Fallout 3

[derspiess]

BethSoft really, really screwed the pooch on this one!

Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but are they really supposed to support mods with their patch?

[Caliga]

Normally no, but Bethsoft typically encourages modding of their products since it releases the tools to do it, so I would argue they probably should in this case... and poor QA is hardly a new development at Bethsoft. 

[grumbler]

Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but are they really supposed to support mods with their patch?

They have since Morrowind.  Mods are what give their games legs. 

PC Morrowind is still selling at #11 in Amazon's RPG genre, having spend 944 days in the top 100.  XBox Morrowind is basically not selling at all.

[Razgovory]

Normally no, but Bethsoft typically encourages modding of their products since it releases the tools to do it, so I would argue they probably should in this case... and poor QA is hardly a new development at Bethsoft. 

I bet there is a disclaimer that says Bethsoft does not support the editor.

[Caliga]

I bet there is a disclaimer that says Bethsoft does not support the editor.

I'm sure there is, hence "probably should" instead of "must".

[grumbler]

Just finished The Pitt.  Overall, I enjoyed it.  There was some nice scenes crawling around on the catwalks far above the Scrapyard (actually gave me vertigo a few times!) and the story was decent.  I just wish they had kept this for a bigger mod (or, better, exerted the effort spent on OA to doubling the size of The Pitt), because it is way too short to do justice to the topic.

The speed and pack nature of the Trogs made them a decent foe.  A melee character may have had batter luck against them than a shooter.  The "escape from Haven" bit was the hardest - it took some doing to get out of there with just the one Stealth Boy.

[Razgovory]

Just finished The Pitt.  Overall, I enjoyed it.  There was some nice scenes crawling around on the catwalks far above the Scrapyard (actually gave me vertigo a few times!) and the story was decent.  I just wish they had kept this for a bigger mod (or, better, exerted the effort spent on OA to doubling the size of The Pitt), because it is way too short to do justice to the topic.

The speed and pack nature of the Trogs made them a decent foe.  A melee character may have had batter luck against them than a shooter.  The "escape from Haven" bit was the hardest - it took some doing to get out of there with just the one Stealth Boy.

Agree!  The problems with the Pitt are the same as with Fallout 3 in general.  It doesn't have enough depth.  There's not enough there there.

[I Killed Kenny]

I just ended broken steel's main quest and now I can't enter Megaton or Rivet city... am I the only one with this problem?

[derspiess]

I just ended broken steel's main quest and now I can't enter Megaton or Rivet city... am I the only one with this problem?

I didn't have that problem with the 360 version.

[Razgovory]

I just ended broken steel's main quest and now I can't enter Megaton or Rivet city... am I the only one with this problem?

Yes.

[I Killed Kenny]

I just ended broken steel's main quest and now I can't enter Megaton or Rivet city... am I the only one with this problem?

Yes.

I did a restart and everything is fine now

[grumbler]

So, the hype around the new DLC made me look at this game again, to see what mods had been created for it in the coupla months since I had played anything but The Pitt.  Turns out that there is now a pretty decent body mod out there, the "Type 3," and some interesting/amusing clothing for it.  The one that struck my eye was the cheerleader outfit.  What a concept for an RP:  Texas high school cheerleader on her way home from a game, gets caught in a weird time/space warp and ends up in the DC Wasteland! I just had to try it!

I created a new character using AltStart Roleplayers.  Main quest turned off.

Face:  I made the best face I could, but it is still pretty lame.  Red hair and green eyes (because the red hair looks best with the outfit).  The hair is from somebody's hair pack.  The name is "Tiffany."

SPECIAL:  The character had to have a high charisma (7) and had the other  SPECIAL point allocated to agility.  Ended up with 5-5-5-7-5-6-5.

Tagged skills:  I tagged repair, small arms, and sneak.

Traits:  I kinda went nuts with these (using QZ traits) and gave Tiffany three:
(1)   Small frame: -40 pounds of weight carried but +25 action points.
(2)   Good natured: -5 to all combat skills, +9 to speech, medicine, barter, and science.
(3)   One-hander: +20% to hit using one-handed weapons, -20% using 2-handed weapons.

Occupation (from altstart): Tiffany wanted to be a politician when her "career as a model" ended, so that is what she was.  +2 to charisma, +5 to speechcraft, -5 to all combat skills.

Now that I had a character, I needed some rules to play by:
(1)   Tiff will never touch nor eat any "animal bits."  She also is picky about what else she eats.  When healing is needed, she will eat/drink, in order of preference:
a.   Mirelurk meat followed by a Nuka Cola if available ("I know Nuka Cola is the wrong color for seafood, but they taste so good together").
b.   Nuka Cola
c.   Dirty water ("it tastes better than the other stuff")
d.   Purified water ("I suppose it is healthy, but why does it have to taste so flat?")
e.   Bloodpacks (until she gets the homophage perk, in which case this moves to just following Nuka Cola) "It tastes kinda like Cherry Coke!"
f.   Dandy Boy Apples ("they sound healthy!") and/or Sugar Bombs ("I really shouldn't because of all the sugar, but...)
(2)   Tiff will never wear anything except her cheerleader outfit ("it is who I am!") plus any hats that look vaguely "western" including the sun bonnet.  She will never wear a baseball cap ("Daddy thought they were crude").  She can wear any accessories she likes.
(3)   Tiff is good-natured and wants to do good things for other people, at least when it costs her nothing.  She will help Brian Wilkes, for instance, but never give the water-beggars anything.  She is a romantic, though, and so will do what she can to consummate true loves, even if it costs her a little bit.
(4)   Tiff doesn't understand this "VATS" thing and won't use it.  She will use Bullet Time.

I wasn't interested in doing quests, per se, though I knew I was going to have to do the Pitt fairly early on, because Tiff was going to start with "Daddy's Big Ol' Gun" (which is Blackhawk) and she also would do Agatha's Song to justify having Blackhawk.  I was just going to send her on missions to fetch stuff.  In essence, I was going to "roll up" quests based on randomly picking a unique item she would need to go and get (though I would allow her to follow quests that lead to these items if it made sense – she went to GNR, for instance, when she was supposed to find the lunar lander radio dish).

The scenario starts with Tiffany's car having a flat outside a small town (Big Town) and her getting out to fix it.  To her dismay, her car disappears back through the spacetime anomaly (just like in The Final Countdown) leaving her stranded.  Total possessions:
1.   Dallas Central High School Cheerleader's Uniform
2.   Daddy's Big Ol' Gun and 24 rounds of ammo, and
3.   a tire iron

With a DR of only 3 (and not destined to get much better than a 6 or so), Tiff is an egg armed with a sledgehammer (DBOG).  She luckily has the APs to stay in bullet time long enough to line up her shots carefully, as her ammo is limited.

Anyway, I have been playing for maybe a dozen hours while using this scenario and MMM, Fallout Wasteland Edition, FOOK and its associated Weapons Mod Kits, and a few other mods (including one that allowed Tiff to obtain caps by "other means" early in the story when she had no legit means by which to do so).  It has been a blast, and for the first time I began to see FO3 approaching Oblivion in depth and quality of play.

Oh, and here is Tiff at Big Town at the start.

[Razgovory]

I'm going to tell you Grumbler you a pretty fucking weird.

[derspiess]

I do agree that grumbler sees to have lost it, but that was funny as shit. 

I now have all the DLC for the 360 version, and will try to get cracking on some of it (Broken Steel is the only one I've completed) this week before Madden is out.  Wonder if I can use my level 30 character for The Pitt and Operation Anchorage?

[grumbler]

I'm going to tell you Grumbler you a pretty fucking weird.

"Bored" is more like it!  Its not like I played this through a whole game.  It is fun to establish rules and live by them, even if your 'toon gets killed a whole lot - fun until it also gets boring, that is!