Drinking water in The Wilds

Use fresh water inland. Camp work will not fill your containers from sea water. In winter, frozen fresh water needs an open fishing hole before you can fill up. The sea stays open, but that does not make it drinkable.

Fill your containers, then boil beside a lit fire. A selected pot treats up to 200 water per job, while a selected bark bowl treats up to 60. The first usable pot or bowl in carried-item order is selected. If a bowl comes before a pot, the current job still treats only 60 even when its quote says 200. Put the pot first for the larger batch. Treatment works through the unsafe water you carry, so you do not need a pouring action.

A full set of containers may need several boils. Read the completion message and each container’s safe amount. Filling a partly used container adds unsafe water while keeping any safe water it already held.

Check the fire before starting. Boiling uses fuel, and if the nearby fire goes out during the work, the reserved supplies are lost. The preview warns when the fire is unlikely to last long enough.