Project Zomboid Negative Traits Guide

In trying to emulate real people and their quirks, Project Zomboid offers a wide range of traits that will affect how your character performs.

Character creation can seem quite cumbersome when playing Project Zomboid for the first time, which is why this guide is here to help. A big part of making a character is picking positive and negative traits that will define how you approach this challenging world. Unlike positive traits, negative ones will effectively gimp your character in various ways while offering you trait points to spend on their positive brethren. I will be ranking these traits from one to five, one meaning that you should avoid these at all costs and five meaning that you can easily pick them up to get more trait points.

Agoraphobic

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: Your character will become panicked whenever he finds himself outdoors, impacting your foraging ability as well. Since you will be spending large amounts of time outside of buildings when looting, this is a pretty terrible trait, especially given that being panicked affects your combat effectiveness;
• Score: 1/5;

All Thumbs

• Point Cost: +2;
• Effects: Transfer times when looting will be increased by 400%. Given how important inventory management is, I would never recommend this trait;
• Score: 1/5;

Asthmatic

• Point Cost: +5;
• Effects: With this trait, your character will lose more endurance while running or sprinting by 40% and by 30% when swinging melee weapons. If you’re already used to properly managing your stamina this can be a decent source of points, just be wary of prolonged combat;
• Score: 3/5;

Claustrophobic

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: The opposite of the Agoraphobic trait, your character will become panicked when indoors. While in your base this won’t negatively affect your character in many ways, but clearing out large buildings will become an issue. That problem can be fixed though by drawing zombies outside and engaging them there;
• Score: 3/5;

Clumsy

• Point Cost: +2;
• Effects: Your footsteps will be 20% louder and your chances of tripping when running or sprinting over a low fence will be increased by 10%. Not a horrible trait to have but it offers too few points overall;
• Score: 3/5;

Conspicuous

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: This trait effectively doubles your chances of getting spotted by zombies, which is pretty horrible. If you’re the type of person that foregoes sneaking completely and thrives in the midst of combat, then this could be a good source of trait points;
• Score: 2/5;

Cowardly

• Point Cost: +2;
• Effects: Anytime your character becomes panicked that effect will be twice as bad. Since panic affects your accuracy, this is an atrocious trait that isn’t worth the amount of points that it offers;
• Score: 1/5;

Deaf

• Point Cost: +12;
• Effects: While the huge amount of points that it offers might look appealing, being deaf is a huge hurdle in this game, especially for a beginner. Unless you’re an experienced player that is looking for a challenge, stay away from this trait;
• Score: 1/5;

Disorganized

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: Lowers the capacity of all containers you interact with by 30%. If you’re used to managing your storage spaces well, this could be a decent source of trait points;
• Score: 3/5;

Emaciated

• Point Cost: N/A;
• Effects: This is not a regular trait, instead you will get this automatically when your weight drops below 50. It will lower your melee damage by 60%, your chances of jumping a tall fence by 25%, and your endurance regeneration by 70%. When you drop below 35, you will also start taking damage until you die, so watch your calorie intake;
• Score: N/A;

Feeble

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: Your strength will decrease by two, lowering your melee damage and your carry weight. Pick this one up only if you’re aiming for a ranged-only character, which is easier said than done;
• Score: 2/5;

Hard of Hearing

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: If you’re already accustomed to the game, this can be an okay trait to pick up. While it will lower your perception radius and make all sounds muffled, it’s not that big of a downside;
• Score: 3/5;

Hearty Appetite

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: Your character will grow hungry 50% faster, which means you will need to focus more on looting foodstuffs at the start of the game. Since you can easily have an infinite source of food with farming/fishing/foraging/trapping, this is a good source of trait points;
• Score: 4/5;

Fear of Blood

• Point Cost: +5;
• Effects: Whenever your character performs first aid on himself, he panics. He will also become stressed when his clothes are covered in blood;
• Score: 2/5;

High Thirst

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: Another easy source of points, this trait will make your character thirsty at twice the rate. While you might struggle at first, getting clean water is not a challenge once you have a pot and a decent source to heat water with;
• Score: 4/5;

Illiterate

• Point Cost: +8;
• Effects: Yet again, this is more of a challenge run trait that will immensely hinder your chances of survival. Not being able to read skill books or recipe magazines is a huge problem in the long run;
• Score: 1/5;

Out of Shape

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: This trait will give you a -2 to your fitness skill. Even though you can raise it by working out, it is one of the hardest skills to level up in the game, so you’re better off staying away from this trait;
• Score: 1/5;

Obese

• Point Cost: +10;
• Effects: Obese will give you a flat -2 to your fitness skill, a 20% bigger chance of tripping when vaulting low fences, and 60% less endurance regeneration. The one positive aspect of this trait is the number of points it gives and the fact that you can get rid of it if you manage to get your weight lower than 100, which shouldn’t be that hard since you start with 105. Just focus on eating low-calorie foods for a while, and you should be fine;
• Score: 3/5;

Overweight

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: The smaller cousin of Obese, this trait is active when your weight is between 85 and 100. It will make your character run 1% slower, have twice the endurance loss, 10% more chances of tripping over low fences, and 30% less endurance regeneration. If you think Obese sounds like too much of a challenge, Overweight is even better since you can get rid of it faster;
• Score: 4/5;

Pacifist

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: All of your weapon skills will gain XP 25% slower. While this might not sound like a lot, it does add up in the long run. An easy fix for this though is choosing one or two types of melee weapons to focus on and picking up some traits that will give you skill points for them. The added XP bonuses that you get from those skill points will offset the penalties from this trait;
• Score: 4/5;

Prone to Illness

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: A very good source of points since it will make you zombify 25% faster while increasing your odds of catching a cold and how long it takes to cure it. Since zombifying is a death sentence anyway you slice it and catching a cold can easily be avoided, definitely try this trait out;
• Score: 5/5;

Restless Sleeper

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: Your character will sleep less each time, and his tiredness stat will go down slower while he is sleeping. Another trait that can easily be taken;
• Score: 4/5;

Short Sighted

• Point Cost: +2;
• Effects: An easy source for two trait points since it’s lowered sight range and foraging debuff can be fixed with a pair of reading glasses;
• Score: 4/5;

Sleepyhead

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: This will make your character become tired 30% faster while lowering it’s regeneration while sleeping by 10%. As long as you pay attention to your moodles and try to not engage in combat when tired, this is a great source of points;
• Score: 5/5;

Smoker

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: One of the “best” negative traits, at least in my opinion. Smoker will make your character become stressed unless he has a cigarette. While there is a set amount of cigarettes that can be found across the map, zombies do have a small chance to drop a pack. And since you’ll be clearing them out in the hundreds and thousands, you will practically never run out;
• Score: 5/5;

Slow Healer

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: Any injuries your character has will heal slower, not including exercise fatigue. While I wouldn’t recommend it to an absolute beginner, this is a trait that I always pick up, especially when playing with infection on where you generally want to get hurt as little as possible anyway;
• Score: 4/5;

Slow Learner

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: Except for Strength and Fitness, all skills will gain 30% less XP. Since certain skills are extremely hard to level, you should never use this trait unless you want to challenge yourself;
• Score: 1/5;

Slow Reader

• Point Cost: +2;
• Effects: Your character will read books at 70% of the normal reading speed. Since there is a set amount of books that you will read on any character, this is a decent source of points;
• Score: 3/5;

Sunday Driver

• Point Cost: +1;
• Effects: Vehicles will accelerate 40% slower and their max speed will be set at 30 km/h, making this an atrocious trait that gives too few points to be worth picking up;
• Score: 1/5;

Thin-Skinned

• Point Cost: +8;
• Effects: Increases the chances that your character becomes injured after being hit and the chances of his clothes being damaged. With infection on you’ll want to get damaged as little as possible anyway, so this can be a great source of points;
• Score: 4/5;

Underweight

• Point Cost: +6;
• Effects: This trait gives you a -1 on your Fitness skill while starting you out with a weight of 70. Underweight will always take effect when your weight is between 65 and 70, meaning you can easily get rid of it by simply eating calorie-dense food to raise your weight. You will also get a 20% reduction to your melee damage and a 15% lower chance of getting over a tall fence. All in all this is a decent source of trait points if you know how to handle your weight;
• Score: 3/5;

Unfit

• Point Cost: +10;
• Effects: A rather atrocious trait, Unfit will net you a -4 to your Fitness skill. Given how difficult it is to improve your fitness skills, you should probably stay away from this trait unless you’re planning to play a character that gets winded after sprinting for a few seconds;
• Score: 1/5;

Unlucky

• Point Cost: +4;
• Effects: This trait will give you a 10% minus chance of finding rare loot and a 5% increase in the chances of failing an item repair. While this might sound pretty bad, it’s a decent trade for the points that it gives. Keep in mind that if you’ve tweaked the drop rates in the sandbox settings to make everything rarer, this trait can make things even worse;
• Score: 3/5;

Very Underweight

• Point Cost: +10;
• Effects: Another trait that you can also gain by losing too much weight, Very Underweight is active when your weight is between 50 and 65. It gives you -2 to your Fitness skill, -40% to your melee damage, and a higher chance to trip while jumping fences. Like all the other similar traits, this can be a great source of points if you can find enough calorie-dense food to get rid of it quickly. The only real problem will be taking on the zombies that are between you and those sources of food;
• Score: 3/5;

Weak 

• Point Cost: +10;
• Effects: You will get a -5 to your Strength skill and a -40% to your knockback power. Unless you’re looking for an extreme challenge or would rather focus on using ranged weapons, definitely stay away from this trait;
• Score: 1/5;

Weak Stomach

• Point Cost: +3;
• Effects: Weak Stomach will double your chances of getting food illness. But this is easily fixed by simply not ingesting any bad or weird food. This means that you are basically getting free points as long as you don’t try to binge-eat trash;
• Score: 5/5;