Late Game Interloper, an extra degree please

[darkscaryforest]

I resumed my first successful interloper save. It's day 117. I didn't really loot the world in this one, just focused on essentials and not dying. It's a bit rough, frostbite, no accessory slot clothing, no second thermal underwear.

Sports socks. Did you know I wasted 6 cloth on my last repair on that? What the hell is wrong with me. I should just rip them up.

Anyways, I've been putting up with the nightmare that is pleasant valley as a staging area to go to TWM summit. I wanted to go on the trip with coal, so I hit Thomson's crossing before the coal mine. What do I find in the cabinet of a bedroom?

Thermal underwear at 4%! Thank you 3rd day of consecutive blizzards for making me hang out and loot before moving on.

Maybe I can wish for an ear wrap at the summit.

[Oolae]

The 2nd thermal underwear is WAY MORE elusive than the ear wraps - drives me nuts to have an unused clothing slot. I've just began exploring BRM in my Loper perma run (250+ days), with that particular item in mind. F%^k the ballistic vest, give me some long undies!

[jswilliams]

Right. I never felt properly equipped until I had my ears, 2 thermals, and 2 thin wool sweaters. As for sox I rolled with sports .1 kg because deep down I knew it was never going to be about the 2000 day run so I just kept them repaired. I was always too annoyed long-term to wear .5C clothing that weighed .25kg so I hunted TWM early for the clothes cargo containers.

[mf187doubleg]

Nice run! Around day 100 you should be able to get the erawrap but it can already be destroyed. I do as Jay - I limit cloths that I need to repair. Usually 1 or 2 thermal depending on luck, 1 or 2 sweathers, 1 toque. I use racks instead of earwrap. Usually I try to hit summit before day 30 but not later than day 90. Tell us more about your run! Where is your base, what were your moves. Congrats again! Not many people pass 100 days! I remember how proud I was after reaching this target! And then rain told me he is around day 200 lol :)

I like this route to the summit: Farmstead > Burned Ridge Cave > Plane > Abandoned Prepper Cache > TWM. This way, even if a blizzard hits you and you have coal, you can survive.

[darkscaryforest]

Originally posted by mf187doubleg:

Nice run! Around day 100 you should be able to get the erawrap but it can already be destroyed. I do as Jay - I limit cloths that I need to repair. Usually 1 or 2 thermal depending on luck, 1 or 2 sweathers, 1 toque. I use racks instead of earwrap. Usually I try to hit summit before day 30 but not later than day 90. Tell us more about your run! Where is your base, what were your moves. Congrats again! Not many people pass 100 days! I remember how proud I was after reaching this target! And then rain told me he is around day 200 lol :)

I like this route to the summit: Farmstead > Burned Ridge Cave > Plane > Abandoned Prepper Cache > TWM. This way, even if a blizzard hits you and you have coal, you can survive.

Thanks, I spawned in DP and discovered too late the furthermost coastal house in CH is burned out in interloper. I got frostbite just before diverting to Misanthrope's Homestead. I setup a base at the ravine / dam and powered up there after forging at FM.

I've rushed the summit successfully in a different run, but it feels harder late game. In the current game, I had actually recently tried the route you mentioned (and it is a great route), but I got in a bad way with cabin fever risk at prepper's cache followed by a blizzard that depleted my fuel in burned ridge cave. I'm really struggling with PV as the back of the cave is too cold for my modest +20 degrees clothing. Was hoping to establish a strong base at prepper's, but alas I'll need to try again.

Most of my interloper experience post day 15 has been in ML and MT so really hoping to branch out and get comfortable in other regions.

Originally posted by Tekel1959:

I tend to use socks, and I also burn through all the cloth I can in a new location trying to get mending to level 3

That is a great point. I'ved tried to repair rabbit gear early and often to get points, but the socks are cheap to sneak one in on too.

[Sokol1]

Originally posted by 0x40008050:

Sports socks. Did you know I wasted 6 cloth on my last repair on that? What the hell is wrong with me. I should just rip them up.

I don't waste cloths repairing socks, they give just 1ºC warm.

[mf187doubleg]

The key on interloper is coal and hunting bears.

With good gear like:
1 toque, 1 rabbit hat, bear and wolf coat, 1 thin sweater, rabbit gloves, deer x 3 (pants, pants, boots), 1 thermal and no socks you can easly survive with a regular bedroll in the back of the cave even in PV (which is 1 of the coldest region). Only rarely during big blizzards feeling temperature in the back of the cave could fall to -6 but as said it is very very rare and a hudge blizzard is needed.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2701918752

With above gear you can easly spend nights in caves and you will never have problem with cabin fever. Try to spend night in caves and craft or get wood from houses during day. This way no cabin fever problem. I use the bear coat under the wolf coat because in case of wolf attack it is easier to repair the wolf coat and you have same bonus to warmth (you get lower bonus to windshield but on loper sometimes winds are so cold that this small bonus is not helping anyway :) )

If you get better at hunting bears and you manage to craft a bear bedroll, you will be super secure and you could spend nights in caves without any risk. Bear bedroll is really a Rolls Royce on interloper. For ex in Coastal Highway which is with ML the warmest region, you could use a bear bedroll in a car during 1st part of day (for ex by passing time) to wait for a better weather or sun and you will feel temperature above 0 (good to fight cabin fever without a need to spend a match on fire).

Check my guide for more loper tips :)

[Kvakosavrus]

Originally posted by JayXL:

Standard Loper gear for cloth items is 2 long underwear, 2 thin wool sweaters, an ear wrap and a Canadian toque. Only 6 cloth items to keep mended and the rest is animal skins.

What about pants? I prefer combat pants instead of deer. Yes they need cloth but not so often - combat pants are durable. And they have almost the same defence (7 against 10), same temperature rating but incredibly light (0.75 kg)

[Evendark]

once you crafted the fur gear +bear bedroll, and have some little foodcamps, you can drop all your cloth gear and doing good.

I use a long time now
2 bearcoats, 1 deerpants, 1 Combat trouser, deer shoes, rabbit hat and mittens.

this means 2 cloth for repair (bedroll and combat trouser) around all 80 days (easy to find on the beach). you can craft all this in under 20 days

[darkscaryforest]

Following your advice, I crafted bear bedroll for the first time ever. It's really nice! I made it to the summit.

For science, here is what you can find at the tail section on day 133 on interloper:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2704288774

Everything shown here is not ruined. That's 10 tea and 5 coffee. Alas, amongst the ruined items were earwraps and wool socks, but in a way they will live on- cannibalized to nurture longjohns and thin wool sweater as is the cycle of life. The 71% firestriker, stim, and 8 flare bullets made the trip very worth it. The container near deer clearing had 3 tomato soup cans at 75%.

Cheers!

[mf187doubleg]

Well done! A firestriker is awesome. Now with your gear you can easly stay and have fun in TWM. You can also try to push for the technical backpack and racks in the gold mine in Ash Canyon. You have very good gear to do that. Coffee will help a lot during rope climbing to the mine.

How to get there: Go through Echo Ravine to Anglers den, Then west to Stone Shelf Cave and west to the ropes (a lot of coffee and maybe sleep before last one with coal). Then just go down a rope (a rope can be found in nearby cave) and you arrived to the mine! :)

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/intothelongdark/images/8/8d/Map-AC-Lv3C-v193-122.png/revision/latest?cb=20210124151056

[cacamaca8]

1. Wool Ear Wrap: you have a fantastic guaranteed Interloper spawn in Hushed River Valley/Reclusive Falls/Hidden Cache: Combat Pants + Whetstone + Wool Ear Wrap + Salty Crackers
2. Combat Pants possible locations: PV (Crash, Signal Hill), HRV (Reclusive Falls, guaranteed), AC (Homesteader's Respite, almost sure is guaranteed spawn)
3. Wool Ear wrap possible locations: HRV (Reclusive Falls, guaranteed), PV (Crash), ML (Carter Dam, inside lockers)
4. Day 117... congratulations. I usually get bored on interloper around day 50. After you get knife > bow in first 7-15 days ... it's getting very easy and boring.
5. I use 2 x Combat Pants instead of 2 Deer or 1 Deer + 1 Combat because the speed and weight bonus is better for my play style than + 1.25 kg extra for +1.5 deg wind bonus from 1 deer pants. Same for bear coat, which I never use. Too heavy for +2 deg. Way too heavy. You can manage without bear coat at -40-50 deg. I also use as much as I can Trail Boots. Very light, zero speed malus....you can move really fast. Really ... +5 deg bonus from several clothes but +5 kg extra weight...it's not worth it. Just killed the moose at Trapper's. After 30 minues it's night+blizzard. Do you think the bear coat can handle -45 deg + -40 wind much better than wolfskin? No. So I go harvest 30 minutes, freeze and lose 10% condition, go back, sleep 1 hour for warmth, harvest again. Meat, hide, guts, 6 crow feathers. Lost 50%-60% condition. Sleep and recover 30%. Travel next day to cabin>abandoned lookout>logging>derailment>camp office. Got 4 stored spray cans to mark my favourite wolf free route from Camp Office to Trapper's. Ok..i can navigate this route at night on blizzard ...but it's fun to mark something else than cave interiors with multiple paths to exit. And to use the heaviest clothing for protection bonus in case of an encounter ... it's not worth it. DO NOT HAVE UNPLANNED ENCOUNTERS. Plan encounters. Avoid the animals. Or kill them.
6. Know the maps, have no shame in using Santana maps (kudos again and again and again, also for previous mapmakers), have checkpoints/base everyhere with water+food+fuel+CPot+Re Tea+Ro Tea+OMB+materials (crossroads, like Prepper's, transition caves, Trapper's etc)
7. Do not gather coal from PV transition caves for TWM. Plenty of coal on the road to TWM Summit or to AC Backpack. Indeed, nicest route is Farm>Burned Ridge>Prepper's. Sleep at Prepper's, if needed. Or Dodger's. Or Skeeter basement.
- Go asap for the backpack + crampons in AC. Even before TWM Summit. Let's say...day 15...maybe?. Or later, after temperature drop, there are plenty of hot caves on the road. Imho, the easiest route to AC Backpack is from Deer Clearing. 2-3 days from TWM/Mountaineer's Hut. Depends: coffee, weather etc. I did Climber's>Gold Mine in one day+night, full blizzard, before the update, when the caves in AC were not hot caves (except Climber's). It was surprise to get into a deep cave and see it's not warm :). No wolf encounters in AC. You only have to avoid/kill the bear at Miner's Folly. Once I found him sleeping and headshot. Other time I avoided him around Miner's. He walks, follows you from distance, you can walk whole map and bait him wherever you want without charging if you keep visual contact, like...100 meters.
- If you have the bow you can manage 1-2 wolves before/around Forest Cave: Mountaineer's Hut>Forest Cave>Cave before Rope>Rope>Deer Clearing>Cave to AC (plenty of coal)> Climber's Cave>Rope>Rope>Miner's Folly>Bear>Wolf's Jaw>Rope down>Gold Mine (get the rope on the way, from the bridge or cave; if not, loot the rope near Gold Mine exit).
- if you do not have the bow but you really really want to go to Backpack: replace Forest Cave route with Cave C>Cave D route, both arriving at unnamed Cave before rope. Probably tou can't go without climbing rope near lake because of wolf/bear on the river + wolf on the plateau. So, you go Mountaineer's Hut>Rope near Lake>Engine>Cave C>Cave D>same as before
8. Back from AC to TWM. No wolf encounters in AC. Avoid/kill moose at Stone Shelf Cave. Gold Mine exit> Birch Forest (plenty of birch...really)>transit cave to TWM (optional detour to Climber's)>Deer Clearing>Cave B (avoid/kill the wolf/bear before Secluded Shelf>Cave A>Cave>Rope>Summit
9. Do not spare matches or firestriker. Use them. Do not wait for sunny days in the beggining. Use a match. Stack them at checkpoints. Use them every time you need them. No point in saving one match and die on hour later. Obvious...use chain torches if you can...
10. After you get bored of vanilla Interloper, probably you will want a different approach. Maybe deadman. Maybe base building. I like the Interloper base building approach. Like patching the whole in TWM Hut with a moose hide. Or furnishing your base with Rosehips drying hanged on the wall and a hatchet on my cedar wood stack. A hatchet...not improvised hatchet. Or go to BI/BRM Ammunition Workbench and craft a hatchet and hunting knife on Interloper (Otherwise...why should I go there on Interloper?). Or move the plastic box on the shelf, to look nicer. Or pickup several containers and bring them to my base, to have nice shelves with boxes and stuff. Or have some bonus for ankles, because you feel it's absurd to sprain every wrist on every slope. Or maybe you feel Cabin fever is a weird mechanic and you are really really bored to have to go once in a while to Forest Cave or Hiltop or any cave to sleep one night just to avoid CF. Really, you will go to sleep into those caves because you will be bored of PV Farm or Mountaineer Hut or Trapper's. Sort of Cabin Fever, but triggered by your brain, not by a fixed number of indoor hours ingame. Water management, with no magic bottles from the air after you boil 6 Water CPots in PV Farm. You will search like crazy for a 500ml plastic bottle and be happy to find one heavy 750 ml metal bottle. Craft waterskins from 10000000 useless rabbit pelts. Craft wolfskin boots. Etc. So... randomized interloper spawns, hunger revamped, place everywhere etc. They make the Interloper experience more pleasant and more rewarding. And no...you won't use anymore the "starving exploit". You will play full stomach asap, all day long for "well fed bonus" and "extra calories bonus" :). You will eat cat tails like crazy, not stacking them, for that nice bonus. You will search for a hammer in 3 regions, because it's randomized spawn...can't use "loot tables". Also for hacksaw, lantern etc. Makes a bit more rewarding searching for them than knowing every special item location depending on which "loot table" your game generated. Oh..I have bedroll here, so I am on loot table X, with hammer there and hacksaw there. Using randomized Interloper spawns, I really didn't know where I have a hammerafter my lucky spawn close to PV/Crash area(Combat Pants+Windbreaker in plane crash). The guaranteed Hammer spawn in Monolith Lake was....bleah...a big no no. Well...I found a hammer after 12 days, searching in 3 regions + transitions (PV, ML, MT)
11. Oh...and you will get tired of harvest/cook exploit and you will harvest 1 kg in your new Interloper runs because it's annoying to harvest/cook 100 g only because it's an exploit. Same with fire starting. You will get bored after several runs and you will just wait to happen. Read books etc. I'm on day 100 now and I did not reached level 5 on fire starting. I'm level 4.5...something. Usually I reached level 5 in first days, spawning fires like crazy with a torch, sitting in the barn at Trapper's, cooking a deer/bear/moose in 100g portions, spawning 6-8 fires, cook on 2 of them, relight the other six, repeat etc. It's not worth it :)
12. Craft 6-8 arrowheads and that's it. Why bother to craft 20 and craft 20 arrows? For leveling? It's absurd. You won't carry 20 arrows. You will carry only 6-8 arrows all game long and have birch/arrow shafts in checkpoints with workbenches. Shoot to kill, not to bleed. Head. Moose it's a bit harder. Bear too. Wait for level 5 to kill deer full face when crouched. Oherwise it's possible not to kill and chase him half map while bleeding. Or not bleeding to death and lose an arow. Useless. Or...bait a wolf into your deer area. He will kill the deer, then scare/kill the wolf. Wolf encounters....bring it on! Use your brand new level 1 bow and shoot full face when the wolf charges. Well...if you can make him follow in your nice warm cave, to harvest inside..that's not for the faint hearted :) TWolves....different approach. Avoid/Scare/Level 5-crouch-shoot head. Read books and shoot rabbits like crazy to level archery. Do not spare arrow shafts. Shoot every rabbit you encounter. Did I tel you to shoot every rabbit till you get to level 5?
13. Be patient till you reach level 5 in cooking. Cook every rosehip, meat can, herbal tea, pinnacle, coffee etc. Cook everything you can cook for leveling. If you like russian roullette and have a bottle or two of antibiotics (and Re Tea at checkpoints)...maybe...just maybe...if you really want to keep "well fed"... eat wolf or bear and hope for rng to avoid parasites. 20 days of parasites on Interloper...not nice. It happened to me once because I wasn't looking eaxctly on screen ant ate raw bear meat instead of cooked one. Guess what...I got parasites :) I survived, but ....bleah...So..till level 5, assuming you are not dumb like me and eat raw food by mistake, avoid wolf and bear. Better use snares and eat rabbit. They work. Free of charge. They do not reset the counter for spawning new animals afer you exterminate entire rabbit population around Trapper's while leveling archery :). Snares work every day, even if you killed the rabbits in the area.
14. Easiest Moose to kill/chase without critical hit: Broken Railroad, because he has no room to flee all map while bleeding and die in a weird spot. Maybe he will flee around cave. Maybe not. Anyway..he will die around a good spot, like cave or cabin. And you can use the fallen tree. Say hello to moose, shoot (hope for head critical). If not critical, go to tree and repeat till death. His death...not yours. After you killed the two annoying wolves, of course.

[mf187doubleg]

Long to read but yes good tips! :) I prefer to hunt moose in the Milton Bassin or close to Trappers. To not get bored I move and set bases all over the regions. It is fun to learn maps and stay 2-3 days in one place to move to another :) Also BI and BRock are good for late lopers to have fun - Only thing I miss would be to be able to craft a rifle (parts collected in all regions) to stay occupied on vanila loper and have a goal to go to BI to craft gun powder and a few bullets. Or maybe to craft a spear like in the story to hunt bears.

[cacamaca8]

Originally posted by Tekel1959:

Originally posted by cacamaca8:

14. Easiest Moose to kill/chase without critical hit: Broken Railroad, because he has no room to flee all map while bleeding and die in a weird spot...

Moose do not bleed, AFAIK they drop or they live.

Yes, they do not bleed, sorry, wrong words. I was saying something like "if you don't kill first shot, moose runs, he stops, you wait for him to return to same spot. Or you can decide to go after moose, try again to kill, but at least you don't have to do this half map if you miss, you will kill him around cabin or around cave"

Originally posted by JayXL:

That's one of the most impressive 'wall of text' posts I've ever seen. :winter2019surprisedsnowman:

Indeed...it's a wall. Maybe it was too much info, almost off topic :). My bad :)

Maybe I should try to write a guide, with chapters and numbers and everything, including also my boring Pilgrim experience, than my 241 Stalker days, with "Cartographer" achievment and a burst of frustration/hysteria/joy, followed by instant delete the save game after I've got the achievment.

Of course, describing also first pathetic/hilarious/tragic/comic experiences on Interloper.

"Hushed River Valley spawn. Wtf? Where am I?. Why is night? Why is blizzard? How lovely...dogs barking in the fog... Oh..it's not a dog. I throw myself into the river 100 m below, fading into the long dark". Repeat 50-100 times, in PV, DP, TWM, HRV, FM.

Or: Pleasant Valley, how sweet. 5 minutes later: hmmm...doesn't seem quite "pleasant", I guess they mispelled the region name.

TWM. yaaaaay, clear weather. Oh...a plane engine...200 m below me? How can I get to the famous Hut? Where am I? OK...i throw myself again from a cliff, 30th time in last half hour, fading into the long dark. Maybe next time...

[SysGhost]

Originally posted by Tekel1959:

Originally posted by cacamaca8:

14. Easiest Moose to kill/chase without critical hit: Broken Railroad, because he has no room to flee all map while bleeding and die in a weird spot...

Moose do not bleed, AFAIK they drop or they live.

That is indeed true. One have to keep shooting until the moose drops dead. The moose do bleed, but it'll heal rather than bleed out.

I was lucky myself hunting one on the Coastal Highway. The moose have already killed a bunch of wolves. I found 4 wolf carcasses nearby where the moose was found roaming. (The Coastal town just outside the gas station)
I suspect the wolves did a number on the moose as I didn't have to fire too many rifle rounds to kill it, or I just got really lucky with critical hits.