Best solo build?

[♡Starlight♡]

I am a beginner who's always getting his booty eaten like its doordash. Is there a proper solo build? Or at least one that would help with co-op?

I typically run an offensive "hit and run" style, but I always panic and get mobbed to death. I am open to adopting a more evasive, base building style if that's what it takes. But I'm horrible at stealth and organization.

[ProtecTron]

Well, forget default gameplay configs and get your hands on sandbox mode.

Give yourself extra points to start with, as begginer on solo, don't be shy about it, give yourself some extra 30 points to avoid skill grinding. Then you could lower it to 22, in time, enjoy and explore game mechanics first.

Burglar is a MUST for all new characters. I'm near 800hs and it's still a pain to level the otherwise requirments to use cars. Then get the +2 traits for endurance and strength. From there it's up to you. You can create a stealth ninja, secure a safehouse, exit and create a second character (multiple chars in the save) being a carpenter/ metal worker and so on.

[Eric James]

Some of my beginner suggestions would be:

Negative Traits: Smoker, High Thirst, Prone to Illness, Slow Reader (Non-Multiplayer), Weak Stomach.

Positive Traits: Keen Hearing (This is really good for new people), Gymnast, Strong, Athletic.

Occupations for Beginners: Burglar, Unemployed, Repairman.

I think a Repairman is a solid alternative for Burglar for beginners. It gives you a bonus to short blunt weapons. Which is the most common weapon in game. Not really the best for end game. But, it can really help early game. If you take gymnast and then level your Electric to 1 and Mechanics to 2, you will have most of what a burglar has. It just takes a little time to get there. Plus, with Repairman you get a major bonus to maintenance. Which will really pay off by getting more duration out of your weapons. Remember, a burglar is mainly for hot wiring cars. The nimble bonus is also another reason why this is so popular.

Another thing... I think you might want to consider is a Park Ranger. Based on your play style, you might really enjoy a ranger living on the outskirts of town instead of wading into the thick of things deep inside the cities. If you take Herbalist, you won't need to depend on looting homes or stores for food. You can start foraging for your food right away. Far from the zombie hoards in town.

Far as weapons go. the best weapon in the game in my opinion is the spear. You can fish with it, fight with it, craft it from foraged items, and get massive damage with it. Just remember to level your carpentry to at least level four. They only last a short time so you need to learn to manage making and equipping them. But, if you master the spear, it will really pay off.

[blademan619]

Originally posted by starlight:

I typically run an offensive "hit and run" style, but I always panic and get mobbed to death.

One thing beginners do that usually kills them pretty quickly is that they try to run everywhere. You can walk faster than 100% of zombies (unless you are playing with sprinters) so there is no reason to run. Just wanted to point it out. Running anywhere drains your endurance really really fast. To give you an idea of how bad it is, just the first level of endurance, "Moderate Exertion" reduces your melee damage by 50%! Almost 20% reduced movement speed. 10% chance to trip when vaulting fences. Etc. At the max level, "Exhausted" you do 95% less damage.

For a build, everyone plays different but there are some general stats to take always.
For negative traits always pick stuff like;
Short Sighted, Slow reader, Hard of Hearing, Slow Healer, Thin-Skinned
Short Sighted - honestly seems to effect nothing for me so its just free points
Slow reader - because you can literally read whenever, it just takes longer.
Hard of hearing - because its really easy to hear zombies from really far away and think they are next to you, this just reduces it and makes it to where you can tell the zombie is in the building in front of you and not 2 buildings down the road.
Slow Healer - because you shouldn't be taking any damage anyways, so again free points. Thin-skinned - so long as you don't go sprinting through trees or getting damage from zombies, its free points.
Anything else is up to you really, although choosing obese or very underweight is another good option since you can gain or loose weight quickly in the beginning. Since you can change your weight over time, this is basically free points, just with slight difficulty added early game

Positive traits I always pick are;
Dextrous, Outdoorsman, Wakeful, and organized
Dextrous - transfer stuff quickly, very useful in the long run. Also remember to keep all extra bags/hiking bags because you can use them to reduce weight of items and instead of transferring 20+ weight of items, you just grab the whole bag or drop the whole bag
Outdoorsman - Counteracts thin skinned for going through woods, but also -90% chance of catching a cold. Really good trait for only 2 points.
Wakeful - Not only do you rest faster with this trait, it also reduces the rate you gain tiredness
Organized - +30% capacity to all containers, including car seats

From here if you picked obese or very underweight, you should have ~28 points. You can pick and choose what you like. I like to grab Strong for +4 strength and Fit for +2 fitness. My class option is usually lumberjack because you get another +1 strength, +2 axe skill and get the class trait "axe man" which lets you cut down trees faster. After that you should have +4 points left. If you play on extremely rare loot, I recommend getting lucky, it has a noticeable effect. Or whatever you want really

[Armagenesis]

My suggestion would be making combat-focused character with as much focus as possible on one of the weapon skills. No matter how good you are at sneaking and kiting, you will need to smack the zeds eventually, so higher initial weapon skill is great.

Police Officer is the best if you want to play with guns. Just have enough shotgun ammo and beta blockers to power-level the aiming skill. Nimble skill is also pretty important for this occupation, so you can try power-level the skill as well using a controller and a rubber band.

Construction Worker is the best for short blunt build with level 3 short blunt out of the bat. Given short blunt weapon is one of the most common weapon type in the game, It's hella nice to start with this occupation.

Lumberjack is another good one for axe build for their faster swing speed with axes. Give the lumberjack the Brawler trait as well and you are set to mow down the hordes.

Long blunt is another common weapon in the game, but there's no profession specifically for it in vanilla. So I usually use Repairman with Baseball Player, Handy, and Brawler for a quick start in this weapon skill.

Fast Learner helps leveling weapon skills so it's always a good trait to pick. While on the other hand, Pacifist is really bad since it hinders your leveling speed a lot.

[Quill]

I think this depends upon your playstyle

For me I like to run with Police Officer as Firearm skills help clear towns while the Nimble boost helps keeping the undead at a distance

Keen Hearing helps make sure I don't get jumped from behind and Organized is a MUST for me as I am an absolute pack rat; allowing you to clear entire warehouses in 1-2 trips. Wakeful makes it so you can spend less time sleeping and more time looting.

Short sighted is a very easy negative trait to deal with. Wanna forage? Wear glasses. Negative gone. In my experience with normal loot settings I end up with over 1000 cigarettes within a Month of Gameplay so if you find a Fanny Pack Smoker is very easy to run with. Conspicuous is a non-issue when using firearms as well; as any that can spot you can also hear the gunshots.

As long as you don't fall for any of the trap traits and focus on skills that fit YOUR playstyle you can make anything work.