Hey all, New to the Discourse. Been playing on and off for a few years. Love the realism building and crafting aspects of the game.
I’m trying to decide on a good melee weapon that I can craft from scratch or repair if it breaks. I though a wood axe would be a good option, but I see that several of the necessary tools are not craftable: steel tongs, swage and die, metalworking chisel. Where can these tools be found?
Are there any good weapons that can be made from scratch, but it looks like makeshift machete or knife spear are my best options?
Various types of spears could be good, copper spear itself only requires stuff obtainable without having to settle down, not needing an actual forge to craft it but merely fire. The most you’d have to worry about then is copper, which is easier to find within civilization.
But yeah, spears are much easier to repair since they call have a wooden component, axes too I suppose but they are a bit dangerous to use as melee weapons at lower skill levels since the attack cost is high and you may just suffer greatly if you stumble, meanwhile spears and other reach weapon you at least have a buffer space for it should you miss in spectacular fashion.
Cool. Yeah I was looking at spears. Just started a new game and the npc needed antibiotics. Took me about 30 minutes but I found them and got them to her in time!!
The tools are craftable, but you need a forge for them (and sufficient skill). I’m not sure if there are forges available, but you can make a base camp and construct the smithy expansion (allowing companions with sufficient skills to work for you), or just construct it yourself (requires skills and materials, of course). It’s possible to construct the tools needed by constructing the tools needed to construct the tools, etc., so you can gradually construct your way up the tool (and equipment) tree.
A very first weapon would probably be a pointy stick, but personally I don’t do melee unless I have to, or have advanced sufficiently to have equipment that absorb most hits without taking damage. I generally start with (thrown) rocks, advance through staff sling, and then bow.
With no skills, I tend to favor the makeshift crowbar. Its not hard to find a pipe and a rock/hammer while out and about, even if its pry utility was nerfed.
Get to fab 3 though, and the Wooden Tonfa can be really good. Easy to repair, craftable with a pocket knife and some foraged wood/sticks, non-conductive for dealing with electric enemies, and light/small enough to fit a spare/backup into a smaller bag, good for a combat kit. By this point, you’ve probably looted a ‘real’ weapon, so stuff like the makeshift spears or glaives start to become less useful. Meanwhile, that wooden tonfa stays in my bag right up until I’ve got a real sword on my hip.
I don’t mess around with crafting weapons too much, but the tonfa does totally rock if you can’t find anything. I usually make due with a pipe until I can get a carving knife, then progress to a bat.
Baseball/aluminum bats freaking rock early game with their decent bash damage and +3(!) to hit, and can be used to kill soldier zombies that drop combat knives which are kind of OP with their rapid strike ability (ignore the -1 to hit, the miss recovery is really good)
At that point you can pretty much kill any early game zombie (watch out for raptors) and go from there collecting your forge + tools at your leisure.