Earned my "Get out of here, Stalker!" Thread - MISERY mod for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

I finished Misery at last. It's been a gruelling month of struggle and self-improvement, but as the credits rolled, a sense of elation came over me that I have only felt a few times in my life (the only game to provide such a feeling was Angband, where my character of 1.5 years died on level 99/100 to the penultimate boss, Sauron. - on this topic, anyone want to try a hardcore version of Misery? I.e., when you die, you need to start again).

I'll admit I'm not very good at FPSs. I'm a bit older than most gamers, and I've kept to strategy games, mostly. I somehow managed to finish COP vanilla on master difficulty, and I saw the potential for this game, so I told myself to suck it up and install Misery. I regretted it almost instantly. I didn't take the Black Road, and played Sniper - I thought this would make it more manageable... It took me about 2h to get to Skadovsk. If I went left, boars mauled me, if I went right, a pack of dogs ate me up. In the middle of the swamp, a few fleshes made merry on their medley of murder. Finally, covered in cold sweat and fearing every sound, I crawled towards the Skadovsk, only to see the tell-tale signs of an oncoming emission. Throwing caution to the wind, I sprinted to the ship (I never actually learned what the "x" key did, so I finished the entire game casually jogging everywhere). I reached the door only to see some poor loner get blown to bits. But I was safe. Safe at last. Then I visited Beard and saw his prices, and my heart sank a second time...

The first days of Misery were spent in the crow's nest atop the barge, sniping at bandits or just scoping out the zone, trying to figure out patterns and timings. The bandit camp under the bridge provided a much needed source of income, only to necessitate the crawl back to the traders (this seemed a horrible ordeal at the time). Now that I look back, I realize that this is what made it possible to finish the game all those hours later. What I learned about how this new and vicious zone worked helped me many a time later. Also, for the first time in my life, I became somewhat proficient at shooting in an FPS. I knew that I had to get headshots pretty much every time, or you just die in seconds. So I practised and practised, piling up bandit corpses.

Many people on these forums boast having a great deal of money. I never felt that. Artifacts seemed a drain on resources before a SEVA, rather than a source of income. Looting corpses was ok, but too much work and time for the effort. I only made money on selling drugs to doctors, but that came late in the game. So I tightened my belt and jumped on the game completion train. I only made three significant purchases all game, I got the C3 from Nimble, the Green Dragon from the doctor at Yanov and a SEVA suit from the Hawaiian. Once I had the dragon, I could finally retire my beloved Mosin Nagant. I never used another gun all game, knowing that practice trumps power and fire rate. I never even had the Gauss rifle repaired... I hope Cardan is happy with his new toy. I also disliked assault weapons, so I never even got to try the grenade launcher I keep hearing so much about.

Not everything was miserable though, there were brilliant and memorable moments as well. For example, when I attempted the Jupiter Factory for the first time, I had just finished off the burers, zombies and bloodsuckers, getting ready to figure out what to do about the four poltergeists, when I heard the dreaded sound of an emission warning. The only safe spot that I could think of was inside the factory, in between the brain-scorching poltergeists! Taking a deep breath, I started a sprint towards the door (still casually jogging of course), ready to take aim at anything that moves. The first poltergeists peeked out from behind the door frame, and without a second's thought, I brought my dragon to bear on it, and fired on instinct. Beautiful flames lit the dark room, and my brain slowly registered that I probably got it. Finding new strength, I continued towards the door. And another poltergeist appeared. The blasted ringing became unbearable, but I quickly took aim, and once again saw the pretty light show. The other two poltergeists were in the back of the room, and were easy pray to my bolstered self-confidence. I swaggered to the entrance to the tunnels, and took a deep breath. "I might just be able to do it", I told myself.

The raised difficulty also created some weird situations. I prepared extensively for the night hunt, taking the Oasis route and ending up in relative safety on top of that broken construction that houses the Oasis. Come night, I realized that nightvision doesn't help much if you have no other source of light. Also, my UDP was quickly getting depleted. (The UDP is the most nefarious game mechanic in the entire mod, so many situations go to hell because of it.) With the droning of the psydog underneath me, I waited for the beast to arrive, only to see it walk in on a pack of dogs. The scariest monster of them all is quickly torn to little bits and I get the credit for the kill. This only reinforced my early game conclusion that there's nothing scarier than a pack of dogs. Unless there's a large rock around.

Speaking about rocks, your choices matter much more than I could have imagined. And I made plenty of terrible choices. For example, after cleaning out the iron forest for the first time, I was predictably bloody, tired, overburdened and low on ammo. Possessed by what I can only imagine is an evil spirit of some mischievous deity, I started heading home via the Krug Antenna Complex - only to be set on by no fewer than four bloodsuckers. I made a mad dash for the nearest boulder, firing my Toz like a madman, missing every shot. When I came to my senses, my ammo consisted of 8 shotgun shots, about 5 bullets for my dragon and four grenades. Doing the hop skip and blast dance for about half an hour, I had killed three bloodsuckers and depleted all my bullets. All I had were the grenades. Apparently, throwing weapons with a fuse aren't all that effective against what I assume is one of the fastest enemies in the game. So when the final grenade caught the bloodsucker, I let off a loud cheer. Only to immediately realize that I still had to get back to base without any ammo. Crawling on all fours, for the second time, a pack of dogs came to my aid as they mauled three stalkers near Izumrudnoye, replenishing my shotgun shots.

Many hours later, I found myself leading the charge against the final defence of monolith forces, and I had developed from a rookie into a formidable sniper. It doesn't matter how powerful their exos are when nearly bullet hits them straight in the head, with only the time to chamber a new bullet to pause the slaughter. In the end, I found out that everyone but myself had perished during the final battle. I didn't reload. It felt like a fitting end. There was a new gunslinger in town.

Sounds like a true Misery experience, starting out as a rookie with little going for him, to a walking (and sometimes casually jogging) death machine. I enjoyed reading this

Will you give the mod another go? I'm waiting for 2.2 before I start a new game.

My play style is a little different, I tend to loot absolutely everything back to base. I actively seek out mercs and bandits just for the loots. I also stick around after finishing the game, just to keep on looting By the end of it my stash has for stuff than the merchants and I'm all kinds of rich!

Congratulations!

I'm gonna join you soon Wait for me at the helicopter...

hehe nice post. The most dangerous thing I have ever lived was when I was outside the jupiter plant where the two bridges/acid anomaly were. I was starting to head back to base when I noticed a chimera coming at me. I dropped my backback and ran under the bridge where there were some pillars to provide some protection for the chimera fight. Before I had done much damage a pack of dogs started charging me. I turned around to get some extra distance as I reloaded my shotgun and saw a pack of pseudodogs coming at me along with another chimera. I was on my A game that night because somehow I managed to kill all the dogs while dodging two chimeras with just a couple pillars for protection. I then managed to kill one of the chimeras but by then I only had a few rounds left, not enough to kill the last chimera. I decided to run to where the truck is where the bandits usually hang out to try to find some ammo....I played cat and mouse with the chimera for a while searching the area but didn't get anything useful. I then got into the truck and started throwing the grenades I had out of it trying to blow up the last chimera but in the end I had nothing left to fight it with. I took a sniff of cocaine and then waited for a good moment to run my ass off all the way back to base. I made it too. My adrenaline levels were so high after that it was crazy.

2.2 will be out soon(I hope). I plan on challenging myself by not being able to use merchants or repair my gear at mechanics. I really enjoy the live off the land style so it should be very fun for me.

"

Strelok was dead, Sokolov was dead. Kovalsky was dead. Damn... Everyone died during the evacuation. It was just me. I saw both of the choppers starting engines. "We can't hold on any longer, Major! Get your ass to the helis! It's now or never!" As I was running at my full speed, a Monolith scum shot me in the leg. I could barely move. Judging by the sound, it was an SVD. I injected a Morphin but it wasn't enough, as I took another shot to my right, already broken, set of ribs. I couldn't move. I couldn't feel the pain. I detached my belt and throw it away with all of my remaining force. I took another shot in the shoulder. I hit the ground. A fellow soldier came to save me. "You go on... And take the Gauss with you." I said. "Thank you for your services, Major." He showed respect and left. I saw the choppers leaving. A Monolith came closer, with his pistol in his hand. He came close to me. I took a long look into his eyes as he pulled the trigger...

That's how my story ends...

"

This is how I finished Misery first time ever (Just now). I won't forget this...

Time for the second playthrough

Edit:

After reloading the last save (Before the last mission), I managed to get everyone out (Except Sokolov who died in the cutscene)

Edited by: ElCaz4dor

Son, no run key or not, not-so-good-FPS'er or not.

You are one hardcore son-of-a-gamer.