Recommended beginner settings?

[Gimli]

I keep getting my butt kicked. Longest I've survived is 4 days. In my recent run I started collecting a bunch of food, tools, etc... and one night while I was boarding up my windows a bunch of zombies came out of nowhere and bit me while I was trying to clear them to continue work on my house. So I just ran upstairs, locked the door and shot myself lmao. I'm gonna start another run after work later.

I'm not complaining but holy hell this game is hard. I'm using ThatGuyPredz 1000 Days mod collection as his series is what got me interested in this game. Just having a little trouble starting out, knowing what to prioritize/risk and whatnot.

[DoktorFar]

Usually you cant fight a bunch of zombies as a group. You'll have to take on 1 zed at a time, perhaps 2. Push them so they fall and then smash their head, either with your foot stomp or with your favoured weapon (aim for the head with the iso metric cursor). Fighting 3 zeds (or more) at a time is difficult because at least one of them is bound to get up before you had time to kill one of them while they all was down. You can often draw 1 or 2 away from the rest by "baiting" them info pursuing you, then when far enough away from the group push it down and kill it. Figthing zeds also takes concentration as missing the push just once can in some cases means you get bitten or scratched.

Try to clear all the areas around your house, like Morgans "clear" obsession from TWD. Do this before working on the house. you may also want to consider barricading the house windows and doors from the inside, instead of outside where you can get ambushed from behind. Usually though you can also hear their zombies moans just a bit before they get close to you if they come from behind.

Be sure to always look around you so you know at all times if the areas around are clear or not. Picking a house that has a double height solid fence around the garden is also a good idea as it really limits the direction the zeds will come from.

Wear protective clothing, look for clothing that has the armor values. Having some armor on body parts versus 0% protection can mean that difference between getting a wound that gets infected and avoiding that.

Lastly there's a risk that a wound can infect with the zombie virus and then it is just game over, nothing you can do. Unless you have that game option disabled before starting the world or you have a mod that allows some kind of cure.

[БагахульныйБаец]

1) recommended settings: custom Apocalypse. set zombie respawn to 0, left them proper (fast shamblers);

2) first day is to establish safe house. of course it should be relatively far from more "populated" areas, but within the city - there is not much loot in the countryside.
watch some Youtube video about how to pull zombies out of area of your interest.
in short, you just gather them around by shouting and guide them as far as possible. if you keep much distance from a horde, they starting to loose interest, which is unacceptable. when they are far from safe house or anything - brake the visual contact by running around some forest patches. once you returned to the area of your interest - repeat the pulling.
later you would be able to use same technique to circle horde into a dence mass and burn them by molotov - it is very effective way to get rid of those pesky large groups, and it is the only way;

3) first couple days is to gather Carpentry books, at least first four of five. Carpentry is the most valuable skill anyway, especially if you hoping to get a chance to survive during winter.
it is important to read the books and watch the TV in your safe house. "Life and Living" timetable is the cheat I use in this game. no one want to grinding their skills forever. using info about TV shedule form the wiki is pretty honest, since your character in this world should know what to use to survive. you would refer to wiki anyway, to learn how to use many game mechanics.
also you would want the first couple books for Mechanics and Electricity, it's handy to be able to steal and to fix a vehicle.
I play without using the map.zomboid.com - IT IS cheaty! but I always started in particular city, so I just where my character is right now and how to invade a school or a book shop to grab what I need;

4) first week is to gather all neccessary tools;

5) you wouldn't need to board your safe house asap - just be sure that there are no unwanted guests or nosy neighbours around. circle your safe house every time you get back home - it is typical situation when you already in your bed, and where are sudden disturbance near your house. you wouldn't want to deal with guest in the middle of a night - it's certain way to get killed;

5) also a typical situiation to fight a group when there is already dark, and you're tired and hungry. plan your time, plan your actions ahead. use the Emergency Broadcast on radio - it is VERY important to know, what conditions will be in a couple next days;

6) everything in this game is important. watch cooking show, wash yourself and your clothes, always carry a backup weapon. use everything what game has, learn how play. you will die of silly mistakes many times at first - get used to it; stay calm, and don't be afraid of the undead

[BDZ1972]

Welcome to the meat-grinder that is PZ!

2 hour days & no zombie respawns are two things you should really look at changing in the sandbox options to give yourself a bit of breathing space.

The longer day gives you more time which is vital in the first week when you need to be reading books and watching TV shows whilst securing a safe place to sleep, gathering resources and finding a working vehicle. It is a lot to do in the first week before the helicopter event, doubling the PZ day from 1 hour to 2 hours will make the world of difference.

Turning off respawns means when you clear somewhere it stays largely clear apart from zombies moving around naturally or responding to meta events. They will never pop up in a building you've cleared again unless they physically break in (which you will see signs of most likely).

Watch some guides by Nurse, Pr1viteLime, AmbiguousAmphibian, IslandPotato, GhulKing, MrAtomicDuck and the like to get an idea of what you need to prioritise and just keep going. You will die frequently, but you will also learn what to prioritise and what is a waste of time.

Predz series was a labour of love...I watched every episode.

[Slimane]

What you described sounds like the exact same thing every single zomboid player has gone through when they started playing this game.

So I suggest you just keep playing on Apocalypse. I personally think if you play on the easier difficulties you'll simply develop bad habits that will get you killed once you try apocalypse again.

Remember that after you die, you can start a new character on the same map if you wish. That way you can find your base/corpse and at least get your items back.

[stevasaur]

If you are learning how to play, there are a few settings that are very helpful.

1: In display, there is an option for "aim outline." By default it is set to ranged weapons only. Changing it to all weapons will allow you to better understand how your character prioritizes targets.

2: Making a sandbox setting with zombie infection set to Saliva Only will make first aid an actually situationally useful skill, and will also mean fewer restarts (which allows you to play around with base-building and skills like Mechanics and Farming with less grinding, because let's be honest, your actual, out-of-game time is limited). You can always go back to vanilla Apocalypse/Survivor/whatever once you're more confident.

I am unfamiliar with most of the mods on the modlist you mentioned, (and my only experience with the Autotsar stuff is from Rhadamant's ongoing Nomad series), so no advice there except to be careful installing mods while you're learning how to play the game: it increases the chance that you'll get "wrong" information when you ask a gameplay question and the mod in question changes the gameplay in your run/server.

[Gimli]

Thanks everybody! super helpful!

[DakotaTheDinoKid]

Originally posted by Slimane:

What you described sounds like the exact same thing every single zomboid player has gone through when they started playing this game.

So I suggest you just keep playing on Apocalypse. I personally think if you play on the easier difficulties you'll simply develop bad habits that will get you killed once you try apocalypse again.

I understand this persons pov but playing on easier difficulty is a super common thing in any game, you cant learn the mechanics if die within the first day, make it easy, experiment what works for you and when you are start surviving longer then start raising the difficulty.

[DoktorFar]

Originally posted by DakotaTheDinoKid:

I understand this persons pov but playing on easier difficulty is a super common thing in any game, you cant learn the mechanics if die within the first day, make it easy, experiment what works for you and when you are start surviving longer then start raising the difficulty.

I agree with your sentiment, it's perfectly good to setup an easier sandbox that doesn't just constantly result in a long string of fiascos. Unless they actually want that kind of struggle, but I personally never enjoyed failing all the time so much when first I started playing.