Per each level survivalist gets 0.6% damage buff to all weapons up to 15%, damage resistance and increased maxium armor by 1% up to 25% and said armor being like SWAT's armor with heavy armor skill which prevents all sorts of damage except siren's and Matriarch's sonic attack, zed time reload by 3% up to 75% and 35% faster weapon switch regardless of level. Survivalist has the option of picking his starting weapon which includes Crover survival tool, Dual 1858 revolvers, SG 500 Pupm action, HX25 Grenade Pistol, Winchester, HMTech-101 pistol, Caulk and burn, AR-15 and MP7 or leave it up to RNG (Random weapon) and the pick his grenade from High Explosive grenade, Fragmentation grenade, Nail bomb and Flasgbang. When level 15 reached molotov cocktail and medic grenade will be added to the cycle depending which skill (Weapon Harness or Ammo vest) is being used.

Note: Zed time reload will decreased time to reload by 75% or will make it 4 times quicker at level 25.
Random weapon means that you will get any of the 9 other perks starting weapon. Just like SWAT's armor affected by Heavy Armor Training, Survivalist Armor will not only take full damage not letting any damage to it's user(unless it's sonic attack or incoming damage is higher than remaining armor can take) but decrease it by 35% as long as you have some armor left.

Skills description is pretty straight forward but some little details are not shown here:

Medic training decreased cooldown of dart and syringe recharge works differently from Field Medic's faster recharge rate: instead of diving it by 1+(0.08*x) times where x is Field medic's level, survivalist's recharge boost will actually cuts recharge rate in half.

Spountaneos zed splotion will deal 50 explosive damage to any near by zeds, stunning them on the process.

Lockdown will always stun any zed when zed time is active with some exceptions:
-If zed was staggered by any means while it in it's stagger animation lockdown won't stun zed
-If zeds like Bloat, Gorefast, Gorefiend, Scrake, Quarterpound, Fleshpound blocking their weak spots lockdown stunning power will be reduced and will be procked after said blocking is over
-If Quarterpound or Fleshpound is on their rage animation lockdown won't work
-If Boss is on their armor phase (Abomination armor, King Fleshpound, Hans or Matriarch shield),they are in animation(Patriarch charging rocket attack, Hans throwing grenades, Abominations charging his rush ect.)or they block their weak spot lockdown won't be triggered

Recommended starting weapon and skills:

• If you are below level 10 just start with MP7 and Flashbangs
  
  
• If you are level 10 and higher and you don't have medic go for HMTech-101 and skills LLLLR
  
  
• If you are level 10 and higher and you have a field medic go for the Crovel and skills LRLLR

Tip: it's common thing to experienced Commandos to switch to Prepared skill for extra ammo, dropping their weapons and then switching back to Tenacious skill. The very same trick can be used on Survivalist as well by using his Ammo vest skill. Please note that if your loadout weights more than 15 kgs you will have to drop some of your weapons before switching to Ammo Vest from Weapon Harness and do that trick for each weapon/weapon combinations individually. Also it's worth mentioning that weapons with different firing modes such as Railgun, Kriss, SCAR ect after being dropped and then picked up will be set to their 'default' setting which is semi-automatic/fully automatic mode and auto-lock in Railgun case. Its especially worth to be keeping in mind with Railgun since auto-lock mode will reduce base damage by 50%.

In this section we are going to talk about survivalist's skills and how should you use them to their maximum potential.

1. Tactical reload and Heavy weapons training.
   This two skills do one thing and they do it well - they allow survivalist have faster reload speed with certain perk weapons (Tactical reload speeds up reload speed with Gunsliner, SWAT and Commando weapons and Heavy weapons training with Demolitionist, Sharpshooter and Support weapons respectively). Keep it mind that in some cases regardless of skill you are using certain weapons still will have reloading speed increased. That includes FAMAS Masterkey, HX25 Grenade Pistol, M16 M203 Assault Rifle, Spitfire, 1858 Revolver, .500 Magnum Revolver, Winchester 1894, SPX 464 Centerfire.
   
   
2. Medic trainig
   This is one of the best survivalist skills. After survivalist gets level 10 and equips this skill he recieves healing potency of level 15 Field Medic and syringe and darts recharge of level 12 Field Medic. The only downside of survivalist-medic is that you won't be giving any buffs to your team which is expected from non-dedicated healer althought if you don't have Field Medic or he is strugges with healing part for whatever reason being able to help him with it would be extremely helpful and maybe even appreciated by him and your team.
   
   
3. Melee expert
   This is probably the most overrated Survivalist skill for better or for worse. Obviously movement speed increase by 25% is extremely good and sometimes can save you from certain death but unfortunatelly it has restriction to melee weapons (it doesn't work with VLAD-1000 Nailgun on Survivalist). Plus additional 75% damage bonus with all melee weapons (doesn't work with VLAD-1000 Nailgun as well). Interesting enough Frostfang recieves both damage boost and speed increase when being used which makes Survivalist having 2nd highest damage output with Frostfang. Take into consideration that having higher damage with Frostfang can be troublesome since ragging pounds will be extremely easy. I would recommend using it only on first wave due to Survivalist starting weapon RGN to have your knife as a back-up or even main source of you damage dealing at the start or you really want to play as '♥♥♥♥♥♥ Berzerker' if you don't have dedicated one.
   
   
4. Ammo vest and weapon harness
   I will be honest with you both of these skills are amagazing since both molotov cocktails and medic grenades are arguably the best grenades in the entire game due to one simple reason - area denial and creating a 'comfort zone' in their respective ways by either setting zeds on fire or poisoning them. Plus they upsides and downsides are perfectly balanced: molotov cocktail won't provide any health regeneration but it will stagger even large zeds whereas medic grenades poison panic won't affect most of zeds (medium and large zeds specifically). Now let's talk about their second effect - 15% additional ammo or extra 5 kg capacity. Extra ammo is always nice. Moreover with this skill Survivalist can overcap ammo on weapons that no other perk can (Eviserator, Hemoclober, HRG Healthrower, HRG Incision, Hemogoblin, Mine reconstuctor, HRG Vampire, HMTech-101 Single weilded M1911. Desert Eagle, Rhino, HRG Winterbite, Glock 18c, AF2011-A1, HRG Disrupter).Overcaping weapons for Firebug with Ammo vest skill can be tricky since some of his weapons are better being overcapped by Firebun (Caulk n' Burn, Flamethrower, Microwave gun, Husk cannon, Thermite bore, Dual Spitfires) and some are better overcapped by Survivalist (Spitfire, Dragonsbreath, Mac 10, HRG Scorcher, HRG Incendiary Rifle, Helios Rifle). If you want to help your Gunsliner, Field Medic and Firebug with ammo you can always ask them if they want to have their ammo overcapped. Also you can overcap ammo for low level Sharpshoter, Commando, SWAT that haven't unlocked their skills that increase their base ammo. Now let's talk about having extra weight capacity. As much as I like having medic grenades I can't get over how much additional weight allows you to use and exploit different weapons combos. Basically it multiplies your versatility dractially. Again I encourage you to experiment with both of those skills and use them depending to your team composition, current map and your personal preferences.
   
   
5. Spontaneous Zed-plosion
   It's an RNG skill and it functions similar to Firebug's Zed shrapnel skill: each zed you killed have 30% chance of exploding stunning nearby zeds and dealing small amout of explosive damage to them. It's a pretty straightforvard skill but it's still extremely viable nonetheless.
   
   
6. Make things go boom
   This is the least useful survivalist skill. MTGB gives survivalist additional 50% resistance to explosive damage that stacks with his passive resistances brining his explosive resistance to 75% at max level making him the most tanky perk to any explosive attacks. The second effect of this perk is what makes it so bad - 50% increased blast radius on every Demolitionist weapon. You may think that it's actually solid upside but considering the fact that Survivalist has only 15% damage boost at max level you will be only knocking zeds down rather that killing them outright. Plus some weapons have big blast radius by default and increasing said radius further by 50% means that you will be hurting yourself a lot especially with M79 Grenade launcher and M32 Grenade launcher that both have highest blast radius of 8,5 meters by default and with MTGB skill on it is increased to 12.75 meters. The only practial use of this skill is to use it for explosive resistance on Boss wave.
   
   
7. Madman
   Unfortunatelly after Lockdown was buffed Madmad became prectically useless cause triple firing speed in zed time benefits only with certain weapons on Survivalist (mostly weapon that can be used for killing large zeds such as Helios rifle). Untill it gets a buff of rework there is no point using it at all.
   
   
8. Lockdown
   This is one of the most broken if not the most broken zed time skill in the entire game. Being able to stun any zed with a single hit or even healing dart is kind of busted, isn't it? Lockdown can save you and your team game giving you and your comrades time to regroup or just help you with killing any troublesome zeds. If you really want to make your and your team life much easier use Lockdown.

Generaly speaking as any level of Survivalist you can either play as 'Precision' or 'Chaotic' perk. Unfortunatelly second choice is not so great on Survivalist cause he lacks skills and raw damage output of both Demolitionist and Firebug to be at least close with them in terms on the effectiveness but again Survivalist wasn't meant to be a direct replacement to a dedicated perk. So this leaves us with the 'Precision' choice left. Up untill level 10 you just be better using SMGs and Assult rifles to clean up trash. Your best starting weapon optioin will be MP7 since it has the highest ammount of spare ammo available and all clots variants take 50% more damage from SMGs and they are the most common enemies. For medium and large zeds you want to use something that will deal high burst of the damage. Unfortunatelly untill level 15 you only have 15 kgs weight capacity so your options are limited meaning you won't have as much flexibility in your loadout builds just yet.

Level 10 will give you the option of going melee-survivalist which isn't bad of the strategy thanks to high damage bonus from melee expert. Additionaly you will be slighty more tankier than Berzerker up until level 15 of both perks thanks to Survivalist passive damage resistance.

After getting level 15 you will reach your maximun utility potential thanks to Weapon harness skill which allow you to have 20 kgs weight capacity meaning there will be more room for different builds.

Level 20 will give you another great skill that we discussed earlier - Spontaneous Zed-plosion. And getting that level 25 will finally make you an insanely powerful supportive perk thanks to Lockdown.

Now let's discuss how you should be playing regarding your team compostion and lane sharing.
If there are no medic or your Field medic need a bit of the help it will be a good idea to use Medic traning along side with Field medic weapon to keep your team alive. Sharing lane with Commando means that as soon as Zed time drops you should let him extend it. Even if there are no level 25 in your lobby you as Survivalist and Gunslinger will benefit from it since both of you have zed time reload speed increased proportionally to your level. You can help you Sharpshooter, Gunslinger and Demolitionist by widling down their head health (in case of first two) or rocking explosive weapon (RPG-7 preferably) to help last one with the pounds. You also are very capable of stunning zeds depending of what loadout and grenades are you using. If there are no Berzeker you can go melee which will save you money for the another weapons which will be discussed a bit later.

As a Precision orientated Survivalist using SMGs, Assault Rifles and Rifles will be the best option along side with some weapons from Demolitionist.

For Survivalist below level 15 there are 2 flexible loadouts that is also viable even as max level Survivalist:

• HMTech-201/ .500 Magnum/ Upgraded HRG Incision
  Skills pick: LL
  
  Strenghts: good trash and medium zed killing potential, high healing potential, EMP incap thanks to Incision (prevents calm Fleshpound from raging for 2,2 seconds and calms down raged Scrake for the same duration).
  Weaknesses: loadout overall cost, inability to parry melee attacks
  
  
• HMTech-401/Twice Upgraded Crossbow
  Skills pick: RL
  
  Strenghts: good trash and medium zed killing potential, high healing potential, ammo preservation of the crossbow and it's ability to stun Scrakes.
  Weaknesses: poor early game, inability to stun pounds, inability to parry melee attacks, somewhat high cost of the loadout.

Now lets take a look at the loadouts for survivalist with level 15 and higher

• HMTech-201/Frostfang/Upgraded Rail gun
  Skill pick: L(after Rail gun purchase R),LRLR
  
  Strenghts: great crowd control, ability to freeze any zed and parry with frostfang, high large zed killing speed, healing potential.
  Weaknesses: mediocre early game, loadout high cost.
  
  
• HMTech-201/Upgraded HRG Incision/Upgraded Hemogoblin or HMTech-501
  Skills pick: LLRLR
  
  Strenghts: extremely high healing potential to the point that you can replace dedicated healer in some cases, great trash cleaning and supporting capabilities, EMP incap, debuffing (if Hemogoblin is picked) or healing grenades (if HMTech-501 is picked).
  Weaknesses: inability to parry melee attacks, high cost.
  
  
• HMTech-401/Upgraded Railgun/ .500 Magnum
  Skills pick: L(after Rail gun purchase R),LRLR
  
  Strenghts: good crowd control, high large zed killing potential.
  Weaknesses: poor early game, high cost.
  
  
• HMTech-201/Twice Upgraded Crossbow/RPG-7
  Skills pick: L(after Crossbow purchase R),LRLR
  
  Strenghts: good crowd control, ammo preservation of the Crossbow, ability to stun Scrakes or knockdown pounds, parries well with Demolitionist.
  Weaknesses: inability to parry melee attacks, high cost.
  
  
• Upgraded HMTech-201/Twice Upgraded Crossbow/Upgraded Mosin
  Skills pick: L(after Crossbow purchase R),LRLR
  
  Strenghts: good crowd control, ammo preservation of the Crossbow and Mosin's bayonet, ability to parry melee attacks, ability to stun Scrakes.
  Weaknesses: somewhat bad pounds takedown, high cost.
  
  
• HMTech-201/Upgraded HRG Crossboom/Upgraded RPG-7
  Skills pick: L(after HRG Crossboom purchase R),LRLR
  
  Strenghts: great crowd control, extremelly great pound takedown potential.
  Weaknesses: high cost, RPG-7 is the only optimal option against Scrakes, nability to parry melee attacks.
  
  
• HMTech-201/HRG Incision/RPG-7
  Skills pick: L(after RPG-7 purchase R), LRLR
  
  Strenghts: exellent healing capabilities, EMP effect, good large zeds takedown potential
  Weaknesses: high cost, nability to parry melee attacks.

The main trick of playing melee survivalist is to use your melee weapon mostly for trash and medium zeds (with few execptions) or to set up a takedown (in case of frostfang).

• Katana/Upgraded Crossbow/RPG-7
  Skills pick: RRRLR
  
  Strenghts: good ability to kill trash and medium zeds, decent early and mid game.
  Weaknesses: low parry strenght of katana, inability to heal your team.
  
  
• SPX 464 Centerfire/Pulverizer/RPG-7
  Skills pick: RRRLR
  
  Strenghts: good ability to kill trash and medium zeds, decent early and mid game, pounds takedown potential.
  Weaknesses: RPG-7 reliance on Scrakes takedown, inability to heal your team.
  
  
• Upgraided HMTech-101/Upgraided Dual Desert Eagles or Dual .500 Magnums/Upgraded Frostfang
  Skills pick: LRLLR
  
  Strenghts: crowd control, ability to heal your team, freezing ability with frostfang and ability to shred Scrakes with frostfang alone.
  Weaknesses: early game, somewhat tricky pounds takedown, high cost.
  
  
• HMTech-401/Dual .500 Magnums/Frostfang
  Skills pick: LRRLR
  
  Strenghts: crowd control, ability to heal your team, freezing ability with frostfang and ability to shred Scrakes with frostfang alone.
  Weaknesses: early game, somewhat tricky pounds takedown.
  
  
• HMTech-401/Upgaided HRG Incision/Hemoclobber
  Skills pick: LRRLR
  
  Strenghts: crowd control, EMP effect, great healing potential.
  Weaknesses: early game, high cost.
  
  
• Upgraided HMTech-101/Upgaided Crossbow/Static Strikers
  Skills pick: RRLLR
  
  Strenghts: crowd control, ability to heal your team, ability to EMP larges and stun Scrakes
  Weaknesses: mediocre Fleshpound takedown potential, early game.
  
  
• Upgraided Incision/Bone Crusher/.500 Magnum
  Skills: R or L,RRLR
  
  Strenghts: crowd control, ability to heal your team, ability to EMP larges
  Weaknesses: early game, high cost.

In this section we are going to take a look on what setup for each boss should you, survivalist, be using. Ideally you want to check which boss you are up against by using this command on console:
getall kfgamereplicationinfo bossindex, whcih gives you 5 different numbers - from 0 to 4.
(0 - Hans Volter, 1 - Patriarch, 2 - King Fleshpound, 3 - Abomination, 4 - Matriarch). Now let's talk about your equipment and skill setup and then discuss details for each individual boss. Generally you should have weapon that can help your Field Medic with healing your team, weapon that can be used to parry or weapon that can incapacitate boss and weapon that deals high amount of damage. For the first case HMTech-201 is the best choice possible due to it's low weight, cheap price and decent trash cleaning potential. For the third last case Rail gun is the most universal and relaible pick since it has decent ammo pull and high DPS. You will be suprised but HRG Arc Generator is as good as Rail gun for dealing with bosses if not better due to every single boss weakness to Arc Generator both primary and secondary attacks of 50% and 100% respectivelly. Additionally Arc Generator secondary attack impiles EMP effect which will be definetly useful againts every boss. For skill setup being a 'worse' Field medic is arguably better option than going survivalist-berzerker but in some cases second option can be valuable. Now let's discuss our loadouts and skills setup for every boss in details. Also you can finally put Make things go boom skill to a use against Hans, Patriarch and King Fleshpound since all of those bosses has some explosive related attacks.

• Hans Volter
  Hans is considered to be second strongest boss for a good reasons. His attacks can be pretty deadly, his health drain that heals him up sometimes can be hard to manage and on top of that he can call large zeds such as Scrakes and Quarterpounds to assist him in battle. Nonetheless with right setup and coordination he can be dealt with with relative ease. As mentioned earlier HMTech-201 is a must and you will see it in almost every loadout. Frostfang can be a decent pick since you can parry with it and sometimes it's even possible to freeze Hans although it's a challenging thing to do since old man tends to dodge a lot. Crossbow can be a decent alternative cause with 2-3 headshots Hans will get stunned. Plus you can pick up Crossbow ammo which in theory gives you an infnite ammo pull. For damage dealing weapon Rail gun and RPG-7 are an excellent choices but I would recommend using RPG-7 in case you got a Demolitionits that knowns how to overcap. In this case you will be rocking RPG-7 with 31 rockets. Also Hans recieves 20% more damage from RPG-7 so that is a nice bonus compared to his Rail gun 10% resistance. If you want to go berzerker-survivalist Bone Crusher and Hemogoblin combo should do the trick. Bone Crusher has a high amount of stumble power and you sometimes can knock down Hans with it if you use shiled bash on his head. I wouldn't recommend using Arc Generator against Hans cause of his frequent dodging. Now let's look at your skills setup.
  *If you are going medic-survivalist:
  1)HMTech-201/Frostfang/Upgraded Railgun.
  2)HMTech-201/Upgraded Crossbow/Upgraded RPG-7
  Skills setup: Heavy weapons training, Medic training, Weapon harness, Make things go boom, Lockdown.
  *If you are going zerk-survivalist:
  Bone Crusher/Hemogoblin
  Skill setup: 5th skill doesn't matter, Melee expert, Ammo vest, Make things go boom, Lockdown.

• Patriarch
  Patriarch can be either the easiest boss or the biggest pain in the ass depending if you let him heal or not. With each syringe used his much like Hans' becomes more and more aggresive so it's the best to kill him outright but sometimes your team mess this up so you should be prepared to deal with him regardless if he dies outright or he got a chance to heal. You once again have 2 options: going more as a medic and passive survivalist or as an tanking survivalist. In first case Rail gun, Incision and Arc Generator are great choices. The last two has the ability to apply EMP effect than can stop Patriarch's sprining. Also it's worth mentioning that Incision's and Arc generator's EMP has a big difference - even though both of them interrupt Patriarch ability to spritnt only Arc Generator's EMP actually makes him unable to use his special attacks and makes him wander arround aimlessly for a 2.2 seconds. Frostfang and Hemogoblin are decent picks to either freeze him or debuff him. Lastly HMTech-201 can be used against trash and to heal up your teammates.
  If you want to go Zerk-survivalist again Bone crusher is your best bet due to the fact that not only has highest parry/block damage redution but you can also block Patriarch's minigun and rocket attacks (not mortar attack, keep that in mind). Then you can go either with Incision or Hemogoblin alongside with HMTech-201.
  *If you are going med-survivalist:
  1)HMTech-201/Frostfang/Upgraded Railgun or Upgraded Arc Generator
  2)HMTech-201/Upgraded Frostfang/Insicion
  Skills setup: Heavy weapon training, Medic training, Weapon harness, Make things go boom, Lockdown.
  *If you are going zerk
  1)HMTech-201/Bone Crusher/Upgraded Incision
  2)HMTech-201/Bone Crusher/Upgraded Hemogoblin
  Skills setup: Tactical reload, Melee expert, Weapon harness, Make things go boom, Lockdown.

• King Fleshpound
  The biggest thread of this boss is his minions - Quarterpounds. You can say that they are not that big of a problem but there are few things that can wipe even well prepaed team. In order to understand the way we should treat his highness we need to know how and when he summons waves of QPs. King Fleshpound will always spawn 4 waves of Quarters: 1st one comes when he spawns, 2nd comes when he lost 25% of his health(he starts making explosions when initiating his rage), 3rd comes when he is at his 60% of his health(now he gets access to beam attack than can be countered by simply crouching, Be careful though since if King Fleshpound is below you and he is about to use it crouching won't help at all), and 4th the last wave comes wheh he puts his shield on which happens when he lost 70% of his health. So as you can see the best way to handle King is to clear his minions first and paste yourself with the amount of damage that you deal to him. Even though King Fleshpound is considered to be 2nd weakest bossn he is almost impossible to knock down or freeze due to his Incapacitation resistances and similar rage mechanic to Fleshpound. However he can be easily EMPed with any weapon that applies said effect. Again you have 2 options: normal survivalist or zerk-surv. Again Arc Generator, Rail gun, Incision are the way to go. Keep in mind that Quarterpounds are neutrual to Arc Genetaor damage so overall Rail gun or Incision is a better option. You would expect to see RPG on this list but unfortunatelly his highness has 20% resistance to explosives. You can keep Frostfang to freeze QPs and parry but you won't be ablr to freeze King with it. And HMTech-201 as usual to heal. In case of zerk-surv Bone Crusher again for above mentioned reasons, either Hemogoblin or Incision, and Magunm to cheap away QPs and King's health if you are low on your guns.
  *If you are medic-survivalist:
  HMTech-201/Frostfang/Upgraded Rail gun or Upgraded Railgun or Upgraded Arc Generator
  Skills: Heavy weapons training, Medic training, Weapon harness, Make things go boom, Lockdown
  *If you are zerk-survivalist:
  Bone crusher/Upgraded Incision or Upgraded Hemogoblin/Magunm
  Skills: 5th doesn't matter, Melee expert, Weapon harness, Make things go boom, Lockdown.

• Abomination
  The easiest boss. This poor soul has nothing in particular to help him with killing your team. He only gets clots and spawns walking 'bloat's mines', can charge at you and suck you up to him to bite you. And that's it. Please not that it's no use to be trying tank hing since he mostly uses his vomit attacks. Weapon pick is pretty straight forward: HMTech-201, Hemogoblin or Crossbow, Railgun or RPG since last can knock him down.
  Skills setup: Heavy weapons training, Medic training, Weapon harness, Spontaneous Zed-plosion, Lockdown.

• Matriarch
  Toughest boss in the game so far. She has a lot of dealy attacks that can shred even prepared teams if you make a tiny mistake. Any incapacitation methods won't work untill her armor is destroyed or his head is exposed. She also calls E.D.A.R.s to assist her which is unbelievably annoying but sometimes their EMP effect uppon dying can be used againt her. Please notice that Incision's EMP doesn't affect her at all so if you want to EMP her use Arc generator instead. Also going zerk-survivalist against her isn't the best idea since she has some high damage close-up attacks. It's also worth mentioning that in order to afflict any Incapacitation to her it's best to go for headshots. You can use this to stumble, freeze, stun or knock down her with this tactic by using Rail gun, Frostfang, Crossbow and RPG-7 respectivelly. Also if you timed your parry you can only her tentacle grab which will stumble her.
  Weapon loadouts:
  1)HMTech-201/Frostfang/Upgraded Rail gun
  2)HMTech-201/UPgraded Crossbow/Upgraded RPG-7
  Skills: Heavy weapons training, Medic training, Weapon harness, Spontaneous Zed-plosion, Lockdown.

Survivalist is all about indepth game knowledge and utilizing your weapon combos as much as possible. You just need to be creative with this perk and different loadouts in order to maximize your contribution to you team. I highly encourage you to experiment with it.

Thank you so much for reading this. I hope this guide helped you to understand how to utilize Survivalist's strenghts to be a great team player. Good luck on your survivalist road!