HRV - Long term playability?

[DaveMcD]

So I've been playing the vigilant flame update running around Hushed River Valley in custom game modes and voyager difficulty to learn the region. I think it's an awesome map, love the twists and turns, the verticality and cave systems -even fluffy in the cave on voyager which scared the crap out of me. (BTW is fluffy responsible for all the ravaged wolf carcasses) Exploring it has been a lot of fun.

The question I have though is once the novelty of the place wears off what is the long term lure of HRV? It's a challenging place with no crafting. I've found good resources on the lower difficulty including a moose hide bag and improvised tools here so is that the draw card at higher difficulties like interloper i.e. one of the only places to find forged gear you don't have to make yourself? Or is there just good looting here in general on interloper?

[Ahatch]

I would think it would be a tough region on Interloper with Fluffy hanging out in the cave system and no crafting. However  it might not be a bad starting point  if one could harvest enough cat tails , mushrooms and rose hips and if one was lucky enough to find say the improvised hatchet maybe grab a few saplings and make for Mountain Town and then take the rope down to Forlorn Muskeg to the forge and finally back to Mystery Lake and if your lucky enough to still be alive after all that maybe manage to  survive long term. 

[Ruruwawa]

Between the nice gear (by Interloper standards) and the warm caves threading throughout the region it's a pretty easy start on Interloper if you know your way around.  Cattails are very plentiful, hundreds on the map.  Medicinal plants are plentiful too.  No hatchet that I found but you can get a hacksaw pretty reliably.  But long term, I don't know if I'd choose it for Interloper... it's really cold. 

[Samsonguy920]

After being trapped in the dam for so long, Fluffy probably came out more cranky than a disturbed hornet's nest and decided she was either going to be Top Dog of her new domain or nobody was going to be.

Or...she escaped the dam, got taken into a new pack which went to the valley, and one night while she was scouting outside something went in and killed the pack. That would make you a top suspect if you wandered in there.

[ben91]

On ‎01‎.‎07‎.‎2018 at 2:52 AM, DaveMcD said:

The question I have though is once the novelty of the place wears off what is the long term lure of HRV? It's a challenging place with no crafting. I've found good resources on the lower difficulty including a moose hide bag and improvised tools here so is that the draw card at higher difficulties like interloper i.e. one of the only places to find forged gear you don't have to make yourself? Or is there just good looting here in general on interloper?

the question is what is the Long term fun in TLD in General. at the Moment Hinterland is doing a very very bad Job to provide any Long term fun for those who are looking for a challenging survival game. for that it really Needs some fundamental mechanic changes like overhauling the hunting System in the game to pressure the Players to travel from Zone to Zone to find Food. their idea of a challenge mode (interloper) is a joke aswell because they apparently think that putting wolves at every Corner and make them respawn every couple of days is a fun and challenging gameplay. custom mode solved that Problem for a couple of hours but you realize pretty fast that there is still a lack of Options.

this game Needs mod Support so badly to bring new and old Players back to the game and provide new challenges and interesting gameplay.
its quite frustrating to get a update  every 6 months but with only a couple of new Things and almost no improvement of other issues and definetly None of the hundrets of awesome ideas suggested in the wish list forum

[Riotintheair]

My long term Loper has spent 80 days there and stockpiled 250 cattails in addition to loads he ate before he'd figured out where good cooking and hunting spots are. I also got 72 matches, 4 whetstones, 2 sewing kits, 2 hacksaws, a hammer, and somehow an wool toque that hadn't decayed to 0 (all the other awesome clothes were ruined). Overall the challenge is that as @Ruruwawasaid, it's a very cold region Interloper - I take a lot of cold condition hit, even going by quick paths between places I know well. I have made a few day trips back to the trailer for crafting and to drop off loot. I brought 20 cloth for my planned 100 day stay and that plus the in-region cloth has been sufficient (unless I screw up again and wrestle a wolf I should have 6 or 7 left when I leave in 20 days).

The north side of the map is a lot richer in shelter and hunting than the south (and a lot of good sites in the south require long paths or climbing to reach). I mostly leave the indoor wolf alone - I killed him once using the arrow to the head method in order to loot the cave and he eventually respawned. The region had a moose (in the valley for me, but it can be at Stairstep Lake as well) and 2 bears, which is sufficient to keep a bear bedroll up. Finally I found deer plentiful, with a pretty good deer/wolf ratio, which could be a real boon before day 100, especially given the relative scarcity of deer compared to wolves in MT, BR, and FM. Reliable deer spawned at Stairstep Lake, Monolith Lake, and at an unnamed lake in the north central part of the region (Monolith Lake and the unnamed lake have nearby caves for easy, safe cooking - there's a depression on the west side of Stairstep Lake that is very wind protected, I'm not sure it's 100%  protected but it worked for me).

I also lost about a 150 day Interloper in this region - though mostly I blame drinking since it involves my character taking all his clothes off and freezing to death because I dropped them rather than just taking them off... And then it got dark and I couldn't find them again. Don't do this.

[Rumpo]

I spent about 100 days gearing up on a custom game that has a stalker base, and then just last night went into HRV blind. I've been there four days. Currently nursing broken ribs and trying to map the area and learn my way around. I'll either walk out after 30 days or I'll be one of the ravaged corpses some time before then.

[JErosion]

I think my biggest challenge with HRV is trying to figure out a way to get to the low without using the climbing ropes... but it turns out those are pretty much the only ways in, honestly ive found more ammunition and food in HRV than I found in Milton before... I was practically tripping over those hidden supply cache

[Sito]

Quote

I did HRV as one of my "go live there for a while" places when it came out. To start there would be very hard I think, but coming in from MT with a bedroll, pot, and bow was very satisfying. I found the cave north of Stairsteps lake and made that my base. Did small explorations so as to not to lose my bearings. Learned the landmarks. Got deer from the lake for food and gradually expanded my knowledge of the map. Lots of sprains!

There are lots of trails if you pay attention to the fallen trees and such. Lots of loot. Found 2 pots to make my cooking fire golden. Found a gun! (i'm always pleased to add a gun to my collection)

Found the signal fire and the moose satchel. Yay!

Almost died many times. Weather turns bad but if you make sure of where you are relative to your base, you can limp home.

HRV is absolutely beautiful! Thanks Hinterland!

 

[RuggedlySurviving]

As long as you know the region well (meaning you’ve explored more than half of it and are willing to countinue to), are well prepared upon enetering, and have considerable experience with wildlife and survival without shelter... I see no reason why long term survival isn’t a possibility. 

[Pillock]

In my custom settings I start with 'Low' gear, but guns, hatchets and knives enabled. I'm finding it very difficult to get started there, but I want to see how long I can last.

Hunting is limited, due to finite rifle and archery ammo, and fishing is out. But I have found snares, and as far as I remember you can repair them without a crafting bench. I haven't found a mag lens anywhere (but I am pretty far from exploring the whole place yet) so sustainable fire-starting (and very limited matches) seems to be the main blocker to longer-term survival so far for me. That is if you refuse to leave the map to resupply, which I currently am.

[Pillock]

3 hours ago, Pillock said:

In my custom settings I start with 'Low' gear, but guns, hatchets and knives enabled. I'm finding it very difficult to get started there, but I want to see how long I can last.

Hunting is limited, due to finite rifle and archery ammo, and fishing is out. But I have found snares, and as far as I remember you can repair them without a crafting bench. I haven't found a mag lens anywhere (but I am pretty far from exploring the whole place yet) so sustainable fire-starting (and very limited matches) seems to be the main blocker to longer-term survival so far for me. That is if you refuse to leave the map to resupply, which I currently am.

Too late to edit my previous post, but...

 I've just found a mag lens! So I guess the main issue is in finding enough food. Warmth is manageable, with the many caves and ample fuel available. There are bedrolls (or at least one!) and snow shelters, so you can sleep. Water should always be obtainable if you are vigilant with your flames. So, yeah - food. Can snaring and stoneage sniping give you enough rabbits to live off? There's plenty of cattails to start with, but they don't last forever. Perhaps long-term you'd have to be following the wolves so you can chase them off their kills?
Oh, and then there's the issue of cloth and sewing material. I've found 1 sewing kit and 1 fishing tackle so far, so that's pretty limited. And the only cloth is from shredding clothes and dismantling snow shelters. So not much of that, either. Unless you can find crafted clothes lying about?

[ThePancakeLady]

I love the new region. It is harsh, beautiful, rugged. A place that, in real life, in my younger days of rock climbing and caving... I would have taken 2 moth vacations to visit and just go nuts in. But... I would have had access to stockpiles of high end gear, and supplies, more sophisticated and comfortable ways to have everything gotten in, to set up my time surviving and playing there. And more advanced technology to help me get the heck out if TSHTF.

I don't think the region is meant to be played as a long term homesteading map. A place you can survive for a while, but will find thriving in to be a bit more difficult to do. Which I think is just fine, actually fitting fr the game. Perhaps in the future HRV will connect to another region, and we will start to see it as a place that is a "must go to" place, but only to get to somewhere else. "A nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there..." situation.

But, there are those truly skilled survivors, who will find ways to not only survive, but thrive. And some of them will even do so without using custom settings, or any exploits or third party helpers. I won't be one of them, lol! I love the new region, but I am in and out and in and out, because it still scares the heck out of me. Not comfortable enough thinking of it as a place I want to, or even can, survive for long months on end, or more.