Valheim, an open world crafting and survival sandbox that takes place in Viking Purgatory, is filled with deadly enemies. There are goblins, skeletons, Draugr and trolls that any player who sees them will fight. But the absolute greatest danger in the world turns out not to be a gray dwarf or a lightning-shooting moose, but the humble tree.
This is not a supernatural phenomenon at all, such as a terrifying graft or a spell of nature. Just normal, large trees in the world turn out to be surprisingly deadly. Valheim has a robust physics system, especially compared to many other survival games. When you mine ore, the rocks around the copper are knocked away; enemy corpses will fall down a steep hill.
This also applies to trees. In some games, a tree falls harmlessly and then disappears without collision detection. In Valheim, when a log goes down, it goes down difficultFalling trees can knock unprepared players through wooden bases at once. They don’t mess around. This is a game where it is absolutely necessary to shout “TIMBER” or else you will squash your friends (or yourself) like little bugs.
To make matters worse, enemies can topple trees by performing area attacks. There is nothing that makes a Viking feel more foolish than keeping their distance and hitting a troll with arrows, only to miss the giant tree trunk crashing on their heads.
If you’re not worried about deadly trees just yet, trolls and other large monsters can grab fallen logs and use them as improvised weapons. There’s nothing more terrifying than flying a troll across the Black Forest feeling a wave of triumph as their health drops … only for them to hit you with a log and turn you into Viking salsa.
Players usually take this up in a good mood, but some are already trying to find ways to get around the tree problem. Some groups build logging camps far from their main base where they can cut down trees without worrying about losing longhouses or carefully built workstations. Other players try to use the logs as makeshift bridges – or even as the basis for other construction projects that go so far into the sky that nothing can hit them.
Valheim is a whole new game, still in early access. It’s likely that as development continues, developer Iron Gate will add much more deadly threats to the world. But for now, tree trunks seem to be one of the most deadly elements of it ValheimNo one suspects that a tree that appears harmless is a weapon of mass destruction. For now, the best thing players can do is keep physics in mind, shout “TIMBER” when necessary, and never stand at the bottom of a hill while cutting down trees. If you die, don’t worry – it’s actually a rite of passage at this point.