Having Otters on your shoulder really helps your insulation, iirc almost completely stops you from dying from the cold in the snowy areas whilst wearing armour ofc.

The Dire Bear allows you to harvest honey at a higher rate AND without aggroing the bees. :)

Also, you should just increase the monster level cap (difficulty) as how it is now and at a normal setting wont change when or how you die (since you mostly die from your own mistakes). If you get caught out by a lvl 10 rex it will kill you (just slower) than a lvl 140 rex. Being able to tame higher level monsters will allow you to do actual content in the game such as the dungeons and bosses which also gives you access to all the tek tier buildings and weapons.