Issue with "Mole Rat disease"

[Garrett]

I have a couple of problems with no apparent solution with this part of the mission in Vault 81. The first is that I find it quite absurd that we can contract the disease/debuff even using power armor ¿How does a supersized rat pierce my ironshell and infect me? That didn't make much sense to me and also, although not impossible, it is difficult to get through that area avoiding being bitten at all, all thanks to that ability of the mole rats to teleport underground right in your face or your back.
The second thing that seemed absurd to me is when we get the cure and we have to take it to the dying child, at that time I was with MacCready and it seemed SO WEIRD that he did not like the fact of giving the cure to the Doctor to save the child, even He disliked the fact that me suggested sharing it. Why did it seem weird to me? Because of the parallels between that boy and HIS OWN SON, both with strange almost incurable diseases and that only had one solution. Yes, I find it strange that MacCready does not have empathy for a case so similar to his and I know that he may be kind of a selfish prick but there is a difference between that and "Yes, I'm going to let this child die to get rid of this slightly annoying debuff" level of evil (Even worse if we don't even catch it)

[Chaosium]

Sneak >>>> power armor for this mission. Having stupid resistances is useless against a bunch of molerats. You need mobility and stealth.

Guess what MacCready doesn't like is not you giving the serum per se, but handing it for free while you could've asked for a whole lot of caps after all the risks taken (he's still a merc after all)

[Out Of Bubblegum]

This is one of the very few true RPG times in the game. And everyone hates it. :(
They mostly hate that they have to have a permanent effect on their health.
I never had MacCready along for that. Yea, he generally is a prick.

BTW, you can also get the disease from your companion or the robot getting bitten. The game really wants you to have to make that decision.

[Coffee Addict]

i always give the kid the vaccine then i use console commands to give myself another cure to purge my body of disease

[Igris]

i sneaked through the area and killed the molerats before they could even get close to me.
didn't get infected so had no problem giving the cure to the doctor for the kid

[matt]

I agree that MacCready's reaction is kind of dumb, but he's an ex-Gunner. For a Gunner, he's practically a hippie.

[Garrett]

Originally posted by Out Of Bubblegum:

This is one of the very few true RPG times in the game. And everyone hates it. :(
They mostly hate that they have to have a permanent effect on their health.
I never had MacCready along for that. Yea, he generally is a prick.

BTW, you can also get the disease from your companion or the robot getting bitten. The game really wants you to have to make that decision.

The debuff doesn't really bother me, losing only 10 HP is nothing, I also use a stealth build so I don't really take much damage if at all. I wanted to test if you could get infected even using power armor and to my surprise, I was infected, it was something "unrealistic" for me, although I also read that even robots companions can get infected so it's pretty stupid how this "disease" works.
But what surprised me the most and annoyed me a "bit" was MacCready's reaction to saving the life of a child, even if he is bother only by the fact that we're doing it for free, how would he have reacted if we had asked him for caps and pushed him to pay us more and more in his case? It seemed a bit silly to me that he did not have empathy or comments in a situation so similar to his.

[Zotliatlicor]

Getting through that place without getting the disease is a fun challenge. C'mon, it's doable (hard on survival, and very very hard with a Companion)

You might consider going alone for that reaason.

Agree on MacCready, his dislikes makes no sense, but the "for free" version could make sense as he really likes it when you extort money out of everyone you meet.

[=EGC= kansasterry]

basically it seems like the game treats it as an airborne disease that we catch no matter who the molerat bites or attacks. The only ways to avoid it is to sneak through unnoticed or somehow kill every molerat before it attacks anyone even a robot companion.

Probably coded similar to that one effect from fallout 3 if that certain extra ingredient was added to the purifier and you drink the water problem was if you had an immersive mod that had npcs like your companion actually drink it then you got the effect because it applies it to the player no matter who it was activated on.

[unweptbuzzard16]

I always never understood how a mole rat penetrates power armor in the first place, but i always give the cure to the kid.

[unweptbuzzard16]

Originally posted by =EGC= kansasterry:

basically it seems like the game treats it as an airborne disease that we catch no matter who the molerat bites or attacks. The only ways to avoid it is to sneak through unnoticed or somehow kill every molerat before it attacks anyone even a robot companion.

Probably coded similar to that one effect from fallout 3 if that certain extra ingredient was added to the purifier and you drink the water problem was if you had an immersive mod that had npcs like your companion actually drink it then you got the effect because it applies it to the player no matter who it was activated on.

power armor has a gas mask built into it, that's why it has radiation resistance.

[henkkass]

A very high luck helps not to get a disease

[darinbob]

It is actually a bug. You can catch it even if only your companion is touched by molerats and you stayed completely in stealth. There's a mod that fixes this to make it a bit more realistic. However that "only one dose, ever!" is too much of an Obsidian-like forced-moral-choice that defies logic.

[DouglasGrave]

Originally posted by darinbob:

It is actually a bug. You can catch it even if only your companion is touched by molerats and you stayed completely in stealth. There's a mod that fixes this to make it a bit more realistic. However that "only one dose, ever!" is too much of an Obsidian-like forced-moral-choice that defies logic.

You can catch it even if you use something to make the molerats attack each other. According to the game's code, the effect is triggered by the molerat hitting, but always specifically applies the disease result to the player, no matter who gets hit.

It's technically not a permanent effect, but the duration is absurdly long, something like 999 days (I don't even remember if that's game days, or days of real time).

[mikk011]

The last time I did that quest the securitron took care of many of the molerats.

[Von Faustien]

Originally posted by unweptbuzzard16:

I always never understood how a mole rat penetrates power armor in the first place, but i always give the cure to the kid.

well you see west tek designed the T45 and T51 to be able to take small arms fire from entire squads of chinese soilders armed with guns, blades and explosives as well as be able to take on the odd Chinese tank.

So that heavy armor plating isnt made to stop bites from mid sized animals hence why a mole rat can bit past the ceramic polymer or steel plating and infect.

also mole rats as of fallout 3 are like the death claw and wemingo a american bioweapon meant to be released in china and were made to be able to cripple infrustructure by biting and tunneling into concreate and steel.