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Lets Fuck Bro
Apr 14, 2009
drat, so I'm stuck again in Fallout 2. I finished all the sidequests I could find in the Den and went off with Sulik and my new, crappy buddy Vic to Vault City (I'm guessing that's my next destination). The trip there is loving brutal though, almost every random encounter destroys me. The guys who carry Hunting Rifles use them to kill my PC in like 2-3 hits. What am I missing, I have some decent guns (me with a magnum and hunting rifle, Sulik with a sharpened spear - I gave him a SMG but he just kept killing Vic - and Vic with a pistol), I just get hit for 18 damage a few times and then that's it. My armor is a pretty nice leather jacket that I found somewhere.

Lets Fuck Bro fucked around with this message at 08:43 on Aug 12, 2011

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Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer

Grand Fromage posted:

We played a lot of Tactics multiplayer in college. You had to set house rules to make it fun. A whole slew of weapons were just banned outright (like Pancor Jackhammers with flechettes), which fixed the majority of the problems.
I really wish Tactics had a co-op mode for the single-player campaign. Me and a friend would certainly have loved it, though we tend to play very patient games of Civilization as well.

Grand Fromage
Jan 30, 2006

L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?


Mordaedil posted:

I really wish Tactics had a co-op mode for the single-player campaign. Me and a friend would certainly have loved it, though we tend to play very patient games of Civilization as well.

Oh man, that would be total loving chaos. Ianing the poo poo out of each others' guys constantly. Why did you put this idea in my head?

Cream-of-Plenty
Apr 21, 2010

"The world is a hellish place, and bad writing is destroying the quality of our suffering."

Lets gently caress Bro posted:

drat, so I'm stuck again in Fallout 2. I finished all the sidequests I could find in the Den and went off with Sulik and my new, crappy buddy Vic to Vault City (I'm guessing that's my next destination). The trip there is loving brutal though, almost every random encounter destroys me. The guys who carry Hunting Rifles use them to kill my PC in like 2-3 hits. What am I missing, I have some decent guns (me with a magnum and hunting rifle, Sulik with a sharpened spear - I gave him a SMG but he just kept killing Vic - and Vic with a pistol), I just get hit for 18 damage a few times and then that's it. My armor is a pretty nice leather jacket that I found somewhere.

I seem to recall Vic being pretty competent with a hunting rifle. It caters to his pondering slowness, but gives him a little more reach and power than a 10mm pistol. That being said, if you're running into random encounters where hostiles outnumber you 2 to 1, it might behoove you to flee. Also, having a decent outdoorsman skill can help avoiding random encounters altogether.

EDIT: Get better armor, too. Leather Jackets don't provide much protection against armed NPCs.

Cream-of-Plenty fucked around with this message at 08:59 on Aug 12, 2011

Fergus Mac Roich
Nov 5, 2008

Soiled Meat

Lets gently caress Bro posted:

drat, so I'm stuck again in Fallout 2. I finished all the sidequests I could find in the Den and went off with Sulik and my new, crappy buddy Vic to Vault City (I'm guessing that's my next destination). The trip there is loving brutal though, almost every random encounter destroys me. The guys who carry Hunting Rifles use them to kill my PC in like 2-3 hits. What am I missing, I have some decent guns (me with a magnum and hunting rifle, Sulik with a sharpened spear - I gave him a SMG but he just kept killing Vic - and Vic with a pistol), I just get hit for 18 damage a few times and then that's it. My armor is a pretty nice leather jacket that I found somewhere.

Hit up Modoc, it's a little closer.

Revener
Aug 25, 2007

by angerbeet

Lets gently caress Bro posted:

I gave him a SMG but he just kept killing Vic

Fallout 1, 2 & Tactics - I gave him an SMG, but he just kept killing Vic

Never ever ever ever give rapid-fire guns to any NPC ever unless you really want all that ammunition you gave to them returned to you at a very inopportune time, in a very rude fashion. Doubly so if you had the charitable nature to give them any kind of gatling gun.

Stunt_enby
Feb 6, 2010

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS
How badly have I hosed myself over by lowering my strength to 4?

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

Lets gently caress Bro posted:

drat, so I'm stuck again in Fallout 2. I finished all the sidequests I could find in the Den and went off with Sulik and my new, crappy buddy Vic to Vault City (I'm guessing that's my next destination). The trip there is loving brutal though, almost every random encounter destroys me. The guys who carry Hunting Rifles use them to kill my PC in like 2-3 hits. What am I missing, I have some decent guns (me with a magnum and hunting rifle, Sulik with a sharpened spear - I gave him a SMG but he just kept killing Vic - and Vic with a pistol), I just get hit for 18 damage a few times and then that's it. My armor is a pretty nice leather jacket that I found somewhere.

You can usually find leather armor at Buckner's place in Klamath, which is much more useful than your jacket. Sometimes you can find metal armor in the Den, but I wouldn't count on it.

Stuntman posted:

How badly have I hosed myself over by lowering my strength to 4?

The only thing you've done is made it where you can't use long arms and sledgehammers for most of the game. Fear not! You can get by with a Desert Eagle and 10mm smg until better pistols show up. Losing out on the magnum revolver kinda sucks for the midgame, but you'll be fine.

dis astranagant fucked around with this message at 09:20 on Aug 12, 2011

Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer

dis astranagant posted:

The only thing you've done is made it where you can't use long arms and sledgehammers for most of the game. Fear not! You can get by with a Desert Eagle and 10mm smg until better pistols show up.

A lot of guns have str req's as well though. Still not a problem, most likely, since he could wear power armor and get enhancements to balance it out. Or use drugs. I think the .223 requires a bit above 5?

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

Mordaedil posted:

A lot of guns have str req's as well though. Still not a problem, most likely, since he could wear power armor and get enhancements to balance it out. Or use drugs. I think the .223 requires a bit above 5?

The only pistols over 4 are the .223, 14mm and the magnum revolver, all of which need 5. He might want to hit Redding early to snag a needler for tough fights, but he'll be fine with a deagle, 10mm smg or grease gun until he hits NCR. Rifles of all kinds are right out, but the basic and sawed off shotguns work, as do power fists.

(the shotguns are junk, don't use them)

dis astranagant fucked around with this message at 09:34 on Aug 12, 2011

Mordaedil
Oct 25, 2007

Oh wow, cool. Good job.
So?
Grimey Drawer

dis astranagant posted:

The only pistols over 4 are the .223, 14mm and the magnum revolver, all of which need 5. He might want to hit Redding early to snag a needler for tough fights, but he'll be fine with a deagle, 10mm smg or grease gun until he hits NCR. Rifles of all kinds are right out, but the basic and sawed off shotguns work, as do power fists.

Alright, I forgot if there was anything else, but it should be alright then.

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

Note that ammo for the grease gun and needler are both rare as gently caress and should ideally be saved for people in at least combat armor (not much gain bursting a grease gun at metal armor vs the 10mm smg). Regular needler rounds suck (shotgun with more range), but the vanishingly rare AP rounds are among the best things to put in some fool's eyes.

dis astranagant fucked around with this message at 10:03 on Aug 12, 2011

HoldYourFire
Oct 16, 2006

What's the time? It's DEFCON 1!

Cream-of-Plenty posted:

I seem to recall Vic being pretty competent with a hunting rifle. It caters to his pondering slowness, but gives him a little more reach and power than a 10mm pistol. That being said, if you're running into random encounters where hostiles outnumber you 2 to 1, it might behoove you to flee. Also, having a decent outdoorsman skill can help avoiding random encounters altogether.

EDIT: Get better armor, too. Leather Jackets don't provide much protection against armed NPCs.

If you want to cheat random encounters, spam "a" (start combat) as soon as you see the lightning bolt. If you're the first one to open combat, it'll end as soon as your first turn ends (as long as your NPC buddies don't shoot anyone, I think). It's conceivably possible to start spamming "a" again so that when combat ends, you start it again and get another turn. Note that you can only use this to run away, if you attack someone they'll "notice" you and the game will start giving them their turns.

Morglon
Jan 13, 2010

Safe and sound, detached from reality.
Just like your posting.
I'm not entirely done with the thread but I just wanted to chip in and say that in every Fallout game ever you should always tag steal and keep it high because stealing everything keeps you well supplied and even helps you get good guns early. This is especially useful in 2 once you get to SF. While you may not be able to steal gear directly you can buy whatever you want and just steal all your money back from those two merchants who have everything ever in the game. In Tactics it helps too since your Quartermasters never turn around.

Minarchist
Mar 5, 2009

by WE B Bourgeois

Morglon posted:

I'm not entirely done with the thread but I just wanted to chip in and say that in every Fallout game ever you should always tag steal and keep it high because stealing everything keeps you well supplied and even helps you get good guns early. This is especially useful in 2 once you get to SF. While you may not be able to steal gear directly you can buy whatever you want and just steal all your money back from those two merchants who have everything ever in the game. In Tactics it helps too since your Quartermasters never turn around.

Steal seems pretty broken in FO: 1 and 2, it's more like it's tied to agility.

I can steal 5-6 items in a row with an abysmal steal skill, same as if it was at 300%.

Gucci Loafers
May 20, 2006

Ask yourself, do you really want to talk to pair of really nice gaudy shoes?


Was Tactics even half-way decent? I'm thinking about getting it but I thought it flopped?

Grand Fromage
Jan 30, 2006

L-l-look at you bar-bartender, a-a pa-pathetic creature of meat and bone, un-underestimating my l-l-liver's ability to metab-meTABolize t-toxins. How can you p-poison a perfect, immortal alcohOLIC?


Tab8715 posted:

Was Tactics even half-way decent? I'm thinking about getting it but I thought it flopped?

As long as you go in expecting to kill lots of poo poo in Fallout and not an RPG, it's great. NMA wanted Fallout 3 and shat all over it at the time, but even they have come around since.

Shirkelton
Apr 6, 2009

I'm not loyal to anything, General... except the dream.

Tab8715 posted:

Was Tactics even half-way decent? I'm thinking about getting it but I thought it flopped?

Tactics came out at a time when people were really hoping for a full-fledged Fallout 3. What they got was a kind of poorly concieved, but fun and fairly in-depth tactical rpg in the Fallout engine. That didn't really fit with the established canon.

John Luebke
Jun 1, 2011
I just tried playing Fallout 2 with Killap's unofficial patch (Not the restoration one.) and now I can't start the game, I just get an error message, saying I'm running the game in compatibility mode, which I'm not. Without the patch the game'll run fine, I tried reinstalling, but the same problem occurs after I've installed the patch. I'm using Win XP.

Anyone know how to solve this?

Or if that doesn't work...I'm not too familiar with the Fallout games, just bought them a short while ago on GOG. Is it still advisable to tackle FO2 without that patch? I hear it's pretty much necassary.

Leatherhead
Jul 3, 2006

For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still

Dan Didio posted:

Tactics came out at a time when people were really hoping for a full-fledged Fallout 3. What they got was a kind of poorly concieved, but fun and fairly in-depth tactical rpg in the Fallout engine. That didn't really fit with the established canon.

But it did give us furry deathclaws! :patriot:
(Not sarcastic. Furry deathclaws are the best deathclaws.)

Leatherhead fucked around with this message at 14:19 on Aug 12, 2011

Rookersh
Aug 19, 2010

Dan Didio posted:

Tactics came out at a time when people were really hoping for a full-fledged Fallout 3. What they got was a kind of poorly concieved, but fun and fairly in-depth tactical rpg in the Fallout engine. That didn't really fit with the established canon.

As long as you skip the intro video, its fine. :colbert:

Seriously, the whole Brotherhood from Vaults thing is never really mentioned again, and the two missions about gas can easily be handwaved as "stockpiles", the Midwest is large/empty enough that its very possible some rear end in a top hat hoarded gas, or one of the billion abandoned gas stations had a few barrels lying around. Its not as if New Vegas doesn't have vehicles ( or mentions of vehicles. ), so obviously not ALL gas was used up.

In terms of setting/Falloutness, its pretty much spot-on, and did a far better job of showcasing just how lovely the Wasteland is for average normal dudes then any of the other games in the series.

Angry Diplomat
Nov 7, 2009

Winner of the TSR Memorial Award for Excellence In Grogging

dis astranagant posted:

Finesse is terrible, especially early on (-30% damage before DT for a 10% increase in crits).

Finesse is indeed terrible 99% of the time, but I seem to remember a friend of mine using it to help with an insane gimmicky sniper build that revolved around getting every possible bonus to the frequency and severity of critical hits, then using a pulse rifle to hit people in the eyes from across the battlefield and automatically kill them (even if the attack did 0 damage). It was probably along the same lines as the silly flare-hurling build someone mentioned earlier in the thread.

You can do some interestingly crazy things with the combat mechanics in these games.


e: Oh, I also used Finesse on a heavy weapons guy that used miniguns. The idea was that I'd let the sheer number of attacks translate into lots and lots of critical hits, but I can't remember if it worked out well or not. All I can remember is spending 90% of my time buying, scrounging, or stealing more bullets for the three giant guns I carried everywhere.

Angry Diplomat fucked around with this message at 17:12 on Aug 12, 2011

Feels Villeneuve
Oct 7, 2007

Setter is Better.
Finesse is not terrible, especially with high luck values. Early game, you probably stand a better chance beating people tougher than you by knocking them out with a crit eyeshot and hacking them to death than just shooting and hoping for the best.

Crits are good enough in FO2 that it's perfectly reasonable to build a character around them.

e: it's worth noting that Finesse becomes useless if you pick up Sniper, but a) i don't tend to level that high anyway, and b) you can always Mutate it out for Fast Shot just beforehand.

Feels Villeneuve fucked around with this message at 18:54 on Aug 12, 2011

HoldYourFire
Oct 16, 2006

What's the time? It's DEFCON 1!

Fag Boy Jim posted:

e: it's worth noting that Finesse becomes useless if you pick up Sniper, but a) i don't tend to level that high anyway, and b) you can always Mutate it out for Fast Shot just beforehand.

Wouldn't Fast Shot make Sniper worthless, though?

Edit: OK, I thought Sniper was "aimed shots always crit" for some reason.

HoldYourFire fucked around with this message at 21:35 on Aug 12, 2011

Feels Villeneuve
Oct 7, 2007

Setter is Better.

HoldYourFire posted:

Wouldn't Fast Shot make Sniper worthless, though?

No, Sniper uses some kind of weird separate table that just adds another (10*LK) chance for a crit that I'm pretty sure isn't modified by things like eye shots or whatever. The mechanics are kinda weird, but with high luck values, fast shot + sniper should be deadlier than aimed shots + sniper.

Cream-of-Plenty
Apr 21, 2010

"The world is a hellish place, and bad writing is destroying the quality of our suffering."

John Luebke posted:

I just tried playing Fallout 2 with Killap's unofficial patch (Not the restoration one.) and now I can't start the game, I just get an error message, saying I'm running the game in compatibility mode, which I'm not. Without the patch the game'll run fine, I tried reinstalling, but the same problem occurs after I've installed the patch. I'm using Win XP.

Anyone know how to solve this?

Or if that doesn't work...I'm not too familiar with the Fallout games, just bought them a short while ago on GOG. Is it still advisable to tackle FO2 without that patch? I hear it's pretty much necassary.

Do you not have to patch your executable for some of the effects to take place? I've installed a few mods for FO2 in the past that require me running a .bat file before I start up the game for the first time.

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

Fag Boy Jim posted:

Finesse is not terrible, especially with high luck values. Early game, you probably stand a better chance beating people tougher than you by knocking them out with a crit eyeshot and hacking them to death than just shooting and hoping for the best.

Crits are good enough in FO2 that it's perfectly reasonable to build a character around them.

e: it's worth noting that Finesse becomes useless if you pick up Sniper, but a) i don't tend to level that high anyway, and b) you can always Mutate it out for Fast Shot just beforehand.

Except that your average character already has ~65% chance to crit an eye shot. A little higher chance isn't worth giving up a third of your damage.

esquilax
Jan 3, 2003

dis astranagant posted:

Except that your average character already has ~65% chance to crit an eye shot. A little higher chance isn't worth giving up a third of your damage.

The damage is technically done by adding 30% damage resistance to the enemy, which doesn't really matter because damage resistance is ignored by most criticals.

John Luebke
Jun 1, 2011

Cream-of-Plenty posted:

Do you not have to patch your executable for some of the effects to take place? I've installed a few mods for FO2 in the past that require me running a .bat file before I start up the game for the first time.

Doesn't look like it, the patch comes in a single executable file, I simply point it to my FO2 folder during the installation process and it should take care of the rest. I've done some research and it seems a lot of people seem to encounter this problem with the patch, mostly on Vista though.

I've found two solutions for XP, one is to actually activate the compatibility mode and then deactivate it again. Doesn't work for me though.

The other solution is to deactivate 256 colors in the compatibility tab. That one is activated in my case so this might actually be the cause of my problem but I can't deactivate it i.e. it simply won't save those settings.

So far playing without the patch is my only solution.

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

esquilax posted:

The damage is technically done by adding 30% damage resistance to the enemy, which doesn't really matter because damage resistance is ignored by most criticals.

Sadly, AP crits don't work that way. They only ignore DT.

esquilax
Jan 3, 2003

dis astranagant posted:

Sadly, AP crits don't work that way. They only ignore DT.

The Fallout wiki says otherwise in several places, so I don't know who to believe.

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

esquilax posted:

The Fallout wiki says otherwise in several places, so I don't know who to believe.

I blame some old NMA threads justifying stacking more DR than they'd ever need as crit insurance.

Angry Diplomat
Nov 7, 2009

Winner of the TSR Memorial Award for Excellence In Grogging
This is why the funniest build is Jinxed, Heavy Handed, 1 Luck, as much Endurance and Agility as you can possibly get, and Doctor and Unarmed as tag skills. At that point it doesn't matter how criticals work, because the only criticals you'll ever see will be critical misses. End turn over and over, laugh as everyone around you collapses in a comical symphony of exploding guns and mysteriously shattering limbs, finish them off with kicks to the face (pausing every other turn to splint your busted leg for the fiftieth time).

Even better if you get that unlucky dog in your party. I love that guy :buddy:

Cubemario
Apr 3, 2009
I'm really considering restarting my playthrough of FO2 (which I haven't beat the game yet) which isn't very far in to do a stupid one.

Reading some of that infamous FO2 LP with Trogg has really made me want to do a stupid run. However I'm wondering if it's a good idea to do that without beating the game first. Also does anyone have some builds they recommend for a stupid playthrough?

Sam.
Jan 1, 2009

"I thought we had something, Shepard. Something real."
:qq:
Definitely a bad idea for a first playthrough, you're missing out on a lot.

Cubemario
Apr 3, 2009
Thanks, another question: Is perception important for a melee build?

but thou must!
Apr 30, 2011

Cubemario posted:

Thanks, another question: Is perception important for a melee build?

Higher sequence helps, but more importantly the Better Criticals perk needs 6 perception (and 6 luck.) Better Criticals is one of the best perks in the game.

Rody One Half
Feb 18, 2011

Well Megamod wouldn't work no matter what I did, kept crashing when I tried to go in the the Temple, so instead I just said the hell with it and decided to do good old vanilla Fallout 2, no Killap Patch, Restoration Mod, or anything else.

e: Turns out I can't live without the Restoration Mod anymore.

Rody One Half fucked around with this message at 02:58 on Aug 13, 2011

dis astranagant
Dec 14, 2006

Rodyle posted:

Well Megamod wouldn't work no matter what I did, kept crashing when I tried to go in the the Temple, so instead I just said the hell with it and decided to do good old vanilla Fallout 2, no Killap Patch, Restoration Mod, or anything else.

e: Turns out I can't live without the Restoration Mod anymore.

Megamod seems to be a buggy piece of poo poo, but Killap's patch is working fine so far.

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Cream-of-Plenty
Apr 21, 2010

"The world is a hellish place, and bad writing is destroying the quality of our suffering."

dis astranagant posted:

Megamod seems to be a buggy piece of poo poo, but Killap's patch is working fine so far.

I haven't had a problem with it. :colbert:

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