You awaken in an amphora, a vessel which sealed the power of The Flame within you. You have nothing save for some ragged clothing and a desire to venture forward. Reclaim the Realm, Flameborn.
When you finish with your character creation duties, and enjoy the cutscene which brings you up to speed on the world of Enshrouded, you’re going to find yourself starting out in the Cinder Vault, the hiding place where Flameborn like you were stored. From there, you’ll begin your descent through the tutorial section and out into the larger world.
The Tutorial Mine And The First Altar
There’s really only way you can go once you step out of the amphora. You’ll step through the doors and find yourself approaching a Flame Shrine. You’ll be prompted to “Commune With The Flame,” which will start the quest “Claim A Spot For Your Base” and unlock the Flame Altar recipe for crafting. From there, follow the stairs down, and read both the tooltip for accessing your Journal as well as the diary on the bench next to a skeleton. This will provide a page in “The Alchemist’s Theories I” and a little EXP.
Descend the stairs further and enter the mine, picking up the Torch at the entrance. The first chamber will have a couple of ladders leading down. At the bottom, you’ll find an area blocked off with destructible planks. Also in this area is a chest which will probably provide you with at least a Torch and a Bandage. Destroying the planks might also provide you with a resource, Wood Logs. Picking up Wood Logs will initially unlock the Shield and Club crafting recipes.
Continue through the mine to the next tooltip on the bridge, warning you about the Shroud and how your time within it is limited. Pick up the Torch, and proceed down further into the Enshrouded area below the bridge. You’ll see a tooltip about how to lock on to enemies (Tab) and how to avoid attacks (Ctrl). Beyond that is your first enemy. They’ll likely drop Torn Cloth and Shroud Spores. Torn Cloth will unlock the recipe for Bandages and the Rags armor set. You’ll notice that all of those items require a material, String, which you haven’t found yet.
The Torch will act as a weapon for now, although the Enshrouded creatures you’ll face could potentially drop more useful weapons or a level 1 Shield. Note that this Shield is not quite as good as what you can craft from Wood Logs, so don’t feel like you have to keep it.
Once you’ve cleared out the Enshrouded enemies and proceed to the mine’s exit, you’ll find a Return Beacon and unlock the recipes for the Workbench and Construction Hammer. These two will be necessary to actually start building a shelter. You can proceed straight down the main road, or you can take a left turn just past the Beacon to enter the ruins of Longkeep.
Longkeep is mostly empty, though you may encounter a couple of Rats as you descend. Entering Longkeep from the main road near the Beacon, you’ll find a training dummy with a tooltip about blocking attacks, as well as a tent with a new lore item that opens the “Captain’s Journal” collection. You can explore Longkeep further to find scattered resources here and there, as well as another lore item, this one opening the “Love Letter to Queen Jezmina” collection. At the bottom of the ruins, you’ll find a well which provides you with Water (useful for improving Stamina) as well as a Campfire, a couple of pieces of Lean Meat, and the “To Eat, Sleep, and Rest” lore item.
The Campfire will have a tooltip about cooking and resting. It should be pointed out that you need to be sitting at the Campfire (either through the default action button “E” or “X”) before you can cook food. Once seated, make sure the Lean Meat is in one of your slots on the action bar, select that slot, and hold down the left-hand mouse button to cook the food. When you hear the sizzling sound the first time, release the mouse button and you’ll have Grilled Lean Meat. If you hear the sizzling sound a second time, you’ve burnt the meat and will gain Tar. Tar is a useful building material later on, but for now, try to avoid it. Grilled Lean Meat will boost your Constitution stat by one point for 20 minutes, increasing the size of your health bar temporarily.
There’s a marker point for you to place your first Flame Altar, but, if you look at the Crafting menu, you’ll see that the recipe calls for 5 Stones. You can gather loose Stones on the ground, and the first one you pick up will unlock recipes for the Axe (useful for felling trees) and the Pickaxe (useful for mining and breaking up larger boulders into Stones). Gather up a couple Stones (you’ll get three for each one you pick up off the ground), then craft the Flame Altar. The Flame Altar will appear in your backpack or your action bars (press Alt to swap bars). Make sure it’s in a slot on an action bar, select the slot, and place the Flame Altar somewhere that looks good to you.
Note that you do not need to go precisely where the quest marker points you, but it’s a good starting point with plenty of resources on hand. Once you’ve placed the Flame Altar, commune with The Flame once more to complete the quest.
Tutorial Recipes
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Flame Altar – 5 Stone
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Workbench – 3 String, 8 Wood Logs
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Construction Hammer – 1 Stone
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Campfire – 2 Wood Logs
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Bandage – 1 Torn Cloth, 1 String
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Axe – 4 Twigs, 1 Stone, 1 String
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Pickaxe – 4 Twigs, 1 Stone, 1 String
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Torch – 1 Twig, 1 Plant Fiber
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Shield – 6 Wood Logs, 1 String
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Club – 6 Wood Logs
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Ragged Shirt – 4 Torn Cloth, 3 String
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Ragged Pants – 2 Torn Cloth, 2 String
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Ragged Boots – 3 Torn Cloth, 2 String
Gathering and Hunting
Now that your first Flame Altar is established, you’ll be able to start building structures. But you’re going to need raw materials. Fortunately, you’ve got a lot of them in close proximity.
Bushes and shrubs provide two materials, Twigs and Plant Fibers, though the actual drops vary. With Plant Fibers, you’ll unlock the recipe for String. Twigs will unlock the recipe for the Bow weapon, a very useful tool both for combat and for hunting, and Wooden Arrows to use with it.
There are also a number of wild animals running around. Sheep and Rabbits can drop Lean Meat. Wolves can drop Wolf Meat, an item which provides better bonuses, but you’re more likely to see them dropping Bones. Picking up Bones unlocks the Wand and Staff weapon recipes. A Staff does not function without ammunition, so you might want to hold off on crafting one until later. Animals of all types can potentially drop either Fur Patches or Animal Fur. There’s not much you can do with these yet, but hang on to them.
Using the Axe and Pickaxe will gain you some other starting materials. The Axe will let you cut down trees to obtain Wood Logs and Resin. Resin doesn’t have much use immediately, but keep hold of it for later. The Pickaxe will let you break up boulders (providing Stones), dig holes in the ground (providing Dirt, necessary later on), and mine out material veins like Flint (providing Flintstone, a useful construction material)
There are three kinds of “wild” edibles out there that will help you survive. Purple Berries appear on large bushes, and harvesting berry bushes only provides the berries, not Twigs or Plant Fibers. Eating a Purple Berry with give 30 seconds of health regeneration, useful if you’re a little dinged up but don’t want to use a Bandage. Red Mushrooms grant a 10 minute buff to your character’s Intelligence stat, useful for those who are going to go the more magical route. You can cook Red Mushrooms to get a Grilled Red Mushroom, doubling both the time and the Intelligence bump. Honey can be found in beehives hanging off trees, producing an increase to Stamina recharge for 3 minutes, useful when you’re doing a lot of climbing or fighting. The beehives also produce Wax, but much like Animal Fur, there’s not much you can do with it right off.
As you explore the immediate area, particularly the ruins of Longkeep and the Enshrouded areas near it, you may come across three other materials. Metal Scraps are useful in a number of later recipes, but finding one right away and picking it up will unlock the Lockpick recipe. Certain chests you come across will require a Lockpick, so it doesn’t hurt to have a few handy, though Metal Scraps are hard to come by this early in the game. Runes will drop from Enshrouded creatures, and these don’t have any immediate use – but don’t dispose of them. They’ll be vitally important later. Shroud Spores also drop from Enshrouded creatures, and these are necessary materials for two upgrades: the Glider and the Grappling Hook. They’ll also be needed for other items later, so save some up.
Hunting And Gathering Recipes
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Bow – 5 Twigs, 1 String
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Wooden Arrow (x10) – 3 Twigs
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Wand – 2 Bones
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Staff – 1 Bone, 2 Resin
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Lockpick – 2 Metal Scraps
The first “day” within Enshrouded is going to find you picking up a lot of stuff and making your first bits of gear. And it only gets bigger from here, so make sure to stock up!
(Author’s Note: Because Enshrouded is in Early Access, some of these materials and recipes may change before final release.)
