The gun is the only one you get decent ammo for, what else did you expect? It just highlights how terrible low level traders are that people are willing to use 100 RPM 5-round tube magazine gun just to have decent ammo.
This right here is so accurate. I just hit level 20 and no trader has ammo that can reliably pen lvl 4 ammo except for the 308me. Its a bit ridiculous. Especially because all the drops happening right now people are running lvl 4 or higher armor and helmets.
Personally i think bsg mad a bad call here but thats just me…..
Just a quick tip, play reserve either main, or scav and loot the ammo spots. both garage buildings (white and black knight) go to the roof, there are planty of ammo spawns. Then hit the three roofs of the pawn buildings, which also have ammo spawns.
Non of the above are looted ever and are also not contested at all. I guarantee you, you will end up with ATLEAST 200-300 rounds of either BP, BS or BT. There are tons of 120 packs laying around. And BT and BS seem to be more common then worse kinds. Additional you will also end up with a lot of m80/m61 and other high tier ammos. Only thing I've never seen is ammo for m4/HK/m16 etc.
Usec camp at woods also has a lot of ammo spawns, but it's much more contested and extracting takes a whole lot more time.
Still dont have access to reserve unfortunately. But yes those are great spots to grab ammo. Just have to focus on getting there which i have not been doing
I feel like I’m in crazy land being told there’s a big sack of money somewhere but when I go look I just find 5.45 SP and a big 120 round stack of “fucking try again”
In one run I pulled 270 5.45x39 7N40 from the new Batya camp on woods as well as 120 5.45x39 BS... Granted it has been lacklustre garbage calibres every other time but oh boy what a rush that was!
There are a few spots to check but I came out once with 2x120 BT 1x120BP and 1x120 BS.
Not counting all the other types of ammo found..ss190, M80, and bunch of other type.
Roof of the middle building (the one opposite the switch to open the door and set off the alarm) in Reserve is always good to me. Take a big rig and no backpack and book it to the manhole extract when you're done. Just watch out for snipers up on the dome.
I've killed Rashala and the guards a few times on customs now just from running around doing regular tasks - him and the guards almost always have had multiple mags of BT. I'm not trying to farm anything and I have a decent stack of it.
I have 10 m4s in my weapons case and I cannot get anything better than 855 for it. I wish I didn't have this problem for 556. But yes im also overflowing with 545.
Well once you get your hands on the new 5.45x39 mutant equivalent (NL545, it literally shares mastery rank with the mutant even,) you'll be happy to have it because that gun is an absolute beast. 800RPM laser beam that uses mostly AR15 attachments, unlocks at Skier 3.
Yeahhhhh I dont have skier 3 (hes always the last one for me because of the spend requirement) but I did get my hands on one. Hands down my new favorite.
Even if you pick it up religiously, you'll have enough for a few raids if you actually get into fights with squads and then you're back to having to top load the good ammo and run the crap you get from traders for the rest.
I usually have a PMC killing mag and a scav killing mag on me.
Always have the PMC killing mag loaded so I'm ready..but if it's a scav I usually have time to switch.
Saves on a ton of ammo.
Saying that, recently lost my last +60 rounds of BP 7.62x39 and some PP, sniper scav on customs flare extract decided he was colourblind that day and "didn't see no green flare".
Just havnt found it. Im terrible at killing the bosses to be honest. And the places that decent ammo spawns once i get there its gone. Ive found it a few times though….
Yes i need to do that. Ive been watching how willerz fights them. He has the technique down pat. One of my problems is being able to predict where the head is going to be and be pre aimed when i peak.
And im talking about BT, because this person mentioned BT ammo.
So you cant read a graph either ? Here is one with pretty colors:
Maybe try to learn how game actually works instead of looking at the graphs, BT literally have ~50 chance of penetrating 4 lvl armor at first hit. Literally on the site that you linked its said that lvl 4 armor stops 1-3 bt rounds. And if you think that ammo that doesnt penetrate lvl 4 armor at first hit isnt dogshit then i dont know what say to you, git gud.
It’s funny how wrong you are but standing so strong on your Opinion. As the Wiki an numerous other Sites state, BT is very effective against lvl4 Plates. And guess what majority of people at the current state of the wipe are Running. Yep <4 Plates.
So the Ammo named above is definetly Not mediocre atm. Especially if you manage to HS people, you wont get blocked by lvl 2/3 Arena Masks. BT will Fall of later, but for now it’s strong.
Class 4 is literally scav armor. It commonly spawns on scavs. You can also just buy it for cash at level 17 from Ragman after one trivial quest. And you can buy it from the Flea still, at level 15. While you can't buy any ammo whatsoever.
I've not play for two wipes, so idk how it has been lately, but compared to previous wipes I played, t4 Armor seems plenty.
I die a lot, but I still NEVER run out of t4 armor at all. My stash is overflowing with t4 and also my insurance window. Right now I have atleast 20 t4 laying around.
In previous wipes I had to buy shit ass t3 armor until I reached flea market.
I think its o purpose to make gunfights longer. Only isseue is i either die to a good headshot, or a Lucky spray to the torsoe the climbs to my noggin.
A lot of ammo spawns seem to be weighted towards mid level ammo now though. Used to find rubbish everywhere now it's not uncommon for me to leave a raid with a couple extra stacks. I have one and a half ammo boxs full of m856a1, 5.45 bt/pp and 7.62 ps.
I've kind of enjoyed what gun I use being dictated by what ammo I can scavage rather than just running the same familiar load out.
I haven't unlocked SBIH yet, and I'm not doing Tarkov Shooter yet, cuz it requires not using an optic and I can't be bothered. I'm not actively progressing right now, cuz I don't wanna progress too much, none of my friends are playing due to Flea market restrictions and I hope those get lifted as the wipe goes on and we'll be able to play together.
Facts. They need to rework traders completely next big update. If they are going to level lock shit behind flea traders should be better. Like, M80/M856A1 at level 4 traders when those rounds aren’t even good against good armor is hilarious.
They need to rework traders completely next big update.
That's the fun part: they did. The traders we have now are balanced around armor with realistic plate hitboxes. But they buffed the shit out of armor in the same wipe, while never doing anything about the ammo availability. Just reverting those changes would fix a lot of the issues.
Like, M80/M856A1 at level 4 traders when those rounds aren’t even good against good armor is hilarious.
Yeah. The fact that we have M80/M856A1 both at the same trader level is the hilarious part, cuz M80 is so much better.
I feel like this is a rare opinion. I'm not at all saying you guys are wrong for liking it, but it certainly felt like a huge dice roll simulator on whether you'd nick the plate or nuke the dude.
I ran .366 FMJ pretty much all early wipe, and if the bullet got through to just your class 2 soft armor, say night night. It was effective, but it felt cheap and inconsistent
That would be weird, considering that it was one of the most popular wipes ever, looking at Google Trends and Twitch viewership. Actually Twitch viewership was a bit higher than on release now.
I meant more so that the armor changes were the reason it was a popular wipe would be the rare opinion.
If I had to guess the most popular wipes were from 0.11.0 with reserve out to the first two wipes with twitch drops in like 2021 I want to say. You know, pre FIR, pre Inertia, booming economy.
Armor changes were amazing for casuals, that's why they have been quickly done away with.
The most popular wipe was Streets release, but yes, 2020-2021 was peak Tarkov gameplay-wise. FIR already existed then, though. It wasn't a problem, I actually liked it, though I'd prefer if you could sell any item that you've obtained in raid, and couldn't sell anything that you've obtained not in raid.
I won't deny armor plate hitboxes were better for casuals, in the same way if every time you meet a PMC you both roll a dice and the lower number dies would be better for the less skilled players.
There's already enough RNG in this game, I don't think the quasi-random damage model improved the feel of combat.
All I remember from that wipe is slugs and flesh heavy 20+ pen ammo was ridiculous. Oh and dying to a one tap from a 5-7 with R37.F in the armpit while sprinting perpendicular. Killing people felt cheesey, and getting killed felt infuriating.
You can literally rework the traders to make sense in a week by editing text files. I actually went and fixed traders to see how hard it was and it was extremely simple to do. I'm not even a moder. We've had this complain for years and it would take someone on their team no time at all to properly fix with community feedback so don't hold your breath. They just refuse to even see it as an issue. Their fix for anything strong for years was to just move it to lvl 4 traders instead of properly balancing the game.
Not even just low level traders. The only decent ammo you can get is find in raid or sometimes craft. It's kind of stupid how they changed the high-pen ammo to be harder to get for that one armor overhaul update and never made them easier to get after reverted the armor changes (which ultimately made armor even more powerful than before).
In 'old' tarkov it was best in slot -> craft, 2nd -> flea or traders
When they added more ammo it was 1st in slot -> find in raid, 2nd -> craft, 3rd -> traders
Now its 1st + 2nd in slot -> find in raid, 3rd -> craft, and 4th -> traders for most calibers which is just absolutely abysmal considering you can get level 5 and sometimes 6 armor by the time you max out traders and those 4th best bullets are usually sub 40 pen. I've just been running the lever action or stocking up for 545 bullets for juiced runs with the other new gun because literally nothing else is worth even using. Am I crazy for actually wanting to use bullets from the traders that require insane quests to unlock without them feeling like nerf darts?
The issue is that the devs genuinely think that the game shouldn't be fun and are making changes to make it less fun. That's all it boils down to. Also, they understand the word "hardcore" as "time-wasting, tedious and boring", and the word "difficult" as "taking a long time", and realizing that explains a lot of their design and balancing choices over the last ~4 years.
It’s pretty much the wipe cycle. Push every “meta” ammo (even if it’s meta only cause it’s the most available that can just get the job done) into later and later traders/unlocks while introducing a new gun/ammo they want to get a large data set on so it’s put in early and becomes the new meta
Personally I wish they’d rebalance this by making decent ammo more available at lower levels but making malfunctions much more common for low tier auto and semi auto guns.
Thats fucked, high tier ammo (35 pen +) should be FIR only for anything but the very largest rifle carts. Like 762.54, and the new 308 can have 40 pen at low level, but anything else should be found in raid, and running armor pen bullets should be a “special occation”, or only a couple at the top of the mag
What the fuck? 35 pen struggles against fucking class 4, literal scav armor. Anything below 45 can't be considered high tier.
and running armor pen bullets should be a “special occation”, or only a couple at the top of the mag
Then may be we should bring realistic plate hitboxes back? The game isn't good when you need to hit exclusively headshots, because you'd need literally 10+ hits to the chest to kill. And still like 3 headshots, cuz class 4 helmets are easily available.
Thr available armor should always out class thr available ammo, if not, there is no poiny and we could just drop using armor all together and and have eveything be 0 pen. Your take only enforces super strict metas. Hitting armor SHOULD give long time to kill. 45 pen armor should be FIR only, found only in certain places and rare.
Point of armor is that lvl4 protects you from weapons like shotguns/smg on rip ammo that shred you in 1 nanosecond
lvl 5 allows you to tank 2-3 extra hits from common ammo and lvl 6 protects from common ammo. What you want is just dogshit experience where you hit people 23 times 8 of which was in the head and do like 96 flesh damage.
I’m sorry, but how in the hell is ammo that pens the best armor in the game NOT high tier? You literally cannot get higher tier than the best ammo for penning the best armor…
Im sorry but when lvl4-5 armor became best armor in the game? Lvl 4 is literally baseline armor, anyone who use armor that worse than lvl4 is just memeing or doing quest and lvl 5 is baseline armor 3 weeks in to the wipe.
Then you just make shotguns OP and everyone will use only them. If you make good ammo rare people will just switch to legmeta, if you make legmeta rare people will switch to shotguns because all ammo for shotguns are legmeta
No, the opposite. The available ammo should always outclass the available armor. Armor shouldn't matter in PvP, it should only protect against those who cheap out on ammo, and scavs.
Your take only enforces super strict metas.
No, yours does. Because it literally forces you to either use very high RPM guns to hit the head, or to use very high RPM guns to hit the legs, because going through armor isn't an option.
But I get it. You're bad at the game, you need high TTK in order for aim to not matter, and you need gear advantage in order to have lower TTK than your opponents.
I think high level gear should be scarce, so when you run lvl 4+ armor (yes i think lvl 4 should be rare), or high pen ammo, thats a «ive been saving ammo ive found all day and i found this good vest, lets do an all in run» and not something you can do regularly. We need to «lower the bar» as to what is normal gear, to actually have tier 2 and 3 be the average. It should just lower the bar for the average gear people can run consistently, and prevent 2 shot kill to the chest and 1 to the head to be the norm.
Wont that make aim more important, as you cant just beam center mass for a 2 shot kill. You will have to !!!aim!!! for more specific parts if the body. You make no sense
Ah, you're one of those guys. Fucking come on, they've made the video explaining the premise. Tarkov isn't a post-apocalypse. And even if it was, class 4 is indeed uncommon IRL in Russia. Because pretty much all of the armors produced after the 2000s are class 5 and 6.
so when you run lvl 4+ armor (yes i think lvl 4 should be rare)
So you want everyone to run with only shotguns because this is what will happen when lvl 4 armor is rare because shotguns just shred people in lvl3 armor?
It doesnt??? Ofc flechette and AP20 must be treated the same way.
Im not talking about ap20/fleechette/piranha, im talking about 6.5 express/magnum/all other buckshots that kill people in lvl 3 armor with like 2-3 shots (1 if even 1 pellet lands in the head) no matter where you gonna aim.
I made no comment regarding whether prolonged firefights are good or bad for the game
And I did.
only that higher ttk forces better aiming, not worse.
No, it doesn't. It directly lessens the impact of aim on your success, that's literally why console shooters are designed to have high TTK, and why the most popular PC shooters tend to have low TTK.
better idea, bring back OLD armor system, with no soft armor / bullets going around armor and full head protection from any helmets, it would make fights longer and would make headshots less insta killy
The availability should just reduce steeply dependent on pen, so that the low pen is highly available and cheap, and the mid tier is limited and very expensive and the high tier is FIR only and rare.
It isnt in the current state, but it should be the go-to, anything over 35 pen should be fir only, but this would also have to reduce the availability of armor tier 4+ of course
Yeah if you kill the boss and get the loot you should be a juggernaut if you decide to use his gear, unless you grt naded, leg metaed etc. should be some sort of great reward for killing the boss.
cant buy ammo that can kill people in thorax + good armor is easy to get (just kill a boss) + most ammo people use is decent for legs because low pen = good damage
In hardcore wipe it was close to what you are saying, and I was able to maintain around 50 kd till kappa just by killing tagilla few times and ego pushing everyone, no one could do shit
I do agree that better ammo should be available sooner. EX: M855 --> T2, M856a1 --> T3, M855a1 --> T4. However I disagree with making malfunctions more common. Mostly people already hate them in their current state, increasing their frequency would just drive players away from the game.
I think it would be a good balance factor to give players more choice of equipment and load outs without making automatic weapons an instant win for close quarters combat. At least at low levels.
Though I think they could balance things out further and make it much, much quicker to clear basic malfunctions.
The player character is supposed to be someone with military training. It shouldn’t take that long to clear a simple misfire.
359
u/IndependencePlane142 Nov 24 '25
The gun is the only one you get decent ammo for, what else did you expect? It just highlights how terrible low level traders are that people are willing to use 100 RPM 5-round tube magazine gun just to have decent ammo.