Day 1 zombies

[agreeksailor]

Just started playing the game. On medium, how many zombies should spawn on day 1? I had 8 lumber jack looking dudes, 2 nurses, and 5 or 6 of this other dude that went down pretty easily. I mean bloody hell, I didn't even get to finish building a floor before I was surrounded. I thought the swarms were supposed to come on day 7? I just quit that game because I couldn't even bring down 1 of the lumberjacks let alone 8 of them. I don't think I did any dammage at all to them. 30 arrows didn't drop one.

That's forgetting about the weird zombie warping that was going on. Like any time they hit an obstacle they just warped on top of it so I couldn't even get shelter from them. I am going to give this one more try and then I don't know. I thought the weird inventory interface was annoying...but the Day 1 zombie swarm at noon trumped that. I thought I would get at least 15 minutes to get my bearings before the zombies started showing up...but I didn't even get close to that. The worse part though is that they were spawning in areas I cleared. That is what killed me about them. Is there no point to trying to clear an area? More importantly is there a weapon that hurts the bloody lumber jacks?

[✪Major Incompetence✪]

Zombie spwans are more area related than time related - with random hordes thrown in for luck.

Clear out a nice large area and it will pretty much stay clear except for the random horde or a screamer attracted by activity. Stick a sleeping bag down to prevent all zombie spawns in the area.

Hit them in the head. Take advantage of the 3X damage when they are stunned. You do double damage when you are crouched and undetected - sneak attack bonus.

Find an isolated building on one of the smaller paths off of a main road. Use that for the first night. Don't try to build a base right away, instead focus on collecting hides, clay, pipes and such to make a forge then iron tools.

Find a friendly biome. In the snow lands you are going to meet lumberjacks who are one of the strongest zombies, but they are slow. Just leave that area until you are tooled up to deal with them.

Stay out of the waste land or you will have hell hounds on your trail and you'll write an even longer post.

So on and so forth. I don't want to write a book. There's a lot to this game. It gets pretty interesting once you give it some time. I'd recommend another go with the simple goal of finding a place and trying to make it to morning on one life.

[Kara]

Originally posted by agreeksailor:

More importantly is there a weapon that hurts the bloody lumber jacks?

I believe the bow is your strongest starting weapon so you're on the right track there just hit them only in the head like Les said. Maybe also beat them with a club of some kind when they fall down if youre burning through arrows fast. Also if youre making arrows as soon as you pick up feathers constantly you are building up your weapon smithing skill so you can have stronger bows/clubs.

[DeadlyDanDaMan]

Lumberjack zombies are just really tough. Just get out of the snow biome asap if you spawn there in the beginning, unless you know exactly what you are doing, which you don't. You want to start in the forest biome on your first few playthroughs until you are experienced. Snow biomes aren't meant for newbs.

Also, when you first spawn into the game, don't go wandering off super far. When you do that, it triggers the game into spawning zeds right away instead of giving you a little buffer time to get prepared. Hope that helps, but there is A LOT more you need to learn. Just keep at it, it really isn't that hard.

And no, you can't "clear" an area. Zombies can spawn virtually anywhere except in areas where you have a bed located (can't remember the exact no spawn distance around player beds, but there is one, and you can only have one active so put it in your main base).

[agreeksailor]

Ohhhhh....thanks guys. Just got back from the store. You helped a ton. I really was doing this all wrong! This is some really good stuff. I totally agree, a ton to learn.

[Patouski]

All good advice in the previous posts. One other thing to consider, is when playing Singleplayer (SP for short), the Zombies all spawn around you, no matter where you are, or how much you cleared beforehand - simply because there's ONLY YOU, in the world for them to hunt. In MP, it's slightly different since there's a hard cap of max zombies alive, distributed amongst all the players.

There's ways to minimize or reduce the amount of zombies you encounter when first setting up your game. You'll see the Standard / Modded options in the middle of the "New Game" menu, in there you will have options for difficulty and spawning. To reduce the amount of zombies in general - select "Very Low / Low" in the spawning option.

Now, following the starting quest is all good and then some, but I'd concentrate on making yourself a bow and arrow ASAP. Arrows first - to build up your weapon smithing skill, which will increase the quality of your first bow, thus better damage output.

If you find yourself in a bad spawn (like the Snow Biome), there's no shame to start a new game to avoid it. Navezgane is easiest to explore and deal with when starting out, since there's so many guides and maps showing you all the various POIs, but it is small and can get repetitive in the long run (or after 5-6 playthrough).

Random Gen is great, because it's like a box of chocolate; You never know what you're going to get! (Thanks Forrest. XD) However, it demands knowing the basics and OWNING them. If you really feel like the elements (weather, building bases that stay up and etc...) are getting the best of you, you can also play a creative map to get your "♥♥♥♥" together. ;)

All in all, there's also Let's Play videos on Youtube, but some use Creative, or God Mode to go about the game... but surely there's one or two that are 100% legit, surely someone has a link for you. If not, I might just start making my own. ;)

Basically - keep on trucking. We've all been there - and we've all gotten better. ;)