Playthroughs and classes

[Torres The Devourer]

I've been wondering about Terraria and how I play the game. Or more accurately, how I don't play the game. When I play I always end up going master mode and focusing on melee weapons. I've tried other playthroughs focusing on the different classes but they have not been finished. I've beaten Moonlord twice, but only with my friends. So I made a drunk world as a medium core character as the sole player to mix things up. I've been having so much fun discovering new strategies and improving at the game! Bosses that scared me; I beat on my first try. I learned about potions, defense, weapons, and armor. I've learned how to not die thanks to Medium Core (although I later switched off of Medium Core after I lost a third of my important items to the void under the lava ocean in the drunk world underworld and couldn't take the pain of losing my items anymore.) It's been a journey. But now I've reached the post-Planterra phase in my playthrough and I realize that this amazing playthrough is about to come to an end.

This leads me to where I am now. I've known Terraria for years, but It doesn't feel like I have accomplished much. Melee is by far my favorite class, but I haven't gotten a solo win with Summoner, Mage, or Ranged. It's weird to say, but I don't "Feel" like a real Terraria player. I know that sounds weird but Terraria is a game I've known for years and it is one of my favorite games of all time. I am excited for the next update where you can combine world secret seeds. Playing as a tank melee set up on a for the worthy (legendary) drunk world sounds like great fun! But in the meantime, I'm not sure what to do.

As one final note, I want to ask you guys how you play the game. What do you like doing? How do you like playing? Have you conquered the hardest challenges or played each class tenfold? Have you beat every single secret seed? Etc. Any advice for a confused player like me? Thanks.

 

[Heath04🌳]

When doing playthroughs I mainly play on Master Mode no Medium/Hardcore. I do find those to be interesting challenges, although I enjoy the relaxed feel of a regular playthrough. I've been playing this game for so long that I don't feel like playing on lower difficulties they just don't keep me engaged especially in the early game. I have played all classes so when I do a new playthrough it is either in a new style or subclass a few examples are a tank mage playthrough that I did which was really fun as well as specialist ranger so blow darts, rocket launchers, really anything that doesn't shoot bullets or arrows. There are more ways to enjoy a class than just y'know going through the tree and eventually landing on your basic endgame weapon. There's people who do yo-yo playthroughs as melee or no zenith tree weapons.

There's also the creative aspect of the game which I've been enjoying a lot, as many people know I make vanities either try to copy them from a TV show or just some custom costume I think looks cool. I also enjoy building so I try to incorporate builds into my playthrough whether technical with wiring or just cool bases to add my pylon onto. There's so much you can do with just building I believe I'm close to 500 hours on journey mode alone. There's a lot of projects I'm working on, sort of waiting for 1.4.5 for more releases/updates but I'm going to try to push out some of these on Steam Workshop in the coming months

 

[Zebok]

I've been wondering about Terraria and how I play the game. Or more accurately, how I don't play the game. When I play I always end up going master mode and focusing on melee weapons. I've tried other playthroughs focusing on the different classes but they have not been finished. I've beaten Moonlord twice, but only with my friends. So I made a drunk world as a medium core character as the sole player to mix things up. I've been having so much fun discovering new strategies and improving at the game! Bosses that scared me; I beat on my first try. I learned about potions, defense, weapons, and armor. I've learned how to not die thanks to Medium Core (although I later switched off of Medium Core after I lost a third of my important items to the void under the lava ocean in the drunk world underworld and couldn't take the pain of losing my items anymore.) It's been a journey. But now I've reached the post-Planterra phase in my playthrough and I realize that this amazing playthrough is about to come to an end.

This leads me to where I am now. I've known Terraria for years, but It doesn't feel like I have accomplished much. Melee is by far my favorite class, but I haven't gotten a solo win with Summoner, Mage, or Ranged. It's weird to say, but I don't "Feel" like a real Terraria player. I know that sounds weird but Terraria is a game I've known for years and it is one of my favorite games of all time. I am excited for the next update where you can combine world secret seeds. Playing as a tank melee set up on a for the worthy (legendary) drunk world sounds like great fun! But in the meantime, I'm not sure what to do.

As one final note, I want to ask you guys how you play the game. What do you like doing? How do you like playing? Have you conquered the hardest challenges or played each class tenfold? Have you beat every single secret seed? Etc. Any advice for a confused player like me? Thanks.

Seems to me your are definitely a real Terrarian. I have not even done a master mode run yet as I am waiting for 1.4.5. As for what you should do now, there are a couple of options. You could go through the absolute throbbing pain that is hardcore mode. But I would recommend that you go the summoner route. In Terraria, defense based setups are quite op. So completing a run with a class like summoner would be quite difficult for someone that has relied on the defense of melee setups for so long. Plus summoners still have whips (which are melee weapons) so you can use imbuing stations, flasks, and all of the buff potions you would normally use. While also tackling a new challenge with plenty of new things to learn about.

 

[Green_Metaknight]

I've been wondering about Terraria and how I play the game. Or more accurately, how I don't play the game. When I play I always end up going master mode and focusing on melee weapons. I've tried other playthroughs focusing on the different classes but they have not been finished. I've beaten Moonlord twice, but only with my friends. So I made a drunk world as a medium core character as the sole player to mix things up. I've been having so much fun discovering new strategies and improving at the game! Bosses that scared me; I beat on my first try. I learned about potions, defense, weapons, and armor. I've learned how to not die thanks to Medium Core (although I later switched off of Medium Core after I lost a third of my important items to the void under the lava ocean in the drunk world underworld and couldn't take the pain of losing my items anymore.) It's been a journey. But now I've reached the post-Planterra phase in my playthrough and I realize that this amazing playthrough is about to come to an end.

This leads me to where I am now. I've known Terraria for years, but It doesn't feel like I have accomplished much. Melee is by far my favorite class, but I haven't gotten a solo win with Summoner, Mage, or Ranged. It's weird to say, but I don't "Feel" like a real Terraria player. I know that sounds weird but Terraria is a game I've known for years and it is one of my favorite games of all time. I am excited for the next update where you can combine world secret seeds. Playing as a tank melee set up on a for the worthy (legendary) drunk world sounds like great fun! But in the meantime, I'm not sure what to do.

As one final note, I want to ask you guys how you play the game. What do you like doing? How do you like playing? Have you conquered the hardest challenges or played each class tenfold? Have you beat every single secret seed? Etc. Any advice for a confused player like me? Thanks.

I recommend trying the most unique challenge playthroughs you can think of, like TheConstant Fresh Start, FTW with super annoying arenas, etc.

 

[Torres The Devourer]

When doing playthroughs I mainly play on Master Mode no Medium/Hardcore. I do find those to be interesting challenges, although I enjoy the relaxed feel of a regular playthrough. I've been playing this game for so long that I don't feel like playing on lower difficulties they just don't keep me engaged especially in the early game. I have played all classes so when I do a new playthrough it is either in a new style or subclass a few examples are a tank mage playthrough that I did which was really fun as well as specialist ranger so blow darts, rocket launchers, really anything that doesn't shoot bullets or arrows. There are more ways to enjoy a class than just y'know going through the tree and eventually landing on your basic endgame weapon. There's people who do yo-yo playthroughs as melee or no zenith tree weapons.

There's also the creative aspect of the game which I've been enjoying a lot, as many people know I make vanities either try to copy them from a TV show or just some custom costume I think looks cool. I also enjoy building so I try to incorporate builds into my playthrough whether technical with wiring or just cool bases to add my pylon onto. There's so much you can do with just building I believe I'm close to 500 hours on journey mode alone. There's a lot of projects I'm working on, sort of waiting for 1.4.5 for more releases/updates but I'm going to try to push out some of these on Steam Workshop in the coming months

Building is one of my favorite things to do, but I find it difficult to start when you get simple block houses up with messy chests in them. Now that I have some downtime after beating plantera, I can finally take a break from progression and start building! I already started in the ocean biome, and I made blue-prints for a house in the snow biome. I'll have to give journey mode an honest try. Maybe with one of those builders workshop maps will help with that.

Seems to me your are definitely a real Terrarian. I have not even done a master mode run yet as I am waiting for 1.4.5. As for what you should do now, there are a couple of options. You could go through the absolute throbbing pain that is hardcore mode. But I would recommend that you go the summoner route. In Terraria, defense based setups are quite op. So completing a run with a class like summoner would be quite difficult for someone that has relied on the defense of melee setups for so long. Plus summoners still have whips (which are melee weapons) so you can use imbuing stations, flasks, and all of the buff potions you would normally use. While also tackling a new challenge with plenty of new things to learn about.

I do have a world and character that is a summoner in the pre planterra post mech phase of progression. Maybe I can finish that playthrough!

I recommend trying the most unique challenge playthroughs you can think of, like TheConstant Fresh Start, FTW with super annoying arenas, etc.

Sounds like absolute pain, but I've been having a lot of fun on the drunk world, so I might check out the other secret seeds. Especially the more difficult ones.

 

[chewythebigblackdog]

As far as secret seeds go, if you want a difficult but fair challenge, go for for the worthy, if you want early game to be even more tedious, go for not the bees or no traps, if you want some minor twists but generally still a normal playthrough, go for drunk, the constant, or celebration mk10, and if you want a world that feels totally different from normal terraria while offering a bit of extra challenge, go for don't dig up. Get fixed boi contains a bit of all of this, it's essentially for the worthy with don't dig up's world gen (but with added tedium) and minor stuff from the rest.

I recommend trying the most unique challenge playthroughs you can think of, like TheConstant Fresh Start, FTW with super annoying arenas, etc.

What do you mean by the constant fresh start? From my experience playing the constant, it's basically just normal terraria with a handful of mechanics thrown in that get trivialized once you've killed a boss or two. If by fresh start you mean starting with no gear, I can't imagine that the constant seed does much of anything to make this a meaningful challenge (with the potential exception if doing it in hardcore due to potential early-game starvation).

 

[Dapling]

I’d say you’re a real terrarian. I don’t even do class runs anymore as they’ve long bored me (and truth be told they aren’t even the optimal way to play the game so when I want to minmax I don’t even play them then either). Not to mention the way I play the game is super slow with an emphasis on experimentation and grinding.

Basically just play the game how you like! There’s not really an invalid way to play terraria. Heck, i’m doing a challenge run with friends where we can only use weapons of our corresponding elements (I’m using Earth weapons if you’re curious)

 

[CannedPotato]

I understand that, the Terraria space has a lot of players that have done a lot of things. Just remember that you really don't have to do everything that everyone else does, just do the things that you feel like doing. If you even can second guess yourself on being a 'Real Terrarian' it means you are already there.

It has been brought up already here, but do give building a try, as well as being a nice creative exercise and a break from everything it is just a very good skill to learn for other playthroughs, making a good house can go a long way for feeling like all of your worlds are different and important but rightfully it feels difficult to get a starting point between all of the blocks, walls and paint to pick from.
For some starting places for building, I recommend trying on a journey mode world but with restrictions on the main blocks used. Here are some things you should try out to get into building.

Spoiler: Ideas for building

Try to make use of 3 or 4 different wood types to make a house, use any paint you want but brown in particular will be helpful. All of the wood types have distinct patterns to them and a lot of them go together to add a lot of texture to an otherwise blank house. Fun fact: Ebonwood has the visuals of normal wood flipped on the side, same for shadewood and rich mahogany, you can use this to create your own beam-like tiles. Through this challenge you can learn how to use 'early enough' block types to create varied houses.
Remember to treat the 'wood only' rule like a thing to bounce back into and not a 'only this' rule, if you do not know what do to next, find a way to add new visuals with wood, but if you feel like a certain other block is right for the build do that instead.

For another idea, try making a house with a predetermined frame. The best way to do this is with a friend, have them make a shape in the game (or even on a piece of paper) and try to make the build inside that shape. Even when it is still made out of basic wood it goes a long way for uniqueness when your houses are made in different shapes. Consider how you can make the house more lively with balconies, windows or other indoor features that help the unusual shape fit in to it's environment.

And for a final building idea, instead of trying to make a house fit into the world around it, try making the world around a house you have already made. This idea needs an existing 'unusual'-type house to do but I think it is really helpful still. Find or make something out of a strange block like meteorite, slime, pumpkin, martian plating or whatever you like, don't think too hard about what the build itself looks like, if you get stuck just take the easiest solution to move on. Now for the actual idea what you do next will be different depending on what you built out of, but imagine a setting where the block type is not so strange or unusual and try to create that around the house in order to give it a more natural setting. If you made a pumpkin house try turning the surrounding area into a pumpkin field, turn the land around a meteorite house into an impact site (remember to test out paints with other ores in substitute for meteorite so that the place isn't turned into an actual crash site) you can also try setting up platforms and other 'research' rooms to make the area more accessible.

After giving some of those a try, you could make a quite nice looking house in an actual world you are playing on, being confident in building is a seriously nice skill to have and is a lot more practical than you think. But in general being able to make all of your worlds distinct from each other and all valued is so important when you have played in so many worlds and want them to feel different.

 

[Green_Metaknight]

As far as secret seeds go, if you want a difficult but fair challenge, go for for the worthy, if you want early game to be even more tedious, go for not the bees or no traps, if you want some minor twists but generally still a normal playthrough, go for drunk, the constant, or celebration mk10, and if you want a world that feels totally different from normal terraria while offering a bit of extra challenge, go for don't dig up. Get fixed boi contains a bit of all of this, it's essentially for the worthy with don't dig up's world gen (but with added tedium) and minor stuff from the rest.

What do you mean by the constant fresh start? From my experience playing the constant, it's basically just normal terraria with a handful of mechanics thrown in that get trivialized once you've killed a boss or two. If by fresh start you mean starting with no gear, I can't imagine that the constant seed does much of anything to make this a meaningful challenge (with the potential exception if doing it in hardcore due to potential early-game starvation).

On the Fresh Start Theconstant I did, there was SUPER BAD WORLDGEN, and it was surprisingly fun trying to overcome it.
Though now that I think about it, not all Theconstant worlds will have that bad worldgen.

 

[Orchamut]

I've pretty much never touched a ranged weapon (besides consumables like bone spears and beenades) and I've completed about a dozen playthroughs or so.
Also I never end up finishing more than half of my runs where I try to limit my options.

 

[Stellar Mastodon 267]

I always have multi class. I’m primarily melee but will always carry around a ranged or magic weapon and will have minions with me. My go to endgame armor is Valhalla Knight even though I still use melee weapons when it boosts summon.

 

[Dapling]

I've pretty much never touched a ranged weapon (besides consumables like bone spears and beenades) and I've completed about a dozen playthroughs or so.
Also I never end up finishing more than half of my runs where I try to limit my options.

Ranger actually has a ton of unique weapons which are super fun. Most of them aren’t guns or bows, though

 

[Orchamut]

Ranger actually has a ton of unique weapons which are super fun. Most of them aren’t guns or bows, though

I think it's mostly just because I'm obsessed with hoarding items so ammo management kind of scares me.

 

[Dapling]

I think it's mostly just because I'm obsessed with hoarding items so ammo management kind of scares me.

Ammo management is very very easy after they buffed the stack sizes of everything in 1.4.4

 

[Stellar Mastodon 267]

Ammo management is very very easy after they buffed the stack sizes of everything in 1.4.4

Yeah but Ammo variety.

 

[Dapling]

Yeah but Ammo variety.

Could you elaborate? I don’t really understand

 

[Stellar Mastodon 267]

Could you elaborate? I don’t really understand

Though we ca. store more of any ammo, the variety of ammo means that the same number of inventory slots are used. Not as much extra storage as it seems.

 

[Dapling]

Though we ca. store more of any ammo, the variety of ammo means that the same number of inventory slots are used. Not as much extra storage as it seems.

Considering that you have 210 inventory slots with portable storage items I would hardly call that an issue.

 

[Torres The Devourer]

I’d say you’re a real terrarian. I don’t even do class runs anymore as they’ve long bored me (and truth be told they aren’t even the optimal way to play the game so when I want to minmax I don’t even play them then either). Not to mention the way I play the game is super slow with an emphasis on experimentation and grinding.

Basically just play the game how you like! There’s not really an invalid way to play terraria. Heck, i’m doing a challenge run with friends where we can only use weapons of our corresponding elements (I’m using Earth weapons if you’re curious)

honestly, I think class runs, while fun in their own right, are very restrictive. You'll likely get plenty of weapons of all the classes in your playthrough. Why lock yourself to just one class of weapons when you can use all of them? Ha ha!
And most importantly, thanks for the reply! I appreciate the kind words. It seems obvious to play how you like (at least to me), but sometimes I get caught up in my own mind and force myself to worry and overthink. Your elemental run is a very creative idea. The only similar run I can think of is where someone did a run with only winter themed weapons. I hope you have fun! Especially with that funky staff of the earth drop from Golem.

I understand that, the Terraria space has a lot of players that have done a lot of things. Just remember that you really don't have to do everything that everyone else does, just do the things that you feel like doing. If you even can second guess yourself on being a 'Real Terrarian' it means you are already there.

It has been brought up already here, but do give building a try, as well as being a nice creative exercise and a break from everything it is just a very good skill to learn for other playthroughs, making a good house can go a long way for feeling like all of your worlds are different and important but rightfully it feels difficult to get a starting point between all of the blocks, walls and paint to pick from.
For some starting places for building, I recommend trying on a journey mode world but with restrictions on the main blocks used. Here are some things you should try out to get into building.

Spoiler: Ideas for building

Try to make use of 3 or 4 different wood types to make a house, use any paint you want but brown in particular will be helpful. All of the wood types have distinct patterns to them and a lot of them go together to add a lot of texture to an otherwise blank house. Fun fact: Ebonwood has the visuals of normal wood flipped on the side, same for shadewood and rich mahogany, you can use this to create your own beam-like tiles. Through this challenge you can learn how to use 'early enough' block types to create varied houses.
Remember to treat the 'wood only' rule like a thing to bounce back into and not a 'only this' rule, if you do not know what do to next, find a way to add new visuals with wood, but if you feel like a certain other block is right for the build do that instead.

For another idea, try making a house with a predetermined frame. The best way to do this is with a friend, have them make a shape in the game (or even on a piece of paper) and try to make the build inside that shape. Even when it is still made out of basic wood it goes a long way for uniqueness when your houses are made in different shapes. Consider how you can make the house more lively with balconies, windows or other indoor features that help the unusual shape fit in to it's environment.

And for a final building idea, instead of trying to make a house fit into the world around it, try making the world around a house you have already made. This idea needs an existing 'unusual'-type house to do but I think it is really helpful still. Find or make something out of a strange block like meteorite, slime, pumpkin, martian plating or whatever you like, don't think too hard about what the build itself looks like, if you get stuck just take the easiest solution to move on. Now for the actual idea what you do next will be different depending on what you built out of, but imagine a setting where the block type is not so strange or unusual and try to create that around the house in order to give it a more natural setting. If you made a pumpkin house try turning the surrounding area into a pumpkin field, turn the land around a meteorite house into an impact site (remember to test out paints with other ores in substitute for meteorite so that the place isn't turned into an actual crash site) you can also try setting up platforms and other 'research' rooms to make the area more accessible.

After giving some of those a try, you could make a quite nice looking house in an actual world you are playing on, being confident in building is a seriously nice skill to have and is a lot more practical than you think. But in general being able to make all of your worlds distinct from each other and all valued is so important when you have played in so many worlds and want them to feel different.

Funny you mention the whole predetermined frame thing, because look what I made!

I admit, it's not the prettiest. I made this on Google canvas and for some reason there is no line tool (maybe I should've used Google shapes instead...)
It's not written on the paper, but this is my rough sketch for a house in the snow biome. I made a really small build in the snow biome one time in a previous world and I'm really proud of it, so I want to see if I still got that building skills in me by building something larger (not too large but something not too small). I also plan on making a floating boat house in the ocean. It's still in the first stages of building, but I plan on making it a wonderful place to hang out and fish in!

Also worth noting that while some terraria super epic hardcore veterans can complete get fixed boi hardcore super ultradeath revengance piss mode, I don't think it's my thing, or something that I would want to do, ha ha! It does make me feel a little small seeing all these awesome players complete such feats, but like you said, I don't have to do what everybody else does. And coming to accept your strenghts and weaknesses is one of the firsts steps to becoming a better player, and even a better person in general.