I just keep dying

[Inconspicuous]

I’ll try some of this. Maybe I’ll be able to get another character past the early game again, without pure luck.

[hexman]

[quote=“Inconspicuous, post:1, topic:13614”]Well, what the title says. I’ve mostly figured this game out, but I have a few more questions regarding the very early game.

1: Which weapon do I use? Knife spear? Makeshift crowbar? What?
2: Character builds. I just can’t get the hang of them. What’s the best character build you have for surviving?
3: Day raids, or night raids? Can’t figure out which one to do.
4: Is wilderness survival more easy?[/quote]

1. Use spears, it’s hands down the best survival weapon. Begin with a knife-spear then move onto the wooden ones and the steel one. The thing about spears is that they can not only take zeds down but they’re also very useful in dealing with hostile woodland creatures (Moose, Wolves, etc.). You can kill pretty much any of these creatures without taking much damage by kiting them in a bush while a survivor with a makeshift-knife would have a hard time even landing a single hit.

2. I’d say it depends. A good character build, in my opinion, should have ample strength (for taking down things in melee and using bows), low intellect (it does not do much regarding improving your survival odds), good dex and good perception; but in the end it all depends on your woldgen settings, whether you’ve hordes toggled or not, you use dynamic or static, etc etc. I don’t know if int was buffed or not as I’ve not been keeping track of the experimental but even though bows were nerfed a long time ago (and are now quickly replaced by pneumatics and crossbows), strength is still a very important stat.

3. Night raids are easier than day raids though it might have changed now. But it’s a situational matter – for example, it’s probably best to loot that house on the outskirts in the day rather than painstakingly going their in the night wasting precious time and skewing your sleep-clock.

4. Again this is also a subjective matter; While some classes might find it easier (Lumberjack, Foo Hunters, Survivalist, etc.), it could be very difficult for others (Convict, Cyberjunkie, Broken Cyborg, etc). Although living in the woods may protect you from zeds and other city-specific abominations, you still need to fight hostile woodland creatures (and their zombified versions). In particular, wilderness survival involves doing infrequent trips to the city because you’ll run out of stuff sooner or later. A nearby mansion or a farm would be a great help but it depends on the mapgen; because of this you should be very selective about where you want to camp.

A more general tip is to not fight everything you encounter; instead when you see a horde try to lure them away. A noisemaker, car-alarm or any other source of noise would be a great help in this.

[prytoclasm]

Try to loot Museums, the Armor and Weapons you can find in there may be cumbersome, but it helps a lot. Especially if you can find a Naginata or any other spear like weapon -> Poor Zeds!

[deoxy]

1. I’m going to buck the trend a little here and point out that the most important thing, early on, is hit bonus. After that, the most important thing is damage/time (DPS, basically). Spears get one, MAYBE two extra hits, but after that, they are SLOW for the damage they put out. For taking one or two zombies, yeah, a spear is AWESOME (decent hit bonus, kill them before they get to swing at you more than once), but if you find yourself having to face more than two, I’d rather have a machete (+3 to hit is amazing, damage/time is amazing). Of course, at the beginning, you usually want to avoid facing more than two…

2. High strength is the most important, as it increases damage, increase how much you can carry, and increases your HP. Dex is next. Intelligence and Perception only matter if you can live long enough.

3. Depends on how many bloody shady zombies you’re getting. Early on, with a normal spawn rate, night raids are definitely safer, but once the incidence of shady zombies and feral predators goes up, night gets REALLY dangerous. Shady zombies aren’t directly any more dangerous than a regular zombie, it’s just that, at night, they can gang up on you without you knowing about it and prevent your escape while something nasty catches up with you. Feral Predators… do I need to say anything about those?

4. Yes. Much. Boringly much if you are playing without hordes. The only real danger is giant wasps and bees (as they can’t be killed with fire), or a few rare nasties if you venture into the wrong swamp.

[Inconspicuous]

So I found a katana, should I use that instead of the spears? Also, I got some good stuff from a few sporting goods stores, as well as a ton of concrete and fertilizer from the hardware stores. I found an atomic lamp, which is amazing, and I’m thinking about moving my base, because the shelter is uncomfortably close to town, and a lot of the windows are broken (Zombie attacks). I was thinking of moving to the abandoned storefront to the south, then clearing out the area near the pumping station further in town and moving there.

[Azrad]

The katana is a great weapon, as long as it’s not the replica version. There’s also a flawed version, which is still pretty decent but you can’t repair it if it gets damaged.

[Inconspicuous]

Nope, it’s the real version. Now all I need to do is level up cutting weapons, and hope to find that one style book that uses it. I also found the book that has the recipes for armor, so now all I need is the equipment to craft it. I’m moving my base to the storefront, it shouldn’t take long. My other two weapons are an ice axe and a recurve bow, with a quiver for holding arrows. It’s spring, day 8.

[latogato]

My opinion:

1. Until you level up your melee and dodge skills the most important attribute of the good weapon its to-hit bonus. At start i prefer makeshift crowbar, it has +2 hit and can open doors so i can loot for better stuff. Later the to-hit bonus is less important, get some weapons with serious damage. Very important to get fit clothes with minimum encumbrance. They greatly reduce the taken damages, a simple leather jacket will save you against most weaker enemies. Also weapons with block feature will save you from a lot of damage.

2. Strength is important for good melee and for more Hit Points. Perception is good for ranged attacks and to detect mines.

3. Day raids, because you can see everything and you can plan your moves. Around corners you can peek and spot enemies in time. I walk until a zombie spots me, i retreat few tiles to prevent other zombies to spot me, i wait until the zombie get close and then i kill it. I lure them one by one until they are gone. If the zombie is strong i set a bush or discarded clothes on fire and i lure the zombie into the fire. I hit the zombie and then run one tile away, with this i can poke it to dead and it can attack back fewer times. If the monster is too strong i run through a house and i close every doors behind me. If there are different groups of monsters i lure one of them into an other one. If they are closer to each others than to me, they will attack each others and i can run away or kill the wounded winners.

4. Never tried it.

edit: blocking weapons

[deoxy]

So I found a katana, should I use that instead of the spears?

IIRC, the katana only has a +1 to hit - see my first rule about early game hit-bonus being most important. Damage/time, it’s pretty good, though. If you don’t have the style for it, other “real” melee weapons are better, though (broadsword for instance).

Personally, I find it hard to beat the machete, unless you have a style and matching weapon. Either of the knife styles that work for machete are just plain amazing with the machete. About the only time I wouldn’t use that is against something with some armor, as the machete is fast/light damage, which just a little bit of armor can ruin - soldier zombies, for instance, are a pain to kill with the machete.

[StopSignal]

It could be a fake!

[Inconspicuous]

I have yet to find a machete… I do have an ice axe, though. +2 to hit, and 89 moves per attack. Is that really better though?

[Profugo_Barbatus]

Quick attacks with a bonus to hit, yea that’s pretty good. Early on, when you’ve no combat skills to speak of, just hitting the target is usually more valuable than actual damage. I’d rather consistently dealing 10 damage than getting stuck because I waffled six 30 damage potential strikes in a row. constantly missing a kill you need to make gets survivors boxed in and killed.

[Inconspicuous]

Is a Cathedral a good place for a home base? I keep hearing about how people build theirs there, because of the stone walls and all. I have a jackhammer, if any re-modeling is necessary.

[John_Candlebury]

Is a Cathedral a good place for a home base? I keep hearing about how people build theirs there, because of the stone walls and all. I have a jackhammer, if any re-modeling is necessary.

Their basements make decent bases, but they are not the best. You’ll need to seal a few doors.

The best bases right now are firefighter stations, or some custom built armored RV.

[Inconspicuous]

I was able to fight off the angry moose and the horde of zombies out front with my katana, now that I have some decent skills. Behind the pantry, there’s this weird locked room in the basement full of “Blank body corpses”, and pillars and stuff. I’ve been able to breeze through most of the zombies easily. One more question, can you OD on aspirin?

[John_Candlebury]

I was able to fight off the angry moose and the horde of zombies out front with my katana, now that I have some decent skills. Behind the pantry, there’s this weird locked room in the basement full of “Blank body corpses”, and pillars and stuff. I’ve been able to breeze through most of the zombies easily. One more question, can you OD on aspirin?

Aspirin in the game has no OD risk, you can chug bottle after bottle and nothing bad will happen to you.

That said its effects wont stack indefinitely, I think you reach the cap with 4 aspirins but i cant check at the moment

[Inconspicuous]

Well, doesn’t matter now. I was killed by a shocker and a spitter.

[Rot]

I have a large guide on my computer answering most, if not all newbie questions. However I’m on my phone and I’m not in my apartment either.

But for now, I recommend good armor (leather touring suit with a motorcycle helmet and corresponding boots and gloves) and a spear for brand new characters.

If you are lucky you could find an NPC with a good weapon or skills to help you out if you can convince them to tag along.
I did it once in one of my numerous lab playthroughs, the NPC had 8 unarmed. By the time I escaped I destroyed everything with my fists of steel.

If you can, get a shopping cart. It’s great because it can store things and if the situation gets hairy, you can just ditch it and come back later.
Keeps your character unencumbered so you can fight and run.

[deoxy]

I have yet to find a machete… I do have an ice axe, though. +2 to hit, and 89 moves per attack. Is that really better though?

17 damage at +2 for 85, while machete is 26 damage at +2* for 89… yeah, the machete is better, but I’d forgotten how good the ice axe is (they are pretty rare), AND, for bonus points, it replaces your crowbar? YES PLEASE! That’s the beginner’s DREAM weapon.

• I was wrong on it being +3, apparently… that’s the baseball bat, which is a great newbie weapon, just a little on the slow side, but good damage. Aluminum bat is even better.

[vassock]

You can survive indefinitely just by killing and cooking animals. Water is quite easy to get. All you need is a hole (or brazier). Then just throw wood in it and boil some water.

Clear out a town one zombie at a time. Unless you built your character incorrectly or have some bad symptoms/conditions (like if you start with the Infected/Tweaker start and are not treated), you should be able to handle most zombies one on one. Use a firearm against the special zeds or something especially harmful like the various acid zombies.