Expand Your Terraria Empire - Pylons, Town Building, and NPC Happiness

---Ooh. Eeh. Honestly, i don't like this. It was already a huge pain in the butt to house all the NPC'S, this'll just make it worse. There's also(in my opinion) an incentive to keep NPC's away from your base so you can hear the old night music(the town music is cool but i prefer the original) and get monsters to spawn. Not a huge fan of this.
They could make an option to enable/disable town music
 
So... I have a world I've been using since the 1.0.6.1 days. I've expanded it and adapted it as new features were added to the game. Obviously, some worldgen-only features never got incorporated in that world (Lizhard Temple, UG Desert, etc.), but I did what I could using new worlds (imported some snow, infected some crimson). I did dismantle a good part of the dungeon, so anything related to that got canned. (This was back in 1.1 when Blood Moon Clowns were a legitimate threat to player bases and dungeon bricks were the only viable explosion-proof mass-building material.) Also, this world dates back to before the shrinking of usable world dimensions, so the baseline "sea-level" altitude is higher than in world from newer worlds (even as far back as 1.1, when I would initially get regularly attack by wyverns IN my base... That got fixed, of course.)

My base has turned into a mass storage warehouse (I try to keep like 5 of everything in terms of dropped equipment.) Most of it is still dungeon brick, of which I would like to replace ever since the texture change. I have a showroom of sorts for armors and vanities. (It was originally so I could more easily see which vanities I did have and could therefore sell duplicates of; then I expanded it to include armors.) This showroom was an addition on top, so was done with typical gray bricks.

Ever since the announcement of block replacement, I've been waiting on 1.3.6/1.4 so I could revamp my old, main base. I've attempted to build new bases in newer worldgens, but always stopped. (This was mainly due to how much effort in would take to import all my items from the old world.) If 1.4 is truly the end for Terraria feature-updates, I may actually get around to making a new main base world. Especially with the features added in this announcement.

One thing I would like to ask, though, is this: With this change of encouraging base-making, will beds still work the same way? I would kinda like it if on death, you could have the option of respawning at the nearest bed (at least in Normal mode; Expert Mode could force the current standard method only.) Maybe a small menu of respawn options when you right-click on a bed.
 
A simple number telling us how much prices can change, or how crowded constitutes overcrowded would be very nice- then we can at least know if we will have to change. I personally don’t build too creatively, but I also don’t do literally the bare minimum- but from what I’ve read and your example screenshots my houses will not be big enough to stop penalties. The post is also worded such that it suggests that if you do not spread npcs out across the world, they will become unhappy regardless of how big you make the housing. If this is untrue, then clarification would be great.
 
So there are really 3 groups complaining here:

1. "Higher Prices" - how do you know what you have built now will trigger this? You don't. Well, unless you build the L-shaped tubes... then yeah, you probably do. :p

If it does, how do you know that making 5 mins of adjustments wouldn't sort it all out? (snip)
Because you didn't clarify that! People react to worst-case scenarios first. It keeps us safe when we cross the road, after all. If people are complaining about things being too strict/vague, when in fact people are over-estimating the restrictions... You could, oh I dunno, clarify if NPCs "close" together is fine, as long as they actually have proper rooms (Rather than the super-compact cells that meet minimum spec).
 
All of the above is predicated on guesswork and assumptions with a lot of emotionally charged adjectives thrown in - who knows, maybe you will turn on your game May 16th and realize all of that gnashing of teeth was for naught. ;)

Of all of it, this one is the most overwraught vs reality... which I suspect folks will discover in a few short weeks.

I have an idea: why don't you tell us how it works in detail, then if it really is "overwraught", we won't be complaining. It sounds crazy, I know, but providing enough information to allay peoples's concerns might, just might... allay their concerns.

If you don't want "guesswork and assumptions", then replace them with facts.

I mean, look at your initial post of the thread. Look how much it talks about NPCs "are tired of being shoved into tiny cubicles or L shaped tubes and they want you to know this!" That's a pretty direct statement that this feature exists to prevent that. So when you go on to say "NPC's are happier when they are not overcrowded with other NPCs ", the natural assumption is that "tiny cubicles" == "overcrowding".

If that's not what the feature is doing, maybe you could describe it more accurately.

2. Why can't I do whatever I want and still get Pylons/I want my <NPC> to live in <Biome>.

Read the description carefully. Happy NPCs = get Pylon. 2 NPCs nearby = use Pylon. What word is missing from the second sentence? :p

That's kind of irrelevant, since you have to make an NPC happy to get a Pylon for a particular biome to begin with. The issue here there is how you acquire Pylons, not how you use them.

Or more to the point, the issue is linking happiness to fast-travel.

3. What about the "V"/Corruption/Crimson?

Defending against the spread of these is part of the game.

Wait, it is? I mean, it wasn't before. Or at least, not like this.

Defending against the spread of CC was just... don't go to those places. That's how you defended against its spread; ignore it. If it is getting close to your town, you built a moat to keep it out, a gap too big for it to cross. You only need to directly defend against it if a patch of it happened to enter your quarantine directly.

The Clentaminator and such were tools for attacking the infections, for eliminating them from a specific area. Not for defending an area from them.

At least, not until now.

I don't much like the idea of having free fast-travel impacted by the rapid spread of early hardmode infections. That sounds like adding a lot of busywork to a section of the game where we're already busy. At that point in the game, I should be exploring underground, looking for hardmode ores and surviving hardmode enemies, not doing upkeep on my fast-travel network.
 
I don't understand the complaints; I think this new mechanic is interesting. My creativity is going to run wild and I won't have to hover 15 blocks @ 55 mph for 5 minutes to reach the jungle. Keep the updates coming Terraria team!
I think people supporting it and against it are just assuming things differently

People against seem to think prices will more than double with the old style of building, and that you need to make things fancy to get them to not actively be angry at you.

People for it think that just spreading out the houses a bit more will be neutral, and all you'll need for a pylon is to move the boxes to around the safe houses you should be building anyways, and that price changes will be minimal.
 
I do agree it is mostly very nice. Between having no new happiness mechanic, or having to grumble around it, I do actually want it in. Buuuut... The third option of a lenient happiness mechanic is better still, yes?
Edit: Pokenar has it right, there are 2 interpretations here. The reason I'm frustrated is it would be easy to iron out that with a single sentence confirming where the line gets drawn.
 
People for it think that just spreading out the houses a bit more will be neutral, and all you'll need for a pylon is to move the boxes to around the safe houses you should be building anyways, and that price changes will be minimal.
I don't mind the price changes or the work involved if it means free teleporting :), Tesla's work is finally paying off
 
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This announcement, and more importantly the Dev response to criticism of it, has single-handedly killed my enthusiasm for 1.4

I won't be playing on launch day.


I can also practically guarantee, one of the first mods to come out for 1.4 will be one specifically to disable this mechanic
 
I wouldn't say I'm complaining, I'm pretty pumped for this. But if I enter hardmode and the instantaneous line of corruption eradicates the will for NPCs to live in a town I make I'll be slightly irate. But it is what it is.
 
I do agree it is mostly very nice. Between having no new happiness mechanic, or having to grumble around it, I do actually want it in. Buuuut... The third option of a lenient happiness mechanic is better still, yes?
Edit: Pokenar has it right, there are 2 interpretations here. The reason I'm frustrated is it would be easy to iron out that with a single sentence confirming where the line gets drawn.
I definitely agree they need to clarify this stuff, they said they announced this ahead of time because it needed explaining... so shouldn't they, you know, explain things when people might have the wrong idea?
 
I decide to build multiple bases in 1.4 and now this news. Ha ha, nice. Whole world will be my base.

But i smell rebuiding houses after beating Wall of flesh and multiple NPC dying during pillars event and also from enemies that can go through walls.
 
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