Nightmares in the ruins needs tweaks probably

[aidancode]

It has been a hot minute since I've done a ruins rush. I've been used to playing on long term worlds with moggles, lazy explorers, that one Woodie main, and especially beefalo that going back to ruins rushing to check out the new update was a huge shock in how oppressive nightmare creatures are during nightmare phase. Depending on what branch I was in, my options would be limited to either staying at the pseudoscience, leaving and trying to find AG, or running in circles for a few minutes. Accidentally aggroing nightmares at a bad time isn't even much of a death sentence, but it is a "run in circles for 4 minutes" sentence.

If nightmares were part of the challenge I wouldn't be so upset. I found ruins rushing and getting swarmed by 4-5 nightmares to be super exciting back when that was the norm so many years ago. I also don't mind the huge swarms on beefalo since it's so easy to dodge. My problem is how often the challenge is *so* great that you pretty much have to just do nothing until the phase ends.

I'd suggest reducing nightmare spawners by 20-30% in the ruins.

It's also really funny how clockworks are basically a non-issue now. The ruins are entirely made difficult by the nightmare creatures and shadow monkeys. Not a great balance. It's very fun to tame clockworks, but it needs adjustment.

Also why does taming cost 1 gear but repairing costs like 3?

TL;DR: nightmares are so excessive in the ruins that it's honestly kinda boring. I took so long to write that because unless I back up my claims with a mountain of anecdotes a certain 2 or 3 of you guys are going to say I have a skill issue or something.

Update: just found out they pushed an update nerfing clockwork taming. For the best probably.

[DegenerateFurry]

The trouble isn't the number of nightmare creatures at all, there's actually not enough of them. The problem is Lurking Nightmares being a bigger pain in the backside than falling on a cactus the wrong way. 

They've got just over twice a Terrorbeak's health, do a slow attack animation where you can't hit them most of the time after each hit you get on them, and do a bunch of damage. They only drop 2-4 Nightmare Fuel and are thus not even slightly worth fighting. They make farming fuel in the ruins way less effective than farming it via angry monkeys. 

I kind of wish they'd either halve the health of Lurking Nightmares or triple their drops to even out the time cost versus the reward a bit. 

Edited February 14 by DegenerateFurry

[Waywarbler]

3 hours ago, DegenerateFurry said:

They've got just over twice a Terrorbeak's health, do a slow attack animation where you can't hit them most of the time after each hit you get on them, and do a bunch of damage.

I think they also disappear earlier than the other nightmare creatures, so they disappear during the dawn phase rather than calm... which means they tend to disappear before you kill them, because of how long it takes :P

[Jakepeng99]

6 hours ago, aidancode said:

It has been a hot minute since I've done a ruins rush. I've been used to playing on long term worlds with moggles, lazy explorers, that one Woodie main, and especially beefalo that going back to ruins rushing to check out the new update was a huge shock in how oppressive nightmare creatures are during nightmare phase. Depending on what branch I was in, my options would be limited to either staying at the pseudoscience, leaving and trying to find AG, or running in circles for a few minutes. Accidentally aggroing nightmares at a bad time isn't even much of a death sentence, but it is a "run in circles for 4 minutes" sentence.

If nightmares were part of the challenge I wouldn't be so upset. I found ruins rushing and getting swarmed by 4-5 nightmares to be super exciting back when that was the norm so many years ago. I also don't mind the huge swarms on beefalo since it's so easy to dodge. My problem is how often the challenge is *so* great that you pretty much have to just do nothing until the phase ends.

I'd suggest reducing nightmare spawners by 20-30% in the ruins.

It's also really funny how clockworks are basically a non-issue now. The ruins are entirely made difficult by the nightmare creatures and shadow monkeys. Not a great balance. It's very fun to tame clockworks, but it needs adjustment.

Also why does taming cost 1 gear but repairing costs like 3?

TL;DR: nightmares are so excessive in the ruins that it's honestly kinda boring. I took so long to write that because unless I back up my claims with a mountain of anecdotes a certain 2 or 3 of you guys are going to say I have a skill issue or something.

Update: just found out they pushed an update nerfing clockwork taming. For the best probably.

. Its part of the challenge. You can avoid the lights if you walk around well enough, or wait until the phase is over.

[DegenerateFurry]

2 hours ago, Waywarbler said:

I think they also disappear earlier than the other nightmare creatures, so they disappear during the dawn phase rather than calm... which means they tend to disappear before you kill them, because of how long it takes :P

Yeah. This is one of those enemies where it feels like the game's telling me not to fight it because it's just a waste of the valuable nightmare cycle, but at the same time, it's borderline impossible not to fight it if I want to farm fuel in the ruins? They aggro from a distance if I hit a Crawling Nightmare and they're too quick and dangerous for me to ignore them entirely.

So, I'm required to fight something that eats up a huge chunk of time unless I just don't fight shadows at all. But I need nightmare fuel to make stuff in the ruins, so that's not what the game's telling me to do either. I guess I'm just supposed to play an AoE character and farm shadow splumonkeys, or bring all the fuel I need before I even arrive, or take multiple full cycles to get all the fuel I need because of how slow Lurking Nightmares are to kill? 

[Dwight34]

6 hours ago, DegenerateFurry said:

The trouble isn't the number of nightmare creatures at all, there's actually not enough of them. The problem is Lurking Nightmares being a bigger pain in the backside than falling on a cactus the wrong way. 

They've got just over twice a Terrorbeak's health, do a slow attack animation where you can't hit them most of the time after each hit you get on them, and do a bunch of damage. They only drop 2-4 Nightmare Fuel and are thus not even slightly worth fighting. They make farming fuel in the ruins way less effective than farming it via angry monkeys. 

I kind of wish they'd either halve the health of Lurking Nightmares or triple their drops to even out the time cost versus the reward a bit. 

I don't know how feasible this is, but an idea I have is the following: Lurking nightmares resemble sharks, maybe they could be neutral by default if you have high-enough % health, but once you get wounded enough they smell the blood in the water ruins and start attacking you, thus allowing you to kill normal shadow creatures in peace as long as you avoid damage. That way they'd only be a punishment for misplaying, rather than a constant threat making it not worth to even interact with the ruins during the nightmare phase.

[Gashzer]

Laughs in Willow main while using burning bernie. 

[Well-met]

Lurking nightmares need to teleport much closer when they get hit

[DegenerateFurry]

4 hours ago, Well-met said:

Lurking nightmares need to teleport much closer when they get hit

Unironically not a bad idea, anything to speed up the process of killing them.

[aidancode]

12 hours ago, Jakepeng99 said:

. Its part of the challenge. You can avoid the lights if you walk around well enough, or wait until the phase is over.

It really depends on the ruins branch. This past ruins rush that instigated this post the first branch I found had places with like 16 lights on screen, it was crazy. Then other parts have like none. And its not like there were even particularly more resources in the areas with tons of nightmare lights. It just seems... unbalanced. I would not be opposed to the easier branches getting made harder and the harder branches being made easier.