SCUM General Guide To Survival

Here's a series of great tips for you to remember to help you survive the longest while playing SCUM.

Like any good hardcore survival simulation game, SCUM doesn’t hand you the instruction manual -- let alone does it even remotely hint at what you should try to focus on or detail the best route to survival. You’re expected to figure it all out on your own with the constant pressure of death awaiting you around every corner.

To ensure you get as much as you can out of each run as you attempt to survive the puppets, robots, and other players roaming around in SCUM, we crafted this guide to break down some important aspects to keep in mind if you want to succeed. Take a look!

Avoid Sugary Foods and Beverages

The developers behind SCUM were listening to their doctors when they heard how badly these high sugar snacks were. This is reflected in the game as they give your prisoner negative health effects if you have too many at one time. You need to save these specific foods for when you’re absolutely desperate and your prisoner is nearly starving.

The more you consume, the less energy you’re going to have over time which means you’re going to have less stamina. It’s important to consume these items in moderation.

As of right now, you’re unable to view the nutritional stats of any food or beverage you pick up. However, if you take the time to read the item’s brief description and name you should determine what food items are high in sugars and fat.

Loading Your Gun

When you discover a gun, a magazine, and some bullets in SCUM, you've hit the jackpot! You're ready to take on more zombies than you could with a melee weapon and even go after players if you spot any in the distance. Though, these items do not magically go together. You need to handle them accordingly and get them set up so you seamlessly load them into your new weapon and fire at whatever you want to take down.

The first thing you need to do is load your bullets into the magazine. Do this by going into your inventory, dragging them into the magazine, and load them in. A magazine can only hold so many bullets, so not all of them will go in. After you've done this, you can then reload your weapon and your character should slap the loaded magazine into it. You're ready to start shooting!

It's important for you to know you do not need the magazine to start firing your weapon. You only need the bullets. However, if you only have the bullets on your person your character will load them one at a time, between each shot. This is a great thing to do if you're in trouble, but again, you only have one shot before you have to reload again. Make them count.

Hunting Made Easy

Because you’re meant to survive during your time on this island, you’re going to need to learn how to catch your own food. There are several different animals wandering the forests you can hunt and loot to provide for your character. For those without the best weapons, you’re going to have to improvise such as throwing a shovel or an axe at a deer to try and kill it.

Unfortunately, it may not down the creature immediately, but that’s okay! If you’ve hit a creature with a sharp object, look around the area of where it ran off to. Chances are you’ll find a blood trail and be able to follow it to its next location. For those with great aim, the animal should die shortly after getting hit by your weapon, even when it runs off after you hit it. This doesn’t happen every time, so prepare to run after it if it bolts!

Hold Items You Want To Use

Because SCUM is in early access, you’re going to run into a number of different bugs. These all differ from graphical issues, not being able to craft items in your inventory, or being able to perform certain gameplay functions with a new item. You can’t expect everything to work.

However, a number of players are running into the problem of not knowing how to have two items interact with one another. For example, some players may not know how to start a fire when they’re carrying pieces of wood and have matches or a lighter on them.

How do you get this to work? Your character has to hold the matches or lighter in their hands in order to light the bundle of sticks in their inventory.

You have to think like a computer programmer for this thought process to make sense! It works this way because you want the matches and lighter to perform an action to something your character is holding in their inventory. Think like this whenever you want to have your character to use an item to do something, and it should work. If this advice doesn’t work, try switching what your character is holding or log back in to find out if it’s a server issue.

Treating Injuries

Escaping a foe in SCUM is the first step to winning a fight. The second step is surviving any injuries you might have.

These injuries are based on how badly your character was wounded and the type of injury they suffered. The first you’ll want to do is go to your character’s health management page and see what afflictions you’re dealing with. No matter what you’re dealing with, whenever you’re using a specific medical item to treat something you need to right-click it and then ingest it or apply the first aid.

Some of the injuries you’ll deal with vary in severity. It should tell you your injuries level and inform you of what healing item you’ll need to deal with it. In worst cases, these injuries become infected or require you to take antibiotics before they’re fully healed. You can use any of these items if you’re dealing with a physical injury:

  • Rags or cloth (level 1)
  • Clean bandages (level 2)
  • First aid kit (level 3)

When you’re dealing with level 1 injuries you need to disinfect the rags before you apply them. This way the wounds heal far faster than if you only placed the material on top of it.

Need Vitamins? Devour Fruits and Vegetables!

While in the health effects screen in SCUM, you’ll notice a breakdown of what’s happening inside your character’s body. A small section of this area details what kind of vitamins your character needs to consume in order to remain healthy.

If you’re on the search on how to boost your vitamin D and E charts, you’re going to want to consume vegetables to provide the largest boost. Where do you find them? The best places for you to go are sections C2 and C3. There you’ll find a small cluster of farms where you should have a higher chance of finding vegetables. Not only will this assist in boosting your character’s vitamin intake, but it will also lower your character’s overall hunger.

For those in a mad dash to keep their vitamin D levels in check, take off any large upper garment you have on and stand outside! Your character can acquire a small amount by having their skin exposed to sunlight. As you may imagine, you can use this to your advantage when the sun is out.

Fighting Other Players

When you're playing multiplayer, you're never alone in SCUM. There's probably a few players wandering the wilderness with you, attempting to survive as much as you are. You must remain weary about them, and if you encounter them, you have to decide what's the best decision for you make: fight or flight?

For those who truly aspire to gain anything in this game, they will almost always choose fight.

The most important thing to watch while you're fighting another player is your stamina meter. This determines how many hits you're going to get in and how strong of a blow you can inflict on them. The more stamina you have, the longer you can fight and outlast your opponent.

If they only have a melee weapon, a good strategy is to let them throw the first handful of attacks at you and then proceed to attack. You want to do this because they have just as much stamina as you, and you know how precious it is. By forcing them to throw as much of themselves at you as they can, you'll catch them off guard when they low stamina and you can freely attack them. This means you're going to have to learn how to properly dodge and evade their blows. You'll have time to practice against the puppets on the island, but that's it.

When your opponents have a gun, running and evading will prove even more critical. Having them waste their ammo is as important as getting close them, especially if you do not have a ranged weapon. Don't focus on rushing an opponent with a gun, instead focus on weaving and dodging around whatever environment you're surrounded in. In a small field? Try to use the thick foliage to your advantage. Use whatever you have around you, get close, and take them out quickly!

Avoiding/Combating The Robots in SCUM

For those who have ventured to the riskier parts of the game, you've likely run into the small floating robots who shine a bright light on you and ask you to leave. These robots do not harm you, but they give away your position and ask you to leave the area. What you need to look out for is the larger robots roaming the game. These ones can, and will, take you out with one shot. You can destroy them, but it takes a large group of prisoners to work together to do so. Do not attack them when you're alone.

The best thing for you to do when you see one of the smaller robots is jump inside of a building as quickly as possible. When you're inside the building, they will eventually leave you alone and fly away. They can't see you inside of a building and they'll wander off eventually. The larger robots are completely different beast.

You can find these monstrous robots in the middle of fields, where you won't have access to a safe building to get away or elude them. Have your character sprint as hard as they can in the direction of a building, and try to shake the robot. This may still get you killed, but it's the best chance you have of surviving the encounter. The worst for you to do is engage them with a melee weapon or gun. Do not provoke the robots. 

If you do get a group together to try and take them out, and you do take them out, is it worth it? The answer is, no. You won't get any insane loot from the robot, nor will you receive a large chunk of fame points for doing so. This will likely change in the future.


These helpful pieces of information and tips should assist you in staying alive long enough to figure out something new every time you play SCUM. Try experimenting along the way and make sure you’re staying informed on the developer’s progress as they continue to release new updates on their game.

For more SCUM guides, check out these ones other GameSkinny writers have written about your new favorite hardcore survival game:

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Published Sep. 4th 2018

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