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June 13, 2024, 08:15:04 AM

we're back, baby

So given this was on sale, and I picked it up, I thought a little necro was due!

Anyhow, a question (then some thoughts):

What order should I play the DLC in, and around what level should I do them?

I have only played a bit so far as I have gone back and restarted my character a couple of times as, well, everyone does that right? I got up to around level 12 but I think I was rushing ahead of the curve (or their is more to the main storyline than I thought)... anyhow: I find the world of NV much much better than that of Fallout 3. The colour is one thing, but the open space and only one real urban environment seem to fit more than the shooter-esque landscape than FO3 descended into.

Quote from: Ice Cream Emperor on October 17, 2011, 08:26:21 PM

I think the main difference is actually that in FO3 I care about my character. The prelude in the Vault -- and the fact that the central plot is about finding your dad -- is so vastly superior to the ultra-generic cutscene/background of my character in F:NV that I think it made all the rest of the interactions in the game more meaningful as well. The choices I am making (so far) in F:NV seem less interesting by comparison, but it's impossible to determine how much of that is the writing of the choices themselves and how much of it is the (lack of) writing for my protagonist.

I feel the exact opposite. In FO3 I felt like an idiot running around exploring shit as there was little justification provided to support my character to act that way. It was so solidly grounded in "you are looking for your father" that it detracted from the other possibilities. In NV I can do whatever I want, as my story can be dictated by me - I can play as someone motivated by revenge, or someone who wants to 'power up' so they don't get pushed around anymore, someone who doesn't want to get involved in anything anymore, ever, or someone who wants to sign on with a higher power for protection, etc. To expect a RPG to narrow the roles you can adopt rather than open them up seems counter-productive, and NV is much better in this regard.

Quote

Similarly, while the Faction system is in theory more complicated than Karma, I have a feeling it's contributing a lot to the lack of 'individual people' feeling I am getting. The whole moral landscape of the game just feels way more normalized -- you have X group who are fascists, and Y group who are nicer fascists, and Z group who are mean badasses, and they like electricity a lot so they're fighting. So just like pick one or pick none but that's pretty much the choice? At least so far I haven't seen a lot of fun stuff come out of that, though the Lottery Town had a nice edge to it, and certainly made me enjoy killing the condescending dick in charge.

Good/bad 'karma' is just a stupid system. No only is there no omniscient god recording your actions and then disseminating it to every other NPC in the game, but characters can move in different directions at the same time. I think the faction system makes sense, and allows further character development.

And I really like hardcore mode. One of my problems in games like this is that I try and do everything and as a result become absurdly powerful early in the game and trivialise everything else. Hardcore mode makes my 3 strength character have a lot more issues with this, I am pushed towards realism with regard to what I carry, so I earn less money, carry fewer weapons, and generally take longer to get to a powerful state. I can't be a champion shooter and craft stuff, as I just can't carry that much stuff - ammo having weight makes a big difference, as does (to a lesser extent) having to carry water and food. It's a shame that drugs and other high value stuff doesn't also have a weight, as I think money will still become pretty easy in that regard, but HC mode does create at least some opportunity costs.

I am going to get the challenge mod to make it even more fun!

My feeling on DLC:

Skip Dead Money, it sucks. Read the story bits on a wiki or something.
Do Honest Hearts first and relatively early, it isn't especially hard.
Do Old World Blues second, and at high-ish level. It is the best. Heart

Do Lonesome Road last (because it is the last one 'story' wise). Do not expect it to be as awesome as OWB. Which is really awesome.

I dunno, maybe you won't hate Dead Money. I know there were other people here who thought it was OK.

Well seeing how I have Dead Money anyhow I figure I'll take a look and see which side I fall on.

I got JSawyers unofficial mod, so I started again.

110 health and 90 weight, starting with none of the DLC gear. Yay.

I kind of liked Dead Money, the scrounging for resources bit made it feel real posatpocalyptic for a change. You just have to ditch the Holorifle afterwards if you want any challenging combat because it is an obscenely powerful all-purpose weapon (Sniper Rifle with scope and VATS-usable ammo size and shooting speed. Oh, and it used readily available ammo as well.).

The scrounging isn't the problem in Dead Money, its the stupid, stupid neck trap thing.

Dead Money is still my favorite of the DLC thanks entirely to how brutally uncompromising it is about survival, compared to the very weak 'hardcore' mode in the rest of the game. The explosive collar thing never really annoyed me, though I wouldn't've missed it if it was gone. OWB is second overall in my book but first in story and writing. Honest Hearts is only okay, and Lonesome Road is just meh, my least favorite of the four.

My personal ranking is OWB >>> LR ~ DM > HH. Honest Hearts never really 'stuck' for some reason, and I thought DM would've been great... in a completely different game. :p LR felt like it was on rails, but at least it gave some kind of closure, so it gets points for that. Obviously OWB is the bestest. SCIENCE!

All DLC have fairly difficult enemies (maybe HH is the easiest here, but those cazadores can be tough), so I recommend level ~15 or so before checking them out.

Honest Hearts always felt like it should be longer than it was. I liked the setting and idea, but it just didn't deliver. It had such a large area, and it just seemed like very little went on in it. OWB is my favorite DLC. I disliked Dead Money so much that it turned me off playing the game for two months or so; I ended up just cheating so I could get the hell out of there.

If you don't use electric weapons STOCKPILE AMMO before going into OWB unless you really like a challenge. All the enemies are robots (i.e. small arms don't do much damage to them) and there isn't that much regular weapon ammo laying around. It was quite a challenge to complete, although it was still very enjoyable.

Hm, I don't remember having much of a problem with it. I was doing the sniper thing, though, so relatively less bullets per kill I guess.

.50 MG match = Heart

Goddammit, now I want to play this game again.

Honest Hearts is okay but kinda mediocre, and while the weapons are awesome it kinda sucks getting ammo for them afterwards IMO. Dead Money feels almost like a different game and is the best written of the more dramatic DLCs but hooollly balls is it annoying and unfun at times. Old World Blues owns bones and could have been its own game. Lonesome Road is honestly, terrible.

I hate the gameplay of Dead Money with a purple passion. If you're not one of a very narrow range of character builds, the whole experience is so shitty that I found myself sometimes wanting to go back and play Mothership fucking Zeta again. Good story though.

Quote from: Ingmar on July 27, 2012, 11:57:08 AM

Hm, I don't remember having much of a problem with it. I was doing the sniper thing, though, so relatively less bullets per kill I guess.

.50 MG match = Heart

Goddammit, now I want to play this game again.

I just had pistol and assault rifles, so maybe that's why. Also I think I was only level 17 or very near the minimum level required to enter it.

IIRC, most of the DLC requires lv 30.

Quote from: CmdrSlack on July 28, 2012, 10:19:05 AM

IIRC, most of the DLC requires lv 30.

Nope, old world blues lets you in at 15

Yea, I did OWB at 16 with guns and well, it was not pleasant.

ED: There is a decent amount of .357 and .44 but not enough to kill things with a 44 pistol or cowboy repeater. There was zero ammo for my 5.56 pistol, or Hunting Shotgun either

Ed: Melee seems to be the way to go in the game to me. The 2x damage in vats means you ignore a lot of DR, and the 4x on top of that for sneaks means that you pretty much one shot any enemy with a vats sneak attack [and if you have a high critical weapon, god help them]

Dead Money was so bad that (despite owning all of the DLC) after I beat it I stopped playing and haven't went back. Now I'm debating firing it up again.

The resurgence of this thread has made me start up NV again to do the DLC. I'd already done the main story and for whatever reason had petered out on HH when I went back to play it. So I finished HH last night and plan to start Dead Money tonight. Thanks for the inspiration.

Quote from: Rendakor on July 29, 2012, 11:26:17 PM

Dead Money was so bad that (despite owning all of the DLC) after I beat it I stopped playing and haven't went back. Now I'm debating firing it up again.

Old World Blues is entirely worth it. I'd actually do Honest Hearts after Dead Money because it's a good change of scenery.

I'm now 8 levels in to my JSawyer hardcore play through. Was going to do a radicalthon but I got too caught up playing it...

Finally made it to Novac. Crippled leg (since a gg near the outpost) and chest (raiders attacking merchants) and severe sleep deprivation. Had to throw away a fair bit of stuff due to my 90 weight limit.

Went north at the start and was actually cornered by a deathclaw for a while. Nothing I had could damage it so I had to hide on the roof of Neil's shack and wait it out. Ran back south pretty quick after that.

Just saw this. It's pretty neat. I'm linking the reddit link because, well, it has more info than the Kotaku article, IMO.

Steam has this and Fallout 3, both with all the dlc's on sale for about 3 more hours. Both games for less than $40, I've almost finished fallout 3 when my disc died for xbox, and I've not played fallout NV yet, so fun times ahead.

I'm near level 20 and saw Vault 34 unexplored on my map, thought I'd have an explore...

Oops, bad idea. Time to get some proper equipment before I go back.

Went and visited Benny to lift my spirits, thought I'd cut a deal with him.

Oops. Bastard isn't going to get away for this...

Played so so so much, yet the map is covered in places I haven't poked about yet, and that's just the ones I've got the markers for. I'll probably hit the level cap before even reaching the DLC.

I almost level capped before seeing NV - and I don't mean entering NV, actually seeing it on the horizon.

Quote from: shiznitz on August 06, 2012, 09:45:54 AM

I almost level capped before seeing NV - and I don't mean entering NV, actually seeing it on the horizon.

You can see it on the horizon from Goodsprings...

Also I'm playing on JSawyers hardcore mode, which lowers experience iirc.

But I didn't know what I was seeing then (although I could guess).

Any advice for level or building in this game?

I'm hooked on the machette and throwing spears! & I have tribal armor too! Is throwing spears using melee or unarmed?

Throwing spears use melee.

Fallout has one of the better wikia wikis out there:

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Throwing_spear

Might want to also consider hitting up The Vault, where the original founders of the Fallout Wiki mentioned moved to after Wikia fired him, taking a goodly bit of his staff with him.

I think I've used both of those without noticing they're different, somehow. I am clearly not up to date on my wikidrama.

I picked up Ultimate (with all the DLC) at the sale. It's still a great game. If it had vehicles (rusty, broken-down ones, mind) rather than quick-travel and less zoning (in particular, the zoning kills NV feeling like a city) it would probably be my favourite open-world RPG. So much stuff to do in it and just the right amount of jank. I like having some jank in my games, it makes them interesting on a meta level.

Quote from: Rendakor on July 29, 2012, 11:26:17 PM

Dead Money was so bad that (despite owning all of the DLC) after I beat it I stopped playing and haven't went back. Now I'm debating firing it up again.

I'm playing Dead Money right now and I don't see what's so bad about it. I haven't gotten in to the casino yet, though. I'm still putting the 3 into position for the gala event.

Of course, I'm also level 30 and had focused on melee & guns as far as perks and fighting abilities. The ability to wtfpwn the inhabitants has made it pretty easy so far.

My complaint with it centered mostly around the instant death mechanics: the bomb collar thing in the beginning, and the unkillable ~~robots~~ holograms in the later half. I also don't like the "we took all your stuff away" plot device.

Yeah, if I was going to capture someone, I'd absolutely let him keep an arsenal of weapons and tools. That's like Smart Captor 101.

I didn't say it was illogical, I said it wasn't fun. If you're going to steal all my shit anyway, let me make a fresh level 20 character to start right at the DLC at least.