🌱 Beginner Guide - First Steps & What to Do First

Escape the dungeon, follow the quests, and do not try to build everything at once. The opening wakes you chained in the Inquisitor's dungeon and walks you into the abandoned Town; the early quest chain (Certificate, Please onward) hands you your first income, and the Sweet Dreams quest hands you your first two zombie workers. Your first real goals, in order: get out, get certified, get buried townsfolk into the graveyard, get your first zombies, and get the church working. Combat, town restoration and the mastery grinds all wait — the tutorial quests are the fastest path to a functioning economy.

You start with your arms chained to a wall in the Inquisitor's dungeon — the escape is the tutorial. Explore, use mushrooms to restore your energy when it dips, and keep the pickaxe you find close: it is both a tool and, per the game's own opening, the key to freeing Larry. Larry matters more than he looks — he is tied to Forest Mine access and the bandits' dynamite, so helping him early opens up the resource areas you will want within your first sessions.

• Wake in the dungeon, arms chained — follow the escape route out.
• Eat mushrooms to restore energy while you explore.
• Use the pickaxe to free Larry (remember him — Forest Mine access later).
• Reach the Town and the graveyard to unlock the quest board.

Your first dependable income is the dead themselves. The Certificate, Please quest starts the burial-certificate economy — bury townsfolk properly and the paperwork pays. As the Town wakes up, take its first orders as soon as they appear: your very first completed town order is the Open for Business achievement, and orders remain the spine of the economy all game. Every early burial also counts toward the 50-burial True Graveyard Keeper milestone, so nothing here is wasted work.

You do not craft your way to the first zombie — quests give it to you. The Plague Doctor provides your first two worker zombies during the Sweet Dreams quest, and Gunter later adds three more around the Written in the Stars quest. Raising zombies yourself needs the Resurrection Lab working on an Envy day, a corpse with all six vital organs (skull, brain, heart, guts, bones, skin), one Reanimation Liquid per zombie (buy from Gunter or the Alchemist early), and a collar — Bronze covers up to 5 red skulls. Red skulls are perk slots, so collar tier decides how smart your not-so-smart troops can get.

• Sweet Dreams quest: Plague Doctor gives your first 2 workers.
• Written in the Stars quest: Gunter gives 3 more.
• DIY resurrection: Envy day + 6 intact vital organs + 1 Reanimation Liquid + collar.

Your graveyard's church is the other engine to bring online early. Sermons generate Faith, and Faith is a crafting currency you will need constantly — every Zombie Collar costs it (3 Faith for Bronze, 5 for Golden, 10 for Steel), on top of ingots and crystals. The Holy Moly! quest line ties into the church and pays out the Words of Faith achievement, so follow the Nun's early quests rather than treating the church as decoration. A working church plus a working graveyard is the whole early game: bodies in, Faith and certificates out.