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[Yolan]

Thanks! ;-)  I hope I can keep staying alive for the time being so I can do more.

[Yolan]

Day Fourteen - Sanctuary, scrapping, building, modding, level 12, power lines, star gazing

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Up with the dawn at Sanctuary, I poke around a bit in some of the houses I haven't properly cleaned up. Some candles are left in one. For some reason they give adhesive when scrapped. Brilliant.


Extending my power network a little more gets me to level 12.


I'm tempted to keep pushing on with charisma, but I decide to go with the armorer perk, which I'd neglected so far. Once I get to rank 2 or 3 I can start to do some pretty cool stuff. One mod I have lets me extend the size of armor at rank 3. The backpack mod lets me add extra carry weight to a backpack from rank 2.


With the extra adhesive I'd found I could add some more pocketing to my clothing for extra carry weight, and also toughen up several of the pieces.


My ballistic defense is now at 126. Not too bad I think. I'll still die instantly from a direct hit with a .308 round, but I can probably now take a few grazing shots from a distance.


Cleaning the last of the trashed houses inside the compound.


Cleaning up here and there, day has turned to night. I've now got a pair of guns stationed at the bridge.


And I added a motorcycle here too.


Gate lights at night.


A few of the houses now have power running to them, lighting up the living spaces.


It's starting to feel like a little town. Population 6 settlers, me, a dog and a brahmin.


And of course Trashcan Carla spends a lot of time here. I appreciate it. I purchase another 12 .308 rounds a decent price. My charisma investment is paying off already.


View from above.


Kind of relaxing just looking at it all.


Power system is really coming along nicely. Added a few extra shacks too.


Goodnight wasteland.

It's been two weeks living out here, and a bullet hasn't found me yet.

[Yolan]

Day Fifteen - the raider, the alpha mongrel, the legendary mirelurk, level 13

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Today was a heck of a day. For the first time I got into a couple of real fights. Three to be exact. And any one of them could have killed me. But they didn't. I'd like to think experience and good calls played a role in me still breathing...


I wake up a bit late, having spent all night scrapping, building and wiring. A new settler is waiting to meet me. Off to the fields you!


Then a radstorm hits. I take a rest in the potato cellar for an hour till it passes. That removes my well rested perk though, which is a shame.


Rather than heading back inside the walls though I make my way down the embankment, and across the stream. I think it's time to do a little recon and scavenging of the area east of Sanctuary. Don't forget to stop and smell the mutfruit along the way. I'll be sure to plant these babies later.


I make pretty short work of a few bloatflys.


In a shack nearby we have a raider and an attack dog. I decide to take her out. I've got a crit stored up, but I try for a regular surprise shot first.


It doesn't do much damage at all. Uh oh. We have a fight on our hands. First step is to get back behind the ridge out of her line of sight. I then swap to my combat shotgun and wait for the attack dog to reach me. One shot at close range finishes it off handily.


Next the raider. I get a little more distance and wait for her to appear. This time I use my crit. It's all over. That the 5th person I've killed now, and the closest I've come maybe to an actual firefight (she never really got a shot off at me I think).


Looting...


The shack nearby also has a body in it, and a bit more loot.


Further east I see a scavenger, but I leave them alone.


Eventually I reach the robot junk yard.


And score another fusion core. That makes #5, including the one that was in the T45 when I found it.


In the nearby building I unlock some hotrod flames for my power armor. These can be applied with no material cost, and get extra agility. I'll add them later.


Heading still further east I get into a fight with a few rabid mole rats, and then scoot north of the airforce dish installation. Definitely not going near there just yet.


Bit of a gristly discovery nearby.


Doesn't seem like super mutant MO. Maybe cannibals? I'm not sticking around to find out more...


Entering the woods now, I'm sneaking along when I hear some kind of mutant grunting, very loud, and very close. I nearly crap my pants, but it was a damn radstag.


Your meat is going in my belly.


Further ahead some settlers are in a gun battle with some raiders. I bravely back away quietly. Instead I have an alpha wild mongrel that is guarding a junkyard to take care of. I take a shot... and miss. Uh oh. My life passes before my eyes as it barrels down towards me.


I keep shooting, but I run out of action points. It gets closer still. Maybe this is it? It can definitely rip my throat open in a split second if it gets close enough. I open up my inventory and start cheming up. Nuka cola. Phsycho. Jet. Give it to me baby. Let's go down fighting.


And my glorious dog gets in the way. Instead of going for me the alpha mongrel goes for dogmeat. I switch to my combat shotgun and pump a good 5 or 6 rounds into the damn thing before it quits. What a rush. That was reeeaaaly dangerous.


I make it to tenpines bluff.


A lady there wants me to go fight supermutants in a nearby hospital. Hahahahaahaa.... yeah good luck with that. See you in three months maybe, if I'm even still alive.


Time to start arcing southwards. I finish off a few lower level dogs and scavenge around the nearby junkyard. The raiders and settlers who were fighting nearby are nowhere to be seen.


Further south I hit the quarry. A man wants me to fix some pipes he is using to drain water out of it. When the water is drained this place will fill up with raiders, but I'd really like the xp from doing this quest.


My dog comes with me for a swim.


Once the job is done some mirelurks appear. I'm up safe on top of the pump where they bloody can't get to me.


I use my lazer rifle with a burning mod to finish the first one quickly. Burn you bastard, buuurn.


Meanwhile another bloody radstorm hits.


And the other mirelurk is revealed to me... a bloody legendary mirelurk. It lurks around in the distance, and I use every bit of fusion ammo I have to little effect. My bullets would only be equally without effect. I could probably run in the opposite direction and get away safely, but there would go my precious xp!


I think I know what to do. This is exactly the kind of situation that I've been carrying around a nuka grenade for. It sure packs a punch. Let's pray to hell I don't blow myself up.


The mirelurk comes running at me. Does it know I am low on ammo? I hurl the damn nuka grenade. This is uncomfortably close. I edge backwards a bit, trying to get the pump I'm standing on to shield me from the blast. The radstorm keeps thundering on in the background. Kind of a nice setting for a showdown.


KABLOOOM! Goodbye legendary mirelurk.


I never really expected that I'd have to deal with this shit when I woke up this morning.


Completing this quest gets me the xp I need to hit level 13. Wow, that was pretty fast.


I still really wouldn't mind going for charisma. But I put another point in toughness instead.


I do a little bit of looting nearby.



Then head to my nearby compound at the drive-in to get some sleep. Tomorrow I might as well go and visit the doctor in Covenant to cure my fatigue sickness.

It's been 15 days living in this wasteland, but it hasn't killed me yet.

-----------

Thoughts: Today was one of those days where if things had gone a little differently, I could well have been killed. I had several tense moments, and at one point with the alpha mongrel I really was wondering if I was about to die. You really need to be playing iron-man to get that kind of tension. As my streak gets longer the stakes are only going to get higher too. Eventually I'm sure to slip up, but who knows? Maybe I can find a way to make this work somehow. For now anyway, I get to live another day. In the near future I'll be clearing out Bedford station and then hitting the Super Duper Mart, but I don't expect too much danger to follow from either of those jobs. We shall see.

[Yolan]

Day Sixteen - Revenge of the Mirelurks

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Starting the day off at the cinema I do a little planting with the vegetables I've collected. Mostly the interior of this compound is tarmac, but here and there I've cleared some open dirt where I can get a bit of planting in. Eventually I'd like to have five or six people living here I think, with some of them used for logistic support.


I was thinking of going to Covenant to get my rad damage treated and my lethargy disease cured, but I decide to hit the nearby railway station again first. I'd already cleared out nearly half the ghouls there before. There should only be 5 or 6, and none of them clumped together. Pretty safe way to get a bit more xp and battle experience.


I'm pretty deep in amongst the box cars when I turn back and see something moving out of the corner of my eye. What was that.... Wait... is that a mirelurk?? I didn't get many shots of this because I was too panicked, but it was like that feeling of watching a car crash. Everything slowly starting to go wrong, out of your hands... I saw just one mirelurk and thought it was moving away to the east, but then another appeared and had seen me. It started moving quickly towards me. I was able to get some distance but it engaged my dog.


Being a bit far away I thought I could risk using my stored up crit to see if I could damage it in the face and help save my trusty canine. Big mistake. I barely injured it (the damn things can shrug off bullets so easily). And meanwhile the sound of the gunshot draw the attention of several ghouls nearby. I turned to face them as my dog was engaged with the mirelurk. Two ghouls. Getting close to sprinting distance. I hit one with my rifle, but it doesn't go down. I switch to pistol and down it. But now what's that sound to my left? A mirelurk almost on me... Damnit. This was really it, I was going to die. And because of my own stupidity.


Nearly out of action points I can't really hope to outrun one. But I do have some jet. The time slow and a bit of nuka cola buys me time and AP to get some distance, while the ghouls, mirelurks and my dog tangle with each other. I run for it, abandoning my poor dog yet again for maybe the fourth time now. I am thoroughly unnerved from the whole experience, seeing how weak I actually was and how easily I could have gone down. Sprinting towards Covenant even the sound of a radroach makes me jump. Oh god oh god oh god... mummy!


I make it to Covenant and get the doc to sort me out. I buy a few rounds of ammo and a makeshift battery for the lead to make more ammo at home later. Feeling a bit more calmed down I decide to head back. The dog would be waiting for me at Red Rocket.


I'm used to the road between Covenant and the cinema being pretty quiet. So I wasn't expecting my meter to flash a red warning when I went into stealth mode to check as I do periodically when traveling. What the.... And then I saw it. A damn mirelurk again. Maybe one of the same two as before. It was looking for me... what the hell?


I was going to head home via the junk yard, but I change course. I'll pass by through the railway area after all. But then there is the other bloody mirelurk, and extremely close. Luckily it was facing away from me and didn't see me. This is very creepy.


I've played this game a fair bit now, but I don't think I'd ever seen this before. Not just mirelurks in this area, but also for them to wander around like this. Freaky. But nor for that matter had I expected the legendary mirelurk which turned up at the quarry. Was I now on some kind of mirelurk wanted list for killing their dear leader?


I was feeling a bit weak at the knees when I finally made it to my compound.


I knocked up a motorbike for fast travel out of there. I really just wanted to go home to Sanctuary and hide under my bed. But of course I didn't have any fuel, and no way of making it. So no help.


Slogging it back by foot I notice the diner defenses are gunning down a few more raiders. I stop by for some easy loot.


Then in Concord I loot the speakeasy as well, because I had skipped over it before. A few nice bits and pieces, including some lovely lovely adhesive.


At Red Rocket I reunite with the dog, and apply the new flame paint to my power armor. This gives it an agility bonus.


I also do some weapon upgrades.


And make some more ammo with the lead from the battery I had bought.


Sanctuary now has a population of eight, so I assign a few more people to farming, and plant some more crops.


It's raining terribly and I'm still pretty shook up, so I just spend the rest of the afternoon and evening making heaps of footlockers and extra beds using some of the extra material I have stored up. This gets me a bit more xp at least.


Sure is fancy living for settlers here at Sanctuary.


Doing a bit more tinkering before bed at Red Rocket, I realise that the dog had been carrying around a Fat Man mini nuke launcher this whole time which it had picked up earlier at the robot junkyard. I don't have any mini nukes on me at the moment, but I store this for later. I can imagine it might be pretty helpful in taking out some super mutants at some point.

And then it's time for bed.

I've been sixteen days living in this wasteland, but I'm still here.

Thoughts: Today was pretty unnerving. Worse even than the day before. It was just the one fight, but what scared me was the way the situation drastically changed before my eyes and in an unexpected manner. I absolutely didn't expect to see Mirelurks at that location, let alone two. They also appeared -behind me- so as to cut me off from my way back to the Cinema, and any shooting was going to at the same time call the ghouls. Just the absolute worst shitfest... if... or rather when I get killed, this is kind of how it will go down. Just like this. With a sick feeling in my stomach as everything just spirals out of control. Thinking back I should have called it quits and sprinted out of there the moment I saw the first mirelurk. I just didn't think that there would be another one. Thankfully drugs saved the day. Maybe there is a lesson in this to be learned?

[Yolan]

Days 17, 18, 19 - settlement work, Sunshine Tidings Coop, level 14, super mutants, a gun fight

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Good morning Sanctuary. It's been a tense few days. The wasteland is scaring me a bit! Time to try and relax by staying put, doing some upgrades around here.


Outside the front gates I meet our newest settler, bringing the population to 9. She has a .308 pipe rifle, so I decide to make her a guard as well. I'll have to remember to give her some armor some time. It would be cool if all my guards could have some kind of uniform in the future.


I've been burning through a lot of raw materials lately, and I'm going to need even more in the future. So I scrap the remaining two houses outside. Now there are no buildings at all outside the walls. Makes for a clearer line of sight!


Definitely less stressful focusing on building. I really need to give my heart a break for a bit.


I slapped down some pre-fab shacks before, but without any proper foundations, meaning they didn't really sit properly on the ground. I go around adding foundations for each of them to improve the look of the place. It's also just an excuse to use up some wood and get a little more xp.


Much better. I have more than enough beds now for pretty much any future population.


I also just go around adding a few extra seats here and there, clearing out weeds, adding some more lighting.


Not looking too shabby. Time for bed.


Good morning.


That's enough resting. Time to get out and about. I decide to head southwards and to the west this time.


I get a little radstag hunting done.


And meet a few non-aggressive people who are standing around. Not sure what their deal is (I've only actually played through maybe a 6th of this game, probably less, so I am flying blind in many respects, apart from the opening 10-20 hours of play).


As I hit the dam to the south west a radstorm hits.


Up the other side I reach Sunshine Tidings Coop. There's a bunch of empty houses, a friendly robot programmed to be "groovy", and..


A few ghouls. I clear them up and take over the place. That makes for my fourth settlement. I have Sanctuary, Red Rocket, the Drive-in Cinema, and here. Of course at the moment only Sanctuary has any people living in it.


As I finish off the ghouls I hit level 14. Finally!


I got for charisma. I'd been wanting to get it for a while. Just one more point, and then I can get the leadership perk.


I start clearing up the scrap around the area, adding some water, and planting a few crops.


As I'm scrapping a find another copy of the Wasteland Survival Guide that I missed when making my first pass around.


Nice, this boosts the meat I can get from animals.


I get started on a perimeter wall around the place. I run out of metal pretty quickly though, with only half the wall finished. Oh well. Time to head home tomorrow.


Day 19. Yup. Still alive. As I cross the bridge back out I get into a fight with a few ghouls I spotted down below. I thought there was just one but there ended up being three. Yikes. Me and the dog got out of there pretty quick.


On the way home I decide to hit a well stocked cabin I know is nearby. I jump on a truck and fire some shots off into the woods to draw some ghouls to me that hang around it.


It works pretty well, and I can clear them without getting mobbed.


This cabin belonged to some kind of not-so-paranoid-after-all prepper type. He has a basement.


A few nice bits and pieces. Adhesive. Oil. Aluminum.


And Gorski himself, all ghoulified. I grab some more supplies and head home.


Back to Sanctuary. It's looking pretty nice.


I spend a bit more time sprucing up the place. The front gate fire gets a radio tuned to Diamond City Radio (with expanded playlist thanks to a nice mod).


I decide to grab a load of steel from Red Rocket and haul it back to the new settlement for use on the walls. First though I use the last of my lead to make a few shotgun shells.


Near Abernathy farm I spot a wild mongrel. I hit it for a fair bit of damage, but it runs off. I give chase but loose sight, and think it gone.


As I'm just nearing the farm I hear my dog running up. But wait.... is that my dog? I spin and enter vats immediately, only to literally see the mongrel already leaping mid air going straight for my face. Just. Crazy.


It's already getting a bit late when I reach the Sunshine tidings.


I add a gun next to the gate using some oil and gears I had brought along specifically for that purpose.


I hear some gunfire. A raider/settler fight is going down on the damn. Nothing to do with me. Back to wall building.


Just as I'm getting close to finishing one of the last sections of the wall near the back end of the farm I hear a ruckus. Turning around I see sparks flying from my turret. What the... super mutants.


The turret takes one of them down, while the other is hiding behind a wall for cover. And blocking the bloody gate out. Yep. This place is too bloody dangerous for me to settle for the time being. I'm out.


I head out the back and slide down into the land depression beneath the dam, keeping my distance from any water and potential mirelurks. I. Hate. Mirelurks. There are a few buildings nearby called "Walden Pond", looking a bit different from Thoreau's day, and also some non-aggro mercs. 


The nearby overpass is a merc base though. I have to keep my distance.


I keep scooting around, and eventually there is just one barrier between me and a road to Abernathy farm and safety. A little outpost with a couple of raiders in it. Hmmm... I have a crit saved up. And I've got a drop on them. I should be able to take one out quickly and then engage the other with enough distance that I can keep relatively safe. Taking two raiders on at once like this isn't something I've ever done. The punks at the diner don't really count as I could get up nice and close with a grenade. I'm a level 14 now though. Time to be a little bolder. Didn't I once kill a legendary mirelurk? Aren't I a little bit of a badass?


The raider up on top of the outpost goes down. But I have used all my action points as well as my critical. I need to relocate so the other raider doesn't get a lock on me. Then when my AP is better I can take him out.


Well that was the plan. But my damn shooting had attracted some nearby mongrels. Holy. Shit. I bolted while my dog delayed them a bit. I only just recovered the AP to take one out in time. Meanwhile the other raider was a pretty good shot. After I tried taking a pop at him he returned fire and was unnervingly accurate.This was the first time I had ever really been shot at I think.  I had some trees in the way that his bullets were slamming into, but I wasn't going to stick around. That was enough for me. Jeezus.


I head back to Sanctuary feeling pretty dejected. Things really haven't been going too smoothly.


Nineteen days and I'm still here. Just.

--------------------

Thoughts: Yes I'm alive, but yet again I can't say that a good deal of luck wasn't involved. The wider wasteland is a dangerous place, and my confidence is really starting to evaporate. I don't think I can really go too far to either the south-west or the east of Sanctuary. The south-east and the Super Duper Mart might be the last place left where I can try and get a toe-hold. After that I'm not too sure. Maybe going to Diamond City and doing the confidence man quest. After I deplete a few more cores I could take three of them and visit Vault 81 as well. That would probably net me quite a bit of XP, and their main quest should be easy enough to do with my current power armor. OK. We have a general plan of action. I can do this. Deep breaths.

[Yolan]

Day 20 - Rescuing Preston, level 15, fighting the death claw

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Morning wasteland. Day 20 here we come.


A bit of cooking first. I've decided that it's time to suit up and finally rescue Preston. They've been battling those raiders for 19 days or so now, so they must be getting tired. I should be fine with the upgraded armor on and with a few drugs. The bigger problem is if I can take out the deathclaw or not. Hopefully I can make good use of exploding cars. Anyway, I really need the XP boost from doing a quest like this. I can't keep on building things forever without running out of material I'll want later for really important upgrades (walls etc.) elsewhere. The amount of low hanging fruit in terms of things to kill is also getting really sparse. Basically it's time for some questing or I am going to have a tough time getting stronger. And I need to get stronger in order to be able to handle pushing further into the wasteland without too much of a risk of death... Not being able to die now and then really, really makes this kind of thing a bigger issue. You just can't rely on "brute force" multiple saving and reloading to push through things which are tough. Certain places (like the Covega plant for example) which I could muck around with even at level 14 when not afraid of dying a dozen odd times are just simply out of my league now.


Hey Carla, wait up. I need some more of that .308 ammo.


I also hit the diner for more .308 and 10mm. That's the last of my caps. Darn.


Finally I go back to Red Rocket for the power armor. I also grab my combat rifle that uses .45s. I have some of those stored up. Should help me with the raiders.


Here we go. Hopefully I don't die. I'm not so afraid of the raiders inside, but once outside on the roof I know that I can be a target of grenades if I'm not lucky. I've died in full power armor from one there before.


Kablaam! Kapooie! Pow!


And another fusion core of course. #6. Great.


I get hit by a few molotovs which does damage me a little, but not too badly.


My dog is a massive help yet again. He is great at distracting people so that they can't get a chance to shoot at me.


Jeepers. I guess this is the first real full on, in your face, bloody combat this character has seen. Definitely starting to get a bit grim here. One more step from being a scavenging opportunist to an actual wasteland warrior. Not that I'd dare try fighting so up close like this if I wasn't in a metal suit. Which is the point of these realism mods, because you wouldn't last long doing so in real life either.


Go dog go!


"Thanks for finally finding the time to come save us. We had to eat three people just to survive for the last 20 days."


Yes. Now my perception is a solid 9 with my welding glasses on.


Next comes the somewhat harder part. I find the mini-gun doesn't end up doing a whole lot. The raiders have had their armor boosted a bit by one of my mods possibly. At one point I cop a few direct hits that gets me down to about 65% of my health, but I can quickly get behind some cover and heal up. The upgraded armor, my extra hitpoints due to being leveled way past what a person normally would be for this, -plus- some medex and what have you helps balance out just how much harder this is than in the vanilla game.


Finally we clear them all. Level 15. Thank sweet merciful lord of atom. I can't quite believe I've managed to get this far without dying even once. If I can make it to level 20 that sure would be something.


I decide to go for the armorer perk. With rank 2 I can start to boost my carry strength more with the backpacks. Helpful for looting and what not.


Then it's time to fight the deathclaw. Predictably my regular ammo doesn't do much. And my minigun is already out of juice. I explode a few cars but it has time to run out the way.


I was able to lure it into walking over a couple of improvised mines I had on me, but even that wasn't enough.


In the end I was totally out of ammo and any options. I gave up and headed back to Red Rocket. The deathclaw is still there, lurking around. I'll need to arm myself again for another go. Not quite sure how I can do that when I have so little in the way of caps. Maybe I can find something around the place to sell.

Yet again the wasteland is putting me in my place and denying me any nice clear victories. But yet again I've grown a little stronger.

It's been 20 days since I came out of vault 111, and yet still I am alive.

[MarcAFK]

I noticed you went into the basement to get away from the radstorm, good idea as the game doesn't care how strongly you make a structure it won't give any cover unless you enter an interior cell.
However you can wait the storm out on a chair or bed, as long as you aren't receiving damage on the instant you attempt to use the chair. I suppose this isn't possible with true storms beause the rad damage is constant. However I'm pretty sure I've slept during a storm with that mod. As far as realism goes yes it's exploity, but it's reasonable as long as your shelter should be giving rad protection anyway, concrete is pretty good for it.

[Yolan]

Thanks for the tip. Might come in handy when in some locations without a basement or house, like the cinema or sunshine coop. There is a mod which adds them in, but it seemed like a bit of a hassle.

[Yolan]

Day 21 - Finishing the Job

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Good morning wasteland. It's day 21.


I trade away a few extra stimpacks (I don't tend to use many, as not getting hit as much as possible is key to me staying alive with these higher realism mods). I use the caps to buy more ammo of course.


Then it's time to hit somewhere nearby that I had passed over before. I never even knew about it to be honest, but it caught my eye when I was looking at a few maps (I'm trying not to spoil the game for myself by looking into stuff past where I have previously played too, but I'm not ruling out doing a little research now and then in order to have an idea about the dangers of areas I go to in order to balance out the fact that this game was never designed with this kind of play style in mind).


Here we go. This place is just north of Abernathy farm. I'd avoided it in the past because I knew there were raiders in this general area, but actually they are further north than that, past the stream.


Three of them that I can see. Definitely not going near them.


This shack also had another copy of the Wasteland Survival Guide. This one reduces damage from melee attacks. Pretty handy.


I want to buy some more ammo so I can finish off the Deathclaw in Concord, but I just don't have much to sell. I go rooting around my containers at Red Rocket. That's when I find a bar of gold from the potato cellar I had left stashed from before. I felt bad selling them with such low charisma and getting a really bad deal, so I had left this one for later. Brilliant.


Off to the diner I go for some ammo purchasing. A raider is attacking again, but their turret takes care of it for me. Extra leather for me.


I sneak into Concord. No need to suit up. If the Deathclaw gets close to me I'm dead anyway. It starts to rain.


There it is. Pretty wounded already. I should have enough ammo, but this is going to take a while.


I can land sneak attacks for double damage, focusing on its belly (the weakest point, rather than the head it seems). But then it runs away and hides for a while. I have to wait for it to forget about me and come back, then shoot once more. Rinse and repeat.


There were a few tense moments. Such as when I dropped down onto this lower roof and realized that it was accessible by stairs. It didn't come up though.


It keeps on raining heavily through the night. It's like a Kurosawa film. My bullets slowly running out, the deathclaw slooowly losing its health.


I'm tempted to drop down to the ground for the finishing blow, killing it with a shotgun shell right as it gets up to me. Would make an excellent screenshot. But of course, I'm not quite that brave.


And down it goes. In the end a single 10mm shot did the job (I'd used up my .308 and .45 rounds entirely).


Hi guys.


I have a little town nearby you can come live in.


And off we walk.


Standing on the bridge in the rain, watching the last of the minute men group walk into town.


And my XP reward. This is what it was all about.


Meanwhile a new settler had also joined during the half-day deathclaw fight. He looks a bit tough, so I assign him to guard duty. Along with Preston that makes 4 guards.


Finally I talk with the mechanic/hacker guy of the group. As I've already satisfied the conditions of the Sanctuary quest by building everything up so much I can grab the xp right away. Not bad. I'm half way to level 16.

Time for bed.

It's been 21 days since I left the vault, and the wasteland hasn't killed me yet.

Thoughts: Tomorrow I'll want to check to see if I can do a few upgrades to my gear, load up on some shotgun shells if I can via trade and construction, and head to super duper mart. Ammo is a problem, but thankfully Preston rewarded me for saving his people with 50 fusion cells. Ghouls are quite susceptible to laser, so I'll definitely be taking my laser rifle along. Hopefully I can get enough xp from ghoul killing to hit level 16. But even if not, I'll stand to gain yet another fusion core (#7 I think now), plenty of food, and some good scrap for upgrades. If I can get enough material I might salvage the power armor from the museum later. In the long run it probably makes sense to have a number of suits located at several main bases. But then again I can also set up a fast travel network to the south in the future, which might render it somewhat unnecessary.

[Yolan]

Day 22, Day 23 - And My Luck Ran Out

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Morning Sanctuary. So it's day 22 huh? Time to do a roll call.


I gather everybody (there are 15 residents including the robot and the brahmin), and find a few without jobs.


I build a few scavenging stations for them. Hopefully they can find me a bit of copper and adhesive soon. That would be nice.


With a second rank in armorer I can now upgrade my backpack so that it actually significantly boosts my carry capacity, rather than just giving me a little bit of a defense bonus.


280 now. Nice. That should help for my next scavenging excursion.


It's starting to get dark already, as I was up until really late the day before. I use the last of my copper to add a few more lights around the place.


And get to work on some more constructions. Then it's time for bed. That was a short day.


Morning Sanctuary. Day 23. And although I don't know it yet, the day that my luck runs out.


I head to Red Rocket first to suit up. Today we are hitting Lexington and the Super Duper Mart.


First I make my usual diner stop for some more ammo.


And into town we go. I don't have my xp left that I need to get to level 16.


I do a bit of poking around near Red Rocket and end up drawing a bunch of ghouls. They come out a few at a time though, and I have distance, so with the dogs help they aren't too much trouble.


Then it's off to the Super Duper Mart.


I recruit the local Security Bot for help.


Find a helpful magazine.


And have fun with the laser shotgun.


Things start to go bad when I head into the back area. Firing on a bunch of these guys ignites some nearby fuel, hurting my dog.


I take them out and run up to heal my dog, failing to watch my back. Right as I'm applying the stimpack to the dog a Feral Ghoul Stalker hits me. For some reason my armor isn't giving me much protection at all. My health starts running down. I jump into my inventory. Drugs. I take some Jet, Psycho, Nuka Cola, a Stimpack and some water. This is it. I might have killed myself...


I get some shots in vats into the ghoul, which is right on top of me, in mid lunge pose. I use my critical hit, but it isn't enough. Back into my inventory again to drink a Nuka Cola quantum, I see that I am at 10% health. This is it.


I don't even get a chance to screenshot my actual death before the game has reloaded and I'm back at my bed in Sanctuary. The first time I've died in 15 levels and 23 days.




"Your life ends in the wasteland..."

[NJW2000]

Well... that was fun to read. Very nicely done.

If you do something similar in the future, do post about it here, so we know 

[Yolan]

Thanks! ;-)

I had a lot of fun with this. I really didn't expect to die in the Super Duper Mart. That's never happened to me before...

I think I'm going to keep playing with this character. Seems silly to keep replaying the first <20 levels of the game again and again when I've never even played through normally once.

I really prefer the tension of an iron man run though so I'm not sure what to do. Maybe I'll just try and die the absolute minimum number of times possible and see how that goes.

Thanks for following along everybody.

[somemildmanneredidiot]

PTW

[Yolan]

I've decided to keep posting as I play with this character after all. What I'm going to do is to continue to seriously try and not die. If possible I'd like to never die again. Perhaps more realistically, I'd like to try and beat the game while dying only a handful of times. We'll see how we go. For now, I'm setting as my immediate goal getting to level 20 without dying again. If I can do that I think I'll feel more like I've recovered the purity of the play style. I have to watch myself to make sure I don't start taking more unbelievable risks based on the foreknowledge that if I -do- die I can always reload. If that happens then I know it's really over.

So, as further punishment: Each death means a scar on my face.

As I have died once, that means next time I visit Diamond City I get a scar. I'm quite attached to my characters good looks, and I'd rather it not become a mess of scars, so this is another bit of motivation.

[Yolan]

Day 23 - Round Two

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I decided to try the Super Duper mart again. My reasoning being that my death really was unlucky. I made a bad call in rushing to stimpack my dog and not paying enough attention to ghouls lurking about, but it wasn't the case that the area was too high above my skill level.


As I thought everything goes pretty smooth, although I am quite on edge. Dying twice in a row here would be pretty damn pathetic. I am searching for a bit of redemption.


As I'm clearing away the ghouls near the fusion core I hit level 16. Great.


Chastised, I invest in another rank of sneak. If they can't see me they can't hurt me.


I grab the fusion core and swap out my old one. I've now got a bunch of nearly drained ones to give to vault 81.


I finish looting and head back home safe and sound. Yep, there definitely was no real reason why I should have died there except for my own poor judgement and some bad luck. Back at Sanctuary a newcomer needs an assignment. I build a third scavenging station for her. Getting free loot, however slowly, seems to be a major reason to have big settlements in this kind of hard-core play style.

Time for bed.

I've been living in this wasteland for 23 days, and I've been "badly wounded" once.