If one suddenly turns into a whole pack, then remember: you’re being attacked by phantoms. The real pseudodog will hang back and only try to bite you now and again... Try to identify it. As soon as the real dog is dead, the phantoms will simply disappear.
― Gonta's description
The Psy-dog is a term used to refer to a special type of Pseudodog that appears in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky and S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat.
Overview[]
The Psy dog resemble the regular pseudodog but with white fur and shares many characteristics with its somewhat more common relative. Unlike other mutants, psy dogs are relatively solitary animals, and can be encountered alone or with other psy dogs.
Behavior[]
Psy-dogs will attempt to confuse stalkers with multiple illusions
The most distinguishing feature of the psy-dog is its ability to affect human minds, where it is able to create seemingly live images of itself. These even seem real and solid, as players cannot simply walk through them and they must be shot to be removed. Although they also attack, they deal no damage, but can mask the direction of the real Psy-dog who is attacking the player. When around the influence of a Psy-dog also, the player's vision is slightly brightened, has a few traces of noise in the vision and hears a familiar sound that is also done by Controllers when around them. They do not generate a psi-field properly speaking, even though the effects of its presence on the player's vision resemble that of a real psi-field.
Psy-dogs typically do not directly attack, but instead rely on their generated illusions to swarm and overwhelm prey then attack. Once an unlucky prey is swarmed, the psy-dog will now usually close-in for the kill, who is masked along with the number of images that are also attacking.
Psy-dogs prefer to summon illusions to attack enemies and retreat. The real psy-dog rarely attack, being usually separated by their copies, and only appear if all of their illusions have been "killed", just to produce more false copies. This continues into a cycle until the perpetrators are finally killed. When a psy dog is killed, all of its illusions will instantly disappear.
Appearances[]
Shadow of Chernobyl[]
Psy-dogs can be found in the Red Forest, but rarely they also appear in the Bar area. They stay deep in the forest or near the Brain Scorcher. They do not go onto the main roads.
Clear Sky[]
The player's first psy-dog encounter is likely to be in the Dark Valley, where Lingov hands out a quest to kill a mutant which has been terrorizing the base. Though referred to by the commandant as a pseudodog, the monster turns out to be a psy-dog. Killing it may be tricky for both new players and veterans, as there is no way to determine which of the visible dogs is the real one, and which ones are merely mirages. Shooting a fake dog causes it to disappear, after which a new copy is quickly spawned. It is easy to sneak up on this one however, and kill it before it creates live copies of itself. If the original one is killed, all the images disappear. Another psy-dog appears in Yantar and more appear in the Red Forest.
It can be useful to use the minimap to look for the red dot to target the real one.
Call of Pripyat[]
Due to the improvement on the A-Life and adding in random occurrences, psy-dogs can sometimes randomly be found in the deeper parts of Zaton, Yanov and Pripyat. Two psy dogs can be found around the Stingray 4 wreckage in the Jupiter factory, and another one is scripted to appear in the Oasis when the player retrieves the Heart of the Oasis.
As in previous games, each illusionary psy-dog can inflict significant damage when they attack, more than that of a normal strength Pseudodog. In fact, the player's priority when fighting these mutants is to prevent the illusions from getting close to them; the psy-dog's premier tactic is to drown the player in fake images of itself then flank them while distracted, trapping the player between its jaws and the wall of fake dogs. Getting to high ground can be helpful to fend off these mutants.
See also[]
Trivia[]
- The Psy-dog's psy-emission abilities were adopted from the Phantom, a mutant which was cut from Shadow of Chernobyl. Unlike some of the other cut mutants that have been added to the series, it is unlikely the Phantom will make an appearance as it has now become the Psy-dog's predecessor.
Gallery[]
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