With our turn to the mountain biomes of Valheim, there has been a focus on silver, the next critical resource. As with the turn from copper to iron, going from iron to silver made me wonder how hard or easy it was going to be to find sufficient silver nodes to supply our needs.
Using the wishbone from Bonemass, I have been able to spot enough silver nodes so far that I think we’ll manage. Some of the silver is pretty close to the surface, but if you get the high pitched fast ping from the wishbone, nodes can be pretty deep. Fergorin and I dug ourselves at least two viking warrior heights into the rock at one point before we hit the node.
I have also come up with a few items from my experience so far.
- Silver Nodes can be Big
After digging down and finding the silver, I have gone through a couple iterations of thinking “This is the last bit” only to dig a bit more and reveal more silver. The veins keep going and I have ended up with some large holes in the ground in getting the last bits out. The mountain is starting to look like Nevada, with open silver pits for people to fall into.
I have take to trying to scrape away and reveal full nodes before I start harvesting, and they can be sizable.
Silver vein exposed
That isn’t as big as some of the copper nodes, but the density is much higher. You get more ore per bite, and the bites are smaller. Also, that node ran deeper than it looks. It is kind of an interesting twist to actually be digging out veins of ore from under ground rather than the surface nodes favored by nearly every MMORPG.
- Silver is Heavy
Well, it is heavier than copper, tin, or scrap iron. I had optimized myself to being able to carry ~33 of each of those… a full stack plus a couple extra pieces… when mining. With silver I can manage ~23, which means I am running more relays back and forth to haul silver ore to the smelter down at Dieppe base.
Likewise, after smelting, silver bars are heavier. So there is a lot more walking back and forth.
- Portals Are Key
Putting a portal up on the mountain turned out to be a huge win. You still have to carry the ore down the mountain the hard way, but you can get back up the mountain immediately. That was working out so well we now have a second portal up at the other end of the mountain biome from our first.
Two mountain portals
I found a nice stone tower complex in the south that I cleared out and built up a bit. As the label indicates, it is also near Moder’s altar, the next world boss we need to fight.
We’ll be fighting down there at some point
Having the portals also makes harvesting stone from your digs very easy. I haul the silver ore down the hard way, then run stone through the portals for use later. I have managed to revamp Dieppe base with all of that stone.
Nice new crafting area
I’ve also managed to pave the whole compound, so we’re not tromping through the mud every time we go out.
- Stone Collapse Fun
Digging stone for stone’s sake can be a chore. But I did figure out a couple of ways to speed things up. The big dome-like stone outcroppings in the mountains are a good target. As with buildings, you can mine them out and they’ll stay standing so long as there is even a small connection with the ground. But if you focus on the base and sever the top from the ground, it will suddenly collapse into a shower of stone.
Stone harvesting time
Then you just have to haul it off.
- Stone Golem Harvesting
An alternative is to use your friendly neighborhood stone golem to do the digging for you. I have gotten my fighting technique down pretty well now, using the iron mace and shield, and take very little damage if I block correctly… something made easier by the golem doing one attack, then a second, then wandering around a bit before it attacks again.
I just kite the golem over near a stone outcropping, put my back to it… which keeps me from getting knocked back… and let the golem take some shots at me. He’ll nicely break up a bunch of stone that you can harvest once you’re done with him.
So we seem to be doing okay in the mountains so far.
One change I have noticed since the defeat of Bonemass is the population of hostile mobs down in the meadows. That gets dialed up with every boss. Now there are a lot of greys wandering around, up to and including brutes. But they have also introduced skeletons into the mix. They are all over now, and they fight with the greys. Some sometimes I get back from the mountains and find the front yard of the base littered with the remnants of their battles.
Another mess out front
Now I have to go out and clean it all up. We’ll never lack for resin or skeleton bones, and a bit of extra wood and stone if useful I guess.
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