Tips and Tricks

This page is aimed at providing players new to Fallout: FROST with **lore and story spoiler-free** **advice** easing survival in the world of FROST.

Trying to tackle FROST without prior experience in Fallout 4, especially in survival mode, is not advised.

## Blind start hints

FROST is hard, and even more-experienced players will struggle with the changes introduced. Here's a a few hints for new players who prefer to have a blind start:

* Do not force it. Become part of it and let go. You are still alive.
* Get used to being thirsty, hungry, irradiated, having a crippled limb, and living with disease or two.
* New recipes and perks can save lives, so check the crafting stations and the perk chart.
* Most anything can quite easily kill you. Pick your battles and remember that running away is often the better part of valor.
* You're not the only target in the Wasteland. Use hostility and terrain to your advantage.
* Don't drag gear around "for later". Store it, use it, or drop it. Now.
* If you start to get overly frustrated, pause the game and evaluate your options.

## Character creation

Character creation in FROST should not be handled the same as vanilla Fallout 4. To create a viable character capable of surviving in FROST's Commonwealth without imposing overly frustrating limits, new players should first familiarize themselves with the changes FROST introduces to the Fallout 4:

* Changes in Gameplay Mechanics
* FROST's changes to survival mode

* FROST's perk chart

For new players, initial SPECIAL statistics should probably aim at immediately increasing survivability rather than mid- or long-term goals with the first level ups used to obtain survival perks instead of increasing any particular SPECIAL statistic.

**The following sections try to give adivce on the impact of SPECIAL choices. They are not aimed at promoting a particular playstyle or at providing a character build.**

### Strength

As FROST drastically lowers the base carry weight, new players may be tempted to boost strength to high levels. While increasing carry weight in addition to unarmed and melee damage, FROST does provide mitigation for the lowered carry weight in the form of backpacks. Also, pocketed and deep pocketed gear is still available, albeit with a lowered carry weight benefit.

In addition, due to the changed damage modifiers, player characters will be capable of defending themselves against many hostiles using baseball bats, knives, or knuckles, even at lower strength levels.

### Perception

Considering the removal of NPC ticks from the player character's compass, perception might at first seem like a dump stat. But perception does gate some valuable perks like rifleman, locksmith or duck 'n cover while also improving V.A.T.S. accuracy.

Due to the fact that V.A.T.S. no longer protects from incoming damage, and criticals no longer increase damage, but merely guarantee a hit, raising perception for the sole purpose of improving V.A.T.S. in the early game is not advisable.

### Endurance

Given the changes to the damage modifiers, surviving a direct hit is often a matter of luck, especially with insufficient armor. Depending on the type of attacker, dying of poison or being crippled are real dangers.

As endurance does not benefit from player character level scaling, endurance may also seem like a dump stat candidate, if it weren't for the health pool reduction due to uncured radiation. As the player character is often very likely to take radiation damage from FROST-introduced sources, reducing endurance to a minimum can have very dire and frustrating consequences early game. The radiation cures that are more commonly available in the early game also damage health, so this SPECIAL stat should not be reduced to a minimum.

Also, endurance gates two of the potentially most important early game perks: Hunter and Lead Belly. Without the Hunter perk, survivors will not be able to retrieve meat from animal corpses, while Lead Belly cuts down radiation received from consumables.

### Charisma

It would seem, that charisma is a perfect candidate for a dump stat during character creation, and it is early game, unless the player character is female, and aims for the Black Widow perk. Lady Killer, the equivalent perk for male player characters is not nearly as effective, due to what probably is an oversight. Please see the known bugs page for more details.

Party Boy or Party Girl may seem tempting to obtain early on, as alcoholic beverages provide for substantial benefits like reducing rads and increasing sanity and players may want to avoid addiction and withdrawal penalties. With FROST putting considerable pressure on the player for sustaining their character, alcohol withdrawal will probably be one of the lesser challenges players will face early game. Also, available merchants will often sell Addictol at a base price of only 125 caps.

### Intelligence

The percentage gain to experience earned from higher intelligence is trumped by a single rank of the Idiot Savant perk, so intelligence may be used as a dump stat early game if luck is favoured instead. Players should keep in mind that FROST removes nearly all quests and their rewards, so gaining XP for leveling up relies almost entirely on other actions.

As many weapon modifications such as silencers or night vision scopes are available on looted weapons earlier on due to the changes introduced by FROST, Gun Nut is probably of less importance.

While Medic seems tempting for the increased effects of Stimpaks and RadAway, one of the main early game cures for radiation, Fungal Purge, has its damage scaled with the ranks of that perk, which may end up with players not having enough hit points left to cure radiation without being subsequently killed by the cure. See the known bugs page for more information on Fungal Purge scaling with the Medic perk.

Players aiming for a power armor build should be aware that the number of fusion cores available is limited, as they are not sold by any merchant. And while additional cores may be obtained from certain kinds of spawned hostiles, this resource still needs careful management.

### Agility

Since tanking damage in FROST is not a viable strategy early game, players will probably want to rely on their character to be able to sneak more efficiently, and in case of need ~~run like hell~~ strategically increase their distance from threats. Players should take note of the fact, that FROST will give a 20% bonus to sneaking at night, while penalizing sneaking for the same amount during the day.

Due to changed perks and game mechanics, only melee attacks seem to benefit from sneak attack damage multipliers, while all other weapons (including throwables) seem to only inflict normal damage, unless they are affected by the Mister Sandman perk.

### Luck

As criticals in FROST merely guarantee a hit without increase damaging unless Better Criticals is taken, Luck may become less relevant to some players. Low-intelligence characters may want to aim for Idiot Savant in the early game in order to compensate the decreased XP gain.

The increased chance for finding ammunition in containers when the Scrounger perk is taken may not be worth investing early on, as FROST reduces these chances, cutting them down to under half of those of the base game.

## Basic Survival

### Surface ambient radiation

The outside surface area of the Commonwealth is subject to constant ambient radiation. Survivors not wearing a proper gas mask will quickly receive considerable doses of radiation.

Only gas masks and power armor helmets will be able to neutralize this type of radiation. Even Hazmat suits, with the damaged variant being the only type available, will not protect the wearer from this hazard.

### Hunger, thirst, and sleep

The Survivor will need to eat and drink regularly as detailed on the survival mode page. Sleep deprivation, which can be temporarily countered with caffeinated drinks, will also impose penalties until a proper bed is used. Mattresses and sleeping bags will not allow a full rest.

Sleeping for at least seven hours will grant the Well Rested temporary perk, which increases strength and endurance by 2 points, while also giving a 10% bonus to XP earned. Additionally, sleeping in a bed will restore all hit points and cure all limb damage.

The most pressing needs will be food and drink to keep hunger and thirst at bay. See the consumables page for checking which consumables and to what degree they affect hunger and thirst.

Obtaining the Hunter perk should be a priority, as without it the Survivor will not be able to obtain meat from slain animals. This perk does not work retroactively, so animal corpses encountered shortly before obtaining the perk will not suddenly carry meat.

Any meat bags encountered should be searched, as they can provide "Strange Meat" most of which can be cooked into non-detrimental variants with sometimes excellent nourishment value.

Most uncooked food adds radiation, damages the Survivor's sanity, and increases the risk of catching an illness. Consequently, food should be cooked before consumption whenever possible to reduce or remove detrimental effects while adding beneficial ones.

Most recipes have been changed to require multiple pieces of meat for cooking instead of a single one, so obtaining the Wasteland Survival Guide #9, which doubles the meat extracted from animals and is still located at Sunshine Tidings will be beneficial.

A good source of nourishment are mutcrab omelettes composed of three Mutcrab eggs and two dirty water, as they are very lightweight and provide excellent food value. The eggs' defenders are small but quite deadly and will try to jump at the Survivor for poisoning them or crippling their limbs. A quick blow while sprinting towards them will take them out before they can attack, but using ranged weaponry or caltops is the safest option. Gear increasing poison resistance (like some types of gas masks) can greatly increase safety. Also, they do not seem to cope well with water, and will die after a while when exposed to it.

Excellent places for farming mutcrab eggs are Neponset Park and Cutler Bend, as their mutcrab inhabitants seem to be of extremely high fertility, and very frequently produce eggs. Both have cooking stations, so all that is needed is dirty water.

Bottles should never be scrapped, as they are required to bottle dirty water for boiling and can be filled with purified water available from the few remaining clean taps. Large quantities of bottles can be obtained from Beantown Brewery, which also has a cooking station and a source for dirty water nearby.

### Alcohol and chems

Bearing the risk of getting addicted, alcohol and chems can substantially ease a survivors life because of their fortifying effects. And while doctors and merchants are scarce, curing addictions is entirely possible if so desired.

While paying a doctor to cure addictions costs the Survivor 500 caps, the base price of Addictol is only 125 caps and it is often easier to find a merchant selling it than it is to find a doctor.

Alcohol will generally increase the Survivor's sanity, as will some chems. It is entirely possible to stay sane without the use of alcohol and chems, but collecting other sanity-increasing consumables can take quite some time and effort.

### Crafting

Crafting is an essential part of survival mode, and being familiar with some of the recipes will ease life for the Survivor, as they then know what to look for and what to keep instead of dragging dead weight around.

Survivors should remember that modifications can be removed from found gear and then applied to other gear even without having the perk(s) required for crafting said modifications. Improving gear this way is efficient, but some modifications are very hard to find or can not be found on existing gear at all and will require the respective perks for crafting. A notable example are deep pocketed modifications for armor.

The following table lists some cooking recipes the Survivor will probably more commonly use.

**Please see the crafting page for a full list of recipes and the consumables page for a full list of effects.**

### Sanity

Sanity is an additional mechanic to have to manage that was added in Frost. It is important to keep this variable in favorable numbers, especially for gun centric builds.

The player starts with 100 sanity points, which the amount of can be checked in the console by typing "player.getav aasanity", Various actions such as murder can decrease this stat and actions such as consuming certain chems and booze can regain your sanity.

When the player murders an adult npc it will decrease sanity by 2 points, and if you murder a child it will decrease sanity by 10, because what kind of a monster would murder an innocent child? Consuming certain chems such as jet will decrease sanity by 2 points. In your inventory, the chem's effect on your sanity will be displayed along with the other normal information when highlighted.

When the players sanity goes below 0, the player will go insane. You will no longer be able to control the spread on your guns and as such makes hitting shots with guns extremely difficult and basically making them useless. However, you will also get a 25% boost to sneaking, and melee weapons also get an increase in damage to balance out being insane. Your sanity will keep decreasing to negative numbers after going insane, which makes regaining sanity increasingly harder if the player doesn't make the effort to regain sanity, On top of this, vendor sell prices will plummet and buy prices will skyrocket incredibly.

### Loot and safe storage

Survivors can find comparatively high-quality gear early on, but food, drink, and ammunition will be scarce. It is advisable to always favor food and drink over gear, or at last consume food and drink instead of dropping it if carry weight becomes an issue.

The drastically lowered carry weight will require careful inventory management, with a very strong focus on weight to usefulness ratio. Survivors should quickly learn to let go of items. A found weapon is nothing more than dead weight if it does not have any desirable modifications, or if it requires ammunition which is not readily available.

Survivors should also be aware that while more protective armor can increase survivability, most hostiles will still be able to kill or at least cripple the wearer with very few hits.

Also, heavier armor increases the chances of being noticed. Hostile inhabitants of the Commonwealth will attack if the Survivor is noticed and consume their ammunition and throwables in the process.

Inventory management should be done on the spot. Having a detrimental effect kick in and subsequently being overencumbered mid-combat can be deadly.

Since corpses may quickly disappear, picking up desired loot and dropping it to the ground often is a viable way for preserving desired items for a period of time. Also, while tedious and potentially dangerous, items can be held in the air front of the Survivor and carried to safe storage at normal walking speeds.

Crafting benches are generally safe to store any loot, unless they are located in an owned settlement. Hungry settlers are prone to consume any food and drink stored or pick up armor and weaponry in case of attack. Any other storage might get cleaned out and have its contents replaced.

Note: Holding the 'E' key will make the player character carry an item or a stack of items in front of them. Once picked up, the 'E' key can be released. Pressing 'E' again will drop the item(s). The held item(s) can be thrown using the 'R' key.

## Settlements And Friendly Survivors

### Downtown

Downtown is an important story location and pivotal milestone in your journey. It has many different entrances and ways of getting into it, and links up to all the most important areas of the underground and has several helpful services to spend your hard salvaged cash on. If you wish to see more detailed information with spoilers, see the Downtown article,

### Doctors and Merchants

In a few select areas, you will find friendly merchants and doctors willing to trade their items and services to you for cash. The prices are very high, but they are a safe and reliable way of getting quality chems and weapons without having to put in the dangerous effort of scavenging and killing for them yourself.

### Locations with friendly Survivors

Some locations have friendly survivors who will not attack the sole survivor and will even talk to them. They are usually in important locations with lots of supplies around them, although taking them may count as stealing.

## Lowering Difficulty

FROST is intended to be played in survival mode, which can impose a significant amount of frustration not only due to the added hunger, thirst, disease, and sleep deprivation, but also because saving the game requires the player character to find a place to sleep.

Changing the game mode to something else than survival might help newer players to gather experience before starting a game in survival mode.

Additionally, there are a number of mods available to ease gameplay in survival mode. See the Mods for FROST page for details.

## Progressing the Story

While playing Frost, it can be easy to be confused as to what to do next. It is important to search all the bodies you kill and the containers you pass for things like notes and journals. Most of these are simple short stories and mood setting, but several give critical hints as to how to progress, such as dropping important location names you should seek out or check more thoroughly for clues. Some clues can also be found through things such as loading screen hints when you have low sanity. Of course, good old fashioned exploring is also a good way to find out what to do next. Important places from vanilla Fallout 4's story are also good places to check, although many are simply blocked off or barren.

If you are REALLY having too hard of a time, you could try to get help from Google or the FROST Discord Server, but where's the fun in that?