Tips for Hardcore Mode

K

Kamakaze Monk

First time out of the vault
So, i've just started a new character, because i'm trying to get the achievement for completing the game on Hardcore. I'm not sure what to expect, so can anyone give me some tips on how to complete it?
 
Just have a few bottles of water with you and avoid remember that stimpaks don't heal instantly.
Oh yeah, and sell the ammo you don't need, it will just clog up your inventory.
And maybe invest a little more into the survival skill. Food is more important in hardcore.
 
Eating a lot of different food/water items at once will help you heal a *lot* of health in an emergency.

You can google a speed run of NV on HC mode. You can finish in like two hours if you just want the cheevos.
 
Unless you've decided to make the game harder by not using companions, you can use EDE as a pack mule. His default carrying capacity is 210, so he can easily carry any water and food you might need a well as any ingredients for food if you plan to use survival.
 
its important to have doctor's bags around. stims dont heal limbs so even if your at full health if your arms and legs are about to fall off you'll drop like a house of cards in combat.

Keep in mind that "Your" bed (in novac and the lucky 38) will heal your limbs to full in addition to the well rested bonus.

aside from the limbs just keep some food and water around, and you cant lug around thousands of rounds of ammo. it can get really really heavy paticularly .50 cal rounds and Microfusion cells.
 
Nave Senrag said:
Unless you've decided to make the game harder by not using companions, you can use EDE as a pack mule. His default carrying capacity is 210, so he can easily carry any water and food you might need a well as any ingredients for food if you plan to use survival.
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I never give ED-E anything. Every time I do he ends up losing it all somehow, it must be some kind of bug.
 
Courier said:
Nave Senrag said:
Unless you've decided to make the game harder by not using companions, you can use EDE as a pack mule. His default carrying capacity is 210, so he can easily carry any water and food you might need a well as any ingredients for food if you plan to use survival.
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I never give ED-E anything. Every time I do he ends up losing it all somehow, it must be some kind of bug.
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Depending on how you use ED-E, that will happen.
Sometimes when he gets dismissed back to Primm by the game you will lose anything he's carrying. I don't know if it still applies but in earlier patches he also would "lose" his inventory if you did either of the ED-E upgrade quests because he technically becomes another npc by his ID in the engine, and they didnt remember to clone the inventory.

I prefer ED-E over rex for a few reasons, so I get him early every time, set him to ranged, never finish either upgrade quest, and I only ever put perishable items on him like ammo, food, regular weapons, and non-faction armors that I collect for trade.

In most my recent game, I have managed to use him the whole time without glitches as long as I made sure to physically go to the lucky 38 and leave him there before every DLC and every time I switched to Rex for quest purposes.

:D
 
I noticed that Honest Hearts is an absolute dream for hardcore survivalists.....new recipes like the healing poultice...new perks like tribal wisdom....BOATLOADS of beneficial plants growing everywhere...a veritable cornucopia :)

I'm a little surprised they didn't have a recipe for the Yao Guai meat unless, of course, I missed it.
 
Try to create Gecko Kabobs (Kebabs?) whenever possible because they satisfy food, h20 and offer nice healing. Geckos are obviously plentiful throughout the Mojave, Zion's chock full of banana yucca and jalapeno peppers can be found in dry lakes.

Desert Salad is another good option if you can find pinyon nuts.
 
i really didnt find hardcore mode too bad after playing it for an hour or so, you just gotta remember to eat an stuff
 
The biggest difference is that survival and barter become much more useful. Just get in the habit of thinking stims are for followers, food is for you. Barter itself isn't all that useful but it does open up some perks that help quite a bit with additional weight management issues that hardcore causes.

Oh, also keep in mind that followers can die for real in hardcore means that you should make armoring them properly and choosing perks that maximize survivability... well, unless you don't mind leaving them dead or reloading constantly. And if Cazadores are around it's not a bad idea to have your followers sit this one out.
 
Hardcore for me involves a little extra planning.

I start off with a decent endurance (8 or so, all implants + nice boost to HP/poison resist etc). I prefer energy weapons, sure the ammo is more expensive, but you don't have to carry several kinds for your weapons, just some MF and SEC cells depending on what you are carrying.

The Survival skill is your best friend, make Desert Salads and Gecko Kebabs, and if you are in a pinch use Maize (lots in the Boomers area, and Sharecropper farms).

The Science skill lets you make Hydra (which, IMO, is WAY better than a doctor's bag) it weighs nothing and constantly restores your limbs. One hydra often heals my limbs to full from crippled. Materials needed are a bit hard to find until you go into Honest Hearts DLC, but Cave fungus can be found on Legion troops semi-often.

Barter skill gets you access to several perks that let you carry more stuff or reduce the weight of all items under 2 pounds, like "Pack Rat" and "Long Haul" If you have Old World Blues, try and get the perk "Them's Good Eatin'" for some uber healing items from just about everything you kill.

Followers die permanently in Hardcore, as was mentioned. Be sure to gear them well, and be careful of enemies you engage. Try to keep your distance, and remember not getting hit at all is better than trying to strafe a charging cazador / deathclaw.
 
VaultWannabe said:
The Science skill lets you make Hydra (which, IMO, is WAY better than a doctor's bag) it weighs nothing and constantly restores your limbs. One hydra often heals my limbs to full from crippled. Materials needed are a bit hard to find until you go into Honest Hearts DLC, but Cave fungus can be found on Legion troops semi-often.
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Adding to this: Healing Poultices are a great alternative to Hydra because their ingredients appear more frequently. Poultices restore less LMB damage than Hydra, but also offer a fair amount of healing. Also, crafting Hydra requires Survival, not Science.
 
Hm. I may not be the guy to give advice here since I've never actually played without hardcore on.

But the main thing for me is to always carry water with you, or your companions. Get used to pawning off ammo, etc. Another helpful hint is that if you drink from a water source, anything from a lake to a toilet it drops your dehydration by 200, and that helps a lot.
 
That 1600+ rounds of .50 cal you probably had on average in your inventory in non-hardcore mode?

Yeah, you probably don't need *all* of it.

But yeah, you probably might want to put some points into your repair so you can recycle some ammunition. This feature was actually something I really quite enjoyed in New Vegas.
 
- Always carry some food and water

- Make a melee/unarmed oriented character so you don't have to worry about ammo clogging your inventory and running out of it in the middle of a hot anal with Deathclaw Matriarch

- Cap Survival

- Get Hones Hearts, full of awesome survival recipes, plants, ingredients, etc.

- Remember a few locations where you can periodically come back and farm plants

- Use chems, ALOT

- Use companions to carry the ammo you're not using or plan to sell

- Watch your companion's health. If he dies, he dies

- Remember there is no instant heal, fight accordingly

- Find a secure location supplied with bed and water and call it home

- and one more important tip-----------> CAZADORS ALWAYS WIN
 
I always keep about 10 Dirty Waters, a bunch of small food items that aren't used in recipes to use as snacks when I get the first level of starvation, plus some heavier food and healing items like Dog Steaks, Brahmin Steaks, Gecko steaks, etc.

As for weapons, I used to find myself carrying multiple pistols, an automatic rifle, sniper weapon, etc. Not needed, I've gone to a high accuracy rifle, an Assault Carbine, a melee weapon and unarmed one.
 
Pack Rat is an incredibly useful perk for hardcore. Since it reduces the weight of items that weigh 2 pounds or less and reduces the weight by half. It really reduces the weight of ammo, water, and food to more manageable levels.

Also when you are planning your character out, make sure to choose a specific way to play. Like if you like range focus on perks that improve damage from guns or energy weapons. Also melee tends to not do so well against certain creatures, without the right perks. Also Cazadors will kill your companions so easily with their venomous stings.

Another thing you will want to do is to achieve challenge perks. These will help you take enemies down quicker, make you tougher, or just help you survive better. Like Camel of the Mojave will improve the effects of drinking water by 15% for both hydrating and healing.

The DLC Old World Blues also adds a very convenient home to you after you complete it. Along with a trait which was absent from the core game, Skilled. With the Sink you can cook, craft, drink, sleep, store and more. The appliances in the Sink will also have useful functions for useless items, by breaking them down to ammo or crafting parts. What really makes the Sink useful is you can use it's transponder to transport there from the wastes Mojave even when encumbered.
 
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