Get ahead with the undead
If you've played State of Decay then you've probably got a
good handle on what to expect from State of Decay 2, but if it's been a
while or you're new to the series here are some top tips that will help
make the game easier as you start out.
Treat your survivors like a Pokémon team
Remember when you were a kid and you played Pokémon Red for
the first time, and instead of levelling your team equally you just
concentrated on getting a wicked hench Charizard? But as soon as you
came up against water trainer Misty she totalled your Charizard and then
your whole team? That can happen in State of Decay 2.
In State of Decay 2 your survivors level up with an almost
RPG-like progression system, where the more they do things the better
they get at doing them. At the beginning you'll definitely have one or
two members of your team who are a bit more capable -- they'll be better
at fighting or shooting and have good cardio. It's tempting to just
swap between the most robust survivors you have because they feel the
safest out in the big, bad, zombie-filled world, but this is a path to
disaster. In the early stages of the game, while there are relatively
few zombies and you can scavenge close to home, send out your weaker
survivors to build up their skills.This means that your whole team will
be more useful to you, and it's less critical to everyone's survival
when you do happen to lose anyone. It also makes it easier when pursuing
personal goals for your survivors if they're not as soft as a bag of
marshmallows.
Rule #1: Cardio
If you don't build up their skills in any other way, at
least build up your survivors' cardio by making them run everywhere when
they're not in immediate danger. Cardio is both the key to getting away
from a fight if you're in danger of being overwhelmed, the determining
factor in how many swings you can take, and if you end up being
overburdened with supplies you'll be glad of the extra stamina in a
pinch.
Get some wheels
You know what stops you being overburdened? Having a car!
You can sling a bunch of stuff in the boot of a car, including supply
bags (of which a survivor can only carry one). They're also essential
for when you start making supply runs further out of town. While you may
be tempted to get a flashy sports car, it's better to find something
more practical and larger instead. They have more inventory slots and
can take more damage from splattering zombies, and many of them have
better fuel consumption. Speed doesn't matter that much when you only
need to go faster than a zombie.
Search even if you can't loot
There will be occasions when you've filled your boots and
can carry no more, but you've still got a few buildings near you that
you haven't cleared and searched. If there aren't any infestations or
hordes around it's useful to search all the containers anyway, because
then the map will tell you which resources are left in that location
when you highlight it. This is much more useful when planning future
supply runs than a question mark, and will save you time looting when
you go back.
Think carefully about your outposts
Outposts supplement your home base. By establishing an
outpost you can use it to switch your active survivor, get access to
your storage locker, and get a steady source of supplies to send to your
home base (depending on the type of outpost. Things like restaurants
and fruit stands send food, clinics and vets send meds, unfinished
houses send building supplies, and so on and so forth). To start with
you can only sustain one outpost, but upgrading your command centre
means you can have more.
Initially it's tempting to build your outposts close to
home, because it feels safer, but in the long run it won't help you.
Instead, you're going to want to establish an outpost in or near each of
the main towns on the map. They'll give you a safe staging area for
operations in each area, as well as somewhere close by to get medical
supplies, fuel or weapons if you run out at any point.
You should also think about what you want to have at your
outposts as your needs change. When you're first setting up it's a waste
of time to turn a power station or a water tower into an outpost, but
later on, when you've got a bigger home base and are setting up a farm,
those utilities might be more useful.
It's dangerous to go alone, so take an extra follower
So take a friend! You can have a follower from your home
base tag along with you, which is helpful for carrying more stuff if
you're on a scavenging mission and for stomping zombie heads if you're
not. You can also have a follower join you who's just a random survivor
you're helping out in the world on top of the follower you already have
This can be really useful -- you can use that second follower to help
clear out infestations or take down a Plague Heart before you go and
complete the mission they actually want you to do. More meat for the
grinder.
Don't bring a gun to a zombie fight
I mean, do, but think carefully about it. You'll get your
own style, but for the most part guns are best used when you're taking
on a Plague Heart or run into a Feral zombie when you're not expecting
it. If you use guns they draw more zombies to you because they're noisy,
so unless you're sniping or you're really up against it then take down
as many zombies as you can with melee weapons. Bladed ones are great
because they're super silent and chop off limbs, but blunt weapons like
crowbars are more resilient.
Build a workshop
When you start a community for the first the tutorial will
prompt you to build an Infirmary at your home base. This is a solid
plan! The infirmary lets you make your own medical consumables like
bandages and painkillers, stabilise infection in survivors, and can
produce a cure for the blood plague if anyone gets infected. But you
should also definitely build a workshop.
With a workshop you can eventually produce makeshift
explosives (which are great for destroying plague hearts), but from
early on in the game right through to the end you can use it to repair
weapons. It can't be understated how useful it is to be able to do that.
A broken machete is a useless machete, and a useless machete can't chop
zombie heads.
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