My tips for SURROUNDED mode

[Silver]

You start with level 4 workbench, so prioritize in making the good items. The most important resource in this mode is nylon. You will need it to build trip wires. If you run out of nylon, you run out of the capability to arm your traps, rendering them useless. You can convert rope to nylon once you have the recycler.

The way an attack works is that NPC raiders will break down your shelter doors and will then try and steal resources from your shelter. DONT LET THEM! I once lost 20 water because 2 attackers managed to reach a water butt before I could get to them.

- Use the "rearrange shelter" mode to move any water butts, pantries and storage boxes away from the 1st (top) level to lower ones.

At the same time, you dont want to put them too far down or your mom and son will have to climb lots of ladders every time they want some food or water.

Ideally, you want mom and son to live on the level 2nd from top. Put things like the ammunition bench, the laboratory, the double beds, the shower, the lavatory and cooking spot to the left of the ladder, while putting the water butt, the pantry and so on to the right and a shotgun trap in front of it. Position your mom and son behind the shotgun trap so that they engage any surviving raiders before they get to your supplies.

- Use your starting resources to construct 3 spike traps next to each other in the ceiling between (to the right of) your hazmat suit locker and to the left of the ladder leading to the level below. Later on, you will also want to build a shotgun trap and a rifle trap in this area. The rifle trap is built on the ceiling and you will have to move a spike trap somewhere else to make room for it.
- Make sure to always have a few tripwires ready so you dont have to build them after an attack starts.
- Dont forget to arm your spike traps once a breach is underway!!!
- Use your starting resources to also make a bulletproof vest
- Build a snare trap outside to gather leather for the second vest
- Use pipes and wood as your initial weapons till you get better ones
- dont waste any time on fixing the water filter, it will never rain in the 50 days, so let it go to 0%
- in fact, disable it to save fuel (i think it consumes fuel if operational?)
- in the first 10 days, you will have few tools in your workbench, so the crafting and repairing speed will be very slow, so let things degrade until later when your speed is a bit better (shown on the workbench)
- you won't run out of food or fuel in these 50 days, but the less you use, the greater your high score towards the end, so use alternatives, like building 1 small freezer to get some meat from the trap outside; burning coal and animal fat in the incinerator and installing a few solar panels mid game.
- you WILL run out of water though, as it never rains, so once you have the resources (after day 20) make sure to build a water vapor condenser and upgrade your toilets and showers to the best version.
- break up some of the beds and secondary showers and toilets to get additional resources, should you need them

- every 10 days, Dad goes on a simulated exploration trip and gathers resources. You get to choose 2 locations each time, and in each of these locations you get to choose 3 places. Try going for the places that have "medium" or "large" next to their name, rather than "small".
- prioritize in getting nylon, tools to speed up the crafting and repairing at your workbench (you only need 1 of each, there are 10 tools in total), metal, pipes, rubber, wood, and computer chipboards. you will want to construct a recycler ASAP to be able to recycle any junk dad brings in that will net you more basic resources.

- some people have said not to bother reinforcing the shelter doors, as the raiders will not stop until they have breached them. while this is true, later in the game when you have to deal with 4 raiders at a time, having 3 battering your door while the 4th is climbing down the external ladder will only make them last for a few seconds, and you really need the extra time to arm your half a dozen traps and get both characters into position, so at least the first upgrade on both doors is definitely worth it, plus you anyway have surplus resources to be able to do this.


During fights, make sure to always equip both mom and son with the bulletproof vests, first aid kids, bandages and a primary weapon whose required strength is less than what they have. Use your moves for attacks - you can always patch up your wounds after the fight. And throw the bodies in the incinerator.

The three characters you see in the intro are named characters who appear individually as bosses over the course of the 50 days. They dont have bulletproof vests on like other attackers, so when you face them, use pistol and bullets to deal with them from afar.

Hope this helps, the first 10 days are tough but the rest is a cakewalk.

[Pawnstar]

These are pretty much spot on, maybe add them to guides since threads do get drown out pretty quick.

You missed out on training survivors, or did your strategy fully rely on traps? I always wondered if that was possible, but there is combat score too.