Welcome to the Daybreak section of this guide. Before we get into the game type itself, the strategies to use to get through wave 7, and achievements we can unlock, we first need to address... loot.
How Daybreak Loot Works
Odd place to start, right? Follow me for a second here - for achievement hunting in Daybreak, we really have two long-term goals: first, play 343 waves of Daybreak (easy enough to grind) and second, to unlock all the loot available in this mode (tied to several achievements). Because of this, it's important to learn how the loot works.
There are a total of 51 items that can be unlocked, and they always unlock in the same order. While there is no achievement for unlocking every item, unfortunately, a lot of achievements are tied to items later in the list, including item 51 of 51. So, from the list below, we see your first unlock will be the CLEO Warhammer (now selectable as a starting weapon in Daybreak), followed by the Remote Grenade (also selectable now at the start of Daybreak), and so on.
These items will unlock if you complete your third round, your fifth round and your seventh round of Daybreak. Notice that I used the word "your" and not the article "the", as the count will begin when you personally join the game. So, if you join in on round six of a Daybreak match, you can only do two rounds of play, and thus cannot unlock any loot. Therein, it is always to your advantage to either host your own games (so you start round one by default) or join another player's game as early as possible. This counts double as earlier Daybreak rounds go faster than later Daybreak rounds.
Starting with item 26, items will no longer unlock for you on round three - you'll have to get to around five to complete your first unlock (limiting your unlocks to two per match if you complete all rounds). Then, starting on item 43, you can only unlock items on round seven (i.e. you have to complete the entire Daybreak match from start to finish to get an item). Given this pattern, the absolute minimum number of matches you need to fully unlock all items is 25. At about a half-hour a complete match (including loading screens), this will take you roughly 12.5 hours to get all items - assuming you play perfectly every time (and you won't, and definitely not in your first Daybreak outings with bad gear).
Below is the loot table in unlock order. Items tied to achievement are emboldened. Notes are added as well for items we'll be using in our "optimum setup" (see: Optimum Strategy section below for details).
Complete Round Three/Five/Seven Unlocks
1.) CLEO Warhammer (Daybreak)
2.) Remote Grenade (Daybreak)
3.) CLEO Pistol (Daybreak)
4.) CLEO Warhammer (Campaign)
5.) CLEO Hand Axe (Daybreak) NOTE: Used for our "optimum setup" described below
6.) Remote Grenade (Campaign)
7.) Sticky Grenade (Daybreak)
8.) CLEO Pistol (Campaign)
9.) CLEO Battle Rifle (Daybreak)
10.) CLEO Longblade (Daybreak)
11.) CLEO Hand Axe (Campaign)
12.) Explosive Fuel Trap (Daybreak)
13.) CLEO Shotgun (Daybreak)
14.) Sticky Grenade (Campaign)
15.) CLEO Mace (Daybreak)
16.) Deployable Minefield (Daybreak) NOTE: Alternate for our "optimum setup" described below
17.) CLEO Battle Rifle (Campaign)
18.) CLEO SMG (Daybreak)
19.) CLEO Greathammer (Daybreak)
20.) CLEO Longblade (Campaign)
21.) Remote Rocket Pod (Daybreak)
22.) CLEO Tumbler (Campaign)
23.) CLEO Blast Rifle (Daybreak) NOTE: Used in our "optimum setup" described below
24.) CLEO Support Transmitter (Campaign)
25.) Prefab: Red Talon Bunkroom (Campaign) NOTE: Used in the Insourcing Achievement (1/4)
Complete Round Five/Seven Unlocks
26.) CLEO Battle Axe (Daybreak) NOTE: Alternative in our "optimum setup" described below
27.) Explosive Fuel Trap (Campaign)
28.) Deployable Pyro Minefield (Daybreak) NOTE: Used in our "optimum setup" described below
29.) CLEO Shotgun (Campaign)
30.) CLEO Machine Pistol (Daybreak)
31.) CLEO Assault Shotgun (Daybreak)
32.) CLEO Mace (Campaign)
33.) CLEO Sharpshooter Rifle (Daybreak)
34.) CLEO Heavy Sniper (Daybreak) NOTE: Alternate for our "optimum setup" described below
35.) Deployable Minefield (Campaign)
36.) CLEO SMG (Campaign)
37.) CLEO Greathammer (Campaign)
38.) CLEO Accelerator (Campaign)
39.) Remote Rocket Pod (Campaign)
40.) Prefab: Red Talon Watchtower (Campaign) NOTE: Used in the Insourcing Achievement (2/4)
41.) CLEO Blast Rifle (Campaign)
42.) Prefab: Red Talon Workshop (Campaign) NOTE: Used in the Insourcing Achievement (3/4)
Complete Round Seven Unlocks
43.) CLEO Battle Axe (Campaign)
44.) Deployable Pyro Minefield (Campaign)
45.) CLEO Machine Pistol (Campaign)
46.) CLEO Assault Shotgun (Campaign)
47.) Red Talon Crafting Station (Campaign)
48.) CLEO Sharpshooter Rifle (Campaign)
49.) Prefab: Officer Quarters (Campaign) NOTE: Used in the Insourcing Achievement (4/4)
50.) CLEO Heavy Sniper (Campaign) NOTE: Used in the Shut Up! Achievement
51.) CLEO Core (Campaign) NOTE: Used in the Cargo Cult Achievement
Prestige Points and Item Based Achievements
Once you've unlocked a item or items for an achievement, how do you go about actually unlocking the achievement itself? Well, for this you will have to do back in one of your campaign games. But before we do that, let's talk prestige points.
After Daybreak matches, you'll notice you're earning a currency called prestige points. This currency can only be earned in Daybreak matches, and can only be spent in campaigns. To spend prestige within a campaign, use your radio, and select the bottom "Daybreak" option. Within here, you can do three things, "Call the Trader" (free), Recruit Red Talon Operative (2250 prestige points) and Recruit Red Talon Soldier (2250 points).
Prestige currently caps at 99,999 points. Make sure to spend some before hitting your cap or you'll lose the excess prestige. NOTE: The cap used to be 9,999 points, so if reading other guides, be aware that said guide may be using the old cap number when giving advice.
The first option, "Call the Trader", will bring a Red Talon Prestige Trader onto the map for 30 minutes. The Prestige Trader works like any other trader in the game, except they take Prestige currency instead of Influence, and sell only the items unlocked in Daybreak (marked on the list above as "Campaign")
Now on to the individual achievements:
To start, you'll need to recruit either Red Talon Operatives or Red Talon Soldiers a total of four times (this does not have to be in the same campaign, as you're allowed to span across multiple campaigns). They will cost 2750 each. Doing this will unlock:
For the next achievement, you'll have to purchase four different items from the Prestige Trader. They are:
Prefab: Red Talon Bunkroom (1500 prestige) -- Requires small indoor slot, 2 materials and 1 labour to construct
Prefab: Red Talon Watchtower (1500 prestige) -- Requires small outdoor slot, 2 materials and 1 labour to construct
Prefab: Red Talon Workshop (2500 prestige) -- Requires small indoor or outdoor slot, 2 materials and 1 labour to construct
Prefab: Red Talon Officer Quarters (2500 prestige) -- Requires small indoor slot, 2 materials and 1 labour to construct
Bring a car, as they're all extremely heavy.
You do not have to purchase all four of these Prefab items all in the same campaign - you can spread purchase out among several campaigns. Given though that these prefabs are pretty awesome (see the Building Tips section of the guide for details), you'll want to invest in many of these Prefabs during each of your playthroughs anyway. To build each Prefab, simply put the prefab item in your home base inventory, then the option to build the facility will appear in the facility build menu when interacting with an open small slot (make sure you have the needed materials to build). Once you build each of the four Daybreak facilities, you'll unlock:
Next up, once you unlock the second to last item, call the Prestige Trader again to purchase the CLEO Heavy Sniper (750 prestige). Grab an ammo pack while you're at it (128 prestige). Now head out into the map and look for a screamer. Easy place to find them is at infestations, as there is always at least one lurking there. Simply use the CLEO Heavy Sniper to kill the screamer, and you'll unlock:
Finally, once you unlock the very last item in Daybreak, call the Prestige Trader one last time and buy the CLEO Core (a whopping 4000 prestige!). This works like the Red Talon Prefabs, as you will need to put this item in your home base inventory and open a large outdoor slot menu at the base to build it (you'll also need 2 materials and one labour). NOTE: not every base has a large outdoor slot, so if you currently don't have one, you'll have to pick up and move to a home base that does. Once constructed, you'll unlock:
In total, you'll need 23,878 prestige to buy everything you'll need to unlock all achievements.
Now that we have all the preliminary stuff out of the way, let's talk about the game itself and best strategies to get past wave 7.
Optimum Equipment
On start of a Daybreak match, you'll be able to select a melee weapon, a ranged weapon and an explosive. Keep in mind you'll need to select weapons to deal with your four major obstacles in the game:
- Multiple Zombies on a Wall: To make it all the way to the end of Daybreak, you'll need to conserve ammo early on (especially Special Ammo). Therein, you'll be doing a lot of melee combat in the first three rounds or so of the game. Occasionally, because of this, a horde of zombies might build upon one of your six walls. You'll need a way to clear that wall quickly before the wall takes significant damage.
- Armoured Zombies: Armoured zombies start showing up in round 2-3, but will be a complete BANE to you in round 5 (aka the hardest round of the match). In a pinch, you need to take these guys down quickly, as they are slow to melee. Plus, armoured zombies cannot be headshotted until the helmet comes off, making them a huge pain to deal with.
- Ferals Zombies: Ferals move fast and can leap over your walls extremely quickly. You'll need a method to take these out or you'll be constantly babysitting your technician.
- Juggernauts: They start coming in round 3, and by round 7, they will constantly be streaming toward your base. You need a tool to take them out efficiently.
Therein, the optimal equipment setup is this:
Ranged -- CLEO Blast Rifle. This is the best all-round weapon in the game. It does high damage, especially close up, and can be used to take Juggernauts out quickly. Because it fires like a shotgun, you can clear walls of zombies in one ore two blasts. It's also fairly effective on helmeted zombies. So, being good at generally everything without the need for pinpoint accuracy? This makes the CLEO Blast Rifle the go-to gun of the game. Alternatively, you can take the Heavy Sniper, which makes extremely short work of Juggernauts and helmeted zombies - the negative though is that its not good for horde clear and needs to be aimed better to be effective. On a team of four, one person can feel free to take the heavy sniper, but for most people, I'd stick with the Blast Rifle.
Explosive -- Deployable Pyro Minefield. Set one field to the front left of your technician and one to the front right of your technician, and you've nullified the threat of ferals for the entirety of the game. The alternative, non-pyro Deployable Minefields, work just as well on ferals, so feel free to use either (the slight nod goes to the Deployable Pyro Minefields though). Between rounds, check the field from time to time and if the mines are getting low, reset the mines or have a teammate do so (NOTE: setting more than one minefield in an area will destroy all the old mines, so stacking minefield is ineffective and wasteful).
Melee -- This is up to personal choice, though keep in mind you're looking for a weapon you like that can melee zombies efficiently, either through Lethality or Knockdown. My go-to was the CLEO Hand Axe, though feel free to experiment and find your favourite.
Now onto the actual match.
Match Strategy
The following guide is written for a team of four players (aka the max number of players possible). If playing in a team of two, simply follow the guide below as written, but with one player on each "side" rather than two.
NOTE: always play in teams of either two or four, as the game is balanced for these amounts of players -- NEVER play in a team of three, as a three player game is balanced for four players and thus you can be easily overwhelmed as you're technically playing with a handicap. While a solo match is also balanced for a team of two, at least there you are given bots to help you in your fight (see Notes on Bots below about how to maximize bot usage).
With your team set, its time to get started...
The goal of the match is to have your technician survive until wave 7. Everything else is expendable (including you).
First off, you want to spend as much time as humanly possible OUTSIDE the base. This way, you can fight zombies well before they get close to the defensive wall. In addition, you can use melee out here as much as possible to prevent yourself from chewing through your ammo supply.
So to do this, before the first round, go into each chest in the back of the base, grab all the ammo, healing items and wall repair kits, and move them to the outside of the base. Ammo and healing items can be dropped in the centre of the street (between the 3rd and 4th wall, so everyone has easy access). There are two exceptions to this rule: first, repair kits should be dropped right in front of or behind each wall section, so someone can grab a kit and repair it quickly if needed. Second, bandages should be dropped near the technician (as bandages are the only way to heal the tech should they take damage).
Starting after wave 2, supply drops will fall in the grassy park across the street from the base between waves. You have a limited time to collect items from these supply drops, but I strongly recommend grabbing all the special ammo at the very least (and maybe the shotgun ammo in case you run low on special ammo) and dropping it in the centre of the street by the base wall. You also will find better healing kits and better energy pills as well, so grab these and place them in the centre of the street between rounds. You also might find a Blast Rifle or Battleaxe if you're lucky and don't have one already - grab these as well if you need.
Side note: following this strategy will easily unlock the following achievement for you:
You should also drop your Blast Rifle here by the ammo at the start of the game. Why? You don't want to use any special ammo in the first three rounds. Therein, instead of the Blast Rifle, pick up a Shotgun or a Machine Gun from the chests in the back. Use this gun for the first three rounds (thus conserving special ammo). Machine Guns are best for people in the "forward" position to quickly take out bloaters, and Shotgun are best for people in the "back position" to quickly clear overwhelmed walls. (see next paragraph for positions).
As for where you should generally fight, I found it best to split into two teams, one for the right three walls and one for the left three walls. One person on the team will be in the "forward" position, and should generally hang out in the grass area across the street from the base. Why? They can intercept zombies early, kill them earlier, and spot and kill bloaters earlier. As a bonus, if a bloater does explode near them, they have a comfort zone to fall back on. This person will generally stay in this area the entire game unless their walls are getting overwhelmed in their section, in which case they can drop back to assist for a bit. Once the wall is clear, they should move back up.
The second person on the team will be positioned on the street behind the forward person (and possibly off to the side a bit). Their job is to catch any zombies that make it past the forward position. As well, their job is to clear zombies off the walls if zombies start stacking up (hence, its good for them to start with the Shotgun and then move up to the blast rifle in round 3/4). Should a feral get to your technician, the back position person is in charge of climbing over the wall, into the base and killing it (though this problem happens extremely infrequently once your minefields go up). The back person can also cross over to assist the other team if they're getting hit heavily by juggernauts and their own side is relatively clear.
Once you're set up and are in position, time to start the match.
Wave 1: Normal Zombies, Bloaters, Ferals. Following the strategy listed above, this round should be very easy. Nothing in this round should cause you any pain (ferals are insta-killed by your minefield, bloaters can be shot at a distance). Sadly, there are no CLEO drops between Wave 1 and Wave 2.
Wave 2: More Normal Zombies, More Bloaters, More Ferals, Armoured Zombies. Same as Wave 1, but with more normal and special zombies, with some armoured zombies peppered in. Armoured Zombies take much longer to kill than normal ones, so if you can get behind them, do the instant take-down trick if you can to speed up the process (
+ 
for a sneak kill if they don't see you, 
+ 
for a dodge counter kill). If you're getting overwhelmed, you can shoot out the Armoured Zombies legs and leave them to slowly crawl around, saving them for a later kill. Otherwise, save ammo on armoured zombies and melee them.
Getting through this round will unlock:
Once the round is over (and in all subsequent times between rounds), head out and collect all the useful items from the CLEO drops, especially special ammo and explosives. Excess items can once again be dropped in the centre street area.
Wave 3: Everything from before, plus a Juggernaut at the end. Same strategy as before, though you'll encounter your first Juggernaut at the end of this round. Best strategy for the juggernaut is to shoot it in the head repeatedly until it kneels, then do an instant takedown on it ( + ). Once this round ends, ditch your starting gun (and any leftover ammo) and grab your Blast Rifle and some special ammo, as round four is where the game really starts to pick up.
If your technician has taken no damage up to this point, you'll unlock:
(And no worries if you don't get this achievement the first time out, you'll have plenty of opportunities. Plus, this achievement is made infinitely easier with minefields in play)
Wave 4: Everything from before, plus a Blood Juggernaut. Many more armoured zombies this round, so be prepared to handle them. This time, the juggernaut comes mid-round. Toward the end, a blood juggernaut will show up. Blood Juggernauts have a slam attack that causes a massive rise in your blood plague meter (in this game type, if your meter hits 100% you die instantly. You can use a medkit to clear blood plague but as medkits are rare, use them judiciously). Outside of that, same strategy as a juggernaut. Killing the Blood jug will net you:
When this round is finished, make sure to loot all the pods for ammo. As well, fix any walls that are starting to break and heal your technician to full if you can, as the next round is a doozy. Also, you should have unlocked:
Wave 5: Two blood juggs and MASSIVE amounts of helmeted zombies. Welcome to the make or break round of the game! Wave 5 is by far the hardest wave in the match, bar none. The reason for this is the MASSIVE amount of helmeted zombies that will storm to your base, where you can easily get overwhelmed by them and your walls can fall in an instant (usually while you're distracted by a Blood Jugg). My suggestion this round is to use blast rifle ammo liberally, and shoot for the legs of regular and helmeted zombies wherever you can (legless zombies can be insta-killed, move much slower, and cannot grapple you). Also, use your energy items very liberally here as well, as you need to keep your energy up and your melee arm swinging. At this point, you should have energy pills, so this shouldn't be a problem. If you've picked up explosives from the CLEO drops up to this point, use these liberally too on both the juggernauts and the armoured zombies - the faster you take out a juggernaut, the more time you have to knock out the swarm of helmeted zombies.
When just starting out Daybreak, I guarantee this will be the round that you will falter on repeatedly. Don't get discouraged, as when you get the mines and blast rifle rewards, this round becomes more conquerable.
If you survived this far in your first match, I'm sure you will have unlocked this achievement at the end of the match:
You'll probably die here a lot, and the first time you do you'll unlock:
If you live, quick run out to the CLEO drops and restock on healing and special ammo, then run back and repair walls as needed. Here comes:
Wave 6: CONGRATS! Wave 6 is no picnic (it's the second hardest round in the game) but it's no Wave 5, and if you get here you have a very good shot of completing the game. This round has lots and lots of juggernauts, but much less armoured zombies, which ironically makes the round easier. Remember to target the juggernaut's head, then use the instant takedown method to kill them. If you're in a complete hurry, you can also blast their head while they're down for a faster takedown (though this uses up ammo). Really, the big danger here is running out of special ammo - if that happens, grab a shotgun and shotgun ammo from the street and use this instead. Shotguns are much less effective than Blast Rifles, but if your teammates hopefully will still have special ammo and you should be ok. Feel free to use up all of your explosives on this round as well, as Wave 7 is much easier than this round.
Finishing this round unlocks:
Wave 7: The last wave! Ironically, this wave is much easier that Wave 6 and especially Wave 5. Why? It's a giant parade of juggernauts, but much, much less of other zombie types. And by this time, you should be an expert at taking juggernauts down! Again, your only real worry is to run out of special ammo, but if you've been collecting ammo between rounds you should be ok. The juggernauts tend to come from one side more frequently than the other, so feel free to move you, back-positioned people, both over to the overwhelmed side.
The sun comes up during this round, so that's a nice touch.
Upon completion of this round, you'll unlock:
Survive or fail, within a few matches you'll also unlock the following just for completing 7 rounds cumulative in matches:
(Obviously the latter is much easier than the former :) )
If nobody died during all seven Waves (which is easier than you think with practice), you will unlock:
If you're having trouble with the above, keep in mind you can hop over the wall to take a break from the zombies to heal, and you can use a medkit to get back to 100% health and clear all ailments. Just warn your partners that you're doing this so someone can watch your station for a minute.
Miscellaneous Achievements
First, take turns being the host with your team (or start a game yourself and allow randoms to join you) to unlock:
Next, when you're consistently clearing Wave 7, you'll need to take turns with your team to be the only one to open CLEO drops, as you need to loot 25 CLEO drops in one match (you need to be the first to open it, which will switch the container colour from green to amber. Your teammates can subsequently loot the drop once you've opened it).
Here are the number of CLEO drops per round:
- After Wave 1: 0
- After Wave 2: 4
- After Wave 3: 4
- After Wave 4: 5
- After Wave 5: 6
- After Wave 6: 6
Add them up and what do you get? 25, the exact number you need. Therein, you have to get to each and every container after every round, changing the light from green to amber by opening it. Remember the counts, and don't miss any. Doing this, you will unlock:
From here on in, it's repeating the same strategies as listed above, but to spice things up a bit, we can also work on a few other achievements during your long Daybreak slog.
First and easiest is to get your technician killed during the first round. This is actually very tough to do with bots, as the first round is fairly easy and the bots are good enough to make it through this round without your assistance. Instead, grab a team of two or four, start a match, then just hang out in the back of the base. In a minute or two, you will unlock:
Next up is to reach Wave 5 without using any explosives (including minefields). To do this simply do not deploy a minefield or throw any grenades at all until this wave. Outside of ferals (which the back positioned people now will have to kill before they climb the wall and/or kill them before they take out the technician), nothing should really be different during this playthrough. Doing this will unlock:
(Note, the achievement unlocks after Wave 4, so feel free to once again use explosives once Wave 5 starts).
Next up, reach Wave 4 without using any guns - easier than it sounds with a coordinated team, as you should be using melee attacks mostly in Waves 1 through 3 anyway. The only real difficult part is the Juggernaut at the end of Wave 3, though you should be able to take him (her? Do juggernauts have gender?) down with a coordinated melee attack.
Alternatively, you can play a solo game of Daybreak and just use melee weapons during the first three rounds, as the bots can use their guns all they want without voiding this achievement. This may make it slightly easier to get, depending on your bots (see Notes on Bots below)
Next up, is to complete Wave 7 without a single wall breaking down. This is not an easy achievement (especially in Wave 5), but the good news is the above strategy is basically what you will use to get this achievement. You can do a few minor adjustments for this - back positioned people should fix walls whenever they have a free moment, walls should be fixed in between rounds (no matter their condition, just to be safe) and finally prioritize zombie mobs on walls. Keep in mind that zombie attacks on walls are exponential - each zombie adds to the damage the other zombies do, so mobs do much faster damage to a wall than a lone zombie or two. Also, you can prioritize leg shots to zombies over headshots, as crawling zombies are much less of a danger to walls than walking or running ones. Finally, make sure someone has the attention of a Juggernaut at all times - do NOT let a juggernaut get to a wall or the wall will tumble very very quickly.
Don't get frustrated if you don't get this right away. Having to play 49+ games of Daybreak, you'll eventually get it, unlocking:
So, remember all that work you did putting together a solid team? Practicing and working together until you become a well-oiled Daybreak machine? Well, you can put that right in the trash It's time to play solo for a bit!
So, some good news - you don't have to complete all 7 Waves to get this achievement. Now some bad news - you do however have to get through Wave 5 (aka the worst one).
You WILL need the optimum setup here - that means Blast Rifle and Deployable Minefields (plus your favourite melee weapon). You will need BOTH of your bots to have rifles instead of shotguns (if any start with shotguns, reset the game, see Notes on Bots below as to why).
Outside of this, its the same setup as described above -- use a shotgun for the first 2-3 Waves then switch to the blast rifle for Waves 4 and 5. Your bots will stay within the base, but you need to be outside as much as possible until the walls start coming down. At that point, use explosives to take out groups of zombies and focus your fire on the juggernauts (if a juggernaut gets to your technician, its lights out). Use explosives and ammo very liberally in wave 5 as you don't need them for wave 6 and 7. With enough practice, you will overcome this challenge and unlock:
(NOTE: It took me 4-5 attempts to get this myself, so don't get discouraged if you die on Wave 5 repeatedly. With bots, luck always plays into it)
Cumulative Achievements
There are a lot of cumulative achievements that will come naturally during gameplay, assuming you're doing a bit of everything during matches. They are:
Prestige Based achievements:
You'll need 23,878 prestige in total to buy all Daybreak loot, but only need 5000 prestige to unlock all the cumulative prestige achievements. You should get this around 50 completed waves of Daybreak, give or take a few (and assuming you fail a lot of your initial matches). If you have a solid team, you may get this faster, as completing later waves rewards a lot more prestige than failing out at Wave 4 or 5.
CLEO Drop Based Achievement:
(NOTE: 0b1111 is 15 in binary. Also, four bits is half a byte, which is referred to as a "nibble". Computer Science jokes! Yay!)
(NOTE: 0b11111111 is 255 in binary)
Simply open drops as you normally would during a game. This will be one of the later achievements you unlock, but as you'll do it naturally, don't worry too much about it. The rough estimate on completing this is about 100 waves.
Miscellaneous Item Use Achievements:
Simply use a wall kit to repair a wall. Do this 12 times to unlock the achievement (it doesn't have to be the same match, it goes across matches). You will be doing this a lot, especially early in the game, so you'll unlock this very early in your Daybreak career.
Use bandages to heal the technician 12 times to unlock this one.
For some reason, you only get credit for this if you are the host of the game, so either do this solo or trade hosting duties with your team and switch hosts once you/they complete this achievement. Since it only takes 12 heals to unlock this achievement, you'll get this pretty early in your career as long as you remember to be the host when you work on it.
Wave Count Achievements:
You can get this after one match of Daybreak if you're lucky, though most likely it will take two or three.
49 waves, not too bad. That's 7 perfect matches or 14-15 imperfect matches. You'll get this after about 4-6 hours of play.
This will definitely be the last achievement you unlock in this game. 343 waves is a LOT of waves, and you will probably be done with everything else after roughly 200 waves, so you have a LONG way to go to finish this DLC.
You can speed things up a bit once you unlock all the other achievements/Daybreak unlockables by setting up solo games and purposely losing the third round (as the first and second waves are much faster to complete than subsequent waves). You can even go AFK for 5 minutes between matches and let the bots do the work for you.
Here are the steps to grind this achievement out:
- Start a Daybreak match.
- Select Deployable [Pyro] Mines as your Explosive choice. Melee and Firearm do not matter.
- Hold
to skip the opening cinematic and jump directly into the game. - Drop both sets of mines in their usual spots to the front-right and front-left of the technician.
- Rebuild the broken fence.
- Talk to technician and start Wave 1.
Now, just park your character somewhere out of the way (or not, doesn't really matter) and AFK for about 5 minutes. The bots will get you through Wave 1 and Wave 2 just fine, but will fail on Wave 3. Repeat for about 150 Waves.
And with that, you're FINALLY DONE! Back to much more fun things, like more campaigns! Or on to Heartland!
Notes on Bots
When playing the game solo or with two people, you're going to have bots on your team. The bots may have different names and voicelines, but everything about the bots is essentially the same EXCEPT for the firearms they use. Because of this, they really fall into two categories: bots that use the shotgun, and bots that use the rifle.
Of the two, the rifle bot is far superior, and if you're going for the 'I Was All By Myself' achievement or doing any of the other higher Wave achievements, you'll want rifle bots over shotgun bots. This is because bot accuracy is good, and since the rifle can shoot further and hit consistently, you get more damage output from the rifle than the shotgun. Furthermore, since the bots never leave the base, a shotgun bot needs a zombie to get pretty close to the walls before they can do damage, which means the walls can get mobbed much faster, whereas the rifle bot can start plinking off zombies before they even leave the grass and get to the street. Rifles also do more damage to specials, and as they can hit specials earlier, rifles help take specials out faster.
In summary, the rifle bot can shoot further, shoot more often, and do more damage per shot than a shotgun bot, all while keeping hoards away from the walls. Take rifle bots.
But how do you know which one is which before a match? Turn on your flashlight (press in 
) and head over to the bots. They'll have their gun slung on their packs on the back right. Look at the butt of the gun (should be facing up with the gun on the backpack) - if you see a coloured stripe on it, it's a rifle. If you don't, it's a shotgun.
With two bots, its a 25% chance to get two bots with rifles. Given this, it's worth restarting repeatedly to get the twin rifle setup if you're planning to go far in Daybreak solo, and especially if you're working on the I Was All By Myself achievement.
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