Don't Starve

[Jon Flannery]

So, Rainy got me a game on Steam, and I've been getting into it.

The game is hardcore as hell, and it really is just a matter of 'when' you die.

Although, in my most recent play through, I was close to creating a meat effigy of myself that would allow me to resurrect (I assume once)

Unfortunately, the game then crashed so hard that not only did I lose all my current progress, but all my save games went away.  

(and all my experience points, which you can use to unlock new characters)

I guess (since this is, after all, a beta) that I should go write a problem report.

At any rate, I present to the field log of a doomed gentleman:

Day 1:

Despite my unpleasant arrival, I have found myself in an area with abundant 

resources.  Though they will not sustain me for long, the berries and carrots 

that grow naturally in this area are enough to keep me fed for the nonce.  I 

have established a small camp in the Savannah, which seems pleasant, except for 

the abundance of killer bees.

Day 2: 

With food supplies high, I have decided to scout the region, to see what the 

area has in store for me.  Things went well at first, and I found even more 

berries and carrots.  The problem came in the afternoon, where I happened upon 

the most bizarrely large spider's nest.  I took it upon myself to rid the 

forest of this problem and was attacked by several spiders that were nearly as 

large as I am.  I fended them off with my ax, but I will have to be careful of 

such creatures in the future.  

Also of note, spider meat does not make for a pleasant meal.

Day 3:

I have decided to make this camp in the Savannah a more permanent location.  I 

returned to the forest where I first landed and have harvested some lumber.  

Between that, and the plentiful grass, I believe I can craft some basic tools to 

assist me in survival.

Day 4:

The killer bees in the area have proven themselves a great nuisance.  I have 

fashioned a basic spear and some body armour from the wood and flint, and 

started to work on the bee problem.  Even though I have killed over a dozen of 

them, their numbers seem countless.  More than that, I have observed that the 

bees will swarm together to attack, even when they are from separate hives.  I 

managed to remove the hive nearest my homestead, but will stay away from the 

rest for now, and lick my wounds.

Day 5:

I have resupplied my lumber, and gathered more food from the forest.  The food 

is far more sparse now, and I am living off of my earlier supplies, plus some 

honey from the bees.  I may soon need to force myself to eat more of that meat 

from the monstrous spiders.

On a personal hygiene note, my beard has grown quite long.  I hope to find a way 

to remedy this soon.

Day 6:

Using some of the spider silk, and a branch, I built a net and captured a handful 

of bees.  This is far preferable to fighting the blasted things.  I have made a 

small hive for them, in hopes that it will keep me supplied with honey.  I have 

far more bees than I need for this purpose, but to build another bee box, I will 

need to acquire more honeycomb, and that means dealing with another hive.

Day 7:

The Beebox has already begun producing honey, though I have not yet harvested 

it.  I managed to build a razor from flint and wood.  Being clean shaven feels 

almost civilized even out here.

Day 8:

I began an expedition to discover more sources of food in the area.  I made camp 

in an unknown land that holds promise of new materials.  I require more silk, 

and hope to find more spiders.  

I found some suspicious tracks, to what animal I do not know.  They lead through 

yet another field of bees.  There seems to be no end to their hives.  This world 

is clearly theirs.  I so name this Bee World.  I only hope my intrusion upon 

their domain is not noticed by the powers that be.

Day 9:

The tracks have led me back through my own main camp, where I was attacked by a 

pair of owl-dogs.  To think that those beast could have come upon me at any time 

while I slept.  And more than that, the tracks continue on, and the owl dogs may 

 not have been responsible for them at all.

Truly Beeworld is a wild and remarkable place.  

Day 10:

I have followed the tracks to a large furry elephant beast.  It seems passive, 

and I wonder what lands it calls home.  The beast offers no promise of long term 

survival, so I have decided to let him be.  I will return to my home, and tend 

to my bees.

Day 11:

I have returned to my home, and resupplied.  I will begin fresh, and hope for 

better results on this next expedition.  It has grown dark during my 

preparations, and I have decided to set out over the familiar ground by 

torchlight.

Day 12:

My search for silk has come up short, but the expedition has had an unexpected 

boon.  I have found a field of minerals, and through excavation, I may soon be 

able to build an alchemy set to further my studies.

The minerals are surrounded by berries and, of course, bees.  I begin to wonder 

if there is more to this correlation.  Do the bees help the berries grow?  Or do 

the bees just build their homes where berries already exist?

Day 13:

Success.  Today has been the most horrifying day in my time here on Beeworld.  I 

spent the morning in excavation, and found the missing materials for my alchemy 

set.  Then, upon further exploration, I discovered a swamp that was populated by 

spiders.

Donning my wooden armor and wielding my spear, I went to do battle.  When I set 

foot in the swamp, I was treated to my first horrid suprise.  A large purple and 

spiked tentacle reached up from the depths of the swamp and attempted to drag me 

back in.  Needless to say, I ran for my life.  Then, upon finding a spider nest, 

I prepared to dispatch it as I had done before.  It turns out that there are 

multiple types of spiders in the swamp, and the green ones are far more 

difficult to deal with than the black.  I was in retreat from the nest, when 

again I came across the swamp tentacle.  I was very fortunate that the tentacle 

decided it would prefer spider to man.

As a result of the day's action, I have components for alchemy, materials for 

nets, a small supply of very dubious meat, and a far greater understanding of 

the dangers of Beeworld.

Day 14:

I have made it back to my home camp, and my bees have been busy.  There was a 

large supply of fresh honey waiting for me when I returned.  The bees were none 

too pleased with me harvesting this honey, but they seem to have calmed down 

now.

I have discovered that the meat and carrots that I have been storing have turned 

bad.  It was only a matter of time I suppose, but I am still sad to see food go 

to waste.  Perhaps I can preserve the food longer if I find a way to cook it.

Day 15:

I have built a shovel and begun digging up the tree stumps of the trees I have 

previously chopped down.  This has proved to be an excellent source of lumber.  

I have also created my alchemy set, though I have not had opportunity to use it 

yet.

Day 16:

I was attacked by a pack of owldogs today.  From one, I was able to salvage a 

tooth that may prove useful in the future.  I have been quite hurt, and hope for 

some uneventful days ahead in which I can rest.

Day 17:

I harvested some honeycomb from a beehive today.  I seem to becoming more adept 

at beekeeping.  I plan to use this honeycomb to build a third beebox.

Day 18:

I have built my third beebox, but I still am running low on some supplies.  My 

health is somewhat recovered, and I will attempt to go forage again tomorrow.

[Rainy]

Adventure! The game is fun and frustrating because death is death.

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[Alan Taylor]

That game looks really fun. Going to have to check it out.

Next time you guys are looking for a new board game, I'd recommend Spartacus (if you haven't checked it out already.) It's got a lot of fun mechanics. Sadly, it maxes out at four players without modification.

--

“Science has proof without any certainty. Creationists have certainty without any proof.”

-Ashley Montagu

[Flannery, Jonathan CTR MDA/DES]

I had one of the most frustrating deaths ever last night.
I had been out adventuring, and... doing stuff that would involve spoilers. Anyway, I was very hurt, got home, and made a fire. Before I went to bed, I was cooking all the food in my inventory. When I got to the monster meat, I accidentally clicked myself rather than the fire. So, this caused me to eat raw monster meat, which you could imagine is not good for you. It was enough to kill me.

I got my lost saves back, sort of.
Turns out the issue is with a steam synch. It lost track of me, and started from square one. It actually fixed itself after a few hours. The problem is that I had already played since then, so I had a game in save slot 1. So, I got my save slot 2 game, and all my xp and such back, but the one I was playing (with the field journal) got dumped when the game tried to deconflict having 2 game#1s. I'll probably go update my issue on the forum with that info, but FYI (since you play on steam) it's a good idea to skip save slot #1 when creating games. If you lose your info, the game will automatically create your "first" game there, and you'd get the conflict.

And now to things about game mechanics. If you don't want to talk about this stuff (Because learning is after all part of the game), let me know and stop reading this.

Have you created the meat effigy yet?
It sounds like you can get a res off of it, but I haven't tried it.

Building the tent turned out to suck pretty hard.

Beeboxes are the best thing ever. I've done them in my last 3 attempts and have the system for creating them pretty well down now.

Last night I just figured out how to transplant berry bushes and saplings, so before I died, I had a whole little farm thing going.

Speaking of farms, the actual food plots that I created have never, ever paid off. I keep trying though.

I've been debating the best way to farm silk. I've been taking out spider nests during the day, but I'm thinking it would be better to set up a nighttime camp amongst the nests to do the farming. The problem with this, of course, is that you are then totally committed to defending that fire. Or, I suppose, keeping a torch on you with the possibility of trying to run like hell.

Also, how many days have you gone so far? Have you unlocked the third dude? I'm very curious about him.

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[Rainy]

New update. Now the game has winter, loooong winter nights, and winter beasts like the Deerclops.
 .

I tend to get on a roll in this game and then make a stupid mistake. Like make all the planks I need for chests because my inventory is full and then drop them too close to the fire. I haven't gotten far with the unlocks yet (see stupid Rainy mistakes) but I've learned a lot about the system. I'm hoping I actually get some time to play so I can make progress.

[Jon Flannery]

Yeah.  I usually die somewhere in the teens.

Honey got nerfed in the patch, and Winter is Coming.

Actually in my current game, I've made it into winter, and food is getting scarce.

It seems like most of the times I die, its because I overreach.

In my first spidersilk farming operation, I built a firepit near a half dozen nests or so... some teir 1, some teir 2.

The first spider I killed pissed off all the surrounding spiders, and I was swarmed by like 20+.

I haven't intentionally set anything on fire yet, but I'd like to figure it out.  I killed a pigdog, and had him catch himself and a nearby tree on fire.

I've been trying to figure out how to burn down trees so that I can get charcoal.  Maybe if I made a trail of dried grass or something...

Fishing seems really good, but it isn't without its challenges.

So anyway, I think Winter happens at day 20... or thereabout.  No idea how long it will last.  This is about as far as I've gotten.

[Jesse McMinn]

I made it to day four or so before going to bed. I haven't figured out much of the game yet other than trying to chase turkeys around with my axe while subsisting on foraged berries and carrots. There may have been a rudimentary grass wall constructed in an effort to trap said turkeys.

[Flannery, Jonathan CTR MDA/DES]

My dude froze to death about 4 days into winter. The nights were long, and I was running out of food. A snowstorm started while I was foraging, and he died before I made it back to camp.
My current guy is a few days from winter, and I'm stocking up as much as possible, but I don't have a good feeling about this. I can't decide if I should spend my remaining days gathering food or firewood. I'm also playing as Wolfgang (who is essentially overly manly man). I made a winter hat for him, so maybe I'll have some protection, but I don't know if it will be enough. I also don't know how long winter is. I've done my best to make a sustainable home, but it just isn't there yet. If I survive the first winter though, I think the second will be much better.

-----Original Message-----
From: blar-...@googlegroups.com [mailto:blar-...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Jesse McMinn
Sent: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 11:59 PM
To: blar-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Blár-Kista] Don't Starve

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[Matt Powell]

Have any of you actually starved?

It sounds like that's the easiest to avoid of the ways to die.  Is that why it's in the title?

--
Jesse, please try to keep your educated opinion from trampling all over the ground-breaking and insightful work of a layperson.
-- Alan Taylor

[Flannery, Jonathan CTR MDA/DES]

I have.
But knowing that starvation is an issue, you end up taking risks to avoid it. Like the guy I had who froze. I had the option of going out for food, or starving. Well, freezing happened. I've had people die to bees or spiders while trying to get food. I've had a guy die to beefalos trying to gather feces for farming.
Food really drives everything. It's what makes you go out and take risks. That, and fire are the only two things you actually need in the game.
Of course, before the winter patch, I did have a guy die trying to farm up the materials for a stylish top hat, but that really is the exception.

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Jesse, please try to keep your educated opinion from trampling all over the ground-breaking and insightful work of a layperson.
-- Alan Taylor

[Rainy]

Yeah. Fire too close to spiders. Spiders too close to spiders. Failure to get logs before dark because you are trying to get more gold. Or...like last night. Spawning in Treelandia and having nothing at all to mine. Sadness.

[Flannery, Jonathan CTR MDA/DES]

Yeah, I had an awful spawn a few days back. I was playing Wendy, and I wandered for the first day or two with almost nothing to show for it. So I just kept on. It took around 7 days to chart the borders of the entire map, but I did it. By the time I was done, I had plenty of material to start a base, but I hadn't really done anything yet. Then the hounds came. Needless to say, I ran like hell. I very nearly escaped through a wormhole, but they got me as I was diving in.

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[Jon Flannery]

So,
Andy has demanded more stories of Don't Starve.  I may or may not elaborate on this later, but I am currently playing my personal best game.  I just fought off the puppies, and am about 1/3 of the way through winter.  Now I am going to bed, but I give you this screenshot.

[Jesse McMinn]

I second the request. I've not played as much, but I think it's one of those games where I enjoy the tales told of it more than the actual playing. 

Also, nice 'stache.

On Mar 18, 2013, at 5:20, Jon Flannery <jon.fl...@gmail.com> wrote:

So,
Andy has demanded more stories of Don't Starve.  I may or may not elaborate on this later, but I am currently playing my personal best game.  I just fought off the puppies, and am about 1/3 of the way through winter.  Now I am going to bed, but I give you this screenshot.

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<DontStarve.jpg>

[Flannery, Jonathan CTR MDA/DES]

Yeah, I tend to play as Wolfgang. He's the strongman who isn't so sure about all this science stuff.
Each character has bonuses that help them out, Wolfgang is extra strong, extra max hp, and an extra large stomach.
I've found that the higher max stats doesn't help much because they are rarely full anyway. You can see how low my health is from the screenshot, but that's at around 40 (normal max is 100)

Wilson's beard could be useful in some ways, but I've never been able to make it work out for me.
Willow's firestarting is amusing, but I don't see a lot of practical application. Now that I figured out starting forest fires, I have no real use for that. Then again, I've screwed up a few times and let myself die due to darkness. I guess she has instant assurance against that.
Wendy's ghost sister Abagail seems like she does more harm than good. She does kill things for you, when she shows up, but you can't sleep while she's around, and sometimes you really need to.
Wolfgang is manly, and is awesome.
WX-97? His name is something like that. He can eat rotting food without penalty. I don't usually have an issue with food turning to rot.

So, this latest game. I worked fast and hard to build up as much as possible before winter. You can see that I have a thermometer, and a crock pot, and some science stuff. My inventory even has a magic staff that has a ranged freeze attack. This allowed me to finally kill that damned turkey. I'm trying to save it for when I need it though. It only gets 20 charges, and it seems to take 3 to freeze something in place. The boomerang just hurts me. I don't think I'll make one of those again. Still, I have a tier3 nest near my house, since I ignored it for too long, and the spiders get bolder by the day. I will have to fight them sooner or later. I'm hoping later. Maybe I can burn the rest of the staff to take care of that problem.
The winter hat helps _A lot_. I have far more beefalo fur than I need. I'm not sure if there's anything else to build with it later.
The game has changed recently and there's a lot more crap. There are three types of mushrooms, which bury themselves under the ground, and pop up at different times of day. I think it's red in the day, green at dusk and blue at night. Eating them is not a good idea, but it is still food and would do in a pinch.
Also, the crockpot is interesting. I put 4 things of food in, and get one unit of superfood out. The superfood is generally better than the sum of the parts, but I probably have only scratched the surface of experimenting. I don't put carrots in there, because when cooked alone, they give a lot of fullness and healing. I have found that 1 monster meat, and 3 rabbit morsels will give meatballs, which has no penalty from the monster meat. Too much monster meat though, and you get monster lasagna, which is really bad for your sanity. I know it fills you a lot, but I'm not sure if it helps or hurts your health.
Anyway, I'm hoping to see the spring, but that shouldn't happen until day 40 or so.

-----Original Message-----
From: blar-...@googlegroups.com [mailto:blar-...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Jesse McMinn
Sent: Monday, March 18, 2013 12:08 AM
To: blar-...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Blár-Kista] Don't Starve

I second the request. I've not played as much, but I think it's one of those games where I enjoy the tales told of it more than the actual playing.

Also, nice 'stache.

On Mar 18, 2013, at 5:20, Jon Flannery <jon.fl...@gmail.com> wrote:



So,
Andy has demanded more stories of Don't Starve. I may or may not elaborate on this later, but I am currently playing my personal best game. I just fought off the puppies, and am about 1/3 of the way through winter. Now I am going to bed, but I give you this screenshot.




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<DontStarve.jpg>

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[Jon Flannery]

And now for some SPAM!

At first, I was all:

And then I was like, "shit shit Shit Shit SHIIT!"

But then it was like, 

Which was awesome, until the game was like,

[Jon Flannery]

So, yeah.

I'm done for now.

Dude has lived through winter, and an all new season of awesome is starting.

I burned every last charge of my ice staff on the deerclops, and all I managed to do was get away.

I led the evil spider queen far away from my home, and ditched her there.  By the way, she's pretty slow, because she's constantly pooping out regular spiders.

I killed the spider nest near my home now that the queen is gone.  Allthough, I ran into a few more queens out in the wilderness.

I have many farm plots, a crockpot, some drying racks, and a refrigerator.  I have many berry bushes to feed me in the summer.

I... had... a grove of trees that I was cultivating for wood, but...

Okay, so the spider queen thing.

I tried to take her down.  I used what tools I had.  When those wouldn't work, I led her into my grove, and set the whole damned thing on FIRE.

She seemed to think, "Heh, cute.  I'ma eat you now, k?"

So, yeah I ran.

Still alive, but I'm a little fried after all that.

[Jon Flannery]

All good things come to an end.

Wolfgang is no more.

So, I was rocking that game.  I had made it into Spring, and back into winter again.

My food stores were high, as was my wood and various other craftables.

The hounds that came for me were a new variety.  Some of them were red, and would light on fire when they died.

But it didn't cause much trouble.

No, I had everything going well, and decided to explore more.  I wanted to find the materials to make the new tier of science machine.

What I found instead was walrus people.

They are NOT friendly.

One of them started shooting a blowgun at me, and their dogs chased after me.  I was dead before equipping my weapon and armor.

Note to self:  Winter is no time for exploration.

On the good side, I rocked that game so hard that I unlocked both of the characters that I didn't have.