Don’t Starve Together: How to Play Solo Yet Surrounded by Friends

There’s something truly beautiful about playing Don’t Starve Together without the togetherness of other real players… That beauty is the fact that the game pauses when you open the map--a lifesaving feature for those of us who lack all sense of direction. Still, it can be hard to give up companionship even for the ability to pause the game, knowing that The Constant is such a dangerous and lonely place. Luckily for us, DST has many substitutes for real life companions that can turn your party of one into a party of five or more, even when you’re playing solo.

Characters with Built-In Friends

If you need companionship from the moment you spawn into the game, you can choose from several characters that come with a buddy. Willow has her stuffed bear, Bernie; Wendy has the ghost of her sister, Abigail; and Walter has his pup, Woby. Each of these extra friends include their own perks, though I’m definitely biased toward Wendy and Abigail. Assuming you choose one of these characters to play as, your party size is now two: your character and their companion.

Critters

To bring your party count up to three, we will adopt a critter to follow us around. Critters are little babified versions of other creatures in the game. They don’t really do anything to benefit our character, but they also can’t be killed off by anyone or anything, so I consider them beneficial to our emotional well being.

To adopt one, you will need to bring the two items that correspond to your preferred critter (one item will always be a crockpot dish, while the other is always an item related to their mob type) to the Rock Den. For a glomglom (baby glommer) these items are taffy and glommer’s goop, for a vargling (baby varg) these items are a monster lasagna and a hound’s tooth, and so on. You will only be able to adopt one critter at a time, though you can return to the den to swap your critter out for a different one if you’d like! Not that you would ever abandon your critter…

Now that your useless, immortal companion has joined the party, it’s time to collect a useful yet mortal one.

Glommer

On the night of the full moon, you can retrieve Glommer by plucking Glommer’s Flower from Glommer’s Statue, which will be found in a deciduous forest. (Unfortunately those are the item names so I had no choice but to write a sentence that just looks like “glommer glommer glommer.”) Once the flower is in your inventory, Glommer will begin following you. If you drop the flower, Glommer will stay wherever the flower is left.

Other than being a cutie, Glommer is nice to have around because it provides a little sanity boost if you’re standing close enough. It will also drop Glommer’s Goop every few days, which can be used as fuel, fertilizer, or consumed for a health boost (though your sanity will take a decent hit for consuming it).

With only 100 health, Glommer is often a victim caught up in the crossfire of hound attacks or other horrors. When Glommer dies, you just have to wait until the next full moon to return to his statue and pick the new flower that grows there. Full moons take place every twenty days, with the first occurrence on Day 11 (so you can check back on day 31, 51, 71, etc…). With Glommer by your side, your party can seek out the next beastie bestie.

Chester

With Glommer’s pesky flower occupying your limited inventory space, you could really benefit from a buddy with a backpack--or a buddy who is a backpack! Chester is an amazing little friend who offers you nine more inventory slots when you click on him.

In order to find Chester, you will need to locate an item called an Eye Bone. Cobblestone paths are the best places to look for it, though it may be found anywhere in The Constant. Picking this item up will summon Chester, who will bounce along behind you as long as the Eye Bone is in your inventory. Like Glommer to its flower, Chester is tied to the Eye Bone and will stay in place wherever the item is dropped.

Chester is also mortal, but quite a bit tankier than Glommer, with a whopping 450 health. If Chester does manage to get killed, it will drop all of the items within it. Keep the Eye Bone with you even when it dies and Chester will return after a day goes by. Despite its mortality, Chester is like a renewable resource. Slay.

By this point, you should have so many buddies following you around that they start to become a straight up hindrance by standing in the way of things you’re trying to click on. Now can you survive with a party of five? I hope the answer is yes, but if this posse isn’t enough to cure your loneliness, read on for even more ideas to grow your friendship empire.

Even More Friendship Opportunities

Below you will find the temporary, the unconventional, the more challenging… Why are you still reading when none of those descriptors were necessarily positive?

A pig or a bunnyman can be bribed into temporary friendship. Feed a piece of meat to a pig, or a carrot to a bunnyman. You can recruit several at a time.

While playing with the Year of the Catcoon event turned on, you can find a Kitcoon hiding in each of eight biomes, with a ninth awarded when the other eight are found. Though they are similar to critters in size and immortality, two key differences are that they do not count as a critter themselves (so you can have these in
addition to one critter) and there is no limit. If you wish to be followed by all nine, you just have to find them.

If you are playing specifically as Wendy, then Abigail isn’t the only ghostly companion you can have around! Head to a graveyard to assist a Pipspook, who will then follow you around. Sure, your ultimate goal is to help the spirit so it can cross over, but who is stopping you from just hanging out with Pipspook for all eternity instead? (If you are intent on helping the poor ghoul, here’s my guide to helping Pipspook Rest in Peace.)

You could also try your hand at taming a beefalo for a fluffy friend and a sick ride.

Worst of all, you could attempt to raise a tallbird, who will inevitably turn against you if you manage to keep it alive from hatching the egg up to adulthood.

I hope the options above are enough to quell your loneliness so that you can continue to pause your game in peace. If I missed any helpful companions in this list, let me know in a comment below!