A Lockpick skill of 100 is needed to get the Gobi Campaign Scout Rifle and all I had was 73. I had the Vault 3 Utility Jumpsuit +5, and the Lockpick skill magazine +20.

I didn't know that by wearing a hat with +1 PER, it would get me to 100.

Any other tips to share?

Hat.
Coyote Tobacco Chew.
Mentats.

If you haven't found it, Tumblers Today.

Dont eat yellow snow

Always a good tip, Morgan.

I did find all of the Tumblers Today but I didn't use the chems to up my skills. Thanks Valkebus. It's good to know all the options. Many of my skills ended up low because I didn't take skill books that were highlighted in red.

Why, I thought it was lemon flavored. Am I wrong?

Best tip I can give is take the perk cannibalism early...
It keeps you fed on hardcoe mode...
After awhile it lets you take body parts with you to eat later...
It turns every person into a walking sarsaparilla bottle .

The only down side is the karma hit, but I eat just just about everyone I kill, and still end the game topped out on the good end of the karma track.

Nice. I'm going to play my hardcoe, very hard playthrough as evil/sneak/unarmed/melee/explosives/assassin so I might as well be a cannibal also.