Having defeated Moder, we were set to move into the plains biome of Valheim. The plains biome holds a bit of lingering terror for us, it being the home of deathsquitos and fulings and lox and a place where we keep managing to wander into while still too low level, requiring elaborate rescue missions, which often become epic tales on their own. It is a place we seem to die a lot.
I got lox stomped right on the edge of the plains… now to get my stuff back
We’ve had a couple of those rescues in this round of Valheim.
But we are also slightly more competent on this run through. Practice makes, if not perfect, at least improvement at times. Even as we had been out searching for Moder we had been pressing into the plains to scout, knowing we would eventually need to have some sort of outpost there.
We would need that because, for the next round of cooking and crafting, you need to be able to plant and grow crops that will only thrive on the plains. Flax and barley are a pair of plains only crops, so we couldn’t, as we had done with carrots, turnips, and onions, just bring the seeds back to our base to cultivate.
However, we have also been somewhat conservative on the base front this time around. In the past we have built out full fledged, full service bases in all the biomes. This time around we’ve tried to bring everything home to our initial base in the meadows.
I had been out exploring and had run into one end of a plains biome that met up with some meadow, black forest, and swamp… and there happened to be a fuling camp pretty much at that intersection of biomes. (Just to round things out, there was also a mountain biome not very far off.)
I had been slowly picking off the fulings carefully before we started on Moder.
The plains mist will protect me!
the Bonemass buff and some nearby structures helped me get past the berserkers.
Just out of his reach
As it turned out that little corner of some plains, with a portal setup and some semi-safe meadow nearby seemed about right to setup a plot of land to do our requisite farming.
It started with just a cultivated plot of land, but it turns out that the local lox just hated us growing our crops out on their turf, something they demonstrated by stomping most of our field to pulp. Well, you cannot destroy fully grown crops, so they essentially harvested them for us, but that was luck on our part. Had they not been ready for harvest we would have lost them. So Potshot got our there with the hoe and a pile of stone and raised a wall around our plot of land.
Our farm base, now walled in
I had started by trying to build a stone wall, but the advantage of the raised earth wall is that mobs cannot knock them down. My walls were taken down and this one was raised… which also proved to be tall enough to not only keep the lox at bay, but also the occasional wolf pack event.
Picking them off from the top of the wall
The wolves also tore up the three lox that respawn there every day, so it was a bountiful harvest.
That gave us our source of flax and barley. Back at the main base Potshot expanded workshop area to fit in the artisan table, the blast furnace to process the black metal… some of which I had already collected… and the spinning wheel to turn flax into linen thread.
The workshop in action
Then out back we erected the windmill to process the barley into flour.
The windmill with the beehives in the background
I don’t think we get as much wind in the meadow as one might on the plains. The barley processing is a bit slow… though it is also well beyond the needs of just the two of us. As with the past crops, it wasn’t hard to expand our reserves well beyond any immediate need.
Then there were lox meat pies to be made with the flour and collected meat.
The food storage and supply area… pies in the oven
With that we were pretty quickly able to start upgrading our gear to the latest level, which is padded armor in the plains. That and a black metal sword to replace my iron one and we were soon out exploring the plains and making new friends.
Playing with the fulings
The upgrades make a difference. I had been collecting iron scraps in advance, remembering that padded armor uses that and linen thread. With that we began to expand across that bit of plains, and on the far side of it we had a bit of luck when Potshot ran across Yagluth’s altar. It was nearby a fuling camp that he had cleared, so a portal was setup there to facilitate the coming battle.
Yagluth is summoned there
That pushed us to the ends of that bit of plains, but it was a nice set of finds.
The plains uncovered… also, the spot where that lox did me in
There are also some tar pits to deal with, but those don’t hold the terror they once did.
Now we’re building up supplies for the next big boss battle, and exploring further abroad to find the edges of the mistlands, the next biome and the first new one we will get to look into this time around.
Another plains fuling tower to take out
Coming soon, the mistlands.
The Ancient Gaming Noob 