How to escape Dune Awakening Sandworms

The Dune Awakening Sandworms are easily the biggest threat in the game, as these giant creatures cannot be killed and instantly consume any player who gets too close. Instead, the name of the game is to evade them or, even better, avoid drawing their attention altogether. Ultimately a Sandworm, or Shai-Hulud, is more of an environmental threat than a real enemy, so we'll explain how to get past them in Dune Awakening below, as well as what you need to know about how they work as a mechanic.

Sandworms in Dune Awakening explained

A Sandworm in Dune Awakening appears when players are on open sand. When you are, there's a vibration meter that appears in the middle of the screen representing how much you're attracting the worms. The higher the vibration, the quicker that one will appear.

Creating vibrations for too long causes a worm to erupt out of the ground somewhere nearby. Where it appears seems to be random - it might show up over a thousand feet away, or less than 300. Once it does, it'll turn and make a beeline for you. Obviously the further away it is the better, as that buys you more time to get to rocks as fast as you can.

If the Sandworm catches up, it'll eat you, killing you instantly. There is no preventing this, none of the best Dune Awakening skills can help and no amount of armor can save you, it's an instant kill. Not only that, but being eaten deletes your backpack (with the exception of the first time it happens, which tutorialises this fact), so you can't retrieve your lost items again.

How to avoid Sandworms in Dune Awakening

If you're getting eaten by the Dune Awakening Sandworms a lot, here's some advice on getting past them:

• Use rocky ground like stepping stones and islands of safety. Traveling around the map, it's best to cross between rocky areas accordingly rather than running over open plains straight to your destination.
• Crouching causes less vibration, sprinting causes more. If you want to spend time on the sand for some reason, be quiet and stealthy. You can't spend infinite time out there no matter what you do, but you can earn more by being subtle.
• Shields and similar tech attract the worms. Sandworms are drawn to Shields and Levitation devices, even if you're suspended above the ground. Turn all of these off when crossing sand.
• If you see the worm emerge, head to rocky ground immediately! At this point noise and vibrations make no difference – it knows where you are and it's coming for you. Use the fastest methods you have to reach rocky terrain immediately, or you're going to get eaten.
• Vehicles are not faster than a worm. Sandbikes are a great way to get around quicker, but while it might take a little longer for the Sandworm to catch you, it will get you eventually. Don't assume you can't be caught, even with the advantage of the Dune Awakening vehicles.
• Watch out for Drumsand! Red sections of sand are "drumsand," that make extra noise when walked on. Avoid this whenever possible!
• There's options out there that can help you. Certain items and gear can actually reduce your vibration down below the minimum, though they're rare and pretty situational.

Crashed ships can fall into sandy areas so you'll have to risk worm attacks to reach them, which means you'll want to be slow and quiet while approaching, then quick once the worm finally notices you. If you've picked the Trooper as your mentor in the Dune Awakening Character Creation process, you can use the grapple hook to yank yourself for those last few yards if you need it. If you're not a Trooper, you can learn the basics at the Dune Awakening Griffin's Reach Tradepost.

Want broader help with the game? We're serving up a whole platter of guides, in fact there's Atriedes to go around! We recommend you get started with our Dune Awakening tips and tricks, which will help any new survivor become hardbitten Fremen warrior.

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