Is There Any Point In Being Neutral?

[dwaynegand]

In previous games, you could be either good or evil. There was no point to being neutral. In 3, you have the option to be neutral where you avoid going above or less. You can steal to reduce karma or donate caps to a church to gain karma, just as long as you don't go under or above into good or evil territory. When playing neutral, companion options give you Sergeant RL-3 and Butch.

But is there any point in doing this kind of playthrough. At the end of the game, you are forced to make a choice that would take you to the highest or lowest karma level even if you maintained neutral karma. And at the end of the core game before Broken Steel begins, you'd have to avoid entering the chamber of Project Purity yourself to avoid the karma gain, unless you first contaminated the water with the modified FEV virus.

With all this in mind, should you focus on the good or evil route as in the previous games? Or is a neutral playthrough worth doing?

[NightmareGats]

Maybe from role playing in a game?

[worm_master]

Yes an No, i think,,, Down by the Super-duper mart. usely early morning, u find a due wandering around with robot's. If you have the right kama, you can take the robot...

I believe it's neutral karma, which means running straight to Super Duper Mart. other then that no.

[Death Approaches]

As Nightmare says, for mostly for roleplaying. A couple places it maters, but not many. There are late-game perks to let you be a contract killer for either way if you take both perks,,,

You can always just open console, 'playyer.getav karma' to check, and then 'player.rewardkarma <int>' to change it.... you're a hero at 734? well rewardkarma -700 and you're neutral again. boom.

Not the Super Duper per se, but Tinker Joe patrols between Robco and Tenpenny Tower... Sergeant RL-3 won't go with you if you're too good / evil... that's pretty much what karma is used for.

You'd think if you were true evil that people who are flagged as "evil" would not be hostile, all raiders and slavers your buddies, etc. Never seems to play out that way, though. Oh well.

[Magic Man]

1) You can have Butch and Sergeant RL-3 as companions.
2) Talon Company mercs and Regulators will not hunt you down.

[Mathius]

If nothing else, it's a challenge to walk that razors edge and not do too many bad or good things.

[dwaynegand]

It's certainly easier to do so than in New Vegas with all those enemies that can give you karma from killing them.

[Mathius]

Originally posted by dwaynegand:

It's certainly easier to do so than in New Vegas with all those enemies that can give you karma from killing them.

Karma system was completely abandoned in NV. They gave you good Karma for killing Ghouls and then forgot it was a thing.

[dwaynegand]

Whereas in 3, only npcs with very evil karma such as Mr. Burke gave you good karma.

[Mathius]

Originally posted by dwaynegand:

Whereas in 3, only npcs with very evil karma such as Mr. Burke gave you good karma.

Because most of the karma was earned through roleplay options, not how good you were at aiming.

[Death Approaches]

Originally posted by Mathius:

Because most of the karma was earned through roleplay options, not how good you were at aiming.

still laugh at that years later, you headshot some raider from across the map, sub-MoA single-pel accuracy from ~1000m out, but somehow magically pop him, and the positive karma trill plays, and you're like damn right you see that!?

[Slithers]

Role playing purposes, The Impartial Meditation perk gives +30 to Speech with neutral karma. I always liked playing with neutral karma because some people need help and others just have it coming to them.