Note: this cheat only applies to the Operation Anchorage downloadable content pack. As soon as you are able to control your own strike team, you'll be able to get specific weapon loadouts from a terminal. If you give these to the Quartermaster, you can go get another loadout. Drop all the new stuff and talk to the Quartermaster. He'll give you your stuff sans ammo. That's no problem though, since you can head to the ammo dispenser for more. Pick up the weapons on the ground when you're ready to go, or repeat for all the weapons you can handle.

If you are having trouble carrying with over-encumbrance, this cool trick could help you tote around some extra gear. First go through and clear an area of enemies, then grab (Click the right analog stick) a 55 gallon drum. They are ubiquitous in most areas. Fill up the drum by physically picking up items and dropping them in and you'll have an instant "shopping cart" for all your stuff. You can even fast travel with it -- but when you appear at your destination the drum falls to the ground and you have to pick it all back up again.

Note: Updates / DLC may disable this! Try using body parts instead (but Fast Travel still won't work).

When you're hacking, the excess symbols between viable passwords selected and used to your advantage. You'll need to find clusters of symbols bracketed by parentheses, such as (%$*!^*&&), which can be highlighted as a whole. Submitting this should result in a removal of a bad password or fully replenish your attempts. Remember: you can always back out and restart to avoid lockout. Happy hacking!

There are 8 followers in Fallout 3. You must have a certain Karma level for most of them. Below is a list of the followers and how / where to get them:

• Butch - In Rivet City, after completing Trouble on the Homefront [Neutral Karma]
• Sergeant Rl-3 - A robot who can be bought of a wasteland-wandering salesman named Tinker [Neutral Karma]
• Fawkes - Must be saved in Vault 87 [Good Karma]
• Star Paladin Cross - Found in the Citadel [Good Karma]
• Jericho - Found in Megaton [Evil Karma]
• Clover - A slave bought in Paradise Falls [Evil Karma] Charon - A ghoul whose contract must be purchased Ahzrukhal in The Underworld [Karma does not matter]
• Dogmeat - A dog found in the Scrap Yard [Karma does not matter]

If you’re heading into seemingly-hostile territory or simply want to survey the area around you for enemies you might not yet see, try hitting the VATS button over and over again as you make your character turn around, searching all angles. Doing so will alert you to any enemies you may not yet see by zooming in on them in VATS mode. You’ll realistically be unable to do damage to your foes from such a distance, but it’s a good way to spot foes before they spot you so you know what you’re getting yourself into before the crap hits the fan.

Here’s a great tip (though it will be obvious for some people).When you hack a computer in the game, you have four tries to hack it successfully. If you don’t hack it successfully on the fourth attempt (as in, you don’t guess the proper password), the station you’re trying to hack will permanently shut down. But if you only try three times and bail out of the process before trying for a fourth time, the password will reset, giving you three more options. You can do this indefinitely without risking shutting the terminal down.

If you’re running out of room in your inventory and don’t want to ditch any of your gear, consider trying to find a companion character. These companions can be found at various places throughout the world and will agree to join you on your journey (temporarily). You can trade equipment with these characters, which will allow you to dump your equipment on them, making you virtually unencumbered. Consider this option when you not only need help with bad guys, but help carrying your crap as well!

If you have a sneak rating of at least 60, you can attempt this infinite goods trick, which takes place at Fort Independence. Head to Fort Independence with a bunch of Scrap Metal in your inventory. Once there, speak with Protector Casdin and tell him you’ve got junk you’d like to give him. In return, he’ll offer up 5.56mm Rounds, Frag Grenades, RadAways, and Stimpaks, and you can choose which you want. Then, save your game (in case you fail the following) and steal your Scrap Metal back from the Protector. Sell the Scrap Metal back to him over and over again, thereby netting you infinite amounts of 5.56mm ammunition, Frag Grenades, RadAways and Stimpaks.

Here’s another great technique, if you’re carrying too much stuff and find yourself encumbered. You know how you can search downed enemies’ corpses for the goods they carry? Well, you can also place your own goods onto the corpse. Since corpses tend to stay around after they die seemingly indefinitely (or, at least, for a good long time), you can drop presently unneeded items onto the corpse of a foe you’ve slain, and then go back at a later date to get your stuff back. This is a great way to never become encumbered.

Here’s an interesting way to avoid becoming encumbered by holding too much gear and too many items. Say you pick up a heavy piece of gear, like forty pound Power Armor, but when it’s added to your inventory, it makes you encumbered. Drop the item and then press the right analog stick (or corresponding button for PC gamers) to pick the item up and hold it in front of you. Since it’s being held and is therefore not part of your inventory, you won’t be charged for its weight and can get to where you need to go from there without being too encumbered.

The game’s five Super Mutant Behemoths can be found at the following five locations: Evergreen Mills, Galaxy News Radio, Jury Station, Takoma Industrial, and The Capitol Building.

If you have bad karma (or don’t mind having even worse karma), head over to Paradise Falls, a place a group of evil slavers call home. To gain entrance without having to open fire, you have to be friendly with the slavers, which will give you an evil slant. But if you can do this, you’ll find a guy endlessly walking around the settlement (he’s usually at or near the bar, but can be elsewhere). When you get near him, he’ll stop you automatically, tell you he found some cool stuff on a recent raid, and give you some of what he got (it will be either some ammunition, Bottle Caps, or various aid items). After your first encounter, all you have to do is keep speaking to him to earn more and more free stuff.

If you want to avoid breaking precious Bobby Pins when picking various locks in Fallout 3, exercise patience. If you’ve failed opening the lock on the first two tries, chances are a third try will break the Bobby Pin. If you back out of trying to pick the lock and then immediately reattempt it, however, your Bobby Pin’s strength will reestablish itself, giving you several more tries. Repeat this technique to never break a Bobby Pin.

To try this, you’ll need to have the Mister Sandman perk activated, which will mean you have to be at least at level ten. You’ll also need a sneak skill of at least 60. If that fits your character, then travel to Andale. Andale is full of kids that can’t be killed (killing kids in Fallout 3 is an impossibility). During nighttime, when everyone in Andale is sleeping, break into various houses and kill the kids while sleeping using the Mister Sandman perk. They won’t die, but you’ll still be rewarded experience for having killed them. You can then repeat the process over and over again for infinite experience points.

If you want your character to have a pet dog in the game, then head over to an area known as Scrapyard, which is northeast from Megaton, just over the river. The dog is automatically named Dogmeat, and you can get him at any time, whether it’s early in the game or otherwise. The dog can attack enemies endlessly and cannot die.

An amendment from druidfire1: Dogmeat can die. Keep him healed using Stimpaks! Once he’s dead, he’s dead for good.

Here’s a great (albeit cheap) way to gain lots of experience. Before you do anything that’s going to net you some experience (such as picking locks, hacking, et cetera), change the game’s difficulty setting to Very Hard. Then, hack the computer or pick the lock (or whatever). Successfully doing so on a harder difficulty level will get you more experience. You can also utilize this technique on mortally-wounded enemies to gain more experience from them as well. Just be sure to change the difficulty back to a more manageable level when you’re done!

Outside of towns like Rivet City and Megaton, you can find thirsty Wastelanders who ask you for Purified Water. Each time you give these guys a bottle, you will get a slight boost to your karma. Do it more and more, and you’ll gain more and more karma. You can theoretically do this as much as you want to any of these thirsty characters for as much positive karma as you desire.

Here’s another technique for infinite good karma. If you head to Megaton, you can find the church for the Children of the Atom, religious people who worship the undetonated nuclear bomb which Megaton is built around. There’s a priest who will be near the bomb or in their building. Talk to him and he’ll ask for donations. Give him donations, and you’ll get a positive karma boost. Do this as much as you want for as much karma as you desire.

If you want to earn infinite amounts of good karma, head to Big Town. If you go there at night, the town will come under attack from a Super Mutant raiding party. For each Super Mutant you help the few residents of Big Town slay, a small amount of good karma can be earned. Repeat this process as much as you want for the amount of good karma desired.

Here's an awesome technique to save Action Points (AP) used in VATS. If you're feeling confident when fighting an enemy or group of enemies, simply aim at an enemy in VATS, but don't fire. You'll retain your AP but still be aiming at the part of the enemy's body in question that you were in VATS. If you shoot quickly enough, you should still strike the desired area without having to expend any AP whatsoever.

Here is a great way to earn seemingly infinite amounts of caps, items, repairs and ammunition.

Find any shop-based trader. The supply shop woman in Megaton is an ideal choice. She has some high value items that you would otherwise spend a fortune on, including all the stuff for your house and a schematic for the Rock-It Launcher.

1. Sell her any stuff in your inventory that you don't need and complete the transaction. This will boost the amount of money she has.

2. Find something in your inventory that you have two of, or that you have one of as well as her. Sell this found item to her.

3. Check that the two like items are of different values once they are in her inventory. The bigger the difference in value, the better and the lower the cheapest item is the better.

4. Now buy back the cheaper of the two like items and complete the transaction, but do not leave the trade session. Look for the item in your inventory. The game should have glitched and the item should have gone up in value dramatically and should be 100% repaired, even though when you sold the item initially it wasn't.

5. If it isn't 100% repaired for whatever reason, sell the item back to her anyway and repeat step 3-4, trying a different item if necessary.

6. From here, the game will remain glitched and you will be able to sell the same item high and buy it back low until you have drained her money completely. If you want, you can hold onto the item as it will be fully repaired - simply keep it on the final round which will leave her with a small amount of money.

7. Either sell the item back to her again once she is out of money, or if you are keeping it, sell her something else of high value and she will owe you that amount. The transaction price will go dim and remain at whatever amount of money she has left.

8. Search through her inventory and find stuff you need. Stimpaks, ammo, miscellaneous item, weapons and armor are all fair game. Eventually, the transaction price will light up again and you may owe her a few caps depending on how much of her stuff you added to the deal. Complete the transaction.

9. If you wait three days she will have new stock and around 350 caps. The longer you wait, the more robust her inventory will become and the more caps she'll have for you to take when you're ready to do this all over again.

Addition by smrtby123: if you do this with a completely broken item, then it will cost nothing to "buy" back.

The Prototype Medic Power Armor is in Old Olney in the far northeast corner of the world map. Since you'll encounter many Death Claws, you may want to set the difficulty to "Very Easy" before exploring this area. On the southern-most street Old Orney is a manhole. Use it to access the sewers. As you make your way through the sewers, you'll come across a ladder on your left. Keep moving past it and a downed Brotherhood of Steel Initiate will be on the ground. You can take the armor from the corpse. Here's the kicker: it talks! Oh, and it auto-administers Med-X when your limbs are damaged.

Head due north from the MDPL-13 Power Station and you'll soon find a small mountain. On the east side of this mountain you'll pick up a Recon Craft Theta radio signal. This will occur when you are just a bit north of an imaginary horizontal line through Greener Pastures Disposal Site to the far east. Search the east side of the slope for a destroyed house and you'll soon come across the source of the signal just west of that: a downed flying saucer. Its pilot can be found below the open cockpit (beware the radiation!). Near the pilot is the Alien Blaster and a bunch of ammo rods. This powerful weapon gets critical hits frequently and is the bane of Behemoths. You'll find ammo for it randomly throughout the wasteland if you're lucky, so use the ammo you'v got sparingly!

The Vengeance: In the Deathclaw Sanctuary (northwest corner of the world map), follow the caves down and be prepared for many a Deathclaw encounter. In the southeastern corner of the caves is a pool of blood under a column of rock. In this pool there is a heap of gore with the Vengeance, an overpowered Laser Gatling Gun.

Contributed by doddssy1

Waser Wifle: After getting access to Little Lamplight, you’ll find a child named "Biwwy” who will sell you the Waser Wifle, an augmented Laser Rifle, for 500 caps. If you have the Child at Heart Perk, you can get it for free (choose "You said you didn’t need it, why not just give it to me for free?”).

Contributed by sammyunlimited4

Abe Lincoln’s Repeater Rifle: Enter the Museum of Natural History and go to the lower levels. In the Museum Offices, there is a central room with a gun case. Lincoln’s Repeater Rifle is here, a strong Hunting Rifle that uses .44 rounds.

Contributed by BronzTheBrute

The Kneecapper: In Girdershade, in the southwest corner of the world map, the town letch, Ronald, has a Sawed-Off Shotgun named the Kneecapper. You’ll have to kill him to get it, passively (via a pissed off radscorpion) or actively (a shot to the head).

Contributed by vaultdweller

Terrible Shotgun: In Evergreen Mills, in the southwest corner of the world map, you’ll find a heavily protected raider hideout, including a Super Mutant Behemoth. Inside the center building is a series of caves where the raiders have set up a brothel and a bar. One of these raiders won’t attack you, and his name is Smiling Jack. He’s a trader, but you should trade him a bullet to the head for his Terrible Shotgun, a better Combat Shotgun.

Contributed by BronzTheBrute

The Firelance: One random event while exploring the capitol wastes is an inexplicable explosion. Head to this area to find the Firelance, a souped-up Alien Blaster and some scattered ammo (which glows and is easier to find at night).

Contributed by DutchDevilPariah

Jack the Ripper: This upgraded Ripper can be found at the lower-middle of the S-shaped map of the Deathclaw Sanctuary. It’s on a dead Enclave Officer in a pile of bodies, next to a giant ant.

Contributed by Jeremy McCann

Sydney's 10mm "Ultra" SMG:Inside or just the outside Museum of History in Downtown DC you'll find a Super Mutant-fighting Ghoul named Sydney. She asks for help defending the area from Super Mutants. You can help her and if she dies, take her "Ultra" SMG -- or just kill her and steal it.

Contributed by dirtyace_98

A3-21's Plasma Rifle: In the "Replicated Man" sidequest, don't to turn Harkness in to Dr. Zimmer. Instead speak with Harkness and chose to unlock his repressed memories. Once you do this, speak with him again and tell him that he should not kill Dr. Zimmer, but instead tell him to run away. He will thank you and give you his old (albeit more-powerful) Plasma Rifle! You may be able to kill him for it too.

Contributed by dirtyace_98

Smugglers End: Once you gain access to the Brotherhood Citadel you can take, search or lockpick anything that you want. When you are in the Solar room you can lockpick the Elder Lyons safe (if your lockpick skill is high enough) and find 300 caps, other misc. items and Smugglers End, a powerful laser pistol.

Contributed by Jay

O1' Painless rifle: In the Republic of Dave, in the northeast corner of the world map, kill Dave to get his key and access to his safe. Inside is the Ol' Painless Rifle.

Contributed by enemy101

Xuanlong Assault Rifle: This powerful Chinese Assault Rifle is located on the body of Jiggs in the diner ner the Jury Street Metro Station. This location can be discovered via the Museum of Technology mini quest, Jiggs' Loot.

Reservist's Rifle: This is dropped by the Drifter in Dickerson Tabernacle Chapel (upper west of world map). It is an augmented sniper rifle.

Victory Rifle: This augmented Sniper Rifle is in a Very Hard locker in the Sniper Shack to the west of Rockbreaker's Last Gas (Middle west of worldmap).

Protectron's Gaze: The Mechanist has this augmented laser pistol. Get it by giving him the Antagonizer's costume. Note: this results in negative Karma.

Contributed by blake10_96

Miss Launcher: This powerful missile launcher also is 5 WG less in weight than its normal counterpart. Find it in the storage room in the lower level of Fort Independence.

Contributed by shadowphaser

Zhu-Rong v418 Chinese Pistol: Found in the east wing of L.O.B. Enterprises in a Very Hard Locked case on a desk upstairs, the Zhu-Rong is a pistol that will ignite flammable substances.

Contributed by xbsxst4t1c lt

Blackhawk: The augmented Scoped .44 Magnum can be obtained from Agatha after completing both Agatha's song and an additional Sheet Music fetch quest (in the Springvale school). You must request a reward from here in the dialog tree for this.

Contributed by MarkusDahl

The Burnmaster: In the very bottom of Falls Church/Mason St. Metro you will find a radiated ghoul camp; here you will find the Burnmaster, an improved Flamer.

Stabhappy: Stabhappy is an upgraded Combat Knife in the "Raid Shack", a house of Raiders. Just head directly East from the Bethesda Ruins and you will see a fenced in house called the Raid Shack. Kill the Raiders inside and one of them carries Stabhappy!

Contributed by THE7THID

Fisto!: In the MDPL-13 power station, enter the door on the right. You will be in an office and on the table in the center of the room is Fisto! the upgrade to the Power Glove. Beware of Ghouls.

Contributed by Kerosa4

Fawkes Super Sledge: When you first meet Fawkes after freeing him from the locked door, talk to him and trade equipment with him. He will already have an item called the Fawkes Super Sledge in his inventory which you can take from him.

Contributed by Alam0

The Break: The Break is a unique pool cue which can be found laying on top of the pool table outside of "Eulogy's Crib" in the middle of Paradise Falls.

Contributed by Alam0

Board Of Education: The Board Of Education is a unique nail board located in one of the abandoned shacks in the "Clifftop Shacks" area just outside of the Oasis. It is laying next to a skeleton lying on one of the beds.

Contributed by Alam0

Junders' Valid Points: Junders' Valid Points are a set of unique spiked knuckles. They can be obtained from the body of Junders Plunkett after you kill him. his hideout is located inside Arlington Cemetery and is on the top of a hill. (Note: if you have enough good karma and have the note stating he is a wanted man, his dead body will also contain his finger which can be redeemed for a nice 1000 cap reward. If you don't have the note is can be found on the body of a dead Regulator on the steps of the nearby metro station).

Contributed by Alam0

Butch's Toothpick : Slightly more powerful switchblade, can be gotten from Butch after the Trouble at the Home Front quest. Kill him or ask him to follow you.

Contributed by ilovehotrodcamaros

Vampire's Edge : This sword is locked in a hard locked cabinet named "sword cabinet" in Vance's room upstairs in Meresti Station.

Contributed by cody_story

The Shocker: Found in the flooded metro, the Shocker is a more powerful power fist(24 damage if 100% repaired).

Contributed by spasmolytic951

Occam's Razor: Occam's Razor is an augmented combat knife found on the CO in the very bottom of Ft. Bannister.

Contributed by Goz

Eugene: Eugene is an improved Minigun which can be given to you by your choice after completing the side quest Reilly's Rangers. Reilly rewards you for helping them you have a choice between Eugene and armor.(tip: choose Eugene)

Contributed by tyson walsh

The Strike: In the slaver camp of paradise falls (you may have to go there in the main quest), on a pool table outside in the main are (outside the shops Eulogy Jones' pad and the slave cages)there will be an augmented version of the pool cue. Beware of slavers, people with good karma.

Contributed by Kerosa4

Highwayman's Friend: In Canterbury Commons, located in the far middle east part of the world map, you will find a Tire Iron called the Highwayman's Friend. The weapon is on a shelf in the back room of Dominic and Machete's house.

Contributed by Crippler55

Terrible Shotgun: In Evergreen Mills (NE of Girdershade) There you will discover a raider hangout including full bar and brothel. A fellow named Smiling Jack resides here and will not shoot you. Kill him for the Terrible Shotgun, a souped up Combat Shotgun.

Contributed by killa01

Experimental MIRV: This gun is a unique variation of The Fat Man that shoots 8 mini nukes at once. It is the most powerful weapon in the game and can be found on a table in a secret room in the armory of the National Guard Depot. There is a computer that asks for a 4 digit passcode. The passcode can only be found by piecing together the Keller Family Holotapes. It comes with 5 mini nukes.

Contributed by xxSteve09xx

The Infiltrator: This high powered Sniper Rifle can only be found in The Pitt add-on. In the Arena, beat the final challenger and search his body for the Infiltrator.

Contributed by FireSire13

Hire Charon. Fire him before freeing Fawkes from Vault 87. Hire Fawkes once you meet him outside. After a while it should appear, "Charon gas returned to the ninth circle". Go back to Underworld where you first hired Charon. Hire him. Now you have two Followers. I don't know if this works with any other follower.