Scavs are actually legit scary now on popular maps like reserve or interchange, and you'll run in to gangs of like 3+ of them relatively frequently if you stick around for too long on your PMC.
Seriously. I've been fucking around on reserve for the past few days now, a mixture of doing the task required without the keys and just hunting raiders to hunt raiders, or glue.. I've done this before in the past, but now? It's a fucking tower defense to secure the raider bodies. Literally fight the raiders, win, then wave after wave of fucking roaches just keep coming. Legit, one of the most fun things I have ever experienced in Tarkov. Some of these player scavs have been sneaky as fuck. It's not that it hasn't happened in the past, but it's every time now. I use to be able to kill a bunch of raiders, and honestly not worry about much and get out. I'm under the conclusion that majority of it, aside from loot, is looking for the rep bonus for killing a PMC that has kill scav/guards/bosses.
The biggest problem is scav betrayal can lead to a complete shit storm of karma problems. Some one player running and jumping around, not sure if PMC or not, shoot to kill. -0.05 Fence. Now the scav NPCS all kill you and you have to fight your way out. -0.02 per dead scav on your way out if you survive the silent spawning shotgun scavs. So now that you just tried to defend yourself you're up to -.1 or worse fence rep all because you played Tarkov the way it's meant to be played. Shooting people that could murder you.
I like the IDEA of the system, but they need tweaks. Obviously having a reason to not just blast all scavs for extra loot when scavving is a great idea. The problem is the negative karma can really fuck you fast and hard. My scav rep is like 0.89 or something, but my friends is like -1. So he has like +20 minutes and sometimes spawns in with just a pistol. So now when he spawns in mid lobby and has a pistol, he HAS to betray a scav to get an AK or Hunter or something so he can potentially kill PMCS. It's like the opposite of what they want. They're giving him more reason to kill NPCS.
I think it'd be cool if +rep just had MAJOR bonuses and there was a bottom out for karma, but not a hole you could just keep digging. I've never been a scav blaster, but it's kind of dumb that they have this whole thing built around not shooting people. That's literally the entire point of Tarkov matches. Blasting before you're blasted.
Just gotta follow the ROE. Don't fire unless fired upon; lol. I haven't had any issues personally, and I have managed to kill player scavs that have either attacked me or killed my friends. I have also died to player scavs too as a scav, usually white names. Unless I'm crazy, and it shows white no matter what.. But as per usual, I'm in the mindset it doesn't matter because I lost nothing.. And if it is a high ticket item, I'm usually pretty decent at getting out without getting got. I think I've only ever died once as a scav with a gpu and that was in the wild west era of scav lifing.
I find that the PMC or player scav can be a bit difficult, but there are some key things that helped.. One being armband, since it's now an unlootable/permanent attachment; it's the first dead giveaway. I've killed a few PMC because I see either a red or blue armband. Another is, as a scav.. Learning scav voice. I use my mumble a lot. On the flip side, if I'm farming items for a task on my scav.. I usually go woods.. Twice now I've stalked someone in the distance for a good 10minutes trying to identify if they're a scav or a pmc.. Both times I couldn't find enough evidence to make an attempt.. But I enjoyed stalking them, following them and watching from afar.. But ultimately a bit of a time waste.. There is also relatively distinct paths a PMC usually goes, while it's only a percent of the actual PMC playerbase; it's atleast distinguishable enough as a player scav moving into those areas for the most part. Which is usually a mixture of knowing timings, and what a person would be doing/going in said areas.
Funny story last night, when I was running all the markers and jammers on shoreline.. I was at the villa, I was trying to locate an ai scav for AKM kills.. Friend was helping me find him. A scav runs up about 10 feet, wiggles at me.. I wiggle back, asking if that is my friend. He's telling me no, and I'm realizing why would my friend be wearing a ushanka hat. He starts to run off, I start to laugh and unload into him. Keep in mind I'm wearing a shatter mask, and diaper armor rig(white armband and muscle bear shirt). This also happened awhile back to my friend when we were sweeping for Tagilla. Scav wiggles at friend, he wiggles back.. Another friend comes around the corner blasting killing scav.. Friend of player scav comes flying out in a blaze of glory to getting gun down. Honestly; it's just an amazing system.. Flaws and all. I feel the interactions have grown significantly versus scavs just killing other scavs all the time. #stopscavonscavviolence
Just have your friend grind some vehicle extracts while doing tasks, we got my friend from -1.3? To .4 np. Grouping with friends as a scav is infinitely easier too because a lonely scav is less likely to open up, eventually you'll be able to command scavs too.. So it will get better.