As I was trying to be liked by everyone in my playthrough, one of the parts of the game that irritated me was that I could never figure out how to raise your reputation with the Raiders above "neutral". No matter how you approached them, they always attack on sight. There doesn't seem to be so much as an article on the Fallout 2 raider camp on the wiki, so it's hard to get a clear answer here. There seems to be some unique NPCs in the camp, including a tribal- I keep thinking if you pull off some quests in New Reno first you might be able to talk to them. Does anyone know if there is a way to increase this reputation, or at least enter the camp without being attacked?

No.

Although there were bigger plans for Shadow Who Walks I think it was always going to be a combat area. Mercs don't tend to like it when stangers walk into their secret bases after all...

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Mercenaries%27_cave

Ah, so they renamed it. All I knew is that John Bishop got pissed when you talk to him after you kill the raiders (he even accuses you of being seen having a robobrain companion, even if you don't), so I figured if you talked to him first you might be able to help the mercs wipe out Vault City.

Given how obnoxious Lynette was I think a lot of players would have chosen this option.

That would be a very fun option Time for a mod?

Heh, well, I have no modding experience with the game, but some of the tools I've seen look pretty powerful. Do you think it's worth checking out?