[Top 5] The Forest Early Game Weapons (And How to Get Them)

There's a gnarly picture of a girl's head, here. Sorry you can't see it!

Updated:

15 Dec 2022

The Forest is a game where you simply can’t progress... Or survive, without weapons. The Cannibals are constantly causing you grief, and even if you do go the passive route at first, you’ll eventually have to fend them off and kill a few. This lovely game will literally force you to become a murderer eventually, so you should at least get your hands on some of the early game, craftable weapons! This quick guide will help you figure out the best ones to get your hands on. Thankfully for you, nearly all of the weapons in this list are able to be crafted!

5: The Plane Axe

Stats:

Speed – 5 ½
Damage – 4 ¼
Block – 2
Range – Medium

The Plane Axe is the first thing you get after entering the game. You pick it up automatically when you go to exit the plane. It’s automatic, so you can’t manage to miss it on your way out! It’s a versatile, all-purpose tool, as well as your first weapon! Not only can you chop down trees, whack bushes for sticks and leaves, and smack suitcases and boxes for loot, but you can also easily damage and kill your targets with it. It really is an all-around great weapon!
Specifically, as an early game weapon it’s the one and only thing that keeps you alive in those first few days. You don’t have to worry about it wearing out and breaking as it has no durability, plus you didn’t have to craft it in the first place. Add onto the fact that it’s upgradable, and you have a pretty good little tool in your hands! Upgrading it just takes tree sap and either some feathers, or some teeth. Adding those items onto your plane axe adds some permanent upgrades in either speed or damage to it!

The Plane Axe excels in certain areas, including:

Resource Gathering! (Despite being a weapon, it’s perfect for gathering all the resources you would need for building. As previously mentioned, you can cut down trees and bushes with it!)
Blocking. (All axes in the game have good blocking states. This includes the Plane Axe! It may not stun your enemies, but it will significantly reduce the amount of damage they’ll do to you.)
Finishing off cannibals. (The Plane Axe is specifically good for finishing off knocked down cannibals. All you have to do is look down while you’re above them and swing. It’s almost always a guaranteed kill!)

Now, while the Plane Axe is a great starting weapon, it’s not the best for actually killing the cannibals. Even the weakest ones – the starving cannibals – take around 4-6 hits to go down. The stronger ones can take up to 12 hits! The best way to effectively kill any cannibals with the Plane Axe is to upgrade it into a flaming plane axe. That way you do extra fire damage!
As mentioned, the Plane Axe is the first thing you get after you finish the beginning cutscene. It’s literally impossible to miss; you can’t get out of the plane without picking it up. It’s not a craftable item, either, so no need to worry. The Plane Axe is basically a free weapon that the game gives you!

4: The Upgraded Spear

Stats:

Speed – 8 ½
Damage – 6
Block – None
Range – Very Long

The Upgraded Spear is an amazing weapon for hunting and dealing with single, attacking cannibals. It does decent damage when being held, and that damage nearly triples when it’s thrown. It can one-shot nearly any animal, and even normal and starving cannibals when thrown. And of course, it has more uses than just fighting off cannibals and mutants!
As I already mentioned, the Upgraded Spear can instantly kill anything it hits when it’s thrown. That’s a lot of damage! Plus, if you hit a cannibal in the head, it’s also a one-shot kill. You can even go up against the mutant cannibals with an Upgraded Spear! This spear is also easy to craft, which is certainly a plus if you wind up breaking or losing it. Not to mention, it’s very good for hunting and fishing!

The Upgraded Spear excels in various areas, including:

Fighting Singular Cannibals. (Just a few hits knock them down, then one final finishing blow while they’re down kills them. This only works when there are very few of them, due to not being able to block.)
Hunting. (Throwing an Upgraded Spear at any animal and hitting it usually kills it instantly. The only animals I can think of that don’t die from one hit are the deer and the crocodile.)
Fishing. (Spears are one of the best tools/weapons for fishing. You just have to look down and poke at the water where the fish is to catch it on the end of the spear.)

The Upgraded Spear is great for hunting, but not entirely for fighting- at least, not if it’s a group of cannibals. One or two and you’ll be fine! Just... Not much more than that. The best way to kill any cannibal that is attacking you is to jab and back away before they can hit you. You could also simply rapid-fire them with attacks one after the other, but you risk getting hurt if you do it that way, as other cannibals along with the one you’re attacking could sneak in some hits while you’re still attacking. Throwing a spear at them is also a great way to kill them with one shot! But, as mentioned, this only works for singular cannibals, or small groups of them.
The Upgraded Spear is a craftable item, so you need to get the materials for it to craft it. You’ll need a weak spear, 2 pieces of cloth, and three bones. Keeping a small stockpile of those materials would be a good idea. Also, unlike weak spears which you can keep in a stack of 5 with the spear bag, you cannot stack Upgraded Spears.

3: The Crafted Club

Stats

Speed – 2
Damage – 7
Block – 9
Range – Medium

The Crafted Club is probably one of the best blocking weapons in the game. That, and it’s just cool looking! It has decent damage, but it’s exceedingly slow, so using it for anything other than blocking and stunning is probably not the best idea. You won’t be able to out-speed the cannibals with this weapon, that’s for sure!
This is still a good early game weapon simply because it’s simple to craft, and because it does decent amounts of damage despite that. That, and the blocking stat on it is incredible. It doesn’t take too long for you to kill a cannibal or animal when using this weapon; usually around 3-4 hits. With upgrades, it takes even less time thanks to the damage being severely enhanced!

The Crafted Club excels in areas including:

Excellent blocking stats. (You can block attacks from nearly any enemy in the game and get almost no damage as a result. Even against the mutant cannibals, you take significantly less damage when blocking with this club!)
High Damage Output. (It’s not the strongest weapon in the game, but it definitely still hits hard! Starving cannibals and normal cannibals take only a few hits to die and might even die in one hit if you get a headshot!)

The Crafted Club is a good overall weapon for fighting cannibals. The block lets you significantly lessen the damage you take, plus the damage output means you can easily take down a group of them without taking too much damage or dying. You can hit more than one enemy when you swing the club, which is a plus! Adding upgrades to it like fire damage, or simply upping its damage output makes taking care of the cannibals even easier!
The Crafted Club is obviously a craftable item, in which you’d need 1 stick and 1 skull. That’s it! It’s incredibly easy to make, so keeping a small stockpile of the supplies necessary means you will practically never run out of them. Not only that, but you can also loot the Crafted Club from cannibals when you kill them. They need to be carrying it beforehand, else there is no chance for you to get it off them.

2: The Crafted Bow

Stats:

Speed – N/A
Damage - None (It depends on the damage of the arrows you use.)
Block - None
Range – Ranged Weapon

The Crafted Bow- or any type of bow- is one of the most useful weapons in the game, period! You can use it for anything: hunting, fishing, and fighting. I consider it one of the fastest weapons in the game, though it doesn’t officially have a speed stat listed. Why? ...Because it’s a bow. They’re fast. You can never go wrong with a bow! And especially not in this game. One of the only drawbacks I can think of is that it doesn’t have an aiming “sight” or crosshair, so you have to practice with it before you can efficiently land hits and kills.
Though the bow is a great overall weapon for any part of the game, it’s a particularly good early game weapon due to how much it opens up for you! It lets you safely kill enemies from farther away, as well as more easily take down prey when you go hunting. Not to mention, you have different arrow types you can craft and use with this bow and the modern one!

The Crafted Bow excels in quite a few areas, including:

Hunting. (Whether it’s birds, lizards, squirrels, or deer, hunting with a bow is far less time consuming than with a spear. The spear may do more damage, but you can hit and kill your prey from a much farther distance with a bow. Plus, you can usually kill most of them in one hit!)
Ranged Combat. (Being able to hide and shoot at your enemies from a safe distance is always a plus, and having the bow equipped with whichever arrows you prefer is a great way to kill cannibals without ever taking a hit back. With practice in aiming, you can even kill them with one well-placed shot to their heads.)
Extra Damage. (This goes into the aspect of having different arrow types but being able to switch to fire and poison arrows means that your targets take extended, small amounts of damage over time. That can be a lot more helpful than it sounds!)

The Crafted Bow along with its counterpart is a wonderful cannibal-fighting weapon. As mentioned, you can safely take them down from a distance and avoid ever taking any damage yourself. Plus, the extra arrow types allow you to mix it up and add some extra damage to what the arrows themselves already do. You can’t add upgrades to it like many of the other weapons on this list, but you don’t need to! Just make a bunch of powerful arrows.
The Crafted bow only requires one stick, one piece of cloth, and one rope to make, which is simple. Again, keeping a small stock of these items will mean you never run out of bows, even if you find the modern one. This bow can only be crafted, however, so there’s no way to find it in the game or loot it from dead cannibals.

1: The Molotov

Stats:

Speed – Very Slow
Damage – Fire Damage
Block – None
Range – Ranged Weapon (It can also be thrown or catapulted.)

The Molotov is definitely a favorite early game weapon of nearly anyone who plays The Forest. You can use it to damage and kill every enemy in the game, especially the mutants! It’s readily available to the player- even immediately after first spawning- and overall, it’s a great weapon for groups.
As an early game weapon, it’s arguably one of the best! It’s easy to make, you can stack it, and it’s a lot of damage in a short amount of time. Other than the explosives, the Molotov is a great area-of-effect damage dealer that can hit more than one enemy at once. Its main damage output is fire damage, but the initial explosion of the bottle breaking and spreading the flammable liquid everywhere is added damage! And, of course, it’s a craftable item! A long-ranged, craftable item that you should always have on you.

The Molotov excels in a few areas of gameplay, including:

Cannibal Groups. (Due to its rather large area-of-effect range, you can easily hit every cannibal in a group of four or more if they’re close enough. Not to mention, that fire damage ticks away and adds up fast.)
Mutants. (It’s one of the best weapons against the stronger mutant cannibals period, and especially as an early game weapon! It’s a great tactic to launch them at the mutants from far away so you’re out of range of their own attacks.)
Destroying camps & Effigies. (Though you mostly do this for resources, it’s still a great tactic to avoid spawn locations close to your base. It’s a great tool for quickly taking care of buildings and those pesky spawn points.)

When fighting the cannibals, using the molotov alongside other explosives and fire arrows is the best way to go against large groups. You can peg them from a distance and lob the bombs and molotovs at them without ever worrying about taking too much damage or dying. The one drawback I can think of is the fact that you can accidentally set yourself, your own buildings, or your teammates on fire if you’re playing a multiplayer game. So, make sure you’re careful and precise about those throws!
Being a craftable item, you can whip some up anywhere you go as long as you have the materials. All you need is one piece of cloth, and one booze bottle. That’s a very simple recipe! Thanks to them being stackable up to 8, you can have a good little stockpile of them sitting in your backpack, and even more back at your base. You can’t find them anywhere in the game, however, so crafting is the only way to obtain them.