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Well It EVENTUALLY Got Better
Jan. 25th, 2026 11:46 pmWe had a fucking rough morning today, with a lot of breakdowns caused by Dad being in massive pain and Mom having almost no luck getting through to anyone about him needing specific pain pills to function (because, again, the asshole doctor who was treating him NEVER CALLED IN THE PRESCRIPTION) -- fortunately, by 10:30 AM, his REGULAR doctor stepped up and called in the script, and Mom was able to get up to the hospital pharmacy, get the pills, and get back before the snow got too bad. So Dad finally has painkillers that, you know, ACTUALLY KILL THE PAIN. There were still a few bad moments (especially around suppertime, when a new pain in his back emerged), but nothing like this morning. And now that we have a ten-day supply, hopefully things will be a little better going forward.
...that is, if we don't get buried in snow, because the OTHER main event of the day was the massive snowstorm that descended upon us -- I believe its name is Tess? At any rate, it dumped a FUCKTON of snow on us today -- Mom and I both went out to shovel at around 2 PM and 5 PM, and both times we were dealing with at LEAST six inches of snow on the ground. And both times it was snowing so fast and hard that we couldn't keep any of our paths or the driveway truly clear -- they all just kept getting covered up with snow again! The second time, we were out there for an hour, and Mom and I were pretty sure it snowed two inches in that hour! It's ridiculous! And it's STILL snowing outside -- tiny little flakes, but they're coming fast and furious, and -- yeah. Needless to say, I do NOT have work tomorrow. And may possibly not have it Tuesday either, depending on how the clean-up efforts tomorrow go. We shall see. *shakehead* Between having to watch the house for Mom while Dad was in the hospital and this, it feels like I might never go back to work at all this January...
Anyway. I owe you two days' worth of "what I did on the computer" write-ups tonight, don't I? "Fortunately," I didn't do a lot online either yesterday or today because of all the nonsense with Dad's pain meds and the snow, so it shouldn't be too hard for me to catch you up. Let's go in order:
Saturday, 1/24/2026: Didn't get that much done after Dad came home in the afternoon, but I was able to accomplish three things --
Tumblr: Was another nothing night over on Valice Multiverse (which I was honestly relieved by), but over on Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler), I took a moment after properly finishing Friday’s entry to write up the “Valicer In The Dark not-incorrect quote” scene idea I had on Friday in full – the one where Smiler’s introducing the trio to another scoundrel, only for said soundrel to recognize Victor as the son of the canning magnate William Van Dort, Alice as the one from Rutledge the Doskvol Illustrated kept writing about, and Smiler as an Advocate who sells a very popular drug...and then ask how any of them get away with any crimes. Alice: “We’re very good.” XD I just – I wanted to do something over there, and that was something I knew I could sort out quick and would give me a laugh, so...glad I got it done.
Fallout: New Vegas: As Dad didn’t come home until 4 PM on Saturday (I know because I’d JUST made a cup of hot chocolate when he and Mom pulled up), I had some time after lunch to play video games – so, having played Tav!Smiler on Friday, I returned to the adventures of Courier!Victor on Saturday! Though, admittedly, his playsession was largely another long conversation with an NPC...let me give you the details:
A) First things first – yes, I turned on Hardcore Mode when I got into the game. ^^; I wanted those survival mechanics, damn it! Though, in accordance with what I said before, turning on the Hardcore mechanics (Victor will need to eat, drink and sleep every so often; stimpacks and Rad-Away heal over time; and ammo has weight) also came with me going into the “Agua Fria” section in the Mod Configuration Menu and upping Victor’s base carry weight from the mod’s base of 50 units to 100 – still 50 below the vanilla game’s base of 150, while allowing for some extra space for Victor’s now-heavier ammo. *nods* I felt like that was a fair compromise! So now Victor can carry a whole 130 units of stuff, yay~
( Time to spare your reading pages! )
FreeTube: Despite everything, I found some time to watch something Saturday night – “CaFae Latte Season 82 - TikTok Compilation” by C. M. Alongi. This latest season included:
A) Drek and Mark (the 14-year-old hunter with no sense of direction from the holiday special) hanging out together in CaFae Latte, trauma-bonding and enjoying the brownies – JC came over and was introduced to Mark (who indicated he’d like to learn how to pick locks; JC was happy to teach him) before asking how they were. Mark tried to claim “fine,” but after Drek revealed he’d had to lure him to the cafe with the promise of free food to get him to open up, said that he couldn’t talk about this with his dad – JC said “welcome to the shitty parents club” and informed him that most of the staff had survived at least one near-death experience, so if he couldn’t find a therapist but needed a third party, cafe was open 6 to 3; Drek briefly deflected by talking about how Cassie seemed to be doing okay, but then admitted that he was having some trouble sleeping, but the main thing that was bugging him was having to deal with Conner and his BS more, and how almost none of his friends got it (except Abby, of course – he promised to add Mark to the Discord server). Cue JC being annoyed by Drek saying none of his friends got it and pointing out their nonbinary pin; Drek teasing them by being overdramatic about his suffering; and JC informing him that when they came out, they were punished by having to pick up all the sticks and branches in the woods behind their aunt and uncle’s house, on the basis that physical labor might fix them. Which was probably bad for the environment (Mark confirmed, saying they were stupid on multiple levels).
( More sparing of your reading pages )
Sunday, 1/25/2026: AKA today -- and between the shitty morning and having to help Mom shovel twice, I only accomplished one thing that would go into one of my typical write-ups --
YouTube: I may not have done my usual workout today, but I still made sure to watch my usual workout video of the day: “Fallout New Vegas: You Only Live Once Remastered - Part 27 - Fight or Flight” by Many A True Nerd! Today’s episode of The Adventures Of Drunken Melee-Only Courier P. D. Shoot included –
A) P. D. camping out in the collapsed yao-guai cave she had to hide in at the end of last episode (because suddenly it was daytime and there were enemies everywhere around her, preventing her from safely fast-traveling out of there to her next objective) until 10 PM so she could sneak out and make her way to a spot where she could fast travel; this involved rather a longer walk than Jon expected because there were so many geckos and scorpions and geckos fighting scorpions about, taking her over the bridge and down the nearby road almost halfway to her ultimate destination, but eventually she was able to kill a Bark Scorpion Hunter in her way and FINALLY create a spot enemy-free enough that she was allowed to fast travel
B) P. D. thus fast-traveling to the General Store she cleared out before, then traveling from there to the nearby Morning Glory Cave (a trip that involved her fluffing a sneaky hit on a mole rat in her path (Jon was very embarrassed, even if she killed it easily with the second swing); managing to take down a giant radscorpion by punching it in the tail (Victor only wishes he could do that); and sneaking past two Zion Mantises hanging out in some grass nearby); once inside, she managed to avoid the first of the spore plants growing within (because apparently this is where the survivors of Vault 22 ended up when they evacuated), but the second came close to detecting her, so she ended up activating a Stealth Boy to sneak past it. Fortunately, this did the trick, and she was able to get past it, deactivate all the traps on the ground in front of the secret survivalist stash she was looking for, then raid the stash and get the map of Grand Staircase Daniel wanted for his evacuation plan. And then kill the spore plant on the way out, because gotta murder those abominations to get the abomination-killing perk!
C) P. D. then sneaking out of the cave under the cover of Stealth Boy, then heading down along the river toward the White Legs camps to steal their war totems and break their morale – Jon was initially annoyed that he’d activated the Stealth Boy so early, as there were only bighorners hanging out on the path...and then a couple of White Legs and their dog spawned ahead of P. D., and suddenly he was quite glad for the Stealth Boy’s protection. XD She managed to safetly get around them and over the Bend Bridge into apparently one of the most chaotic areas in an already-chaotic map –
And, of course, because Jon very much did not want to see any Giant Cazadores, a Giant Cazador appeared before P. D. And started flitting and bouncing around, coming VERY close to bumping into her and detecting her. Fortunately, she managed to run away before it could do anything, and it went to go bother some White Legs while she crouch-sprinted to Red Rapids Dock by the river, then up the nearby hill to grab War Totem #1 from the camp there. She then nervously traversed the nearby ridges over to the second White Legs camp, worrying about where that Giant Cazador was all the way –
Only to arrive at the camp to see the local White Legs gathered around the stewpot and the corpse of the cazador nearby. Jon was very surprised to see they’d managed to kill it, as he’d been sure it would wipe them! But he took the win and had P. D. take the totem, get to an enemy-free spot, and fast travel straight back to the Sorrows’ camp. Yay!
D) P. D. then finding Daniel in the camp to choose which of the DLC’s two ending missions she wanted to complete – the one where the Sorrows stayed and fought against the White Legs, like Joshua Graham wanted, or the one where the tribe evacuated to Grand Staircase, like Daniel wanted (as Jon was not interested in doing the few remaining side missions, as none of them had a good enough reward to justify it). As P. D. prefers sneaking over combat, she naturally chose to go with the evacuation plan. Daniel told her that he and the Sorrows would travel by night in small groups to avoid detection, and that her job would be to kill any White Legs who realized their enemies were escaping, and then to collapse the passage they were using to escape, Pine Creek Tunnel, behind them so the White Legs’ pursuit would be delayed and they could get a good head start. In return, he’d give her a map to get back to the Mojave. P. D. agreed to these terms –
And, upon exiting the conversation, went straight into the Level Up screen, as reporting into Daniel and making her choice had gotten her up to Level 27! Which was a good thing, as it put her that much closer to Level 30 and being able to attempt Dead Money…but was also a bad thing, as it put her that much closer to her level cap of 30 (thanks to Logan’s Loophole), and made Jon realize that he would NOT be able to max out all her “support” skills – Lockpick, Science, Repair, or Speech – like he’d wanted. She simply wasn’t going to get enough skill points from her remaining level ups. Something was going to have to suffer from the lack! He declared he was going to have to have a long think about that later and got Speech up to 80 and Repair up to 85 in the meantime.
E) P. D. thus beginning the final mission “Flight From Zion,” prepared to simply sneak her way to the end and completely ignore every optional objective beyond “clear these White Legs from a bridge you need to cross anyway” – except, well, the game wasn’t about to let her do that without a fight. Because, as it turns out, at the beginning of the mission, one Joshua Graham appears in front of you telling you about how you need to help the Sorrows escape and how he will help you in this mission –
And he will not take no for an answer. And if you try to talk to him or give him commands like a regular companion, he will just say “the time for talking is over” and end the conversation. So P. D. was stuck with him and his absolutely useless companion perk (which reduces spread and increases damage for .45 pistols like the one he himself uses). And worse yet, Joshua, being the guy who wanted to fight the White Legs, was REALLY KEEN on using his gun on any White Legs they might come across, meaning he would be luring enemies P. D.’s way unless she was very careful to stay away from as many White Legs as possible on her journey. Fortunately, Jon already had a path in mind for P. D.’s journey, and thus – after P. D. activated another Stealth Boy for herself – the pair traveled:
I. Across the nearby river and south, away from the main road that was absolutely riddled with White Legs
II. Past a ruined house and down onto a gravel road away from the White Legs in the nearby cliffs
III. Over to the bridge they needed to clear – fortunately, the game put three Bone Breakers, one of the White Leg melee class enemies on there, and they were very happy to focus their attention on the guy who was shooting them; unfortunately, P. D. somehow managed to whiff a 95%-chance-to-hit sneak attack VATS attack on one of the women. Jon was like “how?!” Fortunately Joshua took that one down, and P. D. was able to kill the other two, and steal a mantis gauntlet off one to repair her own Embrace Of The Mantis King!
IV. Down the final road to Pine Creek Tunnel, which involved confrontations with three more White Legs – fortunately, they too focused all their attention on Joshua and his gun, and P. D. was able to get behind them and kill them all with her sneak attack critical uppercuts
V. And – after watching the Dead Horses Joshua had trained take out a few more White Legs with flamethrowers (resulting in one burning White Leg running across the road in panic and Jon shouting “DON’T RUN AT ME WHEN YOU’RE ON FIRE” XD) – reaching the tunnel and the final confrontation with the leader of the White Legs, Salt-Upon-Wounds, who was quite eager to kill P. D. Fortunately, he was one of those bosses could be talked down, and P. D. was easily able to pass his 75 Speech check to convince him that his clan’s power was broken, he could not prevail, and he and his should leave the valley in peace. Salt-Upon-Wounds agreed to leave, though he promised that they would continue to fight –
In service to Caesar. Huh – apparently these guys were working for the Legion all along? That’s a surprise. (Though it’s not like Jon has really shown off the STORY of this DLC at all – just how sneaky P. D. can be despite all the chaos.)
F) P. D. ending “Flight From Zion” by telling Daniel that all the Sorrows were accounted for and he should go, only for Daniel to magically know that she hadn’t completed the optional objections and yell at her that she’d left some of them to die, how could she, before angrily giving her the map and leading the survivors through the tunnel; Joshua for some reason giving P. D. everything in his inventory (including pinyon nuts and some purified water) before FINALLY dismissing himself as her companion; P. D. collapsing the tunnel behind Daniel and company once the fade to black was over with (Jon felt like she was standing a little close to the rock slide she triggered, but since she couldn’t move, he figured it was one of those things that couldn’t actually hurt the protagonist); and the ending slides playing, indicating the fates of all those involved in the DLC (for example, the White Legs were NOT allowed to officially join the Legion due to a failure to root out the New Canaanites in Grand Staircase, and when the Dead Horses stopped them from doing so, the tribe collapsed into a bunch of petty raider gangs, while those Sorrows who survived the final evacuation mission did eventually make it to Grand Staircase and settle there with the help of Daniel and the Dead Horses, but were so grieved by having to leave their homeland that for two generations every member died lamenting the loss of Zion. On the plus side, while Daniel was pissed at the Courier for not helping all the Sorrows, he was impressed enough with their actions as a Happy Trails Caravan employee that he told his family back in Grand Staircase – and they, in order to pay back the kindness, starting making a journey twice a year to trade with the caravan company in Reno. Which made the tough times for the struggling company a little easier to bear. So yay – not all bad news!)
G) And P. D. ending the DLC itself by raiding the goodies chest in front of the exit (containing a bunch of armor and clothing belonging to the important NPCs in the DLC – though the only things Jon was interested in were Daniel’s Hat, as it gives Speech +5 on top of the usual Perception +1, and Joshua Graham’s armor, as it was Light Armor with a DT of 15 and gave Crit Chance +3 – as you might imagine, that immediately became P. D.’s day-to-day wear) before finally heading back to the Mojave. Which gave her a final boost of XP that pushed her over the edge to Level 28! Jon chose to max out Repair to 100 and push Lockpick up to 77, then take the perk Bloody Mess for the +5% damage increase to all weapons and the fact that it can cause enemies to explode into giant piles of gore. Not because that was funny, mind – but because the effect destroyed limbs, and in “Dead Money,” the Ghost People are like necromorphs in Dead Space – they ain’t going down unless you destroy a limb! So yeah, good utility perk, that. (Though he did acknowledge that not taking Light Step to make it impossible for P. D. to trigger mines and floor traps was probably going to bite him in the ass. :P)
And so the episode ended with P. D. stepping back out into the Mojave, ready to resume the main base game mission to get a few more levels before attempting the Terror That Is “Dead Money.” Which meant, given where she was in the base game, it was time to choose her ending – NCR or Legion? (House being disqualified due to the fact that P. D. killed him earlier to get brownie points with Caesar, and already did his ending in the original YOLO, and Yes-Man being disqualified because his ending is too easy to get.) We’ll find out what she decides next week – looking forward to it!
Aaand it is really late and I should really get to bed now! ^^; Oof, dragging myself back toward my work sleep schedule is gonna be fun...ah well. I just hope I can get more sleep tonight than I did last night. I expect I will be doing another round of shoveling tomorrow, but I also hope to fit in some writing (gotta get back into "Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland"), some Portal 2 (science to do), and the final OXBox list video I have to catch up with. We'll see what happens tomorrow! Night all!
...that is, if we don't get buried in snow, because the OTHER main event of the day was the massive snowstorm that descended upon us -- I believe its name is Tess? At any rate, it dumped a FUCKTON of snow on us today -- Mom and I both went out to shovel at around 2 PM and 5 PM, and both times we were dealing with at LEAST six inches of snow on the ground. And both times it was snowing so fast and hard that we couldn't keep any of our paths or the driveway truly clear -- they all just kept getting covered up with snow again! The second time, we were out there for an hour, and Mom and I were pretty sure it snowed two inches in that hour! It's ridiculous! And it's STILL snowing outside -- tiny little flakes, but they're coming fast and furious, and -- yeah. Needless to say, I do NOT have work tomorrow. And may possibly not have it Tuesday either, depending on how the clean-up efforts tomorrow go. We shall see. *shakehead* Between having to watch the house for Mom while Dad was in the hospital and this, it feels like I might never go back to work at all this January...
Anyway. I owe you two days' worth of "what I did on the computer" write-ups tonight, don't I? "Fortunately," I didn't do a lot online either yesterday or today because of all the nonsense with Dad's pain meds and the snow, so it shouldn't be too hard for me to catch you up. Let's go in order:
Saturday, 1/24/2026: Didn't get that much done after Dad came home in the afternoon, but I was able to accomplish three things --
Tumblr: Was another nothing night over on Valice Multiverse (which I was honestly relieved by), but over on Victor Luvs Alice (N Smiler), I took a moment after properly finishing Friday’s entry to write up the “Valicer In The Dark not-incorrect quote” scene idea I had on Friday in full – the one where Smiler’s introducing the trio to another scoundrel, only for said soundrel to recognize Victor as the son of the canning magnate William Van Dort, Alice as the one from Rutledge the Doskvol Illustrated kept writing about, and Smiler as an Advocate who sells a very popular drug...and then ask how any of them get away with any crimes. Alice: “We’re very good.” XD I just – I wanted to do something over there, and that was something I knew I could sort out quick and would give me a laugh, so...glad I got it done.
Fallout: New Vegas: As Dad didn’t come home until 4 PM on Saturday (I know because I’d JUST made a cup of hot chocolate when he and Mom pulled up), I had some time after lunch to play video games – so, having played Tav!Smiler on Friday, I returned to the adventures of Courier!Victor on Saturday! Though, admittedly, his playsession was largely another long conversation with an NPC...let me give you the details:
A) First things first – yes, I turned on Hardcore Mode when I got into the game. ^^; I wanted those survival mechanics, damn it! Though, in accordance with what I said before, turning on the Hardcore mechanics (Victor will need to eat, drink and sleep every so often; stimpacks and Rad-Away heal over time; and ammo has weight) also came with me going into the “Agua Fria” section in the Mod Configuration Menu and upping Victor’s base carry weight from the mod’s base of 50 units to 100 – still 50 below the vanilla game’s base of 150, while allowing for some extra space for Victor’s now-heavier ammo. *nods* I felt like that was a fair compromise! So now Victor can carry a whole 130 units of stuff, yay~
( Time to spare your reading pages! )
FreeTube: Despite everything, I found some time to watch something Saturday night – “CaFae Latte Season 82 - TikTok Compilation” by C. M. Alongi. This latest season included:
A) Drek and Mark (the 14-year-old hunter with no sense of direction from the holiday special) hanging out together in CaFae Latte, trauma-bonding and enjoying the brownies – JC came over and was introduced to Mark (who indicated he’d like to learn how to pick locks; JC was happy to teach him) before asking how they were. Mark tried to claim “fine,” but after Drek revealed he’d had to lure him to the cafe with the promise of free food to get him to open up, said that he couldn’t talk about this with his dad – JC said “welcome to the shitty parents club” and informed him that most of the staff had survived at least one near-death experience, so if he couldn’t find a therapist but needed a third party, cafe was open 6 to 3; Drek briefly deflected by talking about how Cassie seemed to be doing okay, but then admitted that he was having some trouble sleeping, but the main thing that was bugging him was having to deal with Conner and his BS more, and how almost none of his friends got it (except Abby, of course – he promised to add Mark to the Discord server). Cue JC being annoyed by Drek saying none of his friends got it and pointing out their nonbinary pin; Drek teasing them by being overdramatic about his suffering; and JC informing him that when they came out, they were punished by having to pick up all the sticks and branches in the woods behind their aunt and uncle’s house, on the basis that physical labor might fix them. Which was probably bad for the environment (Mark confirmed, saying they were stupid on multiple levels).
( More sparing of your reading pages )
Sunday, 1/25/2026: AKA today -- and between the shitty morning and having to help Mom shovel twice, I only accomplished one thing that would go into one of my typical write-ups --
YouTube: I may not have done my usual workout today, but I still made sure to watch my usual workout video of the day: “Fallout New Vegas: You Only Live Once Remastered - Part 27 - Fight or Flight” by Many A True Nerd! Today’s episode of The Adventures Of Drunken Melee-Only Courier P. D. Shoot included –
A) P. D. camping out in the collapsed yao-guai cave she had to hide in at the end of last episode (because suddenly it was daytime and there were enemies everywhere around her, preventing her from safely fast-traveling out of there to her next objective) until 10 PM so she could sneak out and make her way to a spot where she could fast travel; this involved rather a longer walk than Jon expected because there were so many geckos and scorpions and geckos fighting scorpions about, taking her over the bridge and down the nearby road almost halfway to her ultimate destination, but eventually she was able to kill a Bark Scorpion Hunter in her way and FINALLY create a spot enemy-free enough that she was allowed to fast travel
B) P. D. thus fast-traveling to the General Store she cleared out before, then traveling from there to the nearby Morning Glory Cave (a trip that involved her fluffing a sneaky hit on a mole rat in her path (Jon was very embarrassed, even if she killed it easily with the second swing); managing to take down a giant radscorpion by punching it in the tail (Victor only wishes he could do that); and sneaking past two Zion Mantises hanging out in some grass nearby); once inside, she managed to avoid the first of the spore plants growing within (because apparently this is where the survivors of Vault 22 ended up when they evacuated), but the second came close to detecting her, so she ended up activating a Stealth Boy to sneak past it. Fortunately, this did the trick, and she was able to get past it, deactivate all the traps on the ground in front of the secret survivalist stash she was looking for, then raid the stash and get the map of Grand Staircase Daniel wanted for his evacuation plan. And then kill the spore plant on the way out, because gotta murder those abominations to get the abomination-killing perk!
C) P. D. then sneaking out of the cave under the cover of Stealth Boy, then heading down along the river toward the White Legs camps to steal their war totems and break their morale – Jon was initially annoyed that he’d activated the Stealth Boy so early, as there were only bighorners hanging out on the path...and then a couple of White Legs and their dog spawned ahead of P. D., and suddenly he was quite glad for the Stealth Boy’s protection. XD She managed to safetly get around them and over the Bend Bridge into apparently one of the most chaotic areas in an already-chaotic map –
And, of course, because Jon very much did not want to see any Giant Cazadores, a Giant Cazador appeared before P. D. And started flitting and bouncing around, coming VERY close to bumping into her and detecting her. Fortunately, she managed to run away before it could do anything, and it went to go bother some White Legs while she crouch-sprinted to Red Rapids Dock by the river, then up the nearby hill to grab War Totem #1 from the camp there. She then nervously traversed the nearby ridges over to the second White Legs camp, worrying about where that Giant Cazador was all the way –
Only to arrive at the camp to see the local White Legs gathered around the stewpot and the corpse of the cazador nearby. Jon was very surprised to see they’d managed to kill it, as he’d been sure it would wipe them! But he took the win and had P. D. take the totem, get to an enemy-free spot, and fast travel straight back to the Sorrows’ camp. Yay!
D) P. D. then finding Daniel in the camp to choose which of the DLC’s two ending missions she wanted to complete – the one where the Sorrows stayed and fought against the White Legs, like Joshua Graham wanted, or the one where the tribe evacuated to Grand Staircase, like Daniel wanted (as Jon was not interested in doing the few remaining side missions, as none of them had a good enough reward to justify it). As P. D. prefers sneaking over combat, she naturally chose to go with the evacuation plan. Daniel told her that he and the Sorrows would travel by night in small groups to avoid detection, and that her job would be to kill any White Legs who realized their enemies were escaping, and then to collapse the passage they were using to escape, Pine Creek Tunnel, behind them so the White Legs’ pursuit would be delayed and they could get a good head start. In return, he’d give her a map to get back to the Mojave. P. D. agreed to these terms –
And, upon exiting the conversation, went straight into the Level Up screen, as reporting into Daniel and making her choice had gotten her up to Level 27! Which was a good thing, as it put her that much closer to Level 30 and being able to attempt Dead Money…but was also a bad thing, as it put her that much closer to her level cap of 30 (thanks to Logan’s Loophole), and made Jon realize that he would NOT be able to max out all her “support” skills – Lockpick, Science, Repair, or Speech – like he’d wanted. She simply wasn’t going to get enough skill points from her remaining level ups. Something was going to have to suffer from the lack! He declared he was going to have to have a long think about that later and got Speech up to 80 and Repair up to 85 in the meantime.
E) P. D. thus beginning the final mission “Flight From Zion,” prepared to simply sneak her way to the end and completely ignore every optional objective beyond “clear these White Legs from a bridge you need to cross anyway” – except, well, the game wasn’t about to let her do that without a fight. Because, as it turns out, at the beginning of the mission, one Joshua Graham appears in front of you telling you about how you need to help the Sorrows escape and how he will help you in this mission –
And he will not take no for an answer. And if you try to talk to him or give him commands like a regular companion, he will just say “the time for talking is over” and end the conversation. So P. D. was stuck with him and his absolutely useless companion perk (which reduces spread and increases damage for .45 pistols like the one he himself uses). And worse yet, Joshua, being the guy who wanted to fight the White Legs, was REALLY KEEN on using his gun on any White Legs they might come across, meaning he would be luring enemies P. D.’s way unless she was very careful to stay away from as many White Legs as possible on her journey. Fortunately, Jon already had a path in mind for P. D.’s journey, and thus – after P. D. activated another Stealth Boy for herself – the pair traveled:
I. Across the nearby river and south, away from the main road that was absolutely riddled with White Legs
II. Past a ruined house and down onto a gravel road away from the White Legs in the nearby cliffs
III. Over to the bridge they needed to clear – fortunately, the game put three Bone Breakers, one of the White Leg melee class enemies on there, and they were very happy to focus their attention on the guy who was shooting them; unfortunately, P. D. somehow managed to whiff a 95%-chance-to-hit sneak attack VATS attack on one of the women. Jon was like “how?!” Fortunately Joshua took that one down, and P. D. was able to kill the other two, and steal a mantis gauntlet off one to repair her own Embrace Of The Mantis King!
IV. Down the final road to Pine Creek Tunnel, which involved confrontations with three more White Legs – fortunately, they too focused all their attention on Joshua and his gun, and P. D. was able to get behind them and kill them all with her sneak attack critical uppercuts
V. And – after watching the Dead Horses Joshua had trained take out a few more White Legs with flamethrowers (resulting in one burning White Leg running across the road in panic and Jon shouting “DON’T RUN AT ME WHEN YOU’RE ON FIRE” XD) – reaching the tunnel and the final confrontation with the leader of the White Legs, Salt-Upon-Wounds, who was quite eager to kill P. D. Fortunately, he was one of those bosses could be talked down, and P. D. was easily able to pass his 75 Speech check to convince him that his clan’s power was broken, he could not prevail, and he and his should leave the valley in peace. Salt-Upon-Wounds agreed to leave, though he promised that they would continue to fight –
In service to Caesar. Huh – apparently these guys were working for the Legion all along? That’s a surprise. (Though it’s not like Jon has really shown off the STORY of this DLC at all – just how sneaky P. D. can be despite all the chaos.)
F) P. D. ending “Flight From Zion” by telling Daniel that all the Sorrows were accounted for and he should go, only for Daniel to magically know that she hadn’t completed the optional objections and yell at her that she’d left some of them to die, how could she, before angrily giving her the map and leading the survivors through the tunnel; Joshua for some reason giving P. D. everything in his inventory (including pinyon nuts and some purified water) before FINALLY dismissing himself as her companion; P. D. collapsing the tunnel behind Daniel and company once the fade to black was over with (Jon felt like she was standing a little close to the rock slide she triggered, but since she couldn’t move, he figured it was one of those things that couldn’t actually hurt the protagonist); and the ending slides playing, indicating the fates of all those involved in the DLC (for example, the White Legs were NOT allowed to officially join the Legion due to a failure to root out the New Canaanites in Grand Staircase, and when the Dead Horses stopped them from doing so, the tribe collapsed into a bunch of petty raider gangs, while those Sorrows who survived the final evacuation mission did eventually make it to Grand Staircase and settle there with the help of Daniel and the Dead Horses, but were so grieved by having to leave their homeland that for two generations every member died lamenting the loss of Zion. On the plus side, while Daniel was pissed at the Courier for not helping all the Sorrows, he was impressed enough with their actions as a Happy Trails Caravan employee that he told his family back in Grand Staircase – and they, in order to pay back the kindness, starting making a journey twice a year to trade with the caravan company in Reno. Which made the tough times for the struggling company a little easier to bear. So yay – not all bad news!)
G) And P. D. ending the DLC itself by raiding the goodies chest in front of the exit (containing a bunch of armor and clothing belonging to the important NPCs in the DLC – though the only things Jon was interested in were Daniel’s Hat, as it gives Speech +5 on top of the usual Perception +1, and Joshua Graham’s armor, as it was Light Armor with a DT of 15 and gave Crit Chance +3 – as you might imagine, that immediately became P. D.’s day-to-day wear) before finally heading back to the Mojave. Which gave her a final boost of XP that pushed her over the edge to Level 28! Jon chose to max out Repair to 100 and push Lockpick up to 77, then take the perk Bloody Mess for the +5% damage increase to all weapons and the fact that it can cause enemies to explode into giant piles of gore. Not because that was funny, mind – but because the effect destroyed limbs, and in “Dead Money,” the Ghost People are like necromorphs in Dead Space – they ain’t going down unless you destroy a limb! So yeah, good utility perk, that. (Though he did acknowledge that not taking Light Step to make it impossible for P. D. to trigger mines and floor traps was probably going to bite him in the ass. :P)
And so the episode ended with P. D. stepping back out into the Mojave, ready to resume the main base game mission to get a few more levels before attempting the Terror That Is “Dead Money.” Which meant, given where she was in the base game, it was time to choose her ending – NCR or Legion? (House being disqualified due to the fact that P. D. killed him earlier to get brownie points with Caesar, and already did his ending in the original YOLO, and Yes-Man being disqualified because his ending is too easy to get.) We’ll find out what she decides next week – looking forward to it!
Aaand it is really late and I should really get to bed now! ^^; Oof, dragging myself back toward my work sleep schedule is gonna be fun...ah well. I just hope I can get more sleep tonight than I did last night. I expect I will be doing another round of shoveling tomorrow, but I also hope to fit in some writing (gotta get back into "Londerland Bloodlines: Downtown Queensland"), some Portal 2 (science to do), and the final OXBox list video I have to catch up with. We'll see what happens tomorrow! Night all!
