Valheim is good to tell you what you need to do next, or at least that there is something you need to do. It is much less clear how you are supposed to do anything, and that is to make intimidating.
Hierin Valheim tips and trick guide, we will list our best advice for your first few hours. We will tell you about working towards definable goals, finding new art recipes, gathering resources, managing your inventory and eating food to increase your health and endurance.
For a more detailed overview of the approach Valheim‘s first boss, Eikthyr, watches our passage from Spawn to Eikthyr.
Treat bosses as goals
Valheim is an expansive sandbox, and it’s incredibly easy to get distracted by exploring, hunting, collecting or bending your architectural muscles. There are goals though, and if you work on them, you will stay focused.
Every boss – the Abandoned you call and defeat – needs preparation, and that preparation moves you through Valheim‘s complicated technology tree.
To defeat the first boss, Eikthyr, for example, you need better weapons. To make better weapons, you need specific resources and a workbench. The thing is, a workbench needs a home. A house needs a fire. And so on. The whole game is an extensive stack of dependencies, and preparing for your next battle gives you a clear path through it.
Instead of blindly wandering and building with a nebulous goal of ‘getting ready’, focus your efforts on one specific battle at a time. In fact, we have an Eikthyr guide to help with exactly that.
Resources and creatures spawn based on rules
You will collect a lot of resources Valheim. Fortunately, you can learn a set of rules to find just about anything, and it will save you ton of time.
Some rules are obvious, such as that wood is near trees or that stones are on the ground. Others need more observation. Flint is a good example: it is only found near or in water. If you want flint, look for water.
Creatures work the same. Pigs tend to be near water. Deer spawn in the whey biome. Skeletons spawn near grave rooms.
Look at the common aspects when collecting resources – your environment, the landscape or even the time of day. The rules may be subtle, but it will make it easier for you to learn them.
You stink, so look at the wind direction
There is a small arrow in the lower left corner of your mini pair that indicates the current wind direction. You also see some white stripes in the game world that represent the wind.
Animals – especially deer – are sensitive to odor. If you are upwind, a deer will run away long before it sees you. Keeping quiet while hunting means being aware of the wind (and your stench).
Get resources to learn new art recipes
It’s easy to learn new art recipes Valheim. All you have to do is pick up an ingredient. At the beginning of the game, to pick up a piece of wood and a stone, the stone ax, club and hammer are unlocked – your first set of tools. If you find flint, you will unlock the next set.
Pick up at least one of everything to unlock new recipes. However, you do not have to fill your pockets with everything you find. At that point …
Focus on what you need to collect
Your inventory has only 32 slots, and your weapons, clothing, and tools cover several of them. Space is high on price. You end up gaining weight too (it takes quite a lot).
Just pick up what you need to reach your next goal. Being prepared is fun, but (to describe Alanis Morissette) having four stacks of stone if you only need flint does not help you.
There are things you always need, like wood to build or food to eat, but do not be hoarder. Concentrate on what you need now immediately. A dozen mushrooms will keep you going for a long time, so do not stop picking each one you see.
Do not build a mansion if a tent manages to do so
During your first few hours (and probably even days) in Valheim, focuses on utility rather than extensive architecture.
Most of the time, a backrest (a very simple structure that is more like a wooden shed than a house) will serve you well – like when you first build a workbench. Do not make things too complicated and do not waste your time (and wood) building a mansion.
Similarly, a fast and temporary camping with a roof and a bed is often all you need while you are weak and new and exploring. Save the architectural expression for a central base camp.
That said, it’s nice to have a warm place to sleep between expeditions. A house with a door, walls, a roof, a fire and basic amenities offers you the following equipped effect, which increases your health and endurance for a while.
Eat different foods to increase health and endurance
You will start Valheim with a basic health of 25 … points (?), and you have a fairly limited endurance. You will both burn through quickly.
Eat foods to increase health and endurance. However, the mechanics here are a bit tricky.
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When you eat food, you increase your health and endurance for a set amount of time, and it heals you every tick (a unit of time in the game of about ten actual seconds). You see it all happen when you hold on to a (food) item in your inventory (as we did in the photo above).
You can eat up to three different things at a time. All their effects are active and stacked. You cannot eat any of the same foods until the timer is up. The icons to the left of your health bar help you keep up.
Eating food increases your endurance immediately, but it does not cure you immediately. It only increases the maximum number you can recover on. This is weird, so let’s talk about how it works with raspberries.
You have 25 health. You eat a raspberry and your maximum health increases by 10 to 35. But you do not yet have 35 total health. Over time (ticks) your health recovers to your new maximum of 35. (Check the duration in your inventory to see how long your new maximum health will last.) First you increase the meter and then fill the meter.