u/Charcharo

Upon release, one of the biggest criticisms regarding STALKER Clear Sky as about weapons and shooting mechanics. Reviewers and gamers alike were in general not pleased with how this was handled by GSC.

I cannot blame them – until you had end-game gear it just felt wrong. The weapons were too inaccurate and some of them seemed to do almost nothing at all to even low-end enemies. I will explain what went wrong with the game here.

The first issue with weapons in Clear Sky is that some of the sights on the weapons were misaligned. You can aim the weapon properly and because the sights veer off to the left or right or up or down - the gun ends up shooting at a different point of your screen. It’s a small misalignment, but at medium or long range it absolutely is an issue and can make you miss shots that for sure should have been on target.

Fixing this alone (many modders including SRP have done so) makes a real difference. It isn’t enough though.

Second major issue is that GSC set the maximum fire ranges for many of the weapons unrealistically. For example – just 50 meters for the MP5 or 70 for the AKS-74U. The sawed-off? 35 meters which turns to 17.5 meters with the 0.5x modifier for Buckshot. Just 28 meters for Slugs! Pistols like the Makarov are set to just 30 meters too.

Some people would come here and say that this is somewhat close to real life performance for some of these guns. Sawn offs are indeed quite inaccurate, and pistols lose effectiveness past 30-50 meters, and the 50 meter range is very ambitious. The thing is that it’s one thing to be inaccurate or lack power – it’s another thing to have your bullet disappear! Also, even carbines such as the AKS-74U don’t max out at 70 meters. The AK or G36 don’t magically stop working if the enemy is 150m away (very rare engagement range in CS but still).

Fixing this mistake is quite easy even if not many modders do it. It is of major help for early game guns specifically but also late game ones (though only in certain situations). I legitimately have no idea what GSC was thinking here.

A third major issue is velocity. Weapons in Clear Sky have their initial bullet velocities set to frankly ridiculously slow speeds. For example, the AKS-74 in real life fires at 880-900 m/s. Not bad. In Clear Sky it’s set to just 300 m/s. The AS Val fires at 250 m/s while in real life it’s more like 300. Which isn’t a major difference but its still odd. The lowly Makarov in real life fires at around 310 m/s while in game it is just 200. Clear Sky has upgrades to bullet velocity in its upgrade trees but they very rarely take the weapon close to its normal, real-life performance. More than that – it is like fixing a simple problem you yourself created.

I understand this time why GSC did this change. It makes the upgrades system more important, and it makes firefights more cinematic with the tracers and bullets being easier to spot as they fly around. However, it just makes shooting much harder and less predictable, especially at medium range. A few of the guns are almost like a (very) high-end airsoft replica, not an actual gun.

Fixing this alongside all the things I outlined above so far now for sure makes shooting noticeably better in the game. However, surprisingly there are still more vert odd balancing choices here.

Some ammunition types, especially ones early-game weapons use have nonsensical stats. Here I picture the shotguns specifically. These weapons are great for mutants throughout the entire game, but early on players rely on them for fighting humans as well. Fair enough, a shotgun is a brutal weapon for sure. If it can take down a huge 180-kilogram boar, it can take down a bandit, right? Or a grunt? Here is where GSC’s game design logic goes to outright wacky territory.

Buckshot in Clear Sky has 0 penetration. That is correct – it literally is stopped by leather jackets which have like 0.01 – 0.03 armour when used by NPCs. Make no mistake, buckshot in real life has low penetration too. But it is not 0. It won’t be stopped from a simple thick leather jacket. In the game, direct buckshot blasts can still kill humans. Even very heavily armed humans, especially to the head. But it is just stupid to have bandits with simple jackets tank 2 – sometimes 3 direct buckshot rounds to the chest as if its not that big of a problem.

Combine this with the unrealistically low ranges and it’s for sure going to make a player mad. The TOZ-34 is better here and one can use Slug rounds, but the problem is that those are weak in Clear Sky. 0.3 penetration is a big upgrade but its still pathetic considering what a slug round actually is in real life, when fired from such a long shotgun. And its damage is puny. Only dart is worth something but even that rare ammo type is basically a joke even compared to 5.56 or 5.45 fmj.

I have no idea what GSC were thinking here. I frankly don’t understand the choice here especially since it affects the early game so much. Fixing these values to something logical is easy and trivial. Why they didn’t do it – I don’t know.

There are some other oddities with other ammunition types as well. But those are minor compared to this atrocity above.

Finally, the last serious issue with the weapons – their general accuracy and handling statistics.

This is a design choice done on purpose by GSC to make players save up to upgrade their guns. I will be honest here, fixing every single one of the problems I outlined above would in my opinion have single-handedly made the game have better reception on launch, and it would satisfy me as a fan. However, making upgrades just slightly weaker while improving base weapon statistics on top of the fixes? That would have in all honesty – fixed the game’s shooting and probably made reception for the game noticeably better back in 2008.

Of course, the extreme amount of bugs and crashes and other issues - exceeding even STALKER 2 or Cyberpunk 2077's launch day problems would still have impacted the game poorly but at least the gameplay would be much more well liked. GSC made ballistics and armour penetration systems deeper in Clear Sky and its so frustrating how this far superior to SOC system could not enjoyed by the fans. So much good work - to be ruined by poor game balancing decisions.

*The Vova Vist Cordon MG Nest has insane, abnormal statistics as well. Giving his gun the actual PKM statistics makes his encounter difficult, but fair. That is a topic for another time though.

Hello everyone,

I have already beaten Definitive Edition Soulstorm on Hard with the IG faction. However I want to now replay it with other factions and I remembered - unlike Dark Crusade where Hard mode puts your forces and the enemy forces on equal footing, 100% HP vs 100% HP, Soulstorm Hard actually buffs the enemy HP. So it ends up being your forces at normal 100% HP versus an enemy with increased health (120% I think).

I dont like this. It worked for my fantasy as the squishy IG Faction but if I want to do Necrons or Space Marines and such, it will ruin the feel for me a bit. Doing normal sucks because then my units have 200% health...

Is there a mod that can let you and the enemy both be at 100% Health points while allowing me to get achievements?