I took some time to collect other players suggestions etc. about Woodie's update and made a poll to ask you for your wishes about Woodies update.
I'd also like to share some of my thoughts about Woodie.
My guess for his lore:
Woodie came most likely as a normal character into the constant, he had an axe but it wasn't able to talk yet. He settled down in the single MacTusk area and lived together with some foolish pigs doing this work for him. He placed traps to feed himself with almost anything, and chopped logs daily to keep his Fire Pit alive. But one day he discovered the Moonstone (perhaps it dropped from the sky and he came to inspect it). But once he came closer, the full moon appeared and turned all the pigs nearby into Werepigs. Woodie managed to defend himself with his axe till the event ended. He got hurt by the pigs but suddenly the pigs, flowers & rabbits turned into idols, carrots turned into carrats (& got eaten quickly), trees turned into Treeguards. And his axe got the ability to speak, so Woodie named her Lucy (Shining light), but shortly afterwards Woodie turned into a Werebeaver and started to gnaw down the whole area.
Back in DS, Woodie could use the Logs he gathered to keep his Werebeaver form as long as possible: Fighting mobs or "miming" tools by using logs only. But in DST his Werebeaver form became mostly useless: Deals as much damage as an axe, can tank only 200 damage and can't heal himself as Werebeaver. And Woodie does not have any need for the logs he chops: Beaverness is restored by gnawing anything; Woodie has no additional use for the logs. The only reason I see to chop trees is mostly just to avoid transforming into a Werebeaver (which causes a high sanity drain) or to share the chopped logs with your friends.
Unlike Maxwell, Woodie is only capable to gather alot of Logs quickly. Mining Rocks takes alot of time and turns the Werebeaver in most cases back to his Human form. Maxwell can use his shadows 24/7 (if they don't get killed by rocks or mobs), he's able to collect items while gathering and doesn't need to take breaks while harvesting. Woodie needs to gnaw logs to keep his human form or plant Pinecones / fight Shadows to restore his sanity. Working while being insane isn't effective cause you're forced to run away from the shadows or fight against them, which will keep you away from doing your work.
Right now Woodie is not really dependent on Logs (Unless you want to avoid turning into a Werebeaver) but rather on Pinecones to handle his sanity. But that ability also became way less unique with the introduction of Wormwood, who also gains Sanity per planted Pinecone to compensate his insanity from chopping trees. Wormwood really cares for his forest while Woodie needs the Logs to handle his Werebeaver form.
I don't see any need for Woodie's ability to get a higher loyality time when hiring followers. He already chops faster than most other characters, making it mostly useless to hire Pigs for chopping trees.
Whenever Woodie turns into a Werebeaver, he gains some good options:
- His Werebeaver form takes only 20% of the daily hunger which allows him to survive for about 6.6 days without eating anything. Becoming hungry is almost impossible since you can restore it via gnawing anything. (1.5 Logs per day in DST; 38.4 Logs per day in DS)
- Night Vision allows you to see without any troubles during night: You'll be able to avoid any kind of trap & you won't miss anything because nothing will be covered in complete darkness as Werebeaver.
- Nightmares aren't a real problem as long as you keep running, the +10% Movement Speed allows you to dodge their attacks a bit easier. The only case where Shadows might hurt you is if you're doing any task (fighting mobs, restoring Log-Meter) or if you're surrounded by shadows.
All these abilities turn Woodie into a good explorer who can use his Transformation to scout the whole map for free, as long as it's not too cold or too hot which is the case during Autumn.
But watch out not to die as Werebeaver in locations like the ruins. Dying as Werebeaver in the ruins is in most cases a gg. You'll loose your Night Vision and you won't be able to open your map even as a Werebeaver Ghost. Due to your extremly low vision, you'll have a pretty hard time to find the way back to your teammates or a Touchstone.
Another hidden feature I like but is more likely considered as a bug, is Woodie's ability to distinguish hidden Depths Worms from Lesser Glow Berries. Woodie has a quote for the Depths Worm but there's no quote listed in the script for the Lesser Glow Berry, so he uses Wilson's quote instead, result:
Woodie examining a Depths Worm:
Woodie examining a Lesser Glow Berry:
Any other character:
This feature is actually not that useful anymore because every hidden Depths Worm is always marked as Wet and exploring caves during Winter or Spring is already pretty dangerous because of rain.
I like the fact that Woodie has some kind of improved scouting abilities, but right now these abilities are only used to scout the caves/ruins once and to swap the character after scouting, because his scouting abilities become useless once he explored the whole map. If Wagstaff (who's most likely the DS version of Winona) won't be implemented into DST, I'd suggest to move Wagstaff's ability to see traps to Woodie's ability, this includes:
- Tentacles (Useful to farm reeds in earlygame to make maps for your allies)
- Treeguards (To chop trees in peace or to use the Treeguards against other mobs)
- Depths Worms (Already included)
- (Plants which are about to disease (A reason to keep a Woodie in your base))
- (The mob at the end of a suspicious dirt pile)
- (Incoming earthquakes & hound waves (Allows him to change his form before the hounds arrive))
Woodie is a Lumberjack not because he's a gatherer but because he needs Logs to survive. Also his scouting skills should be more highlighted, he already has a pretty nice but not yet published vignette showing him as a Canadian scout:
Old ideas:
Due to his look and the fact that he's canadian who are known to catch their food with traps, he could also become some sort of a Trapper & get the access to new kind of traps, for example:
Tooth Traps which apply different debuffs to the target, similar to Blow Darts. (Fire trap excluded: Deals almost 0 damage & hurts the environment)
A leghold trap made out of Hound's Tooth.
Or a Wood Gate which can be triggered from a different spot or as soon as the first mob runs through it, making it easier to trap mobs.
While hiding in the Bush Hat, Woodie gets the ability to move slowly without being noticed. It can be used to get the 1st hit on a shy mob (Koalefant, Volt Goats, MacTusk; it will replace the need for making Lucy throwable), or to dodge a hound wave without using any traps. You'll be able to take a dangerous path either hidden or with all the dangers revealed as Werebeaver. But there's almost no area where you can't take a longer path & need to sneak across, except in the ruins during nightmare phase. To make this ability more available, bushes near Moonstone area should always be normal berries, not Juicy Berries.
His traps should be triggerable by Rabbits, Moles and Birds. That would give a hint why Woodie dislikes them.