Game Mechanics Master Mode Unlocked by Default

[Storiann]

Hi everyone,

Tldr: Would be awesome if the upcoming Master Mode was unlocked by default and Expert Mode completion was not a prerequisite.

I'm a long time terraria fan and player. My mates and I have completed this game many times over many years. We followed Terraria closely before its initial release (who else remembers the early 2011 pre-alpha leak?!) and purchased it the instant it came out in May 2011. I have founded and solidified many friendships thanks to this game. It will hold a place in my heart forever.

Since then, we have played almost every patch upon release on both difficulties. This is with the exception of the last patch as it was a busy time in our lives with the conclusion of our studies and beginning of careers.

Over the last decade, all of us have upgraded/replaced our hardware and have lost our original worlds and characters. Cloud saves were not available when we began playing. We will be starting from scratch, which we are actually really looking forward to.

We are exceptionally excited for Journey's End, as ironically it will likely be the last time our old group of school friends comes together to play games, thus marking our Journey's End too. As I'm sure many can understand, it's very hard to convince partners that spending time with a video game can be more fun than spending time with them (watching The Bachelor with the gf vs. Terraria with the boys... easy decision for us gamers, but non-gamers will never understand!).

I don't think I can articulate how much we are looking forward to Journey's End. For us, it's a very special and unique moment to relive our old highschool days. However, we are very concerned that we will have to play through and experience all the new content on expert difficulty (which we have almost completed previously but no longer have that world) in order to experience the new Master Mode, which is the new feature we are most looking forward to.

I understand the concerns regarding inexperienced players choosing master difficulty and getting thrashed. However surely there is an alternative that doesn't remove choice from returning players.

As it currently stands, Normal Mode has grey text and Expert has blue. Perhaps having Master Mode in red text with a pop-up warning once selected would be an alternative that suits everybody.

If colour coding and a pop-up warning is ignored, then I feel it would be the inexperienced player's own fault for selecting it!

I would love to hear the community's thoughts on this.

Cheers,

Storiann

EDIT: For people unsure if Master Mode will require Expert Mode completion, see below.

 

[Dapling]

The thing is, many new players completely ignore the warnings and pick expert because “they can handle it” (spoiler: they can’t, and it’s incredibly annoying to have to explain that repeatedly.)

However, you probably will be able to unlock it by downloading a world with the correct flags of expert moon lord being defeated, similar to downloading a hardmode world to unlock picking crimson/corruption on world generation, so there is still hope for your situation.

 

[Storiann]

That's a good point about downloading a completed expert world. It had crossed my mind and is something I plan on doing if Master Mode is not available by default.

I feel however that the main point of my post did not fully get across.

My reason for posting this is that we are group of about 10 very experienced, long term Terraria players and are all in this situation. If any of us were eligible for Master Mode, I would not have made this post. If it were just me as an individual in this situation, then I would understand and would not have posted.

As it currently stands, none of us, people who have been playing the game since its initial release, are eligible to select Master Mode. This isn't because the content is too hard for us, but moreso due to real life time restrictions and not having the availability to sink hundreds/thousands of hours into the game like we once could.

I'm sure you can empathise that it would be a shame if the only way long term terraria players can play the final patch of their beloved game on the difficult it was designed for was to rely on a 3rd party work around.

My question to you and anyone else reading this is, what's more important in a near 10 year old game implimenting its final patch: increasing the likelihood a new player will have fun on the easiest game mode, or ensuring a returning player is given the choice to play the game they have invested countless hours in on the difficulty they would like?



Edit: spelling

 

[Mutisk]

I would expect it being a setting in config.json, much like
"UseExperimentalFeatures": true,
...can be set to enable world seeds.

I just cant imagine developers go out of their way to invent something new to keep things hidden that would require an actual world download to unlock it

 

[Mille Marteaux]

I just cant imagine developers go out of their way to invent something new to keep things hidden that would require an actual world download to unlock it

i mean, wasn't that basically challenge mode in pokemon bw2?

Challenge Mode increases some opponents' artificial intelligence and the level of their Pokémon, starting from 1 level and reaching 5 levels by the end of the game. Gym Leaders and Elite Four members will also have an extra Pokémon on their team, as well as different movesets and held items. Their IVs are also increased to 30. This mode is unlocked after defeating the Champion in Pokémon Black 2.


To unlock Easy Mode in Black 2 and Challenge Mode in White 2, the respective keys for each version needs to be transferred from a player with the opposite version via the Unova Link.

like, don't get me wrong, i don't agree with nonsense like this but that's just how it be sometimes.

i'd love to have it unlocked by default and there's a very strong level of dissuading you if you don't have an expert clear, but worst case is you can just go generate a character using a save editor, load them up with some optimized endgame gear and boss spawners, and go unlock master mode within 25 minutes.

... i'd really prefer it just be unlocked by default though.

 

[Dapling]

That's a good point about downloading a completed expert world. It had crossed my mind and is something I plan on doing if Master Mode is not available by default.

I feel however that the main point of my post did not fully get across.

My reason for posting this is that we are group of about 10 very experienced, long term Terraria players and are all in this situation. If any of us were eligible for Master Mode, I would not have made this post. If it were just me as an individual in this situation, then I would understand and would not have posted.

As it currently stands, none of us, people who have been playing the game since its initial release, are eligible to select Master Mode. This isn't because the content is too hard for us, but moreso due to real life time restrictions and not having the availability to sink hundreds/thousands of hours into the game like we once could.

I'm sure you can empathise that it would be a shame if the only way long term terraria players can play the final patch of their beloved game on the difficult it was designed for was to rely on a 3rd party work around.

My question to you and anyone else reading this is, what's more important in a near 10 year old game implimenting its final patch: increasing the likelihood a new player will have fun on the easiest game mode, or ensuring a returning player is given the choice to play the game they have invested countless hours in on the difficulty they would like?



Edit: spelling

The thing is, you don’t need to install the world for all 10 people. You only need to for the host, and the same goes for expert clear. I highly doubt that Red would implement a way to lock out players who haven’t unlocked it.

I feel that new players are just as important as the old ones, because if all of the new players left the old ones would eventually go extinct. The old players are able to provide better input than the newer ones, and therefore are probably more worth it to listen to. But the old ones never show up if the new players find their early experience with the game too difficult.

If you really don't want to have to search for a world on Curse, there is another option. I could provide one of my worlds with an expert world clear directly into this thread. I certainly would be willing to help with something like that.

 

[Borch TrzyKawki]

Well a compromise of a sort can always be found, my idea is that the it could unlock after you beat just one boss of the previous difficulty, surely that doesnt pose trouble for a person with right skill to take on higher difficulty right? wheres getting to a boss fight and living through it even on a normal mode does require some basic idea of how the game works.

 

[The Storm]

Well a compromise of a sort can always be found, my idea is that the it could unlock after you beat just one boss of the previous difficulty, surely that doesnt pose trouble for a person with right skill to take on higher difficulty right? wheres getting to a boss fight and living through it even on a normal mode does require some basic idea of how the game works.

I think unlocking hardmode on a Expert world is fair enough.

 

[Borch TrzyKawki]

But that would produce the problem mentioned earlier too, i think. Well in order to finish prehardmode you do need to dig to underworld, and defeat wall of flesh which requires hell bridge, and going without accesories, and hearts makes things harder than actual expert mode, so i quees its counter productive becuse it requires grind that people wanting to go straight for master mode want to avoid.

Also if newb tries and defeats first boss on normal mode, and then tries to do that on expert he gets clear comparison of how much more difficult it is, which is where he propably would revert to playing normal rather than quiting entirely it seems.

 

[The Storm]

True, but if people struggle to defeat the Wall of Flesh on Expert then they won't be playing Master anytime soon, and as for people who really want to play Master mode I'm assuming they've already played before and can just import a world. (Or maybe a secret password to unlock Master mode that's only found on the forums)

 

[Dapling]

But that would produce the problem mentioned earlier too, i think. Well in order to finish prehardmode you do need to dig to underworld, and defeat wall of flesh which requires hell bridge, and going without accesories, and hearts makes things harder than actual expert mode, so i quees its counter productive becuse it requires grind that people wanting to go straight for master mode want to avoid.

It doesn't really produce the same problem, because of how easy it is to rush to hardmode:

1. Generate crimson worlds until you get a water bolt in the dungeon surface.
2. Find some life crystals.
3. Kill the Brain of Cthulhu with the water bolt, it's incredibly easy.
4. Craft Crimson Armor and deathbringer pickaxe, and find a boomstick. You are ready for queen bee already.
5. Kill queen bee, use the bee wax she drops to craft more beenades on top of the ones she drops.
6. You need only your beenades and a single water walking potion to kill the wall of flesh now.

That's what I do when I need to rush prehardmode.

 

[Borch TrzyKawki]

But isnt the problem beeing time rather how diifficult it is? i mean how long would it take you to do 1-6 plan ? and then again in order to unlock master to go through these same steps, or rather many more since the fightr is far harder. propably even double the amount of time and effort? i dont have a good idea how long it takes but what 5-10 hours for normal mode and 7-12 for expert? if youre actually trying to be fast i quess. if someone plays for like 2h a day, unlocking both expert and master would take like between 12-22 hours? which is 6-11 days of not playing what you want? i am just quessing but it feels to me that one boss would be good enough of a message and comparison, i dont feel we need to make it be an exam of a sort.

though yeah i assume unlocking both expert and master if such was implemented, if youre doing only master unlock then i quess its somewhat shorter span of time but still feels like many grindy steps are neccessary to be made, - hellevator, -heart crystals, -movement accesories (needs goblin too), -good enough gear. beenades might be good for wof but queen itself does take time to be found, and the recipe for summon needs honey so you have to find her anyway.

 

[The Storm]

The thing is, what kind of player would play on Master on their first ever world? They'd end up dying so much and would take forever to progress, and may end up quitting the game, so making them play through a lesser difficulty first will help them understand the game more.

 

[Storiann]

The thing is, what kind of player would play on Master on their first ever world?

That's exactly my point. I don't think any completely new beginner would actively seek out Master Mode. I'm not trying to be snide - more metaphorical, but even if they did, who are you to decide how they want to play the game?

Choice is a great thing. If every decision we made were the right one, games would be horrible. They would be easy. No depth. Choice is important because sometimes making the wrong decision is a good thing. It teaches you a whole lot.

Everyone assumes a new player will select master difficult, get smashed by a slime and then quit. If someone is that easily dissuaded from games, then no level of game design can same them from themselves.

I have faith enough in people that if someone were to find themselves in that situation, they will realise their mistake and try again on Normal mode.

But isnt the problem beeing time rather how diifficult it is?

Borch, you are absolutely 100% correct. Again, apologies if I sound snide to anyone else in this thread, but you seem to be one of the few people who understand the point of this thread. Thank you.

Everyone keeps supplying work arounds and trying to explain how easy it is with a bit of help. That's exactly my point. If I personally know of 10 long time Terraria players that would not be eligible for the game mode, surely there are many many others out there. I don't make this post for myself as an individual, I make it for the betterment of a game I care about.

Is there ever a situation in which requiring out-of-client third party workarounds is a better alternative than having it in the base game? Especially with something as cornerstone as difficulty?

Edit: spelling

 

[Tunnel King]

As far as I'm aware, there is currently no requirement to "complete" the game in Normal mode before proceeding to Expert mode. I see no reason why there would be such a prerequisite for Master mode either.

The only "unlock" mechanism I know of is that you have to enter Hardmode (defeat Wall of Flesh) in any world before you can choose between Corruption/Crimson in the subsequent world creations.

 

[The Storm]

In the trailer during the world creation screen there was no option for Master mode;

Even though mater mode was announced in the very same trailer, so it's possible that it will need to be unlocked, or they just forgot to add the option to world generation.

Or perhaps master mode isn't selected upon world generation, but instead unlocked another way.

 

[Leinfors]

@Storiann

Worth pointing out that Cloud Saves were added in 1.3, mid-2015. So if you've been playing most updates as indicated, you should have Cloud Saves available of your save files, unless you all deactivated Cloud Saving for some reason. I'd definitely have you and your friend group check in on that possibility, it seems unlikely that none of you have Cloud Save files available, especially since the last major update was just under 3 years ago.

 

[Storiann]

As far as I'm aware, there is currently no requirement to "complete" the game in Normal mode before proceeding to Expert mode. I see no reason why there would be such a prerequisite for Master mode either.

That was my initial thought. As highlighted by Storm Diver, it was not present as an option in the trailer. This is what initially sparked my concern, however I understand it's a WIP and likely was't implemented in time. I did however watch a YouTube video from a popular Terraria content creator (can't remember who unfortunately) who mentioned it would not be unlocked by default. He could have also been going off the trailer as opposed to written confirmation.

I figured I would be proactive and make this post as opposed to sitting around and waiting to see if I could play or not!

@Storiann
Worth pointing out that Cloud Saves were added in 1.3, mid-2015.

Thank you for your comment - much appreciated! I do have some remaining worlds and characters on the cloud. We personally are in a position where one of my friends used to host a dedicated server (being our primary world and where we progressed furthest on) which he hosted on an external machine from his local connection. Unfortunately it seems this world with all of our progress was not backed up by the host. Egg is on his face and we tease him every time it comes up!

Most of us still have our personal characters (although their banks, being on the primary world are lost) and lesser progressed worlds, but even if we could get our old world back, we would still plan on starting fresh for Journey's End.

I understand there are things we as individuals can do to work around it. This post however, was made not to seek help, but more so to be a voice for other gamers who enjoy difficult and challenging content .

Thanks for your continued hard work!

 

[Dapling]

I did however watch a YouTube video from a popular Terraria content creator (can't remember who unfortunately) who mentioned it would not be unlocked by default. He could have also been going off the trailer as opposed to written confirmation.

If the youtuber in question was either Chippygaming or Khaios, they actually designed the journey’s end trailer, so that means that they have a high likelihood of being correct.

 

[The Storm]

I am curious to see how it is unlocked if it's not unlocked by default, perhaps you may need to defeat any boss and receive an item which permanently changes the world to Master.