bruse

As for food - the sharecropper farms have issues of their own (which you get to partially resolve... or not - in the game) and it's largely suggested that a lot of it is imported from the NCR (the sharecropper farms being built precisely to lessen the need for imports). Even so, after NCR leaves they need new management (these are NCR citizens, protected by NCR military). Even then, all the "visible" stuff just isn't enough. A city of 10K people would require roughly a square kilometer of productive farmland, and from what I recall from in-game, a lot of it is imported into New Vegas. It's quite a big thing, because you can get by without electricity for a while, but you certainly can't get by without sufficient food. New Vegas doesn't have any real working industry to speak of, either. It needs to trade with the NCR far more then the other way around, at least until it gets to it's feet. Regardless, let's take House's terms - the letter of withdrawal demands NCR military basically leaves the area. Let's say the NCR does leave the area, where does that leave you? The people who are caring about the refugees in Bitter Springs, Aerotech park and so on are gone, too. You can either choose to not give a damn (like House wouldn't) or help them out, but the NCR isn't around there anymore to do it. The NCR (under Kimball and such) are conquerors. This is more or less directly hinted by high ranking people in the NCR itself ("we came here to annex New Vegas") and the very request to kill House to be able to annex the whole territory. So, where does that leave you? The army of deathbots is nice and buys you time, but the NCR is far larger then you and wants what you have for itself - and they have successfully waged a war against the BoS (which is no small feat, so they are not entirely incompetent). Their inability to deal with the Legion is more due to chronic mismanagement of the campaign then anything else. Falling back to the Mohave Outpost isn't such a drastically bad outcome for them (if they can't annex Vegas). It's far cheaper for starters - keeping troops abroad is a massive financial strain. Secondly, preety much the only way for the Legion to mount and sustain an offensive against the NCR itself (at this section of the front anyway) is by taking Hoover Dam. An army, even a low-tech army like the Legion, lives or dies on supplies, and there's no getting enough supplies to feed thousands of troops without controling the Dam and the surroundings. If they want to take on the NCR, they have to take on New Vegas first. They can raid in the Mohave with small units, sure, but bringing in thousands of troops, bringing in supplies to feed them daily, ammunition and everything else to go further then that just won't happen without securing Hoover Dam. So where does that leave you? You have to pick up (or don't, if you want to play it like House MK II, and elect not to care) and deal with the fallout of NCR leaving (and they were supporting, eg. refugees all around), and the Legion is really free to conduct small-scale raiding, since while you have an army of deathbots, you don't have boots holding ground anywhere south of Novac, which is itself exposed. In addition, securitrons drive around on a wheel (!) which means they're not going to work that well on rugged terrain, so human defenders are still necessary in some parts.

The input towards the future of New Vegas should be focused on "how do I deal with the aftermath of what I did", in my view, before "let's play god of the Mohave and do what I want". It's in the vein of what Oliver is saying - do you really have what it takes to build a nation? See, the NCR is doing a lot of things throughout the Mohave; you can do a better job then the NCR at it or a worse job at it, but the NCR doesn't want to help you, they want to annex you, and even a temporarily leaderless and weakened Legion is still a huge and hostile entity.

When I talk about logic, let's look at the situation: (1) The NCR intends to (in vanilla game) annex New Vegas. Stated repeatedly by many NCR personnel. I think it's Hsu who complains that "We came here to annex New Vegas, and it feels like they have annexed us" in reference to New Vegas. (2) The current arrengement with House is not satisfactory to the NCR (in fact, just about everyone in the NCR seems disgruntled how the Vegas campaign is going, and if you opt to work for the NCR they ask you to kill House, regardless of the "deal" they have with him). (3) The only thing the NCR is currently getting out of New Vegas is electricity. When I say, what would NCR logically do, well, let's see where we get from these premises. What options do they have in the immediate aftermath of Hoover Dam in case the Courier takes it for himself? (1) Perpetuate the existing (not satisfactory) agreement except they don't have the Dam anymore and you have taken it, and you have cheated them out of their (by their reckoning) victory. (2) Pull out of the Mohave to more defensive positions for the time being and optionally trade for the electricity with an independent New Vegas. Option (2) is cheaper; independent New Vegas needs food and materiel which it simply does not have to sustain itself, and since that is more essential then electricity the pressure to trade is on New Vegas, and not the NCR. It also enables them to regain their strength while New Vegas is left fighting the Legion, weakening both the Legion and New Vegas. Besides, in their view, if left to it's own devices, New Vegas might fall apart - being an upstart nation - and be ripe for taking, which is their intent (in the vanilla game). Furthermore, (1) is a huge problem. NCR is a democracy; you've just cheated them out of their victory and taken from them what they want, and then you would have them defend you or make an alliance with you? Any administration which would go with that would be unpopular at home to the point of revolt. You literally robbed the NCR of something which they earned with their blood, does it sound feasible they're nice to you and defend you, or that they want to tear your head off?

I loved HH myself. Typically it's the first DLC I'll do on any playthrough, and mostly when I get in Zion I'll set about and explore before doing the quests. The scenery is fantastic, and the story isn't bad - even though the quests are somewhat simplistic. The overall setting is quite somber; the survivalist's journals and what you see while exploring, in general. In the main world - New Vegas - the immediate aftermath of the nuclear holocaust is mostly "cleaned up" because so long has passed, but the Sorrows have left things mostly preserved and untouched. The main characters - both Daniel and Graham - are well written, too, in my opinion. Considering the New Caananites are religious folk which send out missionaries, Joshua's heavy reliance on religion makes sense (even though my Courier berates him for it), because it is a large part of what enables him to cope and live with himself after Hoover Dam. I'll invariably fight the White Legs; now while the option of leaving the Sorrows out of it does not exist, it adds to the "dilemma" of the story, and besides, a "courier vs the world" assault isn't very plausible. I use custom gun/damage realism mods which makes a bunch of machinegun-totting tribals far more dangerous, so it's more believeable that you do need all the help you can possibly get. It's one of the better DLCs. I enjoyed OWB in a way, too. Dead Money I've recently obtained and it's not exactly my cup of tea (and I don't see myself replaying it), didn't try Lonesome Road yet (also recently obtained, mainly because some mods require Dead Money and Lonesome Road).

Too big distances for combat is an issue in itself, though. IF the courier can fight at 500+ yds, then the opponents must also be able to. And if they can, due to the fact the Mohave is physically reduced in size and many locations are too close together, then NPCs will slaughter each other where they shouldn't. So the defaults regarding distance are mostly alright - the big problem I'm seeing doing a playthrough with more (still not finished) realistic damage / gunnery is the AI. Basically, a Courier with a 5.56mm semi-auto can clear house with trivial ease, even with improved wasteland spawns, no radar markers (although that makes for some nasty surprises at times when the AI miraculously does decide to hide in ambush), the biggest "danger" in the game are either critters which require more firepower then humans, or power-armour troops which don't care for your puny rifle (BoS), as long as you have clear line of sight to the enemy. The reason is simple, you fire a shot at a group of, say, powder gangers from range and, hit or miss, they resume walking around like nothing happened. If you hit and kill one, the rest come in and watch only to get shot in turn like some sort of brainded zombies. Tweaking with AI values so far has had no result. It's really critical to making the game challenging, fun and immersive, because realistic gunnery when your enemies stand around like mannequins breaks every outside combat (indoors combat works better and increasing detection ranges and such worked, still need tweaking). When you, for instance, get on the hill in front of the NCRCF gate and start shooting on the occupants below, I want it to respond like an actual camp does - the sentries in the towers shooting at you with rifles, and the rest of the PGs either shooting (if they can) or taking cover behind buildings and staying there (if they can't) in ambush, or getting in buildings. Currently assaulting something like a PG camp is trivial and the only hard bits are indoor combat bits in the main building (as when the detection ranges increase it results in everyone attacking you from the moment you fire the first shot as it should). When you give guns their proper accuracy and lethality, the lackluster AI becomes the immersion-breaker. As for armour on body parts, it's a bit trickier. Project Nevada has DT not applied on headshot on actors without head armour; not sure if much can be done there. I haven't gotten into this part yet, but rigging scripts to examine what part was hit and apply or not apply DT based on armour coverage is doable (for armours which have, eg. no armour coverage on arms / legs) and something I might do. Ideally when armour is hit I want one of the following to happen: (1) The round was fully stopped by the armour (damage * penetration modifier < DT); only some damage (say, 5%) is applied. (2) The round has penetrated the armour (so damage*penetration modifier - DT is applied). (3) The round has bypassed the armour (so full damage is applied regardless of armour). (4) The round has hit a vital part of your body (critical hit). Outside of localized coverage (basically done by formlists for armours with no arms / no legs / no arm+leg protection and then scripts to examine what part was hit, so DT is not applied when an unarmoured segment is hit), it's tricky to produce this effect. Perhaps randomly having no DT applied on hit depending on how much does the armour cover would work (and additionally some specific types of armour impacting your chance to be critically hit, as critical hits ignore armour - so, eg. power armour there's just no real gaps to exploit or very very limited). Finally, the last part towards making realistic combat ties to both AI and equipment; the thing is the player can obtain items which are within the context of the game world super-powerful, like power armour. Now, I've made it so in the current iteration of my mod that power armour is still very vulnerable vs some types of weapons, but the problem is that the most of the game world has no access to what they need to defeat power armour and all they have is small caliber firearms which are easily defeated. So you can just go and power through the game world with a few exceptions without any care in the world, including annihiliating the entire legion as they simply don't have the means to stop one power armour goon with a minigun just walking around and mowing everything down. So some rework of equipment lists is also needed, else the game becomes really easy with adv. combat armour II (which provides almost full-body coverage of armour sufficient to defeat small arms fire, esp. since NPCs lack AP ammo) and trivial with power armour. So: - providing a chance of having AP or other specialty ammos to regular enemies - providing a chance of having explosive devices to regular enemies - rearming the legion to use more hunting rifles & carabines and such (all are lore-friendly) and improvised explosives / firebombs (lore friendly) and be less reliant on melee. - NCR is fine with their service rifles all around, if some are given AP ammo and frag grenades. Specifically for power armour: - providing a small chance (at high levels, perhaps) of having anti-tank class weapons such as missile launchers appearing, perhaps some form of new lower tech disposable rocket launcher for the legion (the missile launcher just isn't lore-friendly or looking right on them), perhaps occasional 40mm grenade launchers for the "bandits" factions. - I want the AI to react specifically to power armour, somehow. Which means - run, ambush, whatnot. Seeing a bunch of idiots with handguns and machettes charging a steel Terminator with a minigun just ain't immersive, fun, balanced, realistic, you name it. They should be running for their lives, making ambushes IF they have a weapon which can damage it, unless they specifically have anti-tank weapons. I'm thinking about making power armour be a no-no in many game locations, but that'd mean voice acting and I don't know if I want to do that - but specifically being refused to enter casinos, military bases and such while wearing power armour. Sorry for the long post, I'm working on all of this in my spare time and it's a non-trivial issue to get it all working together as it should. The creators of FNV did a good job at balancing but an atrocious job when it comes to realistic depiction of firearms, and it's very hard to fix the latter without breaking the balancing of the game completely. I want the game to be more realistic but again not too easy (nor mechanically made too hard, eg. scarce ammo) and immersive (and you sniping people standing like mannequins waiting to die is anything but immersive).

Real life is a bit more complicated then "if you get shot in the head, you die". It's not always the case, not even when shot in the brain.

For Dead Money, I just deleted the script for activating collars near radios/etc. It makes zero sense. It makes even less sense then the nonsense red cloud (which doesn't make sense either). Besides, it's relatively easily to mod in realistic weapons (and there's a mod which adds recoil even). Even though it does break somewhat the "RPG-ness" of it when your basic 9mm pistol you start the game with is lethal against any (unarmoured) human you meet in the game, and a hell of a lot more practical then some monstrous endgame .45-70G revolver (unless you want to kill things with armour, but for that you'd use a rifle to begin with), and the Service Rifle which you get in the next town is basically enough to finish the game and more practical then larger-caliber "showoff" weapons (if nothing, ammo's lighter, if using a realistic carry mod / etc - it's a huge deal). The vanilla handling of weapons in NV is almost comical, but the big problem with realistic weapon handling is that enemy AI is so atrociously bad it just allows you to pick them off with a rifle as they shuffle about like zombies waiting to be shot.

I'm working on a mod with realistic damage (and health/armours*) + ballistics for my own use (not yet done all the things which need doing, when it's done, I'll release it). What you can get is bullet drop + realistic bullet speed (which means leading moving targets), wind would require extending what the engine can and cannot do. Basically, what's needed: (1) Rework all projectile velocities to be inline with realistic values (there's a mod which does do this actually as Bethseda length measures are known and listed in GECK documentation). (2) Turn off "hitscan" for all projectiles. (3) Figuring out how the "min spread" translates to MOA measurements would be needed. Then set the weapons to have realistic accuracy (which is in general more accuracy however, but in some specific cases might be less). As a rule of thumb, you'd expect a full length rifle (like, a, say, Garand) to be around 1 MOA, an accurized full length rifle (like a Sniper Rifle) to be under 1 MOA, and a carabine or shorter assault rifle to be around 4 MOA (less if accurized & match ammo). 1 MOA is about an inch at a hundred yards deviation - in general it means many weapons will become more accurate, esp. semiautos and full autos. (4) Figure out how the "gravity" setting in projectile stats works; then set all projectiles to be attracted by gravity equally. There's a few things which I'm not fully clear on, like whether rounds slow down or no (and what's it tied to). I suspect they don't. Which is a shame, but not something you can really do anything about. There is a mod which adds actual recoil to the game, which is needed to make automatics and semiautos work well - GBMM is the name afaik. So you need to readjust aim after firing, and firing in full auto mode at a distance will mean a lot of wasted ammo even though the base accuracy of the guns is not the problem (if anything, a fairly long barrel LMG will be more accurate and also more damaging then shorter carabine-type weapons). *Handling of armour is one great pain. Even bigger pain is AI. Because I'm doing a playthrough now based on a "beta" version of my mod and essentially what happens is that sniping is too easy as you shoot one from a few hundred yards, then another, then another and they're all the time just standing there and walking around even while bullets are whizzing about and their comrades falling to the ground.

Take a look at the ending: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwBfmmL1rMA It is directly implied the NCR is out of the region (that player had Primm side with the NCR and they abandoned that, too). And it stands to logic - without Hoover Dam or the Strip, what interest does NCR have in maintaining camps in the Mohave? Oliver himself suggests the Bear will be back in force, and that is what is closer to logic. Now without the NCR, the Legion, admittedly in dissaray, has essentially free reign to operate in the Mohave - it will need time to reorganize, but the defeat of two men at the top isn't going to topple it immediately, nor are a few thousand troops something the Legion cannot relace. This is basically, pure logic.

And the key to making factions realistic, btw: - The various factions which are not helpless / needing dire assistance aren't and cannot be controlled by you. You can't control the Brotherhood of Steel or the mutants of Jacobstown, or the Boomers. They will necessarily look after their own interests - if you can make the interests of Vegas and their own coincide, great, if you can't, well, they'll pursue their own agenda. Brotherhood could be talked into patroling a stretch of the highway IF it would enable them to pursue their interests and control traffic and confiscate the really good pre-war toys, as Veronica puts it. It's both a blessing and a curse. What the Brotherhood cannot be, is being bossed around to fight your wars at your whim, perhaps once as a favour, or in response to an especially important threat, but they're isolationist at the core. They will never provide tech for you (except you personally with the implied meaning you do not share around, as you are a member of the Brotherhood), ever, because that goes against the core of what the Brotherhood IS. You can see the reason why the NCR went to war with the Brotherhood, and you cannot change this. You can like them and they can respect you (and therefore, not attack you to grab military tech) because of the services you did for them, but the Brotherhood pursues the interests of the Brotherhood, and their interests are military tech. Their needs are some food and such as they're not fully self-sufficient. Perhaps they could be talked into supplying some of the "lesser" weapons or something of the sort in exchange for food and water. That's about it as far as feasible interactions with the Brotherhood, barring some extreme emergency. Boomers are actually slightly more open, but their interests are again their own. While self-sufficent to a large degree, those howitzers and rocket launchers aren't going to regenerate their ammo. So they need some munitions, but what can they give in return? Salvage? Producing this and that? On the other hand, they're going to be more likely to help you bomb something, because from their point of view, bombing savages (defined as, people who are not boomers) is fun. After all, if you have a bomber to rain high explosive death on savages with no direct means of reprisal (at least, by low-tech factions), well, you want to use it. Jacobstown isn't going to fight your own wars, ever. Marcus has seen enough that he doesn't need a new Master figure. All of them have suffered their share of wars and strife for much, much longer then a human lifespan. They're going to keep to themselves, trade yes, fight no. It's not their war, and from the point of view of someone hundreds of years old which has spent much of this timeframe fighting, they just want to be left alone in peace. They are going to be interested in trading, naturally, more because of Marcus being a very smart (and experienced) fellow then because they actually need anything - he knows if they are completely secluded from the world, the world might come knocking at their door eventually. Total seclusion breeds hostility in the end. So out of "outlying factions" you can't really get much; none of them is compatibile with the idea of fighting for Vegas, except the Boomers to a limited degree (and they'd probably need to be supplied with ordinance to be able to do so, anyway). Tribals and Joshua are out of the question. The man has done his part. Perhaps, only perhaps, as a one-off event in a dire emergency, to return the favour for the services you rendered to him. The idea that he could have anything to do with the Legion, outside shooting them, is preposterous. GS / Primm are too small to provide much, and certainly not manpower for your cause. Followers can and probably would help, sure, but what they can do is limited in scope. However practical knowledge of medicine, agriculture and such is very much needed. Combat role is out of the question, naturally. They would be probably willing to support a courier who tries to help the common man. Renmants? If they keep to themselves... you can shelter them, but you go declare a "open door" to former Enclave members to operate in New Vegas, and you're on a fast track with outright war with the NCR, because they hate the Enclave that much, and the BOS will not react well themselves, not only because of historical "disagreements" to put it lightly, but also because it conflicts with their mission as being the only ones wih the really good pre-war toys. So your big job in the short term is to douse the flames and then secure supplies for Vegas as it's not self-sufficient while keeping the enemies which outnumber you by far at bay at the same time. We're talking about "nation building on the fast track on nightmare difficulty mode".

The crux of the matter is, the NCR is out, the supplies the NCR brings is out, the protection they provide is also out, and your "great victory" has become a great headache as people need to eat, tommorow, and you're responsible for feeding these people - or letting them starve. Vegas clearly isn't a self-sufficient place. You have more to worry about then high politics or assasination attempts, and your securitron army isn't going to be enough in the long run, but the basics you have to immediately provide are order, defense, and food. Else your newborn "nation" won't last very long. You've liberated a lot of people, but now you have to do something with them, all of them. And only after you've put out all the "fires", which have to be dealt with right now, you get to deal with the Legion and the NCR somehow, and the fact that in the vacuum left by the retreat of the NCR the Legion has taken a lot of space.

I'd sort of love this. But I wouldn't go overboard with X and Y feature. I mean, logically: (1) Cleanup of post-battle areas. (2) From ending, NCR is defacto marched out of the Mojave and the Legion is on the east side of the Colorado. The "old" NCR NPCs need to go, and Mojave Outpost becomes effectively the border (or Primm, if it is sided with the NCR). Aside from agreeing with the ending, that saves you the trouble of writing dialogue for a whole host of characters talking about what happened. And them not acknowledging what happened would be very immersion breaking. Basically, immediate world-wide changes: - Redo Mojave Outpost with new NPCs and fortifications acknowledging this is now effectively the border of the NCR - Repopulate Fort with new NPCs acknowledging this is now effectively the border camp of the Legion. Repopulate Nelson and Cottonwood Cove IF not purged by player. - Remove clutter (blockades) on the dam itself, with Securitrons patroling and holding the dam. - IF Fiends were purged from Vault 3 & Fiend leaders killed (Motor-runner / Nephi / Violet / Cook-Cook), remove Fiends and Fiend spawns from the area - IF Powder Gangers have been purged, remove Powder Ganger spawns / etc from the game. - IF Sloan Deathclaws were purged and highway cleared of deatclaws, remove their respawns from the game.. - IF all three were achieved (before or after ending), the highway is open again, so now merchants and travelers use it - optionally talk to the Brotherhood to patrol the highway in return for being able to inspect for "dangerous" tech (as is canon ending). So, what is the new game setting: (a) The NCR is now holding onto the Mojave Outpost (it's border) and optionally Primm if player has chosen NCR in "my kind of town". (b) There is a large vacuum regarding places like Camp Golf, McCarran, etc. These can be later populated once the basics are worked out... However the idea that after being cheated out of the Dam and Vegas the NCR would STILL be willing to spend huge sums on defending the Mojave is controary to the ending (they are "marched out") and common sense. They might be planning on coming back with a vengeance. © The Legion, even defeated, with the retreat of the NCR, has free reign to strenghten it's presence in places like Nelson (now unoccupied), Nipton (being the new "forward position" of the Legion), Cottonwood cove and outskirts of Searchlight/etc. The NCR after all has zero interest in holding these areas for you "for free". Essentially, south and east of Novac and east of the highway is all up for grabs by the Legion, because nobody is defending this anymore, and Novac is in danger itself being half-surrounded. In short, good job breaking it, Hero. The setting: Now your independent New Vegas and outlying communities are essentially surrounded by a sea of NCR to the west/southwest and Legion to the east - the only reason the Legion doesn't overrun you right now is because by killing the immediate leaders and a few thousand solidiers in the field you've given them pause, but that pause won't be for very long. The NCR won't protect you for free and will only protect it's border - if and when they come back, they will come back in force. Having an army of killer Robots is nice, but you are surrounded by Empires which number in millions and which don't like you, or in case of Legion, are openly hostile. Your securitrons are limited in number and can't be everywhere. Perhaps a limited number (since you can use "yes man" to deploy them in quests) available in total, tracked by the yes-man. Perhaps place the player at the Strip at the end of the game - with the first order of the day re-establishing order, or letting it clear to the families and interested parties who is the new boss. This would require some more dialogue / scripting. In fact, it would make sense that they are all invited (by the courier) to the lucky 38 for a meeting. If and how many options you would have here is open to debate. In the meantime, game world gets cleaned up and updated as described. The Yes-Man now serves as your advisor/minister and the way to institute "global" changes, and track global variables like food supply, number of available securitrons, troops, power, etcetera, other resources. What would expected / logical quests be? In the immediate timeframe (what needs to be done post haste, you could get these quests automatically): (1) Reopening the highway in case you haven't done this before / optionally ask the Brotherhood to patrol it (and search travelers for tech, however). This could be a prerequisite for a number of other quests. (2) Dealing with the immediate issue of Novac being firmly surrounded by Legion territory now and practically defenseless on top; what options you have are subject to imagination, but for instance, logical options include: a) Abandoning it to the Legion (sic) which means Novac residents are killed/enslaved/gone from the game world (token few might become refugees but someone would have to write dialogue etc) and Novac, the El Dorado gas station are now held by the Legion. b) Posting some Securitrons (but it won't be enough) as immediate defense and going there to "sort it out" one way or another, fortify the place and such, appoint perhaps a mayor or someone to command it (perhaps add a band of NCR "renmants" with an officer who are bitterly disillusioned with the NCR after the battle and would be willing to live and protect it, in exchange for something, it fits with the lore). (3) Dealing with the issue of refugee camp at Bitter Springs being basically out of supplies and with nobody to protect it. Again, options: (a) Abandon it to the Legion (sic) which means, well, you get the idea. (b) Evacuate it to somewhere (McCarran or Aerotech or whatnot), which means a quest to get them (escort them) out of there, after which they are replaced by "new" NPCs with new interactions at McCarran (or whatever other place, Freeside would be ok too, Aerotech park, whatnot), and Bitter Springs and the area become minor Legion camps. © ... whatever lore and logic friendly option you can think of ... (4) Dealing with the issue of refugee camp at AeroTech Offices - without anyone to protect them and anyone to supply them, they are starving and vulnerable to slavers / bandits / whatnot. Again, options: (a) I don't care (bad karma), which means - well, I guess they starve / leave / get deleted. (b) Relocate them (eg. McCarran). © Leave them where they are, but allocate defenses (securitrons). (5) Wherever you've relocated various refugees from (3) and (4) to, you need to get food for the people. They have to eat, today. (a) Let them fend for themselves / starve (horrible karma), just so you have the evil options, in which case they are starving and some die. (b) Allocate food for them. - Food sources (tracked via Yes-Man) can be obtained in limited quantity by working out deals with various settlements which might have some extra, like GoodSprings (prerequisite: highway open) for a very minor amount, perhaps Jacobstown (prerequisite can be quests for them) for a minor amount, Crimson Caravan (will want money / whatnot, and probably favours, etc), Boomers (minor amount, might want something), Westside (will definitely want something in return), etc. Basically, good job breaking it, Hero. Now you have to provide for your people, you don't have a whole damn lot of resources to trade with and have to manage simultaneously feeding and defending your people. Making a revolution is almost easy; but after the celebration wears off, there are two large empires breathing down your neck and people have to eat in the morning. And if they starve, it is now your fault - you got the NCR out of the picture.

In a way both the Yes Man and the NCR are "good" endings, with their share of the bad, of course. One one hand, the defeat of the NCR is a dick move. They are rebuilding civilization as we know it, and doing a decent job at it too; they're a few hundred years short of "modern" times. Vegas would've been a major help along the way; lots of resources, tech, and, well, space to grow, which you rob them of. On the other hand, you're teaching them a lesson; because what should have been a fairly straighforward campaign became a damn mess for no reason except incompetence at the highest echelons of power. To help them to win is to vindicate them, in this or that way. Besides, we see in the game the NCR has become a corrupt and warlike entity, and the best catalyst for change is always a military defeat. And you're setting up the stage for a future incorporation of Vegas in the NCR, but when Vegas is ready for it, and not on NCR's terms. Or, you're setting up the stage for a future war and a more radical NCR (because sometimes, change can be for the worse). Things can be unpredictable like that. However, I don't play the "goody two-shoes" benevolent and nice courier. Running around like some armed Ghandi trying to solve everything with your improbable negotiation skills and do every quest and subquest (by the way, I wish there was a mod to remove the "mission failed" popup when you kill mission-important characters, it feels like such a cheat) in an optimal way isn't as appealing as taking the "more bullets" approach. For such and such a courier, NCR is just no option at all.

It's how it's done in the vanilla game, too. So if you want, you can modify how much the vanilla creature perks give, or better link creatures you want to new DT-giving perks.

While normally NCR would offer more stability, there is however one thing to consider. It's not stability which is the issue for independent Vegas, it's economy. The Courier during the course of the game becomes something like a Terminator meets the Man with No Name crossover. Raiders? The new upstart nation gets ruled by a man which singlehandedly went into Vault 3, armed with a machinegun, combat armour, five doses of Psycho, a bottle of Whiskey and just flipped out and killed everyone inside. By the end of the game it's immersion-breaking that enemies run to you. They should be either in overwhelming numbers and with some serious firepower or flat out running away, given the Courier up to that point is a man-machine hybrid which has killed thousands of armed people, because he didn't like them or was flat out tripping on Psycho. Whether it's overall better for everyone that NCR takes over? Yes and no. Almost definitely for NCR back home, because NCR has ultimately the aim of becoming the USA and Vegas would be a huge step towards rebuilding civilization. However, chaos, raiders ensue? Not during the Courier's lifetime. The long term prospects are something else - what after the Courier dies? Does he manage to, and that's a big deal, forge the entire territory in one nation? Without independent (Courier ruled) Vegas becoming a new "NCR" of the east, which is a lot of work, there's not much future in it. Murderous robots armies and tripping on Psycho killing everyone is one thing, building anything, not to mention a nation, is something entirely different even for the ubermensch the Courier becomes. Vegas has little means to support itself. It needs food production and industry and rules and police and reconstruction, diplomacy... things which the NCR has but Vegas doesn't, and needs to play a game of "catch up" and fast, or die out. The cash-cow of NCR spending and importing things when they're played and evicted at the end means no money and not a lot of resources for Vegas.