Fighting

There are 6 weapons and you cannot cross sides with them — a survivor may not use claws, and a zombie may not pick up a pistol.

Hit chance is a flat percentage rolled once. Skills add to it — a weapon's training skill is +15, its advanced version another +10 — and a handful of traits and passives nudge it further. Zombies get +10 at night. Survivors get nothing at night.

Damage is fixed. Ammunition is spent, and noise is charged, whether you hit or miss.

Noise is the real price

Every action adds noise to the district's attention score, and attention is what the dead drift towards — it decays by half every six hours, and until it does, it is a sign over your building. A shotgun is fourteen points of it. An axe is two. A punch is one.

This is why "shoot your way to a quiet life" is not a strategy the game permits. It is also why the axe is not a poor man's pistol; it is a different tool with a different cost.

Fighting is not the only thing that makes noise. Everything you do in the district is charged against it:

Some acts skip attention entirely and summon nearby ferals directly by position: knocking, a feeding groan, a death rattle, and the arrival of the convoy or a supply crate.

Experience

You earn XP equal to the damage you deal on every hit, plus 10 for the kill. Healing pays 5, reviving 10, searching 2, and a level of barricade 1. There are no levels to gain — XP is spent directly on skills.

Healing and infection

Healing is first-aid kits and nothing else: 10 HP, 15 with First Aid, a little more with Field Medic. A kit always cures infection.

Infection comes only from a bite. While infected you lose 1 HP for every AP-spending action you take, and it kills you at zero. It does not tick on its own — it bills you for playing.