Equipment is a resource problem, not a shopping list
Prices are on the store guide. This page is about the part that decides whether a dive works: what each tool consumes, what it can actually affect, and when carrying it makes the crew worse.
Battery is a shared design axis
Four items draw on battery charge, and the wiki’s descriptions rank them explicitly:
| Item | Charge | Practical consequence |
|---|---|---|
| Walkie-Talkie | Large charge | Comms last; you can keep it on for most of a day |
| Flashlight | Low charge | The torch dies first unless you manage it |
| Pro-Flashlight | Larger battery than the flashlight | The upgrade exists specifically to fix the low charge |
| Zap Gun | Uses battery | Every stun has a cost; it is not a free panic button |
| Jetpack | Uses battery | Flight time is finite and you cannot recharge mid-air |
The useful takeaway is that light and stun compete for the same resource category, and the cheap torch is the weakest link. If a crew keeps losing people in dark rooms, the fix is usually the 25-credit Pro-Flashlight rather than another body.
The shovel has a hard exception list
A shovel deals damage to monsters — except the Coilhead, Ghost Girl, Giant, Earth Leviathan and Jester. Five named entities, no partial effect.
That single line changes how you plan melee. Against most of the facility a shovel is real defence; against those five it is dead weight, and against the Ghost Girl in particular it invites the exact behaviour that gets crews killed. Before you commit a hand to a shovel, check the monster database for which of those five are on your moon.
Sound is a mechanic you can carry
The Boombox plays music and counts as a sound source. That is not flavour text — a noise-emitting object you carry is a thing monsters can react to.
The same logic applies in reverse to the Radar-booster: while active it appears on the ship monitors and can be pinged or flashed from the terminal to play a sound or stun enemies. So the crew has two noise tools, one personal and one remote, and they pull in opposite directions. The booster is the one to buy.
Timing tools: the lockpicker’s 30 seconds
The Lockpicker takes 30 seconds and you stand still for it. Compare that with the Stun Grenade’s “short time” disruption: a stun buys seconds, a lockpick costs thirty of them. On a quiet moon that is fine; with anything roaming, it is the most exposed thing you will do all day.
Plan the door before you kneel at it — know your exit, and know whether someone is holding the corridor.
Movement tools
Extension Ladder drops a horizontal ladder you can climb. It solves geometry, which is a different failure from a monster — crews that die to falls and dead ends get more from a ladder than from a weapon.
Jetpack lets you fly on battery. It is the most expensive item in the game and it does not make you safer by itself: flight changes where you can be, and being airborne with a dead battery is its own problem.
TZP-Inhalant makes you move faster and use less stamina, at the cost of a squeaky voice for the duration. Speed and stamina together is a strong combination, but it is a consumable effect rather than permanent gear.
Building a hand budget
Each item occupies a hand, so the real constraint is slots rather than credits. A working default:
- Light — Pro-Flashlight, one per person who splits off.
- Comms — one Walkie-Talkie per crew, not per person.
- One control tool — Stun Grenade for cheap disruption, Zap Gun if the crew has 400 to spare.
- One geometry tool — Extension Ladder or nothing; a shovel only if the moon’s monsters are outside the exception list.
Everything else is a second-order purchase. The equipment tier list ranks the same items by how much they save, and the beginner guide covers the first-day version of this decision.
Related guides
- Store guide — all 13 items and their real prices.
- Monster database — which entities ignore a shovel.
- Best equipment tier list — the same kit ranked.
- Lethal Company hub — all guides for this game.