Faction relationships

[53 & still gaming]

I really don't understand the factions relationships. As blurry and hard to follow as the main story is, it seems that BY CHANCE I have sided with Strelok and now all are against me.
My favorite city, Malachite, which was unpopulated lately, now seems to be populated again (but I get headshotted as soon as anyone spots me). The same with the chemics factory and the other faction.
Do I have any chance (besides Rostok) for a sophisticated city where the Tech can upgrade my equipment ?

And HOW THE HELL can I talk to a leader again to calm down the upset faction(s) at all ?

[sunflower]

Originally posted by 52 & still gaming:

Do I have any chance (besides Rostok) for a sophisticated city where the Tech can upgrade my equipment ?

Yaniv? Pripyat?

Originally posted by 52 & still gaming:

And HOW THE HELL can I talk to a leader again to calm down the upset faction(s) at all ?

If you progressed through certain point in the main quest you can't. Your relationships is permanently ruined

[Pythagoras]

I teleport to Yaniv or Rostok for repairs. Or the friendlies.

I just did a second play siding with a different faction and there are tons of story/movies/material that differ from previous one.

At first play I was also annoyed but I gave it a chance. It was worth it.

[Lucius Caesar]

its my understanding that there isn't really a faction relation system per se, its just tied to your story choices.

[53 & still gaming]

Ok, understood. So this means when I side with Strelok, I have basically no Malachites anymore (Scar?) and of course no Chemical Plant (overseers). Was not to Yaniv and Pripyat yet. Looking forward to a new merchants hub.
Not sure about the story and its turns, though. I never intended to offend the Malchiate scientists. With what decision did I do it ?

[More_F16s_To_Ukraine]

Originally posted by 53 & still gaming:

Ok, understood. So this means when I side with Strelok, I have basically no Malachites anymore (Scar?) and of course no Chemical Plant (overseers). Was not to Yaniv and Pripyat yet. Looking forward to a new merchants hub.
Not sure about the story and its turns, though. I never intended to offend the Malchiate scientists. With what decision did I do it ?

My guess is your decision to side with Strelok was the trigger.

In my first playthrough, I tried to be neutral as much as possible, yet quite often Duty guys outside and far from camps were openly hostile or at least marked with those red triangles, which combined with somewhat chaotic spawn of various faction NPCs (aka, Monolithians, Mercs and whatnot) around the player led to unnecessary escalation (haha).
And with me being neutral and stuff, even earlier in the game, after I had the Ward badge and I WAS let into their territory in the Chemical Plant, I could not have crossed a certain invisible trigger without them attacking me for no reason 🤷🏻‍♂️

And thank you for raising the question in the first place, will subscribe to wiser commenters 👍🏻

[Deranger]

And remember proper Faction relationships was only ever in CS and it was really poor; game took years to make a better experience in terms of Faction interaction.

S2 has too much ambiguity with lack of information about different groups and your standing however. And AI do not react to the surrounding situations too often.

Having a fire fight while another, supposedly friendly to you, group walk through it as if on a jaunt is rather jarring at times.

[Deranger]

Originally posted by 53 & still gaming:

I really don't understand the factions relationships. As blurry and hard to follow as the main story is, it seems that BY CHANCE I have sided with Strelok and now all are against me.
My favorite city, Malachite, which was unpopulated lately, now seems to be populated again (but I get headshotted as soon as anyone spots me). The same with the chemics factory and the other faction.
Do I have any chance (besides Rostok) for a sophisticated city where the Tech can upgrade my equipment ?

And HOW THE HELL can I talk to a leader again to calm down the upset faction(s) at all ?

Game world reacts to choices you made (the Strelok thing is totally clear in the dialogue) and position in the Main story.

My own take from day one was Side and Exploration first, Main mission last. With this I came across fewer bugs/situations forced by evolution of story. Completed as a Spark supporter and now at Pripyat again with the Ward focus ( everyone thinks you are an ass for it in the game

Not looking up where anything was and exploring naturally made this game SO much more enjoyable for me. I realise a lot just look at "where everything good is" and completely miss out on the actual experience. Finding cool stuff naturally adds so much more, if you miss stuff you don't notice and care. This is probably why I played CS and CoP wrong and completed both in less than 50 hours combined! (100% all loot spots and gear and situations).

FYI: Malachite and Chemical Factory are Ward/Scientist factions (Scientists side with Ward). So if you went the Stalker/Spark/Strelok route/choices you will be more the enemy of Ward/Scientists; there is consequence to your actions.

[Othobrithol]

Originally posted by 53 & still gaming:

Not sure about the story and its turns, though. I never intended to offend the Malchiate scientists. With what decision did I do it ?

Some of this you only see on the Ward side, so I've tagged it:
After the second assault on Duga, the Ward places a squad at Malachite.. They are the ones that are shooting at you. During the events after talking to the representative, the leader of Malachite is shown to be working with Spark. Control is handed over the whiny vendor and she starts running things by the book eg no missions or discounts on services.