How to claim a home island in Aloft

The map i High up is huge, and it won't be long before you're hoping for a way to save energy by gliding between all the islands. Thankfully, you can claim an island as your own home by using the sailing skills you discover through the skies, allowing you to sail an island like a ship.

Once you get a home base, not only will you respawn there when you run out of HP in battle, but you'll have established a true home base for yourself. You can store extra materials, breed animals, cook food and much more.

Unlock sailing skills and claim an island as your own

You'll learn how to claim an island as your own fairly early on in playing Aloft, which is good because having a home base is crucial, especially as you continue through your exploration of the skies! When you first emerge from the starting cave in Aloft, the tutorial directs you towards a nearby Knowledge Stone. This will give you the recipe for one Home dragonthe first piece you need to claim an island as your home. This can be for you alone or opened up to a shared server with friends.

Unfortunately, you cannot take the starting island as your home – unfortunately, some islands are simply too big to be home islands. But don't be confused by this, as there are around 500 islands for you to sail out and discover in Aloft! That means there will be one you're ready to call home, so finish the tutorial after learning the Home Kite recipe, craft your glider, and head out to some of the nearby islands to explore.

Once you find an island you like, you can create and place a home dragon to revive here if you run out of health, or to start leaving your abundance of collected resources somewhere to save space in your backpack. As soon as you place a Home Kite on an island to claim it as your ownyou will be able to name your island and then teleport here anytime, anywhere whenever you need to get back to base.

There are a few important recipes for sailing a home island

This sets off the Forgotten Legacy quest, which is crucial to discovering the key pieces required for an Aloft home island. These important parts of sailing knowledge can be found on anchors with colorful orbs around them which you find on the islands near the starting island (and on many others as you explore the skies further). The main things you will discover on these islands are:

• The recipe for one rudderwhich allows you to steer your island like a boat and clear greater distances through the sky. If you have long distances to cover, simply set the island in the right direction and disconnect from the helm – you can use the time you sail to your next destination to take care of your home island.

• The recipe for simple sailsalthough you will eventually discover the recipe for more efficient sails, because you will find it your sails show wear in the elementsso think about where and how you sail!

• The recipe for rudderwhich is what makes a boat can move left and right.

• The recipe for elevatorsthe tablecloths that hang from the side of your island to allow vertical movement when you sail.

• The recipe for one map tablea massive circular table which shows the sectors you have discovered and the islands within themwith a color scale indicating each island's current ecosystem vitality.

  • While you're always free to explore as you wish, if you're trying to uncover the map or get somewhere specific, be sure to consult your chart table before taking to the helm to steer the island toward your destination.

  • You can also interact with islands on the map table to set waypoints on remote islands. These will appear as green beacons in the sky and as green circles on your chart table.

Once you've uncovered all four of these recipes during the Forgotten Legacy quest, you're almost ready to set sail on your home island! Simply craft and place these items on your home islandand you will be ready to sail it across the sky! Just think about it the heavier your island, the more rudders, lifts and sails you need to place to satisfy.

Sailing gear on your home island will take damage from objects you collide with while sailing, so keep an eye out for a red sail icon on your sails – you need to bring some extra of whatever material they are made of and your hammer, and repair sails that have been damaged by debris in the wind current.

You can see all this information at a glance in the small box in the lower right corner of the screen while controlling an island. You will see some meters in this small menu: gray black to denote your island weightthe orange icon next to that of the island liftthe next column is yellow and measure your rudder and turning ability, and finally, Green to track your sail for durability and resistance.

Be sure to check this oftenas you will find yourself sailing slower if your island gets too heavy. Be sure the elevator, rudder and sails all measure above the dashed line which corresponds to your island's weight on this chart – anything below the dotted line will not respond properly, making your island more difficult to control.

You will find progressively better recipes for these sails as you explore new sectors and find new knowledge stones and sailing skills. The most common upgrade seems to be sails, with lots of different resources that can be used to craft better sails. The better material you use on a sail, the better it will withstand the wind over time.

What can you do on your home island?

There are many reasons why you'll want to claim a home island before too long when playing Aloft! You don't really want to have to slide around the huge in-game map of about 500 islands, do you? Save your energy and claim a home island, because there are several household tasks you can take care of at home.

A big reason to establish a home island sooner rather than later in Aloft is so you can have one central place to store your material. As you establish a home island and collect various materials, you will gradually unlock access to tons of different storage options to store your excess items at home. These include special storage areas for stones, wood, wool, leaves, cloth, rope, and lots of other base materials that you'll need a good amount of when creating newer recipes.

Your backpack may have four tabs, but it's still only that big. It's a good idea to drop in extra materials you've picked up while exploring each time you visit your home island – who knows what you'll find the next time you go exploring, and we're sure you'll want to be able to keep it if you find something good!

Another important thing to check off the list of things to do when establishing your home island in Aloft is to make a bed for your adventurer and place it somewhere before heading out again. If you come back tired or injured, you can rest in bed to restore your HP so you go into your next battle in top form.

Soon you will also start to see various livestock on the islands as you explore the skies in Aloft, and animal lovers will be happy to know that you can bring the animals home from islands you've discovered (assuming your home island is parked close enough) to make them your own. Livestock have to become friends with hay or pellets before they join you, but you can breed animals on your home island for a constant stream of their all-too-important material.

Be sure to pick up after them, though livestock drop manure around your island. Although you can put them in a pen to keep them in a specific place, be sure to pick up the droppings – not only do you probably want a clean living space, but livestock manure is essential to agriculturewhich you will also be able to do on your island once you have found the recipe for the compost bin and have created some agricultural landscapes where you can plant various fruit and vegetable seeds that you have collected from wild plants.

While you'll find lots of odd crops out on islands you explore, a garden on your home island provides constant access to the ingredients you need for cookingwhich you can do with a hot plate over a fire on any island, but leaving a fire pit on your home island is a great way to have a reliable cooking source. The meals you can cook for yourself provide all kinds of buffs, so be sure to experiment and stock up before heading out and engaging in new fights.

Finally, one of the more enjoyable aspects of having a home island is being able to decorate the island entirely to your liking. You'll unlock tons of crafting recipes for things like walls, stairs, platforms, fences, and all sorts of materials to make yourself a real house on the island, so if you have some time between exploring new islands, check out the build catalog and experiment with the customization of your home island.