Biomes & Nature Terraria's Dynamic Wildlife: A Proposal to Breathe Life into the World

[OlleWernersson]

You're running through the Forest and there are no Slimes or Bunnies? Running through the Desert and there are no Birds or Scorpions? Running to the Ocean and there are no Crabs or Dolphins?

Right now, it feels like the Terraria wildlife is not living its life when you are not there. It is not until you arrive that there will slowly be some animals attending.

Proposal
Consider if you are moving to a location that you haven't been to for a while(24 Terraria hours), that a certian amount of mobs would have the chance of being spawned in that generall area upon arrival.

This will make it feel like you are moving through a living Terraria. Take a look on a example on how it works in the current state of the game:
When you first arrive:

After a long wait...

Arriving should be like the one below! Don't you agree?
Do you find it annoying to have to wait for sharks for 10 minutes just to get enough fins? How about visiting the oceans once a day and seeing if there are any sharks waiting for you?

What would this feature achieve?

• Provide the feeling of being in a world where mobs are living everywhere and not just where you are.
• Make traveling more interesting as you would encounter far more mobs, also making pylons feel even more powerful.
• If you are looking for a specific mob then you dont have to wait for it to spawn, you just have to "find" its location.

Spoiler: Implementation Thoughs

Potential Problem
Imagine a scenario where you are moving through an area you haven't been in for a while, and many mobs are there as this feature is turned on. However, you ignore the mobs and continue on, which causes the mobs to despawn. Then you move back, and now it is considered a newly visited area, so not many mobs are spawning, and it is as if the mobs just disappeared.

Potential Solutions

• This isn't a significant problem, as it would be hard to ignore all the enemies that spawn. Therefore, it doesn't necessarily need to be fixed.
• Let ignored locations like this not count as newly visited if a certain number of enemies haven't been killed.
• Have areas remember which mobs were there until enough time has passed that the mobs probably should have changed. When moving back to this area, the remembered mobs would spawn again.

Potential Problem
The increased number of mobs that spawn will lead to increased lag when flying through the world or taking a minecart ride through the caves. It could also cause us to die when trying to speed through the caves with a minecart.

Potential Solution
The number of mobs that have a chance of spawning in certain locations will be fewer than in others and doesn't need to be excessively high to address the problem of the Terraria world feeling unalive.

 

[ANejat🌈🪨]

How did you get them to say that?
Also, neat idea!

 

[OlleWernersson]

How did you get them to say that?
Also, neat idea!

I wrote "improve this text""" and put my suggestion in between the "".

Thank you!

 

[ANejat🌈🪨]

I wrote "improve this text""" and put my suggestion in between the "".

Thank you!

Thank you!
Also, no problem!

 

[Heath04🌳]

I feel like you can break this with afk farms

 

[OlleWernersson]

I feel like you can break this with afk farms

Do you mean that you believe that there could be a way to make afk farms too good if this was implemented?

My thoughs about how this will affect afk farms is that as long as the farm is confined to a certian area and is not absolutely ridiculously big, it will not have a significant impact. It would be easy to increase the duration an area would need to be untouched before allowing for additional spawning.

I could see this feature reducing the need for afk farms as you would just need walk around alot to find many mobs

 

[Heath04🌳]

Do you mean that you believe that there could be a way to make afk farms too good if this was implemented?

yes

My thoughs about how this will affect afk farms is that as long as the farm is confined to a certian area and is not absolutely ridiculously big, it will not have a significant impact.

almost always the case of em being big and not confined to a certain area

I could see this feature reducing the need for afk farms as you would just need walk around alot to find many mobs

not the reason people make afk farms

 

[OlleWernersson]

yes

Could you elaborate on which kinds of AFK farms could become 'too good'? And why would they be considered too effective?

almost always the case of em being big and not confined to a certain area

I believe we have two different visions in mind here. I'm thinking that this would only significantly increase spawns in locations that haven't been visited, let's say for one day. And this would only affect the specific area that hasn't been visited, without contributing to spawning in other areas.

So, when I say 'absolutely ridiculously big,' I mean an AFK farm that would need to be large enough so that you don't cycle through it more than once every Terraria day. Otherwise, I don't see how this would impact the AFK farm.

not the reason people make afk farms

Alright, I understand that AFK farms are designed for 'afk' purposes, and it's great that people create them. I was just considering that maybe some individuals feel obligated to construct an AFK farm in order to obtain a specific drop or money. However, with this added feature, perhaps fewer people would feel compelled to do so. Of course, AFK farms can still be built by those who choose to build them.

 

[Digital Lion]

I love the idea, two thumbs up