When my son and I first entered into the swamp on route to the next boss Bonemass, we built a small portal building right on the coast, in the Black Forest where it adjoined the Swamp. We then made a path inwards towards where Bonemass lay, making use of the hoe, placing campfires, about 100 yards apart along the path with torches in between them. This way we always had an easily visible route back to the safety of the coast & Black Forest. The small building containing our portal was surrounded by 2 layers of cheval de frise (wooden ground spikes).

I understand your frustration. Even though we took great care in preparing the area around Bonemass' altar, by raising the ground and surrounding it in corewood fence, with covered campfires along the inside of the fence, mainly to keep us out of miry ground and to keep the adds at bay, as well as offering us a place to dry off and regen stamina. Bonemass was a challenge. My son gave up in frustration after his 12th death, so I went at Bonemass solo after watching a video. I had him down to under half when my son logged on. We then both finished him in short order with no more deaths.

Keep at it. Remember if the women don't find you handsome at least let them find you handy, quando omni flunkus moritati.

What do you find difficult exactly? With maxed out bronze gear ( or even troll armor) the swamps are not hard.

To borrow an old saying, swampin' ain't easy.

The big killer in the swamp is impatience. The rain makes staying rested a challenge. You'll need to make little cabins to renew your buff. Poison resistance mead is needed to fight slimes and leeches safely. Enemies can be seen from a long way off if you have to stop and observe your surroundings. Take your time and stay calm, and you'll be fine.

Keep yer stick on the ice.

Originally posted by vinyblaster:

What do you find difficult exactly? With maxed out bronze gear ( or even troll armor) the swamps are not hard.

My thought is that one has to learn the swamp before it becomes not that hard.

Originally posted by Leftcoast:

Originally posted by vinyblaster:

What do you find difficult exactly? With maxed out bronze gear ( or even troll armor) the swamps are not hard.

My thought is that one has to learn the swamp before it becomes not that hard.

I dont know. after multiple play throughs, I still find the first trip to the swamp creepy, and tough. I seem to always think, "Im hiding in a bush waiting for day time" thats good game ;)

especially if you boated there and havent built shelter yet. buts thats the fun

For me the toughest part of initial swamp entry is the scouting aka searching for turnips. Of course I'm on the look out for crypts as well, and try to bag a few leeches and Draugr for drops along the way. I prefer to scout along a border between Black Forest or Meadows and Swamp, hopefully mostly higher ground. It seems the defenses to bomes ends up concentrated on the borders - not sure if that is actually true but seems like it.

Once I make the move into the interior of a Swamp things get much easier.

PS: biggest problem by far I have with the swamp is the darkness - my eyes aren't so good anymore and too much swamp gives me a headache.

Originally posted by smokauweeds:

Originally posted by Leftcoast:

My thought is that one has to learn the swamp before it becomes not that hard.

I dont know. after multiple play throughs, I still find the first trip to the swamp creepy, and tough. I seem to always think, "Im hiding in a bush waiting for day time" thats good game ;)

especially if you boated there and havent built shelter yet. buts thats the fun

No arguments there.

I generally always find a meadows landing or at least a rock in the sea swim-able to a black forest. That stated I was more referencing to when you have a beach head and camp established. It also helps to know when to get the hell out and what to avoid.

Swamp is the first (and I think the only) true challenge in Valheim. It's not that hard when you get used to it, but first steps are always the hardest.
Get the best food you can, max your gear, avoid the fight as much as you can and never stay at night. Stealth is the best option, and the knife will be your best friend into crypts. Also always carry lots of potions and a portal to come back to safety faster.
Just keep trying, and if it still too difficult, just ask for some help. Valheim community is always ready to help :)

What worked for me was entering the swamp only during day time and wandering around the edge of the swamp and stocking up on blood bags from leeches and entrails from dragur until I had a nice supply of medium healing meads and sausages. Once I had better food I found the crypt that was closest to the safer adjacent area (meadow or black forest) and built a small base in that area to house a portal back to my main base where my rested buff could be maxed out with the decorations I had built.

Then go back to the entrance of the crypt and build a work bench outside to keep stuff from spawning outside the crypt while you explore. Once you go into the crypt there are 3 possible paths from the entrance (just like the dungeons in the black forest). To start, ignore any that are blocked by scrap piles, none of the swamp critters can go past the scrap piles so you are safe from those paths. When you have identified the unsafe path explore it first. I've noticed that the body piles spawn mobs that are tougher if it is night outside and they seem to spawn them faster so explore the crypt during the day also. After you have cleared any areas that are not blocked by scrap plies find your scrap pile that is blocking the path and start on it. Work on one side of the scrap pile only until you have opened enough space to see into the next chamber but not enough for you or any monsters to get through, then either use a bronze atgeir or your bow to clear out any monsters and body piles in the next chamber. Once the chamber is clear finish off the scrap pile.

Repeat until you have enough scrap iron to make an iron buckler. An iron buckler is strong enough to stagger anything that you will run into in the swamps. This will put you back on par with the creatures in the swamp and you can continue playing as you have in the black forest. Clear our enough crypts to get fully upgraded iron gear and prepare for your fight with Bonemass.

Yes the swamp is the difficulty curve that teaches you a lot.

Constant rain so stamina management is key.

Lots of puddles that require either carefully walking around, jumping over or hoeing.

Posion is strong enough to kill so resitance mead is a good idea.

And of course poor visibility, so you have to really look and see what's in front and around you

One thing to bear in mind; some crypts are inherently dangerous due to layout and RNG spawner presence as well as mob type and rarity. It is quite possible to have an entrance with multiple open paths each containing one or more spawners. It is also possible that any blind tunnels may contain rare mobs and/or spawner such that it is a death trap to most swamp level players.

Bear in mind you do *not* have to clear any dungeon entirely. There are plenty of them in the world (barring large population multi-player) so mark the dangerous ones for 'do later or never' and move on. This is also true in other biomes, but in my experience Swamp is the worst for generating possible death traps that are, for a solo player, practically impossible to do a corpse retrieval from.

for me it's the Plains where the game stops being fun. I do Swamp in deer skin armor and bronze weapons. Just get that Banded Shield made ASAP so you can block/parry the 2* Draugr

As katsuragi pointed out the block/parry is an essential element to survival in Valheim. My nephew taught me this very early in the game, making me practice on trolls. Despite the fact that I was scared schlitlist, I picked up on how to do it on my first troll. This was due to the fact that a troll's attack is fairly slow and well telegraphed. It is important to bring up one's shield to block just after the troll begins its swing. Doing this will result in a successful block/parry which staggers one's opponent. A staggered enemy is weakened and your next hit will kill most enemies. From that point on I was never without a shield, a mace and a knife. Learning which weapon to use on which enemies is extremely advantageous. Because of my success with block/parry I quickly became a much braver and effective killing machine.

The key to victory in the swamp is patience. Take your time and hunt as you would in real life. The first lesson I learned when hunting is not to look at the trees, but to look through them, looking for things that are not stationary. Before long one's eyes become magnets for movement, and in the swamp that means that one can clear out most enemies with the bow before they can detect you. Another essential to surviving in the swamp is height. I love to leap onto those fallen indestructible trees. Not only are they a great place for reconnaissance, they are also the best refuge from enemies. The only thing that can hit you when standing on one of those giant fallen trees is an arrow or a wraith, 90% of the time not even an Abomination can hit you when you are standing on them. Likewise Sunken Crypts are also very useful, make sure to mark them on your map.

I would help, but it wouldn't actually be supportive, because it would go against what you want. So all i can do to prevent getting slapped by forum mods is just agree with you.

Yes, lets get this game nefed. People are dying to falling trees, we should cater to these people and make death basically impossible. GO GO TEAM EVERYONE CAN WIN!!, everyone gets a medal.

Originally posted by Vexov:

I would help, but it wouldn't actually be supportive, because it would go against what you want. So all i can do to prevent getting slapped by forum mods is just agree with you.

Yes, lets get this game nefed. People are dying to falling trees, we should cater to these people and make death basically impossible. GO GO TEAM EVERYONE CAN WIN!!, everyone gets a medal.

This....

Very sensitive and extremely bad mods here for sure. Agree that it's sad how much people complain when something isn't so simple that it's boring. First trips to the swamp should be a challenge, you're under geared. It's possibly better tho, usually you hear more that the game is too easy and people use mods to increase the difficulty. Extremely rare to hear someone saying the game is too hard.

Originally posted by Vexov:

I would help, but it wouldn't actually be supportive, because it would go against what you want. So all i can do to prevent getting slapped by forum mods is just agree with you.

Yes, lets get this game nefed. People are dying to falling trees, we should cater to these people and make death basically impossible. GO GO TEAM EVERYONE CAN WIN!!, everyone gets a medal.

This....

Very sensitive and extremely bad mods here for sure. Agree that it's sad how much people complain when something isn't so simple that it's boring. First trips to the swamp should be a challenge, you're under geared. It's possibly better tho, usually you hear more that the game is too easy and people use mods to increase the difficulty. Extremely rare to hear someone saying the game is too hard.

for me it's the Plains where the game stops being fun. I do Swamp in deer skin armor and bronze weapons. Just get that Banded Shield made ASAP so you can block/parry the 2* Draugr

As katsuragi pointed out the block/parry is an essential element to survival in Valheim. My nephew taught me this very early in the game, making me practice on trolls. Despite the fact that I was scared schlitlist, I picked up on how to do it on my first troll. This was due to the fact that a troll's attack is fairly slow and well telegraphed. It is important to bring up one's shield to block just after the troll begins its swing. Doing this will result in a successful block/parry which staggers one's opponent. A staggered enemy is weakened and your next hit will kill most enemies. From that point on I was never without a shield, a mace and a knife. Learning which weapon to use on which enemies is extremely advantageous. Because of my success with block/parry I quickly became a much braver and effective killing machine.

The key to victory in the swamp is patience. Take your time and hunt as you would in real life. The first lesson I learned when hunting is not to look at the trees, but to look through them, looking for things that are not stationary. Before long one's eyes become magnets for movement, and in the swamp that means that one can clear out most enemies with the bow before they can detect you. Another essential to surviving in the swamp is height. I love to leap onto those fallen indestructible trees. Not only are they a great place for reconnaissance, they are also the best refuge from enemies. The only thing that can hit you when standing on one of those giant fallen trees is an arrow or a wraith, 90% of the time not even an Abomination can hit you when you are standing on them. Likewise Sunken Crypts are also very useful, make sure to mark them on your map.

I would help, but it wouldn't actually be supportive, because it would go against what you want. So all i can do to prevent getting slapped by forum mods is just agree with you.

Yes, lets get this game nefed. People are dying to falling trees, we should cater to these people and make death basically impossible. GO GO TEAM EVERYONE CAN WIN!!, everyone gets a medal.

Originally posted by smokauweeds:

Originally posted by Leftcoast:

My thought is that one has to learn the swamp before it becomes not that hard.

I dont know. after multiple play throughs, I still find the first trip to the swamp creepy, and tough. I seem to always think, "Im hiding in a bush waiting for day time" thats good game ;)

especially if you boated there and havent built shelter yet. buts thats the fun

No arguments there.

I generally always find a meadows landing or at least a rock in the sea swim-able to a black forest. That stated I was more referencing to when you have a beach head and camp established. It also helps to know when to get the hell out and what to avoid.

Swamp is the first (and I think the only) true challenge in Valheim. It's not that hard when you get used to it, but first steps are always the hardest.
Get the best food you can, max your gear, avoid the fight as much as you can and never stay at night. Stealth is the best option, and the knife will be your best friend into crypts. Also always carry lots of potions and a portal to come back to safety faster.
Just keep trying, and if it still too difficult, just ask for some help. Valheim community is always ready to help :)

What worked for me was entering the swamp only during day time and wandering around the edge of the swamp and stocking up on blood bags from leeches and entrails from dragur until I had a nice supply of medium healing meads and sausages. Once I had better food I found the crypt that was closest to the safer adjacent area (meadow or black forest) and built a small base in that area to house a portal back to my main base where my rested buff could be maxed out with the decorations I had built.

Then go back to the entrance of the crypt and build a work bench outside to keep stuff from spawning outside the crypt while you explore. Once you go into the crypt there are 3 possible paths from the entrance (just like the dungeons in the black forest). To start, ignore any that are blocked by scrap piles, none of the swamp critters can go past the scrap piles so you are safe from those paths. When you have identified the unsafe path explore it first. I've noticed that the body piles spawn mobs that are tougher if it is night outside and they seem to spawn them faster so explore the crypt during the day also. After you have cleared any areas that are not blocked by scrap plies find your scrap pile that is blocking the path and start on it. Work on one side of the scrap pile only until you have opened enough space to see into the next chamber but not enough for you or any monsters to get through, then either use a bronze atgeir or your bow to clear out any monsters and body piles in the next chamber. Once the chamber is clear finish off the scrap pile.

Repeat until you have enough scrap iron to make an iron buckler. An iron buckler is strong enough to stagger anything that you will run into in the swamps. This will put you back on par with the creatures in the swamp and you can continue playing as you have in the black forest. Clear our enough crypts to get fully upgraded iron gear and prepare for your fight with Bonemass.

Yes the swamp is the difficulty curve that teaches you a lot.

Constant rain so stamina management is key.

Lots of puddles that require either carefully walking around, jumping over or hoeing.

Posion is strong enough to kill so resitance mead is a good idea.

And of course poor visibility, so you have to really look and see what's in front and around you

One thing to bear in mind; some crypts are inherently dangerous due to layout and RNG spawner presence as well as mob type and rarity. It is quite possible to have an entrance with multiple open paths each containing one or more spawners. It is also possible that any blind tunnels may contain rare mobs and/or spawner such that it is a death trap to most swamp level players.

Bear in mind you do *not* have to clear any dungeon entirely. There are plenty of them in the world (barring large population multi-player) so mark the dangerous ones for 'do later or never' and move on. This is also true in other biomes, but in my experience Swamp is the worst for generating possible death traps that are, for a solo player, practically impossible to do a corpse retrieval from.

When my son and I first entered into the swamp on route to the next boss Bonemass, we built a small portal building right on the coast, in the Black Forest where it adjoined the Swamp. We then made a path inwards towards where Bonemass lie, making use of the hoe, placing campfires, about 100 yards apart along the path with torches in between them. This way we always had an easily visible route back to the safety of the coast & Black Forest. The small building containing our portal was surrounded by 2 layers of cheval de frise (wooden ground spikes).

I understand your frustration. Even though we took great care in preparing the area around Bonemass' altar, by raising the ground and surrounding it in corewood fence, with covered campfires along the inside of the fence, mainly to keep us out of miry ground and to keep the adds at bay, as well as offering us a place to dry off and regen stamina. Bonemass was a challenge. My son gave up in frustration after his 12th death, so I went at Bonemass solo after watching a video. I had him down to under half when my son logged on. We then both finished him in short order with no more deaths.

Keep at it. Remember if the women don't find you handsome at least let them find you handy, quando omni flunkus moritati.

What do you find difficult exactly? With maxed out bronze gear ( or even troll armor) the swamps are not hard.

To borrow an old saying, swampin' ain't easy.

The big killer in the swamp is impatience. The rain makes staying rested a challenge. You'll need to make little cabins to renew your buff. Poison resistance mead is needed to fight slimes and leeches safely. Enemies can be seen from a long way off if you have to stop and observe your surroundings. Take your time and stay calm, and you'll be fine.

Keep yer stick on the ice.

Originally posted by vinyblaster:

What do you find difficult exactly? With maxed out bronze gear ( or even troll armor) the swamps are not hard.

My thought is that one has to learn the swamp before it becomes not that hard.

Originally posted by Leftcoast:

Originally posted by vinyblaster:

What do you find difficult exactly? With maxed out bronze gear ( or even troll armor) the swamps are not hard.

My thought is that one has to learn the swamp before it becomes not that hard.

I dont know. after multiple play throughs, I still find the first trip to the swamp creepy, and tough. I seem to always think, "Im hiding in a bush waiting for day time" thats good game ;)

especially if you boated there and havent built shelter yet. buts thats the fun

For me the toughest part of initial swamp entry is the scouting aka searching for turnips. Of course I'm on the look out for crypts as well, and try to bag a few leeches and Draugr for drops along the way. I prefer to scout along a border between Black Forest or Meadows and Swamp, hopefully mostly higher ground. It seems the defenses to bomes ends up concentrated on the borders - not sure if that is actually true but seems like it.

Once I make the move into the interior of a Swamp things get much easier.

PS: biggest problem by far I have with the swamp is the darkness - my eyes aren't so good anymore and too much swamp gives me a headache.