The Official Fallout 3 thread of post-apocalyptic proportions!

garath said:
Repair is taking an item like a 10mm pistol and consuming other 10mm pistols to add to it's condition.

I.e. you have 2 10mm pistols, one is 20% condition and one is 16%, you can combine one to the other and make a pistol of 25% condition (numbers are made up, but it's small gains).

The higher your repair skill, the more you can repair the item.
ahh it all makes sense now
 
Chojin said:
I'm not sure what you mean by decent vendors. Vendors have a limit of caps they have, Fallout has always been more about the barter system. Megaton has at least 5 vendors that I know of. Also keep your barter skill in mind when trading. When you loot an item you'll get a value of the item (something we didn't get in 1 and 2) based on the item and its condition. Think of it as an MSRP. Just because an item says its worth 50 caps doesn't mean you'll get 50 caps for it, your barter skill also matters.

Also caps aren't always necessarily king, but barter is. They're great cause they don't add any weight, but remember a ton of mac and cheese weighs next to nothing and can be used to trade too.
good point on the bartering. looking for a vendor with a nice stock of ammo and guns, although getting further in the game im picking up alot more stuff
 
Cornballer said:
Has anyone messed around with the hacking? The game manual mentions that if you find certain phrases (facing brackets with or without text in between them), it'll reset the attempt ticker or have other benefits. I've only done one terminal so far, and I don't remember seeing that.
Yeah, they aren't hard to find.

Brackets are: [], (), {}

The special bracket phrase will all be on a single line with the brackets facing each other. So for example...

#=/[+%40WALK
ING{=%$|^HEL
PING}COMPANY
[%=^{#]READE
R(%$#(FEEDER

The bolded one is the successful bracket phrase. Just move the cursor over the first bracket and the whole phrase will be highlighted and shown on the input.

They're somewhat useful in that they will reset your tries or remove words that are not the password. I wouldn't stress about finding them as I find the hacking puzzles fairly easy. But if you happen to run across one while you are reading the screen, go ahead and select it. It doesn't use up one of your guesses.

Just make sure the bracket phrase is ALL ON ONE LINE. In the example up above, the bracket phrase {=%$|^HELPING} is on two lines, so it doesn't count as a useful code and it will use up one of your guesses.
 
Koomaster said:
Yeah, they aren't hard to find.

Brackets are: [], (), {}

The special bracket phrase will all be on a single line with the brackets facing each other. So for example...

#=/[+%40WALK
ING{=%$|^HEL
PING}COMPANY
[%=^{#]READE
R(%$#(FEEDER

The bolded one is the successful bracket phrase. Just move the cursor over the first bracket and the whole phrase will be highlighted and shown on the input.

They're somewhat useful in that they will reset your tries or remove words that are not the password. I wouldn't stress about finding them as I find the hacking puzzles fairly easy. But if you happen to run across one while you are reading the screen, go ahead and select it. It doesn't use up one of your guesses.

Just make sure the bracket phrase is ALL ON ONE LINE. In the example up above, the bracket phrase {=%$|^HELPING} is on two lines, so it doesn't count as a useful code and it will use up one of your guesses.


AHHHH thats so awesome. Man I love this game!
 
To all those wondering - your shit WILL GET STOLEN (IE WILL DISAPPEAR) IF YOU LEAVE IT IN SOME RANDOM BOX. So don't do it. You get a house of your own by completing a quest fairly early on, and can store all your items in there, without worry.

Incidentally, it's crazy how I've been creating my own fun by "nesting" within my house. Even though there's no logical reason to do this, I store different items in different lockers/containers :lol :lol :lol Weapons in one, apparel in another, schematic supplies in a third (surgical tubing, pilot light, etc.), and excess food and nuka cola in the fridge.

It would be easier to just shove all that stuff in one locker, since you can sort items in any container by type, and I could still easily access what I want. But what's the fun in that? I'm not much of an "RP" kind of guy, but it still sucks me into the world a little more to have to go upstairs and rummage through my desk for those pilot lights I put in there a while back.
 
GDJustin said:
To all those wondering - your shit WILL GET STOLEN (IE WILL DISAPPEAR) IF YOU LEAVE IT IN SOME RANDOM BOX. So don't do it. You get a house of your own by completing a quest fairly early on, and can store all your items in there, without worry.

Incidentally, it's crazy how I've been creating my own fun by "nesting" within my house. Even though there's no logical reason to do this, I store different items in different lockers/containers :lol :lol :lol Weapons in one, apparel in another, schematic supplies in a third (surgical tubing, pilot light, etc.), and excess food and nuka cola in the fridge.

It would be easier to just shove all that stuff in one locker, since you can sort items in any container by type, and I could still easily access what I want. But what's the fun in that? I'm not much of an "RP" kind of guy, but it still sucks me into the world a little more to have to go upstairs and rummage through my desk for those pilot lights I put in there a while back.

That sounds exactly like the kind of stuff I would do.

:D
 
Well, I guess I'm going to restart. Didn't realize there were only 20 levels, so I had put 2 points into the EXP perk, which will turn out to be useless.

Now, I think I'll specialize in either lockpicking or science...not sure which.

Also, is charisma even usefull at all? Does it affect your speech skill?
 
beezlebozo said:
i despised oblivion and love fallout 3. it's amazing what a difference changing the setting and switching to guns has made for my interest.

JSnake said:
I feel the same way. It wouldn't be incorrect to say that Oblivion is one of my least favorite games ever, but I'm adoring Fallout 3.

Damn..... I loathe Oblivion with a passion, and had intended to skip Fallout 3, but if there are more Oblivion dissenters like myself who are now praising Fallout, perhaps I might need to try it.
 
I'm also amused that I seem to be incapable of ever building up any kind of significant caps bankroll.

Every single time I complete some big dungeon and roll back into town loaded up with "phat loots" I'm like "Sweet - THIS is when I finally start to get ahead - I'll sell all this and finally have a nice pile of caps."

But instead, I always end up trading all that junk for... a different pile of junk. :lol :lol I always go through the same routine - I select all my stuff for sale, first. So when that's finished, I'll see that the transaction is like <--- 645 caps or whatever. So then I look at what they have for sale, thinking I'll pick up a couple things, but still end up with some huge stack of caps. I'll buy a couple stimpacks, maybe a new piece of armor, maybe a schematic ingredient, and before I know it, the transaction now reads <--- 23 caps and I'm like :(
 
TheExodu5 said:
Well, I guess I'm going to restart. Didn't realize there were only 20 levels, so I had put 2 points into the EXP perk, which will turn out to be useless.

Now, I think I'll specialize in either lockpicking or science...not sure which.

Also, is charisma even usefull at all? Does it affect your speech skill?

I've had it open one dialog option for me, but that was it. It was evil btw. It involves Jerico
and you paying him 1000 caps for him to join you. Don't know if he actually does, I will test this out as soon as I get 1k before I nuke Megaton.
 
Solo said:
Damn..... I loathe Oblivion with a passion, and had intended to skip Fallout 3, but if there are more Oblivion dissenters like myself who are now praising Fallout, perhaps I might need to try it.

i felt the same way about oblivion, so yes you really need to play this game.
 
I'm a huge fan of Oblivion, and this game looks like it would have the feel of it. I think I'll pick this game up tonight--it seems to be good. I've never played any of the fallouts, however, so just how different is it compared to the previous ones?
 
Arggghhhh. I am away from my xbox 360 currently but I am still confused about the megaton bomb thing. This is all I can really think about currently.

Even though I chose to save the town. I told the sheriff and then he went to kill the guy in the bar(I cant remember his name) who wanted to blow up the town.The sheriff went to confront him but the sheriff was shot and killed and the shady guy left. I should have killed him but I did not. Now I know the sheriffs son has my reward for saving the town. The main problem is that when i go by the bomb it only says enable and not disable. I do not have the skill level to do it yet but will the prompt change when I have the skill level? This is confusing to me.

Game is truly epic. I hate walking around at night. To many crazy ass things and its too dark for me.
 
GDJustin said:
I'm also amused that I seem to be incapable of ever building up any kind of significant caps bankroll.

Every single time I complete some big dungeon and roll back into town loaded up with "phat loots" I'm like "Sweet - THIS is when I finally start to get ahead - I'll sell all this and finally have a nice pile of caps."

But instead, I always end up trading all that junk for... a different pile of junk. :lol :lol I always go through the same routine - I select all my stuff for sale, first. So when that's finished, I'll see that the transaction is like <--- 645 caps or whatever. So then I look at what they have for sale, thinking I'll pick up a couple things, but still end up with some huge stack of caps. I'll buy a couple stimpacks, maybe a new piece of armor, maybe a schematic ingredient, and before I know it, the transaction now reads <--- 23 caps and I'm like :(
I think that is intentional on Bethesdas part. You have to sacrifice quite a lot, if you hope to gain wealth. Evil path seems to have an easier time gaining money. I like the scarce ammo drops, items and caps in the Fallout series overall. It leads to a more desperate feeling at times. A lot of games it is easy to grind out some levels and make a ton of extra money, but in Fallouts case it would take away from the setting, if you could buy almost anything you wanted by level 4.
 
GDJustin said:
I'm also amused that I seem to be incapable of ever building up any kind of significant caps bankroll.

Every single time I complete some big dungeon and roll back into town loaded up with "phat loots" I'm like "Sweet - THIS is when I finally start to get ahead - I'll sell all this and finally have a nice pile of caps."

But instead, I always end up trading all that junk for... a different pile of junk. :lol :lol I always go through the same routine - I select all my stuff for sale, first. So when that's finished, I'll see that the transaction is like <--- 645 caps or whatever. So then I look at what they have for sale, thinking I'll pick up a couple things, but still end up with some huge stack of caps. I'll buy a couple stimpacks, maybe a new piece of armor, maybe a schematic ingredient, and before I know it, the transaction now reads <--- 23 caps and I'm like :(


Depending on your character's moral compass you can alleviate that by popping a round into the merchants head and looting his greedy corpse. :D

Travelling merchants for best results. Repair then rob. Who needs money!
 
wenis said:
i felt the same way about oblivion, so yes you really need to play this game.

Same.

Hated Oblivion, only played 20 minutes of it. Have done 3 hours of sidequests in FO3 now.
So Awesome.
 
straydog1980 said:
no, not to my knowledge. If you
check the computer on the top level of the school, you'll learn they were trying to tunnel into Vault 101 (so you already know they failed), and had to stop because of the ants. You don't get to go any further because there isn't really any "further" to go. You do get some sick loot though, an automatic rifle and plenty of ammo so it's worth the trek imo
Of interest regarding Springvale School:
I read on another forum that there are skill books next to the computer upstairs (the one w/ the messages) as well as one near the dead miners at the end of the tunnel. I guess I'll track back there tonight and pick those up - I missed them the first time around.
 
is there a bug with the mole rat repellent quest? I couldn't go to where she suggested as I'd killed all the molerats in there. I found 2 in a station and smacked them with the stick. I found another 3 above ground but when i hit them with it, they don't explode or seem to count. Hmm
 
Solo said:
Damn..... I loathe Oblivion with a passion, and had intended to skip Fallout 3, but if there are more Oblivion dissenters like myself who are now praising Fallout, perhaps I might need to try it.

Fallout 3 is much better than Oblivion. There's really no question about that.

When it actually runs, of course.
 
I think this game is great (I only thought oblivion was ok) but I don't think this is really fallout. The tone of the game isn't depressing enough. Also the writing just isn't fallout to me. I don't know if its the way the dialogue is written or if it is the mediocre delivery of the va's. Its especially sticks out to me after playing fable 2 which has awesome writing and vaing. It does capture somethings well though and is very fun. Vats is a proper evolution of the fallout battle system though.

Game hasn't been glitchy for me so far which is a good thing and the engine appears to be very scalable despite what the recommended requirements say.
 
MrPing1000 said:
is there a bug with the mole rat repellent quest? I couldn't go to where she suggested as I'd killed all the molerats in there. I found 2 in a station and smacked them with the stick. I found another 3 above ground but when i hit them with it, they don't explode or seem to count. Hmm

Kill the 7 or so required for the optional quest objective, and see if you get credit for it.
 
Chojin said:
Depending on your character's moral compass you can alleviate that by popping a round into the merchants head and looting his greedy corpse. :D

Travelling merchants for best results. Repair then rob. Who needs money!

I'm playing a good character, so that's not an option, for me. I don't even really know why I'm playing Good... I truly believe that I'd have more fun playing Evil, but I just can't bring myself to do it.

MrPing1000 said:
is there a bug with the mole rat repellent quest? I couldn't go to where she suggested as I'd killed all the molerats in there. I found 2 in a station and smacked them with the stick. I found another 3 above ground but when i hit them with it, they don't explode or seem to count. Hmm

My speech skill isn't too high (IDK exactly what it is, but I haven't been focusing skill points in it), but I was still able to use Speech to skip this part of the quest. I just lied and told her I tested the stick on the Mole Rats, and she bought it, and allowed me to move onto the next portion.
 
GDJustin said:
I'm playing a good character, so that's not an option, for me. I don't even really know why I'm playing Good... I truly believe that I'd have more fun playing Evil, but I just can't bring myself to do it.

I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.
 
MThanded said:
Arggghhhh. I am away from my xbox 360 currently but I am still confused about the megaton bomb thing. This is all I can really think about currently.

Even though I chose to save the town. I told the sheriff and then he went to kill the guy in the bar(I cant remember his name) who wanted to blow up the town.The sheriff went to confront him but the sheriff was shot and killed and the shady guy left. I should have killed him but I did not. Now I know the sheriffs son has my reward for saving the town. The main problem is that when i go by the bomb it only says enable and not disable. I do not have the skill level to do it yet but will the prompt change when I have the skill level? This is confusing to me.

Game is truly epic. I hate walking around at night. To many crazy ass things and its too dark for me.

Once your explosives level is 25 or higher, just select it and you will have multiple options. Use items to make your explosives higher if you need to!
 
Gerald said:
I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.

I can explain my view point

I am the anti-criminal type in real life, the ideals of being able to be heroic are interesting to me, sure there are MANY who play evil but in Oblivion I even made a Paladin and played LIKE a Paladin (my 1 murder was accident, they walked in front of me)

in KOTOR I was all the way light side for the same reason, its heroics, you CAN be the evil bastard type but some people want to BE the hero, and not scripted hero where you don't make the call, but making tough decisions where one is more desirable whereas one is more heroic!
 
Gerald said:
I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.

It's the opposite for me. I basically never play a good character in any game that offers choice, because I just don't find it nearly as fun as the alternative, but I've also been surprised at the number of people who say they always try and play a good guy. Being evil in a game for me offers the thrills of escapism - being good, not so much.
 
Okay, I'm starting to think that maybe I'm playing this game wrong. I read that small arms, science, and speech were good starts to raise for a first time player. I'm lv8 now and I have those three abilities up to 70(give or take five points) and everything else is 17ish or so. Is the cap for those abilities 99? Should I focus on other things as well or just max those three out for now? I ask because I just realized that I can't even disarm the bomb in Megaton >.> Yet!
 
This game has really grown on me. At first, I was somewhat disappointed, but over the last few hours of play I've become more and more impressed with the variety of skills and perks. This game slays Oblivion in so many ways.

Bravo, Bethesda.
 
Gerald said:
I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.

in fallout 1 and 2 i had no problem killing people that got in my way, because they were just sprites. in fallout 3, i have a hard time killing people because they look more like real people, the whole 3d thang. i shot off Three Dog's head and ended up reverting to a recent save because i actually felt terrible for doing it.

plus at the risk of going dr. phil on everyone, i find it more enjoyable to be a good character and help people in games because in real life i feel like i can never do enough to make people happy.
 
Gerald said:
I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.

Yeah its weird. I really wanted to be an asshole in the game but couldn't bring myself to do it. I guess i'm conditioned to thinking that picking "bad" responses will result in bad things.
 
burgerdog said:
Okay, I'm starting to think that maybe I'm playing this game wrong. I read that small arms, science, and speech were good starts to raise for a first time player. I'm lv8 now and I have those three abilities up to 70(give or take five points) and everything else is 17ish or so. Is the cap for those abilities 99? Should I focus on other things as well or just max those three out for now? I ask because I just realized that I can't even disarm the bomb in Megaton >.> Yet!

The cap on skills is 100, but remember to take outfits, skill books, and bobbleheads into account. If you max your small arms out at 100, you may be wasting points, since your skills will go up naturally as you find skill books and wear the stat boosting clothing. You should add just a little to explosives anyways, it's useful for disarming and looting mines, disarming traps, etc. Some raiders wear a helmet that adds to explosives and big guns as well, I believe, which should be easy to find.
 
Zeliard said:
It's the opposite for me. I basically never play a good character in any game that offers choice, because I just don't find it nearly as fun as the alternative, but I've also been surprised at the number of people who say they always try and play a good guy. Being evil in a game for me offers the thrills of escapism - being good, not so much.

Me too. The only thing I worry about is wacking a character that might have given me a quest or item or push the story forward. There is no way to know if that will happen.
 
JodyAnthony said:
in fallout 1 and 2 i had no problem killing people that got in my way, because they were just sprites. in fallout 3, i have a hard time killing people because they look more like real people, the whole 3d thang. i shot off Three Dog's head and ended up reverting to a recent save because i actually felt terrible for doing it.

plus at the risk of going dr. phil on everyone, i find it more enjoyable to be a good character and help people in games because in real life i feel like i can never do enough to make people happy.

Your beliefs are very interesting, especially in light of your forum title. :)
 
Gerald said:
I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.

Reading the articles right now by the way, interesting and entertaining reads.

As to why we play good characters when we have the freedom to be evil? Well... I'm currently playing to separate characters, one on 360 and one on PC. Both aren't straight good or evil, but both have a separate moral compass. Both are not above stealing. But my 360 character only kills in defense and the PC one she is willing to kill any and every male in the game save for Daddy for survival. I'm having a hard time playing FULLY evil though, right now on the PC save I got going I'm still debating on
blowing megaton to kingdom come
because of the women and little girl there. On one hand
she would get a posh bungalow in a well guarded well maintained (relatively) building instead of a rathole shack of a uh.. shack
but on the other, what would she really gain? Granted its a video game, but being able to make choices on who lives or dies for me? Its weird huh.

I don't view my characters as "good" or "evil". I view them on a more sliding scale.

Now with cannibalism ;) We'll see when we get to that point hohoho.


What I'm curious is how many of you have taken drugs in the game enough to be addicted or have become an alcaholic, I've always played my characters clean, not that I'm straight edge in real life or anything. I'm just a stat whore and the idea of negative stats makes me not inclined. Though it would be interesting to play as a junkie, constantly needing a fix.

I'll have to try that out next play through.

Tom Penny said:
Me too. The only thing I worry about is wacking a character that might have given me a quest or item or push the story forward. There is no way to know if that will happen.

Don't worry about that. There's always more than one way to progress the story. You'll never get stuck from killing an NPC.
 
Gerald said:
I find this sort of behavior fascinating. Why is it that we continue to play good characters even when presented with the freedom to be as evil as we'd like? I wrote about this sort of thing in the article I linked to previously, but I'd love to hear more about why players make the ethical decisions that they do when playing RPGs.

The same thing happened to me with Fable 2, I was all set to be an evil bastard but I just didn't feel at all comfortable playing it like that.
 
Loving the game so far, other than the battle system sometimes. I shouldn't have to unload an entire pistol clip into someone's face at point blank range to take them down.

That and I'm (first town spoiler)
kinda regretting leveling megaton. I did it because I figured you didn't have access to Tenpenny Tower otherwise, and I've been seeing most of the Megaton content via watching my roomie play so...
Also: I can't buy a robot now :[
 
I don't really like this game so far.

I just feel... bored.
I enjoyed the Vault the most in this game, but then I turned into a homicidal maniac and ended up killing damn near everyone during my escape (
Yes, even the Overseer
).

I don't think I chose the best skills, though. Small guns, Lockpicking, and Stealth... the small guns part comes in handy but what are two better choices for the way I'm playing?

I'm planning on restarting, btw. lol
 
JodyAnthony said:
shoot em up!

when i walked in, he started hammering on me so i started hitting him with a sledgehammer till he died.


Ah maybe running away to the town is the reason why the whole town went for a witch hunt on my ass. I guess I'll try killing it while in there and see how far I get.
 
I'll bite.

I find it far more rewarding to play a good character in games like Fable II, Fallout, Oblivion etc. I'm not an evil person in real life, and when playing a 'Role Playing Game' it's difficult for me to step into the shoes of a repugnant murderer. Whenever playing these sorts of games, my character is good, within reason. As in, I'll be polite and help you out, but if you try and trick me, or stab me in the back then my fury will be unrelenting, and you will die.

I can't get into the mindset of playing as a wanker. Who want's to be in a game for 30-40 hours where all the characters think you are an asshole, except for a few other child murdering asshole NPC's ? If I want back stabbing, double talk, snide comments, lies and trickery, I have real life for that shit.
 
gnarkill bill said:
Use Mentats

Ooh, I remember watching that in the video now, thanks.

Gerald said:
The cap on skills is 100, but remember to take outfits, skill books, and bobbleheads into account. If you max your small arms out at 100, you may be wasting points, since your skills will go up naturally as you find skill books and wear the stat boosting clothing. You should add just a little to explosives anyways, it's useful for disarming and looting mines, disarming traps, etc. Some raiders wear a helmet that adds to explosives and big guns as well, I believe, which should be easy to find.

I see, I'll start distributing points in other areas now. I didn't take armor into account at all.
 
Just going off the vids, the 3rd person animations and character models are laughably bad. It was the same thing in Oblivion, totally kills the atmosphere for me. They need to really hire some good animators and character modelers bad.
 
garath said:
What luck does according to ShadowsDieAway on Gamefaqs:

1 Critical 1%, All Skills +1
2 Critical 2%, All Skills +1
3 Critical 3%, All Skills +2
4 Critical 4%, All Skills +2
5 Critical 5%, All Skills +3
6 Critical 6%, All Skills +3
7 Critical 7%, All Skills +4
8 Critical 8%, All Skills +4
9 Critical 9%, All Skills +5
10 Critical 10%, All Skills +5

Holy shit thanks! Luck is most definitely worth it in that case. I'll probably start it off at 8 or 9.

edit: oh wait, it's +5 to skills and not SPECIAL. hmmmm. The crit chance is still a pretty big bonus though.
 
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