Hrm I've been having reasonable success against Death Claw Stragglers using a fully modded Laser Rifle at extreme range (even though I'm more of a cRPG player than FPS (my FPS skills ?? are abysmal)).

If it doesn't regularly deal 50+ damage per normal shot, then it's a poor weapon to take against a Deathclaw.

The more + the better.

AMR firing Match ammo, extreme range.

Given how weak Laser rifle is, there is nothing not reasonable with it :shrug:

I mean I kill my first NV Deathclaw with service rifle, but that doesn't mean it is *effective*

Has anyone made a melee/unarmed character that can stand toe to toe with any of the deathclaw in NV?

Try Legion Attack and Super Slam.

Deathclaws are supposed to be powerful. Huge claws at a lunge attack should do some serious damage compared to the deathclaws in fallout 3. Your best bet is to snipe from a distance and setting up explosive traps at where he would go to you when attacking you. Position yourself around some foilage or big rocks so you can be running around it shooting it. One strong silenced sniper rifle and one powerful close range weapon if it gets serious.

Basically, devise a plan and you should be fine. If you die, you did something wrong.

Deathclaws are awesome creatures. And the Legendary Deathclaw was just win.

Deathclaws know better then to come after me... *Pats AMR*. I took down the Legendary with 2 shots

My last character used melee exclusively, without stealth or explosives. To answer your question directly - Hell no. There was no such thing as toe to toe with a deathclaw. I couldn't just stand there trading punches. They hit too hard; If he tags you, it's over quite quick. I was able to win a fair amount of the time, but not consistently. Drugs are VERY important, but terrain is your best asset. At the quarry, I tried to duck around and climb on top of mining equipment, using geography to my advantage. Try to take them out one at a time, hitting them as they round corners, trying to maneuver around obstacles. Try to put weaker members between yourself and the stronger members. Slopes are quite useful as well. When I got above them, I was sometimes able to run down hill and jump over their heads. Then, I whirled around and hit them as fast as I could. Turbo helps with that. Sometimes, however, they slapped me out of the air like a fly. My character landed in pieces. If you're fast, you can do a lot of damage. The things don't corner too well, and most monsters lunge straight ahead when they attack. Ghouls are a good example; you can charge them, and time your side step and attack as they wind up. Once you've mastered ghouls, you'll learn that DCs attack in much the same manner, but they're much faster. They also have a LOOOONG reach.

All of that being said - deathclaws still beat the crap out of me fairly regularly. Melee without stealth or explosives is a very fun build however. Er- don't forget to pump up medicine and endurance though, you'll need it.

Hope this post makes sense, I'm quite sleep deprived after playing FONV all night.

Regards

I don't even bother to go near them now...just sit well outside of VATS range and cull them with the sniper rifle.

The alien blaster made light work of the Deathclaws I've encountered.. including Den Mother, Alpha Male - heck, the Legendary Deathclaw only took 2 shots to kill.

This Machine + AP ammo to the head. Two to three shots needed, but it fires fast enough that it's no problem. Gun may have been made to kill commies, but This Machine kills deathclaws too!

I killed the Sloan Deathclaws with a Trail Carbine and a Hunting Rifle, with some help from my Thump Thump.

I wiped out the largest pack on the map, ( unmarked location ), with a level 26+ EW expert with a plasma defender. quarry junction + area around with a plasma caster at evel 20, and the cave with a multiplas at level 16.

With guns a silenced sniper loaded with hollow points is best as it allready deals enough damage to get past DT, but the extra damage multiplier makes their health less of a factor.

Melee I would say draw them out with a fire cracker boost up the stims and make sure you don't get heavily crowded, wait untill you're vey high in level but then I took down 7 giant rad scorpions, 3 golden geckos and a nightstalker pack at level 8 with a nail board and metal armour on hard core in one encounter, normal so maybe two or three deathclaws at level 20 is possible?

BAMF

Sneak critical with AMR and incendiaries. Nothing survies that.

I've recently started to run into deathclaws (playing on Very Hard) and I've found they go down fairly quickly to the Matter Modulator - much quicker than I was expecting (I had been rather unimpressed with that gun hitherto). You do ideally need a companion to act as a human shield, though. :laugh:

Guass rifle sneak attack to head usually works but from max distance it doesn't seem to hit them just explodes a foot from there face use gobi and ap rounds then q35 modulator. or spear chucker mode no armor no weapons except 100 throwing spears and jump about like Britney spears works well for deafclaws and blindteeths.