When you first start a game of Kenshi, things might be a bit overwhelming. With the help of our beginner’s guide, you can learn a fair bit about this post-apocalyptic adventure. But beyond what that guide covers, there’s many more technical aspects to learn. One of the things that confuse new players is the way the game’s settings work.
You can also import games to get a fresh start. Think of this like a New Game+ that resets world states and factions. But you can at least keep your squads and the items they’re carrying. It’s a good way to test mods as well. You can even change the parameters for World States to keep certain things the same between save games.
Kenshi Advanced Game Settings Explained
The following advanced options can be toggled to change the way the game and its AI behaves. You can change these in the Options menu, or in the Game Settings section.
Hunger time: In Kenshi, characters need to eat or they will die of starvation. The higher this number is, the less likely a character is to starve. Basically, the slower your hunger score decays. So setting it to 5-10 will make it much easier to survive on limited food.
Chance of death: Taking damage in Kensi will cause injuries. Depending on the severity of wound and if it’s left untreated, it could kill a character. This setting makes it easier or harder to die from wounds. if you set this higher, your armor is much less helpful in preventing wounds.
Global damage multiplier: Like the tool tip states, this simply amplifies the total damage of combat. Use a lower number if you want to take less overall damage.
Production speed: How fast labor and crafting is done by characters. A setting of 1 means the default of 100% at base. Modifiers from skills and items can affect this.
Research speed: The Research task speed is affected by this setting. Modifiers from skills and items can affect this.
Building speed: How fast characters can construct new buildable items. Modifiers from skills and items can affect this.
Number of nests multiplier: Nests are the set spawn points for animals, bandits and more. The higher this setting, the more hostile NPCs that will be spawned in each zone.
Bandits loot the player: This setting will affect if the player is looted by NPCs when they fall in combat. Roaving bandits will also loot downed bodies, including the player if this is toggled on.
Easy prospecting: Prospecting is the basis of mining in Kenshi, as it helps you find resource nodes and their overall volume. Rarer metals need to be found in high concentrations to fuel crafting. This setting turned on should make it easier to find ores.
Once you are happy with your settings you may hit “BEGIN” and go on to customizing your squad.
Kenshi Gameplay Options Explained
You can change the settings below at any time via the Options menu. You will have to reset a save for some of these to apply. These can all be found in the Gameplay section.
Squad size multiplier: This setting will affect how big NPC squads are at spawn. Combining this with more Nests will lead to a lot more combat, which will also be much tougher. That does mean more loot though.
Global population Multiplier: How many individual squads roam throughout the regions of the world.
Town raid size: This setting affects how big each attack on player and NPC settlements can be. If you’re a new player, stick with a lower number to take your towns easier to defend.
Town raid frequency: How often raids happen. Usually, the Raids happen every few days on default settings. You can check incoming Faction Raids in the Faction window, as well as how long they will take to arrive.
Town attacks frequency: The attacks are the random attacks that come from nearby Bandit nests. Setting this higher will increase the frequency of attacks.
Dismemberment: In Kenshi, damaging individual limbs can take them out. There are robotic parts you can use to fix up lost limbs. But it’s best for you to wear good armor to stop this from happening. The skills needed to get your hands on good parts are much higher than getting good armor.
We’ve got more guides for you as well. Maybe you want to learn how to take down the Holy Nation or the Shek Kingdom. Use those World State guides to do so.