STALKER Shadow of Chernobyl Mod Thread

Dog nose?

 

Sounds neat. Hopefully its not a buggy, unfinished PoS like ZoA.

 

What problem you got with ZoA? Cause I have it installed and it's good but not that pretty like previous version.

 

Guys, which mod would you recommend for a first time in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl?

I played through the vanilla version of the game last year and enjoyed it a lot, but there were several flaws and bugs and I'd like to find a mod that fix as many problems as possible while keeping that awesome atmosphere since my brother wants to start it.

Is Zone Reclamation Project the best one out there for a "vanilla++" experience?

EDIT: Also I'd like to know what's the most recommendable mod for Call of Pripyat since I want to play it this year.

 

ZRP is a bug fix. It should keep it vanilla

AMk is complete overhaul, and has a bunch of nice features. Pain the ass to run

Autumn Aurora is pretty nice. It's something of a cross between AMK and vanilla. My only problem with it is that it implements Blowouts and DNS, but it does so half-assedly.

Zone of Alienation is an unstable mess. Avoid

LURK 1.1 is promising, but it still has the ridiculous spawn rates in Agroprom and Garbage, and there's no hunger. It felt more like a generic FPS than stalker. It does change how guns work, which is nice.

Complete makes the game easier. More weight cap, more accurate guns, etc.
Not bad for a first time mod though.

 

I'm trying out both Autumn Aurora and Zone of Alienation concurrently.

Autumn Aurora has very crisp graphics, perhaps the best of all the mods I've tried.
It is also very stable, I've not experienced any crashes thus far.

Gameplay mechanics has been given a light overhaul.
For example, artifact-hunting CoP style, stalker instant-messaging, and blowouts.

Weapons are slightly more varied than vanilla but weapon sounds a bit weak.

Difficulty-wise, I will say its not as challenging as ZoA (more on that later).
I will recommend this mod for players new to the Stalker series.


Now for ZoA, this is an ambitious mod that adds many new features using AMK as a base.
It's a pity that this mod still has some bugs, incomplete translation and unexplained CTDs.

Difficulty is through the roof, you will die in 1-2 hits, enemies have near-instantaneous reaction times and are very accurate.
AI seems to be better than vanilla game, I've seen enemies slowly creeping towards me in low-crouch position. I've never seen that before.

Assaulting the military base at Cordon is now a bad idea, there is an actual usable APC (!) which they will use against you.
If you wipe out the entire base, an attack helicopter will be activated and will seek you out.

Its magazine-reloading system adds more realism at the cost of micro-management.
There are now different magazines for different calibres.

Weapons are much more varied, even when starting out in Cordon.
Grenades are now very powerful, as it should be. It can effectively turn the tide in a battle.

Anomalies move from one location to another but its not as annoying as you think.
You can buy a anomaly detector that beeps when you are near one.
There are separate detectors for anomalies, artifacts and radiation.

Economy has been tweaked for the better, now almost every NPCs have worthwhile items to sell.
NPCs can also pick up nearby weapons and artifacts after a battle, Misery style.
Merchants pay much more for loaded magazines than weapons, while NPCs pay you more for both weapons and magazines.

Overall I will say ZoA is the Misery mod for SoC, in fact I think its much harder than Misery, but its a flawed gem.
This mod is for Stalker veterans who wants expert-level challenge and realism, at the cost of game stability.
If you can overlook the bugs, I will say its an extremely rewarding game if you role-play as a scavenging Stalker.

I will very much like to play further but cannot progress due to a game-breaking bug in Bar area (I can't load my saves in that location at all).
Can someone please help? Thanks.

 

Yes, ZRP is *THE* vanilla++.

 

My 3rd playthrough of Clear Sky ended on Garbage. Hybrid 2.1 was pretty cool and promising, but random bugs and crashes gave me hard, cold shower after hours of fun...
Seems like only Shoker Mod 1.9 and Sky Reclamation Project are valid for full playthroughts. And Faction Wars make a trio of only good mods for CS. What a pity.

And yes, Zone Restoration Project is for first time. Never go full retard with Complete.

If anyone want to try AMK - find AMK Sidorovich Edition. It's only verion that can be run without headaches.

I noticed that to unload bullets from magazine in ZoA you need to press RMB, then switch to other weapon immidietly when you hear bullet shot.

 

Guys ... I need help for my ZoA crashes.

I get this error message when loading my saves in Bar area :

Expression : fatal error
Function : CScriptEngine::lua_error
File : E:\stalker\sources\trunk\xr_3da\xrGame\script_engine.cpp
Line : 73
Description : <no expression>
Arguments : LUA error: ...ow of chernobyl\gamedata\scripts\bind_stalker.script:709: attempt to concatenate field '?' (a nil value)


Sometimes I get the below error also when loading my saves :

Function : CScriptEngine::lua_error
File : E:\stalker\sources\trunk\xr_3da\xrGame\script_engine.cpp
Line : 73
Description : <no expression>
Arguments : LUA error: ...ow of chernobyl\gamedata\scripts\bind_stalker.script:286: attempt to index global 'kirag_take_drop' (a nil value)



Any ideas how to resolve this?

 

playing through autumn aurora 2 and it looks fantastic, but man, I hate the tacked on bullshit like the minimap not displaying enemy locations/numbers which is fucking terrible when you will instantly die from any stray bullet. 99% of the time the enemy will spot you from 200 yards away through the foggy rain, which just makes it 100 times worse.

 

You must be unlucky with AI, cause I managed to sneak through enemy base (car park in Cordon) at night, which is impossible in all other mods, including those lying about fixed/reworked/tweaked/morea realistic AI.

To find enemies you need to check PDA with contacts.
Unless you run in open fields, which is death wish.

 

You can sneak through stuff even in vanilla.

It's just that it's pretty hard without delayed detection safety net and instant notification about being noticed.
There is also the infamous vanilla bug that reloading a save made while sneaking would alert the enemy to your presence even if you were undetected when saving (it's fixed by ZRP, IIRC).

 

yup sneaking in STALKER is a bitch, sadly even on master difficulty I found killing everyone to always be the easier option

nope this bug was definitely still around in my ZRP playthrough last year

 

AA2 has the beast sneaking out of all the mods I've tried. It's wonky, sure, but it does work during the night and during heavy fog days.

 

Misery 2 with Les Miserables also has nice stealth. Get a recon (bonus to stealth in dark) + night and you will see what I mean.

 

Well, you might be able to resolve this if you can open those script files and change the stuff that isn't working. You'd need knowledge in programming though.

Best to ask the devs on their MODDB page.

 

Those who dont like the intro cinematic from Misery 2 can have the original one back by editing this file..

gamedata\configs\ui\game_tutorials.xml

..and swappng everything under the tag <intro_game> with this:

Show Spoiler Hide Spoiler

<intro_game>
<global_wnd width="1024" height="768">
<pause_state>on</pause_state>
<sound>music\intro</sound>

<auto_static width="1024" height="768" stretch="1">
<texture>intro\intro_back</texture>
</auto_static>
<auto_static x="0" y="32" width="1024" height="576" stretch="1">
<texture x="1" y="1" width="638" height="358">intro\cop_intro_movie</texture>
</auto_static>
</global_wnd>

<global_wnd_16 width="1024" height="768">
<sound>music\intro</sound>
<auto_static width="1024" height="768" stretch="1">
<texture x="1" y="1" width="638" height="358">intro\cop_intro_movie</texture>
</auto_static>
</global_wnd_16>

<item>
<length_sec>6</length_sec>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd/>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>20.5</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_1</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="20.5" x="500" y="890" width="890" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_1" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_1</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>10</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_2</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="10" x="500" y="920" width="920" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_2" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_2</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>8.4</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_3</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="8.4" x="500" y="920" width="920" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_3" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_3</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>15.5</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_4</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="15.5" x="500" y="910" width="910" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_4" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_4</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>20.9</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_5</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="20.9" x="500" y="890" width="890" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_5" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_5</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>14.3</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_6</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="14.3" x="500" y="910" width="910" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_6" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_6</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>17.8</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_7</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="17.8" x="500" y="890" width="890" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_7" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_7</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>14.3</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_8</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="14.3" x="500" y="910" width="910" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_8" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_8</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>21.7</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_9</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="21.7" x="500" y="890" width="890" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_9" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_9</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>24.1</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_10</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="24.1" x="500" y="870" width="870" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_10" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_10</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>7.8</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_11</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="7.8" x="500" y="920" width="920" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_11" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_11</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>

<item>
<length_sec>11.7</length_sec>
<sound>characters_voice\scenario\zaton\zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_12</sound>
<function_on_stop>xr_effects.zat_a1_tutorial_end_give</function_on_stop>
<grab_input>on</grab_input>
<main_wnd>
<auto_static start_time="0" length_sec="11" x="500" y="920" width="920" height="500" alignment="c" stretch="1"
light_anim="zat_a1_phrase_12" la_cyclic="0" la_texture="1" la_alpha="1">
<text align="c" font="graffiti22" color="tut_gray">zat_a1_cutscene_phrase_12</text>
</auto_static>
</main_wnd>
</item>
</intro_game>

 

SoC - How to Safely Quit to Desktop During Lock-Ups

For SoC, those who keep experiencing hard lock-ups and not being able to alt-tab back into desktop.
Add this prefix onto your SoC executable : "-silent_error_mode"

So for example, your shortcut target will show : "C:\Shadow of Chernobyl\bin\XR_3DA.exe" -nointro -silent_error_mode

This will allow the stalker program to safely close and quit you back into the main desktop screen, when it detects errors.
Not sure if it works for CS and CoP, feel free to try and report back.


SoC - Editing "Crouch" and "Low Crouch" to More Realistic Values
(Source)

Ever thought that your "crouch" and "low crouch" in SoC is not low enough?

Well then go to gamedata/config/creatures/actor.ltx
Search for line : "ph_box0_center"
Edit the following lines to these values :
ph_box0_center = 0.0, 0.9, 0.0
ph_box0_size = 0.35, 0.9, 0.35
ph_box1_center = 0.0, 0.65, 0.0
ph_box1_size = 0.35, 0.65, 0.35
ph_box2_center = 0.0, 0.2, 0.0
ph_box2_size = 0.35, 0.2, 0.35

With the above changes, your default "crouch" is now "low crouch", and your default "low crouch" is now "prone", perfect for sniping.
I've tested it on SoC / ZoA and it works great.

 

After clearing the brain scorcher (and another fucking lab filled with Burers -.- ) I'm now in Pripyat and get constantly ambushed by always the same Monolith guys. It gets a bit tiresome and I'm not really in the mood anymore to keep on playing. :< Too much linear shooting galleries.

 

Damn, you must be tough to get pass Radar, I gave up here and just teleported my ass to wish granter.

 

G36 and a scope on it make the encounters pretty easy - if it goes to CQB I'll take the AS VAL. I wish I would have found some SVD though, so many weapons I apparently missed :<

 

Thinking of doing a SGM playthrough for the first time.

Should I start with v2.1 or v2.2?
Whats the difference between these 2 versions, other than more maps for 2.2?

My priority is mod stability.

 

SGM is pretty stable mod so no worries. Obviously 2.2 cause it's new and have some fixes and maybe few quests more in the old maps.

Can't wait for SGM 3.0.

 

I hear you. I played this last part just to get at the end, having little joy myself. And the fact the end is so lame only serves to discourage me from trying again.

Stalker really epitomizes that saying "what's important is the path, not the destiny" or something.

 

For SGM, how do I recharge the batteries for my Veles detector?
I have 10 batteries in my inventory but not sure how to use it ...