Game Mechanics Move frost moon and pumpkin moon to post-mech (and hardmode ore balancing)

[muovd🌳]

We can all agree that waiting for the plantera bulb after the mech bosses is very boring and weird. There is pretty much nothing you can do at this point, besides the tier 2 old ones army, which is pretty useless considering the awful drops. Buffing the old ones army drops is something for another thread.

The progression in terraria in hardmode now consist of mining (or fishing, but that is painful) for the hardmode ores:
Hardmode ore balancing
Starting off your hardmode world by doing the same thing every time. Smash all the altars and die to wraiths. Mine the first tier of ore. Make the first tier ore pickaxe. Mine the second tier ore. Make the second tier pickaxe and anvil. Mine the third tier ore. Make the third tier pickaxe and forge. There is no reason to make Cobalt or Mythril weapons or armor, as you will only make the next tier pickaxe and make the last tier armor. This can be fixed like how calamity does it, but an easier way would be to give a reason to make the first 2 tiers of armor. This can be done by giving cobalt and mythril a unique set bonus. The weapons can get the buffs i mentioned in the ore swords weapon balance.
I personally dispise this part of the game, and would wish there was a way to get the mythril anvil and adamantite forge without having to mine or fish for them for 30 hours. A solution for this would be to let Queen slime drop these crafting stations or the materials needed for them. This gives the players that do not need the ore armors a way to get the anvil and forge without having to mine/fish anyway.

After the queen slime, you can fight the mech bosses, which are a fun and action-packed part of progression. Nothing needs to be changed about the mechs themselves.
After the mechs, however, you have to wait a long time for the plantera bulbs and life fruit to spawn. (i know life fruit can be found after one mech, it just makes more sense to be found when you're searching for the bulb)
During the time you have to wait for the bulbs to spawn, there is not a lot to be done.

After plantera, the progression becomes very fast, with a lot being available right now:

• The dungeon transforms into the post-plantera dungeon, with the best pre-moonlord mage armor set being available now.
• Biome Keys can now be used to open Biome Chests in the Dungeon
• The Cyborg NPC arrives and moves into an available vacant house, thus allowing the Princess NPC to arrive as well.
• The Traveling Merchant begins selling the Pulse Bow.
• The Truffle begins selling the Autohammer, used to craft Shroomite Bars and upgrade rockets sold by the Cyborg. The best ranged armor set is available now.
• The Witch Doctor begins selling several items related to minion summoning, as well as the Vial of Venom.
• Butchers, Psychos, Nailheads, Deadly Spheres, Dr. Man Flies and Mothrons will start spawning during the Solar Eclipse event.
• The Prismatic Lacewing starts spawning in the surface Hallow, allowing the Empress of Light to be summoned.
• The Pumpkin and Frost moon are available now, with the best summoner armor being available right now as well.

All of this is way too much content to get only after plantera. To make the progression better, the Frost moon and Pumpkin moon should be moved to the post-mech or post- one mech stage instead of post-plantera. This would also prolong the amount of time that the loot from the event is viable. Considering that the event gets progressively more difficult with every wave, underprepared players would only go to the earlier waves, while the prepared and skilled players would be able to get the best loot.

 

[thisisabadname]

I don't think such a major progression change is good for the game, nor do I think that this is the way to go about making the moons more relevant. Could be neat for don't dig up maybe.

 

[fork_head]

i don't think this is really the way to go about things

imo they should buff golem and cultist a lot, a lot of players just faceroll them and immediately get pillar gear which is sufficient to take on moonlord

or they could make duke fishron or empress a mandatory boss before or after golem

or even make a new boss altogether

There is pretty much nothing you can do at this point, besides the tier 2 old ones army, which is pretty useless considering the awful drops. Buffing the old ones army drops is something for another thread.

this is not necessary either imo. t2 has tome and phantom phoenix and all of the t3 weapons are excellent except for sky dragon's fury. if anything t1 could use a buff, 5 medals per run isn't really anything to be happy about

 

[The lil duck]

I don't think such a major progression change is good for the game, nor do I think that this is the way to go about making the moons more relevant. Could be neat for don't dig up maybe.

I agree but good effort

 

[J Bame]

A solution for this would be to let Queen slime drop these crafting stations or the materials needed for them.

Almost every person fights Queen Slime with basically the same gear they would use against the Mechs, the two are comparable in difficulty with Queen Slime being slightly easier at best. I genuinely dont understand how you can suggest this like she were basically a glorified PreHardmode boss.

• The dungeon transforms into the post-plantera dungeon, with the best pre-moonlord mage armor set being available now.
• Biome Keys can now be used to open Biome Chests in the Dungeon
• The Cyborg NPC arrives and moves into an available vacant house, thus allowing the Princess NPC to arrive as well.
• The Traveling Merchant begins selling the Pulse Bow.
• The Truffle begins selling the Autohammer, used to craft Shroomite Bars and upgrade rockets sold by the Cyborg. The best ranged armor set is available now.
• The Witch Doctor begins selling several items related to minion summoning, as well as the Vial of Venom.
• Butchers, Psychos, Nailheads, Deadly Spheres, Dr. Man Flies and Mothrons will start spawning during the Solar Eclipse event.
• The Prismatic Lacewing starts spawning in the surface Hallow, allowing the Empress of Light to be summoned.
• The Pumpkin and Frost moon are available now, with the best summoner armor being available right now as well.

Most of these are massively stretching out what counts as "Content"; An NPC arriving or a couple weapons becoming available is not even close to being the same kind of content as a whole event, biome or boss fight would be.

Prismatic Lacewings and Moon events, while available post plant, are designed for Post Golem in difficulty and drop quality. Because of this, Post Plantera is actually an extremely short tier, because Golem is an easy fight and gives access to better gear than anything in post plantera.

besides the tier 2 old ones army, which is pretty useless considering the awful drops. Buffing the old ones army drops is something for another thread.

The weapons are not the best but the armors are actually extremely strong, loot is not old one's army's problem (and even if it was, fixing its issues would be 10x less work than retiering these 2 events)

 

[Salty_]

1. It really doesn't take that long to get hardmode ore stuff. Just pop a spelunker potion and walk through the caves you've explored in pre-hardmode.

2. The moon events are clearly post-plantera difficulty, a pre or post mech character would just get obliterated.

3. The reason there's so much content after post plantera is because this is where the class split gets really big; the four classes scatter to get their next sets of gear, spending more time in some areas and less time in others. For instance, ranger doesn't really have much to do in the temple and eclipse, but gets a lot of cool stuff from the moons and dungeon. In contrast warrior needs the temple and eclipse for their next weapons but doesn't care as much about the dungeon.

4. Cobalt, Mythril, and Adamantite sets used to have a much bigger purpose; you combined the chestplates/picks/swords/etc from each ore tier to make the hallowed version with the souls from the mech bosses. This was replaced by hallowed bars, which is why I hate hallowed bars, as it was much cooler to combine your armor sets into one really cool armor set and it made Excalibur and hallowed armor feel more earned, rather than just farm destroyer.