I noticed that my guns character has this extreme buildup of ammo cases th.....cause i just have never found a need to make my own ammo. The amount of ingredients required to make some is crazy when the shopkeepers stock more then enough for my needs.....way easier just to buy it from them.

With energy weapons i did it all the time, cause it just a simple 1 click and all you need are the spent cells, but with bullets? I just end up chucking them away.


Anyone else been like that? is it actually worth my while to try making my own ammo?

I keep collecting cases and other materials for crafting, however like you said there has been no need. I keep finding ammo for the weapons I use and if I run out, I keep a secondary weapon and ammo handy...

Turn unused ammo into parts. Turn the parts plus your casings into bullets that you do use. I don't see why anybody wouldn't make use of ammo crafting considering how easy it is.

Nope. Gun Runners. Too lazy.

This and you can make regular ammo more powerful with the Hand Loader perk.

I've never made my own ammo. It seems kind of pointless in my opinion.

It's the only form of crafting I use. Campfire stuff is fairly useless, even in hardcoe Mode. Workbench stuff is readily available anyway (particularly if using Jury Rigging). I love being able to convert .308 into JSP though, and using custom loaded Match Grade .50BMG ammunition has a certain charm about it.

Can all the ammo I have be upgraded with this perk?

Hand loaded rounds usually take more resources, so you can upgrade it, but you'll have less ammo unless you want to buy some supplies to use up the remaining cases. And it's only for 6 ammo types, so not "all" ammo.

It's useful early in the game when you've only come across a few merchants

Lately I've been running out of ammo for my cowboy repeater so I made some. I went from having about 57 to over 100 and those extra bullets really help. As I find more merchants it might not be as common as a thing for me to do but most merchants just don't seem to have enough ammo for me early in the game (and I don't use the cheap crap).

I turn all my 20 ga shells into slugs.

I use it. (usually to break down 9mm shells and reload .44 shells).

*I'm still early in the game though... Only just out of Primm.

if your too lazy to just buy regular ammo and then break that ammo down ..and then construct new and better ammo with those ingredients then your missing out on a pretty big damage boost. With some hand load ammo you will gain a damage boost and an armor piercing component as well. If you play on anything harder than normal mode then hand crafted ammo is an excellent benifit. If your playing on normal mode then you can almost just throw a rock at any enemy and they will fall over dead.... on normal mode all you need is a sniper rifle and your good. at least thats just my opinion.

Wrong, it's not useful only at the beginning, it's even more useful as game progresses and I do it all the time. Typically I will make ammo out of surplus hulls just to restock what I am using without having to pay for it. But that's only a part of it. Reloading Bench gets really cool after I grab Hand Loader perk allowing to make awesome custom ammo.

10mm JHP - +65% damage
.308 JSP - +50% damage
.357 JFP - -20% spread, -3 enemy DT, +25% damage
45-70 SWC and .44 SWC - +20% damage, -6 enemy DT
.50 Match - +15% dmg, -35% spread

Since you can make those by simply converting basic ones, they aren't hard to make, they often leave surplus materials and they actually increase gun damage by quite a lot.

* .308s are the best example here, find me a perk that would increase your damage by 50% on every bullet, I freaking dare you.
* Another example, hand-loaded .50 MGs for Anti-materiel rifle make more damage than AP rounds of the same type, guess what's easier to acquire.
* Finally, give Tejada a Ranger Sequoia with SWC, enter a Cozador nest and just watch.

How hard is to buy 300 of basic ones at Gun Runners, walk three steps to the reloading bench next to the store and convert them to 200 rounds with half more damage?

Another excellent example of customizing ammo are .12ga shotguns. 12 gauge ammo comes in a number of types:
* base
* magnum, +15% dmg
* beanbag, no damage but slows enemy down
* slug, crowd control, more spread
* coin shot, made out of denarius for sale with huge profit margins

You give enemy a few beanbags, then finish him off with magnums. Dinner Bell from being an average gun suddenly becomes your all-around boss-killer.

Finally energy weapons, why not make a bunch of max charge MFCs and switch Gauss to them when you need to send Mommy Deathclaw flying?

You still say you can't be bothered to make your gun do 25-50% more damage at almost no expense? Well... stop playing on easy?

I think it's funny how ammo now has weight, but the individual parts used to make said ammo doesn't.

It probably was deemed not worth the cost to spend time balancing the weight and costs of components. Cases should be worth selling, at least to Gun Runners. Heck, vendors will sell you cases (that aren't in a box) and used up energy cells for free. And none of the currencies have weight, whether it's pre-war, NCR, Legion, or Caps.

Or maybe it ended up being more of a hassle than simu-fun in testing.

I play Very Hard + hardcoe and in recent days I have started using some mods, "Reload" being one of them, it's the most realistic handload mod out there atm. The vanilla ammo crafting is crap, the Reload mod has a bit of a learning curve but well worth it. It also adds other calibers and weapons that even NPCs will use against you!

Throw in the 1 headshot = death mod and FNV becomes a challenge! (Yes even if you get hit with 1 HS you die)

Never. I don't buy specialty ammo either. I think its one of the more tedious additions to an otherwise fine game.

Kudos, nice post

I find it kind of frustrating, honestly. The whole point of hardcoe mode from my perspective, personally, was a heightened sense of realism. That goes out the window when I've got an inventory full of weightless stuff. I made a character with super-low Strength to compensate, but you need high Strength to use lots of weapons, so I guess I have to go back to arbitrary inventory limits...

To be honest, I find Ammo crafting frustrating. I just stick to buying basic ammo off the Gun Runners. It's alot easier and more convenient.

YES! Any ammo you don't have to pay for means more caps for buying the sweet weapons it goes into. Plus my old man taught me how to reload in real life, sometimes reloads end up being better than factory or surplus ammo if you have the right primers, bullets, and powder. I noticed the reloads in FONV keep weapon condition up and have nearly the same DAM as original ammo. Seeing as I love Guns and hate how neutered Energy Weapons are, I make it a point to RELIGIOUSLY reload .357 Magnum through .50 BMG. Somehow it's easier in normal mode than hardcoe, probably because I haven't taken Hand Loader yet for my hardcoe character Randall Flag. Anyway, this is sweet because it makes FONV seem more like an RPG with ammo weight being a combat and travel factor and the ability to reload.

1. I don't buy guns. I think the only gun I have to buy because I can't find it anywhere is Gatling and Anti-materiel. All others can be acquired for free and with a lot of fun attached to it.
2. They made ammo parts weightless to make up for all the idiotic weight you are using on quest items. They should have made all quest items weightless...

The only ammo i have made so far was .45-70 gov't (normal rounds not the hollow point ones) because after 70 hours of playing i have found only one vendor who sells it and he only has like 12 rounds everytime he restocks, mean while i have over 2000 .50 cal rounds that are used in only one gun.

The biggest thing that annoys me about ammo crafting is as far as i can tell you can't breakdown special rounds just normal ones, so i can't buy .45-70 gov't hollow points and make normal ones because that make actully give me enough ammo to use the guns that fire that round without running out in two or three fights.

Haven't bothered with ammo crafting at all, ammo seems far more plentiful in general than it was in the last game (I only carry three guns as opposed to the half-dozen I'd lug around with me in 3 and I've never come close to running out for any of them).