Milestones and roadsigns: please tell me much more...

[xyzzy57]

I recently discovered a road made with milestones (not wooden roadsigns) that led over various cliffs. I couldn't follow the trail, walking, without constantly having to manually climb something, walk to the next milestone, and try again to follow. I.e. it appears that milestone roads work across cliffs. This was not true for roadsigns in world 15, and probably isn't true for roadsigns in world 16 either.

This is not, however, even hinted at in the wiki.

I've also discovered by experience in world 15 that when trees randomly sprout near a roadsign based road, the teleport function is likely to break. One then teleports as far as one can go, tries to follow the road to the next roadsign, and finds that pathfinding fails. You then try to figure out what the problem is, whether it's a young tree, a dropped object, or something someone has built. If possible, you destroy (or move) the offending object(s). Failing that, you destroy roadsigns and recreate them elsewhere, restoring a functional path.

This, too, is not explained in the wiki.

Finally, there's a lot of weirdness about destroying milestones/roadsigns. There appears to be no mechanic for destroying a roadsign or two to reroute someone else's road around an obstacle. (Perhaps you are using a road someone built long ago, before they quit maintaining it. Or perhaps you want to redirect someone else's road around a place you'd like to settle.) You get told the road is not yours, even if the offending roadsign is on your claim. I presume this is to avoid griefers destroying random roads for lulz, but I'd like to understand exactly how this works. It appears that milestones can sometimes be destroyed by a person who didn't build that road - I observed someone doing this in world 16. He was presumably kin to the road creator, and probably in the same village.

So I've now got a lot of questions:
- what do I need to know to decide where to place a milestone road? How does this change if it's a roadsign road?
- can milestone roads handle cliffs and similar? presumably this is only for teleporting?
- how do roads interact with thickets, beyond the likelihood of blockage by trees within the thicket?
- what do I need to know about maintaining roads?
- how does the permission-to-destroy scheme work?
- what else should I know, that I don't know enough to ask?

Thanks in advance for any enlightenment.

[Sevenless]

I recently discovered a road made with milestones (not wooden roadsigns) that led over various cliffs. I couldn't follow the trail, walking, without constantly having to manually climb something, walk to the next milestone, and try again to follow. I.e. it appears that milestone roads work across cliffs. This was not true for roadsigns in world 15, and probably isn't true for roadsigns in world 16 either.

It was. The key with roads is they go unless the encounter a hitbox. Cliffs have no hitboxes. This is why you can also fire arrows across them.

This is not, however, even hinted at in the wiki.

The wiki is a bit of a touchy subject. It does not have enough people maintaining it currently, so it ends up patchy with information. Part of this is the devs habit of reworking foundational ingame systems. Partly anyway. Wiki is a good starting point but you have to do your own experimenting to confirm it usually.

I've also discovered by experience in world 15 that when trees randomly sprout near a roadsign based road, the teleport function is likely to break. One then teleports as far as one can go, tries to follow the road to the next roadsign, and finds that pathfinding fails. You then try to figure out what the problem is, whether it's a young tree, a dropped object, or something someone has built. If possible, you destroy (or move) the offending object(s). Failing that, you destroy roadsigns and recreate them elsewhere, restoring a functional path. This, too, is not explained in the wiki.

Echoing above, you're putting too much faith in the wiki. Baby trees growing naturally is a fairly new mechanic. It isn't hard to eyeball what's blocking things for a road before confirming your destination.

Finally, there's a lot of weirdness about destroying milestones/roadsigns. There appears to be no mechanic for destroying a roadsign or two to reroute someone else's road around an obstacle. (Perhaps you are using a road someone built long ago, before they quit maintaining it. Or perhaps you want to redirect someone else's road around a place you'd like to settle.) You get told the road is not yours, even if the offending roadsign is on your claim. I presume this is to avoid griefers destroying random roads for lulz, but I'd like to understand exactly how this works. It appears that milestones can sometimes be destroyed by a person who didn't build that road - I observed someone doing this in world 16. He was presumably kin to the road creator, and probably in the same village.

There's a strength requirement to destroy the road, and you may need vandalism+crime turned on to do it, but you can do it. Why you can't destroy something is reported in the system chat window, the messages for this topic are accurate.

So I've now got a lot of questions:
1 what do I need to know to decide where to place a milestone road? How does this change if it's a roadsign road?
2 can milestone roads handle cliffs and similar? presumably this is only for teleporting?
3 how do roads interact with thickets, beyond the likelihood of blockage by trees within the thicket?
4 what do I need to know about maintaining roads?
5 how does the permission-to-destroy scheme work?
6 what else should I know, that I don't know enough to ask?

Thanks in advance for any enlightenment.

1 Wherever isn't blocked. When you're putting the road you'll see the line. You can pave roads to prevent trees, but it's way more work than just cutting trees down when they grow. The only real blockers are rivers that are too wide to road across and areas where elevation gets too steep to properly road.

2 Yes, only for teleporting

3 Haven't made a thicket road, but with the rule of "hitboxes stop it" there shouldn't be issues for teleporting

4 I vaguely remember having the starting milestone claimed adds a protection to the road making all the milestones count as being on claim. I haven't verified how this works in many years though, but it's what I tend to do. I don't bother with paving, just chop the saplings that pop up as needed. Anthills blocking roads are very funny though.

5 Strength/vandalism if the original milestone is on claim. A couple player made items in game have bash protection and require siege engines to destroy, but literally everything someone builds is destroyable.

6 Tbh, haven is an incredibly deep game. But you happened to hit one of the simpler mechanics. You've discovered everything to know about roads. I guess only thing I'd add is that roads very much advertise your location to raiders. So be aware that an extensive and useful road network (say to the ocean or thingwalls) comes with that cost. Nothing you can do about it. And mountains can be roaded into by puttings signs on the flat areas while hopping cliffs.

[Sevenless]

Scratch the claim giving decay protection along the milestones. Just verified that's not true.