Chapter 03 · First HoursFM 93-07
First Hours
Knox County still wants you dead. The Network wants you busy. Do the first job well enough that the second one is optional.
// FROM THE FILES — FIRST LIGHT
People died the first morning because they founded a nation on an empty stomach. Eat. Find a door that closes. Look twice at anyone still walking. The charter can wait until you have a reason.
0. Character creation is a career, not a costume
The old occupations are still on the sheet. The Network adds twelve more, each tied to a workshop. The expensive starts — Sysop, E-Waste Recycler, Gunsmith — are expensive because they skip a week of finding magazines. The cheap starts still eat. Open the Occupations roster and then the leaf for the life you intend to lead before you walk out. You will live with this person.
1. The first thirty minutes are still Knox County
- Hear before you see. Headphones. The moan around the corner is more honest than the minimap.
- Water, a bag, a weapon that is not your fists. A rolling pin beats a shotgun you cannot feed.
- Do not fight in the street. Pull one. Close a door. The Network does not change the fact that three is a crowd.
- Read the moodles. Panic, exhaustion, and a scratch are the same three horsemen they always were.
- Look at people twice. Not every figure on the road is dead. If it has a nametag of its own, see Other Survivors before you swing.
2. Learn the overlay before you found anything
Right-click the world. Show Territory Overlay and Show RZSN Map Markers should stay on until you know the county by heart. Existing settlements draw as outlines — yours in one colour, theirs in another. Vendor stalls pin. Events pin at the precision the announcement allowed, and not a tile more.
Walking into a claim prints Entering [name] across the top of the screen. Walking out prints the other thing. If you intend to build, you want that toast. Building in a foreign claim is how you donate lumber to a stranger.
3. A starter loop that does not get you killed
Hours 0–6
- Secure a house on the edge of a town, not the main street.
- Bag, water bottle, canned food, a melee you can recover.
- Watch the event tracker. An air drop on day one is a fight, not a gift.
- If you meet a wanderer, talk before you hire. Standing starts at zero.
Day 2–3
- Find the skill book or magazine for your workshop. They still sit in the houses, the stores, the gloveboxes.
- Craft the Settlement Charter only when you have a reason — a well, a road, a friend.
- Do not plant on someone else’s boarded windows. Net Control will refuse you for foreign construction.
// DAY ONE TRAFFIC
[AIR DROP] Signal intercepted — Sector D7.
That is Encrypted. You know a name, not a pin. Drive toward the name if you have a car and a death wish. Walk if you have friends. Stay home if you have sense.
The crate is locked until someone finishes the breach. The breach is the ambush window. First lockpick is a job posting for every rifle in earshot.
4. When to plant the flag
A settlement is not a bed. It is a legal fact: a radius (default 20 tiles, a 41×41 square), ranks, build rights, and a tax that skims every vendor trade inside it. You need a craftable Settlement Charter (paper, pen, hammer, nails — cheap) and a green preview. Left-click commits. Naming is a modal; Cancel creates nothing.
Solo claims may be refused on this county. If they are, another operator must be standing nearby when you plant. Read the refusal. It is always a sentence you can act on.
5. The first useful crafts
| Item | Why you want it |
|---|---|
| Settlement Charter | The only way to found. Consumed on a successful claim, not on a failed one. |
| Vendor Kit | Planks, nails, a sheet, a pen. Placeable only inside a claim where you have vendor rights. |
| Skill magazine | Every custom skill has paper in the world. Gunsmithing’s workshop firearms additionally need schematics — skill alone will not invent a shop pistol. |
When the house is quiet and the overlay makes sense, go to Territory or skip to the workshop that matches your occupation.