Could you theoretically live in the caves forever?

[Donke60]

3 hours ago, Bahlsen said:

The best player I know can survive in the ruins (in the solo), here's the plot, and the videos :

"I have 2 days to enter Don't Starve's ruins. Once inside, I can't resurface. It'll just be the ruins and what I gathered along the way. How long can I survive? That depends a lot on the supplies that I get in the first episode. The single player ruins is completely devoid of the most basic materials -- grass, twigs, wood, pinecones -- that are necessary for sustainability, so I'll have to fill my inventory wisely."

 

 

I was just going to suggest that yeah onion if you watch this video and follow it your be in pretty good shape a tophat will negate the sanity drain even for a wolfgang Weather as overheating and freezing just more gradual and they take a very long time if for combat just practice with the worms and the shadows and your be fine

[LadyAzure]

23 hours ago, Rellimarual said:

Been experimenting with this with an experienced player, who, sadly, is a much nicer person than I am and constantly invites newly joining players to the cave base. The main advantage of basing in caves is that you can escape killer newbs and many griefers if you base far enough in. That and no overheating mechanic in the summer.

i haven't gotten much past the first few worm attacks there, but it seems like they won't follow you very far and go "dormant" as fake light berry plants when you're out of range. I run off from base until only one is chasing me,then fight it, which is easy when it's just one and the lag isn't bad. Then you can either ignore the dormant ones or pick them off one by one for meat and berries at your leisure. I'd rather fight one of these than three spiders, tbh.

The main problem with cave camps is when inexperienced players insist on joining you there and have constant problems with sanity, darkness, worms, food, etc. They have to be resurrected every few days. An ideal situation would be a newb camp on the surface full of people saying "Do you have one twig?" and bringing beefalo into camp for no reason then begging for food, and a camp of better players in the caves. The newbs would still have to be rescued a lot but they'd be less of a nuisance underfoot.

i have played with some really good people by this point, but more often than not on public servers the other players are the biggest obstacle to survival. Once I ended up trying this on a group server by myself and I managed to set up, in addition to a basic surface base, a self sustaining cave base by the end of winter (the tam was the final piece in the puzzle).

I have a portal base, right in the spawn and a cave base deep under ground. I limit my server to 3. 

[sealedpenumbra]

2 hours ago, Arlesienne said:

EGGS ARE CONSIDERED MEAT BY THOSE STUPID BUNNYMEN.

Me not  ／(･ × ･)＼ xD

2 hours ago, Arlesienne said:

Pigs won't come out of their huts unless it's not dark around them

Also i've reported twice in Bug Tracker that pigs nor follow the player after giving them meat not assist in chopping trees..*sigh* and i wish devs would fix beardlords animation.

[artemiyME]

I love basing in caves, that is one thing I really enjoy doing in DST. favorite spot is green mushroom biome. It has most of the above mentioned items for survival: at least 2-3 fish ponds for fish, easy to chop green mushrooms, usually a close bunny village for easy depth worm defense, at least one light crack for farming and growing twigs and grass, it is also close to mud biome that is entrance ro ruins. Only thing you really need is to find spider den for silk and easy meatball farm. If you want to only live from cave items you cant have eggs, but stealing a bird from above and some reeds is nice. Only problem with cave living is a complete lack of hounds teeth, but that is easily outvalued by free gems, gold. Marble and rock.

As far as sanity goes hardest character to maintain it as is wolfgang, since he has darkness sanity drain penalty, I would suggest rushing spiders for silk for tents and top hats. Remember food in caves is REALLY scarse so dig up and replant any berry bushes closer. Gather lots of light bulbs for rot to fertelize them. Your first go-to food for starters is fish sticks. All you need is one fish stick and 2 monster meat and you got food and easy health.

A lot of people know that I love pigs, and if you manage to find touchstones, absolutely raid it for pig skins and make pig house for free poop by feeding pigs lightbulbs and make some farms. This obviously doesnt work if you dont have a bird from above, in that case just turn pigs into werepigs and make meaty stews.

Eventually you will have lot of moles around your base, let them make burrows and collect rock for you. Kill moles only after they make burrows, and let them respawn. If you need minerals from burrows dig them up only when mole is alive in your inventory or is roaming around, that way they make a new one and you get their loot. 

Hardest season in caves is winter, thermal stone loses heat very fast and there is not many areas to burn desolate tree, without staring really nasty forest fires.

Hope this helps, its a fun challange and new way of living and summer is amazing in caves! No flingos required too - I hate them.

[AlternateMew]

3 hours ago, Arlesienne said:

Just remember all giants will wait for you at the surface. I remember spending summer in the caves (Nickboom as Maxwell, me as Willow) and emerging to see the bearger's booty up close..

When you're living in the caves, surfacing to see a giant is a blessing. Heck, surfacing to hounds can be a blessing. Those teeth, man. Take them while you can!

I've got one of my cave entrances right next to a reed trap. No way I want to take that on myself, so my plan was to hire Deerclops. Gotta do the same next year - he only took out a little less than half of it. And wandering around with Bearger for a week on the surface was a refreshing, profitable little vacation. Such a gentle giant, that guy!

[Rellimarual]

2 hours ago, LadyAzure said:

I have a portal base, right in the spawn and a cave base deep under ground. I limit my server to 3. 

But don't problematic newbs just ask over and over again where you are? What they mean by "Where is the base?" is really just "Where are you so that I can leech off you,eat your food, contribute nothing and beg resources, then spend all my I me doing something pointless like hatching a tall bird egg?"

[Pyr0mrcow]

4 hours ago, Arlesienne said:

Having shadow minions in the caves seems a waste as unless something changed, earthquakes kill them in one hit.

Eh, I still find them pretty useful, at least toward the beginning. Make a couple miners, hold a lantern and explore the dark rock biomes. Pick up the gold and whatnot and keep moving along. Earthquakes aren't too common...and it's a bit easier to get Nightmare Fuel down there, particularly if you find Fissures or a Splumonkey Pod. Good role for Abi.

4 hours ago, Bahlsen said:

The best player I know can survive in the ruins (in the solo), here's the plot, and the videos :

"I have 2 days to enter Don't Starve's ruins. Once inside, I can't resurface. It'll just be the ruins and what I gathered along the way. How long can I survive? That depends a lot on the supplies that I get in the first episode. The single player ruins is completely devoid of the most basic materials -- grass, twigs, wood, pinecones -- that are necessary for sustainability, so I'll have to fill my inventory wisely."

Yea, as long as you can handle it and have enough supplies going in, the ruins are actually a really nice place. I like making an outpost right outside of them as a way to venture in more easily; make a crockpot and a fridge, maybe drying racks, and Monkeys by themselves will constantly stock you with food and nightmare fuel and all that. And fuel for fires.
...nightmare fuel pretty much everywhere. With that in mind, it's a nice place for Maxwell's Fighter spamming. And Fugu Hutch.

[Arlesienne]

38 minutes ago, Pyr0mrcow said:

Eh, I still find them pretty useful, at least toward the beginning. Make a couple miners, hold a lantern and explore the dark rock biomes. Pick up the gold and whatnot and keep moving along. Earthquakes aren't too common...and it's a bit easier to get Nightmare Fuel down there, particularly if you find Fissures or a Splumonkey Pod. Good role for Abi.

Yea, as long as you can handle it and have enough supplies going in, the ruins are actually a really nice place. I like making an outpost right outside of them as a way to venture in more easily; make a crockpot and a fridge, maybe drying racks, and Monkeys by themselves will constantly stock you with food and nightmare fuel and all that. And fuel for fires.
...nightmare fuel pretty much everywhere. With that in mind, it's a nice place for Maxwell's Fighter spamming. And Fugu Hutch.

Well, that IS a clever idea, especially if you have earthquakes set to less. So after getting a grasp of Maxwell, it's a gambit worth trying. I was referring more to creating a bunch of companions for... companionship rather than some quick utility :).

3 hours ago, ShadowDuelist said:

Its his sweet way of saying -"Hi Guys, missed you, where is base?"

Oh yes, the sweetpea farmed us so much wood and spider loot we had to backtrack several times! See, the sinkhole was between the forest and the rockyland with lots of spider dens spawning queens. And the bearger nuked them all.

2 hours ago, PandoMish said:

Me not  ／(･ × ･)＼ xD

Also i've reported twice in Bug Tracker that pigs nor follow the player after giving them meat not assist in chopping trees..*sigh* and i wish devs would fix beardlords animation.

Of course, my lady :D!

23 minutes ago, AlternateMew said:

When you're living in the caves, surfacing to see a giant is a blessing. Heck, surfacing to hounds can be a blessing. Those teeth, man. Take them while you can!

I've got one of my cave entrances right next to a reed trap. No way I want to take that on myself, so my plan was to hire Deerclops. Gotta do the same next year - he only took out a little less than half of it. And wandering around with Bearger for a week on the surface was a refreshing, profitable little vacation. Such a gentle giant, that guy!

Yes, seconded. This and teeth.

51 minutes ago, artemiyME said:

Your first go-to food for starters is fish sticks. All you need is one fish stick and 2 monster meat and you got food and easy health.

So fishsticks take precedence over monster lasagna?

[FreyaMaluk]

On 9/25/2016 at 10:34 PM, HoveringOnions said:

Do you need to bring down grass turf?

What should I bring down if I wanted to make a perma base down there?

(If you don't know don't worry, I appreciate the response).

Nope.... there are lots of grass and twigs in the caves.... perfect place to stay during the summer... and you can stay forever there... to be honest... the only problem are the hounds teeth... you need them to repair clothing.... so you can live down there, but occasionally you need to come up and kill some doges  The rest you can bring to the caves... Bees, Pigmen, and everything else...

[Arlesienne]

10 minutes ago, FreyaMaluk said:

Nope.... there are lots of grass and twigs in the caves.... perfect place to stay during the summer... and you can stay forever there... to be honest... the only problem are the hounds teeth... you need them to repair clothing.... so you can live down there, but occasionally you need to come up and kill some doges  The rest you can bring to the caves... Bees, Pigmen, and everything else...

Just no beefalos, tallbirds (unless you hatch eggs downstairs, I think), giants, grass gekkos, goats and Chester.

[LadyAzure]

3 hours ago, Rellimarual said:

But don't problematic newbs just ask over and over again where you are? What they mean by "Where is the base?" is really just "Where are you so that I can leech off you,eat your food, contribute nothing and beg resources, then spend all my I me doing something pointless like hatching a tall bird egg?"

Sometimes they ask. SometimeS they dont, I just tell them, I'm in the caves, look for the hole surrounded by the spider eggs, if you can get past then you are worthy of the underground base lol

[artemiyME]

7 hours ago, Arlesienne said:

So fishsticks take precedence over monster lasagna?

However weird it is but that is correct, they came out 100% of times with that recipe

[Pyr0mrcow]

The hound teeth is another reason I tend to base near a Desert cave exit. Assuming that people don't destroy the hound mounds, of course...

Oh, and cacti are nice.

[Arlesienne]

9 hours ago, artemiyME said:

However weird it is but that is correct, they came out 100% of times with that recipe

Neat, thanks!

7 hours ago, Pyr0mrcow said:

The hound teeth is another reason I tend to base near a Desert cave exit. Assuming that people don't destroy the hound mounds, of course...

Oh, and cacti are nice.

Oh yes. I like building myself a little oasis in the desert. Like with cave bases: prebuild the structures, stockpile on basic resources, take pinecones, birchnuts, one or more spider eggs... I don't replant berrybushes, saplings and grass, but others could take them too.

* * *

Another tip for caves: the ruins often have broken clockworks. You can repair them with three gears to get an ally with no alliance time... BUT ensure you don't have Hutch with you. And that they die before you log in the next time. There is still this issue with their loyalty vanishing after resuming, humbug...