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Blood Moon Horde Night Survival Strategies and Tips
Every seven days in the game, a zombie horde arises underneath a Blood Moon and rushes to your location looking for fresh meat. If you're looking to survive the Blood Moon Horde Night in 7 Days to Die, check out our helpful tips and strategies.
Blood Moon Horde Night Explained
It's not called 7 Days to Die for nothing. On the night of every seventh day, a horde of zombies make a beeline in your direction. They will stop at nothing to find their prey. Doors and walls get smashed to bits, and those caught with their pants down soon learn to fear the nights that glow red.
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But don't worry: Surviving the Blood Moon is definitely possible with the right preparations. You can learn more about Blood Moon start and end times via our helpful guide.
Blood Moon Horde Night Strategies - Early Game
For the first few Blood Moon nights, your goal should be to ready a weapon and have a place of safety. You don't need to have guns unlocked per se — a bow and a heap of arrows will suffice. What's most important during Blood Moon is elevation.
Get Yourself in an Elevated Position
During your first week in 7 Days to Die, you should find a house with a second story or (better yet) an attic. You will want to find something with height and stair access to defend yourself from the group of zombies that come your way.
When you find the right building, use a Stone Axe to destroy the staircase leading to your level. Zombies will jump across gaps to reach you, so make sure the gap is roughly two or three blocks in width. Using some Wood, build a ladder that's not attached to something like a wall. On Horde Nights, you can destroy the top ladder block to remove the entire ladder.
Zombies can climb, so destroy ladders to prevent them from reaching you.
Make Plenty of Ammunition to Fire at Zombies
During the Blood Moon, the zombies will try to reach you at your higher position. Early in the game, you should have access to the Primitive Bow and Stone Arrows. Make plenty of the latter and fire down onto the zombies from above.
Killing zombies during a Blood Moon is wise and beneficial. There's no reason not to take advantage of the shooting gallery. Not only will killing zombies during Horde Nights give you a bump in precious experience points, but on rare occasions, you can get a Loot Bag drop. These bags often contain ammunition, weapons, tools, or raw materials.
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Farm Silos Offer Superior Protection
As a tip, you may want to look for a farm with a silo. Metal silos found on farms in 7 Days to Die are perfect for early-game Blood Moon Nights. Often, they'll have metal ladders broken above ground level that are too high for a jumping zombie to reach. Build wooden ladders and attach the blocks to the bottom of the broken ladder. Before the zombies reach you, climb up and knock the wooden ladder down using an axe — they won't be able to climb up after you.
Silos are made of metal, which is highly resistant to normal zombie types. They may also include Steel Doors at the top for even better protection.
If you're playing on the Navezgane map, Boar Barn Fields (across the way from Bob's Boars & Carl's Corn) is ideal for a defensive location. The silo on the property includes a ladder that's easy to reach by stacking Building Blocks, and the Steel Door at the top is a winning touch. You can find the location at 200 W and 680 N.
Other farms with silos close to the starting location in the Pine Forest:
- Fiery Farms
- East of the starting area in Pine Forest, located at 2150 E and 415 N.
- Judy Witch Farm
- It's the closest farm to Boar Barn Fields but in the Burnt Forest. It's more dangerous for new players but can provide good protection if you clear it out. You can find it at 800 W and 250 N.
Take Advantage of Zombie Pathing
Zombies tend to follow the path of least resistance, meaning they will go the fastest route to your location when they're on the hunt. For example, if you're upstairs in a house, they'll attempt to find a door and use a staircase or ladder to reach you. If they can't, zombies will viciously attack walls, doors, cars, windows, and just about anything standing between them and their prey.
You can use this against them. Since zombies will find the quickest route, cutting off access to your location will force them to find the closest path available — so long as it exists. If your safe place is supported by flimsy wood, they'll likely focus it and knock you down to their level. Instead, you can try building a tower close to you but not near enough for a jumping zombie to make it over. Having the path end with a drop is also a good idea since it'll put them back at the beginning again.
As an example, the barn next to the silo at Boar Barn Fields contains ladders that lead high up into the building. By locking down the top of the silo, zombies will try to reach you by ascending the barn, only to drop back down.
Placing traps at the point where they fall is also smart. The Wood Spikes Trap is cheap at only 20 Wood, and can slow down and damage zombies. Place the traps in a viewable location for easy kills.
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Give Yourself Something to Do
You don't have to only fight zombies during a Blood Moon. Instead, use the time to craft, cook, or look over Perks or Skills in which you want to invest points. Keep a Campfire in your hiding spot complete with a Cooking Pot and Cooking Grill to boil any Murky Water you have sitting around. Cook food, craft items, and try to ignore the ravenous horde gnawing at the walls.
Adjust the Settings if You're Having Trouble
7 Days to Die offers a useful suite of game server settings, and some are aimed toward Blood Moon Horde Nights. If you're having issues staying alive during a Blood Moon, you can alter your game settings to make things a bit more approachable.
When making or continuing a game, select the "Basic" tab. The menu lets you adjust Blood Moon frequency, warning, enemy count, and zombie speed. You can also change the days Blood Moons arrive, or disable the feature altogether if you wish. If there are too many zombies to face, change their number in "Blood Moon Count."
Blood Moon Horde Night Strategies - After the Early Game
Blood Moon Horde Nights aren't always going to toss normal zombie types your way, so you'll need to be ready for when things get harder.
Create a Horde Base Separate from your Main Base
A common strategy used during late-stage Blood Moon Hordes is to create a base for the sole purpose of surviving the night. These need to be placed far enough away from your primary base to avoid collateral damage, but close enough to sprint to once the sky turns red.
A good horde base is designed with zombie pathing in mind. They can funnel zombies down hallways laden with traps, or focus the horde on a ladder with a player on top armed with a machine gun and hundreds of rounds. You can also build moats filled with spike traps. Better yet, you can work toward superior traps early by investing points in the right Perks.
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Unlock Skills and Perks for Powerful Traps
Against tougher zombie hordes, you'll want to have access to better traps than sharpened wood. With the points you gain for leveling up, invest points in the Advanced Engineering or Robotics Inventor perks.
Advanced Engineering increases the odds of discovering Electrical Traps Skill Magazines, which unlocks Electric Fences and gun turrets. It also ups your chances of discovering Wiring 101 magazines, which allow you to power your electrical traps.
Robotics Inventor allows you to find more copies of Tech Planet, which awards you blueprints for the Robotic Turret.
You should also keep an eye out for the Tech Junkie Perk Book. Reading issues of Tech Junkie powers your Robotic weapons and unlocks recipes for turret ammo.
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