How to Survive Your First Night in Stillskin Forest
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How do you survive the first night in Stillskin Forest?
Use Day 1 to collect a melee weapon, some food and a First Aid Kit, and stay near your squad. Before dusk ends, get inside a building you know and close the doors. At night, walk rather than sprint near calm infected, keep your headlamp off when you don't need it, fight single infected with melee, and run or hide from groups. Night 1 is always a normal night, never a special one.
Day 1 checklist
- Grab a melee weapon. The Baseball Bat and Machete are quiet and never need ammunition.
- Pick up any food. Each snack heals 25% and identical snacks stack in one slot.
- A First Aid Kit heals 75%. Keep one for emergencies.
- Note where the hide spots are: lockers in the hospital, wardrobes in houses, the alley dumpster. See Hiding.
- Head back toward your squad before dusk.
When dusk comes
Dusk gives you 40 seconds. Get inside, close the doors (the infected cannot open them and need eight hits to bash one in), and agree on a fallback route. Night 1 starts with around 45 infected spread across the map.
During the night
- Walk near calm infected. Sprinting is audible from 30 studs; walking is quiet. Crouching is quieter still. See Detection and noise.
- Mind your headlamp. At night a lit lamp lets the infected spot you from 1.25× further; with it off they see only 0.8× as far. See Headlamp.
- Melee singles, avoid groups. Only two infected can swing at you in any 1.6-second window, but a crowd will still pin you.
- Shoot only when you must. A pistol shot pulls in every infected within 90 studs; the shotgun, 120.
- Break line of sight to end a chase. Chases end after about 22 seconds, or once you get 85 studs clear.
If it goes wrong
If you go down you have 20 seconds; a teammate holds E for 3 seconds to bring you back at 35% health. If no one can reach you, you will become a ghost and can keep watching. See Downed and revive.