By which I mean - how do you approach a fight. Logistics, strategies, tactics, equipment. Tell us how you kill.

Originally my approach was purely ranged based, carried over from Fallout 3. I divided enemies and weapons into 3 categories; long, medium, close. For long range, I used Ol' Painless - in NV finding the Sniper Rifle to be the best choice. For medium encounters, I used the unique Chinese Assault Rifle - it doesn't have a direct anologue in NV, so the Cowboy Repeater I found was best. Up close I used either Blackhawk or The Terrible Shotgun, replacing them in NV with the Riot Shotgun.

However, the increased levels and perks mean that The Courier can be a lot more nuanced than The Lone Wanderer - there are more approaches. With hardcoe mode weight becomes a big issue; Unarmed and Melee far more valuable. Following the release of Honest Hearts, I ditched all my gear and rethought my entire combat approach, so that The Courier can equip any weapon in any situation taking minimum damage.

It boils down to four interconnected states. Detected or undetected, at range or up close - based on a new-found appreciation of Sneak that Zion impressed upon me.

Undetected at range, I use a silenced Colt .45 pistol - quick, fairly accurate and with the Grunt perk and Better Criticals absolutely lethal attacking from stealth. The one shot, one kill technique means I don't carry that much ammunition - this isn't a weapon for protracted firefights.
Undetected up close, Chance's Knife. With Cowboy and Grunt perks its base damage gets a hefty boost. Silent and deadly, it allows The Courier with Silent Running to brutally dispatch a building full of enemies before the first man arrives in Hell.

Detected at range, I equip the All-American for two reasons - accuracy and ammunition availability. A few well placed shots to the temple usually fells any enemy before they can close, although priority is given to enemies which can attack from range. A gunman should always eliminate the greatest threat first. If any make it to me alive, there's...
Detected up close, it's Ballistic Fist time. It is right to learn, even from the enemy - Caesar's Praetorians taught me a fearful lesson in slaughter the first time I stormed his tent. The power of the Ballistic Fist combined with the deadly rush of the Legion Assault means enemies that close within your circle will be dead within seconds. Piercing Strike puts even Deathclaws to shame.

With this setup, I have only two weapons requiring ammunition and no need of any heavy armour, leaving plenty of space for juicy DLC loot. Pretty much any situation can be met instantly with deadly force based on the above formula. The only real threats are explosive wielding enemies - Powder Gangers, for example, can sometimes get off a stick of dynamite before they can be dispatched. Lighter armour means The Courier with this may take more damage that those with other philosophies. Large crowds including those wielding Grenade Launchers are also a problem - the philosophy is based on deadly accuracy, initially attacking from the shadows to pick off enemies one by one. Overwhelming displays of force and crowd suppression tactics are not my forté with this build - I carry no explosives, for instance. However, I compensate via hotkeyed StimPaks and 100 Medicine, as well as the 2 ranks of Toughness.

So, you're heading to an area where you expect a fight. How do you approach it?

Hm, I edge around corners, and prefer to use a high powered pistol of some kind. Blackhawk in FO3 and That Gun in NV (not the most powerful but I love the thing). I don't like armor and usually just wear clothing. If i'm going into a VERY heavy situation i'll stick on some combat armor since it doesn't restrict movement. I'm usually fast enough on the controls that explosives don't usually catch my character. I find that in power armor slows me down enough that I take more punishment than being unarmored and just using scenery.

My characters usually have one thing in common; no killing anyone who isn't a threat (no murder basically), but if anyone draws on me for any other reason than fear they get put down. I've yet to try out a character that relies on KOing opponents. Not that it would matter since companions would kill before I could do so anyway.


I do have fond memories of one of my lesser played Couriers that was only level 2 and look out a group of heavily armored raiders with chances knife. One in metal armor, one in combat armor, the rest in leather. One with a shotgun, another with a rifle, a third with plasma grenades, and the other two with knuckle dusters and such. I use damage mods that meant the knife did enough damage to take them out in two or three slashes; but their weapons were just as deadly and one decent shot from the shotgun or the rifle would have taken me out. In the end I finished with around 4% health (grazes from the guns and taking a couple of punches) but won by duckign around corners and making them come to me. Funnily the guy with the rifle refused to come. I actually had to charge him over about sixty feet and finished him with a lunge just as he was about to kill me. On the charge I used a conveniant beam from a ruined house to get in the way of his aim til I was too close.

That battle always sticks with me. Was one of the most adrenaline filled fights i've had in Fallout. Kinda sad really, since it doesn't speak highly of the games more scripted fights.


I have grown fond of NVs 'nade rifle though. Never used one til recently. My newest character was on the road to Nipton and one of the raiders that tries to ambush you happened to have a Grenade Rifle and 2 grenades. Well when I arrived at Nipton and wolfy came out of the town hall I decided to see how the weapon worked. I expected to die since with the weapon-damage-mods its tough to take out a group without using hit and run tactics. Noticing from the sight that it was an arcing weapon I just decided to wing it, while the Legionaries were still grouped enough to be all hit, and fired. The grenade landed straight at wolfys feet and took out his legs and all his men. My jaw dropped. With Cass following behind I imagined that her jaw would have been on the floor too. Best bit? The characters 'facial hair' was the eyepatch. So, no depth perception.


I've always wanted to play a sniper character but I feel it bleeds all the fun from the game. Not because sniping is broken (even though it can be at times) but because i've been playing FPS for almost a decade. It just turns combat into an pretty shooting gallery. No real sense of tension in combat. Even in close-up battles the sniper is just as effective.

My personal favorite tactic relies on high Guns and sneak skill, Sniper perk, This Machine, and VATS. I always try to do one, if not both of these things:
1. Engage the enemy before they have seen me.
2. Engage the enemy at medium range.
From there, I use VATS to headshoot as many as possible.
In situations where this cannot happen, such as when entering a building full of enemies, I take out all those in my immediate vicinity, then wait in a doorframe, hallway, or cave tunnel for all their friends to come to me. Remember, corridors nullify numbers. If there are 20 of them, and one of me, this lets me stack the deck so they have to fight me one at a time. Unless they're mantises ore something that is ridiculously easy to kill, and does almost no damage to me.

This Machine works well on everything short of Deathclaws and Legates. For them, at short to medium range, a Minigun with AP ammo makes quick work of them.

In situations where long range combat is unavoidable, 100 EW, and a humble, fully modded Laser Rifle with Max Charge ammo do the trick. They can actually sneak attack crit a Deathclaw.

Of course, this is my preferred method of combat. When I roleplay as a Melee/Unarmed character, I do something different, but I like a Guns/Sneak/EW character best.

I tend to use streetlights as cover.

Don't laugh, because street lights are good cover.

When I'm walking around the open areas I like sniping enemies for sneaky one-shot kills (currently using scoped Trail Carbine or YCS/186 fir bigger enemies). One thing I didn't like much is that VATS isn't such a good option for long range combat in FO3 and FNV - the chance of hitting heads are so low, even with Sniper, Commando and Gunslinger perks!

For medium range I use All-American (AP ammo for Legionnaires) or 12.7 SMG for geckos, nightstalkers and the like. For Cazadores and Giant Radscorpions I use the Tri-Beam Laser Rifle (since I lost my Plasma Caster)

For close range I use Riot Shotgun (sometimes Slug ammo if the enemies aren't so close)

I never created a melee/unarmed character in any FO games, but after seeing some of the weapons in FNV (Ballistic Fist for example) I'm considering it. I just enjoy gunning enemies down.

At the beginning of the game, I kinda ninja'd my way around with a coyboy repeater or varmint rifle. Now I either:

A- Crouch around all day sniping things with my Tesla-Beaton prototype

B- Send Cass in with a CZ57 Avenger while I back her up with Mercy.

Me, well i play quite simple...I like to believe i play as i would be (usually on my first play through anyway).

I weigh up the argument from both sides early on, try to advise both parties or any conflict i come across to not spill any blood, if this is not feesable whoever insults me or ignores my advances will end up becoming my enemy especially if they become hostile...

Once i have an enemy or a common foe i believe i would fight from a distance, an Anti-Material Rifle and a Light Sneak Suit (Recon Armour) with my Authority Sunglasses to stop the glisten from the sun, i drop them from as far as possible which creates fear throughout the nemises.

All in all i like to help those less fortunate than me, i like to collect and trade along the way which leads to a sealed bag of caps which keeps increasing...

Eventually, I usually approach a lot of battles by softening up the opposition with my Incinerator. Then my companion and EDE rush in, and I hang back with a rifle (at first) and then the Anti-material rifle, Gauss or a Sniper rifle.

For close quarters stuff I mainly use the .10 SMG and do a lot of flailing around. If the fight's going well I might even switch to a melee weapon.

This is a must. I'm a sniper, I enjoy watching people/animals looking around confused not knowing where the shots are coming from. right before their head comes off. :gun:

I generally play two types of Couriers: Cowboy types and more military "commando" types.

With the "commando" Courier I usually carry a silenced sniper weapon (Ratslayer or silenced Sniper Rifle) and an automatic weapon. Outdoors, I try to snipe fom medium-long range, and anything that comes close is greeted with a hail of lead from the backup weapon. I'm afraid there's not much subtlety to my playstyle.

When playing as a Cowboy, however, one needs to take the low magazine capacity and long reload times into account. You have to go in hard and fast, shot placement is all-important, and it is advised to have some kind of cover you can move behind while you're reloading. Which is why VATS is great for Cowboys. You need to invest a lot into optimizing the build because Cowboy weapons were made AP-expensive by the previous patch, but a VATS-optimized Cowboy with Commando and Sniper can take damage output to a whole new high by headshotting things with a Brush Gun at long ranges with impressive speed.

I go mandalorian. Im proficient in most forms of combat and dont hide myself. I walk right up to my opponent and fire.

Me, my strategy, my strategy is Plan Q, complete and utter randomness. Every time I'm in combat I have no idea how to approach it. I just start shooting, I'll spray and pray with Trail Carbine and snipe with a shotgun it's how I roll.

I don't have an exact plan like you, I don't know this weapon at this time fo this type of encounter but generally I do have a preference though all strategies get used adn all strategies are useful. Sometimes I build an archetype character other times I don't. But Armor is the main thing I use. I used to use Medium Armors for a simple fact. They were quick, but slower than Light but provided more DT than Light. I never used Heavy since there was no incentives, massive DT is great sometimes but being slow svcks adn the high class enemies ala Deathclaws ignore DT making me a slwo moving easily killed target. Generally now I use the High Tier Light armors as tehy provide as much if not more DT than Medium armor and are speedier. Plus there are multiple perks availible to users of Light Armor, IMO Light Armor is overpowered, dreadfully overpowered. They need to either cut DT down some or add perks for Heavy Armor, Power Armor and Medium Armors to balance it out.

My prefered playstyle is a guns character, though I love to throw Explosives into the mix. Low levels you are forced to use Guns as EW are scarce adn so is their ammo and same with Explosives. Though I do know the feeling of running through a tight area knifing everyone to death. And Sniping for me, due to horrible AI at long ranges is not fun enough. I just fire and Sneak kill an enemy wait 2 seconds for it to from CAUTION to HIDDEN adn then fire again.

So my loadout generally is whatever I have but in theory it would be:

Long Range, Detected: A Scoped Rifle of some sort. Either a Scoped Trail Carbine, Scoped hunting Rifle, Sniper Rifle and with as many mods as possible.
Long Range, Undetected: This would generally be the same as detected at such ranges silencing Weapons is not required as the enemy cannot find you anyways plus it saves room in the inventory.

Medium Range, Undetected: Grenade Machine Gun, this thing just tears apart enemies, though ammo is hard to come by and it weighs alot. As well Harcore mode is nearly impossible to use since teh ammo is also heavy. Due to these reason I am more likely to pack a Grenade Launcher or Rifle cause of the killing power and use at ranges.
Medium Range, Detected: I would if possible still use the GMG but the world isn't perfect and you cannot always have your way, I would rely on the Grenade Launchers and Rifles but their slow firing rate means if enemies are nto significantly slow and weak they close in and turn this into a melee fight. So instead I use a Semi or Fully Auto Rifle ala the Carbines or Brush Guns or something.

Short Range, Undetected: An SMG, any kind preferably or Grenades, Mines, Explosives of any and all sorts.
Short Range, Detected: Grenades, Mines, Explosives and an SMG for the Gunfights.

Melee: Shotgun or any Melee or Unarmed weapon depending upon what I take or have availible adn skill level.

This is of course under a pefect world, this wont work when you are running through a valley filled with scorpions and all you have is Throwing Knives of course. And for Armor I like Shock Doctrine of PA and Heavies there is just no incentives to use them. Now I use the High Tier Light armors because they are OP and sometimes Medium Armors.