Fallout: a diplomatic adventure

[Von Drunky]

I’ve played fallout 1 as the good the bad and the gray, but I’ve never played as a diplomat. Since there just so many cool weapons to choose from I really never seen the appeal. But I guess there is a first time for everything. Before I start I had a few questions:

1. Does playing as a true diplomat mean that only you can’t kill or does it mean your NPC’s can’t kill either. Basically do you go solo or do you just have others doing your dirty work?
2. It’s been a while since I played FO would you say the majority of the quest could be solved diplomatically (given that its not the obvious go here kill him quest)?
3. How important is the sneak skill, and what other skills/perks/stats should I focus on? (I’m thinking Speech, Science, Sneak With a concentration on charisma and intelligence and Low Strength also how does luck factor in on all of this?)
4. What are some must have patches, I saw the screenshot for the good hub ending I seeing how I will probably play as a good guy it seems wroth getting.

Any other suggestions/tips that will make my diplomat experience more enjoyable would be greatly appreciated.

 

[mr. pastorius]

1. I don't believe that playing a 'true' diplomat excludes kills made by your party, because that would make any progress in the game extremely difficult (random encounters, for example).
2. The main ones and quite a number of sidequests, yes.
3. Not overly important, from my experience. It can help you get out of tricky situations, but a true diplomat should be able to talk his way out of such situations. When playing as a diplomat, I usually tag Speech (duh), Science and, depending on what I want to achieve, Steal or Outdoorsman (although the latter isn't very useful in F1, from what I've seen).
Also, Luck only affects the Gamble skill, critical hit chance and special encounters frequency. Unless you want those special encounters, go for it. Otherwise, you should invest your char points in something else. Parception, perhaps?
4. I suppose the official patch plus the unofficial patches should do the trick.

 

[Von Drunky]

Isn’t perception only import if your playing as a sharpshooter? I guess I’ll tag steal or maybe doctor to keep my party alive.

 

[mr. pastorius]

Perception increases your sequence, helping you get a turn sooner in combat (I really couldn't think of a less confusing sentence construction at this moment, I'm afraid). I guess the rest is pretty obvious.
Also, Doctor's a pretty good choice, yeah. I forgot about that one.

 

[Misteryo]

I always figured that even a diplomat/moral character would return fire if he was ambushed in the wastes by monsters or robbers... In my mind diplomats aren't pacifists, and I never wanted to play a complete pacifist.

However, I don't like letting my party members kill people when I am unwilling to get my own hands dirty. Either we all avoid the fighting, or we all fight.

For a diplomatic build, I usually tag Speech (Duh.) [There's something delightful about the coupling of the speech skill and saying, "Duh."]
As I was saying, Speech, Doctor and Science. I max out INT, CHR about 4-6, PER 6-7 (there are some PER checks throughout, and I hate to miss 'em), I'll still usually throw some points at STR, mainly for carrying capacity. END can be minimum for all I care. And high LUCK is great if I have the points left over.

Good Natured is a great perk for this character, too. You just gotta survive the first bit of the game...

 

[mr. pastorius]

A diplomat with 6 CH? That's pretty weird. I always set it to at least 8 when I'm playing with a diplomat.
This is my usual build:

Traits: Gifted & Good Natured

S: 4
P: 7
E: 5
C: 10
I: 9
A: 8
L: 4

Skills: Speech, Doctor (I can't believe I forgot about this one) and Science.

I get my NPCs do the dirty work (if any) and talk my way through any situation I run into. If I don't get the chance to convince someone not to attack me, I flee (that's where high AG and PE kick in).
Works like a charm.

 

[Von Drunky]

That’s looks like something close to what I want my character to look like. Also doesn’t luck lower the chance of someone landing a hit on you? I don’t know I guess I’ll play as a complete pacifist, I’m going to roleplay and pretend I’m Gandhi. But I’m still wondering if I can make it through the game with my entire party being passive. Exception being Dog Meat since he is a Dog without any real sense of morals or ethics but only instincts to act on.

 

[Sander]

1. I don't believe that playing a 'true' diplomat excludes kills made by your party, because that would make any progress in the game extremely difficult (random encounters, for example).

RUN AWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!
You don't need to kill anyone in the game, nor do your companions.

2. The main ones and quite a number of sidequests, yes.
3. Not overly important, from my experience. It can help you get out of tricky situations, but a true diplomat should be able to talk his way out of such situations. When playing as a diplomat, I usually tag Speech (duh), Science and, depending on what I want to achieve, Steal or Outdoorsman (although the latter isn't very useful in F1, from what I've seen).
Also, Luck only affects the Gamble skill, critical hit chance and special encounters frequency. Unless you want those special encounters, go for it. Otherwise, you should invest your char points in something else. Parception, perhaps?

Agility, to run away and get a bonus to sneak. Sneak can be very useful, especially in the endgame.
Perception is pretty useless, extra sequence won't matter much if you're not going to be fighting.

 

[mr. pastorius]

RUN AWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!
You don't need to kill anyone in the game, nor do your companions.

I was mostly reffering to unavoidable fights (eg. random encounters). Unavoidable without manually entering combat mode as soon as the map loads, that is.

Agility, to run away and get a bonus to sneak. Sneak can be very useful, especially in the endgame.
Perception is pretty useless, extra sequence won't matter much if you're not going to be fighting.

Can't argue with extra AG, although I personally never had much use of sneaking. Also, I found the extra sequence pretty useful in random encounters.

 

[Sander]

I was mostly reffering to unavoidable fights (eg. random encounters). Unavoidable without manually entering combat mode as soon as the map loads, that is.

Only the random encounters fall under that, and you can simply run away from those.

Can't argue with extra AG, although I personally never had much use of sneaking. Also, I found the extra sequence pretty useful in random encounters.

Sneaking is mostly useful in the Military Base and the Cathedral.

 

[mr. pastorius]

Sneaking is mostly useful in the Military Base and the Cathedral.

Well, I prefer getting my hands on CoC robes and infiltrating that way. But yeah, I guess sneaking can work as well, although it seems pretty risky if you're not wearing robes.

 

[Von Drunky]

1. I don't believe that playing a 'true' diplomat excludes kills made by your party, because that would make any progress in the game extremely difficult (random encounters, for example).

RUN AWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!
You don't need to kill anyone in the game, nor do your companions.

So far I got the waterchip without killing any humanoids. I messed up on my total pacifist character relatively early In the game, when I got corned by a rat and a mole rat in Vault 15 and had no choice but to blast the rat. Actually the scenario played out pretty well, it was kill or be killed, in that situation it was obvious on what had to be done because human life is wroth more then a rat. I might redo my character and focus a bit more on sneak. The Military base is going to be a bitch lucky I have two saved games one being me with the waterchip and being taken to the MB the other is from the Vault right after I have completed the waterchip quest.




Edit: I just finished the game without killing any humanoids (minus those killed in the explosion). I got up to lvl 12. I noticed that playing as a diplomat takes a huge toll on quest availably thereby shortening the game. I couldn’t even help with Killans assassin therefore forfeiting a major quest. In conclusion it is better to play as a well rounded character as in contrast to always using the same approach be it violence or diplomacy


Btw I got some weird encounter I never had before. It says something like crazed peasant is running towards you. Then you talk to him and find out that his name is Trent and he is a guard for the water merchants and how everyone got killed by a deathclaw. Anyone ever get this