Complete Atomfall Crafting Recipe Guide: Every Recipe & Location

Why You Need This Guide (And What Took Me Hours to Figure Out)

After dozens of hours roaming Atomfall’s brutal quarantine zone, nothing frustrated me more than stumbling upon locked crates or deadly gas, only to realize I was missing the one consumable that would’ve saved the day. Crafting isn’t just a bonus here-it’s survival. Merchants rarely have what you need (or gouge you for it), and relying on looting is a gamble. Once I tracked down every recipe, not only did my runs get smoother, but I could finally prep for hazards and bosses without sweating my health pool or ammo stock.

This guide will walk you through every crafting recipe I’ve found in Atomfall-including exactly where to get it, why it’s useful, and the pitfalls I wish I’d avoided while hunting them down. Most recipes are hidden in obscure bunkers or locked behind progression items, so come prepared for some detours.

Quick Recipe Reference: What You Can Craft

• Bandage
• Makeshift Grenade
• Shiv
• Explosive Lure
• Poison Bomb
• Molotov Cocktail
• Nail Bomb
• Sticky Bomb
• Combat Stim
• Painkillers
• Antidote
• Burn Salve
• Strange Tonic
• Radiation Resistance

Several recipes are found more than once-doubling your chances in case you missed one. Let’s break down how to get them all, plus essential advice for each.

Bandage: Early Game Lifesaver

Why it matters: You’ll take bleed damage constantly in Atomfall. Bandages aren’t just healing—using them prevents you from dying to random bleed ticks mid-fight.

• Effect: Restores health over time, cures Bleed, gives Bleed Resistance.
• Location: Slatten Dale. Given by the injured scientist in the Derelict Bunker questline.

My tip: Don’t skip the Derelict Bunker your first time passing through Slatten Dale; if you miss the scientist, you’ll backtrack later.

Makeshift Grenade: Your First Explosive

• Effect: Throwable explosive. Detonates a few seconds after being thrown, useful for groups and door breaching.
• Locations:
  • Casterfell Woods – Pinned to the corkboard opposite the sleeping bag in the Remote Bunker.
  • Skethermoor – In a buried cache near the greenhouses.
  • The Interchange – In the buried cache by the Site Office near the Slatten Dale entrance.

Personal experience: My breakthrough was realizing grenades do huge crowd control—not just for mutants but for vigilantes blocking quest areas. Prioritize getting this early!

Sticky Bomb: Blow Up Anything (and Anyone)

• Effect: Explosive that sticks to targets or surfaces before detonating. Crucial for tough armored foes.
• Location: Casterfell Woods – On the desk in the Garden Centre Cellar.

Warning: I wasted hours trying to stick these to moving enemies—throw at the ground just ahead of them, not directly, for consistent hits.

Burn Salve: Surviving Fire Traps and Gas Leaks

• Effect: Cures Burn, gives Burn Resistance, reduces fire damage.
• Locations:
  • Wyndham Village – Desk in the annex left of Captain Sims in the Village Hall.
  • Wyndham Village – Buried cache near the stone steps up the hill to the Sewer Tunnels.
  • Casterfell Woods – Buried cache in front of the shack on the Bunker L9 bridge path.
  • Casterfell Dam – Corkboard in the Control Room.

Discovery: I missed the cache by the Village Sewer on my first run—look for disturbed earth or a faint glimmer. Having salve on hand lets you speed through burning corridors worry-free.

Antidote: Poison Is Everywhere

• Effect: Cures Poison, gives Poison Resistance, reduces poison damage/build-up.
• Locations:
  • Casterfell Woods – Buy from Mother Jago at the Old Mine.
  • Skethermoor – Beside the B.A.R.D. crate past the electronic lock in Protocol Field Station (requires Atomfall signal redirector).
  • The Interchange – On a data cabinet in Data Store Bravo.

My mistake: I avoided poison clouds thinking loot inside wasn’t worth it. The antidote makes clearing these zones a breeze and opens up safer farm routes.

Nail Bomb: Bleed Damage, Area Denial

• Effect: Throws and detonates shortly after impact, inflicting bleeding to groups.
• Location: Skethermoor – Workbench in Brinsop Manor Cellar.

I only found this searching for the manor’s safe room, so poke around every cellar you find—it’s rarely where you expect.

Molotov Cocktail: Area Burn Damage

• Effect: Explodes on impact, creating lingering burn. Useful for blocking paths and flushing enemies.
• Locations:
  • Slatten Dale – Corkboard at the back of the vehicle depot in Outlaw’s Camp.
  • Wyndham Village – Brewery Cellar wall.
  • Casterfell Woods – Wall beside the B.A.R.D. crate in Watermill Cellar.

Tip: Target doorways or tight corridors. I wasted a bunch hitting open ground—using Molotovs inside multiplies their effect.

Painkillers: Survive Burst Damage

• Effect: Grants Damage Resistance for a period—don’t underestimate how much this lets you tank in boss fights.
• Location: Casterfell Woods – Buried cache near the mess table in Bunker L9.

My big mistake: hoarding painkillers and dying before using them. Pop one at the first sign of a tough encounter.

Combat Stim: Melee Glass Cannon

• Effect: Increases melee damage significantly. Crucial for bosses and armored enemies.
• Locations:
  • Wyndham Village – Case in the Forgotten Cellar under St. Katherine’s Church (need Church Cellar Key from The Interchange Medical).
  • Skethermoor – Desk in Protocol Workshop maintenance bay.
  • Skethermoor – Typewriter in the corner of Protocol Field Station Operations Room.

Getting the Church Cellar Key was a headache (I didn’t realize it came from Interchange Medical). Always use stims before entering miniboss rooms—the difference is night and day.

Specialist Recipes: The Rest

• Shiv, Explosive Lure, Poison Bomb, Radiation Resistance—Some of these are tied to late-game progression or hidden caches and aren’t always available in each run based on your route. When I get them, I jot down the cache or quest for later runs. Keep an eye on electronic locks, bookshelves, and side quests for these rarer recipes.
• Strange Tonic – Found on the desk in the ruined Castle library (Casterfell Woods, same building as Mother Jago’s book), but you’ll need to grab the Castle Key from the kitchen first. Mastering this recipe makes infection runs much less stressful.

Pro tip: Save before major recipe hunts—locks or timed areas can bug out, and losing progress really stings if you’re on permadeath.

Troubleshooting & Optimizing Your Crafting Runs

• Inventory space: Don’t hoard every material early on. Only carry what’s needed for key recipes (usually explosives and healing).
• Map markers: I mark recipe spots on my map for future runs—it’s easy to forget which bunker or cache held which recipe.
• Combine recipes for synergy: Using Painkillers plus a Combat Stim lets you go toe-to-toe with minibosses without instantly dying.
• Merchant strategy: Only buy recipes from merchants if you can’t find them after hours of searching—I wasted credits on Antidote only to find it in a cache minutes later.

Summary & Next Steps

Once you’ve collected these recipes, Atomfall becomes a different game. Stockpile your personal favorites, experiment with combinations in tough zones, and revisit old areas armed with new resistances or firepower. If you get stuck on a particular recipe, keep searching—many are tucked away, but they’re always worth the dig. Don’t sleep on skill upgrades either; buffing crafted item efficiency is a game-changer for endgame survival.

If you’ve missed a recipe or aren’t sure where to hunt next, retrace story-critical bunkers and revisit caches you saw but couldn’t unlock—half my recipes came from areas I doubled back on much later. Craft smart, fight smarter, and see how much further you’ll get on your next Atomfall journey.