Overview
This Guide will teach you how to survive the Michigan Wastelands, mainly by looting, killing and scavenging. Now modified to fit the current v0.9952b-build better.
Getting started
First you need to create a new character. Since every ability has now a different price, depending on its usefulness, which is ranging from 1 to 6 points, the glorious era of the jack-of-all-trades characters is gone, making this first decision a tough one. If you want a character focused mostly on its fighting ability (assuming that’s the reason you read this guide) 3 options seem to be most useful:
1.Strong, Melee, Tough, Botany, Myopia, Metabolism(Trait)
Except from Botany, this character is a full-blown melee fighter, capable of killing every enemy that roams the Michigan wasteland. With the ability to beat a Dogman to pulp with a crowbar or to survive a point-blank shotgun blast, there is not much to worry about if you know how to handle a combat situation. And since many encounters can be survived through the use of these skills, it’s unlikely to find yourself an impasse. But remember that you miss out on the support skills which will block several options.
2.Melee, Tough, Botany, Medic, Metabolism(Trait)
Strong is the most expensive skill you can choose and removing it makes room for lots of other options. This character sacrifices some of its power, to get Medic (and since you’ve got 1 point left and Myopia and Insomniac to get 2 more points, it is possible to pick another one). The biggest downside is not the lowered combat strength, but instead the problems you will have to face during some encounters (e.g. Isotope mine, Hatter), making progress harder to achieve or have the possibility to get you killed outright.
3.Strong, Melee, Botany, Medic, Myopia, Metabolism(Trait)
This time, instead lowering your damage, Medic is paid for with some of the characters resistance against damage and diseases. It may seem useless to achieve a higher healing rate while increasing the chance to get hurt or sick, but if you know how to handle a combat situation, normally you should be able to survive the few hits that make it past your defence. Besides, Tough has the weakest combat move, compared to Melee and Strong, and only a few encounters offer special options if you have it.
Note: The 3 examples above are only suggestions and can be altered to fit your own needs. Especially the second one has room to squeeze another skill into it and Medic can be ignored to pick something else. Be aware that some skills may fit better than others (Ranged may be useful but can devalue the close combat skills to some degree) and some are mostly useless (Tracking and Hiding offer nearly nothing to a combat oriented character).
The very first thing you will see after waking up, is a Dogman triing to eat you in the Cryo-Facility. Choose any skill the game is offering you (Strong and Melee should only be chosen together) to defend yourself. After leaving the building, scavenge the Cryo Facility location to get an usable entrace to the building (and an extra First Aid Kit if you have chosen the “Medic”-Ability). Use the entrace and claim the Facility as your campsite.
Next you should try to save your character from freezing to death. And this is where you start your career as a routhless murderer. Instead of scavenging abandoned buildings for loot, you should just take everything from a roaming Bandit: clothes, weapons and other useful stuff. Grab one of the glass shards found at the Cryo Facility and head to the nearest forest. Use the “Forest”-Item to get a long tree branch. Combine it with the glass shard to get a sharpened spear. If you get attacked before you could make the Spear, run away. If you fight while wielding the glass shard, you will just cut yourself. If your body temperature drops too low during your search for a weapon, hide inside the Cryo Facility or any other suitable campsite (high “Shelter”-Value) and let several turns pass to warm you up. The game should provide a sleeping bag during a random encounter when your temperature drops below “Moderate Hypothermia” the first time.
First Blood
As a pure fighter, you can attack nearly every target without hesitation, but even if you didn’t pick every combat related skill, you should be fine, as long as you keep an eye on the enemies equipped weapon and clothing. But since your main goal is to grab as much loot as possible, sort out Dogmen, Enfield Horrors, Deers and Melonheads as targets, at least for now. They provide most of the time little to no loot. If you want to find some loot worth the trouble, take a closer look at the small graphics that symbolize your enemies. Every humans clothing and the weaponry carried in hand or over the shoulder is shown here. Sort out the ATN-Warriors (red/white facepaint) and the DMC-Guards (armed soldiers). The Blue Frog Cultist (blue/white clothing) can sometimes be tough, but they are not invulnerable. Everything left should be an easy practicing target, just looters and mobsters who no one will miss. Pick whoever is left, or whoever you like, but remember that what you see on the graphic is what you get after the the battle as loot. If you encounter multiple targets, ignore them if you want to stay alive a little while, two enemies can sometimes be managed at once, but three will usually overpower you if you don’t manage to scare at least one of them off.
Your chance to kill your enemy depends on the terrain as much as on your own skills. Not only will the terrain have an impact on the aviable cover and tripping chance, it will also set the distance you have to cover before you can attack. Open fields will mostly set a distance between 20 and 50, hills between 5 and 20, urban terrain between 15 and 5 and forests between 10 and 2. A shorter distance will keeps your victim from running away.
After you attacked your chosen target, the next step depends on the target’s weapon.
Meele: Use “Charge” to get closer. During the day, the chance of tripping should not be too high, but if it happens, get up as soon as possible.
Firearm: Go for cover immediately, and watch the reaction. If he is closing in or running away, he is most likely out of ammo. If he starts shooting, stay calm and wait until he finished depleting his ammo. Then use “Charge”.
If you managed to get in range, the most decisive point is to watch the statuses you and your enemy get during the fight. The goal should be to make the enemy helpless and attack him.
If you picked Strong, Tough, Melee or Trapping a special combat move is sometimes available during battle that may be useful:
Leg Trip(Melee): If you hit, the enemy will be knocked down and suffer minor injuries, sometimes he will be stunned for one turn
Head Butt(Tough): The enemy will sustain a minor bruise and will often be stunned for one turn
Create Obstacle(Strong): Causes up to three minor injuries and will sometimes stun or knock down you enemy
Lure(Trapping): Can knock your enemy down and stun him, and may cause up to three injuries, but will leave you vulnerable
The general status of a figure can be divide into 3 categories:
Helpless: Unconcious, Stunned, Recovering, Fallen(except the “Pull Down”Move)
Easy to Hit: Vulnerable, Severe Pain, Concussion
Normal: None of the above statuses present
Your moves during combat should be chosen depending on those categories.
Player Fallen, Enemy Normal: Choose “Roll Dodge” and “Get Up” next round.
Player Vulnerable/Normal, Enemy Normal: Choose “Parry” and try to use “Create Obstacle”, “Headbutt” or “Leg Trip” next round (whatever is aviable)
Player Vulnerable/Normal, Enemy Helpless: Choose “Kick” or “Meele Attack”
Player Fallen, Enemy Helpless: Choose “Get up”
Player Normal/Vulnerable, Enemy Vulnerable: Choose either “Parry” if you want to avoid damage or choose “Leg Trip”, “Create Obstacle” or “Headbutt” to make the Enemy Helpless
Follow the list until your enemy is dead, most enemies can be killed within 10 rounds.
After your enemy is dead, check your “Health”-Tab, because every wound you got during the fight should be carefully treated.
Bruisings: Can’t be treated that much, only clean them with boiled water and bandage them with clean rags if you have supplies to spare.
Bleeding cuts: Should be cleaned with alcohol (causes pain, be careful) or boiled water, and bandaged with clean rags to stop the bleeding.
Broken limbs: Must be treated with a splint, if not, the healing will cause immense pain and will take much longer.
Broken Ribs: You will just have to wait until they heal on their own.
Internal Bleeding: You can’t do anything, but this condition is most of the time a warning that you won’t survive much more damage. Try to stay out of combat and get some rest.
Pain: You can pass out from immense pain, and nearly every activity will be somehow influenced by it. The pain will ease over time, but on short terms painkillers can keep your character going.
Blood Loss: Loosing too much blood is a death sentence, what makes it so important to bandage every bleeding wound with clean rags. Lost blood will regenerate slowly over time. If you lost a lot of blood the occuring shock will weaken you for a while.
Note: If you only have dirty rags and unboiled water, don’t use them, except you will bleed out if the wound stays unbandaged! Applying dirty rags or infected water to the wound can cause a deadly infection.
Daily Survival
A vital part of your daily routine will be the question, if you can manage to find something edible before your character starves to death. You have three main options to get some food:
Hunting: Deers and several Monsters are roaming through the Michigan Wasteland, providing meat for everyone who can kill them. The easiest target is the deer, its low heath and tendency to run away instead of fight back, makes it a relatively safe food source. Other animals like the Dogman or the Enfield Horror will provide edible meat too, but only if you can kill them before they kill you. Meat should always be cooked before eating to prevent your character from getting ill, and spoiled meat should never be consumed for the same reason.
Foraging: Mushrooms and berries can be found while scavenging a forest or open field. They tend to be rare, but using the “Botany”-Ability will make them a reliable source of food. The blue berries are always edible, while the yellow ones are always poisonous. The red berries and the mushrooms can only be identified by a character using the “Botany”-Ability. If you eat enough berries, it can be possible to manage both food and water at once.
Scavenging: During your scavenging attemps, you can sometimes find food items from the time before the cataclysm. To be more precise you will find gelly bears, ketchup, snack cakes, canned soup and crackers, all blessed with infinite durability. The main problem is that you will never know how long it will take to find some of them, so this may not be an option to rely on. If you don’t want to scavenge yourself, you can sometimes find stuff like this in the pockets of human enemies. If you manage to defeat them, you can use their supplies.
Water can be found nearly everywhere in rivers, lakes or marches, but you will need to boil it, to prevent an infection. Sometimes pre-bottled water can be found while scavenging, which is safe to drink. The Corn-o-Cola will have nearly no influence to your thirst, it will rehydrate you, but will also cause you to dehydrate faster for a while. Whisky will dehydrate you. Water from the Black swamp is contaminated and will cause poisoning/a disease even if boiled. Nearly every food item (Except crackers and cured meat) will also grant you some hydration, especially meat and berries are very effective.
During your journey through the Wasteland, you will have to stop and take a nap every 16 – 24 hours/turns. The best time to sleep is during nightime, as long as you don’t have powered night vision goggles. Without them you will only get one move per turn, and your field of vision will be limited to the hex you are standing on. A torch, a flashlight or a smartphone with a flashlight software can at least bypass the move penalty, but you will attract a lot of unwanted attention with them.
The best way to find a secure shelter is to look for an urban hex containing a building with high enough “Sleep” and “Shelter”-Rating on the “Camp”-Tab. To be safe during nightime, you should refrain from making a campfire (will draw attention to your campsite) and carry four noise traps (will wake you up if an enemy is closing in or triing to steal your stuff) with you if possible.
A common part of living in a world without proper healthcare, is fighting against infections, diseases and poisons of all kind. The reasons for getting ill are numerous:
Cholera: Caused by unboiled water or uncooked meat. Symptoms are diarrhea and vomiting
Stomach Flue: Cholera’s little brother, not letal. Symptoms are diarrhea and vomiting
Sepsis: Caused by applying dirty rags or unboiled water to a wound. Symptoms are heavy pain and fever
Blue Rot: Caused by getting in contact with an infected person during one of two random events or touching a Blue Frog Sash. Symptoms are vomiting and can be very hard to cure even with nanomeds
CRS: Can occur after getting in contact with radiation. Will show up for a short period of time, only to vanish shortly after. That doesn’t mean it ist cured and it will show up later as a lethal disease. Must be treated with nadomeds to avoid death.
Poison: Caused by walking through the Black Swamp (wear a working gas mask to prevent this), consuming contaminated water or eating poisonous berries or mushroom. Symptoms are pain, vomiting and diarrhea
Allergic reaction: Caused by stumbling over black mold while scavenging, prevent it by wearing a working gas mask. Leads to pain and will weaken your immune system. Should wear off pretty quick.
Every disease or poison, except the Stomach Flu and allergy, has three stages. The first one is completely invisible for the player and is most of the time only visible if you have the “Medic”-Ability and thus can see the “Immune System”-Bar drop. During the second stage the symptoms will appear and you will receave a message, stating that the character is ill, or naming the disease if you have the “Medical”-Ability. If you reach the third stage, the symptoms will get even worse and you will most of the time have to use a nanomedic kit or to survive. Sometimes, after the character passed out, he will recover instead of diing right away, but this is very rare.
Treatment
The best way to shrug diseases off, is to fight against the symptoms. Drink a lot of boiled water (this is a good time to use the purification pills if you have some), eat cooked meat or edible berries and keep your immune system going by using antibiotics or use bark tea, made by using the “Botany”-Ability. The ATN-Enclave offers treatment for free, but this will not always work.
If the disease moves to the third stage, you should use everything you have, including the nadomedic kit if you were lucky enough to get one. If not, the DMC-Hospital may help you, if your funds are sufficient. Remember that CRS can only be treated with a nanomedic kit and antibiotics won’t help, since it is caused by radiation.
All the stuff you need to survive
After your first fight, you should at least own two or three clothing items and one shoe. This will slow the process of freezing to death enough to start looting. Urban areas are always a good place to start searching for medicine, clothing, sleds or tools, but the forest huts often offer better supplies if you depend on firearms or need a backpack.
During your scavenging attemps, use everything you can to max out the loot bar. The “Strong”-Ability, a crowbar or a lighter will come in handy here. And don’t let some scratches or cuts keep you from digging, you are a tough guy. Remember that!
The best location for your fist scavenging attemp is located north of the Cryo facility. Next to Zoom Zoom’s, at least six urban areas can be found.
Try to get your hands on the following stuff to be ready for the next step:
The best choice as a meele weapon is the crowbar. The damage may not be the highest aviable, but it doubles as a scavenging tool and has an extremly high durability. Thus it will normally last for weeks, even if heavily used.
A firearm should be weared over your shoulder, no matter if you have ammo to use it or not. It will be most helpful to scare enemies off, and the rare ammo should be saved for moments of great desperation. Personally I prefer the shotgun over the .308, the range may shorter, compared to the .308 (which you will never fully use), but the damage is significantly higher, and the slug-shots can penetrate heavy armor. The only difference between the ordinary and the military shotgun is the size. The military is easier to carry around if your shoulder is occupied.
As a second weapon, i recommend the sling (made by combining two medium threads with a piece of clothing or a newspaper). Ammo (stones and pebbles) is aviable nearly everywhere, and the sling is powerful enough to cause heavy wounds or even shattered bones from afar. Looters and Melonheads will sometimes die from a single shot to the head or chest. Another plus is that you can wear it in your backpack, if you need a hand to wear an additional backpack. On the other hand, the stones you need to fire it, are everything but lightweight.
If you chose the “Ranged”-Ability, you can switch the sling for a compound bow later on. The damage is higher, and “Ranged” makes it possible to craft your own arrows. If you can hit your enemy, the arrows will be stuck inside the wound, causing bleeding and pain if removed.
A fully dressed character should wear two shoes (adds an extra move per turn), a hoodie (2×3 extra pocket), cargo pants (3×3 extra pocket), three t-shirts, a hide tunic (remove it if you suffer from Heat Exhaustion) and two gloves (gives you higher accuracy). Be careful when picking your shoes, since wearing a left shoe on the right foot or vice-versa, will cause blisters (-1 movement point per turn).
The best container you can wear in your “Back”-slot is the backpack, but those are very rare, which means you will have to rely on a plastic bag at first. If you are lucky enough to find a vehicle (shopping cart, sled) in useful condition, you should use it to carry even more stuff around. But sleds need to have a string attached to be useful, otherwise the encumbrance will be very high. Don’t forget to drop your vehicle in combat to make the “Charge”-Move aviable. On the left shoulder, a birch bag from the ATN-Enclave (or a dead warrior) can be carried. The bigger alternative is the Dufflebag, rare, but with a 6×10 storage space really big.
The easiest way to get the +1 bonus to the field of vision is to simply attach a scope to your firearm. Be careful though, if you wear your rifle over your shoulder, you won’t get the bonus. If you don’t own a firearm, a scope with a string attached is a more common and lightweight alternative.
It’s simple, get everything you can lay your hands on. You will need them one day for sure. Painkillers and antibiotics are really precious, and if you can’t find any, the DMC-Clinic will sell them. Sleeping pills are only neccesary if your character suffers from insomnia.
Meat: Very nourishing, but will normally spoil within 2 days. Must be cooked to be save to eat.
Berries: More hydrating than nourishing, but they will take around 5 days to rot.
Mushrooms: They last nearly 7 days and can normally be found in bulk
Factory-sealed Food: Those remnant of civilisation last forever, and thus are best used as an emergency food supply
Try to carry at least 3 to 4 bottles of water with you, this will prevent you from searching for a source of water all the time.
A Sleeping Bag should be provided by luck or a random encounter when your temerature hits “Moderate Hypothermia” the first time. The aviable bags only differ in size and weight, so try to get the small one. To be safe while sleeping, you should use Noise Traps, 4 will max out the alertness of the hex you are on.
Multitool: Used in a wide range of crafting recipes
Lighter: Vital to make campfires and helpful while scavenging to improve loot and safety
Night Vision Goggles: Hard to obtain and need a special kind of battery to work, but will grant you normal movement during nighttime and removes the “Blind”-Status during combat
Nanorobot Medical Kit: Incredibly rare, but will prove its worth in case of an emergency. Makes it possible to survive nearly letal injuries and medical conditions.
Armor: The Hide Tunic functions as a basic armor, but if you want the good stuff (eg. bulletproof stuff) you have to hunt for the DMC-Guards near the DMC. This is dangerous and may have consequences, but the gear you can acquire this way makes you a walking tank.
During the first night, the game should inform you about a light, visible in the distance. This should be your next target. Continue to loot and kill while making your way down to the south-eastern edge of the map. The DMC and the sprawl offer several ways to stock up on supplies and offer healthcare and a (most of the time) save place to rest.
If you don’t want to move to the DMC, the ATN-Enclave should be your target of choice. You need to walk 30 hexes north and 13 hexes east, starting at the Cryo Facility, to find it, but the red/white painted warriors can give you directions if you ask them.
Final Stage of the Game
At its current state, the game offers three trials as advanced content. These are:
– get the eye augmentation
– kill the Merga Wrath
– get the Tactical Armor Vest/fight the DMC-Guards
Since two of the three objectives demand that you stay near the DMC, I reccomend to find a cozy shelter within the sprawn, next to the DMC. It is well guarded, there are no hostiles present (at least 99% of the time) and you can store your stuff there without someone stealing it. The DMC Guard have no interest in picking up any stuff, including things like Nanomedical Kits or ammo.
The eye augmentation is an implant, you can buy at the DMC Hospital. The price is more than just hefty, 5600$ to buy the basic version and an additional 300$ and 200$ to get both upgrades. On the other hand, the prerequisites only include access to the DMC (work for Hatter or dish out 3000$ to get the access bracelet) and money, which you can earn by selling stuff to the junk market. If you get all the stuff from scavenging, from killing some poor looters or even from attacking the DMC-Guards is your own choice. If you want to scavenge or fight looters and mobsters, get some distance from the DMC, or you won’t have much success.
The reward for all your trouble will be a permanent augmentation of your vision. Which means you will get the “Eagle Eye”-Ability. This may seem useless is you already picked it at the start of the game, but if you picked “Myopia” on the other hand, you will double your benefit (removed “Myopia” and added “Eagle Eye”). The two upgrades will expand your field of vision by one and will grand you permanent night vision. At this point your vision range will be huge, and most of the time you won’t be able to make full use of it, because a hill or forest is blocking your line of sight. The night vision will make it possible to walk, fight, scavange and craft completely normal during dusk, dawn and night, without being forced to carry torces, flashlights or the nightvision goggles.
The least possible amount of loot and the highest possible risk, this is all you have to know about this fight. Before you dare to remove your bronce bracelet, to spawn the Merga Wrath, get at least one handgun and one rifle with one clip of ammo. The only thing that can kill your enemy is a one-hit-kill, either a shot to the head (traumatic brain injury) or to the chest (bleeding to the lung or cardiac arrest), every non-lethal damage will be healed at the beginning of the next round. Try to stay at a safe distance, since the claws can rip you to shreds in two or three well placed attacks.
The only reward you will get for this deadly fight, is a short event afterwards and possibly some kind of book.
The armor suit and the helmet are combined the heaviest armor you can currently wear. Your chest and head will be nearly bulletproof, but on the downside you have to carry over 6.5Kg weight around and the armor is nothing you can simply buy at the junk market. Instead you have to loot it from its previous owner. Now try to imagine how hard it will be to kill someone who wears a full set of armor, that protects his head and chest, and to make it worse, that someone will be armed with a handgun and shotgun and can use his radio to call for help. It will be more than just a tough fight, so be prepared. The DMC Guards who wear this armor won’t like it, if you try to take it.
Before you can even think about picking a fight, get a shotgun with 3 to 5 buckshot shells, some slug shells and a crowbar, monkey wrench or club. Buckshot won’t penetrate the Tactical Vest or Helmet, but it can cause up to three severe wounds, while the slugs can hit even through the armor, but will only cause one wound. The main strategy for this enemy is to make him pass out due to massive pain or bloodloss. A letal hit to the head or chest is not impossible, but very unlikely.
The fight should always be a 1vs1-encounter, two DMC-Guards will simply overwhelm you. Try to lure the guard into an urban area, this will make is easier to close in on him. After starting the fight, use charge to close in on him, until the distance is down to 5 or less. If you have 5 shot, use “Blast away” followed by single shots, else use only single shots. The main goal should be to break both of his arms, this will prevent him from firing his guns. If your clip is empty, close in on melee range and keep hitting him. If he calls for sniper support, go for cover to lower the possibility of suffering a letal one-shot-kill. Keep up the fight until dies of bloodloss, if at least 2 or 3 shots hit him, this should take around 7 to 10 rounds.
Your reward will not only be the best aviable armor and some unique clothing (baclava, black shirt, tactical gloves and black cargo pants) but also the smaller shotgun, a handgun, the remaining ammo, a smartphone and some useful survival equipment like the Nanomedical Kit or a flashlight. The uniform and the other equipment is worth around 3000$ – 4000$, and most of the time in perfect condition.
Be careful that other guard might not like it, if you kill their coworkers.
General Hints
If you remove or trade-away your bracelet, you will be attacked during the next round by a nearly invulnerable enemy. If you really want to try this, remember that you can always but the bracelet back on, this will force your enemy to retreat.
Managing your inventory plays a vital role during the whole game. To store as much as possible in you sled or backback, don’t forget to rotate items by using the arrow keys.
If a Hex is littered with loot, it will attract enemies like a beacon. So, destroy everything you don’t need, or you will be payed an unfriendly visit by some raiders. If you kill an enemy, don’t forget to destroy the body afterwards, or the NPCs will litter around with its remains.
Every enemy you will encounter, follows a daily routine, similar to your own. This includes collecting stuff and sleeping. Some enemies tend to fill their campsite with boxes and backpacks full of various items, and can be scared away or finished off while sleeping.
Even if the game offers you the option to feed on your killed enemies, you should try to avoid this at all costs. After two warnings you will suffer an incredible heavy penalty, that can easily kill your character over time. Be aware that the Zoom Zoom’s Barbeque can cause the warnings to trigger without showing the messages. And don’t try to sell this stuff, people really don’t like it.
Over time every item with a durability will dissolve into nothing. Try to replace them before they crumble to dust.
The enemy’s reaction after he spotted you will highly depend on your equipment. If you wield a weapon, a firearm or have the “Strong” or “Tough”-Ability, they will often decide to turn and run. The most terrifiing weapons seem to be the meat cleaver and the broken bottle, the most teryfiing clothes are the Dogman Fur Coat and the 3-Wolf shirt.
Neo Scavenger is a tough game, and you will see more than one character die. You can’t carry anything over to your next character, except the knowledge you gathered about the game mechanics. So, every death will give you the chance to get even further next time.
Try out another character build once in a while. The game will be much more exciting.
Not your preferred playstyle? See my other Guide