Fallout 3

Attributes, Skills & Perks

• Charisma is fairly useless as Speech checks are far more frequent in dialogue than Charisma checks and you can simply tag Speech if you want to be good at talking.

• While Luck is otherwise not crucial, the powerful "Better Criticals" perk which increases Critical Hit damage by 50% does require 6 Luck and 6 Perception.

• Intelligence shouldn't be neglected on any character as skill points are useful no matter the build.

• What skills you tag in the beginning doesn't have a dramatic effect on your character, so tag whatever you believe to be useful early on such as a weapon skill and Lockpicking and/or Science. You're also given a second chance to readjust your skills and attributes once the tutorial is over.

• Hacking and lockpicking checks always require either 25, 50, 75 or 100 Science/Lockpicking, so aim for those numbers if you want to access as many things as possible. Of these two, Lockpicking is arguably more useful as many things accessible by hacking such as safes can also be broken into directly with lockpicking.

• While the Repair skill is very useful, you will eventually encounter NPCs who can repair anything to full durability assuming you can afford it. Also, unique weapons can also be repaired with their mundane counterparts, and vice versa.

• The perks that give you extra skills points from leveling up (Educated) and from books (Comprehension) are both quite useful and worth taking early. Other skill point-increasing perks, as well as experience-increasing ones, tend to be skippable.

• While the Bloody Mess perk can be funny, everything exploding into chunks can make looting groups of enemies a chore.

• If you can't come up with a perk to pick, don't forget about Intense Training. Attributes are difficult to increase permanently, so even just +1 to one of your choice can be helpful.

General Advice

• It's worth picking up as much as you can carry from the starting area for some early spending money and repair fodder.

• Early on, it's possible to skip parts of the main quest if you're enthusiastic in your exploring, but this won't break anything permanently.

• Hold down your Pip-Boy button to activate a short-range flashlight, but remember to turn it off if you're trying to be stealthy.

• You can always back out of terminal hacking mid-attempt to avoid getting locked out. Also, finding various closed brackets like () or [] in the lines of garbage between the words will remove wrong answers from the list or refresh your attempts.

• Handling the atomic bomb situation in Megaton nets you your personal housing where you can safely stash your gear and rest.

• Certain miscellaneous items such as Pre-War Books and Sugar Bombs can be given to specific people for extra money. Nuka-Cola Quantum bottles are of special note, as a certain quest requires bringing 30 of them to the quest giver.

• Keep an eye out for Vault-Tec bobbleheads, one exists for each skill and attribute and they give permanent bonuses. One (Medicine) can be found at the very beginning of the game on your father's desk.

• Ammo and stimpaks have no carry weight so they essentially double as currency. If a vendor is out of money, consider trading your loot for ammo and stimpaks which you can later sell to someone else if you've no use for them.

• While headshots tend to be the most effective in combat, sometimes it can be worth crippling an opponent's arm to cause them to drop their weapon, or crippling their legs to reduce their movement speed.