S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl – Zalissya Quest Issue Workaround Guide

Warning! This guide contain spoilers so read it on your own risk.

How to Fix Zalissya Quest

By Deznam

Short Guide

The best way to fix zalissya quest is to use UETools -> UETools_Ghost to go inside and a console command to kill all the monolith inside FIRST. Do not talk to anyone or it breaks the quests.

Once you do so, the npcs will relax and the doors unlock

When you go to leave Gaffer will pull you into dialogue, and you’ll get the quests and defenses to trigger.

If you force them with talking to Gaffer or force it with the quest command, you won’t get the various vendors sidequests and the defense quests won’t complete correctly.

Also, during the defense, some monolith will sometimes go into the building, you need to use the kill command on them before you finish the defense quest (Gaffer asks to speak to you inside).

Honestly, waiting for the patch will be best for this one, but it is because hostile npcs spawn inside when you enter the town that the whole side quest chain is broken. Any hostiles inside, or outside, even mutants, will force the doors to remain locked and prevent the quest from triggering.

Final Note

Depending on how many loners die during the defense, Gaffer will either say it was a defeat or victory when you talk to him inside afterwards, but as long as you have this conversation, Zalissya should be saved in my testing. It just results in some of the named loners who were in the defense to be dead or not obviously. I didn’t end up with any subsequent radio transmissions about it falling.

Long Read

The only way I got this to work was by doing the following:

• Go to a save before even starting the quest to defend Zalissya (I had a save where I still needed to talk to the professor at Noontide, and already received the initial radio call to come aid Zalissya. I proceeded to finish the professor conversation which required ghosting into the bunker btw and then head to the east checkpoint)
• First go to the checkpoint to the east of town, there is a NPC Kolya Green holding out, and he has a PDA about Uncle. Clear the POI then proceed to town.
• When I arrive at Zalissya after the radio messages, clearing the checkpoint, and the side quest is available/not already activated, the doors are locked and there are a bunch of monolithians inside as friendlies.
• Install the UETools mod and enter “UETools_Ghost” in the console to clip inside (You can use “UETools_Walk” to leave the ghost mode.) Do not talk to Gaffer or anyone.
• Use “XKillNPCInRadius 500 -99999999999999999999999999 -1000” in console near the monolith soldiers to kill them all inside. You might need to do this multiple times if they are scattered around in the former Ward building, just get in the middle of them and use the console command here.
• Once all dead, friendly loners will relax and start going outside, this unlocks the double doors.
• When I went to leave the building Gaffer pulled me into his dialogue to start the quest. I could then talk to Warlock as the optional, and proceed with the quests to help Hampster and Lens (This isnt marked. Talk to the medic guy).
• Do not leave the town until Gaffer gives the resulting speech. It will be after the final wave. He asks you to come back inside to chat in the left room. I only had success if I went around and killed every enemy and the couple that got stuck again inside. After the speech, I never had a problem at all.

I didn’t need to use the teleports or anything along those means, and I was able to complete the defense.

Edit: If any hostiles are around, the doors lock, so make sure that there are no enemies in town. You can tell if you are stuck in alert (red bar on your compass).

What broke it whenever I tried prior to this was ghosting inside and talking to gaffer to try to force it, or using the quest advance or quest trigger state commands, They “completed” the main defense quest but I couldnt talk to anyone, the cutscenes bugged and I never got to do the lens or hamster quests.

Even when I went and did the Teleports, it never reset the town hall or anything and no matter what would end with the failure radio call.

Sorry if it didn’t work for you. I tried several other fixes, this one took me like 3 hours and multiple attempts to work.

All I know for sure is that:

1. You have to use the killnpc command on the monolith inside the town hall to unlock the doors and make the loners relax and get to their routine. If you do anything that triggers or affects the quest before they’re gone, it breaks it.
2. Do not talk to gaffer to start the quest, he should suck you into the initial dialogue.
3. The attack waves (one on the iconic overlooking hill, the other which is the actual big battle) sometimes took a couple minutes to trigger, so you stand outside waiting for the quest to advance with no indication or warning.