where the hell am i supposed to get the power armour? i made it throught the first level of the military base (at the cost of all my npc's) and when i try fight fight any other mutants they basiclly kill me in one hit before i can even attack them!
help, please?

There are 2 different ways that I know of to get some, and both of them involve joining the Brotherhood. One set you can get from rescuing the initiate quest, and the other if you get the power module thing and repair it for the guy on level 3.

Correct. If you are repairing the suit of power armor, you can get the motivator by talking to the requisition officer or by stealing it from the locker in Rhombus's quarters.

What is the initiate quest?
also rhombus never leaves his room for some reason

You get it from the one guy in the room where the guys are sparring with each other. You gotta go find where he's at in the Hub. After you complete it, you get your choice between some weapons, ammo, or a suit of power armor.

Of which the blatant answer is power armour as the rest are plentiful elsewhere.

Some interesting points about the "rescue the initiate quest"
You can rescue this brotherhood guy from the thugs in the Hub before you ever make it to the brotherhood base. The thugs holding him are somewhat tough, so be prepared for that.
You can't officially receive the "rescue" quest until you first become an initiate yourself (because you can't get inside to talk to anyone in the brotherhood until you complete "become an initiate quest".)
However, if you rescue the guy first and then become an initiate, you're good. Just talk to the quest giver twice. First time you talk, you get the quest. Accept the quest and close the dialog. Then talk to him again and let him know that you rescued the guy. He doesn't even mention how quick you are! He'll offer you several rewards, the best of which it the power armor. All of the weapons he offers are fairly easy to acquire during the end game.
This was the way I got my power armor, because I found the thugs in the Hub before I ever made it to the brotherhood. When I was exploring the Hub, I walked into a building and these three assholes just started blasting me. What the fuck? They laid my ass out and I had to re-start from a previous save. There was no way I was going to let those bags of dicks get away with that shit. So I buffed up a bit and went back and wasted the lot of them. I figured they had to be guarding something important, and it turns out they were. Technically, they were guarding a kidnapped guy, but really it was a "FREE POWER ARMOR COUPON" with a pulse. Sweet.
EDIT: It turns out that if you have an Electronic Lockpick, you can unlock the door of the Brotherhood Base and go down and talk to everyone even though you aren't an initiate. You can get an Electronic Lockpick in the Hub as a quest reward.
So the quickest way to power armor is to rescue the guy and pick up the lock pick in the Hub, and then go straight to the brotherhood, ignore the guards, pick the lock, and then go down and talk the quest giver.

I don't recall talking to him twice.... anyway, I'm pretty sure you also need a good deal of speech to talk him into giving you a power armour, after saving the guy in the Hub.

yeah, either do i. i happened upon the initiate quest in the same fashion as mcfeher. when i talked to one of the guards outside of the BoS complex, and he offered me a reward for the rescue right off the bat. of course i took the power armor!

At a general karma of 39, I couldn't even get in the door to talk to the quest give, Talus. Trying to pick it just gets me killed.
I already freed the initiate in the Hub, but that was before I ever got into the BOS.
But coming there later, and making a successful trip to the Glow, didn't help me get in to see Talus.
So I just stole the machinery and repaired the suit on the third floor.

If you are good, you can sneak in, steal the part out of his locker, and sneak out before he comes out of the room where his cot is.

Easy Adv. Power armor in F2:
make sure you buff your sneak skill for this mission. I had mine about %35, or %40.
You can get A.P.A. right after you leave Arroyo. The first step is to travel down to San Francisco, directly south. Enter, and find the Brotherhood of Steel Compound. Talk to the guard outside, and he tells you of a place called Navarro. Agree to get the Vertibird plans for him, as well.
Now, go to Navarro. It should be north. When you get there, there will be a man in a purple robe standing alone. I believe you can either ask him to join the Enclave, or simply kill him, to gain access to the shed behind him. Inside is a trapdoor. Go in.
This is where your sneak skill comes into play. Head down the corridor, open the door, and SNEAK past the guard. Otherwise, his plasma rifle will probably liquify you right off. Head to the room filled with lockers, across the hall. Inside of one of those is the Adv. Power Armor.
Once you wear the armor, you can roam freely about the base. Head up the elevator to ground level, and grab the Vertibird plans by talking to a few NPC's. Return to the tunnel, and head back to San Fran.
Once you get into the BoS compound, you get lots of neat goodies, including some old-time power armor. Sell and/or equip at will.

if you have combat armor equipped, the guards just think you're the new recruit and won't think anything of you walking around the navarro complex. i waltzed right by the guard and i wasn't stopped. granted, combat armor is a little later in the game than right out of arroyo, but if you haven't put anything into sneak, it's another way to go.

actually i'm not sure if u even needed sneak
i walked ard pretty blatantly and the soldiers just asked me to go "grab a uniform"
i talked to the supply guy and he asked me to just go ahead to the lockers and grab the armour :)

It is a rather easy job convincing them you're a new recruit and then grabbing yourself a suit of advanced power armour. No need for any special armour. Though they might react differently without any armour at all, haven't tried that though.