I have the goty edition, and was wondering whats different in the capital wasteland? Obviously the minor expansions added portals to new areas, but the capital wasteland itself thats there from the vanilla version, what's different? Where the out casts apart of the original story, the enclave, the giant robot (liberty prime I think)?

I am also running a few mods and wondering if they have changed the story arc. Should I run into out cast and enclave before I discover the BOS, if I explore the wasteland before going into DC?

Nothing is different. The GOTY edition is just the game with the latest patch and all the DLCs in one. There is nothing special about it.

my question should have been more specific, the goty has broken steel, that takes place in the capital wasteland, so does broken steel add the outcasts and enclave or where they always there?

They were always there. Everything up till you turn on the purifier is 100% normal content.

What? This installs the 1.7 patch without having to download the patch and install?
Just wondering cuz im having problems getting GFWL to run ... keeps saying I need an update each time I sign into windows live. Then updates, restarts and a relaunch then live puts me back at needing another update. So I figured maybe I need to install the 1.7 patch first?
This only matters cuz I was trying to figure out what happens with the GFWL saves and help the trouble shooting.
But no worries I can run the game no problems.

To the OP: Broken steel raises your cap level and adds quests accessable after completeing the purifier.
The only other noteable differences between having BS enabled and not (before completeing main quest) Are that 3 Dog will talk about haveing the purifier running on the Radio. Also Dogmeat and Fawkes are more powerful.

Yes, the GOTY already has patch 1.7
Many problems with installing come from the annoying GFWL and I found the best way to install was to remove it via a mod.

My PC kept having a 'dynamic link library xlive' message that prevented me from playing the game.