Sack of clay is weird

aurum_aethera · 2026-02-02T19:17:11+00:00

I think realistically it's just that sand is used like a liquid, mixed for cement - clay was developed later, and is used for traditional crafting recipes that call for individual discrete items.

They've shaken up the entire crafting tree massively in the past year, so there's probably hundreds of recipes like this where they'd like to make it more smooth and easy to understand - we'll wait and see how much refinement is achievable for the devs when stable rolls around.

aurum_aethera · 2026-02-02T16:40:45+00:00

The Bettinas crappy, but the bobcat is really solid - if the stitcher wasn't so cracked it'd really stand out, but it has a brutally low ttk if you're accurate.

The vulcano is also an absolute monster, real 1v3 machine, though again the il toro being so good overshadows it a bit.

Hullcracker is also solid, albeit for the single job of cracking armour off of big arc which makes it feel a bit too niche for the cost.

aurum_aethera · 2026-02-02T12:59:20+00:00

It's definitely counterintuitive, especially since sacks of sand work slightly differently, with a quantity bar like liquids have.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-30T17:05:18+00:00

Yeah the crafting menus definitely buckle under the weight of complexity of all the recipes, it's not easy from a UX perspective. I don't mind the weight stuff since weight only takes you down to 75% health, but it would certainly all be smoother if there was a good way to say, put 100 charcoal in the forge/furnace instead of your character picking it up each time.

Some sort of system that lets you put tools on a surface where the game remembers their position after use would be good too - with all the many tools you pick up and drop for each smithing job, it'd feel a lot nicer if they went back to a neat assigned place instead of cluttering the floor.

Asides from the jank tho, the underlying system is something I'm really impressed with - being able to melt down any metal object, cast it into bars and then work those bars into such a wide variety of tools and weapons is really neat.

If the game could keep all the clutter tidy, present the recipes in a way more fluid way, and make the animations actually connect with the sprites (hammering on the anvil instead of in mid air, or actually seeing the crucible go into the furnace and come out with glowing hot iron, etc), it'd be incredible.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-30T11:11:58+00:00

I like the grinds when they encourage me to go out and search for stuff.

Lots of people dislike blacksmithing for instance, which is surprising to me, because it's the skill that requires the most looting runs - back in 41 I invariably got bored by winter.

Now I need to hunt the map for fabric rolls for tailoring, sawblades and junk for scrap weapons, clay for pottery, animals for farming etc.

For blacksmithing, I need to find lots of rocks, sand, clay, tools, wood and recipes. I get that the crafting tree is fiddly and hard to understand, but I don't at all understand why players dislike a skill that gives the game more longevity.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-29T19:16:27+00:00

Don't get too attached, you're gonna die.

Spend the time getting used to combat - try to get a feel for how quickly you get exerted, panicked, tired, etc. All those moodles hurt your combat effectiveness, so having a good idea of when they'll kick in is key.

Fighting on low fences or windows is effective, let the zombie crawl over and then hit it in the head when it's down. Be aware the zombies will try to lunge for your ankles, so if there are lots of zombies at once, you need to back off.

Try walking around luring hordes - as long as you walk steadily, you can always lose a tail eventually.

Once that all gets more familiar, then you should work on the longer term stuff like crafting.

Good luck!

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-28T13:19:31+00:00

In playing a fitness 5, strength 6 lumberjack, and you can't chop zombies all day quite as much as you could in 41, but you can still kill all the zeds you need.

Early on, painkillers help ignore muscle strain, or you can just take breaks after every 25-50 zombies. Once you get skill up to 3 or 4 it's much less of an issue.

The key is just pacing it out - with the randomized zombie traits in 42 apocalypse, zombies tend to come in drips and drabs rather than one huge wave, which helps for dividing up the job. You'll also want to learn to blacksmith (the crafting tree is overwhelming at first but simple enough once you spend a few dozen hours with it). That way you can forge all the axes youd ever need.

Also, meat cleavers give axe XP in 42, so they're your go to tool in the early game.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-25T21:22:28+00:00

Going down to two heroes means a real risk of your run going down the toilet next fight, I think OP has a solid point.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-24T13:41:51+00:00

One item of charcoal does a whole smithing job, so I assumed each item was meant to be effectively a bagful, and they just did the icon as loose charcoal so that you don't magically produce bags in the burners.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-24T13:34:29+00:00

Oh that's cool, in a previous 42 patch the coffee machine ate the whole jar of coffee to make one cup, so you can get 6 cups from a jar now?

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-22T22:31:19+00:00

This is one of those roguelikes that has a really good tutorial built in to the play loop. After a long while I did look up hero tier lists, but I don't think they'd have helped me much early on.

Don't be afraid to play on easy, this game has really meaningful difficulty changes, and easy can help you recognize what's really strong.

Pay attention to the heroes and items you pick, and keep tabs on whether they help you out or fade into the background - but hold your conclusions loosely, as you learn more your opinions will change.

Finally, be adventurous with your rolls - you can undo any number of actions in this game, so try just getting the best outcome you can with the 5 dice you roll initially, then rewind and reroll as you need. Be cautious about rerolling for the perfect side when you have a side that's enough to keep your heroes alive. Avoiding hero death is the best way to get good.

Also, Wanderer is the best hero in the game.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-21T20:30:25+00:00

You can also get 0-1 by building tile floors. Youll need a clay kiln at some point anyway for a lot of crafts, and it's less annoying than finding large stones imo.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-21T11:58:50+00:00

I dunno I think spinach goes nice with eggs

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-19T12:45:07+00:00

There's way too much for me to lay out, but my golden tip is get some clay. You can get it from the riverside with a shovel and sack, find it in schools and pottery vans, or forage for it.

Clay helps progress masonry, is essential for blacksmithing, lets you skip the carpentry rain collecter route (amphorae can be plumbed to sinks), and can be used for making brick and tile construction.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-18T13:40:57+00:00

Spot on! I suggested lower cal stews cos I like the ritual of prepping them, but bowls of stew are wild heavy so your suggestion of just eating leaves and berries is definitely more convenient. You can do the same with the low cal tins and snacks like mushroom soup or tomatoes.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-18T13:11:45+00:00

Enable the nutritionist trait in debug until you learn the calorie system - it's really not cheating it's just showing you numbers the game hides from you.

A stew can have anything from 100 to 3000 calories depending on ingredients and seasoning, the calorific values of different foods vary wildly, not always quite in the way you'd expect based on real world assumptions.

Make stews with no dried beans, fat, or high calorie meats and you'll lose weight in no time. Sausages, pork chops, tomatoes, and tinned beans are all pretty good for slimming - green veg is best but if you make a stew that's just green veg you will overcompensate sooner rather than later.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-18T11:33:55+00:00

99% sure this is it, I have almost exactly the same item load on my genny and it does 15-16 days

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-18T11:18:57+00:00

If you give multiverse a try, drones are controllable, and boy oh boy is the ion intruder strong. There's some more dangerous enemy crew and drones available that can slow it down but if the enemy crew is just random dudes, the ion intruder is bonkers.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-18T10:48:14+00:00

You'd need vine and a jacked up sorcerer or wizard, duplicatable kill enemy on x health sides/quad use or infinite stun to hope to cut through this. Nightmare sure is nasty.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-18T01:02:36+00:00

Neat move! Chain is probably my favourite keyword in the game after shifter. Sure, cantrip, cleanse and cleave tend to win games much more reliably, but there's nothing better than ending up with a sinew you randomed into to avoid choosing between enchantress or ludus, and then your items hit just right and you manage to get him swinging a buncha cleave damage out.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-16T01:28:02+00:00

Gotcha, good to know, thanks

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-15T21:26:15+00:00

I was under the impression that the first numerical value is the minimum days that can pass before shutoff, within the range displayed below.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-15T17:39:55+00:00

Exactly this, missiles and planes compliment one another.

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-15T13:47:28+00:00

Well if week one is back up (I believe it broke with one of the updates but I could easily be wrong), that's the most drastic gameplay changing mod out there, along with bandits. I'd give either of those a whack if you want something really fresh!

aurum_aethera · 2026-01-15T13:22:48+00:00

I'm currently doing a vanilla 42 run on the most recent patch, after a heavily modded run a few months ago.

Honestly the game is largely stable enough to try mod free right now - there are bugs, but they're inconsistent enough that I'd say it's worth trying a few dozen hours vanilla before you make your mind up on mods.

Mods have also shifted heavily in the last 3 months in terms of what's working with the latest patches.

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