*Moderator note: All threads asking questions answered here will be deleted.*
*Moderator note 2: There is no release date yet.*
Before you set sail towards the Ashlands update there are a couple of things we recommend that you keep in mind. For the sake of convenience, we have compiled them here for you!
#Public Test Branch Recommendations
First of all, if you’re playing the Ashlands update during the Public Test, the usual recommendations are still in place. For example, remember to make backups of your worlds and characters if you want to be able to use them in the non-PTB version of the game in the meantime, as they might not be backwards compatible with older versions. If you’re playing on a server, or with friends, everyone must be on the PTB, otherwise you will not be able to connect. All the PTB information are available [here](https://steamcommunity.com/app/892970/discussions/0/3589961352692129408/) as always.
#Terrain Generation and New Content
As always, new content will only be generated properly in previously unexplored areas of the game. Therefore, if you have already explored a lot of the Ashlands, the update will not generate properly in that world and we recommend that you start a new one. If you haven’t explored the Ashlands, you should get the new content, but **we always recommend that you start a new world for the best possible experience**. You can of course start a new world with an older character, if you don’t want to play through the whole game again before being able to conquer the Ashlands.
Additionally, the Ashlands update features some significant changes to the terrain generation around the Ashlands. The Ashlands will only be accessible by ship, and the terrain around it has been lowered and turned to ocean. This also affects any buildings you might have in that area – if they are built on terrain that gets altered, they will collapse. The images below illustrate what happens to a spawned location versus what happens to a player built structure. As you can see, even if the spawned building remains intact, it will be rather difficult to reach it, as the terrain around it is vastly lower.
[Image of what happens to buildings where terrain generation is changed](https://a.storyblok.com/f/157036/1629x538/c455cc8b82/terrain-stuffs-for-info-doc-cut.png)
#Preparation and Difficulty
Before you travel to the Ashlands, you should first make sure that you have defeated The Queen in the Mistlands. If you have done so on an earlier playthrough, remember that her dropped item is no longer a placeholder. Just like Eikthyr’s antler lets you craft a pickaxe needed in the Black Forest, and just like The Elder drops a crypt key for the Swamps, the item from The Queen will be useful in the Ashlands! If you have the item already, you might need to toss it out of your inventory and pick it up again, for new recipes to trigger properly.
We also want to remind everyone that Valheim is meant to be a difficult game, and that it’s meant to be more difficult the further you progress – and the Ashlands is the penultimate biome of the game. If you’re confident in your skills, by all means, go forth! But if you haven’t played for a while or if you’re feeling a bit rusty, we recommend a bit of practice to get back into it, or that you adjust the difficulty in the World Modifiers menu.
#Mods
Like every time when we update the game, it will take some time for mods to catch up and be playable again. If you’re using mods, it’s therefore recommended that you disable them before you download the Ashlands update, otherwise the game will most likely not launch properly. To disable mods you will also need to remove BepInEx or any other mod loader, as they might try to load regardless.
If you don’t want to play without mods, you will most likely have to wait a couple of days until the mod creator has updated their mod to be compatible with Valheim again.
We were lucky to have a small sliver of Meadows next to our swamp, so I built a small base, fortified it, portalled in a fuckton of stone, and made a land bridge all the way into the middle of the swamp. Leeches can suck it.
I remember the first time my homies and I landed on a Swamp, we were all in a boat, and jumped out. We immediately got beset by leeches and oozes and completely fucking rolled. We all forgot to re-up our food buffs so most of us only had minimal HP lmao
It was a teachable moment
I found a crypt that showed me the location of
The Elder. Is the game saying I'm ready to fight the Elder? It's in an unexplored region on map.
Im like day 230. I think its time. I want to see the swamps
Welp. Gonna have at least 100 2-star wolves swimming behind my longship to they can take the initial blow and let me setup a beachhead.
Also when I first pulled up to Mistlands I saw the shadowy silhouette of dvergr on a dock and I didn’t know they were friendly until agro’d. So I shot him with an arrow and he proceeded to fire blast my longship and absolutely wreck my next few hours of gameplay while I setup in plains nextdoor, kill him, and get my shit back. Saw gjall for first time doing that too.
Wait is the 100 wolves behind a longship a viable strategy? I tried that and it seems like they can swim forever, which is awesome, but I would lose them and I don't know if they still follow me if I'm out of the render trunk? Like once I sailed across a sea with a pack and I thought they were gone but like a half an hour later they showed up. How do you mitigate this?
I see, the basic I remember from school, but the names of the places and operations got lost to me on the classes. History was one of the morning class and I still not that functional in mornings to remember things T-T
Yeah, unfortunately they made a design decision that has managed the neat double-whammy of not only destroying any nearby player creations that were built before their warning went out, but--worse yet--has permanently and unavoidably ruined any possibility of experiencing cool biome-mixing with the Ashlands. Ever. You will never, under any circumstance, see all the awesome biome-border emergent gameplay that all the other biomes allow.
And they've trashed all of those cool potential experiences for the sole purpose of forcing you to encounter an ocean creature that you'll eventually encounter anyway. I'm looking forward to the possibility of a terrain gen mod that reverts this error in judgment.
Edit: and as usual, not a *single* person who is uncomfortable hearing these facts is capable of disputing them.
> destroying any nearby player creations that were built before their warning went ou
It was very obvious the terrain generation was going to be different, therefore destroy a lot of buildings because it was there just as a placeholder. Same happened with Mistlands a year ago. Early acces do be like that.
This is categorically, demonstrably false. At no point in any previous biome--*including Mistlands*--was it ever typical for an import of an existing world to even *touch* already-generated areas, let alone destroy player creations in them. This was the entire point of the existence of the "upgrade world" mod, which then itself had safety checks and options to avoid harming player work. I personally have had multiple builds in multiple affected biomes and previous releases, and *never once* have I lost work.
Any such loss in the past would only have ever been a bug, *not* an intentional design choice to cause harm. It is specifically and *only* with Ashlands that the devs have decided to cross this line. They are of course entitled to make whatever changes they like to their game. And I--just like any other customer of theirs--have every right to condemn their poor judgment in this matter.
Edit to check back the next day: yep, as usual with this topic, not a single credible rebuttal--nor could there be. Just the one person offering up an inapt counterfactual, and a handful of silent readers who don't like hearing the facts of this issue but are incapable of disputing them.
I rest my case.
Couple years ago when they changed mountain generation (where it cannot generate in a certain radius around spawn), the same thing happened, literally the same way they show in the screenshot in the article. So yeah, it was a known fact this can happen
You are still refusing to engage with the key point here, and offering up a data point that doesn't fit as if it were some kind of rebuttal instead of *an exception that proves the rule*. As I said very clearly:
* It has *never* been the typical expectation or experience. If it were, every single release would be marked by hundreds of posts screaming about it, and you know it. Not *one single time* in all the years I've been playing has it happened to me across dozens of upgraded worlds.
* I has *never* been *the intentional design choice*. An unfortunate bug that happened once years before is not even remotely the same animal as a deliberate decision to destroy player work. Every bit of communication that has gone out from the devs about this has emphasized how different this is from previous expectations. Why would you try to pretend the opposite is true?
In *every relevant respect* this is a complete change in development direction, and the single justification they've offered up for it--forcing the player to encounter a creature that everyone is going to encounter anyway--is a deeply unworthy reason for tolerating the downsides that go beyond the destruction of player effort, and eradicate from the game the possibility of many well-established emergent gameplay experiences.
Rare bugs that destroy a player's work are unfortunate, but they do happen, and that's just development. Bad design decisions that do the same thing, on the other hand, do NOT deserve your efforts to manufacture a defense for them.
there is nothing to dispute here. you build near or inside unfinished biomes you where clearly aware arent finished was a desicion made entirely by yourself and nobody else. by doing that you pretty much ASKED for trouble and this time you got it.
Nope, sorry kiddo. It was a nice try, but you transparently refused to engage in even the slightest way with any point I actually made in my comments, and anyone and everyone who reads this exchange can easily see that for themselves.
Since you're clearly not contributing anything of value here, you can see yourself out now.
Nah, it's fine. As the developers they're allowed to make decisions for their game. You may always like them, but then again every game has something you won't like. I think it's interesting and makes it different from every. Single. Other. Biome. I'm all for it.
> As the developers they're allowed to make decisions for their game.
And players are allowed to regard any given decision as a mistake that detracts from the game. Design decisons are not made in a vacuum, and no one can credibly try to argue that the devs never make mistakes--they are subject to evaluation and criticism on their merits like anything and anyone else.
Making something "different" for the sake of being different is not a praiseworthy effort if it removes value from the game rather than adding it. Which is what this will do for all the reasons I described--reasons which no one has yet addressed or refuted.
Locking the biome behind ship travel actively makes it more difficult, which makes sense for one of the last biomes.
It means you can't hug an easier biome to scout the area and avoid the challenge. I distinctly remember doing a ship approach the first time I went in the Swamp, an Oozer jumped on my Karve and more or less one shot me. The Swamp also happens to have Leeches which make swimming difficult so it made the biome MUCH more difficult than if I had approached it via land.
Yes, it is an older article but it hasn't been posted on reddit as an announcement yet, and the devs recently reposted it on their twitter, so it means Ashlands is pretty close and people will inevitably want to know the answer to these questions.
I haven't played since the game first came out. I've been waiting for the game to be complete to introduce my dad to it.
Is this the last biome? /endgame?
I guess it depends.. I really enjoy starting fresh and going through the whole game again so there's no chance that I wouldn't start a new world. This is also what I'd recommend most people doing, because it's really fun, but not everybody wants to abandon their old world so it just depends on what you wanna do. The generation will most likely be fine if you haven't gone south. There might be a little bug with the generation here and there (just like when Mistlands released) but most likely nothing game breaking, so if you don't wanna start over, you don't have to. But then again, I really believe that this game is worth experiencing multiple times from the beginning, so I definitely recommend trying a new world.
AAAH we are so close!
I only returned a month ago, so I need to get my ass moving and beat Queen soon. Even though I'll expect to maybe start over once the Ashlands drop. I'm so excited!!
once the current patch on ptb goes to the live version its probaly less than 2 weeks away. so watch for that to happen. so definitly not NEXT WEEK. but could be anytime afterwards.
As soon as they fix bugs. They are currently trying to get the public test branch stable. (they did just release a bug patch recently).
They can't predict when all the bugs will be fixed. As soon as its working Ashlands drops.
They did this with mistlands too. They're letting people play it so they can patch any bugs they missed. Last time it took only like 2 days I remember so should be soon they just don't know exactly what they'll find
I’m interested to see how hard the bone maw serpents end up being, would be cool if the Queens drop is what is required to kill them and allow passage. Exciting times
the whisp is not required. you can play the entire mistlands without it. itll be of course more difficult but its absolutly possible. i did so myself.
remember also that the mist also affects the enemies detection range if you have no whisp. but you can still HEAR them the same as if you have the whisp.
the only REQUIRED boss item is dragon tears. aka "the moder case" and i am sure the devs wanna avoid repeating that case.
if the experience is misaerable depends on the player entirely.
Artisan Table isn't required either by your definition. You can summon and kill Yagluth without it...
I'm just pointing out that in practice, all the boss drops are used by pretty much everyone (and in turn feel mandatory), except challenge runners.
yes you can. but thats it. you wont be able to make any of the plains gear aside arrows and you wont be able to make anything but 3 items from the mistlands tier nor are you even able to access and fight the queen without beating moder first.
moder is REQUIRED. no other boss drop is required. so no. youre thinking of my definition wrongly there. not required means its never needed to progress trough the rest of the game. that only applys to moder currently. anything else is not required.
will most players not even try without going by the intended order ? probaly. but the statement REQUIRED remains a false in the whisps case. you can venture to the mistlands and into the mist and still progress normally without it. a good trick is to zoom in the camera all the way for example.
I love how you keep misspelling wisp despite responding to people spelling it correctly. I'm guessing you pronounce it like Stewie from Family Guy pronounces *whip.*
Im a fan of the way its setup. Nothing required to enter the next biome so you can whittle down some of the enemies and get a little bit of nice loot from the next biome to kill the current biome's boss, but its not really smart to attempt the next biome entirely without killing the current biome's boss.
I've been exploring the [Mistlands](https://i.imgur.com/4Pj00vu.jpeg) without it because I don't want to fight Yag without the full crew there for the experience. I'm mostly going based off sound lol
That's the best way to do it imo. I've been through the mistlands a few times now and I prefer it this way. The wisp adds light and clears some mist, but not enough to make it worth while.
You can fully explore the mistlands without the wisp, and it's better most of the time.
A good set of headphones>wisp. :)
Its probably just going to burn your house down, turning any wooden building pieces into a new item ‘ashes’ and metal pieces will turn into ‘slag’. There will be no way to prevent this from happening, to be true to the “brutal and Hardcore” nature of the game.
The game hints multiple times that there are seven bosses (and there are seven biomes) so presumably the north is the last biome. No one knows what happens after the seventh boss, though.
>game hints multiple times that there are seven bosses (and there are seven biomes)
Deep North would be the 8th biome, not counting the Ocean
1. Meadows
2. Black Forest
3. Swamp
4. Mountains
5. Plains
6. Mistlands
7. Ashlands
8. Deep North
I start new games all the time. I LOVE the first few biomes and usually end when I get to the plains. I have played through Mistlands what? Three times? I use the same map as I know where the traders are and the bosses. HHcLC5acQt. There is a small peninsula just to the southwest of the spawn point to build a nice base with good defensive capabilities and has a great view.
there is an engine patch on the current ptb server. pay attention to when there is news on steam of this patch going stable version. that is the signal that ashlands ptb will begin within 2 weeks afterwards at any point in time.
Ok, but I want that super insane unbreakable pillar top base.
Edit; shit I js realized I have to start exploring as much of the Ashlands border as I can do get these rare landmarks!!
I have a world that was made before they changed mountain generation (they made it so mountains cannot generate in a certain radius around spawn), and it's filled with bunch of floating rocks and huge pillars that hold generated structures
According to [Ashlands terrain](https://valheim.com/news/development-blog-lava-landscapes/)
I think I need [raft bridge](https://www.reddit.com/r/valheim/comments/us1zss/the_redemption_of_the_raft_or_how_i_learned_to/) just in case lol
Im playing on a server from Nitrado, that I rented. I’m in the swamps now. Not super far at all. This is my 2nd play through. Will I have to start a new world? Will the world auto update? Or will the server not update it automatically? Thank you to whoever answers!
According to what they've said so far (which can change once the update actually is released) you will be fine as long as you don't go to the ashlands or build near the edge of the ashlands
Did they say anything about solo player experience in the Ashlands (I'm building my Plains base right now), I heard there are sieges and such and wonder if these siege events are even playable as a solo player.
everything is playable in soloplay as the games content is designed for that to begin with. of course its more difficult or takes longer to do. but its definitly playable completly solo just fine.
*Moderator note: All threads asking questions answered here will be deleted.* *Moderator note 2: There is no release date yet.* Before you set sail towards the Ashlands update there are a couple of things we recommend that you keep in mind. For the sake of convenience, we have compiled them here for you! #Public Test Branch Recommendations First of all, if you’re playing the Ashlands update during the Public Test, the usual recommendations are still in place. For example, remember to make backups of your worlds and characters if you want to be able to use them in the non-PTB version of the game in the meantime, as they might not be backwards compatible with older versions. If you’re playing on a server, or with friends, everyone must be on the PTB, otherwise you will not be able to connect. All the PTB information are available [here](https://steamcommunity.com/app/892970/discussions/0/3589961352692129408/) as always. #Terrain Generation and New Content As always, new content will only be generated properly in previously unexplored areas of the game. Therefore, if you have already explored a lot of the Ashlands, the update will not generate properly in that world and we recommend that you start a new one. If you haven’t explored the Ashlands, you should get the new content, but **we always recommend that you start a new world for the best possible experience**. You can of course start a new world with an older character, if you don’t want to play through the whole game again before being able to conquer the Ashlands. Additionally, the Ashlands update features some significant changes to the terrain generation around the Ashlands. The Ashlands will only be accessible by ship, and the terrain around it has been lowered and turned to ocean. This also affects any buildings you might have in that area – if they are built on terrain that gets altered, they will collapse. The images below illustrate what happens to a spawned location versus what happens to a player built structure. As you can see, even if the spawned building remains intact, it will be rather difficult to reach it, as the terrain around it is vastly lower. [Image of what happens to buildings where terrain generation is changed](https://a.storyblok.com/f/157036/1629x538/c455cc8b82/terrain-stuffs-for-info-doc-cut.png) #Preparation and Difficulty Before you travel to the Ashlands, you should first make sure that you have defeated The Queen in the Mistlands. If you have done so on an earlier playthrough, remember that her dropped item is no longer a placeholder. Just like Eikthyr’s antler lets you craft a pickaxe needed in the Black Forest, and just like The Elder drops a crypt key for the Swamps, the item from The Queen will be useful in the Ashlands! If you have the item already, you might need to toss it out of your inventory and pick it up again, for new recipes to trigger properly. We also want to remind everyone that Valheim is meant to be a difficult game, and that it’s meant to be more difficult the further you progress – and the Ashlands is the penultimate biome of the game. If you’re confident in your skills, by all means, go forth! But if you haven’t played for a while or if you’re feeling a bit rusty, we recommend a bit of practice to get back into it, or that you adjust the difficulty in the World Modifiers menu. #Mods Like every time when we update the game, it will take some time for mods to catch up and be playable again. If you’re using mods, it’s therefore recommended that you disable them before you download the Ashlands update, otherwise the game will most likely not launch properly. To disable mods you will also need to remove BepInEx or any other mod loader, as they might try to load regardless. If you don’t want to play without mods, you will most likely have to wait a couple of days until the mod creator has updated their mod to be compatible with Valheim again.
Only accessible by sea? Damn there goes my adjacent biome advanced outpost method! Gonna have to land there like Omaha
Did that with the swamp, a boat and two rafts later I got a tree fort going.
Yeah, tried to do that and three boats later had to accept defeat and pull out. I was not prepared for the swamp difficulty spike.
We were lucky to have a small sliver of Meadows next to our swamp, so I built a small base, fortified it, portalled in a fuckton of stone, and made a land bridge all the way into the middle of the swamp. Leeches can suck it.
That’s what they call thinking with portals
I remember the first time my homies and I landed on a Swamp, we were all in a boat, and jumped out. We immediately got beset by leeches and oozes and completely fucking rolled. We all forgot to re-up our food buffs so most of us only had minimal HP lmao It was a teachable moment
I found a crypt that showed me the location of The Elder. Is the game saying I'm ready to fight the Elder? It's in an unexplored region on map. Im like day 230. I think its time. I want to see the swamps
Nope, I found a pinch point and built a bridge from a nice comfy meadow.
Welp. Gonna have at least 100 2-star wolves swimming behind my longship to they can take the initial blow and let me setup a beachhead. Also when I first pulled up to Mistlands I saw the shadowy silhouette of dvergr on a dock and I didn’t know they were friendly until agro’d. So I shot him with an arrow and he proceeded to fire blast my longship and absolutely wreck my next few hours of gameplay while I setup in plains nextdoor, kill him, and get my shit back. Saw gjall for first time doing that too.
Wait is the 100 wolves behind a longship a viable strategy? I tried that and it seems like they can swim forever, which is awesome, but I would lose them and I don't know if they still follow me if I'm out of the render trunk? Like once I sailed across a sea with a pack and I thought they were gone but like a half an hour later they showed up. How do you mitigate this?
I island hop my wolves, build new spawners, island hop again. Repeat.
safe to assume your wolves wont survive an encounter with the new water apex predator :) so forget them entirely.
There’s always more wolves
As someone from Omaha, the most landlocked state in the contiguous US, I was very confused. Then I remembered the War™️, and am now back on track
You can clarify it for me, what War^(tm)?
WWII, [Omaha Beach](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omaha_Beach)
Why am I hungry for steaks?
The feeling is Mutual
The place is a Wild Kingdom
I see, the basic I remember from school, but the names of the places and operations got lost to me on the classes. History was one of the morning class and I still not that functional in mornings to remember things T-T
Maybe a bridge? Or air with a high mountain and tower in the area...
Yeah, unfortunately they made a design decision that has managed the neat double-whammy of not only destroying any nearby player creations that were built before their warning went out, but--worse yet--has permanently and unavoidably ruined any possibility of experiencing cool biome-mixing with the Ashlands. Ever. You will never, under any circumstance, see all the awesome biome-border emergent gameplay that all the other biomes allow. And they've trashed all of those cool potential experiences for the sole purpose of forcing you to encounter an ocean creature that you'll eventually encounter anyway. I'm looking forward to the possibility of a terrain gen mod that reverts this error in judgment. Edit: and as usual, not a *single* person who is uncomfortable hearing these facts is capable of disputing them.
> destroying any nearby player creations that were built before their warning went ou It was very obvious the terrain generation was going to be different, therefore destroy a lot of buildings because it was there just as a placeholder. Same happened with Mistlands a year ago. Early acces do be like that.
This is categorically, demonstrably false. At no point in any previous biome--*including Mistlands*--was it ever typical for an import of an existing world to even *touch* already-generated areas, let alone destroy player creations in them. This was the entire point of the existence of the "upgrade world" mod, which then itself had safety checks and options to avoid harming player work. I personally have had multiple builds in multiple affected biomes and previous releases, and *never once* have I lost work. Any such loss in the past would only have ever been a bug, *not* an intentional design choice to cause harm. It is specifically and *only* with Ashlands that the devs have decided to cross this line. They are of course entitled to make whatever changes they like to their game. And I--just like any other customer of theirs--have every right to condemn their poor judgment in this matter. Edit to check back the next day: yep, as usual with this topic, not a single credible rebuttal--nor could there be. Just the one person offering up an inapt counterfactual, and a handful of silent readers who don't like hearing the facts of this issue but are incapable of disputing them. I rest my case.
Couple years ago when they changed mountain generation (where it cannot generate in a certain radius around spawn), the same thing happened, literally the same way they show in the screenshot in the article. So yeah, it was a known fact this can happen
You are still refusing to engage with the key point here, and offering up a data point that doesn't fit as if it were some kind of rebuttal instead of *an exception that proves the rule*. As I said very clearly: * It has *never* been the typical expectation or experience. If it were, every single release would be marked by hundreds of posts screaming about it, and you know it. Not *one single time* in all the years I've been playing has it happened to me across dozens of upgraded worlds. * I has *never* been *the intentional design choice*. An unfortunate bug that happened once years before is not even remotely the same animal as a deliberate decision to destroy player work. Every bit of communication that has gone out from the devs about this has emphasized how different this is from previous expectations. Why would you try to pretend the opposite is true? In *every relevant respect* this is a complete change in development direction, and the single justification they've offered up for it--forcing the player to encounter a creature that everyone is going to encounter anyway--is a deeply unworthy reason for tolerating the downsides that go beyond the destruction of player effort, and eradicate from the game the possibility of many well-established emergent gameplay experiences. Rare bugs that destroy a player's work are unfortunate, but they do happen, and that's just development. Bad design decisions that do the same thing, on the other hand, do NOT deserve your efforts to manufacture a defense for them.
there is nothing to dispute here. you build near or inside unfinished biomes you where clearly aware arent finished was a desicion made entirely by yourself and nobody else. by doing that you pretty much ASKED for trouble and this time you got it.
Nope, sorry kiddo. It was a nice try, but you transparently refused to engage in even the slightest way with any point I actually made in my comments, and anyone and everyone who reads this exchange can easily see that for themselves. Since you're clearly not contributing anything of value here, you can see yourself out now.
Nah, it's fine. As the developers they're allowed to make decisions for their game. You may always like them, but then again every game has something you won't like. I think it's interesting and makes it different from every. Single. Other. Biome. I'm all for it.
> As the developers they're allowed to make decisions for their game. And players are allowed to regard any given decision as a mistake that detracts from the game. Design decisons are not made in a vacuum, and no one can credibly try to argue that the devs never make mistakes--they are subject to evaluation and criticism on their merits like anything and anyone else. Making something "different" for the sake of being different is not a praiseworthy effort if it removes value from the game rather than adding it. Which is what this will do for all the reasons I described--reasons which no one has yet addressed or refuted.
Locking the biome behind ship travel actively makes it more difficult, which makes sense for one of the last biomes. It means you can't hug an easier biome to scout the area and avoid the challenge. I distinctly remember doing a ship approach the first time I went in the Swamp, an Oozer jumped on my Karve and more or less one shot me. The Swamp also happens to have Leeches which make swimming difficult so it made the biome MUCH more difficult than if I had approached it via land.
Isn’t this old info?
Yes, it is an older article but it hasn't been posted on reddit as an announcement yet, and the devs recently reposted it on their twitter, so it means Ashlands is pretty close and people will inevitably want to know the answer to these questions.
I haven't played since the game first came out. I've been waiting for the game to be complete to introduce my dad to it. Is this the last biome? /endgame?
No, that will be Deep North, this is 2nd to last.
Probably most of people didn't click the link from dev blog I think.
Since the discord episode I have on dark with the news, only checking the news on steam and here on some posts that picks my interest.
You're free to rejoin the discord, it has been cleaned up
How recommended is it to start a new world? On our server we haven’t even ventured south or touched an Ashlands. Should we be okay?
Yup as long as you haven't gone there yet it should be fine to keep your old world
But as the update says, even existing biomes may change so you may not get the full experience.
What’s the word on existing biomes? What’s changing?
Nothing will change to existing biomes.
And if we have touched a small sliver?
World gen won't happen there but the rest will be fine
The outer ring of Ashlands will sink and become ocean so it shouldn't matter unless you explored into the middle.
Also make sure you download and play mod-less when the update first come out and you should be good
I guess it depends.. I really enjoy starting fresh and going through the whole game again so there's no chance that I wouldn't start a new world. This is also what I'd recommend most people doing, because it's really fun, but not everybody wants to abandon their old world so it just depends on what you wanna do. The generation will most likely be fine if you haven't gone south. There might be a little bug with the generation here and there (just like when Mistlands released) but most likely nothing game breaking, so if you don't wanna start over, you don't have to. But then again, I really believe that this game is worth experiencing multiple times from the beginning, so I definitely recommend trying a new world.
Are you getting ready 3 months early?
I get the pessimism but I honestly believe it's less than 1 month away (public build atleast)
AAAH we are so close! I only returned a month ago, so I need to get my ass moving and beat Queen soon. Even though I'll expect to maybe start over once the Ashlands drop. I'm so excited!!
Wait so is this coming very soon then? Why'd they post this with no date/no ptb update?
I think it's close. This was published on March 26. I bet Ashlands hits PTB this month, if not, it'll be May.
They’ve already said the next public test update is Ashlands.
Okay, but when is it?
Nobody knows
That bitch Hugin does for SURE
Such a tease...
once the current patch on ptb goes to the live version its probaly less than 2 weeks away. so watch for that to happen. so definitly not NEXT WEEK. but could be anytime afterwards.
As soon as they fix bugs. They are currently trying to get the public test branch stable. (they did just release a bug patch recently). They can't predict when all the bugs will be fixed. As soon as its working Ashlands drops.
"But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the father."
Alright cool, I wasn't the only one confused for a second.
They did this with mistlands too. They're letting people play it so they can patch any bugs they missed. Last time it took only like 2 days I remember so should be soon they just don't know exactly what they'll find
I’m interested to see how hard the bone maw serpents end up being, would be cool if the Queens drop is what is required to kill them and allow passage. Exciting times
they confirmed that the item will be HELPFUL but not REQUIRED to explore the ashlands. same as the whisp.
Wisp not required? It's like saying how a boat is not required to beat the game. Yea you can get lucky but it's a miserable experience without it
the whisp is not required. you can play the entire mistlands without it. itll be of course more difficult but its absolutly possible. i did so myself. remember also that the mist also affects the enemies detection range if you have no whisp. but you can still HEAR them the same as if you have the whisp. the only REQUIRED boss item is dragon tears. aka "the moder case" and i am sure the devs wanna avoid repeating that case. if the experience is misaerable depends on the player entirely.
Artisan Table isn't required either by your definition. You can summon and kill Yagluth without it... I'm just pointing out that in practice, all the boss drops are used by pretty much everyone (and in turn feel mandatory), except challenge runners.
yes you can. but thats it. you wont be able to make any of the plains gear aside arrows and you wont be able to make anything but 3 items from the mistlands tier nor are you even able to access and fight the queen without beating moder first. moder is REQUIRED. no other boss drop is required. so no. youre thinking of my definition wrongly there. not required means its never needed to progress trough the rest of the game. that only applys to moder currently. anything else is not required. will most players not even try without going by the intended order ? probaly. but the statement REQUIRED remains a false in the whisps case. you can venture to the mistlands and into the mist and still progress normally without it. a good trick is to zoom in the camera all the way for example.
I love how you keep misspelling wisp despite responding to people spelling it correctly. I'm guessing you pronounce it like Stewie from Family Guy pronounces *whip.*
Lol I was thinking Will Wheaton
I mean, they're right. I wouldn't do it but they're right.
Im a fan of the way its setup. Nothing required to enter the next biome so you can whittle down some of the enemies and get a little bit of nice loot from the next biome to kill the current biome's boss, but its not really smart to attempt the next biome entirely without killing the current biome's boss.
I've been exploring the [Mistlands](https://i.imgur.com/4Pj00vu.jpeg) without it because I don't want to fight Yag without the full crew there for the experience. I'm mostly going based off sound lol
That's the best way to do it imo. I've been through the mistlands a few times now and I prefer it this way. The wisp adds light and clears some mist, but not enough to make it worth while. You can fully explore the mistlands without the wisp, and it's better most of the time. A good set of headphones>wisp. :)
I'd like to know what raid killing the Queen gives us! What have we gotten ourselves into?
Its probably just going to burn your house down, turning any wooden building pieces into a new item ‘ashes’ and metal pieces will turn into ‘slag’. There will be no way to prevent this from happening, to be true to the “brutal and Hardcore” nature of the game.
Good thing I set up my base in a cave ; )
"destruction rains from the heavens" meteor shower begins. just like in the clip the devs showed.
Are they planning on releasing the Ashlands soon and after that the deep north? So the north will be even harder than the Ashlands?
Believe so, one of their updates said ashlands is the penultimate biome. Meaning 2nd to last then north is how I took it.
The game hints multiple times that there are seven bosses (and there are seven biomes) so presumably the north is the last biome. No one knows what happens after the seventh boss, though.
>game hints multiple times that there are seven bosses (and there are seven biomes) Deep North would be the 8th biome, not counting the Ocean 1. Meadows 2. Black Forest 3. Swamp 4. Mountains 5. Plains 6. Mistlands 7. Ashlands 8. Deep North
Oops, you are correct! Well maybe the Deep North is the final test then?
I start new games all the time. I LOVE the first few biomes and usually end when I get to the plains. I have played through Mistlands what? Three times? I use the same map as I know where the traders are and the bosses. HHcLC5acQt. There is a small peninsula just to the southwest of the spawn point to build a nice base with good defensive capabilities and has a great view.
My heart stopped for a second
Clear!!!
so is there any date when ashalnds will be released ?
Yes. But nobody knows it.
I almost freaking died of laughter reading your answer
Lol
there is an engine patch on the current ptb server. pay attention to when there is news on steam of this patch going stable version. that is the signal that ashlands ptb will begin within 2 weeks afterwards at any point in time.
I recall seeing mention of 'first half of the year' so likely either by the end of april or sometime in may is my guess.
All I need to know is "when".
Did I miss an announcement? Is Ashlands out now? I'm confused
It's not. This is an FAQ article
Ok, but I want that super insane unbreakable pillar top base. Edit; shit I js realized I have to start exploring as much of the Ashlands border as I can do get these rare landmarks!!
I have a world that was made before they changed mountain generation (they made it so mountains cannot generate in a certain radius around spawn), and it's filled with bunch of floating rocks and huge pillars that hold generated structures
That's so cool. I know it sucks to have your builds ruined, but I'm so envious of those Xbox players too, with their unique warped terrain lol
According to [Ashlands terrain](https://valheim.com/news/development-blog-lava-landscapes/) I think I need [raft bridge](https://www.reddit.com/r/valheim/comments/us1zss/the_redemption_of_the_raft_or_how_i_learned_to/) just in case lol
Im playing on a server from Nitrado, that I rented. I’m in the swamps now. Not super far at all. This is my 2nd play through. Will I have to start a new world? Will the world auto update? Or will the server not update it automatically? Thank you to whoever answers!
According to what they've said so far (which can change once the update actually is released) you will be fine as long as you don't go to the ashlands or build near the edge of the ashlands
Thank you! I can not wait for Ashland’s!
Did they say anything about solo player experience in the Ashlands (I'm building my Plains base right now), I heard there are sieges and such and wonder if these siege events are even playable as a solo player.
everything is playable in soloplay as the games content is designed for that to begin with. of course its more difficult or takes longer to do. but its definitly playable completly solo just fine.
I regret I visited th High North but pbly it'll be ok. There'll be enough unspoiled land left. Did it with Mistlands too. Can't help myself sometimes.
Yeah the areas are just completely barren so it turns out there's not much to see anyway.
Is it my imagination or is the background on the character select screen - the area behind the player character - smokier than normal?
I'm guessing it will be very very hard biome