[Guide] DayZ How To Make a Base

Updated:

19 Jun 2021

Well, why do you make a base in DayZ? Why is it important - if you just spawned, I wouldn’t advise looking straight away for material to start building your base, before you start building a base you should look for decent enough weaponry, clothing, and stable income of food - of course, you can start building your base whenever you want to, but don’t start screeching when a bunch of bandits are raiding your place and all you have to defend yourself with is a crowbar!

In this guide, I’ll be showing you step by step how to build a base in DayZ. I'll be covering the best spots, what material you need to build the base with, and what you can do in your base. Why building a base is awesome in DayZ:

If you’re sick of running around the map and want to settle down, building a base is perfect for you!

Awesome for stockpiling weaponry and other valuable goods

Start your little community inside of a server!

Step 1: The best spots in Chernarus

If you look closely enough, you’re gonna see red circles - those are in my opinion the best spots for a base, but why? Near those areas are military bases, now you don’t have to place your bases right there, cuz you can do it anywhere, it’s just that you can loot the military bases and stockpile on guns+never worry about running out of them.

Pretty much the perfect base location is somewhere in a forest (in an open field you’re usually easy to spot and will get you into trouble), relatively close to a military base.

Step 2: Building walls

If you want to start building walls, you gotta start with crafting a fence kit - that thingy will help you place the foundations for your walls. So how do you craft it? You’ll need:

x1 rope
x2 short sticks

Combine them and voila, you have the fence kit, so what next?

Next, you’ll need logs, thus get a hatchet or better yet, an axe and cut down some trees, you’ll only need 2 logs for each wall, so carry them to your wall and place them there, now, get yourself a shovel and place the foundations for your wall - you should have 2 vertical logs next to each other.

Alright, now you’ll need:

Nails(boxes)
Planks
Hammer

Unpack the nail boxes and place them on your wall, you’re gonna need 18 planks/36 nails with you to craft the frames+coverings.

This doesn’t require much philosophy, only a hell ton of resources, so make sure you have the means to defend yourself when building a base ;P!

Step 3: How do you craft a gate?

You will need:

Pliers
Metal wire
Combination lock (3 or 4)

You start with placing the metal wire on the wall(you NEED pliers for this), after that it’s gonna become a makeshift gate, but at this moment, without a combination lock, anyone can get into your base - so you’ll need a combination lock, place it on the wall like you did with the metal wire and bam, you have a nice code-locked gate!

Step 4: Types of bases

You can make a base purely from your resources, but did you know that you can make a base inside of a world-generated building, for example, in a warehouse like this:

Starting a base inside of a building will already give you indestructible walls, potentially huge amounts of space(depends on what building you want to start as your base). There are flaws to this sort of base though, you might get unwanted attention from players that might stumble upon your base, not be able to grow your crops, etc.

Starting a base with your own resources allows you to start your base whenever you want to, which includes remote locations that will give little to zero attention from other players, but leaves you vulnerable with destructible walls from all directions.

I wouldn’t recommend starting your base anywhere near the coast, the best locations are in the north, the areas there are pretty remote and you get natural protection from bears and wolves.

Step 5: Building a watchtower

First, you need a watchtower kit, so you’ll need:

x1 Rope
x4 Short Sticks

Place the kit whenever you want to, get 4 logs and place them at the watchtower, get out your shovel and create the foundations for your watchtower.

You will need x4 logs for L1 Base, L2 Base, L3 Base each
x20 nails and 10 planks for L1 Roof, L2 Roof, L3 Roof each
18x nails and 6x planks for L1 Stairs, L2 Stairs and L3 Stairs each

(You can also build walls for your watchtower, either a full wall or just a half of it)

For the final roof of your watchtower, you’re gonna need x6 sheets of metal - get on top of your nearly finished watchtower and place the sheet metal on top of your watchtower, click LMB and after around 10 seconds you’re gonna craft a metal roof for your watchtower!

Watchtowers are useful for scouting out areas, sniping Bambi’s or just keeping an eye out for your base!

Step 6: Things to put in your base

Things that you can put in your base are for example, fire barrels to keep yourself warm and give some lighting to your base or just use the oil barrels as a storage - those 2 items are great as beginner interior items for your base!

Tents are awesome for storing items that usually wouldn’t fit in barrels and other small storages, but the coolest storage in my opinion is the wooden crate - you can bury it under the ground with items inside which makes it incredibly hard for bandits to find.

There are bigger tents that give you protection from rain(if your base doesn’t have a roof).

If you feel like getting better lighting for your base, find a generator and connect it with the power cable to, for example, a construction light.

The Final Step: The Flag

This is the final step, a flag representing your base and asserting dominance over Bambi’s in the region. First you’ll need materials for the Flag Pole Kit:

x1 Rope
x3 Short Sticks

Place it where you want your flag pole to be, and then you’ll need other materials:

32 stones
9 logs
Metal Wire
Rope
60 Nails

You can build the Flag Pole with: Sledgehammer, Shovel, Pickaxe, Hammer, Hatchet

But what you also need is the flag itself! You can find them in Schools, Office Buildings, and Hunting Areas. As of now, there are 23 flags in total in DayZ.

Attach the flag to your flag pole and raise it - taa daa, your base now looks cooler.

To sum it all up:

Bases in DayZ are awesome and useful to have, yet they might require multiple personnel to defend, they need a lot of resources and time. When building bases, be smart about where you’re building them(does the location benefit you/your base, will the location attract pesky players, etc). Make sure your generator is up and running at all times and stock up, on weaponry! That’s all for today folks, have fun in DayZ and see ya!