Getting New Vegas soon

[Retillias]

Fallout New Vegas is brilliant. Quite difficult though, at the start.. Especially if you go North. The most important rule is to stay away from the mountains and the quarry. If you aren't comfortable with your weapons or armour, you aren't ready to tackle that stuff.
Also, combat skills like Guns and Energy weapons aren't too important, compared to things like speech, repair, science and lockpicking.
Another important rule: Remember which armour you're wearing. The legion don't take too kindly to a badass with ranger armour and a fireaxe...

 

[Zydrate]

So, uh. What the hell is North?

 

[x EvilErmine x]

So, uh. What the hell is North?

Death lies to the north...no seriously.

 

[Valkyrie101]

I found Barter in Fo3 to be sacrificeable. I got money just from consistent play. Does it have a bigger part in NV?

Much bigger. It has the same benefits as in FO3, but in New Vegas, there are skill checks in dialogue for many different skills, not just Speech. Having a high Barter will be useful for solving quests diplomatically, because often it works in the same way as a Speech check. This applies to all skills, but particularly Barter. It's vital for a diplomat character.

Its also more useful anyway, because weapons and armour are much more expensive. You can pay several thousand caps for a set of combat armour.

 

[AlternatePFG]

Have a stat of at least 7 Luck and a high Barter skill and you'll be rolling in money as soon as you get to New Vegas.

Like others have said, DON'T GO NORTH. Really, take the suggestions of the NPCs and take the safer route. Even sneaking will do you no good there.

 

[Zydrate]

I'll be getting it within the week

 

[RuralGamer]

That's all I have to say about that.

Have fun though, play how you want. That's the best part of the game.

Reminds me why I should have never tried to cut corners and use Primm Pass at level 8 - Even with cowboy repeater and a mountain of ammo, its still virtually impossible; burned through all my ammo, stims and chems...

 

[RuralGamer]

To the OP: avoid siding with the Legion on your first playthrough; they are a lot harder to complete the main story with, mainly because they offer fewer quests (therefore less cash, experience and items).

 

[Deepzound]

Go melee, it made the game insanely fun. Focus on getting high endurance so you can get all the implants, and then just run straight to New Vegas going north (Like the prior games, the enemies can not scale anything that requires a little jump, so if you stick to the jagged rocks, all Deathclaws and other nasties will just suddenly run off because their AI doesn't know how to reach you.)

Get a high luck (7+, if not 9), as Luck increases all your skills. Make sure you don't get XP until you have the intelligence implant, as you will get the most skillpoints then. Start playing in the deadbeat casino in the Atomic wrangler, break the bank, then you'll have enough money to go to Vegas and become filthy rich within seconds.

If you want to, you can build an unbeatable killing machine with the right melee perks. Getting the one that allows every melee and unarmed attack to ignore damage threshold (-15 to be exact), makes every normally "hard" foe a joke. (mowing packs of Deathclaws down like they were brahmin)

Play on the hardest difficulty, as it is so much more satisfying going through every enemy like butter when you know it can't get harder than this with your special fire-axe (Knock Knock!).

EDIT:

For added fun, get the spiked knuckles and pretend you're playing DOOM II after picking up the Berserk powerup. Just like in Doom, everything you touch turns to giblets.

Also, if you want your character to be a beast in both unarmed and melee, you will have to sacrifice some perks that make you harder to kill in favor of damage perks. That's no problem though, just get a companion to tank for you, then load up some psycho and slasher and go to town with whatever melee weapon you have and everything in the game will die.

 

[Zydrate]

@Deepzound;
That all sounds rather advanced. Not to say I won't follow those tips eventually, but that entire post is hardly something new players should just hop to do.

 

[Deepzound]

TLDR version:

Get high luck and endurance, go north to New Vegas. Break the bank in the Casinos and buy every implant, and then go on the main quest and focus on melee or unarmed perks.

 

[NooNameLeft]

That's all I have to say about that.

Have fun though, play how you want. That's the best part of the game.

Reminds me why I should have never tried to cut corners and use Primm Pass at level 8 - Even with cowboy repeater and a mountain of ammo, its still virtually impossible; burned through all my ammo, stims and chems...

hehe.
I did it with one stealth boy...

 

[Platypusbill101]

Get Boone, and level your speech, thank me later

Also try to avoid Cazadors by any means necessary, never willingly engage them, you'll see why soon enough

Why? I killed a bunch of cazadores at level 2 with a 9mm SMG and a guns skill of 20-ish

 

[Platypusbill101]

That's all I have to say about that.

Have fun though, play how you want. That's the best part of the game.

What, running around underpowered and scared shitless?

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

- Speech, as always, is a must have tag skill. It will come in very handy all the way through the game.
- Repair will also come in handy, especially when you get it up to 90 and can use Jury Rigging to repair really good weapons with really shitty ones.
- Deathclaws will kill you if you engage them in close range combat. Use sneak attack criticals and high DAM over high DPS weapons to kill them.
- Hardcore mode doesn't add much to realism. It can add to a roleplaying experience if you try but ultimately it makes it a lot harder at the start, especially with the limb damage.
- Have loads of Doctor's Bags (if on hardcore) and Stims (on either) on you at all times.
Always pick up weapons from an enemies body, as well as armour. They sell well with the Gun Runners.

- The end game is the end. There is no more playing after, not yet anyway. Either make a save when the time comes or do all the side quests you can before heading out.

 

[Grimlock Fett]

"Hidden" STEAL EVERYTHING
"Detected" Wait for "Hidden" & STEAL EVERYTHING!
The Van Graffs in Freeside have lots of good stuff to steal! You can pick up anything in their store, carry it out of view and STEAL IT! Or use a stealth boy and ransack the whole shop in one go!
A good way to make money or lulz is to STEAL EVERYTHING and sell it back to the people who owned it! (Only works with traders)


Oh and the recharger rifle is the best weapon in the game! I killed a deathclaw using one! All you need to do is climb on top of a digger and chip away at its health for around an hour depending on how good a shot you are! (And it has unlimited ammo)

Also you should always take peoples clothes after you kill them to humiliate their corpse!
If you want to get crazy you can then drop their clothes after. Neatly folded next to their body!

Also you should kill the giant rat the children are chasing in Freeside! ~TRUST~!

 

[Lucane]

In a small town called Primm you can find a little eyebot called ED-E you either need a high science or repair skill to fix him or just bring these parts along to fix him up too. You can get him alot quicker than Boone or any other Companion and he's the pet class so you can bring Boone,Cass,Veronica(my personal favorite out ones I've met) etc, basiclly people who can talk back in english.