This Sucks - Raids 115 and 116 - Level 20

Ode to the Ash-12

Here are some of my favorite weapons in EFT.

• Any SMG (especially the Vityaz and the UMP). 
  Pro: Easy to aim, fun to use. Easy to walk up to the head to get kills.
  Cons: short range and weak ammo. The sniper scavs on customs suddenly become serious threats instead of nuisances. You live or die by headshots and anyone with a face shield is unkillable.  Even the "good" ammo (like AP 6.3) isn't actually very good.  
• 5.56 Scar-L (especially with 14 inch barrel)
  Pro: Fun to use, deadly, great for long and short distances.
  Cons: the good ammo for this weapon is impossible to get. The weapon itself, with mods, is expensive and never comes back on insurance.
• 5.56 ADAR
  Pro: is cheap, fun to use, great for long and short distances
  Cons: has no autofire, has same problems with the ammo as the Scar-L
• The Ash-12 (see below)

The Ash-12

So if you look at the Ash-12 on paper, or maybe just look at the list of Pros, you'd wonder why anyone would use any other weapon in the game.  The pros are formidable:

• the weapon is relatively cheap
• all the ammo choices are available on the flea.
• on paper, the ammos are crazy OP. PS12B has a pen of 46 and a damage of 102.  Wowza!
• good ergo when unsuppressed and vertical recoil high but not crazy
• supports full auto

But the Ash-12 is cheap for a reason, for several reasons. Here are the cons:

• the magazines are limited: only 10 and 20 round. 
• the magazines are often not even available on the flea (sold out)
• the magazines are expensive: a 20 round magazine goes for 50K plus.
• the ammo is expensive. PS12B sells for 4K per round (!!) on the flea
• the ammo is heavy. Just carrying spare rounds makes me overweight before putting on armor.
• the spray in autofire is off-the-hook. Completely unmanageable.
• the suppressor destroys the ergo completely. Better served using an SVD.
• the drop (see below).

The Drop

The Ash-12 fires relatively flat out to 50 meters. But from 50 meters to 100 meters the round drops a full half meter. And it drops nearly two and a half meters (!!) by the time it travels 200 meters. That first range I mentioned, 50 to 100 meters, is where a lot of important engagements happen, but it's also where this weapon suddenly becomes difficult to use.  You simply must land your shots for this weapon to be workable, but at 50 to 100 meters, that's a tall order. 

It's for this reason that a lot of folk try the Ash-12 and then give up on it. Probably rightly so.  It's definitely a W ... T ... F  type of weapon.

But I'm loving it. It has taken me a lot of practice and I've had to develop some tricks, but I've got the Ash-12 working for me.  I was sold on it when in an offline raid I one-tapped to the thorax a raider wearing Class 4 Trooper armor. Magical.

The Tricks

• use a scope, range it correctly. If you dial in the range on your scope correctly, the Ash-12 will fire spot on.  With other weapons you can set the scope to 50 meters and count off any drop on the mil-dots. That's not going to work with the Ash-12. You need to range it correctly even at 100 meters.
• use a rangefinder
• use the monstrum 2x scope instead of a red dot.  This suits me well.
• use scope and laser at same time. when firing on something between 50 meters and 100 meters, for example, I eye the vertical distance between my scope (set to 100 meters, so half a meter of drop off) and the laser (zero drop off) to get the vertical dialed in. 
• use single fire, land shots. Save autofire for very close quarters (like dorms).
• the ammos sell out on the flea all the time. Which is good. Because Prapor L4 sells PS12B for 695 rubles. So when folk come to sell on the flea, many will only see Prapors listing there so they list the ammo for five hundred rubles a round, or a thousand. I've bought all of my PS12B ammo for less than 2K per round, and I've been able to scoop up a couple of batches below 1K per round.  On the flip slide, I've seen offers listing the rounds at 10K each actually move.  Too rich for me.

Raid 115 - Nothing and Nobody

Goal: Kill PMC on Shoreline for Punisher 4

Loadout: Ash-12 with a couple ten round mags of PS12B, extra ammo, class 4 armor, meds, ears, and snacks. Wearing scav vest and balaclava.   Forgot to bring my rangefinder.

Spawned in behind resort. The plan for this spawn is to enter the resort and setup waiting for other players to come in and then kill them. I went to the resort. Sniper scav was up on the rock behind. I dialed in the scope, aimed, fired, waited a bit for the bullet to arrive, and then he crumpled. Nice.

Entered the resort and set up. The map was dead quiet. My shot was the only shot I heard.  There was a shot fired somewhere down the hill, but sounded like a scav bait shot. After nearly twenty minutes of waiting, I exited and went down the hill.  No one at power station. No signs of violence. I skirted and continued down the hill towards the gas station. Suddenly a scav voice shouted. I jumped to cover. Did sniper scav just spawn in?  I went to the edge of the wall, aimed down sight and leaned out. There was sniper scav, looking at me. I aimed, fired a shot, and ducked back to cover.  I waited for my bullet to arrive and then leaned out to check its work. Yes. He was down. Two one-tapped sniper scavs down, thank you very much Ash-12.

Continued to the gas station. There was a scav there, I fired on him but he didn't stop running  - I must have missed. I sidled up to the building and approached the corner. It's a left lean, which is suboptimal. I stepped around the corner, put the laser on the scav and dropped him with a shot to the torso. But there wasn't just one scav there - there were two. The second fired on me fast, hitting. I wheeled away to cover. Arm blacked, bleed. Damnit. Healed a little, and spun around took out that second scav, who was armed with a mosin. I'm lucky to be alive. 

Made my way to tunnel and extracted, carrying almost no loot.

Time In Raid: 41 minutes, 34 seconds
Exp: 1948
Kills: Archi Ozverenshiy, Yustin Pyatno, Vadimka Semyora, Lenya Modeler
Shots: 17 Hits: 6, Accuracy: 0.29, Body: 482

Mistakes

• hanging around too long in the resort.  
• no loot
• need a better plan.  Chase gunshots?

Successes

• Survived
• Enjoyed the Ash-12

Raid 116 - Well This Sucks

Loadout: same

My plan is if I get the spawn behind the resort, to go to resort. Otherwise, I'll chase gunshots wherever they are, probably roam around between weather, power and gas.  We'll see.

I got the spawn behind resort. Made my way to resort - killing once again the sniper scav on the rock with a single long hanging shot. The sounds of weapon fire could be heard as I made my way there. Someone was using grenades over at the weather station. Hopefully I'll arrive at resort before the rush and can win some fights. 

Entered the resort grounds behind admin. Took shelter in a bush and listened. Not much to hear, because it's raining pretty loudly. Peeked out of the bush. Seemed quiet. From here I can't really observe the east wing. Crouched walked over to the next bush for a better peek. But before I could peek I was headshot with a single round of BP.

Time In Raid: 5 minutes, 58 seconds
Exp: 100
Killed By: 2022-dage_bieda    Good shooting 2022-dage_bieda

"da ge bie da" means "big brother, don't hit" in Mandarin.