How to play fallout and not saving every step of the way.

Do you guys hate dying? Or every combat feels like
*dumbass was critically hit in the groin for 69 hit points in a forceful blow, knocking you to the ground. The bruise will look nice and the scars will be good party talk. Feel the pain.*


This guide is made for newer players who doesn't want to get spoiled while being a walking death in the wasteland.

What's makes you SPECIAL?

YOU ARE SPECIAL.
Good builds makes light work. and bad builds tends to have many problems.
I'm not going to berate how much points you gonna put into, but i'm just gonna point out what the points do and how it works.

Don't use any of the prebuilt characters, they are all walking trash waiting to be disposed. And they're not special, they're bland and ordinary. Not like you.

When allocating SPECIAL points there are some things to keep in mind:

Strength: Determines Hit Points, hand to hand combat damage, how much you can carry things and using weapons properly, at least you need 5 points.

Perception: It modifies how fast the enemies would react to you and how far the enemies placed in random encounters. It sounds like a bad stat like charisma, but the perks that needs perception is pretty much essential and broken.
You need at least 6 Perception to get the Almighty Better Criticals perk.

Endurance: Determines Hit Points more than strength, poison resistance and radiation resistance. Not a bad stat, but not a good one either. Unless you want to be a tank that punches things to oblivion,
4 points is enough for surviving the early stages of the game.

Charisma: It's a dump stat. Speech is all you need baby.

Intelligence: Unless you have genocide plan better than America in the Fallout Universe, this is likely your most important statistic since it provides crucial information and good quests from your conversations and determines skill points per level.
7 is a good starting value.

Agility: The best stat in the game, i wouldn't put less than 9. And also 10 Agility at the start isn't a bad idea.

Luck: Luck determines how often you critical hit, getting the sweet special encounters, and how lucky you are at gambling your caps.
You need at least 6 Luck for getting one of the best weapon in the game, and one the best perks in the game.
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This is one of my prebuilt character for the greet and shoot build,
I'm using gifted trait and 8 IN 8 LU since you can upgrade it with psycho IN upgrade glitch and getting 2 LU on the fortune teller glitch.

Traits or no traits?

While no traits is perfectly viable for any characters, using traits can be beneficial if you're building a specific characters.
You can be either a wastelander who punches things rapidly while they die on the spot, or a guy who shoots bird pellets that sometimes kills for no reason.

But some traits are better than others, these are the top traits that i choose from different playthroughs.

TOP TIER TRAITS:
Gifted: The stat bonuses counteract the skill penalties (especially if you put a few extra points to IN), so this is universally regarded as the best trait. I usually use it myself because it feels like cheating.

Small Frame: If you plan on keeping at least one NPC around, this essentially has no downside at all. Free point is a free point earned.

One Hander: One of the best things in life is doing it one handed ( ͡~ ͜ʖ ͡°) Granted, Many of the best weapons in the game are two-handed , but it's good for roleplaying as Disciple of Hokuto Shin Ken character who punch people to bloody bits since the bonus applies for Unarmed weapons, none of which is two-handed (your basic Kung Fu attack is unaffected).

Fast Shot: More to shoot, and more to punch. What's more to love? But if you're a fan of stabbing people in the groin, you wouldn't like this trait at all.

FUN TRAITS:
Jinxed: My favorite perk in the game, since it makes all the things in the game became a white person on infomercial advertisement.

I laughed a lot when some dumb idiot tried to punch me and hurt himself on the process, but sometimes your weapons exploded right on your stupid face for no reason at all.
This is one of the traits that requires you to save a lot, since everything and everyone is a white person on some stupid infomercial.
(which is ironic, since the goal of my guide is trying to make you save less)

Finesse: Bad at the start of the game, in the mid to late game you're death wielding a gun. But if you're a persistent XP grinder, it's a bad trait since Sniper perk makes you death wielding a minigun.

Heavy Handed: Some extra Oomph early on for Kung Fu characters, but not so good in the long run if you plan on getting Better Criticals and Slayer. Same drawback as Finesse.

Good Natured: Become a diplomat and everything can be solved! Decent if you only plan on using one combat skill or, obviously, if you don't plan on using any combat skills. Otherwise you might as well choose something else, since other perks are better.

Traits to view at your own pleasure (ie. magnificent trash):
Kamikaze: This trait makes me feels like a Japanese pilot who doesn't want to be a suicide bomber but got harassed by the superior to commit sudoku.

Skilled: This is the inbred cousin of gifted. A horrible trash trait,
i wouldn't touch it with a ten meter pole.


Fast Metabolism: Both effects are utterly marginal, so it's simply an utterly marginal trait. Basically a boring trait.

Bruiser: Two more strength stat points, but you need the AP for punching people. That's like losing four points of agility, which is ridiculous and waste of a trait.

Bloody Mess: Could be fun to begin with, but doesn't do anything in game terms which is bad, and gets tiresome. You'll see those animations anyway and it will feel more like a reward when you hit that sweet crit.

Night Person: This is very bad considering how many people will only talk to you during daytime. You can however cheese it by waiting till night time, but it's a chore and i don't recommend it.

Chem Reliant + Resistant: Chem is bad. Read a book people. or if you're cool dude like me, just reload the save and voila! using chem is gud ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Skills that kills and pays bills.

Not much to tell, it's pretty explanatory.
But some skills don't pay the bills AND can't kill, evade them like the bubonic plague.

SKILLS THAT KILLS
Small Guns : It's the guns that you use for the early to mid game, you can use it till the endgame though. But it's not recommended since you need bigger or better ordnance for this wasteland.
150% is more than enough to make eye shot at a reasonable distance. It's one of the best tag skills early on, since you get easy 24 10mm ammo and fast leveling to kill early and mid game enemies with ease.

Big Guns : Ah yes, the trinity of fallout big guns. Rocket Launcher, Minigun, and the Flamer. Amen.

While these guns aren't that good compared to the Almighty Energy Weapons. They are the perfect weapons for senseless killing, plus their killing animation is rather unique except for the minigun. But the weapons and ammo weigh a ton, and the ammo is uncommon on the late game. So stock up a bit if you want your killing sprees stays long and prosper.
Still, they are viable for the late stage of the game.
100% Big Guns is more than enough to make your Big Guns shoots and send'em to the shadow realm.

Energy Weapons : While big guns is cool and all, Energy Weapons is cooler AND way more efficient in killing. With these weapons not only you are equivalent as a nuke in human form, the kills you made with these types of weapons is pretty gruesome like the Big Guns counterpart.
150% is enough for Energy Weapons to be very effective, but maxing it isn't gonna hurt you.

Unarmed : My personal favorite skill, punching people and returning people to the great monke beyond.
While Melee Weapons does better damage than unarmed type weapons, Unarmed type weapons don't knockback your enemies to the next dimension. That means more damage and still get the knockdown effect. Tagging this skill will get you a brass knuckle, which is pretty sweet.

Melee Weapons : You know what they say, it isn't a fallout game if 10mm pistol, nuka cola, power armors, and super sledge doesn't exist. While thrusting things in the groin never gets old but you know what does? Knocking them WAYYYYYYYYYYYY out of the park. It's frustrating when you knock someone over and they don't die, this is the reason why i don't really like late game melee weapons.

Throwing : It's trash, don't even bother.
Even if you are roleplaying as a mad troglodyte, it's not worth upgrading since the ammo is scarce and the throwables are suck to begin with.

SKILLS THAT PAYS THE BILLS
This is pretty much how it feels like to use passive or non-combat skills.

Sure, some of them are essential for getting the good stuff and XP, but you can ignore it and still get loot and XP from kills.

You can ignore these skills if you're roleplaying as an idiot :)


Speech : The sole reason why Charisma stat is a trash stat. With high speech, you can get people to like you and gives you quests and XP. And even beating the game relatively easier if you're knowledgeable with the information you get from the wasteland.
55% is enough for most people to like you, but you can tag it for cheesing it on early stage of the game.

Lockpick : The name of the skills says it all, locked door and containers aren't a problem with this skill.
70% is enough to open all of locked doors and containers in the game with the help of a lockpick item. And also tagging this skill would get you a free lockpick, which is pretty neat.

Doctor : You can easily fix a broken limb with a very low doctor stat, the only times you get crippled limbs is when enemies got lucky with aimed shot or precise melee hit.
It's viable not using any skill points for this skill.

First Aid : Free HP for a few hours of your time, but it's purpose got defeated with just walking around on the map screen. You can cheese a few HP everyday, but it's too cumbersome and i rather walk to another area if i'm badly injured.
However, you can upgrade it later without spending any skill points later in the game.

Repair : Pretty explanatory, you use it to fix broken stuff.
You can upgrade it later without spending any skill points later in the game.

Science : You use it for computer stuff. Getting information or do some high tech stuff.
You can upgrade it later without spending any skill points later in the game.

Steal : If you're hurting for some caps, or trying to disarm people. It's kinda funny when you're fighting guys with only their fists.
But i wouldn't put any points on this skill since there isn't any notable difference between 10% Steal and 200% Steal. Steal'em from behind for easy shekels

Barter : It's pretty much getting sweet deals from merchants or even straight up scam these poor people with your crappy deals. Other than that it's not much, you could skip this skill if you don't like to trade. 50% is good enough for not getting ripped off by the merchants.

Sneak : Trash skill. Yes, you can assassinate someone without alerting others with high sneak skill.
But it's inconvenient and i rather kill'em all for the XP and loot.

Traps : Another trash skill, there aren't that many traps in the game + they're not likely to kill you.
I wouldn't even bother upgrading this skill.

Gambling : Only losers gamble.
But if you're a lazy dumbass like me, just put 55% Gambling skill and play some craps tables for easy shekels.

Outdoorsman: The trashiest skill of 'em all. It's for not taking any damage when walking on the map screen which is pretty dumb.
But if you're persistent on upgrading it, you can upgrade it later without spending any skill points later in the game.

Hints, Tips, and closing.

Here's my hints and tips for making the game much more easier and forgiving.

1) Take your time to comprehend what people are saying.Skipping dialogues will get you nowhere or even worse making quests downright impossible. Just roleplay as an idiot with 3 INT if you don't care talking with other people.

2) Flee if the odds are against you. You're a survivor, not a hero. YET

3) Be thorough when you are either scavenging or talking. Don't be surprised if you got some rare item or hidden quests from your excellent observation skill.

4) Be polite. If you are not compliant or even being disrespectful, people will like you less. Some of them may even refuse to speak with you further thus no quest or information.

5) Put away your weapon when you're not using it. By putting your weapon from the weapons slot into the inventory or by switching into an empty weapons slot. Aside from the fact that you'll open doors faster, people won't talk to you or even being hostile if you are persistent on shoving your weapon to their faces.

6) Most important people will be busy or sleeping during certain hours of the day, usually the night time.

7) Lots of times you only get one chance to talk to people; so save often if you want best results like information, XP to extra loot.

8) Check bookcases, lockers, containers for stuff and take it. Pretty explanatory but sometimes people tend to forget or negligent with the map surroundings.

9) Items on the ground or in corpses do not decay, so you can pick'em up later if you're overencumbered. But if you're on inaccessible area such as random map encounters. It will be lost forever.

10) When bartering, the game never checks for weight. What's more, you can't be overencumbered, so you can actually barter for more than you can carry and run around with it which is nice, but the major drawback is you can't pick items even weightless stuff like Bottle Caps or Stimpaks.
While not so useful for a solo character, your companions pretty much is a mule filled with steroids.

Well that's it for my guide. Not a man for closing speech, so this will have to do :)



If you guys liked it, i would post perks upgrades later if i have the time.

[Guts]

you are a sexy as fuck individual thank you baby

[TrueGFS]

Thank you.

[andre.grube]

MVP, man. I'm also late to the classic fallouts so thanks for the awesome summary!

[Santa's Brother]

Yes, the only thing that charisma actually do is making people like you a lil bit better. Like peeps will comment that you are attractive. But in-game? It's trash.

Unless you're playing Fallout 2

[Faraxes]

So, charisma is useless?
I'm playing Fallout for the first time and put charisma at 8 XD

[Mfkin Mikey]

Good stuff. I've played Fallout 3 on and really had to see the glory of 1 + 2 but the game is so different i was quite confused, but really didn't want to see any spoilers, just an easy explanation of what sucks and doesn't suck to play with. This is perfect.

[Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...]

What do you think you are, some kinda helpful guy who posts helpful guides? Pish-pash-pshaw, says I.

[Santa's Brother]

No problem, glad i could help buddy :)

[SquidJustice]

Very much appreciated, I just needed a quick and easy explanation of what these things do and you certainly provided that

[DINGOSHAT]