Loner and Bandit Factions Are Silly

[Preacher]

This has always bothered me at least since Clear Sky. Why are these sort of Stalkers grouped up together in such generalized factions?

Why would some yayhoo who wants to rob people call himself a bandit, dress like a bandit, and paint a target on his back? If he was part of a specific gang, that'd make sense. Does this mean what we currently define as "loners" never want to rob fellow Stalkers? In fact, what does he have in common with other stalkers that puts him in the same faction?

Imo, Loners and Bandits should not be in a general faction that determines their behavior. All outside of mercs, duty, freedom, or the military should be considered independent stalkers if not in a specific gang. One should be just as afraid as getting robbed by a "loner" as he would a "bandit" bc in reality random strangers aren't gonna be so black+white.

tldr: get rid of bandit and loner factions and focus on individual behavior

[PsyWarVeteran]

Video game factions and all that, and the game actually succeeds pulling this to the sort of gray area instead of "good" and "bad". It's not like we haven't seen someone call themselves a loner robbing people before.

[Hunter_02]

It's way easier from a technical perspective to assign NPCs a faction and tie a pool of certain outfits to that faction, instead of randomly generating that somehow for the individual. Also, remember, we're talking about games that are almost two decades old. The concept of asset variety was not really discovered back then, and even if it was, it would not have been available to a small Eastern European development team that had to work with a budget of approximately ten dollars and a high-five.

Regarding the iconic faction patches: Even as somebody not aligned with a faction, it makes utter sense to have a loner patch on your shoulders.
I do agree with that being nonsense for a bandit, so that's indeed illogical.

But if a Freedomer would look through the scope of his SVD rifle and see a masked fellow hightailing it towards them, it would be critical for him to know whether that fellow is a Duty soldier (therefore hostile) or just a random Loner running away from a wild boar. With a patch, the allegiance of an individual is plain for all to see, and I'd say that is preferable in most situations. Therefore, portraying yourself as part of the "Loner" non-faction is somewhat essential to your prolonged survival.

Also, as PsyWarVeteran has written before, there are a few occasions throughout the games where it's possible to make honest deals with Bandits and where Loners double-cross you. Deception is certainly a part of the games storytelling.

Also, let's dig a bit into the lore:
Sidorovich is the unofficial leader of the Loners. He has a massive financial stake in all of the Zone's exports, which consists mostly of artifacts. It's said he even has a monopoly on that.
Loners, to Sidorovich, are walking dollar (or rather, ruble) signs. They gather the artifacts he sells to the outside world at a huge markup. If somebody would start to kill Loners - his workforce, in a way - Sido would have the means to send a hitman or a squad after the killers.
Not that he immediately dispatches somebody whenever a loner is killed by a bandit somewhere, but if that becomes too much, he definitely will do something about it.
All that is another benefit of symbolizing the fact that you're not aligned with any faction.

On the plus side, as evidenced by certain screenshots we've seen thus far, they're going to make outfits more diverse and hopefully a bit individualized in the upcoming game. For instance, there is screenshot of a fight at the Pumping Station in the Great Swamps, (presumably) depicting two bandits or renegades, one dead on the floor wearing some kind of red jacket or shirt with a plain armored vest over it, the other one wearing darker clothing and a hoodie with stripes on it (certainly no reference to certain sports clothing brands at all).

[Cryptic]

Bad guys tend to wear black. This is been a stereotype for about as long as human society has existed. I don't know why you were picking on stalker for having the bandits dressed in black when it can be seen all throughout media everywhere and even in the real world

[marie pavie]

Originally posted by Preacher:

Why would some yayhoo who wants to rob people call himself a bandit, dress like a bandit, and paint a target on his back?

Maybe they do it to annoy you?

[Preacher]

Originally posted by Cryptic:

Bad guys tend to wear black. This is been a stereotype for about as long as human society has existed. I don't know why you were picking on stalker for having the bandits dressed in black when it can be seen all throughout media everywhere and even in the real world

Okay lets forget the cliches and tropes of mass media and think about reality here. Just because someone wears black doesn't dictate their personality. EVERYONE can be a threat, even the people wearing normal clothes.

If you were in public and saw some rando wearing a big fat sign that says BANDITO and a ski mask with a gun drawn, that wouldn't be very smart would it?

@Hunter Fair enough for the technical perspective and possibly lore. More focus on threats from every rando would make the game more tense and the stakes higher, though. Good to see there will be more diverse gangs and outfits.

[76561198192726397]

long story short its organized crime with a hierarchy, pretty much the russian mafia.