Originally posted by Hovercraft:

I guess I just suck at this game.

Good guess but that means you can only get better.

Try using other seeds for gathering matt if it is in low supply on your original.

Originally posted by Hovercraft:

Originally posted by PakaNoHida:

Where exactly is the problem?

Make a temp shelter when traveling maybe?

Upgrade your equipment?

Problem #1: No Tin to upgrade my equipment
Problem #2: Incessant harassment by fauna when looking for tin causing bronze equipment to break.
Problem #3: No tin to make a forge to fix the bronze equipment "locally" to the ore
Problem #4: Upgrading equipment seems to level up the fauna
Problem #5: Trolls in meadows and near ore
Problem #6: The equipment, even at the maximum level for the character is severely inadequate.

Anyway to reduce the difficulty?

If I wanted to struggle for "fun" I would just do something in real life.

Originally posted by Hovercraft:

I guess I just suck at this game.

If you Dig out copper the right way you are left with a giant hole which is great for mini hub spots for check points as you travel gathering the stuff you need. Also WTF do you mean no Tin to make a forge??? you need Stone x4 - Coal x4 - Wood x10 - Copper x6 to make the forge. Now to upgrade the forge you will need Tin, but to make it no.

maybe get into the habit of transport a portal with you... 2 red cubes that you find in crypts, 20 fine wood and 10 dwarf eyes. you will need 2 portals 1 at base and 1 in your inventory so when you go on a harvesting run and your inventory is full make the portal GO back to your base unload then return. Now YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE to transport tin (or any metals ) threw the portal but all the rest should be good.

You might need to slow down - the first boss Eikthyr is quite easy to beat so it is tempting to go storming into the next biome before you're ready. When you brave the Black Forrest and crypts you need the following (especially since you're a noob - an experienced player could get by on less but you want to do things safely):
1. well-established Meadows base, preferable near the Black Forrest and on the coastline. Well-established means a log wall and an upgraded workbench, plus storage and 2-3 beehives. Congrats you will now survive most raids from wildlife/ greydwarves. If you want to be extra safe from trolls, use your pickaxe to dig out a moat/trench.
2. Upgrade your leather armour
3. Don't go into a crypt without a shield and practice using it. Greydwarves and skeletons are extremely easy to stagger once you are used to the timing of a block. 1 or 2 star skeletons may kill you in crypts easily at this point, so go slowly and master blocking.
4. You need an upgraded crude bow and fire arrows.
5. Try to have the best food currently available to you.

Lastly in early game try not to go anywhere near the Black Forrest at night (just avoid being outside your base at night in general). Mobs will spawn more rapidly and are super annoying while you're trying to mine. If you find a good spot for copper and tin but you're too far from your base for comfort, again, slow down and spend a few minutes building a workbench and a rudimentary shelter with walls, a door, a chest, a bed and fire. When you have all your materials you can run a few loads back to your 'main base' for smelting/ crafting. If you are on a coastline it is worthwhile to build a Karve (boat with storage slots) as it is often much faster to move materials by sea than by foot.

It can seem a bit intimidating at first, but once you've mastered that biome and are through to the next tier of materials, the Black Forrest seems like an absolute piece of cake.

What I do to combat the tedious travel times is establishing a portal network. I usually name portals something I have an easy time to remember like this for instance:

1. Boss (near the first boss)
2. Boss (near the 2nd boss)
3. Boss etc
Black Forest 1 (in Black forest)
Black Forest 2 (in another Black forest)
Swamp 1 (in the swamps)
Swamp 2 (in another swamp)
and on it goes....

Then I have a single portal in my base I just continually adjust to all these mini-hubs I've placed all over the world. Go raid some of the Burial Chambers in Black Forest for the Surtling Cores, so you can start making your own network.

Also, from the things you describe you do seem very inexperienced at the game, so my guess is your biggest struggle is gonna be with your own patience. Be patient and let yourself learn the game. Things become easier over time.

Edit: Oh yea, I also place a little marker on the map to indicate where I've placed my mini-hubs and with the corresponding name to make it easier to get an overview

My main advice would probably be to slow down.
I too only got the game a few days ago, but I have pretty much free movement around Black Forest with only trolls, greydwarf hives and especially nasty rooms in burial chambers posing potentially major risks, and all of those are realistically perfectly fine to kill so long as I don't get too cavalier, and I don't even have bronze yet.
Learn the attack patterns and weaknesses of the mobs, and get used to watching your stamina whilst kiting. Trolls are fairly simple to kill with fire arrows, usually without taking a single hit, once you can manage your stamina.
Always be carrying multiple food types ready to eat, when you're about to get into a fight with anything that can actually hurt you to any degree scoff a couple different things to get your max health and stamina up and have good health regen. Going into a fight with your health around 100 and regenerating gives you a vastly better chance to tank a few hits than if you've only eaten some berries and have ~30 HP.
The more time you spend doing stuff the better your skills will be, assuming you can break out of the frequent death cycle, and they make a huge difference. Especially things like Run (reduced stamina drain whilst running), weapon skills (more damage) and blocking (more damage blocked) make a big difference to your characters effectiveness, particularly in larger/longer fights. But above all else being able to Run is critical, if you've accidentally pulled far too much aggro then just run away until enough of the mobs have lost interest, or least become strung out enough that you can take a 1v1 or 1v2 against the closest ones then go back to running whilst recovering health.

Everything that ckempsta wrote. I'd add one thing: you got a couple of the antlers when you killed the first boss. Take 2 pickaxes with you when you go mining. You'll be able to mine more ore than you can carry. And food. Food quality really is the big thing in this game. You can't survive in Black Forest on the same stuff that got you through the Meadows. Spend a day just foraging for the ingredients for the foods- deer meat, boar meat, mushrooms, blueberries. You're going to need the hides and leather to upgrade your gear, so keep everything you collect. As for tin- it's along almost every waterway in Black Forest. Look along the stream banks as well as the coast. For me, tin was always easier to collect than copper but every map seed is different. If you run from a troll, mark its location on your map and stay away from there until you can kick its butt. Good luck. If it was easy, Odin wouldn't have asked you for help.

Keep in mind that each time you die you lose 5% of your skills.

Skill level is actually pretty important. It adds to damage dealt and reduces stamina use.

Also being rested increases the rate you gain XP

So going slow and careful is really the easier way to go.

At this point you might just want to start a new world and character and apply what you have learned.

It sounds like you are running around in the black forest with skills around 0 to 10.

In terms of how to move. If you need to stealth and avoid then only check edges along meadows, don't go in deep just scout around and mark resources. Typically once your skills and equipment are up to max meadows level you should be able to handle a troll. That should drop enough hide to make at least one piece of troll armor,

With that armor level you should be able to start handling the black forest stuff. The trick there is not to let them build up. Kill everything before going on.. that way when you run into a troll you don't have a pack to catch up and make things worse.

The main key points though. Keep well fed and rested. Play slow, no need to even kill the first boss until you have items from the black forest to process the ore.
Take it slow and easy and play carefully... skill points are precious and make a big difference, do all you can to protect them.

To view your skills hit Tab and it has an icon in the upper right.

Where exactly is the problem?

Make a temp shelter when traveling maybe?

Upgrade your equipment?

Originally posted by PakaNoHida:

Where exactly is the problem?

Make a temp shelter when traveling maybe?

Upgrade your equipment?

Problem #1: No Tin to upgrade my equipment
Problem #2: Incessant harassment by fauna when looking for tin causing bronze equipment to break.
Problem #3: No tin to make a forge to fix the bronze equipment "locally" to the ore
Problem #4: Upgrading equipment seems to level up the fauna
Problem #5: Trolls in meadows and near ore
Problem #6: The equipment, even at the maximum level for the character is severely inadequate.

Anyway to reduce the difficulty?

If I wanted to struggle for "fun" I would just do something in real life.

No tin? I'm not buying it. Dark forest coasts are littered with the stuff. Just explore a bit further perhaps. Maybe make a boat.

Tin isn't everywhere on the BF coasts but it isn't non-existent either.

Trolls don't spawn in Meadows, and you can lure them away from ore they're "guarding" even if you don't kill them.

A level 3 workbench allows for perfectly adequate gear to survive in the Black Forest.

I guess I just suck at this game.

Get the mod that lessens tool and weapon wear. I use the endless torch and fire mod and the stronger building material mod also. Valhiem Plus it is called.
This is such a well done game that I use fewer mods for it than any other I can think of.