OMG melee/unarmed weapons own!

Yeah, i'm playiing through for my second time with an unarmed combat character and noticing that unarmed is pretty powerful. Character is only like level 6 with 40 unarmed and she annihalates almost everything in 2 or 3 hits through vats with a bladed fist. She has the heavy handed trait and 7 or 8 str after chugging some alcohol but I don't think it would make that big of a difference? Thought it might be an offset to help even out unarmed/melee with guns since you have to close distance first to begin melee attacks. I think a displacer glove is upper tier weaponry though.

Killing cazadors is not a fair comparison, they have almost no DT which means anything with a high DPS or single hit damage will drop them quickly.

As for gun equivalents, apparently you haven't tried the anti-material rifle which drops damn near anything in 1 or 2 hits. I one-shot sneak criticaled every deathclaw except the mother in the quarry with it.

 

Once you get a nice .308 rifle and start using sneak attacks, Deathclaws go down extremely fast, especially in VATS. I think your weapon just happens to have a nice base damage and might be easier to use. Still, I'm definitely trying out a melee/unarmed character next game. I had a lot of fun with that in Fallout 1... punching The Master to death is one of the more difficult and silly things I've ever done in a game.

 

Maybe this has something to do with Pushy being a unique weapon, and probably the strongest unarmed weapon in the game? Comparing Pushy to a regular hunting rifle is like comparing Gobi Campaign rifle to brass knuckles and saying "omg unarmed sucks".

It just seems that you're too impressed with weapons that offer high DAM vs high DPS. If you think Pushy is OP, wait till you find Oh,Baby!

 

unarmed is way OP no question.

So many killer perks too.

I only started building up my unarmed @ level 20 but by endgame (30) I was primarily running around with pushy and Veronica with ballistic fist lol. Standard procedure is to headshot the first two suckers with sniper rifle then run at the remainders with fists.

even worse if you've lined up attacks in VATs, even though the enemy has moved several metres away you still magically teleport over and punch them in the noggin LOL, though that sorta compensates for how everyone in the game is FASTER THAN YOU

what I don't get is how a lot of the unarmed perks you need MELEE for like the knockdown one. How about either melee or unarmed and it only affects the category you have the threshold in.

 

Yeah melee really does a lot of damage in New Vegas, I got a chainsaw from motor-runner in vault 3, and it carves down super mutants at black rock mountain in like 2 seconds. Also there is balistic fists i think they are called and they pretty much 1 shot everything if you do an uppercut or headshot.

 

Well, he definitely is. Whether high-dam weapons are overpowered, though, is another matter.

Well, I haven't really seen power fists until mid-late game either

You may have a point, but I think it ultimately depends on which opponent you're fighting. Ghouls and humans in light armor go down just as easy to an SMG burst shot.

 

Again, you keep bringing up examples of enemies with high DT only (scorpions). Of course high-dam weapons will be more effective. That, or AP ammo, but that one's rare.

If you're swarmed by a pack of ghouls, though (like vault 34), it's more effective to spray them with something that has high DPS or throw grenades since they'll eat you up if you try to take them one by one in melee.

I'm not sure how many instances of one versus another there are in the game, so the balance may indeed be doubtful as you say, but I found it working both ways. Also, on high-dam vs high-dps melee, the latter works better on certain opponents because of higher cripple chance or more instances to get a critical. I remember decapitating several enemies in one turn with a machete, while, say, with a sledge I'd take out only one if any. High melee dps also works better in early-game where you don't deal a lot of damage in one hit anyway, and most enemies (with notable exceptions like scorpions) have low DT.

I also find it strange that you talk about lack of balance toward high-DAM weapons here while I saw you do the opposite arguing for laser (high DPS) vs plasma (high DAM) in another thread a few days ago.

I'd love to know where, I may eventually play an unarmed character...

 

OK, and to add on the laser vs plasma question. Not the best comparison, but one that shows the difference.

Laser RCW vs Deathclaw took 60+ shots, dealing little damage per shot due to DT. (DAM14, DPS 123)

Q-35 unique plasma rifle took 5-6 shots, bypassing DT (DAM 32, DPS 116).

 

"Sonny, I sliced deathclaw's throat with Figaro"

 

Because most unarmed weapons have a high damage stat, they are not influenced by the enemy DT most of the time. and Rad Scorpions have high DT.

 

I have an unarmed/melee build post somewhere in this forum. Basically start off with 8Str 5Per 9End 1Cha 6Int 6Agi and 5Lck

Get all Implants
Take Heavy Handed and Built to Destroy as Traits

Perks:
lvl2: Intense Training Luck
lvl4: Educated
lvl6: Comprehension
lvl8: There are some mediocre melee/unarmed perks I didn't even bother with them ... I took scrounger for Ammo to sell for money which there are plenty other ways to get caps so Id take toughness here
lvl10: Finess
lvl12: Piercing Strike is a MUST (basically a freebie)
lvl14: Purifier or Toughness 2
lvl16: Better Criticals
lvl18: Purifier or Toughness 2 (basically a freebie)
lvl20: Ninja!
lvl22: Grim Reaper Sprint or Double Chem Duration (a freebie)
lvl24: Slayer
26 28 and 30 are all Freebies so take what you want to suite your fighting style ...

Beware! Unstopable force sounds amazing but I only ever got blocked maybe 5 times playing throughout the game and my characters level 30 ...

Super Slam yeah kinda cool but youll slay things so fast youll often forget you just knocked something down ... and get attacked by it by surprise! And well you usually kill everything so fast it doesnt matter!

Stone Wall what a joke I was only knocked down on my feet once during my whole play through and I got back up and proceeded with the beat down!

Purifier is great even on the limited number of things you get the damage bonus with because whats better than beating three deathclaws at once in melee!

I would take chem resistance & chemist as whats better than going into a complete roid rage and beating a deathclaws face in? Well I can think of quite a few things but its kinda like the Punchout a Cyberdemon Achievement on DOOM2 XBOX360 version (which I have) its called Bragging rights!

Silent running is also a good choice whats funnier than sticking C4 into a baddies pocket and then shooting the wall with a silenced pistol for him and all his buddies to go investigate and then you flip the switch on your detonator ... Freaking hilarious!

I mean all the freebies are up to you but I can make more suggestions if you would like me to.

 

Yes there is DT reduction with the Piercing strike perk which gives you -15 enemy DT look in the game guide to see DT charts and youve basically during the end game removed all to half of most peoples DT! Plus with Heavy handed and a 10 END your Ballistic Fist will be doing 120p hit! With Slayer and 10000 dmg bonus perks with unarmed youll have a 40% faster attack speed ... and with Boones Beret, and Built to Destroy, Ninja, Finess and the 7lck youll have a 35% chance to crit on about 2.5 attacks a second ... if you VATS that will make it a 50% chance to crit! so yeah
120-240DMG -15DT and 2.5 attacks a second you will become known as THE Wasteland Fister ...

 

To answer this: I am using Gobi Rifle and I 1 hit kill every Cazador and Deathclaw I encounter on Very Hard. Without sneak hit criticals.

I also can rape them from a mile away and they won't even know what hit them.

How is pushy "OP" compared to this?

Unarmed and melee are handicapped by the fact you need to be close to your enemy. If anything, I'd like MORE power of unarmed & melee weaponry. Because compared to Gobi, it's all rubish.

 

I disagree as youll be running through them like a hot knife cutting butter So far this was the easiest build to play through on Hardest Difficulty. You dont have to exclusively melee either ... Get guns 75+ and you can free snipe at a distance with a silenced sniper rifle and Lessen the herd then run in and murder them all via melee/unarmed