How to Never Run out of Resources in Whiteout Survival

As many of my active readers know, I’m a big fan of management games, especially those which require a player to conserve and spend resources wisely. While resource management isn’t the preliminary reason for my enjoyment of Whiteout Survival, I do feel a great amount of pride in how well I have been able to manage them during my first run-through of the game.

I have yet to run out of resources on my main account. Even during events such as Hall of Chief (HoC), State Versus State (SvS) and King of the Icefield (KoI), I’ve never run out even and have rarely even needed to tap into my Backpack for extra resources.

Over my time playing Whiteout Survival, I have played on a total of 9 characters in hopes of understanding how much or little a player will need to be logged in to be successful at the game. Although I’ve since reduced the number of characters I play on to 4, I’ve come up with a few different strategies to accommodate how much time a player has to invest in the game.

As is with most things, a player will get better results the more they optimize, and the need for resources will heavily depend on how fast a player’s main account is progressing.

This guide will take you through all the strategies I have come up with when trying to collect resources. It should be noted that this will only focus on Meat, Wood, Coal and Iron as I will write more specific guides on resources like Speedups and Gems.

WHY DO RESOURCES MATTER?

Since I have a long history with games like Whiteout Survival, I knew that resources were going to be one of the biggest bottlenecks in the game. I didn’t realize that this was not common knowledge until I started scouring Reddit Forums to understand the common player’s problems and saw post after post complaining about being unable to upgrade buildings due to a lack of resources.

Our State recently went through their first State Versus State and I saw multiple players complain about how they ran out of Resources, but still had days of speedups to spend. Though this was good for me, since it allowed me to rank very high in SvS prep, the reality is that mistakes like this can lead to the failure of your State, leading to an invasion.

It is tremendously important that all players have a large stockpile of resources and avoid tapping into their Backpack resources as much as possible. Backpack resources are the only resources that can never be plundered and while your Storehouse can protect player’s resources from being stolen, this only accounts for resources that are produced from the Iron Mine, Hunters’ Hut, Coal Mine and Sawmill.

Unfortunately, any resources a player gathers from tiles cannot be protected by the Storehouse, making its utility shockingly… well… unuseful.

Resources like Meat, Wood, Coal and Iron are used for the following:

• Construction
• Research
• Healing
• Training Troops
• Donating to Alliance Tech

Of all of these things, I’ve found that Healing tends to consume the most number of resources, especially when battles are long and lots of batch healing is required. Otherwise, the resources spent on the remaining tasks only tend to be an issue during events like Hall of Chief (HoC), King of the Icefield (KoI) and SvS Prep. During these events, players will want to dump all of their resources to rank on the leaderboard, as they have the best rewards out of all the events.

Since chances are you’re going to be completing the aforementioned tasks with speedups during these events, it’s optimal that these are the only times you tap into your Backpack resources. It’s the best way to ensure you don’t run out midway through.

METHODS OF GETTING RESOURCES IN WHITEOUT SURVIVAL

There are a few methods of gathering resources in Whiteout Survival, and the average player will need to utilize them all. I will not be speaking about any methods that take real money transactions; however, I will note that players who make frequent purchases in the game tend to be less hindered by a lack of resources.

Now, this isn’t always the case and depends on whether you are trying to speed through everything using speedups.

RESOURCE BUILDINGS

Players will receive a significant portion of their resources from the Iron Mine, Hunters’ Hut, Coal Mine and Sawmill. Unfortunately, these resources will not be enough to carry a player very far, however, it is enough to ensure you always have the resources to train Troops and heal any injured Troops.

The nice thing about the resources that come from these buildings is that they are protected by your Storehouse as long as it has space. Resources received any other way will be left unprotected and can be plundered by players who attack your base. Note that this does not include resources in your Backpack, as long as they are left unclaimed.

When these buildings are upgraded, players will need to utilize resources to unlock work slots and can reduce the amount of time it takes to gather said resources and boost the number of resources provided per yield. Each building can employ a maximum of 6 Survivors and will only be active while Survivors are awake.

Players may notice that some upgrades require Steel. Though these are not required in order to continue levelling your Resource Buildings, they will significantly impact how many resources you get overall in the same method. You can hold off of upgrading these slots at first as Steel is also used in the Research Center, but steadily upgrade these as you can.

The happiness and wellbeing of your Survivors will be essential to the production of resources, since sick Survivors cannot work and unhappy survivors will slow down the rate of resource production. Since this is true, players will want to make sure they also upgrade their Shelters, Cookhouse, and the Clinic and address citizen concerns in the Suggestion Box.

The Suggestion Box will give players an understanding of what is going on in their base, though players can also read their Survivors needs by clicking on the numbers by the face icon (to the right of the time) and navigating to the Details tab.

Note: The Cookhouse has 3 meal options in order to raise the fullness of your Survivors. These are found by clicking the list next to Production. While Fancy Meals cost the most Meat, they tend to be the best to ensure that no Survivors go hungry.

When a Survivor gets sick, players can manually select another Survivor to take the workplace of the sick survivor; however, if a Survivor dies a player will need to wait until other Survivors find your camp. There is no way to force Survivors to arrive, however, it doesn’t usually take too long. Still, you will want to avoid this as much as possible.

CHIEF ORDERS

Once players have levelled enough, they will unlock the Chief House. Here players will have access to 6 Chief Orders, however, only 5 will be important in regard to resources.

Though Chief Orders can be executed independently, it tends to be more effective to stack them together for more resources. The order to execute them is as follows: Urgent Mobilization > Productivity Day > Rush Job. This is not necessary and tends to only be worth it if you’re really in a pinch. Otherwise, I would only use Rush Job daily for the extra resources.
The following are the breakdowns of the Chief Orders:

URGENT MOBILIZATION

Urgent Mobilization forces Survivors to work for 48 hours (Survivor Time) without stopping. This lowers their mood by 10 and can be used every 8 real life hours.

RUSH JOB

Rush Job provides players with 5 Days of Resources and has no negative effects on Survivors. It can be used ever 24 real life hours. This is the only Chief Order I use daily.

PRODUCTIVITY DAY

Productivity Day increases the output of all worksites by 100% for 24 hours of Survivor time. It will reduce the mood of survivors by 10 and can be used once every 12 real life hours.

COMPREHENSIVE CARE

In the early game Comprehensive Care comes in clutch, however, when players have upgraded their Shelters and Furnace high enough there should be no more sick Survivors (for the most part). Comprehensive Care can be used once every 4 real life hours and will immediately heal all sick Survivors.

FESTIVITIES

It’s nice to give your Survivors a break, but only when you really need it! Festivities raises Survivors’ moods by 50 and provides them with 30 Comfort, however… they’re going to stop working! Festivities can be used every 24 real life hours.

DAILY MISSIONS

Every day, players are assigned tasks to complete. Though each task does not provide many resources, when players meet certain thresholds and unlock Chests they will get a significant amount of resources.

These are Backpack resources you can hoard, and you will get more based on the level of your Furnace, so it will always be worth doing your dailies.

Luckily, players don’t need to complete all the tasks on the list to get all the rewards. So if for some reason you cannot complete a task you normally do (such as construction or research) there will be other ways to get them done.

GATHERING TILES

By far the most optimal way to collect resources is by farming Gathering Tiles. There are 8 different levels of gathering tiles, though only 6 are found in the Icefields with the remaining only being in the Tundra and Fertile Lands.

No matter where you are, I strongly suggest you only gather from the highest level gathering tile possible. While at first this means you will be sending three Heroes at a time, until you level up your Heroes enough or research Regimental Expansion,

I recommend always having at least 2 of your March Queues left unused for Auto-Rallies unless your Alliance has consistent downtime when you know Rallies will not be called. Although resources are extremely important, rewards that are receive from Polar Terror Rallies are hard to come by and you will want to make sure you never miss out on them.

If you have collected all 50 of your rewards from joining Polar Terror and Berserk Cyptid Rallies you can send out all of your March Queues to gather. As I have 6 March Queues, I typically send out 4 March Queues to gather after I receive all of my Rally rewards.

I would advise against having all of your March Queues dispatched especially at night as you will not be able to track whether or not your Alliance Member’s rallies are filling up or not. Though resources are important, being a team player is more important, even if you have received all of your rewards for that day.

CITY BONUSES

If players are willing to spend Gems they can click on the little arrow underneath their profile picture and navitage to the Growth Tab in order to activate Gathering Speed.

Players can purchase a Speed Boost for 8-hours or 24-hours, though I would recommend the 24-hour one if you are planning on gathering all day. This is especially helpful during events that require gathering resources or when players need a great amount of resources in one batch.

At the time of writing this, I have steered clear of using any of these City Bonuses. A lot of this has to do with me remaining fairly Free-to-Play (F2P) and not wanting to spend Gems on unecessary purchases. In the future I can see myself spending on these buffs during events that require gathering, especially as I develop a much larger stockpile of Gems.

Realistically if you’re ever going to use City Buffs that cost Gems, I would do so on a Farm Account and only purchase them on your main if you’re trying to score higher points.

RARE GROWTH HEROES

While the Rare Growth Heroes have been with us since the very beginning of Whiteout Survival, they don’t see very much utility outside of gathering.

Since Whiteout Survival is a combat focussed game, often Growth Heroes take a backseat. Players can tell whether a Heroes is a Growth or Combat Hero by the icon on the top of their page. Combat Heroes have a Red Icon with two swords, while Growth Heroes have a Green Icon with a Hammer.

While some Epic and Mythic Growth Heroes are the meta for joining rallies, especially for Bear Hunt / Hunting Trap or even Crazy Joe,  this is never true for your Rare Growth Heroes. The reason being? Their Expedition Skills.

It’s not uncommon for players to fall into the Trap of trusting the auto suggestions provided by the game. This often leads players to overutilize the wrong Heroes because they are “more powerful” even though others have skills that would boost the whole team above and beyond the capabilities of the one Hero.

As soon as you have access to Epic or Mythic Heroes, make sure you utilize them immediately for Combat, however, this doesn’t mean that you will want to ignore your Rare Growth Heroes altogether. Quite opposite frankly.

While yes, you won’t ever want to use Exploration Manuals on your Growth Heroes as they can be traded in the Tundra Trade Center, you will want to utilize all the Expedition Manuals you can to get their Expedition Skills up.

Each Rare Growth Hero will increase the output of one of the production buildings and will also increase the player’s Gathering speed for the same resource. When fully upgraded the building will increase it’s output by 25% or the player will be able to gather 25% faster.

Heroes govern the following resources and buildings:

Cloris governs the Hunter’s Hut and Meat Gathering Speed

Eugene governs the Sawmill and Wood Gathering Speed

Charlie governs the Coal Mine and Coal Gathering Speed

Smith governs the Iron Mine and Iron Gathering Speed

If you are a player who does not spend money in Whiteout Survival, do not use Gems to purchase Rare Expedition Manuals and instead just farm them using when completing Intel Missions. There is no rush to fully maxing out your Rare Growth Heroes’ Expedition skills.

POLAR TERRORS

Polar Terrors are one of the most impactful sources of loot in Whiteout Survival. Not only is this because of the Bahiti and Epic General Shards they can provide, but because of the Hardened Alloy used for Chief Gear and the sheer amount of resources a player can get from them.

The most beneficial part about the resources players can get is that they are stored in your Backpack, making them phenomenal to dump into Large Scale Events and ensuring that other players cannot steal them off of you.

When it comes to Polar Terrors, it’s extremely important that you only hunt highest level ones available. This isn’t always possible, due to the significant jumps in difficulty, however, if you get too far behind on killing the latest Polar Terror you will be set behind quite a bit.

From a resource perspective you will be missing out of a minimum of two Backpack items of eacch type per kill. While this might not seem like a whole lot at first, players must remember that it takes a few months for the next Polar Terror to appear and you will be taking down at least 8 a day on average.

This really adds up, especially when you think of the number of Speedups and Hardened Alloy you’d also be missing out on.

That being said, when you join another player’s Rally you will also get similar rewards, though fewer than the person who calls the rally.

BEASTS

Something many players don’t realize at first is simply how many resources they get from slaying Beasts. While it’s incredibly easy to assume that you should only ever use Stamina on Polar Terrors once you are done your Intel Missions, the reality is that you can get some decent rewards from Beasts.

Now, while I truly believe it is more advisable to only Rally Polar Terrors once you are done your Intel, it’s important to note that sometimes higher level Beasts are more efficient at providing raw resources, especially in between new releases of Polar Terrors.

I only noticed this during SvS prep since you got more rewards for killing higher level Beasts than you did taking down Polar Terrors, however, I still chose the route of Polar Terrors since I need agood amount of Epic General Shards. It did make me question whether or not hunting Beasts is a better idea for a farm account, which leads me into the next point.

ALLIANCE CHESTS

Each time a player calls for a rally they provide the Alliance with a random loot chest. These Chests have a chance to contain Speedups, or resources.

Alternatively, when players spend money in the cash shop they will provide their teammates with a different type of Loot Chest that can provide even better rewards, including EXP.

Players can only collect a maximum of 500 Loot Chests that come from rallies a day. If an Alliance calls more than 500 Rallies, those Chests will carry over to the next day.

Quite frankly, Alliance Chests are one of the most notable reason a player will want to call rallies instead of hunt Beasts. Because of the way the game works, players must always think of the collective rather than the individual a strong Alliance means higher chance for better rewards in events or battles.

EVENTS

One thing Whiteout Survival doesn’t lack is events… My god, are there so many events in this game and quite frankly it’s a reason most players burn out.

The nice thing is that these events commonly provide players with all kinds of fancy rewards, including high amounts of regular resources.

While players will want to try to rank as high as they can during events like this, it isn’t the most important as the rewards for simply completing the main thresholds are extremely valuable on their own.

I wouldpick certain events to focus on saving for, but each time an event comes around, try to make sure you complete the tasks that provide you with the full rewards.

That being said, the rewards you get scale with your Furnace! So don’t worry, you’re not going be getting small amounts of said resources forever!

PET ADVENTURES

When Pets unlock players will be able to send them on four Adventures a day. Each Adventure will provide players with different goodies including upgrade resources for their Pets and various amounts of Custom Chests which allow you to claim one of the 4 main resources of your choosing.

Custom Chests tend to come in very clutch since you can never fully plan what resources you will run out of.

VIP SHOP

In my opinion the VIP Shop should always be used sparingly as Gems are terribly important resource for free-to-play players as they are the only way to guarentee some decent Heroes in the Lucky Wheel.

If you are in an absolute crunch on resources, this is the most inexpensive way to acquire them and will be a lot less expensive than buying them raw.

That being said, if SvS is approaching and don’t think you will have enough resources to burst through all of your Speedups you can purchase these in advance.

I would recommend only doing this on a farm account, however, if you do not have a farm then you can purchase them on main.

The costs include:

2,000,000 Meat for 200 Gems

2,000,000 Wood for 200 Gems

1,000,000 Coal for 2,000 Gems

1,000,000 Iron for 4,000 Gems

This means your weekly spending would be 6,400 Gems which is typically 2 days worth of events. While a Farm can sustain this spending relatively easily, it will throw a wrench into your other advancements.

Though resources are tremendously important for the advancement of your city, the Gem cost is much too high for it to be worth it. Quite frankly, the costs for Coal and Iron are absolutely ridiculous since you can get 2,500,000 Coal and 700,00 Iron in 11 hours. The number of resources you get per Gem is extortionate and the only reason I even started buying them on my farm was because I had nothing better to spend gems on.

WHAT ARE THE MOST USED RESOURCES?

Meat and Wood tend to be the most utilized resources when it comes to completing tasks around your base and it’s not really worth mentioning the Furnace’s Coal consumption as it is incredibly low.

The priority for gathering would be:

1. Meat
2. Wood
3. Coal
4. Iron

I would advise players to try to gather all four types of resources daily, however if it is not possible then I would recommend rotating between them.

If you are in the process of upgrading buildings then make sure you prepare the number of resources you need by clicking upgrade on the building in advance to see what the threshold will be. I will always go out of my way to farm for resources in advance so there’s never a pause in my construction, unless I’m simply waiting for Double Time or Builder’s Aide to come off cooldown.

OTHER TIPS TO GATHERING MORE RESOURCES

There are a number of upgrades a player can acquire to boost the number of resources they can harvest, though they tend to be more geared towards accounts that are used as resource farms. I would strongly suggest that every player has a Farm account as you can have two characters per state. If you’re uncertain how to set up your farm here’s a guide to help you out!

RESEARCH CENTER

When players navigate to the Economy section of the Research Center they will be able to research Tech that provides faster gathering speed and resource production speed.

In my opinion, this is going to be the section you want to focus the least on as in the long run as other Tech trees tend to have much more important research. Now this isn’t to say that Economy Tech should never be researched as much as it means you should first research other Tech and focus on the Economy Tree when waiting to upgrade your Research Center to the next level.

In my opinion, gathering speed tends to be more worthwhile as the resource facilities don’t really produce nearly as much. At F30, my Hunters’ Hut does not even provide 1 million Meat when I utilize the Chief Order Rush Job, even though a level 8 Abandoned Animal Farm can provide 14 million in 11 hours.

ALLIANCE TECH

Although it will be a group effort, the Growth Alliance Tech tree has the ability to provide players with a 10% gathering speed boost for all 4 types of resoures.

While in the grand scheme of things this might not seem like a large boost in gathering speed, nothing could be further from the truth as this can often mean an hour of gathering speed reduced by the time they are all upgraded.

This helps make it possible to farm the same type of resource twice in the same day.

It should be noted that a player’s base must be on their Alliance’s Territory to take advantage of any of these bonuses. The actual gathering tile does not need to be in Alliance Territory.

FACILITIES

There is a single Facility that can be overtaken by by an Alliance every 3 days. While not the most gamebreaking, the Gathering Facility provides a 5% Gathering buff when it is claimed. 

DAYBREAK ISLAND BUILDINGS

There are 5 Daybreak Island Buildings that will increase gathering speed and with them all fully levelled you will get a 40% gathering rate speedboost.

I would recommend you avoid focussing these buildings on your main account as there are much better buildings to upgrade first such as ones for Construction, Research, Attack or Defense. However, for a Farm account I would set these up as soon as you can.

HOW TO CHECK YOUR RESOURCES

There are two ways to check your resources. The first is by clicking the Coal or Wood icon at the top of your screen. The icon depends on whether your Furnace uses Coal or Wood for fuel.

Here players can see all of the resources they have that are not in their Backpack. This includes seeing how many are protected by the Storehouse.

For a more accurate view of your resources, head to your Backpack then select the graph in the top right hand corner of the screen.

The first column shows how many resources you have safe in your Backpack, while the second column shows the total number of resources inside and outside your Backpack.

This section will show all types of resources including Steel, Speedups, Chief Stamina, EXP, and Pet Food.

During Events that will use lots of Speedups, I strongly advise you calculate if you have enough of these resources before you plow through. This will ensure you do not waste Speedups on tasks you cannot complete.