After having played the game twice with a typical charismatic cookie-cutting sniper, I've decided to try something else. I plan to only play in real time.
Heavy weapons are lovely to use and when I played mission 8-16 before heavy weapons users were responsible for most my kills. And I've never used a melee character before as they had no room in my previous games where I relied on outranging my enemies, so it'll be a fun change, I hope.
Anyway, since super muties lack sprites for all small arms, I've decided to rough it out melee in the first 7 missions before I get my hands on a heavy weapon. First 3 missions shouldn't be too bad since the weak raiders are piss-poor shots and with some armor and while doing the missions at night they will (hopefully) be perfectly incapable of hitting me. I guess missions 4-7 will be a tad harder since the enemies there are more capable.
On to the character I've planned:
Stats:
8 strength - enough to wield pretty much all weapons, and buffout:ed I should be able to bash stuff pretty well.
10 perception - I'll rely on outrange:ing most stuff
7 endurance - When taking Elixir of Life into account, I'll have access to the awesome perk "tough hide".
1 charisma - Don't need no damn help, and I'm always swimming in money anyway.
3 intellect - I feel 11 skillpoints / level is a minimum, especially since I've got 4 tagged skills to fill up. Would ideally be higher, but I can't afford taking from any other ability.
8 agility - As high as it goes for muties. It affects 3 of my 4 tagged skills, my movement rate and I need the action points to hit my target swiftly.
3 luck - trash attribute. What would I need it for?
Tag skills:
Heavy weapons - It'll be my weapon of choice for missions 8 and onward.
Unarmed - I get it from the Ham Fisted trait and with power gloves and 10 str I should be able to smash stuff without too much difficulty. Starts off at 82! Enough to hit everything in the early levels with a 95% chance. Is there any reason to raise this to 100 or beyond? How hard are enemies to hit at the later levels? Does it do anything but raise my % to hit?
Sneaking - Since I don't wear any armor, I get no penalty here and with 8 agility I'm off to a healthy start. I hate rounding a corner only to have the enemies get the jump on me. This will help me avoid such ambushes. Plus I'll need it to position myself to deliver my righteous beatdowns. Starts off at 44.
Doctor - Since I'll be playing solo and not cheesing it with reloads and stuff, I need it to reliably get rid of bandages and crippled limbs. Starts off at 21.
Traits:
Vat skin - 10 extra AC is huge. It'll make me harder to hit and combined with the perception penalties to people near me, I should be able to take on several enemies at once. Since I will soloing the game, there's no penalty to getting it.
Ham Fisted - Sure it affects a few skills, but to do the first missions without unarmed tagged would suck and I don't have the skillpoints to compensate the tagging. Guess I could get Gifted instead, but it's such a great trait it feels like cheating to take it.
Perks:
Since muties got a perk rate of 4, I'll be a few behind humans.
Level 4: Save to level 6 to get Silent Running. I will rely heavily on sneaking, so it's a no-brainer.
Level 8: Loner. +10 to all rolls sounds nice. Does this mean a +10 to all my skills when determing rolls like chance for attack to hit/chance to unlock?
Level 12: Tough Hide. An amazing +15 AC and +10 all res in one single skill! With 8 agility, vat skin and tough hide I'll be sitting at 33 AC with 35 all res. With the cow skin armor it'll be even higher, but I'm unsure if I'll be using it. It's pretty cheap. Quite decent considering I'll have no armor check penalties to my skills.
Level 16: Bonus Rate of Fire. Will be about bloody time. To be really effective, I'd take steady arm at level 4, but I feel a stealth character is simply too annoying to play without Silent Running.
Level 20: Steady arm perhaps? Not really sure what I need here...
Level 24: Sniper, obviously.
I plan to pop buffout for all missions. It has a duration of 2 hours real-time. And I can't see myself playing any mission for longer than that. My general plan of attack will be to sneak/run up to enemies and attacking them crouched. Ideally, I'll beat them to a pulp before they can respond since I'll do 4 attacks without wait time inbetween in real time. It'll be fast enough to interrupt all their attempts to fight back, assuming they hit. When I face groups, I'll try to either lure them away from eachother, or in worst case position myself between my target and them to use him as a human shield. My raw throwing skill will be 33, which is sufficient to lob a few grenades at especially thick clusters to thin them out.
On the mission where you retrieve batteries, I'll recruit a second char to help me keep the doors shut. On the one you've got to defent the ghoul town, I'll get a full squad since I can't be everywhere at once.
On out-range:ing stuff: Their chance to hit you is affected by your armor class, and mine 'll be 33, which is than most dedicated snipers. Some heavy weapons have a range of 45 - only 5 behind the sniper rifle! - so I'll be able to hit stuff from real far away with 10 perception and a bunch of points pumped into heavy weapons. Plus I'll hit tons and tons of secondaries. The bugged calculations will allow me to shoot at a target which I have a 0% chance to hit and at the same time riddle those next to him with holes who I'd othervise be unable to hit. And face it, the coolest weapons are in the heavy weapons group. Why plink away with a rifle when you can carry a minigun or rocket launcher?
Heavy weapons are lovely to use and when I played mission 8-16 before heavy weapons users were responsible for most my kills. And I've never used a melee character before as they had no room in my previous games where I relied on outranging my enemies, so it'll be a fun change, I hope.
Anyway, since super muties lack sprites for all small arms, I've decided to rough it out melee in the first 7 missions before I get my hands on a heavy weapon. First 3 missions shouldn't be too bad since the weak raiders are piss-poor shots and with some armor and while doing the missions at night they will (hopefully) be perfectly incapable of hitting me. I guess missions 4-7 will be a tad harder since the enemies there are more capable.
On to the character I've planned:
Stats:
8 strength - enough to wield pretty much all weapons, and buffout:ed I should be able to bash stuff pretty well.
10 perception - I'll rely on outrange:ing most stuff
7 endurance - When taking Elixir of Life into account, I'll have access to the awesome perk "tough hide".
1 charisma - Don't need no damn help, and I'm always swimming in money anyway.
3 intellect - I feel 11 skillpoints / level is a minimum, especially since I've got 4 tagged skills to fill up. Would ideally be higher, but I can't afford taking from any other ability.
8 agility - As high as it goes for muties. It affects 3 of my 4 tagged skills, my movement rate and I need the action points to hit my target swiftly.
3 luck - trash attribute. What would I need it for?
Tag skills:
Heavy weapons - It'll be my weapon of choice for missions 8 and onward.
Unarmed - I get it from the Ham Fisted trait and with power gloves and 10 str I should be able to smash stuff without too much difficulty. Starts off at 82! Enough to hit everything in the early levels with a 95% chance. Is there any reason to raise this to 100 or beyond? How hard are enemies to hit at the later levels? Does it do anything but raise my % to hit?
Sneaking - Since I don't wear any armor, I get no penalty here and with 8 agility I'm off to a healthy start. I hate rounding a corner only to have the enemies get the jump on me. This will help me avoid such ambushes. Plus I'll need it to position myself to deliver my righteous beatdowns. Starts off at 44.
Doctor - Since I'll be playing solo and not cheesing it with reloads and stuff, I need it to reliably get rid of bandages and crippled limbs. Starts off at 21.
Traits:
Vat skin - 10 extra AC is huge. It'll make me harder to hit and combined with the perception penalties to people near me, I should be able to take on several enemies at once. Since I will soloing the game, there's no penalty to getting it.
Ham Fisted - Sure it affects a few skills, but to do the first missions without unarmed tagged would suck and I don't have the skillpoints to compensate the tagging. Guess I could get Gifted instead, but it's such a great trait it feels like cheating to take it.
Perks:
Since muties got a perk rate of 4, I'll be a few behind humans.
Level 4: Save to level 6 to get Silent Running. I will rely heavily on sneaking, so it's a no-brainer.
Level 8: Loner. +10 to all rolls sounds nice. Does this mean a +10 to all my skills when determing rolls like chance for attack to hit/chance to unlock?
Level 12: Tough Hide. An amazing +15 AC and +10 all res in one single skill! With 8 agility, vat skin and tough hide I'll be sitting at 33 AC with 35 all res. With the cow skin armor it'll be even higher, but I'm unsure if I'll be using it. It's pretty cheap. Quite decent considering I'll have no armor check penalties to my skills.
Level 16: Bonus Rate of Fire. Will be about bloody time. To be really effective, I'd take steady arm at level 4, but I feel a stealth character is simply too annoying to play without Silent Running.
Level 20: Steady arm perhaps? Not really sure what I need here...
Level 24: Sniper, obviously.
I plan to pop buffout for all missions. It has a duration of 2 hours real-time. And I can't see myself playing any mission for longer than that. My general plan of attack will be to sneak/run up to enemies and attacking them crouched. Ideally, I'll beat them to a pulp before they can respond since I'll do 4 attacks without wait time inbetween in real time. It'll be fast enough to interrupt all their attempts to fight back, assuming they hit. When I face groups, I'll try to either lure them away from eachother, or in worst case position myself between my target and them to use him as a human shield. My raw throwing skill will be 33, which is sufficient to lob a few grenades at especially thick clusters to thin them out.
On the mission where you retrieve batteries, I'll recruit a second char to help me keep the doors shut. On the one you've got to defent the ghoul town, I'll get a full squad since I can't be everywhere at once.
On out-range:ing stuff: Their chance to hit you is affected by your armor class, and mine 'll be 33, which is than most dedicated snipers. Some heavy weapons have a range of 45 - only 5 behind the sniper rifle! - so I'll be able to hit stuff from real far away with 10 perception and a bunch of points pumped into heavy weapons. Plus I'll hit tons and tons of secondaries. The bugged calculations will allow me to shoot at a target which I have a 0% chance to hit and at the same time riddle those next to him with holes who I'd othervise be unable to hit. And face it, the coolest weapons are in the heavy weapons group. Why plink away with a rifle when you can carry a minigun or rocket launcher?