Melee build

[Mad Marduk]

I've never used a melee or unarmed character in a fallout game before. I was thinking of high sneak and obviously melee with either guns or energy weaps to cover me with nailing stuff out of my reach or drawing enemies in. I am looking for suggestions on initial SPECIAL stats, early weapons/perks, as well as when/what skills to bring up.

[Zef]

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Forum:Melee_build_to_be_invincible

As always, take lots and lots of drugs to really be effective.

[Mad Marduk]

Ha. I've never actually used chems regularly because of addiction and side effects mostly. I would occasionally use buffout and of course stuff like med-x/rad-x when needed. I just re-installed the game (I run a smallish SSD and have to uninstall/reinstall games a good bit as I get an urge to play them) so I am pretty rusty on it. Would you lean more towards guns or energy weapons as backup to melee/unarmed? I know guns are more plentiful and my typical build was grossly powerful using sniper rifle/jsp ammo/crit perks but I remember there also being some pretty powerful stuff like pew pew and maybe some stuff from OWB?

[red255]

Lasers are obscenely powerful with ED-E giving beams +5 damage.

the Tribeam laser shoots 3 beams with reasonably close spread for 'close' encounters (the multiplas has more spread if you want more spread)

The Gatling laser does ALOT of damage per second. the Unique one does less damage per second but more damage per beam.

Regular laser rifle is great at all ranges.

Ammo's slightly heavier but what else are you carrying? Never understood why people would use the Ballistic weapons except they don't understand how to make energy weapon ammo? just go to a workbench take your ammo and switch it to what you need.

I usually do optimized rounds for the reduced weight and weapon degradation, but the max charge rounds are preferable if you are going up against DT targets which is kinda of the point of energy weapons.

I mean Guns are great with like a 9mm SMG and JHP rounds for taking down soft targets. and Energy is great with Max Charge rounds for taking out hard targets, like radscorpions and legion hit squads.

The issue with Beams is there aren't cool unique beams. save maybe the holo rifle.

shouldn't be using guns if you want to melee though. I guess a laser rifle would be what I'd pick if I wanted a ranged weapon.

As for drugs?

"I've never actually used chems regularly because of addiction and side effects mostly."

Addiction is ignorable, either 1.) take more chems. 2.) pay 100 caps to a doctor. 3.) take a fixer followed by an antidote. 4.) suffer the minor penalty to stats.

Turbo is bullet time.

Med-x Slasher, Battlebrew is 85% damage resistance.

[Bansheebutt]

I'd recommend going with Unarmed over Melee.

For one Endurance is a most for any close-combat character, and Unarmed also gets a score bonus from it, which will be helpful early on.

Drugs are completely unnecessary. New Vegas is not a game where you need to be 100% optimized in every concievable aspect. That said, Med-X will be very useful for tougher fights, and Jet + Purfied water can be combined via the Survival Skill (which also gets a score bonus from Endurance) to significantly boost your attack speed.

Spiked Knuckles will be your primary weapon for a long time. (The unique variant can be found in Bonnie Springs.)

Be sure to help out Ranger Andy in Novac so he teaches you the Ranger Takedown; the most overpowered attack in the game.


A Revolver or other high-powered Pistol makes a good ranged weapon, because in reality, your fists are going to be more than enough for general combat, especially if you make good use of the Ranger Takedown.


Have fun one-shotting nearly everything once you get a Ballistic Fist.

[E.P.D. Gaffney]

I'm actually doing a melee/unarmed character at the moment and I love it. I've done each before but never together. So, for stealth, I'll often use spears I'll get from hunting Legion, and for most combat I'll use unarmed. My supplemental skill is explosives. Not because they're the most useful, but because I wanted to make a character that didn't use guns.

I've gone very high in strength and endurance and agility, and in addition to the obvious combat skills, I've levelled up sneak as well.

I've taken all the obvious perks that aid in melee and unarmed combat, and in order to aid in my explosives, I have taken both Burden to Bear and Strong Back, and I carry with me all the big explosive launchers, and large amounts of ammo (playing on hardcore). With Heavyweight (perk from Dead Money) and the Fatman-Little Boy kit, the Fatman weighs only 7.5. It's kind of amazing using it with some small bit of regularity. Almost never used to use it with other builds.

A good thing about levelling up both unarmed and melee is each skill is required for some perks that would affect both, so if you never levelled up melee for example, but you were playing unarmed, you'd miss the Ninja perk, which requires Sneak and Melee. Likewise, Slayer requires 90 Unarmed but affects both Melee and Unarmed. Of course, none of this is strictly necessary for a good build, but I did enjoy being able to take advantage of some of these perks for both skills for the first time, after playing this game for half a decade.

If you were to take Pyromaniac, the Saturnite Fist Superheated and the Shishkebab become a fair bit more menacing.

My girlfriend made a melee-only build and has largely supplemented it with the CoS sniper rifle and basically no guns skill whatsoever. She does have high explosives. Like me, she's playing on Very Hard and Hardcore.

Speaking of explosives, if you have GRA, the Mad Bomber perk lets you make some great stuff. MFC clusters are brilliant.

I tend to use a lot of chems just because they're weightless and they're everywhere, but you don't need to. However, as said above, you do want to get Ranger Andy's takedown move.


My first unarmed build years ago was without any DLC, and Ranger Andy's manoeuvre was more than enough to get me through it, but it was much harder than with all the DLC. Implant GRX kind of breaks the game, for example, but at level 46, my character's getting old, so she's all right with it for the last bit of her journey.

[Mad Marduk]

Good stuff. What/where is implant GRX? I don't remember that, is that the DLC implant with I think it was OWB? How do you guys feel about the 'heavy handed' trait? And finally, what/where are good very early game unarmed and melee weapons? I should be good for a bit with melee because some DLC loadin gave me a broad machete that does well, but no fist weapon for unarmed.

[baumgartner]

This is a really interesting thread - great question, an excellent and pertinent Wikia reference (thanks Caelistas) and some well written descriptions of unarmed/melee builds played by other posters.

My previous FNV game was with the Cowboy build about 6 months ago using the Trail Carbine, Chance's/Bowie knife and long fused dynamite. This thread is making me consider trying the Cowboy again and switching out the Trail Carbine for a six shooter.

Interesting (at least to me) after that game I went over to another old game love, Morrowind, and am playing a khajiit where hand to hand is my take down weapon, a spear does the actual killing when they're down and unconscious, and throwing stars are my 'get their attention' weapon. Not really too different then the FNV builds described here. When I'm done with Morrowind I'll probably be like the famous Terminator quote "I'll be back".

[Mad Marduk]

I'm having a good bit of fun so far. I got my hands on chance's knife, which is sick. I am still looking for my first worthwhile unarmed weapon though. So far all I have found is boxing gloves.. which aren't exactly stellar damage and only KO.

[baumgartner]

OP - don't underestimate the Boxing Gloves, the quick KO sets any foe up for the kill. Also you can deal with multiple foes alternately keeping them on the ground and getting in lethal licks with the weapon of your choice when they are all down and unconscious. Works in Morrowind and I remember using it here in the beginning parts of the game.

[E.P.D. Gaffney]

I'm only finding out the power of the boxing gloves now, at level 46. Pretty amazing. I did Someguy's boxing mod, and it was brilliant. But yes, KO damage is formidable.

My favourite build in Skyrim was a Khajit with unarmed and shield skills. Great fun.

[baumgartner]

OH Yes! I did a khajiit build in Skyrim too. The combat animations with the body throws were absolutely fantastic .... too bad they weren't included in FNV, it would raise the popularity of unarmed combat just for the spectacular cinematics.

[E.P.D. Gaffney]

Originally posted by Wiglaf777:

Good stuff. What/where is implant GRX? I don't remember that, is that the DLC implant with I think it was OWB? How do you guys feel about the 'heavy handed' trait? And finally, what/where are good very early game unarmed and melee weapons? I should be good for a bit with melee because some DLC loadin gave me a broad machete that does well, but no fist weapon for unarmed.

I think it is OWB that adds that one, yeah, (defo a DLC, and why would you ever buy one DLC instead of the Ultimate Edition?) and it just turns up in the perks at some point. It's fairly ridiculous. I took down the Legendary Deathclaw and all the others in its cave by using a few doses of it, and they refill daily. Good for a bit of craic, though.

Originally posted by baumgartner:

OH Yes! I did a khajiit build in Skyrim too. The combat animations with the body throws were absolutely fantastic .... too bad they weren't included in FNV, it would raise the popularity of unarmed combat just for the spectacular cinematics.

I always wondered why Skyrim didn't have more of the objective improvements New Vegas brought to the genre/engine as opposed to the other way round but that's true, the animations were lovely altogether. You ever try levelling up the shield skill? Most fun I ever had was the combination of the two.
P.S. I like how you referred to the unarmed build as a Khajiit build.

[Mad Marduk]

Originally posted by E.P.D. Gaffney:

Originally posted by Wiglaf777:

Good stuff. What/where is implant GRX? I don't remember that, is that the DLC implant with I think it was OWB? How do you guys feel about the 'heavy handed' trait? And finally, what/where are good very early game unarmed and melee weapons? I should be good for a bit with melee because some DLC loadin gave me a broad machete that does well, but no fist weapon for unarmed.

I think it is OWB that adds that one, yeah, (defo a DLC, and why would you ever buy one DLC instead of the Ultimate Edition?) and it just turns up in the perks at some point. It's fairly ridiculous. I took down the Legendary Deathclaw and all the others in its cave by using a few doses of it, and they refill daily. Good for a bit of craic, though.

I don't know. I have the ultimate edition. I made specific on which DLC because they start from different quests.

Originally posted by baumgartner:

OH Yes! I did a khajiit build in Skyrim too. The combat animations with the body throws were absolutely fantastic .... too bad they weren't included in FNV, it would raise the popularity of unarmed combat just for the spectacular cinematics.

I always wondered why Skyrim didn't have more of the objective improvements New Vegas brought to the genre/engine as opposed to the other way round but that's true, the animations were lovely altogether. You ever try levelling up the shield skill? Most fun I ever had was the combination of the two.
P.S. I like how you referred to the unarmed build as a Khajiit build.

I did my first Skyrim run as sword and shield. The shield skills were my favorites and I love shield kill animations. Also, have you ever been fighting on a steep hill/mountainside and then used the skill where you hold up the shield and sprint into people? The enemy ragdolls down the slope and off the cliff so fast that it's hilarious. It's like a fus ro wtf.

[Maythorn]

Waht u need is the giant metal hammer from that cave in the snowy area with orcs

[Epsilon]

Use pushy and fight the power and sneering imperialist damage bonus to everything and the penetrating perk i cant remember it you can get pushy at ruby hill mine eso has a good video on it.