Tl;Dr: when you're solo, if you have bad luck spawns, good luck even getting to the uograded crafting materials. This experience made me quit valheim for now. I don't have too much time to play games and this experience I had today just took all the joy out of it. I'd rather play elden ring blind with nothing but the pot on my head and the fundoshi as armor.
Say what you will about how the biomes should be progressively harder and whatnot. And how you need your best gear and food to get going. I did all that. Fully upgraded padded armor. Fully upgraded frostner, black metal shield, and sword. Lox pie, fish wraps and bread for a good mix of health and stamina. Stamina potions, healing potions.
Took it slow with baby steps. Scouted out the area before my mistlands by using the valheim world web app so I could get an idea of where landing would be safe. Since I'm by myself (friends quit a while ago and haven't come back yet) I use the map as a guide.
Set up a safe portal at the entrance of a burial chamber in the black forest a good hundred meters or so before the mistlands entrance. Usually this makes the portal pretty sturdy as attacks hit the burial chamber stone wall, indestructible.
Grabbed my gear, my food, slept at night to get as much comfort as I could and starting out in the morning so I had plenty of time before nightfall. Grabbed my wisplight to clear the mists…. And died 10 steps into mistlands.
It was a tough spawn, seeker soldier and a gjall we're already spawned and waiting. Died mostly to the gjall while running away. Okay that one was on me. Didn't know I needed fire resist mead. Did a quick corpse run and was able to grab my gear since it was on the edge of mistlands. Came back, rested up, ate food, started the next morning.
Took out the seeker soldier with a combined sneak attack to start plus parrying and bone mass ability to block the incoming damage as much as I could.
Got the soldier down and the gjall has returned by that time. I run away back to the black forest so I could see the gjall at all times and has better ground to fight the ticks.
I defeated the first wave of ticks pretty easy then Fired some arrows into the gjall. The hp barely moved, even shooting the soft underbelly. I've popped the fire resist mead but the damage is too much. I head back to my portal….. And the gjall destroyed it with the aoe fire blasts. I hadn't had time to grab any black marble yet so it wasn't well protected apparently. At that point a combination of a tick wave and the gjall fire bomb kill me.
Okay that was just a tough fight and I need to regroup. Grab a karve, hop through the nearest portal, sail back to the mistlands portal area, defeat the ticks that were around and the gjall had moved off. Reset the portal, adding some more walls and protection around it. Reset, grab more gear and food. Repair weapons, rest up, and head back out the next morning.
10 steps into the mistlands and the wounded gjall is back. This time I was ready for it. Hit the under belly. Popped fire resist mead and yagluth abolity. The gjall thankfully dies before spawning ticks. Move on.
This time I get to explore a little. Found a dverger mining op, a dverger tower, mark them so I can come back to them and then I come across a giant skull in the ground. See hugin pop up to give a tip, approach them, and even with the wisplight I don't see the 10 ticks that are around the petrified bones. I die. 3 corpse runs and I die all three times. Once to a seeker soldier that popped up on my run and melted me even with food, wolf armor (fully upgraded) and a backup black metal sword.
It took 2 more corpse runs to get my original corpse with the good gear.
It doesn't discourage me yet so I reset and keep going. Before I can even step foot into the mistlands another gjall and seeker soldier have spawned and kill me almost instantly. Even with fire resist, yagluth, and the best gear I have.
I know that you really need the armor from the mistlands biome before damage isn't a problem. I know that eventually it gets easier and it's supposed to be a challenge anyways. But when you die 20 times, losing your portal twice because of aoe damage when you're running for your life, it just isn't fun anymore. I don't have a squad and up to this biome it hasn't been a problem. Usually by the time I've done a few corpse runs I've managed to figure out the enemies or I've gathered enough materials to craft the upgraded armor and weapons. But when you die so many times before you can even find a location that has the upgrades, the game just isn't fun anymore.
The mistlands is the most brutal biome to date. The wisplight doesn't clear enough of the mist for me to be able to sneak up on enemies to get a stealth hit and usually they see me way before I see them, even watching for the seekers trails in the mists. And the gjall is overpowered. It's fire aoe attack deals an extraordinary amount of damage, even with yagluth and fire resist mead. And with the wisplight not burning away too much of the mists at once, the only notice I get is the sound it makes. And by that time it's already gotten two potshots on me because I'm trying to climb a mountain to get away from it.
For anyone who can solo mistlands, great. Have fun. For me, the inability to even reach the upgraded crafting materials killed it for me.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/valheim/comments/zq7bmc/a_semiveterans_first_attempt_at_the_mistlands/
