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This page lists all skills in Fallout: New Vegas. |
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3.) Scour For Experience - Fallout: New Vegas is a lot of things. It's a sandbox, open-world game that stresses combat and character interaction. But at its very core, it's also a statistically. Apr 07, 2012 3.) Scour For Experience - Fallout: New Vegas is a lot of things. It's a sandbox, open-world game that stresses combat and character interaction. But at its very core, it's also a statistically. A new starting system for Fallout: New Vegas that lets the player choose a history and small story that goes with it. Randomizes starting gear based on skills and history. Random starting locations based on faction.
- 4Improving skills
Background
Fallout: New Vegas shares a similar skill set to its predecessor, Fallout 3, but with several differences. Thirteen skills still remain, but the combat skills have been revised. Small Guns and Big Guns having been combined into the Guns skill, which now covers all conventional firearms with bullet projectiles. Weapons using explosive ordnance (missile and grenade launchers, for instance) are covered by Explosives. New throwing weapons, such as the throwing spear, have been added and are categorized as Melee Weapons. The Survival skill, which is similar to Outdoorsman, was re-added. It allows the player to craft a number various items, such as food, stimpaks, and poisons to augment the effectiveness of weapons.
As opposed to in Fallout 3, skills other than Speech have an effect on dialogue choices. The player must have a certain amount in the particular skill or else the dialogue option cannot be passed. In the case where a player's associated skill level is too low, a dialogue option (highlighted in red) is presented that will fail the skill check, and will not grant a speech success. Unlike Fallout 3, where the same dialogue option is presented regardless of your success or failure, a check that will fail uses a humorously unconvincing response, while a passable check uses a well-thought out argument, thus reflecting the nature of the check.
Unlike in Fallout 3, there are not enough skill points in the base game to max out every skill, even when accounting for every perk and skill book/magazine. Without add-ons installed, it is only possible to achieve a functional maximum in roughly ten skills by using skill magazines and the Comprehension perk for a temporary boost to 100 from a base level of 80.
To offset the necessity of a minimum value for a certain skill, Fallout: New Vegas introduces skill magazines, which provide a large but temporary boost to their associated skill (+10 or +20 with Comprehension). By using one prior to conversation, a check can be passed that might otherwise be failed. They can also be used to boost skill with weapons temporarily or gain access to crafting recipes beyond the player's current skill. Like skill books, magazines are consumed once used, and more need to be collected to maintain the effect.
Formula
The initial value of each skill is a base value of two, plus an amount depending on a character's value in the relevant attribute, plus a bonus determined by their Luck attribute, rounded up.
Example: A starting Endurance of five and a starting Luck of five will give you an initial Unarmed skill of 15.
Later changes to the SPECIAL stat have a similar influence on the respective skill.
During character creation, the player will tag three skills, instantly adding 15 points to each one. When leveling up, the character will distribute ten skill points plus a number equal to half their Intelligence, totaling 15 at maximum IN. The Educated perk grants two additional skill points per level if chosen. Assuming the player has an Intelligence of ten from level 1 and takes the Educated perk at level 4, a maximum of 487 skill points can be distributed without any DLC. Each DLC raises the level cap by 5, thus adding a possible maximum of 5 x 15 = 75 points (or 5 x 17 = 85 points with Educated) to the total available.
Skill Points available with a starting INT of 10 and with/without Educated:
Base game : 487 / 435
One add-on : 572 / 510
Two add-ons : 657 / 585
Three add-ons: 742 / 660
Four add-ons : 827 / 735
Base game : 487 / 435
One add-on : 572 / 510
Two add-ons : 657 / 585
Three add-ons: 742 / 660
Four add-ons : 827 / 735
It can be seen from the above figures that the Educated perk confers an advantage relative to the number of add-ons/levels, so that a player with three DLCs and Educated actually has more skill points to distribute than a player with four DLCs but without Educated.
List of skills
Skill | Description | Associated stat | Associated skillmag | Associated skillbook |
---|---|---|---|---|
Barter | Proficiency at trading and haggling. Also used to negotiate better quest rewards. | Charisma | Salesman Weekly | Tales of a Junktown Jerky Vendor |
Energy Weapons | Proficiency at using energy-based weapons. | Perception | Future Weapons Today | Nikola Tesla and You |
Explosives | Proficiency at using explosive weaponry, disarming mines, and crafting explosives. | Perception | Patriot's Cookbook | Duck and Cover! |
Guns | Proficiency at using weapons that fire standard ammunition. | Agility | Milsurp Review | Guns and Bullets |
Lockpick | Proficiency at picking locks. | Perception | Locksmith's Reader | Tumblers Today |
Medicine | Proficiency at using medical tools, drugs, and crafting medical supplies excluding chems. | Intelligence | Today's Physician | D.C. Journal of Internal Medicine |
Melee Weapons | Proficiency at using melee weapons. | Strength | Tæles of Chivalrie | Grognak the Barbarian |
Repair | Proficiency at repairing items and crafting items and ammunition. | Intelligence | Fixin' Things | Dean's Electronics |
Science | Proficiency at hacking terminals, recycling energy ammunition at workbenches, crafting chems, and many dialog checks. | Intelligence | Programmer's Digest | Big Book of Science |
Sneak | Proficiency at remaining undetected and stealing. | Agility | ¡La Fantoma! | Chinese Army: Special Ops Training Manual |
Speech | Proficiency at persuading others. Also used to negotiate for better quest rewards and to talk your way out of combat, convincing people to give up vital information and succeeding in multiple speech checks. | Charisma | Meeting People | Lying, Congressional Style |
Survival | Proficiency at cooking and surviving in the wastes. | Endurance | Lad's Life | The Wasteland Survival Guide |
Unarmed | Proficiency at unarmed fighting. | Endurance | Boxing Times | Pugilism Illustrated |
Improving skills
Temporary
- Skill magazines will raise the particular skill by 10, or 20 if the Comprehension perk is chosen.
- Certain armor or clothing can raise certain skills when worn.
- Taking chems can augment S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats, and thus raise the coinciding skill by a small amount.
Permanently
- Reading any skill book will raise that particular skill by 3, or 4 if the Comprehension perk is chosen.
- Certain perks can raise skills permanently.
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We love Fallout games for a variety of things but its roleplaying system is wonderful. It allows you to create so different characters from melee maniacs with iron claws to invisible snipers who can eliminate their victims from afar. It’s really nice that players can create their unique heroes but sometimes such variety can embarrass. So we created this guide with the most balanced builds for Fallout: New Vegas.
Here we provide basic info about primary statistics related to S.P.E.C.I.A.L. attributes, tips on skills, and examples of characters with a lot of hints on them. Also, check our guide on characters for Fallout 3.
Best attributes and skills
Firstly, let’s look at primary statistics or S.P.E.C.I.A.L. attributes. You can set them at the very beginning at the doctor’s house at Goodsprings. Pay close attention to these features so far as they affect your secondary statistics, skills, perks, behavior, and dialogues:
![Fallout new vegas starting builds Fallout new vegas starting builds](/uploads/1/2/5/6/125659391/457702024.png)
- ST is for Strength. 5 will be enough for all builds except true fighters.
- PE is for Perception. 1 or 2 is nice so far as this stat almost useless.
- EN is for Endurance. Set it to at least 7 as this stat will help you boost other ones.
- CH is for Charisma. 1 or 2 again, another useless stat again.
- IN is for Intelligence. At least 9 is necessary as it increases a number of skill points.
- AG is for Agility. 5, 6 or even 7 depending on your plans for using V.A.T. S.
- LK is for Luck. Either choose 1 or 9 depending on your plans for critical hits.
The importance of IN is difficult to overestimate. It’s the best attribute because it affects a number of available skill points. Thus, with high IN you can raise your skills significantly which means more efficiency in battles, trading, and dialogues.
By the way, let’s discover skills and their effects. We divided all available features on 4 tiers including the optional one, similarly to the guide for Fallout 3. But New Vegas has some changes in skills, for example, Small Guns and Big Guns are now united in the single Guns category. Also, there is a completely new skill called Survival.
- Tier 1: Barter, Repair, Medicine.
These are essential features for every build. They boost your trading abilities, help to maintain equipment and repair it, and increase the efficiency of medical consumables. You can tag all of them but we suggest selecting at least one skill from the last tier.
- Tier 2: Lockpick, Science.
These are pretty useful but not for all players. First two skills can facilitate your mini-games significantly, they let you unlock more complex doors and terminals. It’s better to invest a few dozens of points to enter protected areas.
- Tier 3: Survival, Sneak, Speech.
«Three S» category contains interesting but not necessary features. Survival is wonderful for true adventurers and, especially, those who play on Hardcore Mode. Sneak is suggested for specific builds based on stealth playstyle. Speech is only for chat-oriented characters.
- Optional: Unarmed, Melee Weapons, Guns, Explosives, Energy Weapons.
This tier is the last but not the least. It’s highly suggested tagging at least one skill from this category if you plan to fight with enemies. Unarmed and Melee Weapons are good for close combats, other stats cover range combats. Choose skills depending on your build.
Exact character builds
Here we want to introduce some sample builds which will be effective during the game for sure. However, you can combine these examples creating your own unique hero. Try different playstyles to decide which one suits you better and then start the real game. Note that you are free to change presented builds. For example, lasers are good weapons for each character as well as Comprehension and Educated perks.
Here are main builds:
Melee Warrior
Probably, one of the most difficult builds. You will use only melee weapons and confront foes in close combats. For this, you will need high agility and fast movement as well as long jumps and enough protection. Select perks and traits which increase the damage against specific types of enemies, e.g. Hunter against animals or Living Anatomy against humans. You also want high enough crit chance and stealth level to perform deadly melee attacks.
Attributes (ST – PE – EN – CH – IN – AG – LK): 7 – 4 – 6 – 5 – 6 – 5 – 7.
Skills: Melee Weapons, Medicine, and Sneak.
Companions: ED-E and Craig Boone OR Arcade Gannon.
Unarmed Warrior
This build is pretty close to the previous one but it’s even more complicated. At the beginning, you will fight with bare hands. The thing is that you should act sneakier, perform more critical attacks, and find better weapons such as Knuckles ASAP. High Speech can help you to avoid unnecessary combats. Also, try to complete a few side missions to learn powerful moves for close combats.
Attributes: 7 – 4 – 6 – 5 – 5 – 5 – 8.
Skills: Unarmed, Medicine, and Sneak.
Companions: ED-E and Craig Boone OR Arcade Gannon.
Sniper
Unlike both previous builds, this one is the easiest. Sniper weapons are your best friends but you should acquire some pistols or SMGs for middle ranges. Using V.A.T.S. to perform deadly shots in heads is crucial, so you have to invest extra points in AG. Don’t forget to sneak as hostiles can slay you from ambush easily. All perks and traits should complement your style increasing the damage, range, critical hits, and a number of action points.
Attributes: 4 – 7 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 – 7.
Skills: Guns, Lockpick, and Sneak.
Companions: Rex and Veronica Santangelo OR Lily Bowen.
Tank
The death machine is the most straightforward build that can focus on regular guns or lasers. Anyway, you want good armor and high HP pool to protect yourself against hostiles. Perks, traits, and skills depend on the chosen weapons type. It will be useful to minimize unnecessary items in your bag so far as heavy armor and weapons weigh a lot. Even if you aren’t a pyromaniac be sure to invest some points in Explosives for additional damage.
Attributes: 7 – 7 – 6 – 4 – 7 – 4 – 5.
Skills: Guns OR Energy Weapons, Explosives, and Repair.
Companions: ED-E and any ranged humanoid companion.
Laser Gunner
Here we have glass cannon. When Tank focuses both on damaging and protecting, Laser Gunner wants to annihilate foes before they can reach him. Lasers are wonderful when it comes to crippling enemies, especially, when you use V.A.T.S. Choose those perks which can help you to keep your equipment in the ideal condition and deal additional damage. Action points are crucial for aiming with V.A.T.S., as well.
Attributes: 4 – 7 – 5 – 6 – 6 – 6 – 6.
Skills: Energy Weapons, Science, and Repair OR Barter.
Companions: Rex and Cass OR Lily Bowen.
Negotiator
Yes, it’s almost impossible to finish the game without a single kill. But you can try and create a talkative hero who will solve all his problems via dialogues. Note that a lot of checks during interactions require a high level of certain skill, so you should invest in almost all features equally. However, we recommend taking at least one weapon-related attribute for tough situations when you cannot persuade enemies.
Attributes: 4 – 5 – 4 – 9 – 9 – 5 – 5.
Skills: Speech, Barter, and Survival.
Companions: really anybody.
Stealth Boy
Do you want to become an invisible thief crawling in shadows? Then choose this build. It allows you to pass guards, open doors, and hack terminals to get access to well-protected areas. When it comes to fights, use melee weapons or put a few mines in key places to deal with all enemies at once. Choose perks that boost your hero at night. The combination of Silent Running and Travel Light is wonderful, also.
Attributes: 4 – 7 – 4 – 5 – 7 – 7 – 7.
Skills: Speech, Sneak, and Science.
Companions: it’s better to work alone.
In addition, we have two unusual builds for specific events:
Hardcore Mode
This build is really the best for Hardcore Mode as its title states. The main purpose of it is to let you survive alone in the Wasteland. For this, invest a lot of points in Survival to create cool consumables. We suggest taking some perks that affect your inventory because ammo has weight in this mode. Also, focus on lasers so far as they are based on the same type of ammo. Another valuable perk is Educated, it gives you additional skill points.
Attributes: 5 – 5 – 6 – 5 – 7 – 6 – 5.
Skills: Survival, Guns OR Energy Weapons, and Barter.
Companions: ED-E and Craig Boone.
Starter
This build is designed for the easiest start of the game that takes action in Goodsprings. It focuses on extremely high IN which gives your character a lot of skill points. After the beginning, you can create any desired build from this one depending on your chosen perks and skills. We highly suggest taking Comprehension and Educated, although. This build is our leader as it allows developing the Courier as you wish.
Attributes: 5 – 5 – 5 – 5 – 10 – 5 – 5.
Skills: Speech, Barter, and Explosives.
Companions: depend on your further playstyle.
Fallout New Vegas Starting Skills Reddit
Choose the best character build or create your unusual one to succeed in the game!
Fallout New Vegas Walkthrough
Published inFallout: New Vegas tips, tricks, strategy guide
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