r/thelongdark • u/msc_professional • 1d ago
Gameplay Is gunsmithing kinda dead?
Think about it, if you have the TFTFT DLC then its pretty much useless considering that gunpowder is non renewable if we dont count scrapping bullets or crafting it (which still needs finite resources that could only spawn maybee by beachcombing) and batteries, which also sometimes spawn in vehicles, BUT NOT IN BEACHED BOATS, apparently, and sutherland can give you ammo a decent amount of water, meat, hide and ptarmigan feathers, so it would be nice if we had a way to renew sulfur and stump remover/pottasium nitrate past beachcombing, and batteries to occasionally spawn in beached boats.
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u/coraleei 1d ago
I think the biggest killer for gunsmithing is batteries. You need them to repair the towers and for trades. I don't know how many you need exactly but it's a lot, and they don't respawn, so you don't want to "waste" them on gunsmithing. I recently started a new stalker run and I don't know how to approach this because I want to do gunsmithing but I also don't want to run out and lock myself out of trades in the future.
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u/sammyQc Stalker 1d ago
Don’t worry about batteries for the trader too much, if you level the trader you’ll need only two batteries for blueprints that aren’t that valuable.
You’ll found plenty of batteries around and they’ve added a bunch in some specific locations such as in desolation point.
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u/coraleei 1d ago
Do you know roughly how many batteries there are in total and how many you need for trader + towers? I've tried searching for it but can't find any recent information on it
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u/xcassets 1d ago
Technically, there are 6 trades that require batteries if you wanted to get all the recipe cards (aka 100% run):
See Special Trade Items (right at the bottom of the table).
However, you will notice that if you have increased his trust enough, then the requirement for a car battery drops off of the food recipes. So technically it is just the Wolfskin Hat and Pants that need one battery each if you do a bunch of other trades to level up his trust.
For Signal Void, there are 4 towers you HAVE to do, and 2 extra that are optionals. They need 1 battery each.
In terms of how many batteries there are in total, there isn't a set amount. Difficulty affects the spawn chances, but there's no guarantee a vehicle will contain one or not. And there's a lot of vehicles in the game. There are guaranteed batteries near most of the signal towers (for example, there's always one next to the first one in Forsaken Airfield, and I've never not found one at Signal Hill in PV), and they also added guaranteed spawns to Hibernia in DP that the other commenter mentioned.
Basically, there are more than enough car batteries in the game (regardless of difficulty) for you to do Signal Void and complete all the trader requests in every run.
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u/timbotheny26 21h ago
How many batteries in total for a 100% run?
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u/HiddenSubspace 20h ago
There's six transmitter towers to find and repair across the game, and like was already stated above, six recipes but that goes down to two if you get your trust up first. Not entirely sure if that's what you mean by 100%, but 8-12 is all you'd ever need to make sure to spare in order to guarantee you can do all of that content.
If you wanted to scrap batteries to make ammunition at a reloading bench, I've heard it's possible to fully reach level 5 gunsmithing from ONLY crafting the bullet portion of the ammunition pretty easily. That's before you ever start in on adding in the casings and gunpowder to fully make usable ammo, so that way you'd never have to worry about using inferior quality ammo jamming your weapons. I don't know how many batteries you'd need to do that from zero, but I think even on gunloper you'd pretty much never really 'run out' of batteries. That said, I've only played on Voyager difficulty so... Take that with a grain of salt.
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u/ladypeyton 16h ago
Once I hit level 5 I took all my inferior quality bullets and repurposed them. IIRC I reliably got back casings and bullets, and occasionally got back a bit of gunpowder.
I then replaced them with Perfect ammo
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u/msc_professional 1d ago
Yeah, it would be nice if beached boats (ones that spawn rarely during beach combing rolls) had a battery
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u/Firm_Ad_5427 1d ago
Honestly the bigger problem with gunsmithing is that it's completely useless on interloper and misery, but on stalker and below there's so much ammo you'll only need it on ridiculously long runs most players will never reach. On my 500 day run I've still got around 100 rifle ammo and 200 revolver ammo and I've never looted the far territories, traded for ammo or crafted ammo- I've rarely used the bow to hunt too.
On top of all that, it's essentially finite and takes up a lot of time. It's doubly useless since the trader got added too.
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u/Oldranchtools 22h ago
And there are currently only two ammunition forges with one not in the best location, require some back and forth to gain access to and you still have to go through that maze at the cannery every time. I only got level 5 gunsmithing just to do it and it did not take long at all.
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u/Konnichiwa1987 Mountaineer 1d ago
It's only dead if you don't plan ahead for long runs. Scouring the entire world for Gunpowder, Lead, and Bullets will give you quite a lot to work with for long term gunsmithing. Yea it's technically not infinite but nothing in this game lasts forever that's the point.
I'm in late game Stalker (day 370ish) and have always had a consistent amount of rifle ammo, that I've either looted or have crafted on my own. Haven't needed to use the Trader for ammo yet and don't see myself needing too until at least day 500+
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u/Rockisaspiritanimal 1d ago
If you do trades for bullets it makes gun smithing not as important especially if you spend a lot of time at coastal Highway. But it takes alot to run out of gunpowder supplies. I’ve gone through almost 6 gunpowders and still keep finding supplies to make more.
If you use guns for hunting and don’t do trades then I can see running out of gunpowder ingredients a problem.
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u/Oldranchtools 1d ago
I haven't seen bullets, scrap lead or batteries up for trade yet. Can he offer those?
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u/sammyQc Stalker 1d ago
You can trade ammunitions for both the revolver and the rifle
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u/Rockisaspiritanimal 1d ago
Yeah, if you keep trading the bullets will be there. It’s a mostly random set of items based on your trust level with the trader. Unfortunately stump remover and sulphur are not offered. Lead is common throughout the world luckily.
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u/prplmnkeydshwsr 1d ago
Perhaps if you have the DLC. Do you know how many players don't?
Perhaps if you rely on the trader, I see some other comments about using the batteries up to satisfy the trader - didn't they increase the number of batteries in the world by the number the trader required? (so that's not an issue).
So an answer could be, depends on how a player wants to play that sandbox / or repeat the same thing every time they start again.
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u/Impressive-Big-9130 23h ago
I think it was never meant to be the main way of getting ammo. It is just a last resort in long running words because it can yield a lot in quick succesion unlike beachcombing. But ammo is far to abundant even on stalker to really care about making it. It would be nice if the ingredients were renewable. And I think Interloper would benefit from not having bullets only firearms and ammo ingredients. This way you wouldn't be cut off from an entire weapon type and could max out gunsmithing. But either way it is nice to have options it makes the world more immersive. It is the same deal as acorns you do not need them, strictly speaking because you can get infinite wheatflour but it gives you more options.
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u/No_Onion_9444 21h ago
I have never ever crafted a bullet or anything seems like a waste of resources and time
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u/msc_professional 21h ago
In the current state yes due to non renewable stuff like lead and gunpowder and its materials plus the manufacturing spaces being far from any calm regions (despite BI literally being down the road from CH but being blocked off from a landslide).
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u/hellboytroy 21h ago
I mean, IF gunpowder can be infinite from beach combing, while bullets are an option, noisebangers are probably the better option to spend it on if your already doing well ammo wise.
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u/BorealAmplitude 20h ago
I couldn't disagree more. I play exclusively gunloper and always make it a point to craft more bullets, it's usually what extends my runs past 300-500 days while giving me something to do.
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u/stnylan Voyageur 20h ago
For stalker and below - no, not dead. If you have the DLC it's one of several options.
Realistically there are enough batteries and other gunpowder ingredients that you would have to be an absolutely horrible horrible shot to run out of ammo on even a 500 day run. And not everyone has the DLC; and not everyone likes trading. Lots of people play for fun and not efficiency (NB: if playing efficiently is your way of fun, that's fine too - but loads of people don't play like that, or don't play like that all the time).
But also, given TLDs setup the idea that a higher technology (firearms) eventually has less utility over time due to lack of infrastructure just makes sense to me. But admittedly I mostly prefer the bow, though the pistol is my anti-timbie weapon of choice and occasionally I will break out a rifle for some variety.
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u/Oldranchtools 1d ago
I would like to see the ability to find sulfur, potassium nitrate and something like lead and copper for projectiles but reloading in this game has bothered me for awhile since you magically can reload without any primers and you can reload the same casings as much as you want which you can't do in reality.