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FAQ TITLE:

The Fallout: New Vegas Optimal Playthru Guide

COPYRIGHT INFO:

This FAQ is copyright 2013 by Stanley E. Dunigan (dunigase@yahoo.com).

Always check one of the official host websites listed below for the latest
version of this FAQ.

GameFAQs (www.gamefaqs.com) -- always the first site updated
Neoseeker (www.neoseeker.com)

Check the Universal Hint System (www.uhs-hints.com) for my complete Fallout: New
Vegas hint file. It's not a FAQ-style walkthru, but instead organizes the hints
into a hypertext-like Q&A document, making it easier to find the hints you need
without accidentally seeing other hints you don't want yet.

FAQ DESCRIPTION:

As with Fallout 3, I had an irresistible urge to replay Fallout: New Vegas, and
to write an optimized walkthrough-like guide for it. This one is done the same
way as my Fallout 3 optimized guide, meaning that I carefully went through
everything that was available in the game (including all official add-ons) and
decided what was most useful in making a powerful and flexible character. My
focus is less on stealth this time, and more on big-time damage dealing.
However, stealth and sneaky long-range shooting are still a large part of it,
especially since the GRA-brand anti-materiel rifle and its explosive rounds make
for some *serious* long-range sniping power!

Everything in this FAQ is based on playthrus of Fallout: New Vegas on the PC
with all four official add-on games, plus the little "Courier's Stash" and "Gun
Runners' Arsenal" add-ons (and no other mods at all). Any differences you
experience will probably be due to playing with a different set of add-ons or on
a different gaming platform.

VERSION 1.0 (11/11/2013) NOTES AND CREDITS:

This is the original version of this guide, so I have no one else to credit yet.

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********************************************************************************
***************************  CREATING YOUR CHARACTER  **************************
********************************************************************************

After you start a new game, create a male character, then give him the following
attributes, tag skills, and traits. (Note that Medicine and Science are only
temporary tag skills, and will be changed to Guns and Sneak later on.)

Strength: 7
Perception: 6
Endurance: 8
Charisma: 1
Intelligence: 6
Agility: 5
Luck: 7

Tag Skills: Medicine, Repair, Science
Traits: Built to Destroy, Skilled

After Doc Mitchell leads you to the exit door and gives you a Pip-Boy, you'll be
asked whether or not you want to activate hardcore mode. The answer to that
question is an ear-shattering, super-sonic, earth-shaking "NO!" (Trust me on
this one.)


********************************************************************************
*******************************  A BRIEF SUMMARY  ******************************
********************************************************************************

Before I get started with the detailed walkthru sections, I will first provide a
brief summary of what each section involves. That way, you can skip reading all
the details if you're really familiar with the game, and can just go for the
goods on your own.

GETTING STARTED AT GOODSPRINGS

- Loot Doc Mitchell's house and sell unwanted items to him.
- Find the "free" home and start storing stuff there.
- Get a Sneak skill book and a roving trader outfit.
- Sell more stuff to Chet in the general store and steal a few things from it.
- Go to the cemetery and pick up the Goodsprings snowglobe and one of Benny's
  distinctive cigarette butts.
- Talk to Sunny Smiles and do her two quests.
- Look all around Goodsprings for more loot.
- Get a stealth boy from the school's safe, then pickpocket one from Joe Cobb.

MAKING YOUR WAY TO NEW VEGAS

- Travel to Primm and sneakily steal some NCR supplies.
- Fix up ED-E to make him a follower.
- Get the hotel's Barter skill book and finish the "My Kind of Town" quest.
- Get the Guns skill book from the Nevada Highway Patrol Station.
- Get the Unarmed skill book from the Nipton Road Reststop.
- Use all of your saved-up skill books after reaching level 4.
- Get the Explosives skill book and lots of NCR dogtags from the Mojave Outpost.
- Loot Nipton and get the Science skill book from its town hall.
- Revisit Primm's casino and deal with the thugs who show up.
- Get the Lockpick skill book from Wolfhorn Ranch.
- Go to Novac and do Boone's "One For My Baby" quest.
- Steal That Gun and get the Medicine skill book from Ranger Andy's bungalow.
- Do the "Checking on Charlie" undocumented quest and get a free motel room.
- Read the terminal in Manny Vargas' motel room, then go to Boulder City and
  talk to Jessup about the platinum chip.
- Go to the 188 Trading Post and get Veronica to be a follower.
- Loot Camp McCarran, including the sniper rifle in one of the tents.
- Steal an NCR uniform from the concourse area and wear it while taking the
  monorail to the New Vegas Strip.
- Discover the Strip North Gate area.

BECOMING THE CASINO KING

- Get the Old Mormon Fort's snowglobe.
- Steal the Naughty Nightwear from Mick & Ralph's store.
- Buy the Luck implant at the New Vegas Medical Clinic.
- Win the limit in Primm's casino.
- Buy the Agility implant at the New Vegas Medical Clinic.
- Win the limit in Freeside's Atomic Wrangler.
- Win the limit in the Strip's Gomorrah and Ultra Luxe casinos.
- Win the limit in the Tops casino while avoiding Benny.
- Get Vault 21's snowglobe.
- Go to the Lucky 38 casino's penthouse and sell snowglobes to Jane.
- Buy all of the Presidential Suite's upgrades and decide which containers to
  use for long-term item storage.
- Loot the Cocktail Lounge for a snowglobe and a stealth boy in a safe.
- Sell the snowglobe to Jane, and loot the penthouse and casino areas.
- Use the Mojave Express dropboxes to move all stored loot from Goodsprings and
  Novac to the Lucky 38's Presidential Suite.
- Craft all the items you can at the Presidential Suite's workbench and the
  campfires that are near the Strip North Gate area.

GETTING SOME SERIOUS WEAPONS

- Loot the Silver Rush building in Freeside.
- Get the Repair and Explosives skill books from Sloan.
- Loot the Brotherhood's bunker at Hidden Valley, including an Energy Weapons
  skill book.
- Talk to Elder McNamara, then buy a ballistic fist from Knight Torres.
- Do Knight Torres' missing laser pistol quest.
- Sneak-attack and loot generic NCR troopers at Camp McCarran.
- Finish the "Boulder City Showdown" quest by convincing Jessup to let the NCR
  hostages go.
- Sneak-attack all the generic NCR personnel at Hoover Dam.
- Get the dam's snowglobe, and keep an engineer jumpsuit for repair work.
- Sell the dam's snowglobe to Jane in the Lucky 38's penthouse.
- Sneak-attack all the NCR rangers at Camp Golf and loot the main building.
- Discover the Spring Mt. State Ranch Park and Gun Runners locations.
- Make some weapon repair kits and use them to repair expensive low-condition
  weapons that you're willing to sell. Also repair some cheaper weapons and
  armor together for selling.
- Load up on sellable stuff and go to the Gun Runners kiosk.
- Buy a GRA-brand anti-materiel rifle, plus all the anti-materiel rifle mods and
  .50 MG explosive rounds that the vendortron has.
- Use the merchant trick to get both sniper rifle mods, plus lots of powder and
  primer, while selling off the stuff you brought with you.
- Buy every remaining implant from the New Vegas Medical Clinic except Charisma.
- Use the merchant trick with the Great Khans merchant, buying lots of .308, .50
  MG, and 5mm rounds (especially 5mm regular and AP rounds).
- Buy .50 MG explosive rounds from Knight Torres in Hidden valley and Alexander
  at the 188 Trading Post.
- Apply mods to your new anti-material rifle and a sniper rifle.
- Get the Guns skill book from Raul's shack.
- Loot Bitter Springs and sneak-attack its generic troopers.
- Get the Lockpick skill book from the Bitter Springs Recreation Area.
- Get the CZ57 Avenger from the Devil's Throat area.

GETTING SOME USEFUL APPAREL

- Finish the "Ring-a-Ding-Ding" main quest to get the platinum chip.
- Turn the platinum chip over to Mr. House.
- Do the "The Moon Comes Over the Tower" quest.
- Get the Sneak skill book from Camp Searchlight.
- Go to Cottonwood Cove and steal its Melee Weapons skill book.
- Give all the NCR dogtags you've collected to Aurelius of Phoenix.
- Go to the Fort and talk to Caesar in his tent.
- Talk to Lucius in Caesar's tent to get the key to the Legion Safehouse.
- Visit the Legion Safehouse and get the Lucky Shades.
- Do the "High Times" quest, and arrange for Julie Farkas to get steady medical
  supplies from the Garrets.
- Donate medical supplies to Julie until she gives you the Followers Lab Coat.
- Do the Honest Hearts add-on to get Joshua Graham's Armor, the "A Light Shining
  in Darkness" pistol, and Daniel's Hat.
- Ambush-kill and loot generic troopers at Camp McCarran and Hoover Dam again.
- Repair expensive weapons and armor with cheaper ones, then do another
  "merchant run" to Gun Runners and the Great Khans armorer.

GETTING SKILL BOOKS AND XP

- Get the Medicine skill book from the Followers' Safehouse.
- Get the Lockpick skill book that's in the Silverpeak Mine's shack.
- Loot Jacobstown, not missing the snowglobe and Melee Weapons skill book.
- Go to the Brooks Tumbleweed Ranch and kill the crazy nightkin for a stealth
  boy, then get the Speech skill book from the ranch house.
- Kill the mercs at the camp NE of the ranch to get the YCS/186.
- Sell Jacobstown's snowglobe to Jane in the Lucky 38's penthouse.
- Get all the remaining skill books that don't require you to do a quest.
- Do the "Bleed Me Dry" quest until you agree to go after night stalker eggs.
- Fight some deathclaws in the Thorn for XP and caps.
- Keep fighting in the Thorn and ambush-killing generic NPCs in various areas
  until you reach level 26.

GETTING MORE STUFF FROM ADD-ONS

- Do the Lonesome Road add-on, getting all the skill books and eyebot upgrades.
- When you reach Ulysses' temple, get the Lonesome Road perk.
- Choose to bomb both the Legion and the NCR to open up two new areas to loot.
- When it's over, add a point to Endurance, and start wearing Ulysses' Duster.
- Talk to Ambassador Crocker in the NCR Embassy to erase your NCR infamy.
- Loot the Courier's Mile area in the Divide, plus the new newly nuked areas.
- Turn in saved-up NCR dogtags to Aurelius of Phoenix in Cottonwood Cove again.
- Buy the Charisma implant from the New Vegas Medical Clinic.
- Get up to level 38 by fighting at the Thorn, ambush-killing generic NPCs,
  and/or going deathclaw hunting.
- Move all of your saved-up coffee mugs, pencils, etc., plus several atomic
  cocktails and weapons repair kits, to the Mojave Drive-in.
- Pick all of that stuff up at once and start the Old World Blues add-on.
- Store everything in the Sink area's containers, then finish the "Welcome to
  the Big Empty" quest.
- Get the three auto-doc holotapes from the Y-17 Medical Facility.
- Do the auto-doc's psychiatric evaluation to change your traits to "Built to
  Destroy" and "Four Eyes."
- Buy the auto-doc's C-13 implant to get a +10% damage increase vs. cazadors.
- Kill all the cazadors in the Z-14 Pepsinae DNA Splicing Lab, and pick up the
  Implant M-5 holotape.
- Buy the M-5 implant from the auto-doc to increase sneak-running speed by 20%.
- Loot Higgs Village to get personality holotapes for the book chute and
  jukebox, plus the sonic emitter's tarantula upgrade holotape.
- Have the Sink's jukebox retune your sonic emitter to the tarantula setting.
- Look around Little Yangtze to get Christine's COS Silencer Rifle, two protonic
  inversal axes, and the book chute's upgrade holotape.
- Do the "X-8: High School Horror!" quest until you get the "X-8: Data Retrieval
  Test" quest, then finish it.
- Kill off the respawned cazadors at the Z-14 Lab to get the final rank of the
  DNAvenger perk.
- Get and install the personality holotapes for Muggy and the toaster.
- Get all of your saved up coffee mugs, etc. converted into useful items.
- Finish the main quest series, then have your spine re-implanted.
- Do the "Project X-13" quest, then redo the robot compliance test to get
  stealth boys.

GETTING TO LEVEL 50

- Optionally move stored items from the Lucky 38 to the Sink, or vice-versa.
- Get to level 49 by exploring more of the Big MT area, fighting in the Thorn,
  finishing the Brotherhood of Steel's quests, etc.
- Do karma-altering activities until your karma is in the range you need for the
  level 50 perk you want to get.
- Do non-karma-altering combats until you reach level 50.

MOVING ON FROM THERE

- Do all the misc. and faction quests you haven't finished yet, including the
  Dead Money add-on.
- Finish up the main quest series, after which the game will be over.


********************************************************************************
***********************  GETTING STARTED AT GOODSPRINGS  ***********************
********************************************************************************

Talk to Doc Mitchell and use the Medicine 30 check to get some extra stimpaks,
then turn the Pip-Boy's light on and look all around the house for loot. Pick up
everything, and get more stimpaks from the chemistry set that's in one of the
rooms. After that, do merchant business with Doc Mitchell to sell off everything
you don't want to keep. (Be sure to use the second list in the "Reference Lists"
section at the bottom of this file to see what all junky-looking stuff will be
useful to keep for later.)

After you exit the house, talk to the securitron named Victor about everything,
then go SE to find a Goodsprings home that you can enter. All of its stuff is
legal to take, and you can rest in its two beds. After looting the place, use
its containers to store everything that you want to keep but not carry around
with you all the time. Leave that home and loot the one that's just to the SW,
being sure to get the Sneak skill book that's on the bookshelves, plus the
Sunset Sarsaparilla Star Bottle Cap that's on the kitchen counter. (Note that
you should save the skill book for after you get the Comprehension perk.)

Go back outside and use the game's wait feature to start a 24-hour wait. It'll
be interrupted at some point by a guy named Malcolm Holmes. Talk to him about
the star bottle caps, then crouch down and kill him with a sneak-attack critical
head shot. (It doesn't matter if other people see you do it, since Holmes isn't
affiliated with Goodsprings in any way.) Loot his body to get his roving trader
hat and outfit, each of which adds 5 to the Barter skill when worn. Keep them
with you and wear them whenever you're doing business with any merchant from now
on.

Head north to find the Goodsprings General Store. Sneakily loot the crates and
sacks that are near it, and look along its right wall to find a reloading bench
and a workbench that you can use whenever you want to. Enter the store and sell
unwanted stuff to Chet (don't forget to wear your new roving trader outfit),
then buy a shovel from him. Quicksave, then look around for some useful items to
steal, including a Barter skill magazine on a lower shelf and a silenced .22
pistol on the display counter. You don't need to worry about karma, but do be
careful not to get caught. Also, don't bother stealing items that you'd only
want to sell rather than keep.

Leave the store and go NE from the saloon until you reach the top of the hill
where the Goodsprings Cemetery is. Go to the north end to find the open grave
you were rescued from, then look on the ground next to it to find several
distinctive cigarette butts. Take one or more of the butts, then go a short way
NW to find a grave with the Goodsprings snowglobe next to it. Take that, then
look around for several graves that you can dig up with your new shovel to find
a few items.

Fast-travel back to Goodsprings, then go south to return to your annexed home
and store stuff. Enter the saloon and talk to Sunny Smiles. Ask about the areas
around Goodsprings to get Sloan and Primm marked on your world map, then ask if
there's any work available to get a Lockpick skill book and 3 bobby pins. Say
Doc Mitchell sent you to get the "Back in the Saddle" quest, then wait for Sunny
to leave the saloon so you can loot the place. Don't miss the small side room
with a terminal on a desk, since you can hack it to open up a floor safe with
lots of good stuff in it.

NOTE: If there's a Goodsprings settler sitting at the bar, you can crouch down
behind him and kill him with a sneak-attack head shot, after which you can loot
his body and the stuff on the back counter. If someone else is in the bar, such
as Easy Pete, wait an hour (or more, if necessary) to get him to leave before
sneak-attacking the settler.

When you're done, go store stuff, then meet Sunny behind the saloon and get
started on her quest. After you finish it, do the "By a Campfire on the Trail"
quest, after which you'll undoubtedly level up. Choose Confirmed Bachelor for
your perk, and use your 13 skill points like this:

Guns => 25
Lockpick => 25
Repair => 45

Talk to Trudy to get the "Ghost Town Gunfight" quest and sell off excess stuff,
then exit the saloon and go west to reach the Goodsprings Gas Station. Go inside
and talk to Ringo, then loot the place (noting that the ammo under the cash
register must be sneakily stolen). Look all around Goodsprings for more homes
and containers to loot, plus plants to pick, storing stuff in "your" home
periodically to avoid getting overloaded. Be sure to loot the school, picking
open its safe (or hacking the terminal to open it) so you can get a stealth boy.

To get another stealth boy, find Joe Cobb leaning against a corner of the small
boarded-up house that's just SE of yours, and get to where you can pickpocket
him unseen. Quicksave, then keep trying to get his stealth boy until you succeed
or give up. (Note that you can sneak-shoot him in the head for an instant kill,
but that'll turn all Powder Gangers hostile and fail one of their quests, so
it's not a good idea.)

NOTE: You should pick up every skill magazine you find, but you don't
necessarily need to keep them all. You probably won't ever use any magazines for
the Energy Weapons, Explosives, Melee Weapons, or Unarmed skills, so sell them
off for extra caps. You could also sell off your Survival magazines, but they
may come in handy for making stuff at campfires, such as antivenom.


********************************************************************************
************************  MAKING YOUR WAY TO NEW VEGAS  ************************
********************************************************************************

Store and sell off stuff to minimize your inventory before you fast-travel back
to Goodsprings Source. Go south from there until you get the prompt to rebuild
your character. Do so, giving him the exact same attributes and traits as
before, but make his tag skills be Guns, Repair, and Sneak. After that, you'll
need to redo your level-up. Choose Confirmed Bachelor as your perk, and do the
following with your skill points:

Guns => 45
Lockpick => 30
Repair => 45
Science => 30
Speech => 21

Once that's done, continue south until you reach Primm, watching out for
numerous geckos as you go. Return to Goodsprings and rest in one of the beds in
your home to heal up if you get badly injured so you can save on stimpaks. Right
after you discover Primm, an NCR trooper will talk to you about the situation
there. Sneakily pickpocket his NCR dogtag, since it'll come in handy later on.
Move on down the highway until you reach a small shelter with three ammo boxes
that you can sneakily raid, then go back up to where the trooper is and around
the big fence to find another shelter with more ammo boxes to raid.

Go south from there until you reach some wooden street barricades, then check
the large ruined building on the right for a floor safe. Search the small NCR
camp past the street barricades to find some stealable stuff, including a couple
more NCR guys who have dogtags you can pickpocket. Go back past the barricades
and enter the ruined building on the right, then go up its stairs and across a
metal walkway to reach another shelter with ammo boxes to steal from. Drop down
to the north to find more ammo boxes, then crouch-walk your way across the
wrecky overpass, disarming and taking all three of the frag mines that are set
on it.

Past the overpass, crouch down and move forward until you can see an escaped
convict or two over to the left, near the large casino building. They aren't
very tough, so you might want to charge them and take them down quickly. An
alternative is to get their attention, then run back across the overpass to get
the nearby NCR soldier to help you. (Or set the three frag mines you just got
and lead the convicts across them.) Once they're finished off, enter the Nash
Residence, then examine the eyebot on the counter. Loot the place, then go enter
the Vikki and Vance Casino and talk to Johnson Nash. Ask him about the men who
shot you to advance the main quest, then ask about his robot to get the "ED-E My
Love" quest.

Do merchant business with Nash, then return to Goodsprings to rest and store
loot. Repairing ED-E will require 3 scrap metal, 2 sensor modules, and a scrap
electronics item, so get those from your item storage. Return to Primm and fix
ED-E up to make him a follower, then go up the stairs in the building that's
next to the Nash Residence to find some ammo and a Guns skill magazine. Crouch
down before entering the Bison Steve Hotel, and try to sneak-shoot the escaped
convict who's on the other side of the large entry room. Let ED-E finish him and
another convict off, then look on the counter for a terminal you can hack to
open a door that leads to a storage room.

Get the key off the table, plus whatever else you want, then crouch-walk your
way through the entry room's back doorway and into the gift shop. Loot it, not
missing the Barter skill book that's next to the floor safe, then exit the gift
shop and move along the left wall unti you come to the door that your new key
opens. Sneak through it and quicksave, then sneak-shoot the convict who's
patrolling the hallway on the right (if there's one there). You should be able
to kill him with one sneaky head shot, so keep quickrestoring and trying again
until you succeed. Sneak into the kitchen and free Deputy Beagle, encouraging
him to run off rather than stick around. Try to sneak away undetected, and be
ready to back ED-E up if any of the other nearby convicts detect you.

Look around for loot if you don't want to sneak out right away, then talk to
Deputy Beagle once you're outside. Ask about the man in the checkered suit, then
talk to him about who's going to be the new sheriff of Primm. Enter the casino
and find the dressed-up protectron named Primm Slim, then talk to it and use the
Science 30 option to reprogram it to be the new sheriff. That'll finish the "My
Kind of Town" quest, and you'll be able to level up again. You don't get any
perks this time, but you do get 13 more skill points.

Guns => 50
Repair => 50
Speech => 24

Look north and NW of the casino for two small buildings to loot, then return to
Goodsprings to sell and store stuff. Go back to Primm, then head south down the
highway until you reach the Nevada Highway Patrol Station. Kill off all the
hostiles outside the station, then go inside to find several more (including
mantises). Loot the place, not missing the Guns skill book that's on one of the
desks. Continue south down the highway until you come to a large group of old
vehicles, then look to the NW for the Nipton Road Reststop. Hang back and dodge
around while ED-E kills off all the radscorpions at the reststop, then look
around for loot, including on a dead ghoul that's next to the main sign. Don't
miss the Unarmed skill book that's in the general store, on the wooden shelves.
(As usual, save it for after you get the Comprehension perk.)

You'll probably level up again before long. When you do, take the Comprehension
perk, and spend your skill points like this:

Lockpick => 35
Medicine => 30
Repair => 55
Speech => 25

Once you have the Comprehension perk, it'll be time to use all of the skill
books you've accumulated so far. If you've stored any in Goodsprings, make a
special trip back there and use them.

Look for more loot in the back of the large red-and-white truck that's just SE
of the reststop, then return to the main vehicle group and go SW to reach the
Mojave Outpost. Search all around it for loot, including many NCR troopers to
pickpocket dogtags from. There's also a merchant in the barracks building, and
an Explosives skill book on one of her under-the-counter shelves. Pick it up in
grab mode, then carry it off somewhere so you can take it unseen. Steal whatever
else you want to, then store stuff in Goodsprings before returning to the Nipton
Road Reststop. Go east down the road until you reach a gap in it, then go around
the gap on either side so you can get back on the road. Keep going east while
watching out for giant ants and Jackal Gang members.

As you go down the road past the Nipton Road Pit Stop, you'll probably see
and/or hear two people shooting at each other. That has to do with the whole
"star bottle cap" thing, so you can ignore it if you want to. Enter Nipton and
talk to a lottery-winning nut, then make your way along the street until you
meet some Legionnaires who are exiting the town hall building. When Vulpes
Inculta talks to you, ask what lessons were learned, then keep talking until you
can say that you admire the purity of the Legion's justice to get some Legion
fame. Loot the town hall building, watching out for Legion mongrels and frag
mines, and don't miss the Science skill book that's in the large SE room on the
top floor.

When you're done in the town hall building, loot the rest of the town, returning
to Goodsprings to store and sell stuff whenever you get a full load. (Remember
that ED-E can carry lots of stuff for you.) When you're done with that, go to
Primm and enter the casino, then move forward and wait a bit to see if some
thugs will enter and talk to you. If not, try exiting the casino, waiting
several hours, and reentering. When they appear, you can either pay them off or
fight them.

Look around the casino for items to steal, then go rest and store stuff in
Goodsprings. Return to Nipton and go east down the road until you get near the
point where it curves north. Check the back of the wrecked blue-and-white truck
for loot, then quicksave before proceeding slowly to where several Viper Gang
members ambush you. Run back to the truck for cover, and use V.A.T.S. to help
you kill off anyone who comes close. You'll probably hit level 5 right about
now, so do the following with your skill points:

Lockpick => 40
Repair => 57
Science => 40

Continue down the road until you reach a major intersection, then look to the
south for Wolfhorn Ranch. Loot it, not missing the Lockpick skill book that's on
the floor in the farmhouse, then head north toward Novac. You should soon
encounter a combat between some Legionnaires and NCR forces. Wait until it's
over, then loot all of the dead bodies before moving on. If there are any
traveling traders nearby, you can do merchant business with them, but resist the
urge to buy anything that's very expensive. Watch out for a small Viper Gang
ambush on your way to Ranger Station Charlie, then keep going without exploring
the station.

When you reach Novac, enter the Dino Dee-lite Front Desk area and talk to
Jeannie May Crawford. (If she's not there, go back outside and wait a few hours
for her to return to work.) Talk to her about the man in the checkered coat,
then ask her what this place is and where you can get some supplies. Also, ask
what there is of interest around here to get a couple of places marked on your
world map. Go back outside and through the fence gate, then go around the big
dinosaur's tail so you can enter its gift shop. Tell Cliff Briscoe that Jeannie
May sent you, then ask about what he sells so you can access his store
inventory. Sell unwanted stuff off, then go up the stairs and through the door
that leads to the dinosaur's mouth to see if Boone is on sniper duty. If he
isn't, reenter the gift shop and wait until after 9 pm, then check again. Once
he's up there, talk to him to get the "One For My Baby" quest.

Reenter the gift shop, then wait if necessary for Cliff Briscoe to leave (or
sneak around while he's still there). Steal anything you want, including the
unique pistol called That Gun. (It's on a shelf next to a bunch of rocket
souvenirs behind the locked door that's behind the counter.) Go loot the Dino
Dee-lite Front Desk area, not neglecting to clear out the floor safe. Wait if
necessary until it's after 9 pm, then go find Jeannie May Crawford, who'll be in
her house to the NW if she's not in the front desk area. Talk to her and tell
her that there's something she should see in front of the dinosaur. Follow her
there, then go to inventory and put on Boone's beret. After Boone kills her,
loot her body, then return to the dinosaur's mouth and talk to Boone. Mention
the bill of sale you got from the safe to prove that Jeannie May was the guilty
one, then talk Boone into becoming a follower. Put on the 1st Recon Beret he
gives you and keep it on, since it'll add 1 to your Perception and 5 to your
critical chance percentage.

Exit the dinosaur and look nearby for Ranger Andy's bungalow. Sneakily steal the
Medicine skill book that's on the bed, then talk to Ranger Andy and ask him
about being with the NCR. Volunteer to check on his friends at Ranger Station
Charlie, then fast-travel back there. Check around the compound for misc. loot
before entering the main building. Crouch down and watch for traps to disarm as
you sneak around, including two dead NCR troopers with frag mines next to them
and a doorway with a tripwire across it. Pick up and listen to the audio log
that's on top of a metal box stack in the entry room, then return to Novac and
tell Ranger Andy that everyone at the station was wiped out. Say that the Legion
did it to get some fame and caps.

Go to the gift shop and wait if necessary for Cliff Briscoe to show up, then
talk to him to get the key to the locked upper-floor motel room. It counts as an
official home, so you can store stuff there and get the Well Rested XP bonus
from sleeping in its bed. Head over to the nearby gas station and look around it
for lots of good stuff to steal, making sure no one sees you do it. Remember to
use grab mode to carry things off somewhere more private when necessary.
Continue looting Novac, storing stuff in your motel room whenever you and your
two followers have a full load.

While looting Manny Vargas' motel room, read the message that's on his terminal
to update the main quest. When you're done looting Novac, store excess items in
your new motel room, then go north to discover the Gibson Scrapyard. Talk to Old
Lady Gibson to trigger a recording in ED-E, then do merchant business with her
if you want before heading NE to El Dorado Gas & Service. Check around for loot,
then go NE until you reach Boulder City. (Watch out for radscorpions on the
way.) Go around to the Big Horn Saloon, then go inside and do a bit of merchant
business with Ike. Steal some good stuff from behind the counter and the back
room, then leave the saloon and go east until you find Lieutenant Monroe in a
side area.

Talk to Monroe and say that you'll negotiate with the Great Khans, then go
through the "door" that's next to him. Pickpocket dogtags from the nearby NCR
troopers, then go down to the other end of the ruins and find the door that
leads to the Great Khans Hideout area. Ask Jessup about the platinum chip, then
exit conversation and level up. The perk to get this time is Toughness, and
here's how to spend your skill points:

Guns => 55
Lockpick => 45
Repair => 60
Sneak => 48
Speech => 30

You may get enough XP to reach level 7 right away (or soon after), so here's how
to use your skill points then:

Lockpick => 50
Repair => 65
Science => 43

Look in the back of Jessup's room for a dead guy and two ammo boxes you can
loot. Leave the hideout, then go SE to find a two-story building with some
shelves on the top floor. Get the critical chance magazine from the shelves, and
be sure to save it for later on. Leave the ruins area, then go NW to the train
station building. Check inside it for a bit of loot, then get on the nearby road
and follow it W/NW to the 188 Trading Post.

Take back any items you've given Boone to carry for you, then dismiss him. Talk
to Veronica to get her to become a follower, then do merchant business with
Michelle or Samuel. There's also an arms merchant next to a truck on one of the
bridges, and a guy named Alexander underneath the other bridge. Check their
inventories if you like, but resist the urge to buy anything expensive. Head
west down the road past the arms merchant's bridge, and keep following it along
until you reach the Grub n' Gulp Rest Stop. Talk to its two merchants if you
want, then check the picnic tables next to the shack for a few items, including
a Barter skill magazine.

Continue down the road until you come to a flaming barrel, then pickpocket the
dogtags from any nearby NCR troopers before turning left (west) and following
the road to where you can discover the Aerotech Office Park on your left. Keep
going west down the road until you can turn left and go over to Camp McCarran's
entrance, then enter it and look all around the outdoor area for stuff to
sneakily steal, not missing the sniper rifle that's on an upper bunk in the
larger tent that's near the SW corner of the tent array. (Note that it doesn't
have to be sneakily taken, since it's not an owned item.)

When you're done, return to Goodsprings or Novac to store stuff, then return to
Camp McCarran and enter the huge terminal building. Scour both floors for stuff
to steal, staying away from the upper floor's NE area, where two NCR troopers
are guarding a door. Use one of the upper-floor doors that lead to the concourse
area, then scout it out for loot. Be sure to steal an NCR uniform from one of
the two "Armor Case" footlockers if you don't already have one from somewhere
else. One of those footlockers is in the NE section of the concourse, and the
other one is in the supply shack area.

Talk to Sgt. Daniel Contreras in the supply shack area, and buy any ultrajet he
has in inventory. (He's your only source for ultrajet, so remember to keep
checking back with him every week or so for more.) You can also sell him some of
the stuff you've been stealing. When you're done, return to the terminal
building's upper floor, then put on an NCR outfit and go through the guarded
door that's in the NE area. Go up the steps that are next to the monorail, then
activate it to travel to the New Vegas Strip's monorail station. Go through the
nearby doors and down some stairs, then talk to the NCR trooper who approaches
you. Activate the nearby Mojave Express Dropbox, then exit to the Strip and talk
to Victor.

Go down the steps and look for a woman named Street Vendor standing nearby. Do a
bit of merchant business with her (sell off your NCR uniforms, if you like),
then look around for nine red magazine vending machines. Each of those machines
will give you one random skill magazine when you open it, so quicksave next to
each one and keep trying until you get a useful magazine. (Remember that Energy
Weapons, Explosives, Melee Weapons, or Unarmed skill magazines are of no use to
you, and Survival magazines will be of little or no use.) When you're done with
that, go through the large gate to the north, then go NE to find another large
gate. Go through it and move forward to discover the Strip North Gate area,
which you can fast-travel to anytime you're wanting to reenter the Strip.


********************************************************************************
**************************  BECOMING THE CASINO KING  **************************
********************************************************************************

Go NE from the Strip North Gate until a guy named Old Ben talks to you, but
don't worry about what he says. The gate's securitrons saw you come through from
the Strip, so they'll assume you have clearance to go back in whenever you want.
Watch for hostile thugs as you go NE to the blue-metal junk gate that leads to
Freeside's outer section, then go forward until you reach the Old Mormon Fort.
Enter it, then immediately turn right and go over to the door that's in the
corner. Go through it, then go up the stairs and look for a snowglobe on some
wooden shelves. Take it, then exit the fort and go back SW to the street
intersection.

Turn left and go down to Mick & Ralph's store. Go inside and ask Mick about
special items, then use the Speech 30 option to get him to open up a secret side
room. Crouch down and move up against the bars, then wait if necessary for your
stealth indicator to read "[HIDDEN]" so you can steal the Naughty Nightwear
unseen. Sneak around and steal some more stuff if you want, then leave the store
and turn left. Go through the large gate to discover the Freeside's East Gate
area, then go north while watching out for fiends to reach the Crimson Caravan
Company's entry gate. Go through it, then cross the compound and go out through
its other gate. Just ahead and on the left is the New Vegas Medical Clinic, so
enter it and look around for Doctor Usanagi.

Talk to her and buy the Luck implant (you should have way more than enough money
for it by now), then put on the Naughty Nightwear to get your Luck up to 9.
Fast-travel to Primm, then enter the Vikki and Vance Casino to find that it's
been restored. Trade in 200 caps for chips at the bank window, then go over to
one of the blackjack tables and quicksave. Play a game of blackjack, betting the
max. If you win, exit the table view and quicksave. If you lose, try playing
again without quickrestoring to see if you can win back what you lost right
away. If not, quickrestore and keep trying to play blackjack again until the
game will let you (or spend the next real-time minute trying to pickpocket stuff
from someone). Whenever you win and the game automatically exits the table view,
wait for the floor manager to talk to you and give you something.

The earnings limit at this casino is 2500, so be careful not to exceed that.
When you get up to 2300, start making smaller bets. Once your earnings are just
under 2500, keep trying to double down until you win 400 chips, which will bring
your total winnings up to nearly 2900. Go cash your chips in for caps at the
bank, then sneakily pick open the locked door that's to the right of the bank
window. You can then sneak around and loot the bank area, including some of the
safes. Leave the casino and check to make sure you have at least 4000 caps. If
not, sell whatever you have to in order to get up to that total (or work ahead
on the next casino). Return to the New Vegas Clinic and buy the Agility implant
from Doctor Usanagi. You'll want to be sure to have it in place before you reach
level 8.

Fast-travel to the Crimson Caravan Company, then go north to discover Freeside's
North Gate. Go in through the big gate, then go straight forward to where you
can use the blue-metal junk gate to enter Freeside's inner section. Go forward
to the street intersection, then turn right and go over to the Atomic Wrangler
Casino. Do the same thing there that you did in Primm's casino, the only
difference being that the earnings limit is 5000. When you're done, cash in your
chips, and forget about robbing this bank. (Its door's lock is "very hard.") Go
back to the New Vegas Strip and proceed to win big at the Gomorrah and Ultra
Luxe casinos. (Note that each of those casinos will make you surrender your
weapons when you first enter.)

Last but not least is the Tops Casino. Benny is standing around at the north end
of the northern gambling floor, so don't go down that way. Instead, find the
bank on the upper floor, then get 200 caps and go play blackjack on the western
gambling floor. Once you finish with it and cash in your chips, you should have
a whole *heck* of a lot of money! However, there's more easy money to be gotten
by selling some snowglobes to a rich collector.

Leave the Tops Casino and go through the large gate to the south, then enter the
Vault 21 Gift Shop. Go through the metal door in the back of the shop, then down
the stairs and through another door to reach the main Vault 21 area. Go down
stairs in it until you find a large room with blackjack tables in it, then go
through the doorway in its NE corner. Go down the hallway that's straight ahead,
then pick the lock on the door that's on the left. Past it, get the snowglobe
that's on a small table between two beds.

Return to the Strip, then head north down it until you reach the Lucky 38
Casino. Talk to Victor, then enter the casino and move straight forward to reach
the elevator. Talk to Victor again and choose to go to the penthouse, then talk
to the nearby "Jane" robot about the snowglobe collection. Hand over the three
snowglobes you've gotten so far to get 6000 caps, then go through the doorway on
the left and down the stairs so you can talk to Mr. House via giant vidscreen.
Agree to get him the platinum chip, then go talk to Victor next to the elevator.

Have him take you to the Presidential Suite, then use the terminal that's across
from the elevator to buy all of the suite's upgrades. (Note that the terminal is
a bit screwy, and you may have to aim a bit lower than the item you're wanting
in order to select it.) After that's done, sell the terminal all the stuff you
have in inventory that you don't want, then look all around the suite for loot
and containers to store it in. This is going to be your new main base, so decide
which containers to use for each type of item you'll be storing.

Have Victor take you to the cocktail lounge, then search it for loot, not
missing the snowglobe that's behind a cash register on the circular counter that
goes around the elevator shaft. There's also a floor safe that you can pick open
to get a stealth boy, and there's a critical chance magazine on a small round
table. Sell the snowglobe to Jane in the penthouse area, then look around it for
more loot. Store stuff in the Presidential Suite and sell what you can to its
terminal, then go down to the casino floor. Go outside and get Veronica and ED-E
to follow you again, then reenter the casino and look all around the casino
floor area for loot.

After dealing with it, return to Goodsprings. Pick up all of the loot you've
stored there and walk slowly over to the Mojave Express Dropbox that's just
outside the general store. Use the dropbox to ship everything to the New Vegas
Strip, then go to Novac and get all the stuff you stored in your motel room. Use
the dropbox that's in the Dino Dee-lite Front Desk area to ship those items to
the New Vegas Strip.

Fast-travel to the Strip North Gate area, then enter the Strip and go to its
second section. Enter the Las Vegas Boulevard building and pick up your items
from its Mojave Express Dropbox. Slowly waddle your way over to the Lucky 38 to
store stuff, then pick up everything you're saving up to craft items with. Make
everything you can at the Presidential Suite's workbench, then slowly walk out
of the Lucky 38. Go back to the Strip North Gate area, then look NW of it for a
couple of campfires. Before you use one of them to craft items, use a Science
skill magazine so you'll be able to craft more stuff. When you're done, return
to the Lucky 38 and store all leftover crafting items.


********************************************************************************
************************  GETTING SOME SERIOUS WEAPONS  ************************
********************************************************************************

NOTE: Whenever you level up to level 8, take the Light Touch perk, and raise
your Science skill to 50. What you do with the rest of your skill points is up
to you. I won't have any inline notes for future level-ups, so remember to check
the first reference list for which perk to take. As for skill points, keep in
mind that Guns, Lockpick, Repair, and Sneak are your "major" skills, and
Medicine, Science, and Speech are your "minor" skills.

Get a stealth boy from item storage and fast-travel to the Strip North Gate
area, then go NE down the road until you can turn left and go over to the Silver
Rush building. Sneakily pickpocket the Van Graff thug's key, then try to enter
the building. Let the thug search you and confiscate your weapons, then move up
to the fence once you're inside and wait until the "meeting" is over. Look
around to see where all of the loose energy weapons and explosives are, then
crouch down and use your stealth boy to become invisible. Quickly crouch-run
around and steal everything, making sure your stealth indicator stays on
"[HIDDEN]" (which it should unless you brush up against someone).

NOTE: If you don't want to use a stealth boy, look in the southern corner of the
area for a door that leads to a side area with bathrooms in it. Carry every
weapon into the bathroom area in grab mode, then make sure your stealth
indicator reads "[HIDDEN]" (and quicksave just to be extra sure) before you take
the item.

After you get everything, open the door in the west corner of the area with the
key you pickpocketed, then look on a table for another laser pistol. Go up the
stairs and search the unlocked rooms for a few more items to steal, then return
to the Lucky 38's Presidential Suite and store all your new stuff. Return to
good old Goodsprings, then go east toward the large cross you see in the
distance until you discover the Yangtze Memorial. Go a short way north to find
an abandoned shack, then check it for misc. loot before going east to Sloan.

Talk to Chomps Lewis at the roadblock, then enter the worker barracks. Look for
a Repair skill book on top of a high-up wall shelf, and an Explosives skill book
on the shelf of a locker. To steal them unseen, carry them into the corner
that's underneath the wall shelves, then wait for your stealth indicator to read
"[HIDDEN]". After you get and use both books, go SE from Sloan and between the
rocks to reach the fence that goes around Hidden Valley. Kill off all the nearby
bark scorpions, then go along the fence until you find a hole in it that you can
go through. Explore all around the fenced-in area to find four bunker entrances.
Enter the west one and go down to a locked door, then wait for Veronica to get
it opened for you. Past it is a door that leads to level 1 of the bunker.

After talking to Paladin Ramos, explore around level 1 for items to steal. Don't
miss all the under-the-floor rooms, or the Energy Weapons skill book that's in a
basket on the floor in Senior Scribe Schuler's office. Talk to Schuler if you
want to do some merchant business, then find Knight Torres' store next to the
nearby firing range. Torres won't do business with you yet, so crouch down and
pickpocket her Hidden Valley depot key. Go back along the walkway until you can
enter the under-the-floor area, then go look in the area that's under the firing
range for a door that your new key will unlock. Past it, sneak around and steal
everything you can, then give Veronica a T-45d power armor outfit to wear (plus
whatever else you have to give her to stop being overencumbered).

Enter level 2 of the bunker and talk to Elder McNamara in his office to get new
objectives for the "Still in the Dark" quest, then go back the way you came
until Head Paladin Hardin talks to you. To keep your quest options open, listen
to what he has to say and agree to help him. Return to Knight Torres on level 1,
then check her store inventory to see if she has a ballistic fist. If not,
you'll need to use the following merchant trick until she has one.

MERCHANT TRICK: Use the game's wait feature to see what day it is. If it's not
Sunday or Wednesday, wait until it's whichever of those comes next. After
putting on your Barter-enhancing attire (and using temporary Barter-enhancing
items for large transactions), quicksave next to the merchant you're wanting
something from, then see if he has it. If not, quit to the game's main menu
without exiting the store interface, then load up the quicksave and try again.
Keep doing that until the merchant has something you want, then buy it, exit
conversation, and quicksave. You can then exit to the main menu and load the
quicksave to see if the merchant will get something else that you want. This is
also a good way to get lots of non-random items that the merchant gets in every
time his inventory respawns (especially if he has a type of ammo you really
want).

After buying a ballistic fist, ask Torres if there's anything you can help her
with, then agree to find the missing laser pistol. Talk to the paladin who's
sitting at the table in the firing range about the missing pistol, then go find
Initiate Stanton. He could be on either level of the bunker, including in the
under-the-floor areas on level 1. When you find him, mention that he was the
last one to check out the missing laser pistol, then agree to find it for him.
Leave the bunker and go straight east until you reach a fence gap, but don't go</pre><pre id="faqspan-2">
through it. Instead, turn right and go along the fence until you reach another
gap, then go through it. Move along until you come to the top of a slope that
leads down into Scorpion Gulch.

Stay at the top of the slope and wait for scorpions to come to you. Shoot the
giant radscorpions as they approach, then switch to your best melee weapon and
hope they focus on attacking your followers instead of you. After the scorpions
stop coming, go down the slope slowly, ready to shoot-and-hack some more. After
you finish all of them off, look for a large rock in the center of the area with
some tall plants and a dead wastelander next to it. The missing laser pistol is
on the rock near the wastelander, so take it and return to the Brotherhood's
bunker in Hidden Valley. Turn it in to Torres to get a tri-beam laser rifle,
then return to the Lucky 38's Presidential Suite to store stuff.

Use a weapon repair kit on your new ballistic fist if its condition is very low,
and rest in your bed for an hour to get the Well Rested XP bonus. Fast-travel to
Camp McCarran, then sneak around and ambush-kill generic NCR troopers with your
ballistic fist (or with another melee weapon that's strong enough for one-hit
kills). To avoid hostility and infamy, you'll need to crouch down behind your
intended target and strike him when your stealth indicator reads "[HIDDEN]". To
get some easy credit for the "Go For the Eyes" challenge, aim just above your
victims' heads. Loot each victim, and keep looking for more until you run out.
Repair all of the NCR armor you get and sell it to Dr. Kemp and Sergeant
Contreras, and save all of the service rifles for later. (You'll be able to
repair your sniper rifle with them after getting the Jury Rigging perk, which
will let you save on weapon repair kits.)

When you're done, store all the stuff you want to save in the Lucky 38, then
rest an hour in your bed. Return to Boulder City and put on the Naughty
Nightwear, talk talk to Jessup about settling things with the NCR. Use the
Speech option to convince him to let the hostages go (using a Speech skill
magazine or party time mentats item first if necessary), then return to
Lieutenant Monroe and talk him into letting the Khans go. That'll finish the
"Boulder City Showdown" quest, and will get you some fame with the NCR and Great
Khans factions. Return to Jessup's little hideout and look around it for loot,
then exit the ruins and go east until you reach some uncrossable rocks. Turn
right and go along them until you reach a road, then turn left and go along it
until you reach Hoover Dam.

Look around outside for generic NCR troopers, rangers, and engineers that you
can ambush-kill. Be sure to keep all the weightless ranger hats you get (for
repairing your light armor after getting the Jury Rigging perk), plus one of the
civilian engineer jumpsuits (to wear whenever you're repairing something). When
you're done outside, enter the visitor's center and get the snowglobe from one
of the large semi-circular desks. Look around for more guys to ambush-kill,
including some who are wearing power armor. Most of the regular troopers will
have sniper rifles or 12.7mm pistols on them, so be sure to get them all. When
you're done in the visitor's center, use the elevator that takes you to the
Power Plant 01 area.

Go through the door in the right (east) wall, then ambush-kill the NCR trooper
who's guarding the door to the offices area. Steal the Lockpick skill magazine
that's on the nearby desk, then enter the offices area and turn left at the
first opportunity. Go down several sets of stairs and through the doorway on the
right to find Quartermaster Bardon. Don't bother talking to him yet -- just find
a container that you can sneak stuff into and out of easily without being seen,
and deposit your collected items there. Go all through the offices and Power
Plant 01 area (and whatever other areas you can reach), stealing and ambush-
killing, and returning to Bardon's area whenever you need to lighten your load.

After you're done, get everything from your storage container, then put on the
Naughty Nightwear. Talk to Bardon and say you'd like to purchase some supplies,
then mention that you're a friend of the NCR. If you can't pass the Speech
option, use a party time mentats item and try again. After you gain access to
Bardon's merchant inventory, exit conversation long enough to put on your Barter
outfit. Get his inventory back up again, then sell him everything you have that
you don't want to keep. If he runs out of money before you're done selling
items, buy some or all of his 5mm armor piercing ammo. After that's done, look
around his area to see if there's anything you want to steal before you go.

Go to the 188 Trading Post to sell off any stuff that Bardon wouldn't buy, then
return to the Lucky 38 to store items and sell the Hoover Dam snowglobe to Jane.
Get the Well Rested XP bonus, then go to the Grub n' Gulp Rest Stop. Head east
from there until you reach Camp Golf, then ambush-kill all of the generic NCR
rangers who are in and around the "house resort" building. Loot the building,
then go down to the camp area and enter the medical tent. Sell off some stuff to
Doc Sawbones, then sneakily steal the items from the table before returning to
the Lucky 38.

NOTE: There are other places where you can ambush-kill generic people sneakily
without gaining any infamy or having anyone turn hostile. (Note that those
places do *not* include the New Vegas Strip or the Brotherhood bunker at Hidden
Valley.) The three places I had you hit are the best ones, and you can hit them
again every now and then after all the generic NCR guys respawn (though the
rangers at Camp Golf may take a very long time to do so).

The next thing to do is find the Great Khans armorer. She'll buy and sell items
at cost without any kind of markup, which makes her a great merchant to go to
when you're wanting to sell off loot. After getting the Well Rested XP bonus
from your bed again, fast-travel to Camp McCarran, then head straight west,
watching out for numerous fiends along the way (including Cook-Cook's gang).
When you reach the mountains, turn south and go along them until you discover
the Chance's Map location next to a road. Go south down the road until you reach
a side road with a big stone "Red Rock Canyon" sign next to it, then go down the
side road until you come to a ruined house. The Great Khans armorer is in the
house's cellar, but don't visit her yet. First, go discover the nearest fast-
travel location. That's the Spring Mt. Ranch State Park, which is a short
distance S/SW of the ruined house.

After discovering the state park and killing off any creatures that spot you,
fast-travel to the Freeside East Gate area, then go south along the nearby fence
until you discover Gun Runners. Return to the Lucky 38 and look through all of
your stored weapons and armor for things you can part with. Make as many weapon
repair kits as you can from your stored supplies, then put on an engineer
jumpsuit that you got from Hoover Dam.

Use a Repair skill magazine, then repair cheaper weapons together, and use
weapon repair kits on the most expensive ones (plasma caster, tri-beam laser
rifles, multiplas rifle, and plasma defenders). If you have plenty of kits left
over, use them on some of the mid-range expensive weapons (flamers, 10mm
submachine guns, hunting rifles, laser RCWs, and lever-action shotguns). Just be
sure to save a kit or two to repair a sniper rifle to good condition (or repair
sniper rifles together if you have several).

Get all the expensive power armor you stole from Knight Torres, plus any other
expensive armor you don't want to keep, then see how much stuff you can offload
onto your two followers. If you leave some of your regular equipment behind
(including the power armor you want Veronica to keep), you should be able to
take everything you're willing to sell. Go to Gun Runners, then move up to where
you can talk to the vendortron that's inside the kiosk. Take everything from
your two followers' inventories, then put on your Barter outfit.

Check the vendortron's inventory to see if it has any anti-materiel rifle mods
in stock. If it does, exit conversation long enough to use a party time mentats
item, then buy the anti-materiel rifle mod(s) and sell stuff until the
vendortron's money is gone. After that, use the merchant trick given earlier in
this section to get all of the following items from the vendortron:

- anti-material rifle (GRA)
- anti-mat. rifle CF parts
- anti-mat. rifle custom bolt
- anti-mat. rifle suppressor
- sniper rifle carbon fiber parts
- sniper rifle suppressor

This next list is of the non-random respawning items that you should buy a whole
lot of. The first four items will be needed to make hand load ammo once you get
the Hand Loader perk, and the other five items are used to make weapon repair
kits.

- jar, rifle powder
- primer box, .50 MG
- primer box, large rifle
- primer box, small rifle
- duct tape
- scrap metal
- scrap electronics
- wonderglue
- wrench

Whenever you buy anything from the vendortron, sell it enough stuff to get its
money supply down to zero (as many times as you can, anyway).

Getting all of the items from the first list may take quite awhile due to the
randomness involved. Exiting the game and rerunning it won't ruin the gimmick,
so feel free to take a break from it and come back whenever you want to.

NOTE: I wasn't ever able to get any anti-materiel rifle mods except the ones
that the vendortron started with, no matter how long I kept trying. If that
happens to you, give up on it for now, and try again in a few days. It's best to
quicksave somewhere else, then fast-travel to Gun Runners and check its
inventory. If it doesn't have the mod you need, quickrestore and try again.
(Note that you can also try this with Alexander at the 188 Trading Post, since
he'll sometimes have anti-materiel rifle mods in stock.)

Once you're done with that, buy the vendortron's .50 MG explosive rounds, then
go to the New Vegas Medical Clinic and buy every implant except the Charisma
one. You should easily be able to afford them all, even the super-expensive
regenerating ability one. Go pick up any items you want to sell that you left
behind before, then fast-travel to the Spring Mt. Ranch State Park so you can go
visit the Great Khans armorer. Use the merchant gimmick to buy lots of .308, .50
MG, and 5mm ammo from her. (Note that you shouldn't ever use any party time
mentats or Barter skill magazines with her, since doing so wouldn't make any
difference in her prices.) You'll want to mainly get 5mm ammo, both regular and
armor piercing, but you'll also want several hundred rounds each of regular .308
and .50 MG ammo. It would also be nice to have some of the other types, too, but
don't spend too much money on them.

Spend all but about 15,000 caps, then go buy .50 MG explosive rounds from Knight
Torres in Hidden Valley and Alexander at the 188 Trading Post. Keep your Barter-
enhancing clothing on for those purchases, and use party time mentats if you
have plenty, but save your Barter skill magazines. You could also run up and
down the main highway that leads south from the Crimson Caravan Company and
passes through the 188 Trading Post in search of merchant caravans. The
traveling merchants will usually have lots of advanced gear, including .50 MG
explosive rounds some of the time. Also, return to the vendortron to see if it
has some new mods or .50 MG explosive ammo. (It might or might not.)

Return to the Lucky 38 to pick up the sniper rifle you repaired earlier, then
add the mods you got to it to silence it and make it weigh only 3 pounds. Add
any mods you got to your new anti-materiel rifle, and keep both of those weapons
with you at all times from now on. It's a good idea to also have a pistol like
the weathered 10mm pistol or That Gun with you, plus the ballistic fist you got
from Knight Torres. I also like to keep a light-weight melee weapon like a
combat knife with me to hack up weak enemies with.

NOTE: Katanas are very nice light-weight melee weapons. You can find them and
their three mods randomly in the inventories of some merchants, including Cliff
Briscoe in Novac and Mick in Mick & Ralph's store in Freeside (and Dale Barton
at the Fort, which you'll be visiting soon). However, you'll probably have to
wait until you've saved up some more money before you can afford it.

There's one more weapon that you'll want to always have with you, and it's
called the CZ57 Avenger. It's the reason I had you buy so much 5mm ammo from the
Great Khans armorer. After sleeping in your bed for an hour to get the Well
Rested XP bonus, fast-travel to the New Vegas Medical Clinic, then go east until
you reach some rocky terrain. Make your way up it to where you discover Raul's
Shack, then raid it for a Guns skill book and other goodies. Get out your anti-
materiel rifle and load it with armor piercing ammo, then make your way east
along the rocks while watching out for deathclaws until you reach the
Brotherhood of Steel Safehouse. Keep following the rocks closely (and watch for
night stalkers) until you reach Bloodborne Cave, then watch for fire geckos as
you go east from there and over some very hilly ground.

When you reach Bitter Springs, look around for loot and generic NCR troopers to
ambush-kill, then go south to the Bitter Springs Recreation Area. Get the
Lockpick skill book from the office shack, then go NE down the road while
watching for cazadores. When the road turns SE, go north toward the radio tower
until you reach Ranger Station Bravo. Go NE/E from there until you get to where
you can see three super mutant masters near a campfire through your anti-
materiel rifle's scope. Take those mutants down with armor piercing and/or
explosive rounds, then go loot them to get some heavy weaponry. Look near their
campfire for a weapon repair kit, then go SE until an undiscovered location
marker appears on your compass.

Quicksave and sneak up to where you can snipe at all the centaurs that are down
in the huge steaming crater called The Devil's Throat. Hang back and let your
followers do most of the combat, then give some stuff to them to make sure you
won't get overloaded down in the radioactive area. Use a rad-x item and run down
to where you can jump into the back of the large blue truck, then run forward to
where you can loot a dead prospector. Grab the Avenger and a pack of 5mm ammo,
then immediately bring up the Pip-Boy and fast-travel to the Strip North Gate.
Rest and store stuff in the Lucky 38, then optionally use a weapon repair kit or
two on the Avenger.


********************************************************************************
*************************  GETTING SOME USEFUL APPAREL  ************************
********************************************************************************

Rest in your bed to get the Well Rested XP bonus, then finish the "Ring-a-Ding-
Ding" main quest. Be sure to do it in such a way that you can kill Benny and get
the platinum chip instead of letting him escape. Go turn the chip over to Mr.
House in the Lucky 38 penthouse area, and be sure to look around for loot while
the securitron upgrade demonstration is going on. After it's over, exit the
Lucky 38 and do the "The Moon Comes Over the Tower" quest to get some Followers
of the Apocalypse fame.

Fast-travel to Wolfhorn Ranch, then go SE down the road until you come to the
Raided Farmstead on the right. Enter its large trailer, then crouch down and
sneak to the back to find some loot. Several Viper Gang members will appear
outside and close in on you, so stay inside the trailer and fire at them from
there (or just let your followers take them all down). Loot all the bodies, then
head east to reach an NCR recon camp. Talk to First Sergeant Astor to get the
"We Will All Go Together" quest, then look in the tent for a gun case to rob. Go
SE from the tent and toward the nearest chapel building, watching out for ghoul
troopers. Use the chapel's trap door to enter the basement, then run around and
loot it while your followers and the resident mercs deal with any ghoul troopers
that followed you in.

Exit the basement and use a rad-x item, then get out the CZ57 Avenger. Make a
run east through the buildings, dodging ghoul troopers when you can, and
shredding them with the Avenger when you can't. Loot all the troopers that you
or your followers kill, then enter the basement of the other chapel. Kill off
the geckos down there, then look for two mini nukes on a table and a Sneak skill
book on the floor next to some metal shelves. Leave the basement and run east or
NE until you escape the radiation, then use however many radaway items are
necessary to remove your radiation sickness.

Go E/SE until you reach a road, then follow it east to Cottonwood Cove. When you
get close, a Legionnaire will talk to you. Pass the Speech option to get some
XP, then continue on to the buildings. Go up the stairs that are next to the
Cottonwood Cove HQ building, then enter the office of Aurelius of Phoenix. Loot
the place to get a unique weapon and a Melee Weapons skill book, then ask
Aurelius of Phoenix if the Legion sees much action there. Ask about getting paid
to kill NCR troops, then give him all the NCR dogtags that you have to get your
Legion rep up to "liked."

Go to the end of the larger dock structure and talk to Cursor Lucullus to get
taken to The Fort. Surrender your weapons when asked to, then keep close to the
rocks on the right as you move past the main gate guard. You'll soon find a guy
named Dale Barton that you can do merchant business with. Go past a lowered
drawbridge, then turn right and go up the sloping path to reach the closed
drawbridge that leads into the main fort structure. Optionally look around for
stuff to steal, then go up to the entrance to Caesar's tent. Tell your followers
to wait for you there, then go inside and talk to Caesar.

Ask how you can serve his Legion to get a few more points of Legion fame, then
keep talking until you get the "Render Unto Caesar" quest's next objective.
Enter the bedroom behind the throne and talk to Lucius, then exit conversation
and talk to him again to get the key to the Legion Safehouse. Leave the tent and
get your followers to follow you again, then leave the fort. Return to the main
gate and talk to Cursor Lucullus. Agree to leave the platinum chip behind so you
can return to Cottonwood Cove, then fast-travel back to the Raided Farmstead. Go
SW from there until you reach the Caesar's Legion Safehouse, then go inside and
talk to Veteran Atticus if he's there. Ask for supplies, then choose stealth
boys to get two of them.

NOTE: Veteran Atticus is often in the safehouse on Tuesdays and Fridays, so come
back on those days and get some more stealth boys from him. He may sometimes not
offer you any supplies, though I'm not sure why.

Go down the stairs and check the beds for loot, including the Lucky Shades.
They're another "always wear" item, and will boost your Luck attribute by one
point. Finish the "Caesar's Favor" quest to get some extra loot, then go to the
Old Mormon Fort that's near Freeside's north gate. Talk to Julie Farkas about
how things seem rough in Freeside to get the "High Times" quest, then complete
it to get some Followers of the Apocalypse fame. Ask Julie about needing medical
supplies, then agree to get some for her. You can then mention that she needs a
steady supply. Go to the Atomic Wrangler in Freeside's inner section and tell
James Garret the Followers need supplies. After a little back-and-forth between
him and Julie, it'll be arranged, and you'll get some more Followers fame.

Now's the time to start donating medical supplies. Keep giving Julie three med-x
and three radaway until she says she has enough of both. Exit the conversation,
and you should get a notification that you're now idolized by the Followers.
Talk to Julie about donating medical supplies again, and she'll invite you to
join the Followers. Accept to get the Followers Lab Coat, which boosts your
Medicine and Science scores by 10 each when you wear it. Keep it around for
whenever you need a Science boost to hack a terminal. (Note that if you don't
have enough med-x and radaway to donate, you can donate some fixer, or you can
buy some more med-x and radaway from medical merchants, such as Julie and Doctor
Usanagi at the New Vegas Medical Clinic).

The next bit of equipment to get is Joshua Graham's armor, which has +15 DT and
+3% critical chance effects on it. To get it, do the Honest Hearts add-on,
focusing on getting all the quests done as quickly as possible. Also, be sure to
grab the snowglobe that's in the general store, and get the Desert Ranger combat
armor and helmet. It's medium armor, which your Light Touch perk won't work
with, but it can be handy every now and then when you need extra protection. See
my UHS hint file for Fallout NV add-on games for more details, and be sure to
take your best weapons and your skill-enhancing apparel (and nothing else that
weighs anything) with you. If you haven't gotten all the anti-materiel rifle
mods yet, try to get whatever you're missing before leaving.

After you get Joshua Graham's armor, you can optionally stay in Zion Canyon for
awhile and get more loot, or you can return later in the game to do that. Make
Joshua Graham's armor your new regular armor, and the unique "A Light Shining in
Darkness" pistol your new keep-around pistol. Also, keep Daniel's hat with you
to wear along with the Naughty Nightwear whenever you're needing to increase
your Speech skill. When you're ready to leave Zion Valley, take everything
you've stored with you, and put most of it in the Happy Trails shipping crate in
the Northern Passage tunnel.

Go get Veronica and ED-E, then make several trips between the Northern Passage
and the Lucky 38 so you can get all your loot properly stored. It's a good idea
to designate a special container for items that you're only keeping in order to
repair other items with. In fact, it's a good idea to keep just about every
weapon and apparel item you get from now on for repair purposes. (This is
assuming you've reached level 18 and gotten the Jury Rigging perk, which you
will soon if you haven't yet.) After everything is transferred, go on another
"ambush-kill generic NPCs" spree at Camp McCarran and the Hoover Dam to get lots
more stuff you can use to repair things with. (Note that your silenced sniper
rifle will be good for making ambush kills whenever you can't get close enough
to use your ballistic fist undetected.)

Repair a bunch of expensive weapons and armor that you're willing to sell with
cheaper ones, then do another "merchant run" on Gun Runners and the Great Khans
armorer, just like you did before. This time, you'll mainly be after powder,
primer, and weapon repair kit ingredients from the vendortron (and .50 MG
explosive rounds), and therefore shouldn't use any of your temporary Barter-
boosting items with it. You might also want to buy the silenced .22 pistols,
single shotguns, and varmint rifles that it always has in stock, since they're
good cheap weapons that can be repaired into several types of expensive weapons.

Save most of your high-priced to-sell items for the Great Khans armorer, since
she'll pay full value for them. Get more of the usual ammo from her (with the
focus on 5mm ammo, as before), then go get .50 MG explosive rounds from
Alexander at the 188 Trading Post and Knight Torres in the Brotherhood's bunker
at Hidden Valley (and maybe from trader caravans on the road). While you're at
it, check their inventories for expensive weapons and armor that you can buy
cheap because they're in lousy condition. After you repair them up with cheap
items, you'll be able to sell them on your next "merchant run" for a big profit.

NOTE: Due to the repair flexibility given by the Jury Rigging perk, you won't
have to make nearly as many weapon repair kits as you used to, and therefore
shouldn't in order to save on wonderglue. Once you get the Voracious Reader perk
at level 22, you'll want to have a lot of wonderglue to use in making copies of
the "True Police Stories" critical chance magazines. That way, you'll have lots
and lots of them to use during tough combats to get a temporary +10% critical
chance. (Note that after you start doing the Old World Blues add-on, you'll be
able to convert coffee cups into wonderglue, so be sure to grab and keep every
single one you find!)


********************************************************************************
*************************  GETTING SKILL BOOKS AND XP  *************************
********************************************************************************

Now that you've built up your weapons arsenal and apparel inventory, it's
finally time to do some serious skill book hunting. You've probably already
gotten to level 20 or so, and will have put lots of points into your major
skills (especially Guns and Repair), and there are plenty of level-up skill
points yet to come. However, that's no excuse to not go after what few skill
books there are for each skill. You've already gotten several, so check the
skill book lists in the "General Tips and Information" section of my Fallout NV
UHS hint file to see where the others are. Use your superior equipment and
followers to help you get all the ones that don't require you to do any quests,
and remember to sleep in a bed you own whenever you can in order to get more XP
for all the combat, lockpicking, etc. that you'll be doing along the way.

It's a good idea to start by discovering the Followers Safehouse (which you now
have the key for) and getting its Medicine skill book, plus all the other
goodies. Note that you can repeatedly raid the fridges to get more and more food
items, including atomic cocktails, whenever Dr. Luria is there. Next, go to
Jacobstown, stopping by the Silver Peak Mine on the way and getting a Lockpick
skill book from its shack. Once you reach Jacobstown, get its Melee Weapons
skill book and snowglobe, plus whatever other useful loot you can find. (Note
that you can get the Well Rested XP bonus by sleeping in the bed in the NE
bungalow.)

Next, go to the Brooks Tumbleweed Ranch and kill the crazy nightkin who's
standing in the corral to get a stealth boy, then grab the Speech skill book
that's in the ranch house. From there, go NE until you come within sight of the
spot where some mercenaries are clustered around a campfire. They've got the
unique YCS/186 weapon, so kill them for it. (I absolutely *love* sneaking up to
where I can blow them all to pieces with a single explosive round from my anti-
materiel rifle. Such power!)

After storing stuff and selling the snowglobe to Jane, go after the other
remaining skill books in whatever order you want. While doing so, feel free to
take the time to thoroughly loot areas, especially ones like the Nellis Air
Force Base, where you can get lots of stuff (including from sneaky ambush-
kills). Also, when going for the Guns skill book that's in Vault 34, you might
as well work on Veronica's "I Could Make You Care" quest, opting to retrieve the
pulse gun. You can get the skill book before you get the pulse gun, but do go
ahead and get the gun so you can finish the quest for XP and an upgrade for
Veronica.

Once you finish the skill book hunt, fast-travel to Freeside's North Gate, then
go a short way NW to discover the North Vegas Square. Enter it and go west down
the street and out through an exit door. Go SW to discover the H&H Tools
Factory, then go west down the road until you pass the last building on the
left. Turn left and navigate the junk barricades until you discover the Westside
West Entrance, then go south and through some more junk until you can turn east
and discover the Thorn. Use the wait feature if necessary to get the Thorn to
open, then enter it through the manhole and make your way over to where Red Lucy
is standing. Ask her about herself to get the "Bleed Me Dry" quest, then work on
it until the point where you turn in fire gecko eggs.

Agree to go after night stalker eggs next, then talk about the Thorn until you
get the option to fight. You can choose to fight up to three giant mantises,
radscorpions, or giant radscorpions, plus "greater challenges," which include
geckos, night stalkers, cazadores, and deathclaws. Needless to say, fighting
three deathclaws gives the biggest reward in both caps and XP, but is the most
dangerous to do. You could quickly shred them with the Avenger using armor
piercing ammo, or you could close your cage door as soon as it finishes opening,
then shoot them through that with just about any weapon. (Do watch out for one
of them glitching its way through the cage door, though.) Another option is to
crouch down and turn your Pip-Boy light off, then sneak-shoot the deathclaws in
the head. Use your silenced sniper rifle to remain undetected, or use the anti-
materiel rifle with explosive rounds for some fun.

Fighting in the Thorn is a great way to get XP, especially if you use it to earn
challenge credit. View all the "kill" and "damage" challenges listed in the
Data/Misc section of your Pip-Boy, and see which ones you want to make some
progress on. For instance, if you want "Bug Stomper" challenge credit, fight
mantises and radscorpions. If you also want "Up Close" challenge credit, kill
them with melee weapons. Every challenge you complete gets you bonus XP, and
some of them give you perks, usually in the form of permanent damage bonuses to
certain types of enemies.

NOTE: Now that you've finished the skill book hunt, it's a good idea to start
using your level-up skill points to increase your lowest skills, even if they're
ones like Barter and Unarmed that aren't really all that useful to this
character build. Doing that will help ensure that all of your skills reach 100
before you reach level 50.

If you haven't reached level 26 yet, keep fighting in the Thorn and/or ambush-
killing friendly NPCs in places like Camp McCarran until you do. Some people
would question taking the Lessons Learned perk at level 26, saying things like
"you'll reach level 50 eventually without it." Yeah, "eventually." Right. How
long do you want it to take? Even though reaching level 50 and never being able
to get any more XP for anything kind of kills the fun of the game, that fact is
totally overshadowed by the fact that the sooner you get there, the more you'll
still have left to do *with* your super-cool, fully developed level 50
character! Whichever level 50 perk you choose, it'll greatly increase your
combat prowess, and I for one want to take advantage of that for as long as
possible before I'm done with the game. If you disagree, you can take a
different perk for level 26, but I strongly advise against it.

SAVE OFFER: I've kept a copy of a saved game I made right before reaching level
26. If you email me using the address given in the "Copyright Info" section near
the top of the file, I'll email you a copy of the save. Note that it's about
2200 KB (2.2 MB) in size, so make sure you have enough room in your inbox.


********************************************************************************
***********************  GETTING MORE STUFF FROM ADD-ONS  **********************
********************************************************************************

After you reach level 26, keep fighting in the Thorn for fun and XP however long
you want to, then get started on the Lonesome Road add-on. It has some very
challenging enemies, and your only follower will be an ED-E robot, but you
should be able to make a lot of progress if you take it slow and easy, and use
stealth to help you get lots of devastating sneak attack criticals with your
anti-materiel rifle and silenced sniper rifle. You'll have already gotten the
Hand Loader perk, so go prepared with lots of hand load ammo for both of those
weapons (and maybe the Avenger, too).

Take the time to thoroughly loot every place, and find every skill book, as you
go. And remember that you can return to the Mojave Wasteland at any time, which
can be useful if you decide at some point that you need to wait until you level
up more to continue. Do more fights at the Thorn, more ambush-killing, some
minor quests, etc. to level up, then come back. Also, whenever you're about to
finish one of the Lonesome Road main quests, return to the Mojave Wasteland and
rest an hour in one of the beds in the Legion safehouse, then return and finish
the quest to get 10% more XP.

NOTE: If you find that you're getting killed way too easily, you could take
along the Desert Ranger armor and helmet that you got in Zion Canyon. It's
medium armor, and won't work with the Light Touch perk, but it is quite a bit
more protective than Joshua Graham's armor. Also, don't hesitate to use med-x
and slasher, either separately or together, to gain some serious temporary
protection. (And throw a psycho into the mix if you want to do even more
damage.)

NOTE: After you pick up the first eyebot upgrade circuit board, you can talk to
ED-E and ask him to repair your weapon (meaning your currently equipped weapon)
once per day. Also, you can use the merchant trick's "quicksave, quit to the
main menu, load the quicksave" routine to get ED-E to repair a weapon again
right away. It's a bit tedious to use that to repair up a bunch of stored
weapons prior to selling them, but it's a very convenient way to keep your
favorite weapons in top shape at all times.

When you reach Ulysses' "temple," do *not* rescue ED-E. Sure, it'd be nice
having him as a follower again in the upcoming combat, but not rescuing him will
get you a great perk that'll add 10% to the damage you do (and to your V.A.T.S.
aiming percentages) whenever you don't have any followers with you. That'll be a
huge help in the Old World Blues add-on, so you'll definitely want to get it. As
for how to handle Ulysses, you can avoid fighting him by putting on your best
Speech-enhancing gear and using temporary Speech-increasing items right before
talking to him. Or if you read all six of his discarded audio logs, you can
choose the dialogue option about him walking the Mojave and learning the wrong
lessons when it comes up, then try to talk him out of a fight without passing
any Speech challenges.

Whether you fight Ulysses or join him in fighting the marked man invaders,
you'll have to choose who to nuke after the combat is over -- the Legion, the
NCR, or both. The most lucrative option is to nuke both, since that'll open up
two highly irradiated areas for you to plunder. The infamy you gain with the NCR
can be removed by talking to Ambassador Crocker in the NCR Embassy at the north
end of the New Vegas Strip, and the Legion infamy won't cause you any problems.
Choose to add a point to Endurance when prompted to, and make Ulysses' Duster
your new regular armor, since it has a +5% critical chance effect on it. Also,
use his mask when exploring the two areas you nuked, plus the Courier's Mile
area that's in the Divide region.

NOTE: When you visit Cottonwood Cove on your way to the Dry Wells area, turn in
all the NCR dogtags you've saved up to Aurelius of Phoenix. That won't erase any
of your Legion infamy, but it will add to your Legion fame, thereby improving
your overall reputation with the Legion. You can do this again after every
"ambush-kill run" you make on Camp McCarran, the Hoover Dam, and any other NCR-
occupied areas.

Once you're done exporting all the loot you saved up, go to the New Vegas
Medical Clinic and buy the Charisma implant. Your new +1 Endurance will allow
it, and you undoubtedly have way more than enough money to afford it. (If not,
you obviously haven't been repairing expensive equipment with cheap equipment
and selling it nearly often enough.) Next, get more XP by fighting in the Thorn,
ambush-killing generic NPCs, and/or random exploring and looting. Another fun
thing to do is go deathclaw hunting at Quarry Junction, Dead Wind Cavern, and
the breeding ground that's east of the Colorado River. (Remember to snipe the
'claws with explosive anti-materiel rounds whenever possible, and shred them
with the Avenger's armor-piercing rounds otherwise.)

After you reach level 38, discover the Mojave Drive-in that's just south of
Nipton. Look right next to the twitching crashed satellite for a garbage can,
then use your followers and however many trips are necessary to move all of your
saved-up coffee mugs, pencils, etc. (all the double-starred items in the second
reference list) to that garbage can. Also bring any atomic cocktails you've
saved up, since their energy resistance will be helpful when fighting robo-
scorpions. (Note that if you're short on atomic cocktails, you can randomly get
them from the two fridges in the Followers Safehouse whenever Dr. Luria is
there.)

Make sure your weapons are all fully repaired and that you have loads of ammo
for each of them (especially the Avenger). Also be sure to take along lots of
auto-inject stimpaks, plus several weapon repair kits and stealth boys. Dismiss
your followers, then return to the Mojave Drive-in and pick up everything from
the garbage can. Walk over and activate the crashed satellite to get started on
the Old World Blues add-on. (If it won't let you, use the wait feature to wait
until after 11 pm.) After you wake up on the Sink Balcony, enter the main Sink
area and look around for loose items to take and containers to store stuff in.
This is going to be another major base where you store lots of stuff
permanently, so take the time to get started right.

Rest an hour in the bed to get the Well Rested XP bonus, then finish the
"Welcome to the Big Empty" quest. Look around the Think Tank area for loot, and
talk to all the weirdo "scientists" to get little mini-quests from them. Finish
all the ones that you can, then return to the Sink and activate the CIU. Do some
merchant business with it if you want, then go get the three auto-doc holotapes
that are in the Y-17 Medical Facility. (See my UHS hint file for Fallout NV add-
ons if you need more details.) Return to the Sink and activate the auto-doc,
then have it do a basic physical exam on you. That'll fully heal you and your
limbs, plus remove all rads and addictions. Remember to do that whenever you
return to the Sink from now on. (But don't forget to also rest an hour in the
bed to renew the Well Rested XP bonus.)

Next, ask the auto-doc for a psychiatric evaluation so you can re-choose your
two traits. Take "Built to Destroy" again, but instead of "Skilled," choose
"Four Eyes." That way, your Perception will be 10 while wearing the Lucky Shades
and the 1st Recon Beret (which you should pretty much always be wearing from now
on). Next, buy the C-13 implant so you'll do 10% more damage to cazadors.
That'll come in handy in the Z-14 Pepsinae DNA Splicing Lab, which is your next
destination. Kill all the cazadors there to get challenge credit, and pick up
the Implant M-5 holotape so you can buy that implant from the auto-doc. It's
very useful, since it'll increase your sneak-running speed by 20%.

After buying Implant M-5, go south to Higgs Village and search it to find
personality holotapes for the jukebox and book chute, plus the opera singer and
tarantula upgrade holotapes for the sonic emitter. Return to the Sink and
activate the jukebox, then have it retune your sonic emitter to the tarantula
configuration. Sometimes on critical hits, it'll cause an enemy to blow up,
which will kill him no matter how much health he has left. Sneak-attacking
powerful foes with the sonic emitter can be a quick and easy way to dispose of
them, as long as you remember to quicksave first in case it doesn't work.
There's no better way to take down the freakishly powerful legendary bloatfly!

Your next goal is Little Yangtze. There's nothing remarkable inside the fenced-
in camp area, but on the hill to the south are two numbered lobotomites who have
protonic inversal axes on them. Those are pretty much the best two-handed melee
weapons in the game, edging out even Old Glory from the Lonesome Road add-on for
sheer slashin' power. Just north of Little Yangtze is a ruined building where
Christine apparently left her unique silenced sniper rifle. It's superior to
regular sniper rifles in just about every way, so replace your modded sniper
rifle with it. (Note that when you take Christine's rifle, three lobotomites
will magically appear just north of the building.) And while you're there, don't
neglect to pick up the book chute's upgrade holotape in the little watchtower.

Once that's done, work on the "X-8: High School Horror!" quest until you get the
"X-8: Data Retrieval Test" quest. Work on it until your sonic emitter is
upgraded to knock out force fields, then finish the quest to get a perk that'll
let you do 10% more damage to night stalkers. Revisit the Z-14 Pepsinae DNA
Splicing Lab and kill all of the respawned cazadores to get the third rank of
the DNAvenger perk, then go get the personality holotapes for muggy and the
toaster. See the "All My Friends Have Off Switches" quest in my Fallout NV game
add-ons UHS hint file for the details.

Once you have all of those holotapes installed, you can finally have all of your
saved-up coffee mugs, toasters, pencils, etc. converted into useful items like
lead and scrap metal. After all that's done, focus on finishing the area's main
quests, after which you'll be able to use a transportalponder gadget to teleport
back and forth between the Sink and the Mojave Wasteland (as long as you don't
have any followers with you). Also, use the auto-doc to have your spine
reimplanted, which will raise your Strength to 10. Don't have your heart
reimplanted, though, since that'll give you a perk that's inferior to the
Heartless one.

Before you use your new transportalponder to return to the Mojave, go back to
the X-13 Research Facility and do the "Project X-13" quest. After you finish it,
you can keep redoing the robot compliance test to get another stealth boy from
the reward safe each time (plus XP). Once you get used to how the test works,
you can speed through it and get quite a few stealth boys. Note that you can
come back and do this whenever you want to, and you don't even have to bring the
Stealth Suit Mk II with you. (It's pretty useless, anyway, due to being medium
armor. Also, its Sneak +25 has no effect once your Sneak skill is 100, which it
long since should've been.)

Even if you haven't been using stealth boys much before, they'll be of great use
now that you have Dr. Mobius' Glove. (It's setting on a table in Mobius' area in
the Forbidden Zone, so go get it if you missed it earlier.) That glove will
frenzy enemies on critical hits, and the easiest way to guarantee a critical hit
is to make it a sneak-attack critical. And the easiest way to get those with up-
close weapons is to be crouch-running around while using a stealth boy. Save
them for when you're fighting two or more very tough enemies, then use them to
sneak-attack one of those enemies. If you're not detected, you probably won't
come under attack, and the enemies will fight each other. When you're short on
stealth boys, use V.A.T.S. and "True Police Stories" magazines to help you get
critical hits more often.


********************************************************************************
*****************************  GETTING TO LEVEL 50  ****************************
********************************************************************************

Use the transportalponder to return to the Mojave Drive-in, then consider moving
your stored stuff from the Lucky 38 to the Sink. If you want to, gather
everything up at once, then exit the Lucky 38 and slowly walk through Freeside
so you can exit it and use the transportalponder. The only disadvantage to doing
this is that you can't have your followers move to the Sink, and you can't
teleport to it from the Mojave if you have any followers with you. If you don't
feel like taking full advantage of the Lonesome Road perk by playing the rest of
the game with no followers, you might want to move stuff from the Sink to the
Lucky 38. To do that, pick up everything you want in the Sink, then use the
transportalponder to return to the drive-in. Dump a bunch of stuff into a
garbage can, then go get ED-E and Veronica to help you move it all to the Lucky
38. (Note that you'll still want to save up coffee cups and such, and take them
to the Sink every now and then to convert them into useful items.)

Your next goal is to reach level 49. One good way to do that is to continue your
exploration of the Big MT area, finding all the stuff you skipped before
(including the remaining personality and upgrade holotapes for the Sink's
gadgets). Or just keep redoing X-13's robot compliance test to get more and more
stealth boys along with XP. Another good thing to do soon is to finish the
Brotherhood of Steel's faction quests, after which you'll be able to wear power
armor. And there's always the Thorn, where you can get XP by fighting (and by
completing challenges as you fight).

After you reach level 49, decide which of the three super-great level 50 perks
you want, and make sure your current karma will allow you to take it. If you
need to decrease your karma, find an owned terminal somewhere and keep accessing
it over and over without letting anyone see you. (The one in the Goodsprings
saloon will work for this.) If you need to raise your karma, go kill a bunch of
fiends, Powder Gangers, and/or feral ghouls. Once your karma is where you want
it, do a bunch of fights in the Thorn (or something else that won't affect your
karma) until you reach level 50.


********************************************************************************
****************************  MOVING ON FROM THERE  ****************************
********************************************************************************

Once your level 50 character is perfected, you can have fun using him to do all
the quests that you've put off, including the Dead Money add-on and the rest of
the main quests. It's entirely up to you as to what order to do the quests in,
whether to take any followers along, etc. Just remember that finishing the final
main quest will end the game with no option to continue playing.

All that's left to do before concluding this guide is to summarize all of the
great equipment you've gotten, and what activities are worth redoing every now
and then.

* 1st Recon Beret: Gives +1 Perception and +5% critical chance.
* Lucky Shades: Increases Luck by 1. Also, along with the 1st recon beret and
  "Four Eyes" trait, will boost Perception to 10.
* Ulysses' Duster: Gives +5% critical chance, and works with the Light Touch
  perk since it's light armor.

* A Light Shining in Darkness: A very powerful and very light-weight pistol.
* Katana (GRA): The best melee weapon to use if you enjoy quickly slashing up
  enemies every now and then. (Best used in V.A.T.S. mode.)
* CZ57 Avenger: The best weapon for quickly shredding nearby enemies. Remember
  to use armor-piercing rounds against armored foes, like deathclaws.
* Christine's COS Silencer Rifle: Great for silent medium-range sneak-shooting.
* Anti-Materiel Rifle (GRA): Best weapon for long-distance sneak-shooting,
  especially when loaded with explosive rounds.
* Sonic Emitter - Tarantula: Critical hits, including sneak-attack criticals,
  will often make enemies explode and die no matter how much health they have.

* Periodically repair cheap weapons and apparel items into more expensive ones,
  then go use the merchant trick on the Gun Runners vendortron and the Great
  Khans armorer to sell off your stuff while buying useful items like powder,
  primer, ammo, and cheap weapons to use in your next repair-fest.
* Also remember to keep buying .50 MG explosive rounds from the vendortron,
  Knight Torres at Hidden Valley, Alexander at the 188 Trading Post, and the
  traveling merchants in the caravans that go along the highway to and from New
  Vegas.
* Keep making hand load ammo at reloading benches, especially for your pistol
  and sniper rifle. Explosive rounds are best for the anti-materiel rifle, and
  either hollow point or armor-piercing rounds (whichever are appropriate) are
  best to use with the Avenger. (Though its cheap surplus ammo is pretty good,
  and won't degrade your weapon very fast if you have Raul with you. You can buy
  loads of it from the Great Khans armorer when doing merchant business with
  her.)
* Keep saving up all of the items on the second reference list that have a ** in
  the second column, and periodically take what you've saved up to the Sink to
  be converted into useful crafting items.
* Don't forget that the X-13 Research Facility at Big MT is your best unlimited
  stealth boy resource. Go back and redo the robot compliance test whenever you
  need more stealth boys.
* Every now and then, go around to areas that have lots of respawning generic
  NPCs and sneakily ambush-kill them so you can loot them for lots of items,
  many of which can be used to repair more expensive items. Camp McCarran, the
  Hoover Dam, and Nellis Air Force Base are three of the best places to do this.
* Don't forget that ED-E can periodically repair your equipped weapon, and that
  you can get him to do so several times in a row by using the "quicksave, quit
  to the main menu, load the quicksave" routine.
* Keep checking your Pip-Boy for uncompleted challenges that you want to work
  on. Some of them give you permanent damage bonuses, and are worth going for
  even though you're unable to get any more XP. See the perk lists in my Fallout
  NV UHS hint file to see which challenges give perks.

</pre><pre id="faqspan-3">
********************************************************************************
*******************************  REFERENCE LISTS  ******************************
********************************************************************************

This first list is of the perks you should take for levels 10 thru 50. Notice
that some of them have skill requirements listed in brackets. Be sure that you
meet the requirement by the time you reach that level, and remember that wearing
skill-enhancing apparel won't help.

10: Finesse
12: Silent Running [Sneak 50]
14: Hand Loader [Repair 70]
16: Better Criticals
18: Jury Rigging [Repair 90]
20: Toughness (2)
22: Voracious Reader
24: Life Giver
26: Lessons Learned
28: Bloody Mess
30: Strong Back
32: Entomologist
34: Robotics Expert [Science 50]
36: Intense Training (Luck)
38: Living Anatomy [Medicine 70]
40: Action Boy
42: Action Boy (2)
44: Grim Reaper's Sprint
46: Math Wrath [Science 70]
48: Burden to Bear [see note below]
50: Just Lucky I'm Alive [neutral] => critical damage +50%  (recommended)
 OR Thought You Died [good] => weapon damage +10%, health bonus
 OR Ain't Like That Now [evil] => attack speed +20%, AP cost -20%, AP regen +25%

NOTE: If you don't particularly want another +50 to carry weight, you can choose
a different perk for level 48. Laser Commander would be good if you like to use
gatling lasers a lot, though this build isn't really designed for that sort of
thing. Also consider Paralyzing Palm, since doing V.A.T.S. attacks with Dr.
Mobius' Fist will then give you a very good chance per hit of either paralyzing
or frenzying your target.


This second list is of all the miscellaneous, useless-looking items that you
should pick up and save whenever you find them during your explorations. Most of
them are used to make certain items at workbenches, reloading benches, and
campfires. The rest are used with special devices in the Old World Blues add-
on's Sink area, and are noted with a ** instead of a -- in the second column.
The list is alphabetized for ease of use.

Banana Yucca Fruit              -- Slasher
Box of Detergent                -- Rocket
Broc Flower                     -- Stimpaks
Buffalo Gourd Seed              -- Snakebite Tourniquet
Butter Knife                    -- Scrap Metal
Case, .308                      -- .308 hand load ammo
Case, .50 MG                    -- .50 MG hand load ammo
Case, 5mm                       -- 5mm hand load ammo
Ceramic Dinner Plate            ** Lead
Clipboard                       ** Duct Tape & Scrap Metal
Coffee Mug                      ** Empty Syringes & Wonderglue
Coffee Pot                      ** Scrap Metal
Dinner Plate                    ** Scrap Metal
Duct Tape                       -- Weapon Repair Kits
Earnings Clipboard              ** Duct Tape & Scrap Metal
Empty Syringe                   -- Stimpaks
Finance Clipboard               ** Duct Tape & Scrap Metal
Fork                            -- Scrap Metal
Honey Mesquite Pod              -- Party Time Mentats
Lead                            -- .308, .50 MG, and 5mm hand load ammo
Medical Clipboard               ** Duct Tape & Scrap Metal
Metal Cooking Pan               -- Scrap Metal
Metal Cooking Pot               -- Scrap Metal
Metal Spoon                     -- Scrap Metal
Nuka-Cola                       -- Rocket
Pencil                          ** Lead & Scrap Metal
Pot                             -- Scrap Metal
Powder, Rifle                   -- .308, .50 MG, and 5mm hand load ammo
Primer, .50 MG                  -- .50 MG hand load ammo
Primer, Large Rifle             -- .308 hand load ammo
Primer, Small Rifle             -- 5mm hand load ammo
Scrap Electronics               -- Weapon Repair Kits
Scrap Metal                     -- Weapon Repair Kits & Lead
Sensor Module                   -- Auto-Inject Stimpak
Surgical Tubing                 -- Snakebite Tourniquet
Tin Plate                       -- Scrap Metal
Toaster                         ** Scrap Electronics
Whiskey                         -- Party Time Mentats
White Plate                     ** Lead
Wonderglue                      -- Weapon Repair Kits & skill magazines
Wrench                          -- Weapon Repair Kits
Xander Root                     -- Stimpaks

You should also hoard all burned, ruined, scorched, and destroyed books (both
large and small) for conversion into blank magazines once you get the Voracious
Reader perk at level 22. They can also be used to make blank books for turning
into skill books in the Old World Blues add-on. However, you shouldn't
constantly overload yourself with them early in the game, so I didn't put them
in the list.