I wanted to give myself a different kind of challenge so I am doing a new playthrough with an unarmed/melee build on hardcoe. Learning to play unarmed and melee has been fun... but I recently started the add-on "Old World Blues" for the first time and I fell like I'm doing something wrong.

I'm at Level 20 and both unarmed and melee are above 75. I have some great unarmed and melee weapons (Thermic Lance, Dr. Klein's Glove, X-2 Antenna, Saturnite Fist Super-Heated) and after I can get close to my opponents things go well.

Here's my problem: How do I get close to them without destroying my armor? I'm wearing light armors to keep my movement speed up (currently Joshua Graham's Armor). I will commonly encounter three lightly-armed Lobotomites while wandering the Big MT. They'll have two 10mm pistols and a Caravan Shotgun between them. As I run up to them they'll shoot me continuously. I'll drink a Sunset Sarsaparilla (or whatever) to keep my health up. I can easily kill them and absorb the damage... but they will shoot my armor to shreds.

I do not have a high repair skill. Even if I did, there does not seem to be enough comparable armor in OWB to keep my armor repaired. I feel like I am going backward instead of advancing. Since I've started OWB I never have any money as I give it all to The Sink Central Intelligence Unit to get my armor fixed over and over. I was driven to post this as I am -- again -- at almost zero caps and with an armor condition of zero.

I've read several melee/unarmed guides and I've tried a few tactics. Making some noise and then hiding behind rocks until the enemies come close to me is the most successful but if there is a group of them they still get some shots in and I feel the armor repair bill. Melee ranged weapons do not seem to be the answer as my poisoned Tomahawks don't deal enough damage and things like Proton Throwing Axes are too rare. Sneaking up to them doesn't work if there are robots because even with a Stealth Boy the d**n robots are very good at detecting me. Or if they don't detect me, I can only surprise crit one of them -- then the others detect me and that LAER shreds my armor.

On my first play through I just wore massive power armor the whole time. I'm trying to explore a different strategy here with light armors but I feel like I'm not getting it. Do I have the wrong armor? The wrong approach?

Thanks for any pointers. I've paid thousands of caps to The Sink CIU for armor repair and it can't go on. I'm not sure what I was doing differently in the main game but this problem didn't seem to come up.

You don't.

OWB is an endurance test. Whereas Dead Money is a puzzle-type challenge and Lonesome Road is just enemies cranked up to the max, Old World Blues' challenge aspect is all about endurance. It tries to wear you down, both weapon and armor wise.

I had the exact same problem with that exact same armor set, though luckily I had plenty of cash to spare. If you don't have the cash to spare? Find a different armor set and wear it.

Armor degrades faster when it's DT is pierced, that's why you had a much easier time with your power armor playthrough. If you're wanting to remedy this with a higher-DT armor set to combat repair costs, you could try wearing http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Christine%27s_CoS_recon_armor Alternatively, http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Hazmat_suit should have a low, reasonable repair fee.