Fallout 4

[jiminator]

you should probably plan out your build along one skill set. melee, heavy weapons, energy weapons, automatic weapons or silenced weapons. Also split between guns and rifles. Then look at the associated perks and plan them out. With stealth/silencer you can boost damage to 4.3x after all perks are applied. Never really run out of ammo. Gotta imagine that is a problem for the other choices, excluding melee.

The settlements, well, they may help with getting some legendary weapons with level 4 vendors, but I have never gotten shit from mine. But you will probably be OP anyway.

 

[chenw]

I went with:

3 STR (for the armor mods)
4 PER (for lockpicking, you couldn't convince me to leave doors unopened)
1 END (all of the END perks just look really lackluster, neither did I have any points to spare. I also don't use VATS so AP recovery is not a great issue)
6 CHA (For local Leader)
9 INT (For Nuclear Physicist, hacking and science, as well as general XP boost)
1 AGI
5 LCK (all of my left over points)

These total 29 points, which is the 28 points you are given by the game and 1 point from "You are SPECIAL!" Book at the beginning of the game.

My gameplay style is, build everything (hence the local leader and all of the crafting perks), loot everything (Luck, scrounger help with look, Lockpicking and Hacking to stop things getting in my way of the said loot)

If I went stealth, I would have dropped INT down to 6 (for Science perk), and drop LCK down to 2 (keeping scrounger) and pump AGI up to 7 (for Ninja and Mr Sandman), which opens up Pistol, Rifle and Automatic weapons as you see fit.

I tried the stealth approach until I got to the first Minuteman mission and I ended up spending 80% of the my time at the raider's base out of stealth mode, so I decided to ditch it entirely and focused on combat and crafting skills.

However, your play style may be drastically different to mine, I actually enjoy running settlements, even though it can be frustrating at time (EG disappearing NPCs, especially the level 4 merchants), so I have quit FO4 until GECK is released and community patch to fix some of the more annoying settlement bugs.

Once that's done though, I might give sneak a more serious try, but I am wary of the changes they made to Sneaking in FO4 (since when is raiders allowed to peep out of a doorway!? they were supposed to run down the hall way for me to sneak crit them!)

 

[Parja]

Some questions without spoilers if possible. Is this game exceptionally grindy?

Nope, not at all. You'll run into some areas that are above your level, but that just means you'll have to back off and do some quests in lower level areas first.

Is the settlement building essentially required to do basic functions? Or can you enjoy the game without bothering with that stuff?

Nope, no need to do any settlement building. The starting town has all of the crafting stations available, so there's nothing you need to build up in that regard.

Likewise, is the combat better than FO3/NV? Can you quick swap between a few different weapons rather than switching to and from the Pipboy every time you want to throw a grenade or something?

Setup some hotkeys and go to town.

The lack of SPECIAL points in this game is borderline crippling to my play style

Why? Just level up your SPECIAL stats to where you need them.

 

[Skott]

Don't forget once you get over say level 50 you will pretty much have whatever build you are doing mainly done and after level 50 you can just fill in with things you would like. You never stop leveling. Most builds you see on YT are level 50 builds becuase after that its pretty much anything you want. I think its at level 230 you will have all the skills and the perks in the game. That is if take your character that high and you certainly won't need them all.

 

[chenw]

Why? Just level up your SPECIAL stats to where you need them.

I always avoid spending precious perks on SPECIAL points, especially now that SPECIAL points are woefully weak. I much prefer having my character planned out from the very beginning, and only use perks for SPECIALS when I have the spare perks to do so (which didn't happen for me until level 35 or so).

However, I would admit I was rather fixated on Nuclear Physicist as I had no idea how fast FC's would run out in power armor, or how rare/expensive they are. It was only later that I found I could use settlements to literally farm money for me, which pretty much pays for all of the fusion cores I would need. That and I am not a fan of the way Power Armor works in this game (the limbs break FAR too easily, even at maxed MK, I almost literally have to repair my and my companion's PA after every freaking fight, or else limbs would break) so I haven't been using PA that much. Without NP I would get another 3 stats available (INT 7 & 8 perks are useless).

 

[jiminator]

you level faster with more int, so not "useless"

 

[chenw]

No, but the same can be said with any SPECIAL stat.

With regards to INT, I haven't been able to find out what is the XP progression between levels, but the XP difference between level 9 INT and level 6 INT is only 7.6% (127% base XP vs 118% base XP), so I would not be surprised if doesn't pay off in any reasonable amount of time. Almost certainly won't outweigh the 3 extra SPECIAL perks you would need to take to get certain perks.

I have not played enough of the game to know for sure if the INT 9 vs INT 6 would lock you out of anything, only a shortcut has that check IIRC.

EDIT: Just did a quick calculation, assuming the XP required per level is 200 + 75 * Level, you will need to reach level 66 on INT 6 before INT 9 gets 3 levels ahead, assuming everything else being equal, and ignoring Idiot Savant (if you also take Idiot savant, it would take even longer because XP average actually decreases with higher INT). INT 9 becomes 1 level ahead INT 6 at level 16 INT 6, 2 levels at 34. A net gain of 4 level (IE that's when you start reaping the benefit of having 3 INT as opposed to 3 of other stats you require to get a specific perk) doesn't occur until level 92, well beyond the point where planning ceases to matter.

So my conclusion on the matter is, putting INT is a good idea until you starting needing to use perks to replace the stats from elsewhere, then it becomes bad.

 

[Parja]

I always avoid spending precious perks on SPECIAL points, especially now that SPECIAL points are woefully weak. I much prefer having my character planned out from the very beginning, and only use perks for SPECIALS when I have the spare perks to do so (which didn't happen for me until level 35 or so).

Yeah, the SPECIAL points themselves don't really make that much difference. They're really just a pre-req for perks, so look at having to spend points on SPECIAL to be an added cost for those higher level perks. I typically figure out where I eventually want my SPECIAL points to be for a given build, then back off for the "You're SPECIAL" book you get right away, the PER bobblehead you get very early, and the STR, INT, LCK, and CHA bobbleheads that are pretty easy to get.

 

[jiminator]

eh, if you wanted to min/max perks you would have to wait until they are 9 before collecting the bobbleheads. not a good design IMO.

 

[MavericK]

Maxing out SPECIAL / whatever is really not that big of a deal. By level 40 or 50 you become so obscenely powerful it doesn't matter anyway.

Starting with decently high INT and getting Idiot Savant as soon as possible is a pretty good way to go for maximum leveling and thus maximum perks / SPECIAL.

 

[chenw]

eh, if you wanted to min/max perks you would have to wait until they are 9 before collecting the bobbleheads. not a good design IMO.

Actually it should be 10, SPECIALS are not capped at 10 in FO4 IIRC, unless they changed that recently.

I once thought about doing it, but in the end I decided I cannot afford to wait until that long, so for all intents and purposes I count the perception bobblehead as my 30th starting SPECIAL point.

Maxing out SPECIAL / whatever is really not that big of a deal. By level 40 or 50 you become so obscenely powerful it doesn't matter anyway.

Starting with decently high INT and getting Idiot Savant as soon as possible is a pretty good way to go for maximum leveling and thus maximum perks / SPECIAL.

Actually, while that is true for level 1 savant, with level 2 you actually get LESS XP with high INT than you would with low INT, unless if your INT is higher than 10 or exactly 1 (between 1 and 10 the average XP peaks at level 2), level 15 INT is the minimum level before INT actually nets you extra XP over INT 2. This, of course, assumes you are not save-scumming for the Idiot Savant to kick in.

I don't consider maxing out SPECIAL as a goal either because most of the time there is no perk I am interested in at those very high INT, except maybe Nuclear Physicist (the Fusion Core benefit), but for all intents and purposes the highest SPECIAL stat I would need for non-niche perk is AGI 7, which is Ninja. And the effects of SPECIAL is even less pronounced than in FO3/NV. I only strive to max out whatever I want to do in the game, but changes to Sneak, and the large amount of Perks required for it to work basically got me to put it on hold.

I will say some of the Perks, especially the Endurance and and high level SPECIAL ones really needs overhaul. For example, most would realise that Toughness perks pale into utter insignificance once you start using Power Armor continuously, assuming Toughness even stack with Power Armor, Ballistic Weave compounds the matter even further, (refractor is another, except worse because it requires level 7 PER) whereas Gun Slinger for example, continues to benefit you throughout the game if you use pistols, or Rifleman if you use Semi-autos.

 

[CaptNumbNutz]

I just counted all the power armor in my garage. I've checked every map and guide. I have 27 suits total, one of them I bought for some silly reason when I had too many caps. According to guides there are 28 in wasteland, even more if there is a way to retrieve the frames off dead BoS knights and Raiders. I believe the 2 I'm missing were Raider's, One from MedTek Research, and the other from the Super Duper Mart cave in the Glowing Sea. The Medtek one was because I couldn't kill the guy before he hopped into it, and the one in the Glowing Sea Cave I never found.
I have about 9 X-01's (4 complete), 6 T-60's (4 complete), 5 T-51's (4 complete), 6 T-41's (4 complete), and 1 Raider. Since there are no more X-01's to be found, I'm going to finish them off with T-60 armor that I can buy.


=====================

I'm about to reach the point of no return on the quests.

I'm also planning on doing mods finally.

How do I back up the save file properly in case I screw something up? I want to be able to take the save, drop it on an external drive, then re-install FO4 at a later date and be able to pick up where I left off.

I'm on Win10 and using Steam version, if that makes any difference to the file structure.

 

[chenw]

That means there are 25 out in the wasteland, even more if there is a way to retrieve the frames off dead BoS knights and Raiders.

According to Fallout Wikia, there is a way to get power armor from power armor users:

Shoot or steal the fusion cores off the power armor, that will force the users to come out of their power armor, and you can claim it as your own.

But the Power armor frame would be tagged as Stolen, where as all of the other parts of the armor will not.

Note that this is easier done with the Penetrator perk so you can shoot the fusion core from any angle rather than exclusively from the back.

 

[jiminator]

try turning off cloud saves (just in case)

go to C:\Users\XXX\Documents\My Games\Fallout4\Saves

For power armor, I think there is one that respawns indefinitely, you have to pull the core though

It is the woman on a bridge or something, in the center of town

 

[AceGoober]

You would be correct. SPECIAL isn't capped at 10. Once hitting 10 then grab the Bobblehead to push to 11.

Does having any SPECIAL above 10 make a difference? None that I've seen. Maybe future DLC will expand the Perk chart so 11+ SPECIAL will have a use. Who knows...

Actually it should be 10, SPECIALS are not capped at 10 in FO4 IIRC, unless they changed that recently.

I once thought about doing it, but in the end I decided I cannot afford to wait until that long, so for all intents and purposes I count the perception bobblehead as my 30th starting SPECIAL point.

 

[Parja]

eh, if you wanted to min/max perks you would have to wait until they are 9 before collecting the bobbleheads. not a good design IMO.

Why would you have to do that? Other than having a natural 10 in a SPECIAL stat and boosting it to 11 with the bobblehead, it doesn't make any difference when you take a point in a stat vs. boosting it with a bobblehead.

And if this was in response to my post, I don't really care about ever maxing out ALL of the perks. I just want to get access to all of the perks relevant to my build plan.

 

[chenw]

You would be correct. SPECIAL isn't capped at 10. Once hitting 10 then grab the Bobblehead to push to 11.

Does having any SPECIAL above 10 make a difference? None that I've seen. Maybe future DLC will expand the Perk chart so 11+ SPECIAL will have a use. Who knows...

Apart from the SPECIAL point effects themselves, no. But there is at least 1 'Break point' of sorts with regards to INT, if you have both INT and Idiot Savant, the average xp you get starts increasing again after INT 10, but it only increases beyond INT 2 (the max before the reversal) until INT 15.

I actually beiief that the game could do with more useful versions of the perks we have as opposed to adding new ones. For example, Toughness (and especially Refractor, since it requires high PER) are both nearly useless after a certain point (50 damage resist points gets drowned out by various other boosts you acquire in the game, notably from Armorer and Science, both of which are also useful for things not increasing your DR, Ballistic Weave and Power armor are final nails in that coffin), but perks like Gun Slinger, Rifleman, etc continue to be useful throughout the game, as long as you keep using the weapons.

The perk definitely needs an overhaul, and I really believe they should do away with the time dependent perks (Solar powered for example) and instead just make it passives that apply all the time.

 

[Parja]

Actually it should be 10, SPECIALS are not capped at 10 in FO4 IIRC, unless they changed that recently.

I once thought about doing it, but in the end I decided I cannot afford to wait until that long, so for all intents and purposes I count the perception bobblehead as my 30th starting SPECIAL point.

Meh, 11 in any stat doesn't increase perk availability, though.

You must post on a number of Fallout 4 forums. 'Cuz you posted almost the same info in post 4911 and post 4917.

I'm ok with Toughness only really being useful early. It's a tier 1 perk, after all. The problem is, you have other tier 1 perks like Iron Fist and Gunslinger that are roughly a bajillion times more effective later on. 5 ranks for 50 Damage Resistance is pretty silly, though. For the same cost, you would be much better off taking 2 points of Endurance and the 3 ranks of Life Giver.

 

[chenw]

Meh, 11 in any stat doesn't increase perk availability, though.

You must post on a number of Fallout 4 forums. 'Cuz you posted almost the same info in post 4911 and post 4917.

I'm ok with Toughness only really being useful early. It's a tier 1 perk, after all. The problem is, you have other tier 1 perks like Iron Fist and Gunslinger that are roughly a bajillion times more effective later on. 5 ranks for 50 Damage Resistance is pretty silly, though. For the same cost, you would be much better off taking 2 points of Endurance and the 3 ranks of Life Giver.

I don't, but I only realised that fact AFTER I posted the second post LOL.

I had thought about lifegiver, but I ended up getting Medic instead. However, I play on Normal and there have been only a few instances where I repeatedly die (and mainly vs Sentry Bots and the Queen), and power armor largely negates the need for a large health pool. In the end I found all END perks (and no, you did not see what I did there) to be fairly lackluster and played with only 1 END on my first play through with no major ill results.

 

[AceGoober]

Took me roughly six hours to complete Automatron on Very Hard without using Fast Travel. DLC is well worth the money. Got my butt whipped more times during those six hours than I have over the past month. There is a nice little surprise at the end.

 

[KickAssCop]

I have the game on both platforms (PC/PS4). Started on both but did not progress. Which is a better platform to play on? How long is main campaign with decent side questing? I remember spending about 55 hours in FO3 + expansions.

 

[Comixbooks]

How do I access the DLC in game?

 

[carnageX]

How do I access the DLC in game?

When you load up the game with the DLC enabled, it should pop up with a quest start that tells you to listen to the Caravan Distress Signal. Doing that will give you the location of the first quest.

Supposedly there's confirmed Silver Shroud dialog options in the DLC....so I'm definitely going to gear up as SS for some hilarity.

 

[Parja]

I have the game on both platforms (PC/PS4). Started on both but did not progress. Which is a better platform to play on?

How is this even a question, particularly for a Bethesda game? PC...always PC.

Supposedly there's confirmed Silver Shroud dialog options in the DLC....so I'm definitely going to gear up as SS for some hilarity.

Awesome! Silver Shroud is definitely one of the best parts of the game. The voice over work for that dialog was brilliantly done.

 

[Nettwerk]

I have the game on both platforms (PC/PS4). Started on both but did not progress. Which is a better platform to play on? How long is main campaign with decent side questing? I remember spending about 55 hours in FO3 + expansions.

I just finished my first play through at 66 hours this weekend.

 

[Comixbooks]

I'm so far behind I'm level 7 just finished the Valentine quest =)

 

[RW2112]

Automatron was a fun run for sure. Nice after the quest line to have a robotic companion available, always wanted an Assaultron to travel with me.

 

[chenw]

I'm so far behind I'm level 7 just finished the Valentine quest =)

Nowhere near as bad as me.

I didn't do Valentine's quest until late 20's and I still haven't gotten past the point of no return after 70+ hours played with 44h recorded on my latest savegame.

Although I haven't finished the main quest in Skyrim either. Exploring, side quest and settlement building took more of my time.

Also, didn't know the DLC was already available, didn't get the message in game last night, and the DLC was labeled as only to be released in April....

Still, probably will wait until GECK release.

 

[RW2112]

I've gotten in 570 hrs currently in the game, having done from start 4 separate times doing all the possible faction playthroughs...

 

[chenw]

My DLC is labeled for release for April 9th rather than 22nd March, for some reason, perhaps localisation? Not that I use it, I always play in English.

Guess 2 weeks of wait is in order for me, and I tried the unticking/reticking the box in the DLC window, doesn't work.

 

[Comixbooks]

Just finished the Kellogg Quest think I'm only level 9 I must say the controls of this game are really awkward you think they could of done a better job playing with a X-Box one controller.

 

[Deleted whining member 223597]

Just finished the Kellogg Quest think I'm only level 9 I must say the controls of this game are really awkward you think they could of done a better job playing with a X-Box one controller.

Worked just fine for me, not sure what you're talking about. Maybe the aim assist? It's pretty low and makes combat kind of iffy with a controller.

 

[MavericK]

I think I stopped playing just before choosing a side...need to go back and finish.

 

[Parja]

Just finished the Kellogg Quest think I'm only level 9 I must say the controls of this game are really awkward you think they could of done a better job playing with a X-Box one controller.

Uhh, you mean you killed him? At level 9? That's crazy. You must be doing nothing but the main storyline quest. That fight had to be rough.

Damn, I'm level 30 on my current playthrough and I haven't even bothered to save Valentine yet. Soon...maybe.

 

[Deleted whining member 223597]

Uhh, you mean you killed him? At level 9? That's crazy. You must be doing nothing but the main storyline quest. That fight had to be rough.

Damn, I'm level 30 on my current playthrough and I haven't even bothered to save Valentine yet. Soon...maybe.

Doesn't it scale with your level? I don't think that fight was all that difficult because Kellogg seems to run away and hide in a corner so you can take out his guards.

 

[Parja]

Doesn't it scale with your level? I don't think that fight was all that difficult because Kellogg seems to run away and hide in a corner so you can take out his guards.

I figured his minimum level would be pretty high.

According to this: Conrad Kellogg

...his minimum level is 15 and he scales at 1.5x the player level. Fighting him at 9, he'd be level 15 and have 330hp. So guess he really wouldn't be that hard to beat.

 

[Comixbooks]

I killed him ducking down while using a Machine gun on him =) Took a few tries he went invisible for a while If you don't take out the Guards I died in one second =)

 

[pothb]

I figured his minimum level would be pretty high.

According to this: Conrad Kellogg

...his minimum level is 15 and he scales at 1.5x the player level. Fighting him at 9, he'd be level 15 and have 330hp. So guess he really wouldn't be that hard to beat.

Shit, so you're saying I fought him when he was like lvl 50 or something? Geez. Bitch was hard as hell for me. Played on Survival, the bullet sponging can be deadly.

 

[GOD'SlittleSERVANT]

DLC came out? Snap, looks like it's time to reinstall.

 

[AceGoober]

Goobernaught is alive!

Dumber than a bag of rocks when going over terrain but still fights fairly well.