This guide is not meant to contain spoilers or to fully guide a new player. For a full beginners guide visit this guide. This guide is only meant to give a new player a base from which to develop their own playstyles. In my opinion, the scariest part about Misery is not the difficulty of combat, but the difficulty of finding out where to start. I believe that this guide will both give a new player a firm start while still not giving away any of the cool secrets that misery has. There should be no spoilers at all.

Now I personally picked recon, but for the purposes of starting out, it really shouldn't matter. But as we'll be primarily using shotguns, technically the sniper class would be the best. Also, snipers are pretty good for dealing with bandits and other hostile NPCs, so it's a pretty good class in general. Plus, the sniper starts with a sawn-off shotgun, which isn't great but it's a start.

Now I'm going to assume that you can make it to the Skadovsk. If this is your first time in the mod, it's very likely that you've just talked to beard and saw a taste of the insane amount of new items in the game. And they're all expensive. And your stuff is worth nothing.

Perhaps you tried to go artefact hunting and were burnt to a crisp immediately. Perhaps you were rekt by several psy mutants around Zaton. Making money seems impossible with all these hazards guarding the good stuff.

Never fear. There is a way for even the poorest stalker to make ends meet. And that is to slaughter as many 4 legged mutants as possible, and sell their guts.

So going back to your weapons. If you're a sniper, you have a sawn-off. This is good enough for hunting fleshes and boars, and the occasional snork/dog. Kill as many as possible, and buy ammo from Owl if necessary (buckshot is relatively cheap).

Good places to hunt are by the Izumrudnoye (circusy area) and the gas station. There are usually hoards of fleshes. Just be careful of snorks.

There are usually lots of fleshes by the skadovsk too for the more lethargic hunters.

Sell all of the non-food parts immediately to either beard or owl (whichever pays you more). Save all the food parts, as they can be cooked and sold for a much larger profit later.

Now this will take some time to make at least 10000 rubles, but ideally you're killing the occasional bandit or discovering a stash or two while out hunting. You are saving up for a stove, which will greatly increase your profit ratio.

So now you have about 10k, and you can finally afford a gas stove (do not buy the charcoal stove at any point. You will not be able to profit with it, as the fuel is too expensive for how much you get). Buy it from Owl, he sells it the cheapest.

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"But Floof, now I have no money! I can't even afford potato!" I know, but believe me, now you will be making mad money. Next, you should sell a bit more stuff and buy a jerry can (the 8 litre one).

http://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=828494580

Since you can resell an empty jerry can for 187 rubles, the real cost is 1422 rubles. At 8 uses, each cook will cost you 177.75 rubles.

Fortunately, cooked food sells for substantially more than uncooked food. Here are the prices for cooked boar and flesh meat (uncooked meat shown for reference).

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As you can see, a significant increase in profit than if you just sold the raw meat.

However, there are some types of meat not worth cooking (either due to poor profit ratio or non-profitable). Here they are in order of least bad to most bad:

dog meat
pseudodog meat
---------------------------- not profitable below this line
snork hand
tushkano meat

To cook food, you need the following in your inventory:

The stove
Fuel for the stove (the hot plate requires high tier fuel, which the jerry can has)
The meat to cook

You then need to double click the stove, then click the fuel source you want to use, then select the meat you want to use, then select "cook".

Once you get yourself enough money, you can buy yourself real double barrel shotgun and hunt bigger game, like bloodsuckers. If you're quick on the draw, a double barrel can shred almost everything when used properly. It is genuinely a solid weapon, only outclassed by other shotguns (which cost a lot to repair and have no class).

Once you get a solid system down, you can now save up for anything, even those expensive suits!

Which weapons should you use?

Well you'll be using shotguns alot. At close range, they tear trough flesh - and can bring down any mutant if you're quick enough. TOZ-76 is your go-to early on. It's cheap, reliable - and can fire buckshot rounds easily. One shot to the face is enough to stop any daring beast. A regular double-barreled shotgun will cost you 10k roubles. Pricey, but a must.

Rifles are worth noting since hunting from afar is a good choice also. It's less risky, and as long as you find a good scouting point, just point and shoot - and go loot them. Anything will do, but an worn SKS is easy-enough to find, and it'll do wonders. Be sure to be ready to turn around at every moment, with a rifle you lack the pure power at close range needed to shut down any blitz attacks.

Ammo is expensive, so aim well.

(NOTE: In many cases, the chimera is an exception to rules such as (mutants can't do X). Those guys can get you anywhere.

Save after skinning any animal if you want to be really careful. If you die and reload before skinning an animal, the loot will re-roll and it's possible that it will not have any loot.

If you come across a freshly killed carcass, do not immediately skin it. The killer may still be nearby, and skinning it may end in death.

Snorks (and every mutant in general) are never alone. If you kill one, the others are probably nearby, waiting to pounce.

After killing something, stand by it and check your surroundings. Only skin it if the coast is clear. Many times I've died to a flesh that was nearby.

You can't use height advantage against a snork. Even the oil pipes near the skadovsk are unsafe. They can leap up there and hit you.

Height advantage is usable against everything else (except psy mutants). Even (outdoor) stairs work, although sometimes dogs can traverse them. Shoot them at your leisure, but don't run out of ammo.

Fleshes can easily be killed with the knife if they are trying to attack you. Just backpedal and right click when they stop to attack. They can't hit you if you backpedal. I do not recommend this with boars.

At the start, your armor is worthless. Take it off. You'll need the stamina. Keep it on, even if it's destroyed. It gives you encumberance bonuses and lets you carry stuff like camelbaks.

Avoid the Scar anomaly and the merc areas at the start. There are often many bandits and mercs here, and you often get shot from high places.

Bloodsuckers are overrated. Once you kill one, the fear should disappear. (But don't take on the bloodsucker lair).

If you see a shootout, stick around. Then you can loot the mutants AND the dead Stalkers.

Different merchants pay more for different items. Owl pays a lot for repair based loot and luxury items (eg maps, jewelry, PDAs). Dead stalkers and bandits may have these items, and they can supplement your pig profits. Beard pays a lot for Mutant parts and general items (eg food, camelbaks, AAM/AAC/IAC). The medic guy pays a lot for medical supplies. When in doubt, check all 3 for their buying prices.

Always carry some cooked pig and smokes. You don't want to go hunting on an empty stomach.

If you are on a hunting spree and Beard has run out of 8 litre jerry cans, Owl sells some for slightly more.

Boars and Fleshes are the best animals to hunt. They're plentiful and have tons of loot.

Don't hunt Chimera. They sell for a lot but they cost a lot to take down. Also they hunt at night and are usually hunting dangerous mutants, which may come after you.

Once you reach Yanov, you can sell the non-food bits to the scientists for slightly more money (or a lot more for the higher level mutants like controllers and burers).

Buckshot is all you need. Don't buy slugs.

If a flesh is running away from you, you can't catch it without shooting it.

When in doubt, run from a mutant. It's less likely to catch you.

Pseudogiants can be easily hunted as long as you pay attention and jump when they thump the ground. Draw them toward stalkers for more loot.

Don't mess with a pack of dogs. Unless there's a rock.

Invest in titanium frames when you can, as they allow you to carry more loot.

Depending on your class, you might get that gas mask with the two circle eye slots If you can get the right tools for technicians, the night vision mods are very useful for night hunting. It's also got extremely good psi upgrades, and comboing it with marijuana will allow you to get close enough to take down psi-mutants blocking your path.

Sell lesser meats listed in the previous section as is. They're not even worth eating.

Once you reach end-game, you can finally get yourself an eco suit and farm anomalies. But hunting is still funner (in my opinion).

Once you get the Bulat suit, non-psy mutants are trivial (except chimeras and pseudos). You can sit there and get mauled all day while taking virtually no damage.

The purpose of this guide is to help a new player find a niche in a rough spot with almost literally nothing. It should allow any player to branch off in any way they choose off of the profits of hunting.

If anyone should want more specific details on hunting areas/techniques for certain mutants, let me know in the comments.

Added information to tips regarding Chimeras. Changed or removed tips with bad info. Floof

Removed duplicate tip on Chimera. Modified tip on Gas Mask (assumed every class got same gas mask, was wrong). Modified tip on height advantage. Added tip about late game suit (Bulat suit). Floof

Fixed typos. Added important information to certain tips. Floof

Added a new author. Floof

Added new formatting to every category. todorb

Added the ''Weapons'' category. todorb

Improved some readability in the ''Money Making with Stove'' section. Added new content to the ''Weapons'' section. todorb