S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Series Megathread: Maybe someday mods releasing edition - Games

[QUOTE=download;52255991]In CoC, can anyone else predict emissions? I can't tell if it's a headfuck or not but I could swear I can predict emissions five to ten minutes off. I'm not sure what trips me off but I wouldn't put it past the modders to have included subtle hints an emission isn't far off.[/QUOTE] I've always wondered if there was some kind of subtle audio cue or something for them. You can kind of tell when one's coming at least a few minutes before, not counting the obvious loud noise right at the start.

[QUOTE=Ghost101;52256470]I've always wondered if there was some kind of subtle audio cue or something for them. You can kind of tell when one's coming at least a few minutes before, not counting the obvious loud noise right at the start.[/QUOTE] Yeah I've always been able to feel them coming minutes before they actually start. I noticed almost everything becomes dead silent and the usual sounds of the landscape stop. Trees rustling and wind blowing just stops completely and it seems the skybox slightly changes.

I know there's a certain droning sound that happens a minute before a blowout happens. There'll be shorter versions of that drone that happen throughout the day, and when they happen I'll always pause for a second whatever I'm doing and wait like a meerkat or something.

I love the look of the models They look very alike to ninja's. Talking about it, is he still working on those models?

[QUOTE=download;52255991]In CoC, can anyone else predict emissions? I can't tell if it's a headfuck or not but I could swear I can predict emissions five to ten minutes off. I'm not sure what trips me off but I wouldn't put it past the modders to have included subtle hints an emission isn't far off.[/QUOTE] Most likely the weather - Most of the time, if the weather goes from 3m vision fog or downpouring rain to clear as far as the eye can see and the sky gets slightly cloudy grey, 2-4min later there will be an emission.

I've found that there's always a sound cue when an emission is going to happen. It reminds me of the distant dragon noise at the beginning of Skyrim. It makes me very nervous to go out into the swamps when I hear it.

I think emissions should be revamped. I've always had my own idea of announcing an emission is going to start. I don't have the time to type it out right now, but I'm sure a lot of you will agree when I say: "Emissions aren't threatening enough as they are right now". Be sure to expect a long post. Hope you guys will give it a thorough read, since I am going to implement this at one point into Radium. So feedback will be welcome.

[QUOTE=LoNer1;52257135]I think emissions should be revamped. I've always had my own idea of announcing an emission is going to start. I don't have the time to type it out right now, but I'm sure a lot of you will agree when I say: "Emissions aren't threatening enough as they are right now". Be sure to expect a long post. Hope you guys will give it a thorough read, since I am going to implement this at one point into Radium. So feedback will be welcome.[/QUOTE] I guess it comes down to what you want emissions to do from a gameplay perspective. They're already very atmospheric, but I've found all too often it just means sprinting for one of five of so nearby buildings (many of which don't feel like they should protect properly due to holes, windows, etc.), waiting for a few minutes, and then returning to previous activities. It can lead to some interesting battles when you end up fighting for shelter with NPCs, but in CoP (and CoC, depending on your faction), there are so few actual human enemies that it's rarely a threat. Personally, I'd like there to be more of a gradient of shelter quality and emission effects - just having a shelter/no shelter kill/live binary of options is a bit naff. But if the player has to choose between a closer shelter that will only protect from half the damage of the emission or a further one that protected entirely (bunkers, safe zones) there'd be a lot more of a requirement for the players to think about what to do.

It would be cool if you used a crap shelter and had to pop loads of psi tablet to survive.

So, in TFW, is there faction resource management and whatnot?

[QUOTE=SirJon;52257224]So, in TFW, is there faction resource management and whatnot?[/QUOTE] Not much - iirc each level has two resource points. Every two resource points held by squads from your faction gives squads better guns and armour (and lets you buy the same from traders).

[QUOTE=LoNer1;52257135]I think emissions should be revamped. I've always had my own idea of announcing an emission is going to start. I don't have the time to type it out right now, but I'm sure a lot of you will agree when I say: "Emissions aren't threatening enough as they are right now". Be sure to expect a long post. Hope you guys will give it a thorough read, since I am going to implement this at one point into Radium. So feedback will be welcome.[/QUOTE] Let me guess: Emissions probability forecast? :v: Today's weather: Light drizzle, thunder and a 40% chance for an emission.

[QUOTE=Sunday_Roast;52257586]Let me guess: Emissions probability forecast? :v: Today's weather: Light drizzle, thunder and a 40% chance for an emission.[/QUOTE] Well, emissions happen on a 24-hour basis so 40% chance is a severe underestimated prediction

[QUOTE=Etcetera;52257155]I guess it comes down to what you want emissions to do from a gameplay perspective. They're already very atmospheric, but I've found all too often it just means sprinting for one of five of so nearby buildings (many of which don't feel like they should protect properly due to holes, windows, etc.), waiting for a few minutes, and then returning to previous activities. It can lead to some interesting battles when you end up fighting for shelter with NPCs, but in CoP (and CoC, depending on your faction), there are so few actual human enemies that it's rarely a threat. Personally, I'd like there to be more of a gradient of shelter quality and emission effects - just having a shelter/no shelter kill/live binary of options is a bit naff. But if the player has to choose between a closer shelter that will only protect from half the damage of the emission or a further one that protected entirely (bunkers, safe zones) there'd be a lot more of a requirement for the players to think about what to do.[/QUOTE] Yeah, I always thought the maps needed a lot more shelter spots of varying quality. Half the time I'd run for something I thought would work, like a pipe or a shack, and it wouldn't even count as shelter at all. Quality levels would help mix things up, like maybe one type of material blocks more radiation while another protects you from the psy waves but you need to pop anti-rads to survive the radiation waves.

[QUOTE=Sunday_Roast;52257586]Let me guess: Emissions probability forecast? :v: Today's weather: Light drizzle, thunder and a 40% chance for an emission.[/QUOTE] Hah, I'd wish I was this simple. Purely talking CoP here: My main idea is actually not very complicated. I believe emissions are just an annoyance at this stage into the game. Not a lot of mods have a new take on emissions. Few are ofcourse the Atmosfear mods from Cromm, but they offer variations on the current emission in-game. Acidic rain / Psy storms are a nice addition to the game, but the mechanic is practically the same. It's unlike the canon emission, though. My ideas were the following: 1. Remove all audio / visual queues and replace them for in-game effects The big red surge fx, the visual clouds and such would all disappear. I would make it so that a slight rain would start with incoming dark clouds and light distant thunder. I would imagine an emission to start as a regular heavy rainfall. The rain, however, would be radioactive. Also, it could have an acidic effect deteriorating your suit, too. This would be left open. Then the rumbling would start like a slow heartbeat, steadily increasing. I'd love to increase the amount of "screen shake" slightly with each "hit". I imagine the wave to come from the centre of the zone, so each wave would be just distortion effects slowly increasing in speed towards the player from a random position. This would distort vision for a slight while, but still no sirens or whatever. The emission would already be in process of actually building up to a "blowout". The waves would increase and I'd make it so the rain would slowly stop and your character would get heat damage because of the waves. This is also just an idea, left open to discussion. 2. Make them less frequent and play a much bigger and longer role Emissions as they stand are a OHK event. Stand outside in an emission without protective gear? You're done for. I think this mechanic of live / die is old. Like many said, there should be gradients of protection. A good suit with psy pills and a little shelter should suffice. For example, an emission could also randomly start immediately without providing you with the before mentioned build up (I'd love to have several versions of a blowout), or have prolonged acidic rain or prolonged heat (heat which could only be countered by going below the ground or within a deep building). I'd love to even include a way to create a mechanic where the player could prone below a car or truck to hide from acidic rain, but he'd have to sprint a way to get to safety before the heat waves strikes him. Emissions should sometimes last longer, sometimes last a short while. It should be a bit more random than the set time it's now. I love how Radium / Gunslinger makes emissions also affect electronics. I'd use that, too. It would be cool to, while being underground, not be able to use your flash or pda. 3. Make them influence the a-life more For now it's only "turn NPC to zombie" or "kill on impact". I'd love to create an emission that would turn friendly stalkers to foe's for the time the emission is active. Sort of like the controller mechanic in Gunslinger forces them to commit suicide, they either do that while there's an emission or turn on the player. This would not happen in safe zones, but outside it would be a cool mechanic (excluding important characters, ofcourse). Also, spawn rates of mutants and anomalies / artefacts should increase. While there would be an emission, I'd love to have the random anomalies change places within a fixed proximity around the player, making pathfinding a little more difficult without making it cruel to try and run to safety. 4. Make emissions have a pretty side, too Why should emissions always be dark? I'd also make it so it could happen at any given time in the day. A nice yellow / orange morning with the sun coming up, but clouds are also moving in. The acidic rain starts and the zone rumbles, but the view is beautiful like so: [t]http://orig00.deviantart.net/bd18/f/2017/141/9/8/perfection_by_mod_a_holic-db9zjbo.png[/t] There's a few of my ideas

Regarding point three I'd personally like to see them affect mutants a little more. My personal take on psi-radiation and emissions (which I guess is psi-radiation + radioactive deposition + atmospheric fuckery) is that they're more dangerous to creatures with higher brain functions - so they'd affect mutants less, but they'd still naturally seek shelter from the rain and wind and thunder and radiation. This'd lead to the occasional swarming event like Noah's 'flood' or the swarm of rats seen in the flashbacks in SoC - which I'm fairly sure is how GSC always wanted to portray it, but I can only assume it was too complicated to implement. [editline]22nd May 2017[/editline] Semi-related rambling: The Zone is alive, right? The whole underlying threat to CS-SoC-CoP is that while the C-Con may have exerted strong control over it, they're not any more. There are strong hints it's conscious and able to control mutants (and zombies?) - which it does in response to anyone probing its inner workings too hard (that scanner mission in CoP). Conversely, some people - the rugged 'old man of the forest' types like Forester, Doc, Noah and Guide show what looks like a supernatural ability to survive the Zone - and have even been gifted (?) with artifacts (Compass) in the past. Even the player can be 'Marked by the Zone', although that's a little different from a story perspective. I really like the idea of the Zone as a sort of fledgling genius loci - it doesn't control its contents so much as it [I]is its contents[/I]. It reacts to intrusion by humans, often but not always by driving them out, depending on their motivations (compare the Wish Granter in SoC with the Room in [I]Stalker[/I] (and the Golden Sphere in Roadside picnic)) which explicitly reacts to the true contents of a man's heart, rather than their professed views. I've digressed a lot already, but back to emissions - necessary in some way to the living Zone's survival, timed by some unknowable and irregular internal rhythm, and tied to its 'heartbeat' - a Zone that is more stressed will respond with more frequent and more intense emissions. [editline]22nd May 2017[/editline] The engrossing thing, I think, for all of us, about Stalker [I]is[/I] the sense of life and randomness. It's a decent but not outstanding shooter with minor RPG elements, average writing, an interesting setting, and some good level design. From the earliest design documents there was such an emphasis on a living breathing world - remember that line about NPCs who'd be able to complete the main storyline themselves? SoC never even came close to achieving that - we know now a lot of what we thought was A-Life was actually scripted, and though modders have made some great strides in improving A-Life mutant and NPC behaviour is still painfully basic. But if I had the skills, the patience, and all the time in the world, the Stalker I'd be trying to create would be a living, breathing world full of NPCs and mutants that had absolutely no need of the player to go about their A-Lives.

[QUOTE=LoNer1;52258477]snip[/QUOTE] You should play Жесть Мод, it has temperature, radioactive weather, and acid rain along with the usual blowouts. [img]http://puu.sh/vXtix/71317382a0.jpg[/img] It's also basically impossible to complete due to those features absolutely destroying you on later maps. :^)

Yeah, that is one thing you'd have to keep in mind while messing with emissions. It's cool to make them variable, but knowing how the game/engine works you'd inevitably get stuck somewhere and probably have to savescum your way out of it.

Finally, a mod everyone will enjoy [video=youtube;gJHhKy5OpF8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJHhKy5OpF8[/video]

That song sounds really familiar to me. Oh no wonder, it's Sailor Moon. :v: Wow I haven't heard that theme in so long

I wrote a new FoV switching tool because the old one is kind of not great [url]https://github.com/JKAnderson/ST-Fov-Editor/releases/tag/v1.10[/url] Read the readme! Pros: - Patches instead of using pre-computed files - Also supports HUD FoV, most of the time :^) - GUI, so you don't have to dick around in the console Cons: - GUI, so you don't get to feel like an elite hacker dicking around in the console [img]http://i.imgur.com/jvWnlfG.png[/img]

[QUOTE=TKGP;52266495]I wrote a new FoV switching tool because the old one is kind of not great [URL]https://github.com/JKAnderson/ST-Fov-Editor/releases/tag/v1.10[/URL] Read the readme! Pros: - Patches instead of using pre-computed files - Also supports HUD FoV (most of the time :^) ) - GUI so you don't have to dick around in the console Cons: - GUI so you don't get to feel like an elite hacker dicking around in the console -snip-[/QUOTE] [quote=TKGP]- Patches instead of using pre-computed files[/quote] [B]Thank you.[/B] I really [I]really[/I] hated that method.

HUD fov?

[QUOTE=Hammer7;52266606]HUD fov?[/QUOTE] Weapon fov. Useful if you want some sick competitive Quake fov but don't like seeing inside your arms.

[QUOTE=TKGP;52266495]I wrote a new FoV switching tool because the old one is kind of not great [url]https://github.com/JKAnderson/ST-Fov-Editor/releases/tag/v1.10[/url][/QUOTE] Uh... [IMG]https://a.pomf.cat/gpsjym.png[/IMG]

[QUOTE=Hammer7;52266706]Uh...[/QUOTE] Programming: easy Remembering to drag and drop a file: hard Thanks m8

Gonna hop back into Call of Chernobyl, perhaps with the Warfare mod. But I'm having difficulties deciding between STCoP and AO.

[QUOTE=Sunday_Roast;52273436]Gonna hop back into Call of Chernobyl, perhaps with the Warfare mod. But I'm having difficulties deciding between STCoP and AO.[/QUOTE] STCoP feels a lot more polished, personally.

AO has more novelty guns, including some old Warsaw Pact eras like moist nugget that's fun to use in hobo phase. But AO has more jank involved. STCoP does feel more polished, but it has its own form of jank in some ways.

First time poster here. Hi there. I've been a STALKER fan since the first game came out, and I'd been putting off playing CoP for the first time, knowing that it was the last true STALKER experience I may ever get; and then I finished it and of course it wasn't enough. I've got some rudimentary Russian ability from when I lived in Kiev and some very mild OCD, so I thought I'd assemble a decent list of STALKER mods, with a focus on cataloging native English and (mostly) translated Russian mods. The project kind of got away from me. Without further ado: [URL="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ZyqBI70RFiON8OaAQt23fpFgRmbPHrq0818Ap2nCG0c/edit#gid=0"]Here[/URL] I don't know if I'm going to be updating this, as it was pretty time consuming, If I do, it'll be as I slowly work through some of them. Anyone should feel free to take this and run with it. I'm sure the sheet could be prettied up a great deal. I left a lot of cells blank as well, since I don't know enough about most of these mods to correctly assess them. I tried to get descriptions for everything, even if it's a bit vague. Hover over the X to read. My main goal was to roll the old /vg/ flowcharts and several sources all together. Hopefully it's not too difficult to read. Columns are sortable and filterable to help narrow things down. Take a look, maybe you'll find something new to play.