Overview
Character States are what your characters are feeling or inflicted with. Usually it affects your character, in both good and bad ways. It is highly recommended to keep watch on their states to avoid, in worst-case scenario, death. Long story short, this is just a full description of the statuses that characters will or may encounter and how will it effect them.
Morale
Morale is a huge part of the survival of your group, and little is understood about the full effects it has on all of the game’s mechanics. Speculation, and logic, dictates that morale would touch everything. A depressed survivor would lose the will to get better, lose the will to fight, making them more susceptible to disease, less effective in combat… and a whole slew of other things. Keep this in mind when handling matters of morale, keep your spirits up whenever possible. Bringing a character to exhaustion might be worth it to help a neighbor and bolster morale.
There are three negative states to morality.
- Sad – Character is a bit slower and less responsive.
- Depressed – Character will stop in the middle of tasks to complain, as well as moving lethargically.
- Broken – Character is unable to take any action, even for self-preservation, and must be attended to by other survivors. Should they stay broken for an extended period of time (2-5 days) they may leave the party, commit suicide, or attack other party members(in the case of Roman).
Negative stimuli
Some actions will cause characters to become saddened with how the group is handling survival, examples include:
- Stealing from other victims, such as the elderly, or unarmed.
- Leaving people with almost nothing on a scavenging hunt.
- Turning away neighbors when they could have been helped.
- Watching other survivors around them fall ill or wounded.
- Get injured or stolen from during raids.
Some actions will cause a severe morale drop, some examples include:
- Killing someone, especially unarmed victims.
- One of your group dying
- Being raided several nights in a row
Positive stimuli
There are many ways to improve the mood and morale of survivors. Examples include:
- Assisting neighbors with problems
- Listening to classical music on the radio
- Having a smoke or coffee (For smokers or coffee drinkers)
- Reading a book in a chair or armchair (This is not select-able, but if the chair and book are available, survivors may do this on their idle time.)
- Getting a full night sleep
- Talking with a survivor of better morale (Usually on depressed or broken characters only. If both characters are of similar mood, this accomplishes nothing)
- Playing the guitar (Especially effective with Zlata)
Additional notes on morale
It’s good to note that some characters react differently to each stimuli, for example Boris does not seem to enjoy reading, and Bruno doesn’t seem to care if you do not help your neighbors. Its best to try to do everything possible for morale all the time, rather than homing in on just one area, because you never know just who might be immune.
Another good note, is that drinking moonshine does not help with morale immediately, characters who become drunk will stay broken or depressed, but their whining will be replaced with bad singing and even worse jokes. After the end of day sleep drunk characters morale will have been boosted(if the scavenging hunt did not result in a further drop in morale). If you wish to boost a party members morale by drinking moonshine, it is best to do it near the end of your days work, so you can drink it and end day immediately to avoid drunken behavior.
Also, unconfirmed, but a higher temperature seems to keep spirits up.
Wounds
There are four categories of wounds.
- Slightly wounded – Character appears to run and walk a little slower, complains occasionally about a trickle of blood, or a small wound.
- Wounded – Character will visibly limp when walking or running, and will ask for medical supplies when possible. When idle, they search for a bed or chair to sit or lie down in.
- Severely wounded – Character is unable to run, and walks with an almost comical limp. If left idle for mere seconds, will start heading to a bed or chair, complains of bleeding out.
- Lethally wounded – Character can barely walk, complains constantly, should not be removed from bed-rest.
Causes and Treatment
The causes should be fairly straightforward, a character becomes injured either from fighting while scavenging, or being injured while defending. Building the defenses up on the home itself will reduce the risk of injury to survivors.
Once injured, however, if not given proper treatment, survivors will get worse until they eventually expire. Wounds must be healed a level at a time, a lethally wounded survivor, given bandages and a bed, will not miraculously become un-wounded the next morning. The path will be lethally->severely->wounded->slightly->healed.
For wounds, there are no variations of medication, there are bandages, and bed-rest. Ideally, if you take a lethally wounded survivor with no other ailments, bandage them, and let them sleep in a bed in a warm environment, uninterrupted by raid, they will step down to severely wounded. And if given all the same again, they will step down to just wounded the next night. However, that requires many bandages, and lots of luck to not be raided. A warm bed and a full belly usually will get the job done in 1-3 days, so its usually best to either use bandages to solve problems before they happen (heal that one slightly wounded survivor so they are all in good health.) Or save bandages for lethally and severely wounded to bring them back to at least functioning levels.
An unconfirmed note, it has been speculated that talking with bed-ridden wounded survivors will help them heal, although if this is simply due to morale or an actual mechanic is uncertain.
Taking a wounded survivor to the Hospital and talking to a Nurse can prompt a brief event in which the survivor’s wound is bandaged for free. it is not known if there is a limit as to how many times this can occur. the downside to this is that there is little to salvage in the Hospital without stealing and angering the guards, recommend bringing moonshine, pure alcohol, or other spare medical supplies with you to trade to the Doctor for small scraps of Materials, Lumber, Cigarettes, and other supplies.
Sickness
There are also four categories of sickness.
- Slightly sick – Character appears to run and walk a little slower, complains occasionally about a a little cough or a headache.
- Sick – Character will cough and move at a sluggish pace, and will ask for medical supplies when possible. When idle, they search for a bed or chair to sit or lie down in.
- Severely sick – Character is unable to run, and walks with an almost comical limp. If left idle for mere seconds, will start heading to a bed or chair, complains of symptoms getting worse.
- Terminally sick – Character can barely move, complains constantly, should not be removed from bed-rest.
Causes and Treatment
Characters become sick seemingly at random. One of the biggest controllable causes of sickness is when you allow the house to get too cold. It is important to pay attention to the survivors when the mention the temperature dropping, as this is a signal that sickness is coming if you don’t keep it warm.
Another controllable cause of sickness is keeping characters too hungry for too long, this is also one of the best treatments, to keep an injured survivor well fed (Not hungry)
Once ill, however, if not given proper treatment, survivors will get worse until they eventually expire. Sickness must be healed a level at a time, a terminally ill survivor, given medicine and a bed, will not miraculously become healthy the next morning. The path will be terminally->severely->sick->slightly->healthy.
With illness, there are two different types of medications. The Herbal Medication is good for a cheap fix if you have nothing else, its also craftable with herbs, sugar, and water; its not guaranteed to be effective, but it is better than nothing. Real Medicine will always work and help reduce the level of sickness, with proper bed rest, in the same way wound healing works.
The most ideal setting for healing illness is a bed, temperatures above 20C, real medicine, a full belly, and a full night’s rest.
Unconfirmed, but common sense would seem to indicate that taking a sick character out in rain, snow, or scavenging will lead them to become more ill.
Also unconfirmed, but there seems to be no correlation that would indicate survivors can spread illness to one another.
Hunger and Other States
Hunger an ongoing need for every survivor and will cause penalties if not maintained. Hungry survivors will have reduced movement speed while starved survivors will probably die.
Each day, hunger increase by one level. “Still Hungry” is considered a half of a level.
- 1: Well Fed
- 0: Not hungry
- -0.5: Still Hungry
- -1: Hungry
- -2: Hungry (#2)
- -2.5: Still Very Hungry
- -3: Very Hungry
- -3.5: Very Hungry (#2)
- -4: Starving
- -7: Extremely Starving
- -8: Death
Well Fed – Keeps character calm. Being fed when not hungry.
Hungry, Very Hungry, Starving – Slows down character movement, can result in death. Spend 1 or more day without eating.
Obviously, the only way to remove the hunger status is to let the character eat something, be it vegetables, raw meat, canned food or cooked meals. It should be noted, however, that they don’t all have the same effect.
- Raw Meat (and Vegetable as well) is the least filling. A Hungry survivor, after consuming one Raw Meat, will be “Still Hungry”.
- Cooked Meals reduce hunger by a 2 levels. A survivor at Hungry #2 consuming a cooked meal will no longer be hungry for the entire day. Eating an additional cooked meal when full will give the Well Fed status, which helps improve the survivor’s mood and likelihood of recovering from sicknesses and injuries. Canned Food functions similarly to Cooked Meals.
- Drinking alcohol while Sad and Hungry will lower Sad level; hunger level will be set to Still Hungry.
As survivors at Hungry state can still function at the level of a well-fed one, it makes sense to feed survivors once every two days to save food.
Well Fed can only be reached by eating when not hungry. Canned food and cooked meals eaten when a character has just become hungry only take them to not hungry, not to Well Fed.
Other States
- Content – Character is happy. From doing good deeds, radio or guitar, smoking or drinking coffee, warm
- Slept Poorly/Badly – May cause Sadness. Sleeping on the floor or without bed.
- Tired, Very Tired – Slows down character movement. Lack of sleep.
- Drunk, Hangover – Relieves Sadness and Depression. Drinking pure alcohol or moonshine.
Extra Notes
The some of the content from this guide came from varied sources (I don’t own any of it) and, others are personal pointers. Other than that, survive and stay alive. Hope you last long. Happy gaming.