On my second playthrough I wanted to develop the perfect character knowing all that I've learned from the first time through. I picked just the right SPECIAL attributes and developed the skills I thought I'd need early. One thing I wanted to do was get as many of the skill books as I could as early as possible, before starting any of the quests so my skills would start out high. (I know, some people think that's no way to play and it's sorta cheating because I know where they all are, and there are plenty of skill points to be had in the game, blah blah blah - but I was having fun and it was an interesting challenge for a second time through).

I was surprised how quickly my level kept increasing. Without doing any quests I was up to level 10 by the time I made it down the road and back up all the way to McCarran. Some of those skill books were HARD to get at a low level too!

Well, I made a huge mistake. I kept picking the Swift Learner perk when I meant to pick the Educated perk. Educated gives you two extra SKILL points on level up while Swift Learner gives you 10% more XP points! I totally got them confused. Now I'm all the way up to level 14. Swift learner was the LAST perk I wanted to choose and here I picked it TWICE. Wah!

Also, I'd been hearing about how awesome Hand Loader was so I finally got around to selecting it but guess what? It requires 70 Repair. I thought I was so clever only getting Repair up just so far, fine tuning it so with skill books it was up to 30, no higher cause with Fixin' Things I can get it temporarily high enough to make weapon repair kits. Who needs Repair, right? So this time I guess I'll put more into Repair early on so I can use Hand Loader.

Things were never so complicated with plain FO3. I think FONV is a much better game.

I don't think I could play a character without a high repair skill.

I never put any skills higher than 88 manually(apart from explosives, that goes to 91). Otherwise I see skill books as wasted points.

you mean 84?

and explosives actually does have 4 books. its at foxtrot.

He means 88. 84 requires a perk, which are harder to come by this time around.

This.

The guide says theres only 3 books, I guess I add that to the list of guide book errors.

Owned.

Have a better plan. My character is pretty decent (bar Barter and Melee)

Barter and melee? wtf?

I mean, it's youre character but man, by lvl 10 i had all my implants and I still have over 15k caps to spend with a booty load of weapons for unarmed and melee when I only need one... shoot, I even have Built to Destroy and I get by just fine with 25 repair so far (I might get Jury Rigging, deffianately getting enough for repair kits but JR seems to be an overkill now)

in any case If you do a New Vegas Rush where you try to get to vegas ASAP (I did this when I ran straight out of goodsprings tutorial and grabbed GS snow globe, HD snowglobe, TS, STR, and MF snowglobs and and craploads of money for it) and was lvl 5... low enough to get my intelligence inplant and have it work wonders)...

Just kill NOTHING, run like a bat outta hell and wear light armor to outrun most enemies and don't kill tougher critters or complete challenges....

I can never create a perfect character either. It just seems repair is a must have skill. The jury rigging perk is the most useful perk I've encountered...not to mention the ease of repairing stuff on the go to lighten carry weight.


I wanted to make a cowboy style character, then I realized I needed a decent melee to acquire the cowboy perk...when I had guns survival and repair as tagged skills.

I have to install 90 skill points into repair, Jury Rigging is just so very invaluable to me. :bonk:

Apparently someone don't know what "bar" means.....

ya, but that perk is easily more useful than any other, except maybe educated.

I think the book only mentions some magazines, I found several in mailboxes in goodsprings that weren't in the book. I think it's a fudge up or books are random spawns because o know my first playthrough i got an explosives magazine ingoodsprings but no mention in the guide.

yes, you are really making choices with long term significance with FNV.

With FO3, it was pretty easy to max out guns, melee, lockpick and a couple other key skills over time, but with FNV some of the best perks really make you choose carefully which skills you are putting points into. kudos to the Obsidian team for thinking through the perk requirements very carefully and building in a good balance.

for example...

- Rad Child which requires 70 survival,
- Jury Rigging which requires 90 repair,
- Piercing Strike which requires 70 unarmed
- Ninja which requires 80 melee and 80 sneak
- Unstoppable Force which requires 90 melee
- Professional which requires 70 sneak

There's only one very good perk here and a bunch of mediocre ones you don't need at all even on specialized builds.

Not just Hand Loader, Jury Rigging is also an awesome perk that requires repair (90!).

IMO these are among the best perks offered in the game, although Rad Child has the greatest effect on combat.

Ultimately, it depends on personal preference, however, in FO3 it was much easier to decide which skills to put points into. The fact that you only get a perk every two levels also makes planning ahead more important.

Fo3 if you have a high enough intelligence by the time you hit lvl 20 you can easily max all your more important skills (and MUCH more) if you take the time to find the magazines.
If you get to lvl 30 you can pretty much have NO understanding of character building, have average int, live off the magazines you find randomly here and there, and you can max out most of not all skills.

FoNV is a totally different ball game. With only 15 perks (none of which really grant any skill points) and 12 skill points tops given by magazines you really have to focus on how you build your toon. If you are a baller and know how to run away from deathclaws and giant rad scorpions like a grey hound chasing rabbits you can:
Start with 9 intelligence, grab the snow glob in the cemetery, speed run all the way up to NV without killing anything, grab the snow globe in the Lucky 38, get 4000 caps, and finally grab the intelligence implant at the NV clinic to get a clean 10 int and THEN finally start lvling up. I did it and let me tell you it was one hell of a nasty trip (unless you cheat and use console commands but this was my no cheat, hardcoe, no companion, solo run through so yeah I really had one HELL of a tough time)

If you find all the skill books, you get +20 science and +16 for each of the other skills, it would be a waste of SPECIAL points to max out intelligence. Better to max out Luck instead

tag is the only one, that gives you a whole levels worth of points.

and the books basically give 4 each, since there is absolutely no reason to not take comprehension, so its 16 total for each skill.

and why would you do that? why not just put one more point into IN and get the implant for something else whenever?



no, i always max intel and get all the books. but sneak and survival still dont get maxed. so without the high intel it just wouldnt be acceptable.

OK, after some obsessive playing I've got nearly all the skill books one can get without doing quests. It's been fun. I thought it would be tedious redoing all of this so soon after doing it in my botched build but it hasn't been. This is a no spoiler forum so must be careful but one set of books was very much harder than last time. I ended up with a horde of Cazadors and Nighstalkers on my tail as I ran like a maniac for the lake, jumped in where I was promptly attacked by pissed off Lakelurks. Whew. Somehow I managed to sneak past them all last time. This time, not so lucky. I have one more skill book to retrieve before I start doing quests. It's guarded by a swarm of Cazadors I managed to sneak past last time. I'm betting this time I'll be running and screaming like a little girl to get away. Oh well.

I really like this build. I only just got to level 6 which is way better than the level 12 I got to last time at this point. I'm happy with the way my skills are progressing. I'm putting less into guns and sneak and more into repair so I can get the hand loader perk soon. Guns and sneak can wait until a bit later to develop I think. You don't need them really big for the early game. I've been neglecting lockpick and should have put a few more points there earlier though, but with 3 Tumblers Today I should be able to get it to my required 50 no problem in the next few level increases. No need to ever go any higher than that.

I really like how you have to agonize over assigning skill points, way more than in FO3. It's a better-balanced game, no question. They did that in No One Lives Forever too. In the first game they had a kind of skill system but it was lame and nobody really cared about it. But in the sequel they really beefed it up and I remember sweating and wringing my hands (metaphorically) trying to decide where to put hose precious few points every level up.