F*cking moron kept opening the doors at night and letting in zombies and demon eyes while I was trying to craft stuff.

It's like he freaking did it on purpose. He'd stay inside all day and then wander out at dark.

So, last night (in-game), I locked him out with a wall of clay, zombies killed him outside and I cheered. I was happy he died: natural selection at work. He was a freaking walking liability.

However, now, I'm wondering if he had a purpose other than handing out advice (I think I can figure out most of that stuff on my own if it's just that)...

Also, is there a way to speed up the night time?

Also, like brick walls, fences are purely for decorative purposes in the background and don't actually keep things out right?

You need a live (at least temporarily) guide to activate Hard Mode. Also, if the guide wanders during night time, you do not have a proper housing. Or at least not housing he can access merely by walking, try leaving the screen and return, if you have proper housing he will have teleported there.

(Brick) Walls are used to ensure that you have a proper house (you need to fill the background with Walls to make a house), Fences are iirc 100% decorative.

Well, I had 2 walls, a roof, doors on each side, walled background, campfire, table and 2 chairs inside. I vaguely recall that qualifying as "housing" according to what the idiot on 2 feet told me before hitting dirt.

Guess I'll have to experiment further.

So, how do I get replacement guide to replace the defective one? Do they pop-up automatically with proper housing or do I need to restart?

You could build a cell. Its far more safe and less annoying than a house.

the game will keep spawning new guides so long as there is a place for them the next day, sometimes almost minutes after the previous NPC dies.(I had guides spawn almost instantly after the previous one was sacrificed to spawn the last pre-hardmode boss/boss of hell)

Oddly enough the glitch in the Guide's AI forcing him to constently open doors and letting mobs in at night lead to the requirement of sacrificing him to summon the boss of Hell/Wall of Flesh as well as a Item you can acquire to allow you to kill him again and again.

I'm getting really good at getting my guides killed. Thank god I'm not playing on hard mode. :P

Okay so my Dye guy just got killed and he hasn't come back in a couple of days.

Do I really need him? If he doesn't show up soon should I restart?

As long as the requirements for spawning him (and there's spare housing) are fulfilled, he (and all other NPCs) will spawn again after being killed. In your case that would be an ingredient for a dye in your inventory (easiest example: harvest a Yellow Marigold).

And no, there are almost no reasons for restarting either your character or your world. (Except if your character is a HardCORE one, which means that your character has only got one life. Hardmode is just the "endgame" if you want to call it that.)

Ah HA!

I had the needed ingredients but I sold them to him right before he got his ass killed. What an asshole! :P

Thank you friend. :D Oh and is Hardcore harder or is it just the one life change?

You're welcome :)

No, it's only the death penalty that changes. More info here: http://terraria.gamepedia.com/Hardcore_mode

as final_option pointed out it's just a penalty change, Hardmode is the mode that makes the game much harder which come 1.3 will be followed by Expert mode.

As mentioned, he shouldn't be wandering at night if he's inside valid housing. A campfire might not count as a light source, or maybe the room is too small. Open your inventory and look on the far right above your equipment, there should be an icon with, I think, a house on it, click that. It'll change to a list of your NPCs plus a question mark. Click the question mark and click on what you think is a valid room and it will tell you if it is or not, and if not, why not. You can also use the list of NPCs to set which room they will live in if you have multiple rooms, so you could add another room on top of the one you have, accessible only through a platform 'floor' between them, and set the Guide to live there so he can't open doors. Nope. No sleeping them away like Minecraft. Right, they don't block movement. Walls only prevent mobs from spawning in that space and make rooms count as rooms.

Campfire does not count as a light source, even though it does provide light. Torches, Lamps, Chandeliers, and Candles do.

I recommend using that time to catch up on emails, get the hockey scores (you are from Canada), or house clean. Of course if you are are looking to build yourself a castle or mansion, just put a huge border around the are you want to build on and then you can spend all night working on your abode.

On a plus note, I recently picked up a zombie arm really early so I haven't really needed to stay indoors at night anymore.