106 Days in Bleak Inlet

[Riotintheair]

So I've recently completed 106 day tour of Bleak Inlet on my very long term Interloper character (he's now spent 100 days in each major region - this is his 2nd time recalled to active duty to add a new region). BI was definitely much easier than HRV was, but here are my thoughts on the new region:

Timberwolves - ultimately I found it pretty easy to dodge the packs. The pack behavior makes it easier to not encounter them because they move as a group. I don't usually carry scent and wasn't much of a bait user in the past and I usually kill wolves from stealth proactively if I need to create an exclusion zone before moving meat (after bow 5 at least). I occasionally killed packs from stealth to generate space in BI as well, and I had one fantastic close moment near the hunting blind at the birch forest. Otherwise the zone's generally open plan and decent sight lines allowed me to stay away from wolves unless I was there to shoot them from stealth. I think they would've probably been more annoying in the early game with short respawn times, but in day 1150+ respawn rates are so low exterminated wildlife stays dead for ages.

Bears - I had one bear behind the cannery residences. Hunted him from a tree twice. Not the easiest bear to get a safe shot on based on where I saw him patrolling and I took quite a bit of cold damage luring him into position.

Moose - There are a lot of moose around the frozen delta. I killed 3 in about 15 days and they served as the core of my food supply. Quite a few good opportunities to hunt them safely - no broken ribs! Kind of felt they were a little thick on the ground, but given the very sparse dear...

Deer - very few deer to hunt and I never encountered more than 1 at a time. I killed 2 up top near the lookout, and 3 down below the climb across the entire 106 days. Mostly they served my staging locations (lookout and cabin beneath the climb) for the resources I was pushing back out of the region via the rope climbs to the dam - my core base is PV Farmhouse and the choicest loot will be heading back there eventually.

Rabbits - I only trapped 4 rabbits to repair clothes, so no real opinion on them.

Fishing - I mostly used the hut at the cannery residences and generally had excellent results.

The Cannery - getting into the workshop the first time was pretty fun, but I do wish we could establish a short cut into it after the first time. I found the repair function on the press to be pretty good. I can see myself planning to return with my worn tools instead of the periodic forging trips I've used before. My most agressive wolf culling was definitely removing them from the yard. The wolf in the workshop was a damn surprise, we had a tussle but I was fresh and he didn't like getting hit with an axe (then we had a Benny Hill moment where I chased him around shooting at him badly before I finally got him).

Good bases - like most zones I had caches in many place, but I generally felt the Cannery Residences was the best base of operations. It's close to the cannery, it's close to the bear cave, it's not near any wolf spawns and it's got a fishing hut out the front. It's also got rabbits relatively close in 2 directions. I never had the bear right on top of me when leaving, but the bear was pretty dead for most of my stay, so YMMV. I also used the Washed out trailers and the cave WNW of there as a base. All 3 moose spawns were relatively close to these, but the interior of the washed out trailer is a depressing dump even by TLD standards - and on my 1200th day of winter I need a nicer place (objectively I think it's a good spot, it's just ugly).

Terrain - like a lot of new regions there's quite a few places that need a little vertex smoothing, but Hinterlands usually smooths these out in the patches after new regions are added. The area around the cannery residences and the lighthouse island are probably the places most in need of a touch. Overall I liked the map and I always like places I need to climb to - I do wish the secret passage through the bastion of rock the radio tower is on could be reached in both directions (perhaps a climbing rope point near the final waterfall?). I thought the lighthouse and mostly wrecked cannery were a lot of fun to explore even if I didn't find much of material value.

Weather - baring in mind that it's late game Interloper, the weather was generally cold, clear and windy. Lots of mag lens opportunities on this map, and Aurora were very frequent, which made using the new equipment less frustrating.

Loot - 6 packs of matches and 6 sewing kits were the main highlights. Got another heavy hammer, and quite a few prybars (3 I think). Otherwise the zone was sparse on loot and I was sad to not score a whetstone - the one I invested in this trip before I knew about the press will be missed. There's a lot of scrap metal, reclaimed wood, and a fair amount of cloth in the zone (though nowhere near the cloth you can get out of some other zones like CH or MT).

[Jimmy]

Great summary! Thanks for the share of your Interloper experience.

From the looks of things, it appears Bleak Inlet is a great spot for an Interloper to pick up an easy moose kill, would you agree? Seems they're a rather common map feature here compared to the more random appearances in other regions.

I think this plus the opportunity to improve tool condition in the Cannery makes this region worth visiting during an Interloper game. Probably not until mid to late game, after clearing Timberwolf Mountain Summit, crafting tools and clothes, and grabbing Hushed River Valley's caches with a side of Mountain Town looting.

[manolitode]

Thanks for the inspiring read! Made me just a little more optimistic about BI 😉. Decided to venture into it the other day from FM just to grab some low hanging fruit (still  haven't maxed archery). I too feel like stealth is a must, gotta see the timberwolves before they see you. The first encounter was a moose between the transition cave and birch forest so I went further into the region and all was quiet and calm. Second was howling. Third was an aurora. Fourth I got the f out. 

Sweet that you found so many kits and matches. How did you find the reishi, rose hips and cattail amounts? About the boring trailer, it would've been nice with more crates up the rope by the cannery for sure, neat place for a sleepover if there was only firewood. 

[Riotintheair]

I definitely don't have any good tactics for timber wolves pre archery 5 (other than avoid them, and that's not possible at the cannery itself). I think I'd stay away from BI before that.

Rosehips, reishi, and OMB is quite sparse compared to other regions. There is birch bark in a stand of birch West of the FM transition cave. I think I hauled ~40 cattails out of the region and left 10 behind. They're more spread out than other regions, but there's quite a few locations with a couple.

[manolitode]

Seems like the wise thing to do, will also wait til the respawn timers are slower. Not til day 1200 but when I went to BI with a 300+ stalker timberwolves didn't respawn at all for 20-30 days. I don't know whether predators respawn more frequently in interloper than other wildlife but I'm thinking around day 300 would equal pretty few timberwolf encounters considering that and your description above. 

Alright so the cattails equals a deer give or take. Though I can't wait to get my hands on the mill that runs on northern light. 

[ElonMoosk]

So far I've only spent about 20 days in BI, so I'm not ready to make a judgement yet. Still too much left to do. But on the positive side, I will say this: Bleak Inlet has some of the most spectacular sunsets I've seen in any region.

Edited February 18, 2020 by ElonMoosk

[Ahatch]

Great work all of you that have dared the region , going to have to get the guts to go there on Interloper as well

[peteloud]

On 2/17/2020 at 11:25 PM, Riotintheair said:

So I've recently completed 106 day tour of Bleak Inlet on my very long term Interloper character (he's now spent 100 days in each major region - this is his 2nd time recalled to active duty to add a new region).

Have you been using any mods to make it easy?

If not, congratulations, I struggled to last 5 days in Interloper.

[jhickie]

I've still not enjoyed the region on Loper or DMC. I played a custom game there right after BI was released, and I brought my 500+ day Loper survivor to Upper BI once, but I had trouble getting used to the timberwolves and didn't even make it to the tower before I turned back. My Loper run was based on the 50 Days Per Region challenge, so I need come back and spend my 50 in BI. I have very little confidence with the timberwolves because I have very little experience with them. That needs to change asap.

Props to those of you who have conquered the timberwolves. Perhaps I need to watch a stream or two.

[Riotintheair]

11 hours ago, peteloud said:

Have you been using any mods to make it easy?

If not, congratulations, I struggled to last 5 days in Interloper.

I mostly play on PS4 so no mods (I have it on steam but my laptop wasn't really up to it when I started playing). I've killed plenty of Interlopers before 5 days and it's been ages since I did a start and I suspect with the changes I'd kill quite a few more now. Once you get to old age, Interloper gets easier - sure the weather's awful and the animals scarce, but there's a big difference between how hard a wolf tussle punishes you on day 5 and when you're fully kitted out. Never mind how much easier wolves are to kill with a bow at level 5. 

[Jimmy]

Has anyone observed if the region has static Interloper loot spawns?

I'm curious if it conforms to the four existing loot tables for equipment availability by region.

[Riotintheair]

15 hours ago, Jimmy said:

Has anyone observed if the region has static Interloper loot spawns?

I'm curious if it conforms to the four existing loot tables for equipment availability by region.

I certainly don't know having only looted the region once, but I did get a hammer. I feel really bad, but I didn't note where I found it and I've forgotten where I grabbed it. So maybe a new set of locations to add to the tables. What's irritating is I can remember thinking I need to remember where it was...