Mixed Bag - Raid 102-105 - Level 20

Goal: kill 10 scavs on Woods with a shotgun

Progress: imperceptible

Raid 102 - Loot Run, I Guess

Got turned around slightly at the beginning of the raid, but hit USEC encampment, Scav Bunker, Abandoned Village and Village before extracting at North UN Checkpoint. Saw and killed exactly one scav. Got a lot of loot.

The scav kill was weird.  I cleared the area around Scav Bunker and then entered it - all clear. Got some loot, was walking through it and suddenly a scav appeared in the section I had just left. He must have spawned in, I would have heard him approach. He was making gasping sounds like he was already injured. I killed him with one shot. On the post-mortem screen I see that I only did 16 damage to him. So either he spawned in already injured, or he somehow magically approached without making any noise or being seen.  

Time In Raid: 35 minutes, 22 seconds
Exp: 1697
Ammo Used: 1, Hit 1, Accuracy: 1, Damage to Body: 16
Killed: Porfiriy Grustnyy

Raid 103 - Shoreline Loot Run and Punisher 4 Kill

I don't have a lot of real-world time for a long Woods raid, so I decided to quickly jump in and out of Shoreline and grab some funds. With the two permanently opened extracts you can usually get in and out of Shoreline with no trouble - no need to cross the map.   I grabbed my pistol and my backpack, but I also threw on a scav vest and a balaclava, just in case I encounter another player and manage to somehow kill him.

I was looting a house in the village when I thought I heard something. If you think you heard something, you heard something. I quieted down, crouched and positioned myself well - if someone comes in this house, they'll likely hit that jacket first, and I'll be behind them.  Footsteps approached and began to run around. Run run run. The got closer, a figure came in and went right to the jacket. I dropped him. It took more shots than expected, but the job was done.  It was some hatchling trying a zero to hero run.  Maybe he does that for fun? Or is his ruble situation so bad that this is what he is stooping to?  

Time In Raid: 11 minutes, 54 seconds
Exp: 904 
Shots: 7, Hits: 4, Accuracy: 0.57, Body: 182
Killed: bairimeng (level 12 USEC).  Sorry man. Better luck next raid.

Bai Ri Meng literally means "daydream" in Chinese, but as an expression it's more akin to the deprecatory "in your dreams" or "as if" in English.

Raid 104 - Again with the Misses

Loadout: Remington M870 shotgun with dot sight, laser and lead slugs. Class 4 armor. Etc.

Spawned between abandoned village and village. Made my way to village. Checked most of the village for scavs - it was empty.  Went behind one of the houses for a bit.  A scav spawned in, in front of the house. I crept forward, leaned out put the laser on his head and fired. Nothing. Put the laser on his chest, fired again. Nothing. What is going on? He was good and mad, I went into the house, hoping to get an angle on him through the windows, but couldn't. He was entering the house - I leaned out the door frame and fired more shots. These last ones were, admittedly, a little more rushed than the previous two, but still nothing. He was firing and I was bleeding. I reloaded just one shell, leaned back out and shot him squarely in the chest. He fired and I was dead.

Time In Raid: 10 minutes, 15 seconds
Exp: 0
Shots: 5, Hits: 1, Accuracy: 0.2  

Mistakes

• I swear to god that since the "lowered jump height" update some time ago, there is something going on with aiming. Three raids ago I put the laser and the reticle on the back of the head of a non-moving scav, and nothing. That first Punisher 4 raid I fired several shots at the side of another players head, and nothing. I had a couple of offline raids where usually the first scav of the raid is just unhittable.  I'm not sure what the common factor is. Well, that's not quite true, I am the common factor.  Maybe it's just me. But I swear, it seems like in some raids the first few shots are just wildly off.  Heck, I killed a player two raids ago with a shot that I thought was way off, but EFT said it was on. 
• Died to a scav
• I need to react better - if this happens again, I need to just roll with it. Instead of pushing the fight I should have gone out the back of the house and tried circling on that scav. 
• Maybe I should bring grenades?
• It's discouraging

Raid 105 - Cowering and Discouraged

Spawned at the UN Checkpoint in the corner. Emercom camp is probably the closest place for scavs, but I think I'll try village again.  I checked my inventory. I had put 5001 rubles in my rig earlier, but then bought some extra ammo, and apparently some of the money was taken from my person, rather than my other rubles - I had only 3840 rubles in my rig.  Awesome. Thanks.  

Made my way north. I reached the old sawmill and something raised my hackles. I hadn't consciously seen or heard anything, but I felt like I might not be alone. I approached cautiously, scanning, wishing I had a scope. There is that weird double level building with good loot. Out of caution, I decided to first clear out the area above - maybe hit the little shack with the food first. Went to the rear of the shack, looked forward - aimed down sight. Seems clear. Went into the shack - juice!  I like juice. ZITT! I was hit.  Someone was shooting at me with a suppressed weapon - not close by. I dodged behind the fridge.  Pinned in the shack is not a good place - fish in a barrel. I ran out the door and cut a hard right - to move across the field of fire. More shots, at least one more hit. Bleeds. I made it to a steep stone escarpment and threw myself over it. Amazingly, didn't break my legs. I took cover behind a pine tree. It's canopy protects me from being seen from above, and if my attacker approaches the lower route, I can lean out and shoot him.

I was cowering below that tree, hoping he wouldn't pursue. He'll come, you know he will. I didn't know what to do, beside crouch and hope he didn't see me.  It took awhile, but eventually I heard his footsteps - he was at the top of the escarpment. I looked up, but couldn't see him for the canopy. Also, the tree trunk was providing good cover from that direction. Is my laser giving away my position? Well, I don't want to make noise by turning it off, plus I'm probably going to need it.  I could hear him rotating around above. He seems to know where I am. I could hear him re-approaching the rim of the rocks above me. I wasn't aiming down sight, because my sight blocks too much of the surrounding view, but I was looking up training my weapon on where I thought his head might appear. ZITT! ZITT! ZITT! More shots, hitting me. I fired, but at nothing. I couldn't see him at all, never got eyes on him.

Time In Raid: 10 minutes, 17 seconds
Exp: 77
Shots: 1, Hits: 0
Killed By: Amitriptylin  with two rounds of M855 to the thorax and others to the arms.

Mistakes

• I was annoyed that I never saw Amitriptylin. At first I thought maybe he got some sneaky angle on the top of my head, but on the post-mortem screen I could see that his shots were mostly on my thorax and arms. How could he shoot my thorax and I couldn't see him? Desync? Peekers advantage?
• As he moved around the top of the rocks, I should have circled the tree, rather than just sitting there aiming at where I heard his movement originate. Once he started firing on me, it was from an angle where I had no cover. That's definitely on me. 
• I was disappointed in myself. I sat down there by that tree trunk just waiting, handing the initiative to him. I should have moved, done something. I'm not exactly sure what the best course of action was, but cowering and waiting was not it.

Successes

• that said, the position I took, while far from ideal, was the best in the immediate vicinity. That still doesn't forgive my inaction, but I did assess the area and made a good choice from a poor selection.

Postscript

Three more Woods raids, and only one more scav killed. This is terrible. This reminds me of my Woods purgatory back when I was a noob, playing 12.10, it took me more than 20 raids to kill 12 scavs.   Now I'm at 9 raids with only 5 scavs killed. 

The funny thing is that most of this wipe I've been proud of myself for not dying to scavs. Dying to scavs is a thing of the past.  Sure, it happens from time to time, as it does to anyone, but I'm better than that now. But with Punisher 4, I'm just getting destroyed by them.  The loss in raid 104 really does not sit well with me. 

When I practice offline, with scavs set to "As Online" and quantity "High", I usually kill about a dozen scavs with no problem. Usually, it's just a matter of running out of energy, hydration or ammo. Weapons like the AKS-74U and the shotgun can be problematic because of sniper scavs (and the sniper scavs should not be underestimated), but I can still manage them. But these online raids, where I can't seem to hit the scavs for nothing, I don't like it.  And players, well, players are always problematic. They are one of the reasons I decided to pursue this Punisher questline - to force myself to hunt PMCs. 

And this loss in 105 is also upsetting - in part because I feel like I'm reverting to old habits: staying still when I should be moving, being afraid of moving, afraid of making sound.  I've worked hard to get past that, to try and find the balance between stealth and action - and it's ongoing work, but todays performance in raid 105 was just the worst.  

Oh well, at least I got one of my Punisher 4 PMC kills, even if it was just mugging a hatchling.