I recently obtained a copy of Fallout 2; after playing 1 and 3 I figured I'd fill in the gap, plus many fans on this forum seem to think it is the best of the trilogy. I quickly learned that the difficult curve is much steeper than the other two, at least for the type of character I wanted to play. I chose small guns, speech, and lockpick as my tag skills, but the only way to defend yourself early in the game is with unarmed and melee weapons... which I'm awful at. I finally obtained a gun after getting out of the starter town (pipe rifle thing), but it is far too ineffective to defend myself with...

Any tips on how I can survive long enough to become practical with my current character? In 1 and 3 weapons and ammo were very easy to come by, but 2 seems very stingy.

EDIT: er, title should read "starting".

I would suggest reading a guide on Gamefaqs or the Wiki, everyone kinda has to figure it out for themselves, its hard to tell you how to play a game like the Fallout Franchise through a few paragraphs on a froum.

Here's a (very) small pointer from the top of my hat:
In Klamath there are the rat caves in the trapper section of the town from which you can find a 10mm pistol. I don't remember too well, but it should be more powerful and efficient than the piperifle. After you've done all the quests in Klamath you should have at least 1-2 levelups and enough loot and money that you can buy a more decent weapon from Den, where you'll probably head for next.

Seriously, do everything you can at Klamath. You need that xp and you need that stuff. Your tags are good long-term choices, but right now you character isn't equipped to make the most of those skills. The Gekos won't be easy, so avoid fighting them as much as possible until you get the perk to skin them (this will also maximize your skins later, and you'll eventually do this quest line after dealing with the above highly recomended rats). Another helpful thing you can do for yourself is go and get all the ingredients for healing powder you can and get as many pouches of the stuff made up as possible.

Seeing as you svck both at unarmed and at melee (a not unreasonable premise but a hard place to be right now) work out which you svck more at and forget that attack approach. The sharpened spear/sledgehammer (depending on approach) is your best for melee right now, spiked knuckles is your best unarmed weapon right now (if you get it from the brothers). Use the best available and try to pick your fights. Killing things/people and taking their stuff is (as always) the road to success.

If you aren't above a bit of grinding, save before doing skill heals and stealing, and if unsuccessful, reload. Try to chain your steals for better effect (3 steals gives more xp than 3 individual steals). I find that incredibly boring to do, but it will get you ready xp without risk.

I forget his name but there is a guy in the bar in Klamath that'll train you in either unarmed or melee (don't remember which...maybe both) if you buy him a drink

There's also some guys at the starting village who can train you in melee and and unarmed.

And do you think I should tell him how to get the Enclave power armor early?

It is a long and dangerous road...definitely not for the weak willed

OP, the beginning is usually the hard part to survive in the game, because usually, ya don't start out with a gun!
As mention earlier, 10mm pistol can be found in a rat nest in the trapper section. Oh, and don't worry about conserving ammo. Ya ganna get ALOT more ammo and handful of weaponry from the Den and from there on.


His name John Sullivan. He teaches pugilism.


Kind of kill the experience, in my opinion.

Here's the trick to Fallout 2: Nick EVERYTHING!

Whenever you leave a building or town, all inhabitants should essentially have no pockets left, because you should steal the lot!

This doesn't only net you a whole bunch of badly needed stimpaks and other thingies, you also get some badly needed experience points early in the game for nicking lots of individual items.

But, I'm roleplaying as an Enclave soldier

Then again, is the OP doing is as well? Though I see this as a early exploited, if anything.

Here's what I rend to do. After you've picked up Sulik, head South to the Den. In the first section, there are two shop keepers. They aren't worth much alive, so just kill both of them a loot their corpes. Watch Sulik and make sure he doesn't go on a rampage, but if you just focus on the shop keepers, no one else should both you. Once their both dead, you should be pretty well set for the early game.

Technically you could of done the same for the BoS PA in Fallout 1. But I do agree that it makes the game way too easy until you start fighting the Enclave. The only thing PA has trouble with is deathclaws, super muties, and other PAed enemies.

One of those merchants Raul is talking about is named Tubby. Don't know the other guy though. Oh and speaking of Tubby, be careful if your going to use Jet, its insanely addictive and you have to do a really long quest that's like 3/4 through the game to cure it.

I would not recommend this though, they restock their item in 2-4 day, good enough to farm outside of Den and sell item back.


But whats more fun then trying to survive a harsh post-nuclear setting with everything ya can scarp to and go Mad Max?

Oh, and speaking of the Den, watch out for those kids in Den! They steal your items when ya walk by them into/out of the building! The best way to avoid this is go into combat mode and use up the AP to get into or out the building!

If it makes you feel better, I'm going to make a non-combat character next who talks his way out of problems and solves problems creatively in McGuiver style ways.

Sort of off topic, is there a way to get the

^^^^^^

But ya, have ya read this guide? http://user.tninet.se/~jyg699a/fallout2.html

Here the http://user.tninet.se/~jyg699a/fallout2.html#sf. In the Quest section.

search every bookcase, locker, desk, crate that you come across. when someone can trade with you, save it and see what you can steal from them (make sure to position yourself behind them...and take off your armor before each steal). if you get what appears to be a difficult encounter, run your ass to the exit grid. spend your money wisely...make longterm investments, like save up for armor and guns that are tantalizing. don't waste $ on a slight damage increase.

i always waited until night and lockpicked my way into shops and stuff to take goodies. you can try that out if you like.

DON'T KILL CHILDREN! lol

I've gone through the game many many times and I have found a few tricks that I use for every character to help out at the begining.

1. Disarm all the traps in the temple of trials. my first few times I purposley set them off to get sharpened sticks, later I realized that the XP from diarming them all allows you to level up before leaving the temple.

2. Once you get to the Den, "use" any jet you have on Metzger and a few of his henchmen. Once you've jetted them wait 15 minutes then attack, they'll be so jatlagged they wont be able to move. You get XP for the kills and for freeing the slaves, you get Vic for free and Becky will give you money as a thank you for killing Metzger. Be sure to do the "what's in the chapel" quests first.

Some might consider 2 to be cheating, like locking the doors to the slavers den so you don't fight them all at once, or stealing all the slavers ammo before the fight starts. I do think that those are pretty silly and kind of cheating, but in real life I would actually consider befriending the scumbag slavers enough to them high/drunk before attacking. But getting the Power Armor right away is definatley cheating and I never do it.

btw, the den casino is very different from any other in the game - you can actually win money without the gambling skill.... just save/load gamble some money.. it's no problem to leave den with 30 000 in your pocket which basically takes care of all your monetary problems for quite a while .... you can also sell anything you find and get the basic equip (leather armor, magnum & ammo) this way..