Originally posted by canned ham 91:

Flare, if I generate a new seed, does my character lose all his XP and the equipment he has in his backpack?

Maps and characters are separate. New characters don't affect your maps, and new maps don't affect your chars. Fyi. So if you "give up" on your current map, you could just play your same old toon on a new map. Doesn't seem much different than playing it on your current map though, except maybe if you got a problematic seed/map. Map layouts being roughly equal, it means that deleting your toon/map and starting over wouldn't really change anything. You're naked with nothing either way; at least with your current toon and map, maybe you have some existing infrastructure you could leverage, familiar geography, and some skills?