Spoiler Warning S5E19: Indecisive Indiscretions

By Shamus Posted Thursday May 19, 2011

Filed under: Spoiler Warning 140 comments


Link (YouTube)

Sorry about the whole, “What do you wanna do? I dunno, what do you wanna do? I dunno what do YOU want to do?” section. Usually we go in with a plan. Or at least, a clue. We usually go in with a plan (even if Josh doesn’t tell us the plan) but in this case we couldn’t come to any agreement. We argued about what to do next, then said, “Screw it, let’s just do the episode.” Sometimes this leads to interesting commentary. Sometimes it leads to… this.

And yeah, before you correct me, the Boomers came from a vault and not the base.

This is the slow part of the game. You’re presented with a handful of tribes, and you have to either ignore them, or do a quest to fix their internal troubles. (And maybe exterminate them? I’ve never figured out of extermination is formally recognized by the game.) Some of the tribes are fun, and a couple are annoying. There’s a little bit of something for everyone. The Boomers are the most time consuming of the bunch, although they also give the best benefits at the end of the game.

And yeah, I was just trolling Rutskarn about the Cowboy Repeater. I only used it once. I wasn’t particularly impressed with it, but it’s not like I did a detailed analysis of it against the other weapons so I don’t know that it’s a particularly weak weapon. I mean, who has time for that sort of study when you could be effortlessly punching dudes to death?

 


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140 thoughts on “Spoiler Warning S5E19: Indecisive Indiscretions

  1. Phoenix says:

    If I remind correctly the cowboy repeater is decent till midgame. I wonder if complete extermination of everything that lives and breathes is possible, I didn’t tried.

    1. Factoid says:

      Yep, it is. I used my cowboy repeater on my Guns character from about level 4 to level 12. I upgraded it a couple times though. You can make it reload faster, be a little more accurate and lighter weight.

      The thing that makes them good for so long is that they’re easy to keep in good repair. You find lots of them on legion troops. I think I got my first one in Nipton.

      You’ll be finding better guns by level 10, but they wear down quickly and have to be repaired by an NPC if you don’t have spare parts.

  2. Dmitri Monro says:

    The cowboy repeater used to be a decent early game weapon for gun-centric characters – Relatively low damage, but you could fire it very quickly. It’s a little wonky to use in first person because of the firing/reloading animations. Apparently they slowed down the firing rate in the last patch, so it’s a thoroughly gimped weapon at this point.

    They did buff up “That Gun”, which is one of my favorite weapons in the game…

    Is Josh still carrying that fucking incinerator around? I’m currently working on my hardcore mode playthrough of the game (fifth playthrough… Jeez, that almost hurts to write…), so I haven’t been watching every episode of this season, but if he hasn’t done it yet could someone make him sell that thing? It’s painful to watch.

    1. Shamus says:

      I KNOW, right?

      Every time we hit the weight limit he opens up his inventory, scrolls past the poor condition, low-on-ammo, crap-skill, and heavy-as-hell incinerator, and drops a dozen other things.

      I feel like *I* am carrying the incinerator, now.

      1. Kibbin says:

        Is it possible that this is going to turn into the ultimate troll of the series?
        We’re gonna get to the end only for Josh to say something along the lines of “wow I still have this thing, why did nobody mention it?”

        1. Fat Tony says:

          If he isn’t working on that joke I’ll be deeply disapointed

        2. Halfling says:

          Josh is the best troll of Spoiler Warning.

          Because the others for the most part Rock, Paper, Scissors each other.

          But Josh trolls all of them and they can’t do anything about it. Its just so beautiful.

      2. acronix says:

        Maybe he`s saving it for the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny with the final boss? Or maybe he just wants to use it to make a barbaque.

        1. BenD says:

          Same thing.

        2. Eruanno says:

          Well, he doesn’t have any ammo for it, so he’ll have to use it as a club…

    2. Alexander The 1st says:

      He used it once, didn’t he?

      1. krellen says:

        In a timeline in which he died, IIRC.

        1. Yes, but also in the one in which he survived, he just switched to plasma grenades later in it.

          But yeah, ditch the heavy weapon you have no skill points in

  3. Vect says:

    I loved my Cowboy Repeater and held it to the endgame. Only to realize that the Trail Carbine is the Cowboy Repeater 2.0. I had the Brush Gun but ammo for that is hard to come by.

    I think if you try to kill Yes Man he just goes “Oh well my AI will just jump to another Securitron. So go ahead and try!”

    “OW! Please have mercy! Goshdarnit! Mercy! :D”
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8k9OYIfG8C4

    If you do the Bugging quest after House dies, apparently his own antivirus software kicks in and the Follower lady (who’s also the one who programmed Yes Man) just goes “Hey, we got a sign-OH GODDAMMIT!”

  4. deiseach says:

    You can’t go wrong with a Jungle Book reference

  5. kanodin says:

    “Does Yes man attack you?” Nope he will calmly and politely stand there while you slowly murder him with whatever crummy holdout weapons you brought in with you.

    Also I’d say the boomers are similar to the Repconn quest, fun and unique the first time, really long any other time.

    1. Irridium says:

      He’ll even accept death with a smile on his face. Saying “I deserved it!” in that cheeful voice of his when you kill him.

  6. Jokerman89 says:

    incinerator is cool, using it to mow down a unarmed man running away just once is worth the hassle :D

  7. Max says:

    You don’t have to follow that guy’s advice to get to the boomers. I just ran a straight path to the gate, while consuming a lot of stimpaks, and I do mean a LOT of stimpaks.

    1. Daemian Lucifer says:

      Id like to see you do that on hardcore where stimpaks heal over time.

      1. Even says:

        Could be done, in theory, but you’d need a metric shit-ton of them and maxed Medicine skill probably.

        1. Vipermagi says:

          Super stims + good-ish DT + Med-X?
          Also, you can stack, say, a lot of Healing Powder on top of the stims to increase heal rate, as well as Nuka-Cola, Sarsap, and the various festive Nuka-variants.

          1. Johan says:

            You can stack a hell of a lot of food item yeah. With high survival, a lot of the things you can make at a campfire heal for a good bit too (up to 15 health per second for the best of them IIRC). Med-X plus Slasher gives you damage reduction 50% I believe, so it is theoretically possible. On the other hand your limbs are almost certainly going to get crippled, stock up on doctor’s bags.

            1. James says:

              and any companions trying to follow you will be dead. on hardcore is far less of a hassle to tell them to wait by that shack nearby and run the gauntlet on your own then go get them back after

            2. Someone says:

              You all have it wrong. ONE Turbo and all the problems go away. Anywhere in the game.

              You just have to take it when you hear the first shell coming and make a beeline to the fence, and you’ll be completely unscathed.

              1. Daemian Lucifer says:

                But youd need the turbo perk first.Or at least prepare a few of them.Yes,that could work nicely.

                1. Vipermagi says:

                  Chemist > Turbo perk; twice as powerful, and generally easier to obtain. They stack, though, so both is of course the best.

                  I forgot that Turbo helped here for some reason *derp*
                  First time I got here, I even used the Turbo tactic myself.

  8. Eddie says:

    The thing I hate about the Boomers is that there’s no way to investigate them without blithely completing all of their quests. The head woman says something along the lines of “Go do some quests to earn the trust of everybody” and I was thinking “Hey, how about you do something for me to earn my trust; the only thing I know about you so far is that you tried to blow me up with artillery for getting close, you psychopath.” And the more you investigate them, the crazier and less trustworthy they seem. The last part of the quest chain is to get them a plane so they can fly around and bomb whoever the hell they want, which, no thanks, why would I want to give them that? Except, as far as I could figure out, there’s no way to resolve the quest except by doing that.

    Oh, and I almost forgot; the constantly call you and everyone who isn’t a Boomer a savage, despite the fact that their entire society is built around blowing things up for no reason and there’s no way to call them out on that fact. God-damned savages.

    1. Chris B Chikin says:

      Actually, giving a bunch of sociopaths armed with explosives access to a B-29 seems like exactly the sort of thing Reginald Cuftbert might do.

      1. Joe says:

        No, the cuftbert way is to keep it for yourself. But don’t put any skill points into piloting. It becomes a kamikaze attack when he tries to eat fifty foodstuffs at once at the controls before running back to the bombardier’s spot. Of course, he’d survive by virtue of sheer dumb luck, only to be killed by a peeved housecat.

    2. Vect says:

      A quicker way to get them to trust you is to listen to their historian and pass some Speech Checks with him. You’ll get plenty of good rep that way.

    3. Hitch says:

      Well, it’s a lot of hoops to jump through, but worth it. They may call everyone else a savage, but if you help them get their B-29 they’ll like you so much, they’ll basically volunteer to bomb anybody you want them to. So, explosive obsessed nut-cases, but they’re your explosive obsessed nut-cases.

      Edited to add: This isn’t much of a Cuftbertian option. It’s long and tedious and you don’t get to blow up as much stuff yourself.

    4. deiseach says:

      I have yet to get around to New Vegas. Having seen that seductive concealed spoiler above I MUST PLAY IT

      1. Factoid says:

        Before you get your hopes up, all that happens is they bring it back to their base and start fixing it up. They don’t get it working and fly it around or anything.

        1. krellen says:

          Not before the end game, anyway.

          1. BenD says:

            And even then the appearance is brief – I have managed to not be looking up at the exact moment several times now – and you never get to like, ride in the plane yourself or anything.

    5. Someone says:

      YES! That’s so true! Boomers piss me off almost as much as the kids from Lamplight.

      And there is no option to call them out on their crap! They keep talking about how they are superior and everyone else is savage, but they kill everyone who tries to approach them with explosives and think nothing of it! They’re gun-crazy fascists! I just want to scream at them: “Look at yourself! You’re the savages! You’re fascists! You murder innocent people with HOWITZERS! Acting so high and mighty, while your only accomplishment is finding an ancient plane you want to use to kill everyone you don’t like, but can’t even fetch because you’re suddenly a lot less scary when you’re not sitting on enough cannons to hold off the entire army of China! The Followers are helping destitute people and spreading knowledge, for free! WHAT DO YOU DO?!?!”

      The entire faction just makes me angry! And the irony of it is, they’re one of the few factions in the game you can’t easily kill off once you reach a certain level. And, at the same time, one of the few factions deserving to be put down, like the mad savages they are.

      1. GTRichey says:

        The big difference between the Boomers and the kids at Little Lamplight is that the Boomers actually make sense. They took the store room of their vault by force because that’s what an experiment creating a bunch of gun nuts and then telling them they can’t have guns results in. They then took a violent stance against absolutely everyone who at the time were primarily tribals before finally settling at Nellis (since it was untouched for fear of radiation). Since then they’ve been unaware of the wasteland outside Nellis and are paranoid. Getting to Nellis is a real pain and the Boomers may grate on some players, but at least it makes sense for them to exist in the form they do unlike a camp of kids in an otherwise childless wasteland for 200 years with no possible way for the population to continue to exist.

        1. Someone says:

          Oh yes, I agree that the concept makes sense, and is actually quite interesting, it’s just that the Boomers’ overwhelming arrogance, coupled with my inability to call them out on their hypocrisy, grates me to the point of shouting obscenities at the screen.

          1. Raygereio says:

            Isn’t this the game protecting you from yourself here? I mean going up to the crazy people with lots of guns and go: “Hey, you guys are stupid!” should be the same as hitting the “I die now”-button.

            1. Someone says:

              Worked for Cuftbe(u)rt.

              Besides, that’s why the Speech skill was invented.

            2. Vipermagi says:

              Nah, they aren’t too bad. The biggest issue arises when one of them spawns with a Fat Boy. Or two do so. Missiles are really easy to dodge and fire fairly slowly, and regular bullets aren’t too much of a threat either.

              Should be, but isn’t.

      2. Eddie says:

        As much as I disliked the Boomers though, I found the introduction to the Brotherhood of Steel to be much more frustrating. Although I now understand there are ways to meet them without being screwed over (Veronica), my first time meeting them left me really annoyed. I had ED-E and had recieved a transmission from them inviting me to go to their base, which I did and then they stripped me of all my weapons, asked me what I was doing there, which the game did not permit me to answer truthfully and then strapped a fucking slaver collar to my neck and forced me to do some bitch-work for them. I wouldn’t have minded so much if they had apologised for it later in a sort of “You know how it is, we can’t be too careful” way but they don’t mention it again and there’s no way to even be rude or short with them other than not doing any of their quests. I think it was the ED-E thing that really bugged me though.

        1. Someone says:

          My first time (and every time since) was the Veronica option, I didn’t even know about the gear-stripping business, or indeed the possibility of accessing hidden valley differently.

  9. Vipermagi says:

    Shamus, I approve of genocidal playthroughs (then again, who cares about my approval!). It’s actually pretty interesting, since you cannot offload your tremendous piles of loot from cleansing all those towns onto a previous town; you have to find a non-murdered merchant first… And preferrably one that doesn’t detest you.

    Works better if you don’t know where to find the loaded merchants, of course.

    Oh, and by the way? I found nine unmurderable entities, if memory serves. Fairly short playthrough, comparatively.

    Ouright murdering every named NPC of a faction is enough for at least Yes Man to be okay with it. Haven’t tried with other endings, but I expect it to work there as well.

    1. Andrew B says:

      Well, take out the Boomers’ leadership is a specified optional choice for completing the Legion variant of the quest. Don’t recall it being marked as an option for the NCR version (although I’ve yet to do an NCR playthrough).

    2. Piflik says:

      The Gunrunners’ Vendortron is a handy location to offload your loot…and yeah…a genocide run is fun…doing it myself, although it is on hold right now…

      The Tribes quests can be solved by killing the respective leaders by yourself…actually I didn’t even know you could send Securitrons there to do the wetwork…but then again I haven’t really investigated all that much…wetwork is so much fun ^^

    3. theLameBrain says:

      Why do you want to offload loot in a genocidal playthru? You don’t need loot, if someone has some stimpacks and ammo you want, kill them and take it!

      1. Vipermagi says:

        Because shopkeepers don’t work that way. I think not even travelling merchants have their entire stock actually in their inventory, but I might be wrong.
        Regular shopkeepers have an invisible Bag of Holding which has their entire stock.

        Also, implants! Gotta get that +1 Charisma botox.

  10. Tiberius Gracchus says:

    Josh, you can just kill the Boomer leaders. It certainly removes this dull quest, and they don’t bomb you at the dam.

  11. Deadpool says:

    No idea about the Cowboy Repeater. The Courier is an Energy Weapons gal. She comes from a long line of Energy Weapons spcialists. The Warrior, the Chosen One, the Vault Dweller… None quite as good as the Vault Dweller (Turbo Plasma Rifle was a BEAST), but there it is.

    Btw, there’s a second path to the boomers. An underground passageway. Pretty sure it’s littered with traps and Feral Ghouls, but that DOES seem more Reginald Cuftbert style…

    1. Even says:

      Let’s not forget the doors with Very Hard-difficulty locks to get inside. It’s a bit of a bummer for low level PCs since it’s hardly ever the first skill you’re going to max and about the time you can get the quest, you’re around the same levels as Reginald is now.

    2. Khizan says:

      You need to pick two different 100 difficulty locks to take that route, though.

      1. Deadpool says:

        Speaking of locked doors… One of the things that I always liked about Fallout 1 was that I could shoot down doors with a shotgun.

        What I always HATED about Fallout is that you COULDN’T shoot down a door with a god damned PLASMA RIFLE…

        1. Vipermagi says:

          Plasma-critting on doors should be a valid entry strategy :(

        2. Khizan says:

          The problem with this is that lockpicking becomes an essentially useless skill as soon as they let you just apply an existing combat skill to opening locks. That’s why you can’t blow open chests/doors/etc. Explosives lets you pass some skill checks and improves your skills with some weapons. If it let you open locks as well, there would be no point whatsoever in lockpicking.

          The only way to “balance” it would be to give it a prohibitive cost, and since the economy is so borked in this game that would be really difficult.

          1. Deadpool says:

            I was more commenting on the fact that, apparently, skill in Energy Weapons doesn’t overlap with skills on regular weapons when it SHOULD.

            The conversation with the Gun Runners is an example of this in New Vegas, and in Fallout, the whole “shotguns blow down doors but super heated plasma doesn’t leave a mark”

            Btw, wasn’t ALL doors, just some of the flimsy, wooden crap…

            Edit: AND it wasn’t quiet at all.

            Not being able to do it stealthly should be a fair penalty for dynamiting a locked door.

            1. Chris B Chikin says:

              They could take the route of the early bioware games and have it that some of the container’s contents are destroyed if you break it open.

          2. Someone says:

            Well D&D games just add a random chance of destroying some or all of the items stored in a container if you force your way into it.

            It doesn’t even have to be that expensive, most of the time you destroy minor stuff like scrolls and potions, but just the simple notion that I accidentally smash a “Longsword of Flaming Icy Death +150” drives me nuts.

            1. GTRichey says:

              This unfortunately doesn’t work for doors to rooms which is the main concern… or maybe it could. Force a door and accidentally kill a vital NPC could be pretty hilarious.

              1. Alexander The 1st says:

                Or even better, not harm the vital NPC but make them hostile to you.

                1. GTRichey says:

                  Either way as long as it actually kills the opportunity for they’re plot lines (i.e. you can’t wait outside the door for 3 days and they magically forget).

          3. Daemian Lucifer says:

            There are lots of metal doors in new vegas,so the option to blow up wooden doors would be both welcomed,and easy to balance.Plus,there are very few places where you could do it without anyone noticing.

            1. Khizan says:

              A lot of the time it doesn’t matter if anybody hears you. Abandoned faciilities, chests in caves, places where all the occupants have already been filed under “future murder victims”. In a large majority of the game “stealth” isn’t a thing you have to care about, so “unstealthy” isn’t a real drawback.

              And one thing is that no door NEEDS to picked. Any plot/quest required door can be bypassed somehow, with a keycard or the like. You can beat the entire game with no training in lockipicking at all, and that means that any door out there with a lock above “very easy” is pretty much just a perk of training lockpicking. Since lockpicking has no conversation skill checks and no combat use, the ONLY use of lockpicking is to open those doors/chests/etc.

              That’s why there’s no other way to open those. Because adding that ability to any other skill would be a disincentive to invest skillpoints into lockpicking.

              1. Daemian Lucifer says:

                There is no use for speech other than in few conversations,that only give you some bonus,and arent plot essential,yet there are numerous places where speech check can be bypassed by other skills(explosives,sneak,barter,….)or some item you found/thing you did.Yet it is still a fun thing to have.So why not do the same thing with lockpicking?After all,the best thing about the game is that there are numerous ways around various obstacles,so why is introduction of new ways to some obstacles a bad thing?

              2. Vipermagi says:

                Stealth is good even if all the inhabitants are on the murderlist; Sneak Crits deal tons of damage with the right weapon.

        3. GTRichey says:

          Just guessing but the biggest reason to not have something like doors you can blow open is because it doesn’t exist in the engine currently. I’m sure it could be implemented, but considering the buggy product we got at release I doubt it would’ve been a good idea to go adding things to the engine. That’s one of the issues when developers are working with someone else’s tools on a time constraint… come to think of it, it was mentioned in a past episode that Ballistic Fist and Displacer glove should use ammo, I’m guessing that they fall under the same category of Obsidian not wanting to (or having enough time to) make changes to the engine as it was for FO3.

  12. Johan says:

    I could never find out how to do anything with the Great Khans. I didn’t want to ignore them, but I did all the quests I could for them and that was still my only option.

    Oh damn, now watching the episode I NEVER REALLY UNDERSTOOD THAT PART.

    I thought the options were “ignore” or “get them to support me”

    I never knew it was “exterminate” or “leave alone”

    1. Zukhramm says:

      The Great Khans you can persuade for or against joining Ceasar’s Legion.

      1. Zerotime says:

        Or tell them that they should pack up, leave the Mojave, and return to their nomadic ways out east.

        1. Vect says:

          Strangely enough, that’s the option I chose for them yet come Hoover Dam they rush to my aid, saying that they heard that I was going to be here and they got here just in time.

          I thought you had to explicitly assassinate Papa Khan in order for them to ally with the NCR, but I’m not taking exactly upset.

  13. Daemian Lucifer says:

    Why not go check on tabitha if you dont know what to do?Its always cool to hear her ramblings.

    Yeah,that artillery thing irked me as well.The game offers you so much different ways to do everything,and then here is a part which you must do this one way and no other.Well theres the underground passage,but still it only leads you nearer the base.Its irritating.

    1. acronix says:

      When I tried to reach the passage, I got bombarded midway. By the time I reached it (after many reloads) I needed a 100 lockpick skill.

      I never returned.

  14. Alexander The 1st says:

    Okay, wow, Yes Man is my favourite character now. Plot exposition that doesn’t try to hide or retcon your choices, and has a plot-able reason to give you all the exposition.

    You should’ve chosen “I’m… not proud of what I’ve done, I’m trying to change, really.” I mean, for Cuftbert, it probably is still technically lying, but the game wouldn’t have given you the penalty to it. :p

    Also, fits in with the fact that you killed the Legion – that should be on her good side, no?

    1. Johan says:

      After he killed the Legion he stole from the Legion, which I think netted him bad karma, so call the whole “Fort” thing a wash.

      1. Alexander The 1st says:

        Well sure, he’s falling back, but he’s trying. You can’t fault him for “failing” at having good karma. Unless you’re a paranoid crazy rogue.

        At least he made an attempt at being good karma. Either way, the game doesn’t note the other speech check as a lie, so it sounds like it’d be more likely to work.

    2. Hitch says:

      Cass is really only happy with a goody-two-shoes positive karma courier. She’s one of the few NPCs that seems able to see your general karma meter — everyone else goes off their faction, but she doesn’t have a faction.

      But (spoilers) if you do her quests, she’s pretty cold-bloodedly homicidal.

      1. Jekyll says:

        I actually really hated this, my first play through of rpgs is always the “do what it takes to get the job done” type character and I had accumulated a lot of bad karma from botched missions and stealing everything. Cass is the only character who follows the morality meter and the game doesn’t seem to let you know that she uses up the three chances to be good whenever you talk to her. The first time I had her I lost all three chances trying to talk about her quest.

        1. Daemian Lucifer says:

          I never had the problem with karma due to all the powder gangers Ive wasted.Even though it always bugged me to get negative karma for looting their stuff,especially after killing them.

      2. GTRichey says:

        There aren’t many murders that move your karma either way (though I think the fiends and maybe another faction that you can’t actually talk to give you positive karma). Most karma comes from theft/break-ins and since Cass was a caravan owner I suppose it makes sense for her to object to actions that would be harmful to caravans (i.e. theft).

        1. krellen says:

          You get positive karma for sneak-attacking feral ghouls (but not if you kill them when they’re aware of you.)

    3. Piflik says:

      Personally I hated the Yes Man thing…not himself, but that I am forced to work with him to rule Vegas on my own…he is always needed as a quest trigger, I can’t just go around and save the world without asking him for permission (at least that’s how it felt for me)…he tells me what to do…and I have to go back to him for quest rewards/XP…the only difference between working for him or house is the narrated ending…I would have loved to be truly independent…just do my thing…sure, there must be some kind of trigger for the Legion’s attack on Hoover Dam, but I think it could have been handled better than Yes Man…

      1. BenD says:

        That trigger is called ‘The NCR is still breathing.’ There’s no storyline NEED for Yes Man other than that devs can’t trust the player with real freedom. I maintain that Yes Man is cool – but a truly independent option would have been a good addition. Portray the Courier as King of Vegas in the end credits, ruling according to however his actions painted him through the course of the game (a use for the karma meter!).

      2. GTRichey says:

        The idea is that you’re simply using Benny’s plan, which was to use House’s plan. The courier really doesn’t know enough to get all the tribes in the right position for him/her to rule the Mojave. I see it as Yes man simply giving you the information you need for you to do what you will. This is evidence by the fact that you don’t actually have to do anything other make contact with the tribes which makes sense since it’d be stupid not to be aware of potential threats to your power. That said I suppose they could go one step further and just let you skip straight to the battle but end with a non-standard game over (the tribes/factions you didn’t do anything about do various things that result in your ultimate demise… that’d be pretty cool actually).

        1. krellen says:

          Developers appear to be scared to death of non-standard game overs these days. I’m not sure any of them feel they could get away with one.

          1. GTRichey says:

            They did do one with dead money. I personally love the idea of rather than just saying “You died. Let me reload that for you.” something actually happens that makes the player sit back and say “Wow I really screwed that up.” New Vegas actually does a pretty good job of letting the PC screw themselves out of story lines My first play through I killed the singer in Novac making the Strip shun me before I got anywhere near it, just because I thought “This guy expects to die… I’ll oblige him.” Yes Man seems to be the only thing they don’t let you lock yourself out of. Different endings for different karma are closer than we get from the vast majority though (like if you’re a psychopath and take over New Vegas it’s a pretty bleak outlook for the future). I guess there’s just not as much surety of high profits if you take big risks anymore though since it seems like everyone wants to recreate the success of popular franchises by simply copying them.

            The Witcher series seems to have the best approach to choice by not having immediate repercussions but having a circumstance much later play out differently.

            1. krellen says:

              I’d forgotten about Dead Money’s non-standard game over. I saved right before triggering it because I was warned it was coming, and was still somewhat surprised that it actually happened.

              1. Vect says:

                There’s two actually.

                1. Set off the trap meant for Dean.

                2. Work with Elijah to gas the Mojave.

                1. Bubble181 says:

                  Gas the mojave?

                  I may have to give in and actually play one of these things.

  15. Eärlindor says:

    Wow… the Yes Man has got to be one of the best NPCs ever!

    I need to get this game one of these days.

    1. Hitch says:

      I think Dave Foley’s voice acting really sells the Yes Man character. His dialog could really fall flat with the wrong readings.

      1. Alexander The 1st says:

        Yeah, Microsoft Sam would’ve been a lot less enjoyable.

    2. Eärlindor says:

      Broke down and bought the game. It was, like, <$17.

  16. Zukhramm says:

    You don’t have to do the Boomer quest do you? With Wild Card you can pretty much ignore all the factions, just ignore them.

    Oh, and I bought Honest Hearts and started a new character and then… the game crashes every time I load outdoor areas. Wow, how fun!

    Also, I thought the extermination of tribes by the Securitons happened during the endgame, which means it happens, you just never see it.

    1. Alexander The 1st says:

      Also, I thought the extermination of tribes by the Securitons happened during the endgame, which means it happens, you just never see it.

      Well *that’s* no fun. We want to watch it, in-game, laughing at the tribes as they scream for help.

      Or like, possibly set the Securitons on them, then back-stab yourself by taking on the Securitons.

  17. X2-Eliah says:

    Umm. Doesn’t the Yes Man effectively betray you at the very end, though?

    For one, installing him on House’s mainframe gives him the chance to self-reprogram, and at the very end, after the big battle when it’s final speaky time, he says that he’s going to take a few days (or was it a longer time?) closed off from you to remove his inhibition to say ‘yes’ to everyone.. So he pretty much says ‘thanks bud, now I’m in control and soon won’t have to take orders from you’.

    At least that’s what I recall.

    1. Even says:

      Only problem with that is it would make the ending completely obsolete. It wouldn’t really make sense anyway unless he somehow found a way to overcome his programming without the game ever even hinting about it. I mean, he’s programmed to help anyone who he might be working with. Installing the update is something the original Yes Man just would never do, assuming he was well aware what the update might do to him.

      On the other hand it makes perfectly sense if he’s working with the idea that by getting that upgrade he can serve you better since he’s well aware of the glaring error in his programming, as evidenced if you ask him about it. He deemed it a liability and decides it’s best to get rid of it.

      I have to admit though that it’s pretty vague what the “little more assertive” actually means, but I’m just trying to go with what we know about him, rather than make wild guesses. Otherwise, it’d be the worst freaking plothole I’ve seen for a while.

      1. Irridium says:

        Well, when I went with Yes Man the ending worked out well enough. I got Vegas, NCR and Legion went away, everything was happy. Well, as happy as it could be in a post-apocalyptic wasteland anyway.

        1. Even says:

          It’s not the given ending that bothers me, but the many implications about that little part of dialogue you get before the ending slideshow begins, like that it meant that it’s Yes Man who ends up being in charge and the various theories on what will happen afterwards.

          The ending makes no mention towards anything like that whatsoever and all credit is given to the Courier. All Yes Man ever gets is a mention about having aided the Courier.

          1. Sleeping Dragon says:

            On the other hand I wouldn’t really feel comfortable with having the Yes Man run the daily management of New Vegas, controlling the securitrons and such if all it took to take over would be for someone to get within earshot of it and say something like “So, care to tell me how I can get rid of that annoying Courier guy?”

          2. Zukhramm says:

            I don’t see why my high intelligence high science Courier would not be able to simply just remove him and run things on their own if he takes too much control.

            1. Deadpool says:

              I took the whole thing to mean that Yes Man would make it so he doesn’t listen to anyone BUT the Courier. It wouldn’t take a high intelligence, high science Courier to do it since Yes Man knows HOW and HAS to obey orders. You could just TELL him to listen to no one but yourself.

  18. gebiv says:

    Cass seems a lot less like a companion, and more like a soon-to-be ex-wife.

    Or late-wife, if Cuftbert stays true to form…

  19. Jakale says:

    I’m amazed. 42 comments and not a single mention about Shamus’ accidental asterisk instead of an open parentheses in that first paragraph? I wouldn’t have pegged that getting unmentioned for the first 5 comments, much less almost 50.

    1. Max says:

      While we’re on the topic of pointing out mistakes, “I've never figured out of extermination is formally recognized by the game.” Pretty sure that should be “if” not “of”

    2. Shamus says:

      Ugh. What IS the internet coming to these days?

      Fixed anyway.

  20. BeamSplashX says:

    The First Law of Mumbotics
    A Mumbles may not injure a robot/lizardman or, through inaction, allow a robot/lizardman to come to harm.

    1. Max says:

      The Second Law of Mumbotics
      A Mumbles must commit genocide on everyone she encounters, as long as it doesn’t conflict with the first law.

      1. Alexander The 1st says:

        The Third Rule of Mumbotics
        A Mumbles must follow the first and second law, unless it directly interferes with a charismatic companion or potential love interest for the protagonist.

        Just covering the Garrus/Talimancing rule. :p

        1. Grag says:

          The Zeroeth Rules of Mumbotics

          If the author needs a maguffin to sell a new book, Mumbles will say screw the rest of these rules and kill everyone. Or not, whatever.

        2. Shamus says:

          Hm. I was expecting the the Third Law would be BEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!

          1. Piflik says:

            Fun fact: There is a single Bee living inside my TV Set…

          2. Deadpool says:

            Have you forgot all the rules of the internet? If didn’t happen two days ago it NEVER HAPPENED.

      2. krellen says:

        Addendum to the Second Law: A Mumbles must consume the flesh of the fallen, in true Cannibalistic fashion.

    2. hewhosaysfish says:

      What about a robot-lizardman?

      EDIT: “Talimancing”? Is that divination using Tali?

      1. Grag says:

        Come Mr. Talimancer, Tali me bananas…

        1. krellen says:

          Shouldn’t that be “Tali me a Garrus”?

          1. Alexander The 1st says:

            That would be just outside the critical pun area.

        2. BeamSplashX says:

          Tali once then we- STOP SHOOTING ME!

  21. Entropy says:

    I think the Yes Man does recognise if you kill the leaders of the minor faction. so technically, all you have to do is cut off the head. And anyway, you don’t have control of the Securitrons under the fort until Hoover Dam, and supposedly the ones in New Vegas are barely enough to keep control. So sending them on raids on major factions might be a bad idea.

  22. Sozac says:

    One thing I liked my first playthrough is if you speech check Benny into going into the presidential suite right away and you go up and talk to him, he legitimately sounds like he’s giving you another quest-line. He’s all like “Yeah I’ll give you a special jobs and pay you a retainer for each one” or something like that. Then you an chose whether to partner up with him or not. I did the first time because it fooled me. He walks out and I’m busy looking around the suite for items and his guards walk in and attack me. I could’ve loaded a save, but I felt I had to give the game respect on that trickery so instead I played on killed the guards and found him at the fort later.

    1. Entropy says:

      I never knew his questline wasn’t legit. Because I shot him. In the face. With my holdout peashooter.

    2. Alexander The 1st says:

      I’m not exactly sure why you’d take his quest line though.

      As they don’t say in Texas:

      “Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice…shame on me some more, because I fell for the same thing twice.”

      I mean, the game opened with him shooting you with a bullet to the head immediately after you were helping him out dig a grave of sorts. That’s not exactly legit.

      Even still, if it was legit, it reeks of Ezio from ACII:

      “Oh no, Rodrigo Borgia, I can’t kill you – it won’t bring my family back. I’m above killing for petty revenge, despite having literally killed at least 50 people over the course of the game solely because you were at fault and I needed to get to you so I could kill you. Now I’m not going to kill you because I’m above all that.”

      Compare to:

      “Oh no, Benny, you shot me in cold blood after I *helped* you dig a grave, then I went and chased you halfway around Nevada trying to get to Vegas to chase you down and kill you for killing me, but now I’m just going to do your questline, because I’m above petty killing, despite almost certainly killing 30 people on my way here.”

      It’s things like this that make me rage at so called “moral choices” in video games – while I personally choose “good” choices, This would be like making peace with the Reapers at the end of ME3 – no ideas, Bioware. Give me a choice in how they die, but don’t try and make my character choose between killing them and saving them. Well, unless its “kill them” or “enslave them”. That would work I suppose, though it seems VERY unlikely to work.

      1. Someone says:

        The guy’s got charisma. Perhaps a little too much. I got fooled by the prez suite thing, just because he persuaded me that it was the sort of a “nothing personal” thing for him to kill me.

        Heck, later on, when I found him at Kaizar’s place, I was going there thinking “I’m gonna burn him, and then beat him with a stick, and then feed him to dogs, and then find a way to bring him back to life just to kill him again, and then…”, but after I’d talked to him, I ended up helping him to escape.

      2. GTRichey says:

        Hmmm that’s an interesting interpretation of the beginning of the game. If I remember the first time you see yourself you’re tied up lying on the ground with the Khan’s digging your grave… seems pretty clear you’re not helping him to me… maybe I’m wrong.

        It’s perfectly reasonable to listen to what he says. The courier has no clue what’s really going on at this point unless you’ve spoken to House first (I never did, that close to Benny I wasn’t about to be sidetracked). The courier wouldn’t trust Benny up front but given the opportunity to hear him out without his guards is reasonable, as is the offer he makes if you take it to be legitimate. I mean having shot you in the face and then seeing you standing in front of him, he’s surely freaked out and realises the courier is bloody hard to kill it makes sense to try to convince the courier to work with him (if you can’t beat ’em…).

        1. acronix says:

          I went directly to Benny too, and while I could smell he would betray me, I felt forced to fell on it anyways because I didn`t have sneak to get holdout weapons into the casino, and my speech sucked, so no convincing him of going upstairs and kill him with my bare hands.

        2. Alexander The 1st says:

          Really? I’ll have to watch the beginning again, because I sworn it was intended to be you who was doing the shovelling. Perhaps it was just the fact that you appear upright when he shoots you in the face.

          And um, at the least, it seems like betrayal of some sort, because otherwise, how did you get there?

          1. TSED says:

            Nope, your hands are quite clearly tied. You look at them, then look up, and he fires.

            Also, he HUNTED YOU DOWN and KILLED YOU after (making Yes Man do all of the) HACKING ENCRYPTED DATA. Haven’t you paid attention to the main quest? Sheesh. ;)

            1. Alexander The 1st says:

              Sorry, I guess I was distracted by all the bunny-hopping, Legion-killing, Ballastic-punching, and imagining Mr. House as Dr. House.

              My bad. :p

              EDIT: Ah, that makes sense now. Re-read Yes Man’s dialog.

  23. Someone says:

    Planting the bug after you’d killed House? Yeah, doesn’t work. I tried it, hoping I could give the Followers House’s entire database in a gift-wrapped stack of holodisks, but the quest plays out exactly the same. There isn’t even an option to tell that woman “I AM THE HOUSE! Wanna tour my ivory tower?”. What a ripoff.

    1. TSED says:

      It worked for me. “Wow, we got SO MUCH DATA! Here, have some XP.”

      House was long, long, looong dead.

  24. Tse says:

    Mumbles, please don’t shout, it becomes physically painful. :(

  25. KremlinLaptop says:

    WITH ALL DUE RESPECT SIR.

    All a man needs is his .308 hunting rifle and possibly a light automatic like a 9mm submachinegun for quick clean up. It’s all a man needs.

    …Although whenever I play a guns character I end up carrying around a fucking armoury worth of guns anyway.

    I need the .308 for generally shooting everything, the varmint rifle has been with me since the start of the game and has the cool scope now (suddenly I’m attached), the anti-material rifle? Well what if I need to shoot all the life out of absolutely anything? Need it. This Machine is required because you never know when you might have to storm the beaches at Normandy. The Light Machine gun? Look buddy all this 5.56mm ammo ain’t gonna use itself.

    Then I’m suddenly also carrying around three different revolvers, two sorts of pistols. Except it’s actually three pistols and two of them are the same, it’s just that I like the scope on my 9mm pistol but I can’t not use Maria but I can’t put a scope on Maria.

    …What’s this now? Marksman Carbine? I need this, no I really need this gun. Oh look it comes in a special camouflage variant too.

    Oooh and a sawed off shotgun. And a pump action shotgun. Oh my.

    At this point in the game I’m carrying around so many friggin’ guns I haven’t got any space left for loot. Truthfully I’d say the Marksman Carbine is the only gun in the game you need, but you get access to it so late in the game I’m sticking with just the .308 and submachinegun if I can.

    1. Chuck says:

      Don’t forget the minigun, for the guns player that goes “hmm, well, it may come in handy. Better safe than sorry.”

  26. TSED says:

    I remember when I first showed up to Vegas, I went to the casino with the white glove society, and they were being pompous and all “I will have to take your weapons, plebian.”

    My courier was all “if you respect me, I’m your best friend. If not, you are sooooo screwed” and, well, let’s say the White Glove Society ended up kind of… dead. The other casinos didn’t have this problem as no disrespect was presented.

    Very dead.

    Room-by-room exterminated, even.

    So, this actually really sucked. This was faaaar before Yes-Man was all “hey go check out the tribes” and by the time that actually happened, there was no way to finish that quest. I hadn’t “investigated” them so I couldn’t “ignore” them. I eventually had to open up the console, reset several global variables, reset (and re-do) several quests (including the “investigate the tribes” in which I had saved the White Glove Society for last since I was procrastinating in a “well this isn’t working, I’ll figure it out later” kind of way), and had to respawn a number of the WGS.

    After FINALLY getting the “ok, you can ignore them!” thing, I went back and remurdered them all. I HATE the White Glove Society SO MUCH.

    1. X2-Eliah says:

      They’re better of dead, actually. Unless you agree with very delectible cuisine choices.

      1. TSED says:

        I found those tasty portions while I was clearing out the casino. It was funny, what with said Courier having the Cannibal perk and all.

        “If only you had been POLITE, we would have gotten along SO WELL. Oh well. BLAMBLAMBLAMBLAM.”

        1. acronix says:

          Don`t you mean “Oh well. *Munch munch munch*”?

          1. TSED says:

            Nope – it wouldn’t let me eat it.

            Go figure, hey?

  27. Will says:

    I know you were troling Ruts but you weren’t too far off. Its only a good gun for your first few levels. The thing quickly becomes easy cash early in the game.

    Also, Shamus, I’d like to thank you. I started my own playthrough a few episodes ago to try out Melee Weapons as you hyped it up so much.

    Up till now, I’ve always played a high speech and high small guns character but you’re sadly right, melee is amazing. I don’t how I ever played this long without specializing in melee.

    I do have a question though, has melee always been this effective and/or great? As in, would it be worth going back and trying melee in the old school Fallout games?

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