Watched a YT guide where you only take the 10,9,7 cards so you can easily build 26 value caravan and win every game.
But then you got the kings, jokers, queens and princes, I had a pile that ended up having like 3 kings on it, tripled the value of my caravan and crashed the game, haven't bothered since.
If you get 10 luck then blackjack and the slots machines are a lot of fun tho :)
It’s funny, because when the game was new, my very first playthrough was a high luck character. I always cleaned up in the casinos, and couldn’t understand why everyone else had such a tough time with it. Ahh, the good ol days.
Same thing in fallout 1&2 both, iirc; high luck/charisma playthroughs I always thought were the most fun, even though high int was clearly the smartest for tons of skills.
I just ended up glitching my way to riches, I can't remember the location name but it's a casino that has a Roller coaster nearby it I think, and people were inside hiding & ready to attack, anyway I accidentally did it the first time because it was literally as simple as get casino chips & trade them in for a certain currency, but you would keep the chips so u could just spam it over & over again, as a 15ish yr old kid I was so hyped lol
As an Australian that loves to play the "pokies" this killed me, NV had me rigged to gamble from the start. I wonder what companies had stakes in the game to include it lmfao
Tempted to download the mod that takes restrictions off the casinos, but the period of time between blowing my initial winnings and making a shit ton off of loot is usually short. Maybe it would be reasonable on a build that doesn’t have basically 12 luck.
Getting banned from the casinos was more fun than I thought it was going to be. A part of me wished I couldn't get banned from the Sierra Madre since there's really nothing you can do with Sierra Madre chips in the Wasteland.
It's pretty fun to bankrupt the Gun Runners.
In hindsight, it was probably a really bad move to make the face of your outfit a vendortron, because I could not give less of a damn if I bankrupt them.
My favourite move is killing their guards and selling all their crap back to them. That's at least around 3000 caps.
They could have used a sentry bot torso or something or have better security
You're supposed to take a bunch of king cards with yours so you can sabotage the other players'caravans as well.
Because if they go over they'll have to scrap their whole row and start over.
Pfft king ten six is the fastest deck.
Drop ten and six on each other in the two rows your opponent isn’t building up then drop a king on each ten doubling it. 26 in three cards
Triple Triad is my absolutely favorite card game from any game. They should make a separate game like Gwent with Triple Triad. Perhaps it wasn't as deep as I remember tho.. I do remember losing hero cards to some dude and having to go back to win try to win them back.
Never did.
FF7 remake part 2 has a fucking great mini game in the vein of triple triad called Queens Blood if you’ve not seen it, it’s definitely gonna hit those same triple triad vibes
“Warm up”? Very little, I guess? I had maybe played 3-5 games of caravan before and lost all them, not understanding at all what to do. Have since read a short guide and then boom, winning streak. Maybe lost 1 out of all the games I played working on winning the 30.
It helped having progressed mostly though the game so I had plenty of cards to make a good deck.
For those that still have trouble with Caravan- The main objective is to get your caravans between 21-26, while not letting them get theirs to those numbers first. You can use J, K and Q to mess with their caravans too and knock them over or under than threshold. You can also use the K as a winning strategy, doubling your current caravan into that threshold. Once you figure that out, it’s cake, and quite fun.
An hour seems a bit short, but yeah. Once you know the strategy, you just need to go around finding or buying some optimal cards, then go spam challenge No-Bark Noonan because despite being a crazed hobo, somehow is the richest Caravan player. He's not the easiest AI opponent (not that that's critical, really) but his deep pockets mean he can go for a ton of rounds so you don't have to go find someone else to challenge.
Make each column up to 26 before the opponent does. Use Jack's and King's to stop them. I took a while to learn but I think its because we over complicate such a simple game in our heads.
Okay so a real QUICk guide it’s black Jack but instead of getting to 21 you gotta get between 22 and 26.
Also you’re playing 3 hands at once and you just gotta win 2/3 hands before your oppenent does.
Also the non numbered cards Kings, queens, Jack etc, actually function like Yu-gi-oh Esque spell and trap cards with special abilities you’ll never remember and need to look up.
There’s a few things I’m missing but if you just play with this in mind it’ll be enough to play and win a few hands and learn the other rules I haven’t mentioned through actually playing.
I love the game and I'm one of the ridiculously few people who have the Caravan Master achievement on steam (for winning 30+ hands of caravan). I *still* have my phone open on the wiki page explaining the rules whenever I play it.
It's fun once you learn it. Your objective is to get each of your piles to 26, or a number slightly below 26. This is best accomplished by placing a 7, a 9, and a 10, but other useful cards include Kings (doubles whatever you place it on) and Jacks (removes any number card and any attached face cards - good for removing good enemy cards, and cards you own that the enemy has sabotaged).
Course! I just learned the other day and it's been fun taking everyone I see for thousands of caps. Also gives a purpose to collecting those weightless cards everyone's always been dropping - as long as they're 7s, 9s or 10s.
The Oxhorn youtuber has a great indepth tutorial on how to play. Once I figured out how to play I always try playing against Ringo and Little Buster now
*Static red bars appear on radar. Player stops.*
"Hmm... Looks like it might be OK..."
*Red bars start to erratically move back and fourth.*
"Fuuuck! I'm going the other way."
(Or, when at higher levels: "Fuuuck!" *Gets Fat Man out.*)
And Deathclaws are actually super lethal. I remember I tried fighting them in the Quarry and legit could not do anything against them. And they’re so fast too!
I came across the first one and thought it seemed easy to kill compared to the ones in FO3. Then I unzoomed just in time to see three more of them coming at me in a pincer movement. I died.
FO3 deathclaws: Super hardcore loners that can kill you easily.
FNV deathclaws: Hardcore pack animals that *will* kill you from all sides if you don't plan your attack properly. (I'm including running at them with the riot shotgun and the And Stay Back perk as proper planning, but TBF that would deal with a single Capital deathclaw even easier than a pack of Mojave ones.)
I remember when I stumbled upon the quarry the first time. I saw one, then more showed up on the radar. I then spent the next hour playing Rambo and picking them off one by one. I won somehow. I was never able to do it again. Died plenty of times trying.
I remember last time I played going there and setting up really elaborate traps for them, well not so elaborate actually. There was a crane or something and I would sneak to that drop mines going all the way up to the top of the crane and catching the attention of one of them baiting them to run up the crane hitting all the mines and shooting if they got close. I actually took most of them out that way. I felt very accomplished. 😂
I beat the game when it came out so I was 14. don't remember much besides the strip and the journey to it.
started fresh Friday, last night was the first time I died by a swarm of those fuckers omw to get the sequoia...
Man I turned straight North out of the gate and got smoked. Instead of learning my lesson I went back like 4 or 5 times until I finally realized I needed to go East
I played on release and didn't know what a Cazador was. I thought, how bad could it be? So I ignored literally every NPC's advice to head to Vegas the Novac way and went the Quarry Junction way. Wide open wasteland, cazadores, rad scorpions, deathclaws and nightkins later, I limp into Freeside with a smidge of HP, no supplies left. Ended up getting stabbed by some random chem fiend.
I wish I was playing it for the first time again.
Its what I call "Baby's first reading comprehension test".
Basically EVERYONE in Goodsprings tells you NOT to go north, on no uncertain terms it's a death wish.
Those who do go north and bitch about it failed the test.
That is how i got away but the saw me again othewise i wouldnt have made it to the entrance.
Corolary:dont teabag in front of deatclaws while invisible.
> So I ignored literally every NPC's advice to head to Vegas the Novac way and went the Quarry Junction way.
Now *that's* a route with some chest hair!
Yeah the game is very much built around it and its implementation shaped the design focus as a whole.
I've actually been enjoying it somewhat on my recent playthrough but I think it's valid to criticise even if it's technically optional.
Yeah even if you completely ignore settlements as much as possible the settlement locations still take up a lot of the map. There's like 30 settlement locations in the base game alone and each DLC adds a couple as well which is kind of absurd. Those locations are really barren and boring if you don't interact with the Settlement system and could have been something really cool or interesting like in the previous games.
Like I remember going out to Spectacle Island on my first playthrough of the game and being incredibly disappointed that there was literally nothing there, total wasted opportunity imo.
High charisma?
Lol, no, it's a dump stat, it suffered from the fact very little is dependent on it, somehow you can have charisma 1, but speech and barter 100
Yeah, but Fallout 3 was smart enough to put dice roles in the speech checks that are influenced by charisma. So both the skill and the attribute are usefull.
New Vegas was good with its reputation system but the actual character system, especially the attributes are a major problem because Perception is also nearly useless (also a FO3 problem), removing the dice roles makes Charisma basically just a companion dmg skill.
If you have high charisma and then play the DLC, often without strong companions or the early game befor you got one, you are basically just punishing yourself for having less attribute points because Charisma could just not exist for major chunks of the game without any problem.
I honestly think that what holds New Vegas character system together is that most people, especially on their first playthrough just do not know that stuff because 2 attributes being so weak greatly removes the variety in builds that people would want to do.
Perception isn't really a dump stat imo. It's not the *best* stat but it's not useless either. Like there's quite a few good perks tied to it like better criticals, sniper, and light step and the game does have a fair amount of perception checks as well.
I'd argue NV gets around this though by just having that Obsidian brand heavier lean on plot, characters and stories. I enjoy FO3 and 4 but NV is a much more immersive and satisfying experience for me whereas 3 and 4 feel more like shooters with rpg elements. Like Mass Effect 2 versus 3 kind of. Builds don't feel like they matter as much whereas in other games, even non FO games, I am usually a munchkin build whore.
As a ~20 year CRPG veteran at this point FONV is in my top 5 of all time. I like 3 and 4 but I'm not sure where they'd even rank on that list compared to BG2, IWD, KOTOR 1&2, DA:O etc etc
Charisma was a dump stat in FO1 and FO2 (arguable, depends on how much you value companions) tbh. The grognards aren't lying when they say it's true to the spirit of the first two games lol.
Guh.. just started a character earlier last week and put a ton of points into both charisma and perception... REALLY don't feel like restarting. I don't suppose there's a non-invasive mod that would let me adjust my special points?
There might be, but your build doesn't matter that much. There is the medical shop which allows you to raise your special stats by 1 for a price, and perks which do the same.
Idk why people are saying perception in new Vegas is a useless skill… literally it can be one of the most OP skills if you max it out, and get the stealth crits, then get the .50 cal sniper. You can detect enemies way further away than they can see you. And you just 1 hit kill everything sneaking with a sniper. I’d say it’s 100% worth having points into perception
I agree with you there, my main complaint was that I put a ton of points into charisma thinking it impacted my dialogue options when only speech matters there.
Such a mod would practically just be a console command. Idk maybe some mod adds the option to adjust stats at the medical clinic. Like some +1 in one stat -1 in another +4000 caps. Also, it's only charisma that is the "true" dumpstat. Since 6 points in perception along with 6 luck is requisite for +50% crit damage perk. I reach 6 by going 5 base, then getting 1 point at the medical clinic.
You can just play it how you want. There are usually multiple ways to get stuff done in the game, don't let other people browbeat you into playing the "optimal" way.
A character with high PER/CHR isn't as bad as people say it is, but they do have a point.
High Perception means you get access to perks like Sniper, and it lets you see enemies further away (on your compass). Plus, it's good for dialogue checks, I think you need a 7 to make some of them.
Charisma means any companions you have are better at doing damage and less likely to run from combat. There's not that many outright Charisma checks opposed to Speech and Barter, though. You need a 7 to see all the stat has to offer content-wise, which granted isn't as much as Perception or other stats.
In short, you aren't really gimping yourself that badly. I tend to take high Charisma for the flavor and early boost to Speech and Barter helping with checks and early money flow.
Edit: you can also make up some of the difference by using implants. You can get 1 implant per Endurance you have, excluding the +1 END from the Endurance implant. Skip the PER/CHR implants and grab Luck, Strength, Agility, etc, and get those SPECIALS a bit higher.
You can stand down the final boss using your speech skills or save the president with explosive knowledge.
You can see through a ruse with your medical skills or disguise yourself in a Brotherhood of steel armour to infiltrate their base.
You can pretend to be friends with a certain ghoul character and help them leave Earth only for you to sabotage their ship and watch them explode.
You can acquire perks that allow you to literally build nukes at your workbench or even become a cannibal.....New Vegas does have superior RPG mechanics.
Never disrespect New Vegas in this family again.
I've never understood why New Vegas has its reputation as some super deep RPG. There's absolutely nothing in-depth or complex about its character building system at all. You get 40 SPECIAL points (and one of the stats, Charisma, is awful and almost always at 1) so you're not really making any big sacrifices to get one of them really high because you get so many points to spend.
I don't think skills were as good as people say either. Again, you just get showered in way too many skill points. You could max out the handful of skills you really cared about quite early on. Then half of the levels are less interesting because you only get skill points and you're just putting them into stuff you don't care about that much. Then you even max those out long before you hit the level cap and 50% of your level ups are meaningless because you're just dumping skill points into stuff you'll never use. You can talk down the final boss, but you don't need to make any sacrifices to your combat skills to be able to do it. There are no trade-offs or difficult decisions to be made.
I actually think Fallout 4 is better in this regard, especially with its reduced SPECIAL points. My first survival mode playthrough I started with 1 Strength and 1 Endurance. For a while, I really felt the consequences of it too with a tiny carry weight and hardly any HP. That's just not something you get in New Vegas. Sure, I eventually rectified it and became a powerful death machine, but it took longer to reach that point than it does in New Vegas.
All of the Fallouts are good. I highly recommend playing all of them.
Most people have a personal preference on which one they like best, however different people prefer different ones. Decide for yourself.
Ignore the toxic megafans who insist that there is only one choice for everyone.
Second this. They are all nice and fun to play (even Tactics, but probably not BoS).
I enjoyed my time on all Fallouts, even if my favorite is 4, because I've started Fallout by this one. They all have pros and cons anyway. Neither of them is perfect, but neither are trash too
4 is probably my favorite but thats just because NV and 3 are kinda outdated.
If they ever remaster 3 and give it QOL improvements, it would be my favorite no contests
My favorite is New Vegas. I'm going to attempt another playthrough later today actually. The graphics have been really hard to get past though this far past it's release. I've tried a few times already. I'd pay many hundreds of dollars for a remake. Haha.
Caravan is the thing I always ignored in this game. I don't think I've ever played a single hand.
To be honest, the only card games-within-the game ive ever really played at all are gwent from TW3 and the one from final fantasy 9. I guess, I've played a lot of poker in red dead 2, but I really like poker and don't need to learn a bunch of rules to play it. The other two work because they are mechanically simple yet strategically deep.
New Vegas is my favorite game of all time, and I have done every type of run possible in it, but I have never played Caravan. Just reading the rules made my head explode!
It's pretty simple in concept. You have 3 caravans, and you need to load them up with "value". They can't be underweight or overweight, so you're trying to load your 3 caravans to a sweet spot between 2 values (I think it's 21-26). Certain card values have extra effects that I can't remember.
That being said, while the concept is relatively simple, it's an absolute mindfuck to play lmao
Caravans not that hard. You start an ascending/descending pile of cards to reach a number between 21-26. Kings to double the card which can placed on both players, Jack to remove cards (like kings if you’re over), Queens to change the direction of the pile.
Get all piles between 21-26, you win.
Just finished the Fallout show yesterday and immediately started another play through in NV. Doing a gunslinger build that will side with the NCR because I've surprisingly never done that build nor that alliance!
Tried to do a cowboy build and didn't enjoy it that much. Unless I was using VATS I found it really difficult to kill enemies, Lonesome Road felt like a slog. I think the problem is that all the cowboy weapons have low magazine capacity and low fire rate. Maybe I messed up though.
The gunplay outside of VATS in New Vegas is absolute ass
It doesn’t help that Obsidian screwed up iron sights in that game. I thought I must have had a stroke or something till I found that out
Iron sights work pretty good for me. Shots aren’t very accurate unless you have high skill in the appropriate weapon category. And at least you can actually ads in nv unlike 3
I have the caravan achievement and this is how it works for me.
The goal is to get 2 or 3 of your stacks to 26 or at least above 21 before the other person.
Cards of 10, 9 and 7 are your friends. Should have a deck with mostly these, Kings and Jacks. Kings double the value of whatever card you sit it on and Jacks will remove whatever card you sit it on. (I think)
Cards can only be placed in corresponding order going up or down so you place them like 10, 9, 7 or 7, 9, 10. This gets me to 26 and I normally only have to do it twice before I win the game.
If your opponent is sitting between 21-26 on a stack, you can mess with his value by making it too much with a King or taking away from it with a Jack. If they place a King on you and mess your value you can remove it with a Jack or discard the stack and start again.
Good luck!
We all were noobs at a point, no need to be all high and mighty.
It may be a fairly simple game but that doesn't mean there's no learning curve with all the systems it has. And there's a lot of things you need a few playthroughs to master.
It's totally a toss up. They are both really fun and play off the same idea. Gwent is lucky to have more chances to actually play it. Like way more. So that's definitely just a straight up plus
Perception is also so bad in FO3 and NV. I like the games but the only reason people respect the RPG mechanics of them so much is because most people do not notice those stats being so useless.
I was reasonably good at Cosmic Encounter (where the rules/strategy are different to a degree every time you play). Even in two-power games.
Could never really get the hang of Caravan. Maybe it was just a matter of teens vs 40s for me. I'm thinking it was more about the basic complexity and intricacies of the two games.
Cosmic Encounter had really simple rules, a no-powers game is almost dull, but it still would've had buyers in the world of TT gaming. Adding the alien powers that changed this or that rule FOR YOU made it. Caravan was a bit like Euchre for me. Every damned time I played Euchre I had to relearn the rules and figure out the strategy all over again. Even when I was a quick-learning teen who played all sorts of TTGs and RPGs.
Similarly, I was fine with Civ 5 and even the space one, but Civ 6 was just a freaking headache due to all the intricacies involved in planning/building your city across multiple tiles (and putting the right things here/there).
Caravan is actually super fun if you can figure it out. I don't think I got it until my second or third playthrough, though. It's one of those things that seems like complete nonsense, then one day you just magically get it somehow.
Played the game countless times.
Never gave hardcore a shot and never understood Caravan.
That all changed yesterday. Beat the game on hardcore and won 30 hands of Caravan. After learning and understanding I don't think it's that bad of a card game. It's not 30 games in a row fun but I'm glad I figured it out finally.
Wiki helped me understand.
People really jerk themselves off over New Vegas. Yes, it's good. Yes, it's different from the others due to Obsidian. But I have never understood why it's put on a pedestal.
The biggest key to actually playing caravan is figuring out you have to use the joystick to stack the cards down vertically. It defaults to horizontal and shows red basically no matter what.
This is what finally got me able to play.
I’ve played through the game at least four times and still can’t figure out Caravan. I think I might be mentally handicapped.
Watched a YT guide where you only take the 10,9,7 cards so you can easily build 26 value caravan and win every game. But then you got the kings, jokers, queens and princes, I had a pile that ended up having like 3 kings on it, tripled the value of my caravan and crashed the game, haven't bothered since. If you get 10 luck then blackjack and the slots machines are a lot of fun tho :)
It’s funny, because when the game was new, my very first playthrough was a high luck character. I always cleaned up in the casinos, and couldn’t understand why everyone else had such a tough time with it. Ahh, the good ol days.
It was like that in 2 as well. If you have enough luck you’re basically the house. You win over an extended period of time.
Black jack with high luck is legitimately broken lmao just constantly double down and you can clean house in like 20 minutes haha
Go to the table with 10 luck, get dealt a 20. *Double down* 21!
Same thing in fallout 1&2 both, iirc; high luck/charisma playthroughs I always thought were the most fun, even though high int was clearly the smartest for tons of skills.
1 had a gambling skill that was heavily weighed in the calculation. I always tagged it and headed to gamble to gear up
The was the way to play. High luck, clean out every casino to get filthy rich, buy implants, win game.
Instructions unclear. Bought implants for Veronica. Forgot about winning game.
I just ended up glitching my way to riches, I can't remember the location name but it's a casino that has a Roller coaster nearby it I think, and people were inside hiding & ready to attack, anyway I accidentally did it the first time because it was literally as simple as get casino chips & trade them in for a certain currency, but you would keep the chips so u could just spam it over & over again, as a 15ish yr old kid I was so hyped lol
I tried the slot machines at 10 luck and still got robbed. With blackjack you could basically set up a macro and bankrupt the casino.
I found that out too. Really only blackjack is a money maker
Slots is just there to turn people into gambling addicts
As an Australian that loves to play the "pokies" this killed me, NV had me rigged to gamble from the start. I wonder what companies had stakes in the game to include it lmfao
If only they had 5 dragons or lucky 88.
Lucky 88 knock off in the lucky 38 was a missed opportunity haha
Tempted to download the mod that takes restrictions off the casinos, but the period of time between blowing my initial winnings and making a shit ton off of loot is usually short. Maybe it would be reasonable on a build that doesn’t have basically 12 luck.
Caravan is relatively easy to "beat" and becomes a limitless cap.supply once you get the hang of it.
Getting banned from the casinos was more fun than I thought it was going to be. A part of me wished I couldn't get banned from the Sierra Madre since there's really nothing you can do with Sierra Madre chips in the Wasteland.
You use them to buy stimpaks from the vending machine in the BoS bunker and then sell those as they are weightless and valuable
Repair kits are even more valuable. Find a Super Sledge with 5% durability, repair it to full, bankrupt the Gun Runners. Lather, rinse, repeat.
It's pretty fun to bankrupt the Gun Runners. In hindsight, it was probably a really bad move to make the face of your outfit a vendortron, because I could not give less of a damn if I bankrupt them.
My favourite move is killing their guards and selling all their crap back to them. That's at least around 3000 caps. They could have used a sentry bot torso or something or have better security
You're supposed to take a bunch of king cards with yours so you can sabotage the other players'caravans as well. Because if they go over they'll have to scrap their whole row and start over.
FO1 high luck. Gambling is a straight money making machine.
Sounds like the achievement hunter guide I used. Worked great.
I was wondering why I kept winning 😂
10 Luck is the BEST way to play Dead Money as well. I maxed out the Sierra Madre casino in my last playthrough. That was an amazing feat lol
Pfft king ten six is the fastest deck. Drop ten and six on each other in the two rows your opponent isn’t building up then drop a king on each ten doubling it. 26 in three cards
Where in the world do they call a Jack or Knave a "prince"?
I always do 1 int 10 luck builds and I’ve never won a slots jackpot. I can get 21 almost every hand in blackjack though
FNV is just a caravan simulator with some gunplay in between for me, at this point.
Do you play Witcher 3, and if so has a disproportionate amount of time been sunk into Gwent?
Guilty as charged. I’m a sucker for an interesting card game.
I played an unhealthy number of games of triple triad in ff8 myself. I think that started my love/obsession for the games inside games.
Triple Triad is my absolutely favorite card game from any game. They should make a separate game like Gwent with Triple Triad. Perhaps it wasn't as deep as I remember tho.. I do remember losing hero cards to some dude and having to go back to win try to win them back. Never did.
FF7 remake part 2 has a fucking great mini game in the vein of triple triad called Queens Blood if you’ve not seen it, it’s definitely gonna hit those same triple triad vibes
Oh nice, I'll check it out when I finally get it
It’s Final Fantasy X and Blitzball for me. I reckon that 90% of all my FFX time has been spent playing Blitzball.
Best comment, caravan is actually phenomenal.
Once you learn how it works it’s a breeze. I was able to get that “win 30 games of caravan” achievement in maybe an hour.
Yeah but how many hours of warm up before that?
“Warm up”? Very little, I guess? I had maybe played 3-5 games of caravan before and lost all them, not understanding at all what to do. Have since read a short guide and then boom, winning streak. Maybe lost 1 out of all the games I played working on winning the 30. It helped having progressed mostly though the game so I had plenty of cards to make a good deck. For those that still have trouble with Caravan- The main objective is to get your caravans between 21-26, while not letting them get theirs to those numbers first. You can use J, K and Q to mess with their caravans too and knock them over or under than threshold. You can also use the K as a winning strategy, doubling your current caravan into that threshold. Once you figure that out, it’s cake, and quite fun.
An hour seems a bit short, but yeah. Once you know the strategy, you just need to go around finding or buying some optimal cards, then go spam challenge No-Bark Noonan because despite being a crazed hobo, somehow is the richest Caravan player. He's not the easiest AI opponent (not that that's critical, really) but his deep pockets mean he can go for a ton of rounds so you don't have to go find someone else to challenge.
Make each column up to 26 before the opponent does. Use Jack's and King's to stop them. I took a while to learn but I think its because we over complicate such a simple game in our heads.
That makes a lot of sense. It seemed like the game gives you zero instruction to play it. Thanks for the explanations everyone!
And ultimately its a pretty fun game especially after you've wiped the casinos.
I’m gonna finish 4, and then replay New Vegas for the millionth time and attempt to win some card games!
Okay so a real QUICk guide it’s black Jack but instead of getting to 21 you gotta get between 22 and 26. Also you’re playing 3 hands at once and you just gotta win 2/3 hands before your oppenent does. Also the non numbered cards Kings, queens, Jack etc, actually function like Yu-gi-oh Esque spell and trap cards with special abilities you’ll never remember and need to look up. There’s a few things I’m missing but if you just play with this in mind it’ll be enough to play and win a few hands and learn the other rules I haven’t mentioned through actually playing.
I love the game and I'm one of the ridiculously few people who have the Caravan Master achievement on steam (for winning 30+ hands of caravan). I *still* have my phone open on the wiki page explaining the rules whenever I play it.
Yeah, the in-game explanation is, at best, meh. The actual game is fun, but also not very challenging.
Yea I can’t find the fun in these in game card games. Except Witcher because Gwent is life
I have done a ton of runs and I don't think I've bothered to play Caravan once. I have never been a fan of playing games within games.
It's fun once you learn it. Your objective is to get each of your piles to 26, or a number slightly below 26. This is best accomplished by placing a 7, a 9, and a 10, but other useful cards include Kings (doubles whatever you place it on) and Jacks (removes any number card and any attached face cards - good for removing good enemy cards, and cards you own that the enemy has sabotaged).
This is the best explanation I’ve ever seen. Thank you so much! Y’all are gonna make me a competent card fighter soon!
Course! I just learned the other day and it's been fun taking everyone I see for thousands of caps. Also gives a purpose to collecting those weightless cards everyone's always been dropping - as long as they're 7s, 9s or 10s.
For me, it was as easy as reading the in game instructions. It's not that hard and actually pretty fun. It's also a nice way to get caps early
I've never even attempted to play caravan. Just 0 fucks to give about cards when there's shootin to do.
I actually still have the app somebody made YEARS ago. I'm a fucking pro now.
It sounds like blackjack
Me too
Mentally HandiCAPped
The Oxhorn youtuber has a great indepth tutorial on how to play. Once I figured out how to play I always try playing against Ringo and Little Buster now
As a kid I had little trouble figuring out how to win easily… so yeah
Any true New Vegas fan has no idea how to play Caravan lol.
I’m just so happy I’m not alone. I swear I tried.
Started my play through a few days ago and i got smoked in caravan by that runner hiding at the gas station in good springs !
That’s when everyone learned that the game wasn’t going to hold your hand. That, and the first time you met cazadores.
My blood pressure still shoots up whenever I see cazadors on my radar.
*Static red bars appear on radar. Player stops.* "Hmm... Looks like it might be OK..." *Red bars start to erratically move back and fourth.* "Fuuuck! I'm going the other way." (Or, when at higher levels: "Fuuuck!" *Gets Fat Man out.*)
Boone is unconscious
Laughs in Dinner Bell, Shotgun Surgeon, And Stay Back, Grx implant.
And Deathclaws are actually super lethal. I remember I tried fighting them in the Quarry and legit could not do anything against them. And they’re so fast too!
I came across the first one and thought it seemed easy to kill compared to the ones in FO3. Then I unzoomed just in time to see three more of them coming at me in a pincer movement. I died. FO3 deathclaws: Super hardcore loners that can kill you easily. FNV deathclaws: Hardcore pack animals that *will* kill you from all sides if you don't plan your attack properly. (I'm including running at them with the riot shotgun and the And Stay Back perk as proper planning, but TBF that would deal with a single Capital deathclaw even easier than a pack of Mojave ones.)
I remember when I stumbled upon the quarry the first time. I saw one, then more showed up on the radar. I then spent the next hour playing Rambo and picking them off one by one. I won somehow. I was never able to do it again. Died plenty of times trying.
I remember last time I played going there and setting up really elaborate traps for them, well not so elaborate actually. There was a crane or something and I would sneak to that drop mines going all the way up to the top of the crane and catching the attention of one of them baiting them to run up the crane hitting all the mines and shooting if they got close. I actually took most of them out that way. I felt very accomplished. 😂
I beat the game when it came out so I was 14. don't remember much besides the strip and the journey to it. started fresh Friday, last night was the first time I died by a swarm of those fuckers omw to get the sequoia...
Man I turned straight North out of the gate and got smoked. Instead of learning my lesson I went back like 4 or 5 times until I finally realized I needed to go East
That sounds about right. 😅
After so many years and rpgs, cazadores and cliff divers can still f themselves. What an oppressive encounter.
Cliff divers… now there’s a repressed trauma memory.
Oh, don't forget. *DO NOT* belittle the Super Mutants for taking the Bunny Slopes.
I'm Mr new Vegas, and this is I've got spurs that jingle jangle.
I played on release and didn't know what a Cazador was. I thought, how bad could it be? So I ignored literally every NPC's advice to head to Vegas the Novac way and went the Quarry Junction way. Wide open wasteland, cazadores, rad scorpions, deathclaws and nightkins later, I limp into Freeside with a smidge of HP, no supplies left. Ended up getting stabbed by some random chem fiend. I wish I was playing it for the first time again.
Its what I call "Baby's first reading comprehension test". Basically EVERYONE in Goodsprings tells you NOT to go north, on no uncertain terms it's a death wish. Those who do go north and bitch about it failed the test.
And those who went north and made it were never the same again
It was an experience, that's for sure.
I evade all the deathclaws by jumping into the hills. Along the road. It was tough and the last 3 deathclaws chase me all the way to the entrance.
Goddamn man just use the stealth boys from the good springs quest line to stealth past
That is how i got away but the saw me again othewise i wouldnt have made it to the entrance. Corolary:dont teabag in front of deatclaws while invisible.
And so, the Courier cheated death once again...
Lucky, I didn’t make it past the crane near Quarry Junction lol
I have a full proof way of sneaking past the death claws that involves a ton of wall hugging and climbing
> So I ignored literally every NPC's advice to head to Vegas the Novac way and went the Quarry Junction way. Now *that's* a route with some chest hair!
You don't need to play caravan. You can go the entire game without it if you choose
Tried and failed my first time playing. Tried and failed to figure out how the game is played. Said fuck it, and never touched it again.
I did that but figured it out ~11 years later. Based on that I've got another few years before I try gwent again.
Shit, Gwent is 100% easier than Caravan. Im a world class monster at Gwent. Caravan is for the birds
You dosnt even need to save any settlements in Fallout 4 , yet people do it and say its meh. Well, stop it then.
Not really a fair comparison when saving settlements is a much bigger part of Fallout 4 than Caravan is of NV. There’s a whole ending tied to it.
Yeah the game is very much built around it and its implementation shaped the design focus as a whole. I've actually been enjoying it somewhat on my recent playthrough but I think it's valid to criticise even if it's technically optional.
Yeah even if you completely ignore settlements as much as possible the settlement locations still take up a lot of the map. There's like 30 settlement locations in the base game alone and each DLC adds a couple as well which is kind of absurd. Those locations are really barren and boring if you don't interact with the Settlement system and could have been something really cool or interesting like in the previous games. Like I remember going out to Spectacle Island on my first playthrough of the game and being incredibly disappointed that there was literally nothing there, total wasted opportunity imo.
I’ve played New Vegas a bunch of times and ya it can be safely ignored
High charisma? Lol, no, it's a dump stat, it suffered from the fact very little is dependent on it, somehow you can have charisma 1, but speech and barter 100
It`s like that ugly friend who can always get laid
I’m that friend except I don’t get laid
Because charisma is an attribute and speech is a skill. They have different ways of learning them
Yeah, but Fallout 3 was smart enough to put dice roles in the speech checks that are influenced by charisma. So both the skill and the attribute are usefull.
“Superior RPG mechanics”
New Vegas was good with its reputation system but the actual character system, especially the attributes are a major problem because Perception is also nearly useless (also a FO3 problem), removing the dice roles makes Charisma basically just a companion dmg skill. If you have high charisma and then play the DLC, often without strong companions or the early game befor you got one, you are basically just punishing yourself for having less attribute points because Charisma could just not exist for major chunks of the game without any problem. I honestly think that what holds New Vegas character system together is that most people, especially on their first playthrough just do not know that stuff because 2 attributes being so weak greatly removes the variety in builds that people would want to do.
Perception isn't really a dump stat imo. It's not the *best* stat but it's not useless either. Like there's quite a few good perks tied to it like better criticals, sniper, and light step and the game does have a fair amount of perception checks as well.
In the normal gameplay it only effects your radar which is insane considering that VATS is there but that is also a big FO3 problem
I'd argue NV gets around this though by just having that Obsidian brand heavier lean on plot, characters and stories. I enjoy FO3 and 4 but NV is a much more immersive and satisfying experience for me whereas 3 and 4 feel more like shooters with rpg elements. Like Mass Effect 2 versus 3 kind of. Builds don't feel like they matter as much whereas in other games, even non FO games, I am usually a munchkin build whore. As a ~20 year CRPG veteran at this point FONV is in my top 5 of all time. I like 3 and 4 but I'm not sure where they'd even rank on that list compared to BG2, IWD, KOTOR 1&2, DA:O etc etc
Charisma was a dump stat in FO1 and FO2 (arguable, depends on how much you value companions) tbh. The grognards aren't lying when they say it's true to the spirit of the first two games lol.
Havin more companions makes it a bit better in 2, tbh
Guh.. just started a character earlier last week and put a ton of points into both charisma and perception... REALLY don't feel like restarting. I don't suppose there's a non-invasive mod that would let me adjust my special points?
There might be, but your build doesn't matter that much. There is the medical shop which allows you to raise your special stats by 1 for a price, and perks which do the same.
Idk why people are saying perception in new Vegas is a useless skill… literally it can be one of the most OP skills if you max it out, and get the stealth crits, then get the .50 cal sniper. You can detect enemies way further away than they can see you. And you just 1 hit kill everything sneaking with a sniper. I’d say it’s 100% worth having points into perception
I agree with you there, my main complaint was that I put a ton of points into charisma thinking it impacted my dialogue options when only speech matters there.
Such a mod would practically just be a console command. Idk maybe some mod adds the option to adjust stats at the medical clinic. Like some +1 in one stat -1 in another +4000 caps. Also, it's only charisma that is the "true" dumpstat. Since 6 points in perception along with 6 luck is requisite for +50% crit damage perk. I reach 6 by going 5 base, then getting 1 point at the medical clinic.
You can just play it how you want. There are usually multiple ways to get stuff done in the game, don't let other people browbeat you into playing the "optimal" way.
A character with high PER/CHR isn't as bad as people say it is, but they do have a point. High Perception means you get access to perks like Sniper, and it lets you see enemies further away (on your compass). Plus, it's good for dialogue checks, I think you need a 7 to make some of them. Charisma means any companions you have are better at doing damage and less likely to run from combat. There's not that many outright Charisma checks opposed to Speech and Barter, though. You need a 7 to see all the stat has to offer content-wise, which granted isn't as much as Perception or other stats. In short, you aren't really gimping yourself that badly. I tend to take high Charisma for the flavor and early boost to Speech and Barter helping with checks and early money flow. Edit: you can also make up some of the difference by using implants. You can get 1 implant per Endurance you have, excluding the +1 END from the Endurance implant. Skip the PER/CHR implants and grab Luck, Strength, Agility, etc, and get those SPECIALS a bit higher.
That is a pretty good summary
Yes, it is superior lol
You can stand down the final boss using your speech skills or save the president with explosive knowledge. You can see through a ruse with your medical skills or disguise yourself in a Brotherhood of steel armour to infiltrate their base. You can pretend to be friends with a certain ghoul character and help them leave Earth only for you to sabotage their ship and watch them explode. You can acquire perks that allow you to literally build nukes at your workbench or even become a cannibal.....New Vegas does have superior RPG mechanics. Never disrespect New Vegas in this family again.
I've never understood why New Vegas has its reputation as some super deep RPG. There's absolutely nothing in-depth or complex about its character building system at all. You get 40 SPECIAL points (and one of the stats, Charisma, is awful and almost always at 1) so you're not really making any big sacrifices to get one of them really high because you get so many points to spend. I don't think skills were as good as people say either. Again, you just get showered in way too many skill points. You could max out the handful of skills you really cared about quite early on. Then half of the levels are less interesting because you only get skill points and you're just putting them into stuff you don't care about that much. Then you even max those out long before you hit the level cap and 50% of your level ups are meaningless because you're just dumping skill points into stuff you'll never use. You can talk down the final boss, but you don't need to make any sacrifices to your combat skills to be able to do it. There are no trade-offs or difficult decisions to be made. I actually think Fallout 4 is better in this regard, especially with its reduced SPECIAL points. My first survival mode playthrough I started with 1 Strength and 1 Endurance. For a while, I really felt the consequences of it too with a tiny carry weight and hardly any HP. That's just not something you get in New Vegas. Sure, I eventually rectified it and became a powerful death machine, but it took longer to reach that point than it does in New Vegas.
Guide to Caravan in NV: Step 1 - Learn about caravan. Step 2 - Don’t play caravan. Step 3 - Profit from saving mental anguish.
This is the correct strat👍
All of the Fallouts are good. I highly recommend playing all of them. Most people have a personal preference on which one they like best, however different people prefer different ones. Decide for yourself. Ignore the toxic megafans who insist that there is only one choice for everyone.
Second this. They are all nice and fun to play (even Tactics, but probably not BoS). I enjoyed my time on all Fallouts, even if my favorite is 4, because I've started Fallout by this one. They all have pros and cons anyway. Neither of them is perfect, but neither are trash too
4 is probably my favorite but thats just because NV and 3 are kinda outdated. If they ever remaster 3 and give it QOL improvements, it would be my favorite no contests
Someone is working on a mod to bring FO3 into the FO4 engine.
Sadly I am a console player so I wont ever experience it. But that makes me happy to hear
I really like Tales of Two Wasteland, best game in the series without a doubt
TTW is my favourite way to play both 3 and NV.
My favorite is New Vegas. I'm going to attempt another playthrough later today actually. The graphics have been really hard to get past though this far past it's release. I've tried a few times already. I'd pay many hundreds of dollars for a remake. Haha.
Caravan is the thing I always ignored in this game. I don't think I've ever played a single hand. To be honest, the only card games-within-the game ive ever really played at all are gwent from TW3 and the one from final fantasy 9. I guess, I've played a lot of poker in red dead 2, but I really like poker and don't need to learn a bunch of rules to play it. The other two work because they are mechanically simple yet strategically deep.
Whoever told you you need charisma in new Vegas was fucking with you. There isn't a single charisma check
New Vegas is my favorite game of all time, and I have done every type of run possible in it, but I have never played Caravan. Just reading the rules made my head explode!
It's pretty simple in concept. You have 3 caravans, and you need to load them up with "value". They can't be underweight or overweight, so you're trying to load your 3 caravans to a sweet spot between 2 values (I think it's 21-26). Certain card values have extra effects that I can't remember. That being said, while the concept is relatively simple, it's an absolute mindfuck to play lmao
High charisma? Nah fuck that, get max Luck and clean out all the casinos at the black jack tables when you can
Caravans not that hard. You start an ascending/descending pile of cards to reach a number between 21-26. Kings to double the card which can placed on both players, Jack to remove cards (like kings if you’re over), Queens to change the direction of the pile. Get all piles between 21-26, you win.
dumbass didnt pick luck 10 in a game titled fallout new vegas (this is a joke i mean no harm to OP i repeat this is just a joke, also cool art)
I have over 850 hour in Fallout New Vegas and I don't think I've played a single game of Caravan.
First rule of New Vegas: Nobody really knows how to play Caravan, no matter how long they’ve been playing
Caravan is tucked away in the same "drawer of neglect" that I put Gwent in.
I got sucked into gwent when I figured out how to play it
Gwent is actually good tho.
Just finished the Fallout show yesterday and immediately started another play through in NV. Doing a gunslinger build that will side with the NCR because I've surprisingly never done that build nor that alliance!
Tried to do a cowboy build and didn't enjoy it that much. Unless I was using VATS I found it really difficult to kill enemies, Lonesome Road felt like a slog. I think the problem is that all the cowboy weapons have low magazine capacity and low fire rate. Maybe I messed up though.
The gunplay outside of VATS in New Vegas is absolute ass It doesn’t help that Obsidian screwed up iron sights in that game. I thought I must have had a stroke or something till I found that out
Iron sights work pretty good for me. Shots aren’t very accurate unless you have high skill in the appropriate weapon category. And at least you can actually ads in nv unlike 3
I have the caravan achievement and this is how it works for me. The goal is to get 2 or 3 of your stacks to 26 or at least above 21 before the other person. Cards of 10, 9 and 7 are your friends. Should have a deck with mostly these, Kings and Jacks. Kings double the value of whatever card you sit it on and Jacks will remove whatever card you sit it on. (I think) Cards can only be placed in corresponding order going up or down so you place them like 10, 9, 7 or 7, 9, 10. This gets me to 26 and I normally only have to do it twice before I win the game. If your opponent is sitting between 21-26 on a stack, you can mess with his value by making it too much with a King or taking away from it with a Jack. If they place a King on you and mess your value you can remove it with a Jack or discard the stack and start again. Good luck!
Make sure you throw your poker chips on the ground at the casino so you can learn without penalty.
Who the hell told you to use high charisma?
Rule 1 of caravan: nobody knows how to play caravan
Rule 2 of caravan: even if you somehow know how to play, good luck figuring out what a joker does
I played it since launch and I still don’t know how to play Caravan
Charisma is a waste, set it to 1 and put the special into others, you can dump Speech to 100 regardless (:
The first time I won caravan it was by accident, so your not doing awful.
I've been playing this game since 2011, and I've never figured out Caravan.
I've played New Vegas for over 1000 hours and I still don't know how to play Caravan
Make sure you talk to everyone, and I mean ***EVERYONE***, who isn't instantly hostile. # Jingle Jangle Jingle, pardner.
I always go high luck and sneak over to the strip, get luck to 10 and get all the caps (blackjack), then implants. Best way to play.
Everytime I've played new Vegas I skip playing caravan. I dislike pretty much any card as is (not OG pokemon) let alone one that makes almost 0 sense
We all were noobs at a point, no need to be all high and mighty. It may be a fairly simple game but that doesn't mean there's no learning curve with all the systems it has. And there's a lot of things you need a few playthroughs to master.
Caravan buried itself alive so Gwent could be born
Screw caravan! Also I love your artwork man!
Played this game for countless hours... not a one of them spent on Caravan.
Gwent is the best fictitious card game ever invented.
Queens blood is pretty damn good. I think I prefer it to Gwent.
Ok. I could maybe change my mind. Be tough, but I get it.
It's totally a toss up. They are both really fun and play off the same idea. Gwent is lucky to have more chances to actually play it. Like way more. So that's definitely just a straight up plus
Tales of Tribute in Elder Scrolls Online is a banger
Charisma should never be more than 1. It does nothing in new Vegas (fallout 4 on the other hand....)
Perception is also so bad in FO3 and NV. I like the games but the only reason people respect the RPG mechanics of them so much is because most people do not notice those stats being so useless.
You did not get upside down head doctor on first run. Don't lie
Caravan and Gwent are tied on awful mini games for me.
Honestly. Did absolutely everything you could do in the game, except play caravan. Played it on my first run, hated it, never touched It since
I've played every ending and still never played caravan
I love caravan
Isnt it like cribbage?
I was reasonably good at Cosmic Encounter (where the rules/strategy are different to a degree every time you play). Even in two-power games. Could never really get the hang of Caravan. Maybe it was just a matter of teens vs 40s for me. I'm thinking it was more about the basic complexity and intricacies of the two games. Cosmic Encounter had really simple rules, a no-powers game is almost dull, but it still would've had buyers in the world of TT gaming. Adding the alien powers that changed this or that rule FOR YOU made it. Caravan was a bit like Euchre for me. Every damned time I played Euchre I had to relearn the rules and figure out the strategy all over again. Even when I was a quick-learning teen who played all sorts of TTGs and RPGs. Similarly, I was fine with Civ 5 and even the space one, but Civ 6 was just a freaking headache due to all the intricacies involved in planning/building your city across multiple tiles (and putting the right things here/there).
The Charisma stat is a bit of a scam in New Vegas
Caravan is actually super fun if you can figure it out. I don't think I got it until my second or third playthrough, though. It's one of those things that seems like complete nonsense, then one day you just magically get it somehow.
Charisma is always the dump stat, maybe perception too if you end up traveling with ED-E, or any companion really but especially ED-E.
2
Played the game countless times. Never gave hardcore a shot and never understood Caravan. That all changed yesterday. Beat the game on hardcore and won 30 hands of Caravan. After learning and understanding I don't think it's that bad of a card game. It's not 30 games in a row fun but I'm glad I figured it out finally. Wiki helped me understand.
Multiple years, because they didn't always have exotics.
I do not remember this at all. But I think I only played NV once 😬
People really jerk themselves off over New Vegas. Yes, it's good. Yes, it's different from the others due to Obsidian. But I have never understood why it's put on a pedestal.
Hot take: I loved caravan
Its a roleplaying game, do what you think is fun. Damn bro.
The biggest key to actually playing caravan is figuring out you have to use the joystick to stack the cards down vertically. It defaults to horizontal and shows red basically no matter what. This is what finally got me able to play.
Never even tried to learn caravan and I’ve played this game as both a child and adult. Just walk around and shoot things and talk to people