Here's what happens to your base in Dune: Awakening if you take a long break from Arrakis

Survival MMO Dune: Awakening releases next month on May 20, and Funcom is churning out information about it faster than a sandworm poops out spice. (Wait, is spice just sandworm poop? It must be, right? Gross.)

In a recent livestream, members of the Dune: Awakening team answered questions from chat, and interestingly one of those questions wasn't about what happens when you play Dune: Awakening, but what happens when you don't play it.

"There will be timers for bases to decay like in Conan Exiles?" was the (sort of) question from a livestream viewer.

In Funcom's other sandy survival game, Conan Exiles, the pieces of your base have a timer that causes them to decay if you haven't been around it for a while—on official servers this can be between one to two weeks. Wander within rendering distance of your base, and the timer is reset. Otherwise, when the timer runs out, your base is marked as "abandoned" and after another 24 hours, if you still haven't returned, it disappears. (Here's a lengthy post about it.)

On the livestream, Funcom explained a bit about the difference between how bases in Conan Exiles and Dune: Awakening work.

"Yes, we have some decay mechanics for the bases," said Dune: Awakening lead producer Ole Andreas. "As long as your base is powered, it is shielded. And as long as it's powered and shielded, [it can't be destroyed]."

But what if you take a break from Dune: Awakening for a few days, or longer?

"You can fuel your base up right now in the beta for weeks, and then come back again," Andreas said. Dune: Awakening's world director Jeff Gagné added: "I think it's 21 days."

That gives your unattended base a week or two longer than the timer on Conan Exiles official servers. The other difference is, while other players in Conan Exiles are a threat to your base, in Dune: Awakening it's something else.

"Once the shield goes down, the sandstorm will start tearing at your base," Andreas said.

"So it's not going to be like in Conan," Gagné said. "But we have something similar to make sure that we get rid of things when people leave the game for too long."

In some ways, it sort of stinks that you can lose your base if you're away for a while, though three weeks feels pretty forgiving for extended absences. I definitely see the need for eventual base decay: a lot of open world multiplayer base-building games run into issues where the landscape winds up absolutely littered with half-built and abandoned creations. Complete server wipes aren't exactly fun, either, so having the desert eventually reclaim your abandoned base feels like a decent alternative.

More details about Dune: Awakening's bases are planned for a separate building livestream in the near future. You can watch the Q&A portion of the Dune: Awakening livestream on YouTube.