Fallout Fallout 1-2 builds

[jackofshadows]

Head to vault city and try to upgrade your armor.

What do you mean by that?

with 8 luck you'll crit non stop

You can boost it by 2 in NCR - talk to the habo girl and agree to whatever she's offering. It's either +2 or -1 rng dependent so a huge risk if you're playing w/o saves.

Overall don't see much of a point of your build: not exactly newb friendly and an experienced player knows how he wants to resolve this or that up ahead so allocates stats accordingly. Sure you can still slaughter the Enclave with this but low hp will be annoying - a few crits in a row and you're dead. With companions you cannot properly abuse corners/doors and you won't have stealth...

 

[Average Manatee]

No bonus move = cringe. 2 shots with 10 AP is nice, 2 shots + 2-4 movement to duck behind cover and never get hit is perfection.

If you're willing to spend a perk on educated you should have just taken Skilled instead IMO. This would also free up needing to take a perk for a 4th tag skill in energy/big guns, meaning if you also drop awareness then you're actually a perk ahead and gained more overall skill points.

I agree on only needing 6 luck. There's not much point taking more. It's not like eye shots multiply your luck crit rate, or luck makes crits more effective, it's just always +1% crit per level which is pretty useless, all you want it for is the perks and maybe random encounters. Sniper is already game-winning when you get it even if its not 100% (especially if you already have the accuracy to shoot people in the eyes). You *can* also get away with 7 perception if you factor in the stat increase available, or even way less if you take chems, but perception is good for sequence, so I'd even consider bumping it to 9. Unless you do like to use a lot of chems for battle.

Overall don't see much of a point of your build: not exactly newb friendly and an experienced player knows how he wants to resolve this or that up ahead so allocates stats accordingly. Sure you can still slaughter the Enclave with this but low hp will be annoying - a few crits in a row and you're dead.

He does have lifegiver for health which is worth a whopping +8 Endurance from the level you take it. Granted it comes a bit late unfortunately, would be way better of a perk if it was level 6 or so.

 

[laclongquan]

Head to vault city and try to upgrade your armor.

What do you mean by that?

He probabbly mean buying a metal armor and trade the old leather armor/vest away. That's my usual procedure. I am not sure luck or which factor decide when the VC shops would sell metal armor mk2.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

I agree on only needing 6 luck.

Yeah you only need 6 luck. I just like having a 100% crit rate with sniper (with the stat boost). Moving the extra points to strength or endurance is valid.

No bonus move

Valid choice, you can take it instead of bonus ranged damage, move better criticals to later

What do you mean by that?

Vault city is where you're likely to find metal armor, though you may not be able to afford it right away

With companions you cannot properly abuse corners/doors and you won't have stealth...

Stealth is gay, Cassidy rules, and Grampy Bone is non-optional.

Overall don't see much of a point of your build:

The build is strong at all levels of the game, not just at certain levels. It also lets you see all content, complete all quests, and play in a pretty "normal" way (you don't need to grind, aren't dependent on chems, don't have to approach battles in a super specific manner, don't need to savescum stealing, etc.) Low HP is the main flaw but companions will take some hits for you, armor solves all damage issues, with good guns everything dies before it can hurt you, and stimpacks exist. You'll need some decent armor to survive the New Reno quests, and you'll need good guns to fight the super mutants at the military base and any deathclaws, but otherwise you should stroll through the game. (To be fair most of that comes from knowing what order to do what areas which is more of a process of player experience than build.)

 

[vota DC]

Skilled is and always will be a garbage trait, unless you're doing some weird marginal build, because you're trading useful perks for skill points that aren't that useful. You likely won't need more than four filled-out skills in a game, and by level 6/7 all your three tag skills should be over 100 already. So you're just left filling in your fourth skill if you want one (usually a combat skill change, like Small Guns >>> Energy/Big Guns or Melee >>> Unarmed, or teching into Doctor or Lockpick in FO2).

Perks >>> Skills, always.

What about super stupid characters? Expecially 2 intelligence AND gifted

 

[Average Manatee]

One thing I've noticed, especially replaying fallout 1 just now, is that armor is a lot weaker with AP ammo fixed (I know there's like 5 different mods fixing it, I'm going by whatever Fallout et tu did by default). In particular this means that even Power Armor isn't quite complete immunity to mid game weapons and Fast Shot bursts are 100% viable with relatively common weapons loaded with AP ammo throughout the whole game. Used to be that buying the combat armor in the Hub was enough to make clearing it out effortless, and with some psycho you were invulnerable. Much less so now, you can still easily lose half your health in a single round to an enemy shooting across the map even without being crit.

I think this definitely moves the game in favor of perks life Lifegiver and Bonus Move that either keep you alive with HP or by not being shot. I don't think you *really* need any offensive perks beyond bonus rate of fire. Even Sniper isn't all its cracked up to be. I remember grinding deathclaws to get sniper in Fallout 1 so that I could one shot supermutants, now I already one shot them anyway with no perks other than 2x bonus move, bonus rate of fire and Action Boy. Granted I'm using the Bozar which is normally a fallout 2 weapon but et tu is also boosting mutant health and the AP modifiers are doing a lot.

 

[Jigby]

Incidentally does that same formula apply for attacks? Does extra skill beyond the minimum needed for 95% chance boost your crit chance?

I looked at the game to recheck and it's the same formula for combat. (the general random roll). So if you have a 95% CTH (after all the penalties have been applied) and you manage to hit the enemy, the game checks whether it's a critical hit. The probability of it being a critical is

;accuracy is capped at 95
crit_chance = base_crit_chance - hit_slot_location_penalty + rand/10; (rand in the steal example was 4.5)
;where rand is a nonnegative rand(accuracy-100, accuracy); (we want the nonnegative part, negative means we've failed the accuracy roll and missed the shot, so by default that's no critical)

So with a hit chance of 66%, if you manage to hit the eye slot with LU10, you should have a critical chance of

10%(LU) + 60%(eyes) + 0%-6.6% = 70% to 76.6%
with a 95% hit chance, if you do manage hit it's 70% to 79.5%

So the best critical chance that you can get is at 95% accuracy.

Also I assume Jinxed will absolutely fuck your stealing ability at low steal skill.

Also looked at this one... Jinxed is apparently applied only in combat hit checks. Not in skills. After reading its description it sort of makes sense though...

"The good thing is that everyone around you has more critical failures in combat, the bad thing is so do you!"

 

[Average Manatee]

WTF is this Kill a merchant? How the hell do you find more merchants to fence your looted armors and weapons.

You take the drugs you just got and go next door to trade them for combat armor and high powered weaponry. Drugs are as good as cash since they are 0 weight, killing him is worth like 10k caps. Once you've got your combat armor and a decent gun you've got pretty much everything you need in Fallout 1 since Power armor isn't bought.

So with a hit chance of 66%, if you manage to hit the eye slot with LU10, you should have a critical chance of

10%(LU) + 60%(eyes) + 0%-6.6% = 70% to 76.6%
with a 95% hit chance, if you do manage hit it's 70% to 79.5%

So the best critical chance that you can get is at 95% accuracy.

Interesting. This does mean that 3x more criticals and finesse would basically guarantee crits on the eyes. All the benefit of Sniper/Slayer, but at level 15 with better crits (or if you use sfall to save perks, level 12).

Probably not worth it though. Just be satisfied with the base ~75% crit rate and take more useful perks.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Turns out that Finesse isn't really worth it: https://www.nma-fallout.com/threads/did-you-know-finesse-is-actually-a-terrible-trait-fo2.220582/
Personally I never used it since it made the early game an even bigger slog due to the 30%~ reduction in normal damage. Finally someone crunched the numbers and I feel vindicated. And it's pretty much impossible to play FO2 normally and not get the Slayer perk which means that Finesse is an even bigger waste.

Damn, if its adding +30% to enemy DR then finesse isn't just not worth it, it's SHIT. JHP ammo adds +25% DR as well and basic bitch leather armor another +25%, which makes Finesse into a -60% damage reduction penalty. And this is, like, the most favorable scenario possible, enemy DR is only going to go up and ammo modifiers don't improve much except for a few weapons.

Guess the powergamer trait decision is between fast shot, good natured, and short frame (obviously everyone takes gifted).

Nope, giving up aiming is a terrible choice as well, the best choice is to not take any perk aside from the flavor ones (sex appeal and the brutal deaths one).
Nothing is really interesting, gameplay-wise.

 

[Ryan muller]

Turns out that Finesse isn't really worth it: https://www.nma-fallout.com/threads/did-you-know-finesse-is-actually-a-terrible-trait-fo2.220582/
Personally I never used it since it made the early game an even bigger slog due to the 30%~ reduction in normal damage. Finally someone crunched the numbers and I feel vindicated. And it's pretty much impossible to play FO2 normally and not get the Slayer perk which means that Finesse is an even bigger waste.

Damn, if its adding +30% to enemy DR then finesse isn't just not worth it, it's SHIT. JHP ammo adds +25% DR as well and basic bitch leather armor another +25%, which makes Finesse into a -60% damage reduction penalty. And this is, like, the most favorable scenario possible, enemy DR is only going to go up and ammo modifiers don't improve much except for a few weapons.

Guess the powergamer trait decision is between fast shot, good natured, and short frame (obviously everyone takes gifted).

Nope, giving up aiming is a terrible choice as well, the best choice is to not take any perk aside from the flavor ones (sex appeal and the brutal deaths one).
Nothing is really interesting, gameplay-wise.

Its actually a good trade off, specially to big guns since they dont have the option to aim anyways

Less ap to use a gun is always great since you can have multiple turns with extremely op guns and in the case of fallout 1, you can even make unarmed worth something by doing shit like 12 consecutive hits with power fist, if the player has the slayer perk that would mean 12 critical hits one after another

Fast shot is goat

 

[Average Manatee]

As I said a few posts ago, a lot depends on your ammo having proper AP modifiers.

Base Fallout: Power armor has 12 DT 40 DR. Minigun does 7-11 damage x 40 shots. Result is that minigun does 0 damage. Actually it usually does something small like 5 damage, I'm not sure why exactly. With hardened power armor on I definitely take a consistent 0 damage from JHP-loaded miniguns though.

Fallout Eu Tu: Still 12 DT 40 DR. Minigun does 7-11 damage x40 shots. AP ammo reduces the DT to 2.4 and DR to 25, which equates to about 5.25 damage per shot, which is then reduced by the AP ammo only having a 50% damage modifier at the end of the equation to 2.6ish damage. But because it's got 40 shots, you should deal around 100ish damage. I'm not sure how rounding works midway through these equations, usually I see myself dealing more like 75 damage (could also be that some shots in the burst are missing both from range and because of only a 95% max chance to hit), but it's excellent either way. 4 AP burst means you can get in two shots and get a lot of movement with 11 AP + 2x bonus move, though Bonus Ranged Damage would be a lot better at 1-shotting far away enemies (but I didn't actually use the minigun to finish fallout et tu so w/e).

 

[luj1]

some good advice in this thread

 

[Darth Canoli]

Its actually a good trade off, specially to big guns since they dont have the option to aim anyways

Less ap to use a gun is always great since you can have multiple turns with extremely op guns and in the case of fallout 1, you can even make unarmed worth something by doing shit like 12 consecutive hits with power fist, if the player has the slayer perk that would mean 12 critical hits one after another

Fast shot is goat

You'll only use big guns for the last 25%-30% of the game, aiming is really helpful early to mid-game.
You might also go energy not big guns or super sniper rifles during late game which are both perfectly viable and require aiming.

Gatling/Laser Gatling are fun but energy rifles or sniper rifles make big holes in pretty much everything.
Well, most anyway, you'd have to go with energy weapons against some enemies.

 

[jackofshadows]

You'll only use big guns for the last 25%-30% of the game, aiming is really helpful early to mid-game.
You might also go energy not big guns or super sniper rifles during late game which are both perfectly viable and require aiming.

Gatling/Laser Gatling are fun but energy rifles or sniper rifles make big holes in pretty much everything.
Well, most anyway, you'd have to go with energy weapons against some enemies.

Man just play with fast shot for once istead of trying to convince everyone that only playstyle with aimed shots is viable. No one forbids you to get your hands on big guns relatively early (I'm not even talking about gimmicks like stealing bozar from NCR vendor guards) and use bursts until that point. But having -1 ap with bursts and especially with sniper in late game is a big deal. Also like someone already said itt getting flamethrower as early as possible in F1 is a fucking amazing experience.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Man just play with fast shot for once istead of trying to convince everyone that only playstyle with aimed shots is viable. No one forbids you to get your hands on big guns relatively early (I'm not even talking about gimmicks like stealing bozar from NCR vendor guards) and use bursts until that point. But having -1 ap with bursts and especially with sniper in late game is a big deal. Also like someone already said itt getting flamethrower as early as possible in F1 is a fucking amazing experience.

I probably already did, back in the days.
And I'd do it again but only if you first go with a crit aim build and tell us how amazing it is.

 

[jackofshadows]

if you first go with a crit aim build and tell us how amazing it is.

Not sure what you mean. The ridiculous flat bonus from shooting eyes usually is enough for me but if you want to throw 1-2 "more criticals" in it - sure, why not. Nothing really amazing about it compared to the raw power of fast shot + big guns + sniper later except for the fact that you can progress somewhat faster and ultimately finish the game earlier. In F1 it's really good because of how op turboplazma is and how grindy it is to get the sniper perk. Also in F2 fast shot + sniper allows for cool use of gauss pistol (something like 7-8 shots per turn irrc with devastating results).

 

[Ryan muller]

Its actually a good trade off, specially to big guns since they dont have the option to aim anyways

Less ap to use a gun is always great since you can have multiple turns with extremely op guns and in the case of fallout 1, you can even make unarmed worth something by doing shit like 12 consecutive hits with power fist, if the player has the slayer perk that would mean 12 critical hits one after another

Fast shot is goat

You'll only use big guns for the last 25%-30% of the game, aiming is really helpful early to mid-game.
You might also go energy not big guns or super sniper rifles during late game which are both perfectly viable and require aiming.

Gatling/Laser Gatling are fun but energy rifles or sniper rifles make big holes in pretty much everything.
Well, most anyway, you'd have to go with energy weapons against some enemies.

Thats only a thing on f1 in ehich again, fast shot works for anything including unarmed

In fo2 you can get the bozar in one hour.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Not sure what you mean. The ridiculous flat bonus from shooting eyes usually is enough for me but if you want to throw 1-2 "more criticals" in it - sure, why not. Nothing really amazing about it compared to the raw power of fast shot + big guns + sniper later except for the fact that you can progress somewhat faster and ultimately finish the game earlier. In F1 it's really good because of how op turboplazma is and how grindy it is to get the sniper perk. Also in F2 fast shot + sniper also allows for cool use of gauss pistol (something like 7-8 shots per turn irrc with devastating results).

I don't like the energy weapons sound effects so I didn't use any energy weapon, except the laser gatling for a long time because how good are all the other weapons sound effects.

Also, I don't want to remove one feature I like from the game even to get -1AP per shot.

And since a good aim takes care of most enemies in one shoot, I don't see the need to go for fast shoot.

I think it's extremely retarded of you to play without one of the best feature of the game.

 

[jackofshadows]

I think it's extremely retarded of you to play without one of the best feature of the game.

Dude I can call burst a feature too then and say the same to you. You're truly something else.

 

[Ryan muller]

I think it's extremely retarded of you to play without one of the best feature of the game.

Thats another point, fun factor can be added to the discussion as aiming is definitively more tactical than luring + bursting as it adds more variety to the conflict

But when it comes to viability you simply cant argue against fast shot. Some of the most absolutely OP builds in both games revolve around having it. Its simply far from bad.

And then for fun factor, i usually combo Big guns with throwing for added variety anyways, so i have both the absolutely amazing gore animations of multilated corpses being destroyed from my burst shots and the fun of exploding people around me with plasma grenades.

 

[Average Manatee]

Fast Shot
+ Requires almost no weapon skill. If you have high perception you'll have a 95% chance to hit point blank with a weapon skill of like 70%, and 100% weapon skill is enough for mid to long range.
+ Less AP
+ Basically godmode with sniper
- Weapon-progression dependent. If enemy armor outpaces your weapon or AP ammo progression then you'll quickly deal no damage.
- Even with 95% hit rate you'll get some damage dropoff with range.

Aimed Shot:
+ Fairly easy weapon progression since any weapon will do decently if you're critting eyes.
+ No damage dropoff with range
+ Huge buff at level 9 from better criticals.
- Requires 60% more skill in your weapon skill to hit at the same range, which can be like ~100 skill points on a tagged skill in fallout 2.
- Slower
- Fairly minor buff from Sniper, though it does make you more consistent.

Both are fine. I like Fast shot because I always like to focus on other skills early game + it's better if you want to play with all of small guns/big guns/energy weapons late game. Being weapon progression dependent is fine as long as you know the game and how to get money or otherwise acquire good weapons. If you're actually wanting to make the absolute most combat effective character early game and dumping most of your points into small guns to rush your skill to like 160%, then aimed shots are probably better because you can snipe with max damage from max range.

 

[Jigby]

Alternatively I think in the F2 engine+sfall you can do both, burst with fastshot and unarmed/melee with aimedshot. I did a playthrough like that in F1.5 Resurrection, doing the early quests with unarmed for lvl6 Bonus Move, then went to the Rebirth Base and knocked out the Savior, took his plasma gatling and continued the game normally (got out of the base with sneak). It also works, because with burst you want some secondary weapon for ammo conservation purposes. The playthrough was meta and broken, but also quite fun.

I think in F2 you could do flamethrower+unarmed.

 

[Darth Canoli]

Thats another point, fun factor can be added to the discussion as aiming is definitively more tactical than luring + bursting as it adds more variety to the conflict

But when it comes to viability you simply cant argue against fast shot. Some of the most absolutely OP builds in both games revolve around having it. Its simply far from bad.

And then for fun factor, i usually combo Big guns with throwing for added variety anyways, so i have both the absolutely amazing gore animations of multilated corpses being destroyed from my burst shots and the fun of exploding people around me with plasma grenades.

For the fun factor, changing your focused weapons each playthrough and/or trying different weapons in a single playthrough is very important, at least for me.
And i'm not just talking about upgrades.

Like one gun in one hand and a sniper rifle in the other one, sometimes changing to a good shotgun.

Also, I didn't install my CD version for a long time but I feel like the original CD version added more damage and crit rate from aimed shots while with fresh steam/gog version, it's so so.

 

[Jigby]

Incidentally, I wonder if when kids steal from you in the Den is all this checked the other way around? Does 100 steal mean you're almost invulnerable to their bullshit?

Well, one would think that it would work that way, but I actually don't know. Would have to test. Or look in the scripts.

Looked into this and the kids are not using the steal code, it's just some scripts mimicking steal. A steal check (the kids' steal skill, not yours) and 1 more random roll check after which the steal animation is played to make it look like steal. So pumping your own steal will not do anything here.

 

[underground nymph]

I wanna replay the first Fallout, but somewhat struggling to begin because it seems that the game is focused on optimal builds, while suboptimal ones don’t get the amount of entertainment one would get with the former. E.g. power armor and turbo plasma rifle are the best options armor and weapon wise, besides they both have a quest attached, which is why not going for them is like missing some sweet chunks of the game.

I am not as troubled by selecting the non-combat skills, but may as well have some fresh view on them. I have an indoctrinated opinion that investing in speech is a must, but what are the other skills that will be of the same value gameplay wise? Lock-picking and science are the two skills that I am inclined to consider to invest to, though I am not sure as to whether they are really worth (I only remember that computers sometimes were keeping some interesting options locked because of my p bad skill stat).

And finally what about stealth? Is it worth trying? I never picked this skill, don’t even know how the stealth system works in the game.