Expedition planning in Die2Nite

What is important when planning an expedition in Die2Nite?

Expeditions that take you far from your town take quit a lot of planning and resources. How do I maximise the returns of my expeditions?

I know that the fields near to a town are depleted very rapidly, but how far should I try to go with an expedition? How important is it to find buildings on the way?

For now, I've had everyone stay on the furthest square we went for the night and dig a bit. This doesn't seem efficient to me as we deplete a field pretty rapidly with a few people. How can we do that better?

Solution 1:

Expeditions is a very important part of D2N:

• It allows people, not to get trapped by zombies, and not have to waste AP, to go rescue them.
• It allows for more communication, so not everyone runs off to the first undepleted zone
• And, it allows for way better planing of a route, than on the town forums.

The most important things to do, while planning an expedition is:

Be aware of zombie counts, NEVER go in to zones, you cant get back from. If you're unsure how many zombies there are in the zone, either have a large enough group of people, or have a Scout (Hero type) to scout out the zones you are going to.

Always try to maximize the route you are going, by going through as many undepleted zones as possible. And, always have a list of what resources you need to most that day. Only bring back the most scarce resources.

The point of expeditions, is to deplete the most zones you can. Always try to go as far out of town as possible, so you can let those lone scavengers, to take the zones that are more safe, and closer to the town.

If you find yourself with zones that have huge amount of zombies, bring some weapons, and start killing them. (NOTE: This will be much easier accomplished, if you have Plumbing built. Which allows you to refill water weapons for free.)

I will also recommend building, and upgrading the Watchtower two levels, as it will give you the exact number of zombies six zones off the town. This makes expeditions a lot easier to plan, and execute.

As stated, you find yourself depleting a zone too fast. This can be solved, by making a group, of active and flexible people. Start by going out right after the attack, and stop at the first undepleted zone, and dig until its depleted, then move on the next zone. If possible, you can even split the group up (Not recommended, unless there is no zombies in the zones you are going to, as weapons take up much inventory space.), and get more searches done, when you sleep.

I would say that the most important thing of expeditions, is communication. Always communicate with your group, the best you can. Either over a chat room, messenger or whatever works for you and your group. Always try to stick to a zone, until it's depleted, and then move on to the next zone. With a flexible group, you should be able to deplete the entire rout for your expedition.

As for buildings, they are very important to find, as there are only ten buildings on the map, and these contains the most scarce resources. If you have a Scout in your town, you should always let them try to scout out the buildings, as you never know how much zombies are there.

Solution 2:

This doesn't seem efficient to me as we deplete a field pretty rapidly with a few people.

It seems to me the primary benefit of the expeditions is the fact that you can rapidly search an area and move on without having to spend many hours on auto search. This allows you to get much needed resources back to town earlier so people can start on the more important projects.

Also, it lets you move through zones you normally wouldn't be able to without wasting valuable water (should be used for AP whenever possible). On top of that, expeditions saves your town the trouble of wasting even more AP having to rescue stranded people.

Overall, a well organized expedition can probably save many hours and valuable AP.

As for expedition planning, depending on the distance required and food/water supply, I would recommend 1 food item and 1 water item for everyone in the expedition (and at a minimum 1-2 weapons spread across the entire party). This allows you to venture out up to 9 squares. If your party finds lots of items early on, however, you can always choose to create a small cache and drop the loot there to be gathered later, or just return to town and save either the water or the food item.