Question about Fallout 2 unarmed skill

T

tysixtus

First time out of the vault
First of all, I'm new. Hi everyone!

I started FO2 over and I'm playing unarmed for the first time. It got me wondering about some game mechanics, and I'm curious if any of you guys shed some light on my question.

Specifically, why is it that I seem to be doing more damage with spiked knuckles in my hand, than when I'm barehanded and using something like "Jab"? Can anyone explain the way the game mechanics calculate unarmed damage with knuckles and/or Powerfist? My "Jab" doesn't seem to be any more powerful than a regular punch, though according to the Fallout Wiki here it has a higher crit chance, etc. I'm just not seeing it. And the empty handed attacks are doing way less damage than Spiked Knuckles. My STR is at 6. Unarmed is like 104%.

I found a thread on it here, but it seemed like the participants already knew this stuff so they didn't go into depth on it. I'm just curious, from a game-mechanics point of view.

If this is the wrong sub-forum, I apologize ahead of time!
 
I think that the Spiked Knuckles, Power Fist etc. give you a massive bonus to begin with; IIRC the former has a similar damage bonus as a combat knife (I think it gives you around +8or so), so it is more powerful than a regular punch by far; I think if you look at the wiki page, then you will find the numbers.

I tended not to use Unarmed much, although with the extra quests and misc bonuses in F2 I would hone Unarmed, and with the high-level attacks such as a Power Kick or Piercing Strike flying in the Chinatown ring, I did inflict high-damage criticals to my opponents routinely;

Also, yes, let me move that to the Gameplay forum since it is specifically about the underlying math. :)
 
Thanks!

So does the damage from Spike Knuckles stack? I noticed that when I had them equipped, I couldn't select my secondary attacks like "Jab."

Does that mean if I want to use Spiked Knuckles, I can't use the special attacks like "Jab" and "Haymaker"?
 
Yes - the weapons provide a bonus, but they only have a default attack with no modifiers
 
It's something I also find annoying. There's no reason why you couldn't throw a Jab or a Haymaker with spiked knuckles. It would be better to allow these punch/kicks and lower the knuckles base values. As a rule of thumb get rid of the knuckles once you get to the 3rd level of of punches. The benefit of increased critical successes outweighs the potential for an extra point of damage.
 
The progression is rather easy - until level 9, you want to be using spiked knuckles. They deal 4-10 (i.e., 7 on the average) basic damage (+your melee modifier) and bonus damage from strong/hammer punch & jab can't quite compensate for that. After that, haymaker becomes better (especially when aimed for the eye as you'll have 80%+ chance of critical), because it deals 1-3+7 damage (more than knuckles) and you'll use it until you find your power fist. Kicks are almost never worth it, unfortunately.
 
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