So what about spears in B42 ?
Being a long time veteran, I was surprised with all my B42 runs that I didn’t touch spears even once. I guess I just forgot about them, and it didn’t help that spears basically vanished in recent weapon discussions.
So last night, I made a new save on Extinction with the explicit purpose of discovering all about them, using them and just get a plain feeling about this weapon category after ignoring them since B41.
Right as I start in Valley Station, I noticed the first big change : you don’t use planks anymore, you use saplings. No problem ! It’s a bit more realistic after all, and planks were a bit too easy to come by. So after a few days of stomping and searching, I got lucky and got myself an almost intact hatchet from a zombie. I cut my first tree and boom, sapling. I carve the spear and decided to take this baby for a ride.
I kill 3 zombies before it breaks.
Fine.
I cut down another tree. No sapling. I take down another. Still nothing. I had it on the third try. My hatchet’s handle is barely hanging on, and the axe’s head lost a third of its durability.
I kill 5 more zombies with my second spear.
Now, I’m getting frustrated because I was more efficient in my screwdriver-only run. I think I’d make more of a killing using spoons.
I search up the recipes and best ways to reliably get spears without needing the entire Rosewood fireaxe arsenal at my disposal.
I tried stone axes but the time to make one, compounded by the fact that they seem to cut 2 to 3 trees max, makes it even more tedious.
Another way is to search rakes and mops, but for that I’ll need to kill 20-40 zombies per house to have the CHANCE to get a single spear out of it (and it would kill less than 5-10).
You can make spears more durable by hardening them with fire but you either need to be lucky to get the “wilderness survival” magazine, or you grind to spear LEVEL SEVEN ?!
Now I’m starting to use the wiki and getting in the forums, and the consensus is that the only non-shitty spear is the pitchfork. Great, now I know to spawn in Echo Creek in my next run.
So that’s what is the current sorry state of spears in B42 ? A constant headache of forest decimation, carving and breaking ? Does the developers intend to make the whole spear category more viable, or is this the best we’re ever going to get with one of Mankind’s oldest and most reliable weapon ?
There must be a balance between B41 spears and what we have now, because with the current ones, I don’t see a reason to ever touch them again- which is a feat, because I’m one of those players that don’t even mind sharpening my large knife every 5 kills.
TL;DR In the current state of B42, spears are insanely tedious and unnecessarily expensive to use. There needs to be a better balance between not being overpowered, and being so ass you’re constantly convincing yourself you’d have more fun having a plunger-only run.