I'm making a summary of the ones I already posted with a couple more. Hope you like them!

1. An improvement for the mother hive could be a new type of hive that increases production. For example with the beargers fur, for new bees that collect a little bit more pollen, and are as efficient in winter as any other season, because they have a furry exterior. (I replaced the last one because of the 1.5.6 update, and mother hive is not as powerful now, I feel it more balanced!)

2. I think it's a good idea to create a "poison dart" , using rot, honey/polen/reeds and stingers. This way you have a reason to have SO many rot and stinger in mid/late game.

3. Bee themed items, for example a spear made with stingers, with a small poison effect, maybe some wings that increase your movement, a disguise similar to bush hat, but you turn into a normal beehive, a helmet that helps you with cold and offers some protection.

4. You could include gems in recipies , so that is not OP, but also not as easy to get as Melissa (which I love). For example, with a yellow gem, honey and stingers, a killer bee summoning staff. It may not be the best weapon, but it could be a good distraction for escaping!

5. Royal jelly , but not in a game breaking way. For example, every 7 days, the hive turns 20 honey into 1 royal jelly.

6. You could "tame" normal bees, the same way you do with pigs, with pollen, for a certain duration.

7. Maybe when wuzzy is caring too much pollen, it starts to slow down, like any other bee, it's heavier.

8. How about a Bee Crown! Made with thullecite and royal jelly, it recharges with honey or royal jelly (like the bone armor) and gives some perks with the other bees, or lowers the cost of crafting hives, plus protection form heat/cold, etc. If given to another character, bees will be friendly towards him/her just like Wuzzy.

Keep it up Renetta! You are doing a great job!

Thanks for creating this. I really like the 7th idea, it sounds realistic for a bee, but it will be another nerf for honey production, as Wuzzy himself must consider to not collect too much pollen when he goes into wilderness. I will consider this. Other ideas are great too btw.

You're very welcome!

About number 7, maybe the time to harvest is before winter, because you will be too slow in it, that way, you have to do something else in winter. Also, maybe increase the amount of pollen flowers drop in spring, like 50% chance of getting 2 instead of just one, thus encouraging harvesting pollen in spring

Also, been thinking about themed weapons, and came up with an interesting mechanic:

Each hive (assassin, ranger, guardian, for now) gives Wuzzy the abiility to craft a weapon/armor based on the hive, also the bee suit and Melissa could be crafted only near the Mother Hive, at least for the prototype.

Guardian hive: Honey helmet , similar to honey suit, also spoils over time, gives extra protection, recovers HP, but it automatically taunts all enemies within certain range, like the guardian bees. Maybe recover use with pollen or honey or royal jelly.

Ranger hive: Either the "poison dart" I mentioned previously or a bow and arrow! Arrows made with stingers, sticks and rot, the bow has X durability, and it deals like 50 damage but poisons for Y damage every second.

Assassin hive: Gives some sort of spear (or any weapon, really) that poisons and/or deals more damage if hits from behind. Maybe gives a small speed boost, just like assassin bees are faster.

EXTRA: Maybe implement a magic bee hive, made with blue gems (or any other) that makes magic bees, or wizard bees. For example, an ice bee that fires a weak cold missile (3 dmg), but starts to freeze the target like the ice staff. I think fire bee would be cool, but a very bad idea, because... well, fire everywhere. Yellow for a light giving bee, green for healing other bees, purple for something, orange for who knows, etc.

So, even though Wuzzy might have tons of stuff for him to do, none of them are easy, and since most work near the hive, I think it helps you survive, but not necessarily in mid/late game.

this is undoubtedly one of my favorite mods and I love the character and I had some ideas (mostly cosmetics) that could be added to the mod.

first my ideas for wuzzy skin


wuzzy skins could consist of references to other insects and media in an interesting way but also taking the idea of ​​"meta bees" to the letter


1 Demon wasps

this variant would be the "soldier" equivalent of wuzzy

in this section the predominant colors would be a strong red with details in wuzzy black would have much less hair and a more triangular shape with multiple eyes all for the purpose of looking intimidating, the shape of the wuzzy head would look more like 1 pair of curved horns while claws would be visible in your hands.
the bee structures would be transformed into a gray mixture of wood and stones using the dark and gray colors of a wasp hive.
wuzzy items and summons would be converted in the same way, the colors of the wasps and things related to wasps would become a more aggressive and intimidating look preferring red and dark tones, while the structures, constructions, and items of the wasps would be changed into similar shapes how wasps build their nests using wood and bone shapes with predominantly gray colors.

2 Leafcutter Ant

this would be an interesting version of wuzzy, it would take the form of a leaf-cutting ant with brown and red colors on its outside forming a resistant shell on its body, in this wuzzy shape its mouth would be replaced by huge mandibles having a rounder head and larger eyes .
the structures would become constructions of tree leaves combined with anthills.
the bees would be replaced by huge flying ants with extremely large wings than the bees, they would have larger mandibles that they would use to attack, while the items would become based on cut leaves and fungi


3 Underground Termites


this skin would be based on subterranean termites making a wuzzy albino body with a large, heavily armored head. wuzzy would assume an albino and fragile color with a resistant carapace on his head assuming the natural colors of termites (maybe he could take this even more literally by removing his eyes and adding some exaggerated bills as parts of his scope being bioluminescent)
The wuzzy structures would become huge, solid hills built with earth and glue in the form of cement created by termites.
the bees will be replaced by small and fragile termites while soldiers and tanks will be increasingly covered in armor plus aina maintaining fragile and soft legs and thorax.


Bonus:
Xenomorph


this is an idea that came from a friend in which after some discussion we realized that it would work perfectly with wuzzy.
wuzzy himself will use dark colors and prefer black and blue over all colors, having no eyes and being similar to a xenomorph queen, with a long tail on her back.
the structures would be replaced by xenomorph wax constructions being entirely black with some brief details in fluorescent green, where in the Hive Mother it would be possible to see a series of eggs at the entrance.
wuzzy items would become constructed from structures similar to xenomorph shells combined with dark wax.
bees would be replaced by smaller xenomorphs changing according to equivalent xenomorph varieties, such as drones, soldiers, spiters, pretorians, etc.

yo dude you did a great job
you should add more bees
like to get one you have to do spesific things
like bring all the celestail altars
or kill the ancients fualwaver or misery toadstoll

0.- As sugestion, i would put a control, or HUD button to release all bees inside wuzzy. This would be SOOO usefull when you're being chased by wolfs or other creature, and need to distract them so you can counter attack, or even initialize an attack without getting close to avoid innecesary aggro.

1.- Also, it would bee nice to add ways to increase the max amount of bees outside Wuzzy at the same time. from 4 to 6 or 8 for example, i noticed that recipes of child hives are so hard to get, so in early game its kinda hard fight with high amount of enemies, like doggos or a bunch of spiders, getting away of them on winter, its not always an option with the slow effect.

2.-Adding a ranged weapon, its also an nice option, with a ranged weapon, like a dart shooter, but instead of shooting darts, shoot bees, using bees as ammo or shooting Wuzzy metapis bees instead of vanilla ones, could be a nice tactical way to start a fight without much aggro, summoning various bees on the battlefield before start the melee fight and not to risking to an 10vs1. (For example, shooting a couple tank bees inside of a group of spiders, doggos, beefalos or walrus camp) Its a nice addition in my opinion, making Wuzzy a lot of more tactical and estrategical character to play. I would love that addition or something like that.

3.- Another suggestion, i would like to see more equipable items to Wuzzy, like, for example, an armor with less protection that the default one (50%) that, when you are hit, it spawns temporal and weak bees, it could be a little version of tank bees, to distract enemies, or a new type of bee, that cause area damage or stun, slow or taunt to distract nearby enemies, so wuzzy can have a little more survival chance on winter or places full of enemies. Due to the slow speed, enemies that chase you like doggos or beefalos could be a death sentence to Wuzzy and nothing-to-do situation, so, i would add an armor or item that spawn bees on hit.

4.-As another suggestion, i would like to see something like a Beehive Backpack, that works like a portable beehive, getting bees and putting inside the backpack (Only can take honey, pollen and bees) could have a double benefit, having a portable source of honey or pollen on spring, summer and atumn, and being able to use that beebackpack as weapon, releasing bees to attack a selected enemy on winter or caves, or using them to start an fight properly, or focus an dangerous target in specific.

5.- As last suggestion for now, like another option to suggestion number 1, i would reccomend an mechanic of Beatrice, The rumble bee mod; if Wuzzy have no weapons in hand, ctrl+left click would release simbiotic bees to attack an objetive without need of melee aproach or attack, for distracting a dangerous enemy, getting aggro away from a group, or engage an tough enemy or group of enemies.

I would like to thank you for making this amazing character. I loved so much Beatrice in DS, but the version of DST its kinda bugged and lacking so much of content from DS original mod. This character is my favorite so far as bee lover and future beekeper, many thanks to take your time to make it, and paying attention to whathever people have to say about it. Of course, the balance of the suggestions are up to you, recipes and counterparts to their benefits are part of this beautiful game.

Also, sorry for my bad english. :p

Well, honestly forgot this existed until Daerelyn spoke of it again. I myself have a few thoughts of what could potentially be added, if you decide to.

1 - First off, is obviously something that shall be done post Return of Them completing. A new Bee Type, but as we've already talked of this I shall go onto the next subject.

2 - After thinking of it, a new Bee type related to the Archives for me feels somewhat off, so I thought of it. Depending on what is to come of the Sealed Portal, we could have a form of upgraded Melissa available. Damage increased to 54 (so that the dmg post dmg modification ends up at 40.5) with 200 uses like the original Melissa, strengthening the bees like the original Melissa but perhaps doubling the bonuses (e.g. Guardians gain 50 hp instead of 25, Rangers & soldiers attack speed gifted doubled, etc). Or the upgraded Melissa could allow 2 additional bees to be spawned from Wuzzy's pool. As for what would be used, I genuinely don't know. I think Congealed Honey should be used for its crafting though. I'll leave the balancing to you Renetta.

3 - An item called Congealed Honey, using (10/20/40 I will let you decide) honey for 1. It could be a non-perishable food item which can be used for the crafting of Wuzzy's advanced items. Any item made should have the effect to not be slipped out of your hands if wet. It can also be used for an advanced version of the honey suit, perhaps 5 congealed honey + 2 rope + 5 living logs, having 90-70% dmg reduction and the same healing effect as the normal honey suit, but lasting twice if not thrice as long. (20 or 30 days until spoilage)

4 - Slots in the Mother Metapis Hive to increase per level of Hive. Rank 1 - 6, R2 - 9, R3 - 12. Allowing the Honey Suit/Advanced Honey Suit to be placed in it would be great, as its short life span of 10 days is annoying and this change helps both early, mid and late game. I'm currently on Day 358 and while I don't make a honey suit every time I go to face the Bee Queen it would be nice to have with that passive healing.

5 - More uses of Royal Jelly, I like the idea of it being used for the Mother Hive but how about it being used in separate Child Hives too? Giving them a "Queen" of sorts, making the respective units (e.g. give 3 Royal Jelly & 3 Congealed Honey to a Child Hive) stronger or have an additional effect. I believe the progression and satisfaction one gets for upgrading Wuzzy's Mother Hive/Creating new Child Hives should be expanded further, in my eyes, he's a late game character with how you must explore the entire map and venture off to many different areas to unlock his true potential, so why not add more late game capabilities into him.

The Guardian Queen could make it so Guardians can taunt Shadow Creatures (Hey! You can finally remove the bug if you do this :D ) and increase the damage reduction of Guardians to 75% and Soldiers to 50% (Or increase their hp to 150) or increase the movement/attack speed slow.

The Ranger Queen could allow Ranger Bees to Attack twice on every attack and the Stage 3 upgrade to allow them to triple attack and let Metapis Soldiers have an electric effect every second attack or could increase the Rangers' range.

The Assassin Queen could permit Assassin Bees to be untargettable if any other bee type exists (i.e. have all enemy creatures unable to attack them until the other bee type die) and a cleave capability or making any target hit more vulnerable making them take 50% more damage, also strengthening the heal of the soldiers Tier 3 upgrade.

The Shadow Queen could grant Shadow Bees and soldiers the ability to attack Shadow Creatures and makes Shadow Bees' spikes do more damage. (These are the hardest to come up an idea for, well for me anyway, cause I am only thinking of ways to summon friendly shadow creatures but I think that'd be hard to code in as there is nothing similar in game).

Due to there being no "Soldier Child Hive" and me wanting the Soldier Bees to be remembered for all their help early on, I wanted them to receive a buff with every Child Hive upgrade.

This is all for now, if I think of anything else that'd be cool to have, it'd be added here.

(Edit: I had an epiphany, instead of using congealed honey, why not have each Child Hive Queen use boss items to upgrade them, but in return, some of the benefits given will be strengthened. There can only be 1 Child Queen Hive of each type.

Guardian Queen - 1 Shroom Skin + 3 Royal Jelly (RJ). The buff of dmg resistance will stay the same for this one, however, the soldiers will have their hp buffed to 150 and damage resistance increased to 50%.

Ranger Queen - 1 Larvae Egg + 3 RJ. The buffs remain the same (Soldiers gain electric attack every 2 hits)

Assassin Queen - 1 Guardian's Horn + 3 RJ. The untargettable status mentioned earlier is removed while the cleave effect become an aoe effect in a small radius around the damaged target. Soldiers gain 3 dmg.

The Shadow Queen - 1 Bone Armor + 3 RJ. Increases Wuzzy's max hp by 50. Every 3rd attack stuns enemies (If this isn't possible, the freeze status will work, so that it is similar to the Ancient Fuelweaver's insanity stunning effect) and the healing the Soldiers do via the 3rd tier Hive's benefit is doubled.)

Thanks for spending the team reading this and thanks for working on the mod.

As an addition to what i said before, i would post another two suggestions and changes in my experience with Wuzzy with around 100hours of gameplay with it.

The metapis portal, that one that summons bees from the main hive, i feel like its not worth it at all. I mean, the recipe isnt cheap at all, and its just an structure, i would change that, into an portable portal, fueled by nightmare fuel or living logs to work. Itself its so limited.

Also, probably has been said before but, we need a production bees hive. A basic hive that allow the main hive to spawn 2 or 4 more worker bees that can work on winter. I love the idea of creating a small town of hives around the big bad ass main hive! I saw that in winter, the production its horrible, less than 1 or 2 honeys at day. A workers hive would fix that, wuzzy depends on its honey to even make its armor, so i feel it like an necessary addition.

Also, i will suggest something that probably has been said before, but a Configuration Menu for Wuzzy would be so great!
i know that you like the character balanced for vanilla, but balance its relative to much people, i personally hate the fact that you only can craft hives with moon, ruins or hermit technology tabs. More than balanced, i feel it like i could play the entire game content before getting all hives. (In my world its day like 250 and the only one that i could make is the tank bee hive) So, adding a config menu would be a nice addition, with the ability to change all hive recipes to the science machine.

Also editing some stats of wuzzy, and setting an option to wuzzy regenerate sanity in a passive way like Maxwell does (i saw something like this in another bee character mod. "Pollen", it have an hat that gives an unlimited amount of sanity, disabled by default, i think its a good idea). I hate sanity SO much. (personal opinion)

So, in my opinion, its more important to make a character fun instead just balanced, i found wuzzy both, but it could be even more fun with a config menu and more flexible craftings for hives, so it can adapt to every person playstyle.

Thank you again, sorry for my bad english and hoping see updates for wuzzy soon!

You should add a configuration option as some people want to make this mod harder or easier. It would make this mod way better. Btw you are doing great, this is a amazing mod!

Hey Reyna here are a few suggestions for Wuzzy
1. A new nurse bee that doesn't attack only heals Wuzzy, freindly bees, and other players. The hive should use honey poultice and maybe other healing items. You should use a science machine to make it since most hives are gotten way later.
2. The hive should only attack if something hits you except for the portal which will have the same mechanics.
3. The level 6 friendship pearl recipe required hive is a little to hard to get could you maybe switch the recipe to a moose goose recipe drop since moose goose is electrically related.
4. If you do number 1. then regular bees 2nd hive upgrade should be a team damage boost.
5. Wuzzy's hive makes pollen and honey during winter and since bees don't do that in winter I don't think they should be able to make them during winter. Wuzzy cant get pollen in winterand normal bees cant make honey during winter.
Those are just a few ill send more if I think of any. You are a great modder btw! I love your mod!

shouldn't Wuzzy spawn bees when attacked as well?

Now, i realize that the probability of any of these being added is low, im just expressing ideas

(please note im thinking of ideas as im writing)

In world gen there should be very little scattered hives of metapis bees that you can capture(perhaps this bee spawns next to pearl or on lunar? Maybe its own new island?), with these bees you could make a special bee box that holds more honey than a normal one, and anyone can harvest it, or these bees deposit their honey in the mother hive perhaps these bees can be active in winter?

Another bee idea adds onto the nurse bee suggestion above, perhaps instead of normal honey it could maybe give a new honey that heals more? or maybe you can harvest a honey poultice every-now and then? ooh medicinal honey... maybe it could make the sweetened poultice without the cactus flower

With 10-15< pollen you can refine it into a clump of pollen, that you can put into the hive or eat directly for an instant honey? maybe you can give it to one of your bees and you get 2-3 honey?

I saw a suggestion saying different crafts at each hive, perhaps when you pre-craft a hive it turns into an item, like the mother hive, and when you place it you could harvest it and get a special honey comb that you could eat, or maybe put into a slot kinda like w-x that lets you access new crafts or maybe you put it in the mother hive and it makes a blueprint? or maybe make a centrifuge to process these combs and mabye it would fling the blueprints out like a player does items after dying.(maybe these stay after death?)

X butterflies to make a giant flower which bees get more pollen from?

maybe a bee that deals fire tick damage to enemies without spreading fire that requires maybe fire nettles?

Speaking of plants maybe add a bee box that requires x amount of every crop and it speeds up crop growth and maybe talks to them as well?

On the topic of bee boxes, perhaps you could make a separate mod that requires wuzzy that adds a bunch of boxes that people suggest? maybe add a config for people who only want certain ones?

Maybe add a way to make honeycomb? maybe 2 Papyrus some honey and pollen? or maybe like wormwood and minus x health plus papyrus honey ♥♥♥♥ like that. or maybe (another) hive that like every ten days you can harvest for a comb

AH another box, maybe add a drop to bee queen that drops the blueprint and make it cost like two bee queen hats a deer-clops eye?(idk) 50 honey 10 royal jelly and maybe add a way to catch her minions and add them as part of the recipe? the hive could have 2 max honey and it has a chance to give royal jelly? perhaps only 1-2 can exist per wuzzy or at all, maybe add a skin that looks like a royal pyramid? or maybe a small castle?

maybe add a new "lightning rod?" that makes it so that all bee related objects, flowers, metapis hives, bee boxes, ♥♥♥♥ like that, cant "bee" burnt or destroyed he-he

maybe add a staff of sorts that can instantly collect all pollen in a certain radius around the player maybe like a honey dipper? perhaps it could also collect honey from nearby bee boxes but in a smaller radius than the pollen?

boomerang that does a very small AOE

i think i saw this somewhere above but when you die all of the bees hibernating in you exit and are aggro-ed to the closest enemy.

speaking of enemies, tree guards and deer clops. i would say this one is more of a bug report but whenever im fights them the bees stay at like the side of my screen and don't help me in the fight

thats all i have for now.

speaking of enemies, tree guards and deer clops. i would say this one is more of a bug report but whenever im fights them the bees stay at like the side of my screen and don't help me in the fight

=> this is actually a mechanic for the bees to avoid AOE damage.

Originally posted by Renetta:

speaking of enemies, tree guards and deer clops. i would say this one is more of a bug report but whenever im fights them the bees stay at like the side of my screen and don't help me in the fight

=> this is actually a mechanic for the bees to avoid AOE damage.

coolio

Got a crazy one here though not sure if someone mentioned it.

How about if you beat the bee queen she drops you a special blueprint, which allows you to place down a "Royal Hive", it will have only 1 mini queen bee or similar, which it boosts stats to the bees (combat and production) but also when in combat will summon up to extra 3 bees to help her out and wuzzy. Or maybe even in the same main hive since we gave it royal jelly

Just got this idea rn and it's ofc not fully developed but i anyways want to mention it since maybe it can give you an idea or even someone being able to upgrade it further and manage to make it an actual feature in the game.