there are definitely some places where your options amount to 'fall in hole', 'get hit by enemy', or 'wait 20 seconds and hope you can shimmy through a gap'.
Yeah, the dev team agrees -- too many enemies in the first biome right now a lot of times
if i am correct 2 hit enemies can drop 3 crystals and 3 hit can drop 5, meaning 3/2 to 5/3 gain [1/2 to 2/3 profit which is worth than crystal seed
Yup! I forget the exact numbers in the latest build, but they are definitely set in a way that should make it more economically powerful to hunt large enemies.
Because you don't have the choice and the enemy density is pretty high, an offensive strategy is very much dissuaded unless you have another offensive seed type.
Yeah definitely an unfortunate side effect of the too-many-enemies thing. I think some dodging of low health enemies is sort of fun, but it's too much/impossible at many points right now.
Basically, what this is saying in the long run is that thorns are very weak and not a good option for usage in the game in their current state.
This is somewhat intentional due to thorns being too dominant of a strategy in the past.
Right now one of the game's biggest problems is that players often don't get the opportunity to become comfortable with the non-default seeds in the game. This is a combination of it being really risky to try out a new seed, the seeds not being super polished (aiming, one of the main offensive seed mechanics, could use a lot of improving), and there being so many seeds that you don't get the opportunity to see a seed type enough to get good with it.
Right now the dev team is pushing hard to get all the remaining features we'd like in the game in the game which is why there hasn't been a build for some time. Your feedback is super valuable since it lines up with a lot of other players' thoughts, and we've been working on solutions to the problems you've been encountering in this feature push.
So, thank you again, and sorry for the slow reply!!