Honest Hearts

Honest Hearts is the second add-on for Fallout: New Vegas, developed by Obsidian Entertainment and published by Bethesda Softworks.

Synopsis
After the First Battle of Hoover Dam, Caesar sent Ulysses to the Great Salt Lake to rally the White Legs to destroy New Canaan. With his help, the White Legs found a large supply of weapons. The White Legs then destroyed New Canaan, sending Joshua Graham (also known as "The Burned Man"), and the New Canaanites to Zion Canyon, where the Dead Horses stand with them against Caesar. The Courier then arrives in the Zion Canyon and meets the Burned Man, Joshua Graham, who is surprised that it is a different Courier than Ulysses that came to him, as he had figured Ulysses would come to murder him. This sparks the beginning of Honest Hearts.

Honest Hearts takes you on an expedition to the unspoiled wilderness of Utah’s Zion National Park. Things go horribly wrong when your caravan is ambushed by a White Legs raiding band. As you try to find a way back to the Mojave, the Courier becomes embroiled in a war between tribes and a conflict between a New Canaanite missionary and the mysterious Burned Man. The decisions the player character makes will determine the fate of Zion.

Crafting
The Honest Hearts add-on adds new crafting recipes to the game that make use of the Survival skill. Unlike recipes added by the previous add-on Dead Money, most recipes added by Honest Hearts do not require add-on-specific items or perks. Most recipes are available from the start of the game, provided the player has the necessary skill level and ingredients.

Notable new recipes include a method of turning one fission battery and 5 drained energy cells into 25 energy cells, as well as being able to make homebrewed Nuka-Cola and homebrewed Sunset Sarsaparilla at a campfire using the appropriate ingredients, (Nevada agave fruit and barrel cactus fruit for the Nuka-Cola, and Nevada agave fruit together with a xander root for the Sunset Sarsaparilla).

There are four new gecko-backed armor types that may be crafted. They require tanned green gecko hides. Green gecko hides are only available in Zion.

Honest Hearts also adds the most effective poison resistance chem in the game with Blood Shield, which is able to be crafted with components available in the Mojave Wasteland, but very commonly available within Zion Canyon.

The add-on has also introduced two new ways of crafting scrap metal. You can create 1 scrap metal at a workbench by either combining a metal cooking pan, metal cooking pot and a pot together or by combining a butter knife, a metal spoon, a fork and a tin plate. The recipes are listed in the crafting menu as "Cookery-to-metal" and "Meals-to-metal" respectively.

Ammunition

 * .45 Auto

Quests
The XP that is rewarded for quests is variable depending upon your level when the quests are completed. The total XP split between the main storyline quests is approximately 3000 XP at levels 1-4 and 22000 XP at levels 45-50, the secondary quest XP ranges from 75 XP per quest to 550 XP per quest.

Behind the scenes

 * Honest Hearts was first hinted at via in-game graffiti, sparking speculation that it would be the next add-on. This speculation was confirmed when ZeniMax Media registered "Honest Hearts" as a trademark. The graffiti hinting at Honest Hearts refers to Joshua Graham, and New Canaan, which were originally to appear in Van Buren, Black Isle's canceled Fallout 3 project.


 * Honest Hearts was again hinted at in the game files of the Dead Money add-on, with the inclusion of an unused snow globe for Zion National Park, and further suggesting it would be the next DLC in line for release after Dead Money.
 * Joshua Sawyer has indicated that the title of this add-on is a reference to Brigham Young's aphorism, "Honest hearts produce honest actions."
 * J.E. Sawyer also revealed that the story of Honest Hearts drew inspiration from the Utah War and Mountain Meadows Massacre.