Understanding Your Core Attributes
Strength: The Foundation of Power
The foundation of any successful unarmed build New Vegas lies in understanding the SPECIAL system. These seven attributes—Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck—determine your character’s capabilities and influence your skills and perks. Choosing the right distribution is critical to your overall success.
For an unarmed build New Vegas, Strength is your cornerstone. This attribute directly impacts your damage output and carrying capacity. A higher Strength score means harder hits and the ability to haul more gear, including the heavy armor you might choose to don. Prioritize this stat!
Endurance: Durability in the Wasteland
Endurance is also key for survival. It influences your hit points, radiation resistance, and the overall hardiness of your character. In the heat of close-quarters combat, you need to be able to withstand a beating. Increased endurance will mean you can take more hits before needing a stimpak.
Agility: Unleashing Your Inner Fury
Agility is vital for your Action Points (AP). AP determines how many attacks you can perform in VATS (Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System). A higher Agility will lead to more punches, kicks, and special attacks, allowing you to dismantle your enemies quickly.
Perception, Intelligence, Charisma, and Luck
While not as critical as Strength, Endurance, and Agility, Perception still has a role to play. It influences your ability to spot enemies and affects skills such as Lockpick and Sneak, which can be useful for avoiding fights or getting the drop on enemies.
Intelligence affects your skill points gained per level, but for an unarmed build New Vegas, it’s less critical than damage output and survivability.
Charisma has minimal impact, unless you plan to do a more conversational playstyle.
Finally, Luck can influence critical hit chance and overall luck. It’s not as essential as Strength, Agility, and Endurance but can prove useful.
Consider starting with a build similar to this to get off the ground:
- Strength: Aim for a minimum of seven, maybe even eight or nine.
- Perception: 5
- Endurance: Minimum of six.
- Charisma: Dump stat.
- Intelligence: 5
- Agility: At least seven.
- Luck: 5
These suggestions can be adjusted depending on your preferred playstyle, but this provides a strong starting point.
The Skills That Matter
Unarmed: Your Primary Weapon
Skills are the tools that you use in the wasteland. Certain skills are much more valuable than others when focusing on an unarmed build New Vegas.
The primary skill is, of course, Unarmed. This directly affects the damage you deal with your fists and unarmed weapons. Invest heavily in this skill as you level up.
Survival and Medicine: Staying Alive
Survival is essential for crafting healing items, crafting food, and mitigating the effects of the harsh environment. Make sure you are constantly crafting or buying food items to heal yourself.
Medicine is important for using stimpaks and other medical supplies to mend your wounds.
Optional Skills: Lockpick, Sneak, and Speech
Optional skills to consider: Lockpick, Sneak, and Speech. Lockpick can help you get into otherwise inaccessible areas. Sneak is invaluable for stealth attacks, which can be devastating when combined with the right perks and weapons. Speech allows you to talk your way out of confrontations or gain access to quests and opportunities.
Powering Up: The Perks You Need
The Core Perks
Perks are special abilities you unlock as you level up, providing significant advantages in combat and beyond. The selection of perks is where you truly customize your build for the best unarmed build New Vegas experience.
Piercing Strike is almost mandatory. This perk allows you to ignore a percentage of your opponent’s damage resistance, allowing you to do more damage.
Slayer is an excellent choice. Slayer increases your attack speed, which is vital for landing more blows in combat and decimating your enemies faster.
Better Criticals increases the damage dealt by critical hits, a huge bonus when you learn to effectively use VATS.
Ninja is exceptionally powerful for stealth-based unarmed builds. It grants significant damage bonuses to sneak attacks with unarmed weapons.
Additional Perks
Other very beneficial perks will make your build almost unstoppable:
- Super Slam! can knock back enemies.
- Chem Resistant makes you resistant to the negative effects of chems.
- Toughness adds damage resistance to your character.
- Finesse adds a critical hit bonus.
Choosing Your Weaponry
The available weaponry plays a significant role in how your unarmed build New Vegas functions in combat.
At the start, your fists are your primary weapon. As you progress, you’ll have the chance to acquire or craft a variety of items.
Weapon Types
- Gloves increase your damage output and attack speed.
- Power Fists are some of the strongest weapons available in the game.
- Unique weapons offer special bonuses or features.
Explore the wasteland, scour vendors, and be ready to get your hands dirty to acquire the best tools for your trade.
Strategic Combat: Mastering the Dance of Brawling
Combat is the heart and soul of playing an unarmed build New Vegas.
Close Quarters and VATS
Close-quarters combat is critical. Get in close, use cover, and wear the correct armor.
Utilize the VATS system. VATS allows you to target specific limbs, increasing the chance of crippling your opponent and making them vulnerable.
Drugs and Enemy Strategies
Use drugs strategically. Buffs like Psycho or Med-X can significantly boost your combat effectiveness.
Learn the strengths and weaknesses of your opponents. Melee-focused characters are less effective against range, so use cover when appropriate.
Adapting and Evolving: Build Variations and Playstyles
The beauty of character building is the freedom to adapt it to your preferred style.
Stealth, Tank and Hybrid
- Stealth Unarmed: Focused on sneaking, critical hits, and quick takedowns.
- Tank Unarmed: Prioritize high health, damage resistance, and a willingness to wade into the thick of the fight.
- Hybrid Builds: blend different strengths.
Experiment and find what works best for you.
From Level One to Legend: Progression and Leveling Guide
- Early levels: Prioritize Unarmed, Survival, and Endurance.
- Mid-levels: Focus on perks and weapon upgrades.
- Late game: Fine-tune your skills and tactics, taking on the game’s toughest challenges.
Level-by-level, you will see the power of your build grow.
Navigating the Challenges: Addressing Limitations
- Range is a primary disadvantage. You have to get close to enemies to attack.
- Plan your engagements and be ready to utilize cover.
Conclusion: Embrace the Power of the Fist
The path of an unarmed build New Vegas is not always easy, but it is ultimately rewarding. It’s a test of skill, strategy, and a willingness to go toe-to-toe with any challenge.
With careful planning, strategic perk selection, and an understanding of combat tactics, you can conquer the Mojave Wasteland and become a legend.
Embrace the power of your fists, and may your strikes be swift and devastating. Go forth, conquer, and leave a mark on the Wasteland.
This guide will get you off on the right foot and set you on the path to becoming the best unarmed fighter in the Mojave Wasteland.
