You are Flameborn, yet you are still human. Hunger, thirst, exposure: you are not immune to these conditions. They will not kill you, but they will weaken you. You must build shelter from which to begin the restoration of our Realm.
Once you’ve gotten yourself clothed, fed, hydrated, and armed during Enshrouded’s tutorial, the next major step will be building a home base from which to operate. This is going to be where you construct equipment, store materials, make cooked food, and ultimately operate out of as you explore Embervale. How you build your base will affect your own preparedness. This guide will cover the basics (or is that base-ics?) of base building in Enshrouded.
The Building Blocks Of Bases
Enshrouded uses a voxel-based system for its construction mechanics. Rather than 2D panels, construction elements are truly three-dimensional and occupy a specific volume within the game space. That said, the basic systems are pretty simple.
When you first picked up Stones, Wood Logs, and Plant Fibers, you unlocked a number of crafting recipes which you can build out in the wild without the Workbench. Accessing the Workbench opens up the construction crafting options, and there are a large number of recipes there. Building materials are crafted in lots of one hundred. When you make the Construction Hammer your active tool/weapon, the Tab key will bring up a number of pre-formed “building blocks” you can use. The 4m blocks are good for roughing out areas, while the 2m blocks and 1m blocks are good for detail work and filling in gaps.
Additionally, if you can’t entirely trust the snapping, or you’re not great at eyeballing placement, you can build Scaffolding to help you reach higher areas more easily. There does not, as yet, appear to be a structural integrity mechanic similar to Valheim, so you can get away with some truly intriguing (and structurally fanciful) designs. Don’t be afraid to play around and see what works best for you!
That said, laying out foundation segments will make it easier for you to get your walls lined up quickly. You’ll also want to build a Crude Wooden Door as soon as possible. Wildlife and roaming monsters can theoretically wander into your home if the door’s wide open, so be sure to block off that particular point of ingress.
There’s one last thing to consider specifically in a co-op world. When you’re building, your buddies can be building right alongside you as long as they have stacks of building materials in their inventory. Take time to communicate how you want to lay things out, divide responsibilities appropriately, and help out where needed. The smart move, to start, is going to be building one central structure. Later, as you improve and expand the Flame Altar, you can see about building secondary structures.
Basic Construction Recipes
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Rough Stone Block (100) – 2 Stones
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Rough Wood Block (100) – 2 Wood Logs
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Rough Flintstone Block (100) – 10 Flintstones
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Scaffold (A/B) – 5 Wood Logs, 1 String
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Plant Fiber Roof Block (100) – 5 Plant Fiber
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Stone Shingle Roof Block (100) – 5 Stones, 5 Flintstones
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Crude Wooden Door – 8 Wood Logs, 2 String
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Wooden Door – 5 Wood Logs, 2 Metal Scraps
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Double Wooden Door – 2 Wooden Doors
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Wooden Window Frame – 3 Wood Logs
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Crude Mattress – 4 Plant Fiber, 3 String, 4 Torn Cloth
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Crude Wooden Bed – 4 Animal Fur, 4 String, 4 Wood Logs, Crude Mattress
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Fireplace – 6 Stones, 2 Wood Logs
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Candle – 1 String, 1 Wax
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Firefly Lamp – 3 Plant Fiber, 5 Fire Flies
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Skull Candle – 3 Resin, 1 Bone, 1 Candle
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Standing Torch – 4 Resin, 2 Wood Logs, 2 Torn Cloth
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Wall Torch – 4 Resin, 1 Wood Log, 2 Torn Cloth
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Crude Wooden Table – 8 Wood Logs
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Crude Wooden Side Table – 5 Wood Logs
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Crude Wooden Nightstand – 2 Wood Logs
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Crude Wooden Stool – 4 Wood Logs
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Bench – 3 Wood Logs, 1 Resin
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Tiny Chest – 3 String, 6 Twigs
Advanced Bases: Clever Design Ideas
Now, you might be of the opinion that you don’t really need to put forth a lot of effort to make your structures look good. Or you might be thinking, “These preforms are nice for quick building, but I want to get really detailed.” For those latter souls, Enshrouded has you covered.
The first thing to keep in mind is that while the preform sections are easy to use, they’re also built with the same one cubic meter voxels that are at the top of the Construction Hammer preforms. You technically don’t even need the Construction Hammer to use the blocks directly. Just drop them into a slot on your action bar, make that slot active, and you’re off to the races. While you theoretically could build an entire structure without the Construction Hammer preforms, it’s going to be slow and tedious. It’s going to take a long time. Literally, it’ll be brick by brick. If that’s your idea of fun, hey, you do you. But it’s probably better to use this method for accents and fine shaping of edges and corners.
Currently, Enshrouded does not have a mechanic in place for world events similar to Valheim‘s “raids” or Age of Conan‘s “Purges.” There’s also no PvP mechanisms, so it’s not like you have to worry about people coming by to gank you and take all your stuff. All that said, there’s no reason why you can’t at least prepare for the possibility. You can use the Construction Hammer to cut out sections of an existing wall with the 1m cube preform, effectively creating an arrow loop which you can shoot through. More complex fortification elements, like merlons that allow you a greater firing arc without moving, probably aren’t doable just yet. But hey, if you figure out a good technique, let us know in the comments.
Home Sweet Base: A Cozy Atmosphere
As you look on the list of Workbench construction options, you’ll notice that some elements are laid out as “Decoration” and some as “Comfort.” The Comfort level of a structure is vitally important to you. Higher Comfort levels mean a higher amount of time on the “Rested” buff, which improves your Stamina regeneration. Each item has its own Comfort bonus, and the bonuses stack with different items. So, for example, you can have a Fireplace, a Crude Table, and a Candle, each of which adds their own Comfort bonus. A full enclosed room or structure normally has a base Comfort level of 5. With the “Well Rested” perk in the skill tree taking on another 5 minutes of Rested, a Comfort level of 10 will gain you 20 minutes of the buff. Making your base as comfy as possible is going to help you a great deal.
However, “Decorations” are just that: decorative. They do not provide any sort of Comfort bonus. They do let your place look more lived in, so if you’re ever feeling like you need to stage up your home in case visitors show up, that’s certainly an option.
With an established base, your adventures in Enshrouded’s Embervale are now a lot more secure. Go forth, Flameborn, for adventure awaits you!
