Please remove the rifle from Stalker

Some may think I'm nuts but please let me explain: in it's current state a typicall Stalker run for me looks like this:

- clear everything in ML

- search the bunker and kill fluffy

- clear everything in CH

- craft all cloths along the way

- shoot a deer/wolf and go sleep for a week on jackrabbit Island

- shoot a deer/wolf and go sleep for a week

- shoot.... you see what I mean?

I usually end up around day 50 in this cycle on the island and I ran out of ammo at day 125 in my actual run. And guess what, now the real fun begins :twisted: Now I have to become creative to get my meal, I can no longer just wait for a deer, chase it into a wolf, shoot the wolf and scare the others around away by the "peng" of the gun. I have to pass on an opportunity when too many wolves are nearby, which means rabbit is back on the table, or left overs from wolves (which you have to find first) or go fishing in wolf invested territory.

To me, this feels like Stalker should be from the beginning, a true challenge. The rifle takes it away for at least the first 100 days, you could probably stretch it to 2-300 days if you strictly only shoot deer/wolf combos. Maybe reduce the amount of wolves in exchange or maybe don't.

Basically there are two motivations to play stalker: to get high into the leaderboard or for the challenge. I used to play it for the former, for which the rifle is perfect. But now I want the latter and I believe that the devs too want to present us a real challenge in Stalker - remove the rifle and it's a done deal

Thought about no rifle in stalker already, too. Basically I agree in terms of there's still to much gunplay in stalker mode.

But I think it's good as a device to save your butt one more last time.

So my suggestion is to have one rifle in one game, on both maps. And of course less ammunition.

Definitely less ammunition. interspersed with duds. That'll keep you on your toes.

interspersed with duds

can feel the adrenalin building up already

You see, the rifle will be out of order for everyone after a while anyhow, so no need to make it unavailable in stalker mode. Just, maybe, only reduce ammunition :twisted:

Definitely less ammunition. interspersed with duds. That'll keep you on your toes.

agreed 100%! duds would be so rad.

At least with the Voyageur difficulty, I've actually found the rifle to be less useful than the knife, esp in the end game. If you focus on double kills, the rifle is at best unreliable. Often as not the wolf will scurry off and you have to go over ridges and through woods to find him many times. With the knife you can to some extent control the amount of damage he takes and I've found I can get him hurt bad enough to die close by. This is a major issue esp. when the blizzards come.

Plus the rifle is heavy, as they are in real life, and it's a lot easier to tote mass quantities of wolf and deer if you don't have to haul the Enfield around. And of course the knife has multiple other uses.

Ultimately I would have traded the rifle and ammo for an equal amount of first aid gear.

you could always let the wolf kill the deer, shoot the wolf, drop the rifle, fill your boots with venison and wolf meat, trek back home, come back later to pick up rifle.

I can agree with this increasing the challenge, but being realistic is also a benefit.

Honestly, if you want the challenge, you can do that yourselves by avoiding the rifle/ammo entirely.

In a real world scenario, running into this much ammo is quite common in remote areas(in fact they are likely limiting it in game more than it should be).

I can agree with this increasing the challenge, but being realistic is also a benefit.

Honestly, if you want the challenge, you can do that yourselves by avoiding the rifle/ammo entirely.

In a real world scenario, running into this much ammo is quite common in remote areas(in fact they are likely limiting it in game more than it should be).

Thank you. While I agree that there is a decent amount of ammo to be found in stalker (I think I accumulated about 45 bullets as I begin to settle into the long game, after having used some to clear out paths/roads) what the poster above said is absolutely true. Is it realistic to find a rifle in a house, but no ammo? I don't think so. I don't know very many gun owners who have no ammo. My room mate has two guns here in our house, a rifle and a pistol, and there are at least 50 rounds of ammunition in his closet as well.

I would certainly imagine that in a wilderness setting, gun owners would be carrying some ammunition as well.

perhaps it would be interesting to find disassembled rifles that require a certain crafting level before you can put it together. this would curtail the immediate availability of the rifle, and make it more difficult to become the hunter instead of the hunted.