Very hard + Hardcore + PN= madness?

[Dilir79]

So i decide to do one more play through and for fun I thought let's try this n very hard, lol oh my was I surprised ?.

 

Things with this settings are nearly impossible at the beginning let's say from lvl 1-8? I get 2-3 shot by powder gangers with pistols ???, small geckos 2 hits and I'm done ??.

 

Now my question is, has some one actually play with this setting and the mod can give me some feed back if things get better as you get better weapons/gear?, because at this pace I die about 100x by now lol

 

Thanks for any feedback

[ArthurStrife]

I tried doing something like this just recently but found out I was too late.. :(

 

Hardcore mode, Difficulty is set to very hard, got some mods that make enemies harder and tougher, Project Nevada makes my screen go blurry when ever my life gets too low making it harder to fight back or get away, Stimpacks take time too heal and many more!

 

Problem is, I only found out about mods when I was like level 30 (note that I also have the DLCs so my level cap has been set to 50) so I had the advantages. :(

 

Going to try and make a new character with all of the above settings in place... oooooh boy. :)

[Cyberlazy]

Heheh, Yea you gotta be pertty hardcore to pull that kind of stuff off.

Try CASE with its submod LLO. Increases damage enough if you use the right ammo that you can still kill things efficencly, Also makes npcs ever so slightly easier when your really low level but around 5+ and they will be getting harder.

[Nihilisaurus]

Yeah< I play like that normally with a bunch of changes to make the AI of human opponents better and also all Damage/DT doubled, so all damage is in the same proportions as before just at double the rate. Add that to a few extra things like realistic wildlife (most things won't attack you unless you piss them off) and the XFO module that makes everything way more expensive (paid 12000 for a 100% condition sniper rifle at barter 45), turns out Fallout can actually be a Harsh survival experience. Well, so long as you avoid the casinos. Even then, the money doesn't last forever...

[Cyberlazy]

Really? weapons being more expensive? I would have thought weapons being less expensive but wear down faster would be better.

I never buy weapons.. they just seem like a waste of caps when I could scrounge em up. Selling them though... sell a couple weapons and all your money troubles are gone as far as food and ammo goes.

[Nihilisaurus]

Really? weapons being more expensive? I would have thought weapons being less expensive but wear down faster would be better.

I never buy weapons.. they just seem like a waste of caps when I could scrounge em up. Selling them though... sell a couple weapons and all your money troubles are gone as far as food and ammo goes.

Not really, the not just weapons themselves are expensive, everything is scaled. A 5.56mm round can set you back about 6 caps, or a .223 3 caps, A .308 costs about 12 and a bottle of purified water is in the 80s (~45) barter. Food is usually cheaper to acquire yourself, a single .223 to the head will kill a gecko and lands you an average of one piece of meat, cheaper than buying a gecko steak, especially if you sell the skin.

 

Enemies are more threatening #1 because of the better AI and #2 because you won't have 10000 stims, 2500 .308 AP and HP and a sniper rifle clutched in your combat (mkII) armoured hands. I didn't clear out the interior of the bison Steve til after I'd gone to Mojave outpost and done the quests there, because CQC is a nightmare unless you've got a plan and a suitable weapon with enough condition/ammo, perhaps with a few explosives and definitely a handful of stims. I mean my personal New Vegas is definitely not perfect, the AI is... quirky in how it detects you sometimes, on the one hand I'd like it to be much more line-of-sight based, on the other hand I don't want it to be too easy because if the challenge leaves it then so does the fun.

 

For perspecive, I started this game (cheatily) with 100 guns, a marksman carbine (edited to use AG Sup. uniques style red-dot instead of a scope overlay, otherwise vanilla with the universal 2x damage modifier) and 300 rounds of ammo. This was not overpowered. In open combat, pistol/smg users weren't much of a threat unless backed up by those with rifles or with terrain on their side, but there's terrain on their side all over the place. Rifle users were a danger, even varmint rifles were powerful enough to kill my character in a small number of shots before I got good armour. Even once I got Lonesome road combat armour (bought from commissary, went no further in) .308 rifles like the hunting rifle were still very dangerous (was fun trying to play a way to attack violet that didn't end with a fatal .308 wound... to me) and lever .357s were still enough of a concern to not be worth ignoring.

 

I got barred from the tops and left with 80 grand. I'm down to 50, though I'm up a hunting shotgun and a sniper rifle (gun runners) and I've had a little income from elsewhere. It's rather fun finding this balance between "OH CRAP SPRAY BULLETS ARGHHH" and "I have three pennies, my clothes, a piece of string and a .22lr round. If I sell all that and my kidney, I can afford a .22 pistol, but have no bullet." Each one is an extreme which would get boring on its own, but at the midle point of "I have a service rifle, 240 rounds, my clothes and enough supplies for a few days, if I find some work I should be able to make enough to cover my ammo and supplies for a few more, maybe even buy a sidearm and some rounds". I don't like going straight to Anti Material rifles and Power armour, they have their place but they're endgame gear. My favourite part of any vanilla playthrough was the bit before you got to Mojave outpost where you're scrounging everything you can get and usually have less than 1000 caps.

[GimmeBackMyMoney]

For me, the game has gotten so easy that it isn't. I'm applying even stricter settings myself.

[nivea]

I made the game harder for myself by using PN+AWOP+Hardcore+VeryHard+PMT+ my own custom mod that removes 70-80% of all ammo found in boxes and reduces ammo found on enemies to 1 or 3 bullets/ 70% of all Clean bottled water/ 90% of all free medical supplies/ 60% of all Prewar Food.

 

Now I run around with just small handfuls of ammo, I need to pick my battles better and use melee when I can. I need to find a mod that lets NPC use ammo, and then it would really feel like the world was picked over and everyone is feeling the effects.

[luceid]

I guess how difficult the game really is, depends on one self and the mods the same way as "Hardcore" and "Very Hard".

 

If you'll use mods like "perk every level" or "skill-based perks" you'll destroy everything in your path even on very hard.

On the other side it's based upon your individual play-style. Using f.e. "Skilled" and "Good Natured" (most people use just one weapon-type anyway) as traits does make the start of the game much easier. Running around with f.e. ED-E, Willow, [Companion X] and maybe a NCR-Ranger (radio) makes the game very easy (even with Charisma 1)

 

But there are always ways to go the other way around.

Mod-wise examples:

Use FOOK (makes the game much harder with f.e. adding new classes, higher levels, more base health, etc. to NPCs)

Use PN Rebalance to f.e. drop your EXP-rate to 75% and 2 Skillpoints less each level-up (with all major DLCs, some mods that add Skill-Books, etc. you'll have still the chance to max everything out...) PN also drops the loot-chances of f.e. ammo quiet a lot and allows you to tweak even more like upping the enemy-HP even more, lessen your own, etc.

(With some excellent quest-mods like f.e. NVB, DEIMOS, The Botanist, a.s.o. you'll reach the max-level guaranteed)

Use some of the XFO-modules so that enemies act somewhat smarter and even heal themselves.

 

If you'd like to cry sometimes: There is still Arwen's left, which WILL let you cry sometimes...

 

And there are also two very underrated mods, which cut off the "hints" which skill you need for dialogues and f.e. repairing.

(http://newvegas.nexusmods.com/mods/41731 and http://newvegas.nexusmods.com/mods/37467)

 

Playstyle-wise: Resist the desire in taking Skilled an Good-Natured and take something else (Build To Destroy f.e.), don't gamble that much, etc.

 

 

On my current playthrough (very hard) I had some serious(!) problems I never had before.

There were many situations I had to use stealthboys, buffout (well, every kind of chem I had) and several attempts to pass them.

(F.e. FIVE reloads to kill those damn Jackals by the Nipton Road pit stop, even with Willow as extra-companion in addition to ED-E).

And that's the way, I like it :)