boring), or using an Umbralla (which is a bit less boring), and could only hurt the player, so it had no real impact on the world.

 

I feel like maybe bringing this back in some way and letting it go through Umbralla domes, as it's not smaller particles (and like cave debris, not be protected from it if under a tree), could be a neat feature.

But it all comes down to what to do in regards to other creatures, their behavior, and if allowing to hurt them, because it's weird how it's not the case compared to cave debris, even if that was made that way to avoid causing issues for players that like to have a bunch of creatures walled up and so (that and, caves were designed with earthquakes in mind and them killing creatures randomly, the surface wasn't).

Maybe it could happen in specific bits of the map to make them more dangerous while lunar hailing is happening, and so that there's less risk of killing creatures the player was herding or protecting or so without ways to prevent it? If it's more curated to only happen in some areas, to be in line with like how the caves account for earthquakes by default, then it could work fine in those areas and it hurting anything, not just players.

There's a lot more to it than just reverting this, but I do agree it'd be a bit weird to remove the danger from the hail itself entirely.

Maybe it could work similarly to acid rain in that it deals damage when exposed to it (and some creatures could be affected by it, and some would just seek shelter like some do in the caves with acid rain). Except that, rather than melting things in your inventory, and equipped gear and so, it's just damage and maybe some other secondary effect. And it could require armor rather to resist it rather than weather protection (as those would get shredded), and maybe not all armor is as effective as it's lunar glass.

Maybe this last bit isn't that interesting but, it'd probably be a bit more interesting and intuitive than old hail? Dunno, just throwing ideas out there.

 

4 hours ago, Feything said:

and even still kept some glass pile up and added floor hazards formed by it in the process.

Something like this would be cool. Some things should happen from the hail building up.

An idea that comes to mind since some people suggested it in one way or another, maybe frog ponds could be affected when hail happens (unless frozen), and this would cause mutated frogs to come out for a while, before it returns to normal.

[lowercase skye]

10 hours ago, Electroely said:

The "danger" in the old lunar hail was solved by either having an Umbralla or standing under a tree a while... it didn't lead to any particularly new or interesting gameplay. I do think it could use some danger, but I definitely don't want to see it reverted to what it was before.

Well, the problem then sounds more to be the short length of the hail, rather than the nature of the hazard. If it lasted a day or longer then it wouldn't be reasonable to just stand still underneath a tree, especially if combined with the idea I've heard of it shredding through an equipped umbralla (while a dropped one fares just fine). If it lasted long enough that you couldn't ignore it, then it would push you to do tasks in parts of your base with above-average trees, spend time down in the caves away from it, go out to sea with a dropped umbralla, hunker down somewhere like the oasis or Jimbo or wobster dens to do an easy repeatable task for its duration, etc.

Basically all the things wildfires are meant to do, but without the heavy world destruction that makes them suck to play around.

Edited July 27, 2025 by lowercase skye

[DVGMedia]

 

7 hours ago, Dyzrespect said:

Immediately rallying for a complete reversion before we see the vision is a shame in my opinion, because it really wasn't anything interesting before.

My thoughts are why not have both?

[Captain_Rage]

Use both. Variety is nice.

[SilverSpoon]

7 hours ago, DVGMedia said:

My thoughts are why not have both?

27 minutes ago, Captain_Rage said:

Use both. Variety is nice.

tbh, I feel that the previous lunar hail was pretty much just a surface version of rockfall, so I'm personally fine abolishing it. That way, perhaps the new lunar hail could be made more dangerous and impactful.

However, this is just my personal opinion, so I don't particularly reject the opinion that they should keep the previous lunar hail.

Edited July 27, 2025 by SilverSpoon

[Jakepeng99]

On 7/26/2025 at 4:23 PM, Kacpert25 said:

Lunar hail was a good mechanic. Removing it was unnecessary in my opinion.
Did Klei simply not know how to implement structure to protect against lunar hail (which, as a reminder, they wrote they would add in the future), so they simply removed it?
Besides, the fact that birds can take damage from lunar hail, and player doesn't take damage anymore doesn't make much sense.

It was just earthquake 2 but I don’t get why they removes that feature.

[Dyzrespect]

What is the danger or the intrigue of taking random chip damage? Even if Lunar hail happened while you were doing a bossfight or something it was completely irrelevant. Why does the idea of a newer, more refined and fleshed out mechanic scare people? At the end of the day if having the damage there or not changes nothing, why have it in the first place? Leave space for actually engaging mechanics instead.

Say they make Lunar Hail spawn gestalts, or anything else that is *actually* dangerous or compelling to deal with, or even if they just amped up the damage on it like some people are suggesting. A large portion of the design space budget gets taken up by this random and annoying chip damage that doesn't add much to the event. It can't do decent damage to you and spawn gestalts and slow you because then the moment you get hit by a gestalt, you get hit by more hail, then it snowballs into oblivion esp if you're trying to deal with anything else. It'd be like if they added a slow to Nightmare Bishop's attack, on paper a 20% slow is nothing, but combine it with what the mechanic/fight already does and you're basically guaranteed to die if you get hit. There is a design space budget for every feature, and they had to clear some to add other more compelling features to the event.

We gotta see the end result of how they implement Lunar Hail before we use the monkey's paw to bring back vestiges of the previous implementation and make it underwhelming again or overwhelming (but I doubt Klei would ship it if it was too overwhelming). This is literally what a beta is for.
 

Edited July 28, 2025 by Dyzrespect

[Walrusst]

What if the main hazard was larger hunks that made shadows, splash down with shrapnel, and act sort of like reverse lightning rod?
After all, hail is a common indicator for possible lighting. That way your threat comes from the movement cycle of large threats emerging and dancing around bursts of lightning to mine away overly large and hazardous moonglass deposits that are attracting real hazards.

[Cruvimaster]

From what I remember, the initial intention of Lunar Hail was to damage players and mobs. Damaging mobs would destroy farms. So Klei removed the damage to mobs, but promised it would be temporary. It doesn't make sense for the player to take damage, but not the Grass Gekko. Furthermore, the rain itself didn't pose any danger. Umbralla easily solved that. Bringing in Bright-Beaked Bird seems much better than it was.

[Jakepeng99]

On 7/26/2025 at 5:09 PM, Radicaljoe said:

Idk, I don't think standing still under a tree for 3 minutes was a good mechanic? 

Just dont get hit. Also umbrellas work.

[Renato59]

I feel like lightning could be a new hazard, when lightning strikes the ground they create Glass Boulders, such as in real life when lightning hits sand and it creates cool glass structures!

Edited July 28, 2025 by Renato59