Zad Archery Getting Started
From the first click to Sniper without wasting gems or rare armor.
Zad Archery is a single-player incremental you buy on Steam, not a Roblox room and not a live-service gacha. Samharia Studios shipped the 1.0 build on September 1, 2026 with a designed length around five hours, twelve Steam achievements, and a combat cap at wave 50. This page is the first-hour route so you stop guessing which tab matters.
Install from Steam, then open Settings immediately. Patch 1.0.2 put your monitor’s native resolution at the top of the list because launch-week players could not find a sane 1920×1080 or 2560×1440 option. Steam Deck is listed as Playable. There is no co-op: you will never invite a friend into the lane.
The lane, the bar, and Arrow Fall
Your archer stands on the left of a 2D hillside. Target-like monsters walk in from the right. The red bar at the top is the wave, not your personal health. When the bar empties, the wave clears and loot dumps onto the grass.
Arrow Fall is the ground click. The UI prints the remaining charges under the combat strip (Arrowfall: 1 at the start). Click a clump, not empty dirt. Early on you only have one charge and a long cooldown, so the skill tree nodes that add charges, shorten cooldown, or let Arrow Fall automate are worth more than a tiny damage bump.
Movement is mouse-driven. You can kite left while shots fire once Sniper is unlocked; until then, plant your feet and let the auto-shot work. Full bind notes live on Controls.
First purchases
Coins (gold) drop constantly. Green gems drop from specific target families once you buy the matching chance nodes. Blue tokens feed crafting levels. Do not treat all three as the same wallet.
Open the first left-hand tab — the branching tree — and buy in this order during hour one:
- Anything that raises Arrow Fall charges or cooldown.
- Gem drop chance for claw targets, then bow targets.
- Attack speed or extra projectiles.
- Flat damage last.
That order matches how incremental games actually scale in Zad: farming currency beats a 4% damage node that you will drown in loot anyway. The skills tier list ranks the same idea for later trees.
Unlock Archer upgrades, then Sniper
The bow tab is jobs. Archer is the default silhouette with three skill slots. Explosive Arrow is the documented starter nuke: area detonation, a handful of hits, and a short cooldown you can MAX with green gems. The other two Archer icons are the multi-shot / support pair you see maxed in mid-game screenshots.
Sniper is job two. It costs green gems (the exact number depends on how far you pushed gem chance, but demo and launch footage both show it as the cheap second unlock). Sniper keeps Archer skills. You do not respec and lose Explosive Arrow. Sniper’s headline perk is attacking while moving, plus a purple orb skill that deletes clustered bullseyes. Spend for Sniper as soon as the button is not a joke relative to your gem pile. Details and the three locked jobs sit on Archer Jobs.
Inventory discipline in hour one
Rare armor and bows can roll extra Arrow Fall projectiles, gold-gain percents, and raw HP. The item card itself prints the chords: right-click to equip, Ctrl+Shift+right-click to sell. The itch.io HTML5 demo trained people to fat-finger sell. On Steam those chords still exist, so hover, read the roll, then click.
Do not vendor a Rare with +1 Arrowfall Projectile. That stat is a skill-tree node you would have paid coins for. Crafting level-ups cost blue tokens and can fail; the anvil tab even labels a Failed button next to Take Item. Read Crafting and Loot before you smash every drop into the forge.
What hour one is not
Hour one is not Mining, Alchemy, cards, or the King. The pickaxe tab shows Gathering Lv. 0 with Herbalism gated behind the first gathering level-up. That is expected. Follow Mining and Gathering after you have Sniper and a stable gem loop, not before.
Guardians do not belong in the tutorial either. They start appearing as you push waves, they drop perks, and they gate the King. Launch-week bugs could skip a Guardian and freeze the final achievement; patch 1.0.2 restores missed guardians on restart. When you are ready, open Guardians and the King and the farming planner.
If you want a ranking instead of a route, jump to the builds tier list after this page. If you want the official store page, Discord, or the itch demo, use the links hub. The rest of this wiki assumes you finished the steps above and still have your first Rare equipped.
Frequently Asked Questions
Quick answers to the most common Zad Archery questions.
Do I need the itch.io demo if I already bought Steam?
No. The Steam 1.0 build is the real campaign. The HTML5 demo is useful only if you want to test the clicker loop before spending $6.99.
Should I max Explosive Arrow before unlocking Sniper?
Max the cheap Archer hits if gems are sitting idle, but do not delay Sniper once the unlock is affordable. You keep Archer skills after the swap.
Why is wave 50 the end?
That is the current combat cap Samharia shipped. Threads asking for more waves are feature requests, not a hidden unlock. Check updates if a content patch lands.
Is this beginner route up to date for patch 1.0.2?
Yes. Native resolution, Guardian restore-on-restart, and gem counts on lower waves are all 1.0.2 behavior.