Misery is total concept modification of Stalker: Call of Pripyat. It's current newest version is 2.1.1

Misery adds entire new spectrum of features, such as your own backpack stashes, portable sleeping bags, your own item maintainence and many more!

However, this mod makes difficult game much more difficult! If this is your first Stalker game and you haven't got grip of vanilla Stalker, you should stay on vanilla one for a while. Otherwise it's going to be frustratingly hard!

Theres 3 classes to pick from:

• Assaulter
  
• Recon
  
• Sniper

As you can see each of them have different stats. I personally like Recon, as I feel like it suits my playstyle, but it's also much harder class to play with, especially early in Zaton. Being forced to fight close quarters combat in swamps definitely isn't easy.

Assaulter is jack of all trades, best for starters as it's hard to get into tight inventory managment. Having an assault rifle is also great as it's great from short to medium range.

Sniper speaks for itself, he can easily pick off targets from long distance, also great with shotguns just in case for short range encounters with mutants, also good pick for starters, but I'd still suggest picking assaulter.

As you wont be able to change your class later in game, I strongly suggest to pick one that seems to meet your style. Assaulter seems to be most universal pick in my eyes.

Each class has different spawnpoint, no matter which point it is, don't go for any of main storyline helicopters, reaching Skadovsk should your number one priority.

After you reach Skadovsk, second thing you'll want to do is to get money, primary currency of everything. I've sectionized ways to make early money below:

Missions usually are quite straight forward and ammo conservative (When you are with other Stalkers). Your reward isn't just mission reward, but also spoils of downed enemies.

Personally sorted by mission difficulity from easiest to hardest available at Skadovsk:

• The Hit (Stalker side)
  
• The Hit (Bandit side)
  
• Strange Phenomenon
  
• Transaction
  
• Find the missing hunter
  
• Mercenary Camp (Really hard, should be avoided until you got really really decent gear)

Many anomaly locations are really tough to get to with simple gear, practically impossible, you'll need special container for artifacts aswell, which can be bought at bar in Skadovsk.

Best to start with would be Claw Anomaly, the only real unavoidable danger is radiation, which simple gasmask should be enough to counter with.

Each blowout populates anomalies with new artifacts, so if you looted an anomaly previously. It should be fresh again after blowout.

Sometimes it's best to keep your artifacts stashed in Skadovsk, as Beard the barman has missions with artifacts after you complete first mission given by him. Missions are simply to retrieve one his mentioned artifacts. If by any chance you have the artifact he wishes for, you can simply trade it in trough a mission for twice a price than normal!

This map should help you get general feeling of danger in Zaton. Use it together with game map.

• TIP #1
  Pick every single junk item that doesn't weight much, plastic jar, playing cards, etc. They'll make the dough in the end.
  
  
• TIP #2
  Each trader has different prices for the wares, compare sell price with all camp's traders before selling an item. For example Beard in Skadovsk takes roughly around 100 rubles for faction patch, but Owl takes them for about 600 rubles. That's six times more profit!
  
  
• TIP #3
  When looting NPC check it's guns for any ammo, if you right click on the gun and see option to "Unload", it means the weapon has ammo loaded in it, and thus can be unloaded.
  
  
• TIP #4
  Remove all attachments from NPC guns, they sell make for an extra dough and dont weight much.
  
  
• TIP #5
  Plan your trip, wake up at 6AM, put all crafting materials into your stash, take the bullets only for your guns, only the stuff you'll need for path ahead. Extra free weight means extra more dough when returning to camp!
  
  
• TIP #6
  Don't angry mercaneries if you don't feel confident fighting them, taking them out in Zaton Workshop will cause them to roam the map more intensively and open fire on you, alternatively this can be great source of loot for you
  
  
• TIP #7
  Avoid mechanics for repairing! Repairing trough mechanics in camps is very expensive, thus getting a new better gear is better choice. If you already got yourself a weapon that you're completely confident with, you should try to maintain it yourself and avoid mechanics.
  
  
• TIP #8
  Dont sell scientific objects to normal traders, store it in your stash for the moment you'll travel to another area. There you'll be able to find scientist camp and sell those objects for much higher value, for example Flesh's eye or Pseudodog meat. You can check if it has any scientific value by checking it's description.
  
  
• TIP #9
  When going for long trip, look around for neutral squad leaders, ask what's their business and they might go to location that is near your destination. This way you'll be able to skip long path and also get there safe.
  
  More tips coming soon!

"It's actually easy to deal with the 'Blue Overlay of Death'. Looting the Shevchenko will result in a bag of weed. Bring it and a couple of grenades to the cave where the Controller is lurking. Smoke some weed JUST before you enter the area, then nade the ♥♥♥♥ to death. Area cleared and some minor loot is yours."

Protip: in the bloodsucker lair, when you have to walk pass all the sleeping ones, there's a toppled over shelf.

If you stand on it the bloodsuckers can't get to you, make sure you stand inbetween each end though, otherwise they can. If you throw a couple grenades downrange and use the broken but usable SPAS-12 dropped by one of the striken stalkers, you can wipe out the lair, get plenty of loot and rewarded loads of cash, less time spent completing the mission and you get a sweet n' excellent veles detector early on.

Hope this helps those who're looking for a challenge.

I personally love playing recon and Black road is honestly rather easy once you know how to handle yourself. When you spawn you need to see if there's any small things you can loot (backpacks, cigarettes) and get into the attic. Don't worry about getting spotted by zombies, if you do, that's actually good, because then the zombies will all crowd into one spot looking for you, making it easier to get to the roof and jump off, loot the sawmill, and be on your merry way.

As an addendum, if you want to do the Mercenary's base quest, I would reccomend going under the cover of nighttime. I also always enter the Water Treatment plant from the east. It's a long way around, comparably, as you need to go under and around the bridge, but I find it very worth it. I usually also take a sneaky ladder up into a pipe. At that spot, all I need is a pistol with maybe 60 rounds to take out all the mercs in the plant, maybe a few bandages for shrapnel.

Shall any questions, mistakes in guide or/and innacuracies arise, you can simply notify/ask me in the comments, I'd be more than happy to help you!