Polylithic – Beginners Guide

The definitive guide to not just surviving but thriving in the Paleolithic.

How to Be a Paleolithic Super-Predator

Сrеdit gоеs to Giuseppe Gnocchi !

Animals

American Lions – Extinct Megafauna, – Not Yet found in Early Access

Bears – They are always right behind you. Aggressive and Dangerous (1-2 found at a time) I’ve only found two variants so far, I imagine the Dev will add more black, brown, grizzly, kodiak, cave bear etc. The cave bear no longer exists as megafauna.

Bison (Buffalo) – Found mainly in the plains. Large Groups that all Agro at Once. (4+)Highly Aggressive in Early Access, Quite Possibly more dangerous than Mammoth.

Note: Avoid at all costs as the entire pack will attack you and your entire family.

Boar (Wild Pigs) – Randomly charge in a straight line at you, aggressive, easy to kill. (2+ groups).

Caribou (Reindeer) – (Found in 2+ groups), everywhere. Runs away from you, doesn’t run if injured. Easy to sneak up on.

Chicken – Found randomly in forests, usually will hear their clucking, won’t attack but will run away from you.

DIre Wolf – (Usually found in pairs), uses hit and run tactics, fairly weak, unfortunately not able to be tamed. Would be great opportunity to have them as a tribe member.

Ground Sloth – Not in Game. This megafauna did not survive its encounter with humans which are the super-predator in history.

Fish – Found in Rivers, requires fishing pole to catch.

Mammoths – Found Mainly in the plains, found in very large groups like Bison. Not Speciated, only generic model exists. Peaceful unless attacked, will kill at least one of your party members, if attacked. Only the attacked mammoth will fight back.

Mastodons – Various Species, Not Found in Game.

Neanderthals/Other Humans – Do not exist as enemies in game. Would be an Interesting choice for the Devs to add as it would be a very divisive enemy decision. Otzi the Iceman and various other archaeological sites show conflict between tribes in pre-history.

Rabbits – Found everywhere. Fast and agile, not worth the hassle.

Sabertooth Cat – Not Yet Found in game, I don’t believe they exist in the Early Access of the game.

Wooly Rhino – Does not exist in early access. Doubt it will be added as its a very forgotten about megafauna.

Building

You can build buildings by accessing the crafting menu by pressing C.

Buildings can be placed down in the world to give it more life/ gameplay options like the ability to save the game by placing down a sleeping bag/ bedroll.

There’s no limit to where you can build.

Crafting and Materials

The most valuable material is stalk, since its used to make string and string is in the majority of recipes in game.

Hide Rack – You must put it down in the world by using your hotbar. Used to refine all your crude hide and fur.

Grindstone – Required to craft, Polished Ivory, Polished Rocks, Polished wood, a shovel, Red Dye (Ochre required), Chisel, Bone Needle, and Blade. You must put it in your hotbar to place it down in the world like a crafting bench.

If you were wondering where to get a blade like I was, the grindstone is your pal. Blades are required to make arrows and improve yield from butchering animals.

Tools – Press C to open your craftin menu, tools are crafted here or on the grindstone.

Chopper – Crafted under tools, using two rocks. Your very first tool, just let it sit in your inventory and it will do the rest.

Bone Needle – Crafted on grindstone, used for creating buildings.

Blade – Crafted on the grindstone, a better more efficient chopper.

Torch – Very valuable if solo, can be used for light at night or to scare off animals. Mileage may vary.

Stone Mallet – Crafted in inventory, lets you build buildings.

Antlers – Haven’t found a use for yet, obtained from butchering Caribou.

Bone – Obtained from all animals, used in most items like buildings and spears.

Clay and Ochre – Clay is required to make most buildings and can be found alongside rivers. Ochre makes red dye and can be found alongside rivers.

Crude Hide – Obtained from animals like caribou and wolves. Use a hide rack to turn it into hide.

Hide – Created on a hide rack from 2 crude hide, Obtained from certain animals. Used in nearly every recipe.

Crude Fur – Obtained from certain animals like mammoth and bear. Can craft into Fur by using a hide rack.

Fur – Haven’t found a use for yet. Created from two crude fur on the hide rack.

Fat – Haven’t found a use for yet. Obtained from butchering animals.

Flint – Bang two rocks together in the crafting menu and boom you have flint.

Logs – Obtained from cutting trees down with an axe or finding the occasional lone log on the forest floor.

Rocks – Found nearly everywhere on the ground in the world. Generally as easy to come by as twigs.

Sinew – Gathered from butchered animals, your gonna need a weapon and skill to get this.

String – Crafted from stalk, stalk is easier to find in open areas.

Twigs – not much use other than building a fence(still requires string), and starting a campfire. Can be found on the ground in forests.

Combat

You will be 1000x more effective in combat if you have one other tribe member with you. However the game punishes you by tanking happiness if the tribe member gets hit. Meaning you will have to wait however long it takes to get happiness back up to 35% to recruit more tribe members.

Not only can a tribe member help you attack hostile animals like boar, bear, and bison (buffalo).

The tribe member can pick up arrows/javelins in the vicinity that you cannot see, like if they land in a bush. Not only that, they can carry extra replacement gear you might need, alongside out of combat bonuses like an extra pair of hands to collect resources and overall more inventory space.

The current weapons are as follows:

• Club
• Stone Axe
• Javelin
• Bone Spear
• Bow and Arrows

The Current Weapon Meta:

Club – The first and weakest weapon in the Paleolithic. A refined log, the only thing its good for is last resort hitting.

Stone Axe – One of the first tools that is actually useful. You can chop down trees or boar with it, it never ceases to be needed. It seems to be superior in DPS compared to the club but requires more resources to produce.

Javelin – Expensive to produce since it consumes, essentially 6 stalk which are used from 2 string. Especially since it despawns when it goes past your vision range.

Bone Spear – Inferior to the Stone Axe since its much harder to hit small targets like boar/ wild pigs. Good for large targets like Bear, Caribou and Mammoth since they have large hit boxes.

Bow and Arrows – The weapon to rule all other weapons in this game. Does the same damage as a javelin more accurately and with a cheaper production cost. Arrows cost only wood making them cheap to produce as wood is 1000x more plentiful than stalk. Since stalk is needed to make string, and string is required at least once in most recipes in the game.

Food

Each different food item has benefits in the games current state.

Each bonus from food is temporary.

• Berries: Increased Player Speed
• Fish: Haven’t caught one yet.
• Roasted Meat: +10% Damage Increase
• Roots: +10% Stamina Recovery Increase
• Nuts: Increased Max Stamina

Berries are gathered from bushes.

Fish are caught using fishing poles in rivers.

Roasted Meat is crafted at fires using Meat.

Meat is gathered from butchering animals.

Roots are gathered from the ground in forests.

Nuts are gathered in forests from orange leafed trees.

Happiness

The only way to increase happiness I’ve found so far is to just wait passively in game for a while.

You have to have a minimum of 35 out of 100 happiness to add a tribe member at the Tribe Elder.

Happiness will go down if people get injured.

My hope is the game developers will add more ways to increase tribe happiness rather than just letting the game run in the background. I would personally like to see a happiness boost if you manage to triumph over megafauna. As that would be akin to a knight slaying a dragon.

How to Save The Game

The only time the game saves is when you use a sleeping bag. You can find a Sleeping bag in the main hut. Press Alt on the keyboard to cycle between sleeping and saving the game.

Sleeping bags must be placed inside a hut, you cannot place them outside a hut.

You can build a hut anywhere by accessing the crafting menu by pressing C. You must first build a frame using a stone hammer. Then add a Leather Covering using a bone Needle and finally adding bone decorations to the exterior for extra flair.

If your not that great at hunting you can use a stalk cover instead.

Hunting and Gathering

Your best bets for food are berries and Caribou. Caribou don’t fight back as long as you can get close to them. However you still need a ranged weapon to attack them unless you manage to trap them in a corner.

Berry bushes just don’t have the capacity to fight, but you need to find them still. You also have to pick them one at time unlike meat gathering which is dependent on your success of a tap the spot on the circle minigame. The chance of winning this minigame far out weighs berry picking.

Roots and Nuts are also good. Roots are possibly the most abundant early game food since your party companion picks up everything they see. Nuts are found in Orange leafed trees and roots grow in the ground in forests.

Every Animal You Can Eat!

Bears: High Health and Damage if your by yourself good luck. A group of people is the best way to deal with them. They will not last against several tribe members armed with javelins and bows. Bears will attack you if they find you, best just to leave them alone.

Bison: Come in herds, several of them will attack on sight/smell of you. Impossible to sneak up on, the most aggressive animal in the games current state, more so than boar. Just avoid them at all costs, not worth the injury or loss of life.

Boar: Fast and small, however easy to dodge as you can roll out of the way with space bar or just walk a foot or two to the left or right. Best bet is to just use an Stone Axe or Club to hit them with in melee. If they hit you they will knock you down to hit you again. They generally don’t do a ton of damage so you will likely win the fight.

Caribou (Reindeer): The best animal in the game to hunt. Will run away if you get to close. Javelins and Bows are the only viable options to sustained roasted meat. They also won’t run if hit with a javelin or bow basically making them sitting ducks. They also tend to travel in groups of 2+ making them a valuable source of food, as the herd won’t really scatter if one dies.

Mammoth: The classic Paleolithic animal, however it takes several people to kill one. You will likely have someone in your party die. Alongside the fact they don’t drop more meat than two Caribou means its not really worth it to hunt them. Considering getting injured in combat absolutely destroys tribe happiness. Even winning and surviving combat doesn’t provide a bonus if you lost a person and destroyed tribe happiness for the same amount of meat from two caribou.

Sabertooth Cat: Does Not Exist In Early Access, Big Sad. At Least I haven’t Found one.

Rabbits: Extremely small, fast, quick to change direction, hard to hit. Basically not worth the trouble to hunt. Berry picking will yield better results. Will not attack you either.

Fish: Requires a fishing pole to catch. Haven’t gotten to this point technologically yet.

Dire Wolf: Usually come in pairs, will perform hit and run tactics where they will hit you once and then run away to come back again and hit you. The best tactic is to chase them down and kill them for good. I haven’t found a way to tame them which is a shame considering wolves were Man’s first domesticated animal, and not just an animal but a family member. Alongside hunting partner and source of food during famine.

Tribe Members

Tribe members can be automated to perform tasks. I have not yet figured this out and I’m a chronic video game player with a Life Sciences STEM degree.

Tribe members are robots that mainly exist to help fight and eat your food. They can be given tasks to be more useful in game. Aside from that they have their own persistent inventory and can carry things for you. Their inventory seems to be lost when they die.

To unlock Tasks you must do X repetitive number of times. Alongside the tribe member leveling up by traveling with you.

As of yet I haven’t figured out how to make them more useful other than a pair of hands to pick up things and store them and fight with me.

All my Tribe members given low level tasks seem to sit in camp and eat food.

Tribe members don’t really have a chance to be revived from critical injuries when reaching 0 hit points they die permanently.

Game Controls

You can only save the game at a sleeping bag, sleeping bags can be found at camp in the main hut or crafted using the crafting menu.

Escape Key – Used to open the games menu to open various other menus like settings, quests, the codex, and technology alongside the map.

• Tab – Opens Inventory.
• C – Opens crafting menu.
• Q – Opens quest log.
• E – Interacts with the world.
• T – Opens Technology Menu.
• M – Opens the world map.
• WASD/Arrow Keys – Used to move throughout the world.

Spacebar – Used to roll away from lifes problems in the paleolithic. Unknown fact that most hunter gatherers performed mid combat rolls.

• Shift – Used to attempt to run away from lifes problems.
• Mouse Buttons – Used to attack and rotate camera.
• Left Control – Used to crouch which is good to sneak up or around animals.
• Alt – Swap between items around you in the world, amazing ability most games should have.

Workstation

Workstations need to be crafted in the crafting menu. Access the crafting menu by pressing C. They must be placed in the hotbar in your Inventory before they can be placed in the world. You then have to build the workstation using the relevant on screen tool.

There are three main workstations.

• The campfire – used to cook meat, roast fish and create cinder(ashes).
• Grindstone – used to make more efficient and advanced tools.
• HIde Rack – Used to turn crude hide/fur into hide/fur.

Theres a fourth hidden workstation in the building menu called the stone stove. Its a eternal campfire that doesn’t require wood to cook meat, fish or burn wood to make cinders (ashes).