Explaining Severity and Active Abilities

A small guide I made to help those struggling with the game by explaining 2 basic game concepts.

I will be explaining active abilities and why Severity = DNA

My first guide also. Pls remember the rate the guide if you found it helpful!

More Severity, more DNA

Most beginners like to adopt the "No severity till whole world infected" strategy, thinking that severity must be devolved at all costs, that it is not beneficial in any way and that it is only good for increasing the cure effort and locking down island countries. What is not widely known is that the more severe your disease is, the more DNA points you get when you infect a new country.

For example, when you have no severity, or next to none, you get a pitiful one DNA point when you infect a new country. Later on in the game, as costs easily skyrocket to 20 + DNA points to evolve one symptom/ability, you will find your plague severely hampered.

This makes sure if you want to play cautiously, or use the aforementioned "No severity till whole world infected" strategy, you will have needed to plan out what to evolve carefully, and dont go anyhow spending points.


[Low severity]


[Only 1 DNA point for new infected country]


On the other hand, if you have moderate or high severity, you can get 2-5 DNA points for just one new country infected. The more severe you make your plague, the more bonus DNA points you get.

This encourages aggressive gameplay, letting you evolve a lot more to counter increased cure efforts and island nations locking down harbors. And lets face it, this is more fun than "devolve all symptoms, wait for whole world to be infect" strategy.


[Moderate severity]



[More DNA points for one infected country]

While some countries, even though you have no severity, will still give you more than 1 DNA point , generally, more severity will add DNA points to that bonus.


TL:DR More severity means more DNA points upon a new country infected, however some countries already have a natural DNA bonus, so with severity added, you can get a vastly increased bonus DNA. Use this to counter increased cure speed and country lockdowns.

Using active abilities for Necroa/Simian Flu

The necroa is both a fun and a easy plague to use, provided you know how to use their active abilities

I'll use the horde instinct active ability as an example.





This ability is quite powerful, allowing you to infect countries that are completely locked down by moving zombies from another compromised country. Excuse me while i give a middle finger to Greenland and deploy zombies from Iceland. Zombies ignore the cure effort by the world, so if just one zed somehow swims across the frozen atlantic ocean, the entire country is compromised forever.

Alright that felt good. Moving on, to use any active abilities, even for Simian Flu, click on the active ability you want to use from the active ability bar on the top left hand corner, below the news bar.



Remember that each active ability costs DNA points to use once, so dont go spamming it.
The cost is indicated by the number on the box of the ability.

Also remember you can only move zombies from a country right next to it, so you cant move zombies from USA to Greenland. However, you can move zombies from USA to Canada and then Greenland.

MORE ACCURATELY:
YOU CANNOT CROSS OVER A COUNTRY, on your way to another... That is:
As long as you have a DIRECT Line-of-Sight between the 2 countries it will work.
NOTE: Sometimes you may need to wangle a starting and ending point between the 2... Thus, in your example above, with a start point in Florida, you can get a direct line to the Southern tip of Greenland. [Thanks to Playto1971 for clarifying]


[Small Tip: You dont need drifting fermentation to move zombies over water. This just increases their speed. Instead, focus on abilities that increase horde size]

[YIPPEE]

@cookedmeet because he doesnt use the no severity till everyone is infected strategy

[3vasion]

How do you have over 1 k dna?

[PokeMageTech - ProNetNeutrality]

I play virus to make it a mutating menace.

[Casey]

i started realy agresive, however I rely on total chaos in strategy games, making the bio weapon, the nano virus and the zombie plauge the best plauges in the game for me.

[Karl Carrios]

The early minor symptoms like cysts, coughing, sneezing, generally pass without too much attention from the world, while considerably boosting infectivity and moderately increasing severity. While research will start, generally it wont end your plague anytime soon. Having just one extra DNA point per country while the plague starts spreading can mean a lot of extra DNA points. Unless you start in Russia, Canada or Norway (ports with Greenland) i recommend getting the minor symptoms to reach the North quicker.

[fuchsbau]

But if you play aggressive too early, countries will start to lockdown airports and seaports, and you may risk yourself not being able to infect these countries, specially islands, a very good example of this is Greenland. I'd wait Greenland to get infected first before starting to develop symptoms.

[Ahoy Ladies!]

Generally first-time players use the Devolve all Symptoms strategy because for them it feels easier but as you progress from n00bie to moderate gamer, you switch your strategy only evolving coughing and cysts and then from moderate gamer to pro gamer, you found this guide and read lots of others and figure "Man! I should have been evolving cyts, coughing, sneezing, necrosis, skin lesions, insomnia and paranoia!". Oh ya, severity = noticed and the more severity and lethality you have when noticed, the more scientists are trying to cure so severity is good but in small doses. It's not "Fill severity bar all the way up!".

[Karl Carrios]

Hope Tutorial comes soon, but until then, guides will have to fill the gap

[OverLordGoldDragon]

Thanks a lot for this guide - never knew more severity = more DNA upon country infection. Ndemic leaves out important information like this - leaving us to wallowing in ignorance.

[Karl Carrios]

Glad to help you!