try new game

Trolls for copper, tin.
Stagbreaker for that elusive iron. I only farmed enough iron to make a iron pickaxe, lvl 5 tool bench upgrade, and the silver sword. Some left over.
Stagbreaker also for silver in the mountains. MUCH easier to find than iron.

My "no portals - no bosses" char Gudrun is fully decked out in lvl 3 Wolf armor, lvl 3 silver shield and lvl 2 silver sword. Also lvl 4 bronze atgeir. Works still like a champ in the mountains and plains.

Found a third silver vein for the upgrade of the silver sword to lvl 3.

My goal is to visit the altars of all bosses. Problem will be Bonemass, but we'll see about that. Got as far as the Elder, but the seed I'm playing on "Valheim" has large continents, so I've explored only two continents so far, and not even those fully.

I'm going to take my time. Good thing now is I can go everywhere and will hopefully not encounter major problems. I've been roaming the plains already. Stayed away from lox and tar pits. Would like to try tar pits, but I need a good mace for that and I'm hesitant about the bronze mace, if it's good enough.

Edit: Swamps is fine with lvl 3 troll gear and lvl 3 bronze buckler. Get the root armor mask ASAP for poison protection. Once you got the full root armor, you can sort of tank Abominations. You can block some of the attacks, but not all of them. You would need the iron banded shield for that. But iron is too precious, you should spend it on the pick axe.

Edit2: Yes, I know about Frostner, but haven't found the trader yet. That shifty dwarf is elusive as hell.

try new game

Never done no bosses. One world where only first boss. Clipping glitches for iron. You never get black metal or linen. Others have said ways for early finewood and finding silver. Rest of game is pretty much regular play.

Sounds like a good run, add no maps perhaps? Seeing as you have played a few times you likely won't need the crutches that most beginners do (metal armor / shields) so your metal requirements shouldn't be that much anyways, just weapon of choice and whatever tools / crafting station upgrades you need and nails for boats.

In a pinch you could reduce your copper/tin needs by not making a bronze axe. Only really needed for cutting fine wood which can be obtained initially by rolling logs together, and later by hunting down shipwrecks and recovering from stools at stone towers.

Personally I would want silver.

With wolf you can comfortably deal with the plains.
I don't like to glitch but I guess there is supposed to be some way to get in to / out of iron crypts.

Other than that...
go light armor and just outrun stuff?

Kind of hard to judge progression without using metal stuff or killing bosses.... I guess as long as you have a plains farm and have 5 totems you can call it good?

I think the end goal in a 'no boss' run is establishing yourself in the Plains; a late stage base so to speak. At least that will be my goal for the run.

Originally posted by Eightball:

I think the end goal in a 'no boss' run is establishing yourself in the Plains; a late stage base so to speak. At least that will be my goal for the run.

Typically I include getting the boss summon items. Not really an issue until the mountains.
But getting 5 totems makes it feel "complete" to me.

I guess I like to think of it as a world I can go back to and quickly deal with the bosses later and continue when the game expands.

@GunsForBucks Good approach especially since we will hopefully get new gear/weapons/consumables over time that might make those boss encounters 'different' when tried with new stuff. I think I might run with it.

Considering killing the first boss is necessary to get the basic pickaxe, and you can't get any other pickaxes without the basic pickaxe, pretty sure that's where you'd be softlocked.

You essentially can neither build nor use anything that requires mined ores/material.

Actually you bait trolls to do the mining for you. If you run them around tin/copper nodes and pause long enough at the right spot so they attack you then those attacks will crack the nodes open. Kill troll. Collect ore.

It can take a bit longer as you need to find trolls, lead them to nodes and then run them around a bit, but it works.

Finding iron and silver becomes a bit more of an issue, but both can be located and mined since you will have been able to make a bronze pick.

Originally posted by Sabaithal:

Considering killing the first boss is necessary to get the basic pickaxe, and you can't get any other pickaxes without the basic pickaxe, pretty sure that's where you'd be softlocked.

You essentially can neither build nor use anything that requires mined ores/material.

Trolls can mine for you. You can then find iron buried in the swamp or by killing oozers, and in the mountains you can use the stagbreaker or iron sledge to find silver.

Originally posted by Łαяsι σð:

You essentially can neither build nor use anything that requires mined ores/material.

Trolls can mine for you. You can then find iron buried in the swamp or by killing oozers, and in the mountains you can use the stagbreaker or iron sledge to find silver. [/quote]
How exactly do you get stagbreaker on a no boss run?

Originally posted by Sabaithal:

How exactly do you get stagbreaker on a no boss run?

stagbreaker doesnt need anything you need to kill bosses for

The Stagbreaker unlocks when you get your first piece of core wood, no need to kill any boss for the recipe and no boss parts needed to craft it.

As an aside it is a great early AOE weapon and I am surprised more people don't embrace it. It can make short work of some of the early raids as well.