EternallyLostBoy: Yeah, the random encounters can be pretty rough.
The best thing to do is makes sure you get all the quests done in the first area (all the exp you can get after all) and then and then inch your way over to the next town... if I find myself getting killed a lot I choose a small amount of movement on the world map(like 3/4 of a square at a time). if I make it there with no encounters I save and do it again... it's longer then just clicking the next city and traveling the whole distance but it's less likely to get encountered and killed. Not all encounters are bad though... Just most of them lol
Once you make it to the first city to will be able to quest some and lvl as well as get your first NPC, sulik, to assist. Makes surviving a little easier.

Keph: Also, high outdoorsman (which does exactly nothing in FO1, by the way) and luck help either avoid encounters altogether, or get more good ones ;)

Rainstorm: A high outdoorsman skill also allows you too avoid encounters, you'll get a message saying what it's about and lets you choose whether or not you want to check it. (like "you encounter a bunch of molerats" or such and the option to ignore)
Mine isn't that high in FO yet, but IIRC you got the possibility to avoid encounters in FO as well. (but I have spent more time with FO2 and I haven't played FO - up until now - for at least two years, hence my memory might serve me wrong and that's why I used "IIRC")

Eddy186: I was wondering if I could get some help?
I'm playing fallout 1 and I can't seem to get a water chip, and I only have 40 days left. I dont want to 2000 to have water sent to my vault, for an extra 100 days.
So far I've been in vault 15 and Necropolis. No waterchip. Should I let them die?
Are there any suggestions?

Weclock: keep looking!
also, you don't have to pay 2k, you can pay considerably less and make your vault pay for the rest. heheheehe.
Actually, I don't know that for sure, I never tried. I just paid the 2k because I had no clue what I was doing.