Opinions on which weapon mods to use

[oldspice2625]

I like to use things for their maximum benefit most of the time, and especially when it comes to weapons. I don't like using something that is sub-optimal (unless it looks totally stupid, wearing like a bathrobe, sunglasses, and ugly shoes just for max stats... I do have my limits!)

 

I wanted to know what you guys found, in terms of what is generally really great to put on weapons and armor, and what to avoid, or sounds really good but is kind of crap and not worth it.

 

I wanted to focus on energy weaponry, if you've dabbled with that. I have Righteous Authority, and I'm modding it to be a long range weapon, since it seems to focus on critical hit damage, figure I'd use it like a sniper of sorts and was figuring on whether or not to put on a sniper barrel. I put the beam focus mod on it, and will crank up the critical damage as much as possible. I have another laser rifle that I am modding to be like the Metal Blaster from FO3. I was thinking, is the Beam splitter worth it? I imagine that it is not the same as the metal blaster, with the beams doing max damage, because of the prism in FO3, versus an actual machine splitting the beams and therefore it acting like a shotgun with the full damage being split between the beams.

 

Is the automatic barrel worth it at all, or does it just suck? Are there any interesting combinations that you've noticed with energy weapons or regular guns?

 

I was also going to do an energy weapons/power armor BoS kind of noble knight in shining armor type of character so I wanted to know what modifications to the armor were really worth the investment up front, and which ones are kind of crap and to be put on last or not at all.

 

Are there any mods that you noticed that kind of surprised you in how good/crappy they were?

[Athanasa]

Unfortunately, crits seem to trigger from vats only. Which is bad, because VATs are usually (until mid/late game) always worse than actually aiming with a scope yourself. So, modding sniper stuff for crits is a bit lacklustre to say the least.

[oldspice2625]

What...the...hell?

 

So, basically, the whole idea of a critical hit being determined by Luck and other factors as a random thing is.... now a controllable element in combat? I thought that meter thing from some videos I saw was for critical banker. If this is true, then when you get a sneak critical, do your other regular, non sneak critical related perks/bonuses also activate, or you need to be in VATS to stack critical dmg/bonuses? if so, that's really stupid.

 

I really don't like using VATS because of how much PER you need as well as perk investment to make it worth a damn other than a desperation thing when someone is super close...

[Athanasa]

What...the...hell?

 

So, basically, the whole idea of a critical hit being determined by Luck and other factors as a random thing is.... now a controllable element in combat? I thought that meter thing from some videos I saw was for critical banker. If this is true, then when you get a sneak critical, do your other regular, non sneak critical related perks/bonuses also activate, or you need to be in VATS to stack critical dmg/bonuses? if so, that's really stupid.

 

I really don't like using VATS because of how much PER you need as well as perk investment to make it worth a damn other than a desperation thing when someone is super close...

Yup. Crits is shits. http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Critical_Hit#Fallout_4

 

 

 

Fallout 4's critical hit system removes the chance-based critical hit trigger, replacing it with a critical meter which builds up with each successful V.A.T.S. hit and, when filled, can then be triggered by the player just before any V.A.T.S. attack, guaranteeing a hit with extra damage. The rate that the critical meter fills increases with the character's Luck.

Outside of V.A.T.S. critical hits can still randomly happen.^{[needs confirmation]} Some chems such as Overdrive can increase critical hit chance by 25%.

I don't think I've seen crits outside of VATS (needs confirmation), but I play mostly sniper anyway... so I guess my crits insta-kill things so I can't compare health bars. If crits CAN happen outside of VATs, their chance is extremely low. I invested quite a few points into Luck when I made my character (hearing Luck meant crits), so I assume I'd crit quite a lot... But I don't seem to.

 

 

 

'Cause RNG crits is hard, gotta dumb it down some more. Also, WHY THE HELL do so many of the sniper attachments give crit boost? By the time you're close enough to reliably hit in VATs, you should be using another weapon.

 

... and don't get me started on collateral in VATs. I used to think I could get away with aiming at a small part on an enemy if that part was surrounded by MORE enemy. Logic being if I missed (but the animation showed the weapon still hitting) I'd still do some damage. Hah. Nope. It just goes straight through and does no damage.

 

Edited December 21, 2015 by Athanasa

[oldspice2625]

God that's infuriating.

 

What a ridiculous concept. A critical hit in virtually EVERY video game that has featured them... has based them off of luck/randomness. Sure, they give extra damage for hitting people in the head for most games, and some do the whole 'Crippling' thing... but this is just a brain dead idea.

 

Who the hell thought that was a GOOD idea?

 

Well... thank god I have it on PC... Mods... TO THE RESCUE! (Soon)

[Athanasa]

Well... thank god I have it on PC... Mods... TO THE RESCUE! (Soon)

 

Soon™

[SayinNuthin]

What weapon mod? This;

 

Minigun .50-Cal Tri-Barrel by The6thMessenger

 

Which I will stop using when the function is rolled into some firearms makeover, seriously a rotary cannon with less damage than a pistol.. you'd be better off using it as a club.

[oldspice2625]

I might try this. I just am hesitant to try mods right now without the support of the CK right now. I'm sure it's fine, as it's a little itty bitty mod.

 

I really think the Big Guns don't have much teeth. The minigun is really the only reliable Big Gun with reasonable cost for ammo (which is scarce at early game, and considering Settlement System replaces most of the god damn merchants in game... I'm really pissed about that, having to build up settlements just to have more than 2 merchants in game)

 

It feels like the missile launcher should have MUCH more teeth to it right out of the box. It's a damn rpg for god's sake, but I can't collateral kill two triggermen with it? Did they really also shoe horn the player into getting Demolitions Expert just to have explosives be viable and not totally suck? I feel like GUNS again are the only way to play serious builds on Survival difficulty. Everything else seems so weak.

 

Fallout New Vegas shined by having such diversity in weapons where ALL builds were viable, even unarmed. It's like you have to use power armor in order to use unarmed, which sucks, or invest heavily into being a sneak character. Unless of course you downgrade the difficulty.

 

That's why I made this thread, to see if anything was crap and sub-optimal and to avoid it, even though it looks good.

 

For criticals, I think you just need to be in VATS to use the crit, since the bar was going up on several times when I checked it. I shot a bunch of dudes up with my rifle (automatic barrel kind of sucks on laser rifles, gonna just stick to either Sniper Barrel or Improved Long Barrel) I entered vats early, the bar was low, then my non vats shots seemed to build up the bar because it was close to being ready to execute a crit. So it seems as though all shots and attacks build the bar up, but maybe you need to be in vats to execute it?

 

It's really effing stupid though. This is the biggest disappointment for me, since I was SOOOOO stoked for FO4. It's fun, but it's not a fallout game. I was having hope after NV but... meh...

[Moraelin]

There are a LOT more than 2 merchants in the game. Both fixed ones and travelling ones are basically more of them than in FO3. Just fixed settlements that have at least a merchant (most of them more) include Diamond City, Vault 81, The Castle (after a given quest), Covenant, The Slog, Abernathy Farm, Prydwen, Bunker Hill, the Railroad, etc. There are literally more than 30 already-existing merchants. That is more than you had in FO3.

 

Yes, you can place your own merchants on top of that, including some rare level 4 merchants if you can get them, but that's extra.

 

So basically I still wish that people would at least know WTH they're talking about when they apparently try to fit in with the whiner gang. Just because nobody gave you a lolipop right after you left the vault, doesn't mean you can jump straight to complaining about how it sucks that you don't get one.

 

You're supposed to explore, not jump straight to complaining that you didn't get all merchants lined up in front of the vault waiting for you. If you couldn't find more than 2 out of over 30 before you gave up just says something about you, not about the game.

 

And incidentally the same goes for weapons and builds. Unarmed isn't viable? Really? WTH? Between Blitz, the damage multiplier from stealth going up to x10 for melee weapons, chems and such weapons as the Deathclaw Gauntlet, melee and unarmed are more viable than ever. A puncturing power fist, with the right perks and 10 str, hits for literally hundreds of HP AND bypasses some armour. An upgraded Deathclaw Gauntlet even more. From stealth, you can literally one-shot raiders in power-armour with it, thanks largely to NPCs not using PA helmets even if they have them.

 

As someone who actually did play a lot of melee and unarmed characters, and made more melee weapons than guns for FO3 and NV, I can tell you it's actually easier than it's ever been. In NV the vast majority of melee and unarmed weapons actually did less base damage than the high end guns. Here it's the other way around. Hell, it's more viable to play a melee character than it was in Skyrim.

[UhuruNUru]

Seriously a rotary cannon with less damage than a pistol.. you'd be better off using it as a club.

Seriously, why would you think any automatic weapon firing 5mm bullets would match a 10mm pistol bullet, per bullet used.

 

On a single shot comparison the minigun should be worse than every other gun.

Indeed this is clearly shown with modding single shot weapons to automatic, where the power of each weapon is approximately halved.

 

To correctly compare an automatic with any single shot weapon, multiplying the single bullet damage by the rate of fire (bullets per second), not the number the game gives which is lower is faster than higher.

 

Get the comparison correct and the minigun wins by using many small bullets while your pistol only fires one.

 

As for the OP's question, max out all mods as soon as you can.

If you use vanilla ammo, available ammo determines what is used, more than what guns you have.

 

I have two pistols that can't be modded into rifles, for bugs and weaklings.

A combat shotgun for close range.

The rest are sniper rigged with every scope carried to change if required.

 

If ammo isn't an issue, there's only one weapon needed.

The full snipered Gausse rifle will one shot legendary BoS in Power Armour, Coursers or Death Claws, if it needs two it's usually because the first was partly deflected.

Even shooting enemies closer to you than the end of the long, long barrel works (it shouldn't).

 

One thing I've noticed when comparing VATS too normal firing, though your own skill may make hitting easier than in VATS.

Damage in VATS seems much greater when it does hit.