I've been adding in mods to slow things down for me a bit. I hate reaching the level cap too quickly. I've been exploring everthing that I can find and I'm between Novac and BC main-quest-wise. I think I hit level 9 last night but I added the slow-down mod at level 6. I attempted Death Claws last night and was quite rudely decapitated by the first one I encountered. My current stock of weapons could barely hurt them.
There's another slower leveling mod here with more options, you can even slow it down so that it takes 3 times as much experience to gain a level.
DeepO or others further in, how much do you suggest leveling should be slowed down? I'm trying to decide which of those mods to use, the last thing I want is a repeat of Fallout 3 where I hit the level cap having barely explored the map. I'm thinking of using the 1.5x mod, but if it's like Fallout 3 then the 3x mod would be more appropriate.
Try to find a mod that reduces the XP you gain, rather than one that simply increases the amount of XP needed to level up. That should ensure compatibility with future DLC that might increase the level cap.
I just reached vegas at level 10. I have been using a mod to slow down my XP gain since the very beginning and have put in around 20 hours. I've barely scratched the surface of this game and I'm already at level 10.
I had been exploring every little part of the wild wild wasteland, but once I hit Novac I had enough. I really wanted to see vegas so I just hoofed it straight there. Now that I've seen it I'm going back to Novac and going to explore around Vegas.
There are interesting places EVERYWHERE. I just ran into one by accident that involved someone/thing (still not sure about that) I just met in New Vegas. Gives him more background. I hope that this will be mentioned later in the dialogues with him or relate to some quest later on.
Even if I did hit the level 30 max I think I still would enjoy playing it. I quit F3 once I hit level 20. I was bored to tears because I could kill anything I ran across and there wasn't anything interesting anymore. With F:NV everywhere you go there is at least something interesting thing to see
Like:
There's a place I found near spotlight. It's a bromin/bighorn ranch. The house is burned down and notes are spread around. I won't tell you what they say, but it explains what happened there.
Now because of what happened the bromin/bighorners and their calves are malnourished. Has anyone found a way to save these poor guys? Damn animals whether they're real or computer genereated always hit a soft spot with me. Now I want to save them, but haven't found any rancher who needs a ranch or anyone else who even hints at the existance of this ranch.
DeepO's impression of the game is similar to my own. I'll leave my companions outside if I go into a cave or a vault. It's just too hard to keep track of them. I'm finding more companions everywhere I go, so I just might go for more realism and if one of my companions die then let him die/no reload. Except for
the little eybot. I love that little guy.
Skills actually matter this time around. Especially SPEECH. I have that one up to 60 because it is not a throw away skill anymore. There are only three skills I am trying to max out. Guns - 60, Speech - 60 and Science - 55. You can't just throw skill points around willy nilly like you could in F3. Repair and survival are also essential if you want to create better items. I have repair and survival around 35. They'll be the next skill I focus on.
The NPCs are alive and the quests actually make some kind of sense. As for factions, I'm still confused about why I get bad karma for stealing from a faction I'm pretty much at war with.
For example:
I wiped out the powder gang at the NCRCF. I became infamous within that faction, yet I still get bad karma for taking anything from them. Odd.
Also another thing about the powder gang. I don't understand why there was no mention anywhere that I had cleared out the NCRCF or at least killed their leader.
One word of warning about choosing quests. Choose carefully before you accept. I learned something about one of the factions that might had helped me in a larger war later, but by then I had almost wiped them out of existance. I may be overthinking this, but to just be thinking about it at all is great. F3 there was nothing like this at all. You had a few different factions that were plainly evil, good or just freakin crazy In F:NV you don't really know the whole picture about factions until it's almost too late. There's a faction in New Vegas that I'm doing some work for that I sure would like to know more about. I'm barely given any details about what I'm doing other than the bare minimun. Even with a high speech value I can't drag anymore details out of anyone.
So basically the biggest improvements were exactly what I thought they'd be. NPCs (SPEECH IS USEFUL)and the plot. All the other stuff is just icing on the cake as far as I'm concerned. Really really great icing
Here's a little hint from J.E. Sawyer that I saw him tweet about. It involves one of the vaults:
Vault 34 is for advanced players only. It's one mean dungeon. Gotta love it
One minor complaint that I hope will be addressed with a future mod. Bartering is still almost worthless. I have too many caps as it is with a barter skill of 20. The prices of stimpacks should be a lot more and I shouldn't find as many of them. Actually the prices on everything could be increased.
In addition, I have way too many items. It took me close to an hour to move all my stuff from Goodsprings to New Vegas. If there was a better inventory manager this might not be a problem, but with this console interface it is extremely tedious to do any kind of inventory manangement.
That's a small complaint and one that I bring on myself because I have to collect almost everything I find. The bartering system can be fixed with a good mod. Hopefully the inventory system as well. Even if it was something like Darknui's Oblivion mod that would help a lot. Small icons instead of a list. I hate that freakin list.
I'm choosing to be an NCR homey this game, though I'm sure they're up to no good. Avellone doesn't believe in "good" guys. Everyone has an agenda. I haven't stepped near Vegas yet. I have no qualms about dropping in any mods that catch my fancy, and I've got 6 or 8 running. There has already been an overhaul-type mod released, though the gal mentions that it's just a basic version until the script extender gets released. I'm doing the quests surrounding Forlorn Hope and having a good time. I'm an explore everywhere type guy too and I can't tell you how many places don't have a little map indicator for them. There are a LOT of places that don't show on the good ol' pip boy.
55 hours (lvl 20) into the game - good game. You can see in Fallout New Vegas, how great it is for a developer to concentrate on story, choices and consequences, factions, dialog and gameworld design.
The old Oblivion engine was already there.
I'm enjoying this a lot too, what I most like is the way the world is designed. Fallout 3 was a vast improvement from Oblivion in that respect, but it still got very repetitve in areas like the endless metro tunnels which had that copy-paste Elder Scrolls feel. At least in the first 20 hours of New Vegas (I've explored most of southern part of the map) there's very little like that - most areas seem like they're a proper part of the setting rather than just fulfilling the quota of dungeons.
Interestingly enough, a lot of people on the Bethboards are complaining about the lack of dungeons and "lack of content" whatever that means.
I think there are a few annoyances in the gameworld, some areas seems unnecessarily annoying to get to for example. But on the whole, I think the Mojave feels far more logical as well as more varied than the DC wasteland.
I gave myself 10 charisma, 7 intellect, 7 perception and used strength/endurance as dumpstats, plus took both perks that made me faster with reduced physical restance. So I am basically a glasscannon. Vats give me 7 shots with laser pistol at level 1.
You do realise that some weapons including energy weapons need the stregth to avoid penalties in accuracy right. IMo having 10 charisma makes the game harder. Then again you could possibly do well with a lot of companions.
LVL 11, about 20 hrs in.
Exploring south areas with "friends". I really like the level design. From what I recall FO3 was undulating hills? I like what they have done with it here.
I have had whiffs of stalker, deus ex - just from some of the explorable areas.
Music is very good, especially around certain areas there is a really sad piece that plays.
My Char is not overly strong by himself, but my buddie(s) are rockin - a high charisma does wonders. I have about 9 CHA, 9 INT, 6 STR and 4/5 on other stats. I cranked up lock picking to the max as there are still loads of locked areas and I love rummaging for goodies. Next up is guns, repair, speech, then maybe science.
Playing on Hard with Hardcore on, but if it starts getting too easy I can crank it up to Very Hard. Still get wasted in some areas, which is reassuring.
Enjoyed the quests so far. Still throwing surprises at me in areas I thought were safe ….
No crashes at all, some graphic glitches but nothing a reload does not sort. Once or twice a critter was stuck in a wall, no big deal as I could kill them if I reloaded.
I don't use VATS and get along fine.
This is much better than FO3. Everything seems more grown up. The opinions from the staff at RPS surprise me really (they may have played further or to completion I guess) as my experience has been the opposite. Actually the atmosphere created reminds me occasionally of Metro 2033 - quite "sad" in a way, contemplative.
Somehow FO3 never felt "real". It was very "gamey". This feels much more "real".
You do realise that some weapons including energy weapons need the stregth to avoid penalties in accuracy right. IMo having 10 charisma makes the game harder. Then again you could possibly do well with a lot of companions.
I have a buddy who kicks ass with my high CHA. I also got a perk which gives them another boost if you are below 50% health. I think they made it that you are so "likeable" and such a good "leader" that you can let others do the fighting whilst you kick back and drink Nuka-Cola and plan the next expedition. I read about so many people dumping CHA to 1 and going solo like rambo. I guess there are some technical / bug issues why they do this, but I like having people with me - I have played enough FPS its quite refreshing to have others work for a change instead of playing another run and gun.
However, 1 Strength as a dump stat is pretty low, the character can barely lift a knife or line up 9mm!
My STR/END is 3 each. I get dehydrated REALLY fast, I dunno if it's caused by my low endurance. Also stimpacks do near nothing. But fine, I'll see how far I can go.
Stimpaks work very slowly .... and if you take too many you get addicted.
Just make sure you scavenge, get buddies (they can help carry) and you will be fine.
I think dehydration is the fastest of the three.
I just completed my first play-through. Steam says 48 hours played. I would say that I visited 90% of the significant locations (excluding all the mines and farms …) and completed 56 quests and sure there were still many not done. I reached level 30 just before the last major battle so for me the leveling was just a little bit fast as I would prefer that level 30 is only reached if you do 100% of content and grind a little.
Played through with hardcore mode and hard and got somewhat annoyed with hardcore mode at the end as it just became mostly a nuisance as I had 20 maize and 20 purified waters in my inventory and had to activate them every once and a while but still glad they added it as an option. Some companions are easier to keep alive than others I found.
I really enjoyed the greyness of the C&C at the end of the game. I ended up doing a sort of calculus to minimize the evil that I was going to perpetrate in the world as I was playing a savior of the wasteland type. The faction I ended up playing for did not make it easy on me and I did one major evil act on a faction that idolized me.
What I really miss is the sprinting option that uses AP that I think FWE added as I got tired of running so slowly through the strip after a while. Would not have minded a fast travel point actually on the strip. Also would be nice to have hotkeys to swap between different equipment load-outs. Anyway enjoyed it more than anything else released this year and I'm sure I will playthough at least once more very soon and can see about 2-3 other branches I would like to explore more completely.
I just completed it as well. Excellent game overall. I played a gunslinger/smooth talker kind of character, worked out pretty well. Already started my 2nd run, this time with a melee guy/smooth talker - melee is overall easier in my opinion, mainly because I feel guns had somewhat low damage against armored enemies. It might also be because my build is more combat focused this time around; I used PE as a dump stat so I could get 10 ST/EN. PE does nothing for melee that ED-E doesn't do even better.
A few notes:
- There's definitely level scaling in New Vegas. I cleared out Black Mountain at level 18 or so, and bumped into a bunch of Super Mutant Masters with the best sledgehammers. I tried the same at level 8 or some such thing last night, and met regular Super Mutant Brutes with regular sledgehammers.
- I agree with skavenhorde regarding the Powder Gangers. I've seen similar behavior in quite a few places.
- The main quest varies greatly depending on who you decide to ally with, though certain things are still the same.
- Faction armor is dangerous.
- Boone is overpowered.
- I actually found the Vaults less interesting in New Vegas than FO3. Somewhat strange, considering most locations and characters are far more interesting in NV than FO3.
- Sprinting would've been awesome..
Stimpaks work very slowly …. and if you take too many you get addicted.
Just make sure you scavenge, get buddies (they can help carry) and you will be fine.
I think dehydration is the fastest of the three.
I use the sarsaparilla drink most of the time. It's cheaper than stimpacks, just take longer to use. The dehydration is manageable.
That said, I just love the hardcore system. The "aid" menu is just SO much important now and I love playing around with what I should eat today. The hardest part is to get my hands on doctors bags. I have to go all the back to the first town to heal myself when I get crippled. Sometimes I have been forced to get through an area with quicksave/quickload and rely on pure luck to get by.
I haven't found a buddy yet. Stacking up on Science/Repair to get the robot.
Spoiler on how to get the robot without the skills:
You simply need the required parts - 3x scrap metal, 2x sensor modules and 1x scrap electronics. You can avoid getting those parts if you have the required skills.
I learned that if you wish to play with low strength (or whenever really) you can use stimpacks and drugs as hard cash considering they have zero weight.
Damn animals whether they're real or computer genereated always hit a soft spot with me. Now I want to save them, but haven't found any rancher who needs a ranch or anyone else who even hints at the existance of this ranch.
)and the plot. All the other stuff is just icing on the cake as far as I'm concerned. Really really great icing 
