Worst case scenario: Global Upheaval, Crustal displacement, Visiting Advanced Cultures, Passing Planetoids, Cosmic Storms, Second Suns etc. Oh, and global civil wars, famine and ummmmmm pestilence.
First you need to know how to locate and clean water in a handful of ways.
next you should have knowledge of how to fish and trap with little or no tools, then having a tool (knife, line, GUN
) makes it much easier.
Have a bow, better yet know how to make one. If society ended few people will be mass producing bullets, so know how to make a bow and arrows.
Learn how to build makeshift shelters out of limbs, bows, debris - you may be a nomad for sometime, advanced structure building is therefore not one of the first priorities.
Be able to make fire in a handful of ways.
Now that you hopefully have a skin of water and a dried meat of some kind, you can travel a bit so you need to know navigation and have a goal where you want to be, like a tropical paradise filled with warmth, food, and water! Hopefully an entire crustal shift of the earth didn't happen, else your knowledge of the previous latitude of your dream home is kaput. Well the latitude isn't . . . there just may not be land there anymore.
So wonder around (I mean you really got no place to be
), find a place that is overflowing with milk and honey, defend it from other chaps who want the same, couple it with the global upheavals of the crustal shift, violent weather changes . . . and you have the Old Testament epic all over again!
The more food and water you have and the easier it is to procure it, the more time you will have to work on more advanced technologies (such as a house!). Hopefully you have a mate, and more than enough food for the both of you, then you can make more of you . . . because you are going to need all the help you can get! Might as well manufacture it!
(c'mon, do you really think people make kids for any other reasons???)
With a larger population of You's, you might be able to ponder mining and refining, if farming lends you any spare time, then, well . . . follow any history book from there.
Soon you will have enough spare time to reinvent war for profit.
Last, practice. You will not die in one day without water, so test your skills, simply walk into the woods and see how long you can go on how little. (*Insert all inclusive disclaimer here*) Knowledge of edible plants is a plus, plus basic geology, for identifying flints and iron, especially. Digging for gold isn't gonna help much, it is in such a situation where gold shows just how useless it really is.
If you cant find water, or catch an animal, and you make crappy shelter, and can't start a fire: This will be a very long day and especially night. (the sounds at night alone, without a "real" tent, will not allow some to even sleep.) But it will definitely make you appreciate society if nothing else! Now just imagine if you have no society to walk back to, the second day is MUCH longer than the first . . . Even if you have plenty of food and water, nature's beasties may be enough to do some in, mosquitoes, ticks, fleas, leaches, . . . Cougars . . . they all have to eat too ya know.
Death from dehydration in 3 to 7 days depending on many variables, especially your skill and experience - without food you wont die for a month. However, any deficiency in either, though you are not dead, you will be Severely impaired mentally and physically. Practice makes perfect!
Try One Full Day. Packing heavy is cheating.
[when confident in your skills] Preferably, Go Alone (*Insert Larger All Inclusive Disclaimer Here*) for, if you learn to depend on others to survive, well . . . you haven't learned Independence.
I'll post some pics and links later, its late now . . .
