Last Ember beginner's guide: surviving your first nights

In Last Ember your fire is your life: if the home fire burns down to nothing, the run is over, and it also ends if every survivor falls. Days last 38 seconds and nights last 55, so the whole game is a loop of gathering wood fast in the light and holding the dark back after sunset. This guide covers what you need for your first few runs, with the real numbers from the game.

How does the fire work in Last Ember?

The home fire sits in the middle of the map and holds up to 100 fuel. A normal run starts it at 70. Three things add to that start: the Dry Kindling camp upgrade (+8 per rank), your Homestead's Hearth (+5 for every level above 1) and your Firemaking skill (+1 for every 5 levels). In co-op the host's bonuses light the fire.

The fire burns about 1.1 fuel a second in clear daylight on Pinewood, so a full fire lasts roughly 90 seconds with no help. Several things change that rate:

• Night: the fire burns 35% faster.
• Weather: rain burns it 30% faster, a blizzard 45% faster, falling ash 15%, snow and sandstorms 20%.
• The map: Frostfall and Sunscar burn 12% faster than Pinewood, Ashfall 10%, Blackmire 5%, Amberwood 3%.
• Party size: every extra survivor in co-op adds 15%.
• Lit camps: every outpost camp you keep lit slows the main fire by 6%.

Each log you burn adds 7 fuel, plus 1.2% for every Firemaking level above 1. Click the fire or press E beside it to feed it. The fire only ever takes wood when you choose, and if it is already full the game tells you and you keep the rest. That matters, because the same wood pays for torches, camps and some crafting.

A glowing ring around the fire pulses red when it is nearly out, and a dashed line on the ground marks where its light ends. Stay inside it at night: enemies standing in any light (the fire, a torch, a lit camp or a Warden's lantern) move 32% slower.

What should you do during the day?

Use every second of daylight to gather. Walk up to a tree, ore rock, fishing spot or plant and press E, and the job repeats until the source runs out or you move. Here is what each one gives you:

• Trees hold 3 to 5 logs each and grow back 80 seconds after you fell them. How many logs you can carry depends on your class: the Woodsman carries 8, the Tinker and Shieldbearer 7, everyone else 6. Every log you carry slows you by 3%, down to a floor of 62% speed, so drop loads at the fire often.
• Ore rocks need Mining level 1 for copper, 10 for iron, 20 for silver and 30 for emberite. Silver and emberite sit far out from the fire.
• Fishing spots sit at the edge of pools. Higher Fishing catches more often and lands bigger fish.
• Herbs, berries and mushrooms grow all over the map, and Foraging sometimes turns up a rare bloom.

Every dawn also brings a few free things. Night enemies flee, 16 fresh logs appear, and a supply cache drops somewhere in the open. Walk over it for a free level-up pick, 5 wood and 30% of your health back. The map's 3 shrines recharge too: touch one for a random 60 second blessing for the whole team (25% faster movement, 30% more damage, 3 health a second, double XP from kills, or every fire burning 40% slower).

Objectives, chests and the landmark

Survival runs give you 3 random objectives, like lighting 2 camps, opening 2 supply caches or gathering 30 resources. Each one pays 25 to 80 embers and 50 survivor XP. Treasure chests wait in an old cabin and two ruins on every map. Each map also has a landmark (The Elder Pine on Pinewood, for example) that calls a challenge in daylight: beat its guardians, most of them elites, and a guardian's chest appears with rare or better gear inside.

How do torches work?

Press T to plant a torch (pressing E with nothing nearby does the same). A torch costs 3 wood for most classes, 2 for the Emberwitch and 1 for the Tinker. It burns for 60 seconds and lights a pocket of ground, so enemies there slow down too. Rain makes torches burn out 80% faster, so plant them for a reason, like lighting a path to a camp or the edge of a fight.

Should you light the outpost camps?

Yes, as soon as you can afford it. Six outpost camps ring the home fire on every map. Lighting one costs 8 wood (5 to relight it later), it gives you a second safe pocket of light, and each lit camp makes the main fire burn 6% slower. Once lit, a camp can hold one defense and one support that you build with more wood. Camps have health, though, and enemies tear into camps nobody guards. Our camps guide covers every structure and how to choose.

How do cooking, eating and the belt work?

Stand at the main fire or any lit camp with raw fish or meat and press K. One press cooks everything you carry, one piece every 1.4 seconds. At Cooking level 1 each piece has a 38% chance to burn, and that drops by 2 points per level down to a floor of 3%, so early burnt food is normal. Cooked food heals over 3 seconds: from 20% of your health for the smallest fish to 60% for the biggest, and 28% for roast meat. Boars and wolves are where most of your meat and hide comes from.

Your belt sits on the action bar and shows how many of each item you carry:

Tonics and elixirs stack: each one adds its 40 seconds to what is left, up to 5 minutes. You can craft all of these anywhere from your pack (B or I). A bandage takes 2 herbs at Crafting 1, a tonic takes 1 herb and 2 berries at Crafting 5, and 1 copper ore with 1 mushroom makes 2 firebombs at Crafting 8. The gear and crafting guide has the full recipe list.

How does combat work?

Your main weapon attacks the nearest enemy in range on its own, so your job is positioning and abilities. Move with WASD or by clicking, and dash with Space or right click. A dash makes you briefly untouchable, and the red rings that bosses drop on the ground do not hit a survivor who is mid-dash.

• Q is your class's signature ability, ready from level 1.
• F is your second ability. It opens at survivor level 3.
• R is your ultimate. It opens at survivor level 8.

Kills also fill a run level. Each run level offers 3 upgrade cards (4 with the Foresight upgrade) that wait in the top right while you keep fighting; pick with the number keys. Cards include class talents, general skills, second weapons that fire on their own (Torch Toss, Ember Orbit, Bear Traps, Hunting Bow, Molotov and Hunting Hawk, up to rank 5) and, about one time in ten, a gold rare pick that is far stronger than the rest. Every card shows what it changes in your own numbers (Damage 14.2 to 16.3, for example), and the Your picks list on the panel shows everything you have taken this run. Our class guide explains every survivor's kit.

What happens at night?

At sunset the dark sends enemies in from beyond the light. Wolves and husks hunt you, wraiths go straight for the fire and the camps, brutes smash camps on their way in, and boars, lurkers and spitters join as the days climb. A few things make some nights worse:

• Elites can appear from day 4: three times the health, a little bigger and faster, and they hit 40% harder.
• Blood Moons come every 7th night. Enemies spawn 50% faster and move 15% faster. Surviving one pays 25 embers and 60 survivor XP.
• Champions can walk out from night 6: named elites with two affixes that always drop rare gear or better.
• Deep nights from night 8 send fewer weak enemies and more elites, many wearing a lighter version of a boss affix.

What happens on a boss night?

Every 5th night a boss walks out of the dark, in the map's own order. On Pinewood that is the Hollow Stag on night 5, Moonfang on night 10, the Lantern Eater on night 15, the Stone Colossus on night 20 and the Brood Mother on night 25, then the list starts over. Other maps use a different order. Every big move has a wind-up you can read, and at half health each boss enrages, speeds up and learns a move it did not have. A felled boss drops a rare or better piece of gear for every survivor still standing, 5 raw meat, 4 hides, a pile of wood and 25 fuel for the fire. The bosses guide breaks down every fight.

What carries over between runs?

Everything you do feeds a survivor who gets stronger every run:

• Survivor XP: 2 per kill, 30 per day, 50 per objective, 150 per boss and 60 per Blood Moon survived, times 1.25 on Hard and 1.5 on Brutal. Levels count the moment you reach them, even mid-run.
• Embers: 6 per day reached, 1 per 4 kills, 20 more past day 5, plus objective rewards. Spend them on camp upgrades, the Ember shop and the Homestead.
• Gear: everything in your loot bag goes to your stash. Drops that would not have beaten what you already wear turn into embers on the spot, paid out at the end of the run.
• Life skills: all seven keep their levels.
• Raw materials: ore, fish, meat, hide, herbs and blooms still in your pack go to your Homestead's Storehouse. See the Homestead guide.

Which difficulty should you pick?

Start on Normal. New maps open as your survivor reaches deeper days: Amberwood at day 3, Frostfall at day 5, Blackmire at day 8, Ashfall at day 12 and Sunscar at day 15. The maps guide explains what changes on each.

A first-run checklist

1. Chop wood right away and feed the fire whenever it drops below about half. Far from home with a full load? Press H to Recall: hold still for 3 seconds and you are back at the fire (it recharges in 60 seconds, and moving or taking a hit breaks it).
2. Grab the supply cache each morning and touch a charged shrine before big fights.
3. Light the nearest camp early. Build a defense there once you have spare wood.
4. Cook raw food with K at the fire before sunset, and keep a bandage or two.
5. At night stay in the light, use Q on cooldown and dash out of red rings.
6. On night 5, watch the boss's wind-ups and step out of its enrage ring at half health.

Frequently asked questions