Fallout 3

(Copied over from "Ambassador of Peace")

The best advice I can offer for this achievement is to play the game Good, as it is much easier to get Bad Karma then Good Karma. When you get to Level 13, you can get the other two achievements, "Pinnacle of Survival" (Level 14 Neutral) and "Harbinger of War" (Level 14 Bad), as well.

Upon reaching level 13, you can either get more XP until you are just on the brink of Level 14 or you can play it safe, save at the start of the level, and work towards 14 and each side of karma.

To get karma, here are some tips:

For Good karma, give Purified Water to the tramp outside of Megaton. He will be to the right laying on some rocks just outside the gate. You can get purified water from Wadsworth at your house. (NOTE: You will only have a house if you have completed "The Power of the Atom".)

For Bad karma, well... this one is easy! Murder, steal, massacre, hit people, whatever you want to do.


ANOTHER TIP:

A friend of mine recommended saving the "Power of the Atom" quest until you reach one of the levels before those in the achievement (7, 13, 19). Once you get to the level, either blow up the bomb or disarm it, and depending on which, you will get XP and karma for completing the quest. The one problem with this is that you might not have Tenpenny Tower in order to blow the bomb up at level 7.


Good luck!

** MINOR SPOILERS BELOW. **

To get this achievement, you need to reach level 14 with bad karma.

Getting to level 14

Straightforward enough, but there are ways to achieve this more quickly. First, avoid companions.

Second, look out for the NPCs who request certain types of items, and then watch to see if redeeming those items provides XP. Two such "standing orders":

* Scrap metal in Megaton. (Easy to find everywhere.)
* Pre-war books at the Arlington Library. (Excellent per-book XP.)

Lastly, I recommend hacking every terminal, picking every lock, and attempting (almost) every speech challenge. All provide nearly guaranteed XP, without the hassle of a fight.

Karma

Bad karma is easily obtained throughout the game, usually through the theft of items or the murder of wastelanders, but can also be gained by simply being mean during conversations. (I particularly enjoyed making children cry whenever possible.)

If you have a good/neutral karma and need to decrease your karma, this is easy -- go on a killing spree in Megaton or Rivet City. (Megaton is great for using the Fat Man.) This will have some obvious gameplay effects (reduced numbers of merchants to access), however, so I suggest saving the game prior to this -- go get the achievement, load your save, and then continue.

Neutral karma can be a tough target to hit sometimes, so my suggestion is to check your karma after each murder / mini-nuke. Once you hit neutral karma, simply stop killing and run away until you are out of range of all angry wastelanders.

If you actually need even more karma loss than that, first steal everything you see, but be careful not to be caught, as it will typically provoke a gunfight. Then go on your murder spree.

One last note: Taking the evil path during the Power of the Atom quest will provide a lot of bad karma, so feel free to save that quest for "the right time".

You can easily glitch your way to any level … starting after you first leave the vault.

First, travel to Megaton and speak to Walter. Find and repair the three leaks around town (Crimson Drifter has pointed out that you must have a Repair Skill of 30 or higher to fix the Megaton leaks). If you like, feel free to complete “Power of the Atom” (if you do, you MUST disarm the bomb). Sell most of the things you carry … except for some weapons and ammo.

Second, collect any scrap metal you find, as much as you can carry (so long as it is an even amount). The more you have for the next part, the better. Additionally, through your search for scrap metal and the locations necessary, try to stay neutral or good, and allocate any points awarded from leveling up into sneaking.

Some decent places to gather scrap metal are the Robco Factory (located south-west of Megaton) and a wandering seller named Tinker Joe who occasionally appears outside Robco, as well as the Meresti Train Station (where you find the Family in “Blood Ties”).

Next, make your way to Fort Independence and look for Protector Casdin. You can sell this guy your scrap metal 2 pieces at a time. This is where the glitch begins. To save frustration, save after every step. For the sake of argument, I will use 48 pieces of scrap metal as an example.

Step one: Sell every piece of scrap metal you have on you. (48 pieces)
Step two: Pick his pocket and steal it all back. DO NOT GET CAUGHT.
Step three: Sell all but 2 pieces of scrap metal back to him. (46 pieces)
Step four: Again, pick his pocket and steal all of the scrap metal back, in addition to his rifle. HE SHOULD CATCH YOU (and hopefully not attack you) AND TAKE ALL OF YOUR SCRAP METAL AWAY.

Technically, though it doesn’t appear in your inventory, you have unlimited scrap metal (provided you got the glitch to work). DO NOT pick up any more scrap metal, or it will end the glitch.

Immediately, head to Megaton and see your pal Walter. Sell him all of your scrap metal, which awards you XP, and you can repeat the transaction as many times as you wish until you level up to your desired level. STOP AT THE LEVEL PRIOR TO THE LEVEL NEEDED FOR THE ACHIEVEMENT.

Now, make a few saves for evil, neutral, and good. Depending on your current status, you will need to either gain positive karma or negative karma.

Negative karma is easy to attain. Murder townsfolk (DO NOT MURDER WALTER) and steal things.

Positive karma is a little harder to attain. You can donate to the churches in Megaton or Rivet City (provided you did not kill the priests) or give your purified water to the beggars outside of Megaton and Rivet City. If you have the house in Megaton, Wadsworth will give you some purified water.

Return to Walter in Megaton after reaching your desired karma and sell more scrap metal to level up once more to unlock the achievement. Continue to level up for the remaining karma/level based achievements. Load the other saves to pursue the other karma options.

EDIT: WHEN / IF CASDIN ATTACKS:

Sometimes when you try to pick Casdin's pocket at Fort Independence and steal back your scrap metal, he will attack you. This doesn't always happen ... but if it does, one or more of the following may remedy the situation (all according to research and/or trial and error):

1) Some suggest if you have open quests he will attack. I cannot confirm or deny this, but it seems ludicrous.
2) Some suggest if you do not have enough rep with the Outcasts he will attack. Credit to Antonysj who had this problem and his solution was to "[give] him some power armour and laser rifles, this was slow so I just went to the alien crash site and salvaged the alien blaster and ammo and gave that to him, instantly making him trust you. You can then pick the alien ammo back, and (providing you have the Broken Steel DLC) get another alien blaster later." Thank you, Ant, for providing a tried and true solution.
3) Some suggest that you do not attempt this glitch at too high a level ... I have no idea why.
4) Some suggest to steal the key in Casdin's possession rather than his rifle ... there are reports of players not being attacked, yet still being caught, while stealing the key. IIRC, my character had to steal everything in Casdin's possession in order to be caught, and I was lucky to not be attacked.
5) Some suggest that if you have previously met and killed off any Outcasts prior to attempting this glitch, Casdin will attack ... which makes sense.
6) Some suggest that karma is key ... if you're good, you're golden; if you're a bad boy, forget about it.
7) Finally, some suggest that your CHA stat will influence whether or not Casdin will attack ... the higher your charisma, the better your odds, and if it is below 4 or 5 you can forget about success ... which makes sense because your charisma determines how people react to your character.

What I suggest:
First, try and steal the key and see if that works for you. If not, well, you have a plethora of options. Examine your karma and CHA and see if you can improve them. Think back to any random people you killed .... were they Outcasts? ... and you can always do like Ant did and fork over some power armor and laser rifles to improve Casdin's disposition towards you.

If those seem to fail you, revert to an earlier save ... which could mean a "right-out-of-the-vault" save, and follow my guide to the letter. If that fails, well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but some people online have even said they have had to start a new game completely ... which basically means you would have to play through the vault again. In any instance, whichever course of action you decide, be sure to allocate those points and perks into things that will aid you in this specific task ... charisma, sneak, stealing, strength (the more scrap you can carry, the better!), etc.

Good luck!

If you don't have any problems with a glitch/mechanic abuse, there is a way to get XP retalively fast after you leave the vault.

The first thing you should keep in mind as you start your game is that it is advisable to keep your character barely good (try stealing things without being caught, saving often, and loading the most recent save when you realize you are neutral) if you are going for all the leveling achievements (the end part of the guide will be assuming you are). Also, make explosives one of your tag skills as you will need a skill of 25 to do this method. Having an intelligence of at least 4 is advisable.

First, go to Megaton and the Craterside Supply (Talk to Lucas Simms at the entrance of Megaton if you are unsure of where this is) and talk to the shop owner, Maria. Tell her you will help with her book and choose to talk about Minefield.

After you finish talking with her, make "The Wasteland Survival Guide" your active quest. then travel to Minefield which should be where your objective marker is. Disarm two mines and fast travel back to Megaton.

Go to the Craterside Supply and make the frag mines you picked up your active weapon. As you walk in, you should see a mercenary leaning on a wall. Head directly behind the wall he is leaning on, crouch, then throw a frag mine and pick it up.

You should keep this process going, getting 5 XP each time you pick up a mine (up to seven with the swift learner perk maxed out). I would advise getting the swift learner perk as quick as possible to increase your speed of leveling up.

One thing to note is that past 5 pm, Billy Crealy will visit the shop and wander, along with his girl. I recomend waiting until 8:00 am when this happens. Eventually, the mercanary will want to go to bed regardless, and you will have to wait until 8:00 am for him to come back.

When your are 35-45 XP from the level you want, then stop. Save, then if you are going for good karma, just keep going until you you level up. If you are going for neutral karma kill both the mercanary and Maria.

If you are going for bad karma, kill the mercanary, then steal everything in the shop. If you are still not bad karma, attempt to hack the computer then back out. Continue to hack in and back out until you are at bad karma or you are confident killing Maria will bring your karma down enough to be bad karma (if she has not run out). If she has ran out, hack the computer succesfully and you will level up.

The video below (which all credit goes to ablestmage on youtube) details the method of throwing the fragmine and picking it up so you can understand. Please leave comments telling me how I can improve my solution. I am always open to suggestions.

Go evil. Just save before you get your level up and go to Rivet City's Church.
Pay Father until you can be neutral (not that expensive).
Go outside and get some XP.

Pay more until you have good karma and go out and kill some creatures.

Then take your evil karma save back and do it again levels 14 and 20.

Easier way..

Play through the game as a good character. When you are nearing level 14/20/30, save the game making sure that you need 100 or so points to reach the next level.
Get the achievement for being good and save (don't overwrite!!) load the previous save, go to any owned locked computer terminal and hack it, preferably one where you will not be disturbed (I used bannons terminal in Rivet City). Keep accessing the terminal until your karma drops to neutral, go and kill some muties for experience until the neutral achievement pops.
Load the save again, do the hacking/accessing of the terminal again until your karma drops to evil, kill some muties and get the evil cheevil!!