ZemX

Yeah, I'm aware of that, but solutions like Creative's Alchemy or IndirectSound were supposed to wrap those APIs and redirect them through their own implementation. And it works for a lot of old DS3D games, but not this one apparently. You can install the Alchemy DLLs in the game directory but it still doesn't "detect" the capability. It must be doing something non-standard to decide that 3D audio isn't available and so it leaves the 3D Audio selection grayed out. Ah well, It's not a huge issue. Just one I was curious about. I'm playing around with the Creative sound control panels to try to tone down the peaks a little and made some of the sounds less annoying without having to dive into individual wave files. It's a little better. Thanks everybody!

I assume since nobody in two years ever responded to this the answer is probably no, but I figured I might as well ask. I keep playing around with audio. I have tried Alchemy as well as several registry hacks related to it found for other games, and can't get the 3D Audio option to un-grey. Anyone else have the magic solution? I otherwise just set Windows to stereo and get at least some left/right separation of sounds in the world. It's not a super big deal but there are certain sounds that are tremendously annoying. Like they are implemented without location at all so if you are in range of the sound it is just blasting max. volume into both ears (I game on headphones). Rushing water in sewer maps, the giant PI teleportals, and the overhead monorail are a couple examples. I just started an Ice Melee character and literally feel brain-freeze when I draw the Ice Sword, it's so damned loud. I can't just turn down overall volume or else everything else is too quiet. I guess I will play with dynamic range in the sound drivers or something. Anyone else with similar problems or is it just me?

Okay, that makes sense. Thanks. Also, I don't want you to think I was giving you a hard time about Regen being a meme. This entire AT was a meme, once. Still loved playing one, even then. 🤪

Really appreciate all the work, Croax, but I'm a little confused by the secondary rankings in this one vs your other guide thread. You didn't give a ranking there but to take just the most glaring difference: There you called Rad Armor "one of the best secondaries across all ATs" but here, you put it in C tier. You also seemed a little more positive on Electric Armor and Willpower there than here. And the worst you said about Regen was "Not a bad choice, but not great either." Here, it's a... meme? 😀 Has your opinion on these just changed that much over time?

Yeah, but it's getting that nerf. Hopefully they do as one person has already suggested and at least up the radius to 10 in exchange for "fixing" the crit. But even then it will be a set with just one AoE unless they give it a little love similar to EM. Though it would be simpler to swap in Repulsing Torrent for one of KM's "too many" ST attacks. Do the same with Martial Arts. Though KM is newer they both suffer from some old-school thinking of what Stalkers were supposed to be.

Oh man, I had NO idea what I was doing when I started the Staff/Rad. It just sounded like oddball fun at the time. But... two relatively good recharging 10ft range/radius AoEs in the primary and two PBAoEs in the secondary, one of which (I think) can hit up to THIRTY targets? That one is practically a guarantee of Assassin's Mark on a big team. I sometimes can't hit Build Up fast enough that I don't end up wasting a proc. Can't imagine how you'd keep up with a set combo that has even more AoE than that.

Then don't do it. Optimal attack chains don't matter a hell of a lot in practical day-to-day missions. If you're competing for DPS on a pylon or attacking a very tough enemy, they can matter. But a typical boss or LT? Not really. If you aren't standing around waiting for an attack to recharge, you are doing fine. And if you want to have a little a-typical Stalker fun, try to fit Presence->Provoke in somewhere. This will solve any issues you have with enemies scattering while soloing and comes in quite handy, I've found, on teams for gathering up strays who might be attacking the support. Plus that whole "Ah ha!" bring-it animation coming from a Stalker is just fun to watch. Though obviously you'll want to go easy on it until you've built some decent defenses. If you really wanted something that's more one-vs-many, you'll probably have to go to a different primary. I've been having a lot of fun with Staff Fighting, but any primary with at least two good AoEs (that aren't ridiculously narrow cones) will make attacking larger spawns a lot less painful. Elec/Shield is said to be a monster in this regard as well, with not only a few big-hitter AoEs but some synergy from Shield benefitting from having more enemies clustered around. But I find Staff a good balance between AoE and Single-Target goodness that it still feels like a Stalker, just one that isn't afraid to take on ten enemies at once. Staff/Rad is surprisingly good, I've found, when IO'd to improve on what the set already does, which is resistance + regen/absorb. I have some added defense but didn't attempt to hit soft caps on anything. It's a layered approach that is so far a hell of a lot sturdier than my Staff/Nin who is soft-capped to positional but little else so far. In any case, lots of fun playing in a very scrappy fashion but still able to sneak/kill when called for.