S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl A-Life Extended Mod v1.3

Increased AI spawn distance, AI models view distance & more!

A bundle of A-Life tweaks for the current system (aka "online A-Life"), which aims to fix recurrent issues.

WHAT IT DOES:
   •  Increased AI Spawn Distance
From 50m-60m to 80m-100m (distance at which the AI is spawned)

   •  Increased AI Models View Distance
From 70m to 120m (distance at which you can see AI models)

   •  Disabled "Spawn in the back"
Spawns now occurs at an angle of 180° instead of 360°
Spawns in the back have been enforced in a recent game patch. See FAQ below.

   •  Increased POIs Respawn Time
From 5mn to 6mn

   •  Increased POIs Respawn Distance
From 25m to 65m

AVAILABLE VERSIONS

   •  Vanilla Edition
Vanilla game flavor with increased AI Spawn Distance.
Use this if you follow the main quest, and just want some increased distance view.

   •  Alive Edition (need feedbacks)
Increased AI Spawn Distance & Spawn Rate. ALife Director scenarios have more chances to spawn, making your journey more memorable.
Use this if you like to roam the zone and think it's a bit empty.

   •  Hostile Edition NEW / EXPERIMENTAL (need feedbacks)

A new, completely different approach. You're not the center of the world anymore. Scenarios spawn around you within a ~90m radius, but AI don't know your position, so they don't actively look for you (unless you get spotted). Instead, they will mind their own business, and sometimes meet another faction.

In that case, you'll hear gunshots at distance, and it's up to you to participate or not. The zone feels active and organic with this version, as there is more AI around the player and they "go about their lives".

Note: considering the design choices of this version, AI can spawn at 360° angle around the player again. But it's not an issue since they spawn far enough (~90m), and most importantly, they don't know you are there too!

TWEAKS

Since the AI Spawn/View distances are increased, enemies can now aggro from afar.
As a counter measure, the following tweaks have been applied:

   •  Very slightly decreased player visibility

10% tuned down. This avoid to get "instantly spotted" at 100m.

   •  Increased Human NPC's weapon mid/long range dispersion

This reduce laser beam shots from long distance

INSTALLATION

• Open the folder "/S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 Heart of Chornobyl/Stalker2/Content/Paks/~mods/"
• Note: If the "/~mods/" folder doesn't exist, create it
• Place the file "ZZZZ_ALife_Extended_P.pak" in the "/~mods/" folder

FREQUENT QUESTIONS

   •  Why not increase the spawn distance further?

If you push the spawn distance too far, you'll encounter less/no AI, since it will roam a place you won't see. A possible workaround could be to decrease spawn timers, so there is more scenarios spawned around the player. But this will eventually turn the zone into action-packed map at some point.

After extensive tests, the current settings seem like the sweet spot. The default spawn timers are also well balanced between exploration & action. So I would rather prefer stick to it.

   •  Regarding the "Spawn in the Back"

In the vanilla game, the spawn angle is configured to 360° around the player. This mod change it to 180° (which includes the peripherical vision).
However, if you turn around like crazy, doing 360°, your "back" will become your "front" at a given time "T". If a spawn timer is triggered at this moment, and you turn around again, then technically there will be spawn in your back.
But the long distance + the focus on 180° generally fix the "where the f*#@ does he come from?".

30/11/2024 Update: After extensive tests, it looks like the devs silently patched the ability to force spawn in front view (180° angle). I don't know which version specifically introduced this "fix", either v1.0.1 or v1.0.2. But the fact is, ALife Director can now only spawn scenarios outside the player view (aka behind).

This change now makes the "spawn in the back" issue more prevalent, because even in the vanilla game it was still possible to get "front view" spawn (it was just rare). I'll release some hotfixes to at least restrict them on the sides (but still behind), and adjust the minimum spawn distance to avoid getting "instant" spawn in the back.

As a result, the Vanilla Edition might have "less action" compared to vanilla game. Since the spawns are far away, and it takes more time for AI to reach the player.

   •  How does it differ from other A-Life mods?

A-Life Extended increases AI spawn distance just like Roadside Panic, but a bit less to avoid "not encountering any action". Roadside Panic decreased the spawn timers to fix that. A-Life Extended use vanilla spawn timers and tuned the distances to maintain the exploration/combat balance. There should be no noticable performance impact either.

COMPATIBILITY

This mod will not work with any other "A-Life" mod. It goes without saying.

FILES CHANGED

• /Stalker2/Content/GameLite/GameData/AIGlobals.cfg
• /Stalker2/Content/GameLite/GameData/CoreVariables.cfg
• /Stalker2/Content/GameLite/GameData/ALifePrototypes/ALifeDirectorScenarioPrototypes.cfg
• /Stalker2/Content/GameLite/GameData/LairPrototypes/GenericLairPrototypes.cfg
• /Stalker2/Content/GameLite/GameData/WeaponData/WeaponAttributesPrototypes/NPCWeaponAttributesPrototypes.cfg