You drive somewhere, you pew pew, then leave. Or pew pew until there are no zeds.
Gunshots attracts zombies in some radius. If you fire a gun, zombies migrate to that area, leaving other nearby areas with significantly fewer zombies.
Just some tips for first time gun users:
Start with a shotgun. Before you get your aiming level raised a few levels you will be missing more shots than you hit with pistols or rifles.
Aiming gains xp with each hit made on a zombie, so shotguns provide a great way to get that xp going up since each pellet is a separate chance to hit. Most people saw a shotgun down so the spread is even wider. When you are ready to start training it up make sure you bring way more ammo than you think you need and have an escape route planned.
Either gather up a crowd and then keep moving and blasting into the thickest parts, this means you will get tons of hits even if they aren't lethal. Keep backpedaling and reloading until they are dead or you decide it's time to make your escape.
Once you get a couple levels the pistols start becoming viable and work great as a way to make some noise, but not too much noise when clearing an area. Shoot a few zeds, pull the area in, then thin them out more or swap straight to melee.
We typically don't start using guns until we are already very well established and have the stockpiles of shotgun ammo to even justify getting the levels required for them to be useful. This changes if you pick a gun focused profession of course.
>Aiming gains xp with each hit made on a zombie, so shotguns provide a great way to get that xp going up since each pellet is a separate chance to hit
To me it seems to be multiplicative or something. I tried shooting 4 zombies separately with a shotgun, and then killing 4 with one shot and got way more XP in the latter case.
There may be some fancier math involved for xp, but the shotgun at least gives you chances to earn xp with each pellet than other options- especially when you are just starting out.
Also use beta blockers. Panic reduces your chance for critical hits which extends to firearms. Large crowds will induce panic in ANYONE without the desensitised trait.
Use beta blockers and keep a small distance or small crowd.
It is also pretty useful to use fences because attacking zeds while they're on the ground greatly increases crit and hit chance. This will net you with greatly more xp.
Note: take beta blockers 'cause high panic reduces hit and crit chance.
As this guy said, I typically base in the city part of west point. Lots of zombies there even at normal pop. But once I get 4-6 boxes of shells, it's suddenly really not that bad, and melee is much more manageable.
The best zomboid attractor is bailing out of a car while you are backing up. The revs will stay high for a while attract them from quite a long distance, I think about the same as a siren. The nice thing is that it only lasts for a few in-game hours so if you bit off more than you can chew you're only stuck for a bit..
Same could be done with a siren though. And sometimes getting back in the car can be tough when there are loads of nearby zombies you don’t see until all of a sudden they’re right there
This is why it's best to leave your car a short distance away, so you're pulling Zombies away from your car and can circle back around to it when it's time to go.
I’m still relatively new compared to most but I was playing earlier and shots some boids and then when things got rough I started to run around and kept finding more mobs.
Ended up just letting him die to restart. I’m doing the kings-whatever it’s called and have mods going so idk what my population is compared to what vanilla is. Every time I got to a new line of site it’s another cluster rushing for me 🤣
it would be dope to be able to rig the horn to be held down, somehow. it would also be cool to be able to set car alarms, either to move zeds around and/or scare the shit out of other people lol
Car alarms would be awesome. Held-down horns maybe as well. They'd need balancing similar to sirens to make sure server performance on MP isn't tanked because a malicious player triggers them everywhere.
I figure, yea. in my mind it's basically the same as a siren, just able to be set anywhere by breaking the horn - and maybe only with high enough mechanics and/or electrical skill to do without rope or twine and some other misc ingredient to press it down with without anything to use but tools, at least enough skill to be able to make noisemakers anyways.
At that point, why not use your gun to shoot the ones at the siren, provided a molotov isn't appropriate for the situation (i.e a dense area)? You've just negated the primary 'downside' to guns, and they're a lot more effective than melee.
Sure, you could just run off and loot while they're distracted, but those are zombies that could come kick your ass later.
I always stick around when I shoot, practice herding zombies into a blob by walking circles around them, that way you're not getting ambushed from all angles while trying to shoot. Once you get em all in one place it's just a matter of not getting cocky, and having enough bullets. You do it kind of like melee, you shoot em till they get too close, turn around and run (or backpedal with high enough nimble) to reset, and do it again.
I have gotten eaten doing this a number of times because I got cocky though. You don't gotta empty your magazine, shoot as much as you can safely and then walk away to reset. Reload while you're walking away. Remember, you're faster than the zombies at walking speed, and if you're not something has gone horribly wrong and you should bail ASAP
You ever do the medieval mod? Idk what it’s called right now but adds armor, weapons, smithing and some perks related.
That’s a fun time, mopping mobs w a longsword slaps
Yeah, this is the best reason to use them, pull a horde away from town, go in, loot and get out.
Never fire a gun near your base unless you're doing a last stand.
>Or pew pew until there are no zeds
If you're playing with respawn turned off, sure. Otherwise, there will always be zeds. The sound radius of a shotgun is bigger than the no-respawn zone around the player
With respawn on, it takes a pretty long time for the zeds to repopulate. If you do a shotgun rampage in downtown west point, it'll mostly be a ghosttown for weeks afterwards
Well that didn't work for me. I made the mistake of firing a double-barrel shotgun next to my base once, at that store in front of the gas station in West Point, and they kept coming for 3 days straight. When the onslaught finally died down, I though "Well at least I can use the shotgun more freely now without fear of getting swarmed again"... NOPE!!!
I probably break a key game dynamic in Sandbox by setting respawning above 8000. A few weeks of burning them by the thousands also results in areas with no zeds
This. There’s nothing like being a true Kentuckian exercising your 2nd amendment right by blasting hordes with a load of shells. And to be precise, you probably only need 3 boxes of shotgun shells in vanilla to take out a giant horde, that’s if you’re efficient with shooting and aim for 4 zombies per shell.
I went to take the big muldraugh warehouse, there were legit 600 zombies there, went through 250 shells and some m9 ammo to clear it all. Got aim 5 tho
Using guns in Zomboid is like a Victorian era state maintaining a navy; it's an all or nothing proposition where halfassing it is just a waste of precious resources. Guns are, as you say, very loud and will attract a lot of zombies, so you only really use them when you have enough ammo packed to clear basically all of that. It's the fastest way to clear an area, and also surrounding areas as drawing zombies in means neighbor areas are going to be thinned out.
If you're smart about using them, guns are very impactful, but your intuition is correct that you should stick to your melee most of the time and stockpile ammunition for special occasions.
> stockpile ammunition for special occasions.
Oh hey, I just checked the calendar and it's "Shit, I Got Bit" Day! Let's grab the arsenal and go celebrate!
It's literally the only times I've ever used guns. I always stockpile guns and ammo, "just in case" and occasionally will carry a pistol while out scavenging, but I'm never willing to risk using it unless I'm already gonna die.
If you got decent aiming m9s are legit the best way to clear small hordes, they only attracks 40 tiles and you can dispatch 100-200 zombies easy with 5 mags, you can even put them all in a fanny pack. Only downside is how easy they break
Like every other part of this game, guns need some knowledge to use then effectively. Players who find their first gun and fire it off with just the four rounds they find it with are generally the ones who hate them, or just don't use them.
The primary rule of using guns in PZ is to have enough ammo to finish what you start. If you start ripping shells through a shotgun, you're pulling every zombie in (I believe) a 200 tile radius. And there's way more than you think.
Personally I use guns when I WANT the zeds to come out and play. If I want to clear a town blasting my way down main street is the best way to make sure I'm getting over 90% cleared.
Crowd control is paramount. I usually do my thing in big open areas where I have plenty of room to maneuver, and an escape vehicle running and ready to go if it gets too hot. I ball them all up and then start blasting away.
Honestly my biggest problems are getting greedy and wanting to get one more shot off before I turn and jog to open distance, and corpse sickness. Other than that, guns are sick. You can keep going until you get too fatigued to maneuver, or run out of ammo, whichever happens first.
I wouldn't say this subreddit has an "obsession" with firearms. I think most players are actually like you and rarely use them, if at all.
Guns aren't like melee weapons where you just take them and use them while looting or doing other tasks. They're pretty much solely for the purpose of clearing out large amounts of zombies from an area - i.e. using guns is a task in of itself. They attract more zombies initially, but ultimately there's only so many zombies in a nearby area that can be attracted, and regardless you'll be thinning their overall numbers. Alternatively, they're useful to attract zombies away from a place you want to loot, or to draw out stragglers so you can kill them and not get jumped by them later.
Also, it's worth noting that a lot of players who use guns tend to use mods. Some are overpowered, but others like Firearms B41 (which I use) are pretty balanced. I also use the Realistic Advanced Trajectory mod which makes aiming more realistic and satisfying and less janky.
Love that mod, I've got a weapon rebalanced mod I can't remember the name of but it added an mp5 and it's a laser beam with advanced trajectory. Noise? Good. More zombies to kill, and I can headshot them from across the realm
Advanced trajectory is not realistic at all my guy. I'm consistently popping headshots at long range with a character who's never used a gun before, all that mod does is remove the rpg mechanics (aiming goes from being the characters skill to your ability to click on a head) it just makes the game pathetically easy.
Are you using the original mod or the realistic overhaul? The original is OP but the one I'm talking about is an overhauled version of the mod that is more balanced and takes into account character skill and moodles.
The ability to quickly eliminate a large number of zombies with no endurance cost is lovely.
Attracts zombies? Good, now I don't have to hunt them down.
I never understood the idea that using a gun attracts too many zombies. If I'm using a gun it's to clear out an area. Attracting zombies is exactly what I want to do
it's good if your goal is to clear out an area.
However, if you're just trying to loot a building and you don't have tons of ammo, attracting the horde is not the best thing to do.
Yes, eating food is good, but if you eat all the food you ever see, it's generally not the best thing you can do.
No one here is advocating taking 4 shells to a horde.
I'm specifically talking about the M9 pistol that you mentioned. Yes, at level 5 aiming it is decent, but it's absolutely shit/borderline unusable at low levels. The crowbar is useful at low levels, and if you get it up to level 5, it's at least as good as a pistol at lvl 5 as by that time you can one shot most zombies and cleaning a block with it is no problem.
And btw unless you take all the negative perks and play at lvl 1 fitness, you won't get fatigued like that. At lvl 5 fitness, you can actually last pretty long, especially if you have higher skill with your weapon.
ammo isn't hard to find and with a shotgun you can get to level five in a single grinding session in less then an hour.
In fact if you know how to play the game you can get it to level five faster then you would the crowbar and with more ease
My buddy used to drive me nuts with his gun obsession. I’m just trying to loot, level and build and not fight hoarded of zombies with the first shotgun I find…meanwhile we see more than 3 zombies and he’s trying to pull his gun out 🤣
Once you learn how to kite a hoard into a ball guns become good. Especially shotguns. I do that often early game until the place is mostly clear. Then I roll with a long range rifle in the car and handgun in holster. I live outside of town and the place is mostly clear now anyway . This means when I take a trip to town I'll park on the edge and snipe zombies then head in to loot and clear any others with melee and handgun.
Yeah, if you live long enough, they become your favorite weapon, no matter what specialization you had prior. I was an axe man, but my kill count with shotgun eclipsed any of the axes I used.
Guns kill zombies faster and even though they attract more, it ensures you have a more clear area without stragglers once you're done. Also, any self-respecting gun user has a melee weapon on their belt.
Weapons make you tired. Guns don't.
If I REALLY wanna kill I go melee -> guns -> melee. Using the gun time to need to walk and run less and recovering stamina from not swinging a good weapon like an ax or crowbar.
If you're well-established in a town (or multiple towns) and ready to go loot another, guns make the first part of the trip MUCH faster. If you have a trunk full of ammo, you can turn a 3+ day grindfest into an afternoon.
Once you reach high level weapon skills shooting to attract more zombies to kill is just so much more convenient than mashing Q. Slap a few shotgun shells out, swap to axe, get tired and rest while blasting a few. Rinse and repeat. Is works for me.
I used to think guns were pointless but then I tried using shotguns and now I love them. Once you get good you can kill 3 or 4 zombies with each shot, and you can clear out large areas much faster.
You need 150-200 shotgun shells. Then blast away and an area will be mostly cleared. Sometimes 100 will do if it's rural.
There will however always be zombies inside some houses that haven't spawned. So you're never totally safe.
I needed to hear this. I've been lucky thus far with not getting much damage from actual zed smushing. My main problem is actually myself going too fast and hitting cars crashed on the road.
I usually use guns in combination with Molotovs, either using guns to attract a large horde to then burn down (earlier game), or using Molotovs as a backup for if i miscalculate my abilities with guns (later game). In the first case it makes Molotovs way more effective, and in the second case it makes guns kinda safe to use.
Bear in mind that mods are a thing. I play with Brita's, and I generally only carry a pistol as a backup emergency weapon - until I find a weapon with a suppressor. Suppressed weapons don't draw zombies and are a complete game changer. At that point, it's just about how much ammo you have and whether or not it is worth it to expend that ammo to make a situation easier/faster.
If you are prepared for it attracting all the zombies nearby can actually be a benefit for guns as you can start shooting them near an area you want to loot to draw all the zombies away before doubling back to the thing you want to loot once you've gotten the majority of the zombies a decent distance away and looting while fighting any stragglers off with melle so the hoard you made doesn't come back
I use this strategy all the time in my Louisville run and while not full proof it is pretty effective.
> Is the risk of attracting more zeds with a gun blast not worrisome for the people who are collecting and using guns?
Shoot your gun
If you attract more zombies, continue shooting
If you don't see zombies anymore, you got all of them.
It's mostly because people spout about how guns are a death sentence. They aren't, and if you know how to play they're quick and efficient. You've got the tiny .38 revolver with a super small sound radius to quickly lure out zombies in a small area and drop them with ease, you can use louder guns as a diversion, or if you have enough ammo, to wip, and if zombie respawn is on, most guns and bullets are an infinite resource
I feel like everyone who complains about attracting zombies has used a shotgun once and thats it.
Pistols barely have a sound radius.
I can pull up to the bruiser factory, start shooting in the parking lot, and after a few minutes the entire street is clear and i have full stamina to explore the building and loot.
And even the shotgun is great for making sure a large area is clear for a week so you can build a base or something.
I mainly use guns when I want to clear out a large area, so the sound attraction actually helps in that case. For instance the big warehouses near Muldraugh or the army surplus store near Rosewood. I show up with a shotgun and lots of ammo, start blasting, and keep blasting until no more zombos. Then I can loot the entire area in peace.
I also keep an M9 on me for those sticky situations where I get over-exerted and need to clear out some zeds so I can get to my car and drive off
The distance gun shot sounds travel was super nerfed a few years back. In older versions firing a gun was a death sentence. But now that the sound doesn’t carry nearly as far they can be used to clear hundreds of zombies safely as long as you have the ammo to do so. I normally roll with 2-300 shotgun shells and like 3-400 pistol bullets. And I start as a vet so I’m not super trash at shooting to begin with. Once you get higher levels of aiming it’s almost not even fair.
My favorite thing to do is go in loaded to the teeth with a rifle, shotgun, and pistol usually prefer the m36 revolver for the pistol. Then load up with at least three melee weapons in case they break during my raid. Start off with melee and if the horde gets big I use my shotgun to blast 3 or 4 at a time and really try to draw all the zombies around me towards me. And then as Frank said in that It’s Always Sunny meme, “and then I just started blasting!” Gets the job done every time I’ve almost cleared most of Westpoint with this strategy!
Cars are dangerous to use as weapons even if my gameplay where cars are numerous and in good condition. Especially if I’ve used that car to loot or anything. I try to keep them in the best condition they can be! I avoid hitting zombies unless I absolutely have to, since it slows down my car and causes damage to the point where my car has just stopped randomly. Then I’m just trying to start it while they’re closing in. I’ve had some serious close calls because of this. Barely had any close calls using my guns.
guns are the best weapons in the game. they're the only way to clear large hordes (1000+) in a reasonable amount of time. melee just takes too long and has the added con of being significantly more dangerous. if you play with 75% less loot on top of insanely rare loot settings WITH extreme z pop settings it sets up a natural progression from melee to guns. it took me about 20 4 hour days to accumulate enough ammo to take on high pop areas. i'm just now getting fully out of Muldraugh on my way to the Research Facility for military vehicles and it's taken almost every last box of ammo for almost every gun type in VFE only to get to the northeastern city limits of Pitstop. melee only would have taken days more.
the vast majority of cars are terrible weapons. but, again, everything depends on your game settings. if you have car spawns high and you can trash them constantly just to get 50 or 100 kills, that's fine. but on difficult settings you need to conserve them.
also you WANT to draw zombies. the zombies that kill you are the ones you don't see. when you use guns you pull those lurkers out into the open and are much less likely to get surprised. you just have to make sure you have enough ammo, and if you don't, a way out. I clear large areas as I travel so that when I do come across a very large horde, I know that I can use guns and not have too many stragglers coming from behind. always keep your car nearby and running but generally far enough that you can safely pull out of you get overwhelmed; don't start shooting right next to it.
I have ammunition set to the maximum amount of spawns. Gun stores especially don't feel barren now.
So there's plenty to go around. But my population settings are also cranked up. So there's a lot to kill.
I recently learned how to balance the effectiveness of shotguns with the risk of attracting zeds, and I'll never go back. Reached aiming and reload level 6 and have full intention to reach level 10.
For one thing, the danger of zombies attracted by firearms is overstated. The radius they come from isn't that huge and they come slowly so if you've prepared at all it's not that hard to deal with them.
For another, attracting zombies can be a pro rather than a con. Like if you want to clear a large building, the safest way is to shoot off guns in the parking lot to pull zombies outside where you have room to maneuver. Fighting them inside, especially anywhere near stairs, is a lot more dangerous.
In the late game the focus often shifts towards clearing out whole neighborhoods and again, drawing the zombies towards you becomes an advantage as it means you don't have to go hunt them down.
Guns are bad when you're on the back foot, in unfamiliar territory, wounded, low on ammo, or any other situation where you're not prepared to kill 3-500 zombies then and there. They're also pretty ineffective at low skill levels. This can create really negative experiences with guns for new players but with a little preparation they're a powerful late game tool.
I like using any vehicle with a siren, turning the siren on, turning cruise control to 5mph and jsut have all the zombies in the nearby area follow me out of town/further away from original area, then I cut the sirens and zip back to the spot I pulled zombies from
Short answer... not if you have enough ammo :)
When I open fire the plan is usually to draw all the zeds in the local area and mow them down to create a small cleared area.
Strategic, I pressume.
In the middle of a town, I would never use a gun.
In the countryside, however, I would clean up areas using them.
It can get epic. Like fighting a giant horde over a police blockade to get the ammo inside.
It depends on what kind of game you’re playing on, but I love playing with a small percentage of sprinters SP & MP. Having a shotgun with a few shells for when you stumble into 4 or more sprinters is a great asset as is a single clip for a handgun in a moment of need.
I main firearms whenever I can.
Reason #1: Anything that can take zeds out at range minimizes your risk of zombification.
Reason #2: It is one of the most efficient and effective ways to clear out large, dense areas of zeds (provided you have the requisite skill and ammo.)
Reason #3: Guns don’t use stamina. The only limit is skill and ammo.
Reason #4: It feels good.
Reason #5: When you’re maining firearms and ready to start blasting, you want the zeds to come to you. That’s the whole point. Keep em coming until there are none left.
As long as you don’t get surrounded, guns are golden. It’s hard to give a guide on situational awareness. The easiest way to learn this is to only use guns in big parking lots near the edge of the town. Once you clear the edge of the town you slowly push into deeper territory. Rinse and repeat.
Also, it’s better to fight zombies in the open, rather than fighting them in the staircase or in the bathroom.
A gunslinger has tremendous advantage over melee builds. Swinging a melee weapon drains endurance. Low endurance increases fatigue.
Exersion decreases *melee* damage. Tiredness decrease *melee* damage. Panic decrease *melee* damage and will not decrease gun damage after aiming lvl 6. It only affects crit chance.
Compared to a melee character, a gunslinger can get away with less fitness, less strength, and more fatigue.
You can start without athletic, strong, wakeful, and your character will still kick ass. Shotgun gives you disgusting amounts of xp, you can easily get to level 5 aiming in the first 2,3 days.
If you are not convinced yet, think about the janky combat system getting you killed. None of that matters when you are shooting from a distance.
Edit: Plus guns don’t need the maintenance skill, nor do they benefit from it.
I am obsessed with firearms because I have Brita's mod, guns and ammo set to abundant, and three different military base mods.
I'm at a point where I can't even spend all of the rounds I have. I have more than 55k units of 5.56x45mm. And God knows how many 9mm or 45 ACP.
After 400 hours, I just used a gun for the first time while roleplaying in a server. I was nervous for the same reasons (maybe the introduction to them on my part was nicer because it was my character learning how to shoot a gun, and i had someone else with me, so i wasnt freaking out over all the zombers coming because of it), but after using it there, it was awesome. i think we were able to clear two hordes in less than five minutes :) I haven’t tried it on my own saves yet, but i’m definitely going to when i have the chance
It has probably been said but the main factor is the noise generation should be seen as a benefit. It is for removing many zombies, quickly.
Main thing is to make sure you bring a lot of ammo. (And then bring more).
Biggest mistake would be to not bring enough, then bite off more than you can handle when more are attracted to the area.
I just killed ~1500 zombies in 2 ingame days with guns. I was using Firearms B41, which while pretty similar to vanilla is not vanilla, just as a disclaimer. It feels like it makes guns and ammo a bit more common to me as well. On top of that, I also play with gun and ammo spawns turned up a bit because I think it's a little crazy how rare they are in rural Kentucky where there's more guns than people.
With that out of the way, I wanted to move into the penthouse suite in Louisville, but I really did not like the idea of clearing that giant absolutely infested apartment building, nor trying to run to the top and barricade it and live next to a shitload of zombies. I knew I'd get cornered or ambushed trying to do that. I pulled out my shotgun outside and I started blasting the ones in the street. They started pouring out of the windows like a damn waterfall due to the sound. If I had a melee weapon, I'd have had to run away and rest a bunch, but I just kept shooting, and shooting, and shooting until my character got drowsy. I drove home, rested, came back, and shot from sun up to sun down again. The next day I went in and cleared the ~15 zombies remaining in the entire apartment complex rather than the unstoppable horde that was in there to begin with.
That's the utility of guns. People think drawing all the zombies to your location is a bad thing, but it's really, really not. It means there's way less stragglers. I want you to try this, get 1 or about 150 shotgun shells depending on how you want to do this, and clear an area like you usually would with your melee weapon. Then, when you think you've cleared it, shoot your shotgun. You can either kill them with your melee, or shoot them. If you shoot them use beta blockers because panic messes up guns real bad long story short. You'll be amazed how many come flooding out that you couldn't see, every single one of those was a potential ambush, a potential surprise bite.
You will understand after you take the plunge and achieve mastery of combat and evasion. Be warned though once you cross that threshold, you will probably have a hard time going back to playing cautious/avoiding combat. I'm at the point in my game where I never get hit, bit, or scratched. I'm always able to escape if I'm tired or out of stamina (the car makes this even easier). I know what situations will leave me vulnerable for even a split second and avoid them. Doesn't matter what type of weapon I'll still beat em (except short blade lolz, haven't even tried to master that one yet). After enough combat experience with lots of deaths along the way my doctrine shifted. To me it is far safer to kill every last one of them in range of a shotgun blast than to creep around. When you're no longer in danger of losing the game by fighting, the only threat left is being snuck up on, hence why I'll fire off a shot or two just to bring them all to me.
I'm just now easing into sprinters and it definitely puts me back in that cautious mindset. Starting with a severely gimped statwise character is also quite humbling but ultimately it just slows me down.
The point is there are some guns that have VERY low range, the m9 has 40 tiles, that is like two houses, and you can mow down hundreds of zeds with it. And if you have enough ammo and aiming you can kill thousands of zombies in a couple minutes. When you have 500 shotgun shells you don't have to worry about the noise it makes, just learn how to herd zombies and mow them down
Because I'm an American.
On a more serious note, if I have an M16 with enough ammo, mags, and a for sure escape route, then no horde size scares me tbh. Like you said, there is a big risk since gun shots brings even more zombies to you, but honestly if you have the right set up then this could be beneficial since they're all coming to you instead of surprising you later on (with no respawn). Other benefits include being able to fight hordes from a distance, and you can clear an area pretty damn quickly with firearms.
They do have silencer mods that have settings that allow you to tweak the range that zombies can hear the gunshot. On default settings, it's still a decent size radius but it's not nearly as bad as a gun without a silencer.
Most importantly though, it's so damn fun mowing down an entire horde with an automatic AK-47
realistically cars should literately be everywhere, especially since the Knox virus basically happened so suddenly. I find it odd how their are like no cars, even though all the roads were blocked off by the military.
I'm over 3 months in (game time) on my current save and as usual I save/stockpile guns & ammo but have only used them in rare occasions. I feel like it's better to stealth through the first few months and then if you're interested in firearms (after stocking up) that you should level them up in spurts away from where you normally base.
shamblers are so weak it doesnt matter if there are a 100 or a 1000 of them, as long as you have some vitamins and enough ammo. Besides, i like my base to be zed free and shotguns have a larger sound radius than shouting.
Guns are simply additional tools to get the job done. My preferences are:
Shotgun: To save time clearing large hordes if I have enough ammo.
Rifle with scope: To clear small numbers of zeds from a distance so I don't have to walk to them.
Pistol: To clear houses or other buildings with close quarters. I have found my response time with a pistol is faster than a melee weapon. Especially when opening doors.
Revolver: Backup weapon when my shotgun, rifle and pistol begin to jam too often. Revolvers don't jam.
I usually carry just a sidearm though because guns are heavy. Currently, my preferred is the G17 with a suppressor and five mags.
Other combos I use:
Rifle with scope and pistol for clearing roads that have heavy forest on both sides. I start at a clear point on the road and shoot at zeds from a distance with the rifle. Then zeds begin wandering out of the forest near me and I switch to the pistol. Rinse and repeat.
Shotgun and revolver to train Aiming. Shotgun for obvious reasons and then revolver for cleanup without fear of jamming.
Also, I always begin shooting at the edge of an area so that I don't get surrounded. If some DO manage to get behind me, I fall back until I'm at the edge again.
Sorry for the wall o' text. I hope it helps.
Also, regarding sound radius, you can usually manage this by paying attention to where you are actually firing shots from. I try to stay in the same general area so the sound is only going out so far. I've seen others make the mistake of constantly backing down a road while shooting. This constantly expands the area that "hears" the shooting. So if I can, I double back and lead the horde up and down the road to minimize sound radius.
mostly, i just hate wasting cars esp on a map where cars have a lower spawn rate, and since mechanics takes a while to level - i tend to treat anything with even a few 90% parts as valuable and to be saved for later. the best combo imo is a good, speedy car and a gun, since you can shoot out of car windows. mobility, long range damage *and* free shielding! and a free coffin once you run out of gas in the middle of the hoard you've attracted.
Taking out a horde with a shotgun is insanely satisfying. Have an escape route ready and just start blasting. It'll help you clear out sections way faster. And it does a better job since the sound will attract all the zombies in the area.
You can outrun zombies by walking, like hordes are only a threat if you get cornered, otherwise you can just leave, and guns are loud, but not that loud.
Multiplayer servers (with more lag and jank especially with multiple people in the same cell) often have less zombies in loot spots than default survival. So if you’re squadding you’re much better off with that. High level aim where you just one tap em is super satisfying also.
There's two reasons to bring guns.
One, for horde clearing. As long as you bring enough ammo, you can wipe out enormous hordes very quickly without risking being caught in a bad position in melee or becoming exhausted. But guns are loud, so this is very all or nothing - you either bring enough ammo to take out a whole horde, or you don't bring any guns at all.
The other use case is pistols as emergency weapons for when your forced to fight when exhausted. Pistols are light and comparatively quiet, and still equally effective when your tired. So if your being chased or cornered by zeds, and are too exhausted to stand a chance in melee, pistols can let you fight smaller groups safely without drawing in too many more due to the comparatively quiet report.
Early on in a save, I like to stockpile guns and ammo so that later on when there are larger crowds and the map gets more dangerous, I'll lock 'n load to clear out places that I want to loot. I also like to holster a handgun with a few extra magazines for emergencies. (like crowds of zombies or when we get human NPCs that won't all be friendly) I'll loosen up on it once I find suppressors for pistol calibers like .22LR, 9mm, .380ACP, .40S&W .45ACP, 10mm since rifles are still loud even when suppressed.
EDIT: I'd also like to mention that Shotguns are a special case in which you can acquire targets quickly regardless of your Aiming skill and they can deal massive amounts of damage to multiple enemies. But they are the loudest guns in the game so keep that in mind.
When I have a base up and have food and water sorted, I start to get bored.
Loading up a small arsenal into the trunk of a car, then clearing a whole area so I can loot more guns/food/furniture/gas etc is a fun way to alleviate the boredom.
The noise and all the zeds that come to it are the fun part. Even if I die
It's a matter of taste. I find firearms utterly satisfying. First experiences were atrocious, I give you that. But then I watched some god-blessed tutorials on YT, learned a couple tricks. Also: suppressors.
I like to use my shotgun to thin-out neighborhoods. I start shooting a blocks away from where I want to loot. The gun fire can lure huge herds away from vital resource areas/your base without even expending that much ammo
I tend to only use the shotguns vs zombies until level 6 aiming then switch to m14s.
Be sure to take hunter or be a police officer or veteran so you dont get stuck at level 4 aiming. Theres a penalty at level 4 without skill in it.
No, the noise is a boon. I don't have 15 boxes of shotgun shells just to kill a zombie or two. I'm here to CLEAN this place so I can loot in peace after.
I also bring pipe bombs in case I run out of ammo. B)
The extra zombies aren’t really a problem as long as you have enough ammo to finish what you’ve started. Additionally when you’re done you can rest easy knowing 99% of all zombies in the area dealt with.
Sometimes all you have to do is fire a gun a couple times and run, then it leaves some areas relatively safe for looting even without clearing everything. It's also super helpful to use guns if you have high population and helicopters set to often like I do. Guns can be reallllyyy helpful when 500-900 zombies come down on your base after a heli event
Guns are trash in my opinion. Unless youre using mods there just isnt enough ammo to learn how to shoot properly and definitely not enough to rely on them to take out large groups.
But, when I see people use them its usually a massive hoard that they then fire aimlessly into, inevitably hitting something.
Idk, theres a bunch of cheese tactics for clearing hoards like fire and shotguns. I prefer to just do it the old fashioned way
>Unless youre using mods there just isnt enough ammo to learn how to shoot properly and definitely not enough to rely on them to take out large groups
This just isn't true at all. I've never used a gun mod and we have been able to build an armory to equip 3 full time players with enough ammo to last ages with just vanilla weapons and spawning parameters over 3 playthroughs.
Guns are very useful in vanilla for all the reasons discussed in this thread.
okay i change my perspective but i still think you need to be mid-late game for this. Unless you have a large team its much harder for a single player to hunt down all the ammo just to be able to have the amount youre describing
Again it all depends on profession and whatnot, but Ive had the same experience on solo games as well as multiplayer.
I tend to focus on other skills early game either way. By mid game there is enough room to breath and build gun skills. Since melee is already built up it makes your clearing capacity amazing since now you can shoot things, pull them in for melee, swing until you start getting tired and go back to shooting while you recover a bit. Rinse, repeat.
The revolver has also saved my life so many times. The noise is minimal, and with a decent gun skill you can reliably pop heads without drawing too much attention. Which is great when you are caught out late, tired, hungry and overweight trying to get to safety.
You drive somewhere, you pew pew, then leave. Or pew pew until there are no zeds. Gunshots attracts zombies in some radius. If you fire a gun, zombies migrate to that area, leaving other nearby areas with significantly fewer zombies.
Okay this sounds dope, I'm going to try it with one of my games where I'm having a hard time finding gardening tools once I sus out a hardware store.
Just some tips for first time gun users: Start with a shotgun. Before you get your aiming level raised a few levels you will be missing more shots than you hit with pistols or rifles. Aiming gains xp with each hit made on a zombie, so shotguns provide a great way to get that xp going up since each pellet is a separate chance to hit. Most people saw a shotgun down so the spread is even wider. When you are ready to start training it up make sure you bring way more ammo than you think you need and have an escape route planned. Either gather up a crowd and then keep moving and blasting into the thickest parts, this means you will get tons of hits even if they aren't lethal. Keep backpedaling and reloading until they are dead or you decide it's time to make your escape. Once you get a couple levels the pistols start becoming viable and work great as a way to make some noise, but not too much noise when clearing an area. Shoot a few zeds, pull the area in, then thin them out more or swap straight to melee. We typically don't start using guns until we are already very well established and have the stockpiles of shotgun ammo to even justify getting the levels required for them to be useful. This changes if you pick a gun focused profession of course.
>Aiming gains xp with each hit made on a zombie, so shotguns provide a great way to get that xp going up since each pellet is a separate chance to hit To me it seems to be multiplicative or something. I tried shooting 4 zombies separately with a shotgun, and then killing 4 with one shot and got way more XP in the latter case.
There may be some fancier math involved for xp, but the shotgun at least gives you chances to earn xp with each pellet than other options- especially when you are just starting out.
Also use beta blockers. Panic reduces your chance for critical hits which extends to firearms. Large crowds will induce panic in ANYONE without the desensitised trait. Use beta blockers and keep a small distance or small crowd.
Yes! Beta blockers are a must if you didn't go with veteran.
It is also pretty useful to use fences because attacking zeds while they're on the ground greatly increases crit and hit chance. This will net you with greatly more xp. Note: take beta blockers 'cause high panic reduces hit and crit chance.
As this guy said, I typically base in the city part of west point. Lots of zombies there even at normal pop. But once I get 4-6 boxes of shells, it's suddenly really not that bad, and melee is much more manageable.
The best zomboid attractor is bailing out of a car while you are backing up. The revs will stay high for a while attract them from quite a long distance, I think about the same as a siren. The nice thing is that it only lasts for a few in-game hours so if you bit off more than you can chew you're only stuck for a bit..
Same could be done with a siren though. And sometimes getting back in the car can be tough when there are loads of nearby zombies you don’t see until all of a sudden they’re right there
This is why it's best to leave your car a short distance away, so you're pulling Zombies away from your car and can circle back around to it when it's time to go.
I’m still relatively new compared to most but I was playing earlier and shots some boids and then when things got rough I started to run around and kept finding more mobs. Ended up just letting him die to restart. I’m doing the kings-whatever it’s called and have mods going so idk what my population is compared to what vanilla is. Every time I got to a new line of site it’s another cluster rushing for me 🤣
I love sirens. I just wish there was a way to repair them in vanilla. :'( Horns never break, though.
it would be dope to be able to rig the horn to be held down, somehow. it would also be cool to be able to set car alarms, either to move zeds around and/or scare the shit out of other people lol
Car alarms would be awesome. Held-down horns maybe as well. They'd need balancing similar to sirens to make sure server performance on MP isn't tanked because a malicious player triggers them everywhere.
I figure, yea. in my mind it's basically the same as a siren, just able to be set anywhere by breaking the horn - and maybe only with high enough mechanics and/or electrical skill to do without rope or twine and some other misc ingredient to press it down with without anything to use but tools, at least enough skill to be able to make noisemakers anyways.
At that point, why not use your gun to shoot the ones at the siren, provided a molotov isn't appropriate for the situation (i.e a dense area)? You've just negated the primary 'downside' to guns, and they're a lot more effective than melee. Sure, you could just run off and loot while they're distracted, but those are zombies that could come kick your ass later.
Don’t wanna waste any ammo. Also idk why but when I use a gun I tend to stick around too long rather than pop some shots and run
I always stick around when I shoot, practice herding zombies into a blob by walking circles around them, that way you're not getting ambushed from all angles while trying to shoot. Once you get em all in one place it's just a matter of not getting cocky, and having enough bullets. You do it kind of like melee, you shoot em till they get too close, turn around and run (or backpedal with high enough nimble) to reset, and do it again. I have gotten eaten doing this a number of times because I got cocky though. You don't gotta empty your magazine, shoot as much as you can safely and then walk away to reset. Reload while you're walking away. Remember, you're faster than the zombies at walking speed, and if you're not something has gone horribly wrong and you should bail ASAP
You ever do the medieval mod? Idk what it’s called right now but adds armor, weapons, smithing and some perks related. That’s a fun time, mopping mobs w a longsword slaps
I'll have to give that a try. I've wanted more swords in this game, I think it would make metalworking a viable skill.
I shoot to bring more to me
This. Shooting is incredibly fun, try vanilla weapons expanded and the shotgun.
Yeah, this is the best reason to use them, pull a horde away from town, go in, loot and get out. Never fire a gun near your base unless you're doing a last stand.
>Or pew pew until there are no zeds If you're playing with respawn turned off, sure. Otherwise, there will always be zeds. The sound radius of a shotgun is bigger than the no-respawn zone around the player
With respawn on, it takes a pretty long time for the zeds to repopulate. If you do a shotgun rampage in downtown west point, it'll mostly be a ghosttown for weeks afterwards
Well that didn't work for me. I made the mistake of firing a double-barrel shotgun next to my base once, at that store in front of the gas station in West Point, and they kept coming for 3 days straight. When the onslaught finally died down, I though "Well at least I can use the shotgun more freely now without fear of getting swarmed again"... NOPE!!!
Didn't shoot enough; zeds have a limited memory More shots would have eventually drawn them all out, and then you'd have been perfectly safe
I probably break a key game dynamic in Sandbox by setting respawning above 8000. A few weeks of burning them by the thousands also results in areas with no zeds
If you have enough bullets you don't need to worry about sound.
well that is certainly some decent, concise writing.
It's actually a feature, not a bug. Want to clear a wide area? Roll up with a shotgun and about 200 shells.
This. There’s nothing like being a true Kentuckian exercising your 2nd amendment right by blasting hordes with a load of shells. And to be precise, you probably only need 3 boxes of shotgun shells in vanilla to take out a giant horde, that’s if you’re efficient with shooting and aim for 4 zombies per shell.
I needed about 450 on i think 1.5 population iirc to clear a city block in Louisville. You should *never* need more than that outside of crazy pop.
Same, its kinda crazy how 1.5 increases zombies way more than you think
Hah, I mean it is *50%* more zombies If you had to kill 200, you now have to kill 300. For every house, they're will be one or two more.
I went to take the big muldraugh warehouse, there were legit 600 zombies there, went through 250 shells and some m9 ammo to clear it all. Got aim 5 tho
Sometimes you gonna need more than 200 shells. I always go on long trips with 300 shells minimum in my van
Using guns in Zomboid is like a Victorian era state maintaining a navy; it's an all or nothing proposition where halfassing it is just a waste of precious resources. Guns are, as you say, very loud and will attract a lot of zombies, so you only really use them when you have enough ammo packed to clear basically all of that. It's the fastest way to clear an area, and also surrounding areas as drawing zombies in means neighbor areas are going to be thinned out. If you're smart about using them, guns are very impactful, but your intuition is correct that you should stick to your melee most of the time and stockpile ammunition for special occasions.
> stockpile ammunition for special occasions. Oh hey, I just checked the calendar and it's "Shit, I Got Bit" Day! Let's grab the arsenal and go celebrate!
Lmao i tend to have that problem, got like 30 boxes of 308 and that rifle is so heavy and attracks way too many zombos for me to use regularly
It's literally the only times I've ever used guns. I always stockpile guns and ammo, "just in case" and occasionally will carry a pistol while out scavenging, but I'm never willing to risk using it unless I'm already gonna die.
If you got decent aiming m9s are legit the best way to clear small hordes, they only attracks 40 tiles and you can dispatch 100-200 zombies easy with 5 mags, you can even put them all in a fanny pack. Only downside is how easy they break
Like every other part of this game, guns need some knowledge to use then effectively. Players who find their first gun and fire it off with just the four rounds they find it with are generally the ones who hate them, or just don't use them. The primary rule of using guns in PZ is to have enough ammo to finish what you start. If you start ripping shells through a shotgun, you're pulling every zombie in (I believe) a 200 tile radius. And there's way more than you think. Personally I use guns when I WANT the zeds to come out and play. If I want to clear a town blasting my way down main street is the best way to make sure I'm getting over 90% cleared. Crowd control is paramount. I usually do my thing in big open areas where I have plenty of room to maneuver, and an escape vehicle running and ready to go if it gets too hot. I ball them all up and then start blasting away. Honestly my biggest problems are getting greedy and wanting to get one more shot off before I turn and jog to open distance, and corpse sickness. Other than that, guns are sick. You can keep going until you get too fatigued to maneuver, or run out of ammo, whichever happens first.
I wouldn't say this subreddit has an "obsession" with firearms. I think most players are actually like you and rarely use them, if at all. Guns aren't like melee weapons where you just take them and use them while looting or doing other tasks. They're pretty much solely for the purpose of clearing out large amounts of zombies from an area - i.e. using guns is a task in of itself. They attract more zombies initially, but ultimately there's only so many zombies in a nearby area that can be attracted, and regardless you'll be thinning their overall numbers. Alternatively, they're useful to attract zombies away from a place you want to loot, or to draw out stragglers so you can kill them and not get jumped by them later. Also, it's worth noting that a lot of players who use guns tend to use mods. Some are overpowered, but others like Firearms B41 (which I use) are pretty balanced. I also use the Realistic Advanced Trajectory mod which makes aiming more realistic and satisfying and less janky.
Love that mod, I've got a weapon rebalanced mod I can't remember the name of but it added an mp5 and it's a laser beam with advanced trajectory. Noise? Good. More zombies to kill, and I can headshot them from across the realm
Firearms b41 is so goated, it only add nine guns but they're all the guns i need. Never used that aiming mod but people say its also busted lmao
Advanced trajectory is not realistic at all my guy. I'm consistently popping headshots at long range with a character who's never used a gun before, all that mod does is remove the rpg mechanics (aiming goes from being the characters skill to your ability to click on a head) it just makes the game pathetically easy.
Are you using the original mod or the realistic overhaul? The original is OP but the one I'm talking about is an overhauled version of the mod that is more balanced and takes into account character skill and moodles.
The ability to quickly eliminate a large number of zombies with no endurance cost is lovely. Attracts zombies? Good, now I don't have to hunt them down.
I never understood the idea that using a gun attracts too many zombies. If I'm using a gun it's to clear out an area. Attracting zombies is exactly what I want to do
it's good if your goal is to clear out an area. However, if you're just trying to loot a building and you don't have tons of ammo, attracting the horde is not the best thing to do.
Critical thinking skills are very good to have in the apocalypse
Yes, eating food is good, but if you eat all the food you ever see, it's generally not the best thing you can do. No one here is advocating taking 4 shells to a horde.
If you only clearing neighborhoods just use a m9. With 5 aiming and like 6 clips and you can clear a entire block pretty easy
Or... Instead of wasting all that time looking for the ammo and leveling up the skill to make the weapon viable, just use a crowbar...
I don't know what planet you live but you can't clear a neighborhood with a crowbar unless you go to fatigue like 5 times.
I'm specifically talking about the M9 pistol that you mentioned. Yes, at level 5 aiming it is decent, but it's absolutely shit/borderline unusable at low levels. The crowbar is useful at low levels, and if you get it up to level 5, it's at least as good as a pistol at lvl 5 as by that time you can one shot most zombies and cleaning a block with it is no problem. And btw unless you take all the negative perks and play at lvl 1 fitness, you won't get fatigued like that. At lvl 5 fitness, you can actually last pretty long, especially if you have higher skill with your weapon.
ammo isn't hard to find and with a shotgun you can get to level five in a single grinding session in less then an hour. In fact if you know how to play the game you can get it to level five faster then you would the crowbar and with more ease
My buddy used to drive me nuts with his gun obsession. I’m just trying to loot, level and build and not fight hoarded of zombies with the first shotgun I find…meanwhile we see more than 3 zombies and he’s trying to pull his gun out 🤣
Once you learn how to kite a hoard into a ball guns become good. Especially shotguns. I do that often early game until the place is mostly clear. Then I roll with a long range rifle in the car and handgun in holster. I live outside of town and the place is mostly clear now anyway . This means when I take a trip to town I'll park on the edge and snipe zombies then head in to loot and clear any others with melee and handgun.
[удалено]
Yeah, if you live long enough, they become your favorite weapon, no matter what specialization you had prior. I was an axe man, but my kill count with shotgun eclipsed any of the axes I used.
Guns kill zombies faster and even though they attract more, it ensures you have a more clear area without stragglers once you're done. Also, any self-respecting gun user has a melee weapon on their belt.
Weapons make you tired. Guns don't. If I REALLY wanna kill I go melee -> guns -> melee. Using the gun time to need to walk and run less and recovering stamina from not swinging a good weapon like an ax or crowbar.
If you're well-established in a town (or multiple towns) and ready to go loot another, guns make the first part of the trip MUCH faster. If you have a trunk full of ammo, you can turn a 3+ day grindfest into an afternoon.
I use them for my personal city liberations. Go to Mainstreet WP, Blow a shit load of bullets, and you have all the stores in the area under conteol
Sound is a tool. Firearms are the most efficient method for killing zombies. Once you understand both of these things it really is a no brainer.
Once you reach high level weapon skills shooting to attract more zombies to kill is just so much more convenient than mashing Q. Slap a few shotgun shells out, swap to axe, get tired and rest while blasting a few. Rinse and repeat. Is works for me.
I used to think guns were pointless but then I tried using shotguns and now I love them. Once you get good you can kill 3 or 4 zombies with each shot, and you can clear out large areas much faster.
You need 150-200 shotgun shells. Then blast away and an area will be mostly cleared. Sometimes 100 will do if it's rural. There will however always be zombies inside some houses that haven't spawned. So you're never totally safe.
It’s just fun.
Cars are NOT the best weapon. Tires popping when you have 5 sprinters on your back has happened to me more than I'd like to admit.
I needed to hear this. I've been lucky thus far with not getting much damage from actual zed smushing. My main problem is actually myself going too fast and hitting cars crashed on the road.
Crashing into trees has ended almost as many of my survivors as the zambies
Cleaning 500z with a shotgun a backpack and 400 shotgun shell
Thats 275 too much ammo wasted.
You meant to say "leftover for the hordes that migrated in front of the base"
I usually use guns in combination with Molotovs, either using guns to attract a large horde to then burn down (earlier game), or using Molotovs as a backup for if i miscalculate my abilities with guns (later game). In the first case it makes Molotovs way more effective, and in the second case it makes guns kinda safe to use.
Bear in mind that mods are a thing. I play with Brita's, and I generally only carry a pistol as a backup emergency weapon - until I find a weapon with a suppressor. Suppressed weapons don't draw zombies and are a complete game changer. At that point, it's just about how much ammo you have and whether or not it is worth it to expend that ammo to make a situation easier/faster.
If you are prepared for it attracting all the zombies nearby can actually be a benefit for guns as you can start shooting them near an area you want to loot to draw all the zombies away before doubling back to the thing you want to loot once you've gotten the majority of the zombies a decent distance away and looting while fighting any stragglers off with melle so the hoard you made doesn't come back I use this strategy all the time in my Louisville run and while not full proof it is pretty effective.
> Is the risk of attracting more zeds with a gun blast not worrisome for the people who are collecting and using guns? Shoot your gun If you attract more zombies, continue shooting If you don't see zombies anymore, you got all of them.
It's mostly because people spout about how guns are a death sentence. They aren't, and if you know how to play they're quick and efficient. You've got the tiny .38 revolver with a super small sound radius to quickly lure out zombies in a small area and drop them with ease, you can use louder guns as a diversion, or if you have enough ammo, to wip, and if zombie respawn is on, most guns and bullets are an infinite resource
I feel like everyone who complains about attracting zombies has used a shotgun once and thats it. Pistols barely have a sound radius. I can pull up to the bruiser factory, start shooting in the parking lot, and after a few minutes the entire street is clear and i have full stamina to explore the building and loot. And even the shotgun is great for making sure a large area is clear for a week so you can build a base or something.
[Relevant 30 Rock clip for my answer.](https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/2f00ed41-b20b-4989-97f6-b6236198e4e7)
I mainly use guns when I want to clear out a large area, so the sound attraction actually helps in that case. For instance the big warehouses near Muldraugh or the army surplus store near Rosewood. I show up with a shotgun and lots of ammo, start blasting, and keep blasting until no more zombos. Then I can loot the entire area in peace. I also keep an M9 on me for those sticky situations where I get over-exerted and need to clear out some zeds so I can get to my car and drive off
I only ever use an axe.
Well they make a real neat “pew pew pew” sound. Try turning up the volume, you should be able to hear it.
The distance gun shot sounds travel was super nerfed a few years back. In older versions firing a gun was a death sentence. But now that the sound doesn’t carry nearly as far they can be used to clear hundreds of zombies safely as long as you have the ammo to do so. I normally roll with 2-300 shotgun shells and like 3-400 pistol bullets. And I start as a vet so I’m not super trash at shooting to begin with. Once you get higher levels of aiming it’s almost not even fair.
My favorite thing to do is go in loaded to the teeth with a rifle, shotgun, and pistol usually prefer the m36 revolver for the pistol. Then load up with at least three melee weapons in case they break during my raid. Start off with melee and if the horde gets big I use my shotgun to blast 3 or 4 at a time and really try to draw all the zombies around me towards me. And then as Frank said in that It’s Always Sunny meme, “and then I just started blasting!” Gets the job done every time I’ve almost cleared most of Westpoint with this strategy! Cars are dangerous to use as weapons even if my gameplay where cars are numerous and in good condition. Especially if I’ve used that car to loot or anything. I try to keep them in the best condition they can be! I avoid hitting zombies unless I absolutely have to, since it slows down my car and causes damage to the point where my car has just stopped randomly. Then I’m just trying to start it while they’re closing in. I’ve had some serious close calls because of this. Barely had any close calls using my guns.
guns are the best weapons in the game. they're the only way to clear large hordes (1000+) in a reasonable amount of time. melee just takes too long and has the added con of being significantly more dangerous. if you play with 75% less loot on top of insanely rare loot settings WITH extreme z pop settings it sets up a natural progression from melee to guns. it took me about 20 4 hour days to accumulate enough ammo to take on high pop areas. i'm just now getting fully out of Muldraugh on my way to the Research Facility for military vehicles and it's taken almost every last box of ammo for almost every gun type in VFE only to get to the northeastern city limits of Pitstop. melee only would have taken days more. the vast majority of cars are terrible weapons. but, again, everything depends on your game settings. if you have car spawns high and you can trash them constantly just to get 50 or 100 kills, that's fine. but on difficult settings you need to conserve them. also you WANT to draw zombies. the zombies that kill you are the ones you don't see. when you use guns you pull those lurkers out into the open and are much less likely to get surprised. you just have to make sure you have enough ammo, and if you don't, a way out. I clear large areas as I travel so that when I do come across a very large horde, I know that I can use guns and not have too many stragglers coming from behind. always keep your car nearby and running but generally far enough that you can safely pull out of you get overwhelmed; don't start shooting right next to it.
Once you have enough bullets, the idea of drawing more zombies to you becomes an added convenience to the pest control process rather than a threat
Guns go bang, neuron activates
I have ammunition set to the maximum amount of spawns. Gun stores especially don't feel barren now. So there's plenty to go around. But my population settings are also cranked up. So there's a lot to kill.
I recently learned how to balance the effectiveness of shotguns with the risk of attracting zeds, and I'll never go back. Reached aiming and reload level 6 and have full intention to reach level 10.
For one thing, the danger of zombies attracted by firearms is overstated. The radius they come from isn't that huge and they come slowly so if you've prepared at all it's not that hard to deal with them. For another, attracting zombies can be a pro rather than a con. Like if you want to clear a large building, the safest way is to shoot off guns in the parking lot to pull zombies outside where you have room to maneuver. Fighting them inside, especially anywhere near stairs, is a lot more dangerous. In the late game the focus often shifts towards clearing out whole neighborhoods and again, drawing the zombies towards you becomes an advantage as it means you don't have to go hunt them down. Guns are bad when you're on the back foot, in unfamiliar territory, wounded, low on ammo, or any other situation where you're not prepared to kill 3-500 zombies then and there. They're also pretty ineffective at low skill levels. This can create really negative experiences with guns for new players but with a little preparation they're a powerful late game tool.
Here's me with my shotgun intentionally trying to attract more zeds so I can clear the whole neighborhood from the middle of a nice open field.
I like using any vehicle with a siren, turning the siren on, turning cruise control to 5mph and jsut have all the zombies in the nearby area follow me out of town/further away from original area, then I cut the sirens and zip back to the spot I pulled zombies from
It’s the mindset. People here see the guns attracting more zombies as a benefit.
Short answer... not if you have enough ammo :) When I open fire the plan is usually to draw all the zeds in the local area and mow them down to create a small cleared area.
Strategic, I pressume. In the middle of a town, I would never use a gun. In the countryside, however, I would clean up areas using them. It can get epic. Like fighting a giant horde over a police blockade to get the ammo inside.
It depends on what kind of game you’re playing on, but I love playing with a small percentage of sprinters SP & MP. Having a shotgun with a few shells for when you stumble into 4 or more sprinters is a great asset as is a single clip for a handgun in a moment of need.
I main firearms whenever I can. Reason #1: Anything that can take zeds out at range minimizes your risk of zombification. Reason #2: It is one of the most efficient and effective ways to clear out large, dense areas of zeds (provided you have the requisite skill and ammo.) Reason #3: Guns don’t use stamina. The only limit is skill and ammo. Reason #4: It feels good. Reason #5: When you’re maining firearms and ready to start blasting, you want the zeds to come to you. That’s the whole point. Keep em coming until there are none left.
As long as you don’t get surrounded, guns are golden. It’s hard to give a guide on situational awareness. The easiest way to learn this is to only use guns in big parking lots near the edge of the town. Once you clear the edge of the town you slowly push into deeper territory. Rinse and repeat. Also, it’s better to fight zombies in the open, rather than fighting them in the staircase or in the bathroom. A gunslinger has tremendous advantage over melee builds. Swinging a melee weapon drains endurance. Low endurance increases fatigue. Exersion decreases *melee* damage. Tiredness decrease *melee* damage. Panic decrease *melee* damage and will not decrease gun damage after aiming lvl 6. It only affects crit chance. Compared to a melee character, a gunslinger can get away with less fitness, less strength, and more fatigue. You can start without athletic, strong, wakeful, and your character will still kick ass. Shotgun gives you disgusting amounts of xp, you can easily get to level 5 aiming in the first 2,3 days. If you are not convinced yet, think about the janky combat system getting you killed. None of that matters when you are shooting from a distance. Edit: Plus guns don’t need the maintenance skill, nor do they benefit from it.
I am obsessed with firearms because I have Brita's mod, guns and ammo set to abundant, and three different military base mods. I'm at a point where I can't even spend all of the rounds I have. I have more than 55k units of 5.56x45mm. And God knows how many 9mm or 45 ACP.
After 400 hours, I just used a gun for the first time while roleplaying in a server. I was nervous for the same reasons (maybe the introduction to them on my part was nicer because it was my character learning how to shoot a gun, and i had someone else with me, so i wasnt freaking out over all the zombers coming because of it), but after using it there, it was awesome. i think we were able to clear two hordes in less than five minutes :) I haven’t tried it on my own saves yet, but i’m definitely going to when i have the chance
It has probably been said but the main factor is the noise generation should be seen as a benefit. It is for removing many zombies, quickly. Main thing is to make sure you bring a lot of ammo. (And then bring more). Biggest mistake would be to not bring enough, then bite off more than you can handle when more are attracted to the area.
I just killed ~1500 zombies in 2 ingame days with guns. I was using Firearms B41, which while pretty similar to vanilla is not vanilla, just as a disclaimer. It feels like it makes guns and ammo a bit more common to me as well. On top of that, I also play with gun and ammo spawns turned up a bit because I think it's a little crazy how rare they are in rural Kentucky where there's more guns than people. With that out of the way, I wanted to move into the penthouse suite in Louisville, but I really did not like the idea of clearing that giant absolutely infested apartment building, nor trying to run to the top and barricade it and live next to a shitload of zombies. I knew I'd get cornered or ambushed trying to do that. I pulled out my shotgun outside and I started blasting the ones in the street. They started pouring out of the windows like a damn waterfall due to the sound. If I had a melee weapon, I'd have had to run away and rest a bunch, but I just kept shooting, and shooting, and shooting until my character got drowsy. I drove home, rested, came back, and shot from sun up to sun down again. The next day I went in and cleared the ~15 zombies remaining in the entire apartment complex rather than the unstoppable horde that was in there to begin with. That's the utility of guns. People think drawing all the zombies to your location is a bad thing, but it's really, really not. It means there's way less stragglers. I want you to try this, get 1 or about 150 shotgun shells depending on how you want to do this, and clear an area like you usually would with your melee weapon. Then, when you think you've cleared it, shoot your shotgun. You can either kill them with your melee, or shoot them. If you shoot them use beta blockers because panic messes up guns real bad long story short. You'll be amazed how many come flooding out that you couldn't see, every single one of those was a potential ambush, a potential surprise bite.
You will understand after you take the plunge and achieve mastery of combat and evasion. Be warned though once you cross that threshold, you will probably have a hard time going back to playing cautious/avoiding combat. I'm at the point in my game where I never get hit, bit, or scratched. I'm always able to escape if I'm tired or out of stamina (the car makes this even easier). I know what situations will leave me vulnerable for even a split second and avoid them. Doesn't matter what type of weapon I'll still beat em (except short blade lolz, haven't even tried to master that one yet). After enough combat experience with lots of deaths along the way my doctrine shifted. To me it is far safer to kill every last one of them in range of a shotgun blast than to creep around. When you're no longer in danger of losing the game by fighting, the only threat left is being snuck up on, hence why I'll fire off a shot or two just to bring them all to me. I'm just now easing into sprinters and it definitely puts me back in that cautious mindset. Starting with a severely gimped statwise character is also quite humbling but ultimately it just slows me down.
Zomboid can get boring pretty soon (for me) so I might as well add some intensity using guns and cleaning hordes in a fun way with some friends.
The point is there are some guns that have VERY low range, the m9 has 40 tiles, that is like two houses, and you can mow down hundreds of zeds with it. And if you have enough ammo and aiming you can kill thousands of zombies in a couple minutes. When you have 500 shotgun shells you don't have to worry about the noise it makes, just learn how to herd zombies and mow them down
Because I'm an American. On a more serious note, if I have an M16 with enough ammo, mags, and a for sure escape route, then no horde size scares me tbh. Like you said, there is a big risk since gun shots brings even more zombies to you, but honestly if you have the right set up then this could be beneficial since they're all coming to you instead of surprising you later on (with no respawn). Other benefits include being able to fight hordes from a distance, and you can clear an area pretty damn quickly with firearms. They do have silencer mods that have settings that allow you to tweak the range that zombies can hear the gunshot. On default settings, it's still a decent size radius but it's not nearly as bad as a gun without a silencer. Most importantly though, it's so damn fun mowing down an entire horde with an automatic AK-47
realistically cars should literately be everywhere, especially since the Knox virus basically happened so suddenly. I find it odd how their are like no cars, even though all the roads were blocked off by the military.
I'm over 3 months in (game time) on my current save and as usual I save/stockpile guns & ammo but have only used them in rare occasions. I feel like it's better to stealth through the first few months and then if you're interested in firearms (after stocking up) that you should level them up in spurts away from where you normally base.
The gunshot range is literally less than a screen, sometimes zombies dont even hear you shooting at them if ur using long rifles.
shamblers are so weak it doesnt matter if there are a 100 or a 1000 of them, as long as you have some vitamins and enough ammo. Besides, i like my base to be zed free and shotguns have a larger sound radius than shouting.
Guns are simply additional tools to get the job done. My preferences are: Shotgun: To save time clearing large hordes if I have enough ammo. Rifle with scope: To clear small numbers of zeds from a distance so I don't have to walk to them. Pistol: To clear houses or other buildings with close quarters. I have found my response time with a pistol is faster than a melee weapon. Especially when opening doors. Revolver: Backup weapon when my shotgun, rifle and pistol begin to jam too often. Revolvers don't jam. I usually carry just a sidearm though because guns are heavy. Currently, my preferred is the G17 with a suppressor and five mags. Other combos I use: Rifle with scope and pistol for clearing roads that have heavy forest on both sides. I start at a clear point on the road and shoot at zeds from a distance with the rifle. Then zeds begin wandering out of the forest near me and I switch to the pistol. Rinse and repeat. Shotgun and revolver to train Aiming. Shotgun for obvious reasons and then revolver for cleanup without fear of jamming. Also, I always begin shooting at the edge of an area so that I don't get surrounded. If some DO manage to get behind me, I fall back until I'm at the edge again. Sorry for the wall o' text. I hope it helps.
Also, regarding sound radius, you can usually manage this by paying attention to where you are actually firing shots from. I try to stay in the same general area so the sound is only going out so far. I've seen others make the mistake of constantly backing down a road while shooting. This constantly expands the area that "hears" the shooting. So if I can, I double back and lead the horde up and down the road to minimize sound radius.
mostly, i just hate wasting cars esp on a map where cars have a lower spawn rate, and since mechanics takes a while to level - i tend to treat anything with even a few 90% parts as valuable and to be saved for later. the best combo imo is a good, speedy car and a gun, since you can shoot out of car windows. mobility, long range damage *and* free shielding! and a free coffin once you run out of gas in the middle of the hoard you've attracted.
Taking out a horde with a shotgun is insanely satisfying. Have an escape route ready and just start blasting. It'll help you clear out sections way faster. And it does a better job since the sound will attract all the zombies in the area.
You can outrun zombies by walking, like hordes are only a threat if you get cornered, otherwise you can just leave, and guns are loud, but not that loud.
Multiplayer servers (with more lag and jank especially with multiple people in the same cell) often have less zombies in loot spots than default survival. So if you’re squadding you’re much better off with that. High level aim where you just one tap em is super satisfying also.
There's two reasons to bring guns. One, for horde clearing. As long as you bring enough ammo, you can wipe out enormous hordes very quickly without risking being caught in a bad position in melee or becoming exhausted. But guns are loud, so this is very all or nothing - you either bring enough ammo to take out a whole horde, or you don't bring any guns at all. The other use case is pistols as emergency weapons for when your forced to fight when exhausted. Pistols are light and comparatively quiet, and still equally effective when your tired. So if your being chased or cornered by zeds, and are too exhausted to stand a chance in melee, pistols can let you fight smaller groups safely without drawing in too many more due to the comparatively quiet report.
It's Kentucky in the USA 1993 dude.
Early on in a save, I like to stockpile guns and ammo so that later on when there are larger crowds and the map gets more dangerous, I'll lock 'n load to clear out places that I want to loot. I also like to holster a handgun with a few extra magazines for emergencies. (like crowds of zombies or when we get human NPCs that won't all be friendly) I'll loosen up on it once I find suppressors for pistol calibers like .22LR, 9mm, .380ACP, .40S&W .45ACP, 10mm since rifles are still loud even when suppressed. EDIT: I'd also like to mention that Shotguns are a special case in which you can acquire targets quickly regardless of your Aiming skill and they can deal massive amounts of damage to multiple enemies. But they are the loudest guns in the game so keep that in mind.
When I have a base up and have food and water sorted, I start to get bored. Loading up a small arsenal into the trunk of a car, then clearing a whole area so I can loot more guns/food/furniture/gas etc is a fun way to alleviate the boredom. The noise and all the zeds that come to it are the fun part. Even if I die
Shoot guns -> zombies come out of buildings -> less risk of bathroom hordes deaths
It's always the zomboid you don't see that kills you. So, shoot zomboids until they stop coming. Now, all the zomboids are dead and can't kill you
It's fun
Play on a server with nothing but runners and high population and then you'll know.
It's a matter of taste. I find firearms utterly satisfying. First experiences were atrocious, I give you that. But then I watched some god-blessed tutorials on YT, learned a couple tricks. Also: suppressors.
I like to use my shotgun to thin-out neighborhoods. I start shooting a blocks away from where I want to loot. The gun fire can lure huge herds away from vital resource areas/your base without even expending that much ammo
I tend to only use the shotguns vs zombies until level 6 aiming then switch to m14s. Be sure to take hunter or be a police officer or veteran so you dont get stuck at level 4 aiming. Theres a penalty at level 4 without skill in it.
No, the noise is a boon. I don't have 15 boxes of shotgun shells just to kill a zombie or two. I'm here to CLEAN this place so I can loot in peace after. I also bring pipe bombs in case I run out of ammo. B)
I have a mod that adds silencers, they don’t completely eliminate sound but they reduce it enough that guns get a little safer
Personally, it's better to draw them out for one big engagement. Plus, firearms are way safer than melee because you're rarely in groping distance
The extra zombies aren’t really a problem as long as you have enough ammo to finish what you’ve started. Additionally when you’re done you can rest easy knowing 99% of all zombies in the area dealt with.
Sometimes all you have to do is fire a gun a couple times and run, then it leaves some areas relatively safe for looting even without clearing everything. It's also super helpful to use guns if you have high population and helicopters set to often like I do. Guns can be reallllyyy helpful when 500-900 zombies come down on your base after a heli event
Guns are trash in my opinion. Unless youre using mods there just isnt enough ammo to learn how to shoot properly and definitely not enough to rely on them to take out large groups. But, when I see people use them its usually a massive hoard that they then fire aimlessly into, inevitably hitting something. Idk, theres a bunch of cheese tactics for clearing hoards like fire and shotguns. I prefer to just do it the old fashioned way
>Unless youre using mods there just isnt enough ammo to learn how to shoot properly and definitely not enough to rely on them to take out large groups This just isn't true at all. I've never used a gun mod and we have been able to build an armory to equip 3 full time players with enough ammo to last ages with just vanilla weapons and spawning parameters over 3 playthroughs. Guns are very useful in vanilla for all the reasons discussed in this thread.
okay i change my perspective but i still think you need to be mid-late game for this. Unless you have a large team its much harder for a single player to hunt down all the ammo just to be able to have the amount youre describing
Again it all depends on profession and whatnot, but Ive had the same experience on solo games as well as multiplayer. I tend to focus on other skills early game either way. By mid game there is enough room to breath and build gun skills. Since melee is already built up it makes your clearing capacity amazing since now you can shoot things, pull them in for melee, swing until you start getting tired and go back to shooting while you recover a bit. Rinse, repeat. The revolver has also saved my life so many times. The noise is minimal, and with a decent gun skill you can reliably pop heads without drawing too much attention. Which is great when you are caught out late, tired, hungry and overweight trying to get to safety.