Okay, so I know that some companion quests open up by doing certain events with the companion in your party. With ED-E, for example, hearing something about Poseidon or HELIOS, and for Boone, involving yourself in NCR quests like Silus Treatment and I Put a Spell On You. My question is, can you still do these quests even if you missed the chance to do these events with specific companions? Am I permanently locked out of quests like 'I Forgot to Remember to Forget' because I didn't pick up Boone earlier in the game, before I've done some of these quests?

EDIT: Mind, this question isn't Boone-specific, I'm using him as an example. In general I prefer traveling alone (for stealth purposes), so many of my quests were done solo. I know you have to of course do Veronica's before you blow up the Brotherhood, but outside of that?... Thanks in advance for help rendered.

I know with Raul, if you talk to Ranger Andy, one of three people who cause a trigger with Raul, WITHOUT having Raul present, you can never complete his quest.

Boone - if you've already done all of the quests/situations that gets you "trust points" with him, you're locked out. If you're pretty close to the end of the game/done tons of stuff already, this is most likely going to be the case (locked out).

Arcade - pretty sure as long as you haven't reached a certain point in the main plot(close to the end), you can do his anytime. His is just triggered by taking him to certain places and he'll say stuff. There are also some quest-specific situations for gaining trust points that you can be missed/locked out of, but there's enough others to do without those. He won't trigger his quest until a certain point in the game even after you get the favor points. I think if you do YesMan you don't even need the trust points, but never went that way myself so no personal experience.

Raul - there was a bug with Ranger Andy (and maybe the others) where you couldn't trigger Raul's quest if you'd already talked to Randy/the others without Raul present (Raul's dialogue would then not trigger). This was fixed in one of the patches, but with this game, whether the fix actually works for you is always up in the air.

Cass - If you've killed the Van Graffs or McLafferty, her quest may stall/not be completable since confronting them are vital to her quest. Other than that, should be able to do it any time.

Veronica - if you've destroyed the BoS bunker already (no npc's in there) I'd make the guess you'd be locked out. Other than that I'm not sure. She's always been a bit wacky for me...she supposedly has quite a few triggers and sometimes will trigger even without those under certain circumstances, so hard to say for sure.

Lily - no idea, don't care.

EDE - with the patches I think he's doable no matter what (should be, if not glitched), except if the BoS bunker is gone.

Edit: In short, there's no single/simple answer. Each companion is a bit different in regards to whether you can do their quest "at anytime" - even if you can do them "anytime", there may only be one specific path left to you if you wait a long time.

Personally I'd advise you to go through the quest guides on the wiki for each companion quest ... it'll list known triggers/combos, possible bugs/glitches, etc. http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas_companions

Thanks for the reply. I already have a pretty good list of trigger points, but I wasn't sure whether to avoid things or what. Judging by that, I'll probably do Arcade last, since I tend to do all of the major sidequests before I continue the main quest in any great capacity. I wonder how early I can get to Raul without getting torn to shreds by the supermutants...

You used to be able to get Raul early level (like maybe lvl5) by going in the back way over the mountain or something (still had to deal with some mutants where he is) but not sure if one of the patches made this a lot harder.

If you go at low level, the mutants/invisible guys are often less in number and possibly less strong weapons-spawning wise. In my experience anyway. It could also be the fact that sometimes areas don't spawn the enemies like they're supposed to (eg if you reload they're suddenly there or not there).

You can also get Boone (or Veronica) early, use him to get up the mt, and then fire him before talking/getting Raul.

Crimson: Yeah, I remember going in at level 3 on my 1st hardcoe guy- he had 2 stealth boys and got Raul. Shame I was playing on hardcoe, Raul lasted in my service for not even 15 seconds and he got blasted by Annabelle.