Originally posted by FissionChips:

So.. we're discussing how the biomes are when you first enter them, assuming you bothered to bring decent gear from the previous biome?

Mistlands is the worst. The mobs hit like a truck, sure, but they're manageable - the problem is the mist makes it take forever to find anything. You can sprint the plains, or sail passed, and raid villages willy nilly. Mistlands is like finding a needle in a hay stack with a drop of dew for a magnifying glass.

Swamp is the hardest. It's the first real long boat ride you'll ever have to do, arrive cold wet and unrested, spawns are relentless. Sure you can set up in a side biome before dipping toes, but even so you've a good chance of wave after wave of graydwarf and trolls before you can even get a portal down and port home to rest. Then you can fight for several in game days against waves of dragur, skeletons, leeches, and blobs to try to even get into the swamp to poke around.
Of course, it can go the other way too - pull up karve into a shallow, whack it down, throw up a portal in a building, bam swamp set up. Nothing much spawns and you're good to start hitting crypts. It's really quite weird, swamps are either 0 or 100 - no inbetween.

^^^ Yep the steepest learning Curve for a beginner is Swamp.low vis, low gear, aerial enemies... and darkness tod balance confusing at first. unles u happen upom a plains like i did and died in ocean on a raft.:-) beginner trap :-) was way to far from anything