So what would it actually mean to bring the game to max difficulty? Basically, set anything good for you to minimum and everything bad for you to maximum. Resources, saves, fuses, locker randomization, all odds stacked against you.



There are a couple sticking points that you can make arguments about, Trap Amount and Fire/Gas Duration.

More traps mean you might actually have more creative ways to deal with problems, as well as more or less infinite throwables if you manage to reach the wire cutters. However, every other door is now wired up, and you practically can't go down any hallway without hopping over at least one trap.

Fire and gas, while they can't necessarily force the Stalker to retreat, can help with area denial. You might be able to hold off the Stalker from an area you have to work in just a bit longer. That or fire and gas might just trap you in a closed off area for longer than you can survive.

Choose for yourself what you think might be harder; I personally went with upping all of their values.

Some of these tips might help in a normal game, but a lot of them are skewed towards the reality of the starvation diet this difficulty imposes upon you. The simpler solution to a lot of this on lower difficulties might just be "use the resources the game gives you".

You might approach the game completely different from me and simply disagree with how it should be played. Take the tips as suggestions to try out, preferably on a game you can save with. Maybe let me know if you have a better approach or think something simply doesn't work. Who knows, maybe we'll both learn something.

Minimum Resources really means almost to a minimum, there will be very few dynamic resource and ammo spawns. You'll get very familiar with the permanent static spawns and your entire run will have to revolve around how you use them. Everything extra you find along the way is a miracle, crucial to getting you that much farther. The fact that you start with only 3 inventory slots is barely even a factor with so little items to find. With that in mind, here are some general tips:

• Don't skip searching, even if nothing spawned there the first 5 times you played. You need everything you can get, and you do not want to miss a fuse. For the longest time I thought nothing ever spawned in the Pantry, but lo and behold there was a piece of meat on one of the dining tables on one run. The small lockboxes and hook latch cabinets in particular seem to spawn items very rarely, but don't forget to search them.
  
• Until you get access to fuel storage and the wire cutters, you simply do not have the resources to deal with every problem. If a rat corpse or barred door can be ignored, you'll probably have to leave it behind.
  
• Items very rarely can come out of broken boxes and barrels. Taking the time to block off a hole with a box might miraculously net you with a grenade or piece of meat. Some areas, like the Mission Storage shelves, have heavy boxes you can shove off to break on the ground.
  
• I somehow missed this in the many runs I've played, but the items coming out of boxes thing also applies to the little wooden boxes you can pick up. Specifically, the ones with the metal parts to place a padlock, what I just learned are called hasps. Charge up a throw and toss them at a wall and you'll get a noisy chance on another item.
  
• If you're going to break a small wooden box, try to do it in an out of the way area so you don't have to contend with all the wooden bits making noise every time you walk through them
  
• The rats will often come get dropped meat from destroyed boxes if you don't pick them up in time. Not much you can really do about it, but it can happen.
  
• Very rarely (as in you probably won't ever see it), you can get two items out of box, and you can sometimes get preassembled molotovs and torches out of them too.
  
• You'll only need three of the fuses you'll find, so make sure to save them for the relevant sections. If I don't have the lighter, I place them in the order of Soldier's Quarters (opening up the Arsenal gives you a whole area to get loot from), Prison (wire cutter and important supplies), then the Arsenal. With the lighter, I'd get a fuse to the Prison first.
  
• If there's only one rat chomping on a corpse, you might consider lingering nearby to see if it wanders off. You might get a free code without expending resources.
  
• Even cloth comes at a premium, so consider carefully what you'll need it for. I find myself mostly using it for emergency bandages and the odd torch if I'm lucky. Using it for molotov cocktails could be a waste.
  
• It's almost never worth firing the revolver until you've gotten through the Roman Tunnels. Only use it if it's your absolute last option.
  
• Given the lack of resources, getting hurt is almost never worth it if you have the choice. You really don't want to try to play the game while half blind, stumbling, and trailing hungry rats. Without a nearby bandage or a lucky medkit, it's almost worth restarting by choice if you get hurt in the wrong situation.
  
• The only static medkit spawns in the game are in the Prison behind the chained door, and in one of the combination lockers (Auclair, I think). You usually find at least one more, probably two if you're thorough and lucky. It might be worth leaving a couple at strategic points; I like to leave one specifically on the generator room floor, so I can just run in and lock the door to safely heal if necessary.
  
• If the Stalker breaks a desk, don't get lazy searching through the wreckage; you don't want to miss a fuse and have to scour the entire bunker when you realize you needed it.

• Fuel will be used almost entirely to burn rat-infested bodies. The generator is almost only there for mission progress, unless you get lucky enough to get to both the Fuel Storage and the bottle storage. Fuel is too precious to use on light and time, and the Stalker basically comes out on the first few noises anyways. You'll only need to fuel the generator three times, for the Arsenal code, the Wire Cutters, and the water pump. Everything else is a luxury.
  
• Focus your initial fuel usage on opening up access to every section, particularly Maintenance. Even if you don't have the fuel code, there are three permanent static spawns of the two fuel cans in the Clerk's office (the first barricaded room with dead rats in it), and the fuel bottle in the Foreman's Quarters (the room up the stairs with the burnt body).
  
• Given how little cloth you'll find, Fuel in can form can be more useful than in bottle form, so try not to put fuel in bottles if you can. The ability to spread out the fuel in a 3 splashes can help with setting off fires.
  
• A fire's radius spreads quite a bit more than the fuel splash indicates. Keep this in mind when trying to set off fire near rat bodies safely. You can throw a fuel bottle well out of the rats' aggro radius (though probably not out of their angry hiss radius) and the fire should still spread enough to burn the body.

Actually setting fires with no lighter or gun comes with its own complications, detailed in the Trap Tricks section further below.

I've thought this myself several times, then started pulling out every dumb possible thing to do, found a miracle, then finished. When you're out of the sensible options, it's time to shoot for the moon and do everything possible to make a little progress.

• Blow up rats with grenades, shoot lone rats at bodies with the revolver, shoot gas cylinders
  
• Sprint through rat bodies while you still have healing items (you can't crouch walk through the rat tunnel though, it'll just kill you)
  
• Call the Stalker with rat hisses, sneak out of sight as he searches, and grab the dogtag after he repels the rats
  
• Move every barrel and box into the middle of hallways for the stalker to break in hopes of some loot
  
• Drag explosive barrels much farther than you'd ever want to from other sections

If you set the Trap Amount to maximum, running down a hallway in the dark and opening random doors without carefully checking can end badly for you. On the other hand, the multitude of traps can help save yourself the few loose resources you have.

• Shoving an explosive barrel in front of a Stalker hole or chokepoint and waiting for him to break it can cause an explosion if you place it right. It won't stop the Stalker from emerging, but the explosion can set off fuel puddles, kill rats, and break down nearby doors. You might even consider pushing explosive barrels farther than you normally would if there's a hole near anything worth exploding.
  
• Using the three splashes out of a fuel can to lead to a flare or frag grenade trap can help burn a corpse without having to expend any other resource.
  
• Flare and grenades traps and by themselves can repel rats long enough to grab a dog tag, though obviously they can't burn a body by themselves. Even if the frag grenade radius isn't close enough to kill the rats, they actually will just leave at the sound of a nearby explosion.
  
• Don't forget that you can set off a trip wire by just throwing something at it
  
• Every once in a while, explosive barrels simply don't set fire to nearby fuel puddles. I've had this happen to fuel puddles the barrel was literally sitting on top of. There's no real solution here, it just really sucks when that happens.
  
• Keep an eye on potential chain reactions from trapped doors too close to each other, or set them up yourself with an explosive barrel.

This particular trick has come in useful a surprising number of times, especially in the Central Bunker area where all the factors are likely to come together to make this possible. You'll need a loose flare in your inventory or a flare trap, specifically a door flare trap, a wooden bucket, and a reason you need a flare. If you're not sure what kind of bucket, there should be one right outside the saferoom, near the door leading to the Medical area.

1. Place the bucket at the door trap, directly under the flare. Use the fuel puddle to reference where it will drop. Alternatively if you have a loose flare, just place the bucket over where you want to set a fire in case you mess up and it falls out.
   
   
2. Ready whatever you would need a flare for, most likely dumping fuel on a body.
   
   
3. Set off the door trap, watch the flare drop into the bucket. Alternatively, just toss your flare into the bucket.
   
   
4. Pick up the bucket and move before the fire hurts you
   
   
5. Carry it off to whatever you need it for.
   

Place the bucket on a fuel puddle (reliable) or throw the bucket (less dangerous) to set a fire. Scare off rats from multiple bodies. Set multiple fires if you're careful. You could even break through the rat tunnel this way. Of course, keep in mind you'll bring over the Stalker doing any of this. Note: I thought I was being clever, but you cannot bring a flare past a section load, it'll just despawn.

Your personal boogeyman, you'll have to spend the entire game running from him, managing him, and wishing he would go away.

• You don't have the luxury of deciding to head back to base every time he's out, or you won't get anything done. You'll have barely a minute of time to yourself when you enter an area, probably less. Get used to having him around. Know how much noise is safe to make relative to how close he is, when to push your luck, when you can sprint, and when you should head back home.
  
• The Stalker is simultaneously more and less perceptive than you might think. He'll zero in on sounds from far away even while he's spawned and out and about. Opening and closing doors definitely makes a noise he can come check. He can see you in the dark from fairly far away. On the other hand, he's prone to losing the chase fairly easy if you can break line of sight, he'll waste time roaring, he doesn't seem to perceive much when initially clambering out of a hole. You can spend quite a long time circling a shelf with him even if you're charging the flashlight the entire time. Even if you're spotted, finding a place to carefully loop around him can keep your survival rate pretty high.
  
• Know the "loops" in the area, how and where you can circle around him and not get trapped. It may even be worth expending resources, burning bodies you don't necessarily need to burn just to open up space to run. Places like the closed off section near the kitchen in the Soldier's Quarters, or the Changing Room behind the padlocked door in Maintenance are good examples of this.
  
• Get familiar with his "heard a noise" hiss, it could mean he's about to waltz right up to your position. Also try to recognize his "I'm going to check on that right now" run, and get out of the way. If you continue making noise after he's already decided to check on something, he'll often start running, so pay attention.
  
• He can in fact hear you kicking all the broken wood around while you move. If you aren't in a hurry, pile stuff out of the way of areas you're always moving through.
  
• Obviously, be careful where you shine the flashlight, he can see your light around corners.
  
• If you're trapped and imminent death is closing in, don't give up, pick up something and toss it into a far corner, then hide in a blind spot. I've judo-ed my way out of many a dead end with random stuff on the ground.
  
• Don't underestimate the power of sternly and calmly walking away. Walking makes much less noise than it sounds. Even if you're spotted, just walking away and then crouch walking if he gets within breathing distance might be all you need to break contact.
  
• He can be surprisingly reluctant to chase after you if he loses sight, even in a dead end. Once he reaches your last known position, he might decide to just wander back.
  
• If you're really spotted, keep an ear out for the "serious" chase music, the one with the drumming. He'll really be on you, and most sounds louder than walking will update your last known position. Hiding probably won't save you, so try to keep moving. It might be worth just heading back to the saferoom.
  
• If he's seriously chasing you and loses the trail, he does a very distinctive roar that will let you know you've lost him
  
• If you're injured and survive, you might still be able to outrun an aggroed Stalker all the way to the safe room if you don't stop for anything. Don't stop running to charge your flashlight, just trust in yourself to take the corners and dodge traps as you move.
  
• Good spatial audio can help with knowing where the Stalker is.
  
• Don't be afraid to take a breather in the saferoom and wait for him to despawn.
  
• On the other hand, the saferoom music kicking in doesn't necessarily mean he's actually despawned, he might just be sitting around far away.
  
• When he's moving about in the walls, freeze as he clambers near you if you don't want him to definitely spawn near you.
  
• He has two ways of lurking at a hole entrance, when he has a claw grabbed at the edge of the hole and starts growling, or he'll clamber up to hole and remain completely silent. Just one good noise can make him pop out. He generally won't come out on his own when he's like this. If you need to be there, you can just wait patiently for him to leave, though he'll often spawn immediately elsewhere wherever he decides to go. Try to pay attention to where he stops when moving through the walls, so aren't surprised if he decides to stay quiet.
  
• You can sort of manage him by switching to a different area section with a level load, but a few different things can happen:
  - He despawns in the other area (you'll learn to recognize the noise) and immediately clambers over to harass you in the next area, either by spawning as soon as possible near your position or by waiting in the walls for you to make too much noise.
  - He despawns, then holds position in the previous area. If the next zone you go into is physically close to the previous (like how the Soldiers' Quarters is directly below the main bunker area), he'll technically still be close by and make angry noises if he hears you moving about, but you're generally safe until he officially decides to clamber over.
  - He'll sometimes spend some time out, searching the area you left, giving you a bit of a break. You won't hear him immediately despawn, but the threat music will continue to play. You can actually take the chance to sprint around and make a bunch of noise when he's still active in another area.
  - He'll straight up chase you into the next area. If you hear him still running, keep running. He'll even come up and down the stairs to the Soldier's Quarters if he's close enough to your ass.
  - If you noisily leave the area while he's onto you, he might dig a hole through the sandbags near the detonator area and just sit right outside the saferoom. On returning, don't just run towards the saferoom blindly, listen and be ready either 180 or make a direct break for the generator room.
  
• If he doesn't know where you are and runs into damage, he might decide to head back into a hole despite the game setting saying that he'll never retreat.
  
• As said above, gas and fire may not force him to retreat on max difficulty, but it can deny entry if he's not actively chasing you. This can save you if you're lucky or plan ahead. A gas grenade or molotov thrown early at a chokepoint might be an expensive way to save your life.
  
• I'm not sure why or when he does this, but he can in fact open doors quietly with the handle.
  
• If he's nearby, you don't know where he is, and you're near the area entrance, he can in fact wander over almost to the next section. Don't just blindly run to the area change or you might get caught.
  
• This might just be a placebo effect, but section distance from other sections does seem to have an effect on how long you have before the Stalker comes to bother you again. If you're having trouble in the Soldier's Quarters, consider making some progress in Maintenance, that kind of thing.
  
• He seems to be able to just walk on over from the level entrance into the area, so don't rely entirely on hearing him clamber in through the holes.
  
• A rat hiss, breaking wood, a flare, a gunshot, or an explosion are the surest ways to call the Stalker exactly to a position. It will take the guesswork out of waiting for him to break an explosive barrel or go past your hiding spot so you can move.
  
• If there's any loose breakable thing near a trip wire in his way, there's a good chance he'll set it off. If you have a plan involving any trap, finish whatever it is you're doing sooner rather than later before he takes the opportunity away.
  
• He can inadvertently trap you in an area with gas or fire. Keep an eye out for the possibility, predict the consequences, move boxes and gas canisters away from relevant traps, and consider setting off tripwires early in high risk areas.

• Discretion is the better part of valor on a no save run. If something feels risky, seriously consider putting it off or doing something else.
  
• Shop around. If you feel stuck or stressed by the Stalker in one area, leave and make progress in another.
  
• Bricks are not affected by lowered resources, keep searching until you find them. There seems to be a minimum number of bricks in each area, it's just that some of the areas they spawn in are much less convenient than others. Don't be afraid to ferry bricks over from other areas if you need to.
  
• The most reliable way for me to jump over trip wires has been to walk up to them, then press the sprint and jump button almost at the same time, with sprint being barely before you press jump (look up pianoing in fighting games if you don't know what I mean). The walk lets you set the course of the jump correctly and you'll have less of a chance of bonking anything overhead. The short sprint jump will still give you all the distance of an actual running jump.
  
• The flare throws a bit lower than you think, might bounce off your cover if you're unlucky
  
• At a certain point with your inventory size, it might be worth always carrying a bandage or medkit with you
  
• When they mean the grenade damage radius is high, they mean it. If you trip a tripwire, you basically have to be moving at a dead run in the opposite direction or get around a corner to not get wounded.
  
• Readying your hotkeys and memorizing relevant locker codes before you set out will minimize exposure time, and maybe even save your life if you have to use an item under pressure.
  
• Gas grenades and setting fires with a lighter appears to be more or less silent. Triggering or disarming a trip wire is decidedly not.
  
• Meat and torches are obviously not permanent solutions, and the torch will barely stay lit more than 10 seconds. You'll most likely want to use them to grab dog tags from rat corpses that don't block off anything, like most of the corpses in the Soldier's Quarters.
  
• If you get an early lighter, it might be worth just dropping everything you thought you were going to do and prioritizing getting through Maintenance. Getting free fuel will massively simplify the rest of the game.
  
• Blocking off a hole the rats can come out of won't stop them exactly, but they will have to spawn farther away from a body to get to it. This raises the chance that the body will be unattended long enough for you to swoop in and get the code for free. Block enough holes, and rats might have to take quite a trip to get to a body.
  
• Keep an ear out for the sound of silence when you're passing near a known rat corpse. Since they aren't biting, that might be your chance to grab the dogtag.
  
• As far as I can tell, bleeding out doesn't actually kill you (I've sat in the explosives cage with no health behind a cloud of gas for a solid two minutes), so if you can close yourself off from rats and limp away to a medkit, you might still have a chance.
  
• The very edge of a frag grenade explosion might do a tiny bit of damage to you, but might not leave a bleeding wound. Check yourself before you reflexively heal.
  
• This is just a working theory, but it seems like an area will have a certain population density of rats based on how many bodies there are, staying constant even when you burn a body or kill a rat. Areas with lots of rat corpses means that the rats might be spread out a lot, moving between bodies, to the point of possibly leaving an body unattended. On the other hand, burning a body will condense the rats on to the remaining bodies, to the point that you might see 6 or 7 rats on one body. Basically what I'm getting at is I think that the more unburned bodies in a section, the more sparse the rats will be on each individual body; the more burned bodies, the thicker a particular pile of rats will be. (I've heard an alternate explanation that it's simply that killing a rat will result in more total rats spawning, but I haven't personally observed this myself. I suppose one could test this by just idly killing rats without burning bodies.)
  
• When a trapped door has the wire on the wrong side from you, you can still disarm it. Open it just a tad and you can still reach in with the wire cutters. Push the door open slowly and make sure the door is completely still when you let go.
  
• Flares actually do have a finite sound radius. I've seen the Stalker ignore flares if he's clear on the other side of the section.

Finishing the game while setting the traps to zero is completely possible, but with different difficulties. While you're in less moment to moment danger and searching goes a lot faster, there's always a possibility of a soft lock where you're completely out of options. Pull every trick out of the book, search every corner, break every box you can, hope for an early lighter or gun, dig deep.

I find that it's helpful to note down where each locker is as you find them. With the Steam Notes function, you don't even have to tab away. Here's a template that I'm sure is missing some locations, but you can add to it as you find them. You save this as one note, then copy and paste into a new note while taking out the part in parentheses if you intend to try several runs.

(Template) Current Run Locker Location

Locker Room -

Soldier's Quarters

Clerk's Office -

Barracks Corner -

Mess Hall -

Prison

Clerk's Office -

Control Room -

Storage -

Maintenance

Changing Room Alcove -

Cheese Room -

Chapel -

Fuel Storage -

Munitions -

Arsenal

First Corner -

Second Corner -

After pulling the planks -

Near Explosives -

• Make sure the break the 4 or so boxes in the infirmary while you're there, you might get lucky with a free medkit
  
• Don't forget the static fuel spawn at the burnt bodies in the Doctor's Office, I've ran past that unthinkingly a few times.
  
• Consider blocking off the Stalker emergence holes in the area with the couple of boxes in the Kitchen, you have all the time in the world so why not.
  
• While rare, meat may spawn in the Mess Hall/Pantry area. I have never ever seen anything spawn in the very first hook latch cabinet you're supposed to get ammo from, though I still habitually check every time.
  
• The Stalker will not activate until you specifically go down the hallway into the Officer's Quarters (marked green on the map). That means you can screw about in Mission Storage or even the hallway to the Arsenal as long as you need. Take the time to search carefully, open the locker for the body in Mission Storage if you're lucky, block holes, break the lockdown wheel, roll explosive barrels around, etc.
  
• As said above, the Mission Storage shelves have a couple heavy boxes you can shove off, possibly netting you an item early. Best to do this before you activate the Stalker.
  
• Even if there's a rat body near Mission Storage, consider leaving it alone for now until you secure enough fuel, you can skirt past and only get hissed at for your trouble.

• If you can't open the barred metal door to Medical, the vent into Delise's room is the quietest way to loop around the monster. If you're being actively chased, hopefully the area around Strategic Operations (the meeting room with the DnD DM's blocking screen) is clear to run around.
  
• With maximum Trap Amount, this place will be extremely trap heavy, almost so that every optional door is trapped and 3 or 4 trip wires around. Keep an eye out for door flare traps to try the bucket trick on.
  
• There will usually be at least one explosive barrel around, see if there's a way you can use it to burn a body, like blocking the hole outside the Arsenal.
  
• If there's body blocking the entrance to Maintenance, check to see if there's a frag grenade trap past it near the lockdown doorway. It will in fact reach far enough to set alight fuel that you might dump on the body. A good throw with a random object will set it off, though it'll probably take a few tries. Try using one of the planks blocking the vent from Delise's room for your best chance at hitting the wire.

• If you can get an explosive barrel blocking the very first Stalker hole here, you can break into the Clerk's Office (the room with the very first barred door) for free if you're lucky. You can sort of see through the bars if it's worth breaking in or not.
  
• Check the Barracks doors to the main hallway for traps before you go around, and prioritize the untrapped doors to open up space to run.
  
• I find that it's not all that worth it to break into the Security room (with the note on the owner of the key), since you'll generally want your bricks for other reasons. If you can, take a glance through the bars, you'll be able to see everything the room has to offer unlike the Clerk's Office.
  
• The key can be under a pillow or helmet, tucked under folded blankets, on the bedframes at the side of the mattresses, in the boxes with the name placards, and possibly even more. Don't get lazy searching for the key or you'll miss it and waste valuable time.
  
• Try to search the area systematically so you don't end up searching the same couple of lockers over and over again. I generally go with searching one side of the room first if I'm not blocked by a trap.
  
• Don't forget to also search over the lockers and bunks for bricks and supplies
  
• If you find a brick, try to get it closer to the Mess Hall hallway, but you may want to focus on searching for supplies and the key first.
  
• If the Stalker is wandering about the Mess Hall area while you're in the Barracks, it may be worth lingering while not making any noise in hopes that he'll break through a door without your input.
  
• If you find the key and it's safe, consider searching Communications even if you haven't activated all the switches yet.
  
• There will often be traps right next to rat bodies which can help with getting a free code.
  
• Once you commit to making progress down the Mess Hall hallway to the isolated breaker switch, consider doing it piecemeal, breaking down a door and running back down the hallway, coming back when it's safe to break the padlock, etc.
  
• If you have excess fuel, burning the body in the corner of the hallway between the Mess Hall and the Break Room is definitely worth it for your survivability. Sometimes there's a flare trap right next to the body. The accompanying fuel splash under the flare will straight up burn the body without any other preparation, so you might as well set it off. You might be able to get an angle on the trap before you even get close with a pillow or something. Sometimes the Stalker will manage to set it off without you by breaking down the nearby door, leaving you with a precooked body before you even get there.
  
• Evading the Stalker in this area will require every trick you have. Try to open up both ways out as early as you can. Wait patiently until you can hear which way he's going. Throw stuff into dead ends and get out of the way. The corner in the Kitchen might be the hiding place that saves your life if you're trapped. Also in the Kitchen shelves will a throwable wooden box, which you can use break when you absolutely need to get the Stalker in a position for you to get out. The obvious hiding spots like the closets and under the tables will probably just get you killed.
  
• Don't forget Henri's dogtag (the Clement one); you'll definitely need the two revolver cartridges.
  
• Absolutely make sure the isolated Utility Room breaker is thrown before you leave, you don't want to be have to go back down there if you can help it.
  
• One unit of fuel is just enough time to sprint from the generator to the barracks radio room, get the code, and sprint back to turn off the generator if you aren't stopped along the way. It's worth doing because the tiny bit left counts as an entire unit fuel load when you get another can into it.
  
• Don't forget the loot in the Barracks vent when you get the wrench, it's definitely worth coming back down here for a couple bullets or inventory space. The vent in the Mess Hall has never been worth it for me considering the risk you take going down there.

• Getting to here and getting the three guaranteed fuels is crucial to the run, but don't be too quick to spend them elsewhere. You might need them all for the rat tunnel.
  
• If the Clerk's Office door (the map room) is trapped, trigger it on your way out after searching elsewhere.
  
• Don't take any risks here before you open up the rat tunnel, leave if the Stalker is in the main hallway
  
• There's at least one easy dogtag in the Foreman's Quarters with the burnt body, and there's probably going to be the one in the main hallway a rat is supposed to accidentally burn with a flare trap.
  
• There's many, many small breakable boxes around this area, 5 or so near the entrance alone. I've taken to gathering a few up in the Clerk's Room and smashing them all as I leave for the least amount of exposure to the Stalker. You could also consider leaving them around at key points to smash against the wall for a free distraction, especially if you haven't opened the rat tunnel yet.
  
• Getting cornered in the Workshop (the room connected to the rat tunnel) is annoyingly likely and likely deadly. You can try hiding under the table next to the tunnel entrance. You can push a barrel next to the workbench close to the double doors as a hiding spot. You can try using the metal barrel near the rat tunnel (though it's a little awkward to move behind. My personal choice is try to create a hiding spot using the stack of barrels opposite to the door, then throwing something at the rat tunnel to create an opportunity to get past.
  
• If there's a rat corpse in the Changing Room, you can skirt past it while only getting hissed at, but I'd consider burning it early before dealing with the rat tunnel if I have the fuel.
  
• The jump over the possible trip wire in the Changing Room is annoying enough that you might consider triggering it early. It's fairly likely that you'll trigger it accidentally when under pressure and the run to the stairs is a little awkward.
  
• If there's two bodies next to each other near the entrance to the rat tunnel, you might be able to get them both in one go with a fuel can and a well thrown fuel bottle.
  
• Try not to halfass the rat tunnel, go in with a solution and see it through, or you might get trapped.
  
• If the stars align and you have what it takes to try to gas your way through the rat tunnel, take it very slowly and make absolutely sure that the rats are running away; it'll take an annoying amount of time for them to react.
  
• Try to go into the tunnel with an unused brick you toss along the way, and focus on breaking the padlock to the door to the changing room before you do anything else. Then later you can bring it to the Pillbox door so you can break into Munitions Storage.
  
• Watch for traps before you get into the Chapel, and consider blocking the hole nearest to Fuel Storage
  
• The Stalker will only sometimes check into the Chapel when you grab the key. If he doesn't check, he'll often be wandering around the Storage Hub area directly in front of you when you try to leave the Chapel.
  
• Munitions Storage should have 3 static grenade spawns, don't forget to loot it
  
• Don't hesitate to climb up the Pillbox and wait patiently for the Stalker to go away. He might even break into Munitions Storage for you.
  
• If the Fuel Storage door is trapped, just input the code and the door will slowly swing open to trigger the trap. You'll have plenty of time to clear out before it goes off, just make sure to not be between the door and the Stalker. If you aren't ready to set it off, you can just put in the code and immediately pull the door closed so it'll be faster to set it off when you're ready.
  
• If you have to make repeated fuel runs, that makes it all the more important to clear out the routes in both directions out of the Storage Hub.
  
• If there's a tripwire right next to the vent, do not try to undo the nuts without dealing with the trap. It looks like there's just enough space, but there really isn't. If you don't deal with the trap and try to open the vent, the ratcheting animation will play normally, the trip wire will activate after it's done, and then you might be screwed. Learned this one the hard way...
  
  
  Pillbox entrance door glitch/exploit? (may not work as of the accessibility patch)
  I'm not sure if this is foolproof, but it's happened to me every time I tried it. When you open up the door to the Pillbox ladder, you have the opportunity to activate this glitch. Go in, close the metal door, block it with a barrel, then call the Stalker. If the wooden barrier to Munitions hasn't been opened yet, a brick should do nicely, otherwise there's a throwable wooden box inside that should do it. Get up the ladder just in case this doesn't work. The Stalker will try to break down the door, scoot about, then you just won't hear him move around anymore. You'll hear the heartbeat warning that he's close, but he simply won't leave or even move. When you gather the courage to climb down and look around, you'll find him stuck in the wall and maybe slightly twitching.
  
  
  
  I don't know if he can get you like this, but you can in fact skirt around him without him grabbing you through the wall, and he simply won't despawn until you leave Maintenance. If it works for you and you're willing to more or less cheat, you could use this opportunity to completely clear out the entirety of the area, breaking every box, searching every corner, shove every box and barrel near holes, dealing with every rat corpse (and cheese) you have the resources for. You can ferry everything you find to the entrance, drop it, then head back to keep grabbing things until you get sick of it. If you move a barrel near him in this state, he'll attack it, but continue to be stuck.

• You really don't want to be in here without the wrench if you can help it, but it can be rewarding if you don't die. The prison might be the place to search of last resort if you're absolutely out of options, or an early one to reap the benefits quicker.
  
• Without opening the vent, you basically should leave as soon as you do any noisy action. Break the door or set off a trap and just get moving without waiting to hear the monster.
  
• The dogtag corpses in here will be completely rat free. There can be up to three bodies, in Interrogation Room, somewhere in the cells, and somewhere in Storage. The one in the cells can often be accessible without opening any cells.
  
• If the Stalker spawns blocking your way out of the prison and you can't open the vent, it's not the end of the world. Your best chance is making some sort of noise in the cell hallway or at the Storage doors, preferably breaking a door to be sure, then hiding off to the side somewhere. Off towards the cells, near the vent, and the wheelbarrow of boxes in Storage can all give you a chance to get behind the Stalker and get out. Any of these places he can eventually check, so be decisive.
  
• There's a good chance that every single Storage door except for the chained up one will be trapped. If you end up setting off a frag grenade, there's a good chance it will break one or more doors, setting off a chain reaction. If you're going to risk setting them off yourself, just get all the way out of Storage every time you try to open a door.
  
• You can sort of see what kind of trap is behind each door by looking through the door crack and plan accordingly
  
• The chained up door has a static spawned medkit in a lidded box and usually several valuables like grenades or ammo. If you don't see a locker in the Clerk's office, it's definitely worth saving the brick you find in the area for this.
  
• Placing an explosive barrel right on the Stalker hole in Storage probably won't break every door, so you can try to set it somewhere in the middle of the room and hope he'll break it when he wanders into the area.
  
• Another thing I've never tried myself is setting up an explosive barrel in the middle of the room, setting off a frag grenade trap, and getting the heck out of there. It looks like there's just enough time to get around the corner before getting blown to bits, but I've never trusted myself enough to try it.
  
• Once you open the vent, flip open all the cell door switches (except the prisoner if you're nice) even before you have the generator on
  
• It's actually completely possible to keep the prisoner alive without too much trouble, even when you can't fight off the Stalker at all. If the Stalker hasn't climbed to the area yet, open the cell door, immediately sprint out to the prisoner, crouch under the opening door and grab the wire cutter, then immediately sprint back to the door controls and close it again. If you're fast enough, the door will close in the face of the approaching Stalker. Gott im Himmel!

• The Arsenal dynamite run might be the only time that it's worth it to go out of your way to completely fill the generator, which you'll really need access to fuel storage for. Try to dealing with a few of the first problems in the Arsenal maze before leaving early. Then, turn on a filled generator and you might be able to get to the explosives cage and halfway back out before the Stalker comes to get you.
  
• Don't forget that there might be a rat body to deal with before you even get to the Arsenal door.
  
• It's worth checking the Arsenal area early even if you don't have the code. The possible rat corpse is often unattended by any rats when you first get there, as well as the burnt body outside the locked door. If you're lucky and fast, you can storm in, grab the codes, search the immediate area, and get out without too much risk.
  
• Even if you don't have the wire cutters, the collapsed entrance to the Roman Tunnels that you can crawl under is a no go zone for the Stalker. He can in fact drag you out and kill you if you haven't crawled all the way through. But if you can get through, he won't follow you in at all, which can help in a pinch (thanks KidMonkeyKing). While you're screwing around in there, the Stalker might decide spawn inside the Arsenal and break shelves before you can even get in.
  
• Take a look through the door window to the Clerk's Office to see if there's a inventory bag on the desk to see if it's worth prioritizing breaking in.
  
• Before you head through the Arsenal door, take a look through the bars of the explosives cage and through the open door to see if there's a rat body right outside the door to the dynamite. Plan accordingly.
  
• If you can, be ready to burn bodies before you enter the Arsenal door.
  
• Keep an eye on how you can move around every indestructible obstacle and how the Stalker is likely to break the wooden shelves that open space up. I consistently have to wait behind the shelves right inside the Arsenal door for the Stalker to come in from the outside, break the wooden shelves in the middle, and then I'll have to circle around to the right to get back out the door.
  
• Watch for frag grenade traps near breakable shelves. Opening up space could be more important than staying quiet.
  
• Bringing in a brick can help you bypass rat bodies and open up loops. I like to break the shelf that has fallen on top of the explosive barrel in particular.
  
• Your loadout when you're committing to the Arsenal run can make or break it. I personally prefer to go in over-prepared if possible, medkit, lighter and molotov, gasmask, and wire cutters while picking up throwables from the traps along the way.
  
• Going in with the wire cutters can make your life a lot easier, no longer have to make loud jumps just to move around. The throwables are nice, but you have a lot of capacity to screw yourself over with bad throws and random gas canisters around, so use discretion.
  
• Going in with the gas mask is a nice security blanket I'm more likely to have than not.
  
• If you have more frag grenades than you need, going in loud and blowing up every possible shelf you can blow up might give you a surprising amount of space to work with.
  
• When you have to push the box off the table to progress, keep a hold on the box as it falls and it won't break, making less noise and you can push it up against the nearby hole
  
• The section with sandbags and barrels can be particularly killer. You'll want to burn any bodies and disarm any traps before you have to deal with any issues. If the Stalker is near, be as patient as you can, keep your ears open for what direction he's going, try to deal with obstacles before he gets close, and try not to over commit. He's likely to helpfully break down shelves to give you space to move.
  
• Having the bad luck to get a rat corpse right before the door to the dynamite can end your run if you aren't decisive. The louder ways to deal with them could bring in the Stalker, and if you aren't ready you could easily get cornered. If you save a healing item or diversion item, you can sort of clamber over the boxes on the left to enter, but not to leave; then you can use the item on the way out. Try throwing a grenade or flare into the explosives cage and hiding near the boxes outside. The Stalker will scare away the rats and go check inside, leaving you a free route out.
  
• The loop around the barbed wire and barrels can be your lifeline here, especially if you disarm the traps and/or open up the way to the alternate way in the corner to the explosives cage.
  
• If you have to deal with the corpse loudly, you'll want to either move in quick and grab the dynamite and leave, or retreat back to the area around the barrels and barbed wire to wait and see what direction the Stalker decides to go.
  
• If you find a gas grenade, consider saving it for the Arsenal. If the Stalker is approaching your position when you get to the explosives cage, it might be the only thing that saves you from being trapped. If you're lucky enough to have the gas mask, this just might be your smoothest, quietest way in and out if there's a rat corpse blocking the door.
  
• It's probably not worth breaking into the supply closest at the end of the Arsenal labyrinth. There's barely ever anything in there, and you really don't want to call the Stalker around here.
  
• Do what ever you need to do to get through the slog back. If you have the resources or can scavenge something off a tripwire trap and the Stalker is still in your way, it's worth throwing something loud behind you then getting out of the way.

• You already probably have your approach, but here's mine. Once you drop in, set up your exit, get to the slightly open door, peek, aim, and wait. Keep an ear out for his rhymes and your heartbeat to get a sense of where he is. Remain patient, and don't move (and try not to shoot the hallucinations). He'll fire about randomly, but he won't know where you are. If you need to, try throwing a bottle or two into your kill zone. Don't get impatient and don't get out of cover. For me, he eventually wanders by, not noticing you. With a little luck you can take him out with a clean shot to the head.
  
• If you only hit him in the body, he'll retreat and it might take a long time to convince him to wander back over. Just remain patient and wait for him to come back.
  
• If you can get a lock on his position and you know for sure he's in one of the rooms and not the hallways, you can move in and camp near one of the doorways. Maybe make a noise somewhere past your position so he doesn't just leave out the other way.
  
• Pay attention to the heartbeat proximity noise since it also works for the Shotgunner too.
  
• It's your decision, but I prefer not to use the gasmask; sound for me is more important than not seeing the hallucinations.
  
• Don't forget the inventory slot and the rabbit doll
  
• If you can't find the gun, uhhhhh good luck. Before you enter his active zone, try to set up the area so you can escape easily. If you can't get lucky with a grenade or molotov, you'll have to either stealth it or bum rush your way in. Listen carefully to where he is as you move, and be decisive with whatever method you have to break down the door. There should be a brick somewhere here, and the Shotgunner might have blown down the door himself if you really don't have anything on you.
  
• On your way out after grabbing the plunger, you can actually stack up boxes and barrels to vault over the barricade in the middle of the entrance hall, but make sure he isn't near when you start dragging things around. There should be a large wooden shelf with two medium boxes, you can pull them down on top of each other to create stairs to jump up. If one falls off the other, you might be able to pull in an upright barrel as the taller stepping stone.

*Or whatever it's called, the Ruins, the Abyss, the Arena, etc.
If you get this far, just remain calm and stick to what's safe and what works, no need to get fancy and screw it up right near the end. Nothing below should be all that new to you, but I'm putting it here for completion.

• Like with the Shotgunner, I do the same thing every time, the plan only failed me if I failed the plan. Go in with the doll and as many grenades as you can carry. Throw the doll onto a wooden bridge section, then throw two grenades as the Stalker closes in. Either wait until he's distracted by the doll, or throw it before he gets onto the bridge for best results.
  
• If you miss or mistime (he'll often change speeds and move unpredictably), you'll have to go on a merry chase around the various bridge sections, desperately trying to throw the grenades at just the right time to not die and take him out. Be conservative and stick to running until you're absolutely sure you have enough time to focus and time the throw.
  
• Try to plan your attempts and not box yourself in by collapsing the wrong bridges.
  
• Even if you collapse part of a bridge section, there might be enough left to jump to the other side
  
• It turns out that after everything Henri went though in the Bunker, he learned how to do a pullup. Though you obviously don't want to risk it if you don't have to, you can make longer jumps than you think to the grab onto ledges and mantle up.
  
• That bridge section that gets rubble dropped on it from the ceiling when you first enter the area is still completely traversable.
  
• If you run out of grenades or were forced to spend it all just to get to here, you still have a chance of survival. Kite the Stalker around until you get enough space, then get to the exit, push the taller box close to the exit wall for as long as you dare. Run away, kite some more, push some more, until the big box is close enough, then repeat the process with a smaller box. Jump out and away. I found that if I led the Stalker all the way to the entrance and ran back to the exit, I had enough time to push both the tall and short box without having to abandon them and run another circuit. If you somehow end up with more molotovs than grenades, consider starting with this plan and boxing the Stalker out with fire while you push boxes. Remember that you can pull up the stone drawbridges with the nearby valves.

And so you made it. To the end of the guide at least. I thought I was just transposing my single phrase notes from the Steam Notes thing into a guide, but suddenly my evening is gone and this happened.

All these tips could be more indicative of my personal playstyle than of any objectively better strategy, but I hope they help you see the game from a different perspective, and give you something that makes the game a little easier. Maybe you managed just a bit more progress, or maybe even finished the game. Maybe you play a more dead men's aggressive playstyle, sprinting to the finish. Maybe you crouch walk everywhere and are even more cautious than me. If you have any personal tips on how to play at max difficulty, let me know and I'll see if I can't include them with crediting.

Thank you.