I just started playing this game and got to the Rad Scorpion quest, I beat it but it involved me to constantly reload my game because of repeatedly dying do to my character constantly missing its target in combat. Are there any things that I can do that will help combat be more successful for me in the future? Not only that, but is the game as unfair as I think it is because of the scorpions taking out massive damage?

Edit: I should probably note that I am a newbie at Fallout and most RPGs like it so don't be too harsh on my skill as evidenced in this post. :P

First of all, don't treat Fallout like an action game (it is possible, but with a properly created character). :)
Second, there are a few things you can do:
* Fight from a distance, using targeted shots.
* Use armor. There is a Leather Jacket you'll find soon, and Combat Armor you could get when coming back from V15
* Use better weapons. A Hunting Rifle will go a long way, but if that's hard to get there is an SMG somewhere in V15
* Fight smarter. Always use a few AP to move away from melee opponents.

On further note, solving the scorpion quest is possible without fighting even one of the things. But to do that, you have to first go to Vault 15. :)

Military-grade combat armor? Best bet is a ways south of Shady Sands, and it's a lot of combat and looting away unless:
(a) your bartering skill is quite good, or
(b) you can rob everybody blind (or blinded), or
(c) you do a little sequence-breaking, or
(d) you have a high Gambling skill and a lot of patience*, or
(e) you can think of something I haven't.
Leather jackets shouldn't be impossible to find if you explore your immediate options. Leather armor might be a little more difficult, but if you're statted to be a cruel bruiser or take advantage of nearby dead'uns in another town you might come across a good suit. Metal armor will be a little tougher, honestly, and might not be entirely worth your bother by the time you get to it. It's good, but heavy and not necessarily superior to other options you can explore at that stage.
Mind you, I've played character arcs that took advantage of metal armor with no regret and no small amount of success. It's good armor. Just not as cost-effective or weight-efficient as the military-grade armors in the game.

If you want to slaughter everything in sight, beef up your relevant combat skill (Unarmed, Melee, Firearms, or Heavy Weapons ordinarily; avoid Throwing. It's boring.) until you can manage called shots for the eyes. It's a bit cheesy, but the critical hit rate is disturbingly high.

* This is actually a very good option if you can be bothered to go with it. A bit time-consuming, but not in a way that devours your countdown time.

There's a hunting rifle in V15 but it's hard to spot.

I'm still not convinced it's always there.

Sorry, meant Leather Armor but mixed up the name with Combat Armor. Been too long since I last played the game.

The Jacket is in one of the lockers in V15. You can get Leather Armor off dead Raiders, Metal Armor off their leader.There's also a small chance of running into a trader with a pair of bodyguards in the desert. I don't remember if it was trading with them or killing them (or both), but you could get a rifle frm that encounter.

In every game i played it was there, it is just pain to pinpoint it with the mouse.

First off, how did you build your character? Fallout is one of the most versitile yet unforgiving RPGs ever made, which is why it is considered Legendary. Any combination of SPECIAL and traits can successfully complete the game, but they will all take very different paths to get there.

For combat specifically you need to look at your weapon skill, the weapon you are using, the distance from the target (if using ranged weapons) and the enviroment:

-Raising you appropiate weapon skill is a sure fire way of improving your chances in combat. If find some ultra-super-all-powerful weapon but are not skilled in its use then it is worthless to you.
-When chosing a weapon look closely at its stats. For example when looking at the damage range the minimum number is often more important. Lets say you have two weapons, one has a damage range of 2-12 the other has 8-10. The first on has a higher Max but also a larger range. The average damage of the first is 7 but 9 for the second, so even though the max damage is lower the second weapon is more powerful. Also look closely at the AP cost of the weapon. To use the same weapons from the damage example; if you can fire 2 shots per round with one weapon but only one with the other then chose the faster weapon, 14 damage per round (two shots that average 7damage each) is better than 9. Finally look at the ammo capacity and factor in how often you will need to reload during combat when looking at AP costs.
-Each ranged weapon has a max effective range and it really makes a big difference when you try to go beyond that range. Also you weapon skill is effecied by distance. Try this, target a hostile unit and look at the percentage number that tells you your odds of hitting it, now move a hex or two closer or further and watch how that number goes up or down.
-Use your eyes and look around. Everything you see has negative modifiers to you weapon skills. The biggest one is light level. Fighting at night or in a cave can be tedious. This is why you can have 110% in your weapon skill but only have a 60% chance to hit. There are negative modifiers for being in the dark, for being far away from the target, for having scenery inbetween you and the target and for the targets Armor Class.

Specifically in the Rad Scorp cave, it depends on you build but you can get a companion to help, you can block off the cave access so the buggers can't get out or (my personal favorite) wait until you get an SMG and get up close and personel in full burst mode. Remeber what I said about weapon damage, well that number is per bullet! It may not look to impressive to have a weapon that only does 5 damage, but if it fires a 10 round burst then thats 50 damge. The catch is that burst weapons are fairly inaccurate. Its best to get really close to your target, and if there are multiple targets its best to target the one in the back of the line. I had 3 Rad Scorps lined up and coming at me and I bursted at the last one; most of the bullets hit the one right infront of me and killed it and enough hit the second that it ran away wounded. According to the game I "Oops! Missed the rad scorpion and hit the rad scorpion instead" but I'll take that kind of miss any day.

Most important is to save the game and reload your guns often.

I remember this game...This part was really hard when you don't have the right skills in the gun marksmanship and makes it even worst when you had to melee the whole area out. Sometiimes the companion AI would think your a enemy and then pop ya with their weapon and well...you die horribly...

I would just take my time and then try to lvl up to increase the skills and then go back battling the cave...LOL...

The appearance of the hunting rifle could be luck-based. There are a few things like that in the game that are hard to spot and seem buggy but are actually due to luck (Whether or not Vic's shack is locked in F02 is another luck-based thing I think).

To combat, it depends. If you get Ian he has a jacket I think which you can take, that helps. If you're going guns, make sure to put enough points into smallguns early on, and take aimed shots at weak points if you can. Throwing down a lit flare in the cave can increase your to-hit chance due to the extra light.

Completing V15 before going to Shady Sands, or at least before doing the Radpscorpion quest, will help you gain an extra level I think which will help a lot, and as others have said there are various goodies there.

i think perception is also important in this

as the others stated, make sure you weapons skill is high enough (this is the reason i ALWAYS tag small guns) and don't forget shotguns and rifles are still small weapons (big means huge in fallout)

one more piece of advice: try to get your enemies in one-on-one combat. if they gang on you, you are probably doomed.

oh and maybe this site will help [url=http://user.tninet.se/~jyg699a/fallout.html#char]http://user.tninet.se/~jyg699a/fallout.html#char[/url] (it is the walkthrough i used from time to time)

Everyone here is answering you quite well,but to put it more simply:
-If your character is not combat based,the scorpion cave can be quite a challenge (or even almost impossible for pure diplomacy build characters);
-Look at your character:Tag skills?SPECIAL attributes?Trait?Writing them here could really help us to figure out what may be your problem;
-If you just can't beat the cave, just skip it, it's not essential.Or if you really want to destroy the scorpion nest,try to lower the combat difficulty in the options. I finished this game 6 times,and I didn't know you could do that.
This game is fucking huge.

Don't feel too bad, it took me 10 years and some blind dumb luck just to notice something odd about about that quest. Even then it was alot of trial and error before I broke down and Googled what I found. My reaction was very similar to yours.

okay so i just started replaying F1 again and i just discovered there is a shotgun (+20shells) to get in vault 13. its behind the locked door on lvl3, in a box hidden in the left side of the room. this made the radscorpion quest a lot easyier