HumanitZ Strategy Guide · Cosmo Strategy Guides

01 · First Hour Priorities

What you do before dark on day one decides whether the next week is survival or scavenging.

Choose your spawn on purpose Four starting points. Starter Spawn hands you a repairable car and basic kit; West Road pairs the best loot with the worst crowd.
Solve water before anything else A bottle and a pond gives Dirty Water. Boil it over a campfire or use a purification tablet.
Respect the 35 kilogram limit You carry 35 kg. Weight, not danger, is why most early loot runs get abandoned halfway home.
Swing, do not shoot Melee is quiet, costs no ammunition, and kills almost everything early. A gunshot downtown is an invitation.
Loot the outskirts first Detached houses, sheds and roadside garages hold the same nails, tape and tins at a fraction of the density.
Strip every hood you pass Fan belts under some hoods, fuel pumps under most, batteries in cars and garages. Collect before you need them.
Build the workbench before the walls The bench is your dependable source of nails, and nails gate almost every later build.

02 · Vitals & Conditions

Four bars, three conditions, and a weather system that quietly ties them together.

Four bars run your survivor Health, Hunger, Thirst and Stamina. Hunger and Thirst do not kill directly: when either empties it drains Health.
Hunger burns half a bar a day Roughly half the bar empties per in-game day. Two days of food is the minimum before leaving known ground.
Stamina is a combat resource Sprinting, vaulting, swinging and working draw the same bar. Fight down to half, never to empty.
Temperature tracks the weather Weather is dynamic and body temperature follows it. Rain and night chill you, and a cold survivor recovers slowly.
Infection is managed, not cured A green skull icon sits beside your health. A hit risks infection, a bite pushes it near fifty percent.
Bleeding is the fastest killer A bandage stops it. Untreated, it puts you on the ground during a fight you were winning.
Coughing means sickness Sickness does no direct damage, but the sound carries and pulls zeeks toward you. Treat it before quiet work.

03 · Professions at Character Creation

Eleven starting professions. The perk is permanent, so pick for how you actually play.

Unemployed No perk at all. The honest pick for a pure vanilla run, the worst one while you are learning.
Mechanic Fifty percent more effective with Repair Kits, which restore installed car parts. This keeps one vehicle alive all game.
Junior Biodiesel Researcher Fifty percent more fuel from every Fuel Can. Fuel limits long drives, so this halves your search time.
Emergency Medical Technician Twenty five percent more effective with all medical items. It matters most on a permadeath save.
Apprentice Gunsmith Fifty percent more effective with Gun Repair Kits, which also service bows and crossbows.
Amateur Boxer Your hands deal three hundred percent more damage unarmed. A silent backup weapon that never breaks.
Farmer More seeds recovered from raw vegetables. The multiplier turns one lucky tomato into a permanent garden.
Food Service Worker Fifteen percent more effective with all food items, the resource you spend most often.
Sunday Fisherman Better odds on every catch. Fish recipes are the ones that do not spend water bottles.
Car Salesman Better terms with traders. The traders you reach over the CB radio deal in car parts, fuel and weapons.
Outdoors Man More meat from every animal you hunt. With a stove and a fat converter it becomes a food loop.

04 · Skills & Level Progression

One point per level. These are the nodes that change how a run feels.

One point per level, no refunds Experience accrues from play and each level grants one point. There is no cheap respec.
Two families of skills Weapon skills branch by what you carry: firearms, bows, melee. Survival skills cover crafting, building, movement and carrying.
Beast of Burden comes first It lifts carry capacity from 35 kg to 55 kg. Twenty kilograms is one trip you never have to make again.
Movement nodes compound Sprinter cuts running stamina cost by ten percent and Speed Stealth speeds up crouched movement.
Aim nodes before damage nodes Steady Aim removes twenty five percent of firearm sway, Smooth Aim reduces bloom while moving, Bow Stamina covers archers.
Builder nodes fund the base Resourceful halves building resource costs, Make It Last adds fifty percent durability to improvised weapons.

05 · Weapon Families at a Glance

Nine weapon families, ranked by the stat that matters outdoors: how far the sound carries.

Family	Noise	Best For
Improvised Melee	Quiet	Pipes and planks you craft on day one. They break fast, so carry a spare and keep duct tape.
Bladed Melee	Quiet	Machetes and axes. Best single target damage in melee and the most reliable head strikes.
Blunt Melee	Quiet	Bats and hammers. Better stagger than blades and gentler on durability when tape is scarce.
Heavy Melee	Quiet	Two handed weapons that flatten a walker in one swing. Brutal on stamina without Power House.
Bow	Near silent	Ranged kills that do not call the street. Arrows are recoverable, which makes it viable far from base.
Crossbow	Near silent	More damage per bolt than a bow, slower to reload. A Gun Repair Kit services it.
Sidearm	Loud	The emergency answer indoors. Light to carry, easy to feed, the least catastrophic gun to fire.
Shotgun	Very loud	Runners and anything inside arm reach. Assume the district heard it and plan the exit first.
Rifle	Loud, and it travels	Clearing a route at distance and the only sensible reply to a bloater. Ammunition is the limit.

06 · Zeek Variants

Five zeek behaviours. Identify which one you are looking at before the first swing.

Walker Slow, numerous, everywhere

Shambling movement and a short detection cone
Dies to two or three clean melee strikes
Dangerous only in numbers, which is most of the time

Bring: Any melee weapon and the patience to fight one at a time.
Take: Easy experience and a safe way to learn swing timing.

Never let a group form a semicircle around you. Back into a doorway or a fence line so only one can reach you.

Runner Fast, agile, hard to track

Closes distance before you can reposition
Dodges and weaves, so precision shots miss
Low health once you actually connect

Bring: A shotgun or an automatic weapon. Single shot rifles will not land.
Take: Nothing worth the ammunition unless it is already on top of you.

If a runner spots you, stop retreating and commit. Turning your back is how a single runner becomes a chase across a town.

Screamer Horde caller, top priority

Shrieks the instant it sees you
The scream summons everything in earshot
Otherwise physically unremarkable

Bring: A bow, a crossbow, or a melee weapon and a quiet approach.
Take: The kill only counts if it happened before the scream.

Sweep for screamers before you open any loud container or start a fight. One missed screamer converts a routine run into an evacuation.

Bloater Slow tank with a knockdown

Large health pool that shrugs off melee
Stomps the ground to knock you off your feet
Very slow, so kiting always works

Bring: A rifle and open ground. Melee against a bloater is a losing trade.
Take: Fight it only if it stands between you and something you need.

Being knocked down next to a bloater means the walkers behind it reach you first. Keep a full body length of space at all times.

Spitter Ranged toxin, lingering hazard

Releases a toxic cloud on death and at close range
The cloud persists after the body drops
Infection risk climbs sharply inside it

Bring: Any ranged option. Kill it from outside the cloud radius.
Take: Antibiotic supplies before you go near one, not after.

Never melee a spitter in a corridor. If you do catch a dose, treat the infection immediately rather than pushing on with the run.

07 · Noise, Stealth & Engagement

Every fight here is decided by who heard it and where it happens.

Three things make noise Gunfire, sprinting and breaking objects. Each has a radius, and every zeek inside it starts walking over.
Crouch is the indoor default Crouched movement cuts your noise footprint and your silhouette, and Speed Stealth removes the speed penalty.
Head strikes end fights fastest Aimed head strikes drop a walker in far fewer swings, saving stamina and durability at once.
Fight in a chokepoint Doorways, stairwells and fence gaps reduce a crowd to a queue. Open ground is where numbers win.
Night is for base work Visibility collapses and a torch advertises you. Spend dark hours crafting, cooking and repairing.
Maintain weapons before they break Duct tape repairs melee, a Gun Repair Kit repairs anything ranged. A weapon that snaps mid fight was a decision.

08 · Vehicles & Road Travel

A working car is the difference between a map you visit and a map you live in.

Five parts and a tank of fuel A dead car needs a Fan Belt, a Fuel Pump, a Battery, a Starter and four tires, plus gasoline.
Know where each part lives Belts and pumps live under hoods, batteries in cars and garages. Starters and tires cost you a detour.
Craft fuel when you cannot find it A Fuel Can comes from two oil, four bottles of liquor and one empty can. Never pass a liquor cabinet.
Repair Kits mend parts, not tires Each use restores an installed belt, pump, battery or starter by five percent. Carry spare tires.
Watch the condition bar Vehicle condition sits above the fuel gauge and falls whenever you use the car as a weapon.
The horn is a tool, not a toy T runs the headlights, H sounds the horn. Use it to pull a crowd off a building, never by accident.
Park like you expect trouble Off the road, facing your exit, close to the building you are clearing. Anything else is scenery.

09 · Shelter, Stations & Supply

The bench order, the build costs, and why your kitchen keeps running out of water.

Workbench, then everything else Nails gate rain collectors, compost bins, farm plots and most fortification, and the bench makes nails.
Rain Collector: four wood, one tarp, one rope Then you wait for weather. Two or three turn water from a daily errand into a background process.
Compost Bin: six wood, ten nails It converts organic waste into fertiliser, so you stop depending on finding ready made bags.
Plant under open sky A plot with clear space above it is watered by rain. Roof one over and you hand water it forever.
Chemistry Station is the medical tier Infection Inhibitor and Infection Treatment are crafted there. Until you build one, every bite is only postponed.
Stove and fat converter if you hunt Cooked meat keeps longer and feeds better than raw, and the converter turns carcass fat into material.
Fish and meat spare your water Most recipes spend water bottles; raw fish and meat recipes largely do not. Cook before you hoard.
Choose the site, not just the building High ground for sightlines, central for travel time, floor space for benches and a garden.

10 · Radio Towers, Traders & Co-op

The tower network is the campaign, and the reason to keep a CB radio.

Every tower starts broken Radio towers are scattered across the map and none of them work when you arrive. Repairing one is a project.
Four components, every time A Car Battery, Electronics, an Electrical Cable and a Radio Receiver. The first three come from vehicles and garages.
The receiver is the bottleneck Radio Receivers drop in police stations and military checkpoints, and a city music outlet has better odds.
A repaired tower pays four ways It reveals map, marks points of interest, becomes a respawn point, and unlocks the next frequency.
Tower progression is linear Tower one points at tower two, tower two at tower three. In order is also the fastest way to see the map.
Air drops follow the towers Bringing the network back online enables air drops, the best source of equipment you cannot craft.
Four survivors, four professions Co-op runs to four with proximity voice chat. Mechanic, medic, gunsmith and farmer cover different systems instead of stacking.

11 · Pro Tips

Habits that compound across a long save.

Carry capacity is the real progression Every weight improvement, from Beast of Burden to a car outside, beats any weapon you will find.
Quiet kills are the whole game Melee, bows and crossbows clear a district without announcing it. Firearms are an emergency tool.
Scout screamers before you commit Take one slow lap of a location before the first swing. It is the cheapest insurance here.
Never travel on the last of anything One bandage, one bottle, a weapon at low durability. Any two together and you walk home.
Treat infection like a clock It is suppressed, never removed, so every hour of delay is health you pay back later.
Let the world water your farm Collectors and open sky over the plots turn food into a system that runs while you are away.
Permadeath changes the correct play With permadeath on the optimal line is boring: shorter runs, earlier retreats, more spare parts.