Early play through feedback

[subtledoctor]

I finally got TTW up and running (v2.2a) and have put about 2 hours into it. Here's what I've seen:

- Level progression is fast! Even with the TTW XP mod. I hit level 2 out of the vault, and level 3 after clearing Springvale School and disarming the Megaton bomb. I was level 5 before finishing Those! and chapter 1 of the WSG. I traded out the TTW XP mod for a simple NV mod that just doubles the required  XP for each level. Now it seems a bit better.  

- Talon Co. at the Super Duper Mart: a few people have mentioned this and I saw them there too, BUT I have the explanation: it's not a TC random encounter, they we're hired to take me out by Tenpenny for disarming the bomb (there was a note). They were hard (hit me with an assault rifle and ~12DT armor, at level 3) but I overcame them (maybe because I play on normal difficulty). 

- I have an assault rifle now! In fact, at level 5, I already have a ton of weapons, including a Chinese assault rifle, a .357 revolver, a .44 revolver, a service rifle, a laser pistol, a plasma rifle, a 10mm sub machine gun, and a bunch of 10mm pistols. Taking down raiders feels like Christmas, as they are weak and seem to have unusually good loot. Also, outside the junkyard near Minefield, I saw an Outcast patrol. 'Great' I sez, 'I can scavenge what they kill.' But, they ran into a deathclaw (!) which one-shotted all three of them and came after me. Luckily they had weakened it a LOT, so my 10mm panic-fire killed it. It was a scary encounter, which is great... but it also gave me crazy loot like power armor and plasma weapons. A bit more Christmas than I deserve, to be honest. Thankfully for balance, I don't have much ammo other than 9mm & 10mm. 

- Fire ants are big! But, weak. I could take out all but the nest guardians with a 9mm pistol. Maybe their carapaces are brittle... frankly I think it's okay given this quest usually happens at low level. Just an FYI that they are different than in vanilla FO3. 

- Overall, the experience so far is surprisingly not very different from how I remember FO3. I'm not sure what I expected... but this is basically what it says on the tin: Fallout 3 with DT, better weapon variation, and other NV goodness. Awesome. 

- There are lots of mod conflicts. I think my game is pretty stable now, but there is still some hinky stuff. My 'skill perks' mod has Lonesome Road as a master, and when I enabled it I got the message from Ulysses to Courier 6. The 'weathered 10mm fixes' mod evidently uses the classic pack as a master, and when I enable it, it gives me the classic pack items. (Fine with me, it makes sense I would take a canteen with me out of Vault 101.) So it seems that mods at the bottom of my load order are invoking the NV DLC content that TTW usually suppresses. I don't know the technical issues that cause this, but maybe a TTW end-of-load-order .esp would be able to override the NV mods and control this. 

- Great job... I'm loving this so far!

[JaxFirehart]

Alrighty, thanks for the feedback.

USE THE TTW LEVEL PROGRESSION!!!!

Seriously though, it ramps up. The time taken to get from level 1 to 50 is DOUBLE what it would take in NV, but the time taken to get from 1 - 10 is the same as it would take in NV. So the early levels are just as fast, but the late levels are almost 3 times longer. So use what you prefer. The plugin that doubles xp requirements ultimately does the same thing as the TTW one, its just a matter of approach.

Talon Co. is a random encounter, and the Super Duper Mart is a random encounter zone, I might need to check and see why Talon Co. seems to show up so often there, you may be on to something with it having to do with the bomb in Megaton.

The raiders max out at skill level 50 weapons, but that should be at level 10-15, so I need to check into that, I've gotten other reports of the same.

The fire ants were changed over to being the NV version of fire ants, so that's just an effect of NV overwriting FO3.

I'm glad you like the approach, the team and I have made pains to make it as close as possible to vanilla FO3, but with NV improvements. There have been those who wanted to "upgrade" the game, both on the team and not, but Chuck and I stood firm. It's always nice to hear from prefer who are glad that we stuck to vanilla.

Finally, your load order determines what wins and because you are using mods that effect the same scripts that TTW uses to delay DLC and Stash packs, those changes are overridden. No helping it unfortunately. The only way to incorporate both changes to the script is to do it yourself.

[subtledoctor]

I'll reply in reverse:

- I don't think the load order issue is a big deal; it has no real effect (except to give me a Vault 13 Canteen, which I actually like as I play in hardcore mode).  Just mentioning it for the sake of thorough reporting.

- I think the Talon Co. encounter is not a random one, because they don't do the usual line about "look, it's that do-gooder, let's take him out," instead they are hostile from the get-go and one of them was carrying a note from Tenpenny.  I don't have time to test now, but I'm willing to bet that if you don't defuse the bomb before going to the Super Duper, you won't see them there.

- I *was* using the TTW XP mod... but as you say it matches NV progression for the first 10 levels, and NV progression is way too fast for me.  Totally a subjective thing, it's nothing to do with TTW... it's more just a comment on the difference between the two games: NV has almost twice as many levels, and gives you level-ups more often, but gives you fewer skill points & perks with each level-up.  I didn't remember it being such a big difference, but playing the one game with the other's rule set makes it very noticeable.

[orik]

I really enjoyed my level 3 Talon Co. encounter. I had just cleared out the mart with stealth, had picked up two mines and a few grenades. I leave the store and then they were there.



I ended up getting them to chase me around back of the mart and hid behind a trash can. I had dropped a few mines when I turned the corner and that took two of them out. I had a bit of a shootout with 17 bullets and a Chinese Assult rifle, but backed off as the last mercs moved forward near a car.



I threw two grenades in vats at them not expecting the car to blow up also but boy, did that take care of things.



After this I saw some boy running away and chased him down; he led me to those scary as hell fire ants.



I think TTW is gripping and scary. I like it.

[subtledoctor]

[quote=orik] a bit of a shootout with 17 bullets and a Chinese Assult rifle, [/quote]

Oh yeah, I didn't highlight that aspect: while I have found lots of weapons, and thus made a lot of money to spend on house upgrades, I have not been able to stockpile ammo. I may leave megaton on an expedition with a 10mm pistol as my main sidearm; by the time I get back, I'm out of 10mm rounds and I have to use a .357 revolver for the next trip. Moira is my only steady store (I haven't been to Underworld or rivet city yet) and her inventory hasn't replenished yet.  This scarcity is a bit frustrating - not enough ammo for my preferred weapons, no weapon mods to buy - but it's also challenging and fun, and I'm thinking about prioritizing Repair to use reloading benches. 

That's quite a difference from NV, where the GR store and the Vendortron mean there's no such thing as ammo scarcity. GRA really makes NV kind of boring.  

[Risewild]

Yep, the reloading benches are the answer to the ammo problem, I like it that way since it makes the player use the NV benches, the logic behind it is that there is no GR making new stuff in the capital wasteland so ammo and weapon mods are more scarce just like in FO3.