The Fringe Settlers are another force that emerged after the apocalypse. What makes them different from the other factions is that they have learned to live in harmony with the new world, with the Forest.
Background[]
They take their name from the fact that their main base is located at the border between the Forest and safe territory. Many people don't understand how it could come about that a Faction could be located on the very border with the Forest.
Rather than being scared they learned to live in harmony with it and the Forest the same. Their main idea is that the Forest may not always be dangerous and that one can co-exist with it. As opposed to just simple survival, they treat it as a religion. They have symbolism, things that simply cannot be explained rationally, and they use artifacts very frequently.
The Fringe Settlers are known to believe that in the future mankind will be able to live in harmony with the Forest. So they defend their beliefs, convince other forces of that and demonstrate by their own example that the Forest will only be aggressive to those who show aggression to it first.
Equipment[]
The equipment of the Fringe Settlers is special in that the gear helps one survive in extreme conditions; in extremely low temperatures, anomalous impacts and so on. They're mostly focused on surviving in anomalous conditions.
Their more advanced suits are a sort of hybrid between man-made things and certain supernatural materials which the Fringe Settlers harvest from the Forest.
The faction's armament largely consists of Warsaw Pact guns with certain elements of NATO weaponry. In particular, their weapons are usually customised using harvested materials such as amulets and animal skins wrapped around the guns.
A settler carrying an M4 variant
A pair of settlers transporting a rare sample
Low-tier equipment concept art
Stalker concept art
Black Market · 
Fringe Settlers · 
Renaissance Army · 
Scavengers