Survival Tip #28:

Fortress Defenses

This needs to be adapted based off of which type of Primal Age you are dealing with, because if you are facing hordes of undead, or surviving a post fall out existence the strategy will need to be tailored some, but overall the principals hold true.

I know we talked about locations and finding a place with defenses already in place, but that isn’t enough. You need to take your defenses into your own hands, and then use those hands to build better defenses.

We’ve already talked that you want height in your base(fortress, castle, man cave, whatever you want to call it), even if it’s just one raised location with full 360 view that is fortified.

The accepted rationale is that Zombies can make it up steps but not ladders. A Marauder can shoot a gun, or swing a sword while ascending stairs, but either task becomes nearly impossible while climbing a ladder. So, knock out stairs in favor of ladders. Set up pulley systems for moving weight.

Moats. Not a good idea. Standing water brings disease and bugs, which carry disease. Avoid it. A deep hole will have the same effect on the undead. Feel free to add a thatch covering if you would like to catch people, spikes at the bottom if you don’t want to catch them alive.

Medieval castles had an outer and an inner wall. The entrances to these were set far apart so that an invading force that breached the outer wall had to zig zag to get to the next wall to breach that. This slowed down the attackers and gave the defenders a second chance to pick them off.

Bottle necks are key. It doesn’t matter if there are 10,000 zombies at your door, so long as they can only line up one at a time to have their head bashed in.  If you don’t understand why a bottle neck is wise, go watch 300.

Have an entrance, an exit, an emergency exit, an alamo, and another emergency exit.

The best defense you have is your own eyes. Always have someone on watch.

Make sure to live in shifts. Again this will be team dependent based on your numbers and strengths. If you have certain members who function well at night and can sleep during the day light, let them hold down the nocturnal hours. However it is a good practice for your team to be evenly split. (I trust you can do math).

Figure out what works best for you. Two shifts. Three shifts. Four shifts. I’m not here to tell you how to pick your nose.