ROLE:

The floral crater is the easiest spawn region of the Chasm and acts as an introduction to the many biomes and characteristics of the map. Later on in the player’s progression, it will act as a crossroad leading to almost all surface and underground biomes. Characterised by it’s lush environment and giant flowers, it’s a friendly start to a harsh game.

NAVIGATION: Speed plants, placed mainly around water sources, make traveling less time consuming. Ramps lead up to 2 other surface biomes. Caves are entrances to underground biomes Water tunnels lead to the underground Ocean Pathways lead down into the only part of the ocean that’s exposed

Water sources act as important landmarks because they all lead to entrances to other biomes. Waterfalls are especially important as they are easy to spot, acting as reference points from every point of this biome. For a player that discovers the map for the first time this leads to a natureal progression towards other biomes as following rivers is easy and fast.

RESOURCES/DIFFICULTY:

In the floral Crater, rare resources such as metal, pearls, cristal and oil are mostly found around waterways. In the case of rivers, this allows the player to stock those resources, which are spread in small quantities on the river beds, on boats for easy transportation. However, the biggest concentration of metal and cristal is situated in the most dangerous part of the biome, the thermal lakes. This creates a tradeoff, do I risk getting a lot of resources fast in a dangerous area or do I take the time to scrape everything from the river beds for the same amount of resources.

Resources are not the only thing that dictates if the player wants to get to certain areas though. Outside of getting cristal for your first spyglass or metal for your pickaxe, more difficult areas are populated with progressively stronger creatures.

In green areas, you have access to your average berry gatherers and early game traveling mounts with the only hard hitter, Gigantoraptor, not being tamable yet, instead acting as a protector killing predators in the area.

Yellow areas are where your first damage dealing/utility creatures spawn. Though still not the strongest picks in the game, those creatures should allow the player to feel more comfortable and explore more areas.

The orange area, however, is home to 2 key creatures very important in the player’s progression. The thermal lakes is the only place in the floral crater where a true apex predator, Spinosaurus, can spawn, as well as one of the first creaures able to climb on walls the player can tame, Megalania. Spinosaurus is a rare spawn in this region and acts as a potential high risk high reward encounter that will give players a sudden jump in power. Megalania is much more common, acting as a dangerous poison applicator, forcing players to back off when bitten in the wild, but also a keystone tame that will make traveling a lot less restricting for the player.

Additionally, whereas the northern ramp is situated in a less dangerous area and lead to a slightly more dangerous area, the eastern ramp in the thermal lakes leads to a much more difficult area. This creates a natural barrier preventing player from venturing into Biomes they are not prepared for.