It’s there, it’s very radioactive, and there are some mini-nukes and a Fat Man and I think a few other minor things…it’s tough to find without precise directions, and it’s not so much a building as it is a crater with an access tunnel nearby. If you really want to see everything you can in the game, go for it, but it’s not really necessary for any part of the game.
I’ve actually been inside (and on an unofficial tour) so I don’t need another one. 
Be interesting to see what’s in there now.
-XT
Cuckoorex, I’ve already ‘won’ the game, so I’m playing through this time precisely TOO see everything this go around. I’m not going to complete the game until I’ve basically been to every spot this time around…and maybe not even then, depending on how the official mods are (one should be coming out soon).
Going to try another mod tonight (as well as look for the White House)…Haven. Looks like it might be interesting.
-XT
xtisme, maybe you should check out this site.
Cool, thanks. I was using another site that was similar, but always love to see new ones.
-XT
So, after scouring mod sites for a binocular mod (there’s a few mentions of works in progress, but nothing seems to have come of them) I have given up and downloaded the G.E.C.K. A brief perusal of the tutorial and a bit of looking at the object data on the scoped weapons suggest that a makeshift spotting scope at the least should be quite simple. Heading to bed here, but tomorrow I’m going to try it out - will just be a scoped .44 model with attributes modified (won’t accept ammo, lowish weight, etc), and quite possibly a different scope overlay to make it feel less constricted. Modifying the magnification is easy, but I see no simple way to make it zoomable.
Properly done it should have a unique model and animation, but I wouldn’t know where to start.
Once I have something working, I could fire it over to interested parties.
Sure, I’ll give it a shot if you get it up and working. I downloaded the Vault 010 mod last night but it was kind of lame. Just a lot of ghouls to fight. No dialogue yet for the NPCs, nothing really to do as far as I could tell except kill stuff…and the stuff to kill wasn’t very challenging (I can one shot ghouls…even the glowing ones aren’t much trouble).
I discovered that I actually had already been to the White House (such as it is), since I’d discovered the tunnels with the motor cycle jump earlier in the game.
-XT
See, now tunnels with a motorcycle jump is news to me. I got to the White House by coming up through one of the metro stations and then overland. Was frustrated by the fence blocking my view so I toggled tcl in the console and flew up for a nice aerial view. I saw the door down there but since it wasn’t accessible (I’ll happily use tcl to get unstuck or to get a better view of a scene, but I don’t use it to cheat and get somewhere I couldn’t without it) I didn’t go through, and I was occupied by something other than finding the way in.
Working my way through the GECK tutorial atm. It’s teaching me all about how to make new locations and is somewhat laborious. None of what I’ve done so far is necessary for what I want to do, actually, but it’s nifty stuff nonetheless.
I think the primary issue with a makeshift spotting scope will be draw distances - if I give it high enough magnification it will be looking beyond where there landscape has been populated. So it may take a bit of playtesting to get a decent balance. I’m also going to have to find some format converters - the scope overlay is a .nif which appears to be a game-engine-specific format. I’m sure there’s tools available, just a matter of finding them.
ugh. I wish the 360 version at LEAST had a level cap mod. 
There’s a tiny manhole next to one of the buildings on Pennsylvania Avenue that gives you access; if you put a marker the White House location on your PipBoy world map the local map should show you exactly where it is; down there are two ramps to jump a car, a motorcycle and some schmuck who impaled himself on a light fitting trying to jump it.
I’ll have to go poke around Pennsylvania Ave a bit.
In other news, my “scope” is a bit meh. It works fine, but it overpowers draw distances even with everything cranked out to max. I scaled the rocks just east of Megaton and looked down on Springvale - with the magnification I’d set (which is simply an entry which dictates angular field of vision when you right-click) to be moderately higher than the sniper rifle scope I got about two houses in view. Problem is, the one on the near side of the street was in full detail and the one on the far side had low detail textures and absolutely none of the clutter was drawn. Silver’s house wasn’t visible at all, just an open field.
You can see this same effect just looking normally from any high spot, but it’s not nearly as jarring with a non-magnified field of vision.
I’m afraid that to be of any use, a scope or binoculars would have to force the game engine to draw all cells in view. That might be possible with some scripting, but it’s beyond my abilities (at least at this point). Sadly, toting a .44 or a sniper rifle about is as effective from an optical perspective as you’ll get. For the record, the zoomed-in FOV on a .44 is 35 degrees, and the sniper is 25. My “scope” is 15.
You got me interested though in looking into the GECK myself. I’m sort of disappointed in most of the quest/world expansion mods so far. No dialogue, not really much to do. I enjoyed the Death Canyon one, but that was more because it was a very challenging fight…which is all it was in the end (well, that and a shit load of goodies at the end). I’d like to see what you could do with the GECK as far as adding some real content to the game.
-XT
Oh, it’s possible to do lots of things. GECK is nothing less than the development tool used by Bethesda, after all. You can do most anything you want using existing content building blocks, and if you have the modeling and texturing expertise, can easily add your own blocks. To do significant quests, though, you need to do some good writing and preferably some good voice acting, plus you need someone with some scripting expertise if the quest advancement/completion conditions are at all complex. GECK has only been out for a few weeks, so it’s a bit early to be looking for either significantly creative additions, or wholistic rebalancing mods.
What we’ve got so far is just about what you’d expect - various gameplay tweaks focusing on various peoples peeves (weapon/armor degradation, weapon accuracy, etc), difficulty modifiers in both directions, in the form of stronger/easier enemies and various limitations/additional powers for the PC, and individual bits of added content - this or that weapon added, this or that texture redrawn, a few small dungeons, etc.
I would think, though, that with time we’ll see some very good added content, some wholistic rebalancing mods akin to those that surfaced for Oblivion, and a couple of total conversion mods that people will work on for months and never really finish.
Ok, going back to revisit some of the things I missed. I’m at the National Guard Depot and I can’t figure out how to get into the locked room. According to a friend of mine there is a bobblehead in there…and you are supposed to drop into the room from a hole in the floor or something (the room is locked and says it can only be opened from somewhere else). I’ve been up on the floors over this room wandering about and I don’t see any way to drop through a hole into it…only drop through a hole to where the locked door is.
Anyone have any idea how to get in there? I’m trying to max out my bobblehead collection here so this is vitally important! 
-XT
There’s actually two locked doors to get through. For the first, look for electrical switches (the kind with the largish electrical boxes and the big blade switch). The second door requires a code and is linked to the Keller Family Transcripts. Yes, there is a bobblehead inside. There’s also the Experimental MIRV, which isn’t terribly practical but is fun to experiment with - fires a spread of 8 mininukes in one volley. The MIRV is just behind the first door, and the bobblehead may be as well. Can’t remember.
Cool, I’ll look for the electrical box. Can I assume you aren’t actually supposed to drop down into the room from above then? Wouldn’t be the first time my friend was wrong…he insisted that the guy in Arefu who was guarding the bridge would go back into his house as soon as you completed the Family quest…and he never did. I ended up simply breaking in to get the bobblehead with only a small Karma loss and no gun fire afterward.
-XT
There may be some dropping down into rooms, but only as a means of navigating through the rest of the building. You definitely don’t drop down into the armory/bunker secured part of the building.
After you come out of the offices/training grounds back into the starting part of the building, there’s a switch to the left of you; you should be able to see the door open below you.
Oh, and there definitely is a bobblehead down there; for small guns.
Yeah, you have to go through other parts (zones) of the building to get to the switch. And to clear up, the bobblehead is accessible without the Keller transcripts, the MIRV isn’t.
Found the electrical panel…it was in another part of the building. I’m missing one of the Keller Family holotapes (number 4) so I can’t get into the inner bunker. I’ll have to see if I can figure out where that one is and pick it up.
-XT