Shivan
Terrarian
Hi everyone, ive been playing Terraria for years now and lately ive been watching people trying Terraria for the first time, and completely remembered the same issues ive had over the years when introduccing new people to the game.
Im going to cut to the chase and just suggest a list of what i think make new players not to stop playing because they are lost and dont know what to do or resort to the wiki.
1) The first thing the guide should say to you should point you at the crafting help option. Right now it says something about you should talk to him if you are stuck... but ive knew people who beat the game without ever realising that a thing. Also make sure the dialog was open more than a second because its likely a new player will open the dialog menu and close it inmmidiately whiout realising.
2) One doomsday scenario for new players is the guide getting killed before they know they need to make houses for it to come back or they know about the crafting menu... two things that may help here, one is making the guide respawn whiout needing a house, and two, maybe move the crafting recipe help to the player UI without needing the guide? put the square to drop the item below the crafting menu with a clear tooltip that says "drop an item here to see all the recipes".
3) Add, to all materials, from where you get them from in the tooltip, for example if it is a common pre-hardmode ore "common mineral found in the caves". If it is an accesory "some times found in chest in", if it is dropped by a boss it should say from what boss you can get them from or a very strong hint. Everyone wants to know from were you get an item that you see un the crafting guide menu, if the game dosent tell you they will go to the wiki to find that information.
4) Add a new "blacksmisth NPC", after a forge and an anvil has been placed in the world, the idea of this NPC is guide you with ore progression. Its a very common thing that people has no idea of the ore progression, or worse, whats more is availible to get. So this npc should talk about the ores, and better yet, guide you quests, like "bring me tin/copper bars and i give you a reward", then the next tier. This would help A LOT in not getting lost specially at the hellstone part and the new ores in hardmode.
5) Add more quests to the NPCs to demo some functions, adding quests like "hey you know you can make X with X and X at the Tinkerer workshop? bring me one" using some very common accessories. Its very common for people to completely miss the function of the tinkerer workshop. Or the guide at the start giving you a quest for making him a home. etc.
6) The starting tools should be made of wood, stone or both, its confusing that the first ore you are likely find and have in quantities is not an upgrade to what you already start with. I think the ideal would be wood sword, stone axe and stone pickaxe, with copper/tin being better.
7) Its very easy to miss hellstone and have people arrive at hardmode without any way to get the new ores or any idea of what to do and in what order. This is critical, people will likely stop playing the game here, i had this problem a lot with my friends. I know the blacksmish NPC should help a lot here but to be safe. What i would do to fix it is first making Hellstone more visible, because a lot of people dont even realise is there, there is way too much stuff going on on hell when you go there for the first time and in order to even realise its there you likely need to try to mine towards teh lava, who does that? and second, making it to be in your way. BEcause right now, you dont need to mine it.
A fix to this issue would be spawning some hellstone in minor quantities on the top layer of hell, instead of only be on the bottom. And second, making bricks in hell need the pickaxe to break them. And finally just to be safe, add some hellstone to the wall of flesh drop, even if they think you can get it only from the wall, its better than nothing, that at least will tell you there is a pickaxe if you drop it in the crafting menu.
8) Boss summoning items should tell you were you can use them and when.
The last two are general suggestions not really intended for new players:
A) Add different types of beds that will accelerate the pass of time faster depending of what material they are made of. Maybe use biome wood and gems for that?
B) Make Pearlwood items better so they are an alternative to a player starting new in an already hardmode world. Like how the hammer is on the level of the silver hammer, or the pearlwood sword is equivalent to a early hardmode weapon? i belive the same could be done to the bow and armor, maybe no so early hardmode, but equivalent to a pre-hardmode crimson/corruption armor and bow.
Thank you. I wrote what i remembered at the time, if i can think of anything more ill add it after this point.
9) The guide voodoo doll you strongely hint at what you need to do. Add something like "dont burn it" i think would do wonders here.
10) The temple. the temple can be a huge time waster, people would look for a key that very likely dosent exist at that moment... I think what could be done here is, add unpasable, undestructuble "vines" blocking the passage to the door, and ony remove them once plantera has been defeated.
Im going to cut to the chase and just suggest a list of what i think make new players not to stop playing because they are lost and dont know what to do or resort to the wiki.
1) The first thing the guide should say to you should point you at the crafting help option. Right now it says something about you should talk to him if you are stuck... but ive knew people who beat the game without ever realising that a thing. Also make sure the dialog was open more than a second because its likely a new player will open the dialog menu and close it inmmidiately whiout realising.
2) One doomsday scenario for new players is the guide getting killed before they know they need to make houses for it to come back or they know about the crafting menu... two things that may help here, one is making the guide respawn whiout needing a house, and two, maybe move the crafting recipe help to the player UI without needing the guide? put the square to drop the item below the crafting menu with a clear tooltip that says "drop an item here to see all the recipes".
3) Add, to all materials, from where you get them from in the tooltip, for example if it is a common pre-hardmode ore "common mineral found in the caves". If it is an accesory "some times found in chest in", if it is dropped by a boss it should say from what boss you can get them from or a very strong hint. Everyone wants to know from were you get an item that you see un the crafting guide menu, if the game dosent tell you they will go to the wiki to find that information.
4) Add a new "blacksmisth NPC", after a forge and an anvil has been placed in the world, the idea of this NPC is guide you with ore progression. Its a very common thing that people has no idea of the ore progression, or worse, whats more is availible to get. So this npc should talk about the ores, and better yet, guide you quests, like "bring me tin/copper bars and i give you a reward", then the next tier. This would help A LOT in not getting lost specially at the hellstone part and the new ores in hardmode.
5) Add more quests to the NPCs to demo some functions, adding quests like "hey you know you can make X with X and X at the Tinkerer workshop? bring me one" using some very common accessories. Its very common for people to completely miss the function of the tinkerer workshop. Or the guide at the start giving you a quest for making him a home. etc.
6) The starting tools should be made of wood, stone or both, its confusing that the first ore you are likely find and have in quantities is not an upgrade to what you already start with. I think the ideal would be wood sword, stone axe and stone pickaxe, with copper/tin being better.
7) Its very easy to miss hellstone and have people arrive at hardmode without any way to get the new ores or any idea of what to do and in what order. This is critical, people will likely stop playing the game here, i had this problem a lot with my friends. I know the blacksmish NPC should help a lot here but to be safe. What i would do to fix it is first making Hellstone more visible, because a lot of people dont even realise is there, there is way too much stuff going on on hell when you go there for the first time and in order to even realise its there you likely need to try to mine towards teh lava, who does that? and second, making it to be in your way. BEcause right now, you dont need to mine it.
A fix to this issue would be spawning some hellstone in minor quantities on the top layer of hell, instead of only be on the bottom. And second, making bricks in hell need the pickaxe to break them. And finally just to be safe, add some hellstone to the wall of flesh drop, even if they think you can get it only from the wall, its better than nothing, that at least will tell you there is a pickaxe if you drop it in the crafting menu.
8) Boss summoning items should tell you were you can use them and when.
The last two are general suggestions not really intended for new players:
A) Add different types of beds that will accelerate the pass of time faster depending of what material they are made of. Maybe use biome wood and gems for that?
B) Make Pearlwood items better so they are an alternative to a player starting new in an already hardmode world. Like how the hammer is on the level of the silver hammer, or the pearlwood sword is equivalent to a early hardmode weapon? i belive the same could be done to the bow and armor, maybe no so early hardmode, but equivalent to a pre-hardmode crimson/corruption armor and bow.
Thank you. I wrote what i remembered at the time, if i can think of anything more ill add it after this point.
9) The guide voodoo doll you strongely hint at what you need to do. Add something like "dont burn it" i think would do wonders here.
10) The temple. the temple can be a huge time waster, people would look for a key that very likely dosent exist at that moment... I think what could be done here is, add unpasable, undestructuble "vines" blocking the passage to the door, and ony remove them once plantera has been defeated.
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