[Guide] Way of the Shadow Blade

Way of the Shadow Blade

Hey guys I’m going to discuss my absolute favorite playstyle and in the process hopefully share additional information about playing the infiltrator.

I love being a ninja so, as you may have guessed already my loadout is Infiltrator, Stalker cloak, Carver. This being my favored playstyle I build the rest of my loadout as follows: Secondary Weapon QCX bow, Tool slot Motion Spotter, Suit Slot Adrenaline pump, Grenade EMP, Equipment Slot Medi-kit, and Implant Enhanced Targeting.

Before I get into the main portion of this guide I’d like to discuss the reason and the weighing of the alternatives and I’ll go through them in order listed.

Secondary Weapons

There are many choices in this category starting with the default Mag-shot, the Rebel, the Desperado, the Commissioner, the Underboss, the QCX bow, and the Mag-scatter. While all of these weapons work great depending on what weaknesses you might want to shore up stemming from your Primary Weapon choice, you don’t get to use a Primary weapon with the stalker cloak so your Secondary weapon had better be able to stand on its own. From this list I would rate the choices into two categories. First category comprises the ones that do stand on their own, the Commissioner, the QCX, the Rebel, the Desperado, and the Underboss. The Mag-shot and the Mag-scatter do not

Having Raxed all these pistols as a stalker Infil I feel that I can accurately speak to the strengths and the weaknesses of all these secondary weapons and while the Mag-shot is an excellent secondary (especially if you primary an smg and your looking to finish that 3v1 and need some extra dmg from a weapon that fires fast and has good dmg with a decent mag size this is a good choice) it makes a poor primary. The main reason is that it takes 5 body shots to kill a non-nano-weave non-infil in a best case scenario range of 10m and under (less with a silencer). On a Nano-weaved Heavy that pops his shield it’s not going to provide you with any advantage that you sorely need against these players. It just takes too long to kill with a Mag-Shot and you end up having to use more bullets than anything.

As for the Mag-scatter I’m sure it’s a decent secondary for some other set up I’m just not sure which one. In all honesty this pistol is largely over-shadowed by the Commissioner. Not only does the Commy have a better rate of fire it has better dmg projection over range and 2 more rounds in the magazine. Even though the theoretical output is 600 dmg per shot every pellet you miss is a minus 100 dmg. About the only thing the Mag-scatter has going for it is a faster reload and a two-shot body kill at about the 4m range and under. Any ranges past that and you’ll be lucky to take down a regular person and don’t even think about a nano-weaved Heavy with his shield on there aren’t enough bullets in the mag unless you are in knife range already. If you like these weapons and they treat you well feel free to use them but know they will be the least competitive choices for the Carver Infil.

Of the secondaries that preform well as a primary the Commy and UB are powerful and popular choices but they lack an important feature necessary to survival behind enemy lines namely the use of a silencer. If you can maintain a successful playstyle even while showing up on the mini-map every time you fire feel free to use them. I’ve even successfully used them to mini-map bait but it’s a poor use of the ammo.

The Desperado, not much to say here that isn’t already known, it’s a great cqc pistol and can be silenced, the problem is it shines in the same range as your knife all the way out to about 12 or 14m at the far end of reasonable effective range. My only issue was that I found myself using it more than my knife since it offered competitive kills in the same range as the knife and farther out too. If you can keep yourself from using it as a crutch it’s a great weapon.

The Rebel, now some people may wonder why I rated this higher than the Mag-shot when it’s only a slight up-grade with the usual trade off of dmg for rounds in the mag and rate of fire. The difference is that the dmg is 250 out to 15m scaled down to about 10m with the silencer. While that may not seem like much of a difference, after the no headshot resistance change it means this weapon can two-shot headshot anyone out to a respectable range. And with a 261 rpm fire rate that’s a max of 4 shots in one second with some room to spare. Slowing that down to manage recoil and you can easily two-shot headshot someone inside of a second or one-shot headshot knife combo them. That makes this weapon a powerful and, in my opinion, an underrated secondary.

The QCX, in my mind this weapon meshes perfectly with the Carver as a primary. The carver is your close and personal primary and the QCX is for that silenced kill with a guy far off, or in a pack of friends. It’s the perfect weapon for keeping the streak going when you find yourself in a tight spot or getting to the target is not feasible because of obstructions. The real beauty comes in when you realized your target has no shields or has less than full shields. When that happens it grants headshot kills all the way out to 35m the more the shield dmg the farther away you can be; you’d be damned surprised how far you can be and still secure the kill. Enemy Infils get one shot headshot out to about 45m that’s quite a ways away! The other thing that makes this weapon as powerful as it is the same reason you would choose a bolt action over a semi auto sniper rifle, one powerful shot and then you can cloak back up. No over exposure time as you try to send dps down range. Where this becomes truly sinister is when you’re in the middle of an open field battle and you tag that one heavy and cloak before he can turn around to find out what hit him. In this scenario he has a few choices neither very good. One, continue on his merry way and hope you can’t peg him again for the kill. Two, attempt to search vainly for you and hope someone else doesn’t gank him. Or three, dive for the nearest cover sucking medi-kits the whole way. Personally I enjoy tagging them every so often to see if I can get them to use all their kits before they find cover, sometimes enjoying the little things can create its own meta.

Which pistol you use should speak to your playstyle and I recommend giving them all a try to see how they work and how they don’t and for me the QCX is a clear winner.

Tool Slot

Tool slots only come in two choices the Recon Detect Device and the Motion Spotter. I feel that either one is a playstyle choice. For me I prefer to know exactly what my enemy type is and have instant knowledge about their direction change. With the RDD only lasting 45 seconds max and only updating an enemy position every 2 seconds and not letting you know if it’s a MAX or a regular soldier I feel it’s an inferior choice. It’s true that it allows you to recon the area and detect enemy movement before you get there since you can fire it like a dart but I tend to just take the extra time sneaking up to my objective. The other added bonus to the MS is that the enemy can see it on the mini-map so it becomes a great bait tool to draw the enemy in a more favorable position.

Suit Slot

Suit slots, will largely depend on what you like personally but I’ll share my thoughts on why I choose adrenaline pump. The first three I’ll talk about are advanced shield capacitor, nano-weave, and flak-armor. These seemed decent enough choices until I stopped to think about what they do. My only issue with these choices is that they don’t work unless you take dmg or have taken dmg.

Nano-Weave Armor: As an infil if your taking bullet fire especially against a competent player and don’t already have cover it isn’t going to help enough to matter. In most cases as an infil with less health than everyone else already you’re only going to be extending your life by one extra bullet. If you’re not getting away because of one bullet you’re not close enough to your egress routes.

Flak-Armor: Taking explosive dmg in this game does happen and frequently and maxed flak armor will give you a whopping 50% resistance to explosives. This can be great for also surviving the odd anti-personnel mine. These are all good reasons but ultimately this suit slot choice just lets you be a little sloppier with your stalker work and you would be better served by just staying on top of your stalker game. I also feel that if you are operating in the correct area of battle namely among the enemy but outside friendly explosive range it isn’t as big of an issue (unless some enemy noob miss throws his grenade).

Advanced Shield-Capacitor: Since you can cloak and stay cloaked until you choose waiting for the timer to tick till your shield naturally does what it is supposed to isn’t a big problem either. It does lessen the amount of time you have to stay decloaked till full but I’ve never found much of an issue with it.

Ammo Belt: This setup’s primary weapon the Carver doesn’t use ammo so it’s a rather pale choice.

Grenade Bandolier: Offers some great utility when paired with EMP grenades when you use them but once you’re out of grenades it’s not doing anything for you unless you go back to a friendly area or find that rare enemy equipment terminal the devs somehow left in the game. I always stalker knife for extended periods of time and found myself running out of emps either too quickly or ended up not using them much at all.

Adrenaline Pump: This is a useful suit slot for nearly all your stalker work since it gives you more speed while sprinting. It’s not a lot but it definitely gives you an edge and with a limited cloak timer while moving the more ground you can cover the better your mobility is and on the battlefield mobility is King! The other perk is that everybody with the exception of shield using heavies and Maxes are capable of sprinting after an infil at the same speed as an infil. That means that unless you can sprint faster you will never gain a distance advantage to give yourself enough time to hit deep cloak before your enemy rounds the corner. From the moment you stop moving and hit crouch it will take you just over a second to reach full deep cloak. The more time they chase the ground you gain and the easier it is for you to find a spot to deep cloak in.

*Gotta vent here* One of the main balances for infil in PS1 was to give us less overall health but allow us to move the fastest of all the armor suits not sure why they gave us less health but the same run speed. Seems a poor design but I’ll debate that later.

Grenade

With only two choices for grenade (mention decoy or its cool ability to fool spitfires and I’ll go on another rant and no one wants that) I preferred the extra utility of the EMP versus something that might give me an extra kill or more if I’m lucky. Emp also meshes well with the QCX as it turns everyone in its blast radius into single body shot kill fodder out to 40m.

Equipment Slot

Equipment choice is similar as well but it more of a toss-up than with grenades since you can have two anti-personnel mines or 4 medi-kits (not going to mention resto since the less time you spend visible the better off you’ll be). With the AP mines if someone is chasing you it can be a nasty surprise for them to turn the corner and looking at their death screen. The more you do it the more powerful a deterrent it becomes in an area. Once you move to a different area however, the lesson needs to begin anew that chasing you is a risk not worth taking. If you have people that don’t care about kdr or just plain don’t learn lessons it’s a trick you can only play twice or worse it doesn’t work at all if they are sporting flak armor. Honestly I feel that with Adrenaline Pump and proper practice you won’t need the AP mines. That said if you find a place where enemies cluster by all means run out there for some nasty surprise deliveries. My personal best is 18 kills with two AP mines; 15 from the AP mines and 3 from a C4 that happened to be there as well all in one run (screenshot available upon request). If you end up running a regen implant the AP mines can make a good choice but I still feel that the medi-kits edge out as a better choice for on demand healing.

Implants

Of all the implants my favorite is Enhanced targeting. Not only does everyone start out with one for free but it comes in two flavors tier 1 with a low energy drain rate but also a tier 4 version for even less energy drain (as of this writing I still don’t have my tier 4 one yet Damn you RNG!). The main reason this is a critical implant is it further lets you discriminate your targets. With only a Knife and a secondary knowing which enemies are close to death and which are not can be vital. For instance, if a max is down to 25% health he is Carver fodder no questions asked. Heavy Assault at 75m away with only a sliver of health, twang goes the QCX string and up goes your kill count. The ability to make an informed target choice is a powerful one. While there are other good choices such as regen for longevity and safefall for parkour and tricking that weird guy intent on following you off every cliff, Enhanced targeting gives you the most bang for your energy buck.

Special note to Sensor Shield tier 3 and 4 they are powerful as well but I don’t consider them strong enough to warrant their level of energy usage. Especially with SS t3 not working if you are sprinting (who the hell runs around not sprinting? And if you do think you got picked up on radar going to crouch and only moving a little will serve you better). And SS t4 lets you sprint until you get within 20m of the radar before you’re picked up. Neither help when falling or jumping; most of the time you won’t really be running into much radar in an open field. You’ll be cloaked as it is and if you are using your own recon devices properly you should know when the enemy is starting to get wise to your location before it becomes a problem.

.......to be continued in the reply

PART II

The Carver

Having talked about the different type of loadout choices let’s discuss the Carver. Aside from having a rather cool design it comes with an alternate mode of fire when wielded that when activated one shots all non-Max enemies aside from a shielded-heavy which is a 2 shot. When not wielding the carver it is slower than a regular melee option for quick knifing. The activation and deactivation of this knife is almost as loud as your cloak sound but doesn’t carry nearly as far. During activation mode there is a slight buzzing or humming sound. In the heat of battle this noise is all but imperceptible to everyone; however in sparse environments, one where you can hear the enemy’s footfalls it’s likely he can hear your blade. I know I can, and have found more than one infil on such occasions because he left his knife on when the surrounding area was too quiet to do so. In these scenarios it’s best to turn your knife on at the same time you decloak for the kill since you’ll be making noise anyway.

One of the nuances with this knife is that unlike quick knifing with a regular melee weapon when you attack it takes about .2 to .3 sec for the dmg to be applied even though you see the animation go off. What this means is that you need to keep the center dot on your enemy no matter what happens for a little bit before you can kill them. It’s honestly a little like having a melee version of the Rail-Jack. One other discrepancy I’ve noticed is that if you’re too close the knife tends to go through the target and the dmg is not applied. I don’t know if they fixed this as I’ve trained myself to find that sweet spot of just close enough and no further but if anyone is willing to test I’d be open. If you do happen to miss your first swing you can swing again much faster than if you were trying to quick knife and it seems to be a consistent rate of fire between swings, so once you get your timing down you can easily burn through 3 or 4 people before they can react. One of the most important things to remember about this weapon is that even with adrenaline pump you cannot sprint after an enemy that is also sprinting and knife them. I have tried every conceivable way of doing this to include sprint jumping knifing then pressing sprint before I hit the ground with no success. Even someone backpedaling is extremely hard to knife, this pisses me off more than anything (personally I think that if you are wielding a knife swinging that knife should not take you out of sprint mode).

Last thing to remember about swinging a wieldable knife is it takes noticeably longer to cloak back up after swinging it. This is because your cloak won’t cycle until the animation is completely finished and your character returns to normal state of ready with the knife out. Let me repeat this again: You Can Not Cloak After Swinging your Knife Until You Settle Back Into The Ready Position! This means you need to be aware that you will have approx 1.2 seconds after you kill till you can cloak again.

Stalker Cloak

Now let’s talk about the cloak. The Stalker cloak gives you 16 seconds of cloak and recharges in 12 when maxed and as long as you’re not moving your cloak will recharge. This lets you stay cloaked indefinitely as long as you aren’t moving. The most important thing to remember about your cloak is that it is not invisibility! Even deep cloak, a state that is only achieved while crouched and not moving is not a perfect cloak people can still see you if they are good enough or if there are enough changes in your backdrop. There are still bugs with the cloak where people see you even though you are cloaked, people can see your magazine if you reload a weapon before reaching deep cloak (move slightly to re-deep cloak your mag), and the whole Slasher knife and the Icikill handle will not go into deep cloak at all if you are wielding either of these melee weapons. Not sure why that’s a bug but it is and I recommend you never wield these weapons in deep cloak or you will give yourself away. Crouch walking and sprinting are both the same level of cloak transparency so unless your wading through bushes or tip-toeing around enemy radar it is always more efficient to sprint to get where you are going as fast as possible and then getting back into deep cloak before you are noticed.

So SideWinder what’s the good news with this cloak? Glad you asked, first outside of 40m if you are cloaked you will not render for enemies (although if a 6x and up scope sees you and you run outside of the 40m range you won’t just de-render for them) sprinting or otherwise. When people spam smoke cloak allows you to not show up on IRNV. I absolutely love it when the enemy spams smoke, it’s like free reign to sprint around knifing like there’s no tomorrow.

Darklight is annoying and a potential hazard but know its weaknesses. If you use darklight be careful about showing it. Most professional Infils I know will make you top on the target list if they catch you using it! You will light up a full two meters from a darklight before the enemy sees you lit up so that gives a bit of breathing room. Many times an enemy swept a room with DL causing me to light up but he wasn’t close enough to me for it to register for him. Once he sweeps a portion of the room try to get behind him to an area he checked already if you can. Also for those friendlies out there be aware that your DL reveals cloaked friendly Infils to enemies also. You prolly don’t notice since we always show up as if we were DL lit to you but believe me we can tell the difference. Once you learn where and where not to hide 90% of people can and will walk right by you without the slightest clue to your whereabouts.


The Shadow Blade

Now it’s time for the real meat of this article: How to be successful as a Knife Stalker. The first and most important skill is don’t die! Har Har Har SideWinder I see what you did there. No seriously not dying is the single most important thing to remember and most people fail at this task because they are used to getting tons of kills in a short time period or they rely on their reaction time and accuracy with a weapon to go toe to toe with the enemy even 2 v 1. That will not work with this playstyle. You need to watch your enemy, you need to understand the enemies flow pattern into and around the area your fighting in, you need to be aware of enemy vehicles and friendly vehicles, you need to learn that spending 7 or 9 extra minutes to flank will be the difference between a low kdr and a 21 kill knife streak that leaves you with an average 3 to 5 kdr, and with access to a maxed out wraith flash or hot-drop ESF there should be no such thing as ‘it takes too long to flank’.

Once you’ve mastered moving around the battlefield with the enemy unaware of your presence and are confident that you can in fact secure the kill on an enemy you’re ready to move on to step two. Step two is always having an escape. When you consider killing someone with your knife even if you are confident you will win the fight you need to have an escape or it’s a risky kill. Once you knife this poor sap then what? Where are you going to egress to? Just because you killed your oblivious target does not mean no one noticed. Especially if he has a prominent outfit tag you can bet he just communicated the death over voice comms. Also with the cloak sound as loud as it is you should assume all enemies in a 60m radius are now aware of you and starting to look in the direction of the sound. Let’s say your target also picks the exact second you swing your knife to start sprinting off so you miss the target and he now knows that a whistling blade just whooshed by his ear. Unless he’s a total nard-bagel he’s going to wonder what that was and turn around with his weapon leveled your way. Once you find a potential target ask yourself if this goes wrong where do I sprint to for cover? I know it seems like a lot to do all at once but as you do it more and more it will become second nature. If you pick your targets and terrain wisely the battle will flow seamlessly from kill to egress to kill to egress and you will find yourself very comfortable with the natural rhythm of the battle.


Terrain and Targets

You’ve mastered steps one and two now it’s time to talk in detail about terrain and target selection. Ideally you are looking for areas that allow you to break contact and line of sight with the enemy at a moment’s notice but with a decent amount of distance between points of cover. You also want areas that aren’t too restricted. The lack of restriction means that the enemy is more likely to spread out. Remember enemies that are clustered closer together are more capable of assisting one another. If the enemies still cluster this is where the QCX pays dividends. Pick a single target and make him your sole mission for the moment. Plink away at him and then cloak back up. Repeat this as often as able till he realizes that even though he’s among friends he’s not safe. Grenades and even EMP’s are great tools for forcing people to spread out more as well. You can also use motion spotters to lure enemies into a trap.

If the enemy has the base buttoned up take that extra bit of time to flank the long way around. You should be looking for those engies on AV and AI mana turrets. Look for snipers on the ridgeline. Watch the enemy armor to see where they retreat to repair then be waiting for the next time they rep to dispatch the driver. You should avoid chasing a running enemy that just spawned along their main flow into the battle because more than likely another enemy probably just spawned a second or two after the first guy did and will be able to gun you down since your back will be to him.

The battle should present you the opportunities or you should help nudge the situation in your favor but as long as you are patient and keep your head you will have a lot of fun ganking the enemy with your knife.


Let me know if you have any questions, tips, or additional tricks I love to hear them


-SideWinder

The enhanced targeting tier 4 is not yet implemented in the game. May your wasted implants rest in peace.

Anyways, lovely guide. If I had the certs to put into this playstyle I'd definitely do it. Bookmarked!

First, disclaimer: I did actually read the entire thing.

Alright, that been said. I don't agree with a few things in there, but I'm not much of a stalker cloaker anyways, I find the ability to be permanently invisible redundant and useless in most cases.

That being said, I think the guide strived a bit too much for a perfect ideal scenario or gameplay all the time, but it had a few good points, and I wouldn't be against suggesting it to someone as a starting point if they were to pick up stalker cloak. I think it does have a few things to change though.

Willing to listen to the points your critical of. Especially the part about stalker being redundant and useless in most cases. Did you mean as opposed to a hunter or NAC cloaker? Or did you mean the class itself? I know I really like infil even though there is certainly a strong argument that others classes can do the killing better. Heck even Mustarde / CondimentActual has taken a break from the Infil class.

That being said I don't understand what you mean by strive to be a perfect scenario. As a stalker cloaker if you're outside your ideal scenario things tend to fall apart, but then that's no different than other setups like using a shotty in a ranged fight or using sniper rifle for cqc inside a room or using an smg to kill someone 100m away. These things can be done but their not very effective either.

-SideWinder

Thanks for the like on the guide!

Can you source that the Enhanced Targeting is not in the game? The implant is displayed as a possibility to have on DA's stat site is it just a placeholder?

Thanks for any light you can shed would hate to steer someone wrong

-SideWinder

Well, I say it's redundant/useless because Hunter Cloaking will achieve the same effect combined with the tool (darts). If you know where enemies are, you can cloak only when needed. I rarely if ever ran out of cloak at a bad time. Hence the redudancy/useless.

Infiltrator is my favorite, and most played class by far, and I personaly think it's the best class to kill once used properly, so it has nothing to do with the class itself.

The perfect scenario was the "escape plan". Often, my escape plan is mostly to "kill everybody" in places like Esamir. There's not always a good escape available. It's certainly something to consider, but to expect to have a fail-proof escape all the time is wishful thinking in my opinion.


The things I would change would be first, the implant. Enhanced targetting only works if the target is spotted. And since even cloaked, enemies can hear you scream when you spot, unless someone does it for you (not something reliable) it's basically the equivalent of uncloaking for any semi-experienced player.

Also, I find adrenaline pump to be useless. Considering how tiny the speed buff is, it's not something you can count on. And if you're close enough to your target so that it would make a difference, then the enemy is close enough to simply shoot you down, or keep running after you until you are in a place he can do so. And if he's far enough that he can't kill you before you turn a corner, then you would of made it just as well without adrenaline pump.

Also, I disagree with the tool which require you to place it at your feet. I find that tool useless except to spot maxes. Everything else you can figure out using your minimap+darts. I can see the use of it in defending a base though, It's great when you'll be staying in one location. But for target-hunting, darts allow you to scout instantly, cover wide areas and not reveal your location. They also don't get destroyed even if shot at an enemy's feet.

Nice title.

We should create a secret order of Infiltrators. We could use our equipment to take out certain targets, such as military leaders, traitors, war criminals, deserters and more. We could change the tide of war however we want it. Our order would exist within every faction, across the factions. Relaying informations and extradition of prisoners.

[plotting intensifies]

It's a nice guide and should help people to get a good start, however there are a few "nuances" that should be changed imho. For me personally using the Crossbow and the activatable knife is a no-go. Even if you intend to only use them separately in a situation where you need to switch from your knife to your crossbow it takes way too long, so I wouldn't recommend it for beginners. The commy is a great weapon, especially for killing infiltrators. While not being able to equip a silencer, if your playstyle revolves around moving around a lot, it doesn't really matter. If you play alone or attack/defend a small base using a motion spotter is definitely a good choice, but if you're in a platoon I'd always prefer the recon darts. If you're sitting on some ammo you can light up the base like a christmas tree.

That's all I can say for know...and it is of course just my personal opinion.

I'll take this in bits

"Well, I say it's redundant/useless because Hunter Cloaking will achieve the same effect combined with the tool (darts). If you know where enemies are, you can cloak only when needed. I rarely if ever ran out of cloak at a bad time. Hence the redudancy/useless."

To be honest since your primary is a knife it seems more redundant to use a cloak that is just going to run out sooner, won't let you wait among your enemies even if you do get in a tight spot, and just lets you use another weapon that takes away from the primary purpose of knifing everyone. And you said you like to use tools to compensate for this weakness many times I will often not use a recon tool if it causes people to be more aware that I am there. If you are in an area where using a tool is detrimental in your scenario you'll be out of luck with only 12 seconds of cloak. Also using the Stalker cloak allows to watch the battle a little without having to worry about a time limit.

"The perfect scenario was the "escape plan". Often, my escape plan is mostly to "kill everybody" in places like Esamir. There's not always a good escape available. It's certainly something to consider, but to expect to have a fail-proof escape all the time is wishful thinking in my opinion."


I think I see what you mean there and I would agree that on Esamir it can be harder but not too much harder. Remember you only need to break los till you can safely deep cloak with Stalker. Using Kill everyone as an escape plan is not always feasible. I prefer relying on plans that I can control most of the elements in not just hoping that a bunch of enemy just happen to be worse than I am. To say nothing of the fact that in PS2 if a vehicle or max or even another soldier pops up at your going to die unless you can escape anyway so you might as well have it in mind before you start the knifing spree.

"The things I would change would be first, the implant. Enhanced targetting only works if the target is spotted. And since even cloaked, enemies can hear you scream when you spot, unless someone does it for you (not something reliable) it's basically the equivalent of uncloaking for any semi-experienced player."

You're half correct knowing not to spot someone 15m from you is indeed important and if someone is close enough to hear you shout the spot then you would have been better served simply knifing them. I meant to use the spotting for targets further out so they can be swept up as easy kills with your secondary weapon if you choose.

"Also, I find adrenaline pump to be useless. Considering how tiny the speed buff is, it's not something you can count on. And if you're close enough to your target so that it would make a difference, then the enemy is close enough to simply shoot you down, or keep running after you until you are in a place he can do so. And if he's far enough that he can't kill you before you turn a corner, then you would of made it just as well without adrenaline pump."

Not sure why you think you can't count on it it works every time you sprint. The difference is small but certainly not unnoticeable. And no the enemy can't run you down that's the point. Plus you only need to run until you can deep cloak. It's more about being able to keep as many corners between you and the chaser until it no longer matters. Often it only requires 3.

If you did not have Adrenaline pump your chaser would chase you down because you have no way to increase the distance. Sometimes you are only a second ahead of your target when you reach a corner. which will not give you enough to to cloak back up.

"Also, I disagree with the tool which require you to place it at your feet. I find that tool useless except to spot maxes. Everything else you can figure out using your minimap+darts. I can see the use of it in defending a base though, It's great when you'll be staying in one location. But for target-hunting, darts allow you to scout instantly, cover wide areas and not reveal your location. They also don't get destroyed even if shot at an enemy's feet."

Not sure why this matters as much with a stalker since you should be able to get to an area you are interested in hunting without being detected any way. Dropping a Sensor takes no real time and there's no reason you should stand on top of it once you have placed it. I do have a point that it does mark a location you had to physically be located for a second but it does no more to reveal your current location than you let it.

Covering wide areas i guess if you fire multiple darts but they only work for 45 seconds anyway and I would happily wait them out and then your out of luck. Much harder to wait out a 4 minute sensor timer. Also don't forget your darts can be destroyed as well I do it all the time to keep enemy infils in the dark.

Then there's the matter that A dart is only an update at max rank of every two seconds. You'd be very surprised how quickly I can move especially with adrenaline pump in that time period . Also if I move in 1.5 second spurts you could end up not knowing my position for 4 whole seconds depending where in the cycle you catch me at.



You get the same amount of darts as motion spotters so over the long term you''l get more radar coverage with a spotter.

An additional tip for using them with this build should look like this: When you get to an area of enemy you really don't want to announce your presence right away just plopping down a sensor or popping off a dart. Kill a few people then you pop the sensor down because you presence is now know by the people you just killed. I'm not a big fan of announcing your presence before you even get there which is what darts do. You might argue that you don't have to go to an area that you dart but then you just wasted a dart and let all the enemies in 100m radius of your dart that an infil is interested in the area.

Regardless of which you choose, and I did mention that it was a playstyle choice, you will not be served by letting the enemy know you are in the area before you've made your first kill. Your first kill should be the first indication your among the enemy if they even notice. A Dart blinking away for 45 seconds or a motion spotter dropped before that does nothing to disguise your presence.

Using recon tools should be reserved until you find yourself in a position where you suspect additional enemies in the area that you haven't accounted for and there is a real chance they could compromise your ability hunt successfully or to identify enemies entering an area you already cleared.

I enjoy the discussion but noticed (other than the recon choice) you didn't bring up any alternative choices to say the suit slot and why you use them. You mention the cloak but I remain unconvinced that the Hunter or NAC would be better for a knife primary build.

-SideWinder

Love the plotting there. I can certainly understand the concern about the QCX but any secondary in the stand alone pistol section will work the QCX is just my preference. I immensely enjoyed both the Rebel and Desperado as silenced options and prefer the Commy for un-silenced work. I guess I just like having the pocket mini-sniper heh heh.

Being in a platoon doesn't really work with this guide this is more of a solo or small team infil group playstyle. In a platoon you are much better served with a different more dmg projection weapon that a primary can provide versus trying to primary a knife.

And I agree about lighting up a base with darts I have over 30k darts fired over my play session. It's very useful.

-SideWinder

I may be in error. I saw a post which said it wasn't put in with the others. I don't actually know anyone who has it, or seen a picture it of equipped, or heard anyone say they have it though. Can anyone post proof it exists?

This thread is awesome! A really cool guide by a player who knows what he's doing

I've enjoyed reading it, and I'm looking forward to doing some knifing of my own. I'll add a link to your guide to the list of useful resources in my beginner's guide.

Guides like this always pump me up to start playing Infil again. And then fail miserably. Until I read another guide...

Ok Thanks to Commander BeanBag I went back through the update notes and he is correct when the T4 implants came out Enhanced Targeting T4 version was not mentioned.

Source patch notes: https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/game-update-12-18.210014/

I still don't have all the T4 so I don't consider them wasted as I'm a bit of a collector.

Sure wish I could edit the guide though lol

-SideWinder

Alright, sorry for the late answer. Anyways, here goes (my answers are green):

"Well, I say it's redundant/useless because Hunter Cloaking will achieve the same effect combined with the tool (darts). If you know where enemies are, you can cloak only when needed. I rarely if ever ran out of cloak at a bad time. Hence the redudancy/useless."

To be honest since your primary is a knife it seems more redundant to use a cloak that is just going to run out sooner, won't let you wait among your enemies even if you do get in a tight spot, and just lets you use another weapon that takes away from the primary purpose of knifing everyone. And you said you like to use tools to compensate for this weakness many times I will often not use a recon tool if it causes people to be more aware that I am there. If you are in an area where using a tool is detrimental in your scenario you'll be out of luck with only 12 seconds of cloak. Also using the Stalker cloak allows to watch the battle a little without having to worry about a time limit.

The use of having a primary would be to have a silenced sniper, or any silenced weapon really; instead of relying on your secondary. Otherwise, yeah, stalker is good. And if your goal is to knife only, I can see that being a nice challenge to give oneself, but it's probably not the most efficient. Using the knife mainly can be efficient, but having a primary to get those longer-ranged targets (or panic moments)is just as good in my opinion (also 1 shot kill instead of 2 shot kill). The stalker cloak does indeed give you more time to watch the battle. I find darts to do a fine job for that though, shoot 1-2 of them and I can see the whole battle quite fast without needing LoS.

"The perfect scenario was the "escape plan". Often, my escape plan is mostly to "kill everybody" in places like Esamir. There's not always a good escape available. It's certainly something to consider, but to expect to have a fail-proof escape all the time is wishful thinking in my opinion."


I think I see what you mean there and I would agree that on Esamir it can be harder but not too much harder. Remember you only need to break los till you can safely deep cloak with Stalker. Using Kill everyone as an escape plan is not always feasible. I prefer relying on plans that I can control most of the elements in not just hoping that a bunch of enemy just happen to be worse than I am. To say nothing of the fact that in PS2 if a vehicle or max or even another soldier pops up at your going to die unless you can escape anyway so you might as well have it in mind before you start the knifing spree.

Indeed, killing everybody isn't always an option, but when there's truly no way out, there's usually a way to avoid that fight. Having an escape plan is indeed good, but I don't think you can expect to ALWAYS have one, or always have a fail-proof one. Which i something I felt the guide inferred a little. Maybe the use of the word "master", I'm not sure. Funny enough but I haven't had trouble with maxes in a long time, I found a way to deal with those and I've never had much trouble since.

"The things I would change would be first, the implant. Enhanced targetting only works if the target is spotted. And since even cloaked, enemies can hear you scream when you spot, unless someone does it for you (not something reliable) it's basically the equivalent of uncloaking for any semi-experienced player."

You're half correct knowing not to spot someone 15m from you is indeed important and if someone is close enough to hear you shout the spot then you would have been better served simply knifing them. I meant to use the spotting for targets further out so they can be swept up as easy kills with your secondary weapon if you choose.

You should add that to the guide

"Also, I find adrenaline pump to be useless. Considering how tiny the speed buff is, it's not something you can count on. And if you're close enough to your target so that it would make a difference, then the enemy is close enough to simply shoot you down, or keep running after you until you are in a place he can do so. And if he's far enough that he can't kill you before you turn a corner, then you would of made it just as well without adrenaline pump."

Not sure why you think you can't count on it it works every time you sprint. The difference is small but certainly not unnoticeable. And no the enemy can't run you down that's the point. Plus you only need to run until you can deep cloak. It's more about being able to keep as many corners between you and the chaser until it no longer matters. Often it only requires 3.

If you did not have Adrenaline pump your chaser would chase you down because you have no way to increase the distance. Sometimes you are only a second ahead of your target when you reach a corner. which will not give you enough to to cloak back up.

What I mean isn't that it's not working, it's just that it's not usefull in any kind of situation. Let me try to be clearer, I'm having a hard time explaining it, sorry. If you just turned a corner, and you expect someone to come running after you, considering your goal is to knife and you got a OHK knife, I find it would be a better idea to pop a medkit (if hp is damaged) and wait a second at the corner and simply knife him as he's coming around the corner (usually a weak moment for players, especially if they are expecting a chase).

If you're far enough that this isn't a viable strategy, you're far enough to get into deep cloak before he turns the corner, or simply keep running to deep cloak at the next corner. The 5% speed won't be a game-changer.

"Also, I disagree with the tool which require you to place it at your feet. I find that tool useless except to spot maxes. Everything else you can figure out using your minimap+darts. I can see the use of it in defending a base though, It's great when you'll be staying in one location. But for target-hunting, darts allow you to scout instantly, cover wide areas and not reveal your location. They also don't get destroyed even if shot at an enemy's feet."

Not sure why this matters as much with a stalker since you should be able to get to an area you are interested in hunting without being detected any way. Dropping a Sensor takes no real time and there's no reason you should stand on top of it once you have placed it. I do have a point that it does mark a location you had to physically be located for a second but it does no more to reveal your current location than you let it.

Covering wide areas i guess if you fire multiple darts but they only work for 45 seconds anyway and I would happily wait them out and then your out of luck. Much harder to wait out a 4 minute sensor timer. Also don't forget your darts can be destroyed as well I do it all the time to keep enemy infils in the dark.

The thing is that darts are easy to refresh, sure, you can wait them all out, but by that time, I'll either be done with the area, either I'll be dead. Also, consider that as you spawn at a sundy or a base, you can shoot 3-5 darts around to cover a big area, quickly ressuply and then go on your way. You could even drop a motion spotter on-spot at wherever you ressuplied (switching to darts won't remove it). That way you get a 45s extra for dart-coverage, a motion spotter to help your team at the spawn point (or yourself depending on the area) and you can see a way bigger area.

Yes darts can be destroyed, but nobody does it. If you shoot them on buildings, towers, trees or the such, they are way harder to see/shoot down, and most players don't know you can destroy them. I'd usually see anybody trying to shoot my darts down, and if I can't see them, I'll just shoot another one, knowing there's someone to watch out for. And I will know where that person is because they will be at the location to kill my dart. So it makes for a swift revenge

Then there's the matter that A dart is only an update at max rank of every two seconds. You'd be very surprised how quickly I can move especially with adrenaline pump in that time period . Also if I move in 1.5 second spurts you could end up not knowing my position for 4 whole seconds depending where in the cycle you catch me at.

You can shoot multiple darts if you really want more intel, but in general, 2s is more than enough. if you can see the map, you can guess the direction they are going, which is also going to be confirmed by your dart in a second. I never had any issue with those. also, adrenaline pump is 5% faster, so I know you'll be 5% farther ^^

You get the same amount of darts as motion spotters so over the long term you''l get more radar coverage with a spotter.
An additional tip for using them with this build should look like this: When you get to an area of enemy you really don't want to announce your presence right away just plopping down a sensor or popping off a dart. Kill a few people then you pop the sensor down because you presence is now know by the people you just killed. I'm not a big fan of announcing your presence before you even get there which is what darts do. You might argue that you don't have to go to an area that you dart but then you just wasted a dart and let all the enemies in 100m radius of your dart that an infil is interested in the area.

Well, I usually use darts in group of 2-3 and shoot them in wide places to cover a lot of area, so people know there's someone "somewhere", which doesn't help them. Never made anybody go on high alert. Also, considering that darts can be shot from insane distances, it doesn't say much except that there's an infiltrator somewhere within 250m or so. People usually go by the mentality that the one killed by that infiltrator won't be them anyways.

Regardless of which you choose, and I did mention that it was a playstyle choice, you will not be served by letting the enemy know you are in the area before you've made your first kill. Your first kill should be the first indication your among the enemy if they even notice. A Dart blinking away for 45 seconds or a motion spotter dropped before that does nothing to disguise your presence.

Since I'm darting all the time, darts aren't really an indicator of anything anymore, they are just "there". Also, once I died once, people know I'm there anyways, so I might as well give myself every edge I can. Which means covering a huge area and knowing exactly how many and what path they are going to take.

Using recon tools should be reserved until you find yourself in a position where you suspect additional enemies in the area that you haven't accounted for and there is a real chance they could compromise your ability hunt successfully or to identify enemies entering an area you already cleared.

I'm addicted to recon tools, I use them all the time personaly.

I enjoy the discussion but noticed (other than the recon choice) you didn't bring up any alternative choices to say the suit slot and why you use them. You mention the cloak but I remain unconvinced that the Hunter or NAC would be better for a knife primary build.
Nanoweave armor's the one I'm using. Simply because it allows you to take way more bullets, also makes the most of your shield and your medkits. I can see why someone would use a grenade bandoliere, though. ASC I find not to be worth it, it's quite nice and all, but cloak will usually keep me out of trouble for the time needed before it recharges.

Nice work! If I may suggest anything at all (aside from a couple nit-picky things), it would simply be to condense the guide. It's really well-composed, just a bit lengthy (but yes, I read the whole thing!). A series of infiltrator guides is in the works (I have completed the Sniper's Guide, which can be found Here and CuteBeaver is working on the Camo guide). It would be great of you to let us (and by 'us', I mean the handful of people working to get this series put together) include a proofread and condensed version of this! Credit will, of course, be given where credit is due.

Until then, have a like!
Stay Fr0sty

Yeah I have to say this is really well done. Its perfect for someone getting into stalking, which is especially great since we have the PS4 launch coming soon. So many people dismiss the power of knife. I would recommend encouraging EMP's with bando for squad play however. That just seems common sense - but that enchanced targeting has been a huge help on my wraith flash as well. Slim I'd hold out and wait for him to write about the new Blackhand before you do the mega source guide thingy. I have a feeling Blackhand going to be very amusing in the hands of stalkers.

As far as progress goes Slim. Daybreak fixed the "camos cost money bug" on PTS, they are back to the price of 1 cert. To get around the issue of TR / NC videos being added later, ill just make a master playlist we can link to for the guide. Then insert faction videos as they are created.

You guys should probably consider doing what I did - create your own website with guides. There's little point in writing guides on forum, since you won't be able to edit them, and they will not be stickied anyway.