I think this game dose a lot better at not just being a survival crafting game that just has the grind loop, but I think if a good part of finding loot/materials was from fighting monsters in a monster hunter like way that would make it even way farther from the mold

like a variety of mini bosses will appear in your world and you have to hunt them down to get loot/material thats maybe considered side grades to each other and different tiers of them will spawn that have things considered upgraded loot/materials

seems like a more interesting thing to do then just mine

I know that sounds like a suggestion but i was just explaining the idea