Fortnite for Boomers: Hitting the island

Now it gets real

When you hit the dirt it’s on! Every player will be of the same mind – get ready for combat. That means finding weapons, materials and survival stuff. (You land with nothing but a pickaxe.)

(OK – you might land with some gold bars, but let’s not confuse things…)

While the ‘island’ is only about 2 km across, there are many very different terrains from towns to mountains. Even if you choose to land in the same place each time, Fortnite’s masterminds ensure you never get the same situation to deal with.

And, although you can come across stuff lying around anywhere, by far the most loot (weapons n’ stuff) is found in buildings. Of course, everyone knows this and will be zeroing in on areas with a high density of structures. The Boomer approach is to target buildings with the highest loot potential and lowest likelihood of competition.

The main thing you are searching for is ‘chests’. These are glowing… chests – treasure chests, mostly gold – and they make a distinctive sound to help you locate their whereabouts.

(Sound is super-important in this game – playing with headphones is pretty much essential.)

When you find a chest, you open it with the ‘X’ button (it’ll remind you) and the random contents will spill forth. Now you can start collecting your ‘loot’ or ‘inventory’. Any chest can hold any contents. But standard gold chests usually hold lesser value (and lesser effectiveness) weapons.

Weapons come in a colour-coded sequence of effectiveness. The more effective, the rarer.

So, when you crack open a gold chest you’ll most likely get a common (green) weapon – serviceable but could be better. Early on in the game you want ANYTHING that can be fired. You can worry about upgrading later if you survive the first few minutes.

Far less common are Rare Chests (aka Super Chest, Mythic Chest, or Legendary Chest) with their own, distinctive, more ominous sound – you’ll soon learn to prick your ears up for it…)

These always have the good shit – but no guarantee of what type. (There are other weapon sources but that’s enough for starters)

If someone’s beaten you a chest, it’ll be open, not glowing, and silent. Too late… move on.

Building your all-important loot

So, Objective One: Get Armed. (You CAN eliminate someone with a pickaxe but it’s difficult and messy – ie: chances are you’ll suffer major damage)

You have 5 inventory spaces which are empty when you land – choosing how you use them is key. Everyone has their own preferred arsenal – I’ll go into mine later.

Objective Two: Get Armoured. When you land, you’ll have 100% health but no shield. You can take a hit but not many and not for long. You need to find and use shields. They come in two ways. Small ‘common’ shields (shown above left) can take you from zero to 50% shield in two hits – but no further. Large ‘rare’ shields (above right) can give you 50% on top of whatever you currently have. Your best strategy here, then, is: down a couple of small then slug back a large for your quickest full shield. Easier said than done – but bear in mind if you hit the large first, you can’t go past 50 with a small.

You can stock up to a max of 6 small or 3 large shields in one inventory space.

Also – find bandages. You know what they say; ‘If you haven’t got your health…’ – this couldn’t be more true here. You can swan around with zero shield just fine, but if your health goes – you go.

Bandages restore your health – chances are you’ll lose some. That can happen when you’re shot and have no shield. Or when you’re caught in the storm. (The WHAT? – we’ll get to that…) Or… if you jump/fall from a height. (Mind you, if you fall from high enough, it’s sayonara…)

There are small, common bandages (above left) that give you a 15% health boost with each use. You can stockpile up to 15 of these – can be very handy later – but… they can only take you to a maximum of 75% health.

Then there are ‘Med Kits’ (above right) – larger and rarer, they can take you to a full 100% health in one hit no matter where you start. (I’ve done this from 1% – knife-edge stuff…) They have a maximum load-up of 3.

You can also find restorative ‘slurp juice’ around the map – but let’s just cover the basics for the moment.

#BadassDad tip: Why I prefer small bandages

When you administer extra health (or shields) – you have to be stationary!

While Med Kits will bump you to 100% health, they take a LOT longer to complete – that can be the difference that gets you seen and eliminated. So, I prefer to stock up on small, quick application bandages so I can get moving faster. (Can also be crucial when you’re caught in the Storm – yes yes, that’s coming…)

No matter what you apply, if you can, pick a place where you can’t be spotted. It’s an easy mistake to make when you’re desperate to shield up – but it can so easily be your last. (Everybody forgets themselves in this situation at some point, and I’ve capitalised on that countless times – more on that later too.)

Wow – all this and we haven’t even fired a shot yet! Alright, we’ll get to that…