Guide:Not the bees

Not the bees is a special seed that adds an enormous amount of bee-related material to the game. It makes the game much more challenging. It can compare to The Constant, which adds new mechanics on top of old ones, and For the worthy, which takes existing mechanics and makes them harder. This seed, in contrast, radically reworks many key parts of progression, making progression the true challenge, rather than bosses.

This guide will help with that progression.

The Beginning
The first things you'll notice upon spawning are:
 * The Jungle biome has replaced the Forest.
 * The Merchant has replaced the Guide.

The reason for the merchant's placement will soon become clear, because all stone in this world has been replaced with Hive blocks. This means that digging downward will release swarms of bees that can kill characters easily even on the lowest difficulty level. The lack of stone makes it impossible to build a Furnace or Arrows. Both of these, however, can be purchased from the nearby merchant.

One perk of this seed is that Rich Mahogany armor is stronger than regular armor, as are Mahogany weapons. Abigail's Flower makes a good first summon weapon, given the likelihood of frequent deaths for you (or for NPCs in Hardcore Mode).

Honey pools near spawn will slow you down dramatically. As mining is dangerous initially, it may be better to place platforms over them.

Biome choices
For initial exploration, the starting area is very challenging, as it is a jungle biome with extra hive blocks. The snow biome, commonly regarded as the second-easiest biome, has been completely replace with hive blocks, making it extremely hard to mine.

This makes the easiest options either the actual jungle (which can be identified as the one region of the world with few hive blocks, and also by its access tunnel), or the Underground Desert, an area which is usually too dangerous to explore early on but is perhaps the best option to start with in this seed.

Challenges with early bosses
Mages will learn early on that all gemstone blocks have been replace with crispy honey blocks. Gemstones can be find in Desert Fossils with extractinators; however, all Slush Blocks are gone in this seed. Since all pools of water have been turned into Honey (except deep under the ocean layer and on floating islands), fishing for crates is much more difficult. In fact, it may be hard to make Angler spawn without putting some sand over the Honey Blocks that have replaced the usual ocean sand.

Mages can, however, find plenty of Amber in the underground desert (and Sturdy Fossils from either the Extractinator or from killing Tomb Crawlers, allowing the crafting of the Amber staff. The Thunder Zapper can also be found there. The Wand of Sparking, Gray Zapinator, Vilethorn and Crimson Rod are the only other early options.

As stated before, rangers will have to purchase Arrows or find them pots, unless they dig down to the lower half of the world, where stone occurs in place of clay or silt.

Summoners will have difficulty finding the Flinx Staff. Underneath the outer 1/3 of the world, in the cavern layer, enough snow and ice blocks can spawn to create small snow biomes. If the player can reach this area (through a large amount of jungle and digging through hive blocks), Snow Flinxs will spawn plentifully, as they spawn on blocks that are not ice or snow.

Due to the rarity of gems, King slime can be significantly harder to summon manually. The Eye of Cthulhu, Eater of Worlds and Brain of Cthulhu spawn normally.

Queen Bee
You will almost certainly defeat Queen Bee many times in this game. You will also almost certainly die to Queen Bee many times in this game (or exit out and return). Larvae, the fragile item that you pop to spawn Queen Bee, appears every in this world: near your starting location, under the ocean, in houses in the The Underworld, on Floating Islands.

It is very easy to accidentally mine one of these or hit them with a stray projectile. In addition, Queen Bee will become enraged if not in the Jungle proper or (slightly less enraged) if above the surface. This means, though, that you have a good chance of farming Queen Bee for her powerful weapons and accessories.

Deerclops and remaining pre-hardmode bosses
Deerclops can be difficult to spawn without a snow biome (although you can mine blocks and create your own). However, if you go to the same place you found Snow Flinxs and use the Deer Thing in that location, you can successfully spawn this boss.

Skeletron and Wall of Flesh proceed fairly similarly to regular fights. Be careful of stray Larvae, especially in the underworld; it may be worth going through and clearing them out before a fight.

Early Hardmode
Early hardmode can be a huge pain for many reasons:


 * Potions are very difficult to create. Mushrooms and Dayblooms do not spawn naturally, there is much less dirt for Blinkroot to spawn, and most fish cannot be caught without extensive remodeling of the world. This makes it difficult to create Regeneration Potion, Ironskin Potion, Endurance Potion, and other powerful potions. Finding an Herb Bag can get seeds for planting in Planter Boxes. Alternatively, the player can use holy water followed by purification powder to convert a portion of the surface to Forest.
 * Spider caves do not generate, making it impossible to craft the Spider Staff, Queen Spider Staff, Spider armor, or to obtain the Poison Staff or Venom Staff.
 * Fishing is difficult, making it unlikely to get the Crystal Serpent, Bladetongue or Toxikarp.
 * The snow biome doesn't exist, meaning that blizzards don't occur, precluding the use of Frozen Wings, Frost armor, or Cool Whip.
 * Unless converted earlier, your home base is now surrounded by Angry Trappers, Jungle Turtles, and other powerful enemies.

Summoners may want to use Obsidian armor with Abigail's Flower and Firecracker to kill the Dreadnautilus or Queen Slime to get a good hardmode summon.

Mechanical Bosses, Queen Slime and early invasions
It can be difficult to farm for Treasure Maps without replacing some of the honey blocks in the ocean with sand.

The mechanical bosses and Queen Slime themselves aren't any harder than usual. However, the Megashark can no longer be crafted without finding a way to fill the oceans with water (such as by draining the ocean then refilling it with wet bombs).

Plantera through Golem
At this point the game starts turning a bit in your favor. The world is packed full of Chlorophyte. Plantera's bulbs can spawn throughout the world. In fact, it could be useful to keep a seed of this game in your saves to farm for chlorophyte and Plantera. Yelets and the Jungle key are much easier to obtain in this seed (conversely, the Frozen key is harder to obtain, making it likely you'll never have an additional sentry to use during the Old One's Army events).

The Pumpkin Moon can be hard to summon, as Pumpkin Seed don't grow on jungle grass. Buying planter boxes can help.

Alternatively, the Clentaminator might be a good option now to finally rework your world. Using blue solution followed by green solution can turn much of the surface into Forest.

The Jungle Temple can be tricky to find, as it doesn't have to spawn inside the 'real' jungle. Having the Mechanical Lens or The Grand Design can help by spotting the traps from far away. Once found, summoning the Solar Eclipse and Golem proceeds as normal.

Remainder of the game
Post-Golem, the game is very similar to standard playthroughs. The lower half of the Cavern layer turns all dirt into Glowing Mushroom biome-mud, making enormous mushroom biomes, especially under the 'real' jungle. This makes farming for Duke Fishron relatively easier. He can be summoned even in Honey.

By this point, it can be easy to get a good launcher and refill the oceans with water using wet rockets. And defeating the Moon-Lord multiple times to get the Drill Containment Unit can re-make the oceans and other biomes any way you like.