Skip's Fallout 3 Q/A Thread - Spoilers!

[Skippman]

Well, having successfully broken the main quest by accident through exploring the city I figured I'd start a Q/A thread for those of us playing the game to help each other out. This thread will contain many spoilers so go into the thread knowing that.

A couple pieces of advice from the beginning of the game.

Character Creation

S.P.E.C.I.A.L.

You're attributes play an important part in character creation. Depending on the type of character you want to play your choices will be very different.

Strength is useful for characters who want to melee. While I advise avoiding melee combat due to your inability to dodge if this is your thing make sure to crank this up. This also determines your carry limit which may matter early in the game. Strength can also be used to force certain locks open.

Perception is useful for long range combat and finding "hidden" items. Perception is used to calculate your to-hit numbers for ranged weapons along with your ranged weapon skill and applicable perks. Perception is also used to determine how far away you can notice enemies as denoted by the red markers on your HUD’s compass. Perception is also useful in certain character dialogue's.

Endurance is used to determine how many hit points you have and the effects of drugs and radiation on you.

Charisma is used to calculate your reaction modifier for factions and bartering. It also presents you with unique dialogue options if it's high enough.

Intelligence determines how many skill points per level you acquire. It is also used for certain dialogue options if the level is high enough.

Agility is used to calculate to hit numbers for ranged combat. It's also used to determine how many action points you have in the V.A.T.S. combat mode.

Luck is surprisingly useful. Luck determines how many and what type of items a NPC will be carrying. Luck is also used to determine your critical hit rate. A high luck along with Finesse and Sniper makes your character a head shooting engine of death.


For ranged combat characters I recommend Perception, Agility, and Luck.

For close quarters I recommend Strength, Endurance, and Agility.

My personal choice is Intelligence, Perception, and Agility.



Skills

Pick a weapon skill and stick with it. It might seem fun to have high Big Guns and Melee weapon skills but you'll do far more damage by specializing in one weapon skill. Small Arms works well as they're plentiful and available early in the game. Expect to have ammo shortages for the more powerful small arms later in the game such as the .308 Sniper Rifle and .44 Mag pistol.
Energy Weapons are not as uncommon as they were in previous games but should be used as a secondary weapons skill. I recommend maxing Small Arms early in the game and picking a secondary weapons skill later such as Energy Weapons or Big Guns.

Pick a useful trade skill such as Science or Medic as a tag skill. They present unique dialogue options later in the game. Science is great for unlocking safes as many are connected to computers. Medic is excellent as it determines how much HP is recovered when you use a Stimpack and how effective other drugs such as Rad Away are.

Barter is pretty useless as by the time it will be high enough to matter you'll have more than enough caps anyway.

Speech is good as you can usually get unique dialogue options and extra caps from people.

Lockpicking is always a good choice as there are many locked containers in the wastes and you can get experience for unlocking them.

Skills top out at 100%, not 230% like they did in previous editions of the game.

Tag skills do not get double points per point spent like in previous Fallouts but get an immediate 15pt skill boost. I advise tagging one weapons skill, speech, and one useful skill like science or medicine.

My personal choices were Small Arms, Science, and Lockpick.


Opening Game Pointers

Make certain you grab the bobblehead in your dad’s laboratory before you leave the vault. You will NEVER have another chance to get it and it provides an immediate 10 point Medicine skill boost.

Focus on one weapons skill. It's better to be accurate and do max damage than have variety and be inaccurate with them.

Fight guerilla style. Use your enemy's weapons. You'll find far more 5.56 and .32 than you will anything else. Using weapons that fire those rounds will keep you supplied with ordinance. Take advantage of cover. Pop out when your AP’s are back to max, take your shots with V.A.T.S. then move to cover while they refresh.

Don't explore DC itself to much. Battles there are rough and you're likely to break a quest by accident (happened to me).

Don't waste your perks on "Here and Now". True it gives you more skill points and HP right now, but it also wastes a perk choice, something that's critical as you approach level 20.

Lockpick and Science skills are useful for gaining XP. You can hack a computer terminal bound to a safe for the XP and still lockpick the safe. Double dip the experience.

Hold on to Scrap (to give to Megaton), Nuka-Cola Quantum bottles (for a quest), and undamaged Pre-War Books (to turn in at the Library). Had I known this at the beginning I’d have leveled twice as fast. Nuka-Cola Quantum is EXTREMELY rare so DON’T DRINK IT!

[ratNukit]

Nice overview Skipp

I've only played about 6 hours now and just wondered if you could say how many bottles of quantum one needs for the quest?

And how exactly did you break that quest, just by exploring too much or by killing too many creeps?

[Skippman]

You need exactly 30 bottles of Nuka-Cola Quantum. They go to a Nuka-Cola fanatic (or her wanna be boyfriend) in the town of Girder Shade all the way on the west side of the map on the main interstate. You get the quest either by talking to her, or by finding a stash containing Sexy Sleepwear in a subway tunnel.

I broke the quest by finding holodisks containing Dad's notes in the Jefferson Memorial. Once I picked them up it completed the "Following His Footsteps" quest which prevented me from gaining access to the GNR compound and talking to the Brotherhood Sentenial who can eventually get you the Power Armor Training perk.

[martini161]

haha, i did strength, endurance and agility. then big guns, small guns and medicine

[Skippman]

If you're a X-Box Live user make sure you log in with your Live username and password BEFORE you begin playing or you will not get your achievements. (One of the reasons for my restart).