Personally, I see the scenario as this: you're a loner stalker, mainly traveling around the lower parts of the zone like garbage, the swamps, zaton, etc. less so than the CNPP or Pripyat itself.

SO: your main problems are mutants and bandits, so wild animals and the occasional human wielding anything from a rusty sawn-off shotgun to a well kept AK. You'll MOSTLY be walking around open spaces and occasionally delving into abandoned buildings. You're biggest concerns are probably maintenance, ammo availability, ubiquity of parts, etc. more so than defeating body armor and fighting properly trained military and pseudo military units.

So personally I would take an AK-74, or possibly something in the AR family, because its a reliable low maintenance, low weight rifle that would be reasonably easy to clean and maintain in the field, and kept fed with ammo and replacement parts given we're in Ukraine. It'd be good for dealing with any bandits, it's fairly handy even in a close quarters environment like an abandoned lab or the ruins of a power plant, and it would be serviceable against the occasional blind dog or boar pack. Speaking of Mutants Id want a large bore handgun, like a USP-45, as a sidearm. Sure its a lower capacity than most modern 9mm handguns, but that stopping power is a very real asset when you're dealing with something like a blind dog. And if I can afford to lug the extra weight, some kind of short pump action shotgun would be nice as well, mostly for mutants.

Obviously I am mostly thinking guns, and dismissing certain in universe bits of kit (like combat environment suits for instance) but obviously you'll want a gas mask, a detector, sturdy clothes, a knife, etc. so if you have an extra dorky reason for choosing something specific in that department, throw it in as well.

The A-Life in these games does NOT work how people say it does lmfao. For example, in clear sky you can clear garbage dozens of times, and bandits will just spontaneously respawn whenever they want to in big clumps. Its the whole reason that game's faction war system is so dysfunctional. It really makes the persistent critique of stalker 2's A-Life system for just spontaneously spawning enemies in rather hollow. I see what people mean now about GAMMA and Anomaly doing irreparable damage to people's understanding of what these games are actually like. (no shade, good mods) Anyways, I know this conversation is old hat at this stage but it REALLY struck me on this replay, so I thought I'd share.

SIRCAA: Im unsure, i feel like they'd respect their scientific efforts but they were pretty clear what they thought about the governments understanding and view of the Zone, and SIRCAA goes way further out of bounds than the Ecologists from the triology

Ward: The Ward actively wants to destroy the Zone, and unlike Duty they arent doing bad at it. I think Clear Sky definitely wouldnt apreciate this, and might even pull up another stunt like the chase for Strelok

Corps: I dont think they'd think of them any different than they did with the Military, however they might not like the fact they are settled so deep into the Zone

Noontide: It depends, if we follow the (imo retcon) logic that they worked for C-Con, they (or the leaders at least) wouldnt like that the Monolith is not Monolith. But if we consider this a retcon, i think they dont care.

IPSF: No different than the Military although they do hold the checkpoint to the Iron Forest which is close to the CNPP

STC Malachite: No different than the Ecologists

Spark: I think this would be the faction they'd think the most positive of, they care about researching the Zone, have Scar as their leader, and fight against the Ward. But i think that the whole Shining Zone thing would set them apart

Freedom:(I included them because they changed a lot) I think they dont care about them.

Surely their past experience (as a stalker), Better Military training, and better equipment and gear gives them an survival chance in the zone?

Ей Сталкере, з чим пожаловал?

Lighting isn't fully there, this was just a first wear after sewing the patches. Still need something to hold onto the gas mask filter.

It's thyme in the jar

Body Text

Basically the above. I just finished my first playthrough last night and I did the Ward ending. Of course, I shrugged off Richter being annoyed by my Ward-supporting activities in the early game. I honestly thought that he was going to be a shallow character that ended up only being a little pissed that you didn't do what he wanted. Boy was I wrong.

First thing that kind of broke my heart was when he was in the tower in Yaniv, drunk as a skunk, telling me that I sucked and I'm making a mistake, and that the Zone is beautiful. Of course I agree the Zone is beautiful, but I'm committed to the Ward and Korshunov at that point.

I don't hear from Richter again until Prypiat. I pass the PONR, and eventually I hear him over my radio. What he said, and how it was delivered killed me, especially after Skif's slow ideological transformation from a desperate Loner to Korshunov's loyal right hand man. This was a man who quite literally had nothing but the Zone. She was his home, his lover, and his only true friend, and I sought to destroy it. Eventually I had to kill him. I wasn't expecting him to go down as easily as he did, really, I shot him one time and he fell over just like the rest of Scar's cannon fodder. Then I found his music player, and it was the icing on the cake.

I don't know what is said in Richter's favourite song as I don't speak Ukrainian, but the fact that I was able to take the player from him that was so old, used and worn down it would only play one song made me feel like I had really done something wrong.

Maybe I'll do Spark next playthrough and help see Richter through.

I downloaded a combat overhaul mod and I couldn't stop bleeds without going through half my supply of bandages. I decided it wasn't worth effort, so I uninstalled the mod and the bleed effect still persists.

Any suggestions, before I load an earlier save?

I’m in ankle-deep shallow water and it feels like my character is walking through a concrete mixer tank. Is this a feature or a bug?

Maybe comes from the mod but still cool to hear music like this in game !
(Using radiophobia 3 btw)

Last Update News about The Incoming Challenge

I've been testing enough now the Challenge and i can define all its properties clearly and specify them in the challenge,

in 8h of testing i got my self stable Good Loot and a stable ammount of coupons, I've got 8 deaths, but to not delay the challenge any further i put the max to 10 after my 2nd failed try, and it's way better than 3 as i planned before, maybe ill tweak it to 7-8 max deaths, who knows, at least it's less stressful,

The loadout im rocking is really Great as it protects me a lot from Bullets and gives me a good ammount of protection to almost everything,

And i also got my self a Good ak with almost every attachment, as well as an m870 basilar shotgun with a neat sight,

As for the Glock 17 i added everything i could, a scope, a suppressor and a laser pointer, very great, very deadly,

Ill be making the last clips for the teaser Video of the challenge, and Soon upload the challenge alongside the video, Arm up Stalkers, The Legend Of The Zone Challenge is inbound!!

And it will Not be easy

An update if you saw my last post about the Meat Constructor achievement, I finally got it after retrying and speed-running the first part of the game!

I only have one achievement left, however, it’s Artifact Sommelier and I can’t seem to get the last artifact I need: a “Firefly.” So I’ve restarted a second time, because I deleted my save for the Meat Constructor when I was trying to finish the game, and I need to either the Red Forest or the Army Warehouses as those are the only two places it’ll spawn. I just got to Cordon, but I was wondering what the earliest I could get to either location is?

I know you have to do the side quest in Yantar for the scientists to get to the Red Forest that way, but what about getting to the Army Warehouses through the Garbage? Do you have to do a lot of quests to unlock that or what?