I sat on the shore in my boat for about 20 minutes, unable to pull away because of the wind. I got out a few times to push the boat around - to no avail. Finally, I just gave up, ran 'home' and logged off.

You can row the boat both forward and backward. The wind does not prevent you from pulling away from shore.

That's another way that the game is actually more generous than real-life. There's not way one person could row a boat the size of a longboat into storm-force winds, but Valheim lets you do it.

Sailing works great. The wind does not always go against you. It is favorable way more often than not. In fact, just as often as you would expect from the wind compass.

Once you defeat Moder, you can use Moder power to invoke a magic tail wind that lasts five minutes. I don't bother. On the rare occasions the wind is against you, you can still make good progress rowing, and if you bring fixings for a Chappa'ai you can put to shore at sundown and sleep in your Dragon bed at night.

What is needed is for more stuff to be added to the Ocean biome, and the devs have said more is coming.

Lol? Sailing update? Fr? May as well ask for the end of world hunger.

Originally posted by Polonius Ulf:

Once you defeat Moder, you can use Moder power to invoke a magic tail wind that lasts five minutes.

So in other words, it turns your Longship into a... Moderboat? =D

rofl! Just so.

The amount that you're able to sail into the wind has nothing to do with skill (at least not in the game, where they show you exactly how you're oriented with respect to the wind and trim the sail for you), it has to do with the physics of how sails work, and I think they're already being generous, compared to how tight you can sail into the wind with a square rigger.

I think sailing in Valheim is one of the best implemented portions of the game, and "dumbing it down" would only take away from the game, not add to it.

If they're going to fix anything in the game related to water, it should be swimming, or just being able to climb out of the water.

I actually died last night in the swamps, not due to anything related to combat damage, but due to a couple of skeletons hitting me while I was in the water and drowning me. I couldn't do anything about it.

It was the most senseless death I've had in the game. Even worse than not eating while building, and dying from little nicks and scratches jumping off blocks, or sticking your head in smoke. At least that's something stupid on my part. Having a skeleton bump me into a few feet of water and being completely defenseless is just stupid.