@Skirt with a weapon: It's just one of the glitches in the game. Sometimes the game will give you that popup message after your companion has died. The other Mister Gutsy you see is indeed related to the quest you completed. I'm sorry your RL-3 is gone but at least he went out in a blaze of glory and not by floating off a bridge or something dumb like that.

While hilarious, he was a pain in the butt. I don't miss him THAT much

Someone should update The Vault to reflect this information, haha.

My character isn't the stealthy type at all, but rather likes to go in guns blazing in any situation. So i don't have a problem with companions blowing my cover. As for dying, Dogmeat never held up in a fight but Fawkes has never croaked on me. Perhaps you just have it on a higher difficulty? I'm on normal.

I play on normal difficulty, too. Supposedly, Fawkes is nearly indestructible, but I haven't yet tested that theory.

Only with Broken Steel, him and dogmeat become pretty damned impossible to kill at lvl 30.

Well, it's possible but it takes serious effort, I don't know any enemies, very hard overlords with tri lasers included, who can fell them...

You forgot RL. ALL companions that's classified as creatures will become tougher than a two days old steak if you have broken steel installed.

This is my first play through of FO3 on the 360 and I am currently a level 14 with very good karma. I have Dogmeat as my only companion and he has yet to die on me. He was CLOSE to dying at GNR because of that Super mutant behemoth but he took it down eventually with a little bit of help from me (some hunting rifle rounds here and there). I believe it's because of that Broken Steel glitch. The only thing that bugs me about Dogmeat is that he blocks doorways sometimes, but other than that he is a real life saver.