Enemies are bullet sponges and the player character is fragile

[Slammyn]

Literally keeping myself in cover and popping out and burst firing enemies. Some are still standing after 4 plus shots. I get shot once, maybe twice with armor on. I'm bleeding out, it takes ages to bandage, so most of my health is gone. Then you have to use a med kit. All while the enemies that you shot repeatedly are still chasing you, with no blood loss or having to retreat. I never understand why devs use such silly mechanics. It doesn't create tension. It just plan annoying. I would not recommend until some changes are made.

[Dan]

If the bandits and enemies went through the same thing as you when shot or hurt? Then I would be all about it, but yeah as you say now it's wacky.

[Dragoonseal]

I regularly mow down bandits with just a few bullets from the KEDR SMG using the standard PS ammo, and it's one of the lowest damage weapons in the game. A single sniper shot will do the trick too. So generic bandits are super squishy, but some enemies like hunters and the village boss Lazar and his guards are much more armored and definitely soak up a lot of bullets if you don't use an ammo type with more penetration. I'm guessing the Solider faction is better armored too, but I always leave them alone.

The problem is it's hard to tell at a glance who is actually armored or not. You kinda just have to learn the hard way and die to hunters or Lazar to get the idea.

[Kau5tiK]

For the multiple shot issue, you need to select the right ammo. 7.62 x 39 is solid and the basic PS rounds will kill most things in 2 shots. When you find better 5.45 & 9x39 variants you'll be able to use those guns more reliably. As per meds, take note of those you can use while moving vs not. I always carry the bandage type that let's me move as well so that I can get to a safe space to deal with a bleed and bigger healing. Don't get me wrong, it's hard and you'll die lots but above might help a bit. Happy hunting.

[Coffee]

Originally posted by Judgementk:

Literally keeping myself in cover and popping out and burst firing enemies. Some are still standing after 4 plus shots. I get shot once, maybe twice with armor on. I'm bleeding out, it takes ages to bandage, so most of my health is gone. Then you have to use a med kit. All while the enemies that you shot repeatedly are still chasing you, with no blood loss or having to retreat. I never understand why devs use such silly mechanics. It doesn't create tension. It just plan annoying. I would not recommend until some changes are made.

The game is Tarkov inspired, so yeah, bullet type matters a lot.

[Slammyn]

@coffee I understand that completely. Just my opinion, but Tarkov's mechanics don't belong in a game designed like this. The distance that the character can see in Zero is laughable. Taking inspiration is fine. But don't over do it. I've played Tarkov. I don't remember the healing mechanic being so annoying. This reminds me more of a rogue lite shooter, than a game inspired by Tarkov.

[Imp0815]

I had the same issues as you describe but Ammo types REALLY matter, let me just say you will encounter hordes of enemies that have gear on par with the bandit boss in the village and without BT ammo i would not have killed them. Range is also really important the scopes are really good at taking out unsuspecting bandits. You need to develop a feeling when and where you will encounter enemies and always use the aim function to look ahead where you are going. Corners will be your death always stay away from them and try to swoop around with distance.
Later you will find a better anti bleeding remedy that has like 2 seconds use time.
The beginning is hard but after a while you will have the an easy time clearing sawmill and from there on you should be knowledge enough to encounter everything else.

[StankLocator]

100% percent, and unlike tarkov or some first person game you cant make up for it with skill as much since head shots don't exists.

[ScullsnBones]

Bandits? pfft.. go down easy, have you encountered 27 wolves all at once, on every single trip to extraction?

[Lockin277]

Originally posted by ScullsnBones:

Bandits? pfft.. go down easy, have you encountered 27 wolves all at once, on every single trip to extraction?

That nightmare. in may case i chase by 10 Wolf, like 5 Ghoul, and 2 Blinker and the best one i'm out of bullet

[Lockin277]

Originally posted by Judgementk:

Literally keeping myself in cover and popping out and burst firing enemies. Some are still standing after 4 plus shots. I get shot once, maybe twice with armor on. I'm bleeding out, it takes ages to bandage, so most of my health is gone. Then you have to use a med kit. All while the enemies that you shot repeatedly are still chasing you, with no blood loss or having to retreat. I never understand why devs use such silly mechanics. It doesn't create tension. It just plan annoying. I would not recommend until some changes are made.

The enemy need some arrangement, i even never see them bandaging or reloading after chasing. but i must say that was minor problem, when you get better armor they just a rat. The real problem is mutant, spider, and wolf. They attack 100% make you bleeding, i mean i'm using best armor and 1 ghoul make me 3 Bleed in single attack ? Oh, Come on

[Vitec001]

even soldiers , lazar are squessy . 2 shots with sv 98 ( armor pen ammo) or sd val. think lazar need 3-4 shots. Everything else die with 1 shot in the forrest.
Industriel area crimson need 2 shoots with val or sv 98 and other high end weapons with scope.
I hate the most rats. little fast things that still hits you hard , speaking of bleeding .

I saw the enemys realoading ( or at least saying that they reload) but also drinking and eating.
But mainly beacuse i most one shot kill them so no need to reload for them :)

[inigo montoya]

If you had played for longer you would have found many different fast healing items or even trained skills high enough to increase the speed. If you got all of this at the start there would be no feeling of progression and would get boring quick.

[g.scott.b]

Enemies do need to stop and reload. They even tell you they are doing it.
They also do other animations that put them at risk just like when you need to heal.
You are likely referring to the harder boss type enemies or higher tier characters with good gear, not just armor but also prefight meds.

[=M$= Oroberus]

Originally posted by Judgementk:

Literally keeping myself in cover and popping out and burst firing enemies. Some are still standing after 4 plus shots. I get shot once, maybe twice with armor on. I'm bleeding out, it takes ages to bandage, so most of my health is gone. Then you have to use a med kit. All while the enemies that you shot repeatedly are still chasing you, with no blood loss or having to retreat. I never understand why devs use such silly mechanics. It doesn't create tension. It just plan annoying. I would not recommend until some changes are made.

Ye-No not really but kind of if you 'suck'

The fragility of the player comes down to the health pool (upgradeable through hideout kits), armor protectionm (Class I and II are paper ...) and ammo used by the enemy (AP ammo does lesser damage while HP ammo while penetrate less)

So if you're not upgraded and still only got CI or CII armor, you're ♥♥♥♥♥♥ quickly.

Same goes the other way around, if you use AP ammo against soft targets, they'll soak quite a bunch of bullets, just as if you're using HP ammo on hard targets.

And on top of this ... where you hit also counts ;)

If your enemy has not shown a helmet on their sprite, go for HP ammo and headshots, they'll literally oneshot them

EDIT:
Also, maps have difficulty regions. See that big light grey block in the forest? That's the lowlife sector, soft targets, low quality guns with no upgrades on them, you can literally take them out with a Makarov

See that dark grey grid? That's the boss area, beside a lot of Ghouls you'll find there, the enemies have higher armor class and not only upgraded weapons but outright better weapons (like the AS VAL).

I tried for 3 hours straight to tackle the hard area because I didn't know, had no chance what so ever ...
Another 2 hours later I had run the easy bandits for at least 5 times with lots of loot, crafting parts etc and was able to buy me some nice stuff, which enabled me to go after the hard bandits with ease.

EDIT 2:
Also, quests, go for quests, they pay great and are very easy in the beginning and will give you a kickstart

[Sklizzmo]

its the armor, dog