Hello everyone, this is my first post.
My problem is that I have trouble staying alive. It might have something to do with my insanely low amount of patience, because almost always my game ends while being chased by a mob of zombies. So, I ask you, what do you do to wait until nighttime? And, is there any advice anyone could to give me about going on night raids?
Hoo, boy. I was just like you; impatient, and constantly running from hordes of zeds.
I have no tips to offer on waiting until night. Well, finding a nice building and boarding it up for the night isn’t a bad time waster. But I do have some tips on nighttime.
At night, try to keep in the alleys and fields rather than the streets.
If you’re anything like me, you’ve already memorized the buildings just from the outside in the dark. But you’re not, so just walk into a building and stand near the wall and check your map and it’ll tell you what the building is.
Always keep a flashlight with you. Flick it on and off to keep your distence from the zombies.
That’s pretty much It from me. Welcome to the fourms.
Take Quick + Fleet footed to break the game; I wouldn’t suggest you doing this after 2 or so “successful” characters, because the game really becomes super easy.
For looting just clear one house at a time and avoid the front rooms, remember that you can close the curtains of closed windows using c, once they invariably spot you, wack whatever comes as it crosses the broken window, just do that until your torso/head hp reaches pink, after that retreat somewhere safe for the rest of the day. Also just loot houses for the first 3 days, leave shops for later.
I usually do some light scouting in the day time not to far from my initial evac shelter. Before going outside, do the standard smash the locker grab a pipe deal. Check out the basement of the evac shelter. Sometimes nothing, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. If it is a lot you’ll get a little practice in with your newly acquired pipe.
If there are any books in the basement I’ll hang out and read them, if not I just wait until midnight. Than off to the city. Like ninja said, stick to alleys. For the first day or two stick to the outskirts of town. Yes the gun store is very tempting but it is probably in the middle of town and you aren’t ready for that yet. You can kill zombies one on one, maybe one against two but you have to be smart. Use furniture/windows to your advantage.
During the first days I’m always on the look out for a house with a basement. An ideal find is a basement with a bed on each top corner, food/meds/weapons/books in the middle. Make this your base a while. From here you can continue going out at night and reading during the day. If you get lucky and find a tailoring book that will raise your skill level to 3 read it before doing anything and reinforce your clothes.
Whew, that’s enough info for a while.
if you can find a trap site in the wilderness, and loot a few crossbows those will do you a lot of good in a fight. also watch your torso encumbrance, you absolutely will not be able to melee anything if it is too high.
Honestly, early on I would say its less about fighting and more about speed. You need to be faster than the things that can attack you, and you need to get in (to town, or into whatever area has stuff you need) then get out. Like was already stated, fleet footed and such almost make this too easy, but if you keep yourself moving as fast as possible without those things, you should be able to escape “most” of the threats.
Things to keep in mind for keeping speed up:
-Encumbrance, particularly of the lower extremities, can give you a penalty to speed.
-If you don’t start with shoes or wear shoes that slow you down swap em out for something decent as soon as possible.
-Pain is your enemy, if you get hit, you get pain, and pain slows you down, early on, pain killers like codine can help immensely (also raw speed from meth and such as well to help you escape).
-You get minor speed penalties for hunger and thirst, so try to keep topped up when your raiding.
-Don’t go over your max volume… just because the game will let you doesn’t mean you should, it adds torso encumbrance and slows you down.
-train your combat skills on weak targets only early on, child zombies (in small numbers) or dogs are a good way to get some relatively safe skill.
-travel on roads or sidewalks and other flat surfaces, but try to put objects (shrubs, trees, cars, buildings) between you and zombies chasing you as well, but dont be afraid to duck into narrow gaps between buildings. Zeds are dumb, and they pretty much go straight towards you regardless of how hard it is to get to you so use that to your advantage.
As stated above, if you must fight in melee, and early on you probably will not have many other options (though throwing things can help wear down approaching enemies), make sure your torso encumbrance is as low as possible, early on 1 or 0 till you can afford to lose some dodge/melee. Always go with a melee weapon with high positive to hit values as you can find. Having any clothing covering a body part, as long as it doesnt affect speed/dodge too much, will help. Your biggest danger in early melee is not the damage itself but the pain slowing you down, or getting an infected bite wound. Cauterizing can stop the infection MAYBE but the pain it causes you will still be killer if you are not careful. Pain Resistant can be a great trait to have in this case.
Edit: I forgot about the recently added rollerblades/skates etc. They result in an amazing boost in speed relative to your enemies provided you use them on smooth surfaces, if you find a pair (fits is best) slap em on and you should be able to outrun a lot of early threats with ease. Just dont use them while fighting/offroad.
at start try loot a mansion it have food tools armor books and weapons inside and only hostiles here are few normal zombies
get a crowbar you can make makeshift one with pipe and rock it allow you open closed doors and lift manhole covers alslo if you do not have anything better it can be used as mele weapon
look for traps in the field if you see a crossbow trap just throw a stone or something at it you get free crossbow and crossbow bolt alslo in middle you will see more or less usefull items
during night raid on town is good to have night vision it allow you see enemy 1 tile before he can atack you in mele (higher chance to run away or throw something) and stay away from bloated zombies before you get gas mask or firefighter PBA mask if you hear SMASH! in city it can be hult so better move in other direction look at your in game hour allways make sure you can escape city before dawn or hide in safe place (subway or sewers alslo firestadion if you see one)
My biggest piece of advice is “Don’t get hit”. As mentioned before pain slows you down, which makes it get easier to be hit again. As a result you want to approach things slowly. Lure 1-2 zombies out of the edge of town and kill them through kiting, luring them onto bushes, hitting them, and then moving away so that you never actually get hit. (Pits work great for this once you get a shovel). Smash the bodies, then go back and lure the next few zombies out. Repeat until all the zombies are dead. (Note that if you deal with a few zombies, such as zombie dogs, you may have to turn and fight temporarily since they are faster than you).
Also don’t head for the shops right away. Shops are generally located at the city center, where zombie spawns will be the thickest. Try to find some houses that poke out from the opposite end of the city from the shops and start there until you at least have some basic equipment from the houses present.
Alright, I took you guys’ advice and I am suriving for about three days now. But now I’m thinking about what to do now. I really haven’t ever gotten this far into the game (goal wise, not day wise, my record of most days survived is five). Im going for kind of a nomadic playstyle, kind of like Walking Dead type nomadic (basically sometimes setting up a temporary base.) Anyone got any advice?
This is actually going to make things harder for you if you have Static zombie spawns on. Because you won’t be killing off the monster population of an area and then living there for a long time.
But anyway if you really want to do that then I’d suggest building yourself an RV. A nice vehicle with built in kitchen, solar panels, and a welding rig. You can sleep in it comfortable and use it for lighting too.
Id actually say semi nomadic is the way to go. My general theory plan is clear and loot. Clear out an area of zombies, grab what you want, dump it in a house or later your car, then go do some more clearing and looting. If your health gets low, chill out in a clear area and read some skill books. Dont stress so much about building a base, if you have cleared an area of about 9 map tiles, the one in the center is pretty much safe, closing the curtains while you sleep should cover you for most things. If you clear a road and the buildings on both sides of the road, you should have that path sorted out. (s)mashing walls is a good way to check if there are any zombies inside or in the area generally. If you smash and nothing moves, you are 90% safe.
Wandering out onto the street, waggling your meatbuns at some Zs then leading them back to a 1 tile wide window where you can easily kill piles of them is a good way to clear.
also if you can i would do as person said above luring alot of zombies, find a chokepoint, then bladetrap. when the zombies get to you “if they do” they will be mostly in kill range… good for dealing with relativly large hoards…
As for long term survival, check bushes. a lot of times, they have trash in them. but occasionally you can find eggs, vegetables, and herbs. sometimes youll find useful things like bottles.
As has been mentioned, a good goal is to build an RV or some vehicle with good storage and some amenities like a welding rig, kitchen unit, minifridge, and recharging station. A normal battery is fine to start, but youll want to switch to a large rechargable and solar panels later. keep your solar panels on the “interior” tiles of your vehicle, they are fragile. as time goes on, you may find military tier vehicles with military grade armor, strip the armor off as well as any reinforced parts and guns. Once your mechanics skill gets up high enough, start attaching more engines. my personal advice on engines is, stop at 3. each engine gets a diminishing return on power for each other engine in the car, and after I think 4 the power you get doesnt get any higher. remember to stick a muffler on it, otherwise youll be deafened by the car and attract zeds. also, you have a lot of power and the ability to “safely” drive your car at high speeds, its tempting to do, but only do it when your sure your not going to hit anything. I had a truck I took up to about 500 MPH. I hit several bushes with it and they tore my truck apart. dont stick your engines in the front tiles of the vehicle, keep them back in the “interior.” they arent as fragile asthe solar panels (not nearly) but you dont want them breaking. a V8 or V12 are a massive pain to replace. overall, maintain your vehicle. quarter panels are not too big a loss if you lose them, other parts are not so easy to get.
Problem being that I think someone moved the vehicle welding rig recipe into a book…
yeah, but you can still find them out and about. mostly in public works sheds. fairly rare, so its one of the tools that really needs to be maintained.
Ive got yet another question about survival for you guys now. How you get your charachter to last past the first few days? Do you just have to make a base somewhere untill you can go out and face the unspeakable horrors of the outside world? Is there any way to lead a semi-nomadic lifestyle while still in the noob phase? What’s the key to protecting yourself?
So many questions!
a) Well, you can certainly try and stay out of harm’s way after you’ve covered all the necessities;
b) You need to cover all the survival aspects - a warm safehouse, food and water sources;
c) defeating opponents in CataDDA means planning your expedition, staying protected and equipped and ensuring a safe route out;
d) you can scavenge, hunt and keep yourself healthy whilst travelling - you’ll become a survival expert but not a metalworker, for sure;
Keys to protecting oneself in Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead
Think of your real life, outside the safety of your house. What do you really need out there? You need shoes, right? You need some pockets, a pouch or a purse? If you’re working, you need some tools, isn’t it?
> Quality gear assembly
> Storage space enough to accomodate your needs without needlessly encumbering your torso
> Assorted tools, weapons, modifications and ammunition
You may want to split weapons into silent ones and firearms. Noise, much like your scent attracts scavengers and predators alike. A silenced SMG tucked in between your pants and belt is the subtle difference between a bite from a zombie, and a lively adventure downtown. Think about painkillers, medkits and bandages for a brief moment, go for difference between postapocalyptic life and death.
[quote=“Sneak, post:16, topic:7156”]Ive got yet another question about survival for you guys now. How you get your charachter to last past the first few days? Do you just have to make a base somewhere untill you can go out and face the unspeakable horrors of the outside world? Is there any way to lead a semi-nomadic lifestyle while still in the noob phase? What’s the key to protecting yourself?
So many questions![/quote]
are you doing anything with tailoring?
Generally, I beeline to get these things (in order of importance):
Once you have all those, you have everything you need to survive indefinitely near any water source (or sewage treatment plant… if thats your thing). During times of bad hunting, you can scavenge underbrush for eggs and, if really desperate, make a fishing pole and try your hand at that.
Get a knife and good clothes. All I’ve ever needed to start my years.