Attempt at a leveling guide

[blackborg]

Greetings. Since guides here not being updated and i still see a demand in discord, no wonder considering the new update. People asking for build help, leveling help etc.

As of today, in my personal opinion and experience, first you need to get to level 50, obtain cash, then switch to boss hunting for loot and experience to grind for prestige levels. (Considering the 5 mil requirements for each of them).

Just a brief intoduction:
Every level you get 1 skill point, every prestige also gives 1 skill point. At level 50 + 10 prestige, you will have 50 + 10, for a total of 60 points. Each skill is maxed out at level 5. Same skill level can be increased at these levels: 1, 5, 10, 15, 20. (At level 20 you can have 4 skills maxed out). FYI.

Some equipment can be very costly, either having good stats, being hard to find or being top of it's line. Ammo runs your bank quite dry + medicine too.

With all this in mind, i would suggest a player to do missions, until level 50 is achieved.
Here on DF2heaven you can filter missions by location and type. In discord, within mission-info, people post a map with building locations, directions etc. Which will ease the missions grind.
The easy ones are "bring item", "find person" and "find item".
Let's get to it.

I prefer jog over sprint, simply because you need 1 stat instead of 3.
We gonna max out our movement speed around the map and experience gained.
At this point any weapon will do, since weapons need a lot of skills to be great. (to deal with some zombies in a pinch).

For good players the build could look like this: [every skill level 5, with these numbers you can approximately see what you will have with every 5 level difference, just remember you can max a skill out starting from level 20]
Jogger 5 - must have
Fast Learner 10 - must have
Stealth 15 - must have if you want to do missions easy and without spending money, by using melee weapons. Surprise damage under stealth is great.
Melee Expert 20 - must have since we went Stealth and using melee weapon. (At this point buy a Sledge Hammer for max damage, you want to take down a zombie in 1 shot, whether he dies or falls on the ground).
Exterminator 25 - great bonus
Aim for the heart 30 - good bonus
Looter 35 - faster looting and better quality finds. [Can be taken at any level, if you want to get it faster]
Mule 40 - more inventory is always good. [Can be taken at any level, if you want to get it faster]
Sprinter 45 - very nice addition for faster traveling (sprint speed is what we want, 2nd sprint cooldown and only then sprint duration). [Can be taken at any level, if you want to get it faster]
Last 5 skills can be anything, Lockpicking is a nice addition. [50].

As for items, we want:

Speed:
Jog speed on 2 weapons, headgear, gloves, pants, boots. (Can be single stat items, which we will swap, after getting to our destination). Bonus would be sprint speed, followed by cooldown, duration.

Experience:
From level 5 or 10, we can already obtain unique items that give us extra experience - body gear, pants, boots. As well as 2 weapons, headgear, gloves which you can find with experience of most/any quality.

Stealth:
We will benefit from Sneak Speed, Surprise damage and most importantly Sneak Visibility Range! <- this stat you want to be at least 60% in total, better 70-75 [caps at 75]. Keep in mind we get 25% from Stealth.

Damage:
Melee Expert + Exterminator + Aim for the heart.
All of this gives us damage with Melee weapon, we benefit from Body damage, Damage vs Infected.

Looter:
Extra search speed is great. As well as find "XXX" bonuses, whatever you feel like looting more. Ammo+Meds for more money [example]

Mule:
Preferably you will have a good bonus of inventory slots from Body gear, Pants, Backpack, maybe even on your weapons.

1. Speed gear for getting fast to destination. (2 weapons, pants, boots)
2. Stealth+Loot gear for Missions and looting. (Full set)
3. Exp gear to be worn when hanging in missions. (Full set)
I usually run 1+2 or 1+3 variants with me.

At level 50, we can reset skills and go for boss hunting - weapon build.
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For leveling with weapons, if we assume leveling by boss hunting:
Fast Learner 5
Weapon expertise 10 (Shotgun / Rifle / Pistol)
Jog or Sprint 15
Hunter 20
HeadHunter / Aim for the heart 25/30
Marksman 35
Reloading 40
Quickshot 45
Sprint/Jog / Toughness / 2nd Weapon expertise / Exterminator [50]

Main rule while boss hunting, is killing most zombies in 1 shot, so that they don't bother you. At least the skinny ones, better if Fat Female also, perfect if Fat Male is in the complete list !!!
You can swap damage for supporting skills first.
We're maxing out Experience and Damage, followed by supporting skills.
With this build you can carry on getting Prestige levels.

Items:
If you're doing easy bosses, that you can kite. Having experience gear is great.
Otherwise you want Damage vs Mutated, Body damage, HeadShot damage. Rest is optional, Damage vs Infected, Attack speed, Ammo capacity, reloading time, etc.

Weapon expertise:

Rifles are good weapons, precise, medium ammo cost, but! if you want to budget hunt, best weapon is gonna be a Scout with 5.56 ammo, Scouts are hard to find and expensive, until you get to level 40, getting hands on Gewehr43 with 8mm rifle rounds. M14 / Dragon SVD good weapons, with quite expensive 7.62 ammo. I like rifles, biggest concern is cost, the weapon itself as well as ammo being medium cost.

Shotguns are great weapons, universal. Biggest downside is the ammo cost, as well as weapon cost. 12G is probably the most expensive ammo in the game (at least it was before update) and it's what you want to kill bosses. While you can kill zombies with a 20G, ammo is also quite expensive.

Pistols are mediocre-good weapons, with OK precision, mediocre damage, low ammo cost, at least most of them. Preferably used for zombies. Has best aim time from all weapons.
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Fast learner and Experience gear are great pre level 50, the sooner you get them, the more useful they will be. After 50, depending where and how you gonna play, if you feel you better off with some other skill, drop the experience stuff/skill.

The only and important support skills for any firearms are:
Marksman
Reloading
Quickshot

For damage:
Weapon expertise - must have, alternatively you can have 2 weap. exp. if you have 5 skills you don't know where to put and want to use 2 weapons, one for bosses and another one for zombies (or be more versatile depending what the boss is, smh.)
Hunter - only needed if you're doing boss hunting
Exterminator - optional, only needed if you lack those 25% dmg for 1 shotting zombies
HeadHunter - good skill vs half of bosses and most zombies, until you get to high level area, where enemies can have head protection
Aim for the Heart - good skill vs half of bosses and half of zombies in high level area.
Honestly i feel like High level area body damage is better than HeadShot and vice versa in low level zone.
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A final build (after skill reset) would look something like this:
Jog 5
Sprint 10
Weapon Expertise 15
Hunter 20
HeadHunter 25
Aim for the heart 30
Marksman 35
Reloading 40
Quickshot 45
Toughness 50
55-60 Pick two. (or three, if you drop jog or sprint)
Armourer (if you use armor), Exterminator ( if you lack that 25% dmg vs Z's), 2nd Weapon Expertise (if you need that), Immune System, Thick Skin, Quick Reflexes, Mule, Looter, Medic.
Jog or Sprint can be dropped if you have enough stats in one of them and feel no need for the other one.

Items:
Damage vs Mutated, Body damage, HeadShot damage, Damage vs Infected. (Optional: max accuracy, attack speed, ammo capacity, reloading speed).
Incoming damage reduction, jog-sprint stats, inventory, HP.
Other - protection vs Burn, Infection, Bleed, Radiation, Walk speed, Exp gained.
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I honestly tried to put everything together and make it simple.
But i now realize there's just too much to cover and variations.
Kinda sad to delete this, so i'll post it anyway.
Hope it helps someone.