User:Spinfx/Guide Early Sky Exploration

Early Sky Exploration

It's possible to explore the sky at the very start of the game, by jumping and placing dirt blocks below you, so you slowly build a pillar that goes up - all you need is to dig out and collect enough dirt blocks (a stack of roughly 300 or so should suffice for the average height from surface level to the top of a Large sized world).

Why would you do this? Because high above the surface of your world exist chunks of land known as Floating Islands.

See main article: Floating Island

They are generally small chunks of forest land sitting on a larger cloudmass, with a single central room which always contains a Skyware Chest and some Skyware furniture, although occasionally you will find Floating Island cloudmasses which only hold a lake (unless playing the mobile or old console versions, as those are not updated for that). Not only that, the cloudmass also very often contain veins of silver/tungsten or gold/platinum.

Most importantly, you may obtain the Starfury from a Skyware Chest, which is an extremely good weapon for early game. It is further enhanced with the star projectile it casts when swung, making it a solid first choice for melee based characters.

Preparation

It's very easy to accidentally fall off a pillar you build under yourself by jumping, not to mention you merely unlock little more than a screen's worth of area, forcing you to build the next pillar relatively close nearby, resulting in having to build a lot of pillars.

Here are some potentially useful pieces of equipment you may want to obtain before you head out:

Hook

These are self-explanatory. In case you slip off the edge of your pillar for whatever reason, a hook lets you grapple back to the pillar and make your way back up. This is also useful for pillars you want to leave to climb back again later, for example once you've located a Floating Island and wish to have a way back up to it.

The good news is that hooks are craftable, and not hard to obtain early in the game. See main article: Hooks

Umbrella

Since you can't craft these, they will be harder to get compared to a hook, but an umbrella will greatly expand your sky exploration capability. Why? Because of the increased horizontal drift effect. This allows you to build pillars spaced further apart from each other, reducing the total number of pillars you need to build overall. The fact that they nullify all fall damage is icing on the cake. This is arguably the most important item for exploring the sky early in the game.

Without an umbrella you can only reveal the area immediately around the current pillar, which forces you to have to build subsequent pillars close by.

Melee weapons

Considering the possible hazards you may encounter (see "Challenges" section below), early in the game you may not really have access to anything more than wooden or copper swords, making it a better idea to flee rather than attempt to fight while you stand on top of your pillar (extremely inadvisable considering that a fall is all but guaranteed on getting hit) or grapple from one side.

Challenges

There are aboveground hazards as well, with the main one being the Harpy - these flying enemies can easily knock you off your pillar, which makes having a hook or at least an umbrella a necessity. Prior to hardmode they are restricted from spawning in the middle area of the map, roughly a tenth of the way horizontally. This makes the center of the map a prime candidate for your initial pillar, and it also conveniently divides your world in half.

Enemies from the Corruption/The Crimson/Jungle can also harass you before you pass a certain height. At night, be wary of Demon Eyes, although these too are limited by height.

Cleaning up

Once you've made the most of a pillar, it's strongly recommended to dig it back out. This will prevent meteor hits from being wasted on them. If you're looting everything from a floating island, it's advisable to dig most of it out as well - or at least replace the Skyware Chest with a regular one and leave a token item (like a block of dirt) in it, again to prevent meteor hits (this time from being wasted on hitting the floating island).