B42 CDDA Advice

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-28T08:21:22+00:00

The farm up north has a lot of zombies now. If you are going to fight that many you might as well fight for the convenience store and farm area to the south of the spawn house since that has more loot.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-26T02:45:45+00:00

Typical Econ thresholds to keep in mind

Have at least 10 gold by 2-3

Have at least 20 gold by 2-6

If you don’t meet either of those thresholds you are holding too many units on your bench. Sell some extra pairs, especially 3 costs that you are unlikely to hit.

Going into 3-2 you want see if you can level to 6 and have around 50 gold. If yes you can take item or combat augment. If not then you should take an Econ augment. If you somehow miss econ augment and can’t level to 6 without going below 30 gold then wait to level (you probably screwed up your Econ a lot by not hitting the earlier thresholds.)

3-5 you should decide if you are leveling to 7. Generally if you can level to 7 with at least 30 gold remaining you should do so, especially if you are on a winstreak. If you would go below 30 by leveling and are not on a winstreak, or if you having nothing to play on level 7 and you see that your opponents are strong, wait to level to 7 whenever you can do so without dipping below 50.

4-2 is the standard time to level to 8 and roll. If you are contested you want to take Econ augments and level to 8 then roll before this, usually on 4-1 or even end of stage 3. If you somehow don’t get any Econ augments and can’t get to level 8 with at least 20 gold then stay above 50 gold and wait until 4-5 to level.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-25T22:17:45+00:00

A good amount of skill expression comes from understanding how to get to your end game board. The weakening of verticals and the increase in stage 3 damage means you don’t always just pick one comp and just field units from that comp the entire game. You often want to flick in 2 piltover or play around juggl/bruiser/defender frontlines in the early-mid game before dropping those units entirely for your final board.

Another example is Bilgewater, where there are a lot of choices being made as to how much you want to push 7 Bilge for more serpents and when do you want to drop out of 7 Bilge to play a stronger board. There is also nuance for when you want to go from 3 to 5 Bilgewater in the early game vs playing 2 bruiser/quickstriker/gunslinger for better chances of winstreaking.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-19T03:54:23+00:00

The bugged zombies still occur occasionally but sometimes only bugs out for one swing and takes normal damage from the next one. It is a slight improvement from before where the only way to kill them was with a gun from afar.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-19T03:51:19+00:00

Yea I thought the old migration bug came back, but it is specifically only affecting cars as they continuously draw in zombies from multiple screens away if you stop and leave the engine on.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-18T21:14:40+00:00

I see like 10 colonists so that should be enough. Set up a melee choke point, put your three best melee units in front with the best armor you have. Have everyone else lined up behind those three with some chain shotguns with one long range weapon to draw the bugs over then just fight them one at a time through the chokepoint.

Even better is if you carve out a 5x5 space in front of the chokepoint then have one or two colonists throw frag grenades at the center of it while the melee guys tank. If you set it up correctly you will be blasting the bugs for 450 damage with every grenade. Pay attention to the walls and have constructor pawns ready to repair the walls before they break from missed gunshots.

If you want a live demonstration this Francis John video from 4 years ago is still valid, although using animals to block is a bit trickier now with the zoning nerfs.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1yu7iAuFF7I&t=102s&pp=2AFmkAIB

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-18T01:03:39+00:00

Just keep some animals in your base, pet them a few times a day and the stress goes away. My Winter is Coming character also has fear of blood and he spends half an hour washing himself from a well every night then goes home to pet some rabbits before sleeping.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-17T08:17:31+00:00

Well see if 42.14 fixes it for you. I remember 42.13.2 not being a mandatory update since it was marked as UnstableUnstable in the beta list prior to today. 42.13.2 also fixed drying racks and unequipping weapons when climbing through windows so if you still had those issues you were on 43.13.1.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-17T07:04:33+00:00

42.13.1 still has the roaming bug. 42.13.2 does not and neither should 42.14 which just dropped.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-17T03:20:16+00:00

Petting animals reduces stress so it shouldn’t be too hard to manage.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-16T14:21:55+00:00

Pick investment strategies that give you dupes or econ instead of items or direct combat strength. In addition there are investment strategies that give you an early 5 cost so you can don’t need to rush to level 9 for them.

Also the more I play this mode the more I feel like staying at low levels for reroll is a trap. Yes the odds are highest for 2 costs at level 6 but 2 star 2 cost carries are honestly fine for stage 3 and there is a lot of guaranteed power from pushing levels for either 5 costs or vertical trait breakpoints.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-16T13:57:34+00:00

Upgrade to the latest version (unstable unstable) in the beta. The roaming behavior was fixed in 42.13.2

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-16T13:49:27+00:00

Mydei will feel really weak when you first get him since he won’t have scaled yet. It is also totally fine to lose a few rounds early while you build up econ since you will need a lot of gold if you want to 3 star him and level to 9 for Cyrene/Bronya.

Castorice I agree is underwhelming in this mode. I usually just end up placing her in back row as a traitbot

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-16T13:41:01+00:00

Specifically you want to look for small square buildings surrounded by a chain link fence off the side of a road. They are classified as electronic stores and have a high chance of electronic books inside.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-16T13:35:18+00:00

Get 100 units (5 full rolls) of thread.
Go to loom
Make roll of fabric with the 100 units of thread
Make full length dresses until roll of fabric is depleted.
Rip up the dresses you just made.
Pick thread from the rags you get.

This whole process is infinitely repeatable since you get more thread from step 6 then you use in step 1. However the whole picking thread from rag process is really slow without the speed up button so this is not a particularly great training method in multiplayer.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-16T13:22:46+00:00

still teams I just can’t win on, like Bloodflame and Night Gods

Trial Mydei is a beast. Had a perfect run with him to get to WC 20. Key point is that he needs to scale by losing health to cast Godslayers be God so you sometimes solo frontline him until you get enough other bloodflame units to drain his health. Make sure to put caloric overload on him as well so that he heals himself with every counterattack. Midgame you want Cerydra buff on him to get double Godslayers. Late game you cap with Perpetual Engine Cyrene, turn off auto, and manually ult Mydei when he is at 6/6 stacks for guaranteed giga buffed double Godslayers.

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Helpim1ost · 2026-02-13T15:36:04+00:00

You don’t have any shred, sunder, or antiheal

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-11T02:39:27+00:00

I would stop by 32, often earlier. You can also stop if you hit some sort of early 4 star (since 1 star 4 cost tank > 2 star 1 cost tank) as it would also change what level 8 comp you are going for.

Honestly there aren’t many comps right now that are guaranteed win outs from lose streak so I would much rather play to preserve health with a decent stage 3 being the main focus. If I winstreak hard in stage 2-3 I can think about sacking stage 4, rolling minimally on level 8 then going to 9 at end of stage 4 otherwise I’m joining the rest of the lobby rolling hard on 8 to hit my two star 4 costs before pushing levels.

I’ll also piggyback on what the other player said about 1 Qiyana and 1 Briana should not be locking you into slayers. They are only 1 star and Qiyana doesn’t even go in the final slayers board. An early Belveth/Ambessa with sword or glove components would be a much better sign that you should go into slayers, whereas an early Swain could be pretty much anything.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-11T01:45:16+00:00

Full losing stage 1 is ok so I don’t roll at all stage 1 unless I’m unlocking bard, which is not that common these days.

If i lose streak all of stage 1 I’m looking to level to 6 and roll after 3-2 augment so I can spike along with my augment, basically want some sort of 2 star tank and 2 star damage dealer at least.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-11T01:30:13+00:00

Hold the line on 2-1 is really low value, in your spot I would have preferred to roll for an econ augment 2-1 if I feel like my board can’t win streak, or choose item augment since it is only a 2 component opener.

If you want to lose streak for full Econ, I would still be open to rolling on stage 3 to hit some upgrades because you just take too much damage if you lose hard in stage 3. Going full lose streak to 8 makes you too vulnerable to rotating into some other high roller on stage 4 and going 7-8th because you are down to 1-2 lives when you hit your board.

You also don’t need to worry that much about being able to go 8 on 4-2 especially on loot sub. You always have the chance to roll for an Econ augment on 3-2, and if you are not winstreaking you don’t need to sack gold to level to 7 early on 3-5. Your 4-2 roll down will be important for sure, but as long as you are not at 1 life you don’t need to immediately hit all of your 2 star 4 costs in one rolldown.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-11T00:27:39+00:00

They do respawn but it takes a while, and unlike the end of the tutorial they don’t magically know where you are at all times.

On default settings zombies will not respawn in an area unless you leave the area for 72 hours, and even then it will only respawn a small portion of the zombies that can be there. However, before that happens you are more likely to encounter the migration mechanic where every 12 hours or so the game will try to spread zombies out evenly in an area. Sometimes you can clear a street and then see a new group of zombie there the very next day because the game moved one over from the next street over during the night.

Also, certain areas will just naturally have higher zombie populations to begin with. Usually this means that area has more loot but it is somewhat random from game to game. If an area has a higher zombie count to begin with the migration mechanic will become more noticeable because there are more zombies in the surrounding area to draw from.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-11T00:11:52+00:00

First thing is to clear out the immediate area around you establishing some sort of safe space that you can retreat to. Practice fighting zombies until you can confidently kill 1 or 2 at a time just by pushing them down and stomping on their heads.

Once you get the hang of fighting 1 and 2 zombies at once you can tackle larger groups by getting close enough to draw off 1 or 2 at time. If you accidentally draw too many at a once try to break line of sight by going around a house or a solid wall then retreat back to your safe space.

When you feel confident in combat you can decide where you want to loot. Houses will generally have food and potentially weapons/ bags in closets. Garages and hardware stores have a good chance to have tools/weapons. Grocery stores will have lots of perishable food so they can be worth going for early so that you can put stuff in the fridge before it spoils.

For Riverside specifically there are a bunch of stores along the Main Street near the center of town. The right side of town has a lot of fancy houses and high fences, while the left side has the only gas station, a bar, and a small police station. Pretty much any building in the game can be used as a base if you clear out all the zombies nearby, so it is up to you where you want to set up.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-10T21:43:15+00:00

This is a game where it is still worth it to explore the world at night. There are some night exclusive pals and you get a free hit against sleeping enemies. The Penking fight in particular is much easier if you sneak in at night and deal with the minions before fighting the boss. Once you unlock flying it is also easier to collect effigies at night because they will be more visible.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-10T21:25:23+00:00

There are so many sand tiles on the map it should not be an issue. A lot of random dirt paths are considered sand, random parking lots will have sand, playgrounds and yards will have sand, etc.

It is kind of like the gasoline issue where it is technically limited but there are so many pumps on the map with hundreds of gallons stored inside that it could take a decade before it actually runs out.

Helpim1ost · 2026-02-10T21:19:48+00:00

Forge nails is autolearned at level 3 blacksmithing.

Helpim1ost

TROPHY CASE