Survival Mode guide · reviewed 31 October 2026 · mode and DLC notes
These guides describe vanilla Survival Mode. WINTERMUTE is the story mode, with its own objectives and rules; Survival Edition alone does not include it. Challenges use their own settings. Pilgrim, Voyageur, Stalker, Interloper, Misery and Custom settings change loot, wildlife, afflictions and recovery. Locations are route examples, not guaranteed spawns.
Tales from the Far Territory is a paid Survival expansion. Its regions, ptarmigans, Frontier Cooking, cougar, Trader and Meat Curing Box require that content. Improved fishing, scurvy and basic Safehouse Customization arrived as free Survival updates; availability still depends on the platform build and settings. Region names and advanced Tale equipment below may spoil exploration; no story solutions are covered.
Hinterland released IRON ROAD in Early Access on 27 October 2026, initially on Steam. Its train systems and planned additions are outside these guides. Check your installed version against Build Status; these pages do not claim one shared version across platforms. For the first steps, use the beginner guide.
Tools & Crafting
Essential tools, curing, bows, forging, ammo, and accessories
The Long Dark Tools & Crafting Guide
Bring the tools needed for your route and leave heavy backups at shelter. Check curing time, station requirements, fuel and materials before a crafting trip; experience mode and DLC ownership limit which equipment is available.
This is the best featured video for the page because it covers the broad foundation: standard tools, weapons, bow crafting, improvised tools, forge basics, and firearm maintenance.
Start here
Quick tools and crafting rules
Tools are powerful, but they are also heavy and condition-based. Learn what each tool solves before carrying everything you own.
Do not carry every tool
Tools are useful, but weight matters. Carry what solves your current route, and leave backups at safehouses.
Repair before tools break
Knives, hatchets, hacksaws, firearms, and clothing tools all need maintenance. Keep repair supplies organized.
Cure materials indoors
Hides, guts, maple saplings, and birch saplings must cure before they can be used for crafting.
Plan forging trips
Forging is not casual crafting. Bring coal, scrap metal, a heavy hammer, food, water, and enough warmth.
Tool basics
Essential tools and what they do
Many tools overlap, but they are not interchangeable. The right tool depends on whether you are harvesting, crafting, looting, repairing, fighting, or forging.
Knife
A knife is useful for fast harvesting, crafting clothing, and wolf struggles. On harder difficulties, you may need an improvised knife instead.
Hatchet
The hatchet is one of the most flexible tools. It can chop limbs, break furniture, harvest animals, craft gear, and help in struggles.
Hacksaw
The hacksaw cuts saplings, harvests scrap metal, works on frozen carcasses, and can be repaired with tools and scrap metal.
Prybar
The prybar is mostly for opening locked lockers, trunks, and car trunks. It can also help with ice fishing holes or struggles in a pinch.
Heavy Hammer
The heavy hammer is required for forging. It can also break furniture and help in wolf struggles, but it is heavy.
Sewing Kit / Fishing Tackle
Sewing kits and fishing tackle keep clothing alive. Fishing tackle is also useful for line and hooks.
Tool choices
Knife, hatchet, hacksaw, prybar, or hammer?
The Long Dark often gives you multiple ways to solve a problem. Pick based on speed, condition loss, risk, and weight.
There is no one-tool answer
A knife may be faster for harvesting, a hatchet may be better for firewood, a hacksaw may preserve whetstones, a prybar may be best for towns, and a hammer may only be worth carrying when you are forging. Tool choice is part of route planning.
Beginner tip: store extra tools at safehouses instead of carrying every tool everywhere.
Knife vs hatchet
A knife can cause a bleeding wound in a wolf struggle; a hatchet offers broader harvesting and woodcutting uses. Struggle outcomes also depend on fatigue, clothing, condition and input, so neither tool guarantees escape.
Hacksaw value
The hacksaw is slower for some jobs, but it cuts saplings, harvests scrap metal, and repairs with scrap instead of relying on whetstones.
Prybar timing
Carry the prybar when looting towns, cars, lockers, or industrial areas. Leave it behind for lightweight hunting or short routes.
Heavy hammer timing
The hammer is essential for forging, but too heavy for everyday travel unless you have a specific reason.
Materials
Crafting materials to save
Good crafting starts before you reach the workbench. Save the materials that become bows, arrows, clothing, repairs, and long-term survival gear.
Cured Gut
Fresh guts need to be dropped indoors and cured before use. They are required for bows, snares, fishing line, and many crafted items.
Maple Sapling
Maple saplings cure indoors and become the main body of the survival bow.
Birch Sapling
Birch saplings cure into material for arrow shafts. You need shafts before you can make proper arrows.
Crow Feathers
Feathers are found near corpses where crows circle. They weigh almost nothing, so grab them whenever you see them.
Scrap Metal
Scrap metal supports forging, hacksaw repairs, and other crafting needs. Keep a pile near a workbench or forge route.
Cloth and Leather
Harvest weak clothing and shoes for cloth or leather so you can maintain better gear.
Bow crafting
How bow, arrows, and curing work
The bow is one of the most important long-term tools because it turns hunting into a more renewable system.
Cut maple and birch
Maple becomes the bow. Birch becomes arrow shafts. Cut saplings when you find them and cure them indoors.
Cure guts
Harvest animal guts and drop them indoors. Cured guts are required for the survival bow.
Forge or find arrowheads
Arrowheads can sometimes be found, but forging them is the reliable long-term path.
Collect feathers
Crow feathers are required for arrows and are usually found near corpses.
Bow crafting loop
A survival bow needs cured maple and cured guts. Arrows need arrow shafts from cured birch, arrowheads, and crow feathers. The important beginner lesson is curing: drop saplings, guts, and hides indoors early so they are ready when you need them.
Fire-hardened arrows are cheap small-game arrows. Use proper arrows with arrowheads for larger targets.
Forging
Forge basics
Forging is a major progression step, especially on harder difficulties where standard knives and hatchets may not spawn.
What you need to forge
To forge, bring a heavy hammer, scrap metal, coal, cloth for some tools, food, water, and enough warmth. The forge must reach 150°C before improvised tools and arrowheads become available.
Do not arrive at a forge without coal or a heavy hammer. Those are the two mistakes that ruin most beginner forge trips.
Bring a heavy hammer
Without a heavy hammer, the forge trip fails before it starts.
Bring fuel for forge heat
Forging needs a heavy hammer and a forge temperature of at least 150°C. Bring coal for heat, scrap metal, cloth for tools, and enough supplies for the crafting time.
Forge arrowheads
Arrowheads are one of the most important forge crafts because they unlock renewable bow hunting.
Forge improvised tools
On standard Interloper and Misery, manufactured knives and hatchets do not spawn; forging improvised tools is an important option. Custom availability settings may differ.
Where to forge
Forge locations
Each forge has different travel risks. Pick the one that fits your current route, region knowledge, warmth, and difficulty.
Forlorn Muskeg
A common forging destination, but exposed to weather. Bring warmth, food, water, and a plan for safe travel.
Broken Railroad
An indoor forge that protects you from weather, but long indoor crafting can create cabin fever concerns.
Desolation Point
A coastal forge located on the shipwreck between the lighthouse and Hibernia Processing.
Forsaken Airfield
A forge in the Tales from the Far Territory region of Forsaken Airfield. The trip requires that expansion and preparation for exposed travel.
Advanced crafting
Ammunition crafting
Ammo crafting is a later-game system. It is powerful, but it requires dangerous locations, preparation, and gunsmithing skill.
Use ammo workbenches
Ammunition crafting happens at ammo workbenches, not normal workbenches.
Collect casings
Revolvers drop casings when reloaded. Rifles eject casings after shots, so look down and recover them.
Harvest batteries into lead
Car batteries are very heavy. Harvest them with a hacksaw and carry the lighter scrap lead instead.
Level gunsmithing
Higher gunsmithing improves crafted ammo quality and component recovery.
Ammo crafting checklist
Utility gear
Accessories and carry-management tools
Some tools are worn instead of swung. These accessories change how you climb, travel, carry tools, hunt, or absorb damage.
Crampons
Crampons help with rope climbs, weak ice, beachcombing, and sprain risk. Wear them when needed, not all the time.
Moose-Hide Satchel
A carry-capacity option for hauling. Compare it with crampons, insulation or protective accessories for the route; two satchels do not stack.
Foreman’s Tool Belt
Useful if you regularly carry multiple heavy tools, but less valuable if your route is already lightweight.
Rifle Holster
Best when you regularly carry a rifle. If you mostly use a bow or revolver, it is less important.
Ballistic Vest
Huge protection, but very heavy and punishing to mobility. Save it for dangerous hunts, not normal travel.
Safehouse crafting
Woodworking tools and advanced crafting notes
Woodworking tools are useful for safehouse customization, but they are not a first-week survival priority.
Woodworking Tools
Woodworking tools are for furniture and safehouse crafting. They are not an early survival priority.
Furniture Workbench
Basic Safehouse Customization is a free Survival update. Build at the Furniture Workbench with the required tools and materials; some Trader blueprints and items still require Tales.
Modded crafting
Some linked videos include modded crafting. Those additions are outside this vanilla guide; check the video description before applying them.
More videos
Supporting tools and crafting videos
Use these videos for deeper dives into accessories, tool choices, forging, forge locations, ammo crafting, bow crafting, and woodworking tools.
Tools and Accessories
Utility accessories like crampons, satchels, tool belts, rifle holsters, and ballistic vests.
Tools | How To Survive
Practical tool tradeoffs for harvesting, firewood, crafting, wolf struggles, and repairs.
Tools and Crafting
General crafting materials, workbenches, curing, and tool organization. Skip or label modded parts.
Forging and Harvesting Tips
Forging improvised tools, working around forge temperature, and harvesting frozen carcasses.
All Forge Locations
Shows the main forge locations and why coal, heavy hammer, and route planning matter.
Crafting Ammunition
Ammo benches, shell casings, gunpowder, scrap lead, bullets, and gunsmithing skill.
Craft Bows and Arrows
Curing saplings and guts, collecting feathers, crafting bows, and making arrows.
Woodworking Tools in Bleak Inlet
A specific route for finding woodworking tools at the Last Resort Cannery.
Mistakes
Common tools and crafting mistakes
Most crafting problems come from missing one required item, carrying too much, or waiting too long to prepare materials.
Leaving saplings uncured
Saplings, hides, and guts do nothing for crafting until they have cured indoors.
Going to a forge unprepared
Bring heavy hammer, coal, scrap, cloth, food, water, and enough warmth before committing to a forge trip.
Carrying the hammer everywhere
The heavy hammer is essential for forging, but it is usually dead weight when you are not on a forge route.
Ignoring tool condition
A low-condition firearm can jam, and damaged tools can fail when you need them most.
Wasting rare materials
Do not burn through cured hides, guts, feathers, arrowheads, or scrap without a plan.
Mixing modded and vanilla advice
If a guide uses mods, separate those tips from the vanilla survival advice players expect.
Crafting is preparation, not panic
The best crafting runs start days before you craft the item. Cut saplings early. Cure hides and guts indoors. Save feathers. Store scrap metal. Know where your hammer and coal are. When the materials are ready, tools stop feeling rare and start becoming part of your survival plan.
Next guides
Keep building your survival plan
Tools and crafting connect directly to food, warmth, hunting, maps, and long-term survival.
Beginner Guide
Learn the basic survival loop before worrying about advanced crafting routes.
Food, Water & Cooking
Prepare the food and water you need before long forge, hunting, or looting trips.
Clothing & Warmth
Use crafted clothing, repairs, and warmth planning to survive longer trips.
Hunting & Wildlife
Turn bows, arrows, hides, guts, meat, and tools into a sustainable hunting loop.