Yes, I put this in the wrong forums at first. But it's fixed now, alright?
So I've been thinking about DST's ocean a lot recently, and how it still has the same problems that it's had for the last 3 years. But in this pondering, I realized something really weird.
As a whole, none of the characters really want to go onto the ocean. It's not entirely absent. Wicker, Wigfrid, Warly, and Webber all have minor crafts that are related to the ocean or lunar island in some way, and Wurt gets close between needing Kelp for a lot of her kit and ocean fish being her best source of gold.
But overall, most characters don't really benefit from going out to sea at all. And this strikes me as odd. Ocean development and Character additions/refreshes lined up almost perfectly on a time scale; Return of Them entered public beta only 2 months after Winona's refresh and Wortox's release; putting it before Wormwood, Warly, and the like. So giving characters ocean-themed perks feels like it would have made a lot of sense; both to tie into the recently released conent. And becuase I think it would have gone a good way to fix the problems with the ocean. I won't go into detail here, but to put simply, the ocean's in a bad spot because most of it's content is either self-refferential or fails to be impactful in a way that's meaningful enough to compete with the tried and true resources and items that have been on the mainland for years.
And while you certainly could argue that this wasn't the case because the ocean was just too young too have anything meaningful for new characters to benefit from, Return of Them ended well before the character refreshes did. and the only content it's seen sense then has been Waterlogged and Curse of the Moon Quey, which is... well it's kind of sad, but it also means there would have been a good amount to work with. Well, relatively speaking atleast. But then, how could different characters have benefited from the ocean?
Wormwood's a child of the moon, but doesn't really have any interaction with the Lunar Island. In fact, he generally has some anti-synergy with the lunar island sense he's so good at keeping his sanity up.
Woodie's curse is tied to the moon; and the canon reason for his refresh is because of the increasing influence of the moon making the curse stronger. So then why doesn't he have ANYTHING to do with the lunar island? In this case, Woodie's biggest problem post-refresh is that his transformations are good in the early game, but don't scale well as the game progresses. So having upgrades to his transformations be available through the lunar island would have been a great way to make Woodie scale better.
Wendy I could see having a few Ghostly Elixers use ingredients from the ocean. Salt in particular is often associated with spirits and ghosts; particularly as a ward against them, but who cares?
Walter I think would have VERY much benefited from his top-tier round being from the lunar island instead of the ruins. Walter is generally considered a "new player" character. So having his progression guide said players to an out of the way; but still fairly safe zone as opposed to the single most dangerous area in the game would be a smart choice. Plus, Moon Glass is much more plentiful/easier to farm than the Thulecite or Marble he currently burns through. So that being used for his best rounds would have also helped with the slingshot costing an arm and a leg to use.
WX has the chorusbox circuit. But I bring them up because they really, really like the moon. So WX not having a lunar-based circuit honestly just feels like a crime.
As a closer, I do think that this is more a missed opportunity than anything. Or perhaps it's a testament to how little the ocean really has going on after 3 years of development. (the fact that most of my ideas tied into lunar specifically sure is). And hey, maybe if we get any new characters in the future, they'll be sailing focused and make my entire point mute! Ah, a man can dream, huh? But regardless, if any characters get a mini-refresh like Wortox and Wormwood did, then that would be a great opportunity to revisit the ocean and maybe integrate it into their kit a bit more.
