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Hot Fucking Sunday
Jul. 13th, 2025 11:49 pmThat I got to experience up close and personal, much to my regret -- I'll tell you all about it in the write-up below:
Tumblr: Another night where nothing happened on Valice Multiverse, but over on Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler), I did successfully finish drafting my “Teen Valicer Save” post before lunch today, yay! I didn’t have that much left to do, admittedly – just had to:
A) Choose two more Aspirations for Alice to complete so she had the same number as Victor and Smiler in their sections (ended up going with The Collector, because there’s a good number of collectibles in Alice: Madness Returns, and Bodybuilder, so she can be as strong and skilled in real life as she is in Wonderland)
B) Add some lines to the “general overview” indicating which aspirations I’ll be having them ALL complete (namely Academic during their college years, and Paragon Partner because it suits them being polyamorous...though I did just realize that I wasn’t thinking about them being a “V” relationship (meaning Alice and Smiler are each romantically involved with Victor, but not with each other) when I picked that...hmm. Well, I suppose I’ve had Alice and Smiler occasionally do romantic things in my fanfics – Alice kissed Smiler in one of my not-incorrect quote collections, in fact – so maybe they can declare themselves partners and we can pretend it’s queerplatonic. (Or...actually, Lumpinou has a mod that makes queerplatonic relationships a thing in the game – maybe we can see if that counts for the aspiration?))
C) Finish off things with a concluding paragraph acknowledging that, for a “less complicated” save file, I have given my Sims a LOT to do (I like having goals!), and talking about how the next step is to actually get the save file off the ground...which would be easier if the game wasn’t so buggy
D) And add the tags, bitching some more about how I’ve had this idea in my head for a while, but it’s been hard to actually get it STARTED thanks to all the bugs (especially from the recent July 1st patch, yeesh) and the other games vying for my attention (such as Baldur’s Gate III, Superliminal – and come December 8th, good old Paralives...)
So yeah – post is all done now, and I should be able to pop it into this week’s queue no problem. :) Figuring out the REST of the queue is left as an exercise for Future Victoria. XD
Workout: Ended up going out and about with my parents early this afternoon, which included a reasonably-extensive walk...which I did NOT dress correctly for, I am sad to report. The problem was, it was cloudy this morning, and stayed cloudy for a while, so I was tricked into thinking I’d be okay in a black t-shirt and a baseball cap – and ended up sweating like a pig throughout the whole trip. Just absolutely MISERABLY hot. *sigh* Very glad that I brought my water bottle to rehydrate...and that I DID think to put some sunscreen on to protect myself from burning after Mom suggested I should. I may have been boiling, but at least I did not also end up as red as a freshly-cooked lobster! Still, I was glad to get home, get in the AC, have some food, and take a nice cool shower. Next time – WHITE t-shirt, Vic. You may only have like two, but they DO exist!
Writing: I got another good chunk of “The Van Dort Vacancy” done today, I’m happy to report. :) Today’s chunklet revolved all around Victor’s closet – specifically, Alice and Smiler getting a look at it while Victor got his carpet bag out and being like “you – you own twelve suits?” (For reference, Alice’s father, a respected educator at Doskvol Academy who lived in Brightstone, had five, with one reserved for special occasions.) Poor Victor was promptly embarrassed by their stunned reaction and ended up asking if they wanted to take any to unstitch and turn into clothes for themselves – cue Alice correctly guessing that this was an offer born out of guilt, and Smiler reassuring him that they weren’t judging him for having more than they did (Alice: “just your parents”), and he didn’t have to “make up” for being rich. Victor relaxed a little after that, but insisted they were still welcome to take some of the suits to repurpose if they wished, and Smiler ended up suggesting he take three that he really wanted, and one that he could stand to see cut up. Because they had all the clothes they needed back at the MOJ, but they knew Alice could use another dress. Alice concurred and said she wouldn’t say no to a repurposed suit – but that she also wouldn’t mind leaving with the servant’s dress she had on, since it was so nice. Victor was like “if you want to, go for it, I don’t mind...just maybe alter it a little so it’s not so obviously from our house,” with Alice replying, “Not a problem, I was already planning on shortening the skirt to my preferred length.” XD I left it with her wondering if her sewing skills were up to moving some of the lace from the collar to the skirt hem, and Smiler and Victor both offering the skills of someone they knew to help her with that if necessary. Tomorrow, Alice will get them back on track with packing (noting that even if Lord Fortescue doesn’t mind being left in the wine cellar, she and Smiler may be missed from the kitchen), and Victor will start grabbing everything he thinks he needs – which might include an old masquerade mask in need of repurposing...
Baldur’s Gate III Planning: Yeah, ended up not having time again to play Superliminal (meaning I’m thinking this upcoming weekend should be Superliminal Collectibles Run Wrap-Up Weekend), so I went back to this instead. And I’m pleased to announce I did make a little progress, specifically on organizing my list of mods I intend to install. Basically, I decided to separate them into subcategories based on function – I now have sections specifically for “Appearance” mods (stuff that makes sure Smiler always looks like, well, Smiler); “Bugfixing” (what it says on the tin – just one mod here, but it’s a doozy, with loads of fixes); “Utility” (for stuff that makes my life easier – better tooltips, the ability to go around with a bigger party, leveling characters up to level 20, etc); and “Equipment & Spells” (again, what it says on the tin). I am also going to make sure I have a link for each mod, plus a note indicating when it was most recently updated and if it has the “Patch 8 Tested” tag or not. *nods* So yeah – once I finalize which mods I’m using, I should have a nice, highly-organized list that I can easily browse to see what I’ve got and what might be causing problems. :) Just gotta get all the mods in it now!
YouTube: Being Sunday, the YouTubery of the day of course consisted of Jon of Many A True Nerd’s latest Fallout-related video: “Fallout New Vegas: You Only Live Once Remastered - Welcome Back To Goodsprings!” Part one of his new F:NV YOLO series, which is a “no healing permadeath” run through the game – that is, he is not allowed to heal any damage he may take over the course of the game, and if he dies, the run just ends right there. I never saw his original F:NV YOLO run, but I did watch and enjoy his Fallout 4 YOLO run with Finn Ally (the woman who went for the Minutemen ending despite doing all the raider stuff in Nuka-World and pissing off Preston), so I’m quite eager to see how this one goes! Here’s what happened today’s brand-new shiny first episode:
A) Jon laid down the rules for this “YOLO Remastered” challenge:
I. No healing, death is the end of the run (as per what we’ve already established – he’s modded out any health regen the game might have tried to foist on him, and is prepared to use console commands to redamage his character down to her “actual” health for those instances where she is fully healed upon entering a DLC land)
II. Game must be played on “Very Hard” difficulty, as the original was played on merely “Hard” (though Jon declined to go all the way into “Hardcore” mode when the game offered it via pop-up right after character creation – the changes it makes to healing and rad removal and whatnot were obviously not applicable to his character, and forcing her to keep up with food and drink meant she would be forced to consume healing items, thus defeating the purpose of a YOLO run)
III. No permanent companions, because otherwise his character could sit back and let Boone handle everything for her (he is apparently a monster)
IV. And the big one – NO. RANGED. WEAPONS. Because Jon remembered that, in his original YOLO run, his character solved everything with either skill checks or sniping, and he felt that the latter made things too easy. So not only is this a YOLO, it’s also a Melee/Unarmed Only run, as Jon is not using any guns, explosives, or throwing weapons! ...Well, except when the game FORCES him to shoot something as part of a quest (like how in Lonesome Road he’s got no choice but to use the Laser Detonator on the warheads to proceed), but fortunately those instances are apparently few and far between. Other than those fleeting moments, NO. RANGED. WEAPONS.
B) Upon waking up in Doc Mitchell’s clinic in Goodsprings after the opening “Benny, aka Chandler Bing [RIP], shoots you in the head” cutscene, Jon designed his character – or, rather, redesigned his former F:NV YOLO Courier, P. D. Shoot! The P. D. stands for “Please Don’t.” XD I don’t know what her stats were in her original adventure, but in this one, the bedraggled Courier had:
I. 7 Strength, 5 Perception, 6 Endurance, 1 Charisma, 9 Intelligence, 7 Agility, and 5 Luck to start (Jon needed the high Strength for Melee and Unarmed attacks; the high Agility for extra AP (action points, necessary for VATS); and the high Intelligence for getting skill points faster to level up her skills sooner – it really hurt him to leave his beloved Luck at solidly average, though. Don’t worry about that 1 Charisma, though – doesn’t mean a thing when you can level up the Speech skill separately :p)
II. Melee Weapons, Speech, and Sneak as her “tagged” skills (I’m not sure what exactly that MEANS, other than them being like “main” skills that get a little bit of a boost at the start – taking Doc Mitchell’s personality test originally got her Survival as a “tagged” skill, but Jon moved that to Sneak because being stealthy is one of the things that will keep P. D. alive
III. And “Skilled” and “Logan’s Loophole” as her traits – the former immediately added +5 to every skill, but caused P. D. to gain 10% less experience going forward, meaning she’d level up more slowly (which Jon was fine with, as that meant enemies would ALSO level more slowly and be easier to deal with), while the latter meant she could never get addicted to chems and they lasted twice as long, but kept her from ever progressing past level thirty (it’s a reference to the movie Logan’s Run, where everyone in a dystopian society is killed at age 30 – Jon was fine with never leveling past 30 as he was pretty sure that, given all the sneaking P. D. would be doing, she wouldn’t have actually gotten much past 30 level-wise anyway, and it was worth it to get the trait’s perks – which were more extensive than you might think...)
A rather interesting build – hopefully it works out for him in this challenge!
C) Once released from character creation (and the endless DLC pop-ups), P. D. went around Goodsprings looting anything that could be helpful to her in the future! The most notable loot included:
I. A weapon repair kit from one house, to keep her melee weapons in good condition
II. A “Chinese Army: Spec Ops Training Manual” (which she immediately read for +3 Sneak skill)
III. A bottle of whiskey, which allowed Jon to explain why he took “Logan’s Loophole” – while the description claims it applies specifically to chems, in reality it applies to ANY consumable, including alcohol. And alcohol boosts Strength in this game when drunk, so P. D. is gonna want to get boozed up if she gets into any fights!
IV. A Wasteland Settler Outfit that gave her a little more protection than her Vault 21 jumpsuit, plus +1 Agility (which boosts her Sneak skill and AP) and +1 Endurance (which sadly DIDN’T boost her health, as that’s calculated solely using her BASE Endurance – did at least increase her rad and poison resistance a skoosh)
V. And a “Locksmith’s Reader” skill magazine in a mailbox (more lockpicking skill, yay)
D) Once she was done looting, P. D. went over to the local saloon and kicked off the opening game quests! Specifically, she met up with Sunny Smiles to do exactly the very first mission of the tutorial (hilariously, also the very first instance where Jon had to break the “no guns” rule because Sunny wouldn’t speak to P. D. until she SHOT the sarsaparilla bottles lined up on the fence instead of knocking them down with a knife stolen from Doc Mitchell’s), then – after ending the tutorial to avoid fighting geckos at the water supply – went to talk to Trudy at the saloon to kick off “Ghost Town Gunfight!” A quest where you must rally the people of Goodsprings to help the caravaner Ringo (who they let lay low in their town after he stumbled in claiming to be the only survivor of an attack on his caravan by a gang) take out the nasty Powder Gangers! Here’s how P. D. handled that whole thing:
I. After learning what was going on from Trudy (and buying some of her skill magazines in exchange for the guns she’d picked up but couldn’t use), P. D. sought out Ringo and offered her help, then went to get Sunny on-side when Ringo said they’d need as much of the town as possible to fight back to have a chance of winning. Sunny happily said yes right away, guaranteeing them at least one ally. P. D. also took advantage of the opportunity to ask Sunny if there was any work in town that would get her some caps – Sunny said no, but said if she wanted to scavenge in the schoolhouse, there was an old safe in there nobody had been able to crack yet (even with dynamite!)…
II. P. D. then went over to the saloon to talk to Trudy and convinced her via her reasonably-high Sneak skill that they could set up some good ambushes near the saloon and general store, if they had the manpower – Trudy thought this was a good idea and said she’d talk to some people, get them to join the little militia P. D. was forming
III. P. D. then went over to the general store next door and convinced Chet, the manager, that the Powder Gangers taking over would be bad for business and he should outfit the citizens – he agreed to spare them some leather armor and ammunition, and even gave some armor to P. D. herself! Which was exactly what P. D. wanted, as she needed an emergency set of good armor to help her take a hit better if and when things started going belly-up. She also mysteriously decided to buy a shovel from him
IV. Having set up a little army with decent ammo and weapons, P. D. then reported back to Ringo, telling him they were ready as Sunny ran in to say the Powder Gangers were on their way –
Aaand then stayed well back out of the fight, watching as the Goodsprings citizens and Ringo took out the Powder Gangers on their own. XD The reason why she didn’t get her own hands dirty? Well, while she was never going to be LIKED by the Powder Gangers for helping set up this ambush, not killing any of them PERSONALLY meant she was merely “Shunned” by the group instead of “Vilified” as per F:NV’s faction reputation system...which mean that the gang wouldn’t shoot her on sight. And as you might guess by her name, getting people NOT to shoot at her is like P. D.’s top priority. XD And it’s not like Goodsprings thought any less of her for not joining in – she is officially “Liked” by the town for putting all this in motion, and Ringo was nice enough to thank her to the tune of 100 caps! So about the only sad thing that happened for P. D. is that she stumbled across the corpse of Sunny Smiles’s dog Cheyenne while looting. :( With her eyes hovering a few inches from her head because New Vegas may be an Obsidian game, but it’s still got that Bethesda smell. XD
E) With the fight over with, P. D. looted the corpses for her first super-weapon – the humble baseball bat! (Plus a cool cowboy hat that gave her a tiny bit of damage protection.) Why is it a super weapon? Well – once you get your Melee Weapons skill up to 50 (which P. D. did after picking a lock to push herself over the threshold to level 2 – she also took the “Intense Training” perk to get her Endurance up to 7 for more health), melee weapons have special attacks unlock in VATS. And the baseball bat gets the “Grand Slam” – an attack that costs more AP than the normal attack, but does double the damage. Which is good, but not amazing –
And THEN Jon explained how, if you get a sneak attack crit on someone, thanks to the various multipliers F:NV adds to the attack, the bat will do like FIFTEEN TIMES its base damage – and against a weak enemy, that is a fucking hell of a lot. Hell, even against a strong enemy, that’s still a pretty damn good hit! And the best way to ensure that sneak attack crit? Use a Stealth Boy, which Joe Cobb, leader of the Powder Gangers, just so happened to have on his corpse. A Stealth Boy that normally lasted two minutes –
But, thanks to “Logan’s Loophole,” would now last four because guess what counts as a consumable? :D Yeah, Jon knew what the hell he was doing when he took that perk!
F) Having obtained her super-bat, P. D. continued looting, heading up to the cemetery with her shove to dig up and loot the graves, then very carefully threading between some rad scorpions and coyotes to reach an unmarked shack to dig out all the guns, ammo, and drugs to sell, and a 9-Iron golf club to take as Super Weapon #2! What makes THAT a super weapon? Simple – as Jon explained once he got P. D. back to Goodsprings via fast travel (and recovered from the game telling him she was in [CAUTION] when she first arrived), the gold club’s special VATS ability is Fore! An otherwise-normal attack –
That knocks enemies flat. Meaning any enemy charging PD can now be knocked down, and thus have to spend precious minutes getting back up while she changes to her bat and wails on them. XD Basically she now has a one-two punch for any enemies who dare try to get in her face while she has the AP to use VATS attacks!
G) And, to close things off, P. D. headed to the schoolhouse to pick the safe inside for its goodies, including a second Stealth Boy! Jon fully expected her to lose some health to the baby mantises inside doing this (and had her wear the leather armor to help minimize the loss), but as it turned out, they were all on the other side of the room, so P. D. was able to sneak in, crack the lock (after one busted bobby pin), get the goods, then SPRINT outside with all of her health. Yay! :D
And that was that! Next week, P. D. ventures out into the wider world to see what is what and figure out how she’s gonna handle everything she needs to do. I’m looking forward to it!
Aaand that, as usual, took way longer than it should have, so I have to sprint to bed now. In my nice cool air conditioned room. Hopefully this upcoming work week isn't too stressful -- night all!
Tumblr: Another night where nothing happened on Valice Multiverse, but over on Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler), I did successfully finish drafting my “Teen Valicer Save” post before lunch today, yay! I didn’t have that much left to do, admittedly – just had to:
A) Choose two more Aspirations for Alice to complete so she had the same number as Victor and Smiler in their sections (ended up going with The Collector, because there’s a good number of collectibles in Alice: Madness Returns, and Bodybuilder, so she can be as strong and skilled in real life as she is in Wonderland)
B) Add some lines to the “general overview” indicating which aspirations I’ll be having them ALL complete (namely Academic during their college years, and Paragon Partner because it suits them being polyamorous...though I did just realize that I wasn’t thinking about them being a “V” relationship (meaning Alice and Smiler are each romantically involved with Victor, but not with each other) when I picked that...hmm. Well, I suppose I’ve had Alice and Smiler occasionally do romantic things in my fanfics – Alice kissed Smiler in one of my not-incorrect quote collections, in fact – so maybe they can declare themselves partners and we can pretend it’s queerplatonic. (Or...actually, Lumpinou has a mod that makes queerplatonic relationships a thing in the game – maybe we can see if that counts for the aspiration?))
C) Finish off things with a concluding paragraph acknowledging that, for a “less complicated” save file, I have given my Sims a LOT to do (I like having goals!), and talking about how the next step is to actually get the save file off the ground...which would be easier if the game wasn’t so buggy
D) And add the tags, bitching some more about how I’ve had this idea in my head for a while, but it’s been hard to actually get it STARTED thanks to all the bugs (especially from the recent July 1st patch, yeesh) and the other games vying for my attention (such as Baldur’s Gate III, Superliminal – and come December 8th, good old Paralives...)
So yeah – post is all done now, and I should be able to pop it into this week’s queue no problem. :) Figuring out the REST of the queue is left as an exercise for Future Victoria. XD
Workout: Ended up going out and about with my parents early this afternoon, which included a reasonably-extensive walk...which I did NOT dress correctly for, I am sad to report. The problem was, it was cloudy this morning, and stayed cloudy for a while, so I was tricked into thinking I’d be okay in a black t-shirt and a baseball cap – and ended up sweating like a pig throughout the whole trip. Just absolutely MISERABLY hot. *sigh* Very glad that I brought my water bottle to rehydrate...and that I DID think to put some sunscreen on to protect myself from burning after Mom suggested I should. I may have been boiling, but at least I did not also end up as red as a freshly-cooked lobster! Still, I was glad to get home, get in the AC, have some food, and take a nice cool shower. Next time – WHITE t-shirt, Vic. You may only have like two, but they DO exist!
Writing: I got another good chunk of “The Van Dort Vacancy” done today, I’m happy to report. :) Today’s chunklet revolved all around Victor’s closet – specifically, Alice and Smiler getting a look at it while Victor got his carpet bag out and being like “you – you own twelve suits?” (For reference, Alice’s father, a respected educator at Doskvol Academy who lived in Brightstone, had five, with one reserved for special occasions.) Poor Victor was promptly embarrassed by their stunned reaction and ended up asking if they wanted to take any to unstitch and turn into clothes for themselves – cue Alice correctly guessing that this was an offer born out of guilt, and Smiler reassuring him that they weren’t judging him for having more than they did (Alice: “just your parents”), and he didn’t have to “make up” for being rich. Victor relaxed a little after that, but insisted they were still welcome to take some of the suits to repurpose if they wished, and Smiler ended up suggesting he take three that he really wanted, and one that he could stand to see cut up. Because they had all the clothes they needed back at the MOJ, but they knew Alice could use another dress. Alice concurred and said she wouldn’t say no to a repurposed suit – but that she also wouldn’t mind leaving with the servant’s dress she had on, since it was so nice. Victor was like “if you want to, go for it, I don’t mind...just maybe alter it a little so it’s not so obviously from our house,” with Alice replying, “Not a problem, I was already planning on shortening the skirt to my preferred length.” XD I left it with her wondering if her sewing skills were up to moving some of the lace from the collar to the skirt hem, and Smiler and Victor both offering the skills of someone they knew to help her with that if necessary. Tomorrow, Alice will get them back on track with packing (noting that even if Lord Fortescue doesn’t mind being left in the wine cellar, she and Smiler may be missed from the kitchen), and Victor will start grabbing everything he thinks he needs – which might include an old masquerade mask in need of repurposing...
Baldur’s Gate III Planning: Yeah, ended up not having time again to play Superliminal (meaning I’m thinking this upcoming weekend should be Superliminal Collectibles Run Wrap-Up Weekend), so I went back to this instead. And I’m pleased to announce I did make a little progress, specifically on organizing my list of mods I intend to install. Basically, I decided to separate them into subcategories based on function – I now have sections specifically for “Appearance” mods (stuff that makes sure Smiler always looks like, well, Smiler); “Bugfixing” (what it says on the tin – just one mod here, but it’s a doozy, with loads of fixes); “Utility” (for stuff that makes my life easier – better tooltips, the ability to go around with a bigger party, leveling characters up to level 20, etc); and “Equipment & Spells” (again, what it says on the tin). I am also going to make sure I have a link for each mod, plus a note indicating when it was most recently updated and if it has the “Patch 8 Tested” tag or not. *nods* So yeah – once I finalize which mods I’m using, I should have a nice, highly-organized list that I can easily browse to see what I’ve got and what might be causing problems. :) Just gotta get all the mods in it now!
YouTube: Being Sunday, the YouTubery of the day of course consisted of Jon of Many A True Nerd’s latest Fallout-related video: “Fallout New Vegas: You Only Live Once Remastered - Welcome Back To Goodsprings!” Part one of his new F:NV YOLO series, which is a “no healing permadeath” run through the game – that is, he is not allowed to heal any damage he may take over the course of the game, and if he dies, the run just ends right there. I never saw his original F:NV YOLO run, but I did watch and enjoy his Fallout 4 YOLO run with Finn Ally (the woman who went for the Minutemen ending despite doing all the raider stuff in Nuka-World and pissing off Preston), so I’m quite eager to see how this one goes! Here’s what happened today’s brand-new shiny first episode:
A) Jon laid down the rules for this “YOLO Remastered” challenge:
I. No healing, death is the end of the run (as per what we’ve already established – he’s modded out any health regen the game might have tried to foist on him, and is prepared to use console commands to redamage his character down to her “actual” health for those instances where she is fully healed upon entering a DLC land)
II. Game must be played on “Very Hard” difficulty, as the original was played on merely “Hard” (though Jon declined to go all the way into “Hardcore” mode when the game offered it via pop-up right after character creation – the changes it makes to healing and rad removal and whatnot were obviously not applicable to his character, and forcing her to keep up with food and drink meant she would be forced to consume healing items, thus defeating the purpose of a YOLO run)
III. No permanent companions, because otherwise his character could sit back and let Boone handle everything for her (he is apparently a monster)
IV. And the big one – NO. RANGED. WEAPONS. Because Jon remembered that, in his original YOLO run, his character solved everything with either skill checks or sniping, and he felt that the latter made things too easy. So not only is this a YOLO, it’s also a Melee/Unarmed Only run, as Jon is not using any guns, explosives, or throwing weapons! ...Well, except when the game FORCES him to shoot something as part of a quest (like how in Lonesome Road he’s got no choice but to use the Laser Detonator on the warheads to proceed), but fortunately those instances are apparently few and far between. Other than those fleeting moments, NO. RANGED. WEAPONS.
B) Upon waking up in Doc Mitchell’s clinic in Goodsprings after the opening “Benny, aka Chandler Bing [RIP], shoots you in the head” cutscene, Jon designed his character – or, rather, redesigned his former F:NV YOLO Courier, P. D. Shoot! The P. D. stands for “Please Don’t.” XD I don’t know what her stats were in her original adventure, but in this one, the bedraggled Courier had:
I. 7 Strength, 5 Perception, 6 Endurance, 1 Charisma, 9 Intelligence, 7 Agility, and 5 Luck to start (Jon needed the high Strength for Melee and Unarmed attacks; the high Agility for extra AP (action points, necessary for VATS); and the high Intelligence for getting skill points faster to level up her skills sooner – it really hurt him to leave his beloved Luck at solidly average, though. Don’t worry about that 1 Charisma, though – doesn’t mean a thing when you can level up the Speech skill separately :p)
II. Melee Weapons, Speech, and Sneak as her “tagged” skills (I’m not sure what exactly that MEANS, other than them being like “main” skills that get a little bit of a boost at the start – taking Doc Mitchell’s personality test originally got her Survival as a “tagged” skill, but Jon moved that to Sneak because being stealthy is one of the things that will keep P. D. alive
III. And “Skilled” and “Logan’s Loophole” as her traits – the former immediately added +5 to every skill, but caused P. D. to gain 10% less experience going forward, meaning she’d level up more slowly (which Jon was fine with, as that meant enemies would ALSO level more slowly and be easier to deal with), while the latter meant she could never get addicted to chems and they lasted twice as long, but kept her from ever progressing past level thirty (it’s a reference to the movie Logan’s Run, where everyone in a dystopian society is killed at age 30 – Jon was fine with never leveling past 30 as he was pretty sure that, given all the sneaking P. D. would be doing, she wouldn’t have actually gotten much past 30 level-wise anyway, and it was worth it to get the trait’s perks – which were more extensive than you might think...)
A rather interesting build – hopefully it works out for him in this challenge!
C) Once released from character creation (and the endless DLC pop-ups), P. D. went around Goodsprings looting anything that could be helpful to her in the future! The most notable loot included:
I. A weapon repair kit from one house, to keep her melee weapons in good condition
II. A “Chinese Army: Spec Ops Training Manual” (which she immediately read for +3 Sneak skill)
III. A bottle of whiskey, which allowed Jon to explain why he took “Logan’s Loophole” – while the description claims it applies specifically to chems, in reality it applies to ANY consumable, including alcohol. And alcohol boosts Strength in this game when drunk, so P. D. is gonna want to get boozed up if she gets into any fights!
IV. A Wasteland Settler Outfit that gave her a little more protection than her Vault 21 jumpsuit, plus +1 Agility (which boosts her Sneak skill and AP) and +1 Endurance (which sadly DIDN’T boost her health, as that’s calculated solely using her BASE Endurance – did at least increase her rad and poison resistance a skoosh)
V. And a “Locksmith’s Reader” skill magazine in a mailbox (more lockpicking skill, yay)
D) Once she was done looting, P. D. went over to the local saloon and kicked off the opening game quests! Specifically, she met up with Sunny Smiles to do exactly the very first mission of the tutorial (hilariously, also the very first instance where Jon had to break the “no guns” rule because Sunny wouldn’t speak to P. D. until she SHOT the sarsaparilla bottles lined up on the fence instead of knocking them down with a knife stolen from Doc Mitchell’s), then – after ending the tutorial to avoid fighting geckos at the water supply – went to talk to Trudy at the saloon to kick off “Ghost Town Gunfight!” A quest where you must rally the people of Goodsprings to help the caravaner Ringo (who they let lay low in their town after he stumbled in claiming to be the only survivor of an attack on his caravan by a gang) take out the nasty Powder Gangers! Here’s how P. D. handled that whole thing:
I. After learning what was going on from Trudy (and buying some of her skill magazines in exchange for the guns she’d picked up but couldn’t use), P. D. sought out Ringo and offered her help, then went to get Sunny on-side when Ringo said they’d need as much of the town as possible to fight back to have a chance of winning. Sunny happily said yes right away, guaranteeing them at least one ally. P. D. also took advantage of the opportunity to ask Sunny if there was any work in town that would get her some caps – Sunny said no, but said if she wanted to scavenge in the schoolhouse, there was an old safe in there nobody had been able to crack yet (even with dynamite!)…
II. P. D. then went over to the saloon to talk to Trudy and convinced her via her reasonably-high Sneak skill that they could set up some good ambushes near the saloon and general store, if they had the manpower – Trudy thought this was a good idea and said she’d talk to some people, get them to join the little militia P. D. was forming
III. P. D. then went over to the general store next door and convinced Chet, the manager, that the Powder Gangers taking over would be bad for business and he should outfit the citizens – he agreed to spare them some leather armor and ammunition, and even gave some armor to P. D. herself! Which was exactly what P. D. wanted, as she needed an emergency set of good armor to help her take a hit better if and when things started going belly-up. She also mysteriously decided to buy a shovel from him
IV. Having set up a little army with decent ammo and weapons, P. D. then reported back to Ringo, telling him they were ready as Sunny ran in to say the Powder Gangers were on their way –
Aaand then stayed well back out of the fight, watching as the Goodsprings citizens and Ringo took out the Powder Gangers on their own. XD The reason why she didn’t get her own hands dirty? Well, while she was never going to be LIKED by the Powder Gangers for helping set up this ambush, not killing any of them PERSONALLY meant she was merely “Shunned” by the group instead of “Vilified” as per F:NV’s faction reputation system...which mean that the gang wouldn’t shoot her on sight. And as you might guess by her name, getting people NOT to shoot at her is like P. D.’s top priority. XD And it’s not like Goodsprings thought any less of her for not joining in – she is officially “Liked” by the town for putting all this in motion, and Ringo was nice enough to thank her to the tune of 100 caps! So about the only sad thing that happened for P. D. is that she stumbled across the corpse of Sunny Smiles’s dog Cheyenne while looting. :( With her eyes hovering a few inches from her head because New Vegas may be an Obsidian game, but it’s still got that Bethesda smell. XD
E) With the fight over with, P. D. looted the corpses for her first super-weapon – the humble baseball bat! (Plus a cool cowboy hat that gave her a tiny bit of damage protection.) Why is it a super weapon? Well – once you get your Melee Weapons skill up to 50 (which P. D. did after picking a lock to push herself over the threshold to level 2 – she also took the “Intense Training” perk to get her Endurance up to 7 for more health), melee weapons have special attacks unlock in VATS. And the baseball bat gets the “Grand Slam” – an attack that costs more AP than the normal attack, but does double the damage. Which is good, but not amazing –
And THEN Jon explained how, if you get a sneak attack crit on someone, thanks to the various multipliers F:NV adds to the attack, the bat will do like FIFTEEN TIMES its base damage – and against a weak enemy, that is a fucking hell of a lot. Hell, even against a strong enemy, that’s still a pretty damn good hit! And the best way to ensure that sneak attack crit? Use a Stealth Boy, which Joe Cobb, leader of the Powder Gangers, just so happened to have on his corpse. A Stealth Boy that normally lasted two minutes –
But, thanks to “Logan’s Loophole,” would now last four because guess what counts as a consumable? :D Yeah, Jon knew what the hell he was doing when he took that perk!
F) Having obtained her super-bat, P. D. continued looting, heading up to the cemetery with her shove to dig up and loot the graves, then very carefully threading between some rad scorpions and coyotes to reach an unmarked shack to dig out all the guns, ammo, and drugs to sell, and a 9-Iron golf club to take as Super Weapon #2! What makes THAT a super weapon? Simple – as Jon explained once he got P. D. back to Goodsprings via fast travel (and recovered from the game telling him she was in [CAUTION] when she first arrived), the gold club’s special VATS ability is Fore! An otherwise-normal attack –
That knocks enemies flat. Meaning any enemy charging PD can now be knocked down, and thus have to spend precious minutes getting back up while she changes to her bat and wails on them. XD Basically she now has a one-two punch for any enemies who dare try to get in her face while she has the AP to use VATS attacks!
G) And, to close things off, P. D. headed to the schoolhouse to pick the safe inside for its goodies, including a second Stealth Boy! Jon fully expected her to lose some health to the baby mantises inside doing this (and had her wear the leather armor to help minimize the loss), but as it turned out, they were all on the other side of the room, so P. D. was able to sneak in, crack the lock (after one busted bobby pin), get the goods, then SPRINT outside with all of her health. Yay! :D
And that was that! Next week, P. D. ventures out into the wider world to see what is what and figure out how she’s gonna handle everything she needs to do. I’m looking forward to it!
Aaand that, as usual, took way longer than it should have, so I have to sprint to bed now. In my nice cool air conditioned room. Hopefully this upcoming work week isn't too stressful -- night all!
