How to win: survive to the final duel and take Champion

The three phases of a match

Early game: don’t be the easy target

The first words of a match decide who is left. In our first match ZOMBIES landed about a minute and a half in and knocked us out on open grass; in our second, a nuke came within the first two minutes. What helped:

• Read every tip line immediately. “Climb something tall”, “Get inside the BUNKER”, “Get under a roof or by a fire”: the game tells you the answer.
• Stand near height. A roof or ledge you can climb in two seconds beats the middle of an open field.
• Use your free revive early if you get it. In our first match the first revive was marked FREE; it put us back in a safe spot.
• Watch your writer chance. The percentage next to the dice climbed from 8% to 20% during our first match. Have a word ready.

Enlarge screenshot:

Middle game: write words that keep working

By the middle of a match several words are active at once. In our first match a kraken’s tentacles, snow, fog and a roaming tornado were all on the island together. Two things matter now:

1. Your writing turn. Pick words that stay on the map and keep pressuring the remaining players: TORNADO (“It roams all match”), ZOMBIES, ZONE. Avoid wasting it on a second NUKE (it becomes bombs) or a random name (it just spawns a character).
2. Your position. Keep track of where every lasting threat is. A safe roof stops being safe when the tornado heads toward it.

Heals come from words too: HEAL drops a medkit at a red flare (“first one there gets it”), APPLE gives everyone food, and JESUS heals everyone who stays close. If one of those is written, move to it.

The final duel: how two players write at once

When two players remain, the game changes the rules. Here is the exact sequence we recorded in both matches:

1. “FINAL DUEL!” appears.
2. The top of the screen shows “A & B are writing…”. Both players type at the same time.
3. When one finishes: “A ready · B writing…”.
4. “Both are ready!” then “Words in!”: both words land.
5. “Both write again in 13”: a short countdown, then the next round.

In our first match the final duel ran for more than five minutes and went through BUNKER, 7867, MANSION, 6767, DOOM, ANGEL, DEMON, HALLOWEEN, 9999, HEAL, GOD, REST, GG and ZONE before one player won. A few lessons from watching it:

• Quantity matters. You get a word every round, so have a list ready. Hesitating wastes your turn.
• Joke words waste rounds. The 67 kid came up three times in that duel and the match simply went on.
• Protection words are blocked. “FORCEFIELD is off in the final!” and “No more peace in the final.” Don’t try them.
• Mix offense and survival. Answer a deadly word with a shelter (BUNKER, HOUSE) or a heal (HEAL, JESUS), then go back on the attack.
• Items still work. A Force Field item from your loadout is not the FORCEFIELD word; save it for the duel.

The match ends with “name wins!” and “Going to the lobby…”.

The winning loadout

“Your best 5 go with you into the match.” For winning, pick items that save you from the most common threats and one that helps you move:

• Force Field (Legendary): nothing can hurt you for 20 seconds. Your duel trump card.
• Medkit (Rare): full heal and removes fire, poison and cold; not used up when you are fine.
• Portable Ladder (Rare): instant height that “always reaches above a flood”.
• Smoke Bomb (Rare): creatures, even bosses, lose you for 8 seconds.
• Rainbow Magic Carpet (Epic) or Speed Coil (Uncommon): get anywhere fast.

Odds and all 40 items: Items & Spins.

Champion, Unstoppable and Survivor

Survivor and Champion often come together: a long final duel adds two words every round, so a player who wins a long match has usually lived through a lot of words. More on the badges page.