Wish Shadow Splumonkeys Were Remotely Fair

[Renegade_Doll]

Splumonkeys are kind of the most obnoxious and unfun enemy I've ever seen in a game. But whatever, it's funny for some developers to troll their own playerbase.

 

I just had a playthrough that was game over'd in a single moment because the nightmare cycle started as I was entering the ruins, six Shadow Splumonkeys chased me, and I spent four minutes running all over the entire ruins trying to get them off me while gradually freezing to death because it was near winter and the cave rain had not stopped for over a day. So I died, because I literally had no way of surviving; I could not fight them because the horde was too large and would just stunlock me so I could not even attack, and I couldn't stop the damage ticking because anytime I tried to create a fire they would just hit me. And they chased me, for four minutes, through the whole ruins until I died.

What is the recommended strategy, never go anywhere near any Splumonkey areas when the arbitrary nightmare cycle that I technically cannot accurately keep track of without the medallion or a nearby fissure has reached the point where they turn into their Shadow form. So beyond how absurd that is, the recommended strategy for countering this content is to not associate with this content.

 

Don't Starve is a great game but Splumonkeys and especially Shadow Splumonkeys are just terrible, asinine game design which serves no purpose but to frustrate and potentially end the players game in ways they have almost no control of. I exclusively resent going to the ruins because of them. Two design elements you will not see done in any well designed game: enemies that never drop their aggravation regardless of what the player does, and enemies that stunlock players to the point of it not being possible to actually fight back. They combined both of these, into one enemy, then put that in a retail game; obstructing the entrance to one of the most important areas in the game.

If Klei seriously can't be bothered to make their own game fair then could somebody at least create a mod that nerfs Shadow Splumonkey aggravation. I would like the ruins to actually be fun.

[FreyaMaluk]

16 minutes ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Splumonkeys are kind of the most obnoxious and unfun enemy I've ever seen in a game. But whatever, it's funny for some developers to troll their own playerbase.

 

I just had a playthrough that was game over'd in a single moment because the nightmare cycle started as I was entering the ruins, six Shadow Splumonkeys chased me, and I spent four minutes running all over the entire ruins trying to get them off me while gradually freezing to death because it was near winter and the cave rain had not stopped for over a day. So I died, because I literally had no way of surviving; I could not fight them because the horde was too large and would just stunlock me so I could not even attack, and I couldn't stop the damage ticking because anytime I tried to create a fire they would just hit me. And they chased me, for four minutes, through the whole ruins until I died.

What is the recommended strategy, never go anywhere near any Splumonkey areas when the arbitrary nightmare cycle that I technically cannot accurately keep track of without the medallion or a nearby fissure has reached the point where they turn into their Shadow form. So beyond how absurd that is, the recommended strategy for countering this content is to not associate with this content.

 

Don't Starve is a great game but Splumonkeys and especially Shadow Splumonkeys are just terrible, asinine game design which serves no purpose but to frustrate and potentially end the players game in ways they have almost no control of. I exclusively resent going to the ruins because of them. Two design elements you will not see done in any well designed game: enemies that never drop their aggravation regardless of what the player does, and enemies that stunlock players to the point of it not being possible to actually fight back. They combined both of these, into one enemy, then put that in a retail game; obstructing the entrance to one of the most important areas in the game.

If Klei seriously can't be bothered to make their own game fair then could somebody at least create a mod that nerfs Shadow Splumonkey aggravation. I would like the ruins to actually be fun.

they are.. just wait for nightmare cycle to end to pass through or farm them for resouces.. done! wear moggles if possible to have a better range of vision.

and you can actually tell when they are about to transform.. you hear some sounds like an alert and the colors start to change. 

If you have problems with them, just leave one or two barrils for farming resouces and destroy the rest. You can hammer them down or burn them.

From what I've seen people are just to impatient to wait for the cycle to end and end up dead.

[Faintly Macabre]

TL;DR: I died making bad decisions, so there's something wrong with this feature.

[Renegade_Doll]

8 minutes ago, Faintly Macabre said:

TL;DR: I died making bad decisions, so there's something wrong with this feature.

Yeah, bad decision was going near this content. Because, the best kind of content in a game is that which players exclusively have to try to not interact with because of how overpowered it is. Reasonable right. Sure.

[Faintly Macabre]

6 minutes ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Yeah, bad decision was going near this content. Because, the best kind of content in a game is that which players exclusively have to try to not interact with because of how overpowered it is. Reasonable right. Sure.

Yeah, the board is full to the brim with complaints of how unbalanced the ruins are. Everybody is clearly avoiding them.

Sorry you're not having fun, but you made bad choices and that's all there is to it. The caves and the ruins are by design much more dangerous content than the forest, and you were exploring them unprepared. Like basically every feature in this game, you live (or die, I guess) and learn. Don't bumble around the caves/ruins as winter approaches with no means to deal with it or moisture.

[FreyaMaluk]

On 20.12.2017 at 3:38 AM, Renegade_Doll said:

Yeah, bad decision was going near this content. Because, the best kind of content in a game is that which players exclusively have to try to not interact with because of how overpowered it is. Reasonable right. Sure.

you made a bad decision not paying attention to the audio and color hints in the game, that's probs not the a game design's flaw. Besides, you can always prepare a meat effigy or a an amulet in case you get killed. There is 0 reason for a run to be over in the caves unless badly prepared.

I recommend that you precraft a thermal stone just inb case if you are exploring the caves late in autumn. There are tons for rocks for campfires and thermals to keep you tosty. 

Finally, spelunkmonkeys are the BEST and QUICKEST way to farm food, poop, hair and nightmare fuel in the entire game. As I said before, just hammer or set on fire all the other monkey houses you dont need and kill them in small groups when transformed.

Moggles are your best friend here. I always rush ruins with two moleworms in my inventory, an alchemy precrafted, and a croc pot .. I make a mini base in the lichen area, kill a depth worm and make moggle ASAP. Best way to avoid dangerous situations.. Besides, you can also have a meat effigy and some amulets there in case **** goes wrong. 

Just take some time to prepare better next time 

[GiddyGuy]

7 minutes ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Yeah, bad decision was going near this content. Because, the best kind of content in a game is that which players exclusively have to try to not interact with because of how overpowered it is. Reasonable right. Sure.

You were playing DST correct? Just make an amulet so when you do die to spumonkeys and not doing w/e @FreyaMaluk said, you can res and not lose your world.

Btw My take on things, I think nightmare spulmonkeys are great for getting food and beard hair ^{(Even if no one uses meat effigies now a days.)} as long as you take them out one by one, tank a few or get another player to take the agro off. I think they're perfectly balanced

[FreyaMaluk]

5 minutes ago, GiddyGuy said:

 ^{(Even if no one uses meat effigies now a days.)}

REEEEEEEE 

I do

[Renegade_Doll]

2 minutes ago, Faintly Macabre said:

Yeah, the board is full to the brim with complaints of how unbalanced the ruins are. Everybody is clearly avoiding them.

Sorry you're not having fun, but you made bad choices and that's all there is to it. The caves and the ruins are by design much more dangerous content than the forest, and you were exploring them unprepared. Like basically every feature in this game, you live (or die, I guess) and learn. Don't bumble around the caves/ruins as winter approaches with no means to deal with it or moisture.

Bad choices, my exclusive choice was to enter the ruins. I have no control over the nightmare cycle and if the game does not generate any items I can use to determine the nightmare cycle in its current state; the only way I can learn if the Splumonkeys are in their permanent aggravation is to get in proximity of their aggravation. Poor design.

2 minutes ago, FreyaMaluk said:

lol... you made a bad decision not paying attention to the audio and color hints in the game, that's probs not the a game design's flaw. Besides, you can always prepare a meat effigy or a an amulet in case you get killed. There is 0 reason for a run to be over in the caves unless badly prepared.

I recommend that you precraft a thermal stone just inb case if you are exploring the caves late in autumn. There are tons for rocks for campfires and thermals to keep you tosty. 

Finally, spelunkmonkeys are the BEST and QUICKEST way to farm food, poop, hair and nightmare fuel in the entire game. As I said before, just hammer or set on fire all the other monkey houses you dont need and kill them in small groups when transformed. Moggles are your best friend here. I always rush ruins with two moleworms in my inventory, an alchemy precrafted, and a croc pot .. I make a mini base in the lichen area, kill a depth worm and make moggle ASAP. Best way to avoid dangerous situations.. Besides, you can also have a meat effigy and some amulets there in case **** goes wrong. 

Just take some time to prepare better next time 

Audio and colour hints. Oh, you mean that audio que I never heard. Do you mean those colour hints only visible on ruins related objects which you can only see if they are actually around to be seen. Yes, respawning stops death. That should be the excuse every developer uses to make their games as unfair as possible.

Thermal stones do not hold heat perpetually, so that is absolutely worthless information. The Shadow Splumonkeys chase the player forever until the cycle ends which takes far longer then a thermal stone usually lasts. If you are such l33t at this game why are you offering "suggestions" that are literally not applicable.

4 minutes ago, GiddyGuy said:

You were playing DST correct? Just make an amulet so when you do die to spumonkeys and not doing w/e @FreyaMaluk said, you can res and not lose your world.

Btw My take on things, I think nightmare spulmonkeys are great for getting food and beard hair ^{(Even if no one uses meat effigies now a days.)} as long as you take them out one by one, tank a few or get another player to take the agro off. I think they're perfectly balanced

Again just because the player can revive doesn't excuse the game for killing the player unfairly.

Getting into a one on one fight with them is completely based on the density that the game spawned their pods in and where they currently are when you get in range of them. And, if they wander over to you while you are fighting another one.

[Faintly Macabre]

1 minute ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Bad choices, my exclusive choice was to enter the ruins. I have no control over the nightmare cycle and if the game does not generate any items I can use to determine the nightmare cycle in its current state; the only way I can learn if the Splumonkeys are in their permanent aggravation is to get in proximity of their aggravation. Poor design.

No, you chose to enter the ruins unprepared for even basic concerns. I get the distinct impression you got into this game and started out reading some guides and such so maybe you're not used to it, but this is par for the course for this game: you do some stuff, you get comfortable, you overextend a bit, and the game bites you in the ass. If you were prepared for low temperatures and moisture (or maybe just didn't explore stuff you've never experienced before when those things are a concern), you'd have probably lasted long enough to discover that the shadow splumonkeys will revert to normal when the nightmare cycle ends. What part of wandering around in the dark unprepared for current challenges, much less new ones, sounds like a good idea to you?

[Sicko Hog]

Just because you died to something doesn't mean it's unfair, read the wiki or look at some guides for how to deal with Splumonkeys and how to tell the difference between nightmare cycle phases.
I thought we would've learned something from the "I can't kill Fuelweaver so he is unfair" thread a few weeks ago.

[fimmatek]

Splumonkey are the most annoying animals in DST, not surprising that someone posted them in the "What do you hate in DST" topic, I agree. Both in ther normal and shadow form. That's why you should avoid them as far as possible (and the ruins as well, if the worldgen is so) if you aren't prepaired, as others already poined this out. Especially at the end of autumn, when you need to even prepaire for winter first. If you are entering the ruins and have no idea what phase is it, you should be extra careful till you find out. You can go slower in so that you see in time when a monkey aggros on you (besides, you can hear them from further if you pay attention to it) and when one or two monkeys find you, you run back on the safe, known way till you ensure that no more monkey join the chase.

What you could have done at least is running out of, not all over the entire ruins. The caves are still a lot safer than the ruins, especially during the nightmarephase, and you already know a part of it (minimum the path to the ruins).

[cropo]

Judging by this being the DST section you have even less of an excuse to complain.  Your main issue seems to be ''it was raining''.  This tells me you made the terrible mistake of entering the ruins on a non-summer season.

 

 

Here's a tip, ONLY ENTER THE RUINS IN SUMMER.  In Don't Starve Together, Summer inside of the caves is basically the same as autumn.  It will NEVER rain, you will NEVER overheat, and structures will NEVER combust.   This is especially true if you are a new player, but NEVER explore the ruins on a non-summer season.  Do more important activities until Summer, and make that your dedicated spelunking month, it saves you the entire burden of Summer on the surface and helps you concentrate your entire underground journeys on a single season.

 

What were you thinking going in the Caves near Winter? Do you know how easy Splemunkeys are to juke for a couple of minutes?  As soon as they transform back into normal monkeys they even fall asleep! This gives you plenty of time to lure them to a secluded area and let them change back and make your escape so they aren't bothering you throughout the entire ruins!  I don't think you should be complaining about the difficulty of the ruins when you entered them near the start of Winter.   That would be like me going into the Water Temple in Ocarina of Time and not wearing a Blue Tunic and then complaining the temple is unfair and cheaty.

[Rellimarual]

I remember when splumonkeys seemed impossibly hard to deal with, but they aren’t. You just need more practice. While he nightmare cycle is random in its length, it’s pattern of  dormant, warming up, peak nightmare, and cooling down periods is consistent. You can learn to recognize it by the color of the entire ruins area. The safe period Is when the ruins take on a bluish tinge and sound quiet. When everything is grayish brown, it’s either cooling down or warming up. When anything red on your character or environment seems to be glowing, the cycle is high. Vents appear in The ground glowing pink rather than grayish. Earthquakes often occur when the periods are changing over.

The main way to deal with shadow monkeys is simply to wait until it’s safe to pass them. Don’t enter the ruins unless it’s the dormant period and find a nook or bridge away from vents and fissures to hole up in if the cycle is on when you want to leave. This is the hardest part: just sitting there waiting out the cycle.

[Pyr0mrcow]

They're a deterrent; the Ruins (unless you're experienced and like rushing them like some of us) are kinda endgame content, or at least were at one point. They have challenges of their own to throw at you, so you should be slightly experienced with the rest of the game (ie able to survive cold temperatures, having healing items at the ready, ect) before diving that deep.

That said, Splumonkeys and even shadow ones aren't hard to deal with once you've done it a few times. If you curve your movement, you can focus large groups of enemies into a small point, meaning that when you approach them, they all try to attack once; if timed right, you can bait out an attack, run away without being hit, run back up to them, hit one a few times, and rinse and repeat until they're all dead.
Or, wait it out; if you're properly prepared for cave/seasonal conditions beforehand, you can run away long enough for the monkeys to change back to normal and lose interest.

...alternatively, go Wendy and let Abigail devour everything; she's strengthened by the Ruins and, while not immortal, she's terrific for large groups.
Just remember to give her time to regenerate health or heal her yourself, if you need to take on multiple groups.

Play to your strengths, change your tactics to suit them, learn and improve.

[HamBatter]

You can also go with a friend, so while the monkeys focus all on one the other could place the fire and reduce the numbers.

[Soulk]

Also learn to Sync enemies and then kite groups, i can kite around 4-8 splumonkeys at the same time, i frist sync then i kite hit twice kite. they die in 3 hits with a weapon that does 42 or more dmg, if you are wolfgang you just 1 shot them with darts too.

[Brickfest]

Well I suppose you got told that you made a poor decision so many times I shouldn't repeat that... but here's some stuff you can do to make ruins exploration easier:

• Prepare for what's about to come
  • Set up a camp near the ruins so you can wait out the nightmare circle there before you enter. Crockpot and campfire is good enough
  • You're going into one of the most dangerous areas ingame, make sure you have backup plan if you die. Build some life-giving amulets, or meat effigies. What I like to do is to have two effigies at least so when I die, I use one to revive and the second one is just a backup in case I mess up when farming for a new one. Also pick a good season to go spelunking, in summer it's cool enough in the caves for you to be without any heat protection (make chest with equipment in the entrance so you won't overheat when you come out), autumn is good too. I almost never go into caves during winter, spring is bit better but still not ideal if you don't have proper experience.
  • Equip yourself accordingly. Wood armor and helmets, you might be tempted for a spear, but I'd recomend either hambat, batbat or dark sword (watch your sanity when using it). Also nightmare amulet and telelocator staff are good to bring with you, maybe some sanity raising clothing like top hat or tam-o-shanter
  • Supplies always help. What I like to bring is minimum 5 fishticks for healing and I usually pick up some green mushrooms so I can cook them and raise my sanity...You can also bundle your supplies so they last longer. I suggest you read the wiki page for gigantic beehive, there's pointed out how to get honeycombs needed for the recipe without having to destroy normal beehives or summon the bee queen.
• Try, try, try again
  • Just accept the insufferable weight of being alive and acknowledge the fact that you will die... a lot. If you manage to get past splumonkeys, you'll get wrecked by ruins mobs, nighmares during the nightmare circle or you'll just starve when you forget to bring more supplies, you'll run out of lightbulbs for your lantern etc. That's why backup is important...or you know, endless mode if you aren't playing with friends.
  • Wait out the nighmare circles in safe areas in front of the ruins or don't push further if they're in their full strength. If you get caught in nightmare circle while splumonkeys are near, don't run towards the ruins, retreat instead
  • learn how the mobs attack and try to evade their attacks. Duh...
  • Nightmare splumonkeys are your friends actually... so far it's been the easiest way to farm beard hair in large quantities. And beard hair means meat effigies... 
  • Crockpot is the most magical thing ever
  • There's still plenty of stuff to do outside of the ruins. Killing deerclops, bearger and Goose/Goose could give you some better equipment. Also making a base that is able tu feed you without the need to leave should be your priority before attempting to get into the ruins if you're serious
  • Bring friends... some mobs have larger health in DST so it will make it easier to take them down if you're in the group
     

Hope that helps! If you don't have friends who play the game just go on public servers, add people you enjoyed playing, play together some more on publics and eventually host your own game

[FreyaMaluk]

 

12 hours ago, fimmatek said:

Splumonkey are the most annoying animals in DST, not surprising that someone posted them in the "What do you hate in DST" topic, I agree. Both in ther normal and shadow form. That's why you should avoid them as far as possible (and the ruins as well, if the worldgen is so) if you aren't prepaired, as others already poined this out. Especially at the end of autumn, when you need to even prepaire for winter first. If you are entering the ruins and have no idea what phase is it, you should be extra careful till you find out. You can go slower in so that you see in time when a monkey aggros on you (besides, you can hear them from further if you pay attention to it) and when one or two monkeys find you, you run back on the safe, known way till you ensure that no more monkey join the chase.

What you could have done at least is running out of, not all over the entire ruins. The caves are still a lot safer than the ruins, especially during the nightmarephase, and you already know a part of it (minimum the path to the ruins).

Splumenkeys CAN be annoying, but they also are an incredibly stupidly good source of meat and fuel and essential for surviving long term in the caves. 

Remember that this game is about taming the wild and also knowing when to run for your life.. Most of the time u can always run. And if it's day 18 and u are in the caves you should have prepared well so that u had at least the recipe for a thermal and an umbrella. I mean, basic stuff really.

And for all the people saying Splumonkeys are "unfair" this shows only that u need to learn a bit more how the ruins and the ruins cycles work. You DO get visual and auditory clues for the nightmare changes even WITHOUT a Thulecite Medallion and if you are unaware of them, then you need to start paying attention.

Besides, I'd say that 80% of the time peeps die to Splumonkeys cuz they pushed to far into the ruins even knowing they cycle was about to change or basicly cuz unprepared or just plainly inexperienced. 

 

12 hours ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Again just because the player can revive doesn't excuse the game for killing the player unfairly.

dude who told you DST is suppose to be fair in the first place ..  lol

sorry to tell you but it isn't. Every death feels hard cuz rng can be a *****. That's the game.

12 hours ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Audio and colour hints. Oh, you mean that audio que I never heard. 

what do you expect then?? A siren with two flying pink rhynos dressed as superman telling u with trumpets and a banjo that Splumonkeys are about to change?

I mean are you serious u don't hear the audio queue? It's fairly loud. there is a sound like a horn, an alert when they are about to change. The nightmare cycle is not all all "arbitrary"

FYI http://dontstarve.wikia.com/wiki/Nightmare_Cycle

Calm

Warning Phase

Nightmare (aggresive Splumonkeys)

Dawn Phase (aggressive Splumonkeys)

if that's the case, just pull back to a safe place and make a campfire, wait for the nightmare cycle to be over and done. 

pls, DST is about lil details and paying attention. Besides.. There is a thing called moogles that allows u to see if they are transformed without any risk and staying at a safe distance.

12 hours ago, Renegade_Doll said:

Thermal stones do not hold heat perpetually, so that is absolutely worthless information. The Shadow Splumonkeys chase the player forever until the cycle ends which takes far longer then a thermal stone usually lasts. If you are such l33t at this game why are you offering "suggestions" that are literally not applicable.

Basic stuff 101. Have an umbrella precrafted if you are approching the caves in late autumn or leave before day 18.

Basics: In the caves winter is a b-i-t-***. It rains, it's cold. If you wanna be THERE then PREPARE and don't compalint cuz you were cold and weat and Splumonkeys killed u, ergo unprepared.

and killing the annoying monkeys is just so incredibly satyisfying. I love it xD

[Rellimarual]

1 hour ago, Brickfest said:

You can also bundle your supplies so they last longer. I suggest you read the wiki page for gigantic beehive, there's pointed out how to get honeycombs needed for the recipe without having to destroy normal beehives or summon the bee queen.

This info is seriously outdated. Bundling wrap can only be made after killing the bee queen or (maybe) Klaus. Also, fish sticks will go bad too quickly. Pirogis are a much longer-lasting healing food. Jerky will also help with sanity and stay fresh a while.

[Faintly Macabre]

35 minutes ago, Rellimarual said:

This info is seriously outdated. Bundling wrap can only be made after killing the bee queen or (maybe) Klaus. Also, fish sticks will go bad too quickly. Pirogis are a much longer-lasting healing food. Jerky will also help with sanity and stay fresh a while.

What's outdated? Bundling still stops spoilage, and the gigantic beehive can still be hammered (rarely) for honey comb. Though I doubt somebody who's traipsing through the caves and ruins unprepared for wet or cold has put the Bee Queen away.

On the other hand, Winter's Feast enables gift wrapping.

[Cyberboy2000]

12 minutes ago, Faintly Macabre said:

What's outdated? Bundling still stops spoilage, and the gigantic beehive can still be hammered (rarely) for honey comb. Though I doubt somebody who's traipsing through the caves and ruins unprepared for wet or cold has put the Bee Queen away.

On the other hand, Winter's Feast enables gift wrapping.

Bundling wrap needs a blueprint which Bee Queen drops.

[Rellimarual]

1 hour ago, Faintly Macabre said:

What's outdated? Bundling still stops spoilage, and the gigantic beehive can still be hammered (rarely) for honey comb. Though I doubt somebody who's traipsing through the caves and ruins unprepared for wet or cold has put the Bee Queen away.

On the other hand, Winter's Feast enables gift wrapping.

Telling someone who can’t even manage splumonkeys and the nightmare cycle that they should kill the bee queen to get bundling wrap is not that helpful. Many, many months ago, the bundling wrap recipe could be made with a science machine, but that’s not the case anymore, and that seems to be what the poster had in mind. A honeycomb is absolutely useless to the OP. It’s true that you can use gift wrap now, but only for a handful of weeks.

Or they could just make pirogis! Or jerky! Or just bring a stack of honey. All of those foods should last long enough for a quick trip to the ruins. Literally, “Kill Bee Queen to get bundling wrap so you can take fish sticks to the ruins” is a joke that belongs in the Inefficient Advice thread.

[LEX-7O2]

Wigfrid + x no. of blow darts= x no. of dead monkeys IF....

You are aware of the fact that if you spam blow darts you may shoot a second blow dart onto the dying monkey and it consuming another blow dart, thus a waste. A blow dart will not be consumed unless it hits something, which will create a noise upon impact, that can easily be heard. Unless you have the sound turned down.

[fimmatek]

4 hours ago, FreyaMaluk said:

Splumenkeys CAN be annoying, but they also are an incredibly stupidly good source of meat and fuel and essential for surviving long term in the caves.

[...]

Yes, and there are many ways to kill them, using Abigail, tooth traps, with a friend, rock lobsters or just simply in small groups.

So if one is prepaired or experienced enough before encountering them, they are extremely useful, otherways they can mess up the plans pretty well.