most difficult mod i have ever seen Thread - S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Anomaly mod for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

I can't even make first quest, kill boars in cordon. My weapon deal no damage, can't kill even one boar when i shoot it to the head and soon i run out of ammo. 16 rounds to basic pistol cost 700 and i start with only 1k. And also there are already 4 zombies attacking. It is not even possible to start. So imbalanced and difficult, while i chose difficulty stalker. Also this will be grinding fest. All so expensive and also basic quests are so far away and you proably won't get much money and barely cover used ammo and meds... While i have no problem with normal stalker game on master difficulty.

Edited by: empleat

I thought that at first too but actually when you get going you'll find missions pay good money and you can use buddies to deal/tank dmg. What Anomaly does force you to do though is take more care in both fire fights and hazards you can't Rambo around like vanilla. That's no bad thing though....

Start with the rusty toz-34 and you will be good for the rest of the game lmao dead serious. Mod is actually too easy with almost nothing going on in every sector.

empleat wrote:

So imbalanced and difficult, while i chose difficulty stalker. Also this will be grinding fest. All so expensive and also basic quests are so far away and you proably won't get much money and barely cover used ammo and meds... While i have no problem with normal stalker game on master difficulty.

Seems someone never tried Misery.

Start with some decent weapon, don't take quests which require serious gunfigth until you get better protection, get yourself a mask and geiger counter.

Quests are providing great amount of money, so after few you will be able to buy what you need, however most of useable items can be scavenged from bodies , especially if you play as agressive faction.

Quests are providing great amount of money, so after few you will be able to buy what you need

Uhh, you have to finish a quest to have money to finish the quest? Makes no sense and doesn't answer their concern.

Base game costs are definitely 100% not balanced at all. It doesn't make any sense to have bullets be outrageously expensive AND have people constantly shooting you on sight with automatic weapons - each group would be shooting away their life savings every 10 seconds. Either the bullets should be cheaper OR enemies should be more careful with their bullets (just like you). Yes, I tried Misery as well, and it has a similarly broken economy.

I'm having a MAJOR issue with enemies being bullet sponges. I took the Toz 34 to start and it might take 4-8 rounds to kill a single person, meanwhile if you're lucky you've only been hit once or twice but now your health is <25% and you're bleeding out. Then you get to spend thousands of rubles on extremely precious healing items. Repeat this every area you enter and it costs you 10,000-30,000 rubles in ammo, armor and weapon repair costs, food, and medical supplies for a single quest. How are you supposed to get ahead like that?

Needless to say I am spending considerable effort to make the game more balanced and less pointlessly punishing. When I have to pay 14,000 for a repair kit that will repair my 4,000 price armor at best 50%... something is seriously wrong.

Edited by: Jivixfromwc3

really? Don't feels much differences than other mods / original tbh.

the trusty double barrel shotgun is ALWAYS a good start.

also, running is an option. If you pit against a situation you can't win, just goat-damn RUN!

if you're playing Stalker like you're playing FarCry then you got a problem...

Ah, I guess this was also a problem with the original game. For some reason, they tied the accuracy of the gun AND the "hit chance" of the gun to the difficulty, so on the lowest difficulty you might have to shoot a person, point blank, dozens of times as only 10-20% of the bullets that hit him would do any damage. The upside is that enemies would be subject to the same. When playing the original I was always sure to bump the accuracy of enemies back up to a reasonable number and make the hit chance value 100%.

Another problem is enemies seem to be way more bullet resistant than the actor. I'll sneak up on a duty soldier alone, stick my Toz right in the back of his head, and try to blow his head away, but alas it doesn't one shot them most times. The knife literally does more damage. This happens with monsters too, especially snorks and dogs, they seem to take multiple shots to kill, usually you don't get that much time though unless you exploit the AI.

Edited by: Jivixfromwc3

You just lack experience. 12 guage buckshot can 1 shot just about every npc in the game and .45 hydroshock can 1 tap bloodscukers so stop missing lol

The start is drammatic for most players since the basic aproaach dont work out.

double barrel doen't help at all ...just 2 shot long reload and to many target at a time ….plus no way to run or dodge mutants.

One is forced to get easyer tasks that one think are more difficult instead , like go kill a pack of badits in theyr base.

dogs and cats reach you in no time , if one is without exoscheleton must first get into a high safe sot and just after start shoot… not a good way of progression imo.

I really apreciate the effort to make a new good playable verin of staler to be clear on that , i just want to point what i find not working imo at the moment to make it better where is a chance.

Best regards.

Edited by: MFDSuraj

Yeah the Toz 34 is a genuinely terrible shotgun. For some reason even a 25% condition pump shotgun feels like it is much more likely to insta-kill.

I found out if you just start out with an AK you do way more damage per second, and can easily take out most monsters ranging from 1-2 for the small guys to 3-4 for the larger ones. Why even bother with the crappy double barrel?

So i have played this game for years now and i start my games with 0 lives and Ironman mode (harsh af i know) It makes it more fun for me knowing that when ur dead its over u take more care in what ur doing u have to think out ur path. However i am unable to play this game this way anymore because of the extremely random and sometimes unfair deaths you have. For example i survived 15 days as Loner and he had everything u could imagine a full set of Rhino Duty Armor 4 slots for artifacs which he was using at the time. Insane weapons and all of it was fully upgraded to the max i was loaded so much money and then... i went to streloks hideout and met a controller there and it took me to 1% health but i managed to quickly hide heal and kill it. Then after this shocking adventure i tried to get out of the tunnels and stepped into some green goo and i died instantly.... i literally stuck my small toe into it and he just fell over dead and it was over. This is not the first time this kind of thing has happened and its annoying as hell. I enjoy the hard part of this mod its what makes this mod so great. But at the same time there are things that are just... unreal and unfair. I really wanted to play this game with just the one life. Also i was playing on EASY mode which when your doing 0 lives is respectable imo you have no idea how many times i have died to bullshit like a snork or a cat.. everything in this game is very hard but there comes a point when u can handle 90% of it including Humans, Mutants and even Radiation and things. But something ALWAYS gets you and it kinda breaks the game a little bit. I will try again but without Ironman mode i don't like the idea of Ironman mode with lives... it makes no sense to me atleast. I hope this can be tweaked in the future to make it a littttttttle bit less hard. Thanks

As digitalifeless said

if you're playing Stalker like you're playing FarCry then you got a problem...

Anomaly is a type of game, that punishes hurrying and ignorance, and rewards patience and knowledge. Besides, the beginning is the hardest part of the game, when you are fragile like a little child.

Fortunately it allows for great customization of the difficulty - in the settings. So if you struggle, help yourself. You can literally make enemies take more damage from your bullets and make them deal less damage to you. But I wouldn't advise it, just get used to higher difficulty. Like in real life, don't take a fight against a Pseudogiant or a Military squad with a pistol.

My advices are:

• Don't trade with Sidorovich - he is a SCAMMER. Sell your items to Loris - he is in the farmstead, north of the bridge. To get there, stick to the west side of the area and go through the tunnel.
  
  
• Collect enough money and get yourself MP-153 shotgun from the Butcher in Garbage, in the Depot - it's the best non-automatic shotgun in the game in my opinion. Get to the Garbage through western hidden path, not the Cordon's northern Military outpost. Safer that way.
  
  
• Boars have thick skulls, they go down faster when shot in the back or sides. Get yourself two missions - the tutorial mission from Fanatic and the one from Wolf during which you get accompanying stalkers. You can explore the area with them, they WILL HELP you. Get rid of them when you will be strong enough.
  
  
• DON'T mess with the Military at the beginning - don't get close to the southern and northern checkpoint. Don't even let your companions get close - in the case, set them to Passive mode, and move away.
  
  
• Good armor is very useful and necessary later in the game. But even the best armor won't protect you better against bullets than a 30 centimeters of concrete or 5 centimeters of metal. When in a fight, ALWAYS stand behind a cover. Trees are good too, usually.
  
  
• Best defense against MOST mutants is taking a high ground. Literally, when you see more than 1 dog - jump on a nearby car, container, big rock or something else. Eliminate them from there, while taking 0 damage yourself.

That's it. Basically, it all comes down to knowing what you can and cannot do at the moment. Early you feel weak, because you are. But later you will be strong enough, that you will be able to fight Chimeras and Burers, both at the same time. GL!

Edited by: pierce.oneal

While this may be late, but this may come handy for more ppl.
"The game treats ignorance with punishment" (not trying to insult ppl).

When you get into the zone as a loner think of yourself like a inmigrant trying to survive, and get rich, like all the other stalkers on the zone, on harder dificulties you get only basic items, simple handgun or shotgun that you prob looted on your way into the zone. (You come here as a poor common stalker) some common tips are:

• As a newbie never wander around solo without a companion, there are lots of experienced stalkers out there, like the military ppl that are usually dangerous like irl they have better equipment weapons and are experienced at killing trespassers.
• Mutants here are may be the least worrying treat since most of them since they can be killed without you being damaged, you can even lure them out of their nests into other stalkers.
• If you arent sure about being capable to survive in the zone with your pistol you can follow a squad that goes out to explore and wait for them to find monsters or bandits, if you are lucky you can loot the dead enemies or mutants for profit without spending a single bullet.
• And like most of the ppl here on anomaly or another stalker games be carefull with the anomalies, even pro stalkers get killed by them.
  
  

Some advanced tips are:

• Check the price of the items u are buying, bandages can be expensive but there are alternatives that may come handy on large battles.
  Its almost never good to buy rad free food, you can survive with packs of old meat (unless you already have the money or are prepping for long travels).
• Dismantilng weapons/armors is profitable only if you check the parts that the weapon or armor have, if all the parts are torn/deformed forget it. (Try to dismantle only weapons/armors that have at least 2 scratched/clean parts), also use the multitool only for the weapons never for armors or other stuff (if you want profit).
• Dont repair tools at the mechanic, always buy the sharpening stone set to repair tools.(I also suggest to buy only one multitool for the entire game).
• Dont repair grooming kits or swiss knifes always buy new ones from mechanics (garbage trader have the cheapest swiss knifes).
• Also dont let the grooming kits or swiss knifes break away, store them when they get less than 12% durability you can use them for crafting or quests.
• Slug ammo is much better if you want to kill an armored stalker with one headshot (helmet may protect better than you think) or if you are hunting a monster that is big enough and you dont need to worry about aiming. (Dart is overkill for me) (this tip is not good for sawn-off shotguns).
• Weight is a big factor on how you play this game, if you keep picking everything you find you will lose a good amount of time traveling with stamina issues, my recommendation is placing stashes near common fighing places if you dont wanna lose items (most of them wont be needed right away but maybe later). then when you find more companions you can go back to pick what you need from those stashes and place it on the companions inventory.

If you have a hard time trying to decide what you need to always pick.. i will make a list

1. Priority 1 is medicine (all of them)
2. Recipe notes
3. PDA's. Artifacts, Accesories (Camelback, Titanium Grid)
4. Maintenance Tools (swiss knifes, oils, repair kits)
5. Ammo (clean ammo)
6. Food items (Canned food, meat)
7. Faction Patches (this is because they are lightweight)

After that whatev you bring and slows you down isnt good, and should be stashed until you get a better backpack.
Some examples for bad items to carry are..

Charcoal, Hides, All helmets with 19% or less durability (except Cloth Mask), Field cooking kit, Powder can (never pick this, its useless right now), armours (dissasemble everything until you get enough money or clean parts to fully repair a suit), common weapons, Exoskeleton Frames (You cant repair them and unless they are clean they are bad for repairs, dismantle them), lots of old or bad ammo.

Edited by: DDLicio

Back to the topic, is it the most difficult mod?

I say yes, beause of 2 reasons:

1. As far as i know there is just 1 Invictusplayer who made it to the end (me), but a few i know who made a Ironman Miseryrun.

2. Even Invictus isnt the most difficult the mod can be, you can turn down the rewards by like 90% and the dmgreduction can be poor, Invictus is middle. At this piont i didnt even turn on the hardcore AI aim on and your weapons can break down after like 3 mags, while you also get no loot at all from a stash and every 6 hours you have a Emission or Psystorm wich spawns no artefacts. It becomes silly.

Edited by: SnorkHugger

Honestly, I've always played these games Vanilla and otherwise very slow. Moving cautiously through areas, scouting with my binoculars on who is up ahead, paying attention to the time as to not be trapped out far from home at night, taking quest that I can actually complete early on and etc... I always liked the survival elements of these games more than the "Shooter" aspect. The best advice I can give is caution is your best friend. Run from fights early on and scavenge from the leftovers of fights when possible. It is also a smart idea to learn where you can fight enemies such as mutants and stalkers. Stalkers are a little harder as they wander about the zone but mutants usually have one spot to which they linger. The spawn locations are similar to the base games so I just sort of know where are good places and where are the bad ones. But anyhow, I'm just rambling now the point is caution.

With a bit of know how you can tweak your experience and add some addons too, if you do the mod has so much more value than others because it has a lot of good features. I agree with some of the points, mutants and anomalies one shooting you is not fun or immersive.

I got a good start on gear in the very first moments of the game by luring some military into the rookie STALKER base and then hiding when there was a shoot out. I then looted all the corpses so I had a AK and a decent shotgun. They weren't in the best shape but they were good enough to allow me to take out boars, dogs, bandits, zombies, and the military guys up by the broken train tracks. I was always looting and storing stuff in stashes. I don't think I ever needed the starting pistol other than to irritate the military enough to attack the STALKER base.