Graveyard Keeper Early Progression: Graveyard, Church and Research

Edition: The opening and basic workstations of the original Graveyard Keeper on PC Steam, app 599140. Breaking Dead is included with the Steam base game, but automation procedures are outside scope. Do not mix in requirements from paid DLC, console editions or Graveyard Keeper 2.

Verification scope: Public sources compared on 2026-10-04. No game launch, current build-number check or full comparison of current Japanese UI names was performed. Use the controls shown in your settings.

Sources checked: 2026-10-04

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Break early progress into small milestones

This route covers the introduction, basic workshop, church, first research and early requests from related NPCs. Follow completed milestones rather than aiming for a particular time on a particular day.

Solution 01

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From the introduction to your first sale and smithing

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From the introduction to your first sale and smithing: 5 entries
Milestone	Prerequisite	Required action	Character / location	Next check
The first corpse has arrived	Gerry's introductory instructions	Carry the corpse, perform the instructed procedure and take it to a grave. Finish the burial work.	Gerry / morgue → graveyard	A Burial certificate enters your inventory
You received the graveyard request	After the first burial	Listen to the Bishop and check the graveyard chest for tools and repair materials	Bishop / outside the church	You know the target graveyard rating
You reached the village tavern	Bring the certificate	Talk to Horadric and sell the certificate through trading. Hear about the blacksmith.	Horadric／Dead Horse	Check your money after the sale
The blacksmith's request	The introduction through the tavern	Repair the sword you receive, deal with the specified slimes and return	Krezvold / southeast of the village	Check iron technology and Simple iron parts
Preparation before going home	Complete the tavern and blacksmith conversations	Receive beer for Gerry and buy an initial Iron ingot if necessary	Horadric／Krezvold	Reserve materials for starting your own iron production

The introductory instruction to extract flesh is separate from preparing later corpses for good burials. You do not need to remove the same part every time thereafter.

Solution 02

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Make the workshop self-sufficient

Clear small obstructions in the workyard outside your house and gather red and green points
Unlock Sawing and build a Sawhorse with 10 Wooden sticks. Put logs in the timber stockpile and make Flitch and Wood billets.
Unlock Firewood and build a Chopping spot with 5 Wood billets to produce firewood
Unlock Primitive Forging, then build a Wooden anvil first using 2 Wood billets and 2 Simple iron parts
Turn 1 Iron ingot, bought or obtained elsewhere, into 4 Simple iron parts. Together with the parts you reserved, secure the 4 needed for the Furnace.
Build the Furnace with 4 Flitch, 14 pieces of stone and 4 Simple iron parts, then add fuel and iron ore separately to smelt iron
Add a carpenter's workbench and stone cutter to make planks and grave decorations. Detailed recipes are in the crafting guide's closed tables.

Using all your furnace parts on other workstations may force you to buy more. Check the starting parts and your inventory; do not allocate the same pieces twice.

Solution 03

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Reach graveyard rating 5 and open the church

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Reach graveyard rating 5 and open the church: 5 entries
Milestone	Prerequisite	Materials / action	Character / schedule	Next check
The graveyard rating is negative	Equip your tools	Clear shrubs and rubbish, then check each grave's rating and damaged decorations	Work at any time	The overall graveyard display increases
You have starting repair materials	Distinguish wood from stone	Check how much the selected decoration will recover before using a kit. You do not have to repair everything.	The grave interaction screen	Did the grave's value change?
You lack repair materials	Carpentry and stoneworking stations, plus grave-decoration technologies	Make new wooden crosses, fences or basic gravestones and replace damaged pieces	Workyard → graveyard	Also check the corpse's white-skull limit
You reached rating 5 or higher	Check the overall graveyard display	Report to the Bishop	Bishop / Pride, the sun day	The church opens, allowing you to proceed to prayers and research
You cannot make the required item	For example, clay gathering is not yet available	Instead of insisting on crafting stone repair kits, return to wooden decorations or basic gravestones	Workyard / technology tree	Break out of a material dependency loop before opening the church

Flower beds are another way to improve the graveyard, but the numerical tables here focus on grave repairs and replacements. Starting damage and buried corpses affect how many you need, so this guide does not promise a fixed number of placements to reach 5.

Solution 04

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Check corpse quality before burial

This describes handling fictional corpses in the game. Separate improving a burial's rating from gathering materials.

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Check corpse quality before burial: 5 entries
What to inspect	Meaning	An action to try early on	Failure / recovery
White skulls	They affect the maximum positive rating the grave can achieve	Confirm that decorations alone cannot exceed that limit	Check the corpse before making a stronger gravestone
Red skulls	They reduce the grave's rating	If blood and fat extraction are unlocked, compare the values before and after each procedure	Reread the values if a surgical mistake occurs
Blood / fat	A normal extraction removes 1 red skull and adds 1 white skull	After taking both, check the remaining skull colors and counts	Even with no red skulls, use the result screen, including any mistakes, as your reference
You want skin or organs as materials	Some extractions conflict with improving burial quality	Do not perform extra procedures indiscriminately on a good corpse intended for burial	Skin adds red and removes white. Do not assume fixed effects for important organs.
Time / decay	The corpse deteriorates before burial	Decide how to process it after arrival and reduce time left unattended	Do not assume an early table prevents decay forever

If you do not want to add a poor-quality corpse to the graveyard, cremation is an option once unlocked. Check the crafting guide for cremation-site materials and per-use consumption. This is not a procedure guaranteed to make every corpse the highest quality.

Solution 05

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Connect the first church sermon to research

Check the Casual prayer received from the Bishop and deliver a sermon at the church pulpit. Use sermon opportunities on Pride thereafter.
Collect the Faith and retrieve donations from the designated collection point. Check graveyard rating and church quality separately.
Go down to the Alchemy Lab beneath the church and find the existing Study table. You do not need to dismantle and rebuild a table to begin early research.
Bring Clean paper and decompose it at the Study table to store Science. One sheet provides 2 Science.
Select an unstudied item such as Fat or Flesh. Compare the display showing 1 Faith, 1 Science and 20 blue points, then study it. Costs and reward colors differ between items.
Collect the blue points and return to the technology tree. Bringing another copy of an already studied item does not repeatedly award its first-study reward.

Faith rewards are not necessarily the same after every sermon, including after the first. For a normal Casual prayer, use church quality 10 as the success benchmark and check the prayer's requirement display.

Solution 06

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Recover when you have no paper or blue points

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Recover when you have no paper or blue points: 5 entries
What has stalled	Unmet requirement	Workstation / character to revisit	Action
Science is 0	You have not decomposed paper	Study table	Select Clean paper, decompose it and check the amount remaining at the table
You cannot make paper	You lack Paper Crafting or the Church workbench materials	Technology tree / metal Anvil	If building the workstation, process materials up to Complex iron parts. If urgent, check the Astrologer's paper stock.
You are not receiving blue points	The chosen item rewards a different color	The study item's description	Choose an unstudied item that awards blue points and prepare Faith and Science
You have no Faith	You spent it elsewhere after the sermon	Church / Pride	Prepare the workyard and church quality until the next sermon
You dismantled the table	Reconstruction materials are required	Research technology / church-cellar blueprint desk	Published new-build materials are 6 Wooden planks, 4 Simple iron parts and 3 Conical flasks. Return to processing technologies if you lack them.

Rebuilding the Study table is not the normal first-research route. Before detouring into advanced glass production, check the existing table in the cellar.

Solution 07

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Early response when the Donkey stops delivering

After the church opens, read the Donkey's request event through to the end. Check morgue capacity and the requested items.
Obtain 1 bottle of Seed oil from Dig, on the route from the village to the lighthouse. Keep the bottle for the Donkey; do not use it in your inventory to convert it into Oil.
Give the requested Seed oil in its bottle and prepare the carrot box outside the morgue
Add carrots in batches of 10. Normally, each corpse consumes 5, so adding 10 does not mean one delivery's worth.
Continue checking carrots and corpse capacity. Also distinguish the normal rule that deliveries do not arrive on Pride.

To start growing carrots, inspect the garden blueprint desk and then talk to Horadric to gain use of the garden. This guide does not prescribe a fixed day for the first delivery.

Solution 08

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When you lose track of early NPC dependencies

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When you lose track of early NPC dependencies: 5 entries
Objective	Required first	Day / location	Next confirmation
Gerry's relevant dialogue	Advance the tavern and blacksmith introduction and give him beer	Morgue	Topics such as the Astrologer become available
The first transaction with the Astrologer	Advance Gerry's dialogue and prepare the requested skull	Sloth / lighthouse	Advance the request and check sales of paper and other items
Preparations for Snake's door	Underground passage, Faith and the relevant dialogue stage	Church cellar; normally use Envy as your reference	Reach the stage where you receive Instructions for key
Study the key	Keeper’s key＋Instructions for key	Study table	Use an additional 2 Faith and 2 Science to make the Active key
The Bishop's next stage	Complete the initial church unlock	Pride / outside the church	Check dialogue for new technologies and requests, including clay

This covers early dependencies. It is not a completed walkthrough of every NPC's final reward, all DLC events or the late-game ending.

Frequently asked questions

Have I failed if I miss the target in the first week?

You do not have to finish these early requests in the first week. Prepare materials, workstations and tools until the visitor's next day comes around.

Are the church and graveyard numbers the same?

No. Check the requirement of the request you report and the church-quality requirement of the prayer separately. Specific stages are in the closed solution sections.

Do I need to rebuild the table for research?

Using it for the first time normally differs from rebuilding it after dismantling. Determine whether you have not found it or actually dismantled it, then check solution 06.

I cannot give an NPC the requested item

Check the recipient, current request stage, item name, quantity and quality. An earlier conversation with another character may be needed; compare the dependencies in solution 08.

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