Mastodawn

ladyteruki Jun 3

Everything was going well. Everything was going so well ! Everything was going TOO well...
My latest run was really good. Found a functioning truck within two days, drove all the way to my base spot, didn't crash the f*cking truck by the way, secured the base spot, started scavenging for important stuff (additional fridges/generators/water coolers...), packed food from the nearby egg factory, looted the gardening center and the car repair factory...

I was on a f*cking roll !

ladyteruki Jun 3

Every time I had a setback, which did happen, I recovered. I found decent gear, I organized my storage, I was ON IT.

And then, it happened. Because of course, something was gonna happen.

ladyteruki Jun 3

See, I found a trailer at a nearby farm, and decided I was going to try and use it. I've never had a trailer before but I've seen the videos, I know how they work.

I approached the trailer with the back of my truck. Slowly, to not ram into the truck.
I had to do it at an angle, but I didn't damage anything.
I turned off the truck's engine.
I used "V" and attached the trailer to the truck.

ladyteruki Jun 3

AND THAT'S WHEN THE TRAILER DECIDED TO START FLYING, TAKING MY TRUCK WITH IT, AND LANDED ON THE FARM'S ROOF.

So, first bug with my arrr🏴‍☠️ version of build 42 (which is itself unstable).
Fine. I'll go do the dishes.

ladyteruki Jun 4

At the risk of tempting fate... NEW PERSONAL BEST !
...and counting. For now. But given that the electricity was just shut off, a lot of things are going to be more complicated now.

ladyteruki Jun 5

Jeanie had a f*cking good run. The best one so far, in fact.
But it had to come to an end...

#ProjectZomboid

ladyteruki Jun 5

My base was STACKED. All my shelves were full and I had 7 fridges running, each full of food (although admittedly I didn't have shelves for canned food, so they were in the fridge too). Electricity shut off ? No problem, had 3 generators. Water shut off ? No problem, I had just filled a barrel of clean water (complete happenstance : I filled it right before the water shut off, which is a randomly timed event). Need to loot a farm with a garage full of goodies ? No problem, just found a trailer.

ladyteruki Jun 5

Honestly I was doing pretty well. When the zombies got me (and in my defense, there were 6 of them in a tiny trailer with what looked like party hats), I had just leveled up in fishing, maintenance and foraging the night before. I'm so getting the hang of this !

ladyteruki Jun 5

Granted, I've come to understand something I didn't know at first, which is that "Builder mode" is code for "Noob-a** b*tch easy level", so this is clearly not as hard as it can get. But given how I've progressed in the past month, at some point I should be able to try my hand at the Apocalypse mode (...in hindsight, I could have guessed THAT was the hardest difficulty XD ). Or I can choose to play Builder for however long as I f*cking want, of course, but I might give it a try at least once.

ladyteruki Jun 5

By the way, I did the math real quick and...
...With at least 5 characters surviving a lifespan of 20 ingame days, in which 1 ingame day is 1 IRL hour, plus some shorter lives (especially in the begining) for some characters here and there, it's very likely that I went over 100 hours since I've picked up the game.
So whenever I can finally buy the game, let's all remember that Steam's data will only tell PART of my love story with #ProjectZomboid XD

ladyteruki Jun 6

Extremely grateful to @ham_sando for their generous donation which allows me to do this !!!
IT'S HAPPENIIIIIIIING !

#ProjectZomboid

ladyteruki Jun 6

So far it's not going great XD

My first official character was turned into flesh ribbons by zombies. The second one was... well, in a way I got extra lucky because there was only a 7% chance for me to get that result XD

https://pzwiki.net/wiki/Knox_Infection

ladyteruki Jun 7

That's too bad because the second character found a golf bag within five minutes, with 4 golf clubs in it !
And the golf bag was purple !

I really thought things were going my way, instead I exhausted all my good luck on a bag XD

ladyteruki Jun 7

Ok, file this under lesson learned, but the warehouse full of food ? The game starts on July 9th and when I got to the warehouse the next day (at the expense of other early game choices...), 99% of the food there was already rotten.
I will no longer focus my energy on that damn warehouse, I think XD

ladyteruki Jun 7

By the way, THIS is precisely what I love about survival games. You die and die and die, until you find something that works. And every choice no matter how small matters.

For instance I chose to drive as fast as possible to the food warehouse and crashed my vehicle into a tree by not taking sharp enough of a turn... well now either I find another one (except this one could really carry a lot of stuff in the back) or I learn mechanics to fix it up, otherwise this is going to doom me.

ladyteruki Jun 7

There is no way this damaged vehicle doesn't refuse to start at the worst possible moment, for instance (I'm gonna stay away from busy cities until I have a better solution, trust me). Considering my chosen base spot is a little bit in the middle of nowhere, I absolutely need a functioning vehicle for my loot runs, so this is absolutely devastating. ONE MEASLY TREE ! God I love survival games.

ladyteruki Jun 7

This week it was the birthday of my oldest friend (sorry, I mean I've known him the longest, not that he's particularly old XD ), and I was talking about both ARK and Project Zomboid, and he said : "Oh, you like survival games* ? I've been playing a game you might like"

* I am worried I haven't been annoying enough about survival games if he has to ask

ladyteruki Jun 7

And he recommends... this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clair_Obscur:_Expedition_33

Which is very much not a survival game.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - Wikipedia

ladyteruki Jun 7

(you'll also notice its tragic lack of dinosaurs)

ladyteruki Jun 7

My character arrived in the middle of the night on Day 2 at the base spot. She was exhausted but I took the time to open each room to make sure there was no Zed anywhere, spent some extra time putting all the food away in the freezer, washed her clothes & her face, and went to bed around 1am. We'll sort the rest later.
Alarm clock rings at 5:40am to not miss the Life & Living TV show (it levels up some skills !), she watches TV with a bowl of cereal then goes out...

...only to find this :

ladyteruki Jun 7

ladyteruki Jun 7

I think the Zed splattered in the middle of the road was actually something I ran into with the van last night XD I never switch on the headlights if I can avoid it, so it's very possible I didn't notice it at the time.

ladyteruki Jun 7

I'm afraid of unpausing XD

ladyteruki Jun 7

Ok I got 4 of them. I take breaks because that sh*t is bad for my anxiety XD

ladyteruki Jun 7

...The next 3 got me. Well. That was to be expected...

ladyteruki Jun 7

I'm easily amused XD

ladyteruki Jun 8

Casually browsing mods like I'm window shopping : "Hm, maybe... definitely yes for later... absolutely mark it as a must have... haha nope..." like I haven't been playing that game for only a month XD

ladyteruki Jun 8

But the odds are, if there's a mod that improves even marginally the UI, I'm going to subscribe to it sooner or later XD

ladyteruki Jun 8

O_o
Look what is parked in the back of my (currently) favorite base spot in a new save !!! And I made it here on July 9th !
I just HAVE to survive in this run :P Sure, there's only one gas pump working, but I get to drive AN AMBULANCE !!!

ladyteruki Jun 8

THE KEYS ARE ON THE IGNITION ! What are the odds of me being that lucky *and* lasting in this save ?

ladyteruki Jun 8

Aaaand there's a large trauma bag to replace my small backpack ! On top of some medical supplies, of course...
I can't believe my luck.

ladyteruki Jun 8

The basement door is locked this time, so I'm going to have to find some welding stuff to force it open and who knows what's down there, but other than that no Zed in sight. This looks like the best possible start I could hope for. I'm going to gently log off and step away from the computer, because at 4am there are SO MANY WAYS I could mess it up XD

ladyteruki Jun 8

On my way to the base, I drove past Ovo Farms and it looked like they had AT LEAST a truck parked in the front. They've had a trailer parked near the house in the back a couple of times too, so I like my odds. Either way, tomorrow I go get me some fresh eggs first thing, and load up on fridges from the farm to store them, and I'll be set for food for a solid two weeks.
I like that there's a plan, now :) I have the beginning down to a science...
...
...when I don't mess it up.

ladyteruki Jun 8

You know the fun thing about this whole falling in live with Project Zomboid thing ? Supposedly the building mechanics are pretty deep, but I haven't built a single thing yet (other than relocating furniture). Normally that's the reason I stick with a game no matter how anxious it makes me BECAUSE of the building gameplay. It certainly was a huge part of why I stuck with ARK in the beginning (that and prehistoric creatures, obviously). But here that's not even what keeps me hooked !

ladyteruki Jun 8

...Don't get me wrong. I *will* build at some point. But probably not for dozens of hours because that's such a long term goal (and I still die so easily).
It's fascinating how I shouldn't like this game and yet am completely in love with it. Haven't built a thing. Tragic lack of dinosaurs. Full of anxiety. And yet here I am !

It's so interesting I could talk about it for hours. But I will spare you.

ladyteruki Jun 8

I do have to say, I hate the UI though. The fact that I can't display my health AND my skills at the same time, for instance. How the minimap is so vital but always in the way somehow. How you have to hover everything to know essential data instead of, like, having an optional column in inventories for weight or durability. How you can't filter foods by status (it's so needlessly slow to select each rotten or stale item).
Some of this might be settings I haven't found yet. The rest MUST be mods.

ladyteruki Jun 8

Nevermind Ovo Farms' parking lot, there's a trailer parked on the lawn right in front of the laundromat across the street XD

ladyteruki Jun 8

Ok that's just not fair, I just found my THIRD generator in the wild (...in the garage at the back of Ovo Farms). This run is going waaaaay too well.
I'm going to die horribly, aren't I ?

ladyteruki Jun 8

This should not be happening ON DAY 5 ! Three fully functional generators with a tank full...
Things are going to become tragic soon, I can feel it.

ladyteruki Jun 8

Note that my kitchen is also packed with fridges already, also on Day 5. Like, ok they're not all full at the moment (and those that are actually have it all in the freezer), but still.
I am the queen of preppers XD

Well, we all knew this was gonna happen.
I got bit while on a trip to Rosewood's book store.
9 days.

ladyteruki Jun 10

Sure, because God knows there isn't a lot to deal with already, we have to mod stuff like that on top of it XD

(this is a community of masochists and I feel at home)

ladyteruki Jun 10

"I'm not going to download mods just yet, I'm just favoriting them for later"

There is no way this ends with 712 pages of favorited mods, right ? RIGHT ?

ladyteruki Jun 10

I love reading mod descriptions because it teaches me so much about the game. For instance I have been dutifully collecting napkins in every of my saves, thinking "that has to be useful at some point" (we have established I'm of the Just In Case school of thought, yes ?), and I just learned that there's a mod that gives them a use.
Alrighty then XD

ladyteruki Jun 10

No but let's stop for a minute to consider this : Project Zomboid has SO MUCH STUFF GOING ON, and so many items, that this game can afford to have items that have no use. Just for immersion and messing with new players, I guess XD
*cough ARK could never cough*

ladyteruki Jun 10

As a noob in this game, I do wish sometimes it could be easier to see what an item is useful for when I loot it. Sometimes it's very hard to decide what to leave behind without that information !
But that's probably something I won't need as much in the long run.

ladyteruki Jun 10

(who are we kidding, I'm a loot goblin : it's hard to leave stuff behind ANYWAY)

ladyteruki Jun 10

In my second to last save, I died horribly because I absolutely wanted to take back a certain number of wooden sticks and handles back to my truck.
Do I have use for wooden sticks and handles at the moment ? Absolutely not.
Was I going to leave the 3 wooden sticks and 2 handles in the garage where I found them ? Also absolutely not.

ladyteruki Jun 10

I am constantly overburdened in this game. I think the first mod I'll install, if I find it, is a mod that allows me to carry 5 bags at the same time and still be able to hop over a tall fence XD

ladyteruki Jun 10

See ? Something else that I'm learning.
That actually explains a lot XD

ladyteruki Jun 10

Oh sh*t there's been a game update earlier today ! I was wondering why my game was taking so long to launch... there's a new game version on the 42 unstable branch XD
(I have played no other)

ladyteruki Jun 10

I have issues with the PZ wiki, honestly. As a new player it oftentimes isn't helpful at all.

Like, I'm trying to see how food illness works, to see if it's worth taking the Weak Stomach trait.

No problem, I'll just check the "Weak Stomach" page :

https://pzwiki.net/wiki/Weak_Stomach

Uh oh, it doesn't say what it makes me more prone to, and instead advises to check the "Health" page. Fine, I'll do that.

https://pzwiki.net/wiki/Health

ladyteruki Jun 10

Uh oh, it doesn't say. There's only a table for the DURATION of food illness, not the causes.

ladyteruki Jun 10

Fine, let's try something else and look at the page for "Cooking" :

https://pzwiki.net/wiki/Cooking

Nope, nothing.
Maybe over at "Sick" ?

https://pzwiki.net/wiki/Sick

Still no luck. It mentions food poisoning, but not the causes.

ladyteruki Jun 10

So what's a noob supposed to do ?

ladyteruki Jun 10

And look, eventually I'll find out. Either by playing and dying to food sickness, which will inform what not to do for next time, or by accidentally finding that information when I no longer look for it, for instance when I'll be browsing mods or watching gameplay videos.
But isn't that what a videogame's wiki is supposed to be for ?

ladyteruki Jun 11

VERY surprised that noone has attempted to implement dinosaurs. Yet ?
Being chased by Raptors in the streets of Muldraugh would be pretty funny ! Or raising a herd of Trikes for their meat, based on the code of B42's animals...

Am I the only one who can picture this ?

ladyteruki Jun 12

We all knew that would happen, there it is : I'm using my first Project Zomboid mod ever.
For now it's just a very simple mod that allows me to have additional icons for when I write something on my map. But we all know this is the beginning of a modlist that's going to grow exponentially over time :P

ladyteruki Jun 14

Me : "Ow my back 😣 I'm in so much pain on top of everything else... I think I'll go lie down in the bedroom for a bit. As long as I make sure I don't fall asleep at 8pm !!"
Youtube : "Ok how about a great guide to optimize your odds of eventually building a base in Project Zomboid ?"
Me : "Noooo ! Now I want to go back to the computer and play, it involves sitting ! 😭 "

I don't think there's a way for me to come out on the other side of today without frustration.
And pain. So much f*cking pain.

ladyteruki Jun 14

And yeah, I said "odds". Because it is far from being a given, even for experienced players. In other games I have to worry about design and maybe resources, but PZ's crafting system adds a lot of complexity...

https://youtu.be/r1ODdjDmeV4

Ultimate Project Zomboid Base Building Guide

YouTube

ladyteruki Jun 16

New character.
I choose to start in Riverside, and luck out by spawning in the trailer park.
I cross the road to get to the Lectrolux parking lot.
I try the first parked truck I see. It's unlocked.
I check the trunk & glove box. I find the key.
I put the key in the ignition. Half a tank of fuel.
I check the trunk's capacity. 115 units, one of the best I could hope for.
I drive the truck across the road to the gas station, and finish filling the tank.
I grab some food at the gas station's store -

@ladyteruki this is the most frustrating thing. When you start to do more crafting and you realise some piece of junk you saw in a house two hours ago is needed to craft. Good luck trying to find it ever again 😭

Challis2070 Jun 10

@ladyteruki Sounds like something I would add to a game.

I mean, totally not me, having added food to Stardew Valley specifically because I wanted it to be used in recipes...(I mean, like, add fruitcake to use fruit that wasn't used elsewhere).

ladyteruki Jun 10

@Challis2070 : this mod has tons of different small things it makes playable instead of just "junk"/"decorative" vanilla stuff. There's a popcorn machine in the game, and in the beginning I tried for 1 ingame hour to make it work, and couldn't. Turns out ? You need this mod XD
I get the food part so so much. I love cooking in games ! In PZ you can make stews and roasts with pretty much any ingredient (as long as it's not frozen... well you can defrost it), it's fun !

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3042138819

Steam Workshop::Functional Appliances 2

@ladyteruki Just got mine published for B42!

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3133520800

Managed to get the battery shelf working.

Steam Workshop::Veracious Network's Garage

ladyteruki Jun 10

@cdp1337 : nice work !