Fallout: New Vegas: Ain't that a cuck in the bed?

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Fallout: New Vegas: Ain't that a cuck in the bed?

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

I'm going to be doing an unarmed run for the first time, and I had a couple questions about unarmed weapons. First, am I understanding correctly that there's basically no significant direct damage benefit from putting points into the skill, just the ability to effectively use better weapons and access perks? Second, I've read that crits are supposed to be a bigger deal for unarmed weapons, but looking at the list on the wiki the modifiers for most of the good-looking weapons don't seem any better than for melee (Embrace of the Mantis King seems slow and Two-Step Goodbye sounds awkward). Am I missing something? Finally, what are considered to be good early-to-middle game weapons? I presume the Bladed Gauntlet is what I want starting out, I plan to get the Paladin Toaster before going to Big MT, and the Industrial Hand seems like the be-all-and-end-all later on, but I'm looking for something to grab before doing Honest Hearts then coming back and raiding Vault 34 for the Pulse Gun and snagging the Toaster from its cave. Pushy's easy to get but requires 100 Unarmed, and I'm unsure how effective trying to get Greased Lightning from Torres would be, since I don't know whether she stocks it at low levels and trying to reach the Boomers at low levels to stop the artillery to allow access to the scout corpse seems like a suicide mission.

Paracelsus fucked around with this message at 03:02 on Oct 25, 2013

# ¿ Oct 25, 2013 02:05

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# ¿ Apr 28, 2024 09:44

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Excelzior posted:

Nope. Unarmed skill increases damage dealt. In fact, it is the ONLY way to increase unarmed damage besides getting better fist weapons (it's unaffected by Strength, unlike Melee weapons).

So is it a multiplier? Looking at the formula on the wiki (ceil ((Unarmed / 20) + 0.5 )), it maxes out at 5.5, and at first I thought that was just adding 5.5 damage.

quote:

Several perks (notably Ninja and the perk you get from stealing Veronica's message) increase the critical damage multiplier, but exclusively for melee and unarmed attacks. The Industrial Hand's ability to crit *several times per second* more than makes up for the lack of a special crit ability, as well.

It looks like Elijah's Ramblings only works on melee weapons unless you mod it.

# ¿ Oct 25, 2013 04:34

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

There are so many options that the game gives you that I just can't bring myself to do. This does mean that there are a lot of quests I'll do the exact same way each time. I don't think I could even actually do a Legion run.

I did recently learn that Dead Money can be made infinitely easier by bringing along the Fist of Rawr still in quest item form, all ready to be weaponized at the first workbench you come across. Then you just kinda wave it around and Ghost People fall apart all around you. It's on par with Light Step and Light Touch for "thing you should really have before starting this."

# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 09:24

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Sir Unimaginative posted:

Considering it's a unique drop in Lonesome Road, which is a DLC that makes almost no sense to do until just before the endgame, this is a bad idea.

I found that going through HH and OWB beforehand left me at a high enough level (even with the Skilled penalty) that I wanted to make sure I did LR before the Deathclaws got even stronger instead of going to DM. It worked out surprisingly well, Christine's sniper rifle with JSP ammo killed everything in sight (often killing Deathclaws in a single hit) and all I needed to do to kill Rawr was set him on fire from range then shoot him 4-5 times. LR isn't so hard that you have to leave it to the end, unless you're talking about story reasons to leave it until later. At the very least it's helpful to do the first part of it early on so ED-E can be a free repair kit every 24 hours.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 19:06

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

MrL_JaKiri posted:

Ease of use stuff: have at least 6 in Perc and Agi. Cha is the dump stat as far as there is one. High luck is very very useful.

Also base Endurance controls how many implants you can get, so having a decent amount will allow you to pick up a bunch of stat increases, although the END implant doesn't count as increasing the number of implant slots. If you have Old World Blues, then you can get a significant strength boost from it (+1 at the start, possibly +2 at the end). If you do OWB, make sure you have a way to deal with armored enemies. Sunset Sarsaparilla is like Nuka-Cola without the radiation, has the possibility of getting a quest item collectable, and is just as plentiful if not moreso, so there's no reason to drink Nuka-Cola.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 21:01

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Wolfsheim posted:

Almost every bit of debris has it's uses in some fashion or another, but that's the most important one.

A lot of them have no use beyond extremely optional unmarked quests, like steam gauge assemblies or firehose nozzles. And many of them have no use, like ash trays and chessboards, and the cap value isn't worth the weight. For the most part, it's probably worthwhile to pay a visit to a workbench and campfire, go through the lists and find things you might want to make at some point, then put together a list of what it takes to make them. Otherwise you might end up hauling around 10 lb. leaf blowers that are only good for selling at less than 20 caps.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 22:52

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Excelzior posted:

you mean some people don't use the conveniently-placed explosives to bury him under rubble, killing him instantly?

I tried the nukes before but they didn't seem to do much.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 23:20

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Wolfsheim posted:

I don't remember the full list but I believe The Sink added a bunch of uses for most of those miscellaneous items that didn't serve any other purpose, pencils and whatnot. Not sure if chessboards are on that list, but I did say that most of them were still not terribly useful.

The book chute eats books, clipboards, and pencils to produce bank books, duct tape & scrap metal, and lead & scrap metal. The toaster turns electrical devices into energy weapon ammo. Muggy turns plates and mugs into lead, cases, powder, syringes, and wonderglue. They're neat, but not worth collecting items for in large amounts aside from the books for the chute to make skillbooks, and those are easy to collect by doing a few focused runs hitting big stockpiles instead of scrounging throughout the game.

# ¿ Nov 6, 2013 23:49

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Wolfsheim posted:

I...agree with you, though? My whole point was that collecting the materials for weapon repair kits is beneficial for most of the game (Dead Money aside) whereas most other debris has situational usefulness, but there are very few items that are entirely worthless in every respect, which I remember being the case in Fallout 3.

I guess I took "Almost every bit of debris has it's uses in some fashion or another" as "you should be picking things up, since they'll come in handy eventually."

# ¿ Nov 7, 2013 00:37

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

D34THROW posted:

God drat, Mobius! You've got a problem.

Isn't the liquid in the brain tanks made from ground-up Mentats anyway? Plus Mobius talks about how much he loves all those delightful chems and how his broadcasts are done while he's hyped up on Psycho.

# ¿ Nov 8, 2013 18:11

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Dead Money suffers a lot from extremely repetitive visuals and only one type of enemy in the first 2/3ds. There's also a lot of pixel-hunting for those vending machine recipes if you haven't found them before, if you even realize that they exist.

# ¿ Nov 10, 2013 01:29

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

pun pundit posted:

4: Educated (Int 4)

I find that I prefer Comprehension at 4. Getting more out of the Skill books is almost as much of a boost as Educated taken to level 50, provided that you're thorough in tracking down books, and the extra boost from magazines lets you skimp out on skills like Lockpick and Science, where there's no point in taking them over 80 on a permanent basis (unless you want Nuka-chemist for some reason). If you're using Logan's Loophole, you'll probably get a lot more points out of Comprehension, although it will spread them out.

# ¿ Nov 14, 2013 05:34

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

pun pundit posted:

I see where you're coming from here. Thing is, this build has very tight skill limits for its perks (if you want to meet limits on other skills for checks). Educated gives you more control on what skills get raised to what levels when than Comprehension does, hence the choice. Also, I don't like depending on skill mags; that's just me though.

I don't use skill mags very often, but when I looked at the lists of locks and terminals on the wiki I noticed that there are only a few Very Hard ones, and most of those can be done by fairly simple alternate methods or are pointless (like most casino cashier doors). For lockpicks, the only one that I can think of the doesn't have a key and is actually worthwhile is the Gobi footlocker. For terminals I don't think there are any Very Hard ones that make you feel like you need to get them, and Programmer's Digests are one of the more common magazines anyway.

I am pretty bad at actually using limited-supply items like magazines, chems, and explosive ammo, though. Gotta hoard 'em all, and why bother bringing up the Pip-Boy when I can just shoot a thing in the head or punch it while "hidden" by crouching in plain sight?

# ¿ Nov 14, 2013 10:42

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

When do people think are the right situations to use Med-X, Psycho, Buffout, etc.?

Turbo seems easier to figure out (there are 8+ dudes with strong attacks that I want to punch), Mentats are for occasional skill checks, and Steady might make sense if I were going to use SMGs or Miniguns (which I don't very often), but I've usually got high endurance anyway because I plan to buy most of the implants, I one-shot enemies often enough that +25% damage usually seems superfluous, and almost all combat situations seem to fall in a bi-modal distribution pattern where they're either easy enough to kill without much trouble (humans) or so overwhelming in direct combat at my current level that it doesn't seem like the chems would be enough to turn things around (Deathclaws, Cazador swarms, Legendary Bloatfly).

Jet and Rebound seem marginal enough to be useless without Logan's Loophole, since it's not hard to just dodge and take cover until you get your AP back normally and combat rarely takes long enough care.

# ¿ Nov 14, 2013 21:46

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

D34THROW posted:

Actually, I'm a pretty loving terrible chem hoarder. My current run has me carrying at least 10 of every kind of chem. gently caress stashing it, it has no weight and you never know when you'll need it.

Items with value but no weight are the worst for hoarding. Have over 10k pre-war monies after getting banned from the Sierra Madre? I should pawn all this heavy stuff instead! And then you never spend the greenbacks ever.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2013 01:53

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

RBA Starblade posted:

It's funny seeing people talk about Bethesda's Bad Guy Brigade when New Vegas had NCR versus the slaver rapists.

NV was good at making all the factions have some serious problems without going overboard on most of them, but they really could have toned down the Legion a fair bit and still had them be effective antagonists.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2013 19:43

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

RBA Starblade posted:

Ingame, NCR has one atrocity (that thing with the Great Khans or Boone, I don't remember) to the Legion's dozens.

If you have the Khans agree to help the NCR, the NCR will just round them up and stick them in a reservation later. The NCR is really big on annexing people whether they want it or not and then sticking them with exorbitant taxes without necessarily providing much actual protection. Plus Colonel Moore will get furious if you find a peaceful solution to the Brotherhood instead of wiping them out and you'll get a bunch of NCR infamy for it, which suggests that some of them have a bit of an appetite for atrocity instead of it being just one of those things that happens occasionally due to intercommunication and frontline troops getting scared. It's not up to Legion levels of "kill/enslave everything in our path," but it does do a good job of making them not the clear choice when stacked up against House or Yes Man.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2013 20:46

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

RBA Starblade posted:

I agree, I usually tell both of them (and House gently caress him too) to gently caress off since New Vegas is mine, but if the choice is between NCR and the Legion, the NCR wins.

For the most part I agree, although they did at least not make Yes Man resolve all contradictions (Freeside and the Followers have a rough time of it because you aren't as good at keeping order, the Brotherhood and Boomers don't seem to open up as much) and his statement about making himself more assertive is rather ominous.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2013 21:13

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

graynull posted:

Then again, we're dealing with an alternate timeline in which technology seems to have been stunted before The War even occurred.

Path-dependency can be a powerful thing. In the real world we had the technology for electric cars early in the 20th century and designs for thorium-based nuclear reactors that wouldn't create weaponizable waste and which used a cheaper, more plentiful fuel midcentury, but didn't develop them at all because for the first case it was easier to use oil than develop the sort of batteries needed for large scale and for the second the lack of plutonium production was viewed as a downside.

We know the pre-war society had more advanced robots and energy weapons than we do, they just didn't focus as much on commercial/consumer data processing technology (which seems odd in light of the robot thing, but they may have just taken the 60s/70s IBM approach of "why would a home need a computer?").

# ¿ Nov 16, 2013 00:19

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Xander77 posted:

I'm willing to to chalk that up to indoctrination (which is a tad simplistic, but there's only so much psychological complexity you can expect here). My issue is still with feasibility in terms of scale - not numbers, but percentages.

Repressions are conducted against someone defined as an enemy, whether within or without your territory, for the (ostensible) benefit of the silent/participating majority that is not being repressed - since you can't actually repress the entirety of your population, no matter how bloodthirsty or totalitarian you are. Had the Legion followed the example of the Mongols / Golden Horde / Timurids etc - bloody atrocities in the name of conquest on the borders of the empire, peace and quiet in the territories under secure control, that would have been fine (and we see a nod to that with the notion that trade routes are safe within legion territory). But none of those guys, ancient and modern, turned around and went "rape camps for everyone (slave collars for the others)". Anyone who (mis)understands Hegelian dialectics should be able to do a basic analysis from a Marxist perspective (or going back to Rome, "gold is the lifeblood of war" or something of the sort) about the necessity of a stable population not being actively repressed as it supports your atrocities elsewhere .

To summarize: "We're going to brutalize everyone who is not us" works for a darker shade of grey faction and is realistic-ish. "We're going to brutalize everyone including us", is just stupidly grimdark.

One thing I'm a little confused on is what the distinction is between the groups that the Legion assimilates into its military forces and those it doesn't. There are clearly people living in Legion-conquered territory who benefit from the lack of non-Legion raider groups left in their wake, and who aren't running around in football armor and funky helmets, but one sometimes gets the impression that the Legion is going to enslave everyone it comes across (like the Weathers, who were just traveling).

# ¿ Nov 17, 2013 18:17

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Wolfsheim posted:

I was under the impression that the Legion only assimilated other tribals, and would enslave/kill non-tribal settlements who either fought back or committed some especially egregious offense (Nipton's disloyalty).

Otherwise they left you alone and all was well. I mean, clearly they had no issues with that one trader, or with Raul, who had to travel through hundreds of miles of their territory and had nothing bad to say about them.

Did the Weathers fight, though? (I never actually talked to Frank before freeing the rest, so I'm not sure about that.) Also Siri seems to be from a town and we don't know what, if anything, they did to merit being destroyed. Aside from Dale Barton, those are the only non-secondhand information we get about people who encounter the Legion and aren't either killed or assimilated.

Also the definition of "tribals" seems a bit hazy. The New Canaanites and Boomers apparently qualify, but they're both organized to the point of being functioning technological civilizations who can rely on their own production systems and not predation for their needs.

# ¿ Nov 17, 2013 19:54

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

razorrozar posted:

So you just run from all the radscorpions and geckos and ants and the pre-hostile enemies like the convicts in Primm? Seems a little unreasonable, if you ask me.

Grab the Stealth Boy from the Goodsprings Schoolhouse safe (you may need to put up with some mantises, but they aren't much of a threat), head to Niel's Shack, get up on the ridge along the road, turn on your Stealth Boy, and run to Repconn HQ or thereabouts. From there you can head east to 188 to pick up Veronica, then north along the east side of Vegas where there are no enemies. Get into Freeside, earn caps running errands or gambling, get a passport from Ralph if you have 50 Speech or pony up for the securitrons if you don't. You're in the Strip. Alternately, if you can pick up NCR armor somewhere, you can try and outrun the Fiends to McCarren, don the armor, and take the monorail. That's a huge chunk of the game bypassed without firing a shot.

I wouldn't recommend trying to pacifist through the DLCs, though.

Paracelsus fucked around with this message at 22:52 on Nov 17, 2013

# ¿ Nov 17, 2013 22:47

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Eiba posted:

As for player choice, if you're going to pretend like you're giving the player a choice, meaningful choices are more fun than a "lol-evil" psychopath side option that the rest of the game does its best to ignore (though I guess you can keep those in, 'cause they can indeed be fun). Meaningful choice is pretty inexorably linked with moral ambiguity- the setting needs to allow for a two reasonable people to approach the same situation in different ways.

I think one of the main pitfalls of moral choice systems is that they rarely feel like they have any moral weight behind them. Aside from the choices usually boiling down to "hippy v. racist thug," the two choices usually end up in about the same place. There's rarely any price to be paid for doing the "right" thing (at most doing the evil choice will give you a bit more money, often in a game where there's more than enough of that to go around), or any real expediency to doing the "wrong" thing, reducing the issue to whether or not the player is in the mood to be a gratuitous dickbag. Doing the right thing should foreclose the possibility of getting awesome loot, and not in a "you'll make it up and then some later" way, make you take long ways around through hard enemies, and in some cases fail to work at all because the underlying situation just wasn't amenable to feel-good solutions. Otherwise it's just choosing between red and blue. New Vegas is better at this than most games, since the "good" solutions are often going to require a skill check that the player may not have until higher levels if they aren't building to pull off that sort of thing, although it's still a fairly low hurdle to clear.

SpookyLizard posted:

Food can be very useful, but it requires hardcore mode I think? Maybe I'm thinking of rebalance (CCO or Jsawyer, probably) that made it much more useful. I do know that cooked foods and campfire recipes can supplant stimpacks almost. Food can also heal you faster by eating many different things at once. I think Survival may also increase food gains too.

Desert Salads and Black Blood Sausages are by far the best healing items in the game. Survival does boost how much HP/sec you get from food items, although in many cases that means going from 1/sec to 2/sec once you get up to 100 survival. Stimpacks weigh nothing, though, so it's a lot easier to carry around 100 of them, and they're generally better at mid-combat "don't die now" healing, even in hardcore where their healing is more spread out.

# ¿ Nov 19, 2013 04:50

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Has anyone ever had problems with the Nuka Chemist perk? I tried to use the recipe for Quartz, but it just produced a regular Nuka.

# ¿ Nov 30, 2013 10:30

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Parker Lewis posted:

How is Dead Money generally regarded in comparison to the other DLCs? Can I expect them to get better after this?

Dead Money has the tightest-written story of any of the DLCs, and a fantastic payout if you know what to do (knock over the casino and turn your chips into pre-war money at least; additionally, doing well at the casino will lead to a voucher for 1000 chips being delivered to the bunker you entered through every 3 days, allowing you to use the vending machine there for ammo, weapon repair kits, and Med-X), but repetitive and dull visual design and combat.

Honest Hearts has a gorgeous, very open and explorable zone, the combat is fine, the recipes for healing items and pseudo-drugs are fantastic, and a couple of the characters are interesting (especially one met only indirectly), but the plot that you actually play through is sparse and characters focused on energy weapons may want a back-up plan. Pick every broc flower, xander root, agave fruit and cave mushroom you can and make dozens of healing poultices, eat gecko steaks and banana yucca fruits, drink fresh water from the rivers, and feel like you're actually living off the land.

Old World Blues is large and open and adds a ton of stuff (you'll probably never want for inorganic crafting materials ever again). The writing is intentionally goofy, which might be a positive or negative depending on your taste. Bring a good weapon and plenty of ammo, because some things can be rough if you don't have the ability to penetrate a lot of DT and haven't found/don't have the skill or strength for the new toys you find, and the only merchant is bugged in a way that prevents their stock from refreshing while you're doing the DLC. Energy weapon users will have a much easier time finding ammo than gun users.

Lonesome Road is visually interesting, has some of my favorite combat in the game, has neat set pieces, provides a lot of neat weapons and armor (and is quite lucrative if you're willing to keep hauling armor sets to the commissary units to sell), and turns ED-E into The Best Companion (since you can enter and leave freely, you can pick up his first upgrade at a low level before you start having to fight things). However, it's linear in nature and the plot is muddled to the extent that you may find yourself wondering what the point of it all was.

# ¿ Dec 5, 2013 18:09

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

ChibiSoma posted:

How far into the base game should a person new to it all start to tackle it?

Most of them will give a suggestion before you get all the way in. OWB recommends 15+, DM 20+, and LR 25+. You can enter and leave LR freely, so you can give it a shot whenever you feel like. Honest Hearts seems rather flexible, but at higher levels the enemies will be using a lot of brush guns and riot shotguns, which are sweet to loot but can also wreck you. Be able to clear a lot of 75+ skill checks before doing DM, but your gear doesn't matter for it because it gets taken away when you start and you don't get it back until you leave the DLC zone (and you can never return there). For OWB, as I previously mentioned, bring a good weapon and plenty of ammo that can deal with high DT.

Note that the enemy difficulty will scale with your level, which can get stupid at very high levels, and you'll be gaining something like 4-5 levels in each DLC so you can find yourself on a bit of a "must do all DLC now" kick. You can take Logan's Loophole to counteract this if you just want to go through things for loot and fun instead of gaining exp.

# ¿ Dec 5, 2013 18:48

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

ChibiSoma posted:

Also forgot that you should never, under any circumstances, raise anything else until Speech, Medicine, Science, and maybe Repair are maxed out.

This is rather odd, since there aren't any important Science checks of any real difficulty until much later in the game, Medicine isn't a particularly important skill and I don't think ever has a check higher than 75, and Repair never needs to go higher than 90 (and you can game even that by getting within one level's worth of points, then on your next level up allocate the points, select Jury Rigging, then reset and reallocate the points even though Jury Rigging is still selected and will be granted when you finish leveling). Speech should be gotten medium-high fairly early, as should Lockpick, but 100-point checks for Speech don't happen until the endgame and you can boost your score with armors, mentats and magazines as needed for the rare instances you want it.

Maxing out skills early is a bad idea since you're leaving skill book points on the table. And not putting at least some points into one of your combat skills is asking for trouble unless you're going pacifist.

# ¿ Dec 6, 2013 21:01

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Raygereio posted:

It depends more on the build you're going for. Levelling science early to get Vigilant Recycler could be usefull for an energy weapons build for example.

This is true, but it's still not maxing out the skill or "never raise anything else until this is done first."

# ¿ Dec 6, 2013 21:28

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Fag Boy Jim posted:

Really, at some points, I think it should have been combined with Sneak and turned into like, "Stealth"? I don't know. They did a good job making the other skills have multiple uses, but there's only so much you can do with "Pick locks".

"Pick locks" is still really good, though, and very much worth investing in up to 75.

ChibiSoma posted:

So I'm stumped! I have no loving idea how to get to where the Khans are. With how Bethesda tries preventing you from exploiting their busted-rear end engine to make travel not take an hour, I'm just naturally assuming the path from the west is off-limits, too.

It was like trying to get to the Hoover Dam. I hopped in the lake near where I raised that Bomber and swam over to the nearest beach... nope, all walls. Despite the fact that the terrain is only mildly sloped and you could easily walk up it, it's blocked for noooo loving reason. Ditto trying to trigger the fast travel point by swimming up to the dam. There's a gated off area that you can't jump over. You can get on the barrels, but the Courier suddenly becomes scared of a 3-inch high net in the water.

There are a couple of places where the invisible walls are legitimately aggravating (trying to get to the Cazadors for Red Lucy's hunt), but here you're either trolling or being a moron who can't possibly try a different approach than the first one that sprung to mind. You get to the Khans from the open area SW of Vegas (hint: it's the spot where the mountains have a bunch of red rocks), and the Dam by following the roads east of Boulder City.

# ¿ Dec 7, 2013 02:21

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

ChibiSoma posted:

Not sure how to get to the Great Khans Encampment, but it isn't "From the west" or "From the east." South's blocked, so I guess I'll travel somewhere north and try that. Gotta be some direction that doesn't walk me right into Deathclaw territory, right?

Man, fast traveling to Goodsprings Cementary and going from there was bad.

If you are trying to go North from Goodsprings, you are going to run into a narrow band of territory overrun with Deathclaws and Cazadors. If you go west while you are north of said band of territory, you're not going to run into Deathclaws and Cazadors unless you start going south. If you're trying to go west from Brewer's, you're too far north.

code:

X (Goal)     ^     (Brewer's Bootlegging is north of here)                 
               ^ More Mountains!
^            ^
| <- visibly red rocks 
\___________________________ X (Somewhere SW of Camp McCarran, where you should be starting)
X (Spring Mountain Ranch State Park)
                                       ^
                                         ^
(HERE BE DEATHCLAWS AND CAZADORS)      ^
                                         ^   Mountains!
                                       ^
X (Goodsprings cemetery)                 ^

# ¿ Dec 7, 2013 06:52

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

eating only apples posted:

People have so much trouble finding the way to Melissa and I can't quite understand it (hint: there's no need to go through the quarry proper to get to her). It's not a difficult or counter-intuitive climb, I'm pretty sure there's even a clear path. It is the northwest corner of the quarry but there's apparently a path straight there from Vault 19. If you're low level there probably won't even be any deathclaws.

There have always been Deathclaws by the northern entrance when I was there, but a Stealth Boy and careful movement will get you past. Having time-extenders for the Stealth Boy will be handy, though, unless you brought two.

# ¿ Dec 7, 2013 18:26

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

StashAugustine posted:

Press ~ and type.

If you're using a controller, unplug it so hitting ~ will work.

# ¿ Dec 9, 2013 22:58

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Synonymous posted:

I see a lot of love for every DLC except Lonesome Road. Am I crazy for loving that one? Tied favourite with Old World Blues, but I really like Ulysses. I got the mod that makes him a proper follower, which is pretty cool.

I just like him being a mirror of (what is probably) the canon Courier Six.

Lonesome Road did a lot of great things, but I think it's let down by the resolution with Ulysses. After all the rhetorical checks he was writing, being able to talk him out of his convictions/obsessions in a couple short exchanges made him feel a bit hollow, and the reasoning behind his actual ultimate plan is still a bit hazy to me. The map is also really linear, and some people don't like that.

Fantastic environment, combat, and goodies, though.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2013 00:01

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Synonymous posted:

True, though if I can recall, the Couriers words are quite well spoken, and after all, you had no idea your package would be such a problem. You're a Courier, your job is to carry the goods, not be responsible for how they're used.

"How was I supposed to know" isn't really what I'd expect to work when it comes to talking down someone on a holy mission. I was mostly referring to the "you may not believe in nations, but I do" stuff in the final arena.

One other misstep on LR: The dusters are neat armors (well, most of them; the NCR one is a little meh), but man do they look goofy/goony as hell.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2013 01:00

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

2house2fly posted:

They do that so that non-combat builds can finish the game. Look at Alpha Protocol for an example of how people react when you give them non-combat options but include mandatory boss battles. If you don't like them feel free to just blast away, but in RPGs they're an important part of the game.

The dissonance is basically baked into the nature of this sort of storytelling, but that doesn't make it less of a problem.

quote:

Plus I like the odd spin on it, like the end of Honest Hearts, where the antagonist isn't the tribal dude in charge of the enemy faction but the dark fire that burns in the heart of man and all that.

Joshua's lines about "I want to call it my own, to make my anger God's anger. To justify the things I've done," are probably one of the best bits of pure script writing in a video game ever. It's a pity that they couldn't do more with the scene besides having him standing there.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2013 02:09

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

2house2fly posted:

That said, I personally didn't experience any dissonance when it came to Ulysses. I liked the feeling of cutting through his endless rambling with short, armour-piercing questions and statements, illuminating the "antithesis" to his "thesis".

It's probably satisfying in that it makes the player feel like their position is naturally superior to his, but it feels "off" to me. Making assertions contrary to someone's worldview isn't liable to convince someone to abandon the entire purpose they've constructed for their life all by itself.

The Lanuis speech victory was handled much better, I think, because you're convincing him about the nature of a tactical situation, not that the Legion itself is wrong; he'll even reiterate that he still believes that the Legion would be better for the people of the West.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2013 02:30

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

ChibiSoma posted:

Also? "You let them die!" Eat poo poo, you sawed-off little religious twerp, I was SMGing everything in like one volley of shots apiece. Maybe you should lift your dainty little fingers and help out if you want your guys to live!

You probably should have checked your quest list, because that result you means you missed one of the objectives.

The vast majority of the complaints you've posted in this thread seem to be direct consequences of a lack of observation on your part.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2013 03:56

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Internet Kraken posted:

Can anyone recommend a good place to use as a house that you can fasttravel to? I always like making my own little house in these kind of games. I found plenty of good spots in Fallout 3 but haven't found one I really like in New Vegas. I mean I could just use the Lucky 38 but you can't fast travel to it and don't really like the design. I doesn't even need useful stuff, just a place I can dump off random crap as decorations.

The Lucky 38 requires far too many loading screens when fast-travelling to/from to be useful as a base. Before I started using mod-based houses I used Lone Wolf Radio, which has a bed and a couple containers and you appear really close to them with no need to change cells.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2013 18:29

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

Sergeant_Crunch posted:

Just went to the store and traded in my copy of New Vegas for the ultimate edition. Haven't played in a year or so and I'm getting the itch.

What is the canon order for the dlc's? I want to experience them in the proper order.

Recommended-level-wise, OWB is 15+, DM is 20+, and LR is 25+. HH doesn't seem to have a level recommendation, but ~level 10 seems to work okay for me; if you're using guns you probably want your gun skill up to 75 for the .45 Auto SMG, and there's a level 90 speech check to get the best ending if you're so inclined. OWB can get obnoxious if you leave it until later.

Pacifism is totally possible, you just have to sprint past some enemies in the endgame and never tangle with Deathclaws. I wouldn't try it in the DLCs, though.

# ¿ Dec 11, 2013 00:00

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# ¿ Apr 28, 2024 09:44

Paracelsus: Apr 6, 2009; bless this post ~kya

RBA Starblade posted:

I like Dead Money but after the Nth time of having my legs crippled by barely visible bear traps it starts to grate a little.

Try stepping lightly.

# ¿ Dec 11, 2013 01:53

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Fallout: New Vegas: Ain't that a cuck in the bed?

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