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Sheltered (iOS) Beginner’s Guide: 10 Tips & Tricks to Survive Longer

In a post-apocalyptic world, the moral choices you make can be the difference between life and death for you and your family. Sheltered is a new disaster management game from Team17, which is out now for mobile devices. In this game, you are in charge of leading your family into a concrete underground shelter. There, you will have to establish a base that will protect you from all the threats of the new world. You will have limited resources and unlimited enemies. Explore the dangerous wasteland outside your shelter in order to find crafting materials. Defend your base from feral beasts and wandering factions. Things will get even bleaker as your family struggles to hold on to your dwindling supplies. Do you have what it takes to continue making the right decisions? Make sure you read our list of Sheltered tips, tricks and cheats if you want to survive.

1. Keep Family Members Fed And Hydrated

Dehydration is one of the biggest threats to your family. Since you have limited supplies, you always have the risk of running out of water before you can get more. You don’t know how long it will be before you can get more water, so make sure you give your family members just enough water to keep them from getting dehydrated.

Wait for rain before you decide to spoil your family members with water. Rain gives you a lot of water, so this will be the perfect opportunity to fill up their thirst, dirtiness, and toilet levels. Take advantage of rain whenever you can as it will help keep your family satisfied for a little longer.

Another need you should be keeping an eye on is hunger. Food is a little harder to come by in this game, so you will have to get creative. If you can, try to pick family members that have the “Small Eater” trait. This will keep them from getting hungry as often as other member if the family.

2. Find More Tools

Speed can be a lifesaver in Sheltered. Anything that can help you work faster is a good thing. That is why you should always keep an eye out for any tool while you are out on expeditions. Pick up all the tools you can find even if you have no immediate use for them. You will be able to extend your life a little longer by not exhausting yourself from working without tools.

Once you have tools, focus on building Tier 2 items. It will be easy enough to gather enough resources to skip over Tier 1. Don’t bother with any of the Tier 1 items because they will be replaced quickly. The resources used for creating Tier 1 items will just be wasted.

Don’t bother picking up any toys or books during your early expeditions. These cannot be stored until you have crafted their appropriate containers. They will just end up as junk that takes up precious inventory space. Of course, they will be handy in keeping family members from getting too stressed later on in life, so there is some value in keeping them, just not during the early parts of the game.

3. Check Your Clipboard

The clipboard gives you an overview of the integrity of every item in your shelter. This will give you an idea which items you should prioritize for maintenance and repairs. Do not wait until these items break before checking on them. Keeping your shelter well-maintained is a good way to ward off additional problems later on.

4. Listen To The Radio

The radio sometimes picks up incoming transmissions from other expedition parties. Listening to these transmissions will help you gain valuable information that can help you stay alive in the game. If not for anything else, they are also pretty realistic, making the experience even more immersive and haunting.

5. Manage Your Family’s Stress Levels

Living in a post-apocalyptic world is probably the most stressful experience there is. Make sure you keep an eye on the stress levels of your characters so they don’t snap. A character that has too much stress may end up catatonic, and will stop responding to your instructions. If you keep neglecting it, stress can be just as deadly as any other threat.

6. Keep Your Generator Up

Your shelter runs on power, but it is not unlimited. You will need to regularly top up the generator with fuel to ensure everything runs smoothly. Don’t forget to maintain your generator as well since it is also subject to wear and tear. The last thing you want is to have a power outage while there are enemies roaming just outside your door.

7. Use Masks On Expeditions

The air is no longer safe. Make sure you always have your characters wear masks before they go out on expeditions. They will most likely end up getting poisoned from the lingering radiation if you send them out without a mask. Try to craft several extra masks for your family to make sure you are prepared in case you suddenly need to go out of the shelter.

If you are out of gas masks, your last resort will be the anti-radiation pills. Pick one new recruit to send out on an expedition. Have him gather as many items as he can, then give him the anti-radiation tablet as soon as he returns. You can send him back out immediately because he will be protected by the tablet for as long as there is a green plus sign beside his health bar.

You can continue to use new recruits on your expeditions even without anti-radiation tablets. Just keep sending them out as soon as they return. They will most likely end up dead, but your family will not be traumatized since they are just newcomers. What’s more is that they can be harvested for food after they die. It sounds totally nefarious but desperate times call for desperate measures.

8. Broadcast For Traders

When you are really low on certain resources, you can send out a broadcast asking for trades. There are traders listening to your broadcast and they will be willing to give you what you need for a price. More often than not, the trades will be overpriced. Unfortunately, since these are desperate times, you might not really have choice. Paying extra is still better than starving to death.

9. Split The Water Supplies

Since not all of your family members will leave the base for expeditions, make sure you split the water supplies. You need to leave some water for the family members that get left behind to ensure they don’t die of dehydration while the expedition team is out. The same conservation rules apply even in expeditions, so give each member just enough water to keep them from dying.

Try to build a second water butt as soon as possible. This will make water management a little more bearable. Leave the water butts at level 1. The cost of upgrading them is too high. It would be better to spend those upgrade resources on other things since you only need enough water to survive.

10. Set Some Traps

Setting traps outside your base is a good way to get some food without putting yourself in danger. Check the traps from time to time in order to harvest supplies. Don’t forget to craft a freezer before catching too many animals for food. Leaving food outside of the freezer will make them spoil faster. You don’t want to die of food poisoning after all the hard work you put into the game.

The world may be a wasteland but with the help of our Sheltered strategy guide, you will be able to survive! If you have any other tips or tricks to share, don’t hesitate to drop us a line below in the comment section!