Rust - Simple Solo Vanilla Start

Whether it’s wipe day, or a few days in, vanilla Rust is tough for most Solo’s.

From naked’s rock fighting on the beach, cutting into time you could have spent getting a base down, to Zergs on a roam and feeling far too superior to let you keep your stone hatchet; Welcome to Vanilla Rust.

This guide will get you started!

Simple Solo Vanilla Start

Whether it’s wipe day, or a few days in, vanilla Rust is tough for most Solo’s.

Disclamer: This guide will not cover PVP tips, or Raiding.

To Start

1. When you spawn in, check the map and decide where you want to build (General rules of advice).

Monuments will have higher concentrations of people.
The higher the monuments card level (Green, Blue, Red) The higher geared (And typically skilled players will be).

2. If you’re a solo, it’s advisable to want to build away from big overgrown Zergs, or player heavy areas. Building remotely is often a better idea.

In the authors personal experiences, wipes built in mountains, hills, by Airfield or Launch had more opportunities for PVP but when built close to others, left you open to being quickly raided.
Wipes built away from the slug fest, such as by Fishing village and lighthouse was met with less opposition, and more prim PVP. The ocean is a great opportunity to safely farm your way to Revolver and DB.
Building near monuments and ocean is great if you plan to farm the ocean.

3. You have your location, but you’re on your own. It’s important to start small, a 1×2 with a triangle airlock on the left or right side is sufficient for a beginner, and any solo just looking for a starter.

(Never put the triangle on the front, as a door camper can see all of your base, and potentially destroy your TC).

Check out Evil Wurst’s YouTube video’s to see a comprehensive breakdown of this base formats effectiveness! He also makes great base design videos for all types of players.

4. You have your base down! Where to next?

You’re settled, what you need is scrap for research, purchases, workbenches.
Components for crafting guns, etc…
Metal, Stone, Sulphur, and Wood

5. You’re going to want to farm scrap at less visited monuments such as lighthouse, junkyard (Not always the case, depends on time, population, etc…) and/or farm the dirt roads for scrap. (Ideally you’d want to hit the ocean, but we’ll assume you can’t get a boat at this moment)

You will want metal tools at first as the resource outputs far surpass the stone tools
Hit every red barrel you see. You need that low grade for crafting furnaces, which in turn gives you the metal you need for the tools.
Aim to have a healthy upkeep in your Tool Cupboard, have your base all stone, with your doors all sheet metal.

6. Base is set, you’re looking to progress beyond prim. You have a few options.

PVP other players at or around monuments (Riskiest).
Farm for scrap and comps (Medium)
Farm road to fishing village, buy boat, farm ocean (Safest).
Take the scrap and push your way to DB and Revolver in Tier 1, then jump to a Tier 2, get road sign, med pen then aim for the guns.

7. You will likely wish to raid and/or PVP at some point along this path, and I highly encourage it. However, there are far more informative guides on Raiding/PVP than what I can offer.