I dont know why I never thought to use baking soda to reduce tomato acidity but holy shit that works works.
Making some chili mac that was just too acidic and I dropped in about half a teaspoon of soda, got a nice fizzy, and all the flavor is there with absolutely none of the burn. This is gonna take my roasted red pepper and tomato soup game to another level.
I'm going to attempt to make a chicken and andouille gumbo this month at some point
Chairman Meow on
+6
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited April 14
Some tips for the overall game:
-lots of stashes are junk, but many have some exceedingly good gear. I'm nearing the late game or into it and basically every suit upgrade I've gotten has come from stashes, generally putting me several hours ahead of when the game might make a similar suit available. At least half the guns I've used also came from stashes with most of the rest coming from lucky drops. I think I've actually bought maybe three guns the whole game.
-nearly all the stashes in the game a pre-populated, i.e. the items are there whether or not you've got the coordinates. I've found a ton of good stashes that were not marked yet. They love to be on rooftops (especially any towers you can climb), behind conspicuously-locked doors, doors with keypads, in ceilings, etc. Pay attention to where you find the first 20-30 stashes and you'll start seeing in-world clues for where stashes might be.
-stashes locked by keypads often have clues at or around the stash. These can be notes you pick up, stuff written on walls or scenery, etc. However, at least a few have the clues way the fuck off from the keypad such that you cannot reasonably search and find them; these you might want to simply look up online.
-stashes aren't just good for guns and armor, they can also be necessary for unlocking weapon/armor upgrades as well as finding weapon attachments that can be a BIG upgrade for your current weapon.
-the early game might lull you into not trying armor-piercing ammo. As you start to get later in the game, enemy armor increases considerably and virtually every enemy will be wearing a helmet and helmets work. If you find yourself really struggling against enemies even when landing headshots, you might need to start carrying armor-piercing ammo.
-it's not obvious at Weak level, but artifacts which grant Bleed Resistance accelerate how quickly you stop bleeding and that means less time spent bandaging and healing. This Attribute at Strong or Maximum is arguably as good as the Physical Resistance trait also at Strong or Maximum.
-I have found several artifacts with Strong or Maximum traits and not yet found a single artifact with more than Weak radioactivity resistance. Since a Strong radioactivity attribute takes three Weak anti-radioactivity artifacts and Maximum takes four, I strongly suggest aiming for shielded artifact slots over more artifact slots if only because I don't even know if Medium, Strong, or Maximum traits are an option for anti-radioactivity.
-carry at least one main gun that uses a common ammo type. The most common rifle ammo type is 5.45x39, followed by 5.56; squads will generally have enemies with one or both of these ammo types. Buckshot is also common. 9x18/9x19 are also common but they're pistol/SMG rounds, so they don't have the armor penetration or punch of rifle rounds. It just really really sucks to go out for a long run and get halfway through and be almost totally out of ammo for everything because you used multiple uncommon ammo types for your guns. My personal preference is my main rifle in 5.45x39, taking mostly armor-piercing ammo out into runs. I scoop up ammo as I go and by the time I run out of AP ammo, I've got a pile of regular ammo.
-stripping the ammo out of guns without picking them is a huge timesaver. A gun will have 5-10 rounds, an enemy inventory will only have something like 0-3 rounds. So scavenging ammo from three guns is usually a half-mag to a full mag of ammo, scavenging three enemies might yield no ammo at all.
-drinks/medkits/vodka/food can take a ton of weight without you realizing it, particularly drinks of any kind. You will find a TON of that shit in the field so generally there's not much reason to take more than a dozen or so medkits, 15-20 bandages (they're light), 4 cans of food, and maybe a few energy drinks. Anti-rad drugs are tremendously lighter than vodka and you should ditch vodka ASAP when you get the drugs, vodka weighs a ton.
-eat food from the environment, use your inventory only when walking a long way. Carrying a dozen cans of food just isn't worth it but there is no penalty for over-eating, so I just eat some bread or whatever out of every group of enemies I kill.
-don't eat as soon as you're hungry if you're on the move. A can of food goes a long way and there's not much real penalty for moderate hunger, so let it progress a while before eating. This will cut down how much food you should carry by a good half or more.
-later in the game, weapon Penetration counts a lot more than Damage against armed enemies. Even basic ammo on a rifle with good armor penetration can punch through strong helmets in a few shots, where you might dump a dozen buckshot rounds into the same enemy and they won't drop. The buckshot technically has 3x the Damage of and assault rifle but virtually nothing for Penetration, so armored enemies can tank a LOT of it unless you're just point-blank. But shotgun slugs? One-shot headshots basically every soldier I've seen in the game, though only at moderate range. Slugs hurt.
-Psi damage is cumulative! There is no meter but even with Psi resistance on your helmet/armor (only slows the buildup, not blocks it), being in the vicinity of something that causes Psi damage causes stages of effects. In order, these effects are: audio effects with no source, spawning illusionary human enemies that shoot you, spawning "ghost" enemies that run at you and deal damage if they touch you (they can be shot), and finally an ongoing psychic "bleed" effect that causes damage until you die or remove the field effects. The effects can only be removed by leaving the vicinity of the damage or destroying the source. Psi-block will also block Psi damage from accumulating for the duration of the drug.
Aside from tips, cripes is this game a lot bigger than its predecessors. I didn't know before I bought it, but they're brought back the bulk of the old maps plus several new maps and you go everywhere, plus no more level loading so everything is one bigass map. I really would like more destination options for Guides, reaching some places from bases is a pain in the ass. Call of Pripyat had a great solution for this that I hope gets implemented here: you could talk to random Stalkers on their way to locations and pay to fast-travel there with them. You could actually follow them to every target location and back to a base on a loop if you wanted, but still very useful for cutting out a ton of one-way travel time and virtually any Stalker group in the field offered the option.
EDIT: One last tip: there seems to be a bit of a bug with barrel-related upgrades. When you buy the upgrade for things like a foregrip, you'll buy the upgrade and then it's like the game "over-clicks" and deselects the upgrade instantly. Foregrips and lasers are removable, which means you buy the upgrade and then accidentally turn it off. Make sure that you can visually see the upgraded item on the gun for those items, they'll show up in the upgrade image and on the gun when you use it.
EDIT EDIT: Holy shit, I just found out that the "T" attachment menu will include all compatible scopes for a gun. So if you've got something you like to swap between multiple scopes, you don't even have to use the inventory.
Anyone getting good at playing the guitar in game yet? I don't know any actual songs on guitar, so it's just random strumming for me.
In case you missed it, there is a guitar laying on a bed near the player's stash box in Zalissiya that you can pick up. It won't appear in your inventory, but any time you can find a spot to sit at a camp fire, you'll be able to pull it out and start playing via with the radial menu. Tab changes scale, pick the chord with 1-6 or mouse, and strum up and down with the two mouse buttons or arrow keys.
Chairman Meow on
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
+3
ButtersA glass of some milksRegistered Userregular
edited April 14
On this first cold weekend of the 2024-2025 winter, I am reminded of how drafty my 1940s built brick house can be. Really wish there were more options for improving this beyond the $7k quote I got for spray-foam insulation two years ago which I am sure would be closer to $9k now.
ButtersA glass of some milksRegistered Userregular
edited April 14
So my problem is the house walls against the outside are plaster so I'm not sure its realistic for me to get what's needed done by myself compared to a pro doing an injection from outside and I can't justify that cost. It would take 15-years for the energy savings to come close to paying for itself.
Anyone getting good at playing the guitar in game yet? I don't know any actual songs on guitar, so it's just random strumming for me.
In case you missed it, there is a guitar laying on a bed near the player's stash box in Zalissiya that you can pick up. It won't appear in your inventory, but any time you can find a spot to sit at a camp fire, you'll be able to pull it out and start playing via with the radial menu. Tab changes scale, pick the chord with 1-6 or mouse, and strum up and down with the two mouse buttons or arrow keys.
i'm sure somewhere in the Zone a Stalker just sat down with his guitar and after chugging six red bulls:
An amazing realization I had last game session, working my way through Garbage.
Stalker 2 Garbage is, with a bit of massaging, Stalker 1 Garbage + Dark Valley (plus padded out). It suddenly struck me when you go to visit
Varan and his kingpin "not at all a bandit" camp
is exactly the Factory compound at the north end of Stalker 1 Dark Valley.
Like, the sense memory when it hit me was so strong, I immediately stared at the map for a minute, then at my surroundings, and suddenly knew and felt exactly where I was standing in the world.
I've literally never had that kind of experience in a game before. Goddamn what a rush.
I get that feeling, but also a strong sense of Mandela Effect as these locations are not on the map where I remember them being, like the Zone has shifted things around me. Familiar but unfamiliar at the same time.
Chairman Meow on
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
0
MrMonroepassed outon the floor nowRegistered Userregular
edited April 15
I was blessed with three thanksgivings this year. I have gained four pounds or so but that's the cost of doing business.
Two of them the person doing the turkey did a whole multi-day brine + sous vide into a cast iron pan to crisp things up under the broiler.
The turkey that came out by far the absolute best was the one where they did the stuffing inside the bird, put it in a roasting pan, and put it in the oven until the thingie popped up, despite that not happening >30m past where the time/lb guidelines would have suggested. They just had faith in the Old Ways and it came out so good.
Well I think it should have thickened more but it's pretty tasty though I served too much rice under mine also
Gonna have lots leftover. Need to let it cool and then dish it into containers for saving.
Chairman Meow on
+5
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited April 14
So for later game stuff, if you've never played the prior games I strongly suggest looking up a story synopsis for them plus the cinematics. For everybody who has played the prior games and remembers the story beats, get ready for some wild story shit, it gets pretty awesome and there are some crazy STALKER franchise callbacks.
And yes, the game has definitely shifted maps around and altered stuff within them from the other games. Basically every map from the prior games has some major elements moved; the Garbage in particular has things adjusted to work with the new overall map. A number of spots have the same structural layout but have been rotated or moved from their original locations. Since the new map is one contiguous thing, a shitload of fences have been removed and the space beyond them replaced with navigable terrain between regions.
Case in point, Cordon was the starting point from the first game and there was no perimeter wall to the south, just the end of the map and to the sides were rising hills and fences you couldn't jump. It was a long narrow map and, in the second game, the Swamp was west of Cordon and accessible by routes in that direction. For STALKER 2, the Swamp is now east of Cordon and no longer connected. What is now west of Cordon is some new terrain, plus a couple of Clear Sky/Pripyat maps kind of curled around and moved south from where they used to be. Cordon originally would lead directly into Garbage, but now the Wild Island is where Garbage used to be. Zalissya is the new starting point and didn't exist in prior games and now Garbage is directly north of it. Garbage has many spots that are the same, but they've been moved around in distance and orientation plus the whole area has been expanded and the Slag Heap added as a base. To the east of Cordon, they added Zaton from the third game (which had large regions, which is why it's so big) and wedged it between Cordon in the Swamp. So yeah, lots of stuff from the prior games is there but much of it has been scrambled and redone on the broader scale while things like buildings and facilities are damn near identical to how they were in the first game. Army Warehouses is laid out the exact same as it was in Shadow of Chernobyl, even if the map it is in has had some adjustments to squeeze it into the new world.
It should also be noted that the older games apparently amounted to something less than 8 sq km of terrain and the new map is a massive 64 sq km of terrain. Even with all the recycled stuff, they've had to add a massive amount of new terrain to cover. And because it's the Zone, yeah, it's reasonable that weird shit has happened to layouts; radiation has kept entire regions inaccessible to anything but mutants, there is old psi shit around messing with perception, and the region is rife with time and space warps. Entire chunks of the area being uprooted and dropped somewhere else is just Zone Shit, and I think that's kind of implied by the dirt cliffs we see around now; I figure they're the result of big moves of terrain in the Zone as they're relatively unworn and around the edges of regions.
Speaking of heaters, our current situation is all-electric. Which is exactly what I want for most days, but does leave me wanting an option for if the power goes out that isn't "run away to a hotel".
We are *way* more insulated than I thought before we moved in, which I suppose would help, but only for so long.
Chairman Meow on
0
Johnny ChopsockyScootaloo! We have to cook!Grillin' HaysenburgersRegistered Userregular
Found a puddle of water under our water heater this morning. So that's fun. The water heater is from 2009 so I guess it's time to replace. Those with tankless heaters, do you feel it was worth the extra upfront cost? What's the delay like when you open a faucet for hot water to start flowing?
There shouldn't really be any change in the delay assuming you're installing it where the old tank water heater used to be because the delay is coming from water cooling off while sitting in the plumbing.
We need to replace our kitchen faucet and I've been trying to talk my roommates into one of the fancy ones that have essentially a mini tankless water heater. Our water heater is on the opposite side of the house and it takes well over a minute of running the water until it begins to warm up. And that was in the summer >_<
While the majority of delay is waiting on water flow through the pipes, and will be the same for both types of installed in the same spot, there will typically be 10-30 seconds additional delay added with a tankless heater as the unit needs to get up to temperature and heat the water first every time you turn on the tap. Can't get around thermodynamics. A tank heater keeps the water hot all the time, so there is no additional heating delay. But one other benefit of tankless is that due to the smaller size they can potentially be located closer to the taps, thus eliminating a lot of the flow delay through long pipes and making them faster overall.
Chairman Meow on
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
0
smof[Growling historic on the fury road]Registered Userregular
edited April 15
My dear yanks, today I got it in my head that I want to try making biscuits and gravy. Anyone got a recipe they recommend?
Chairman Meow on
0
Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered User, Transition Teamregular
edited April 15
Yesterday I made a spontaneous purchase and grabbed a box of non-alcoholic butterscotch beer bottles.
Was looking at Google maps and found out there's apparently an entire indoor mall about 10 minutes walk away from me, and it's got a Korean corn dog place with great reviews somewhere in those three floors.
Weekend visit seems to be in order. Might even be daring and try their milk chocolate corn dog.
My dear yanks, today I got it in my head that I want to try making biscuits and gravy. Anyone got a recipe they recommend?
My dear brit, it's a good thing to have in your head. They are not particularly my jam as I don't like taking a nap at 10am but this won't steer you wrong: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoFkDmTm2uc
Full recipe is in the description.
Dear southern yanks, yes I know...but this is an easy way of making and trying out sausage and gravy. Let them try this first before y'all get weird with "well my grandma made them like..."
Is he a non-shitty Alton? That would be nice to have.
Kenji? Yea, pretty standup fellow by all accounts. ...also one with zero patience for trolls.
Unless you're asking about his recipes, in which case he's a James Beard Award Winner (twice, I think?) and maybe one of the most respect food research/technique people in the game.
So, made my annual post-Thanksgiving turkey pot pie, and this time made the roux with the rendered turkey fat/butter mix from said birb,along with drippings.
Me: *sniffling like crazy as lips burn like fire* "I added way too much chili crisp to this ramen."
Also Me: *guzzling the entire bowl of broth*
That's me when I decide that my ramen needs both the hot chili oil and that spoonful of sambal on top of it
I regularly put a spoonful or so of Gochujang in my ramen broth while cooking. Then I also through some sambal in there. Two different heat flavors. Then when it's all made in a bowl, Sriracha on top, then chili crisp on top as well. Love it, helps clear my sinuses.
Chairman Meow on
+1
Andy JoeWe claim the land for the highlord!The AdirondacksRegistered Userregular
edited April 15
Every time the McRib comes back I go "Oh, this'll only be around for a limited time" and get one
And every time, I am reminded I don't really care for the McRib
ButtersA glass of some milksRegistered Userregular
edited April 14
My dad has a tankless in his guest house and it takes a real long time for hot water to get to any faucet or shower head. My guess is the drawback is if you live in an area where water is actually an expensive utility then you'll see more wasted before it gets to temperature.
MichaelLCIn what furnace was thy brain?ChicagoRegistered Userregular
edited April 14
My dad's solution was to make a box out of insulation panels and duct tape - the silver kind - with a roll of reflective insulation on top along with an old blanket to hold it all down. Janky as hell like everything there.
We'd drop it over the hatch, but could lift it up as you opened the hatch if needed as it was not heavy.
While there probably is some conductive heat lost through the wooden panel, I bet most of the heat loss is convective through air drafts around the edge. I'd use pieces of rigid foam insulation on the back of the wooden door, and add weather-stripping around all of the edges of the hatch itself to reduce the air drafts. Or you can also just use an after-market solution like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07ZVCLKQV
While there probably is some conductive heat lost through the wooden panel, I bet most of the heat loss is convective through air drafts around the edge. I'd use pieces of rigid foam insulation on the back of the wooden door, and add weather-stripping around all of the edges of the hatch itself to reduce the air drafts. Or you can also just use an after-market solution like this: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07ZVCLKQV
I'd probably go for the foam box style rather than the tent style. That tent is only R14 insulation and you want your hatch insulation to meet or exceed the attic insulation value (by code). The foam board ones can be gotten in a variety of R-values such as this one that's R38.
If you are handy, you could easily construct a similar XPS foam box of whatever thickness you need, but I'm not sure you'd save money over just buying the premade kit to the same R-value.
Chairman Meow on
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
0
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited April 14
Well... holy fucking shit. That story goes some places and it gets twisty. I never expected to be impressed with the story of a STALKER game but here I am, definitely impressed. Very curious how widely the endings can differ; there are some player decision points made early enough in the game that I'm kind of hesitant to even discuss what my playthrough was like because I don't want steer people away from their own choices. My game time was a whopping 61 hours to complete the game and I know there's some shit I missed and a couple regions I barely touched, but I was reasonably persistent with exploring stuff. The game doesn't just have a lot of space, it runs your ass all over and through it and under it. It's fucking wild that they go to so much effort to wrap up story material from the older games while leaving the door open for further games; my ending in particular involved some pretty crazy shit happening with the Zone. There are also some set pieces along the way that I was amazed to see pulled up from the older game and overall, my ending had a very symmetrical "ending at the beginning to make a new beginning" result.
I do have some final grumps. Number one is the fucking stupid autoaim on NPCs. It's bad enough they can still shoot you through bushes, it's another (and this is particularly bad in the last mission) when you're getting nailed through steel plates because the enemies are firing while hiding behind them but have perfect aim still. Two sets of steel plates, the ones you're using for cover and the ones the enemy is using. The insane aim really needs to be tuned down and the X-ray vision should go away completely. Number two is the lighting/flashlight. The flashlight is almost useless weak and the game lighting is too damned dark. Again, in the last mission, I was frustrated multiple times because I literally could not see the enemies shooting at me from across a dark room while they were nailing me center of mass. In this vein, I really wish helmets had low-light/nightvision options like prior games. Number three, I hope they get the A-Life system up soon and can fix the spawning. It's annoying when you see enemies pop out of nowhere at the edge of "existence range" for the player and it would be great if they could get entities spawning and interacting with the world without you being in a certain range. Not a dealbreaker for my several dozen hours, but it gets more noticeable once you see it the first time.
I'm very interested in seeing what modders do with this game. There is overall just so much more meat on these bones than any of the prior games. This environment is enormous and the base game is already good, but there is a crap-ton of things that could be added/adjusted for survival mechanics, upgrades, guns, artifacts, fast-travel options, and so on. Frankly, it's kinda wild just how ambitious the devs were with this game because it is like ten times the world of the prior games combined.
Oh, and just so everybody knows, the game is VERY VERY clear about the point of no return for the end of the game. I dunno if the point itself can vary, but you get a pop-up right in the center of the screen saying "hey, this is the point of no return, don't go past this point unless you want to finish the game". And they're serious, once you go past that point you are not returning to any other places except where the game takes you.
For the dark nights and crappy flashlight, I just turned up the Gamma a bit. Makes the nights perfectly visible, and really doesnt effect the daytimes at all.
I think the visibility issues have a lot to do with the eye adaptation setting. It's overly aggressive through doorways, even indoor to indoor, making things look pitch black when they shouldn't until you step through. Outside at night you can generally see better turning off your flashlight because the bright foreground is no longer blinding you to the darker surroundings.
Chairman Meow on
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
+1
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited April 14
Yeah, the bizarre thing about the darkness is that outdoors is actually 100% fine. If anything, it might be a little too bright, but I'd rather it where it's at than being too dark to see. Even at night, I can barely tell the flashlight is on half the time. In terms of atmosphere, the light engine is used pretty well for outdoors stuff.
The problem is when you go inside anything. The flashlight simply stops after maybe 15 feet and anything beyond that is just opaque darkness if there isn't some ambient light. There are plenty of friendly locations where you can't even navigate a stairwell or hallway without the flashlight on because they're just pitch, pitch black. It's a decided issue with the entire game development industry, though, every game nowadays gives you a completely shitty flashlight with no range and poor brightness. It's a fucking awful design decision that needs to die, flashlights are bright as hell these days and darkness isn't some kind of soup that stops a light beam dead. I cannot stand flashlights that are worse than some crappy garbage you could get at a dollar store.
It's not just annoying here, there are points in the endgame where it could be outright gamebreaking. The final mission of the game throws a LOT of enemies at you and they don't give a shit about how dark it is, so you're looking across a room and there's a half-dozen heavily-armored heavily-armed enemies nailing you center-of-mass and you can't actually see any of them, flashlight or not. They're just in total impenetrable darkness so you have to kind of fire at where you see bullets coming from and hope for the best. I played on regular difficulty and, even as a long-time veteran of STALKER bullshit, it was tough. If you're playing on the hardest difficulty, I could see it being a hard stop to progress without doing some really tedious shit or getting lucky.
I'm already seeing mods touching on the flashlight, but I think the game could definitely do with things like being able to toss flares like grenades (plus bringing back nightvision as an upgrade). ANOMALY/GAMMA had throwable chemical flares as an interesting idea, which was nice not only for illumination but also for marking paths. UNREAL can obviously handle flares as well, so there shouldn't be any kind of technical reason to not do it.
And FYI, the game has flashlight dynamic shadows off for some reason but there are also mods to turn them on. It's not a huge thing but it certainly impacts atmosphere to have a light source that interacts with the environment.
Tonight's dinner: chipotle-infused beef pot roast with vegetables, and farfalle in a chipotle-beef gravy made from the braising liquid and a turkey fat roux:
The flashlight shadows create a glowing pink texture problem if shadow quality isn't also maxed out, which is almost certainly why they disabled flashlight shadows for the release build. It's a deeper issue than just a simple setting change and complaints of "Why are all the enemies pink?" from anyone not on max settings would be far louder than those of "why does my flashlight not cast shadows?"
Chairman Meow on
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
0
Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
edited April 14
Ah, yeah, I figured it was something like that. Like I said, it's really a minor thing and not something I thought of much. Overall my experience was pretty positive as far as bugs; aside from the consistent memory leak issues everybody seems to get, I was getting through game content pretty fast and I was only hours ahead of GSC patching game-stopping issues so there was effectively no game interruption for me. I had a couple CTDs, but none after the first major patch.
I'd say the results are a lot more impressive than, say, Bethesda open-world games where they just keep releasing new builds of the same shitty broke-ass engine. Not only did GSC make a game enormously larger and more complicated than any of their other attempts (though bits of it are still not working yet), they damn near duplicated the feel of games made by a now-defunct company (the original GSC was dissolved over a decade ago) using an entirely different engine and they also stepped up the visual design and presentation a fair bit. And they've set up the game such as to be highly moddable right out of the gate. Not to mention the slightly relevant issue that they've managed to finish this game while their country is being invaded by Russia.
And the sound work is just plain AAA top-notch, GSC punches way above its weight class there. The audio environment of this game is incredible, from creaking branches in the wild to scraping bootsteps on concrete to the pulsing hum of a nearby anomaly.
I got another Gamersupps flavor called Acid Rain, which is Rainhoe's new signature. It promised to be sour peach ring, so I kinda had to try it.
It's good. Not sour at all, so that is disappointing, but it tastes exactly like a peach gummi ring. If they do a decent sale for Christmas I'm going to try to pick up a few "sharper" flavors since I want some variety rather than just sweet.
Posts
Making some chili mac that was just too acidic and I dropped in about half a teaspoon of soda, got a nice fizzy, and all the flavor is there with absolutely none of the burn. This is gonna take my roasted red pepper and tomato soup game to another level.
-nearly all the stashes in the game a pre-populated, i.e. the items are there whether or not you've got the coordinates. I've found a ton of good stashes that were not marked yet. They love to be on rooftops (especially any towers you can climb), behind conspicuously-locked doors, doors with keypads, in ceilings, etc. Pay attention to where you find the first 20-30 stashes and you'll start seeing in-world clues for where stashes might be.
-stashes locked by keypads often have clues at or around the stash. These can be notes you pick up, stuff written on walls or scenery, etc. However, at least a few have the clues way the fuck off from the keypad such that you cannot reasonably search and find them; these you might want to simply look up online.
-stashes aren't just good for guns and armor, they can also be necessary for unlocking weapon/armor upgrades as well as finding weapon attachments that can be a BIG upgrade for your current weapon.
-the early game might lull you into not trying armor-piercing ammo. As you start to get later in the game, enemy armor increases considerably and virtually every enemy will be wearing a helmet and helmets work. If you find yourself really struggling against enemies even when landing headshots, you might need to start carrying armor-piercing ammo.
-it's not obvious at Weak level, but artifacts which grant Bleed Resistance accelerate how quickly you stop bleeding and that means less time spent bandaging and healing. This Attribute at Strong or Maximum is arguably as good as the Physical Resistance trait also at Strong or Maximum.
-I have found several artifacts with Strong or Maximum traits and not yet found a single artifact with more than Weak radioactivity resistance. Since a Strong radioactivity attribute takes three Weak anti-radioactivity artifacts and Maximum takes four, I strongly suggest aiming for shielded artifact slots over more artifact slots if only because I don't even know if Medium, Strong, or Maximum traits are an option for anti-radioactivity.
-carry at least one main gun that uses a common ammo type. The most common rifle ammo type is 5.45x39, followed by 5.56; squads will generally have enemies with one or both of these ammo types. Buckshot is also common. 9x18/9x19 are also common but they're pistol/SMG rounds, so they don't have the armor penetration or punch of rifle rounds. It just really really sucks to go out for a long run and get halfway through and be almost totally out of ammo for everything because you used multiple uncommon ammo types for your guns. My personal preference is my main rifle in 5.45x39, taking mostly armor-piercing ammo out into runs. I scoop up ammo as I go and by the time I run out of AP ammo, I've got a pile of regular ammo.
-stripping the ammo out of guns without picking them is a huge timesaver. A gun will have 5-10 rounds, an enemy inventory will only have something like 0-3 rounds. So scavenging ammo from three guns is usually a half-mag to a full mag of ammo, scavenging three enemies might yield no ammo at all.
-drinks/medkits/vodka/food can take a ton of weight without you realizing it, particularly drinks of any kind. You will find a TON of that shit in the field so generally there's not much reason to take more than a dozen or so medkits, 15-20 bandages (they're light), 4 cans of food, and maybe a few energy drinks. Anti-rad drugs are tremendously lighter than vodka and you should ditch vodka ASAP when you get the drugs, vodka weighs a ton.
-eat food from the environment, use your inventory only when walking a long way. Carrying a dozen cans of food just isn't worth it but there is no penalty for over-eating, so I just eat some bread or whatever out of every group of enemies I kill.
-don't eat as soon as you're hungry if you're on the move. A can of food goes a long way and there's not much real penalty for moderate hunger, so let it progress a while before eating. This will cut down how much food you should carry by a good half or more.
-later in the game, weapon Penetration counts a lot more than Damage against armed enemies. Even basic ammo on a rifle with good armor penetration can punch through strong helmets in a few shots, where you might dump a dozen buckshot rounds into the same enemy and they won't drop. The buckshot technically has 3x the Damage of and assault rifle but virtually nothing for Penetration, so armored enemies can tank a LOT of it unless you're just point-blank. But shotgun slugs? One-shot headshots basically every soldier I've seen in the game, though only at moderate range. Slugs hurt.
-Psi damage is cumulative! There is no meter but even with Psi resistance on your helmet/armor (only slows the buildup, not blocks it), being in the vicinity of something that causes Psi damage causes stages of effects. In order, these effects are: audio effects with no source, spawning illusionary human enemies that shoot you, spawning "ghost" enemies that run at you and deal damage if they touch you (they can be shot), and finally an ongoing psychic "bleed" effect that causes damage until you die or remove the field effects. The effects can only be removed by leaving the vicinity of the damage or destroying the source. Psi-block will also block Psi damage from accumulating for the duration of the drug.
EDIT: One last tip: there seems to be a bit of a bug with barrel-related upgrades. When you buy the upgrade for things like a foregrip, you'll buy the upgrade and then it's like the game "over-clicks" and deselects the upgrade instantly. Foregrips and lasers are removable, which means you buy the upgrade and then accidentally turn it off. Make sure that you can visually see the upgraded item on the gun for those items, they'll show up in the upgrade image and on the gun when you use it.
EDIT EDIT: Holy shit, I just found out that the "T" attachment menu will include all compatible scopes for a gun. So if you've got something you like to swap between multiple scopes, you don't even have to use the inventory.
In case you missed it, there is a guitar laying on a bed near the player's stash box in Zalissiya that you can pick up. It won't appear in your inventory, but any time you can find a spot to sit at a camp fire, you'll be able to pull it out and start playing via with the radial menu. Tab changes scale, pick the chord with 1-6 or mouse, and strum up and down with the two mouse buttons or arrow keys.
Successfully playing Through The Fire And Flames requires finding the Weird Guitar Pick legendary artifact first.
I get that feeling, but also a strong sense of Mandela Effect as these locations are not on the map where I remember them being, like the Zone has shifted things around me. Familiar but unfamiliar at the same time.
Two of them the person doing the turkey did a whole multi-day brine + sous vide into a cast iron pan to crisp things up under the broiler.
The turkey that came out by far the absolute best was the one where they did the stuffing inside the bird, put it in a roasting pan, and put it in the oven until the thingie popped up, despite that not happening >30m past where the time/lb guidelines would have suggested. They just had faith in the Old Ways and it came out so good.
It's simmering now at I need to take the opportunity to sit a minute and then chop the chicken into smaller parts to add back in at the end.
Gonna have lots leftover. Need to let it cool and then dish it into containers for saving.
And yes, the game has definitely shifted maps around and altered stuff within them from the other games. Basically every map from the prior games has some major elements moved; the Garbage in particular has things adjusted to work with the new overall map. A number of spots have the same structural layout but have been rotated or moved from their original locations. Since the new map is one contiguous thing, a shitload of fences have been removed and the space beyond them replaced with navigable terrain between regions.
Case in point, Cordon was the starting point from the first game and there was no perimeter wall to the south, just the end of the map and to the sides were rising hills and fences you couldn't jump. It was a long narrow map and, in the second game, the Swamp was west of Cordon and accessible by routes in that direction. For STALKER 2, the Swamp is now east of Cordon and no longer connected. What is now west of Cordon is some new terrain, plus a couple of Clear Sky/Pripyat maps kind of curled around and moved south from where they used to be. Cordon originally would lead directly into Garbage, but now the Wild Island is where Garbage used to be. Zalissya is the new starting point and didn't exist in prior games and now Garbage is directly north of it. Garbage has many spots that are the same, but they've been moved around in distance and orientation plus the whole area has been expanded and the Slag Heap added as a base. To the east of Cordon, they added Zaton from the third game (which had large regions, which is why it's so big) and wedged it between Cordon in the Swamp. So yeah, lots of stuff from the prior games is there but much of it has been scrambled and redone on the broader scale while things like buildings and facilities are damn near identical to how they were in the first game. Army Warehouses is laid out the exact same as it was in Shadow of Chernobyl, even if the map it is in has had some adjustments to squeeze it into the new world.
It should also be noted that the older games apparently amounted to something less than 8 sq km of terrain and the new map is a massive 64 sq km of terrain. Even with all the recycled stuff, they've had to add a massive amount of new terrain to cover. And because it's the Zone, yeah, it's reasonable that weird shit has happened to layouts; radiation has kept entire regions inaccessible to anything but mutants, there is old psi shit around messing with perception, and the region is rife with time and space warps. Entire chunks of the area being uprooted and dropped somewhere else is just Zone Shit, and I think that's kind of implied by the dirt cliffs we see around now; I figure they're the result of big moves of terrain in the Zone as they're relatively unworn and around the edges of regions.
Also Me: *guzzling the entire bowl of broth*
We are *way* more insulated than I thought before we moved in, which I suppose would help, but only for so long.
That's me when I decide that my ramen needs both the hot chili oil and that spoonful of sambal on top of it
Steam ID XBL: JohnnyChopsocky PSN:Stud_Beefpile WiiU:JohnnyChopsocky
While the majority of delay is waiting on water flow through the pipes, and will be the same for both types of installed in the same spot, there will typically be 10-30 seconds additional delay added with a tankless heater as the unit needs to get up to temperature and heat the water first every time you turn on the tap. Can't get around thermodynamics. A tank heater keeps the water hot all the time, so there is no additional heating delay. But one other benefit of tankless is that due to the smaller size they can potentially be located closer to the taps, thus eliminating a lot of the flow delay through long pipes and making them faster overall.
Folks, that's a drink with SUGAR!
Weekend visit seems to be in order. Might even be daring and try their milk chocolate corn dog.
My dear brit, it's a good thing to have in your head. They are not particularly my jam as I don't like taking a nap at 10am but this won't steer you wrong:
Full recipe is in the description.
Dear southern yanks, yes I know...but this is an easy way of making and trying out sausage and gravy. Let them try this first before y'all get weird with "well my grandma made them like..."
Kenji? Yea, pretty standup fellow by all accounts. ...also one with zero patience for trolls.
Unless you're asking about his recipes, in which case he's a James Beard Award Winner (twice, I think?) and maybe one of the most respect food research/technique people in the game.
It is very yum.
I regularly put a spoonful or so of Gochujang in my ramen broth while cooking. Then I also through some sambal in there. Two different heat flavors. Then when it's all made in a bowl, Sriracha on top, then chili crisp on top as well. Love it, helps clear my sinuses.
And every time, I am reminded I don't really care for the McRib
We'd drop it over the hatch, but could lift it up as you opened the hatch if needed as it was not heavy.
I'd probably go for the foam box style rather than the tent style. That tent is only R14 insulation and you want your hatch insulation to meet or exceed the attic insulation value (by code). The foam board ones can be gotten in a variety of R-values such as this one that's R38.
https://www.homedepot.com/p/The-Energy-Guardian-R-38-Attic-Ladder-Insulation-Cover-and-Air-Sealing-Kit-for-Pull-Down-Ladders-with-IM-27-in-x-55-in-x-10-in-PS2-38-11A/206891334
If you are handy, you could easily construct a similar XPS foam box of whatever thickness you need, but I'm not sure you'd save money over just buying the premade kit to the same R-value.
I do have some final grumps. Number one is the fucking stupid autoaim on NPCs. It's bad enough they can still shoot you through bushes, it's another (and this is particularly bad in the last mission) when you're getting nailed through steel plates because the enemies are firing while hiding behind them but have perfect aim still. Two sets of steel plates, the ones you're using for cover and the ones the enemy is using. The insane aim really needs to be tuned down and the X-ray vision should go away completely. Number two is the lighting/flashlight. The flashlight is almost useless weak and the game lighting is too damned dark. Again, in the last mission, I was frustrated multiple times because I literally could not see the enemies shooting at me from across a dark room while they were nailing me center of mass. In this vein, I really wish helmets had low-light/nightvision options like prior games. Number three, I hope they get the A-Life system up soon and can fix the spawning. It's annoying when you see enemies pop out of nowhere at the edge of "existence range" for the player and it would be great if they could get entities spawning and interacting with the world without you being in a certain range. Not a dealbreaker for my several dozen hours, but it gets more noticeable once you see it the first time.
I'm very interested in seeing what modders do with this game. There is overall just so much more meat on these bones than any of the prior games. This environment is enormous and the base game is already good, but there is a crap-ton of things that could be added/adjusted for survival mechanics, upgrades, guns, artifacts, fast-travel options, and so on. Frankly, it's kinda wild just how ambitious the devs were with this game because it is like ten times the world of the prior games combined.
Oh, and just so everybody knows, the game is VERY VERY clear about the point of no return for the end of the game. I dunno if the point itself can vary, but you get a pop-up right in the center of the screen saying "hey, this is the point of no return, don't go past this point unless you want to finish the game". And they're serious, once you go past that point you are not returning to any other places except where the game takes you.
I think the visibility issues have a lot to do with the eye adaptation setting. It's overly aggressive through doorways, even indoor to indoor, making things look pitch black when they shouldn't until you step through. Outside at night you can generally see better turning off your flashlight because the bright foreground is no longer blinding you to the darker surroundings.
The problem is when you go inside anything. The flashlight simply stops after maybe 15 feet and anything beyond that is just opaque darkness if there isn't some ambient light. There are plenty of friendly locations where you can't even navigate a stairwell or hallway without the flashlight on because they're just pitch, pitch black. It's a decided issue with the entire game development industry, though, every game nowadays gives you a completely shitty flashlight with no range and poor brightness. It's a fucking awful design decision that needs to die, flashlights are bright as hell these days and darkness isn't some kind of soup that stops a light beam dead. I cannot stand flashlights that are worse than some crappy garbage you could get at a dollar store.
It's not just annoying here, there are points in the endgame where it could be outright gamebreaking. The final mission of the game throws a LOT of enemies at you and they don't give a shit about how dark it is, so you're looking across a room and there's a half-dozen heavily-armored heavily-armed enemies nailing you center-of-mass and you can't actually see any of them, flashlight or not. They're just in total impenetrable darkness so you have to kind of fire at where you see bullets coming from and hope for the best. I played on regular difficulty and, even as a long-time veteran of STALKER bullshit, it was tough. If you're playing on the hardest difficulty, I could see it being a hard stop to progress without doing some really tedious shit or getting lucky.
I'm already seeing mods touching on the flashlight, but I think the game could definitely do with things like being able to toss flares like grenades (plus bringing back nightvision as an upgrade). ANOMALY/GAMMA had throwable chemical flares as an interesting idea, which was nice not only for illumination but also for marking paths. UNREAL can obviously handle flares as well, so there shouldn't be any kind of technical reason to not do it.
And FYI, the game has flashlight dynamic shadows off for some reason but there are also mods to turn them on. It's not a huge thing but it certainly impacts atmosphere to have a light source that interacts with the environment.
12 hours, low and slow.
I'd say the results are a lot more impressive than, say, Bethesda open-world games where they just keep releasing new builds of the same shitty broke-ass engine. Not only did GSC make a game enormously larger and more complicated than any of their other attempts (though bits of it are still not working yet), they damn near duplicated the feel of games made by a now-defunct company (the original GSC was dissolved over a decade ago) using an entirely different engine and they also stepped up the visual design and presentation a fair bit. And they've set up the game such as to be highly moddable right out of the gate. Not to mention the slightly relevant issue that they've managed to finish this game while their country is being invaded by Russia.
And the sound work is just plain AAA top-notch, GSC punches way above its weight class there. The audio environment of this game is incredible, from creaking branches in the wild to scraping bootsteps on concrete to the pulsing hum of a nearby anomaly.
It's good. Not sour at all, so that is disappointing, but it tastes exactly like a peach gummi ring. If they do a decent sale for Christmas I'm going to try to pick up a few "sharper" flavors since I want some variety rather than just sweet.