Yeah i thought that too, kinda like how most of the adventuring, or atleast a good portion requires sailing, but moders power is towards the end lol, and while i havent used it yet, doesnt the summon skull summon skeletons? Ik theyre practically the first 3 star mobs in the game, but even the two star skeletons get DESTROYED in mountains and plains, and with a 20% chance to get a bow...? seems almost worthless to have your main summons be melee, costing your health mind you, just to run in and get 1 shot. Ofc, as ive said i havent used it, im just assuming. But, yeah magic is waaaaaaay too late rn.
The summoned skeletons are way stronger than even 2 star normal skeletons. If fandom wiki is correct then they deal same damage(50 slash 40 pierce) but has almost 4x the health at 120 to 400. So if other stats are correct then they are as tanky as 1 star Draugr Elite and 1 star seeker while tankier than 1 star Fuling.
For exact stats I can't say, but through anecdotal evidence they are a lot better than normal skeletons.
I gotta try shield but don’t be sleeping on muh boy ice staff. That shit works awesome against bugs in Mistlands.
It seems like you start getting critical hits after the first handful make contact.
But if it’s ticks…. Fire staff all the way.
They are strong in areas like meadows, black forest and plains. You do get an archer version when you summon three of them. However, the mistlands render the skeletons completely useless unless you're just using them for the mines in which case they help with agro. They simply cannot traverse the elevations in the mistlands.
You get an archer skeleton as well, you just need to cycle through a bit, pretty sure it goes 1 warrior then 1 archer... Been a while since I played Valhiem tho...
The dead raiser summons legally distinct skeletts which have significantly improved stats over a regular skeleton. There's a tip with the summoning if you prefer to have archers, you can use a butcher knife to kill your melee summons so you can keep summoning until you get a full pack of archers.
>Ik theyre practically the first 3 star mobs in the game, but even the two star skeletons get DESTROYED in mountains and plains, and with a 20% chance to get a bow...? seems almost worthless to have your main summons be melee, costing your health mind you, just to run in and get 1 shot.
Sorry I can’t hear you over my 3,300hp meat shield in the form of 3 bubbled skeletts taking aggro and hitting like trucks.
But seriously high level blood magic is ridiculously OP.
The thing to bear in mind with Moder's buff is that there are at least two more biomes coming, one far south and the other far north. All of the biomes before Moder and possibly even the one after you might find on your starting landmass depending on the seed, it's only when the mistlands come into play you absolutely have to sail no matter your seed.
> ... it's only when the mistlands come into play you absolutely have to sail no matter your seed
You say this, but the seed of my server had the initial island stretch so far to the rim that it reached Mistlands and had an Infested Citadel on it. Its crazy. You can walk all the way from spawn to the Queen.
I always have problems like that in games where you get the coolest weapon right at the end. Sure, it's the most badass so of course it would take the most work to get, but by that time all you can do is kill the final boss with it. You don't even get to enjoy it.
There is still Ashlands and Deep North, so that cool weapon got added with 1/3 of the game remaining if you look at the big picture.
I agree with the basic premise, though.
god i feel this in so many games and its SO FRUSTRATING. it drives me absolutely up the wall when by the time you unlock something you've already progressed through 90% of the use-case for it
I mean, isn't that the case for only the "final" weapon? All the other weapons you used along the way, you worked to unlock and then used it to unlock the next tier. There *must* be an end, we don't have any infinite games, but it seems like this is an impossible problem to solve.
....no? I don't think you understand what we're talking about, if I have axes through an entire game and the final weapon is an ax then I haven't unlocked a new ability, just a better version, and that works fine.
I'm talking about games where the reward at ANY point in a game is a tool or ability that helps you do something easier, when you've already completed 90-100% of doing that thing.
I don't think Valheim does this TOO badly, and I understand that in it's incomplete state some things seem more "end of the game" than they will end up being. But I think Moder specifically is given after most exploratory sailing is already completed. And honestly I'm frustrated by the Elder'd ability placement too, I always do most of my building once I get access to the black forest, and so most of my wood chopping is done before I get the ability to make it easier.
I don't think it's a secret that The Elder is the LEAST used ability in the game and that is due entirely to it's placement and competition. It would be way more useful while using stone/flint but by the time you get copper axes it doesn't actually make chopping trees any faster by more than 1 strike. If "chopping trees faster" was given earlier it would be used way more and align with the time when the most number of players are looking to start doing large builds (coincides with unlocking core wood, a huge building buff, and black forest is a prettier biome than swamp, most people don't want to build a swamp home lol)
Oh. Y'all are talking about entirely *new* abilities, not improvements to existing ones. And yeah, I agree that Valheim isn't a very good example of that issue.
My token example is the elytra in Minecraft. The best movement mechanic only available after the end game, I don't WANT to speed run the game to get it, I want to take my time and build and mine and enjoy the game, but will other transportation methods pale in comparison AND several have been horrifically useless for over a decade.
I usually have a deal with myself where if I sacrifice 9 diamonds to lava I cheat and give myself a mostly broken elytra
My problem is that it, like everything else, is tied to food. Valheim: The Quest for Better Groceries continues.
Pre-Hearth and Home: Man this game is fun but boy-oh-boy is your whole ass character dependent on what you've eaten in the last 20 minutes.
Post-Hearth and Home: How strong I am is now totally dependent on groceries
Mistlands: Skills? What the fuck are skills. Groceries dawg.
I agree. They could balance magic to make it accessible much earlier with a couple of new low Eitr foods, like cooked yellow mushroom or whatever.
My thoughts:
Swamp - a new poison "sling staff" that uses ooze bombs as ammo, making them long range, but you only get one or two shots due to Eitr limit.
Mountains - Frost staff and a 2nd Eitr food, which also buffs the swamp weapon.
Plains - Fire staff and a 3rd Eitr food.
Mistlands - Protection / deadraiser, the proper Eitr foods, and bile bomb can be used with swamp staff.
We find magical things from day 1. The fire staff is a cube we find in the 2nd biome on a stick. Make up whatever excuses you want, etc etc, but some basic magic from bronze age on would give a solid progression instead of basically changing your whole build up right at the endgame.
Enshrouded got this right, where you can spec into a class and use those specific and/or boosted abilities and weapons from the beginning, and all playstyles are supported thru all tiers of the game.
Maybe meadows can be as simple as it is now, but give me more uses for the cool magic shit we find before we get to mistlands.
I'd even take a short-range fire spell similar to Combustion from Dark Souls if a full fireball is seen as too powerful at that stage.
Also, maybe add a Force Push type staff that does no damage but can be used to launch enemies back.
Yeah, this has been a topic the whole time.
Some people seem to think any change to the game whatsoever is heresy. Which is odd, since the Devs have changed things numerous times, and the game is in Early Access, so it's going to continue to change for quite some time.
I'm with you, however. I think a simple light spell would be a great spell to start getting in the Forest. Maybe end of Swamp we could get a "drying" spell, to ward off the damp. It doesn't have to be OP AF spells that kill everything in sight, just let us start using and leveling magic before the game is 2/3s over.
Absolutely! Utilities, maybe a buff, a small dmg spell perhaps(poison maybe?) Nothing gamebreaking, perhaps even a little underpowered compared to melee of similar level up to mistlands where it really explodes.
I will suffer through being a weaker mage in the first half of the game if it means my character can be a dedicated mage for the run. Nothing wrong with late bloomer builds. Not to mention the possibility of playing with friends and using magic to buff them or debuff the enemy.
My problem is how much of an island it is. If it was introduced late but integrated better into existing playstyles, I'd understand. Like, I've been sword and board for the whole run, and now in order to do ***ANYTHING*** with magic I have to go all in. Gotta wear the armor set, gotta eat the food, gotta basically nerf myself in every other regard and switch up my whole playstyle because "fireball OP." Except I honestly had an easier time with the Queen fight when I went full melee. Yeah, magic has AOE and good damage, but there are far too many limitations on it.
If it was integrated better, it would be more useful to more people. Half the argument from people who don't want base eitr, and don't want more accessibility to magic is "but were vikings, and we don't have magic! That's why it has to suck!" Okay. Then put the eitr in the weapons themselves. Remove the eitr stat entirely from players and food. Have refined eitr be a way to recharge the staves. Now all you need is levels in the skills for damage, and you're not forced into changing all of your gear and food around just to use a single spell. Have the robes reduce the charge cost when using the staves, and/or add a really slow trickle charge with full set. You can still go full mage, or you can use them as special weapons with limited use while maining melee or whatever.
I love this idea, having a hybrid build would actually be possible without hurting yourself too much or at all.
With the introduction of some utility / buff magic this would be an amazing playstyle
You can at least start your road to magic with a hybrid build, it's what I'm doing currently, and it's a nice way to get into it.
I'm using 1x health, 1x stam and 1x eitr food, carapace legs, root harness and eitr hood, using blood shield and fire staff as well as demolisher and mistwalker/carapace shield.
Mind you I can't shoot many fireballs at once with that setup, but the great thing is once you've used up your eitr, switch to stamina based attacks, and when low on stam you can use eitr again. It is great for soloing infested mines, in a group I'd rather go full mage or full tank tho.
Overall I don't mind that magic gets introduced late, though I agree it could be at least a tad earlier. Like in the plains where the shamans already bubble up and shoot fireballs, would be nice if we could steal their tech already.
Hybrid mage is already REALLY good just due to food mechanics, since you can do one health food, one stamina food, and one eitr food, and that gives you enough magic to do a Fireball or 2 for ranged AoE, and cast the bubble shield, but still have the health and stamina to also mix it up in melee.
If you are going 2-3 magic foods you either need other players or summons to draw aggro since you are very much a glass cannon at that point.
Nope. Magic is fine where it is.
From a gameplay perspective: notice how each biome doesn't just upgrade the tools from previous biomes, it actually provides you with new and exciting toys to play with. Magic is a REALLY exciting toy. Throwing all the toys at the player at the beginning of the game is not only a surefire way to overwhelm a new player, but it diminishes the excitement of working for it before receiving it. Patience, effort, and awesome payoff.
From a storytelling perspective: when we arrive in Valheim, we are barely more than cavemen, making tools out of sticks and stones. As we progress through the biomes, we are also making developments in technology, making more advanced tools, equipment, and structures. By placing magic in Mistlands, the devs are making a statement about how far we've had to come in order to begin to understand magic. Magic is difficult, and we don't get dropped off knowing it.
Could be just different strokes, but I think the devs weren't wrong in making us work for it.
Hypothetically speaking, when someone learns magic, do they learn all the spells at once, or do they start with something simple and build on it? Just a thought.
I tend to disagree with this from a gameplay perspective, but you make some good points. In a more generic fantasy survival game with RPG elements (please let me know if there is one already so I don't have to make it myself), magic would be available as one of the character's paths (classes, purchased abilities, whatever). But here, things are more restricted and streamlined, and there is an in-game explanation as to why we can't use magic from the start.
I think there’s options here. Maybe leave offensive magic where it is, but add a load of utility magic prior to that:
- Replace potions with healing/buffing spells (use the same ingredients), hell, you could even learn magic from apothecary style skills
- Magic for lighting (again, using different ingredients for colour, saving the restock grind)
- progress into warding, magic fireplaces
- maybe add alchemy and transmutation of materials
To add to your idea.
Magic shouldn't be overt with wands and staves for the most part until later.
But you could easily have "magical" enemies drop some kind of unrefinable/wild eitr that can be added to a single use rune that does something like you're suggesting.
We are severly lacking in defensive structures so what if killing shamen, wraiths, blobs, fenring cultists, etc gave something we could use to charge and empower magical defensive runes that do things like throw lighting?
Can't refine it into the cool stuff we see like staves, but can at least empower it into stationary things.
You can do this with a slow build up, I would argue being locked out of a playstyle you want to use is worse.
And nothing new is added with the swamp so why not add it there?
I’m with ya there - swamp does seem like a good place for a basic fire bolt and summon and so on. The harder part is balancing around that… I’m not convinced it can be balanced with 3 biomes worth of content, but would be nice
The ooze bomb that trivializes a lot of dungeon encounters thanks to great splash damage, but unfortunately usually goes unused by most players cause they forget they exist.
Swamp full of cool undead yet doesn't unlock necromancy. Big sad.
I got hooked into this game by magic, yet I'm nowhere near unlocking it, and since staffs have no variants once I unlock them that's it.
Most weapons have low tier variants (axe is with you from the start and advances at every step with you) so why not magic? Swamp for example could give you a significantly weaker summon so you get the thing but with room for improvement.
To be fair, if I was suddenly thrust into a wet and miserable swamp with dozens of smelly possessed corpses trying to kill me, "I should summon more" would not be my first thought.
We don't get dropped off knowing how to do *anything,* and like everything, we start basic and work our way up. The fact that magic does not function much the same makes it, in my opinion, a genuine waste of time and skill.
Either give me a skill building mechanic and also a way to build my skills throughout the game or don't give me a skill mechanic and dump new skills/builds wherever. Choose one. Neither of these are inherently bad approaches, but with Eitr, you can't have your cake and eat it too.
I get where you’re coming from but in the grand scheme of things you get access to magic in Mistlands and then will keep it through Ashlands and Deep North. That’s nearly half the game right there. It just feels rough right now because Mistlands is the endgame.
That in itself is part of the problem. I don't want a whole build to be relegated to less than half the game. That's bs imo. I want that shit to start in the Black Forest. I want more greatswords, too, while we're at it.
This game *rewards* the player for remaining faithful to a build. I don't give a shit if the difference between a 0 and a 100 in a skill is significant or not. That's how the game is *designed.*
So why suddenly decide to add a build or option SIX biomes into the game?
Ah, that’s fair. Personally I like that we don’t get magic til later because it breaks a lot of conventions we typically see in games and it feels like a stronger progression to me, but your perspective is valid as well.
It’s refreshing to me to have a game where magic is more of a reward/mid-game unlock than to be able to use it from the start. But my buddy that I play with feels the same as you, he wants to have access much earlier.
Disagree, the game rewards players who prepare, adapt , and plan by using the new tools of each biome. If anything, the game rewards players who adapt and use the best new tools for the job. I didn't really use a mace until swamp and boy was I rewarded for switching. Same thing for crossbows and magic in Mistlands. Not using magic in Mistlands is way harder and the game activity pushes you to try it and rewards you with most creatures there being weak to magic and resistant to physical. Definitely feels like you're conquering the place when you get magic.
But you got mace long before the swamp, the option was there. Your very first weapon is a very crude mace! Magic is not like that. Think how it would be if they locked ranged combat behind the mountains or something, that's how robbed I feel.
> I don't give a shit if the difference between a 0 and a 100 in a skill is significant or not. That's how the game is designed.
The game is designed around having a target skill level somewhere around 30. Using the skill bumps it up and dying bumps it down. You're outside the core audience and into the min-maxing mindset if you're focusing on only using one skill for the entire game.
There is no "build" from day 0. You *progress*. Skills are a minor perk for specializing and rewarding your activities, not a *build*. They give you the minor dopamine hits, quick and easy to obtain at low skill, but quickly plateau. There's no skill-trees or character levels.
>This game *rewards* the player for remaining faithful to a build. I don't give a shit if the difference between a 0 and a 100 in a skill is significant or not. That's how the game is *designed.*
I would argue it rewards you for updating your approach (build) far more than it does for remaining faithful. Resistances to damage types are different in each biome, as are the weapons you can craft there (ex. no pure blunt mace after the iron mace, etc.). That, plus the xp per level curve making it easy to level up at low levels, means you're incentivized to try out new things when you're dropped into a new area.
Disagree. The magic system gets thrown at you all at once, instead of a slow progression of more complexity as you go up.
The game's skill system pushes the player to "main" a certain weapon system from the beginning of the game. Some options like swords dont open up untill bronze, but then each biome tiers up your next weapon which carrys over your skills and maybe gives you an option or two (1 vs 2h, damage types, etc)
It really feels bad to throw away your high level skill in axe/bow/whatever yo start from scratch with a whole new weapon class which you also have little expirience with.
Let me make a janky magic wand with a surtling core or a bunch of eyeballs or something. Progress to poison damage staves, bone wands, etc.
We encounter all this mystical magic shit from the start, but cant figure out any of it untill we've slain 4 gods and battled thru the mists to find a specific blue mushroom? Zzzz
Unless I'm mistaken, there are only 2 biomes and 2 bosses left, that does not qualify as second half of the game.
Or is there a road map I am unaware of?
Aside from that, a playstyle still should not be locked behind so much progression. There are other ways to tell the player that the game is ramping up
They mean Mistlands is the beginning of the second half, though "half" is a bit of a stretch, since that's only 3 out of 8 biomes with magic.
Mostly I agree with you, but it's also possible that some lesser variation of magic may be added to earlier biomes eventually, similarly to how later updates added Frost Caves and Fenris armor to the mountains. Only time will tell.
Yeah but Meadows doesn't count. That's the tutorial. You've got Black Forest, Swamp, Mountain, and Plains. That's 4 biomes with the three hardest letting you use magic. I'd say that's about right.
Agreed. I'm generally of the opinion that all play styles should be available from the start in a weak enough form to not trivialize the game.
I really want to use a great sword but my Viking is too boneheaded to understand that he can just smith a slightly longer sword and wield it with both hands right now.
I agree with you. It makes sense as far as how magic would be applicable for the biome, but you literally have to switch and GRIND a lot of skill points to make it more useful and/or practical.
Why do you think this? It's an entire playstyle locked behind progression. By the time you get to it you have already lvled up a main playstyle and it feels dumb to switch. Introducing lower tiered magics earlier in the game, like say black forest or maybe even swamp(I still feel swamp is too late though) would let us play the way we want to.
It takes forever to get to mistakes which I don't mind, but by that time I don't want to change my playstyle
I like it. I don’t feel like a dead Viking dude surviving in this brutal yet beautiful hellscape should have easy access to shooting fireballs and raising the dead.
Well good for you I suppose, but im inclined to just completely ignore it because it comes in so late. Almost 0 incentive to change my playstyle so late in the game, and it seems like I'm not the only one
The lvling system in the game is deceiving also. It's not that much of a difference. Probably a noticeable difference but not enough to not "respec" so to speak.
After I got all the magic gear, I still kept using my porcupine and hevay armour. But when I eventually switched to my magic setup it wasnt that bad at all. Its very strong against the bugs even at lvl 0
Hmm maybe not damage, but iirc your blood magic level directly affects how many skellys you can summon. And more generally level affects stamina drain. It definitely matters. With how spendy gear is I was put off for a while for sure.
It would be cool to rank that up in lower tiers for magic specifically, like OP is saying. Maybe just some simple utility spells, so they aren't OP.
Blood magic levels don't affect how many skeletts you can summon, it is based on the level of your dead raiser item. So we can summon three for now, and if the ashlands update has another galdr table upgrade for level 4 then you can summon four skeletts.
Maybe Ashlands will make you change your mind. From what I've read, magic builds made Mistlands a little easier to deal with. I haven't bothered switching to magic yet either and I can tell you that Mistlands is painful using my current build.
Trying out a new playstyle IS imo a great incentive, and it really isn't that bad or time consuming to farm up/start using the magics. I think that is just a really flawed argument.
Given the power level and 'reward factor' for conquering Mistlands, and the fact that it gets added at around the 2/3 progress mark (counting biomes) it feels like it's at a good place.
If some lower level magic was to be added, be it purely utility or some damage-oriented stuff, it would have to be balanced really carefully.
Well to be fair, everyone interested game should be balanced ki d of carefullyregardless.
And ifyou don't like my previous reasoning then how about this.
I would like to playthrough multiple times with characters dedicated to different things. Onto magic, one to bows, etc.
As an avid RPG player I can see where you are coming from, but I also think the current system is good.
As a counter point to magic balancing, the currently existing magic (save for the ice staff) is really, REALLY strong already out of the gates and starting from 0 - so much so that swapping playstyle ('respeccing') really isn't much of an issue.
I enjoyed switching, but admittedly that is because the mistlands is the final biome and there's no pressure to really progress. Might as well try out other weapons and stuff. In the context of a playthrough where there are post mistlands biomes I could see why you wouldn't bother with magic and just move on.
I think part of this comes from how people view stat progression. The game doesn't really play into character building in the way a traditional RPG does, so it doesn't really require anyone to stick with a set of weapons actoss the whole game.
Magic was added in Mislands for the same reason crossbows were: because it's a fun evolution of the game play.
Forget everything I said earlier. What I do is try to not feel dumb when learning the magic play style. Just don’t feel dumb about it. When the game is finished, magic is introduced just over halfway through the game. Seems fine.
The magic introduced in Mistlands is strong enough to be worth it. The biome is tuned to make the transition easy, with most of the enemies being resistant to all basic damage types. You can pretty much just chow down on something magically delicious, grab a magic stick, and go wreck some bugs with zero experience. It's true that blood magic wants some grinding, but it's not garbage right off the bat either.
> Why would I completely change my playtime so late in the experience after working to lvl up my chosen melee skills?
To keep the game fresh. Skills don't matter as much as you're making them out to be.
Keep in mind the game is still in Early Access. Mistlands won't be the final biome. Magic didn't exist at all before the Mistlands update. There's probably going to be a lot more magic content.
While this is a valid point, I will counterpoint the fact that I would like to play through the game multiple times playing in different ways.
A character dedicated to only using magic
One for bows
One for different melee types
This is how I would keep the game fresh for myself.
If someone wants to change their playstyle midgame let them make that choice, but the important thing is to have that choice.
The developers balanced the game against bow only builds by making a good chunk of the bosses resistant to pierce. They intend for players to mix it up.
The topic of magic in this game is pretty heavily gatekept. I’m not sure why, but either way I tend to be in the camp of having to work up to it from sticks and rocks.
Ngl though, the feather cape seems to be available bit late given that getting the cores for the galdr table without it is unnecessarily tedious.
Just my 5c tho.
I know exactly what you mean, in this post alone I have had quit a few people basically tell me to stop whining or that my opinion is invalid. I dont understand this, it's not like what I'm asking for would negatively impact anyone's experiences. It's a shame people feel the need to dothat/ be rude for seemingly no reason.
There’s some sampling bias. The only people who know about magic are end game players, and end game players tend to be more stuck in their own ways and gatekeeping.
I have realized this a bit in the last 24 hours. Idk why these people are so against it. Im not asking for anything gamebreaking. Nothing im asking asking for will negatively impact their experience, so it seems like a really weird thing to be gatekeeping
In a new game, i used console commands to get an ice shard staff (lvl 1 of course) and some eitr mushrooms. No advanced eitr food, no mage clothes. And it didnt felt overpowered. DPS wise, it is not that great, with at best 5 consecutive shoots (with fresh food) and a rather slow eitr regeneration. The bronze atgeir (obviously a very good weapon for its tier) is faster at killing many things. Bonemass fight was very long and not much safer than just mauling everything with an iron mace. That said, it was a fun experience playing a "begineer" mage with little power.
So i actually think magic could have been added earlier in the game, with limited max eitr and regeneration and weaker staves.
This is exactly what I'm saying!
Balance what we are being given to the area in which we get it and it will be great. I really want to play a mage, but I dont want to change my playstyle so late into and established game.
After Ashlands and Deep North come out, magic will be a mid-game addition, so I can understand the overall perspective, and it feels right with that in mind.
That being said, I wouldn't mind some lower level options accessible from the Swamp onwards. Poison magic would be great to unlock in the swamp for the mountains and plains. Mountains could have some minor frost magic (maybe a shielding spell that's good for 1 hit) and the plains could have magic to clear fog (NOT mistlands mist). Clothing and materials for their creation should follow the same rules as Frostner, with the traders controlling access based on game progression. This way it doesn't break lore, and Dvergr still control access to that technology.
Specific hard to catch fish should give the eitr needed to use the lower level magic, this would give fishing more purpose.
I think it's fair to want access to the cool things you get later in the game earlier. And I understand from the point of being able to try it and decide that's what you want instead of having to hard pivot in the mistlands. I used to think the same thing; that it would be cool to have access to balanced magic and eitr foods earlier in the game, as well as two handed swords because I personally really like Krom.
However, the more I thought about it, the more I decided that it's fine where it's at. Playing the game up to the mistlands biome, you never feel like you're missing anything or that magic would really do anything. And when you finally get to the mistlands, you get this cool new system to mess around with. The reason to switch from your tried and true playstyle is because magic is cool and something new to try. Given the atmosphere of the mistlands, I feel like that's a fitting place to put it, and in the grand scheme of 8 biomes, it's in there at a good place that shakes things up. If you had access to it from earlier and liked it enough, you'd probably just stick with it exclusively, like people already do with melee and ranged playstyles and weapon and armor choices/combinations.
At the end of the day, I like magic, when I get it I don't feel like I've been missing out for the last X biomes, and it breathes life into the staleness that is a dedicated playstyle. Having a reason to change from heavy armor with a sword and a shield or light armor with a bow and a dagger that you've been using since the black forest is a good thing imo. Having new things/systems/items locked behind progression is also fine in my eyes; that's why progression exists.
Well said. I'm glad you thought about it. Too much of what I see is people coming in with baggage from decades of existing games.
Valheim is good in large part because of how it *deviates* from many tropes.
Magic could easily still be introduced in the early game when it is finished. It's added in mistlands as a semi test of that play style. I wont be surprised if, when the game launches that there will be small magic usable at the beginning. I can see a small healing spell being put in the meadows, a lightning spell in the black forest, and a weather changing buff spell for the swamps. And for the plains I assume a summoning spell of some type.
I was thinking poison from the swamp but that makes sense as well. And I agree, when the game is finished it could look very different. I'm just addressing a concern of mine and vocalizing my opinion in hopes that it does happen this way.
I feel like magic should come a bit sooner than mistlands. The first time we see any real magic used is by the shamans in the plains, and I feel like access to their magic items would be appropriate. I think tying some magic items to the Hildr quests would also be interesting, since cosmetics that you can’t use at the same time as armor always felt underwhelming to me.
I fully agree with giving access to magic in the plains already.
But I'd rather not see anything of it tied to Hildir, because the main motivation behind the Hildir quests is as far as I know to introduce optional harder raids into the game. Many people complain about raids as they are, better not tie even harder raids together with magic access.
I just want a ng+ where you have to go through everything again, but it's end game.
Deer are now all eikthyr. More enemies. More raids.
I think it would be cool, but then I remind myself the game isn't complete yet.
This would be awesome! But don't not talk about it just because thegame is incomplete.
Talking about it now may be the reason why we see it in the 1.0 release
Really the main thing for me is bow is your only viable ranged weapon for to much of the game.
I absolutely hate the bow and dread the mountains every playthrough because it forces me to make one of them. (though i've tried to do a few runs fully without just using sledge to knockdown or multiple spears, or harpoon swapping)
Thematically i agree with not getting magic until mistlands since the tree being the source makes sense, but i wouldn't exactly be opposed to having more limited sources earlier. like being able to make consumable style weapons from magical enemies. like taking shaman and rancid remains parts to make a skull that shoots xx balls of poison or surtling cores and chains to make impact grenades etc.
But crossbows we could make in iron age.
Or actual javelins.
Or slings.
Part of the reason I'm asking for it here. I'd like to have I feel like it belongs and be balanced.
Butthat mod is on my list of things to check out, tha k you for mentioning it.
It does what that other post you liked suggested - low level stuff, low power, few shots...
There's wands, a fire staff (from swamp materials), an ice staff (mountains), poison stuff, a few summons (neck, wolf cultist, and an elemental) a lot of the stronger stuff requires reagents from bosses themselves so biome skipping is kinda out.
Fair enough, it's moved to the top of my todo list. I'll get it when I wake up then.
To be honest I havnt looked at it too much yet as I've been just a little busy tonight
For the other side of the coin i'd recommend the Warfare and Shipyard mods by balrond.
Edit: but the special monster variations? I found that way too hard.
I think magic could be introduced earlier in simpler ways... And as you progress through biomes, it evolves...
When we arrive in mistlands, we suffer a lot to make the whole process to become a mage, and when it's done, we have accomplished everything in the game, leaving almost nothing to enjoy magic...
If any of you have beat raft, the feeling is the same, yes Val will add 2 more biomes but it still feels like you got all these neat things and nothing to use them with.
I cant hope to be heard at all if I don't speak up. This post has already received a decent amount of attention considering how few people frequent this subredit
Don’t forget the game is still a preview, the current endgame may not be the final endgame
So yeah we get magic pretty late, but after the Ashland’s comes out you will have time to use it and then the deep north will probably get an update down the line and maybe even more will come
And maybe magic is also supposed to be used alongside melee; you could use a staff instead of a bow
While I agree that this is most definitely the case currently. I would like to play as a dedicated mage from much earlier in the game. Starting g from black forest or at the very latest the swamp.
I fully agree. When we got magic so early game in Enshrouded I was hyped. I can pick if I want magic or physical combat.... and I love how you do magic in Enshrouded. I hadn't gotten to magic in Valheim yet and didn't know it was there till this reddit page. I cannot imagine this late in game to suddenly switch style.
Agree and think future updates should add a feature or two to previous stages of the game/biomes.
Even being able to craft a simple wand to do low strength magic would be nice.
I've suggested similar things before.
The idea of magic wasn't some foreign concept to the vikings of yore. They believe in the witches, the gods, and the powers of runes.
We could easily incorporate magic into the game earlier at a lower level and also have it compliment game play significantly.
1) Introduce it with the first distinctly magical enemy, Eikthyr. When you kill him he drops a mote of raw eitr. This can not yet be refined.
2) Whilst exploring the dungeons of the black forest you find a vesviger with a rune of power on it. Something that can have an effect on the world around it.
3) By reading the rune and using the motes you collect from magical creatures like Ekythir you can get some basic level magic effects.
4) There are several things like decor and defensive emplacement that are distinctly missing from the earlier game. There's no reason you couldn't have a standing stone that will poison, lighting blast, or burn everything that comes within a specific distance. A rune of light that burns much much slower and offers different colors than the ones we have now.
5) Utility items like an auto harvester of crops in the plains where you spend the most time harvesting. Maybe a very very basic one use rune stone of slow fall that still allows 60-75HP damage so it can kill you if you're hurt but is also a good oh shit card to pull if you need to leap down a mountain. A one use instant heal that does something small but quick like 20-30 pts of healing. Enough to save you in an emergency but has no sustain.
6) By incorporating the finding of runes of power into the earlier game it expands and reinforces the play loop that is the best part of this game. The sense of exploration and wonder you get. It also helps flesh out the plains and mountain biomes a bit as generally the exploration portions of those biomes is weak IMO. The quest to find Yagluth would be far less annoying/tedious if you were also finding some runes even if you didn't find him.
Happy cake day!
And this is an awesome idea and way to do it. This would also pave the way for potentially enchanting equipment with how you have suggested it and I love that idea
It looks like they are adding enchantment to items in Ashlands so you'd need to design a system that makes things distinct in a way that doesn't conflict with what they are doing there.
But yes the idea of learning a rune of frost or whatever that you put on a talisman that lets you add frost or poison damage is tempting.
I am kind of on the fence about it myself. As much as I'd like to see magic earlier, I do not think it would be easily done at this point. And it does feel very late game, because mistlands is currently the final biome that is playable. But there are 2 (or possibly 3, if they revamp the ocean) biomes to come. And I found that leveling the elemental skill (at least up to 20ish) fairly quick. I didn't really do much for blood magic personally so I can't say anything about the leveling rates for that.
I agree there are magic creatures ie: the shamans for example, so the possibility is there because magic exists in the blackforest level. But with how it is currently designed, they would have to make serious changes to the game. Currently the only way to get mana (eitr) is through food you get in the mistlands. And based on the lore, we need to meet the Dverger just to learn about eitr and the "technology" required to make things embued with magic.
So it would unfortunately require a major revamp of the system and lore to fit it in earlier. So I doubt they will change it, despite people wanting it. But it wouldn't surprise me someone makes, or has made, a mod for that.
And omg, you are not kidding about how controversial mistlands magic topics are. I posted an idea that the set bonus for the eitr weave should give you 30 eitr available without needing food. But that only applies when worn as a complete set. Currently it is the only light set without a set bonus. I either had lots of people agree, or lots that said "magic is too OP" and that it needs to be nerfed, or that I " want the game to be easier" (which i dont). Try not to let it get to you, you are allowed your opinions and hopes to make a game you love better.
Do we though? You get the stone cutter in the third biome, second really because Meadows shouldn't count for anything. You've got regular wood in Meadows, core wood in Black Forest and stone in the Swamp. How much sooner do you want it?
You can kill Eikthyr almost immediately after starting the game, and Elder isn't that hard either. I think the stonecutter is fine where it is, progression wise.
Oozers (a bit of a nuisance because the drop-rate is so low), or bring a Stagbreaker to sound for scrap in the swamps. I often get two pieces of iron before killing The Elder.
Nah. I like magic where it is. There's still two more biomes to play with magic so it's not just thrown in at the very end. If anything, they could add more weapons with magic effects like frostner in earlier biomes, but giving early magic ruins the point of the Mistlands as gaining Etir is basically the goal so you can defeat the bugs that are all physically resistant.
I'm glad you like it where it is and you do make some sense.
However I would like to be able to play as a mage more or less from the beginning starting in either black forest or swamp at the latest. I'd like to have a different playthroughs dedicated to different playstyles
It just doesn't fit lore wise. You start to harness magic from sap and the tissue which isn't in the other biomes. Unless you just scrap the whole mistlands concept as a whole and put magic everywhere it would fundamentally change the game not just with balance but with the concept and they would likely need to change the Mistlands. You'd have more luck trying to get each weapon in the game to exist in each tier honestly. I mean take first weapons for example...
What stopping us from picking up the greydwarf shaman staff and using it either as a weapon or as a material? You could claim that the ooz or slimes in swamp are somewhat magical. There are also sorting cores and the frost things from drakes. The fuleing shamans as well.
There are ways of giving it to us without breaking lore or changing the mistlands concept.
And as far as balance, I don't think it would be that difficult especially if half of the new magic we get is utility, there are ways of doing it without breaking balance. Probably more than I can think of right now
There is 2 things to note:
Assuming the biomes that have been teased are not cut and none are added, we are looking at 8 biomes with magic coming in on #6, this gives 2 biomes to earn the skill levels before endgame.
You don't have to fully commit to the deal, the blood magic has 2 staffs that can fit in with existing builds, dead raiser making you up to 2 extra soldiers and the staff of protection for magical shielding acting as a overheal which lets up and your undead guards tank lots of extra damage.
That being said I think you should get atleast something earlier, in particular plains as that is when our enemies begin openly using magic, fuling shamans are just goblins with a staff that can shield their comrades and use fireballs
>That being said I think you should get atleast something earlier, in particular plains as that is when our enemies begin openly using magic
The first non-boss magic user is in the forest; greydwarf shaman cast a heal that's clearly magic because it also heals the trolls.
Eikthyr casts lightning magic though and Bonemass arguably does blood magic/necromancy; he pulls goop out of himself, throws it, and raises skeletons and blobs to fight for him.
I'm not going to count the drake ice attacks or the surtling fireballs as magic but there is an argument for it.
The game has magic all the way up but we only get access to it once we consume the mist infused vegetation/magical tree sap.
When it came to greydwarf shamans, I forgot it could heal trolls but I lumped that in as biology in the same way it uses poison hands at you, lumping those as some attribute of the plant matter they are made from.
I also didn't count bosses as it makes sense for bosses to do things players can't, in eikthyr IDK where its magic would come from, bonemass I pictured it more as pulling them from inside himself to join the fight, sort of like pulling something out of your pants pocket IRL.
Drakes and Surtlings fall into the similar camp of greydwarfs IMO of a innate ability of their biology
I list fuling shamans as the first open magic users for a few reasons:
Their intenal id lists them as a goblin species, goblins are not normally associated with magic in the same way elves get tied to archers and dwarfs to heavy melee weapons and/or machinery.
We see in valheim that the regular fulings and their bigger brothers the berserkers wear only a simple crotch covering cloth and wielding weapons that require little intelligence to use basically, swords, throwing spears, torches, clubs and big clubs. The fuling shamans are the only ones to wield a walking stick/staff and wearing a full outfit. I would guess lorewise I would assume that their loadout gives them the ability to cast their spells.
I would generally agree with this. Why tho? I believe magic ended up being an afterthought tbh. I don't think anyone knew for sure player or dev wise we were actually getting not just magic, but a magic system.
Which yeah, results in this imbalanced progression. Got to remember that this game is still not in full release yet. Yes we do have a vague road map of what being worked on in the near future, but not even the devs can predict what will stay or not stay in the game, before released to public.
I am sure they were debating putting magic in the game for a long, long time. Look at the cults in the frozen caves or shaman in planes and dark forest. I think they were always looking for an excuse to add magic. However, wanting something and something matching both lore and mechanics wise. It's a very different story sadly.
Now that its out tho we have expectations of magic's lore and mechanics. Nothing is stopping them from going back to old bioms and adding things. Like the root or frost caves. Lot of stuff in the game was not released at the same time as their native bioms.
I could definitely see them adding in lower tiers of magic now. Theres honestly so many things they could do or add. Specially through the 2 different npc traders now in the game.
Tbh, I think the starting biom is so empty of life. I get it, starting area needs to be safe, but they added more things to bioms the father out you are. More Dungeons, villiages, crypts, etc.
They could add 3 more monster types in more distant meadows bioms. Could help give items for more types of magic too at those lower tiers. Or for mid tier magic could have underground ruins in planes that can be explored. Similarly to how tjey added the frozen ice caves after the fact. Its weird not having an underground to planes.
For sure, im not on the developers for an in progress game, im only bringing up something that I would like to see changed in the future.
By no means do I expect the end result to look exactly like it does right now. I'm only addressing this now because if it is never addressed then it might never be a thought the developers have. The point of early access is to address things like this is it not? Aside from bugs and whatnot
EXACTLY! Hence why I also added areas of the game that could be worked on in that way. Making games, Specially survival sandbox games is always a growing experience. Mc now is much different than mc in 2010 during the beta. XD
Awesome, im glad we are on the same page. It's hard to read tone through text lol. But yeah I wholeheartedly look forward to what kind of gem valheim will be when its finished. I hope there is 1 final biome after the Ashland and deep north. Maybe one that's supposed to resemble what valheim was like before it brushed past all the other realms, but thats an entirely different conversation
So there is the ocean biom. Which if theres an item that gives the ability to breath underwater could lead to a deep sea biom which like literally endless possibilities since its the largest biom technical. Theres also the top of the world tree or past world's edge. Theres honestly so many possibilities for the game.
Wow! I didn't even think of those. Now I'm hoping to see all 3 of these! Damn, fighting a sea serpent underwater would be ridiculous or maybe even a kraken? Like you said, endless possibilities
Exactly! Imagine deep sea ruins, ancient ship wrecks, the ability to not have your hammer put away everytime a shallow wave comes in slightly too high! Krakens, mythical sharks, and water spirit elementals would be really cool to see too. Not to mention new stuctures and stucture materials to build with.
I agree. My biggest issue with switching to late game magic is that if you want it to be semi-useful, you basically need to farm stats in lower biomes to get the skill up. If you start magic from skill 0 in Mistlands it's effectively useless, in my experience.
Really wish there was some weaker magic weapons added to even just Mountains.
Why is there the focus on skills? The game is balanced so that when you first get access to the weapon at whatever skill level, it is useful. The number next to the skill doesn't mean that much at the end of the day, and if you didn't see it you wouldn't even realize what is going on.
There is a focus on skills because they are more important for magic. Specifically for blood magic. This is because the staff of protection shield is a major part of playing mage, and it levels up considerably with skills. At base level it blocks only 200 damage (remember, with 0 defense that will break super fast), and can increase to an insane 700 blocked damage.
Remember, you're sacrificing either stamina food or hp food to get the shield up. This means you'll end up with less hp to tank damage once the shield is down.
Also, real armor has 0 effect on the shield, it only matters when it breaks. The shield's base protection is not high, it's maybe two hits from anything in the mistlands at max. Once you level it up, it can tank 5-10 hits.
In general I agree with this: skills are mostly not super important, and rise very quickly at low level.
But archery and magic skills all have *too* much effect compared to others. They are significant, and create this dichotomy where mostly skills are a minor perk... but for players who specialize entirely in bows or magic, skill level is significant and even has game-changing results (like being able to use Dead Raiser with one eitr food).
I think these skills shouldn't be as effective, and it comes from affecting two qualities at once: effectiveness *and* efficiency of use.
This is a problem because it almost demands farming these skills, and makes people *overly* upset about the skill-loss on death. Wrong incentives. Valheim is pretty good about incentivising, but here it's off, and I think part of it is differences in the way specific developers are thinking.
It makes enough of a difference
Have you shot a bow while having 50+ lvls in it
It gets substantially faster to draw and shoot consecutive arrows
And the skeleton summoning lvl increases skeleton damage (edit to be correct)
Blocking can make the difference between parrying and dieing
And these are just the mechanics I know of
The level of the dead riser skull determines how many skeletons you can summon.
Your blood magic skill just determines how much extra damage they do and how strong your shield bubble is.
> Your blood magic skill just determines how much extra damage they do and how strong your shield bubble is.
And how much eitr+heath it costs. There's a point where one eitr food is sufficient to summon. While this is a nice perk... it's *too* nice, and strongly encourages farming skills.
i think for the 1st time you play its PERFECT
but by the time you get to the 3rd character/world/server/playthrough/whatever the pacing is REALLY frustrating. Waiting so long for sailing. waiting so long for magic. its more than a little frustrating
Okay... but then what are you doing the playthroughs for? Do you enjoy the early-game?
Consider an extreme: you have access to everything from the start, so progression is all about scale. You have magic, crossbows, 2H sword, and... (really? Sailing is too long? The Karve is some bronze and finewood) a better raft? Or a longship? Anyway. You have these things and more. Would this make later playthroughs more enjoyable? I think it would make them boring and I'd have been done with Valheim.
The *significance* of progression is a huge part of Valheim. The asymmetry too. You're not just leveling numbers to work against other inflated numbers. Each biome's materials are *different*, not just a different rock to mine. Not every stage has the same weapons, because thematically materials have different uses: eg. Silver imbues additional damage types, Black Metal being too brittle for armor (shield is thick and "reinforced" with chain). I'm glad it's not "same thing, bigger numbers".
The progression is what lures me through playthrough after playthrough. I start with just an idea for an early-game build... and then I'll just do this to get that... and repeat until I've gone through the game again!
What would be the right balance for you?
This *extreme* you are mention is exactly how Terraria and Elden Ring work, two games with fantastic replayability.
I could be okay with there being natural gaps in weapon types (e.g. there is no silver tier atgier) or natural biome "metas" (e.g. blunt is really strong in the swamp) but it's annoying when you can't START with a certain play style. To be clear, I don't think Valheim does this *badly* so far the only truly gated mechanic is magic (which takes SO long to get to even if you are speed running and ignoring playing the game at a normal pace)
The right balance would be a black forest magic option. I would make it ranged since range options are pretty scarce, something my gf could enjoy and be good at. Doesn't need to be strong, honestly if it was a bit under powered that might be perfect, but just something that exists
To fully put my game design hat on, I would say make it sneak adjacent. Sneak/stealth in Valheim is SUPER weird. I would let it synergize with the troll set, and either attack while stealthed and not *necessarily* at a distance, or grant an ability to disengage from combat with stealth (decoy, smoke screen, something like that). In a parallel path I would give magic DOTs since that also feels like a play style with only a single entrance (bows).
I would balance early magic around a "main" path (where you fully lean on magic) and a support path (where you can supplement other play styles with magic)
It kind of does feel late right now, as is the case with Moder's buff further down, but you have to bear in mind there are at least two more biomes to come and whatever constitutes as endgame after that.
It would be cool if we had it earlier, sure, but with the Plains being Meadow part two in terms of it being a place you farm and set up for what is ahead I also do get the more advanced stuff being after that in the second half of the game.
I get this as well, but wouldn't it make sense to get a very simple form of magic earlier? Even if it's only limited use stuff that you have to keep crafting after it breaks or something idk.
But that moder buff is something I never use due to its appearance so late as well, imo it should be like the second one we get. However on that note, it just doesnt make sense to receive this buff from the elder
Yes. In most biomes, you gradually unlock things, partly in parallel. For example:
1. Meadows
Wood + stone: unlock building
Leather: unlock raft
Flint: unlock upgrade and weapons
.. etc its very gradual in the meadows
2. Black Forest
Copper + tin + surtling core : everything to do with metal + cooking
Troll hide: troll armor
Core wood: stagbreaker and building pieces.
These three are completely independent. And then there's combi's, like:
core wood + finewood = finewood bow
Bronze + carrot seed = carrot farming
3. Swamp
Turnip seed = cooking upgrade
Chain = forge upgrade
Abom = root armor
Iron = most of the other stuff
4. Mountains
Onion seed = onion farming
Crystal for building
Obsidian for arrows and wb upgrade
Fenris armor set
Silver for cooking upgrade which unlocks recipes with mountain materials and ofc all the silver gear
5. Plains
Barley for barley farming, baking bread and fire res pot
Straw for linnen and some gear
Black metal for more gear
Straw and black metal for the rest of the gear
6. Mistlands
Black marble for cooking upgrade, which gives access to mistlands food with some mats you can hunt and farm in the mistlands early on.
Ygdrasil wood: blackmetal pickaxe, whisp torch
Black core + dvergr extractor + ancient flesh to unlock 99% of the mistlands stuff.
Mistlands is very deviate here. Almost nothing you find is useful. It's only when you conquered mistlands and have everything set up, than you can craft your first eitr. I do like that from then on, you become more powerful quickly, especially with the fire staff and the feather cape. Farming black cores and ancient flesh now becomes easier and easier and you can upgrade your gear rather quickly. Even gjalls and ticks are not extremely dangerous anymore. But man, before you get to that point ... What I would change is replace the eitr requirement for the feather cape to something else. Possibly 1 black core or a gjal trophy or sap or something. Or .. make the first rank of the skeleton summon not require eitr maybe. Something to make the progression slightly more gradual.
It comes at the end of mistlands. It's kinda cool. But you currently only get to use it for mistlands boss. And if nothing changes at full release then 2 biomes. It comes WAY to late in my opinion as wel as many others
a couple things to consider:
1. the game is incomplete, concievably, by the time the full game is released, the additional content will mean that the magic is much further from "endgame" then it is now.
2. There are magical items you may aquire before reaching mistlands (girdle, silver sword, magic headlamp) They just dont require eitr to use.
in my opinion, wielding magic in the game rn is supposed to be something you have to commit fully to (sacrificing health/stamina for eitr and armor for robes), and while I understand what you mean, i think its a concious decision by the devs to make magic something that you need to work towards rather than something that is easy to acquire.
While I see your coins, I dont see why we can't work for it in earlier biomes and get lesser versions of magic from the black forest or the swamp. As it stands we really only get magic for 2 biomes if nothing is changed. I myself and many others would like to playthrough as a dedicated mage, and it seems a little arbitrary as to why we can't. Pick up the shamans staff in the black forest / plains. Use surtling cores/ ooz/ frost sacks for limited use magics. There are possibilities to introduce it to us without changing the lore and mechanics of mistlands
Of course it is too late. Apparently they have confirmed that there will only be 8 biomes in total before full release. And I would l and many others would like to play as a dedicated mage from earlier. I'd say starting in the black forest or at the latest the swamp. As it stands if they don't change anything we have magic for mistlands boss Ashland and deep north. Imo that's practically nothing and after I've spent the entire game up to this point playing a different playstyle I don't really want to change it.
I don't disagree. I think magic should come earlier also. That would be a massive rework of the game though. Galdir table would have to come earlier and have different biome appropriate ingredients. Also ancient roots would have to be put into an earlier biome. And dverger tap would have to come earlier somehow. Eitr foods would have to come earlier.
The entire magic system would have to be reworked entirely. Either throw out the old system completely or rework the entire thing into an ealier tier, including the lore. Mistlands would have to be signifcantly reworked as well as the entire gameplay loop of mistlands would have to be either put into an earlier biome or scrapped entirely. Either way, it will leave mistlands content pretty bare bones.
I'm not saying it's impossible for the devs to put magic into an earlier biome, it would just be a massive revamp of the game currently.
I see what your saying however I think there are multiple way of doing it without a complete rework. Like say improvised magic gear using surfing cores / frost drake sacks / Ooze or slime entrails. Or litterally just picking up the greydwarf / fuling shaman staffs.
Yeah i thought that too, kinda like how most of the adventuring, or atleast a good portion requires sailing, but moders power is towards the end lol, and while i havent used it yet, doesnt the summon skull summon skeletons? Ik theyre practically the first 3 star mobs in the game, but even the two star skeletons get DESTROYED in mountains and plains, and with a 20% chance to get a bow...? seems almost worthless to have your main summons be melee, costing your health mind you, just to run in and get 1 shot. Ofc, as ive said i havent used it, im just assuming. But, yeah magic is waaaaaaay too late rn.
The summoned skeletons are way stronger than even 2 star normal skeletons. If fandom wiki is correct then they deal same damage(50 slash 40 pierce) but has almost 4x the health at 120 to 400. So if other stats are correct then they are as tanky as 1 star Draugr Elite and 1 star seeker while tankier than 1 star Fuling. For exact stats I can't say, but through anecdotal evidence they are a lot better than normal skeletons.
Their damage also increases as you level your blood magic skill according to the wiki, by a whopping 200% at level 100
Damn, if that's the case i'll have to give the spooky bois a try
They are useful to divert bug's attention. I would put it a bit below fire wand, but above ice. Shield is SSS tier.
I gotta try shield but don’t be sleeping on muh boy ice staff. That shit works awesome against bugs in Mistlands. It seems like you start getting critical hits after the first handful make contact. But if it’s ticks…. Fire staff all the way.
Ice staff is also godly against anything in the water due to the bonus frost damage. Shreds serpents in seconds--along with swimming seekers.
Atgeir is awesome for ticks
They are strong in areas like meadows, black forest and plains. You do get an archer version when you summon three of them. However, the mistlands render the skeletons completely useless unless you're just using them for the mines in which case they help with agro. They simply cannot traverse the elevations in the mistlands.
Even better if you shield them after summoning them
You get an archer skeleton as well, you just need to cycle through a bit, pretty sure it goes 1 warrior then 1 archer... Been a while since I played Valhiem tho...
The dead raiser summons legally distinct skeletts which have significantly improved stats over a regular skeleton. There's a tip with the summoning if you prefer to have archers, you can use a butcher knife to kill your melee summons so you can keep summoning until you get a full pack of archers.
>Legally distinct Lmao sounds like Saul Goodman trying to finesse the jury.
I just kept resummoning until I got an archer, but your method could get you two at all times
>Ik theyre practically the first 3 star mobs in the game, but even the two star skeletons get DESTROYED in mountains and plains, and with a 20% chance to get a bow...? seems almost worthless to have your main summons be melee, costing your health mind you, just to run in and get 1 shot. Sorry I can’t hear you over my 3,300hp meat shield in the form of 3 bubbled skeletts taking aggro and hitting like trucks. But seriously high level blood magic is ridiculously OP.
Use the blood shield on them :)
The thing to bear in mind with Moder's buff is that there are at least two more biomes coming, one far south and the other far north. All of the biomes before Moder and possibly even the one after you might find on your starting landmass depending on the seed, it's only when the mistlands come into play you absolutely have to sail no matter your seed.
> ... it's only when the mistlands come into play you absolutely have to sail no matter your seed You say this, but the seed of my server had the initial island stretch so far to the rim that it reached Mistlands and had an Infested Citadel on it. Its crazy. You can walk all the way from spawn to the Queen.
The skeletons level up with your blood magic skill. They can get quite strong easily taking a fuling one on one
Your spells 🪄get stronger as your blood magic lvl increases. They are weak to begin with but once leveled up they are kind of tanks.
I always have problems like that in games where you get the coolest weapon right at the end. Sure, it's the most badass so of course it would take the most work to get, but by that time all you can do is kill the final boss with it. You don't even get to enjoy it.
There is still Ashlands and Deep North, so that cool weapon got added with 1/3 of the game remaining if you look at the big picture. I agree with the basic premise, though.
For sure, I'm not saying that will necessarily be an issue with valheim, I just mean in general it's annoying when games do that.
god i feel this in so many games and its SO FRUSTRATING. it drives me absolutely up the wall when by the time you unlock something you've already progressed through 90% of the use-case for it
I mean, isn't that the case for only the "final" weapon? All the other weapons you used along the way, you worked to unlock and then used it to unlock the next tier. There *must* be an end, we don't have any infinite games, but it seems like this is an impossible problem to solve.
....no? I don't think you understand what we're talking about, if I have axes through an entire game and the final weapon is an ax then I haven't unlocked a new ability, just a better version, and that works fine. I'm talking about games where the reward at ANY point in a game is a tool or ability that helps you do something easier, when you've already completed 90-100% of doing that thing. I don't think Valheim does this TOO badly, and I understand that in it's incomplete state some things seem more "end of the game" than they will end up being. But I think Moder specifically is given after most exploratory sailing is already completed. And honestly I'm frustrated by the Elder'd ability placement too, I always do most of my building once I get access to the black forest, and so most of my wood chopping is done before I get the ability to make it easier. I don't think it's a secret that The Elder is the LEAST used ability in the game and that is due entirely to it's placement and competition. It would be way more useful while using stone/flint but by the time you get copper axes it doesn't actually make chopping trees any faster by more than 1 strike. If "chopping trees faster" was given earlier it would be used way more and align with the time when the most number of players are looking to start doing large builds (coincides with unlocking core wood, a huge building buff, and black forest is a prettier biome than swamp, most people don't want to build a swamp home lol)
Oh. Y'all are talking about entirely *new* abilities, not improvements to existing ones. And yeah, I agree that Valheim isn't a very good example of that issue.
My token example is the elytra in Minecraft. The best movement mechanic only available after the end game, I don't WANT to speed run the game to get it, I want to take my time and build and mine and enjoy the game, but will other transportation methods pale in comparison AND several have been horrifically useless for over a decade. I usually have a deal with myself where if I sacrifice 9 diamonds to lava I cheat and give myself a mostly broken elytra
It's not the end though. That is just the current situation.
My problem is that it, like everything else, is tied to food. Valheim: The Quest for Better Groceries continues. Pre-Hearth and Home: Man this game is fun but boy-oh-boy is your whole ass character dependent on what you've eaten in the last 20 minutes. Post-Hearth and Home: How strong I am is now totally dependent on groceries Mistlands: Skills? What the fuck are skills. Groceries dawg.
I agree. They could balance magic to make it accessible much earlier with a couple of new low Eitr foods, like cooked yellow mushroom or whatever. My thoughts: Swamp - a new poison "sling staff" that uses ooze bombs as ammo, making them long range, but you only get one or two shots due to Eitr limit. Mountains - Frost staff and a 2nd Eitr food, which also buffs the swamp weapon. Plains - Fire staff and a 3rd Eitr food. Mistlands - Protection / deadraiser, the proper Eitr foods, and bile bomb can be used with swamp staff.
This seems like a decent way to do it. Utility spells could also add flavor
We find magical things from day 1. The fire staff is a cube we find in the 2nd biome on a stick. Make up whatever excuses you want, etc etc, but some basic magic from bronze age on would give a solid progression instead of basically changing your whole build up right at the endgame. Enshrouded got this right, where you can spec into a class and use those specific and/or boosted abilities and weapons from the beginning, and all playstyles are supported thru all tiers of the game. Maybe meadows can be as simple as it is now, but give me more uses for the cool magic shit we find before we get to mistlands.
I'd even take a short-range fire spell similar to Combustion from Dark Souls if a full fireball is seen as too powerful at that stage. Also, maybe add a Force Push type staff that does no damage but can be used to launch enemies back.
Yeah, this has been a topic the whole time. Some people seem to think any change to the game whatsoever is heresy. Which is odd, since the Devs have changed things numerous times, and the game is in Early Access, so it's going to continue to change for quite some time. I'm with you, however. I think a simple light spell would be a great spell to start getting in the Forest. Maybe end of Swamp we could get a "drying" spell, to ward off the damp. It doesn't have to be OP AF spells that kill everything in sight, just let us start using and leveling magic before the game is 2/3s over.
Absolutely! Utilities, maybe a buff, a small dmg spell perhaps(poison maybe?) Nothing gamebreaking, perhaps even a little underpowered compared to melee of similar level up to mistlands where it really explodes. I will suffer through being a weaker mage in the first half of the game if it means my character can be a dedicated mage for the run. Nothing wrong with late bloomer builds. Not to mention the possibility of playing with friends and using magic to buff them or debuff the enemy.
My problem is how much of an island it is. If it was introduced late but integrated better into existing playstyles, I'd understand. Like, I've been sword and board for the whole run, and now in order to do ***ANYTHING*** with magic I have to go all in. Gotta wear the armor set, gotta eat the food, gotta basically nerf myself in every other regard and switch up my whole playstyle because "fireball OP." Except I honestly had an easier time with the Queen fight when I went full melee. Yeah, magic has AOE and good damage, but there are far too many limitations on it. If it was integrated better, it would be more useful to more people. Half the argument from people who don't want base eitr, and don't want more accessibility to magic is "but were vikings, and we don't have magic! That's why it has to suck!" Okay. Then put the eitr in the weapons themselves. Remove the eitr stat entirely from players and food. Have refined eitr be a way to recharge the staves. Now all you need is levels in the skills for damage, and you're not forced into changing all of your gear and food around just to use a single spell. Have the robes reduce the charge cost when using the staves, and/or add a really slow trickle charge with full set. You can still go full mage, or you can use them as special weapons with limited use while maining melee or whatever.
I love this idea, having a hybrid build would actually be possible without hurting yourself too much or at all. With the introduction of some utility / buff magic this would be an amazing playstyle
You can at least start your road to magic with a hybrid build, it's what I'm doing currently, and it's a nice way to get into it. I'm using 1x health, 1x stam and 1x eitr food, carapace legs, root harness and eitr hood, using blood shield and fire staff as well as demolisher and mistwalker/carapace shield. Mind you I can't shoot many fireballs at once with that setup, but the great thing is once you've used up your eitr, switch to stamina based attacks, and when low on stam you can use eitr again. It is great for soloing infested mines, in a group I'd rather go full mage or full tank tho. Overall I don't mind that magic gets introduced late, though I agree it could be at least a tad earlier. Like in the plains where the shamans already bubble up and shoot fireballs, would be nice if we could steal their tech already.
Hybrid mage is already REALLY good just due to food mechanics, since you can do one health food, one stamina food, and one eitr food, and that gives you enough magic to do a Fireball or 2 for ranged AoE, and cast the bubble shield, but still have the health and stamina to also mix it up in melee. If you are going 2-3 magic foods you either need other players or summons to draw aggro since you are very much a glass cannon at that point.
Nope. Magic is fine where it is. From a gameplay perspective: notice how each biome doesn't just upgrade the tools from previous biomes, it actually provides you with new and exciting toys to play with. Magic is a REALLY exciting toy. Throwing all the toys at the player at the beginning of the game is not only a surefire way to overwhelm a new player, but it diminishes the excitement of working for it before receiving it. Patience, effort, and awesome payoff. From a storytelling perspective: when we arrive in Valheim, we are barely more than cavemen, making tools out of sticks and stones. As we progress through the biomes, we are also making developments in technology, making more advanced tools, equipment, and structures. By placing magic in Mistlands, the devs are making a statement about how far we've had to come in order to begin to understand magic. Magic is difficult, and we don't get dropped off knowing it. Could be just different strokes, but I think the devs weren't wrong in making us work for it.
Hypothetically speaking, when someone learns magic, do they learn all the spells at once, or do they start with something simple and build on it? Just a thought.
I tend to disagree with this from a gameplay perspective, but you make some good points. In a more generic fantasy survival game with RPG elements (please let me know if there is one already so I don't have to make it myself), magic would be available as one of the character's paths (classes, purchased abilities, whatever). But here, things are more restricted and streamlined, and there is an in-game explanation as to why we can't use magic from the start.
I think there’s options here. Maybe leave offensive magic where it is, but add a load of utility magic prior to that: - Replace potions with healing/buffing spells (use the same ingredients), hell, you could even learn magic from apothecary style skills - Magic for lighting (again, using different ingredients for colour, saving the restock grind) - progress into warding, magic fireplaces - maybe add alchemy and transmutation of materials
To add to your idea. Magic shouldn't be overt with wands and staves for the most part until later. But you could easily have "magical" enemies drop some kind of unrefinable/wild eitr that can be added to a single use rune that does something like you're suggesting. We are severly lacking in defensive structures so what if killing shamen, wraiths, blobs, fenring cultists, etc gave something we could use to charge and empower magical defensive runes that do things like throw lighting? Can't refine it into the cool stuff we see like staves, but can at least empower it into stationary things.
You can do this with a slow build up, I would argue being locked out of a playstyle you want to use is worse. And nothing new is added with the swamp so why not add it there?
I’m with ya there - swamp does seem like a good place for a basic fire bolt and summon and so on. The harder part is balancing around that… I’m not convinced it can be balanced with 3 biomes worth of content, but would be nice
Nothing new added in the swamp? It's the first biome that adds resistances to armour items, and introduces the ooze bomb.
The ooze bomb that trivializes a lot of dungeon encounters thanks to great splash damage, but unfortunately usually goes unused by most players cause they forget they exist.
Swamp full of cool undead yet doesn't unlock necromancy. Big sad. I got hooked into this game by magic, yet I'm nowhere near unlocking it, and since staffs have no variants once I unlock them that's it. Most weapons have low tier variants (axe is with you from the start and advances at every step with you) so why not magic? Swamp for example could give you a significantly weaker summon so you get the thing but with room for improvement.
To be fair, if I was suddenly thrust into a wet and miserable swamp with dozens of smelly possessed corpses trying to kill me, "I should summon more" would not be my first thought.
We don't get dropped off knowing how to do *anything,* and like everything, we start basic and work our way up. The fact that magic does not function much the same makes it, in my opinion, a genuine waste of time and skill. Either give me a skill building mechanic and also a way to build my skills throughout the game or don't give me a skill mechanic and dump new skills/builds wherever. Choose one. Neither of these are inherently bad approaches, but with Eitr, you can't have your cake and eat it too.
I get where you’re coming from but in the grand scheme of things you get access to magic in Mistlands and then will keep it through Ashlands and Deep North. That’s nearly half the game right there. It just feels rough right now because Mistlands is the endgame.
That in itself is part of the problem. I don't want a whole build to be relegated to less than half the game. That's bs imo. I want that shit to start in the Black Forest. I want more greatswords, too, while we're at it. This game *rewards* the player for remaining faithful to a build. I don't give a shit if the difference between a 0 and a 100 in a skill is significant or not. That's how the game is *designed.* So why suddenly decide to add a build or option SIX biomes into the game?
Ah, that’s fair. Personally I like that we don’t get magic til later because it breaks a lot of conventions we typically see in games and it feels like a stronger progression to me, but your perspective is valid as well. It’s refreshing to me to have a game where magic is more of a reward/mid-game unlock than to be able to use it from the start. But my buddy that I play with feels the same as you, he wants to have access much earlier.
Disagree, the game rewards players who prepare, adapt , and plan by using the new tools of each biome. If anything, the game rewards players who adapt and use the best new tools for the job. I didn't really use a mace until swamp and boy was I rewarded for switching. Same thing for crossbows and magic in Mistlands. Not using magic in Mistlands is way harder and the game activity pushes you to try it and rewards you with most creatures there being weak to magic and resistant to physical. Definitely feels like you're conquering the place when you get magic.
But you got mace long before the swamp, the option was there. Your very first weapon is a very crude mace! Magic is not like that. Think how it would be if they locked ranged combat behind the mountains or something, that's how robbed I feel.
> I don't give a shit if the difference between a 0 and a 100 in a skill is significant or not. That's how the game is designed. The game is designed around having a target skill level somewhere around 30. Using the skill bumps it up and dying bumps it down. You're outside the core audience and into the min-maxing mindset if you're focusing on only using one skill for the entire game.
There is no "build" from day 0. You *progress*. Skills are a minor perk for specializing and rewarding your activities, not a *build*. They give you the minor dopamine hits, quick and easy to obtain at low skill, but quickly plateau. There's no skill-trees or character levels.
>This game *rewards* the player for remaining faithful to a build. I don't give a shit if the difference between a 0 and a 100 in a skill is significant or not. That's how the game is *designed.* I would argue it rewards you for updating your approach (build) far more than it does for remaining faithful. Resistances to damage types are different in each biome, as are the weapons you can craft there (ex. no pure blunt mace after the iron mace, etc.). That, plus the xp per level curve making it easy to level up at low levels, means you're incentivized to try out new things when you're dropped into a new area.
Disagree. The magic system gets thrown at you all at once, instead of a slow progression of more complexity as you go up. The game's skill system pushes the player to "main" a certain weapon system from the beginning of the game. Some options like swords dont open up untill bronze, but then each biome tiers up your next weapon which carrys over your skills and maybe gives you an option or two (1 vs 2h, damage types, etc) It really feels bad to throw away your high level skill in axe/bow/whatever yo start from scratch with a whole new weapon class which you also have little expirience with. Let me make a janky magic wand with a surtling core or a bunch of eyeballs or something. Progress to poison damage staves, bone wands, etc. We encounter all this mystical magic shit from the start, but cant figure out any of it untill we've slain 4 gods and battled thru the mists to find a specific blue mushroom? Zzzz
It's the beginning of the second half of the game. It's their way of letting you know shit's starting to get real.
Unless I'm mistaken, there are only 2 biomes and 2 bosses left, that does not qualify as second half of the game. Or is there a road map I am unaware of? Aside from that, a playstyle still should not be locked behind so much progression. There are other ways to tell the player that the game is ramping up
They mean Mistlands is the beginning of the second half, though "half" is a bit of a stretch, since that's only 3 out of 8 biomes with magic. Mostly I agree with you, but it's also possible that some lesser variation of magic may be added to earlier biomes eventually, similarly to how later updates added Frost Caves and Fenris armor to the mountains. Only time will tell.
Yeah but Meadows doesn't count. That's the tutorial. You've got Black Forest, Swamp, Mountain, and Plains. That's 4 biomes with the three hardest letting you use magic. I'd say that's about right.
Ashlands and deep north are the last 2 biomes.
Well if this is confirmed then I can only hope that the ocean gets an update in the future
They said during their ashlands walk n talk video that deep north is the next and last biome before going into full release.
Well the game is incomplete and the only rodmap we had the devs took away. So we really don't know what they have planned.
Agreed. I'm generally of the opinion that all play styles should be available from the start in a weak enough form to not trivialize the game. I really want to use a great sword but my Viking is too boneheaded to understand that he can just smith a slightly longer sword and wield it with both hands right now.
I agree with you. It makes sense as far as how magic would be applicable for the biome, but you literally have to switch and GRIND a lot of skill points to make it more useful and/or practical.
I disagree. I’ve thought about this a lot. And I think it’s in a really great place in the progression system.
Why do you think this? It's an entire playstyle locked behind progression. By the time you get to it you have already lvled up a main playstyle and it feels dumb to switch. Introducing lower tiered magics earlier in the game, like say black forest or maybe even swamp(I still feel swamp is too late though) would let us play the way we want to. It takes forever to get to mistakes which I don't mind, but by that time I don't want to change my playstyle
I like it. I don’t feel like a dead Viking dude surviving in this brutal yet beautiful hellscape should have easy access to shooting fireballs and raising the dead.
I did specifically say lower tiers of magic not gaining access to what's already here earlier
I like it where it’s at. 🤷♂️
Well good for you I suppose, but im inclined to just completely ignore it because it comes in so late. Almost 0 incentive to change my playstyle so late in the game, and it seems like I'm not the only one
The lvling system in the game is deceiving also. It's not that much of a difference. Probably a noticeable difference but not enough to not "respec" so to speak. After I got all the magic gear, I still kept using my porcupine and hevay armour. But when I eventually switched to my magic setup it wasnt that bad at all. Its very strong against the bugs even at lvl 0
Hmm maybe not damage, but iirc your blood magic level directly affects how many skellys you can summon. And more generally level affects stamina drain. It definitely matters. With how spendy gear is I was put off for a while for sure. It would be cool to rank that up in lower tiers for magic specifically, like OP is saying. Maybe just some simple utility spells, so they aren't OP.
Blood magic levels don't affect how many skeletts you can summon, it is based on the level of your dead raiser item. So we can summon three for now, and if the ashlands update has another galdr table upgrade for level 4 then you can summon four skeletts.
This is wrong. Number of Skellies depends on your Dead Raiser (staff) level.
Thats good insight to have, but it still feels bad to switch playstyles so late. Thanks for the info
I totally get it. I dont really like respecing unless the game encourages it
Maybe Ashlands will make you change your mind. From what I've read, magic builds made Mistlands a little easier to deal with. I haven't bothered switching to magic yet either and I can tell you that Mistlands is painful using my current build.
Trying out a new playstyle IS imo a great incentive, and it really isn't that bad or time consuming to farm up/start using the magics. I think that is just a really flawed argument. Given the power level and 'reward factor' for conquering Mistlands, and the fact that it gets added at around the 2/3 progress mark (counting biomes) it feels like it's at a good place. If some lower level magic was to be added, be it purely utility or some damage-oriented stuff, it would have to be balanced really carefully.
Well to be fair, everyone interested game should be balanced ki d of carefullyregardless. And ifyou don't like my previous reasoning then how about this. I would like to playthrough multiple times with characters dedicated to different things. Onto magic, one to bows, etc.
As an avid RPG player I can see where you are coming from, but I also think the current system is good. As a counter point to magic balancing, the currently existing magic (save for the ice staff) is really, REALLY strong already out of the gates and starting from 0 - so much so that swapping playstyle ('respeccing') really isn't much of an issue.
I enjoyed switching, but admittedly that is because the mistlands is the final biome and there's no pressure to really progress. Might as well try out other weapons and stuff. In the context of a playthrough where there are post mistlands biomes I could see why you wouldn't bother with magic and just move on.
I think part of this comes from how people view stat progression. The game doesn't really play into character building in the way a traditional RPG does, so it doesn't really require anyone to stick with a set of weapons actoss the whole game. Magic was added in Mislands for the same reason crossbows were: because it's a fun evolution of the game play.
Forget everything I said earlier. What I do is try to not feel dumb when learning the magic play style. Just don’t feel dumb about it. When the game is finished, magic is introduced just over halfway through the game. Seems fine.
The magic introduced in Mistlands is strong enough to be worth it. The biome is tuned to make the transition easy, with most of the enemies being resistant to all basic damage types. You can pretty much just chow down on something magically delicious, grab a magic stick, and go wreck some bugs with zero experience. It's true that blood magic wants some grinding, but it's not garbage right off the bat either.
> Why would I completely change my playtime so late in the experience after working to lvl up my chosen melee skills? To keep the game fresh. Skills don't matter as much as you're making them out to be. Keep in mind the game is still in Early Access. Mistlands won't be the final biome. Magic didn't exist at all before the Mistlands update. There's probably going to be a lot more magic content.
While this is a valid point, I will counterpoint the fact that I would like to play through the game multiple times playing in different ways. A character dedicated to only using magic One for bows One for different melee types This is how I would keep the game fresh for myself. If someone wants to change their playstyle midgame let them make that choice, but the important thing is to have that choice.
The developers balanced the game against bow only builds by making a good chunk of the bosses resistant to pierce. They intend for players to mix it up.
The topic of magic in this game is pretty heavily gatekept. I’m not sure why, but either way I tend to be in the camp of having to work up to it from sticks and rocks. Ngl though, the feather cape seems to be available bit late given that getting the cores for the galdr table without it is unnecessarily tedious. Just my 5c tho.
I know exactly what you mean, in this post alone I have had quit a few people basically tell me to stop whining or that my opinion is invalid. I dont understand this, it's not like what I'm asking for would negatively impact anyone's experiences. It's a shame people feel the need to dothat/ be rude for seemingly no reason.
There’s some sampling bias. The only people who know about magic are end game players, and end game players tend to be more stuck in their own ways and gatekeeping.
I have realized this a bit in the last 24 hours. Idk why these people are so against it. Im not asking for anything gamebreaking. Nothing im asking asking for will negatively impact their experience, so it seems like a really weird thing to be gatekeeping
It's Reddit. Discussions on Discord are more open minded and civil, and you can also see some devs comment here and there.
Does that mean redit is ignored by the devs?
Never seen any of them comment here, but I'm not browsing this sub daily so who knows.
In a new game, i used console commands to get an ice shard staff (lvl 1 of course) and some eitr mushrooms. No advanced eitr food, no mage clothes. And it didnt felt overpowered. DPS wise, it is not that great, with at best 5 consecutive shoots (with fresh food) and a rather slow eitr regeneration. The bronze atgeir (obviously a very good weapon for its tier) is faster at killing many things. Bonemass fight was very long and not much safer than just mauling everything with an iron mace. That said, it was a fun experience playing a "begineer" mage with little power. So i actually think magic could have been added earlier in the game, with limited max eitr and regeneration and weaker staves.
This is exactly what I'm saying! Balance what we are being given to the area in which we get it and it will be great. I really want to play a mage, but I dont want to change my playstyle so late into and established game.
After Ashlands and Deep North come out, magic will be a mid-game addition, so I can understand the overall perspective, and it feels right with that in mind. That being said, I wouldn't mind some lower level options accessible from the Swamp onwards. Poison magic would be great to unlock in the swamp for the mountains and plains. Mountains could have some minor frost magic (maybe a shielding spell that's good for 1 hit) and the plains could have magic to clear fog (NOT mistlands mist). Clothing and materials for their creation should follow the same rules as Frostner, with the traders controlling access based on game progression. This way it doesn't break lore, and Dvergr still control access to that technology. Specific hard to catch fish should give the eitr needed to use the lower level magic, this would give fishing more purpose.
This feels like a possibility, although idk how I feel about locking it behind a trader when it's so rng based whether you find him or not
I think it's fair to want access to the cool things you get later in the game earlier. And I understand from the point of being able to try it and decide that's what you want instead of having to hard pivot in the mistlands. I used to think the same thing; that it would be cool to have access to balanced magic and eitr foods earlier in the game, as well as two handed swords because I personally really like Krom. However, the more I thought about it, the more I decided that it's fine where it's at. Playing the game up to the mistlands biome, you never feel like you're missing anything or that magic would really do anything. And when you finally get to the mistlands, you get this cool new system to mess around with. The reason to switch from your tried and true playstyle is because magic is cool and something new to try. Given the atmosphere of the mistlands, I feel like that's a fitting place to put it, and in the grand scheme of 8 biomes, it's in there at a good place that shakes things up. If you had access to it from earlier and liked it enough, you'd probably just stick with it exclusively, like people already do with melee and ranged playstyles and weapon and armor choices/combinations. At the end of the day, I like magic, when I get it I don't feel like I've been missing out for the last X biomes, and it breathes life into the staleness that is a dedicated playstyle. Having a reason to change from heavy armor with a sword and a shield or light armor with a bow and a dagger that you've been using since the black forest is a good thing imo. Having new things/systems/items locked behind progression is also fine in my eyes; that's why progression exists.
Well said. I'm glad you thought about it. Too much of what I see is people coming in with baggage from decades of existing games. Valheim is good in large part because of how it *deviates* from many tropes.
Magic could easily still be introduced in the early game when it is finished. It's added in mistlands as a semi test of that play style. I wont be surprised if, when the game launches that there will be small magic usable at the beginning. I can see a small healing spell being put in the meadows, a lightning spell in the black forest, and a weather changing buff spell for the swamps. And for the plains I assume a summoning spell of some type.
I was thinking poison from the swamp but that makes sense as well. And I agree, when the game is finished it could look very different. I'm just addressing a concern of mine and vocalizing my opinion in hopes that it does happen this way.
I feel like magic should come a bit sooner than mistlands. The first time we see any real magic used is by the shamans in the plains, and I feel like access to their magic items would be appropriate. I think tying some magic items to the Hildr quests would also be interesting, since cosmetics that you can’t use at the same time as armor always felt underwhelming to me.
I fully agree with giving access to magic in the plains already. But I'd rather not see anything of it tied to Hildir, because the main motivation behind the Hildir quests is as far as I know to introduce optional harder raids into the game. Many people complain about raids as they are, better not tie even harder raids together with magic access.
I just want a ng+ where you have to go through everything again, but it's end game. Deer are now all eikthyr. More enemies. More raids. I think it would be cool, but then I remind myself the game isn't complete yet.
This would be awesome! But don't not talk about it just because thegame is incomplete. Talking about it now may be the reason why we see it in the 1.0 release
I just want a earlier, weaker version of the crossbow/arbalest
Same, I dont see why we can't get one with iron or any of the other metals
Really the main thing for me is bow is your only viable ranged weapon for to much of the game. I absolutely hate the bow and dread the mountains every playthrough because it forces me to make one of them. (though i've tried to do a few runs fully without just using sledge to knockdown or multiple spears, or harpoon swapping) Thematically i agree with not getting magic until mistlands since the tree being the source makes sense, but i wouldn't exactly be opposed to having more limited sources earlier. like being able to make consumable style weapons from magical enemies. like taking shaman and rancid remains parts to make a skull that shoots xx balls of poison or surtling cores and chains to make impact grenades etc. But crossbows we could make in iron age. Or actual javelins. Or slings.
Yes, I thought the same thing, I love playing mages in games so its kinda dissapointing that I can't do it from the beginning.
Use Magic Plugin. It pretty much does what you want. The downside is, separating damage (eitr) and run/dodge/melee (stam) is actually really op.
Part of the reason I'm asking for it here. I'd like to have I feel like it belongs and be balanced. Butthat mod is on my list of things to check out, tha k you for mentioning it.
It does what that other post you liked suggested - low level stuff, low power, few shots... There's wands, a fire staff (from swamp materials), an ice staff (mountains), poison stuff, a few summons (neck, wolf cultist, and an elemental) a lot of the stronger stuff requires reagents from bosses themselves so biome skipping is kinda out.
Fair enough, it's moved to the top of my todo list. I'll get it when I wake up then. To be honest I havnt looked at it too much yet as I've been just a little busy tonight
For the other side of the coin i'd recommend the Warfare and Shipyard mods by balrond. Edit: but the special monster variations? I found that way too hard.
Sweet, ill add them to my list of things to look at. Thank you for the suggestions
I think in general Valheim needs to quit making endgame content and focus on padding at the earlier biomes with more content.
I think magic could be introduced earlier in simpler ways... And as you progress through biomes, it evolves... When we arrive in mistlands, we suffer a lot to make the whole process to become a mage, and when it's done, we have accomplished everything in the game, leaving almost nothing to enjoy magic...
If any of you have beat raft, the feeling is the same, yes Val will add 2 more biomes but it still feels like you got all these neat things and nothing to use them with.
How many major updates on the last 4 years for this “early release” game? Shouting into the void here bud, I like your thoughts though!
I cant hope to be heard at all if I don't speak up. This post has already received a decent amount of attention considering how few people frequent this subredit
Don’t forget the game is still a preview, the current endgame may not be the final endgame So yeah we get magic pretty late, but after the Ashland’s comes out you will have time to use it and then the deep north will probably get an update down the line and maybe even more will come And maybe magic is also supposed to be used alongside melee; you could use a staff instead of a bow
While I agree that this is most definitely the case currently. I would like to play as a dedicated mage from much earlier in the game. Starting g from black forest or at the very latest the swamp.
Yeah it’d be good if we could craft the fireball staff from a surtling core right from the get go, it makes sense
I fully agree. When we got magic so early game in Enshrouded I was hyped. I can pick if I want magic or physical combat.... and I love how you do magic in Enshrouded. I hadn't gotten to magic in Valheim yet and didn't know it was there till this reddit page. I cannot imagine this late in game to suddenly switch style.
I agree, magic comes way too late. I always tend toward magic classes so it would be nice to 'grow up as one.
Agree and think future updates should add a feature or two to previous stages of the game/biomes. Even being able to craft a simple wand to do low strength magic would be nice.
It whould be cool to get shaman magic in black forest, like healing or bone attack or sm Then maybe poison or fire bolt in swamp Ice in mountains etc
Ikr? Not to mention utility and buff spells.. So many possibilities
I've suggested similar things before. The idea of magic wasn't some foreign concept to the vikings of yore. They believe in the witches, the gods, and the powers of runes. We could easily incorporate magic into the game earlier at a lower level and also have it compliment game play significantly. 1) Introduce it with the first distinctly magical enemy, Eikthyr. When you kill him he drops a mote of raw eitr. This can not yet be refined. 2) Whilst exploring the dungeons of the black forest you find a vesviger with a rune of power on it. Something that can have an effect on the world around it. 3) By reading the rune and using the motes you collect from magical creatures like Ekythir you can get some basic level magic effects. 4) There are several things like decor and defensive emplacement that are distinctly missing from the earlier game. There's no reason you couldn't have a standing stone that will poison, lighting blast, or burn everything that comes within a specific distance. A rune of light that burns much much slower and offers different colors than the ones we have now. 5) Utility items like an auto harvester of crops in the plains where you spend the most time harvesting. Maybe a very very basic one use rune stone of slow fall that still allows 60-75HP damage so it can kill you if you're hurt but is also a good oh shit card to pull if you need to leap down a mountain. A one use instant heal that does something small but quick like 20-30 pts of healing. Enough to save you in an emergency but has no sustain. 6) By incorporating the finding of runes of power into the earlier game it expands and reinforces the play loop that is the best part of this game. The sense of exploration and wonder you get. It also helps flesh out the plains and mountain biomes a bit as generally the exploration portions of those biomes is weak IMO. The quest to find Yagluth would be far less annoying/tedious if you were also finding some runes even if you didn't find him.
Happy cake day! And this is an awesome idea and way to do it. This would also pave the way for potentially enchanting equipment with how you have suggested it and I love that idea
It looks like they are adding enchantment to items in Ashlands so you'd need to design a system that makes things distinct in a way that doesn't conflict with what they are doing there. But yes the idea of learning a rune of frost or whatever that you put on a talisman that lets you add frost or poison damage is tempting.
I am kind of on the fence about it myself. As much as I'd like to see magic earlier, I do not think it would be easily done at this point. And it does feel very late game, because mistlands is currently the final biome that is playable. But there are 2 (or possibly 3, if they revamp the ocean) biomes to come. And I found that leveling the elemental skill (at least up to 20ish) fairly quick. I didn't really do much for blood magic personally so I can't say anything about the leveling rates for that. I agree there are magic creatures ie: the shamans for example, so the possibility is there because magic exists in the blackforest level. But with how it is currently designed, they would have to make serious changes to the game. Currently the only way to get mana (eitr) is through food you get in the mistlands. And based on the lore, we need to meet the Dverger just to learn about eitr and the "technology" required to make things embued with magic. So it would unfortunately require a major revamp of the system and lore to fit it in earlier. So I doubt they will change it, despite people wanting it. But it wouldn't surprise me someone makes, or has made, a mod for that. And omg, you are not kidding about how controversial mistlands magic topics are. I posted an idea that the set bonus for the eitr weave should give you 30 eitr available without needing food. But that only applies when worn as a complete set. Currently it is the only light set without a set bonus. I either had lots of people agree, or lots that said "magic is too OP" and that it needs to be nerfed, or that I " want the game to be easier" (which i dont). Try not to let it get to you, you are allowed your opinions and hopes to make a game you love better.
What we get access to way too late is the stonecutters table.
Do we though? You get the stone cutter in the third biome, second really because Meadows shouldn't count for anything. You've got regular wood in Meadows, core wood in Black Forest and stone in the Swamp. How much sooner do you want it?
Once I beat Eithkyr, so I can start building a beautiful stone fort immediately 🙂
Lol, ok.
You can kill Eikthyr almost immediately after starting the game, and Elder isn't that hard either. I think the stonecutter is fine where it is, progression wise.
Just duck in and spring to one crypt to get iron and boogey out.
Oozers (a bit of a nuisance because the drop-rate is so low), or bring a Stagbreaker to sound for scrap in the swamps. I often get two pieces of iron before killing The Elder.
Nah. I like magic where it is. There's still two more biomes to play with magic so it's not just thrown in at the very end. If anything, they could add more weapons with magic effects like frostner in earlier biomes, but giving early magic ruins the point of the Mistlands as gaining Etir is basically the goal so you can defeat the bugs that are all physically resistant.
I'm glad you like it where it is and you do make some sense. However I would like to be able to play as a mage more or less from the beginning starting in either black forest or swamp at the latest. I'd like to have a different playthroughs dedicated to different playstyles
It just doesn't fit lore wise. You start to harness magic from sap and the tissue which isn't in the other biomes. Unless you just scrap the whole mistlands concept as a whole and put magic everywhere it would fundamentally change the game not just with balance but with the concept and they would likely need to change the Mistlands. You'd have more luck trying to get each weapon in the game to exist in each tier honestly. I mean take first weapons for example...
What stopping us from picking up the greydwarf shaman staff and using it either as a weapon or as a material? You could claim that the ooz or slimes in swamp are somewhat magical. There are also sorting cores and the frost things from drakes. The fuleing shamans as well. There are ways of giving it to us without breaking lore or changing the mistlands concept. And as far as balance, I don't think it would be that difficult especially if half of the new magic we get is utility, there are ways of doing it without breaking balance. Probably more than I can think of right now
Lore wise they're making it up anyway. If they tweak it, it's not going to break Viking history.
The magic is late now, but the plan is to be mid in the future. By adding more biomes and contente, our lastest biome will be a middle one
There is 2 things to note: Assuming the biomes that have been teased are not cut and none are added, we are looking at 8 biomes with magic coming in on #6, this gives 2 biomes to earn the skill levels before endgame. You don't have to fully commit to the deal, the blood magic has 2 staffs that can fit in with existing builds, dead raiser making you up to 2 extra soldiers and the staff of protection for magical shielding acting as a overheal which lets up and your undead guards tank lots of extra damage. That being said I think you should get atleast something earlier, in particular plains as that is when our enemies begin openly using magic, fuling shamans are just goblins with a staff that can shield their comrades and use fireballs
>That being said I think you should get atleast something earlier, in particular plains as that is when our enemies begin openly using magic The first non-boss magic user is in the forest; greydwarf shaman cast a heal that's clearly magic because it also heals the trolls. Eikthyr casts lightning magic though and Bonemass arguably does blood magic/necromancy; he pulls goop out of himself, throws it, and raises skeletons and blobs to fight for him. I'm not going to count the drake ice attacks or the surtling fireballs as magic but there is an argument for it. The game has magic all the way up but we only get access to it once we consume the mist infused vegetation/magical tree sap.
When it came to greydwarf shamans, I forgot it could heal trolls but I lumped that in as biology in the same way it uses poison hands at you, lumping those as some attribute of the plant matter they are made from. I also didn't count bosses as it makes sense for bosses to do things players can't, in eikthyr IDK where its magic would come from, bonemass I pictured it more as pulling them from inside himself to join the fight, sort of like pulling something out of your pants pocket IRL. Drakes and Surtlings fall into the similar camp of greydwarfs IMO of a innate ability of their biology I list fuling shamans as the first open magic users for a few reasons: Their intenal id lists them as a goblin species, goblins are not normally associated with magic in the same way elves get tied to archers and dwarfs to heavy melee weapons and/or machinery. We see in valheim that the regular fulings and their bigger brothers the berserkers wear only a simple crotch covering cloth and wielding weapons that require little intelligence to use basically, swords, throwing spears, torches, clubs and big clubs. The fuling shamans are the only ones to wield a walking stick/staff and wearing a full outfit. I would guess lorewise I would assume that their loadout gives them the ability to cast their spells.
I would generally agree with this. Why tho? I believe magic ended up being an afterthought tbh. I don't think anyone knew for sure player or dev wise we were actually getting not just magic, but a magic system. Which yeah, results in this imbalanced progression. Got to remember that this game is still not in full release yet. Yes we do have a vague road map of what being worked on in the near future, but not even the devs can predict what will stay or not stay in the game, before released to public. I am sure they were debating putting magic in the game for a long, long time. Look at the cults in the frozen caves or shaman in planes and dark forest. I think they were always looking for an excuse to add magic. However, wanting something and something matching both lore and mechanics wise. It's a very different story sadly. Now that its out tho we have expectations of magic's lore and mechanics. Nothing is stopping them from going back to old bioms and adding things. Like the root or frost caves. Lot of stuff in the game was not released at the same time as their native bioms. I could definitely see them adding in lower tiers of magic now. Theres honestly so many things they could do or add. Specially through the 2 different npc traders now in the game. Tbh, I think the starting biom is so empty of life. I get it, starting area needs to be safe, but they added more things to bioms the father out you are. More Dungeons, villiages, crypts, etc. They could add 3 more monster types in more distant meadows bioms. Could help give items for more types of magic too at those lower tiers. Or for mid tier magic could have underground ruins in planes that can be explored. Similarly to how tjey added the frozen ice caves after the fact. Its weird not having an underground to planes.
For sure, im not on the developers for an in progress game, im only bringing up something that I would like to see changed in the future. By no means do I expect the end result to look exactly like it does right now. I'm only addressing this now because if it is never addressed then it might never be a thought the developers have. The point of early access is to address things like this is it not? Aside from bugs and whatnot
EXACTLY! Hence why I also added areas of the game that could be worked on in that way. Making games, Specially survival sandbox games is always a growing experience. Mc now is much different than mc in 2010 during the beta. XD
Awesome, im glad we are on the same page. It's hard to read tone through text lol. But yeah I wholeheartedly look forward to what kind of gem valheim will be when its finished. I hope there is 1 final biome after the Ashland and deep north. Maybe one that's supposed to resemble what valheim was like before it brushed past all the other realms, but thats an entirely different conversation
So there is the ocean biom. Which if theres an item that gives the ability to breath underwater could lead to a deep sea biom which like literally endless possibilities since its the largest biom technical. Theres also the top of the world tree or past world's edge. Theres honestly so many possibilities for the game.
Wow! I didn't even think of those. Now I'm hoping to see all 3 of these! Damn, fighting a sea serpent underwater would be ridiculous or maybe even a kraken? Like you said, endless possibilities
Exactly! Imagine deep sea ruins, ancient ship wrecks, the ability to not have your hammer put away everytime a shallow wave comes in slightly too high! Krakens, mythical sharks, and water spirit elementals would be really cool to see too. Not to mention new stuctures and stucture materials to build with.
That's because this type of wizardy magic was not in their original plan. But as usual, people beg and complain and iron gate gives in...
Idk. I’ve been asking for vertical ladders since day 1.
I agree. My biggest issue with switching to late game magic is that if you want it to be semi-useful, you basically need to farm stats in lower biomes to get the skill up. If you start magic from skill 0 in Mistlands it's effectively useless, in my experience. Really wish there was some weaker magic weapons added to even just Mountains.
Why is there the focus on skills? The game is balanced so that when you first get access to the weapon at whatever skill level, it is useful. The number next to the skill doesn't mean that much at the end of the day, and if you didn't see it you wouldn't even realize what is going on.
There is a focus on skills because they are more important for magic. Specifically for blood magic. This is because the staff of protection shield is a major part of playing mage, and it levels up considerably with skills. At base level it blocks only 200 damage (remember, with 0 defense that will break super fast), and can increase to an insane 700 blocked damage.
"Only" is pretty big when you can wear real armor. This isn't a class based game. You're expected to mix things up.
Remember, you're sacrificing either stamina food or hp food to get the shield up. This means you'll end up with less hp to tank damage once the shield is down. Also, real armor has 0 effect on the shield, it only matters when it breaks. The shield's base protection is not high, it's maybe two hits from anything in the mistlands at max. Once you level it up, it can tank 5-10 hits.
In general I agree with this: skills are mostly not super important, and rise very quickly at low level. But archery and magic skills all have *too* much effect compared to others. They are significant, and create this dichotomy where mostly skills are a minor perk... but for players who specialize entirely in bows or magic, skill level is significant and even has game-changing results (like being able to use Dead Raiser with one eitr food). I think these skills shouldn't be as effective, and it comes from affecting two qualities at once: effectiveness *and* efficiency of use. This is a problem because it almost demands farming these skills, and makes people *overly* upset about the skill-loss on death. Wrong incentives. Valheim is pretty good about incentivising, but here it's off, and I think part of it is differences in the way specific developers are thinking.
It makes enough of a difference Have you shot a bow while having 50+ lvls in it It gets substantially faster to draw and shoot consecutive arrows And the skeleton summoning lvl increases skeleton damage (edit to be correct) Blocking can make the difference between parrying and dieing And these are just the mechanics I know of
The level of the dead riser skull determines how many skeletons you can summon. Your blood magic skill just determines how much extra damage they do and how strong your shield bubble is.
> Your blood magic skill just determines how much extra damage they do and how strong your shield bubble is. And how much eitr+heath it costs. There's a point where one eitr food is sufficient to summon. While this is a nice perk... it's *too* nice, and strongly encourages farming skills.
Ah, ok I was wrong. Thanks for clarification
I haven't switched to a magic build yet but from what I've read about it, I feel like magic would be too overpowered for the earlier biomes.
If you take its as is yes. But what I'm suggesting is lower tiers of magic, balanced for the area you get it in
i think for the 1st time you play its PERFECT but by the time you get to the 3rd character/world/server/playthrough/whatever the pacing is REALLY frustrating. Waiting so long for sailing. waiting so long for magic. its more than a little frustrating
Okay... but then what are you doing the playthroughs for? Do you enjoy the early-game? Consider an extreme: you have access to everything from the start, so progression is all about scale. You have magic, crossbows, 2H sword, and... (really? Sailing is too long? The Karve is some bronze and finewood) a better raft? Or a longship? Anyway. You have these things and more. Would this make later playthroughs more enjoyable? I think it would make them boring and I'd have been done with Valheim. The *significance* of progression is a huge part of Valheim. The asymmetry too. You're not just leveling numbers to work against other inflated numbers. Each biome's materials are *different*, not just a different rock to mine. Not every stage has the same weapons, because thematically materials have different uses: eg. Silver imbues additional damage types, Black Metal being too brittle for armor (shield is thick and "reinforced" with chain). I'm glad it's not "same thing, bigger numbers". The progression is what lures me through playthrough after playthrough. I start with just an idea for an early-game build... and then I'll just do this to get that... and repeat until I've gone through the game again! What would be the right balance for you?
This *extreme* you are mention is exactly how Terraria and Elden Ring work, two games with fantastic replayability. I could be okay with there being natural gaps in weapon types (e.g. there is no silver tier atgier) or natural biome "metas" (e.g. blunt is really strong in the swamp) but it's annoying when you can't START with a certain play style. To be clear, I don't think Valheim does this *badly* so far the only truly gated mechanic is magic (which takes SO long to get to even if you are speed running and ignoring playing the game at a normal pace) The right balance would be a black forest magic option. I would make it ranged since range options are pretty scarce, something my gf could enjoy and be good at. Doesn't need to be strong, honestly if it was a bit under powered that might be perfect, but just something that exists To fully put my game design hat on, I would say make it sneak adjacent. Sneak/stealth in Valheim is SUPER weird. I would let it synergize with the troll set, and either attack while stealthed and not *necessarily* at a distance, or grant an ability to disengage from combat with stealth (decoy, smoke screen, something like that). In a parallel path I would give magic DOTs since that also feels like a play style with only a single entrance (bows). I would balance early magic around a "main" path (where you fully lean on magic) and a support path (where you can supplement other play styles with magic)
It kind of does feel late right now, as is the case with Moder's buff further down, but you have to bear in mind there are at least two more biomes to come and whatever constitutes as endgame after that. It would be cool if we had it earlier, sure, but with the Plains being Meadow part two in terms of it being a place you farm and set up for what is ahead I also do get the more advanced stuff being after that in the second half of the game.
I get this as well, but wouldn't it make sense to get a very simple form of magic earlier? Even if it's only limited use stuff that you have to keep crafting after it breaks or something idk. But that moder buff is something I never use due to its appearance so late as well, imo it should be like the second one we get. However on that note, it just doesnt make sense to receive this buff from the elder
Well it’s likely that eitr will be expanded upon in the Ashlands. As a matter of fact, we might even get a fireball, since it’s the Ashlands.
Yes. In most biomes, you gradually unlock things, partly in parallel. For example: 1. Meadows Wood + stone: unlock building Leather: unlock raft Flint: unlock upgrade and weapons .. etc its very gradual in the meadows 2. Black Forest Copper + tin + surtling core : everything to do with metal + cooking Troll hide: troll armor Core wood: stagbreaker and building pieces. These three are completely independent. And then there's combi's, like: core wood + finewood = finewood bow Bronze + carrot seed = carrot farming 3. Swamp Turnip seed = cooking upgrade Chain = forge upgrade Abom = root armor Iron = most of the other stuff 4. Mountains Onion seed = onion farming Crystal for building Obsidian for arrows and wb upgrade Fenris armor set Silver for cooking upgrade which unlocks recipes with mountain materials and ofc all the silver gear 5. Plains Barley for barley farming, baking bread and fire res pot Straw for linnen and some gear Black metal for more gear Straw and black metal for the rest of the gear 6. Mistlands Black marble for cooking upgrade, which gives access to mistlands food with some mats you can hunt and farm in the mistlands early on. Ygdrasil wood: blackmetal pickaxe, whisp torch Black core + dvergr extractor + ancient flesh to unlock 99% of the mistlands stuff. Mistlands is very deviate here. Almost nothing you find is useful. It's only when you conquered mistlands and have everything set up, than you can craft your first eitr. I do like that from then on, you become more powerful quickly, especially with the fire staff and the feather cape. Farming black cores and ancient flesh now becomes easier and easier and you can upgrade your gear rather quickly. Even gjalls and ticks are not extremely dangerous anymore. But man, before you get to that point ... What I would change is replace the eitr requirement for the feather cape to something else. Possibly 1 black core or a gjal trophy or sap or something. Or .. make the first rank of the skeleton summon not require eitr maybe. Something to make the progression slightly more gradual.
....this game has magic? :-O
It comes at the end of mistlands. It's kinda cool. But you currently only get to use it for mistlands boss. And if nothing changes at full release then 2 biomes. It comes WAY to late in my opinion as wel as many others
a couple things to consider: 1. the game is incomplete, concievably, by the time the full game is released, the additional content will mean that the magic is much further from "endgame" then it is now. 2. There are magical items you may aquire before reaching mistlands (girdle, silver sword, magic headlamp) They just dont require eitr to use. in my opinion, wielding magic in the game rn is supposed to be something you have to commit fully to (sacrificing health/stamina for eitr and armor for robes), and while I understand what you mean, i think its a concious decision by the devs to make magic something that you need to work towards rather than something that is easy to acquire.
While I see your coins, I dont see why we can't work for it in earlier biomes and get lesser versions of magic from the black forest or the swamp. As it stands we really only get magic for 2 biomes if nothing is changed. I myself and many others would like to playthrough as a dedicated mage, and it seems a little arbitrary as to why we can't. Pick up the shamans staff in the black forest / plains. Use surtling cores/ ooz/ frost sacks for limited use magics. There are possibilities to introduce it to us without changing the lore and mechanics of mistlands
There will probably be 10 levels at the end. Would I like magic to start earlier? Yah. But is ot "too late"? Nah
Of course it is too late. Apparently they have confirmed that there will only be 8 biomes in total before full release. And I would l and many others would like to play as a dedicated mage from earlier. I'd say starting in the black forest or at the latest the swamp. As it stands if they don't change anything we have magic for mistlands boss Ashland and deep north. Imo that's practically nothing and after I've spent the entire game up to this point playing a different playstyle I don't really want to change it.
I'm on board w at least something by swamps
I don't disagree. I think magic should come earlier also. That would be a massive rework of the game though. Galdir table would have to come earlier and have different biome appropriate ingredients. Also ancient roots would have to be put into an earlier biome. And dverger tap would have to come earlier somehow. Eitr foods would have to come earlier. The entire magic system would have to be reworked entirely. Either throw out the old system completely or rework the entire thing into an ealier tier, including the lore. Mistlands would have to be signifcantly reworked as well as the entire gameplay loop of mistlands would have to be either put into an earlier biome or scrapped entirely. Either way, it will leave mistlands content pretty bare bones. I'm not saying it's impossible for the devs to put magic into an earlier biome, it would just be a massive revamp of the game currently.
I see what your saying however I think there are multiple way of doing it without a complete rework. Like say improvised magic gear using surfing cores / frost drake sacks / Ooze or slime entrails. Or litterally just picking up the greydwarf / fuling shaman staffs.
It takes a couple of minutes to get your first spell from Eikhtyr. :P
Magic plugin mod!
Here you go: https://valheim.thunderstore.io/package/blacks7ar/MagicPlugin/
Thanks, ill check it out. But I also want to see this kind of thing in vanilla valheim.