I had not seen another discussion on this topic so apologies if someone has already covered it but I wanted to record some recipes for making various terrain wall structures as much to remind me how much stone is needed as to help any new players who might be curious about how valuable the hoe is in this game.

Starting in a new seed I typically re-purpose one of the existing ruined structures in the Meadows spawn area but within a few days am scouting for the location of a more permanent residence. Players have a lot of opinion on one or many bases and I tend to have a main base with satellite bases as needed. We are all familiar with base events that can turn so much of our hard work to rubble and there are many solutions out there to solve that challenge. When I locate a good location for my primary residence - usually a flat and open area in the Meadows near the sea - I like to put down a 16x16 split rail fence square that will outline what my residence will eventually become. I also like to orient the square along one of the cardinal directions so that digging my moat will have clean walls. Before taking Eikthyr I like to anticipate the first event that will hit my base which is The Forest is Moving. To meet this event I like to insure that I raise a terrain plateau in the center of my 16x16 fence line and this plateau needs to support a 4x4 simple structure that allows for 2 fire pits to one side. Such a plateau needs about 600 stone and those come from loose stones that can be found in the spawn area. Now I'm ready to get those antlers.

After obtaining the antlers from Eikthyr it is time to dig the moat to the outside of my 16x16 fence line. While working on this phase of the primary residence it is quite likely that I will get The Forest is Moving and if I'm not in the mood to take on Greydwarf Brutes and Shamans just yet I can just climb to the top of my initial plateau and ride it out. But eventually I want to not only dig my moat but also fill in the plateau to the entire 16x16 fence outline and those antlers are smoking as I need about 8000 stone from various area rock formations to finish. Usually the Meadows area can supply those and I like to flatten the top of my plateau and line the outside with a palisade and gate. This is usually good enough to survive remaining base events including The Ground is Shaking. Trolls typically sit in the bottom of the moat and glare up at me since the depth of the moat and the height of the plateau are more than enough to render them harmless. I like to re-do the residence with stone after getting the stone crafting station but a wooden residence is probably sufficient.

There are as many discussions on Forsaken combat as there are players in the game so apologies for yet one more. Since I don't have good SP combat skills I like to once again use the hoe to prepare the Forsaken arena area with an asymmetric figure-8 design. In this design, the Forsaken alter is surrounded with the larger ellipse of the figure-8 and a smaller ellipse is where I like to hide. The pinch point between the ellipses is wide enough for me to jump through after making the sacrifice and also where I can launch my range attacks against the Forsaken. The asymmetric figure-8 is actually quite effective against The Elder, Bonemass and even Yagluth and insures that creatures in the area are not able to join the party. Since Moder can fly, she requires a different combat engineering technique. From the safety of my smaller ellipse I can usually subdue The Elder with about 200 fire arrows and use a bronze ax to chop up his root attacks. His vine attack is rendered ineffective when I dodge to one side of my smaller ellipse. Bonemass usually can go down with less than 100 frost arrows when done from the safety of the asymmetric figure-8. I usually wear root armor when taking Bonemass so he can spew all he wants and his spawn attacks can be easily dealt with by using a stagbreaker. Yagluth is a little tougher as he has to be dealt with using melee and I find I have to jump in and out of the larger ellipse and engage him with the secondary attack of the black metal sword. His fire breath is useless if I hide inside the smaller ellipse but his meteor attack can still hit me. I do like to dig below a Forsaken alter if the water table allows and have an access point from the smaller ellipse so I can recover. Usually Yagluth's alter does allow this but in my seeds The Elder has been by water and Bonemass obviously does not have this option. The Asymetric Figure-8 is fairly cheap to build with only 2000 stone and can allow even a mediocre player like myself to survive Forsaken challenges. WIll it work in the Mistlands? We shall see .....