DwayneGAnd
Look, Ma! Two Heads!
This is yet another guide I have written for newbies from a former newbie. Since I now feel I have mastered the game, I would like to share some wisdom.
In my opinion, this is the best Fallout game so far. It's also my favorite. Maybe because there are so many different types of characters you can make. Thanks to all the unique perks that benefit certain combat skills and the use of certain weapons, there are so many builds to make.
New Vegas feels much more like a Fallout game than Fallout 3 due to the return of traits, a reputation system, more low-intelligence dialogues, and a setting closer to the original setting where the franchise began. Thanks to the fact that you can join one of four endgame factions, this game has incredible replayability.
Unlike Fallout 3, New Vegas has a much greater range of specialization for your character, adding to replayability. There are three major archetypes of builds.
Critical - Focuses on inflicting as much critical damage as often as possible. Luck needs to be maxed for the highest critical chance, together with certain perks, equipment, and traits. Single-attack weapons with high critical chance and critical damage work best, especially if they also deal high damage. This build has the highest potential for critical chance with the right weapons. Perks, equipment, and traits that increase critical chance and damage are the bread and butter of this build. Chems that increase attack speed can give you an extra edge in combat. Light Touch adds a flat bonus to critical chance not affected by modifiers, it's even better with automatic weapons because the flat modifier added by the perk when wearing light armor is not affected by the modifier of automatics, making it one of the few ways to have reasonable critical chance for automatic builds.
Quickshot/Quickfist - The goal is to attack as fast as possible to inflict damage in a short matter of time. While criticals can help supplement the damage, they are not the main focus of this build, but are more than welcome since the faster you attack, the more criticals in a shorter period you can inflict. Some chems and consumables also increase attack speed, giving this build the potential for the fastest attacks. Weapons with fast attack speeds and high damage per shot and second, not including automatics, work best with this build.
All Out - This build focuses on inflicting as much raw damage as possible per attack, but does not depend on criticals to add damage. Automatics, explosives, and hand-to-hand with the Heavy Handed trait is the way to go. These builds have the strongest damage potential outside of critical hits or speed. The higher the damage per shot or per second, the more damage that will be added to each attack, the better. These characters are built like tanks to maximize their defense and offense.
If desired, these characters can be built as either one of these variants:
Wild Wastelander - Takes the Wild Wasteland Trait. This is primarily for a unique gameplay experience. You can make use of any combat skill. But beware that certain weapons are unobtainable if you take this perk, such as the YCS/186 which the Alien Blaster replaces.
Imbecile - Intelligence is less than 4. For a humorous gameplay experience. Can also make use of any combat skill, but remember that you will not be able to get Pack Rat which can reduce the weight of ammo in Hardcore mode, so you won't be able to carry as much ammo for your weapons. Certain perks requiring higher intelligence such as Comprehension are also unavailable. Imbeciles will also not be able to max all their skills, even if they find all the skill books.
When deciding what kind of character you will make, first choose one of the three archetypes above. If you chose Critical or Quickshot, decide whether or not to use light armor as there are perks that benefit it. The best choice of armour for either choice increases the chance of critical hits. With critical hits, you have a choice of whether or not to use Light Touch with light armor for more critical chance. If you are using automatics, light armor is the way to go if you take Light Touch and use criticals. Regardless of your choices above, do you want to make heavy use of VATS? Although not as strong as it was in Fallout 3, it can have its uses such as increasing your accuracy, the chance of critical hits, or slightly reducing the damage you suffer from enemies. It also increases your damage with all hand-to-hand weapons. But overall, VATS is best used with plasma weapons due to Plamsa Spaz, Fast Shot, and Math Wrath.
Like Fallout 3, it is possible, though more difficult here, to max all your skills by the level cap. In Fallout 3, it was very easy to make a Jack of All Trades type character that could maximize effectiveness in all forms of combat, this was due to all those skill books, making it easy to max your skills, even with low intelligence. In New Vegas, this is no longer possible, due to perks being gained every couple of levels instead of every level, and the fact that there are so many specialty perks, you won't have enough perk slots to choose them all or most of them. There aren't as many skill books, though they do give a couple more skill points each. High intelligence and certain perks are required to max all skills by level 50. You also do not gain as many skill points per level as you did in Fallout 3. There is also no way to max all your stats as you could in Fallout 3 due to the absence of the Almost Perfect perk.
Still, due to the higher perk rate, you only get twenty-five perks from levelling up compared to Fallout 3's 29. If New Vegas allowed you to get a perk every level, making a Jack of All Trades character that maximized the effectiveness of ranged, melee, and explosive combat would be a different story. Since you don't get as many perks from levelling up this time, depending on your build and what other perks you get that are important, you probably will not have enough perk slots to fully develop the ranged, melee, and explosive combat styles. Try to get all of your non-combat skills maxed no matter what as they are all useful. Certain other skills are useful as they allow you to pass certain skill checks in dialogue.You can also raise certain skills to 90 and then read a magazine if you need to pass a check, or 80 with Comprehension. This can also help you save on skill points. For characters using both ranged and melee weapons, since the best Unarmed and Melee Weapon perks require 80 In both, you can save on skill points by using either for your arsenal, maxing the skill for it and leaving the other at 80. If building primarily around melee combat, the other combat skills are only good for passing skill checks, but you can save skill points for more important skills by not pumping points into combat skills you don't use.
Ranged characters who use Guns or Energy Weapons primarily can also use hand to hand weapons as part of their build to have a versatile arsenal, maybe even include explosives. They can pick up perks to benefit hand to hand combat. All Out characters can also add in some perks for explosives. Explosives isn't very practical on its own, but it can be included as a secondary combat skill.
For Fallout 3 characters who enjoyed playing a sneaky assassin wearing Chinese Stealth Armor, no armour has a stealth field when sneaking in this game. Due to the limited amount of Stealthboys you can find, it is much more difficult to sneak around without being visually detected, even with Silent Running. This means that you'll have a harder time inflicting melee ranged sneak attack criticals unless you use certain perks, implants, chems, or drugs. Any character can do this, though light armour characters have the potential for the fastest sneak speed. Like Fallout 3, there are times when you will be forced to attack out of stealth.
Only choose perks that benefit your build's effectiveness and combat style. A good example is the Cowboy and Grunt perks. These two perks affect the damage of specific weapons, so if you choose either of those perks, you'll have to restrict yourself to using certain guns, explosives, and melee weapons. Same with Pyromaniac where you'll have to limit yourself to using fire-based weapons. With critical and quickshot builds, you'll have more than enough skill points to max both Guns and Energy Weapons so you can use weapons from both categories to add versatility to your arsenal. If you are making a build that does not rely on critical hits, don't get perks that increase your chance of criticals or their damage. Unlike in Fallout 3, you won't have enough perk slots to maximize your combat potential picking perks for ranged, melee, and explosive combat. Perks that affect explosives work best if you focus on them as a primary combat skill.
Some of the DLCs also limit what you can carry, especially when you first enter Honest Hearts. Dead Money strips you of your inventory and you don't get it back until after you finish. High skills in Guns, Melee Weapons, or Unarmed help in Honest Hearts and Dead Money. Old World Blues and Lonesome Road allow you to keep your inventory but save Lonesome Road for last.
As in Fallout 3, you should choose weapons for your build that deal good damage and are easy to maintain, though here in New Vegas you can craft Weapon Repair Kits to help maintain weapons. The Jury Rigging perk can help make repairs easier, but certain weapons can only be repaired with an identical weapon even if Jury Rigging was taken. That's what you need Weapon Repair Kits for. Having Raul as a companion can also reduce the decay rate of your weapon as can one of ED-E''s upgrades from Lonesome Road which can repair your weapon once a day. Jury Rigging is more of a convenience and isn't really necessary if you ca create repair kits for your weapons and find enough repair materials for your armor. It is recommended that you only carry a few extra weapons to handle any situation. Still, due to the weight of ammo in Hardcore Mode and other important items you'll be picking up, including food and water, your arsenal won't be as expanded as it was in Fallout 3. Only limit yourself to a few weapons, and restrict how many heavy weapons you carry in your endgame arsenal if you use any.
Due to carry weight concerns together with other useful items you may need to carry, such as crafting items, food, water, supplies for medical or repair, ammo in Hardcore mode, and the armour you wear, it is recommended that you do not carry too many weapons. Sell what you are not using. If you are ranged, carry at least one pistol, one rifle, and at least one weapon that either has very powerful damage per shot or can chamber armour-penetrating bullets. The pistol will be good for taking on weaker opposition to conserve ammo or for closer range, though you need the rifle for fighting at a longer range and dealing more damage. If you focus exclusively on critical hits and damage, choose weapons with a good critical damage modifier and high critical damage.
Thankfully, there are no Overlords, Albino Scorpions, or Behemoths in the Mojave, unlike Fallout 3. Reavers are much more fragile here than they were in the Capital Wasteland. The game however does have its own nasties of comparable difficulty. The five legendary creatures, Marked Men, some robots including Robo-Scorpions, Cazadores, Nightstalkers, some super mutants, and Deathclaws are among the most dangerous and toughest to face. For these enemies, you should include at least one powerful weapon with high damage per attack in your arsenal.
If critical hits are part of your build, it is also a good idea to carry a scoped weapon for extreme ranged sniping. Good choices include the Trail Carbine (for which you can buy a scope), Christine's CoS Silencer Rifle, Anti-materiel Rifle, and YCS/186.
Check the table at the Fallout wikia for New Vegas to get all the info you need on choosing the best weapons for your build.
Depending on your build, the only stats worth maxing endgame for certain builds are Strength, Endurance, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck. Strength for melee weapon damage and carry weight. Endurance for health, resistance to radiation, poison, number of implants, and how long you can stay underwater. Intelligence increases skill points per level up. Agility increases reload, draw, and holster speed. And Luck affects criticals, gambling at casinos, and increases all skills. Higher strength also allows you to use a wider variety of weapons. The Minigun and its unique version are the only ones that require max Strength.
As in Fallout 3, only set certain stats to what you need to qualify for perks plus the implant and the bonus point you get from completing Lonesome Road, any more is a waste. If you want to max Strength, Endurance, Agility, or Luck set your stats to what you need to max them with bonuses from implants and equipment. Playing as an imbecile will give you more extra points.
When setting your SPECIAL stats, here is how to do so according to my notes for maximum effectiveness:
Strength - 5 to 7 is a good starting value. The implant raises it by one. So does wearing T-51b Power Armor. Reinforced Spine increases it by two. You need it maxed by the end of the game if specializing primarily in hand to hand combat as Melee Weapons get a bonus to damage from strength. You don't need to have it maxed by endgame if you specialize primarily in ranged combat, though higher strength can be good for increased carry weight. All Out builds can have it maxed regardless of whether or not they specialize in hand to hand combat because their weapons can be quite heavy and use lots of ammo. Some good perks require a minimum strength of 5 even if you are not engaged in melee combat, such as Strong Back, so starting with average strength can be more beneficial than just what you need to use your weapons with all bonuses, which could hamper you in the long run until then. Many of the best weapons in the game have very high strength requirements, so this is a good place to put any leftover stat points from setting your other stats. But only the implant helps qualify for perks. To know how much you should start with, subtract 2 from 10 for Reinforced Spine from Old World Blues, 1 for the implant, another 1 if planning to wear T-51b Power Armor, and finally 1 if planning to use the Lonesome Road bonus point here, for a maximum of 5 points. All Out builds can best use the stat point bonus from completing Lonesome Road here or in Endurance. Low-intelligence characters will want to have it maxed by endgame for more carry weight as they can't get Pack Rat.
Perception - 6 is needed for Better Criticals, which is all you need Perception for. Keep it at the default 5 if using criticals or go down to 4 if making an All Out build. Having ED-D as a companion gives you the same effect as having this stat maxed.
Endurance - Endurance is a much more important stat in New Vegas than in previous Fallout games. The higher, the better. Starting with 9 can allow you to get all implants, though you can max Endurance by starting with 8, getting the implant, and wearing either the normal Valence or the unique Atomic version. Many agree that the charisma implant is worthless. Hand-to-hand characters and those using automatic ranged weapons need more endurance because they either need more health or to qualify for the Implant GRX perk which needs 8, or both. Getting an upgrade here through an implant will not give you an extra implant space, though many agree that the implants to upgrade your stats are better than the Monocyte Breeder. 7 or 8 is recommended for any character.
Charisma - Charisma is the least important stat as usual. This time, its most important effect is upon your companions, increasing the damage they deal and their damage threshold. Feel free to keep it at 1 and use chems to give yourself a boost to Charisma to affect the companion nerve which is a better idea.
Intelligence - 6 or 7 is a good starting value for many characters. For the imbecile, you can set it to 2 to get all the low intelligence dialogue options and other special ways to solve certain tasks, the implant will allow you to get the most amount of skill points you can have while still leaving you as dimwit. 5 is needed for Pack Rat. If built around criticals, set it to a minimum of 6 and get the implant. If you have an extra point left, you can set it to 7. 7 is required for Voracious Reader, a great perk for any build maximizing their critical chance.
Agility - You need 6 for Silent Running which is good for any character and 7 for Slayer which is good for hand-to-hand combat characters. VATS characters need 7 for Nerves of Steel. Light Armor characters need 8 for Tunnel Runner to increase sneaking speed. Agility also raises reload speed as well as the draw and holster speed of all weapons, though the bonuses are minimal. Low-intelligence characters, however, will definitely have enough points to have this maxed by endgame and have points to spend elsewhere.
Luck - You can have it maxed by endgame for a higher critical chance, better gambling, and a bonus to all skills. Lucky Shades can give you an extra point. Any character can benefit from maxed luck for more successful gambling to help earn money and for a bonus to all skills, even those who do not focus their build on criticals. It's best to start with 7 if you include critical hits and damage in your build. You can max it with the implant, Lucky Shades, and after completing Lonesome Road. If you need the points in other stats as an All Out build, you can keep Luck at a lower value. Critical automatic builds will need a minimum of 5 to get the implant to qualify for Better Criticals because it's impossible to have a very high critical chance with those weapons even if you take the perks and traits, so an endgame of 6 is all you need endgame for them. Make sure your endgame value is an even value to get the bonus to all skills.
You can get implants to raise a stat, how many you get depends on your endurance stat. 5 allows you to have five implants for example. Finishing Lonesome Road grants you an extra stat point that you can put into any of your stats, depending on your build, it is best put into Luck, Endurance, Agility, or Strength. Remember that stat increases you get from equipment do not allow you to qualify for perks.
Lucky Shades can give you an extra point of Luck, which is great for builds using critical hits, but you'll need to be Liked by the Legion to gain access to the safehouse where it is. There are ways outside of quests to raise your reputation with the Legion. You can repeatedly pickpocket d NCR troops (the drunk ones in the Strip are the easiest) as well as take any off of dead troops you come across and give them to the guy in charge of Cottonwood Cove. Once you gain access to the safehouse and get the Lucky Shades, you can then start working against the Legion if you are not siding with them endgame. You'll need to have Beware the Wrath of Caesar failed in order to get rid of all that positive reputation if you want to recruit Arcade or Boone. Don't recruit Boone early in the game because he'll attack any Legion troops you come across, making it difficult to start building temporary relationships.
As in previous games, you can change your gameplay experience by varying your stats, as long as you set them to qualify for perks because drugs will not help you do that as they could in games before Fallout 3.
After setting your stats, choose your traits. Some are more worth taking than others. Traits are another reason why you should specialize around one style for maximum benefit and effect. The best traits are:
Skilled - increases all skills at the cost of reduced experience. Considered by many to be the best trait, much more useful than the early games. It is useful for any character to start off with, best swapped out for something else during Old World Blues.
Good Natured - increases Speech, Medicine, Barter, Science, and Repair by five points, at the cost of reducing all combat skills by five points. It's another good trait to choose at the start together with Skilled, but you can swap it out for another trait in Old World Blues.
Fast Shot - increases your attack speed and reduces AP costs with Guns and Energy Weapons, but reduces accuracy by increasing weapon spread. In earlier versions and certain consoles, this capped your accuracy in VATS at 76%, taking accuracy perks such as Gunslinger, Sniper, and Commando fixed that. On PC however, Fast Shot does not reduce your accuracy. Fast Shot is great for increasing your attack speed with Guns and Energy Weapons and allowing you to get off more shots in VATS. It pairs off nicely with Built To Destroy for ranged builds not using automatics. Reduced action point costs stack with Plasma Spaz and Math Wrath, but Plasma Spaz works only with plasa energy weapons. The increased attack speed does not affect fully automatic weapons such as Miniguns, Flamers, and Gatling Lasers. It's the most important trait for the Quickshot build, as long as you use either Guns or Energy Weapons.
Trigger Discipline - the exact opposite of Fast Shot. It increases your accuracy by reducing weapon spread. The trait also increases accuracy with Guns and Energy Weapons in VATS. However, it also increases AP costs in VATS for those two weapon categories. Better for fully automatic weapons such as Miniguns, Gatling Lasers, and Flamers as they receive the benefit of reduced spread, while not being affected by the reduced attack speed. If you choose this trait, you should not use any single-shot long-range weaponry as their attack speed will be reduced.
Built To Destroy - increases critical chance at the cost of increasing the decay rate for all weapons. This is the most important trait for any build using critical hits, unless you are using automatics. Also good for hand-to-hand builds using criticals as part of their arsenal due to the lack of other good traits to use with those builds.
Heavy Handed - increases damage with melee or unarmed weapons at the cost of reduced critical damage. Perfect for All Out hand-to-hand builds. Don't take it if you are including criticals as part of your build.
Hot Blooded - increases your damage when your health falls below 50%, but reduces Perception and Agility by 2 when this happens. Good for anyone who wants to maximize their damage, such as All Out Tanks.
Wild Wasteland - adds lots of strange content to the game to change your gaming experience, but some weapons become unavailable as they are replaced by specific weapons found only when you take the trait. This is mainly for unique gameplay experiences. Can be built for any type of combat.
You can change your traits during Old World Blues if you find the update for the Autodoc. At the start of the game, I recommend you choose Skilled and Good Natured for the skill boosts unless you are making a Wild Wastelander. This way, you start off with higher skill levels. Once you become stronger and more skilled, you can change your traits at the Autodoc in Big Mountain. So choose either Skilled together with Good Natured or Wildwasteland at the start, and change your traits in Old World Blues to what your build needs.
The best armour in the game for builds that use criticals is either the Elite Riot Gear or Ulysses' Duster. Both armors increase your critical chance by 5% as does the best helmet which is the 1st Recon Beret, which you get from Boone after completing One For My Baby to his satisfaction. The Duster is for those who take Light Touch.
All Out builds do not depend on critical hits as much as the Critical build, nor are they inflicted as much and as often in Quickshot builds. For this reason, the best armour for the All Out build is T-51b Power Armor. The best helmet is the Space Suit Helmet because you can wear it with a very good accessory mentioned in the next paragraph. Space Suit Helmets are good for critical automatic builds.
The Atomic-Valence Tri-Radii-Oscillator can be worn as a helmet for a higher damage threshold, a bonus to endurance, and a healing effect. According to the Fallout wikia, you can wear it over certain helmets that do not take up the eyeglasses slot, such as hats, berets, and space suit helmets. But you cannot wear them with helmets that cover your entire face, such as power helmets. Since you can find two of them, you may want to give one to your endgame companion. The normal Valence is the accessory of choice for critical and quickshot builds if you want to wear Lucky Shades, unless you started with 8 Luck, then you can take the unique version of the Valence.
Due to a wider range of perks than in previous Fallout games to benefit different combat styles and the fact that you get a perk every two levels, you will no longer have more perks than you truly need for your build. This means that perks that you may have been forced to pick in Fallout 3 when you had no others to benefit your build are now useless. You also can't get as many as you could in Fallout 3.
All builds should get the following perks:
Bloody Mess (increased damage of all attacks)
Silent Running (improved sneaking ability which can help reduce the damage you take)
Them's Good Eating (gives you a chance to find good food items on dead enemies and create the best healing items in the game)
Chemist (all chems duration doubled, including Implant GRX)
Living Anatomy (increases damage against humans and ghouls while also allowing you to see your enemies' damage threshold, helping you pick the right ammo and/or weapon for dealing with them)
Implant GRX (provides free non-addictive turbo to slow down time and make things easier. A great alternative to VATS which is much weaker than it was in Fallout 3)
If you want to focus your build on the maximum potential of critical hits and damage:
Just Lucky I'm Alive (further increases the damage of critical hits. Neutral karma is required at level 50. The best level 50 perk for the critical build.)
Better Criticals (increased damage of critical hits)
Finesse is another useful perk for critical builds as it increases your critical chance by 5%, stacking with other bonuses from equipment, traits, and other perks. Quickshot builds can also benefit from Finesse and Better Criticals. Finesse isn't very good for automatic criticals, but it is great for any other weapons you might use with them, such as Unarmed, Melee Weapons, or single shot weapons.
Comprehension with Voracious Reader is a great combination for characters who want as high a critical chance as possible. This will allow you to craft an unlimited supply of True Police Stories for a temporary 10% increase to your critical chance. Since the bonus is applied before the weapon's critical chance modifier, you won't get much benefit with automatics.
If you want to focus on attack speed:
Ain't Like That Now (further increases your attack speed. Stacks with Slayer and Fast Shot. Does not work with automatic ranged weapons or automatic melee weapons. Evil karma is required at level 50 and is the ultimate perk for the Quickshot build.)
If you want to focus on increased damage per attack:
Thought You Died (further increases your damage per hit. Good Karma is required at level 50. A perfect fit for the All Out build)
There are other perks that increase damage against specific targets or in VATS, though depending on your build, you might not have enough perk slots available to take them.
Just Lucky I'm Alive works best with weapons that deal high critical damage and damage per shot, and stacks with Better Criticals. Ain't Like That Now stacks with Fast Shot for Guns and Energy Weapons (not including automatics) and Slayer for Unarmed and Melee Weapons, it works best with weapons that have quick attack speed, stacking further with chems such as Rushing Water. Thought You Died is the perk of choice for All Out builds, the increased damage adds up with automatic weapons and stacks with Heavy Handed for hand-to-hand weapons, but it isn't as useful for single-shot ranged weapons because the final total damage isn't as high as the increase from higher attack speed from Ain't Like That Now. If using weapons deals high critical damage per shot, high critical damage, and a good critical chance modifier, take Just Lucky I'm Alive. Weapons that deal lower critical damage per shot but having fast attack speed are better used with Ain't Like That Now or Thought You Died depending on whether or not they are automatic or if you are using Heavy Handed or not. For example, single-shot weapons such as shotguns are best used with Ain't Like That Now due to low critical chance and critical damage, while automatics such as Gatling Lasers are better off used with Thought You Died due to their automatic fire mode and low critical damage and critical modifier, but Pacienca is fantastic with Just Lucky I'm Alive due to high critical chance and critical damage. Lever-action weapons such as those used by Cowboy, Paciencia, and Anti-materiel Rifle have slow attack speed and thus would not gain much benefit from Ain't Like That Now, but are fantastic with Just Lucky I'm Alive. Slower weapons inflict more damage per hit and critical damage. The faster, the less. Critical builds can use Rushing Water for increased attack speed and gain part of the benefit of Ain't Like That Now. Explosives benefit best from Thought You Died.
According to the weapon charts on the wikia, lever-action guns inflict the most critical damage in the Guns category. Plasma deals more damage and critical damage than fast-firing lasers, though some laser weapons can still inflict great damage and critical damage. Energy Weapons not classified as laser or plasma inflict the most damage and critical damage in this weapon category. Bladed melee weapons are faster than blunt melee weapons and Unarmed, but they don't inflict as much damage or critical damage. Weapons affected by Grunt are among the fastest firing, excluding automatics, in Guns, but deal less damage and critical damage than the top tier guns. The best shotgun, the Riot Shotgun, has some of the fastest firing rates among semi-automatic guns, the others are more lever -action, but like the Riot, they deal little critical damage per pellet.
In short: if using automatics (whether ranged or melee) or explosives, have good karma, unless they are part of a critical build, in which case, have neutral karma. If using lever-action weapons with high damage and critical damage, energy weapons neither classified as laser or plasma, blunt melee weapons, have neutral karma. If playing with fast-speed weapons excluding automatics, such as weapons affected by Grunt, shotguns, and bladed melee weapons, have evil karma. Certain Unarmed, laser, and plasma weapons can be good for either a critical or quickshot build, all depending on how fast they attack. The tables on the weapon entry for New Vegas on the wikia. Decide what kind of weapons you'll be using and then play your character, keep that karma level before you hit level 50. The level 50 perk you qualify for is pretty much the only point of karma in the game. The only other changes are your interactions with Cass as a companion and the ending slides of the victorious faction.
If you use Guns, get Hand Loader which allows you to craft better ammo. Take Shotgun Surgeon which allows you to ignore ten points of Damage Threshold (better for slugs) and And Stay Back which gives a chance of knocking your foe down when using shotguns (buckshot and magnum are better for this). Grunts and Cowboys have ranged, melee, and explosive weapons that are affected by the perks. Grunts don't have shotguns affected by the perk, so don't take either shotgun perk if you choose Grunt.
If Energy Weapons are used in your build, get Laser Commander which increases your damage and critical chance when using them. The chance is flat and not affected by the critical chance modifier of weapons, so it is great for critical automatics. Also, get Vigilant Recycler which allows you to craft better ammo. If you do not use lasers, choose between fire or plasma. Plasma weapons benefit from Plasma Spaz which reduces the cost of action points in VATS, whether they are in Energy Weapon or Explosives. Pyromaniac is for those who want to use flamers or incinerator-type weapons, but those weapons deal poor critical damage and are not suited for critical or quickshot builds, but are good for All Out. Pyromaniac also affects certain unarmed and melee weapons as well, both of which can be good for Pyromaniac builds that focus on critical hits and damage or increased attack speed. Fire ammo for certain weapons is not affected.
One perk you should be careful with as an Energy Weapons user is Meltdown. The resultant blast caused by enemy deaths from Energy Weapons can cause chain reactions but can cause self-harm, friendly fire, and of course collateral damage to neutral npcs. The damage is also dependent on your weapon, the stronger the better. If you choose this perk, do not use Energy Weapons in close-range combat, nor should you have your allies fight in melee range.
Remember that if playing an Energy Weapons user, there is a bonus perk that can also increase your critical chance by up to 4% if you achieve both ranks, but it requires you to use lasers to get it. The perk affects all Energy Weapons. Laser Commander also increases your critical chance by 10%. Like Light Touch and the bonus in VATS, these are added to your critical chance after being multiplied by the modifier of your weapon. Set Lasers For Fun, Laser Commander, and Light Touch allow laser weapons to be the best weapons to use with an automatic critical build, for a total of 19% when using automatic lasers such as the Gatling Laser, with plasma weapons being a close second. Both are superior choices to Guns for a critical build using automatics.
Unarmed and Melee Weapons are also much more powerful than they were in previous games and thus they can make a very effective addition to your build. Add in these perks for your character:
Super Slam (chance for melee and unarmed weapons to knock down foes, rendering them helpless.)
Piercing Strike (your melee and unarmed attacks ignore fifteen points of the enemy damage threshold)
Slayer (increased attack speed with melee and unarmed attacks. Good for builds that focus on increasing attack speed)
Super Slam has a chance to knock down enemies. However, Super Slam doesn't work with automatic melee ranged weapons such as the Ripper, Chainsaw, Industrial Hand, or Thermic Lance, nor does Slayer or Ain't Like That Now increase their attack speed. Although the Industrial Hand, Ripper, Chainsaw, and Thermic Lance ignore the damage threshold of your enemies, it isn't applied correctly, but Piercing Strike fixes that. You can carry a single-strike weapon together with an automatic striking weapon if you choose in order to apply Super Slam and Slayer. Chems are needed for improving damage and survivability against tougher opposition. Ninja increases critical chance and sneak attack damage of melee and unarmed attacks, so it is another good perk to consider.
Other Hand-To-Hand perks to consider if you are purely hand-to-hand are Stonewall which grants a bonus to the damage threshold from melee damage inflicted upon you and prevents knockdown, Purifier to increase damage against abominations such as Deathclaws, and Unstoppable Force to quadruple damage against enemies that block. However, you might not have enough perks slots to get some or all of them depending on your build. Ninja isn't as useful for Heavy Handed characters and there really aren't all that many enemies that do block, which reduces the worth of Unstoppable Force. Stonewall is also great for tank characters. Since the Heavy Handed character primarily fights in hand to hand combat, they can definitely pick up the Unarmed and Melee Weapon perks.
VATS isn't as strong as it used to be and for many characters, you don't need to get any perks for it, even if you use it to help your accuracy until you can get Implant GRX. But with Plasma Spaz, Fast Shot, and Math Wrath, it truly shines. If you want to build such a character, get the following:
Math Wrath (reduced action point cost)
Nerves of Steel (increased action point regeneration)
Grim Reaper's Sprint (replenishes twenty action points when you kill in VATS)
Plasma Spaz (reduces the AP costs of all plasma weapons)
Weapons that fire off multiple projectiles per shot are much weaker in VATS because there is only one chance for a critical than out of it. These weapons include Shotguns, Multiplas Rifles, modded LAERs, Tri-beam Laser Rifles, etc. Automatic weapons also perform poorly in VATS due to the increased risk of firing off more rounds than necessary which can be wasteful, as well as requiring more APs to fire off. They also only have one chance for a critical in VATS per burst. Certain automatic melee and unarmed weapons also function differently in VATS. For these reasons, if your build focuses on automatics or any weapon that fires off multiple projectiles per attack, use Implant GRX instead of VATS.
Explosives provide excellent crowd control and can make a powerful addition to tank builds. You will need to be more careful using them due to the risk of collateral damage against neutral or friendly npcs. It may be necessary to bring a spare weapon to safely deal with enemies that get too close and avoid friendly fire when other npcs are around. If you want to maximize the effectiveness of explosive weapons, get the following perks:
Demolition Expert (increases damage of all explosive weapons. All three ranks need to be taken.)
Hit The Deck (increases damage threshold against all explosives, including your own)
Grenades are much easier on your carry weight than missiles, rockets, 40mm and 25mm grenades, and mini-nukes. Increasing blast radius with Splash Damage isn't necessary and the bonus to throwing velocity with Heave, Ho! isn't useful because throwing weapons aren't very plentiful or powerful and even with grenades, the increased throwing velocity isn't very useful.
If you want to have more explosive weapons available, get Mad Bomber to unlock craftable explosives. Nuka Chemist allows you to craft Nuka Cola recipes that are needed to make Nuka Grenades and thus gives you a reliable source. Thought You Died is the best level 50 perk for explosives.
If you build your character around the use of criticals, get the following perks to supplement your critical perks:
Light Touch (adds a flat 5% chance to your final critical chance score which is applied after calculating your critical chance with your equipped weapon)
Travel Light (increased movement speed, also affects sneaking)
Tunnel Runner (increased sneaking speed)
Note that you need to wear Light Armor for Travel Light, Tunnel Runner, and Light Touch to take effect. They also take effect if you wear no armor.
Like VATS, Light Touch adds a flat 5% bonus that is not affected by your weapon's modifier after all calculations have been made. If specializing in Energy Weapons, Set Lasers For Fun and Laser Commander can add a total of 14% which is also a flat bonus. Laser Commander only affects laser weapons, Set Lasers For Fun affects all energy weapons, but it requires you to use laser weapons in order to earn them. Flamers deal practically no critical damage.
Once you have all perks you need for your build, you can add other useful lower-priority perks, which are good to choose if you don't meet requirements of perks you still need. Strong Back and Burden To Bear both increase your carry weight by 50 pounds, they are especially good for stupid characters because they can't meet the requirements for Pack Rat. Pack Rat is very useful in hardcore mode as ammo has weight. It's also good for Normal mode if you carry lots of crafting items. The gender perks increase damage against humans of a specific sex while granting special dialogue options. For those who use chems, including those that increase damage dealt and reduce damage taken, some perks reduce the chance of addiction which can be helpful, including Chem Resistant and Old World Gourmet. There are other perks as well to choose from, though depending on your build, you might not have enough perk slots available. Make a list of your planned characters and their perks so you'll know what to choose. Remember that at lower levels, you may need to choose certain low-level perks, as long as they would benefit you.
Don't forget that if you are playing as an imbecile, you won't be able to meet the intelligence requirements of Pack Rat or Comprehension.
Next, I will record what companions work best for specific builds. Arcade is not on the list because he doesn't fight in the final battle if you complete his companion quest. Certain companions are better suited to a specific combat style. Veronica is best suited for Unarmed, but she can also use Energy Weapons such as Gatling Lasers at higher levels. Boone is better with Guns even if he also has Melee Weapons tagged. Lily is obviously better with Melee weapons as her other skills other than Sneak don't increase. Cass can use both guns and melee but is better with guns. Raul is best suited with Guns. Rex can only attack melee range. ED-E is better suited for long-range combat. Give your companions better weapons of both long-range and melee so they will be better prepared for combat against tougher opposition, and don't forget about giving them better armour.
ED-E : When you get all the upgrades for him in the Divide, you gain a bonus to VATS accuracy, damage with laser weapons, and damage threshold. He can also allow you to repair your weapon or give you energy cells and fuel once a day. He is the better choice of non-humanoid companion for builds that focus on VATS, lasers, or critical light armour builds. A safe choice for automatic All Out builds and Energy Weapon users that took Meltdown.
Rex : Not as useful as ED-E, but he is good for melee support if you don't use VATS and lasers. He has his own tackle attack which can knock enemies down, useful for melee or unarmed attackers. Don't take him if you are an Energy Weapon user who chose Meltdown.
Boone : Only take him endgame if you are siding with NCR as he won't tolerate you working with the Legion, and completing a certain quest for Yes Man or Mr. House can cause him to leave you permanently. You can pair him up with ED-E to take advantage of his Spotter perk together with ED-E's Enhanced Sensors for the best extreme range sniping. Because of his hatred for the Legion, you won't be able to recruit him if you are travelling with Rex when his implanted brain is that of Lupa. He prefers to use rifles so equip him with those. Good for characters who need ranged single-shot support.
Cass : You gain a damage threshold when drinking whiskey without the negative loss to your stats as long as she accompanies you. The extra damage threshold can be useful for survival. You need to have neutral or good karma to be able to do her companion quest. If you are branded a terrorist by NCR, do not part company with her. She has her own version of Shotgun Surgeon, so give her shotguns to use in combat with slugs.
Veronica : Like Rex, she is more useful for melee support when you fight from long range, punching out her foes. Make sure you have a very high reputation with the Brotherhood of Steel if you destroy them later in the game if you intend to keep her endgame. She can also use powerful Energy Weapons such as Gatling Lasers, making her a good choice for those who use single-shot weapons or chose Meltdown for their Energy Weapons.
Lily : Stealth Girl not only increases the length of stealth boys, but it also increases your sneak attack critical damage. She's a good choice for characters who need melee range support or if you do not have a high reputation with the Brotherhood of Steel when they destroy them. The only combat skill of hers that actually improves is Melee Weapons, so have her use that. If you have been branded a terrorist by NCR and do not have Cass as a companion, Lily is a great alternative. Don't take her if you chose Meltdown.
Raul : Both maintenance perks make him a great choice for characters who specialize in weapons that have low durability, high decay rates, or builds that use Built To Destroy. Guns is the only tagged skill he has that is useful for combat so have him use that. He is also one of the best choices of humanoid companions for a character that sides against NCR endgame.
You can also choose not to have a companion by endgame. There is a unique perk that you can get in Lonesome Road if you do not release ED-E from captivity before you confront Ulysses. The perk increases your damage by 10% and you gain a bonus of 10% in VATS, but both require you to have no companions in order to take effect. This perk is best for All Out characters who want to maximize their damage potential, especially explosives. Of course, one of ED-E's upgrades increases your laser damage by 5 per shot, so if you use laser weapons, having him as a companion is better for your overall damage than getting the Lonesome Road perk.
Lastly, like all RPGs, the farther you get from where you start, the tougher the enemies become. So follow Sunny's advice, follow the roads, don't stray too far away from them, do quests to level up in your area, and explore nearby locations. Pick up and read those skill books. Sell excess weapons and other loot to raise money.
For the best game performance and enjoyment, install the YUP patch. It is also recommended that you install other mods that may benefit the game, such as bug fixes and anti-crashes. A list of mods to recommend that go well with YUP can be found on the page for it at Nexus.
In the future, I'll post how to make each build.
In my opinion, this is the best Fallout game so far. It's also my favorite. Maybe because there are so many different types of characters you can make. Thanks to all the unique perks that benefit certain combat skills and the use of certain weapons, there are so many builds to make.
New Vegas feels much more like a Fallout game than Fallout 3 due to the return of traits, a reputation system, more low-intelligence dialogues, and a setting closer to the original setting where the franchise began. Thanks to the fact that you can join one of four endgame factions, this game has incredible replayability.
Unlike Fallout 3, New Vegas has a much greater range of specialization for your character, adding to replayability. There are three major archetypes of builds.
Critical - Focuses on inflicting as much critical damage as often as possible. Luck needs to be maxed for the highest critical chance, together with certain perks, equipment, and traits. Single-attack weapons with high critical chance and critical damage work best, especially if they also deal high damage. This build has the highest potential for critical chance with the right weapons. Perks, equipment, and traits that increase critical chance and damage are the bread and butter of this build. Chems that increase attack speed can give you an extra edge in combat. Light Touch adds a flat bonus to critical chance not affected by modifiers, it's even better with automatic weapons because the flat modifier added by the perk when wearing light armor is not affected by the modifier of automatics, making it one of the few ways to have reasonable critical chance for automatic builds.
Quickshot/Quickfist - The goal is to attack as fast as possible to inflict damage in a short matter of time. While criticals can help supplement the damage, they are not the main focus of this build, but are more than welcome since the faster you attack, the more criticals in a shorter period you can inflict. Some chems and consumables also increase attack speed, giving this build the potential for the fastest attacks. Weapons with fast attack speeds and high damage per shot and second, not including automatics, work best with this build.
All Out - This build focuses on inflicting as much raw damage as possible per attack, but does not depend on criticals to add damage. Automatics, explosives, and hand-to-hand with the Heavy Handed trait is the way to go. These builds have the strongest damage potential outside of critical hits or speed. The higher the damage per shot or per second, the more damage that will be added to each attack, the better. These characters are built like tanks to maximize their defense and offense.
If desired, these characters can be built as either one of these variants:
Wild Wastelander - Takes the Wild Wasteland Trait. This is primarily for a unique gameplay experience. You can make use of any combat skill. But beware that certain weapons are unobtainable if you take this perk, such as the YCS/186 which the Alien Blaster replaces.
Imbecile - Intelligence is less than 4. For a humorous gameplay experience. Can also make use of any combat skill, but remember that you will not be able to get Pack Rat which can reduce the weight of ammo in Hardcore mode, so you won't be able to carry as much ammo for your weapons. Certain perks requiring higher intelligence such as Comprehension are also unavailable. Imbeciles will also not be able to max all their skills, even if they find all the skill books.
When deciding what kind of character you will make, first choose one of the three archetypes above. If you chose Critical or Quickshot, decide whether or not to use light armor as there are perks that benefit it. The best choice of armour for either choice increases the chance of critical hits. With critical hits, you have a choice of whether or not to use Light Touch with light armor for more critical chance. If you are using automatics, light armor is the way to go if you take Light Touch and use criticals. Regardless of your choices above, do you want to make heavy use of VATS? Although not as strong as it was in Fallout 3, it can have its uses such as increasing your accuracy, the chance of critical hits, or slightly reducing the damage you suffer from enemies. It also increases your damage with all hand-to-hand weapons. But overall, VATS is best used with plasma weapons due to Plamsa Spaz, Fast Shot, and Math Wrath.
Like Fallout 3, it is possible, though more difficult here, to max all your skills by the level cap. In Fallout 3, it was very easy to make a Jack of All Trades type character that could maximize effectiveness in all forms of combat, this was due to all those skill books, making it easy to max your skills, even with low intelligence. In New Vegas, this is no longer possible, due to perks being gained every couple of levels instead of every level, and the fact that there are so many specialty perks, you won't have enough perk slots to choose them all or most of them. There aren't as many skill books, though they do give a couple more skill points each. High intelligence and certain perks are required to max all skills by level 50. You also do not gain as many skill points per level as you did in Fallout 3. There is also no way to max all your stats as you could in Fallout 3 due to the absence of the Almost Perfect perk.
Still, due to the higher perk rate, you only get twenty-five perks from levelling up compared to Fallout 3's 29. If New Vegas allowed you to get a perk every level, making a Jack of All Trades character that maximized the effectiveness of ranged, melee, and explosive combat would be a different story. Since you don't get as many perks from levelling up this time, depending on your build and what other perks you get that are important, you probably will not have enough perk slots to fully develop the ranged, melee, and explosive combat styles. Try to get all of your non-combat skills maxed no matter what as they are all useful. Certain other skills are useful as they allow you to pass certain skill checks in dialogue.You can also raise certain skills to 90 and then read a magazine if you need to pass a check, or 80 with Comprehension. This can also help you save on skill points. For characters using both ranged and melee weapons, since the best Unarmed and Melee Weapon perks require 80 In both, you can save on skill points by using either for your arsenal, maxing the skill for it and leaving the other at 80. If building primarily around melee combat, the other combat skills are only good for passing skill checks, but you can save skill points for more important skills by not pumping points into combat skills you don't use.
Ranged characters who use Guns or Energy Weapons primarily can also use hand to hand weapons as part of their build to have a versatile arsenal, maybe even include explosives. They can pick up perks to benefit hand to hand combat. All Out characters can also add in some perks for explosives. Explosives isn't very practical on its own, but it can be included as a secondary combat skill.
For Fallout 3 characters who enjoyed playing a sneaky assassin wearing Chinese Stealth Armor, no armour has a stealth field when sneaking in this game. Due to the limited amount of Stealthboys you can find, it is much more difficult to sneak around without being visually detected, even with Silent Running. This means that you'll have a harder time inflicting melee ranged sneak attack criticals unless you use certain perks, implants, chems, or drugs. Any character can do this, though light armour characters have the potential for the fastest sneak speed. Like Fallout 3, there are times when you will be forced to attack out of stealth.
Only choose perks that benefit your build's effectiveness and combat style. A good example is the Cowboy and Grunt perks. These two perks affect the damage of specific weapons, so if you choose either of those perks, you'll have to restrict yourself to using certain guns, explosives, and melee weapons. Same with Pyromaniac where you'll have to limit yourself to using fire-based weapons. With critical and quickshot builds, you'll have more than enough skill points to max both Guns and Energy Weapons so you can use weapons from both categories to add versatility to your arsenal. If you are making a build that does not rely on critical hits, don't get perks that increase your chance of criticals or their damage. Unlike in Fallout 3, you won't have enough perk slots to maximize your combat potential picking perks for ranged, melee, and explosive combat. Perks that affect explosives work best if you focus on them as a primary combat skill.
Some of the DLCs also limit what you can carry, especially when you first enter Honest Hearts. Dead Money strips you of your inventory and you don't get it back until after you finish. High skills in Guns, Melee Weapons, or Unarmed help in Honest Hearts and Dead Money. Old World Blues and Lonesome Road allow you to keep your inventory but save Lonesome Road for last.
As in Fallout 3, you should choose weapons for your build that deal good damage and are easy to maintain, though here in New Vegas you can craft Weapon Repair Kits to help maintain weapons. The Jury Rigging perk can help make repairs easier, but certain weapons can only be repaired with an identical weapon even if Jury Rigging was taken. That's what you need Weapon Repair Kits for. Having Raul as a companion can also reduce the decay rate of your weapon as can one of ED-E''s upgrades from Lonesome Road which can repair your weapon once a day. Jury Rigging is more of a convenience and isn't really necessary if you ca create repair kits for your weapons and find enough repair materials for your armor. It is recommended that you only carry a few extra weapons to handle any situation. Still, due to the weight of ammo in Hardcore Mode and other important items you'll be picking up, including food and water, your arsenal won't be as expanded as it was in Fallout 3. Only limit yourself to a few weapons, and restrict how many heavy weapons you carry in your endgame arsenal if you use any.
Due to carry weight concerns together with other useful items you may need to carry, such as crafting items, food, water, supplies for medical or repair, ammo in Hardcore mode, and the armour you wear, it is recommended that you do not carry too many weapons. Sell what you are not using. If you are ranged, carry at least one pistol, one rifle, and at least one weapon that either has very powerful damage per shot or can chamber armour-penetrating bullets. The pistol will be good for taking on weaker opposition to conserve ammo or for closer range, though you need the rifle for fighting at a longer range and dealing more damage. If you focus exclusively on critical hits and damage, choose weapons with a good critical damage modifier and high critical damage.
Thankfully, there are no Overlords, Albino Scorpions, or Behemoths in the Mojave, unlike Fallout 3. Reavers are much more fragile here than they were in the Capital Wasteland. The game however does have its own nasties of comparable difficulty. The five legendary creatures, Marked Men, some robots including Robo-Scorpions, Cazadores, Nightstalkers, some super mutants, and Deathclaws are among the most dangerous and toughest to face. For these enemies, you should include at least one powerful weapon with high damage per attack in your arsenal.
If critical hits are part of your build, it is also a good idea to carry a scoped weapon for extreme ranged sniping. Good choices include the Trail Carbine (for which you can buy a scope), Christine's CoS Silencer Rifle, Anti-materiel Rifle, and YCS/186.
Check the table at the Fallout wikia for New Vegas to get all the info you need on choosing the best weapons for your build.
Depending on your build, the only stats worth maxing endgame for certain builds are Strength, Endurance, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck. Strength for melee weapon damage and carry weight. Endurance for health, resistance to radiation, poison, number of implants, and how long you can stay underwater. Intelligence increases skill points per level up. Agility increases reload, draw, and holster speed. And Luck affects criticals, gambling at casinos, and increases all skills. Higher strength also allows you to use a wider variety of weapons. The Minigun and its unique version are the only ones that require max Strength.
As in Fallout 3, only set certain stats to what you need to qualify for perks plus the implant and the bonus point you get from completing Lonesome Road, any more is a waste. If you want to max Strength, Endurance, Agility, or Luck set your stats to what you need to max them with bonuses from implants and equipment. Playing as an imbecile will give you more extra points.
When setting your SPECIAL stats, here is how to do so according to my notes for maximum effectiveness:
Strength - 5 to 7 is a good starting value. The implant raises it by one. So does wearing T-51b Power Armor. Reinforced Spine increases it by two. You need it maxed by the end of the game if specializing primarily in hand to hand combat as Melee Weapons get a bonus to damage from strength. You don't need to have it maxed by endgame if you specialize primarily in ranged combat, though higher strength can be good for increased carry weight. All Out builds can have it maxed regardless of whether or not they specialize in hand to hand combat because their weapons can be quite heavy and use lots of ammo. Some good perks require a minimum strength of 5 even if you are not engaged in melee combat, such as Strong Back, so starting with average strength can be more beneficial than just what you need to use your weapons with all bonuses, which could hamper you in the long run until then. Many of the best weapons in the game have very high strength requirements, so this is a good place to put any leftover stat points from setting your other stats. But only the implant helps qualify for perks. To know how much you should start with, subtract 2 from 10 for Reinforced Spine from Old World Blues, 1 for the implant, another 1 if planning to wear T-51b Power Armor, and finally 1 if planning to use the Lonesome Road bonus point here, for a maximum of 5 points. All Out builds can best use the stat point bonus from completing Lonesome Road here or in Endurance. Low-intelligence characters will want to have it maxed by endgame for more carry weight as they can't get Pack Rat.
Perception - 6 is needed for Better Criticals, which is all you need Perception for. Keep it at the default 5 if using criticals or go down to 4 if making an All Out build. Having ED-D as a companion gives you the same effect as having this stat maxed.
Endurance - Endurance is a much more important stat in New Vegas than in previous Fallout games. The higher, the better. Starting with 9 can allow you to get all implants, though you can max Endurance by starting with 8, getting the implant, and wearing either the normal Valence or the unique Atomic version. Many agree that the charisma implant is worthless. Hand-to-hand characters and those using automatic ranged weapons need more endurance because they either need more health or to qualify for the Implant GRX perk which needs 8, or both. Getting an upgrade here through an implant will not give you an extra implant space, though many agree that the implants to upgrade your stats are better than the Monocyte Breeder. 7 or 8 is recommended for any character.
Charisma - Charisma is the least important stat as usual. This time, its most important effect is upon your companions, increasing the damage they deal and their damage threshold. Feel free to keep it at 1 and use chems to give yourself a boost to Charisma to affect the companion nerve which is a better idea.
Intelligence - 6 or 7 is a good starting value for many characters. For the imbecile, you can set it to 2 to get all the low intelligence dialogue options and other special ways to solve certain tasks, the implant will allow you to get the most amount of skill points you can have while still leaving you as dimwit. 5 is needed for Pack Rat. If built around criticals, set it to a minimum of 6 and get the implant. If you have an extra point left, you can set it to 7. 7 is required for Voracious Reader, a great perk for any build maximizing their critical chance.
Agility - You need 6 for Silent Running which is good for any character and 7 for Slayer which is good for hand-to-hand combat characters. VATS characters need 7 for Nerves of Steel. Light Armor characters need 8 for Tunnel Runner to increase sneaking speed. Agility also raises reload speed as well as the draw and holster speed of all weapons, though the bonuses are minimal. Low-intelligence characters, however, will definitely have enough points to have this maxed by endgame and have points to spend elsewhere.
Luck - You can have it maxed by endgame for a higher critical chance, better gambling, and a bonus to all skills. Lucky Shades can give you an extra point. Any character can benefit from maxed luck for more successful gambling to help earn money and for a bonus to all skills, even those who do not focus their build on criticals. It's best to start with 7 if you include critical hits and damage in your build. You can max it with the implant, Lucky Shades, and after completing Lonesome Road. If you need the points in other stats as an All Out build, you can keep Luck at a lower value. Critical automatic builds will need a minimum of 5 to get the implant to qualify for Better Criticals because it's impossible to have a very high critical chance with those weapons even if you take the perks and traits, so an endgame of 6 is all you need endgame for them. Make sure your endgame value is an even value to get the bonus to all skills.
You can get implants to raise a stat, how many you get depends on your endurance stat. 5 allows you to have five implants for example. Finishing Lonesome Road grants you an extra stat point that you can put into any of your stats, depending on your build, it is best put into Luck, Endurance, Agility, or Strength. Remember that stat increases you get from equipment do not allow you to qualify for perks.
Lucky Shades can give you an extra point of Luck, which is great for builds using critical hits, but you'll need to be Liked by the Legion to gain access to the safehouse where it is. There are ways outside of quests to raise your reputation with the Legion. You can repeatedly pickpocket d NCR troops (the drunk ones in the Strip are the easiest) as well as take any off of dead troops you come across and give them to the guy in charge of Cottonwood Cove. Once you gain access to the safehouse and get the Lucky Shades, you can then start working against the Legion if you are not siding with them endgame. You'll need to have Beware the Wrath of Caesar failed in order to get rid of all that positive reputation if you want to recruit Arcade or Boone. Don't recruit Boone early in the game because he'll attack any Legion troops you come across, making it difficult to start building temporary relationships.
As in previous games, you can change your gameplay experience by varying your stats, as long as you set them to qualify for perks because drugs will not help you do that as they could in games before Fallout 3.
After setting your stats, choose your traits. Some are more worth taking than others. Traits are another reason why you should specialize around one style for maximum benefit and effect. The best traits are:
Skilled - increases all skills at the cost of reduced experience. Considered by many to be the best trait, much more useful than the early games. It is useful for any character to start off with, best swapped out for something else during Old World Blues.
Good Natured - increases Speech, Medicine, Barter, Science, and Repair by five points, at the cost of reducing all combat skills by five points. It's another good trait to choose at the start together with Skilled, but you can swap it out for another trait in Old World Blues.
Fast Shot - increases your attack speed and reduces AP costs with Guns and Energy Weapons, but reduces accuracy by increasing weapon spread. In earlier versions and certain consoles, this capped your accuracy in VATS at 76%, taking accuracy perks such as Gunslinger, Sniper, and Commando fixed that. On PC however, Fast Shot does not reduce your accuracy. Fast Shot is great for increasing your attack speed with Guns and Energy Weapons and allowing you to get off more shots in VATS. It pairs off nicely with Built To Destroy for ranged builds not using automatics. Reduced action point costs stack with Plasma Spaz and Math Wrath, but Plasma Spaz works only with plasa energy weapons. The increased attack speed does not affect fully automatic weapons such as Miniguns, Flamers, and Gatling Lasers. It's the most important trait for the Quickshot build, as long as you use either Guns or Energy Weapons.
Trigger Discipline - the exact opposite of Fast Shot. It increases your accuracy by reducing weapon spread. The trait also increases accuracy with Guns and Energy Weapons in VATS. However, it also increases AP costs in VATS for those two weapon categories. Better for fully automatic weapons such as Miniguns, Gatling Lasers, and Flamers as they receive the benefit of reduced spread, while not being affected by the reduced attack speed. If you choose this trait, you should not use any single-shot long-range weaponry as their attack speed will be reduced.
Built To Destroy - increases critical chance at the cost of increasing the decay rate for all weapons. This is the most important trait for any build using critical hits, unless you are using automatics. Also good for hand-to-hand builds using criticals as part of their arsenal due to the lack of other good traits to use with those builds.
Heavy Handed - increases damage with melee or unarmed weapons at the cost of reduced critical damage. Perfect for All Out hand-to-hand builds. Don't take it if you are including criticals as part of your build.
Hot Blooded - increases your damage when your health falls below 50%, but reduces Perception and Agility by 2 when this happens. Good for anyone who wants to maximize their damage, such as All Out Tanks.
Wild Wasteland - adds lots of strange content to the game to change your gaming experience, but some weapons become unavailable as they are replaced by specific weapons found only when you take the trait. This is mainly for unique gameplay experiences. Can be built for any type of combat.
You can change your traits during Old World Blues if you find the update for the Autodoc. At the start of the game, I recommend you choose Skilled and Good Natured for the skill boosts unless you are making a Wild Wastelander. This way, you start off with higher skill levels. Once you become stronger and more skilled, you can change your traits at the Autodoc in Big Mountain. So choose either Skilled together with Good Natured or Wildwasteland at the start, and change your traits in Old World Blues to what your build needs.
The best armour in the game for builds that use criticals is either the Elite Riot Gear or Ulysses' Duster. Both armors increase your critical chance by 5% as does the best helmet which is the 1st Recon Beret, which you get from Boone after completing One For My Baby to his satisfaction. The Duster is for those who take Light Touch.
All Out builds do not depend on critical hits as much as the Critical build, nor are they inflicted as much and as often in Quickshot builds. For this reason, the best armour for the All Out build is T-51b Power Armor. The best helmet is the Space Suit Helmet because you can wear it with a very good accessory mentioned in the next paragraph. Space Suit Helmets are good for critical automatic builds.
The Atomic-Valence Tri-Radii-Oscillator can be worn as a helmet for a higher damage threshold, a bonus to endurance, and a healing effect. According to the Fallout wikia, you can wear it over certain helmets that do not take up the eyeglasses slot, such as hats, berets, and space suit helmets. But you cannot wear them with helmets that cover your entire face, such as power helmets. Since you can find two of them, you may want to give one to your endgame companion. The normal Valence is the accessory of choice for critical and quickshot builds if you want to wear Lucky Shades, unless you started with 8 Luck, then you can take the unique version of the Valence.
Due to a wider range of perks than in previous Fallout games to benefit different combat styles and the fact that you get a perk every two levels, you will no longer have more perks than you truly need for your build. This means that perks that you may have been forced to pick in Fallout 3 when you had no others to benefit your build are now useless. You also can't get as many as you could in Fallout 3.
All builds should get the following perks:
Bloody Mess (increased damage of all attacks)
Silent Running (improved sneaking ability which can help reduce the damage you take)
Them's Good Eating (gives you a chance to find good food items on dead enemies and create the best healing items in the game)
Chemist (all chems duration doubled, including Implant GRX)
Living Anatomy (increases damage against humans and ghouls while also allowing you to see your enemies' damage threshold, helping you pick the right ammo and/or weapon for dealing with them)
Implant GRX (provides free non-addictive turbo to slow down time and make things easier. A great alternative to VATS which is much weaker than it was in Fallout 3)
If you want to focus your build on the maximum potential of critical hits and damage:
Just Lucky I'm Alive (further increases the damage of critical hits. Neutral karma is required at level 50. The best level 50 perk for the critical build.)
Better Criticals (increased damage of critical hits)
Finesse is another useful perk for critical builds as it increases your critical chance by 5%, stacking with other bonuses from equipment, traits, and other perks. Quickshot builds can also benefit from Finesse and Better Criticals. Finesse isn't very good for automatic criticals, but it is great for any other weapons you might use with them, such as Unarmed, Melee Weapons, or single shot weapons.
Comprehension with Voracious Reader is a great combination for characters who want as high a critical chance as possible. This will allow you to craft an unlimited supply of True Police Stories for a temporary 10% increase to your critical chance. Since the bonus is applied before the weapon's critical chance modifier, you won't get much benefit with automatics.
If you want to focus on attack speed:
Ain't Like That Now (further increases your attack speed. Stacks with Slayer and Fast Shot. Does not work with automatic ranged weapons or automatic melee weapons. Evil karma is required at level 50 and is the ultimate perk for the Quickshot build.)
If you want to focus on increased damage per attack:
Thought You Died (further increases your damage per hit. Good Karma is required at level 50. A perfect fit for the All Out build)
There are other perks that increase damage against specific targets or in VATS, though depending on your build, you might not have enough perk slots available to take them.
Just Lucky I'm Alive works best with weapons that deal high critical damage and damage per shot, and stacks with Better Criticals. Ain't Like That Now stacks with Fast Shot for Guns and Energy Weapons (not including automatics) and Slayer for Unarmed and Melee Weapons, it works best with weapons that have quick attack speed, stacking further with chems such as Rushing Water. Thought You Died is the perk of choice for All Out builds, the increased damage adds up with automatic weapons and stacks with Heavy Handed for hand-to-hand weapons, but it isn't as useful for single-shot ranged weapons because the final total damage isn't as high as the increase from higher attack speed from Ain't Like That Now. If using weapons deals high critical damage per shot, high critical damage, and a good critical chance modifier, take Just Lucky I'm Alive. Weapons that deal lower critical damage per shot but having fast attack speed are better used with Ain't Like That Now or Thought You Died depending on whether or not they are automatic or if you are using Heavy Handed or not. For example, single-shot weapons such as shotguns are best used with Ain't Like That Now due to low critical chance and critical damage, while automatics such as Gatling Lasers are better off used with Thought You Died due to their automatic fire mode and low critical damage and critical modifier, but Pacienca is fantastic with Just Lucky I'm Alive due to high critical chance and critical damage. Lever-action weapons such as those used by Cowboy, Paciencia, and Anti-materiel Rifle have slow attack speed and thus would not gain much benefit from Ain't Like That Now, but are fantastic with Just Lucky I'm Alive. Slower weapons inflict more damage per hit and critical damage. The faster, the less. Critical builds can use Rushing Water for increased attack speed and gain part of the benefit of Ain't Like That Now. Explosives benefit best from Thought You Died.
According to the weapon charts on the wikia, lever-action guns inflict the most critical damage in the Guns category. Plasma deals more damage and critical damage than fast-firing lasers, though some laser weapons can still inflict great damage and critical damage. Energy Weapons not classified as laser or plasma inflict the most damage and critical damage in this weapon category. Bladed melee weapons are faster than blunt melee weapons and Unarmed, but they don't inflict as much damage or critical damage. Weapons affected by Grunt are among the fastest firing, excluding automatics, in Guns, but deal less damage and critical damage than the top tier guns. The best shotgun, the Riot Shotgun, has some of the fastest firing rates among semi-automatic guns, the others are more lever -action, but like the Riot, they deal little critical damage per pellet.
In short: if using automatics (whether ranged or melee) or explosives, have good karma, unless they are part of a critical build, in which case, have neutral karma. If using lever-action weapons with high damage and critical damage, energy weapons neither classified as laser or plasma, blunt melee weapons, have neutral karma. If playing with fast-speed weapons excluding automatics, such as weapons affected by Grunt, shotguns, and bladed melee weapons, have evil karma. Certain Unarmed, laser, and plasma weapons can be good for either a critical or quickshot build, all depending on how fast they attack. The tables on the weapon entry for New Vegas on the wikia. Decide what kind of weapons you'll be using and then play your character, keep that karma level before you hit level 50. The level 50 perk you qualify for is pretty much the only point of karma in the game. The only other changes are your interactions with Cass as a companion and the ending slides of the victorious faction.
If you use Guns, get Hand Loader which allows you to craft better ammo. Take Shotgun Surgeon which allows you to ignore ten points of Damage Threshold (better for slugs) and And Stay Back which gives a chance of knocking your foe down when using shotguns (buckshot and magnum are better for this). Grunts and Cowboys have ranged, melee, and explosive weapons that are affected by the perks. Grunts don't have shotguns affected by the perk, so don't take either shotgun perk if you choose Grunt.
If Energy Weapons are used in your build, get Laser Commander which increases your damage and critical chance when using them. The chance is flat and not affected by the critical chance modifier of weapons, so it is great for critical automatics. Also, get Vigilant Recycler which allows you to craft better ammo. If you do not use lasers, choose between fire or plasma. Plasma weapons benefit from Plasma Spaz which reduces the cost of action points in VATS, whether they are in Energy Weapon or Explosives. Pyromaniac is for those who want to use flamers or incinerator-type weapons, but those weapons deal poor critical damage and are not suited for critical or quickshot builds, but are good for All Out. Pyromaniac also affects certain unarmed and melee weapons as well, both of which can be good for Pyromaniac builds that focus on critical hits and damage or increased attack speed. Fire ammo for certain weapons is not affected.
One perk you should be careful with as an Energy Weapons user is Meltdown. The resultant blast caused by enemy deaths from Energy Weapons can cause chain reactions but can cause self-harm, friendly fire, and of course collateral damage to neutral npcs. The damage is also dependent on your weapon, the stronger the better. If you choose this perk, do not use Energy Weapons in close-range combat, nor should you have your allies fight in melee range.
Remember that if playing an Energy Weapons user, there is a bonus perk that can also increase your critical chance by up to 4% if you achieve both ranks, but it requires you to use lasers to get it. The perk affects all Energy Weapons. Laser Commander also increases your critical chance by 10%. Like Light Touch and the bonus in VATS, these are added to your critical chance after being multiplied by the modifier of your weapon. Set Lasers For Fun, Laser Commander, and Light Touch allow laser weapons to be the best weapons to use with an automatic critical build, for a total of 19% when using automatic lasers such as the Gatling Laser, with plasma weapons being a close second. Both are superior choices to Guns for a critical build using automatics.
Unarmed and Melee Weapons are also much more powerful than they were in previous games and thus they can make a very effective addition to your build. Add in these perks for your character:
Super Slam (chance for melee and unarmed weapons to knock down foes, rendering them helpless.)
Piercing Strike (your melee and unarmed attacks ignore fifteen points of the enemy damage threshold)
Slayer (increased attack speed with melee and unarmed attacks. Good for builds that focus on increasing attack speed)
Super Slam has a chance to knock down enemies. However, Super Slam doesn't work with automatic melee ranged weapons such as the Ripper, Chainsaw, Industrial Hand, or Thermic Lance, nor does Slayer or Ain't Like That Now increase their attack speed. Although the Industrial Hand, Ripper, Chainsaw, and Thermic Lance ignore the damage threshold of your enemies, it isn't applied correctly, but Piercing Strike fixes that. You can carry a single-strike weapon together with an automatic striking weapon if you choose in order to apply Super Slam and Slayer. Chems are needed for improving damage and survivability against tougher opposition. Ninja increases critical chance and sneak attack damage of melee and unarmed attacks, so it is another good perk to consider.
Other Hand-To-Hand perks to consider if you are purely hand-to-hand are Stonewall which grants a bonus to the damage threshold from melee damage inflicted upon you and prevents knockdown, Purifier to increase damage against abominations such as Deathclaws, and Unstoppable Force to quadruple damage against enemies that block. However, you might not have enough perks slots to get some or all of them depending on your build. Ninja isn't as useful for Heavy Handed characters and there really aren't all that many enemies that do block, which reduces the worth of Unstoppable Force. Stonewall is also great for tank characters. Since the Heavy Handed character primarily fights in hand to hand combat, they can definitely pick up the Unarmed and Melee Weapon perks.
VATS isn't as strong as it used to be and for many characters, you don't need to get any perks for it, even if you use it to help your accuracy until you can get Implant GRX. But with Plasma Spaz, Fast Shot, and Math Wrath, it truly shines. If you want to build such a character, get the following:
Math Wrath (reduced action point cost)
Nerves of Steel (increased action point regeneration)
Grim Reaper's Sprint (replenishes twenty action points when you kill in VATS)
Plasma Spaz (reduces the AP costs of all plasma weapons)
Weapons that fire off multiple projectiles per shot are much weaker in VATS because there is only one chance for a critical than out of it. These weapons include Shotguns, Multiplas Rifles, modded LAERs, Tri-beam Laser Rifles, etc. Automatic weapons also perform poorly in VATS due to the increased risk of firing off more rounds than necessary which can be wasteful, as well as requiring more APs to fire off. They also only have one chance for a critical in VATS per burst. Certain automatic melee and unarmed weapons also function differently in VATS. For these reasons, if your build focuses on automatics or any weapon that fires off multiple projectiles per attack, use Implant GRX instead of VATS.
Explosives provide excellent crowd control and can make a powerful addition to tank builds. You will need to be more careful using them due to the risk of collateral damage against neutral or friendly npcs. It may be necessary to bring a spare weapon to safely deal with enemies that get too close and avoid friendly fire when other npcs are around. If you want to maximize the effectiveness of explosive weapons, get the following perks:
Demolition Expert (increases damage of all explosive weapons. All three ranks need to be taken.)
Hit The Deck (increases damage threshold against all explosives, including your own)
Grenades are much easier on your carry weight than missiles, rockets, 40mm and 25mm grenades, and mini-nukes. Increasing blast radius with Splash Damage isn't necessary and the bonus to throwing velocity with Heave, Ho! isn't useful because throwing weapons aren't very plentiful or powerful and even with grenades, the increased throwing velocity isn't very useful.
If you want to have more explosive weapons available, get Mad Bomber to unlock craftable explosives. Nuka Chemist allows you to craft Nuka Cola recipes that are needed to make Nuka Grenades and thus gives you a reliable source. Thought You Died is the best level 50 perk for explosives.
If you build your character around the use of criticals, get the following perks to supplement your critical perks:
Light Touch (adds a flat 5% chance to your final critical chance score which is applied after calculating your critical chance with your equipped weapon)
Travel Light (increased movement speed, also affects sneaking)
Tunnel Runner (increased sneaking speed)
Note that you need to wear Light Armor for Travel Light, Tunnel Runner, and Light Touch to take effect. They also take effect if you wear no armor.
Like VATS, Light Touch adds a flat 5% bonus that is not affected by your weapon's modifier after all calculations have been made. If specializing in Energy Weapons, Set Lasers For Fun and Laser Commander can add a total of 14% which is also a flat bonus. Laser Commander only affects laser weapons, Set Lasers For Fun affects all energy weapons, but it requires you to use laser weapons in order to earn them. Flamers deal practically no critical damage.
Once you have all perks you need for your build, you can add other useful lower-priority perks, which are good to choose if you don't meet requirements of perks you still need. Strong Back and Burden To Bear both increase your carry weight by 50 pounds, they are especially good for stupid characters because they can't meet the requirements for Pack Rat. Pack Rat is very useful in hardcore mode as ammo has weight. It's also good for Normal mode if you carry lots of crafting items. The gender perks increase damage against humans of a specific sex while granting special dialogue options. For those who use chems, including those that increase damage dealt and reduce damage taken, some perks reduce the chance of addiction which can be helpful, including Chem Resistant and Old World Gourmet. There are other perks as well to choose from, though depending on your build, you might not have enough perk slots available. Make a list of your planned characters and their perks so you'll know what to choose. Remember that at lower levels, you may need to choose certain low-level perks, as long as they would benefit you.
Don't forget that if you are playing as an imbecile, you won't be able to meet the intelligence requirements of Pack Rat or Comprehension.
Next, I will record what companions work best for specific builds. Arcade is not on the list because he doesn't fight in the final battle if you complete his companion quest. Certain companions are better suited to a specific combat style. Veronica is best suited for Unarmed, but she can also use Energy Weapons such as Gatling Lasers at higher levels. Boone is better with Guns even if he also has Melee Weapons tagged. Lily is obviously better with Melee weapons as her other skills other than Sneak don't increase. Cass can use both guns and melee but is better with guns. Raul is best suited with Guns. Rex can only attack melee range. ED-E is better suited for long-range combat. Give your companions better weapons of both long-range and melee so they will be better prepared for combat against tougher opposition, and don't forget about giving them better armour.
ED-E : When you get all the upgrades for him in the Divide, you gain a bonus to VATS accuracy, damage with laser weapons, and damage threshold. He can also allow you to repair your weapon or give you energy cells and fuel once a day. He is the better choice of non-humanoid companion for builds that focus on VATS, lasers, or critical light armour builds. A safe choice for automatic All Out builds and Energy Weapon users that took Meltdown.
Rex : Not as useful as ED-E, but he is good for melee support if you don't use VATS and lasers. He has his own tackle attack which can knock enemies down, useful for melee or unarmed attackers. Don't take him if you are an Energy Weapon user who chose Meltdown.
Boone : Only take him endgame if you are siding with NCR as he won't tolerate you working with the Legion, and completing a certain quest for Yes Man or Mr. House can cause him to leave you permanently. You can pair him up with ED-E to take advantage of his Spotter perk together with ED-E's Enhanced Sensors for the best extreme range sniping. Because of his hatred for the Legion, you won't be able to recruit him if you are travelling with Rex when his implanted brain is that of Lupa. He prefers to use rifles so equip him with those. Good for characters who need ranged single-shot support.
Cass : You gain a damage threshold when drinking whiskey without the negative loss to your stats as long as she accompanies you. The extra damage threshold can be useful for survival. You need to have neutral or good karma to be able to do her companion quest. If you are branded a terrorist by NCR, do not part company with her. She has her own version of Shotgun Surgeon, so give her shotguns to use in combat with slugs.
Veronica : Like Rex, she is more useful for melee support when you fight from long range, punching out her foes. Make sure you have a very high reputation with the Brotherhood of Steel if you destroy them later in the game if you intend to keep her endgame. She can also use powerful Energy Weapons such as Gatling Lasers, making her a good choice for those who use single-shot weapons or chose Meltdown for their Energy Weapons.
Lily : Stealth Girl not only increases the length of stealth boys, but it also increases your sneak attack critical damage. She's a good choice for characters who need melee range support or if you do not have a high reputation with the Brotherhood of Steel when they destroy them. The only combat skill of hers that actually improves is Melee Weapons, so have her use that. If you have been branded a terrorist by NCR and do not have Cass as a companion, Lily is a great alternative. Don't take her if you chose Meltdown.
Raul : Both maintenance perks make him a great choice for characters who specialize in weapons that have low durability, high decay rates, or builds that use Built To Destroy. Guns is the only tagged skill he has that is useful for combat so have him use that. He is also one of the best choices of humanoid companions for a character that sides against NCR endgame.
You can also choose not to have a companion by endgame. There is a unique perk that you can get in Lonesome Road if you do not release ED-E from captivity before you confront Ulysses. The perk increases your damage by 10% and you gain a bonus of 10% in VATS, but both require you to have no companions in order to take effect. This perk is best for All Out characters who want to maximize their damage potential, especially explosives. Of course, one of ED-E's upgrades increases your laser damage by 5 per shot, so if you use laser weapons, having him as a companion is better for your overall damage than getting the Lonesome Road perk.
Lastly, like all RPGs, the farther you get from where you start, the tougher the enemies become. So follow Sunny's advice, follow the roads, don't stray too far away from them, do quests to level up in your area, and explore nearby locations. Pick up and read those skill books. Sell excess weapons and other loot to raise money.
For the best game performance and enjoyment, install the YUP patch. It is also recommended that you install other mods that may benefit the game, such as bug fixes and anti-crashes. A list of mods to recommend that go well with YUP can be found on the page for it at Nexus.
In the future, I'll post how to make each build.
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