Destination Woods
Goals
- survive
- kill scavs (approx 10 more to finish quest)
- locate convoy and usec camp (if convenient)
Progress: Interminable Grind
Raid 26 - Boring
Loadout: VPO-206 with .366 TKM FMJ and variable dot/scope sight, extra magazines, rig, sling, ears, class 3 armor. 3001 rubles for car extract. Water and Medkit in pouch.
Insurance: 0K (previous insurance).
Most of my recent Woods raids have been in the morning, but this one was in the early evening. Spawned near spine, which I didn't realize was an option. Don't really have a plan for this spawn. Exfil is at Outskirts, so maybe just go to Scav house and see if I can ring up better numbers than I have so far. Headed out, but shortly after encountered another player. Not sure if he saw me and hid. He passed. But once I started moving again, heard him coming up again behind me. Turned, crossed a ridge. Put some distance between us. Tromped through woods. Lost. Used the sun position to guide me, and here I made my first mistake: I forgot it was evening, so instead of bearing west I went east. I figured it out when the old train station came into view. Such an idiot. Ok. New plan. Go to emercom camp, look for scav kills there. No scavs there. Found a CMS med-kit, which is new to me. Cool. Made my way across map to exfil as the sun was setting. No scavs sighted.
Time in Raid: 36 minutes 39 seconds of my life that I can't get back.
Exp: 910 ( and leveled up my "boredom" skill)
Mistakes
- getting confused about time of day
- getting lost
- finding 0 scavs (lame)
- evading player. If he was really pursuing me (unlikely) then perhaps I should have tried to evade and then set-up on him.
Successes
- survived
- evading player
Raid 27 - Dumbshittery + Shotguns = Death
Loadout: same as before, except instead of my car med-kit I have that fancy new CMS med-kit in my pouch.
Spawned near spine, same place as raid before. But this time I am a man with a plan. Heading to Village. Made my way there. As I went there was a ridge above me I needed to cross, so I went up and stepped into a scraggly bush that was there, to view the valley on the other side. Just as I was preparing to proceed again, I heard footsteps coming toward me. Fuck. A player loomed in view, moving fast. He was just below the ridge I was perched on, with his back mostly to me as he scanned for threats below. I started to aim when more footsteps came from behind me. His buddy was on the other side of the ridge, just steps below me, looking south with his back to me. Two players on either side of me, their backs to me. Should I or shouldn't I? By the time I decided they were gone, they were moving so fast up to the sniper rock. After they passed I moved again, and turned around to look at that scraggly Charlie Brown Christmas tree bush I had been "hiding" in. OMG, how had that little fig leaf hid me? Lucky.
I continued. Making sure to keep trees and other things between my noggin and sniper rock. Arrived at the village, at the bridge. There's a bus there. I ran to it to use it as hard cover. Peeked the corner and there was a scav. (Yes!). I set about aiming, but he was fast and shouted and shotgunned me. Oof! I think his rounds went right through the bus. My legs and arms were badly hurt. We exchanged fire, but I didn't land anything and his shots were just devastating me. I staggered down the hill, retreating and PK-ing. Took cover and began healing. Used up my cheese and esmarch. Went for the the CMS kit and got an upleasant surprise. It could unblack my leg and arm (yay) but had no other healing. Not like a Salewa or Car Kit. Damn. Well, somewhat healed is better than nothing. Knowing I might not survive, I drank my water and moved my scope/sight into my pouch along with grenades. I can't buy those, and the grenades aren't insured. Not sure if the CMS medkit is insured or not, but at this moment, I resent it, so fuck it. I went back up to the village, but I came out of cover too early - close to the bridge, not behind the buildings and vehicles. Bam, Boom. Shotguns and AKs were my immediate reception. I fired at nothing in particular then fell over dead.
Killed by Slava Koroy (and friends).
Time in Raid: 16 minutes, 34 seconds
Exp: 272
Healing: 8.4K rubles
Fired four shots, no hits.
Mistakes
- died
- noob mistake with med system. CMS kit is not a panacea.
- totally sucking at combat. OMG - dying to scavs is not a good look.
- should I have engaged those PMCs?
Successes
- moving items to pouch before death. This is debatable, because I can't use the sight without the dust cover, but I can't take that off while in raid. So I saved a sight I can't use now, and may have lost the CMS med-kit.
- it was a good plan, even if not borne out by the available evidence
Raid 28 - Back on the Slow Train
Loadout: VPO-136 with two 10-round magazines of BP. And three mags of PS. And extra rounds of PS in pocket. Class 5 armored rig. No backpack. Ears. Meds in pockets. Water and car med-kit in pouch. Two grenades and a can of sardines. Forgot to pack rubles for car extract.
Insurance: 20K
Spawned near UN Roadblock. Oy. Going to be on the clock for this raid. Immediately started hustling north, heading towards village. Made my way there and once again took up firing position behind bus. Aimed down sight, leaned out, spotted a scav, fired. Hit him! Aaaand he ran behind a building. Changed my firing position, and tried again. Spent a good 10 minutes playing wack-a-scav. I was moving, using cover, aiming and firing fairly well. But any scav I didn't headshot would take off running. I tried hunting them down, but mostly lost them. I did catch one, I started shooting - and click! no ammo...I reloaded, but he was gone again. Anyway, I bagged two, and wounded several others.
Made my way across the map to Outskirts because I forgot to bring rubles for extract. Had two different players take shots at me, but evaded both. Tagged a scav near scav house, but to no ones surprise, he ran away. Sigh.
Killed: Grishma Shnippel and Senya Dryohlyy
Ammo Used: 59 Hits: 17 Fatal: 2
Heal: 1.5K Rubles
Time In Raid: 37 minutes, 45 seconds
Exp: 1444
Mistakes
- Not killing more scavs. Had plenty of opportunities, and blew it.
- Not bringing money for car extract.
Successes
- Survived (always good)
- Hit ratio still not great ( 0.25 ) but I feel good about landing 17 shots.
- Remembered to eat and drink ( adulting )
You should give shotguns a try. They're surprisingly effective in tarkov.
ReplyDeleteI have never had much luck with them. Certainly, the scavs who have them are the most dangerous to me. But to me they are just loud, unwieldy noisemakers that don't do anything except make the birds stop whistling.
DeleteDo you have a recommendation on a particular one?
I have enjoyed reading these, hope you continue to post more about your raids. I like to learn about how other people play Tarkov and what their decision making is like. I've been playing for at least 4 wipes or so but understanding they way other humans play this game is incredibly valuable... Plus it passes the time at work, eh?
DeleteThe mp-133 or mossberg 590 from Jaeger are decent. I personally like the mp-153 because it's a semi auto version of the mp-133. I don't think any trader sells it at loyalty level 1 though. You should also use 7mm buckshot. It's 8 pellets that do 39 damage each which means it can kill in one lucky pellet to the head. You have 8 chances for a headshot each shot.
DeleteShotguns are a bit finicky to use sometimes. The shotgun spread in tarkov is much less than other fps games which means sometimes you'll miss even though you're 5 feet away. You could go in an offline raid and shoot a wall to see the spread for yourself. With a bit of luck, you should be able to just aim in the general direction of their head and headshot them.
Keep in mind though, even though it has a tight spread, it is still a shotgun which means you won't be shooting anyone at 100 meters. The pump action also means you won't be able to easily spam it as a rifle so you have to take a little more time to aim your shots to make them count. It takes a little skill to get used to it but I bet you'll be dropping scavs in no time.
I forgot to mention that you can cancel the shotgun and sks reloading animation. If you click and hold left click as soon as your pmc finishes loading a round into the gun, it will stop the animation. It takes a little practice to get the timing right so just go into an offline raid and practice canceling if you want. You can also cancel healing animations. Say you take out an ai-2. You can stop the animation if you just left click and your pmc will put it away. You can only cancel healing animations during a brief period at the beginning of the animation though. If your pmc is already halfway to sticking a needle in his arm you can't cancel that.
Delete