Captain Potato's Hardcore Challenge 2- Mapping the Test Maps

[Tbet]

Hardcore challenge with Willow

I was also very interested in trying to play the game in a hardcore way. I didn't want to craft any item and see how far I could go, and therefore I chose Willow who is the only character (to my knowledge) that allows to survive without crafting anything.

What I don't like with crafting a torch is that it can be used as a weapon. Without it you either have to fight with your fists (ctrl + click) or to find a tentacle (quite challenging!).

I had never used the new map generator before and I had to kill my previous character to do so :'(

Here is my world after 21 days of survival

After 12-13 days I had pretty much discovered all the map following the coast. But it felt still too easy so I went back and tried to discover the inside parts as well. As you can see I managed it except for the highly dangerous swamps. I didn't feel like doing an extra trip inside, just to discover... more swamps.

The path was linear except for two bridges between zones 3 and 4. I didn't realized it was that linear before I got the whole picture!

As in potatoe's map the beefalos' area was at the very end and I think it would have been very hard to play it in a "regular" way. If I think of a newbie player it must be very frustrating to see items that require manure and not being able to find it. I think at least 10 days of intensive search would be required to find the beefalo area. As you can see there is a tiny island with no bridge.

Here is a picture of myself after 21 days

In this picture I also wanted to show that it is actually possible to hunt birds with only one's fists. You have to bait them with seeds, then attack them (ctrl + click) at the right timing as you would do with another weapon. Three hits are required to kill it but it's not especially difficult since the bird is stunned after the first hit (like when you free a bird from a bird trap). It may not appear very important but this source of meat made my survival much easier for several reasons:

- Meat allows to "hire" pigs, that can fight many monsters (giving out more meat or just protecting yourself)

- Meat can bait hounds and many other monsters to win time during a fight

- Meat has a quite good health / food ratio (I ate like 200 flowers beside that XD)

Bugs / Comments

- No pig king (assuming that it's not on the last island, which I don't believe)

- No mandrake

- I was able to fight a tallbird with my fists while it wasn't fighting back (I don't know the reason)

- Many many many spiders, in almost every areas.

- "only" five bee hives or so.

The numerous graves

This is a little something appart from the hardcore challenge. I am not a big fan of graves myself. I keep wondering: "why would there be so many grave on a otherwise inhabited island?". Does Maxwell dig them each time he leaves somebody on the island?? I have no clue of that. It might as well be on purpose. Anyway, I think that digging graves (which I haven't done in this challenge of course) shouldn't give anything else than......... bones! Bones could perfectly be included in the meat effigy's recipy btw. I don't find any interest in the items you dig from the graves and the amount of gold you can get from them (imagine with the 100 graves of this map...) ridiculous!

Overall

I likes the way the islands were splitted. It added difficulty and gathering ressources from an island to another must be much more rewarding.

Edited December 31, 2012 by Tbet