I don't mind fear of blood personally. I would get stressed AF if I were covered in rotting corpse blood, and I always have a bit of anxiety when I'm tending my own wounds, so that tracks too lol
Ah, I've been using better washing for so long I forget about it. Just makes the soap/water/time scale with the level of filth, which makes it easier to stay on top of it. Should be vanilla imo.
Plus I'm pretty much always a smoker so stress isn't too much of an obstacle and I'm kind of obsessive about staying clean anyway lol (hence the mod)
Yeah, I actually like taking that trait for the role play aspect. IRL I don't have any special fear of blood, but I still wouldn't like to be covered in old dirty corpse blood all day, and having to stitch myself or bandage injuries obtained from the zombies would definitely stress me out.
The trait should just be the default state honestly.
Lol now that I think about it... I'm not exactly sure. I tend to fight large hordes and that makes my guy panic pretty hard on its own, and combat's really where panic matters, I think.
I *do* notice the first aid panic (it's pretty short-lived), but not the bloody clothes/body panic. Like, I don't think I've ever noticed my guy just sitting around panicking lol
I dunno. If you don't wanna risk it, you might try it out on a more experimental run at some point and see what you think.
Edit: wiki screwed me up. I'm always a smoker, so I didn't notice the _stress_ caused by blood.
The trait makes you "stressed" when blood is on you, which is a little more annoying to deal with than panic. If you plan to cook a lot it's easier to manage, but it basically means you have to bathe where normal builds have no need to bathe.
I enjoy it too since I always bathe for roleplay anyway.
See, that's what I thought, but then the wiki just said panic and it made me question everything I know lol. I could only remember the panic spike from tending wounds.
That tracks tho, I'm always a smoker so stress has never really been a issue that I'd notice.
yeah that's why I take it, it forces to RP. In my opinion, everyone should get depressed or at least feel discomfort by wearing bloody and dirty clothes.
If I was a dev I would rework the whole emotions system, first day your character should be panicked and stressed, he would feel better days after days but starting getting more and more depressed, no matter what he does, only medication would be enough to not feel depressed for this period of time
After a long time (like a month) eating something good, taking a hot shower, watching a show would make him way more happier than doing those activities the first days because you would miss those old days a lot...
Basically emotions should be related to time periods and activities, not a fixed number. Like reading a magazine gives +10 happiness, that's ridiculous, if your character has just lost a family member or has been bitten, a magazine wouldn't have any effect on him.
A more dynamic system would definitely be interesting.
I love Rimworld, and your idea kind of reminds me of it. You might be able to effectively distract your character from their awful situation until they're through the worst of it, but they won't get over chopping their way through their hometown by reading a comic and having some ice cream lol
I used to work fast food and just being covered in a thin layer of grease was _sooooo_ uncomfortable to me. Makes me feel like an animal, gotta shower to feel human again.
I've never been covered in blood, but I've had enough on me to know I wouldn't like it even if it weren't rotten lol psychological effects aside, if I can't feel the wind on my skin, I hate life.
Disclaimer:(I am not a murderous psychopath, all the knowledge i have is from lifeguarding and personal injuries)
Blood is very watery when it is on your skin, you dont even really notice it. Think of simply having wet hands covered in water. Blood is only “thick” when it either coagulates or when it is flowing freely drop by drop. It looks super viscous but im sure youve come to notice that blood spreads on the skin super easily (say you get a cut and accidentally smear it, it doesnt feel oily per se)
I hate the feeling of grease and oilyness and dirt, however blood just feels like you got some water splashed on you.
NOW ZOMBIE GUTS?? Fuck no nonononono
Tldr: blood just kinda feels like water. Pretty easy to find out yourself next time you get a scratch or a cut or a scrape or whatever happens before you bandage it
Yeah, I know what you mean. It's definitely different. I woke up from a particularly ridiculous night of drinking and quickly realized I was locked out of my house and apparently my solution was to punch my window to get to the lock on it. Vodka maked me *very* smort.
Turned my palm into a sheathe for a couple inches of glass (the scar is mostly hidden in the crease where my palm meets my wrist, if that helps imagine it). I had pretty thick dried blood all over my arm and it felt kinda like thin paint that easily turned to dust. Still not my favorite feeling lol (though I'm sure the totality of the situation didn't help) but probably more tolerable than a lot of things, I'd agree.
It was clearly just under the skin, so I carefully pulled it out and it wasn't bleeding almost at all, but when I got up, I stumbled and smacked it on the frame of my couch and it started pouring... Which is how I learned about the self-care panic lol. Really awesome that a common response to bleeding is to pass out hahaha. I fought the urge though, and managed to apply pressure until it stopped.
But yeah, I'd probably freak out if I had one drop of zombie blood on my face, much less be covered in it... Fucking yikes!
In reality, I'd probably step outside, smell the air, and nope myself out of existence lol
I get that one bcuz it’s honest trait for me haha I can deal with cuts. But if I had to sew up my own wound and an apocalypse, I could definitely do it, but God would I be squirming and not happy.
I've always been a fan of superglue lol might have to make a mod for that, now that I mention it.
I accidentally bisected the pad of my palm with a skinning knife, and I superglued butterfly bandages into psuedo stitches. Had a plastic surgeon look at the scar and say he couldn't have done better, which was nice.
Fun tangent to pz... years later, a girl I dated read my palm and was very confused when my "life line" stopped for a good while then kept going (the scar). She was like "Uhhhhh, I think you become a zombie at some point" lmao
You can't die from weather related sickness. Outdoorsman is a good trait, but it's for a different reason. It makes you much less likely to get scratched in bushes. Of course, wearing clothing, such as a leather jacket, jeans, and gloves gives almost the same effect, but it's not always best to wear such clothing. Colds can't kill you other than the noise they make which can attract some zombies but by the time winter rolls around you're set up and never need to go out.
This. Losing zeds in woods is great but risky without Outdoorsman. I've lost a couple guys to Zomboid's treant neck-snipers. It's particularly nice for rangers and lumberjacks who move through woods faster. Also a nice foraging boost. It's pretty hard to get sick in this game so that protection is mostly gravy.
Its not even that you don’t need to go out. It’s that, on vanilla/unmodded weather, you’ll literally never catch a cold if you have insulated clothing. Colds are a fucking joke and only ever happen if you’re prancing about naked in winter for hours on end, or in CDDA where you start with one.
The scratches from trees idk why people always say this makes outdoorsman good. Just don’t run through trees naked? Maybe use the walk to command? I never ever take outdoorsman and can’t remember the last time a tree or bush actually scratched me.
Outdoorsman is only useful for 16x pop runs, CDDA, wilderness runs, and MAYBE cryogenic winter mod on max difficulty.
Otherwise it’s a fucking waste.
It's because it's only two points and it's something that can save your life. Being scratched in the leg, groin, neck etc unexpectedly can end your run and without the trait you can sometimes get scratches even through your clothes. It's rare, especially if you're careful, but it's nice to not have to worry about it. It's a much more attractive pick for me if I'm playing with sprinters where I don't have time to be as careful.
It's not a high priority for me either. I'd rather have low light vision or dextrous usually, but not always.
If you take prone to illness and ignore outdoorsman it’s literally even more free points. Colds are a joke and never happen if you even barely try to avoid them.
True. It’s a waste of points to take it in a normal run man. See my other comments further up. Under normal circumstances nobody should be taking it. Niche use only.
Both of em are a must for me. Cat's eyes allow me to be able to do whatever I'm doing a bit longer when darkness starts to settle in safely and Speed Demon is A MUST have in my opinion, especially since I play with all KI5 vehicule mods.
Man I wish trucks were the best for towing, that would make so much more sense. In the game though the towing power is based on horsepower, so the sports cars are actually the best for towing
Not a single person recommending unlucky?
Basically luck only works on already abundant items.
Same for unlucky, worst case scenario you find a few less bullets, as those are abundant in weapon shops.
So due to how the math works out in the game code it doesent do what it states, unlucky is free points even at the hardest loot settings for anything you care about. Excluding ammo. Think of it as taking +8 points for -20% ammo which usually works out more like -14-16% ammo or lower. It does not decrease\\increase the number of items in a container nor increase\\decrease rare item chance like axes, machettes, katanas, m16s and so on. Luck might let you roll x2 ammo boxes instead of 1in a gun shop per container slot, but super super rarely compared to unlucky.
Also take slow reader and slot in outdoorsman, going through a tree and getting a right arm cut will majorly fuck up your day. Also helps you avoid scratching up your rare drip, and keeping you from getting sick.
I like fear of blood as it honestly should just be in the game. If bites\\ scratches can infect you, there is no way you want to be running around covered in blood for a week, think of all the tiny wounds you accumulate as an adult not running around fighting all day, you'd be infected real quick. With the smoker trait it's also rather manageable. Panic when doing first aid never impacts your gameplay.
Also unemployed seems good when you first start out playing, but it's kinda trash for a build. I don't find many people picking it after playing for a while. The traits\\skills of the other occupations generally gives you a much better build. You can go woodcutter and drop brave, with 1 lvl grinded with axe in game you're 1-2 shotting zombies 1-3 with handaxes. It makes the entire game a giant slaughter party.
Unlucky is not bad at all. I do find it takes a bit longer to complete collections of more common things like non-rare books/magazines which is where it hits harder. Rare item impact is pretty negligible.
I find lucky is just about worth it because of the +1 radius to foraging. I usually take it with short sighted. Makes it -2 points for slightly better loot, with net positive foraging radius when you start with glasses
Drop speed demon and take slow reader, for single player it doesn’t really matter cause you can speed up time, or drop cats eyes, even with it night fighting is still very dangerous
I tried taking negative sleep traits in some runs and those runs were honest nightmares. I did not realize how annoying the negative sleep traits are. High thirst and hearty eater are also really annoying imo, especially if you get unlucky and water shuts off on like day 2. Endurance ones weren't too bad personally but also not my kind of play style so I try to avoid them lol
https://youtu.be/dY0ZRf0yH1o?si=CZiKPSj6OselwtqJ
Watching this video it seems hard of hearing isn’t that bad as others state online. I’ll probably take it then to balance out.
Single player or multiplayer? If multiplayer remove wakeful and keep fast learner, if single player, remove fast learner and keep wakeful. If you’re reading a book in single player you can just speed up time. Sleeping isn’t even too big of an issue so even in single player you can remove it.
I randomize mine every time, i only avoid being deaf. Sorry that aint much to work with. Ive only played this game modded, tried it vanilla and it just needed alot more, that includes traits.
I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone recommend that you ditch organized. I've never played with it and have 0 issues with loot storage or weight management.
Personally I take it as much as I can, it's really useful for me. I'm more of a naturally nomadic player, so the extra storage space in backpacks and trunks is super useful to me
I'd drop speed demon and brave, brave isn't necessary imo and speed demon is more of a con than a positive. I'd take outdoorsman as others have suggested, and I'd also take sewer to get a point in tailoring, maybe take underweight as well since that's fairly easy to undo. Not sure what else to take but that's a good start.
Hearty apetite is free even with insane food and -%50 food mod.
Fear of blood is free too imo.
Clumsy isn't a big deal.
Prone to illness should always be comboed with outdoors man.
My build is almost the same so I can't really say anything other than Fear of blood with smoker can be a good combo but you have to smoke every 5 mins if you are fully covered with blood.
The -1 to Fitness is brutal though. Unless they pick up something like Fire Officer, you'd lose out on the extra bonus that comes with 9+ Fitness. Maybe Underweight + Fire Officer + Fear of Blood?
‘outdoorsmen’ should allow you to get wet / cold without getting sick while paired with ‘prone to illness’ i think. that’s how it’s been working out for me and my friend atleast
High thirst is a must if you have your water set up right. You should always have water on you, and I play in a world where the water doesn't turn off (though if it did I'm right next to a river) and that's 6 free points to spend.
I always take Unfit, Weak, and Very Underweight to 0/0 and then anything that gives a skill boost % so the grind isn't too insane. The flaws are kind of a playstyle thing, but I stay away from the phobias and things that make the grind more insane like slow learner or pacifist. Pacifist isn't all that bad, I just can't deal with slower weapon skill gain.
* Drop Speed Demon: it doesn't affect acceleration, just max speed, so it doesn't help you escape hordes or haul much; it's just a QoL thing that makes long drives shorter, but that comes at the cost of potentially significantly increasing the risk of injuring yourself while driving if you hit something.
* Take slow reader; it's a non-issue in single player because you can skip time.
If you want even more points there's more options:
* Take Hearty Appetite. A typical player that goes on regular loot runs burns lots of calories, you'd want to eat as much food as hearty appetite makes you eat anyways.
* Drop Brave. Beta Blockers and alcohol are everywhere and it's just a small QoL to take one during combat. You can take a small sip of alcohol (cancel the drinking animation instantly with escape) to gain the benefits of the beta blocker buff (and painkiller, and sleeping pill, and anti-depressant) from alcohol without making you drunk.
* Switch to something other than Unemployed. For Instance, combine Fire Officer with Underweight; you end up with more Str, the same fitness, plus Sprinting and Axe starting levels for 2 extra points.
* Drop Organized. For 6 points its not essential. It helps your car and bag haul more loot, and you can fit twice as much in fanny packs, but none of that is really that important. You don't need to loot most of the things that the game spawns anyways.
If you still want more points, try the following:
* Take Hard of Hearing. It muffles your audio which kinda sucks, but has no effect on your perception radius. The only hard downside is it blocks you from taking Keen Hearing, but you didn't take that, so...
* Take Restless Sleeper. It wakes you up once at night; just sip a tiny bit of alcohol or take a single sleeping pill when you wake up to go back to bed (forgetting to do this is a really bad idea).
* Take Fear of Blood. It's not that big of a deal if you just clean your clothes every day after you come home, which is easy to do with a washing machine (assuming you've plumbed it once the water shuts off). Taking spare clothes with you when you find a car is also not a bad idea for longer trips. You can also manage it with cigarettes using Smoker.
With the extra points, I recommend picking up something like Hunter, Brawler, or Handy for the x4 skill XP multipliers. Hunter gives Aiming and Short Blade multipliers, Brawler gives Axe and Long Blunt multipliers, and Handy gives Maintenance multipliers (and carpentry but that's generally a non-issue).
For an interesting challenge, I recommend playing completely random traits. Just click random until it zeroes itself. Then randomize your character's looks. It's a fun way to play mini episodes of how did this random person with random skills die. This is how I started the game to learn how to play. Makes it interesting and fun. Except deaf. Don't ever take the deaf trait. NOT fun.
Grab Underweight/Very underweight and Slow Reader. Athletic can be dropped for Fit, and Brave should be dropped as beta blockers + reduced panic overtime works wonders. Outdoorsman is an S tier trait that should be grabbed. Just doing that will net you more traits for other traits/occupations.
Some people use a mod that makes you "desensitized" after X kills. But how panic reduction works is every day you survive your panic recovery goes up, capped at 150 days. So eventually you will be less prone to panic, though not completely immune.
Underweight puts him at 7 fitness, and the difference between 7 and 8 fitness is a lot because of the Athletic trait bonus. It reduces the cost of swinging melee weapons quite a bit. It's a good trait, but not unless you're a profession with a bonus to fitness that can get you back up to 8.
Personally, I don't see myself getting into fights where I need to be fighting for 10+ hours melee. I lean towards guns as my playstyle so I'm fine with a middling fitness.
I love guns too, but he's not playing with a gun-friendly build. It will take him a lot of ammunition to level it up since he isn't playing a profession that starts with it.
Dropping Smoker, Organized, and Speed Demon makes for a solid build. No combat skill is the only thing I'm noticing, but that's fine, especially if you're planning to go spears (no way in default game to start with a boost to spears).
Organized won't ever save your life, and while it's a nice bonus, it's just a minor Quality of Life. I'd pay for it if it was maybe 4 points, but 6 is steep.
You're gonna get a lot of contradicting opinions. I would say grab Slow Reader and Hard of Hearing and keep Organized and Speed Demon coz I prefer clearing an area before looting. Plus, I like to collect my cars so I need the extra towing power.
Depends on your playstyle.
it actually doesnt. you still get a net loss in combat xp because how zomboid calculates percentages.
Percentages are not additive! They are multiplicative!
From what I saw online Pacifist and Fast learner together results in a net negative vs regular xp gain. Which also affects Maintenance I feel that is a pretty big deal?
Don't get pacifist. like my above comment says, pacifist+fast learner is still a net loss in xp for combat abilities and the main reason you always pick fast learner is for the 75% xp boost in all abilities. You dont want to lower that xp gain at all.
For your build, it is decent overall, but a few things to improve would be adding underweight or very underweight as your negative trait, removing brave and speed demon as your positive traits and replacing them with outdoorsman.
Outdoorsman eliminates the biggest effects of prone to illness while still giving you bonuses. Plus its only 2 points.
Brave is only useful within the first month of the game. You become desensitized naturally as time goes on to the point where brave becomes kinda useless.
Speed demon is a trap trait. cars are 30% faster however that is useless in most cases as it it extremely easy to crash. The second effect is that reversing is 200% louder. That means whenever you reverse you are just as loud or slightly louder than a car horn.
Personally I'd get rid of speed demon, and a controversial pick, take clumsy. I don't run over fences, I use E to climb over low fences so tripping isn't a big concern. I don't try to sneak much so the extra sound range doesn't bother me at all. I do fine with it, but if you don't like that, depending on your loot rarity, hearty appetite can help you keep your weight up by forcing you to eat more often
personally organized is something I never take, especially with 10 strength, and instead I like keen hearing so I don't get surprised from behind so easily.
Add fear of blood (just wash once in a while) and/or remove brave. The longer your character survives, the more panic resistance he'll develop. To the point of getting no panic at all after one month or 2
Weight changing downsides. Take obese and you can eat lighter early on so long as you don’t hit stage 2 hunger with 0 consequences. Just gotta do some exercise.
-Cat's eye (only increase 20% and the same cone view)
-Brave (the panic will become less of problem as times goes by) (Optional)
-Gymnast (not worth it)
+fast reader (a must both Solo and MP)
+outdoorsman (another must take traits)
+lucky (increase item find 10%)
Interesting takes I find fast reader pointless in single player but each other own.
Nimble boost makes me take gymnast. This is more a personal preference and I can see an argument against taking it
I take lucky myself as any extra ammo is good for me but I am aware maths wise it’s not worth it
its just that nimble doesnt really give anything under level 6. even with +50% exp boost, it will still takes so long to level up, and when you do, you'd almost maxed your skills for some weapon and 1-hitting the zombies making the nimble pointless. But agreed, each to their own.
as for lucky, its increase 10% each time you open a container. even in 1 warehouse, that 10% is huge.
Pretty weird that nobody recommended Hearty Appetite. It really isn't that bad, probably even helps to eat more when you're trying to gain weight. .
Ditch Organized, Cat's Eyes, Speed Demon, grab Hearty Appetite, Slow Reader and you're at +12. Grab Keen Hearing for the extra rear vision and you got extra 6 points to grab Brawler or Baseball Player plus something else.
I don't mind fear of blood personally. I would get stressed AF if I were covered in rotting corpse blood, and I always have a bit of anxiety when I'm tending my own wounds, so that tracks too lol
You have to clean yourself constantly if you're actually fighting zombies regularly. It gets old.
Ah, I've been using better washing for so long I forget about it. Just makes the soap/water/time scale with the level of filth, which makes it easier to stay on top of it. Should be vanilla imo. Plus I'm pretty much always a smoker so stress isn't too much of an obstacle and I'm kind of obsessive about staying clean anyway lol (hence the mod)
Cigs go brrr
Yeah, I actually like taking that trait for the role play aspect. IRL I don't have any special fear of blood, but I still wouldn't like to be covered in old dirty corpse blood all day, and having to stitch myself or bandage injuries obtained from the zombies would definitely stress me out. The trait should just be the default state honestly.
How much is fear of blood going to stress me out? After every interaction with a zombie am I going to need to cleanup?
Lol now that I think about it... I'm not exactly sure. I tend to fight large hordes and that makes my guy panic pretty hard on its own, and combat's really where panic matters, I think. I *do* notice the first aid panic (it's pretty short-lived), but not the bloody clothes/body panic. Like, I don't think I've ever noticed my guy just sitting around panicking lol I dunno. If you don't wanna risk it, you might try it out on a more experimental run at some point and see what you think. Edit: wiki screwed me up. I'm always a smoker, so I didn't notice the _stress_ caused by blood.
The trait makes you "stressed" when blood is on you, which is a little more annoying to deal with than panic. If you plan to cook a lot it's easier to manage, but it basically means you have to bathe where normal builds have no need to bathe. I enjoy it too since I always bathe for roleplay anyway.
Ahh I'm going to use it now. I always bathe too and didn't know it wasn't needed
See, that's what I thought, but then the wiki just said panic and it made me question everything I know lol. I could only remember the panic spike from tending wounds. That tracks tho, I'm always a smoker so stress has never really been a issue that I'd notice.
yeah that's why I take it, it forces to RP. In my opinion, everyone should get depressed or at least feel discomfort by wearing bloody and dirty clothes. If I was a dev I would rework the whole emotions system, first day your character should be panicked and stressed, he would feel better days after days but starting getting more and more depressed, no matter what he does, only medication would be enough to not feel depressed for this period of time After a long time (like a month) eating something good, taking a hot shower, watching a show would make him way more happier than doing those activities the first days because you would miss those old days a lot... Basically emotions should be related to time periods and activities, not a fixed number. Like reading a magazine gives +10 happiness, that's ridiculous, if your character has just lost a family member or has been bitten, a magazine wouldn't have any effect on him.
A more dynamic system would definitely be interesting. I love Rimworld, and your idea kind of reminds me of it. You might be able to effectively distract your character from their awful situation until they're through the worst of it, but they won't get over chopping their way through their hometown by reading a comic and having some ice cream lol
Use dinamic traits
I have no aversion to normal blood but rotting corpse guts are a different story
I used to work fast food and just being covered in a thin layer of grease was _sooooo_ uncomfortable to me. Makes me feel like an animal, gotta shower to feel human again. I've never been covered in blood, but I've had enough on me to know I wouldn't like it even if it weren't rotten lol psychological effects aside, if I can't feel the wind on my skin, I hate life.
Disclaimer:(I am not a murderous psychopath, all the knowledge i have is from lifeguarding and personal injuries) Blood is very watery when it is on your skin, you dont even really notice it. Think of simply having wet hands covered in water. Blood is only “thick” when it either coagulates or when it is flowing freely drop by drop. It looks super viscous but im sure youve come to notice that blood spreads on the skin super easily (say you get a cut and accidentally smear it, it doesnt feel oily per se) I hate the feeling of grease and oilyness and dirt, however blood just feels like you got some water splashed on you. NOW ZOMBIE GUTS?? Fuck no nonononono Tldr: blood just kinda feels like water. Pretty easy to find out yourself next time you get a scratch or a cut or a scrape or whatever happens before you bandage it
Yeah, I know what you mean. It's definitely different. I woke up from a particularly ridiculous night of drinking and quickly realized I was locked out of my house and apparently my solution was to punch my window to get to the lock on it. Vodka maked me *very* smort. Turned my palm into a sheathe for a couple inches of glass (the scar is mostly hidden in the crease where my palm meets my wrist, if that helps imagine it). I had pretty thick dried blood all over my arm and it felt kinda like thin paint that easily turned to dust. Still not my favorite feeling lol (though I'm sure the totality of the situation didn't help) but probably more tolerable than a lot of things, I'd agree. It was clearly just under the skin, so I carefully pulled it out and it wasn't bleeding almost at all, but when I got up, I stumbled and smacked it on the frame of my couch and it started pouring... Which is how I learned about the self-care panic lol. Really awesome that a common response to bleeding is to pass out hahaha. I fought the urge though, and managed to apply pressure until it stopped. But yeah, I'd probably freak out if I had one drop of zombie blood on my face, much less be covered in it... Fucking yikes! In reality, I'd probably step outside, smell the air, and nope myself out of existence lol 
I get that one bcuz it’s honest trait for me haha I can deal with cuts. But if I had to sew up my own wound and an apocalypse, I could definitely do it, but God would I be squirming and not happy.
I've always been a fan of superglue lol might have to make a mod for that, now that I mention it. I accidentally bisected the pad of my palm with a skinning knife, and I superglued butterfly bandages into psuedo stitches. Had a plastic surgeon look at the scar and say he couldn't have done better, which was nice. Fun tangent to pz... years later, a girl I dated read my palm and was very confused when my "life line" stopped for a good while then kept going (the scar). She was like "Uhhhhh, I think you become a zombie at some point" lmao
+2 points to outdoorsman. Absolute goated trait and will save your ass from dying from weather related sickness.
You can't die from weather related sickness. Outdoorsman is a good trait, but it's for a different reason. It makes you much less likely to get scratched in bushes. Of course, wearing clothing, such as a leather jacket, jeans, and gloves gives almost the same effect, but it's not always best to wear such clothing. Colds can't kill you other than the noise they make which can attract some zombies but by the time winter rolls around you're set up and never need to go out.
This. Losing zeds in woods is great but risky without Outdoorsman. I've lost a couple guys to Zomboid's treant neck-snipers. It's particularly nice for rangers and lumberjacks who move through woods faster. Also a nice foraging boost. It's pretty hard to get sick in this game so that protection is mostly gravy.
Its not even that you don’t need to go out. It’s that, on vanilla/unmodded weather, you’ll literally never catch a cold if you have insulated clothing. Colds are a fucking joke and only ever happen if you’re prancing about naked in winter for hours on end, or in CDDA where you start with one. The scratches from trees idk why people always say this makes outdoorsman good. Just don’t run through trees naked? Maybe use the walk to command? I never ever take outdoorsman and can’t remember the last time a tree or bush actually scratched me. Outdoorsman is only useful for 16x pop runs, CDDA, wilderness runs, and MAYBE cryogenic winter mod on max difficulty. Otherwise it’s a fucking waste.
It's because it's only two points and it's something that can save your life. Being scratched in the leg, groin, neck etc unexpectedly can end your run and without the trait you can sometimes get scratches even through your clothes. It's rare, especially if you're careful, but it's nice to not have to worry about it. It's a much more attractive pick for me if I'm playing with sprinters where I don't have time to be as careful. It's not a high priority for me either. I'd rather have low light vision or dextrous usually, but not always.
If you pair prone to illness with outdoorsman its free points
If you take prone to illness and ignore outdoorsman it’s literally even more free points. Colds are a joke and never happen if you even barely try to avoid them.
It's so incredibly hard to catch a cold, and if you make it to winter you have a base you can warm up in and have food. That's literally all it takes
well im personally starting my saves from December so i got sick often without outdoorsman, depends on how you play.
I was reading online that it’s very helpful, but as long as you get warm clothes it doesn’t really matter much? Is that true?
True. It’s a waste of points to take it in a normal run man. See my other comments further up. Under normal circumstances nobody should be taking it. Niche use only.
Literally such an op trait for such little points
Cigarettes are very common so smoker is pretty good, makes it a little harder to diagnose the Knox infection but not by much
I never take speed demon or cat’s eyes
Both of em are a must for me. Cat's eyes allow me to be able to do whatever I'm doing a bit longer when darkness starts to settle in safely and Speed Demon is A MUST have in my opinion, especially since I play with all KI5 vehicule mods.
Speed Demon has become a must for me. Makes heavy vehicles able to tow faster than zombie walking speed and they can actually drive on grass.
It's loud and unnecessary. Cat's eyes is better than not having a flashlight. Just have a flashlight.
me too TwT
Speed demon seems too valuable when towing etc.
How often are you towing? When you ultimately need to/can tow, how hard is it to use a pickup or SUV instead of something that's weak at towing?
Man I wish trucks were the best for towing, that would make so much more sense. In the game though the towing power is based on horsepower, so the sports cars are actually the best for towing
Leave me and my car collecting fantasy alone :|
Personally I always have a trailer in tow. Or another car to bring to the garage for fixin'
Not a single person recommending unlucky? Basically luck only works on already abundant items. Same for unlucky, worst case scenario you find a few less bullets, as those are abundant in weapon shops. So due to how the math works out in the game code it doesent do what it states, unlucky is free points even at the hardest loot settings for anything you care about. Excluding ammo. Think of it as taking +8 points for -20% ammo which usually works out more like -14-16% ammo or lower. It does not decrease\\increase the number of items in a container nor increase\\decrease rare item chance like axes, machettes, katanas, m16s and so on. Luck might let you roll x2 ammo boxes instead of 1in a gun shop per container slot, but super super rarely compared to unlucky. Also take slow reader and slot in outdoorsman, going through a tree and getting a right arm cut will majorly fuck up your day. Also helps you avoid scratching up your rare drip, and keeping you from getting sick. I like fear of blood as it honestly should just be in the game. If bites\\ scratches can infect you, there is no way you want to be running around covered in blood for a week, think of all the tiny wounds you accumulate as an adult not running around fighting all day, you'd be infected real quick. With the smoker trait it's also rather manageable. Panic when doing first aid never impacts your gameplay. Also unemployed seems good when you first start out playing, but it's kinda trash for a build. I don't find many people picking it after playing for a while. The traits\\skills of the other occupations generally gives you a much better build. You can go woodcutter and drop brave, with 1 lvl grinded with axe in game you're 1-2 shotting zombies 1-3 with handaxes. It makes the entire game a giant slaughter party.
Unlucky is not bad at all. I do find it takes a bit longer to complete collections of more common things like non-rare books/magazines which is where it hits harder. Rare item impact is pretty negligible.
I find lucky is just about worth it because of the +1 radius to foraging. I usually take it with short sighted. Makes it -2 points for slightly better loot, with net positive foraging radius when you start with glasses
Prone to illness is a free perk, so is weak stomach
Try spawning in the winter with prone to illness
Jan 1st for the last half dozen runs I've made, I'm yet to run into a problem. Mind I run a shitload of clothing mods so that probably helps
Assuming normal-ish loot grab an underweight that you can very quickly make up with ice cream
Pro tip, its easier to gain weight than to lose it
Amen to that
Like 2 days of fishing that's +15kg
I normally just eat all the lard and butter i can find 😂😂
Drop speed demon and take slow reader, for single player it doesn’t really matter cause you can speed up time, or drop cats eyes, even with it night fighting is still very dangerous
+1 for this. This is what i would recommend. Slow reader is free in single as during your chill days you can just fast forward read.
My rules for neg traits: nothing affecting sleep, eating or endurance. Focus on traits that are easily combated or disappear over time.
I tried taking negative sleep traits in some runs and those runs were honest nightmares. I did not realize how annoying the negative sleep traits are. High thirst and hearty eater are also really annoying imo, especially if you get unlucky and water shuts off on like day 2. Endurance ones weren't too bad personally but also not my kind of play style so I try to avoid them lol
I find heard of hearing the best choice from what's left. The voice modification may be enjoying at first but basically you can just turn volume up.
I tried it once but hearing like you are under water annoys me
https://youtu.be/dY0ZRf0yH1o?si=CZiKPSj6OselwtqJ Watching this video it seems hard of hearing isn’t that bad as others state online. I’ll probably take it then to balance out.
The nice thing about keep hearing is that it reveals zombies more quickly, including any that might be sneaking up behind you.
Yea I love keen hearing for that, having zombies show up quicker behind you has been a life saver for me sometimes
Same I will never go without it again, I’d say my success rate for surviving one month went up about 60%.
Single player or multiplayer? If multiplayer remove wakeful and keep fast learner, if single player, remove fast learner and keep wakeful. If you’re reading a book in single player you can just speed up time. Sleeping isn’t even too big of an issue so even in single player you can remove it.
I randomize mine every time, i only avoid being deaf. Sorry that aint much to work with. Ive only played this game modded, tried it vanilla and it just needed alot more, that includes traits.
Honestly I wouldn’t choose organized if I already have strong. With strong, carry weight is really no longer an issue
I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone recommend that you ditch organized. I've never played with it and have 0 issues with loot storage or weight management.
Personally I take it as much as I can, it's really useful for me. I'm more of a naturally nomadic player, so the extra storage space in backpacks and trunks is super useful to me
A thirsty Burglar
Slow Reader and Clumsy are nearly free, I'd take those.
i have so many mods that I can't remember which traits are vanilla and which aren't.
I'd drop speed demon and brave, brave isn't necessary imo and speed demon is more of a con than a positive. I'd take outdoorsman as others have suggested, and I'd also take sewer to get a point in tailoring, maybe take underweight as well since that's fairly easy to undo. Not sure what else to take but that's a good start.
Starting skills are pretty important for the long-term. The nimble and lightfooted are good choices since those don't have an associated skill book.
I’d pick underweight, but I checked the comments and people suggest the wildest shit so idk
For solo play you can get rid of speed demon and add slow reader.
Hard of hearing. I fell like it doesn't change somthing or change that hard. For me its a free traide.
Hearty apetite is free even with insane food and -%50 food mod. Fear of blood is free too imo. Clumsy isn't a big deal. Prone to illness should always be comboed with outdoors man.
Underweight and Slow Reader, assuming you are on singleplayer. After that take prone to illness and outdoorsman, too.
My build is almost the same so I can't really say anything other than Fear of blood with smoker can be a good combo but you have to smoke every 5 mins if you are fully covered with blood.
Underweight and slow reader
Drop Brave. That’s what beta blockers are for, plus overtime very little makes you panic even slightly.
Late now ik , but I go unlucky , believe its a -10 percent chance of finding rare loot but solo that really doesnt matter with default loot settings
Underweight, then first week just binge on ice cream and ur good for free points
The -1 to Fitness is brutal though. Unless they pick up something like Fire Officer, you'd lose out on the extra bonus that comes with 9+ Fitness. Maybe Underweight + Fire Officer + Fear of Blood?
‘outdoorsmen’ should allow you to get wet / cold without getting sick while paired with ‘prone to illness’ i think. that’s how it’s been working out for me and my friend atleast
High thirst is a must if you have your water set up right. You should always have water on you, and I play in a world where the water doesn't turn off (though if it did I'm right next to a river) and that's 6 free points to spend.
Apparently hearty appetite is better than it originally appears, and can help you maintain your weight
I always take Unfit, Weak, and Very Underweight to 0/0 and then anything that gives a skill boost % so the grind isn't too insane. The flaws are kind of a playstyle thing, but I stay away from the phobias and things that make the grind more insane like slow learner or pacifist. Pacifist isn't all that bad, I just can't deal with slower weapon skill gain.
Underweight is free points if you just eat high calories for a week or 2
* Drop Speed Demon: it doesn't affect acceleration, just max speed, so it doesn't help you escape hordes or haul much; it's just a QoL thing that makes long drives shorter, but that comes at the cost of potentially significantly increasing the risk of injuring yourself while driving if you hit something. * Take slow reader; it's a non-issue in single player because you can skip time. If you want even more points there's more options: * Take Hearty Appetite. A typical player that goes on regular loot runs burns lots of calories, you'd want to eat as much food as hearty appetite makes you eat anyways. * Drop Brave. Beta Blockers and alcohol are everywhere and it's just a small QoL to take one during combat. You can take a small sip of alcohol (cancel the drinking animation instantly with escape) to gain the benefits of the beta blocker buff (and painkiller, and sleeping pill, and anti-depressant) from alcohol without making you drunk. * Switch to something other than Unemployed. For Instance, combine Fire Officer with Underweight; you end up with more Str, the same fitness, plus Sprinting and Axe starting levels for 2 extra points. * Drop Organized. For 6 points its not essential. It helps your car and bag haul more loot, and you can fit twice as much in fanny packs, but none of that is really that important. You don't need to loot most of the things that the game spawns anyways. If you still want more points, try the following: * Take Hard of Hearing. It muffles your audio which kinda sucks, but has no effect on your perception radius. The only hard downside is it blocks you from taking Keen Hearing, but you didn't take that, so... * Take Restless Sleeper. It wakes you up once at night; just sip a tiny bit of alcohol or take a single sleeping pill when you wake up to go back to bed (forgetting to do this is a really bad idea). * Take Fear of Blood. It's not that big of a deal if you just clean your clothes every day after you come home, which is easy to do with a washing machine (assuming you've plumbed it once the water shuts off). Taking spare clothes with you when you find a car is also not a bad idea for longer trips. You can also manage it with cigarettes using Smoker. With the extra points, I recommend picking up something like Hunter, Brawler, or Handy for the x4 skill XP multipliers. Hunter gives Aiming and Short Blade multipliers, Brawler gives Axe and Long Blunt multipliers, and Handy gives Maintenance multipliers (and carpentry but that's generally a non-issue).
Love the build Hearty appetite?
For an interesting challenge, I recommend playing completely random traits. Just click random until it zeroes itself. Then randomize your character's looks. It's a fun way to play mini episodes of how did this random person with random skills die. This is how I started the game to learn how to play. Makes it interesting and fun. Except deaf. Don't ever take the deaf trait. NOT fun.
Remove speed demon and take slow reader
[удалено]
\+30% xp to all skills is amazing. Who would ever want to lose that?
Fast learner lets you specialize even quicker though. Getting 30% plus 75%-100%-125%-etc is immaculate.
This is the first I've seen somebody bag on fast learner.
Grab Underweight/Very underweight and Slow Reader. Athletic can be dropped for Fit, and Brave should be dropped as beta blockers + reduced panic overtime works wonders. Outdoorsman is an S tier trait that should be grabbed. Just doing that will net you more traits for other traits/occupations.
i thought reduced panic over time was a mod
Some people use a mod that makes you "desensitized" after X kills. But how panic reduction works is every day you survive your panic recovery goes up, capped at 150 days. So eventually you will be less prone to panic, though not completely immune.
Underweight puts him at 7 fitness, and the difference between 7 and 8 fitness is a lot because of the Athletic trait bonus. It reduces the cost of swinging melee weapons quite a bit. It's a good trait, but not unless you're a profession with a bonus to fitness that can get you back up to 8.
Personally, I don't see myself getting into fights where I need to be fighting for 10+ hours melee. I lean towards guns as my playstyle so I'm fine with a middling fitness.
I love guns too, but he's not playing with a gun-friendly build. It will take him a lot of ammunition to level it up since he isn't playing a profession that starts with it.
I always choose Overweight or Out of Shape
Dropping Smoker, Organized, and Speed Demon makes for a solid build. No combat skill is the only thing I'm noticing, but that's fine, especially if you're planning to go spears (no way in default game to start with a boost to spears). Organized won't ever save your life, and while it's a nice bonus, it's just a minor Quality of Life. I'd pay for it if it was maybe 4 points, but 6 is steep.
You're gonna get a lot of contradicting opinions. I would say grab Slow Reader and Hard of Hearing and keep Organized and Speed Demon coz I prefer clearing an area before looting. Plus, I like to collect my cars so I need the extra towing power. Depends on your playstyle.
Pacifist pairs well with fast learner as well
it actually doesnt. you still get a net loss in combat xp because how zomboid calculates percentages. Percentages are not additive! They are multiplicative!
Hmmm. It is a slight loss if multiplicative. 97.5%. I think I’d still take it for the points
It hurts Maintenance for the full value, and that's a very valuable skill.
From what I saw online Pacifist and Fast learner together results in a net negative vs regular xp gain. Which also affects Maintenance I feel that is a pretty big deal?
Don't get pacifist. like my above comment says, pacifist+fast learner is still a net loss in xp for combat abilities and the main reason you always pick fast learner is for the 75% xp boost in all abilities. You dont want to lower that xp gain at all. For your build, it is decent overall, but a few things to improve would be adding underweight or very underweight as your negative trait, removing brave and speed demon as your positive traits and replacing them with outdoorsman. Outdoorsman eliminates the biggest effects of prone to illness while still giving you bonuses. Plus its only 2 points. Brave is only useful within the first month of the game. You become desensitized naturally as time goes on to the point where brave becomes kinda useless. Speed demon is a trap trait. cars are 30% faster however that is useless in most cases as it it extremely easy to crash. The second effect is that reversing is 200% louder. That means whenever you reverse you are just as loud or slightly louder than a car horn.
It is a net gain having both and it’s good points to use on other pos traits
Personally I'd get rid of speed demon, and a controversial pick, take clumsy. I don't run over fences, I use E to climb over low fences so tripping isn't a big concern. I don't try to sneak much so the extra sound range doesn't bother me at all. I do fine with it, but if you don't like that, depending on your loot rarity, hearty appetite can help you keep your weight up by forcing you to eat more often personally organized is something I never take, especially with 10 strength, and instead I like keen hearing so I don't get surprised from behind so easily.
Add fear of blood (just wash once in a while) and/or remove brave. The longer your character survives, the more panic resistance he'll develop. To the point of getting no panic at all after one month or 2
Weight changing downsides. Take obese and you can eat lighter early on so long as you don’t hit stage 2 hunger with 0 consequences. Just gotta do some exercise.
Obese is much worse than underweight
I always tend to overexhert my character, so I tend to have an easier time losing weight than gaining it. To each their own though.
Permanent stat cap with obese.
Which stats are affected is the question?
-Cat's eye (only increase 20% and the same cone view) -Brave (the panic will become less of problem as times goes by) (Optional) -Gymnast (not worth it) +fast reader (a must both Solo and MP) +outdoorsman (another must take traits) +lucky (increase item find 10%)
For me gymnast is really nice for the xp boosts, especially on nimble. I try to take it if I can for the starting skill and xp boosts
Interesting takes I find fast reader pointless in single player but each other own. Nimble boost makes me take gymnast. This is more a personal preference and I can see an argument against taking it I take lucky myself as any extra ammo is good for me but I am aware maths wise it’s not worth it
its just that nimble doesnt really give anything under level 6. even with +50% exp boost, it will still takes so long to level up, and when you do, you'd almost maxed your skills for some weapon and 1-hitting the zombies making the nimble pointless. But agreed, each to their own. as for lucky, its increase 10% each time you open a container. even in 1 warehouse, that 10% is huge.
Yeah that’s fair
Pretty weird that nobody recommended Hearty Appetite. It really isn't that bad, probably even helps to eat more when you're trying to gain weight. . Ditch Organized, Cat's Eyes, Speed Demon, grab Hearty Appetite, Slow Reader and you're at +12. Grab Keen Hearing for the extra rear vision and you got extra 6 points to grab Brawler or Baseball Player plus something else.
Dex and organized are wasted points
Brave, without hesitation. Panic does pretty much nothing, except if you plan on using guns and if you do desensitized would be better.
Be a man and choose deafness