Unfortunately (unless it was a glitch that got you) you made mistakes and now you're paying for those mistakes. Lost time, lost gear, lost skill is the punishment for dying. It's supposed to be a brutal survival game, and it really isn't that bad for the most part. The one aspect that could be considered brutal kicks in when you mess up big and die. It's like that for a reason, it's not supposed to feel good when your character dies. Too many games make it too easy to recover, and honestly it's usually not really all that bad in Valheim. Your stuff isn't deleted. Your character isn't reset to zero skills. It could be a lot worse.

You have options. You can do what wizard_of_woz suggested. You can grab some of your old gear and go get your stuff back carefully. Build a small base with a spawn point nearby so if you die again it won't take long to get back to it. You can make new stuff or upgrade your previous gear a little and just move to the next biome, the next resources. It's pretty rare that you absolutely need everything fully upgraded. Grab enough ore for a good shield and weapon then move on - carefully.

If you spent 2 hours trying to get your gear back and failed to do so then you've got to try something different. This game rewards planning and preparation, and sometimes you just have to cut your losses if you can't figure out a way to recover your gear. If you don't want to use dev commands (cheats) to get your stuff back, and none of these options appeal to you then you also have the option to ask another player to jump in with you to help you get your stuff back.

As for the tin and copper mining grind maybe you're spending too much time doing the same thing. Collect 10 or 20 ore, go back to the smelter then go hunting. Find a burial chamber. Build something. Just do something else while it smelts. Then go grab 10 or 20 more ore later and repeat. Don't sit in one place grinding ore all day or you will probably get bored. I don't find tin all that bad because you can find a few nodes as you explore and you aren't sitting in one spot harvesting for a fairly long time. Copper, and later iron, are the worst because they do take a bit more time. Still, you don't have to collect all that much copper since there's no need to fully upgrade a full bronze set of gear unless you're really struggling with the Elder or combat in general. I do think they could give a better bronze yield instead of the current 3:1 ratio and if they did it would cut down on the grind significantly without making progression too easy.

I found Minecraft far more of a grind than Valheim, maybe it's what you're choosing to do in the game.

Originally posted by Benjaminius:

Originally posted by Major One:

Well frankly ALL videogaming is a epic waste of time but this game isn't any worst than any other IMO, the trick here is don't think because you made this armor or that weapon you can take risk and not pay a price for it, play smart play with patience, and unless you drove your Karve off the side of the world you 'can always' get your gear back, 'it can be done', stay clam and start playing 'smarter'. ;)

I disagree that all videogames are a waste of time. I think everybody on this site would disagree with that statement.

To go into a little bit more detail about how I lost the gear: The wind shifted unexpectadly and I ended up getting my ship stuck on rocks with some really powerful (presumably end-game level) creatures. They can all one shot me (even with the best armor currently available to me).

I was exploring far from base at the time, so it is a really long trek over there and I die as soon as I get anywhere near my gear. So it isn't really a matter of playing smarter. I just can't go back to that area until later in the game.

If I tried a few times, I could possibly find some way to lure the enemies away long enough to grab my stuff and log out. But, it is such a pain in the ass getting there that it isn't really worth it.

Thanks for explaining a bit more. The wind shifting unexpectedly didn't cause the problem, you weren't paying enough attention while sailing. The wind doesn't push your boat significantly when it changes and you should have plenty of time to notice it and adjust before it was too late. If you got stuck on rocks near the shore then you were too close to the shore where the enemies could be. Try to stay a good distance from any shore while exploring on the water. I'm not trying to be harsh here, it's just that most deaths in Valheim are due to a player choice or mistake and it sounds like you made a couple mistakes. It's painful, but you can recover. I've been able to recover from every mistake I made, even when I ended up in the plains and got one-shotted.

You can absolutely change your tactics, which could amount to playing smarter. Find a safer spot nearby to land, build a small base - bring the materials with you so you don't have to gather materials which will increase your risk. Get a bench down quickly and slap up a small base just large enough for a bed with a fire nearby so you can set a spawn there. Have a spare karve or raft back at your main base in case this goes sideways, that way you can get back and recover. Ideally build a teleporter as well so you can get your gear and retreat quickly, this would also allow you to spawn back at your base and then teleport to the area where your gear was lost. I'm assuming you have access to teleporters since you're running around in a Karve and exploring.