How important is Charisma?

[Cake for Mumm-Ra]

I'm still new to the series, and I'm only ~5 hours into this game. In New Vegas, I dumped Charisma (1), put lots of skill points into Speech, and never had any trouble passing speech checks in the game. I realize that F4 isn't using skills like Speech or Lockpick, etc., and I'm finding that my 1 point in Charisma isn't going to get me very far.

How important is Charisma for my first playthrough? I.e. how often will it be an important tool for passing speech checks? I'm not as interested in getting good barter deals, I'm only asking about speech checks and how frequent or important they are.

Now would be a good time for me to reroll my character if necessary, so if you'd recommend I put some points into Charisma, please list a stat arrangement for a typical gun/sniper/horder type character.

[LordMikey]

its still got lockpicking :)

[Cake for Mumm-Ra]

Originally posted by LordMikey:

its still got lockpicking :)

You know what I mean.. :P

[Breitmacher]

charisma help you with guests, give you more reward, romancing your comanions faster
+ some useful perks you can pick

[Awen]

Because of the gutting of the stat system, charasima is what all speech checks are based on.

However, the vast majority of the speech checks in the game are asking for more money three times from NPCs when they give you quests.

You also can fail speech checks even with maxed out charisma and 3/3 Lady Killer/Black Widow perks. There is always a chance to fail now.

[Barsik_The_CaT]

If you want to get into settlements, get at least 6 charisma for 'local leader' perk, Without it, the whole settlement thing is almost unplayable.
Discounts and rewards do not really help (again, that 6 charisma will be more that enough, +1 from the bobblehead, and you can always get +5 from grape mentats).
It also helps to end discussions with no blood, so, if you prefer this way of doing things - get it to 5-6 and carry grape mentats with you. Keep in mind, such situtations are pretty rare (Bonnie, Nick and mafia guys, dr. Hildern, DC surgeon, Cabot's sister - that's all I can remember atm) due to lack of quests in this game.

[Smilodon]

IMO, Charisma's greatest use is the Local Leader perk at level 6. I find a lot of the speech checks are close to meaningless.

[Bored Peon]

Charisma will affect the following:

1. You chance at success for a speech check.

2. The prices you pay for an item, higher your charisma is, the cheaper it is. For example a fertilizer shipment is 360 cap wiht my 13 charisma, if I equip agatha's dress bringing it to 16, it will change that 360 to 300 caps.

3. The amount of settlers you can have in a settlement. This is affected two ways. The maximum population size is limited to your charisma +10, so a charisma of 1 means 11 is your maxium. This is before applying cha clothing or buffs, they can raise the maxium. A settlement below 70% happiness will only recruit to your base charisma, buffs and clothes will not matter.

Also keep in mind, there is no level maxium. So you do not need to start over because eventually you will gian enough levels to bring it to 10 charisma. The one thing I do suggest is getting to 10 in a stat BEFORE picking up a bobblehead, this will allow you to reach 11 base in a stat.

[Cake for Mumm-Ra]

Good tips, thanks all. I guess this is why they've added in that character manager. I wouldn't want to waste stat points just to have the option to build settlements using a character playing on hard or survival. I guess this first playthough will just be learning the ropes. Jesus.. am I going to have thousands of hours on this game like I did with Skyrim?

[Awen]

Originally posted by Cake for Žižek:

Good tips, thanks all. I guess this is why they've added in that character manager. I wouldn't want to waste stat points just to have the option to build settlements using a character playing on hard or survival. I guess this first playthough will just be learning the ropes. Jesus.. am I going to have thousands of hours on this game like I did with Skyrim?

Don't sweat your iniitial build too much. You can also choose to increase a SPECIAL stat rather than take a perk every time you level up. There is no limit on doing it or level cap, do you can be 10s across the board if you wanted!

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

Also keep in mind, there is no level maxium. So you do not need to start over because eventually you will gian enough levels to bring it to 10 charisma. The one thing I do suggest is getting to 10 in a stat BEFORE picking up a bobblehead, this will allow you to reach 11 base in a stat.

LOL. I edited that while you two were posting.

[rex]

Charisma is actually semi-important in quests that actually have story. You can use it to keep some people from dying, or squeeze out extra info from some NPCs if I recall correctly.

[MEMPHIS]

Charisma is kind of like Luck. It is as important as you want it to be. You're not going to miss out on a lot of content without it, I don't think. But the same could be said about any other stat.

Since the traditional "Speech" skill is tied up into Charisma, then... it just depends on how you like playing RPG's. Personally, I'm always the social sort in these types of games. But I wouldn't say they are better or worse modes of play. They're just different. Regardless, you're going to be shooting things either way. So... plan accordingly.

There is the straightforward asking for more money and better prices at stores aspects of it. And there have been a few quests that resolved differently because my Charisma was pretty good. But additionally, the stat is geared toward Settlement building.

My advice is, if you want to do a lot of Settlement building - Charisma is a really great stat to invest pretty deeply into. If you aren't incredibly excited about Settlement building, I would simply put it as a dump stat, or keep it around 3 or lower. Having a 1 isn't a terrible thing, either.

It really is all just how you like to play. Investing into it is only wasted if you don't take advantage of the perks that it provides access to.

[Jeff Kaos]

Originally posted by Smilodon:

IMO, Charisma's greatest use is the Local Leader perk at level 6. I find a lot of the speech checks are close to meaningless.

^This^
Also with a Charisma of 6 you can put on a hat, a pair of dark glasses and just about any suit and pump that to 9 (or more if you get a hold of a specific suit that gives a +3 charisma bonus and/or use chems) for speech checks or when you need to buy and sell items; which will save you A LOT of caps.

[Barsik_The_CaT]

Originally posted by Cake for Žižek:

Good tips, thanks all. I guess this is why they've added in that character manager. I wouldn't want to waste stat points just to have the option to build settlements using a character playing on hard or survival. I guess this first playthough will just be learning the ropes. Jesus.. am I going to have thousands of hours on this game like I did with Skyrim?

Very unlikely. This games lacks content a lot. There's nothing to do for thousands of hours.

[Awen]

Originally posted by Barsik_The_CaT:

There's nothing to do for thousands of hours.

You mean except for complaining on the forums, right?!