Scrap

Scrap turns loot into blueprints. Put an item you found and some scrap into a research table, and you can craft that item for the rest of the wipe. The table costs 20 scrap itself, so it is usually the first thing you buy. The workbench works the other way round: from a Level 1 workbench up, you spend scrap along a tech tree and unlock blueprints you have never held.

The first few hundred come from barrels along the roads and crates at monuments. The rest comes out of the recycler, where gears, pipes, springs and other looted components break down into scrap, and so do spare backpacks. A road run with a bag of components, then the nearest recycler: that is the classic first hour.

Older guides tell you to save scrap for the next bench. On current data that no longer holds, since a Level 2 workbench wants basic blueprint fragments and high quality metal instead. So research comes first and bench upgrades later. The Salvage upgrade cuts every tech tree unlock at that bench by a fifth, but nobody can craft it: it only comes from loot or a trade.