Graveyard Keeper 2 Combat Guide

You are the strongest fighter in the encounter (100 HP, refilled after every fight), and you must have both a sword and armor equipped before the Defense Power gate will let the battle start — a bow cannot substitute for the sword. The standard rhythm is swing with your sword (costs 20 stamina out of a 100 pool), back off, let stamina regenerate, and swing again. The bow is stamina-efficient because each arrow costs only 10 stamina and deals more damage at range. Do not send ranged troops into a melee brawl, and do not wade into combat on a low stamina bar — both leave you unable to attack and open to being surrounded.

Sword swing stamina stays at 20 per tier; bow shot stamina stays at 10. Damage resolves with a flat formula (attacker's damage minus target's armor, never below zero), with no crits or randomness, so Common enemies hit for 4–7, the Wild Zombie cannot hurt you in Master Armor, a Barrel Zombie hits for 10, and a dying Stinker's burst ignores armor outright.

Give a zombie armor plus a pike or bow via Inspect (swords do not work on undead soldiers), then place it in a squad slot at the Barracks. Talk to Battle Ram to spend Defender's Emblems on opening new slots and unlock combat talents like Impaler (pikes) and Blindseye (bows). Zombie soldiers never permanently die: when one falls, a fresh copy respawns with its gear. You can also hire mercenaries through the Merc Leader for one slot — 2 pikes and 2 bows starting at 8 power, upgrading to 16 with 3 Iron Ingots and 24 with 3 Steel Ingots, with fees escalating through 5 → 7.5 → 10 → 15 → 20 silver, then switching to Gold-quality Wine after the Inflation quest chain. Squad banners anchor the squad to a flag, or you can carry one banner at a time to lead them. Place banners on a Barricade or Spiked Barricade so the squad defends that line.

Fortifications are built at the red blueprint table next to the Barracks before each fight, then snap to preset positions on the field (structures return to the Barracks inventory after victory, so you only pay once). Spiked Barricades cannot be used in Sewer Brawls. Space starts at roughly two towers and two barricades and grows with every Victory Banner you win. Required materials per level scale Bronze → Iron and Planks → Beams (for example, Barricade I: 6 Bronze Nails + 2 Short Logs + 2 Reinforced Planks; Barricade II: 8 Iron Nails + 4 Iron Details + 2 Reinforced Beams). Tearing down a fortification refunds every nail and beam.

Battle potions are brewed at the Alchemy Tower (Laboratory), with recipes unlocked through the Alchemy tech tree and listed in the Folio. Brewing them is part of the prep checklist alongside paying mercenaries, recruiting zombies, and upgrading gear. The most useful are: Fighter (+3 damage per level), Berserk (removes all stamina cost so you can swing without waiting), and the strongest healing potions — the player does the most damage, so never face a battle without healing on the hot bar. Stacking potions matters: each Fighter level adds damage, and the sermon buff God's Fury adds +2 sword and +3 bow damage. Food and drink are not required for battle stamina. Potions can only be consumed while you are inside the battle, including the frozen prep phase, and a loss only costs you the potions you actually used.

Each battle is flag-capture: roughly three objectives per fight, capture by clearing the red circle (the flag turns blue and spawns stop), and hold every flag until the timer (about five minutes) runs out. Bringing more troops into the capture radius speeds up the take. Dropping a banner on the objective pins your squad to it, and the red bars at the top of the battle screen show when and where zombie waves will hit each lane (up to three). You lose if the enemy takes your base or your HP hits zero, and some victories unlock a second phase that drops you into a new defense location with rebuild time.