Starting Guide

First of all, you should choose how you want to start the game. There are a bunch of options to choose from but for this guide I will be talking about the Wanderer start as it is the most beginner friendly start.

QWhich race should I pick and does it affect the gameplay a lot?

If you want to continue the game solo then yes it matters a lot. If not then no, the squad can balance itself. However I would advise starting as a Human (Greenlander) or Shek. In my opinion they are the most beginner friendly races. Skeletons are immune to starvation but their repair kits cost a lot and unless you know how to make quick money or steal a repair kit I would advise playing them in your second playthrough or just recruiting one later in this playthrough. Hivers on the other hand can be tricky with their low HP on body parts. My first character was a Hiver and it was tough to deal with.

Note: Just like in real life there are rules in this world too and if you are not strong enough you are bound to live under them. These rules also include your gender and race =)

QI chose my race and customized my character, now what?

Before you run around and possibly get killed by bandits (or worse) you should be aware that your character is the weakest and stupidest. Obviously we can get stronger but this will not be comfortable. Have you ever taken boxing classes? On your second day you probably sparred with a dude who weighs 100 kg and has been doing this ♥♥♥♥ for years. Your character will end up like you ended up after that spar but the most important factor is staying alive.

So what we should do is build toughness, but this is not something you can do on your own. You also need some money for first aid kits and a bedroll.

But before all that you should be able to feed yourself. Luckily for you this is not hard.

As a free man you should be able to find or buy something to eat. We are currently not interested in the “finding” part as we are not strong enough to do that, so what we should do instead is buy food. You already have 1000 cats but you need more than that, so this is where mining helps. Now I am not saying mine until you die from old age, however until you can afford 10 dried meat you should mine. Luckily for you there are great copper sources nearby the town you start from (HUB). If someone chases you, just run back to the city and head to the bar. Guards and a few other NPCs should attack the bandits and you will be safe. Getting hit is important for our toughness but we are not ready yet, every hit we take could be the last so let’s focus on other things for now. If you see a knocked out (or killed) bandit feel free to take their loot. Nobody in the bar will attack you for it. Pause the game and check if there are any leaders among them. You can do this by left clicking on their unconscious body. If there are, prioritize picking their gear first as you can sell it at a higher price compared to the rest.

Note: Before getting chased hit the pause button (space) and drop all the coppers or irons in your inventory as they will make you heavier and you will run slower. Not doing this will result in you getting caught and beaten real bad. You can come back to the same place later and hit the alt key to see the items you dropped.

Note 2: Merchants will buy anything as long as they have the money for it.

After all this mining journey you should be able to feed yourself.

Note 3: Characters automatically eat the food if you have it in your inventory.

There are many ways to make money, including drug dealing, but it all depends on how you want to play the game. You can either take risks and steal ♥♥♥♥ or you can play it safe. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. For an experienced player there are no real risks, but for a beginner there are plenty. This is why I recommend having a backup save. Do not attempt iron-man in your first playthrough, so that if you ♥♥♥♥ something up you can learn from it.

Side note: In order to steal something from the chests and crates without getting caught, you should have 75 to 80 thievery. It is extremely boring to level up this skill but once you do it, you will see the benefits.

For this method we will travel to Squin (it will be available on your map) and head to the second floor of the bar.
From here you should be able to pick up the items on the shelf in sneak mode. When you get them simply drop them to the ground and repeat until you hit 75 thievery. You can check your progress in the stats menu. After that you will be able to steal items from a chest or a crate with a 100% success rate. You will also be able to fence stolen items without any issues, unless you try to fence them to members of the same faction. In that case you will have a much lower fencing chance.

Note:
Blue eye icon= You are currently safe from being spotted.
Yellow eye icon= There is a chance that you will get spotted.
Red eye icon= You are spotted.

You will also need sneaking but there is no safe way of incrasing this that i know of(there is but the process is too slow) so you can either do that(sneaking around people and incrasing it like that) or you can go to the skinners roam and find a huge bandit group and sneak behind them.

If you can increase your sneak to 50 that should be enough for shoplifting. Be aware that carrying a heavy load and wearing some armor pieces will lower your sneak ability. There are also some outfits that increase sneak, so you can use them. Ninja rags are one of the best outfits for shoplifting, but you can also use assassin rags. The sneak increase percentage will be lower than ninja rags, but it still helps.

This method can be hard for a new player, so I advise sticking to the safer method.

In order to make money in a safe way, you will need two people. Head to Squin if you are not there yet and find the Shek woman called Ruka. She is one of the few NPCs desperate enough to join you for free. Considering you do not have the same speech level as monkeys, you should be able to convince her with the right dialogue options. If you are not good with talking, do not worry, you can try again lol. After hiring her, you should mine until you can afford two large backpacks. You can buy the backpacks from the tower in Squin. I advise mining copper since it tends to be more expensive than iron.

After getting the large backpacks, give one to each of your characters. One should be mining copper for eternity and the other should be luring bandits to the guards of Squin. The character who is luring the bandits should not have any encumbrance. Athletics are not that important if you are luring Dust Bandits (I advise luring them) since they mostly wear samurai boots which slow them down. If you want to play it safe though, run around until you hit 20 to 25 athletics.

as you can see Here I have found a Dust Boss which means high tier loot. You can either sell these or save them for later. If the loot is high tier you should save it, however if it is standard level you can sell it until you make some money. There is also a “committing crime” timer and when that ends the character will have a bounty on them. You can head to the headquarters of the city and turn them in to the police chief. They will usually have a bounty of around 500 to 1000 cats. This will give you some extra money. You can return to the battlefield and grab another body if it has not been transferred to the cages yet.

As for your miner, if he gets attacked by starving bandits do not worry too much. Your character probably will not die instantly and you can save them with your other character by performing first aid and putting them in a bed for 8x recovery speed.

Note: A bedroll only gives 4x recovery speed.

Note 2: You can use the beds in bars to make the injured character recover faster, however this will cost some money. It depends on the bar, but in Squin you usually pay around 100 cats.

Do not forget to place a torch near your designated mining ore. At night characters’ labouring skill gets a penalty unless there is some kind of light nearby. Campfires are not considered “light” but do not worry, it is easy to craft a torch. Just head to the store and buy a single building material.

Do this until you can afford a standard grade samurai armor and samurai legplates. You should also have head coverage, but you can use the standard or high tier helmet you took from the Dust Boss. The most important body parts are the stomach, chest, and head. The others are also important, but these are the places where you can get lethal injuries. If you cannot afford legplates and boots and you are too bored to gather more money, do not worry about it. You might lose a leg, but I believe that is unlikely since we plan to fight starving bandits.

Note: Have at least one bedroll for the backup character. You will understand why in the next part.

okay, now this will be the riskiest thing you have done so far, but it is necessary. Have both of your characters ready and give the armor to the one you want to become a fighter. For now Ruka is a better candidate unless your character is a Shek.

The other character will hold the food, medkits, and bedroll in their backpack. They should stay close enough to help in case of a critical injury but also far enough to avoid getting involved in the fight.

Note: The reason why we are hoarding the food on one character is that starving bandits will steal your food once they knock you out.

Find a starving bandit group and enable block with Ruka, then run into them and attack. They will beat the ever-living ♥♥♥♥ out of Ruka, but at the same time she will gain both block and toughness points. Do not worry about attacking right now since it is impossible for Ruka to beat them. What we want is for her to stay in the fight longer rather than hurting them. After a while Ruka will be on the floor wondering what the hell happened to her. Once the bandits leave, bring your other character over and perform first aid. After the unconscious timer ends she should be in the state of “Recovering Coma.” Place the bedroll and let her rest until she recovers. If a town is nearby, place Ruka in a bed instead, since this allows her to recover faster.

Repeat this until she hits 17 toughness, then heal until full health. This is the most important stuff, so read carefully. If a character gets knocked out and is able to get back up, they won’t get up instead, they will play dead until the enemies move away. When that happens, force them to get back up (just command them to attack), and you will see that your toughness will increase by 4–5 levels. It’s very easy to reach 40 toughness with this method. If your character gets knocked out real bad and can’t get up on their own, simply get your other character near them and perform first aid.

Note: Do not involve city guards in this method.

After Ruka hits 30 toughness and 30 block, she should be safe from getting killed in the Border Zone unless you constantly make her fight without recovering her critical body parts. Of course, it is beneficial to go higher than this, like 50 toughness and 50 block, but if you are bored then 30 should be enough.

Now fight bandits with some help. You can either hire bodyguards from bars (the HUB has mercenaries to hire) or use the ally option (I will explain this later).

QWhich weapon should I choose?

There is an important factor in the game: unfortunately, we cannot fight with just any weapon we want yet, because we are not at that level. You need to be strong enough to wield a weapon effectively. There is a quick way to calculate this

Example:
Weapon: Exile Plank Model Meitou
Weight: 48 kg
Required STR level to wield effectively: 96

This means you should multiply the weapon weight by 2 to find the required STR level. Weapon weight increases when the weapon quality is higher, and injuries will lower your strength a lot.

QIs it too bad if I cannot wield it effectively?

Yes. You will still be able to swing the weapon, but it will be slow as hell. It wouldn’t matter much if you have a huge squad, but for 3–4 members, it really matters.

QShould I go for lighter weapons then?

Both yes and no. You will need both strength and dexterity. Dexterity is really helpful for combat speed and makes you swing faster. Strength, on the other hand, allows you to hit harder with heavy weapons (also in martial arts). If you want a pure dexterity build (like katana), strength still matters for carrying wounded members and wearing armor, but not as much as dexterity. If you want a pure strength build, unfortunately you still need dexterity to swing faster.

QWhat is weapon skill then?

Weapon skill (not attack skill) determines how much damage you deal with that type of weapon. The higher the stat, the higher the damage. You must master the weapon of your choice.

QHow will I understand if the weapon is dex or strength?

Weapons that deal cutting damage will increase your dexterity, and weapons that deal blunt damage will increase your strength. There are also hybrid weapons that deal both types of damage; in that case, you get XP for both.

Note: Dexterity increases cutting damage.

QNow I know what to do with dexterity, strength, and weapon skill, but you still haven’t told me what weapon to choose.

Unfortunately, there is no “best weapon” in this game. There are only some weapons that the community finds more effective. My personal favorites are Falling Sun and Desert Sabre for effectiveness, and Naginata and Nodachi for their looks. I have used every type of weapon and brought factions down, so in a crowded group it does not matter that much. High-tier crossbows are also great.

First of all, don’t worry about it, losing a limb is a good thing in Kenshi, as it makes your character much stronger considering you can afford masterwork/specialist robotic limbs.

QWhere can I buy masterwork and specialist robotic limbs?

Mongrel is a great place to find such quality robotic limbs, as it’s close to the Border Zone. However, it’s also located in a very dangerous area (the foggy place on the map above the Border Zone). There are some things you’ll want to avoid there, so I wouldn’t recommend going there until you’ve hit a high level in athletics.

QSo am I doomed to wander around without my limb?

Of course not. Hivers are perfect for cheap robotic limbs. They offer economic ones that give penalties to your stats, but trust me, it’s still better than wandering around without a limb. They are extremely close to Squin, and you can find them by simply moving north of Squin. They have weird structures and all that, and if you notice red rain and rivers, then you are at the right place. The area itself is more dangerous than the Border Zone, but in case something happens you can run to the hive village. Soldier drones will slay anything on their path and you will be safe.

QWhat if I get spotted by beak things?

Then you are ♥♥♥♥♥♥. It’s a gamble you have to play for a robotic limb. At some point you will see them, but the ones in Hiver territory are weaker compared to the ones that wander around Catun. At least that’s what I assume, as I have never seen an elder beak thing in that territory in my 292 hours of gameplay. If you see one, then I don’t know what to say to you.

QHow do i repair my robotic limb?

You’ll need a repair kit for that, and unfortunately they are expensive as hell. You will also need a good robotics skill, as repairing robotic limbs doesn’t count as first aid even though it’s your body part. Luckily, you get XP each time you repair your limbs.

Now, there are many ways to do that and some factions require specific things such as

-completing a quest for them

-paying 10K cats

-catching their enemy faction’s leader for them

I am thinking about making a specific guide for each one of them, however for the time being let us focus on the Sheks.

Sheks are good warriors and definitely someone you would want as allies in your first playthrough. There is a quick way to do that, however some players might call this cheating or exploiting bugs. But I believe in sandbox freedom. If you want to do it, then do it, and if not, just do not do it lol. I am going to show it anyway.

Now, this is a rare occurrence without effort. In my case, it happened and I did it with two slavers. You simply want to make sure the Squin’s prison cages are full of hungry bandits, also the poles, and give the character who has a bounty on them to the police chief. After that, you take another character who also has a bounty on them, both for the Shek Kingdom, and talk with the police chief again while their body is on your shoulders. The police chief will give you the money and your relationship with the Shek Kingdom will increase. However, since the police chief already has a body on his shoulder and all cages are full, you will keep the second body and still be able to talk with the police chief again to hand him over. You will not get money the second time, but your relationship with the Shek Kingdom will increase a lot if you repeat this method.
As you can see, we can deliver him as many times as we want, as long as the cages and poles are full and the police chief has a body on them.
And this is how it affects our relationship with them.

Now, you might think base building is a good idea. I get that, because that is what I had in mind in my first playthrough until I got my ass beaten again and again. Look, pal, I know you want to craft your own armors and weapons, but you cannot do that unless one of your characters hits 70 in all combat-related stats. You also need to explore the world a lot in order to progress in your tech level. There are also some research blueprints you have to find, as you cannot research them on your own, so do not even consider building a base until you hit

70 melee attack
70 melee defense
70 toughness
40–60 strength
40–60 dexterity
70 martial arts and 80 dodge if you are a martial artist

Obviously, this can also be spread across three different characters who have around 50 in these stats, but take your time and explore the world a bit.

I am planning to create a detailed guide purely focusing on base building.

Thank you so much for reading my guide. I hope it was helpful. This was a beginner’s guide, so I didn’t go into too much detail about advanced stuff. If you liked my guide, I would be happy to help you with the advanced stuff too.

Farewell, friends. I hope you have a better fate than this on the moon of Kenshi.