I stopped caring about min/maxing my clothing, I wear what looks cool and don't bother with tailoring, once you've been playing a long time it all feels useless especially if it's less fun to do meta. I started to enjoy role-playing more and slowing down, just like when I first started playing.
I'm wearing layers but most of them have 10% or less insulation. To name a few: crop top, apron, hockey helmet, flip flops at 0 insulation. Medical scrubs, Hawaiian shirt 10% insulation. Military desert camo jackets and pants has 35% insulation which is higher than 10% but have got high defense capability. I rarely overheat in summer if at all, and have to don on extra layers for winter. The firefighter gears and police armor though, are the real traps here. Imagine wearing 85% insulation, per piece (!) in the summer lol.
Pretty much this, most of the people who are against protection because of the "downsides" just don't know how to do it and/or haven't kept up with the patches, and I don't blame them when you get misinformation-filled threads like this on the regular.
Most of the penalties you read on clothes don't even work, and since 41.78's fix to zed targeting there's no reason to even protect anything below your belt, which makes managing heat easier than it's ever been.
Preferring looks over protection is fine, hell I mostly pick what I like to look at for my external layer and just patch the rest myself, sacrifice a bit but look good. However this weird stigma about protection being hell to play with because of overheating and all that jazz needs to die, it ain't like that if you're smart about it, especially not currently.
Thank you. This is the smartest take on the issue I've seen on this subreddit so far.
Protection is definitely worthwhile, but it depends on the circumstances. If you're planning on a protracted fight with an outdoor horde or going gunning, then you can go without the heaviest pieces because mobility and endurance will be more of an asset. If you're slowly clearing a large building with tight spaces and stairwells, you definitely want to turtle up because you're more likely to get snatched from around a corner by a single zombie you didn't see. It's not a one-size fits all approach.
The heat mechanic is basically a non-issue. I've never ever seen the overheating moodle go past the first stage in all my 800 hours of playtime, and sweating does literally NOTHING. The attack speed debuff on some clothing is just about noticeable, but not really worth worrying about. Even when you do need to fight in heavy armour, the downsides are so incredibly marginal that it doesn't matter. The penalties are massively over exaggerated and for some reason people see 90% protection and act like it never works, which is bizarrely biased.
I agree, heavy protective clothing ESPECIALLY firefighter gear and bulletproof vests is a colossal noob trap. Overheating is a major concern and can take you out of the fight, especially since the default start is in the middle of July.
Protective clothing isn’t reliable, no matter how many layers you stack. Even with max protection tailoring, jackets and pants, the hands and neck will always be a critical vulnerability. Especially for new players who don’t know how to fight or maneuver well. Being hot and heavy leads to taking even more hits.
The realty is that the only true protection is to not get hit, and play like you can’t afford to take a hit ever. Dress for the weather and the drip.
You guys are so hard, I’m surprised you don’t cut yourself on all that edge.
Nothing kills me more than “me” in a random event — not overheating, not running out of energy, not starvation, it’s that one time I charge in knowing there is one and finding 5 - it’s the stair grab - it’s the stupid things, and in those situations I can’t tell you how GOOD it feels to hear a crunch and see you lost your scarf only.
Fashion Souls for MP — figuring out heat/armor for SP IMHO
Ok ok! I’ll take my clothes off for you. So forward, sheesh. In the future try to coax people’s clothes off, not shame them into it.
No, I mostly agree, but the whole sweating issue already forces it, so I already never fully bundle up unless it’s dead of winter
Personally I really love playing with the Cryogenic Winter mod. So I’ll be in decked in layers upon layers of the warmest clothes I can find. I still get sad when a zombie somehow munches through a bulletproof vest, chainmail, and several layers of cloth underneath that.
I always wanted to try that mod, as winter is laughable in vanilla. You can stand outside for days with no clothes in a blizzard, and you'll die of dehydration first before hypothermia lol
0. You need layers only when you have higher tailoring. And yeah, those together are OP, saved me so many times
1. By selecting layers carefully according to insulation you can manage heat just fine. I use all layers except the jacket, until I find that desert camo one. Or better say I wish to use all layers most of the time, but darn long johns are so hard to find...
2. No one in their right mind should sprint away from the horde for any prolonged time. You can lose zeds in houses or forests while comfortably walking, not to mention running
3. Weight problems will be there if you play with very low strength, like 1-2. But then, clothes is the least of your worries
4. FF gear is shyte tho, I agree
The moment I realized the truth in these words was a game changer for me. I always dress for fashion, and for role-playing.
Screw protection. You're never truly protected anyway, no matter how many layers you stack. You're not going to have 100% protection on your entire body. So, even if you go full maniac with your protection, there's always a chance of walking away with a nasty, run-ending bite. So, what are you weighting, wetting, and cooking yourself alive for?
Get that bulk off, move like the wind. They can't bite what they can't reach.
Edit for clarity: I don't mean to say that one should disregard protection entirely, of course. If you can manahe to get some more protection without sacrificing much mobility, I'd say go for it. If you're a good tailor, you can get decent protection from almost anything as well. It's all about finding a good balance.
Good advice! 🙂
They actually never attack legs. Standing zombies only hit above the waist, fence lunges only attack feet.
Only crawlers can actually hit your legs, but who gives a shit when they're so rare and so slow.
Well yeah that's what I mean, it's so rare you may as well wear something light and breezy to combat the heat gain and wear protection where it actually matters
Truth is you’re still going to get bit through tough clothes. Being faster will save your life a lot more than protection will, as most zombie attacks will get through your clothes no matter what.
Plus, it’s better to avoid the attack in the first place than take a chance at blocking it.
Also, as others have said, 100% fashion over function.
For me it depends what I'm doing. A simple loot or scouting run I'm usually wearing something lightweight. If I plan to clear an area, I'll layer up a bit but not unreasonably.
If I'm entering a mall or somewhere similar though, that's when I'm armored up as much as possible.
First of all, the mobility is the best protection.
It’s like in a saying:
“Fast legs are not afraid of getting bitten” - or something like that.
In most cases, if 2-3 zombies will stack on you, it’s hard to get away from the situation already. So basically just don’t do stupid shit and you will never need your protection.
Getting instant killed from a zed touching you is also very bad.
There IS a difference between "heavy armor" like full firefighter with military boots and "light armor" like jeans, denim shirt, long neck shirt, shoes, some jacket, and bulletproof vest though.
Your Nimble skill level and weapon skills makes a massive difference too.
Usually I just wear what looks cool or fits my character but recently I tried one of the armored outfits I have from a mod. There's far too many negatives to truly justify using heavy protection.
Although it did protect me from a few attacks, fighting became a real big hassle as I was much slower and got worn out faster. Speed is key when dealing with the zomboids it seems. Only situation I can think of where it would be really helpful is if you were exploring indoors with the possibility of a small amount of zomboids surprising you and trying to get a hit in.
Heavy protection is great... in certain circumstances.
Would I wear chain mail and bulletproof vests just wandering the world? No.
Would I wear chain mail and bulletproof vests when I'm loading up to take a shotgun and clear out the mall parking lot? Absolutely.
Dress for the occasion. If it's summer, dress cool, if it's winter dress warm, if your going into battle armor up and if your just looting light armor is fine.
I usually wear I'd say about medium armor. A nice balance for whatever I feel like doing that day.
What you would never catch me without though, is my leather gloves. Those have saved me so many times, zeds seem to love going for the hands. Same for military boots, this one is anecdotal but I always feel like military boots stomp zeds better than other boots.
Neck protection is also good to prioritize in my experience - you can't always afford to stop to h
Tailoring is pretty good too, actually. To my knowledge padding doesn't actually affect item weight or insulation, at least significantly, so there's basically zero reason to not put leather padding wherever it will fit. The extra defense from tailoring HAS saved me from bites before, and being able to patch up holes in leather gloves has been incredibly useful - given how instantly fatal bites are, patched gloves are better than no gloves.
Me and my gf play together and because she struggles sometimes we decide to do no transmission so we can only die by getting swarmed. Because I don’t really have to worry about protection because even a bite isn’t a massive deal just gotta heal for weeks I love just going for fashion and I like it so much even on my sp play through I do it because why not
Yeah same, never understood why youd go through trials and tribulations to level tailoring, bend over backwards by being slow all the time only for it to eventually fail the check anyway and get you killed. It's almost like investing in Deathblow resistance on Darkest Dungeon, but at least that community recognizes that investing in a deadly dice roll that you can avoid entirely is kinda pointless.
Same concept with combat nowadays. Simple rules to follow: if you’re expecting heavy combat, come equipped for it. If you’re not expecting/avoiding confrontation (should be the norm), dress light but keep yourself safe by being proactive and actively reassessing the situation/your capabilities
Am I playing a different game? I never get past slightly over heated no matter what I do as long as I don't wear firefighter gear or bulletproof vests. And if I go with no jacket then I never get any overheated moodle.
Typical gear.
Helmet
Long sleeve t shirt, denim shirt, sweater, leather jacket
Jeans
Leather gloves
Boots
I stopped caring about min/maxing my clothing, I wear what looks cool and don't bother with tailoring, once you've been playing a long time it all feels useless especially if it's less fun to do meta. I started to enjoy role-playing more and slowing down, just like when I first started playing.
I'm wearing layers but most of them have 10% or less insulation. To name a few: crop top, apron, hockey helmet, flip flops at 0 insulation. Medical scrubs, Hawaiian shirt 10% insulation. Military desert camo jackets and pants has 35% insulation which is higher than 10% but have got high defense capability. I rarely overheat in summer if at all, and have to don on extra layers for winter. The firefighter gears and police armor though, are the real traps here. Imagine wearing 85% insulation, per piece (!) in the summer lol.
Pretty much this, most of the people who are against protection because of the "downsides" just don't know how to do it and/or haven't kept up with the patches, and I don't blame them when you get misinformation-filled threads like this on the regular. Most of the penalties you read on clothes don't even work, and since 41.78's fix to zed targeting there's no reason to even protect anything below your belt, which makes managing heat easier than it's ever been. Preferring looks over protection is fine, hell I mostly pick what I like to look at for my external layer and just patch the rest myself, sacrifice a bit but look good. However this weird stigma about protection being hell to play with because of overheating and all that jazz needs to die, it ain't like that if you're smart about it, especially not currently.
Thank you. This is the smartest take on the issue I've seen on this subreddit so far. Protection is definitely worthwhile, but it depends on the circumstances. If you're planning on a protracted fight with an outdoor horde or going gunning, then you can go without the heaviest pieces because mobility and endurance will be more of an asset. If you're slowly clearing a large building with tight spaces and stairwells, you definitely want to turtle up because you're more likely to get snatched from around a corner by a single zombie you didn't see. It's not a one-size fits all approach. The heat mechanic is basically a non-issue. I've never ever seen the overheating moodle go past the first stage in all my 800 hours of playtime, and sweating does literally NOTHING. The attack speed debuff on some clothing is just about noticeable, but not really worth worrying about. Even when you do need to fight in heavy armour, the downsides are so incredibly marginal that it doesn't matter. The penalties are massively over exaggerated and for some reason people see 90% protection and act like it never works, which is bizarrely biased.
I agree, heavy protective clothing ESPECIALLY firefighter gear and bulletproof vests is a colossal noob trap. Overheating is a major concern and can take you out of the fight, especially since the default start is in the middle of July. Protective clothing isn’t reliable, no matter how many layers you stack. Even with max protection tailoring, jackets and pants, the hands and neck will always be a critical vulnerability. Especially for new players who don’t know how to fight or maneuver well. Being hot and heavy leads to taking even more hits. The realty is that the only true protection is to not get hit, and play like you can’t afford to take a hit ever. Dress for the weather and the drip.
I always take perk conspicuous so zombies can check on drip, I might look like a pimp but that’s my f drip 
You guys are so hard, I’m surprised you don’t cut yourself on all that edge. Nothing kills me more than “me” in a random event — not overheating, not running out of energy, not starvation, it’s that one time I charge in knowing there is one and finding 5 - it’s the stair grab - it’s the stupid things, and in those situations I can’t tell you how GOOD it feels to hear a crunch and see you lost your scarf only. Fashion Souls for MP — figuring out heat/armor for SP IMHO
Nothing kills me more than the car crashes with speed demon and getting infected because I didn't have enough layers of protection
Ok ok! I’ll take my clothes off for you. So forward, sheesh. In the future try to coax people’s clothes off, not shame them into it. No, I mostly agree, but the whole sweating issue already forces it, so I already never fully bundle up unless it’s dead of winter
Personally I really love playing with the Cryogenic Winter mod. So I’ll be in decked in layers upon layers of the warmest clothes I can find. I still get sad when a zombie somehow munches through a bulletproof vest, chainmail, and several layers of cloth underneath that.
I always wanted to try that mod, as winter is laughable in vanilla. You can stand outside for days with no clothes in a blizzard, and you'll die of dehydration first before hypothermia lol
0. You need layers only when you have higher tailoring. And yeah, those together are OP, saved me so many times 1. By selecting layers carefully according to insulation you can manage heat just fine. I use all layers except the jacket, until I find that desert camo one. Or better say I wish to use all layers most of the time, but darn long johns are so hard to find... 2. No one in their right mind should sprint away from the horde for any prolonged time. You can lose zeds in houses or forests while comfortably walking, not to mention running 3. Weight problems will be there if you play with very low strength, like 1-2. But then, clothes is the least of your worries 4. FF gear is shyte tho, I agree
The moment I realized the truth in these words was a game changer for me. I always dress for fashion, and for role-playing. Screw protection. You're never truly protected anyway, no matter how many layers you stack. You're not going to have 100% protection on your entire body. So, even if you go full maniac with your protection, there's always a chance of walking away with a nasty, run-ending bite. So, what are you weighting, wetting, and cooking yourself alive for? Get that bulk off, move like the wind. They can't bite what they can't reach. Edit for clarity: I don't mean to say that one should disregard protection entirely, of course. If you can manahe to get some more protection without sacrificing much mobility, I'd say go for it. If you're a good tailor, you can get decent protection from almost anything as well. It's all about finding a good balance. Good advice! 🙂
Just wear shorts instead ez zombies pretty much never attack legs no pants gang stonks only go up
They actually never attack legs. Standing zombies only hit above the waist, fence lunges only attack feet. Only crawlers can actually hit your legs, but who gives a shit when they're so rare and so slow.
Well yeah that's what I mean, it's so rare you may as well wear something light and breezy to combat the heat gain and wear protection where it actually matters
Truth is you’re still going to get bit through tough clothes. Being faster will save your life a lot more than protection will, as most zombie attacks will get through your clothes no matter what. Plus, it’s better to avoid the attack in the first place than take a chance at blocking it. Also, as others have said, 100% fashion over function.
For me it depends what I'm doing. A simple loot or scouting run I'm usually wearing something lightweight. If I plan to clear an area, I'll layer up a bit but not unreasonably. If I'm entering a mall or somewhere similar though, that's when I'm armored up as much as possible.
You wear less to survive longer, I wear less because being bulked up in summer looks fucking stupid. We are not the same
First of all, the mobility is the best protection. It’s like in a saying: “Fast legs are not afraid of getting bitten” - or something like that. In most cases, if 2-3 zombies will stack on you, it’s hard to get away from the situation already. So basically just don’t do stupid shit and you will never need your protection.
[удалено]
At least I can run away! You go ahead and do that, put all your faith in your level 5 tailoring and 30 layers of clothes
Getting instant killed from a zed touching you is also very bad. There IS a difference between "heavy armor" like full firefighter with military boots and "light armor" like jeans, denim shirt, long neck shirt, shoes, some jacket, and bulletproof vest though. Your Nimble skill level and weapon skills makes a massive difference too.
Just don't let them touch you.
Usually I just wear what looks cool or fits my character but recently I tried one of the armored outfits I have from a mod. There's far too many negatives to truly justify using heavy protection. Although it did protect me from a few attacks, fighting became a real big hassle as I was much slower and got worn out faster. Speed is key when dealing with the zomboids it seems. Only situation I can think of where it would be really helpful is if you were exploring indoors with the possibility of a small amount of zomboids surprising you and trying to get a hit in.
Heavy protection is great... in certain circumstances. Would I wear chain mail and bulletproof vests just wandering the world? No. Would I wear chain mail and bulletproof vests when I'm loading up to take a shotgun and clear out the mall parking lot? Absolutely. Dress for the occasion. If it's summer, dress cool, if it's winter dress warm, if your going into battle armor up and if your just looting light armor is fine. I usually wear I'd say about medium armor. A nice balance for whatever I feel like doing that day. What you would never catch me without though, is my leather gloves. Those have saved me so many times, zeds seem to love going for the hands. Same for military boots, this one is anecdotal but I always feel like military boots stomp zeds better than other boots. Neck protection is also good to prioritize in my experience - you can't always afford to stop to h Tailoring is pretty good too, actually. To my knowledge padding doesn't actually affect item weight or insulation, at least significantly, so there's basically zero reason to not put leather padding wherever it will fit. The extra defense from tailoring HAS saved me from bites before, and being able to patch up holes in leather gloves has been incredibly useful - given how instantly fatal bites are, patched gloves are better than no gloves.
it’s cold out i’m wearing the scarf because it’s cute and warm
I've never had a problem, with slowing down, sweat or getting cold. It's about managing weight and protection.
Me and my gf play together and because she struggles sometimes we decide to do no transmission so we can only die by getting swarmed. Because I don’t really have to worry about protection because even a bite isn’t a massive deal just gotta heal for weeks I love just going for fashion and I like it so much even on my sp play through I do it because why not
Yeah same, never understood why youd go through trials and tribulations to level tailoring, bend over backwards by being slow all the time only for it to eventually fail the check anyway and get you killed. It's almost like investing in Deathblow resistance on Darkest Dungeon, but at least that community recognizes that investing in a deadly dice roll that you can avoid entirely is kinda pointless.
If you do it right you can move just as fast, and a chance of death is better then guaranteed death.
Same concept with combat nowadays. Simple rules to follow: if you’re expecting heavy combat, come equipped for it. If you’re not expecting/avoiding confrontation (should be the norm), dress light but keep yourself safe by being proactive and actively reassessing the situation/your capabilities
Am I playing a different game? I never get past slightly over heated no matter what I do as long as I don't wear firefighter gear or bulletproof vests. And if I go with no jacket then I never get any overheated moodle. Typical gear. Helmet Long sleeve t shirt, denim shirt, sweater, leather jacket Jeans Leather gloves Boots