--------------- FALLOUT TACTICS --------------- - FAQ V2.6 - by Guiler (J Novakouski - guilersk@earthlink.net) This guide may be reproduced only with my permission, for non-profit purposes only. You may download, save, modify, or use this for personal reasons only, but I would appreciate that you send any suggestions and updates to me, to help make this the best FAQ it can be. If you would like to post a copy of this on your fansite, email me at . In addition, if you do so, I will automatically send you any updates I have made. FALLOUT TACTICS is (c) 2001 Interplay Entertainment Corp This is by no means complete, but it ought to help you play the game. If you know of something that I don't, drop me a line at and I'll credit you for it. Note that while these people get credit for sending stuff in, they might not want to be badgered with emails, so you're best off sending questions and suggestions directly to me at: Special thanx to the following contributors: a black cat nearby "Adam Shahid" Alastair Hutcheson André Devaux Andres J. Andrew Lusk-Hahn Andy "Angus Lai" Ariel Falgui "Arthur B. Byrne" "Ashley K. Lovins" Benjamin Winston Booga Booze Miller brian Rafal Kubat chad athey Chaltione Bonkfriks Charles J DeVito Chew, Christopher (XSSC SGP) Chris369@aol.com Chris Calvert Chris Lynch "Chris Pendergrass" Christoph Clown Colin crayz@singnet.com.sg "Daniel Caine" Danny Hioe David Ng david.s.jannke@accenture.com David S. Dhany Permana "Edward Adams" Ferri Forrest Gabriel Garred Whalen Garry Upton Gilkey, Gregory Glenn M. Sanford Grev "h.kenward" Houston Bruck iweird Jason Salem Jason Wang Jeffrey Ross Jim "ShowLow" Sorrick Joiro Hatagaya "Jolt - Ganj" Jonas Karlsson Josemaria Hernandez Justin Cramer Kam Fung Keith Steiger Ken Boren Kenny Wong Kevin Weiser KittyH Kulsz Kyriel lobar Louie Imperial "Marcus Robinson" "Mark Allman" Matt "Matt Thobe" "Matthew wong" Mike Fletcher mike perlewitz Nightfall@mindspring.com Pak Chung Paradox Patrick Bryan "Patryk" Phil Chermak Philip L. McMahon Phred "r wong" Rajmohan Rajagopalan Ray Macey Rick Schneider Rob Healy Rob Knebel Robert Luong ROBERT L BURGESS "Rodriguez" sean wilkins Sean Yeo da Syko Shane Feather Shen Borbe Shirwyn Dalgliesh Snyder, Adam "Teoh Siang Swee" "Tom Carlsen" Tom "Tomas \"Reveille\" Rodriguez, Jr." Uliasea "Vanni Loriggio" Wansheng Zhu WD-40 "Wright, Stephen J" ygdrasil And extra thanks to KJ for all his help on the special encounters and everything in general! TABLE OF CONTENTS: -Version History -Character Creation -Tough Guy Suggestions (NEW! 2.4) -Weapons Chart (NEW! 2.3) -Perk Table (NEW! 2.3) -Enhancer (Drug) Table (NEW! 2.6) -Walkthrough 0.0 SPECIAL ENCOUNTERS 0.1 BROTHERS GRIMM 0.2 COPPERTOPS 0.3 BAZAAR DAY 0.4 EVERREADY BUNNIES 0.5 TITANIC 0.6 FARMER 0.7 TRADER 0.8 BRAHMIN POKER 0.9 PITCH BLACK 0.10 L33TISTS 0.11 REAVER DANCE 0.12 CANADIAN INVASION 0.13 PHIL THE NUKA COLA GUY 0.14 B-1000 0.15 KOMODO MAN 0.16 SIXTH SENSE 0.17 GAS STATION 0.18 PIPBOY 0.19 UPRISING 0.20 CPF vs. PFC 0.21 BRAHMIN ARMOR 0.22 DEATHCLAW LIBERATION 0.23 4 HORSEMEN OF THE POST-APOCALYPSE 0.24 BRAHMIN TIPPING 0.25 MIR 0.26 AMELIA 0.27 HERMIT 0.28 MERCHANT 0.29 MORTE 0.30 INVASION RECREATIONISTS 1.0 BRAHMIN WOOD 1.1 BUNKER 1 2.0 FREEPORT 2.1 BUNKER 2 3.0 ROCK FALLS 3.1 BUNKER 3 4.0 MACOMB 4.1 BUNKER 4 5.0 PREORIA 5.1 BUNKER 5 6.0 QUINCY 6.1 BUNKER 6 7.0 MARDIN 7.1 BUNKER 7 8.0 ST. LOUIS 8.1 BUNKER 8 9.0 JEFFERSON 9.1 BUNKER 9 10.0 KANSAS CITY 10.1 BUNKER 10 11.0 OSCEOLLA 11.1 BUNKER 11 12.0 JUNCTION CITY 12.1 BUNKER 12 13.0 GREAT BEND 13.1 BUNKER 13 14.0 COLDWATER 14.1 BUNKER 14 15.0 NEWTON 15.1 BUNKER 15 16.0 CANYON CITY 16.1 BUNKER 16 17.0 BUENA VISTA 17.1 BUNKER 17 18.0 SCOTT CITY 18.1 BUNKER 18 19.0 CHEYENNE MOUNTAIN 20.0 VAULT 0 21.0 BONUS MISSION (SPRINGFIELD) VERSION HISTORY: 1.0- created, missions 1-4 3/25/2001 1.1- added Preoria (mission 5), Macomb mine trick 3/26/2001 1.2- added Quincy (6) and several player suggestions 3/28/2001 1.3- added Mardin (7) 3/30/2001 1.4- added St. Louis 3/31/2001 1.5- added Jefferson 4/1/2001 1.6- added Osceolla and Junction City 4/4/2001 1.7- added Great Bend and Special Encounters 4/8/2001 1.8- added Coldwater and part of Newton 4/8/2001 1.8.5- added a whole bunch of mail and player suggestions 4/11/2001 1.9- added up to the middle of the last mission 4/16/2001 2.0- complete to end of game. Missing bonus mission (soon) 4/17/2001 2.1- added a WHOOOOOOLE lot of suggestions and a littl bit on the patch 4/23/2001 2.2- added more suggestions (bonus mission coming soon!) Also started marking updates so you don't have to go looking...4/30/2001 2.3- added bonus mission, weapons table, and perks table 5/12/2001 2.4- updates, added 'bandage' note 5/20/2001 2.5- updates 5/28/2001 2.6- many updates 7/3/2001 CHARACTER CREATION: For all you Fallout people: Much as Icewind Dale was the combat version of Baldur's Gate, so this is the combat version of Fallout. Your silly skills like science, repair, and whatnot have little place here. You're much better off picking skills that allow you to be killin' stuff, so to speak. For all you Laser Squad/XCOM/Jagged Alliance people: This is a lot more RPG than you've ever had before. Imagine; you can actually see the amount of experience you've got, and pick the skills you want to increase when you level! Because of this customization, You shouldn't 'throw away' soldiers on suicide missions, as some of the games listed above need you to do. It's much better to go cautiously and retreat crippled soldiers from the field of battle. As this game is made for killing, I naturally have some suggestions on how to make a killer character. We want you to excel at the death- dealing on high levels, so I suggest working towards the 'sniper' and/or 'slayer' perks. On the way you should take Bonus Rate of Fire (or Bonus HtH if Slayer), Bonus Ranged/HtH Damage (again, depending on Sniper or Slayer), More Criticals, Better Criticals, and Sharpshooter (if Sniper). If you can't get these, take Action Boy (essential if you don't have max agil), Educated, Flexible, Gain (statistic), Swift Learner, Packrat, Strong Back, Ranger, or Explorer. UPDATE: As of 1.0, sniper is worthless, and Better criticals seems worthless too. I am in the midst of re-evaluating the worth of the perks. ----2.4---- "Kenny Wong" writes: Bonus moves perk is useless in CTB mode. Duh! I made a slayer type char with this thinking he'd close in faster when I started with TB mode. But in CTB, nothing seems to change. -------- However, some of these perks have nasty attribute Requirements, which is a good reason why you should take Gifted. I also suggest Fast Shot, as Fast Shot and Bonus Rate of Fire means that it costs 2 points to fire a weapon; with 10 action points, that's 5 shots a round. Keep in mind that targetted shots, which is what you lose for taking fast shot, can be mighty useful because they give you an increased chance of critical hit, so it's really a trade-off; you get more shots, but you don't have a chance to take more effective shots. I suggest the following attributes (with Gifted on): ST 6 (8 if a Slayer) PE 8 (absolute minimum 8 if a sniper) EN 6 CH 5 (more is helpful) IN 6 (absolute minimum 6 if a sniper) AG 10(absolute minimum 8 if a sniper or slayer) LK 6 (for all those critical-based skills) "Daniel Caine" adds: Charisma seems broken, I designed a sniper character (Pe 10) and set my CH to 2 I still get all three recruits (more since the patch on the first Bunker) as I did with my previous Character who had CH 5. Those extra 3 points come in very useful. ----2.3---- On the other hand, since you won't get sniper until the end, you might want to be a heavy weapons specialist; Fallout Tactics rewards the heavy weapons person bigtime in this game with the Browning M2, easily the best long range weapon in the game. The problem is that it has a strength requirement of 9 and the ammo is hard to come by and terribly expensive. So in that case, you still want fast shot (more rounds out per combat turn) but you want more strength (9) and a bit less of the other stats (endurance can probably suffer here). UPDATE: I finally beat the game, and got sniper for the 2nd half of the last mission. It was totally not worth it; the difference between this and Fallout 2 is unbelievable; I highly suspect that there is a bug that prevents sniper from working. None of my guys exhibited any more critical hits than usual, and far less than I would get with even targetted shots. Sniper is a crock, and I'm pretty ticked off about it. So, instead of sniper, take increased critical hits and bonus rate of fire (bonus rate of fire just might be the best perk in the game). The path of melee can be very rewarding. If you get close enough to hit the enemy without him tearing you to pieces (sneak and cover), you can really rip it up with them, so to speak. If you're good, you will likely knock them down and cost them lots of action points, so many that they will stay down constantly (CTB) or not have enough action points left to attack you with (TB). This is hard with mutants, but it can be done. For Tag skills, small guns is essential, and then later Energy Weapons and Big Guns if you intend to use stuff like rockets and chainguns. Big Guns is crucial if you intend to even flirt with the Browning. Also useful is Lockpick, Unarmed or Melee if you plan to go the Slayer route, Bartering, and maybe Outdoorsman. Also take Stealth if you're the Slayer; you need to get close to kill them, so getting close without being seen is the best way, especially if you have Silent Death. Rafal Kubat wrote in with this sly trick: If you want a REALLY good final sniper then Set up your character as follows, it works great for me ST 5/6 PE 8/9 EN 2 (i'll explain) CH 8 IN 9 AG 8 LK 6 The 2 Endurance will harm you at the beginning of the game, but by exploiting a bug in the game you can get it up to 12 without a problem. When you find the Gas Station Random Encounter (Usually Located 1 square north, 3 squares west of Bunker Beta), go in there THE FIRST TIME with everything possible. Trade for the Elixir of Life and anything else you might find useful, then take the elixir, and put it on the shelf where the Tool Box is (also put anything else that you want unlimited of in there) Then exit the encounter, come back in. Take all that equipment back, and exit the encounter again. Come back in, and now all those items that you put on the shelf (and everything that you sold to the woman, i sold her everything so she cant even move) is gonna be there for the rest of the game. This is great cause u can put things such as those much needed shotgun shells and other ammo as well as a whole s***load of doctors bags/first aid kits. I now never run out of medical supplies, stim packs, drugs, or elixirs thanks to this. Do this a bunch of times an you'll have 12 endurance from the elixirs, and about 200 hps, (you can drink more elixirs just cause they give u 15 hps a piece), my guys are invulnerable now, and all this with no official "cheating". Note: you can do this with any encounter in the game. You can even drop the items on the ground like this. ----2.4---- writes: I found out something very interesting using a variation of the item duplication cheat I found on your FAQ. If you go to a special encounter that allows you to bring your vehicle(s) in, like L33tists, Deathclaw Liberation, Merchant, etc., you can leave your vehicle at the encounter and then come back over and over again to get more of the vehicle you left,a just like items. I tried this with the Tank at CPF Vs PFC and now I have two tanks. I unloaded the tank before leaving it, as usually leaving a vehicle behind deletes the stuff inside, but I am not sure if it would do that in a special encounter or not. Also I tried to go back with my two tanks to get a third, but I had some weird graphics error where the turrets for the tanks where floating away from the tanks. It then kicked me out of the encounter, but it did leave a circle showing where I had left my tank. That means I now have three (well four, I tried again to go into the encounter with two tanks to get a third), but I don't know how to get the third and fourth while driving my two tanks. It should probably be suggested to only do this cheat once or at least don't drive two tanks in to get a third, you could always stock pile the vehicles to the various bases. Then: I tried out the code further and you can leave the vehicle loaded and the stuff inside gets duplicated as well. Also the vehicles function well in combat, I ran a fight with my two tanks and it went well (other than not having a second good pilot or gunner). -------- UPDATE: The duplication bug is DEAD in 1.25, according to several sources. Kenny Wong writes: The mutate! perk will change traits. However, if you don't have a trait to start with, then you just get a free trait. Not so useful for your main char, but could be useful for your squadies. Imagine a whole team of gifted squadies.... and The mutate! perk (getting a trait for nothing) still works in 1.25. ------------- I have done this. It rocks. I totally recommend it. Do it around L12 so your skills won't suffer too badly. Chris Calvert suggests: Here is a tip I came up with that will provide infinite experience points. This works best if you have at least 30% in lockpicks and a set of lockpicks as well. Just go to a level with a safe (Rock Falls or Preoria for example) and move the char equipped with the lockpicks next to the safe and keep hitting '2' (hotkey for lockpick skill) and clicking the safe. You will unlock and then lock the safe. Each successful locking or unlocking will provide a minimum of 15 exp points. The higher your skill (obviously) the more often you will be successful. Also you do not always get just 15 points. You can get more, and it is partly random and partly based on your skill. I had a char with 30% do this and the max he got was 24 points, but my char with 80% in the lockpicking skill got a max of 47 points. ------------- Booga suggests: There's this odd bug that my friends and I managed to find out. Exploiting the bug will make the game unfun though. Here's how it goes. First, you need a vehicle...then, before you exit the map into the world map, make all your character crawl INTO the vehicle then exit the map. Whenever you come across a random encounter or next mission, your characters will start standing, but the values for crawling will still be there (doesn't work when going back to base or some special encounter). Keep crawling into the vehicle everytime and the values for the crawl will stack up onto each other. Keep doing this and even without increasing your gun skills!! However, this only works for your NPCs. I think the programmers remembered to reset the main character but not the NPCs. Most of my NPCs have all guns skills above 500% using this method, but remember, melee skills WILL suck...(reaching -1000%) ------------- blaze@storm.cx.net writes: As of v1.25, the crawl into vehicle bug doesn't work anymore. ----2.2---- For money problems, suggests: To help you out with your money problems, simply enlist in the services of an amazing gambler. In my game, Stumpy has it tagged and it was already high. If you use him a few times and add all his skill points to gambling, he should be able to swindle most of the mechanics in the game, the medical officer and the quartermaster at the gamma outpost. Its all about trial and error, save and load. if you stock up on everything anyone who gambles has, and do a decent amount of looting, money should no longer be any issue. ------------- "Matt Thobe" suggests: When ever you gamble just save before you start and gamble like 1 rp for 1 rp until you win, and count how many times till you win, then reload and gamble 1 rp till you get the the time when you win, then bet everything, and its all yours. ----2.6---- This little trick works because (like many games), it saves the random number seed (and the next couple)to assure that you can't just reload a game and avoid a nasty fate (usually in combat). Works great for gambling, though. "Patryk" adds: Advisable in any mission when you cant carry everything you want to keep from a mission. All the crates, bookshelves, boxes and lockers are there to yield to you equipment, right??? WRONG. They are there for you to place equipment inside of them!!! Each has a limited capacity but certainly you can find many of them. Inserting equipment into boxes is vital to your cause because the killed enemies have a tendency to dissapear when you leave the mission area. Not all but almost 70% (approximetly). All those things left in various lockers will remain for you to come back and claim your rightful share of the spoils of war. ----2.6---- Pak Chung adds: I found some tricks about gambling that really saved me lots of money, in bunker gamma ( i think ), the quarter master will gamble with you. so you merely can some of the most expensive stuffs from this bunker through gambling. first of all, you dont really need gambling skill, get as much cash as possible, lets say you want to get the power armor, it cost it 20000 each, so lets say this is the first time you gamble with this quater master, put as much money as u can something around 30000, and even without gambling skill u can still win neartly 100% of the time, but the drawback is, everytime the quater master lose, he will change the rate, the next time you bet with him, for a power armor lets say, he will only bet for like 25000 or so ( the more money u put for betting the higher chance you win, if u put 1 dollars to bet with his power armor u will never win ) I managed to get 4 power armors and 1 advanced power armor before he drop the rate to a level that i will never win ( like 12000 to bet for stuffs worth 20000) -------- Chaltione Bonkfriks adds: I have noticed a little bug: whenever you gamble with ANYONE, you can just put in whatever you want from them, and put in nothing from your side, and keep clicking on gamble. Eventually you'll win the gamble. That way i gambled away everything (4000+ lbs) the quartermaster in bunker gamma had with a character with only 14% gamble skill and 4 luck. It is still working with patch 1.25. ----2.3---- Try it out! you'll end up with loads of stuff that way... Josemaria Hernandez adds: I tried using mentats to see if it would help some npcs get perks like sharpshooter. Does not seem to work unfortunately. Still using buffouts for your heavy guns guys so they can use Browning's in the missions before power armor is not a bad thing esp since they last the whole mission. Leader is a great perk btw. everyone in the squad under the influence gets +1 agility and added 5 bonus to armor class (I think). I would highly recommend just loitering around the wastelands. As far as I know there is no time pressure to finish the game and its a great way to load up on stuff and XP. For some reason when I encounter bots in the waste they are always under gunned, they fire one or two rounds then run out of ammo. They then rush you and you can pound them into scrap and get huge XP. One time I ran across 2 behemoths and 5 or 6 humanoids. I was lucky enough to critical hit both behemoths before they got into range and knocked them out. At the end of it all I got 5000 xps for that one encounter. I have leveled up around 4 or 5 times just wandering the wastes and am still in Newton but fighting with level 21 characters now. Another cool trick is just leaving ctb mode on during these random encounters. When encountering mutants and reavers you should be able to get away without suffering a hit at all. Pancor's armed with the purple shells are great against smaller bots; with bonus rate of fire i can fire twice and by the second burst kill 3 or 4 bots. ------------- Louie Imperial and I have been having a discussion about the value of the Divine Favor Perk; while it has a high ability requirement (CHR of 8), he says it pays off handsomely, as it increases your highest stat by +1 and reduces the number of levels it takes to get perks (so if you'd normally get one every 3 levels, you get one every 2 levels instead). I have yet to experiment with this, but he thinks highly of it, so give it a shot. shirwyn@vcn.bc.ca suggests: On the Awareness Perk I've noticed that you only need to have one character with it and they all can use it. The trick is to have any of your characters get a line of sight on the enemy then click, just once, on the character bar name of the of the one with Awareness (even if that charcter is on the other side of the map) and the info shows up. Probably a glitch but enjoy it while it lasts. ----2.2---- "Robert Luong" writes: Regarding the Bullhorn call/trap (something like that)... Weird thing w/ this accessory. Just put it on your hands and you gain +4 strength and your HP's shoot up to around 7 million(My main had 8str initially). You don't need to use it, just put it in one of the weapon slots. But you also become addicted to buffouts. I dunno if that had any effect cuz it didn't lower any of my stats nor affect my fighting ability. Try it out=) You can have a guy w/ a Strength of 3(min to use handgun, 4 is min for rifles/smg) then after the 1st mission buy this thing at the alpha bunker. Then when you get to beta bunker you can do that elixer thing for your endurance. Gives you more points to put into other stats...if you're careful enough that is.. and later... Basically all I needed to do was brave thru' the 1st mission. Str. of 3 gave me the ability to use handguns. I did CTB cuz there were some benefits I could gain from a high agility. With handguns costing 4AP per turn, you can shoot 3 times before they even get one off.(AP bar slowly regains 1AP in b/w shots) With kamakaze I hoped after 3 shots they'd die=) You just have to be very careful in CTB or it's suicidal. Anyways, after the 1st mission, go back to alpha bunker, buy the bullhorn, equip on free slot. Automatic 12 Str., 70million HP, and your small arms goes into 70million% too. it was crazy=) No one ever misses. Every shot is a critical. Now, only thing you gotta be careful of is when u're addicted you have a random chance of dying. But I went for months with out dying, then all of a sudden after I complete a mission I die. I just unequip the bullhorn for a sec everynow and then just to be safe. Sucks, but only if you didn't save. I guess that's the only drawback. I haven't patched the game yet either. So what you said with it not working, could be cuz you patched it already. I'll give you some screenshots I took whenever I find out how to transfer them to this comp. ----2.3---- I was not able to get this to work, but I've had it independently confirmed by Paradox , so I'm pretty sure it works. Give this one a shot, although it's sort of an in-game cheat. "Marcus Robinson" adds: Note that if you hold shift when you click the credits button in the main menu, just like in Fallout 2 you'll see comments from the makers. ----2.3---- Kam Fung suggests: The Leadership perk works really well if you have people in you party with 7 (I think...) agility, the +1 your party gains from the perk is enough to push their action points up to 9/round. This is enough to change stance twice (up and down) and take a targeted shot, the armour class bonus is gravy. The thing is, the perk doesn't appear to work when you're in a vehicle (as of 1.25). Perhaps it doesn't realize your team is in close proximity when they are in a vehicle? Here's something to try when you have a whole whack of one item (like AK47's or SAW's) and they just don't bring home the bacon anymore: don't just sell them to the quartermaster, the mechanic and the healer will both give you great prices for items they don't have. It also appears that the quartermasters at all the bases have the same stuff, so selling to different bases for more money doesn't appear to work. Similarly, traders will give you better prices than the quartermasters if they don't have a lot of an item. I find I can usually sell about 10 of an item before the value starts to drop a lot. ----2.3---- André Devaux writes: 1) I've noticed that the starting equipment of your main character depends partially on your tag skills. If you tag some skills, you get additional items to start with. I haven't tried out every skill yet, but here is what I found out: -Gambling nets you 500 BOS scripts -Doctor gives you a doctors bag (yay!) -Throwing adds a few spears, some rocks and one fragmentation grenade The following skills give no bonus items: Stealth, Lockpick, Big Guns, Energy Weapons 2) In answer to Daniel Caine: charisma has no effect on which NPCs you can hire. It soley depends on your rank (you can hire NPCs of the same or lower rank than you). BUT: Promotions seem to depend on your CH score. Higher charisma seems to let you gain ranks quicker. For example, my CH 2 character got promoted to senior initiate only after the second mission while another one with a charisma score of 7 got promoted after the first. I've tried this several times and solved the first mission always in the same way. ----2.5---- Ariel Falgui writes: Having a 100 pts. Outdoorsman Skill will enable you to ignore all enemy encounters. ----2.6---- UPDATE 2.4: The 'Bandaged' Debacle Now, I have been getting a lot of questions about the 'bandaged' state. I'd like to write something definitive about it here so I don't get any more questions about it. If you are bandaged, you must use the doctor bag to remove that state. Put the doctor bag in the hand of the character with the highest 'Doctor' skill. Click on the bag icon (in your hand) and then click on the poor guy who is 'bandaged'. Note; this can include the doctor himself! Now, prior to the 1.25 patch, you had to have been damaged; that is, missing at least 1 hit point. After the 1.25 patch, this is fixed, and you may successfully use it on someone who is not damaged. TOUGH GUY SUGGESTIONS (UPDATE 2.4): Andy wrote in with some suggestions for Tough Guy mode: Perks: Dont pick a perk until lvl 9 because if u cancel the perk dialog u wont loose the ability to choose later, so wait until lvl 9 and than look what perks u want, the best perks are avaible in lvl 6 and 9 and 12, u can easy work without perks up to lvl 9. Pick the mutate perk first and choose gifted if u want have some extra perks avaible. If u safed all perks to lvl 9 u will be able to choose mutate first and than get new perks avaible and still have 2 perks left to spend. It is also wise to pick the Fast Shot skill from mutate if your char has already good stats. Teams and char buliding: i tryed first play with a full sniper team (high PE and AGI + Ranged DMG Bonus perks and or sniper perk).... worked well up to mission 8, but than with all the rocket luncher guys and long range hard hitting weapons i did loose in that mission over and over and over ...... dont ask how long i tryed this mission.... finaly i figured that i had spend more points into sneak ... so i had could sneak behind the hard guys and fire them down at 1 burst... even with 6 sneaking snipers u wont be able to kill 2 rocked guys ... so i started over and well teh new team was a blast :-) new team: 4x sneaker (tag skill from lvl 1 and pushed sneak fast to 121) 2 of the sneaker are special in small and 2 in big guns (think of sneaking with 2 rocket luncher and fire them on a hard guys from back ... no chance hehe) 2x long range heavy weapon/sniper combo .. (heavy weapon/small weapon/ maybe engery as tag skill and high perception or at least with the perk/gifted trick able to get sharpshooter in 9 and get so to PE 8 or 9.... start with 6 PE ... mutate .. gifted ... get 7 PE + Sharpshooter than 9 PE ... so look for nice guys with at least 5 LK and 5 Agi/Int and 6 PE + Tag combo) normal use your 4 sneakes against hard guys and burst them from the back so they cant even get 1 round or rocket out on u.... pick hit the deck in lvl 12 as perk, because it lower the chance to get killed from rocket guys or mines. Pick ranged bonus dmg or sharpshooter also for all and awerness this helps to keep u informed. i also choosed night vision for all in my team, because u get a big range advantage at night and sneak also work better. Because u cant save in hard mode, u want realy fight at night so that the chance is bigger u dont get killed if u run into traps or hidded guys and get killed in first encounter. I did equiped the 4x sneaker team with long range or long range burst weapons (hunter rifle, ak47, m16, sniper rifle) in primary mode and 2x SAW/rocket lancher and 2x CAWs for burst mode. The 2x heavy snipers with 2 SAWs/M2/rocket lancher. my own char: STR: 9 (for use M2 at 5 feet in sneak mode ... hehe) PE: 7 (to upgrade to sharpshooter + bonus dmg) EN: 6 CH: 2 INT: 10 (more skills) AGI: 7 (8 Action points are enough ... fast shot rocks) lK: 6 (sharpshooter/dmg bonus) Fast Shot + Gifted heavy weapons + doctor + sneak perks: night vision comprensive (read all books) bonus ranged dmg/sharpshooter hit the deck thats a good start at lvl 12 i choose doctor because there isnt realy 1 nice doc with sneak and usefull stats, with 10 int u will also be able to get small guns fast up to 114 and than u can start put more into heavy guns and doc skill... also u need a doc in first line if sneak fail and u get under heavy fire and your friends get blinded or crippled. ----2.4---- WEAPONS CHART (UPDATE 2.6) Thanks greatly to André Devaux for providing this chart; he did all of it, so all of the credit is his! It's missing some of the guns later on in the game, but those will be added pretty soon. writes in with some general observations about weapons: some infos to weapons and how to compare the dmg/range/ammo so how u choose the best weapon for your team ? just by the displayed dmg of the weapon ? NO ! some infos to weapons in BOS in general: all weapons with a burst mode arnt so precision like the single shot mode weapons even if they have the same range ! example: the ak47 or m16 have nice range in single shot mode, but with a huting rifle u will still get a higher percantage for aiming than with a burst weapon of the same range ! In burst mode a weapon do much more dmg than it is displayed. Displayed is always the single shot mode, burst mode need to be calced ! how to compare single shot and energy weapons: just by range and dmg that is displayed. But think of the armor types, normal energy dmg will get more absorb than normal dmg, so normal weapons can do more dmg against a well armored guy ! It is also a good idea to not compare the max dmg a single shot weapon do, just compare the minimum dmg. how to compare burst weapons: compare the range than the normal burst dmg displayed, now u need calc the ammo and how many rounds per burst are driven out. Example: SAW can hold 30 rounds and u can shot 3 times.. ergo 10 rounds per burst of 7.62 mm and 20-30 dmg displayed Vindicator can hold 100 rounds and u can shot 4 times .. ergo 25 rounds per burst of 7.62mm and 16-25 dmg displayed M60 can hold 50 rounds and u can shot 5 times .. ergo 10 rounds per burst of 7.62mm and 18-26 dmg displayed wich weapon is better now ? for ammo/dmg the vindicator is best, even if the saw have higer dmg displayed, but the vindicator get out more than twice of the same ammo than the saw ! Since the M60 and SAW have same ammo/burst rate the saw wins over the M60 in ammo/dmg how to compare ammo: I did not notice a difference between the ammo types in general if no special dmg or penetration factor is displayed. The only thing i notice is the shotgun shells do more dmg than other burst weapons compared for his burst/ammo mode. Also shotgun shells have a nice area effect in hurt groups. So a CAWs or a Jackhammer are very deadly weapons on short range and with the special dmg bonus ammo they can kill 3 low armored mutants in short range at 1 burst even if only 2.5 shells are pumped out at 1 burst ! I did not notice any difference between ammo types like 50mm, 5.56mm or 7.62mm or .303mm. So just compare the dmg displayed. 9mm ammo is the worst because the normal ball get dmg and penetration penalty. U should choose your ammo so that the dmg/penetration is average and/or u have some types of special ammo avaible for your gun, so the shotgun weapons are the best for dmg/ammo/burst in short range because u have 3 types of ammo to load and the dmg done with just 2.5 shells in 1 burst is awesome. best ranged heavy burst weapons in game: Gaus Minigun: weapon from hell !!!! (could not test it yet but stats sounds damm nice) Vindicator: high dmg / high range / ammo sucker (cant shot in prone mode) M2: high dmg / high range / heavy like hell SAW: good dmg / high range / good overall power M60: good dmg / med range / nice magazine of ammo avenger: fair dmg / med range best small burst weapons in game: Jackhammer: high dmg / low range / good overall power CAWs: high dmg / low range / good overall power Fn Fal: good dmg / nice range / good overall power Neostead: good dmg / low range Ak47: good dmg / med range M16: fair dmg / good range happy bursting :-) ----2.5---- Fallout Tactics - Weapon and Armor Chart (v2.0) =============================================== Small Guns (Note: all revolvers cost 1 AP less to fire) ======================================================================= Ammo Type: 2mm EC Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- PPK12 Gauss Pistol 22-32 50 12 5 Single 1 M-72 Gauss Rifle 60-80 50 20 6 Single 1 Ammo Type: .303mm Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- M-14 7-16 32 20 5 Burst 8 8-18 40 Single 1 Ammo Type: 44. Mag Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Desert Eagle 15-23 25 8 4 Single 1 Mark XIX 44 M29 Revolver 14-21 18 6 4 Single 1 Ammo Type: .45 Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Thompson Gun 7-28 25 50 6 Burst ? 8-32 32 Single 1 Colt 45 12-18 17 12 3 Triple 3 22 Single 1 Casull Revolver 13-18 15 6 4 Single 1 Ammo Type: 5.56mm Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Enfield XL-70E 14-26 28 20 5 Burst ? 16-30 35 Single 1 Ruger AC556F 14-26 18 20 5 Burst ? 16-30 22 Single 1 Steyr AUG 13-26 24 40 5 Burst ? 15-30 28 Single 1 M16A1 8-19 36 24 5 Burst 8 10-22 42 Single 1 Ammo Type: 7.62mm Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 7.62 FN FAL 21-32 28 20 5 Burst 5 24-36 35 Single 1 Sniper Rifle 14-36 50 6 5 Single 1 AK47 10-22 28 24 5 Burst 5 12-25 35 Single 1 Hunting Rifle 8-20 40 10 5 Single 1 Ammo Type: 9mm Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- FN P90C 13-21 18 50 4 Burst 5 16-25 22 Single 1 MP38 10-21 16 30 4 Burst 6 12-24 20 Single 1 Sten Gun 14-21 16 32 4 Burst 3 16-24 18 Single 1 MP5 H&K 8-17 20 30 4 Burst 6 10-20 25 Single 1 Calico Liberty 100 8-17 17 50 5 Burst ? 10-20 22 Single 1 Walther MPL 10-17 20 32 5 Burst 4 12-20 25 Single 1 Scorpio 8-16 18 32 4 Burst 4 9-18 22 Single 1 Uzi 7-14 16 25 4 Burst 5 8-16 20 Single 1 P220 Sig Sauer 7-15 19 9 3 Triple 3 24 Single 1 9mm M9FS Beretta 8-15 17 15 3 Triple 3 22 Single 1 9mm Calico M-950 7-15 17 50 3 Triple 3 24 Single 1 Browning HP 7-14 16 12 3 Triple 3 20 Single 1 9mm HSI Mauser 6-14 28 7 3 Single 1 Zip Gun 6-12 22 1 3 Single 1 Ammo Type: 12 gauge Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Pancor Jackhammer 20-32 30 10 5 Single 1 17-28 24 Burst 3 H&K CAWS 18-28 30 10 6 Single 1 16-25 24 Burst 3 Neostead Combat SG 15-25 22 12 6 Single 1 13-22 17 Burst 3 Pump-action Shotgun 14-24 14 5 5 Single 1 Beretta 470 Silver- 12-22 14 2 4 Single 1 hawk 10-19 Double 2 Ammo Type: 30.06 Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Browning Auto Rifle 18-32 28 20 5 Burst ? 18-32 35 Single 1 M1 Garand 12-24 40 8 5 Single 1 Ammo Type: Flamer Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Flamer Pistol 22-45 5 3 4 Burst 1 Ammo Type: HCl Acid Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Water Gun 5-25 24 10 5 Single 1 Ammo Type: Grenade Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- M-79 Grenade 20-45 32 1 5 Single 1 Launcher Ammo Type: Needler Cartridge Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Needler Pistol 13-27 30 10 3 Single 1 +Poison Ammo Type: Speargun Bolts Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Spear Gun 3-15 25 1 4 Single 1 ======================================================================= Big Guns ======================================================================= Ammo Type: 2mm EC Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Gatling Gauss 60-80 35 80 6 Burst ? Ammo Type: .303 Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Lewis Gun 22-32 45 47 7 Burst ? Bren Gun 20-30 40 30 7 Burst ? Ammo Type: 5.56mm Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF -------------------------------------------------------------------- Avenger MiniGun 7-11 35 120 7 Burst 40 Ammo Type: 7.62mm Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF -------------------------------------------------------------------- M-249 SAW 20-30 40 30 6 Burst ? M60 18-26 35 50 7 Burst 10 Vindicator MiniGun 16-25 45 100 8 Burst ? Ammo Type: 50 cal. Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF -------------------------------------------------------------------- Browning M2 40-50 45 90 9 Burst ? Ammo Type: Flamer Fuel Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Flamer 45-90 5 5 6 Burst 1 Ammo Type: Rockets Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Rocket Launcher 60-120 40 1 6 Single(5) 1 ======================================================================= Energy Weapons ======================================================================= Ammo Type: Small Energy Cells Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- YK32 Pulse Pistol 32-46 20 5 3 Single(3) 1 Plasma Pistol 15-35 20 16 3 Single(3) 1 Spasm NeuroDisruptor 10-24 30 10 4 Single 1 Laser Pistol 10-22 35 12 3 Single(3) 1 Ammo Type: Microfusion Cells Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes ROF ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Pulse Rifle 54-78 30 12 6 Single 1 Pulse Rifle Proto. 42-64 30 10 3 Single 1 Plasma Rifle 35-60 35 10 6 Single(6) 1 Sunbeam Laser Rifle 23-50 45 12 6 Single 1 Gatling Laser 20-40 30 30 6 Burst(6) ? ======================================================================= Ammo ======================================================================= Type Damage mod Penetration mod ------------------------------------------------------ Speargun Bolts 0 0 9mm Ball -11% -20% 9mm JHP +60% -20% 9mm AP -25% +50% 7.62mm 0 0 .45 0 0 12 gauge 0 0 12 gauge flechette +60% -20% 12 ga. Slug Shells -11% +31% 12 ga. EMP Shells 0 0 (great against robots) .44 magnum Ball -11% -20% .44 magnum JHP +60% -20% Small Energy Cell(SEC) 0 0 Large Energy Cell (LEC) 0 0 5.56 0 0 30.06 0 0 Explosive Rocket +60% +11% .50 Cal DU 0 +50% HN Needler Cartridge 0 0 Flamer Fuel 0 0 ======================================================================= Melee Weapons (Add ST bonus to both min and max damage) ======================================================================= Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes -------------------------------------------------------------------- Dynamite Spear 10-30 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Ripper 15-22 1 30 (SEC) 4 Swing (4) Diamond Spear 15-20 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Cattle Prod 12-20 1 20 (SEC) 5 Swing (4) 3-6 Overload (3) Micro-Sledge 8-20 1 - 5 Swing (4) 9-21 2 Thrust (4) Piston Spear 6-20 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Monkey Wrench 8-18 1 - 5 Swing (3) Combat Knife 7-18 1 - 1 Thrust (3) 6-14 Swing (4) Claw Hammer 4-16 1 - 5 Claw (4) 3-10 Head (4) Dak Targ 5-15 1 - 1 Thrust (4) 4-12 Swing (3) Club 5-15 2 - 4 Swing (3) 5-15 Thrust (4) Crowbar 3-15 1 - 4 Swing (3) 3-15 Thrust (4) Machete 3-15 1 - 4 Swing (4) Cleaver 6-14 1 - 4 Swing (4) Knife 1-14 1 - 1 Thrust (4) 1-11 Swing (4) Axe Handle 4-12 2 - 4 Swing (4) Scalpel 3-12 1 - 1 Thrust (4) 3-10 Swing (4) Iron Pipe 2-12 1 - 5 Swing (4) Slugger 3-11 2 - 4 Swing (4) 3-11 Thrust (4) Serrated Blade 8-10 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Deco-Filament 3-10 1 - 1 Swing (3) Snake Spear 3-10 2 - 4 Thrust (4) +Strong Poison Festering Spear 3-10 2 - 4 Thrust (4) +Poison Spear 3-10 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Barbed Spear 7-8 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Throwing Knife 3-6 1 - 1 Thrust (3) Switchblade 2-5 1 - 1 Swing (3) 2-6 Thrust (4) Sharpened Pole 2-5 2 - 4 Thrust (4) Shiv 1-5 1 - 1 Swing (3) 1-6 Thrust (4) Broken Bottle 1-5 1 - 1 Swing (3) 1-6 Thrust (4) Plunger 1-4 2 - 1 Swing (4) 1-4 Thrust (4) ======================================================================= Hand-to-Hand Weapons (Add ST bonus to both min and max damage) ======================================================================= Name Damage Range Clip Min Str Modes --------------------------------------------------------------------- Power Fist 12-24 1 25 (SEC) 1 Punch (3) Razor Claws 6-24 1 - 1 Punch (3) Punch Gun 10-20 1 3 (12 gauge) 1 Punch (3) Impact Gloves 8-16 1 - 1 Punch (3) Punch Dagger 5-14 1 - 1 Punch (3) Mace Gloves 6-10 1 - 1 Punch (4) Lacerators 5-10 1 - 1 Punch (3) Tiger Claws 4-6 1 - 1 Punch (3) Sappers 4-6 1 - 1 Punch (3) Shredders 3-6 1 - 1 Punch (3) Brass Knuckles 2-5 1 - 1 Punch (3) ======================================================================= Throwing Weapons (Add ST bonus to both min and max damage) ======================================================================= Name Damage Range Min Str Mode ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Diamond Spear 22-30 8 4 Throw (5) Dynamite Spear 10-30 8 4 Throw (5) Piston Spear 9-30 8 4 Throw (5) Serrated Blade 9-12 8 4 Throw (5) Snake Spear 3-12 8 4 Throw (5), St. poison Festering Spear 3-12 8 4 Throw (5), Poison Spear 3-12 8 4 Throw (5) Fantasy Ball 8-10 15 1 Throw (2) Boomerang 7-10 15 1 Throw (1) Barbed Spear 8-9 8 4 Throw (5) Powder Bag 4-7 16 1 Throw (2), Stuns Chakram 4-6 15 1 Throw (2) Dart 3-6 16 1 Throw (2) Throwing Knife 3-6 16 1 Throw (5) Throwing Star 2-6 15 1 Throw (2) Sharpened Pole 2-6 8 4 Throw (5) Rock 1-4 15 1 Throw (2) ======================================================================= Grenades (uses throwing skill) ======================================================================= Name Damage Range Min Str Notes ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Pulse Grenade 105-155 15 4 Only against Robots Plasma Grenade 41-91 15 4 Incendiary 41-61 15 4 Fire damage Acid Grenade 31-61 15 4 Fragmentation 31-51 15 4 Boom Bugs 11-26 15 4 Molotov Cocktail 9-21 18 1 Fire damage, 2AP Flash Grendades 4-10 15 4 Stuns ======================================================================= Armor ======================================================================= Name AC Normal Fire Gas Expl. Energy Elec. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Advanced Power Armor 35 18/60% 15/65% 7/45% 10/50% 17/55% 0/0% Power Armor 30 13/55% 13/60% 5/30% 10/50% 16/50% 0/0% Tesla Armor 15 4/35% 7/45% 0/0% 4/20% 15/80% 0/0% Environmental Armor MkII 10 6/40% 5/42% 20/90% 9/45% 6/60% 0/0% Environmental Armor 10 5/40% 4/40% 13/70% 6/40% 5/55% 0/0% Metal Armor MkII 15 4/35% 4/20% 0/0% 4/30% 4/45% 0/0% Metal Armor 10 4/30% 4/15% 0/0% 4/25% 3/37% 0/0% Leather Armor MkII 20 3/25% 1/17% 0/0% 1/25% 1/30% 0/0% Leather Armor 15 2/25% 0/15% 0/0% 0/20% 0/25% 0/0% Ghoul Armor 10 0/20% 0/10% 0/0% 0/20% 0/25% 0/0% Notes: - The first number of each category is the damage absorption, the second the damage resistance. - Absorption is first substracted from the damage roll of any attack. - Then the remaining damage gets reduced by the amount of damage resistance you have. - Metal Armor and Metal Armor MkII: -25% Stealth. - - Ghoul Armor can only be worn by ghouls. ======================================================================= PERKS TABLE (UPDATE 2.3): André Devaux has come through again and provided a perk table (something which I admittedly should have done some time ago)! I have added occasional comments to it, but the main body of the work is his. Keep in mind that it is very useful sometimes to save a perk (say, at lvl 3) and spend it later (to get 2 lvl 6 perks). Perk List ========= Rating follows this scale: useless, bad, average, good, very good, must have. Please note that this rating is solely based on my opinons. If you like one perk, then by all means take it regardless of my rating! One last thing: take the "one time bonus to skills" perks only if there's nothing else around or you really need those skill points. But there's nearly always something more useful to take... Level 2: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Brown Noser CH 5, IN 6 1? Useless? Die Hard EN 6, 1 Useless First Aid 40% Level 3: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Awareness PE 5 1 Average, only one char. needs it (GUILER SAYS: I'd say good, but it's true that only 1 person should have it) Bonus HtH Damage ST 6, AG 6 3 Very good for Slayers Comprehension IN 6 1 Average (GUILER SAYS: I usually give all my books to the main char. If you save your books until you get this, or get it early, this is OK, but you will get enough books in the game that you will never really need it) Drunken Master Unarmed 60% 1 Bad (GUILER SAYS: Jackie Chan, yes. FT, maybe not) Faster Healing EN 6 3 Useless Flower Child EN 5 1 Must have if you like using drugs Gunner AG 6, 1 ? Small Guns 40% (GUILER SAYS: Not many missions with vehicles...) Healer PE 7, AG 6, IN 5, 2? Good, but only for your medic First Aid 40% Here and Now None 1 Useless, too weak a bonus Lead Foot PE 6, AG 6, 1 Not very useful Piloting 60% Night Vision PE 6 1 Average (good for snipers) Quick Pockets AG 5 1 Average Rad Child EN 6, Ghouls only 1 ? Scout PE 7 1 Bad Stat! AG 6, 1 Useless, it's better to use stimpack during First Aid 75%, combat. And outside of combat you have as Doctor 50% much time as you want. Stonewall ST 6 1 Bad Strong Back ST 6, EN 6 3 Average to good (depends on carry cap.) Survivalist EN 6 1 Bad Outdoorsman 40% Swift Learner IN 4 3 Very good, take it early Team Player CH 4 1 Good "Kenny Wong" adds: Team player is bugged. It doesn't work at all! Should work the opposite of Loner, where all your skills get +10% and go blue when near someone, but nothing happens. ----2.4---- I've actually seen it work before; but I am inclined to believe it only works near other team players. Thief None 1 Average Toughness EN 6, LK 6 3 Bad "Kenny Wong" adds: Toughness is actually pretty good (IMO) 3 Toughness + advanced power armor = 90% damage resistance. Even with 1 Toughness you still get 70%. Probably most usefull if you're playing Tough Guy. ----2.4---- Level 4: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bracing EN 5, 1 Good (if you have low ST) Big Guns 60% Death Sense IN 5, 1 ? Deathclaw only Flexible AG 6 1 Average "Kenny Wong" adds: Felixble is good only in turn based, and pre-1.25 at that, when the computer didn't go into overwatch. ----2.4---- Hit the Deck AG 6 1 Average to good Leader CH 6 1 Very good Loner CH < 5, 1 Bad Outdoorsman 40% "Kenny Wong" writes: Loner is currently bugged. The bonus is on all the time even when you're standing next to someone. This actually makes it pretty good as you get +10% to all skills at all times! Unfortunately, you need a low CH, which conflicts with Divine Favour. Bummer. ----2.4---- Steady Arm ST 6, 1 Must Have? Mutants only Level 6: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Adrenaline Rush ST < 6 1 Useless Bone Head ? 1 Useless ? Bonus Move AG 5 2 Very good, but useless for CTB Bonus Ranged Damage AG 6, LK 6 2 Very good for gunners Cancerous Growth ST < 7, 1 ? Ghouls Only Educated IN 6 3 Average (good if you're Gifted) Gambler Gambling 50% 1 Average Ghost Sneak 60% 1 Bad to Average (bonus only in darkness) Harmless Steal 50% 1 Average Not for Deathclaws! Heave Ho! ST < 9 1 Bad More Criticals LK 6 3 Very good (especially for snipers) Not for Mutants! Negotiator Barter 70% 1 Average Pack Rat None 1 Average (only if you have low ST) Pathfinder EN 6, 2 Useless, theres no time limit in this Outdoorsman 40% game! Quick Recovery AG 5 1 Average Rad Resistance EN 6, IN 4 2 Bad, two Rad-X pills will do the trick Not for Ghouls! Ranger PE 6 1 Average (only one char. has to take it) Salesman Barter 50% 1 Average Not for Animals! Silent Running AG 6, Sneak 50% 1 Very Good for Slayers Snakeater EN 3 2 Useless Stunt Man ST 6, EN 6, AG 6 1 Average? Not for Animals! Way of the Fruit CH 6 1 ? Not for Animals! (GUILER SAYS: gives a bonus to str if you eat a fruit. Kind of like drugs but with no drawbacks) Level 8: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bluff Master CH 3 1 Bad Brutish Hulk ST 7, EN 5 1 ? Deathclaws only Psychotic EN 5 1 ? Mutants only Tunnel Rat AG 6 1 Good (especially for Snipers) Level 9: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Better Criticals PE 6, AG 4, LK 6 1 Doesn't seem to work? (GUILER SAYS: compared with F2, this perk is a crock; no instant death if >100. The only difference I noted was that I always did damage with knockdowns, as opposed to people without it who sometimes did knock downs w/o damage) Crazy Bomber In 6, Traps 60% 1 Bad, just blow up those mines Not for Animals! Demolition Expert AG 4, Traps 75% 1 Useless, could be useful in MP games? Dodger AG 6 1 Bad (bonus to AC is quite weak) Explorer None 1 Useless (GUILER SAYS: Maybe get 1 if you don't want to wander the wasteland for all of the SE's. Certainly gravy, though) Light Step AG 5, LK 5 1 Useless (don't step on traps) Mutate! None 1 Must have: give NPCs the Gifted trait! Pyromaniac Big Guns 75% 1 Average, works only with Flamer Sharpshooter PE 7, IN 6 2? Very Good for Snipers Level 10: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hide of Scars EN 6 1 ? Deathclaws only Level 12: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Action Boy AG 5 2 Very good (Must have if AG < 10) "Kenny Wong" adds: Action Boy is very good in TB mode, but isn't all that good in CTB mode, especially in prolonged firefights. Example: assuming you originally had 9aps, armed with a 5ap burst weapon. In CTB, you'd fire, pause, fire, pause, pause, pause, pause, pause, fire, etc. With Action Boy, you'd fire, fire, pause, pause, pause, pause, pause, fire, etc. The only difference is in the opening rounds. Obviously though, in TB, there's a world of difference between firing once/round and twice/round. ----2.4---- Bonsai Outdoorsman 40%, 1 ? Science 40% (GUILER SAYS: fruit grows on your head. Ghouls Only Use with Way of Fruit) Gain (Stat) Stat < race max. 1 Must Have HtH Evade Unarmed 75% 1 Good (only for Slayers) Lifegiver EN 4 2 Very Good "Kenny Wong" Lifegiver is a must have if you're playing Tough Guy (obvious really) ----2.4---- Living Anatomy Doctor 60% 1 Very Good (for the bonus damage to living) "Kenny Wong" adds: Living anatomy is useless by the endgame. ----2.4---- Master Thief Steal 50%, 1 Average Lockpick 50% Master Trader CH 7, Barter 75% 1 Average Not for Animals! Medic! First Aid 40% or 1 Average Doctor 40% Mr. Fixit Repair 40% or 1 Average Science 40% Not for Animals! Tag! None 1 Must have! (GUILER SAYS: Tag energy weapons late in life) Talon of Fear ST 6, Unarmed 60% 1 ? Deathclaws only Tough Hide EN < 8 1 ? Mutants only Weapon Handling ST < 10, AG 5 1 Good if you have low ST Not for Animals! Level 14 Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Divine Favor CH > 7 1 I have heard MANY good things about this one. Gives you a perk 1 level earlier, so every 2 levels for normals, 3 for ghouls, etc. ----2.5---- Level 15: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bonus HtH Attacks AG 6 1 Must have for Slayers Bonus Rate of Fire AG 7, PE 6, IN 6 1 Must have for ranged fighters Pickpocket AG 8, Steal 80% 1 Very good if you like stealing Level 16: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Bend the Rules LK 6 1 Could be good (GUILER SAYS: Doesn't exist in the game?) ----2.4---- Level 18: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Silent Death AG 10, Sneak 80% 1 Very good for Slayers Unarmed 80% Level 20: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Break the Rules LK 6 1 Possibly very good (GUILER SAYS: Doesn't exist in the game?) ----2.4---- Level 24: Prerequisites Ranks Comments / Rating ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Slayer ST 8, AG 8, 1 Must have for Slayers Unarmed 80% Sniper PE 8, AG 8, 1 Doesn't seem to work? Small Guns 80% (GUILER SAYS: Curse them for breaking Sniper! CUUUURSE THEEEEEM!!!!!) ENHANCER (DRUG) TABLE: All of this was provided by Ariel Falgui Enhances your body but after a period of time will make you weak. You can be normal and regain your stats again quickly if you wonder around the forest for days. Table of Enhancers and their effects: Voodoo Mentats Trauma Pk Buffout AfterGum Psycho Mutie FusionCola ST +2 +2 +1 +4 +2 PE +2 +1 +3 EN +2 +3 +4 +5 CH +1 -3 -1 IN +2 -1 -2 AG +2 +2 +3 -4 +3 LU +3 Voodoo, Mentats, Buffout: * Using one of them in 4 consecutives is fine. Use one more and you’re overdosed. Use another one will make yourself killed. Afterburner Gum: * 3 is fine, 1 more is overdosed, 1 more is killed Psycho: * 1 is fine, 1 more is overdosed, 1 more is killed * Good for killing person without getting friendly people go hostile and will not degrade your rank and reputation Trauma Pack: * Good for avoiding to get overdosed. Take 3 Trauma Pack and you can use Psycho more than 1. I’ve used Enhancers in orders: 2 Voodoo 2 Mentats 3 Trauma Pack 2 Mentats Total of 9 drugs without getting overdosed. My Stats after using 9 drugs: Before After ST 6 12 PE 9 12 EN 6 12 CH 2 6 IN 9 12 AG 9 12 LU 6 12 ----2.6---- WALKTHROUGH: Please note that I play Turn-based. Squad Turn-based is good for the XCOM/ Jagged Alliance crowd, and regular Turn-based is good for Fallout fans. CTB is good for suicidal RTS gamers, who will probably have a lot of trouble and frustration playing this game that way. There are benefits of CTB games, but I prefer not to play that way. I do occasionally set it to CTB when fighting off hordes of melee'ers, though. I just line everyone up like a firing squad aimed at the charging melee guys and mow them down. With that in mind, let's begin. 0.0 SPECIAL ENCOUNTERS: Special encounters can happen at any time in the wasteland, and may appear based on your luck, your Outdoorsman skills, and the Explorer and Scout Perks. They are generally benign and/or silly. Once you have discovered them, a small green circle (much like the normal mission circles) will appear on the map where you found them and you will be able to return to them whenever you like. UPDATE 2.2 It really seems that most of the encounters appear in the same spots; not to say that the same encounter will appear in a spot, but rather that certain spots are activated when you start the game, and the encounters they house are swapped around. With this in mind (and no need to flood me with email, but...) if you want to help, write down the locations of the encounters you've found and send them in. I want to compare them to see if there really is a pattern or what. Please give the locations in relation to mission locations or bunkers. (I have a bad feeling about this...) KJ adds: The best way to know if you found a special encounter is if your party was travelling in a vehicle and the vehicle "disappeared" in the map. You will get back in when you exit the encounter but the next time you go into another encounter, your party will be out of the vehicle. Take Note!!! In the merchant and the l33tists encounter, you will still retain your vehicle. -------- "Daniel Caine" has a great tip: You can get multiple special encounters in the same square. Once you have found a sector just run back and forth over the very corners of the square, and as you can see, I have managed to get up to four encounters per square. Also I have found that it is pointless spending perks on explorer or ranger. I am managing fine as you can see, with just Rebecca who starts out with the scout skill. Another thing, once you get two or three encounters in a square, you cant get another in it until you visit a different encounter giving square. Therefore on S.E. runs it is better to have 2 or three known squares on the go. They do stay the same from game to game, although the actual encounters differ slightly. I have also found a solution to the very anoying "Character Swap" bug found with the Four Horsemen S.E. It is still applicable after the patch even though the readme says it is fixed. Anyway to avoid having your lead character swapped, you have to know when it is going to occur. Basically when I came accross it I re-loaded. That encounter will be next. Either go onto an empty wilderness map by clicking on your little triangle, or do a random encounter. In my game the Hummer pilot is my main character and so has to be selected in order to drive. Position the vehicle a distance from the exit grid, then click on the exit grid to leave, however as you start to move, select a different character. When you then encounter the Four Horsemen, the character you selected will have swapped places with another member of your party, NOT your lead character though. Then you can just re-order them via the character screen. This is an important tip, as if you are doing S.E. runs you will come accross the Horsemen and it can seriously screw up your game. Below is a list of a few S.E. squares, I have more than this, but these are accessible from early in the game. and in conjunction with the tips above allow you to rack up a fair number of them. 2 Sq North of Bunker Beta 1 Sq North, 3 Sq West of Bunker Beta 1 Sq West, 3 Sq South of Brahmin Wood 2 Sq South of Preoria 2 Sq South, 3 Sq West of Macomb 1 Sq East, 3 Sq South of Macomb Like I said there are plenty more than this, near Jefferson and Kansas for example, but these are plenty to be going on with. ----2.3---- Ariel Falgui adds: Bunker Alpha: 4 south / 8 south, 2 west Preoria: 2 south Macomb: 1 south, 3 west / 3 south, 1 east Bunker Beta: 1 north, 3 west / 2 north / 4 north, 1 west Quincy: 2 north 1 west / 2 south, 5 west / 8 west ----2.6---- Tom adds: 4 north 4 east of Brahmin wood 5 east of Springfield or 3 south 5 east of Preoria (if you do not have the bonus mission) 4 north 1 west of bunker beta 6 south 7 west of St. Louis 2 south 8 west of St Louis 5 south 11 west of St Louis 2 south 14 west of St Louis ----2.6---- "Rodriguez" adds: 4N, 1W of Bunker Beta 5S, 6E of St. Louis 4W of Bunker Delta 1N, 2W of Bunker Epsilon 2E of Great Bend 5E of Coldwater 2N of Osceolla 3N of Kansas 2N, 1E of Bunker Delta 5S of Bunker Delta 1N, 1W of Quincy 2S, 1E of Osceolla 2S, 3E of Newton ----2.6---- WD-40 adds: A tip on finding special encounters EASILY - all that you will ever need is a character with lots of luck. If your own char isn't lucky, you should wait until a guy named Dos becomes available - it'll happen kinda late in the game (because he's rank 11 - paladin commander), but he's also a tremendously good small arms sniper with 10 PE, 34% critical chance, and a LK of 9. Walking through the wasteland with him in my party netted me about 8 special encounters in about an hour of real time. It really makes things easier, and you get an opportunity to take all those rare screenshots (if you're into it ;-) ----2.6---- 0.1 BROTHERS GRIMM: There are 2 mutants in a small area. One of them is wounded. Heal up the wounded one and (I think) they will join your roster back at the brotherhood. Charles J DeVito adds: Yes, if you heal the wounded brother, the two of them will end up as available recruits. They're both rank 11 (Paladin Commander), so not available til fairly late in the game. One is a melee specialist, the other is big guns/energy weapons and has (according to his character description) a habit of wearing women's clothing. ---------- 0.2 COPPERTOPS: This is a large building filled with treadmills and people called 'human batteries'. At the end of the row is a humanoid robot and there are lockers by the side of every pair of 'human batteries'. The lockers are locked, but if you open them, they contain 200 sm energy cells each. Destroying the humanoid robot, who raves about taking over the world, netted me 27 XP and the 100 rounds of 7.62 that he had on his person, and little else. I'm curious to know what else can be done with this encounter. 0.3 BAZAAR DAY: I haven't actually gotten this yet, but I've heard about it from several different people. The first one I heard from was Danny Hioe , and he gave a description of the Devilthorn Coat, which can be gotten here. Jonas Karlsson gives a more complete description, saying: In case you haven't encountered the "Bazaar Day", which might be a special encounter, I'll tell you a little bit about it. On my way to some mission I stumbled on this Bazar Day, it consists of a bunch of civilians that sell stuff. One of them has a very rare item, in fact it states that it is a "unique item". It is an armor of some kind with the name "Devilthorn Coat". It costed something around 24 000 ringpulls, but I had a lot of weapon that I could trade with. Once in my possession, I got almost hilarious of joy, the armour provided with 100 AC, +10 strength, +50 resist fire, -6 damage from enemies, furtheron it was indestructable. When you have read this far I guess you see that it is some kind of joke, probably an item from Diablo 2 or something, and it is rather unusable since it requires a strength of 75! ------------- KJ adds: mainly just five civilians around selling extremely cheap goods, cheaper than typical Brotherhood of Steel fashion. There is one guy who sold a 24987rp armor and i stole it. Turned out to be a Diablo 2 fakie. Nice momento, but no dice. I have not checked out whether the supply would be replenished or not. ------------- Chris Lynch writes: In the bazaar day special encounter the devilthorn coat can actually be worn if you get your strength over 75. It is with the use of a cheat you can get from www.avault.com ------------- (Please note that I neither use nor endorse this editor; please do not ask me questions about it, as I don't know a thing about it.) Wansheng Zhu adds: I just read about the bazaar day encounter in your faq and i noticed that they mentioned that you can buy something called the "Devilthorn Coat", and than i read the stats, and i remembered that these stats are exactly the same as a "unique armor" which can be found in Diablo 1. The stats are exactly the same and even the str. req. are the same, but the real armor is called "Demonspike Coat". It was actually a great piece of armor in Diablo 1, too bad you can't use it in Fallout Tactics. Anyways, just thought i should tell you this since some ppl thought it was from Diablo 2. ------------- "Adam Shahid" adds: The 'Bazaar Day' special encounter itself is actually poking fun at 'Bazaar Days' (usually on Saturdays) in the online RPG 'EverQuest'. The things the civilians in the bazaar shout are all typical things you hear people shouting in EverQuest. The 'Devilthorn' armor is poking fun at Diablo 1, though. ----2.2---- Jonas Karlsson adds: The number of civilians who sell items are five, except the Devilthorn Coat they also offer some stimpacks and other various items. And besides that one of them has what I think is a Ghoul armor, so if you have Ghouls in your squad, pick it up. I bought the Devilthorn Coat and brought it to a BOS bunker, when I returned to Bazaar Day she had another copy of it for sale, so it seems that some parts of their supply gets replenished. In a nearby room there are some gamble tables, but noone to play with. I encountered Bazaar Day just outside Preoria, to the north. ------------- "sean wilkins" adds: ok, regarding the devil thorne coat and day of bazaar, or whatever, ok it is an encounter with people who are talking about EverQuest and there are a few items you can get and the devil thorne coat IS from diablo and as far as i know useless, even with a hack of 100 of all stats, so. but i believe you can also get another armor there you cant use, i think it is for ghoul or super mutant, it has no description. also the bazaar is located early on and usual SE of preoria, i have only gotten it there, it is like 3 south and 3 east, or close too it. there are also some medical items for trade and some ammo, so basically the whole encounter is to listen to the comments of the people, as they make fun of EQ, talking about groups and corpse runs etc... ----2.5---- 0.4 ENERGIZER BUNNIES: KJ writes: There's some 30 neutral dots on your maps but the bunnies cannot be seen. They just say it keeps goin' and goin' and all that. Not much use except if you have a shotgun or something you could blash them all but just killing one of them (10 xp) then set everyone at agreesive. The bunnies will be blasted!!! Great fun since they don't fight back!!! ---------- "Tomas \"Reveille\" Rodriguez, Jr." adds: This pertains to the random encounter 0.4 (Energizer bunnies) with the neutral, invisible targets. If you attack (throw a grenade or whatnot) and kill all the targets, be aware that this DESTROYS your reputation and rank. I went from a Rank 9 Junior Paladin who was a Shield of Hope, down to a Rank 7 Senior Knight who was a Demon Spawn.. A bit of a surprise, and not worth the tiny amount of XP you get from killing them. :) Of course, if you like being evil, this random encounter is for you. ---------- 0.5 TITANIC: KJ writes: Jack's dead!!! **Sniff** But it's ok. He left a sketch (pretty comical but useless) and an expensive jewellery for you! ----------- 0.6 FARMER: KJ writes: I never got the farmer to do anything but guys said that he could sell you stuff. Pretty useless considering the "stuff" is Colt 45 and some bullets and food. Anyway i stole from him. It seems that he won't attack you if caught. ------- 0.7 TRADER: KJ writes: A merchant with nice stuff and some raiders. If you don't have some 70 hp each or a vechicle, don't attack!!! But the rewards are pretty good though, 4 pancor jackhammers, the best shotgun, and lots of money, bullets and useful stuff. YUMYUM! ------------ Louie Imperial writes: There are two raiders and two civilians plus the trader. The raiders both have AK47 while the the civilians - one with 9mm M9FS beretta and the other one has Neostead Combat SG. He sells in exchange for rp. He's got with him 1 environmental armor, a rocket launcher, a Flamer pistol, 12 ga EMP and 12 ga Slug Shells for the shotgun, a P220 SigSauer, a Desert Eagle Mark XIX 44, a needler pistol, 1 FN P90c, .44 magnum AP ammo, 5.56m ammo, Basic Shogun Shells, small energy cells, afterburners, mentats, radaway, acid grenade, flash grenade, inciendary grenade, 1 avenger minigun, stimpaks, 7.62mm ammo, 1 festering spear and shiv plus the others i have not mentioned. Again, you can steal it from him if you have a high percentage in steal - this will make it a whole lot easier than just to buy it from him. ----2.2---- lobar adds: I just recruited Babs when I encountered these guys. If you have no problems with stealing, she's perfect for the job. I put her in stealthmode and picked the place clean. Some gaurds have small enery cells on them and cattle prods while others have Panzers and 12 ga. ammo. The merchant was a breeze too and was loaded with tons of stuff. I think the more you steal the greater your chance at being caught because the merchant himself did eventually catch me. So take less and be selective. Normally I do not steal, but for raiders I make the exception. I used Babs to replace Rebecca since Babs has more balanced stats, and her skills as a whole were much better. ----2.2---- 0.8 BRAHMIN POKER: KJ writes: A couple of those cute two-headed creatures playing Poker! Cool! Cooler once you check their tables for Ring Pulls. Some 30000 of them! Oh and one of the gamblers say something from Fallout 2! I won’t spoil it, but if you can’t remember, it’s in Modoc, and a Brahim too. ------------ 0.9 PITCH BLACK: Some twenty deathclaws in a radiation and dark place. At first there is a guy who taunts you. Merely follow him until he attacks the deathclaws (I feel sorry for him) then run in the direction he WAS heading. Keep on going until you see an exit grid. The deathclaws are HARD! As you are without a vehicle, it means lots less protection. However the saving grace is that the deathclaws are only agreesive when you near them and comes in two packs. Skip them until some mission 9. ------------ "Tom Carlsen" adds: There is an encounter spot Pitch Black at the location 1 grid point NW of Quincy. This is a stage which is pitch dark except for a few glowing spots illuminating a path through the place. There are about 18 Deathclaws on each side of the path. There is also a guy named Riddick here. He will walk past the squad and head towards the extraction point. Let him go all the way through as the Deathclaws will not attack him. If you can make it through to the extraction point alive, you will get to recruit him. He can see in the dark and is fairly decent. --------- lobar adds: Oh man, I wish I knew about waiting until Ripley walked all the way through. One less recruit to worry about I guess. Anyway, if people are going to fight, it's best to head off to one side of the glowing path. This way you encounter the Deathclaws in smaller numbers. I tried running straight up the path, but I never made it. The Deathclaws out run you, and when you go up the middle, they charge in from all sides including from a head of you. I got circled real fast and we all died. Could be they modified this encounter with the patch. The trick that finally made the world of difference was using the Voodoo drug with all my people. It adds +2 AG, +3 LK, +20% to your damage resistance, and +25% to your critical chance (which also gets raised with the luck addition too). End result, you move faster, fight better, take less damage, and get more criticals that are better. I was able to take down a Deathclaw with one shot from a revolver. Made this fight much easier with the high lucks. ----2.2---- Joiro Hatagaya adds: It is actually a reference to the movie "Pitch Black" which is about a space ship crew crash landing on a planet full of bloodthirsty creatures living deep underground in darkness and fearing light. Shortly after the crash landing a total eclipse starts and the crew find themselves depending on a murderer named Riddick who is able to see in darkness thanks to a special eye operation. The random encounter references a part of the movie, where the remaining people are moving to a certain location, using light to scare away the creatures. ----2.2---- 0.10 L33TISTS: 2 guys, named Ph4tman and L33tleboy. The names themselves are references to the 2 atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, and the spellings are reference to '1337'-speak; the corruption of spelling often used by script kiddies and adolescent gamers. It's pretty l4me, if you ask me, but you're probably familiar with it if you've played Quake, Counter- strike, Tribes, or even Diablo II in some cases. Much like their real- world counterparts, these guys are pretty worthless. One of them has some afterburner gum. 0.11 REAVER DANCE: A group of Reavers, dancing up on stage. Your guess is as good as mine. Christoph adds: concerning encounter 0.11: "Reaver dance" = a reference to "Riverdance", an Irish stepdance show which has been popular in Europe for a few years. (Don't know if elsewhere). Basically looks like someone very drunk is orchestrating some puppets on strings. ---------- 0.12 CANADIAN INVASION: A group of tribals, reenacting the Canadian Invasion. They will attack you, and you will most likely destroy them. Here you can get the Supper Soaker which can use acid for ammo (you've found some of it in previous missions). A pretty good medium-range weapon, but with a high AP cost. 0.13 PHIL THE NUKA COLA GUY: writes: A guy in a red jacket riding on a bike complaining about delivering cola. I killed him and he had a Hundred plain nuka cola and one Fusion nuka cola. ---------- "Tom Carlsen" adds: Also, forgot to add something else I discovered. The Nuka Cola guy that cruises around on his bike can be killed and his bike can be stolen. The mechanic at bunker epsilon has a "jet bike key" that can be stolen, but not bought. If you kill the nuka cola guy after you obtain this key you can drive off on his bike. Lots of fun. -------- 0.14 B-1000: writes: Part cow, part machine. Odd little Brahmin with 999 health that gives up an UZI when it dies. ---------- 0.15 KOMODO MAN: writes: Basically the post-apocalyptic version of the crocodile hunter. Humorous to watch for a little while. ---------- 0.16 SIXTH SENSE: Charles J DeVito writes: A herd of ghost brahmin surrounding a brahmin named Cole. Cole says "I see dead brahmin". No one has anything of any interest if you kill them. ---------- 0.17 GAS STATION: Charles J DeVito writes: An old woman in a gas station who sells things, including an "Elixir of Vitality". It cost about 5000K rp, but raises endurance by one point permanently. ---------- 0.18 PIPBOY: Charles J DeVito writes: A small area with a real live Pip Boy. He carries some 7.62 ammo and a machine gun. ---------- I have heard that he will join your party if it only has 5 members in it. He's supposed to be pretty good, but can't change stance. Andres J. adds: The Pipboy random encounter, if you have less than 6 people, gives you the pipboy character, his statistics are as follows.... Level 10 ST-7 EN-7 (I believe.. I used the vitality drink a few times so it's either 6 or 7) PE-6 CH-5 IN-6 AG-6 LK-10 His tags are: Small Guns Bigs Guns Energy Weapons Sneak All are below 80, but can be developed much higher in time. Only trait is the lovable Bloody Mess Perks are: Flexible (Bulls***!!! He can't even crouch or lay prone!!!) Stunt man (Pretty useless, but, hey...) Tag! (That's why he's got 4...) And 2 others, which I can't remember, but aren't of any real importance. He cannot lay prone or croutch, and, in spite of his very, very short appearance, -seems- to have all the characteristics of standing at all times. Any idiot with basic math skills can tell you he has 6, that's right, 6 goddamned extra character points, so he has a total of 11 extra points instead of the normal 5 you and everyone else you've ever seen before had. Hells yes, that little guy rules. Gains perks at the normal (3 levels to a perk) rate, despite the fact he has 5 when he's at level 10... Please note: He can run and walk, both are just a -tad- bit slower then a normal human's. My personal evaluation------ The Pipboy is, if you can look past his numerous, yet pretty small problems, a good, all around character, possibly a keeper until the end of the game, or, at least until a robot manages to jump him with a lead pipe. His relatively high strength (7), extremely high luck (10!!), and tag skills in all gun categories make him a very, very good carrier for the lighter heavy weapons (Bren gun, M-60, Avenger, Laser Gatling, etc.) and as a covert operative who manages to pack quite the punch with his heavy weapons and energy skills. Now, I don't know why in the hell they made his perception so low, but, if you want (Like I did), you can give him a Gain Perception and a sharpshooter, this will bring him up to a whopping 9 in perception for shooting purposes (as if there was any other purpose.) If you do this, give him the Mutate (to add fast shot) and bonus rate of fire, and he is a EXCELLENT SNIPER. I mean this, I really do. Allow me to explain. The high ST allows for the heavier, harder-hitting varient of weapons. The ridiculously high LK affordes him with a extremely high critical chance. The 9 PE means he can actually aim the damn thing The weapon skills allow him to blow away anything in his path in the most ethical way. And, the sneak tag allows him to get into the best possible position unspotted. The perfect sniper. F***ing A. Hand him a laser rifle, or, if you get some power armor, a Browning, and you'll never have another worry as long as you live. If not, he makes a exemplory grunt, a fine scout, and, it just feels so damn good to have the little dude in your group! He's as cute as a button. Bugs -Might just be me... Probably is... But he seems to get crippled a bit easier. -After you get him out of the random encounter, his name appears as "CORE-pipboy" instead of the usual, sensical "PipBoy". Wierd, huh? ----2.4---- "Jolt - Ganj" writes: If you have a full party on this special encounter and let the Pipboy character wander off the map, he'll become available as a recruit. However, rather than being named as CORE_pipboy, he's just plain Pipboy, (though he does have a character description - sorry, I didn't make a note of it) and rather than a Luck of 10, he has just 4, (those extra 6 stat points gone). ----2.6---- 0.19 UPRISING: Charles J DeVito writes: A BOS bunker entrance (that you can't enter) with two BOS soldiers out front, standing over the butchered corpses of about 12 civilians. The civilians have only junk. The BOS scum have avenger miniguns, but killing them will reduce both your reputation and rank within the brotherhood. ----------- Sean Yeo da Syko adds: i just encountered uprising and used voodoo to kill the BoS scum without penalties and they were vindicator miniguns, not avengers. ----2.4---- 0.20 CPF vs. PFC: brian writes: Two groups of tribals are yelling at each other, one group is purple, and the other red. They stand near banners declaring thier affiliation. You can attack one without rousing the other. I only killed one side (I like red) so I don't know what everyone has, but the side I killed had nothing of real value. Just a Monty Python reference, I guess. Neither attacks and you can't talk to them. i just went agressive to see what would happen. ----------- 0.21 BRAHMIN ARMOR: KJ writes: Once you get in you are facing a wall. when you get out, you will see an enclosed compound with four turrets. the 4 are stange though, as i saw they have some 300 hp but was destroyed with a single hit each from my pancor. they can do REAL damage, so beware. there is a brahim in the compound but it always get wasted in the second round. maybe you can save him or something. however, the skin it drops can turn you into a brahim! cool but you cannot attack. oh, and the 4 turrets contain micro fusion cells too. ----------- Uliasea adds: It's about the special encounter "Brahmin armour". I found that this armour isn't by far useless - if you've a supermutant in your group. While everybody else wearing this armour looks like a brahmin and cannot attack, your mutant can wear it without changing his outlook, he CAN still attack and has a good armour value (at least better than wearing nothing beside his skin...) -------- "h.kenward" adds: re:- the Brahmin Armour from the special encounter - while it disguises humans as cows, has no obvious effect on a ghoul, and is fairly reasonable armour for a super mutant, IT IS AMAZING ARMOUR FOR A ROBOT ! I put it on the Robot I recruited prior to the Robot Power Plant Level, and it took his armour class to 57 and his damage resistance to 90% ----2.6---- 0.22 DEATHCLAW LIBERATION: I found this on the way to Preoria from Bunker Delta. A humanitarian goes into a cage of deathclaws to free them and gets killed. You then get to kill the deathclaws. The humanitarian is called 'Janet Badall', a reference to Jane Goodall, who is a wildlife expert, specializing in primates. 0.23 4 HORSEMEN OF THE POST-APOCALYPSE "Kyriel" writes: they're pretty lame actualy, all they do is talk, say things like "maybe we should switch sides.." or.. "6.1 billion people gone, just like that *snap*" etc etc...they have around 14,100 some odd HP, and only punch you, however, i didnt have the resources to kill them, so i didnt... -------- Mike Fletcher adds: it is each horseman of the apocaplpse,war,famine,pestilence,death, they are standing around a campfire whining. one funny crack was made by WAR, he says "i wish they would stop saying i never change, i can change. (in reference to the war, war never changes at the beginning of each fallout episode) each says almost dead, so i attacked them, 1 .50 cal mg 1 vindicator MG, 2 plasma rifles, 1 sniper rifle. i ran outta ammo before they were dead, i killed 3 before being reduced to fists. this leads me to believe that each has HP up around 20k - 25k. tho they are unarmed and have no equipment apart from hands and feet so they cant hurt me i shudder to think at their health points if they were at full health. --------- Garry Upton adds: I killed War - horseman of the post-apocalypse...and got a whopping 269 experience. If you want to take them on, bring lots of Dr's bags and give everyone pistols with lots of ammo. Don't use burst, and have them all target the same guy. Put it on CTB and walk away. Check to see if you need to heal any crippled limbs every now and then. ----2.5---- Rob Knebel writes in, saying: This is in regards to what, precisely, the Four Horsemen special encounter does, and why it tends to mess with so many people's games. It makes the character in the group with the lowest Charisma the leader. If, for some godawful reason, your main character has a Charisma of 1, you'll have no problems at all with these guys. If not, the character with the lowest charisma will be your new leader. Easily remedied, though...just pump up your former leader with some Mutie, then reenter the SE. ----2.5---- Hopefully Rob's tip will help out everyone who got screwed with in this encounter. Thanks much! "Jolt - Ganj" adds: Extra experience points for your medic character if you heal up the 4 horsemen. They clock in at around 100,000, (yes one hundred thousand!) hit points a piece and Stitch was racking up 75 exp per 75 hp healed... I only had enough supplies to get two of them to Unhurt status tho, (and that only because a Doctors' Bag based heal fully healed them in one go). Be interesting to see what happens, (if anything) if they're all healed to unhurt status... It's on the slate of things to do second time round. ----2.6---- 0.24 BRAHMIN TIPPING: Ferri writes: A field filled with many brahmins. Clicking on any 1 of them will tip them. Imagine a brahmin with a very very heavy head =P --------- 0.25 MIR writes: No, really, Mir. The space station. Apparently in this alternate universe the space station crashed into middle America. Nothing to do but it is kind of interesting to see what the artists did with their free time. --------- 0.26 AMELIA Andrew Lusk-Hahn writes: I found a huge crashed air plane in the wasteland. There isn't anything you can do to it besides get the cross air looking thing over the front end of the plane, but you can't repair it or anything. The name of the encounter is "Amelia". ---------- I'm guessing that this is a reference to Amelia Earhart(sp?), a female aviator in the early part of the 20th century who disappeared in a transatlantic flight. 0.27 HERMIT: Louie Imperial writes: There are five wolves around there and one hermit. The hermit sells 12 ga. flechette shells for the shotgun, a 9mm Calico M950, a plasma grenade, a scout handbook, a couple of dynamites and a metal armor plus some other items not much worth taking. You can steal it from him if you have a high percentage in steal - this will make it a whole lot easier than just to buy it from him. -------- 0.28 MERCHANT: "Vanni Loriggio" writes: Just thought you might like to know : one of the special encounters you described in your Walkthrough is named incorrectly. I got the Merchant encounter and they didn't have Pancors - that's an encounter called Trader (IIRC). Merchant, on the other hand, sells nice stuff : an FN FAL, 2 science books, a piloting book, good explosives and fairly rare ammo, not to mention a GAUSS PISTOL (no 2mm EC ammo though). He also carries a Browning M2, so if you overdose him on Voodoo (use it on him till he dies) you get ALL his stock plus his Browning without losing rep. Cheap yes, but when you have an FN FAL in Macomb, it makes a difference :) Oh, and the Farmer now has nice stuff too (as of patch 1.25), including a Small Guns book and an Outdoorsman one (other OK stuff as well). ----2.2---- 0.29 MORTE: I must have had about 10 people send this in, but Ariel Falgui sent it first... Ariel Falgui writes: You’ll see a floating skull around. Kill him and you’ll get nothing but degrades your rank and reputation. ----2.6---- Morte is a reference to Black Isle's own PLANESCAPE:TORMENT(TM) game, which I highly recommend if you like plot-based RPGs. 0.30 INVASION RECREATIONISTS: Ariel Falgui writes: Talk to Clarisse, leader of Canadian Invasion Recreationists, and she will says that they will invade America (sometimes it says Canada ) by stepping over the line. ----2.6---- "Rodriguez" adds: I stumbled upon another Special Encounter which I don't think is on your FAQ. I am not sure if the Canadian Invasion is the same SE as Invasion Recreationists. The civilians are not tribals and they do not seem to attack me unless I attack them. Plus they don't hold the super soaker. Anyway, the SE is entitled as "Invasion Recreationists". There is a sign saying "Canadian Invasion Recreationists". There are 6 civilians, and another one that has a name, Clarisse. Once I talk to Clarisse, they start talking about crossing to the Canadian side. All they do is walk across a dark line in between two sign posts that doesn't say anything. Then the come back to the picnic tables on the other side. After crossing, the Clarisse no longer talks to you except for offering you food that you cant get. The civilians hold several bottles except for one that has a beretta, bullets and a stimpack. ----2.4---- 1.0 BRAHMIN WOOD (MISSION 1): You're going to start with Stitch the medic and Farsight the sniper. In combat, Stitch is pretty useless due to his low perception; he will only do any damage when close, and then he will do a lot of damage because of his shotgun. Farsight is good enough at range, although she will miss often. Your character should start with an MP5, a submachine gun which is middling with range, and can do lots up close with a burst. Burst isn't all that accurate at range, however, and burns ammo fast. You'd best get yourself a rifle ASAP if you have good perception (which you ought to if you're a sniper) and work in concert with Farsight to pick off people from afar or middling distances, and have Stitch patch you up when you're hit. One of the best tactics is to duck behind a wall, and on your turn stand up, fire a round or two, and then duck down so you can't be seen. Keep this in mind as I describe the areas below. UPDATE: with the fix for overwatch in 1.25, the crouch->stand->fire-> crouch doesn't work as well anymore; they will fire on you when you stand. However, they will only get 1 round off, so it's better than 2 or 3... "r wong" suggests: the solution is to post bait out around max range for the target... they may have to fire to get response fire, but usually just being visible is enough. once you've drawn the overwatch fire, you can pop up the crew hiding closer and shred target with much more accurate and damaging fire. works best (and only tested) in squad TB. against mutants with heavy burst weapons you'll probably only wanna post one decoy since misses might miss into anyone standing nearby. ----2.6---- You start in a ruin. Go NE and talk to the village elder. Then crouch everyone and move to the bridge, N of you. There are a couple guards NW of you past the rocks, and one NE of you, patrolling, with a dog. Try to engage them one at a time; get into the rocks if you can, and remain crouched because you are harder to hit that way. Also, if you hide behind the rock structure with the firepit in front of it, you can take potshots at the NW guy without being hit (only Farsight has this capability with her rifle). When done, DON'T FORGET TO RELOAD YOUR WEAPONS. This is done easily by selecting everyone and hitting the 'R' key. "Kenny Wong" adds: You can reload for 0 ap by dragging the weapon from one hand to the other. More usefull in TB than CTB as you'll still need to switch weapons, which takes about 1-2aps worth in real time. -------- The guy to the NE has a Mauser (a 9mm pistol) and a baseball bat. You want your main character to loot him because the ammo he has is useful for the MP5. The NW one has a zip gun (1-shot, sucks), ammo, and a stimpak, great for healing. Advance NW to the bunker. There is a guy patrolling the area. Advance on him and cut him down. Then position 2 people (including Farsight) to the SW, against the wall, and put them on agressive attack. Use the 3rd to bait the guy out of the bunker, and your other 2 will ambush him. In a close-quarters fight, you should be ok, especially with stitch's shotgun. Loot the 2 bodies to get a 44 (a good pistol) and an uzi. .44 should go to Farsight, who needs a close weapon, as the rifle can be innaccurate up close. Put it in her 2nd weapon slot and RELOAD. Head into the bunker to get the chest, wherein you may find a key and rifle ammo, as well as a stimpak (rifle ammo goes to Farsight). Then head SW to the ruin and talk to the shaman. Now go back NE and into the door by the bunker. Make sure you're on agressive (or not, if you intend to sneak) and open the door. There is a guard inside, and hopefully you'll hit him once or twice. Also note the guard outside by the garden, and the dog running around out there. Crouch inside and use the walls for cover once the initial guy is down and try to hide behind the walls. Stand up, take a shot, and then duck. Don't get too close, though, as he has a shotgun, which sucks for range but does a prodigious amount of damage should it hit. Loot the raider inside and the shelf next to the blue shelf. Also take the booze on the ground. Also loot the shotgun guy for more shells for stitch. Advance NW to the tent. Loot the shelf inside, then go N to the area with the sleeping people. Put yourself on passive sentry mode and get as close as you dare so as to kill them before they can do anything at all. Getting Stitch near the dogs is a good idea as he can kill them both with one good shot from the shotgun, if you're lucky. Go through the gate here into the Brahmin pen. Do not injure them. This next part is a bit tricky. You want to make sure not to hit any of the civilians in the tent, and yet there are 2 guards in there who need to be killed. Put stitch at the N entrance and the other 2 at the south entrance. Advance the south team in on agressive to shoot the one guy, and move Stitch around to shoot at the guy who runs in among the kids. Alternately, put your MP5 guy there to try to hit him hard before he runs in among the kids. If you're lucky, nobody will be hurt, but this part is hard. Definitely save beforehand. Go out the NE door when you're sure the sentry isn't around, and into the tent N of you. Kill the guy inside and take his speargun. Also loot the shelf for shotgun shells and drugs (worth money). Sentry time. Put the MP5 guy in the tent with the kids, then set all to agressive. You want to ambush the sentry because she has a rifle, which has some serious accuracy bonuses, so you want to hit her fast and hard, at short range, so she won't be able to get away and have the advantage. Put Farsight and Stitch in the N tent, near the door, on agressive, and the MP5 guy in the tent with the hostages (alternately put Stitch there for shotgun power) and wait for her to come around. When dead, give the rifle immediately to the main character and put the MP5 in the 2nd slot. Now move NW to the next bunker, on crouch. The guy will notice you, but you should be able to kill him quickly with 2 rifles. Unlock the door and go in. Inexplicably, he has both shotgun shells and rifle bullets, which you can split between the two riflemen. Also loot the crate in here. Head out the next door, across the street, and into the little parking lot that might once have been a basketball field. Beware the guards here and do not make a frontal assault on the bunker. Instead, move down behind the tin wall, killing resistance on the way. You will kill one guy there who wants to ambush you, and also the sentry who moves back and forth. From there, move to the trees in the middle and advance cautiously. Shoot the guards when they activate; hopefully you are close enough to do damage. If not, you'll have to go around the back of the bunker. Give the 3rd rifle off of the guard here to stitch, for his 2nd slot, and make sure to loot the crate for grenades and first aid. Then carefully move through the hole in the SW wall and to the sniper post (with the ladder). Go up the ladder with your main char on aggressive, ideally with the MP5 selected, on burst. You ought to blow him to smithereens. Once up here you might be able to see other guys and shoot them, so look around with the rifle on, set to aggressive. Before you leave, get the stimpak and rifle bullets in the crate. Move SE through the next wall, into the next ruined area, this one with wood floors. If you didn't snipe him, there's a guy here with a pistol who you can deal with. Then move SE to the buliding with the burning barrel. There are 2 guys here, waiting in ambush, along with a dog, so be careful. Move SW into the room with the wood floors and tin walls. There is an uzi- packing thug here that shouldn't cause too much trouble if you're careful. Next move W into the courtyard and take out the 2 sentries there, from cover if you can. Move around the building N (on the east side) and come around to surprise the sentry on the west side. Once he's gone, you can either get onto the roof to shoot people from there, or go in the front door. The best way to finish this mission is to walk out a single step, fire a shot or two, and then move back behind cover. They won't be able to take a single shot at you. It's pretty easy if you ask me. The only risk is when you take the first step out, as there is a guy on the right side with a machine gun. Either set your MP5 to burst and go on the right side, or do the left side to activate TB combat and then machinegun him on your next turn. Whatever you do, do it crouched. UPDATE: with the fix for overwatch in 1.25, you *will* get shot at when you go around the corner, so keep this in mind. If you have a lot of trouble, do it crouched. Killing Horus ought to send you up a level. Put all your points in small guns; I'm not kidding. It will be very hard on you if you don't. Loot the bodies for stuff. There is also a crate and a box and a locked box. The locked box is tricky to open without extra lockpick points, but contains 2 stimpaks (not earthshattering if you miss them). Go all the way back and talk to the shaman, who will give you heal powder. Then go back to the Elder and talk to him; he will give you a detonator if no natives died. Then, step on to the green patch nearby to leave. Head back to the bunker for healing, equipment, and new recruits. 1.1 BUNKER 1: Hit 'M' to see the map, and head directly to the Recruits pool. Pick up 3 people (you might see more than 3 with high charisma), and then outfit them with all the loot you have, ideally with a rifle and a neostead apiece. All of them suck at riflery, with low perceptions and middling 'small guns' skills, so they will be backup and mules for now. Note that though they are wearing leather armor, they don't get the bonuses for it; this is a bug. Unequip the armor, then equip it to fix this. Head to the Equipment store to sell off your stuff and buy anything neat they might have. I suggest selling all your drugs as they are addictive and expensive; I don't ever use them and I find that if I do, i suffer because I get addicted. Buy yourself some lockpicks and some rifle ammo if you need it. And, if you're a melee person, get a mace glove or sappers. Make sure to do all buying and selling with the person with the highest barter skill. Kenny Wong writes: (Unconfirmed) Items seem to sell for more if the quartermaster doesn't have a lot of it in stock. The 1st AK-47 I sold was way more than the 57th one. This means it's much better if you sell all 57 of 'em in one go rather than selling 2 or 3 at a time. Just have the whole party loaded up, have your barterer within talking distance of the quartermaster, then shift everything over. (Gotta confirm this myself, but I'm definately sure my 57th AK went for a measily 67 scripts, while my 1st one went for a few hundred.) ------------- Rick Schneider adds: Heya! I just thought I'd give some more info on selling stuff to the quartermaster. The price you get does indeed go down depending on how many he has in stock. But selling all at once does not gain you anything, the calculations are figured in to the total sale based on quantity. If selling 1 gun gets you $100, selling 20 will give you a lot less $2000. ------------- I have seen this myself; heavy machineguns that once would sell for over 1K have been reduced in price to less than 100. Once you start to hit the point of diminishing returns (especially for larger guns), either come back for them in a scavenging run (a vehicle helps) or don't bother at all (unless you have a vehicle, in which case you can put it all in the vehicle; even the scouter has no inventory limit). WD-40 adds: Medical supplies - if you become aware of the fact that each and every Medical officerkeeps all his/her supplies in his/her pockets, available to everyone with a reasonable Steal skill, things should get much more simple. The sad part is that they don't replenish over time, but I had never, not for a single moment, run out of meds this way. I didn't have any thief in my party, but after you finish Quincy (mission 6), Babs the ghoul becomes available for recruiting, and she has the Steal skill tagged, so I just took her in when I needed something stolen, and put her back afterwards. ----2.6---- Rob Healy suggests: Drugs are useful because you can use them on other people. If you use more than six of a drug (Voodoo works great! -- cheap and plentifull) the person will overdose and be knocked out. Any more usually kills the person. Try this at the bunkers for some great guns early in the game (if you don't mind killing some of your comrades.) Also -- combat is not iniatiated when you do this, so if you know you wil have to fight someone later you can kill them first using this method. ------------- "Matthew wong" tried this and says: Basically I'm writing to say I tried something in your guide but it didn't work. It's the suggestion by Rob Healy that killing a brotherhood of steel by overdosing them on drugs. The problem is after you kill said person you get a cinematic picture having you character thrown out of the brotherhood. ----2.3---- Anybody know what he could have done wrong? Was this fixed in the 1.25 patch? Once done with this, head to the briefing room to get your next mission. You are to go to Freeport. Head out via the green exit area. "Kevin Weiser" writes: I think this may be a fluke, but after I completed the first mission of the game, right after I left I had a random encounter. 4 civilian girls against radiscorpions. I killed the scorps, but they got 2 of the girls. on the bodies were NeoStead Shotguns! Yes, I had 2 (two) Neosteads from the 2nd mission on. It makes the game MUCH easier, let me tell you. Deathclaws are not much of a problem, as a burst from the Neostead does 80+ damage. ------- Phil Chermak adds: In response to Kevin Weiser's notice about the NeoStead shotguns, it's not a fluke. In the sector directly west of Brahmin Wood, it's fairly common to run into encounters involving both citizens and radscorpions. In these encounters, the citizens randomly carry various items, including 9mm berettas, stimpaks, NeoSteads, and standard shotgun ammo. By continuously finding this type of encounter, you can easily stockpile NeoSteads by allowing the radscorpions to munch the citizens. It's also a good (but tedious) way to stockpile shotgun ammo, which will otherwise be hard to come by if you liberally use the NeoSteads. ------- SERIOUSLY consider walking around on the square W of Brahmin wood to get these encounters. Neosteads are worth good money and do great damage, and they will make the next couple missions much easier. You MAY have to do this before entering the bunker the first time, so keep that in mind. 2.0 FREEPORT (MISSION 2): If on aggressive, you'll likely snipe a guy and a dog off to the E as soon as you enter. Then advance up to the line of cars and duck behind them, standing to fire at the combatants on the ridge. Don't fire unless you have at least a 30% chance to hit; you will just waste ammo. There are 3 ways in to the complex, as advised by the map. I suggest taking the south route as you can get to your contact there. It is highly advisable to keep the alarm from sounding if you can help it, so engage the gaurds quickly and quietly so as not to send them running to the sirens. Move SE towards the SE stairs. You can kill the bridge guards if you want since they don't have guns (pretty dumb if ya ask me), but there are sentries that walk around with guns. The N section with the still is especially highly guarded, with a guy with an AK47; a great weapon, but you have to take it from him. KJ suggests: shooting the alcohol still nets you a 200 xp. -------- The south side is pretty lightly guarded, and in a tent (on the W side of the gorge) is a shelf with stuff and a sleeping guy, easily ambushed. Move to the agreed meeting point and find the guy with red armor. He is in the building, crouched. From there, go NE to the room with the bookshelf. Kill the guy with the spear and his buddy nearby. Get the scouting manual on the shelf and read it for outdoorsman skill. Go NE again and kill the spear guy there by the fire. Head E into the wood- floored room and loot the cabinet. Once there, move the squad N to NE of the porthole building with the sleeping guards. Sneak in and then kill them quickly. Then move SW to the room with the locked door and 'Ripley the prisoner'. You may have to sneak, and/or shoot the guards in the main street before they set off the alarm. This will be tricky, and if you find it difficult, you'll likely have to go all the way around through the still area, killing those foes, and come from both sides, the north and the south side of the street, to get enough shots off to kill them before the siren goes off. You can try to pick the lock, but it'll be difficult. If you do, she'll open the door and run off. Go into the tent nearby and rescue the elder. Ware the guys in the bunker in the street. Shooting nearby will probably set off the guards to attack you, and they'll start coming out of the tents. If you're good enough, you can pick them off 1 at a time as they come at you, but crouch and take cover just in case. When done, loot the bodies and tents for some good stuff. If you're lucky, you won't have awoken most of the guards, and they will be sleeping in the tents. Just walk your guys up to the door on passive sentry, and then activate agressive; 6 free shots at 95%. Execution style, as it were. Head N from here to the little compound with the guy locked inside. Getting through the door is difficult. I have yet to actually get in there, and would be most interested to find out what was inside... chad athey writes: Concerning the locked house that you were interested in getting into on the Freeport mission, one of the guards that generally hangs around the tent the elder's in has the key. In fact, If I remember correctly, in addition to the key he has better loot than any other guard in the Freeport mission. Hope that helps. ----------- Gabriel writes: In Freeport just North of the (northeast) building with the two sleeping guards which is northwest of the guard by the fire, there is a locker with an AK-47 (your first one to get - and not on a person) and some ammo or other stuff. You can return their to confirm the contents. I only bring this up since this weapon can help out immensely on this mission and gives you at least two by the end of this mission. ----------- Next, head E toward the still. Stop in the room full of boxes to kill a guy and loot a crate. Then continue toward the still. There will be guys sleeping here, and a guy with an AK right near the still, so be careful and crouch on the approach. If you have to, hide behind the crates and move out, shoot at him, and then move back out of sight. Once they're all dead, go talk to the Tribal Elder and tell him to go to the exit area, then proceed there yourself. 2.1 BUNKER 2: Return to the bunker and talk to the new tribals there; the girl has a gun magazine you can buy. Check out the new recruits to see if you like anyone there. 3.0 ROCK FALLS (MISSION 3): Head E and then NE towards the 2nd entrance, noted on the map. The first obstacle is the camp to the east. Sneak up and engage them from a distance. By now you ought to have 2 good snipers (you and Farsight, if you're a sniper) and a 3rd, Rebecca, might be available at the base. The others ought to be at least passable at the rifle, as well. If you're not too close, they likely won't hit you. Follow the same idea for the next group to the NE. They'll probably run out into the field, and you can hit them from there. When they're down, you can head NE, to the E of the garbage wall. Watch for the sniper post across the street to the NE. There's a guy with an AK up there and he has buddies in the building below him. Take him out and then approach the building slowly to get his friends (2). You should get 2 AK's from this; if you're into automatics, they'll be your friends for a while. I prefer the hunting rifle with a secondary automatic weapon myself, or a shotgun. Go N to the car wall, and then around it to get the crate in the SW corner, made by the L of cars. Be aware that there is a raider there with an auto- matic weapon, which you might not have seen if she was crouching. Head N to the gap in the wall crouched. Set to aggressive, and then stand. You might to see some guards and shoot them. Once done, head around the perimeter wall around back, and beware of the mines there. The slower you go, the more mines you'll discover with your eyes, rather than your feet. You probably don't have anyone who can disarm them, so just leave them be. shirwyn@vcn.bc.ca adds: Going down on your belly makes it easier to spot land mines. ----2.2---- Now you can head NW towards the gate control if you like. Pick the door if you can to get at the gate control. From there, you can get into the area with the boss raider. Once through with him, we can proceed to clean up the rest of them. UPDATE 2.6! MANY MANY MANY MANY MANY people email me, saying 'I can't pick the door, what do I do?' This tells me 2 things: first, they probably play the game right from the FAQ, and second, they don't bother to read ahead. If you read ahead, it says that you get the key to the gate control from DAISY THE RAIDER, described below. However, it is also my fault for not mentioning that here. Once again, if you cannot pick the door lock, get the key from DAISY THE RAIDER (do a search on 'daisy' and you'll find her). Thank you. ----2.6---- You can either go in the ground floor or the top floor. The ground floor is locked, and might pose a problem, so you may have to go upstairs; ware the sniper there. Downstairs, 'Jesse' might be able to shoot at you through obscure mapping errors. Specifically, there is a spot to the right of the door that allows you to shoot at the second floor. If you feel lucky, put your best shot there and take care of the 2 guys upstairs. Eventually you should get into the door, and make sure everyone is lined up outside to see in and set to aggressive. If you can't you'll have to to upstairs and then down the indoor stairs, a dicey proposition at best. Of course, if you go in the ground floor and then upstairs, you'll have 2 or 3 enemies to contend with, which is also a pain. It might be best to go up the outside stairs and take care of them through the door. Of course, then you have to contend with the enemies on the balcony. You can also hit guys on the walls from the balcony, a good idea in my opinion, allowing you to get up on the walls and fire at them. Inside the small room is a safe which eluded me for some time. I tried clicking on it and it said 'out of reach', but it can be accessed. You must move the character to the left of the safe; in fact, put them right on the left side of the safe. Then use picklocks to try to open it. I picked it on my first try, but this might be an anomaly. Rebecca is good for that, with high picklocks and possibly a kit you should have bought at the base. Inside are ring pulls, RadAway, and a Traps book. As with most books, either give it to the expert or your main character. As you likely don't have a trap character yet, it should go to the main character or be saved. notes: you mentioned the safe in Rock Falls that can only be opened by standing to the left of it; actually, all safes can be opened without the "out of reach message" by crouching or lying prone . . . ----2.6---- Next you ought to get up on the wall to fire at your the nearby field. Make a complete circuit of the 'C' and then go down off the wall and back out to the mine-laced area. Go into the field next to the brahmin building and shoot at the guy in the building to the W ('Bo the Raider'). Make sure to loot him because he has several grenades on him. There is also a l