Fallout 4 Perks Guide

List of All Perks, Effects, and Benefits

Having written guides to all 7 Stats in Fallout 4 and all of their Perks, I thought players might appreciate having all of them listed in one place as a reference. You can go to the individual Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck pages to learn how the Stats themselves affect your character, as well as the Bobblehead Location for that Stat. If you want a list of ALL Bobblehead locations click here This page ONLY focuses on the Perks. If I've typo'd on a Perk ID or listed the wrong one (there are many that come up) you can use the same Cheats you'd use to look up an item id (if on PC) to try and find the Perk ID yourself.

Jump to a Perk Category:
    Strength Perks
    Perception Perks
    Endurance Perks
    Charisma Perks
    Intelligence Perks
    Agility Perks
    Luck Perks
    Companion Perks and Likes/Dislikes (Separate Page)

Strength Perks

These are all Strength Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Strength effects and its bobblehead location in my Strength Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• Iron Fist
• Big Leagues
• Armorer
• Blacksmith
• Heavy Gunner
• Strong Back
• Steady Aim
• Basher
• Rooted
• Pain Train

About Iron Fist: First, to answer what will likely be questioned by many - do you have to truly be unarmed? No. Power fists, Deathclaw Gauntlet, and knuckles get boosted THIS Perk and NOT Big Leagues. So that's an important distinction to be made. Use common sense to realize if something is meant to be used with a punch, and you'll probably be right about which Perk it gets boosted by - the damage numbers found in your inventory menu DO reflect this Perk. If you max out this Perk, you will severely limit your choice of weapon to these types of weapons. Is that necessarily bad? That's up to you. You can certainly reach high damage numbers with this Perk and benefit every bit as much as if you'd gone with other types of weapons under the Melee classification. The chance to disarm is 10% for Rank 2, 1% to cripple at rank 3. The chance to disarm rises to 15% at rank 4+.

You cannot use unarmed weapons in Power Armor, but Power Armor punch attacks are roughly equivalent to a Power Fist in terms of damage. You can also mod Power Armor's arm pieces to increase unarmed damage, add bleed effects, or energy damage. This saves this Perk from being nearly useless, because if Power Armor punches were too weak, it'd be pointless for players who enjoy wearing the bulky combat suits.

About Big Leagues: This affects all other types of Melee weapon and won't boost the 'unarmed' style (ie punch) weapons. Melee is very Viable in Fallout 4, but mainly with the Blitz Perk found under the Agility category. This allows you to zip around rooms hitting targets from a much higher distance, which means you won't take damage going from target to target. On Hard and below, you don't necessarily need this advantage to survive, it's just a nice one.

The percentage chances to disarm are 10%/15% at Rank 2/3 and the chance to cripple at rank 4 is 10%.

About Armorer: A necessity at high level if you play on Hard Difficulty or above. Players can certainly avoid using this, but it's very nice being able to add mods like Pocketed, Lead-Lined, Ultralight build, while also boosting the damage and energy resistance of your armor. The cumulative effects of these boosts are huge. You can live without it for a time, probably into the 20s, but you will want it later so as to mod your armor and not just rely on what the game gives you. This is required for anything from helmets to chest pieces and Power Armor. It is also required for the Railroad's Ballistic Weave Armor Mods.

About Blacksmith: This is a very intelligent and obvious choice if you're going with either Big Leagues or Iron Fist and making a Melee build. The damage boosts play off the weapon's modded damage, so you'll get even more mileage out of melee weapon upgrades. At rank 5 Big Leagues, the upgrade damage amount would be doubled, for example. Melee weapons suffer in that there isn't a lot you can do to customize them, but you can definitely hit high damage numbers with Blacksmith and Big Leagues. As for players relying on what the game gives them, it's worth nothing this is probably less important than Armorer just because nearly all melee weapons can only get one modification made to them.

About Heavy Gunner: If you like Flamers, Fat Men, Gatling Guns, or Gatling Lasers, and want to use them primarily, this is the Perk for you! It's worth noting that Fat Men also benefit from the Perception Perk, 'Demolition Expert', so they can get even larger bonuses to explosion damage and an increased blast radius. Take this with Steady Aim if you like hip-firing weapons, as it will greatly affect the accuracy of your Big Guns. If you like VATS, you should probably go another route with your build. Because heavy guns can fire so fast, the chance to stagger is low - like 1.5% per bullet at rank 4+, but you know how fast a minigun can fire! Note that big opponents like Deathclaws and Supermutant Behemoths cannot be staggered, but humanoids can get stun-locked with a fast-firing weapon pounding them.

About Strong Back: Ranks 1 and 2 are a necessity at some point in the game, at least in my humble opinion. It works out very well by allowing you to carry more weapons for different situations, or more junk to craft items and structures in your Settlements. Rank 3 is not as useful at first, as the game pauses to let you sort out your inventory and you should drop junk to allow yourself to fast travel. There's no point to it until the 4th rank, which is going to allow you to use Rank 3 better - get outside without walking super slow and then head to the base where you can offload your loot.

About Steady Aim: This works out well for players who like automatic weapons and prefer not to use VATS and Action Points. If you want to play Fallout 4 like a straight up shooter, you'll enjoy this Perk's effect in combination with that of Commando or Heavy Gunner.

About Basher: Sorry Bethesda, this Perk is broken. It's far too weak compared to just swapping in a melee weapon and properly bashing someone. The only way to boost damage is to put a bayonet on your weapon, and they are fairly weak in terms of additional damage. This Perk also does not benefit from any melee damage boosts. Some players may take this one for fun and be able to decimate lower-level enemies, but I'm all about growing powerful against the strong ones and will save this for much much later. Attaching bayonets to weapons reduces accuracy, and I enjoy ranged builds.

About Rooted: This is a great Perk for Melee OR Ranged. With just 2 points, you're getting 50 Damage and Energy Resistance. The description is a bit off and doesn't make you realize you're getting both. The thing about Rooted is, it kicks in right away when you stop - immediately and so long as you're not charging an opponent or using a sprinting power attack, you can benefit from this. You don't even need to stop briefly to benefit, because when you are mid-swing in any attack that doesn't involve sprinting, you're getting the bonus. It is outstanding with heavy gunner, gunslinger, or a melee build. While you're standing in one spot and hacking at targets, you're taking less damage from their friends. Now that I've researched this Perk, I'm taking it on my main (who does not use Power Armor). That's way more resistance in one point than you get from those that boost Damage/Energy flatly (10 per point, and only one type!).

Melee users will especially like this, because just like the damage resistance, it kicks in immediately on stopping. The damage boost is multiplicative, as far as I can tell (for the mathematically challenged that is a good thing). It bases the damage off the weapon's stats including Big Leagues or Iron Fist.

About Pain Train: So only the largest of opponents and robots will not be impacted by your stagger. This pairs exceptionally well with a high Agility or Endurance build - either one - because it will let you sprint that much more. If you've taken interest in this, you may also want Moving Target's third rank, because you'll get extra damage resistance while sprinting, and also have 50% slower AP drain from sprinting. I recommend it for a melee build. Once you're at your target and have knocked them down, you can easily lay into them with your super sledge. I tested this on some opponents, and found Supermutants are not immune (if you expected them to be as I did). Enemies that are immune to the stagger also seem immune to the damage, which is indeed large. It did about 3-4 hits worth of damage when compared to my 176 damage Super Sledge. Very nice!

Perception Perks

These are all Perception Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Perception's effects and its bobblehead location in my Perception Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• Pickpocket
• Rifleman
• Awareness
• Locksmith
• Demolition Expert
• Night Person
• Refractor
• Sniper
• Penetrator
• Concentrated Fire

About Pickpocket: Each rank of this will increase your chance to steal items by 25%, 50, 75% and double what you'd normally see. If it was 40%, with Rank 4, you'd now have an 80% chance to steal an item. The more valuable items are always harder to steal, so this does help a lot. Agility is what actually affects the chance to steal when pickpocketing, so high base agility will make this much more useful. Weapons and armor are not normally even shown when pickpocketing - sometimes this could be helpful for making money, or even taking an enemy's weapon while using a stealth boy and light armor, only to leave them weaponless when the fighting starts.

Just move the grenade from your inventory to theirs, and it's Live. For sneaky characters, being able to place a grenade into an enemy's pocket is very useful - assuming you can sneak up close enough to pickpocket. I was able to successfully plant a grenade and kill someone in a back alley without anyone noticing using this perk, but doing it in the market caused people to look around, revealing me and causing the entire city to aggro. One of the drawbacks is, you've got to move away just after planting the grenade, which can cause you to be detected. I don't recommend it without the Perk to improve sneaking as well.

About Rifleman: I definitely recommend people who want to snipe take this perk, since enemies' armor is going to absorb quite a lot of damage from a sniper rifle. The higher their armor, the more extra damage you'll do with the Rifleman Perk. In that way, it increases damage more so than the other weapon damage Perks.

It is worth noting that anything that isn't automatic, a heavy weapon, or a pistol pretty much counts as a rifle. Laser rifles, shotguns, and the laser musket all count as rifles for the purposes of this Perk, along with anything that has rifle in the name (of course). Take this along with Sniper and Concentrated Fire for some massive damage headshots.

The crippled limb component means that sometimes, you'll just straight cripple a limb without depleting its health as you would normally. This can be super helpful for taking out an enemy's weapon hand. Thankfully, this Perk is going to help both VATS and non-VATS users equally.

About Awareness: Displays an opponent's four types of resistances - Damage, Energy, Radiation, and Bleed. Crossed out symbols mean immunity to that type of damage. Ghouls have rad resistance of 1,000 but they are healed by radiation, so it's not perfect. The Awareness Perk grows in usefulness the further you go in the game, because enemy resistances are going to get higher and higher based on your level. It's unlikely you know by heart what every creature is resistant to, and it's likely you carry different classes of weapons so that you can take advantage of any enemy's lowest type of resistance. Even if you're a rifleman, you may have a sniper rifle, shotgun, and laser rifle so you can take advantage of an enemy with lower energy weapons resistance that has high damage resistance. Take it to help save some ammo, and perhaps save your life. Humanoid opponents can have such a wide variety of armor and resistances that this is particularly helpful, but it's also great against the wasteland's monstrosities.

About Locksmith: Consider this a necessity if you want to be able to loot everything in Fallout 4. I regretted having to keep track of where the Master safes were located, so I could go find out what was inside them later. Sometimes, while leveling up, I saved a perk point or two so that I could possibly unlock the next level of Locksmith or Hacker to be able to get at terminals, doors and safes. Master-level safes usually hide the largest caches of ammo, caps, and other loot, so the further you go, the better - at least up until Rank 3.

Rank 4 is a massive disappointment. You probably won't have so few bobby pins by level 41 that it even comes into play. It's more likely you'll have 99+ and won't ever need this, especially if you couple it with at least moderate Perception to make lockpicking easier. There is also Tumblers Today magazines, which make Lockpicking just a little easier for each one you collect. Take this only in the level 200s range when you have nothing else to spend a point on. The same is true for level 4 of Hacker, which just prevents a measly 10 second lockout should you fail to guess the password.

About Demolition Expert: I found grenades nearly useless without rank 2 of this Perk, so that you can see where the first bounce is going to occur. You must take into account that the grenade won't explode where it lands, but it's an amazing Perk that helps immensely in sneak attacks on groups of enemies, or to flush out an enemy in hiding. The fact that this also increases the radius along with damage just makes it all the more likely your grenades and mines are going to hit their targets.

What the last rank means is that when you aim at a grenade in midair or a mine on the ground, they will additionally deal double damage. Sometimes it's possible to catch a raider tossing a grenade at you while in VATS, and you can then target it and make it go off right nearby - this doing double damage could cause him to harm his friends. Good stuff, and makes for a fun playstyle.

The 'craft explosives' portion of this is kind of unnecessary, it should probably state that on each level because subsequent levels unlock new recipes. For example, at level 2 you can make the Baseball Grenade, and at level 2, Fragmentation Grenades. Demolition Expert Level 3 and 4 stuff takes Science Perk levels as well - you can craft Pulse, Plasma, and Cryogenic Grenades.

It is worth noting that this affects the Missile Launcher and Fat Man's blast radius and damage, along with grenades and mines. They certainly qualify as destructive weapons, so this makes sense.

About Night Person: After reviewing this Perk, I simply cannot recommend it. While Solar Powered is better, this night-time bonus is not good at all. You'll get at most a 12% increase to hit (over what you'd see without it - 80% becomes 90% with 2 points in it. Night/day have no effect on your ability to hit targets, as the night vision will not improve accuracy in V.A.T.S. - Now, it may work very well for you if you're playing without using VATS much. The night vision will help when you're being sneaky, but enemies always show up on the radar to indicate where they are as soon as they've spotted you. This is going to come in handy more whenever you're seeking targets from afar, before you've been spotted. Rank 2 of this Perk gives you a little incentive to turn quests in during nighttime, since you'd get 9% bonus XP.

About Refractor: If you're a Power Armor user, you're not going to notice this Perk much. For a sneaky build, Refractor is much more helpful. Each rank only gives you +10, not 10, then 20 etc. This is a Perk to get later in the game when more enemies are using energy weapons, most low-level enemies come at you with pipe pistols and those are completely unaffected. Once you're 25+, enemies will really begin using laser rifles much more often. A faction you encounter a lot in the main quest is known for heavy use of laser weapons, so it could come in handy for those encounters as well.

About Sniper: The first two ranks are excellent for players who play Fallout 4 more like a shooter. The first rank will reduce the AP drain of breath-holding while Sniping manually with a scope. The second rank will make targets occasionally get knocked down, whether in V.A.T.S. or not.

Rank 3 of the Sniper Perk is amazing. It ADDS the 25% to whatever you had before. 50 becomes 75, 4 becomes 29 - got it? Great. It's one of the best Perks here for people who like to snipe from afar, and is super-useful in a sneaky sniper build. It synergizes incredibly well with high Perception (surpassing 10 through gear and drugs). It does exactly as it says - but even a short scope, which reduces AP cost in VATS when compared to a long scope, will trigger this effect. Use this to your benefit and shorten the scope to take more shots, or use the long scope to take your shots from a longer distance.

About Penetrator: Click the guide linked above to learn more about Penetrator. In short, this Perk will let you 1. hit enemy body parts that are behind other body parts, or even other enemies. This is very helpful for sniping fusion cores from the front when dealing with enemies in Power Armor. Also, hard-to-hit body parts on enemies, such as a Deathclaw belly or a Mirelurk's head, become much easier to target. 2. It will let you get through one layer of cover, although some objects in-game just cannot be penetrated (like large steel drums). You can easily penetrate one layer of fence or metal sheeting typical used for cover, so enemies basically don't have cover so long as you're lined up right. Crits, with this perk, can go straight through cover of ANY KIND. It's an exceptional perk that any heavy V.A.T.S. user should take for their build.

About Concentrated Fire: This Perk is sick, and I almost expect them to change it in some way down the road. If you use fast weapons, you'll benefit most. The +percentage is additive, meaning if you had a 4% chance to hit, with rank 3 the second shot would be 24%, 44%, 64%, and so on, up to the cap of 95%. It shows you this as you queue up the shots in V.A.T.S. - pay attention to the enemy's health to get maximum benefit. Try not to go but one or two shots over what it'd take to kill them, assuming a shot might miss. You can then switch to a second target, assuming your weapon is fast enough. The most hits that can be queued up in V.A.T.S. is 16. With this perk, you can nail far-away targets with handguns so long as you can get the 1% chance to hit needed in order to try. By the 5th attack, you'd be guaranteed to hit.

As for the secondary effect of Rank 3 in Concentrated Fire increasing damage, this one does not continually stack up, or else by the 16th shot a Deathclaw I tested it on would've been taking 4x damage from my attacks. It takes 20% extra damage though, that's for sure. This is really nice for hitting them in the belly, which is their weakest point.

Endurance Perks

These are all Endurance Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Endurance effects and its bobblehead location in my Endurance Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• Toughness
• Lead Belly
• Lifegiver
• Chem Resistant
• Aquaboy
• Rad Resistant
• Adamantium Skeleton
• Cannibal
• Ghoulish
• Solar Powered

About Toughness: In my opinion, this Perk needs buffed at higher ranks to be truly desireable. +10 is a good start for a low level character, but at rank 5 it should probably be doubled. It does have a great effect at levels 1-31 where it will give you a substantial improvement in defense against ballistic and melee attacks assuming +40 damage resistance, but it's almost completely useless if you're wearing Power Armor. +40 is not even a 10% gain in Damage Resistance. Another shortcoming is that later on, many enemies will be using energy-based weapons against you. It will help against missiles and fat men then, but those are best avoided anyway.

I personally don't like Power Armor in Fallout 4, mainly due to the HUD and that I like to be sneaky. That they give it away so early just feels ... wrong, but I'm a veteran of the series. On to the benefits though: Toughness is a good Perk for a stealthy character who will wear the best leather gear, in order to shore up Leather's inherent weakness of low DR with higher Energy Resistance - it'll make it more like you're wearing heavier Combat Armor. Additionally, you can Join the Railroad and get Ballistic Weave upgrades for clothing to further boost DR for a sneaky type.

About Lead Belly: Very useful early-game, since RadAway is quite expensive and doesn't come up often. Later, it's less of an issue. The first rank will cut the radiation taken from eating contaminated foods or drinking water by half - and this is reflected when you view the food in your inventory.

Rank 2 reduces it by a bit more, causing you to take only 1/3 the Radiation you'd normally take - it's substantially less effective than the first rank. However, you'll be one rank away from being able to use any food or drink unlimited water to heal yourself. It is, however, a slow process particularly for a high-life character. Drinking water only heals about 15 life, though early on it gives you 3 rads - costing you 1% of your max life to drink it.

Overall, I'd leave this Perk. You WILL find it very useful early-game, it's just that you could rather take Medic and make RadAway and Stimpaks more effective, and later will not even use it. That's one of my criteria for Perk choices - if I won't use it late game, why bother. Normal foods - like mac and cheese and cram just do not heal much HP to begin with, so they're less useful to a high life character. I personally use these irradiated foods to make some extra caps at vendors and never bother eating them - we can cook in Fallout 4!

About Lifegiver: A very powerful Perk early on, because you will gain something like 5 levels worth of HP if you had only 3 Endurance. Taken early, it's usually around a 20% increase in total life and very noticeable in helping you survive combat. It's great for your survival because enemies level up with you, and taking this Perk gives you a distinct advantage at low levels only. Stimpaks will also go much further, since they heal a percentage of life./p>

Later it is less noticeable, but the third rank fixes this issue and makes it incredibly useful everywhere but inside combat. While out of combat, you'll regenerate 1% of your total health every 2 seconds. So in about a minute and a half you could go from half HP to full. It's great from recovering from small skirmishes, just not useful for long battles. It will absolutely save you some caps in the long-run, and many players will end up selling off excess Stimpaks using this Perk.

About Chem Resistant: Find Fallout 4's drugs like Jet, Mentats, Psycho and Buffout save your life on a regular basis? The powerful chems you can combine to create at the Chemistry Station can be highly addictive and makes it likely you end up hooked on one or both drugs when used in a few battles within a short time frame. This is a great Perk, since you'll get by with using Jet to save your butt or using Mentats to get extra XP from quests/better Perception for sniping enemies.

I definitely recommend this Perk if you like the benefits of chems, since Addictol and the components to make Refreshing Beverage at the Chemistry Station can be rare or costly and addictions seem to be permanent, requiring these items. I tried sleeping for a week and was still addicted to simple alcohol, maybe more live game time needed to pass but it's nice to get to use these in hard fights without worrying about drawbacks. It's not a stellar Perk, it's just one that will certainly serve you into the late-game when you can afford to buy masses of chems.

So what's the chance to get addicted? It seems the first time is unlikely to get you addicted, but afterward the chance begins to ramp up. I did a few dozen tests and it seems like it's around a 5x that you can use most chems before you're almost 100% likely to be addicted. I imagine that not using them for quite some time will reset a hidden meter of sorts. So with rank 1, it will double the amount you can use before addiction. Note that alcohol doesn't fall under this category - party boy/girl affect that, and it's around a 10% addiction rate.

If you'll ignore chems, I don't need to tell you to skip this Perk. They can be worth a good bit, so you can pocket the caps and skip this while using chems sparingly.

About Aquaboy and Aquagirl: This Perk can help with a few things you might find underwater in Fallout 4, since taking Power Armor underwater can sometimes mean having to leave it there for being unable to find a way out (you sink). Otherwise, it's not that useful and will come into play only in a quest or two. You can use Rad-X to help prevent radiation damage while underwater in those situations, or else wear a Hazmat Suit.

Rank 2 may help with ambushes in some situations, but it's not going to come up often - you're in a city with few large bodies of water, although there is some hidden treasure to be found in the actual ocean. The glowing sea is all land, not underwater, so don't be tricked by the name and choose this Perk to help you with any related quests.

About Rad Resistant: Radiation Resistance works similarly to Damage Resistance. It helps more with large amounts of Radiation and is based on proportions. There are other Perks here related to Radiation that may be better, but this Perk is certainly better than Aquaboy. For example, going into bodies of water you may take 10 rads. When you take rank 1 and get 10 Rad resistance, you'll see this fall to half - 5 rads. Now, with the 2nd point, you'll take 3 rads. What is telling is the third point still left me at 3 rads while in water, so it's functioning a bit like damage resistance in that it gets harder to reduce the amount taken on low-strength attacks.

Where larger amounts - 30-50+ Rad resistance are going to come into play is during situations like fighting a Glowing One, an enemy capable of delivering a large amount of Radiation damage. The effects of having 10 vs 30 are much more dramatic. Having even 10 is great for reducing average Rads taken in normal situations, but the large amounts will only help with big enemies and strong sources of radiation. I suggest you carefully consider between this and Ghoulish as having Rad Resistance will prevent Ghoulish from working at its full potential. If you use Power Armor heavily, ignore both of these Perks!

About Adamantium Skeleton: A point or two in this can be helpful, as limb damage can occur at frustrating moments and force you to blow a Stimpak. Still, there are much better Perks available and you should put those first because you can prevent ever taking damage by dealing more of it yourself, or giving yourself the ability to make better armor, criticals and loot, hack and lockpick, modify a gun - need I go on? Seriously, too many strong choices. Regardless of my recommendation to avoid this for the first 40 levels or so, when supermaxing a character being able to reduce then eliminate limb damage will be one more luxury that helps you feel truly godlike.

About Cannibal: Feasting on corpses takes a strong stomach and a lot of resolve, so it's no surprise this Perk requires such a high level of Endurance. The first 2 ranks of the Cannibal Perk will heal you for 25 health for any of the listed corpse types. The next rank does not add additional corpse types, but doubles the healing to +50 Health. It has been noted that this Perk can be very useful on Survival Difficulty, given the slow healing rate.

I'd take this Perk if you are a penny pincher, because it's going to help you recover health after battles and save on Stimpaks - the only thing that heals you well when you've got tons of life as a high Endurance character would have.

As far as Companion influence, note that only Strong will like you doing this - Supermutants of course don't mind you being a Cannibal. Cait, Deacon, Nick Valentine, Piper, and of course Preston Garvey will frown upon you using this Perk in their presence. Just so you are aware, it does have that drawback - but a Melee character can gain great Affinity with Strong by using this regularly, resulting in getting his unique Perk - Berserk - which gives +20% Melee Damage when you're below 25% health.

About Ghoulish: This is a very interesting Perk. You will still take Radiation damage and thus lose some of your max health, but whenever you take Rads, you restore health equal to 50% of the Radiation Damage with Rank 1. At rank 2, it becomes 100, then 150%. Now, if you're fully healed this is useless. Some enemies, however, deal damage along with radiation damage, and it can prevent them from hurting you nearly as bad. Realize that having even 10 Rad resistance may greatly reduce the healing factor, but you are probably better off to have a mix of both - with rank 3 and some Rad resistance, enemies would not be able to drop your max health as much while healing you for some of the damage they've dealt.

You can go with 0 Rad Resistance from Perks if you want to maximize healing - a strong Glowing One or any Glowing enemy can deal Radiation damage, but they'll do as much in health given their typically high levels. This is a tough call as far as how much Rad Resistance to go with and will be entirely situational, but there's 0 doubt that the Ghoulish Perk will be an entirely bad choice. There's radiation everywhere in Fallout 4, and this will offset some of the damage irradiated enemies deal to you.

About Solar Powered: After doing some testing with this Perk, I'm left disappointed and will not use it in my main build - I've had my eye on it a while, but will instead go with Lifegiver because it doesn't require as much Endurance. I think Life Giver and Ghoulish are much better Perks. First - the 2 stats being boosted only during those specific hours are only good for melee, and only going to come up half the time unless you wait around to do things by day. Second, by the time you get Rank 2, you should not have a problem with Radiation. Sure, you can sell your Radaway but you may as well take Ghoulish rather than this and heal some health during combat - that brings up my third issue with this Perk, which I really wanted to like. Despite you being 'solar powered', like Life Giver, it just doesn't work during combat. 0 regeneration during a time when it would be most helpful. Both are good for restoring lost health after battle, but they will do nothing for you in fights. I wouldn't recommend rank 3 at all, but Melee characters may want the first 2.

Charisma Perks

These are all Charisma Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Charisma effects and its bobblehead location in my Charisma Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• Cap Collector
• Black Widow & Lady Killer
• Lone Wanderer
• Attack Dog
• Animal Friend
• Local Leader
• Party Boy
• Inspirational
• Wasteland Whisperer
• Intimidation

About Cap Collector: The first rank gives you a 10% discount when buying and 10% increase in price when selling items. The second rank gives 20% on top of that, multiplicatively. It's also multiplicative with your character's Charisma. Going from 6 Charisma to rank 2 of this Perk, I saw an item valued at 109 before the perk go all the way to 144 with both ranks and at 10 Charisma to 191.

While the third rank may not seem very useful, it is - very much so. There are 6 types of shops you can build in your Settlements with Local Leader. There are several variants for each type - from simple to full-blown emporium. If you invest 500 caps in a Trading station, all Trading buildings - from the simplest to Emporiums, throughout all of your Settlements will have that additional 500 Caps to spend! It's very good for the later half of the game, when you're finding items that are higher value and cannot seem to find a vendor with enough money to pay you the full price.

The Cap Collector Perk pretty much gives you the effect of a full 10-point Charisma build, just shy of what a character would get in discount without this Perk. It works even better when you've got both.

About Lady Killer and Black Widow Perks: You'll get offered the Perk for the opposite sex - men are Lady Killers and women are Black Widows. The flat damage boost is nice, but much higher damage can be found in other Perks, though this may be part of your build strategy for maximizing damage in the end. This is more about the combination effect. Women have it a bit better than men as there seem to be more guys to kill in Fallout 4, although both will benefit from the persuasion checks. See the guide for more details on this perk.

About Lone Wanderer: I love this perk, because I'm not a big fan of companions. I like to sneak around, however it is definitely not for everyone. There is a second Perk in this tree for Companions - Inspirational, and it will let you increase their carrying capacity. Dogmeat does not count for Inspirational, and having the dog does not break the bonus you get from Lone Wanderer. This is reported to be a glitch, and may be fixed in the future so don't flame me if a patch comes and makes the carry weight bonus disappear when using Dogmeat. Dogmeat can carry 150lbs.

My attitude about companions may change later in the game. I am certain that equipping them with a good weapon and armor set, they can be incredibly useful, plus there are hidden perks you can get only by having a certain type of Companion around and reaching max relationship status with them by doing things they approve of. This is an either/or situation. Either you take this, to get an early game boost, or you wait and get the boost to your Companions. If you DO take Lone Wanderer, expect to spend more points in Attack Dog so that you can make Dogmeat a little better.

About Attack Dog: As stated above, you might take this if you're going the Lone Wanderer route. It takes Dogmeat from a simple assistant and pack-mule to a true, helpful ally in combat, though it's worth noting you will get XP from any kills made by the dog. While Dogmeat can normally hold an enemy and help you to manually target an enemy better, he doesn't give the chance to hit from V.A.T.S. without the first rank in this Perk. So, I'd definitely give that a favorable review.

The second rank isn't very exciting to me personally, but I know that in tougher fights it could come in handy when he grabs an arm - most enemies are just going to go down so fast that this doesn't matter. Him holding them, period, is what helps - they're temporarily removed from combat and Dogmeat can do that anyway.

While Dogmeat can absolutely bring down Supermutants, there are certain enemy types he can only skirmish with and not grab. This is the big weakness of using just Dogmeat and not a companion with, say, a gun. Additionally, you're not able to raise Dogmeat's carrying capacity though you can with Companions like Preston Garvey and Cait.

About Animal Friend: Aim (hold the actual aim button down), then press the interact button you normally use to loot things to use the Animal Friend perk. Animals are not that common, and Wasteland Whisperer may be more useful for this reason. Being able to turn a raider's attack dog against them is cool and all, but enemies won't be permanently pacified. I'd take this perk later in the game when I just don't feel like engaging a wild beast that has attacked me.

About Local Leader: If you're going to make use of Fallout 4's Settlements system, this is the main perk you'll need. First, having a trading station (doable with rank 2) will allow you to raise Happiness a bit in Settlements where you make that investment. Additionally, being able to set up Supply Lines will let you share resources among connected Settlements for building and crafting purposes. All your Settlements will dump their water/wood/etc. into one large stockpile, and you can take it out anywhere you are (for the useful items they come up with). This also applies to things that are scavenged. It's suggested that you use one heavily fortified city as the main hub, then connect other Settlements TO that hub, directing them from their home town to the hub city.

To establish a Supply line, click one of the people named 'Settler' in your town, because Quest NPCs can't be used to do this. That settler will then magically make all items available in the town they're connected to. This applies ONLY to items that are in Settlement Workshops' inventories, not items you have stashed away in other containers, of course.

About Party Boy or Girl: Good for Melee Characters, because Alcohol can raise strength. You may also wish to drink before talking to an NPC quest give or shopping, because it also raises Charisma. There are many variants, some better than others. If you take the first rank, definitely take the second. Having a drink or two may let you fast travel back home with 20-40 more pounds of gear than you could otherwise, though you'll be encumbered when you reach your destination. Removing the chance of addiction is decent. This is a perk I'd take later in the game, given the need for Local Leader, Gun Nut, Armor, and other awesome Perks that raise your combat potential and damage resistance.

About Inspirational: If you use Companions, this is almost required. You don't want them throwing a grenade toward you and knocking you out, and the fact that they need gear (Which Dogmeat does not) means they could use the extra Carry Weight to help you bring more loot home to sell and break down into materials.

I've read that rank 2 is bugged at present, though they should still resist more damage from enemies. Shooting your companion is a wasted bullet, anyway, so you should try to avoid doing that and hit your target! Much more important if you have a melee companion who will get in the way more often.

About Wasteland Whisperer: Mutated creatures, like Deathclaws, Radscorpions and Blood Bugs can now be pacified the same way animals can - assuming they're under your level. To use it, see how Animal Friend works. This is a Perk I'd take later in the game, though you may find it useful at times strategically, it will be used sparingly until you're regularly facing powerful wasteland creatures.

I used Wasteland Whisperer to successfully pacify a Deathclaw. It was only pacified about 15 seconds, though as you know with multiple Deathclaws attacking it is nice to have one out of the fight for a moment. It seemed like by giving the Deathclaw some commands, it stayed pacified just a bit longer. Order them to attack another threat and make use of this Perk when you can.

The cooldown seems to be at least 30-45 seconds. It's yet unknown just what might make a persuasion attempt easier in this regard, perhaps more Charisma, an even bigger level gap, maybe a bigger gun! I'd imagine that lower level creatures can be pacified for longer periods of time, while in the case of my Deathclaw example, it was just useful to either escape or keep it out of the fight for a time.

The cooldown on persuasion attempts is tied to the specific target, so you could try on 2-3 targets in quick succession and it's likely at least one of them might obey.

About Intimidation: See my info on the Wasteland Whisperer Perk above for some examples on how this works. They must be below your level, as stated. This will come in handy way more often than Wasteland Whisperer or Animal Friend. You can try on each humanoid attacking you, and it's likely at least one will obey. Order them to attack their friends, though do know that any XP earned for those kills will not be counted.

Intelligence Perks

These are all Intelligence Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Intelligence effects and its bobblehead location in my Intelligence Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• VANS
• Medic
• Gun Nut
• Hacker
• Scrapper
• Science
• Chemist
• Robotics Expert
• Nuclear Physicist
• Nerd Rage

About V.A.N.S.: This is not a very useful Perk. Yes, you might find the path a bit sooner but we already have quest markers to show us about the world. To use it, you HOLD the button for V.A.T.S. when no enemies are around. It will not appear even in normal VATS unless you perform this hold, so it won't always annoy you. At times, it may help you to get out of an area when you have difficulty navigating a large building - but that's it. Sometimes going the wrong way leads to a discovery, and always knowing the right path to choose will take away from the adventure. That said, if you're a person who is frequently lost, go ahead and let VANS light the way.

About Medic: Medic takes Stimpaks and RadAway from restoring 30% Health or 30% of a bar worth of Radiation to 40/60/80/100%. This means you'll get much more out of one, allowing you to avoid buying them and maybe even stockpiling enough of them that they become yet another form of currency alongside ammunition. The last rank allows you to heal so quickly that you'll be to full before the character is done with the injection animation, unless you're playing on Survival where healing slows. I think that difficulty is where this Perk being at rank 5 is going to help the most, but only as something you take well into the 40-50+ range in order to keep up with enemies' level scaling and higher damage.

About Gun Nut: Gun Nut is recommended if you're in for the long haul with Fallout 4, but isn't 100% necessary if you don't mind scrounging for mods on weapons that are randomly dropped. The best weapons mods require it, and sometimes at least a rank or two in Science, though Science is mainly used for energy weapons (and sometimes all you need to upgrade them). Thankfully, if you will not use Energy weapons, you'll probably only need Science at rank 1 to get the best damage-boosting modifications.

Since you can take Rank 2 at level 13, it's worth noting that you should probably have a look at your weaponry and the upgrades/crafting materials available to you and see if you will really even benefit from Rank 2 at such a low level

About Hacker: While not required to enjoy Fallout 4, this Perk can get you some great stuff and sometimes help you complete a quest or clear an area easier by opening safes electronically, doors, or even disabling turrets. Fallout 4 does not allow you to even attempt Advanced, Expert, or Master Terminals without these specific Perks - your character just says they're not good enough at hacking.

Since the reset time is only 10 seconds should you get locked out, it's really not worth taking the last rank although if you do not like the hacking system it can let you keep trying at random until you guess the password. Really, hacking isn't so hard that this is ever needed.

About Scrapper: Scrapper is a wonderful perk for getting extra crafting materials after looting enemies. Without the Perk, you will not even see these items available when scrapping - even a Gauss Rifle will yield you only Steel and Wood. With the perk, items like Pipe Pistols and regular Shotguns will provide you with Steel, Screws, and slightly better items offer Copper (the mods of the weapon seem to matter big-time, notably if it's a component required in the recipe to make the mod yourself).

Overall it's an incredible Perk for someone who uses weapon and armor mods heavily, and who doesn't? It's really the only way to stand up to the waste's toughest enemies - you can absolutely double the damage and accuracy of weapons, while giving yourself incredible protection even without Power Armor if you have the right modifications. Plus, you can make specialized gear. Items like Circuitry and Nuclear material can come in such small quantity that it's hard to pass up rank 2 as soon as it's available - and it's when it will really come in handy (level 23). By the time you're in the mid-20s-30s and enemies are using much better weapons against you, you'll get all you need to outfit yourself in the very best with this Perk.

In order to make best use of Scrapper when you must be selective of what items you loot from enemy corpses, head to your inventory and the junk tab. From there, select component view. When you do so, you can tag items for search. Those without scrapper can do this too. This allows you to see a little magnifying glass next to the item when you're looting if the item has components on your favorite list. Where Scrapper comes in and what's special about it, is items in the game world will be highlighted green so that you know to pick them up and miss less of the components you're looking for.

About Science!: The usefulness of this Perk depends entirely upon the needs of the player. It is required to line armor with lead, which increases radiation damage resistance. For Power Armor, you will not be able to go past Model B without the Science! Perk. All later designs rely on increasing ranks of the Armorer Perk and 1 rank in Science is enough. For Power Armor Material modifications, Science can come into play for allowing Energy and Explosion resistances. The really good stuff is found in Misc Mods, where you can put in blood cleansers (to prevent chem addiction) or increase Action Point recharge speed. Changing headlamps requires Science, as well. If you want a Jetpack, you will need both rank 4 Science and Armorer.

For Weapons, there are a wide array of useful upgrades related to this Perk. Special scopes on normal kinetic weapons requires Science, but most of those upgrades are provided by the Gun Nut Perk. If you're going to use Energy Weapons a lot, go with Science in order to give them the best Capacitors possible. You may need a dash of Gun Nut here and there. This is where Science comes up most in terms of weapon mods.

Science will also let you make laser turrets and industrial water purifiers for your Settlements. All in all, it's a wonderful Perk BUT you should not bother taking ranks until you're sure you need it. Every modification and structure you can make in Fallout 4 states its requirements. If you do not even have the items you need to make the mod/structure anyway, you're better off putting a point elsewhere until you can. For the most part, 1 point in Science early in the game will suffice, and only later will you need ranks 2-4 - but then, that's when they're available. Later.

About Chemist: I cannot make a major recommendation about this - it's all about your playstyle. I'm not personally a big fan of drugs in Fallout 4 and never have enjoyed them in the series, but some players will use them heavily enough to get addicted. I use them in very tough battles - certain drugs like Psycho and Jet can be incredibly helpful, so a point or two in this will not hurt although there are better Perks. It can make Mentats last 24 minutes, Psycho 15, and Jet 30 seconds. All of the durations these typically have are quite long enough, but in a large battle only 10 seconds of Jet is not that much. I guess the big point I'd make here is, if you're a fan of the shorter-acting drugs and do not want to get addicted, this Perk will let you use them less frequently by getting a larger effect out of them on each use.

There are, of course, means of removing addiction in the game. Time is one factor, and the other Power Armor and its ability to keep addiction at bay entirely. You can also buy/craft the refreshing beverage and possibly visit a doctor to remove addiction.

About Robotics Expert: There's a major flaw in this perk, in that to really benefit you'll probably also need stealth to make good use of it. You've got to sneak up to hack a hostile robot. There are a number of opportunities to take control of Protectrons and Turrets via hacking, but this Perk seeks to let you do this directly. It absolutely does work on powerful bots, there just aren't many opportunities to use it to justify a Perk point that could be spent elsewhere to raise your combat effectiveness in all situations.

Still, I'm sure some of you will come up with some great uses for it and tell me I'm wrong. If I change my mind, I'll certainly come back and give this Perk a more favorable review.

About Nuclear Physicist: There are two components to this Perk, though you should only use it if you want to use Power Armor heavily. First, let's just look at the Power Cores. If you're a fan of Power Armor, then you'll probably want this in order to allow yourself to use it freely without buying somewhat expensive cores while finding them sparingly. Doubling the duration is great, no doubt, given the massive amounts of protection and carrying capacity that good Power Armor can give you. Take this, with Science! and Armorer and you'll be able to make great armor that can be used constantly later in your adventures.

The second component of rank 3 in Nuclear Physicist will allow you to eject Fusion Cores, though you cannot throw them. You do this just as you would a grenade, holding the weapon bash button to eject it. Since cores go in the back of the unit, they'll appear just behind you, armed and ready to explode. It's best done while running with multiple enemies just behind. The core does indeed do a lot of damage - comparable to a mini nuke - and it may be used in desperate situations in order to save your life. The core is consumed, and they seem to do the same damage no matter the energy level - so a core at 10% can be ditched to do this extra damage and another core will automatically go in with 0 delay. You'll just notice your 'fuel' stock has gone down by one.

The other component of Nuclear Physicist is to raise the damage of Radiation Weapons. This is a very, very specific weapon type that comes down to mainly the Gamma Gun, which itself is not particularly great when compared to other weapons given some enemies are highly resistant to Radiation. Now, with an unique variant (which I'm currently not sure about) it could be much better. Thankfully, you're getting both parts of this perk and the Radiation Weapon damage increase may be just an added benefit that occasionally comes in handy.

About Nerd Rage!: Hanging out at around 20% life is not a good thing. This is a desperation move that may come in handy for characters with already high health. It seems to restore a small percentage of life when you make a kill - nothing spectacular to justify it, though the damage increase is indeed huge (the resistance not so much). It's more an I'm out of resources and need to kill these guys Perk than something that you will use regularly, and most of my perks I like to use regularly. The boost to damage and slowed time (which is like using Jet) may help you finish a tough fight and come out ahead, but being that low on life has the odds stacked against you anyway. With Life Giver and high Endurance, it might not be so bad. The higher your level, the more likely you are to survive and make good use of Nerd Rage, yet at the same time the less likely you are to even see it trigger in the first place.

Agility Perks

These are all Agility Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Agility effects and its bobblehead location in my Agility Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• Gunslinger
• Commando
• Sneak
• Mister Sandman
• Action Boy
• Moving Target
• Ninja
• Quick Hands
• Blitz
• Gun Fu

About Gunslinger: For many ranged builds, Pistols will excel at dealing with medium-range trash enemies. This Perk will save your bullets and put an accurate pistol's range in between that of a normal one and a sniper rifle. You get +50% range total between Perk ranks 2 and 3. The ability to disarm without regard to where you hit the enemy, along with the fact that you can sometimes randomly cripple targeted limbs without depleting their HP make this Perk a major winner. It is both a great starter for a player who will later seek to max out Gun Fu, or just for a sniper to have something to deal with hordes of approaching ghouls while using VATS. Be sure to also read up on my guide to VATS AP usage.

About Commando: Read the linked guide to get screenshots of this great perk in action and read a bit more about how it works. It's particularly useful for players who will use automatic weapons while hip-firing them (not aiming or using VATS). It gives a tiny boost to accuracy, but the reduction of spread when hip firing is the big draw, aside from the obvious doubling of the damage of all automatic weapons. You will hit enemies at medium range much more often thanks to tighter spread and dish big damage with each bullet that connects - and they can connect remarkably fast if you mod your weapon right.

About Sneak: The boosts that Agility provides to sneaking are kind of tiny, but will be multiplied by a percentage for each rank you take in the Sneak perk. This means the higher your Agility, the more you will get out of this. Just for sniping, the first rank is helpful if you've got an extreme range on your weapon or a Suppressor installed. This is also amazing for Melee players who will use Blitz - 'teleport' to opponents and smash them for big sneak attack damage, then chop up their friends.

The secondary benefits of this are a nice addition, given the Perk gives less of a boost to sneak at higher ranks. It's worth noting that rank 4 means you do not have to walk slowly any more in order to keep detection down. You can't sprint - don't confuse that with running, which is what your character is doing most of the time when you're playing unless you somehow enjoy walking at the pace of an NPC.

About Mister Sandman: For a ranged sneaking build (sniper or not), Mister Sandman is one of the best Perks out there, but only in combination with Ninja - that perk increases sneak attack damage by a larger amount. Mister Sandman stacks addivitely with Ninja to ultimately increase sneak attack damage to up to 4x - 4.8x if you get Deacon's Cloak and Dagger Perk last as of patch 1.4. Alternate between Ninja and Mister Sandman as you level to get the most damage possible when you're running a sneak build.

About Action Boy/Girl: Use VATS? This is a no-brainer pick if you do. It's a little less useful if all you use your AP for is sprinting. It will stack with other Action Point refresh speeds you have, such as those that come from armor. With Action Boy maxed out, a sniper can be ready to fire a second salvo by the time enemies start moving to search for him, and a melee character will benefit as well. It works better the higher your AP, so high agility characters will want this for big battles. Action Boy/Girl is a solid pick for any build type, even at one point.

About Moving Target: I consider this more a Perk for players who don't care about stealth at all and want to charge in either for melee or to close distance in order to use pistols or automatic weapons. This will be more useful early on, as 50 damage/energy resistance is not much by later in the game. The last rank will let you close big gaps with some AP intact, but the first 2 are probably more important. Obviously, this is also good for fleeing battles you can't win... but why not take a perk that will help you win those battles instead? This is one I will personally take only later when I am trying to max out my character, and it will come late.

About Ninja: The normal sneak attack damage is 2x, so a ranged character will get 25% more total damage out of a sneak attack per point while melee will get 50%, 250%, and 500% - 5x normal sneak attack damage. Three or 4 points into Sneak along with light armor or a suppressor should be considered a requirement for Ninja to be effective at range.

This Perk performs much better for Melee, though Melee will need heavy investment in Sneak and Blitz to make great use of it. Snipers will want the aptly named Sniper Perk from the Perception tree, and possibly Penetration, so that they can score headshots at much longer distances and avoid detection. For a sneaky sniper, obviously consider this Perk - just note that once they are searching for you, you're not getting the sneak attack any more. You need the green indicator to show they've let their guard down.

About Quick Hands: This provides a 25% increase to reload speed at Rank 1 (from 4 to 3 seconds for a minigun). At rank 2, the bonus reload speed isn't increased (I checked to see if it's a hidden benefit). How well Rank 2 performs for you depends on your weapon type of choice. For powerful weapons with low ammo capacities, it's going to help a lot - more so if you are also using a weapon that takes about 4 seconds to reload, like the missile launcher. In that case, it helps immensely as you can only fire one rocket without the Perk (and above average AP), while you could fire two missiles with this Perk. Of course, you could just get the Quad barrel, though there are other weapons that have low capacities I've yet to find for myself, I am sure.

About Blitz: This is an amazing Perk for Melee players, though I couldn't recommend it to anyone else except for specific scenarios related to escape or evading an enemy's range. I loved this Perk so much that I went on to make a guide to it. In short, the increase in range is quite large as the Perk suggests. You can see examples on the page linked in the title of the Perk. Here's the big reason to love Blitz, particularly for sneaky players - you don't have to get so close in order to execute a sneak attack. Additionally, your second target can be further from your first, so you can clear a room full of opponents so long as you have a powerful weapon and select them in a chain that is all within the range of your Blitz rank.

About Gun Fu: This is one of the big draws of a high-Agility build in Fallout 4. Gun Fu is absolutely incredible, but only sees its maximum potential when you're fighting 4 or more foes and have the AP to deliver enough shots to make it worthwhile. The way it works, if you only had 3 targets, you could not trigger the critical hit even if you selected different body parts - it's per enemy, and parts don't matter. That's just a mechanics statement.

What'd happen is, you'd hit that third target for 50% more damage on every shot - so therefore, you should repeatedly hit the third target in that case, until it's dead. If you went back to target #1, it'd take normal, target #2 would take 25%.

For obvious reasons, it works well with low-AP cost weapons that have moderate damage. With Rank 4, you'd be able to crit every enemy beyond the fourth as many times as you want. It keeps track of which was your first, second, and third target so you'd want to hit only new enemies that have not yet been targeted. If something is set to die. Given crits always hit so long as you have at least 1% in VATS, it is worth using those 4th+ target shots to clear distant enemies, even with a pistol.

Agility Builds

Agility is useful in either a Perception-heavy ranged build, or a Strength-heavy melee build. Melee users will want Blitz, badly, in order to do some seriously badass combos and dash around rooms knocking out foes. Either can benefit from the Better Criticals Perk that Luck provides, but players who use Gun Fu will enjoy it most.

Learning about Blitz has me convinced I'll enjoy a Melee build one day, while my current is set on a path with Gunslinger and high Perception. I've always enjoyed sneaky ranged builds, because it's easy to play on a high difficulty and score even better loot to max out my character. I'll make wonderful use of Gun Fu when I get to that, but will also be utilizing Four Leaf Clover and Grim Reaper's Sprint in my own build.

Hopefully some of these mechanics help you figure out which Perks you will want to max out in your own build, since there are so many combinations. With no level cap, there's no real pressure, although there are many utility Perks we need to be truly successful - Blacksmith/Gun Nut and Locksmith, for example, which slow down these dream builds but make them a realistic choice.

Luck Perks

These are all Luck Perks in Fallout 4 - You can learn about Luck effects and its bobblehead location in my Luck Guide.

Jump to a Perk!

• Fortune Finder
• Scrounger
• Bloody Mess
• Mysterious Stranger
• Idiot Savant
• Better Criticals
• Critical Banker
• Grim Reaper's Sprint
• Four Leaf Clover
• Ricochet

About Fortune Finder: This Perk is low on the list of priorities. Luck will already help you get more caps, and honestly when an enemy explodes into a shower of caps, it's a pain to find them on the ground! It's not a BAD Perk, it's just not nearly as good as others you may invest into. Earlier on you may want to improve your damage/accuracy because selling loot can earn you more caps than any of the explosions. It's worth a point or two, but don't expect rank 5 to be impressive - it's just fun to see sometimes, and doesn't happen as often as you might like.

About Scrounger: Like the above, Luck is helping you to get more ammo, but it's better than the previous as later in the game you will have a chance at rare ammunition you might not otherwise have easy access to. Much, much better than more caps. Only certain types of containers seem to benefit from this, but when exploring a large area you will certainly see it come into play. Early in the game, it is the better choice between the first two, because you'll have more ammo to run on. Avoid at all costs if you're melee.

About Bloody Mess: The extra damage applies to all weapons and will reflect on the numbers you see in the inventory screen, and it's really the only perk that increases damage flatly without being tied to a specific weapon type. Very rarely, you may actually see other nearby enemies affected by this but it does not happen often. Honestly, the gore is entertaining for a while but eventually you may find that in big fights it's harder to keep track of which body part belongs to who, for looting purposes. While it does have a strength for people who have difficulty deciding on a weapon type because of the extra damage, this is a big weakness - especially once the novelty factor wears off.

About Mysterious Stranger: The Mysterious Stranger appears at random to kill an enemy, based on their remaining health (40%). He only appears on the last shot of a VATS salvo, so consider that when you judge this Perk's undisclosed proc rate. It works much more often than it seems - around 20% of the time at Rank 2. The chance to fill the critical meter seems to be 25% for the Rank 3 bonus. If a player is not using a luck-heavy build, it is probably better to take only the first 2 ranks to get the Stranger appearing at a decent rate while ignoring the third. For a player with Critical Banker, the free full meter would be more useful given it can overflow.

About Idiot Savant: The lower your Intelligence, the more you'll benefit from this perk, though it always gives more XP than not having it, even once you're past 10 Intelligence. The sweet spot is 4 INT, as far as proc rate and average gains. This can apply to quest experience, as well as building in Settlements. This is a strong pick if you're focusing hard on a Perception/Agility/Luck or Melee build and neglecting Intelligence. Question whether you want to level faster, since enemies level up with you and you may have less time to find upgrades for your character, plus have 2-3 Perk points that only sped up that process without contributing anything to your combat abilities, settlement building, etc. Anyone who wants to max out a character (given the lack of a level cap in Fallout 4) should consider this Perk at some point, in order to reduce the time to get all the Perks.

About Better Criticals: Synergizes wonderfully with the below Perks, particularly Grim Reaper's Sprint - you're more likely to get a killing blow, and criticals are guaranteed headshots. Absolutely take this if you will invest heavily in Critical Banker and the other amazing Luck Perks.

About Critical Banker: This Perk is absolutely amazing, and probably the best Luck Perk, definitely one of the best Perks in Fallout 4 for players who use VATS heavily. You've got three stars that appear to the right of your critical meter. You can fill all 3, plus your bar, so you can stock up 4 crits in a row from utilizing V.A.T.S. heavily. Save these for an emergency or go on a rampage with Four Leaf Clover and Grim Reaper's Sprint!

Note that last bit - when you bank a critical, there is a small chance that you get ANOTHER Critical, instantly. This Perk is too good to pass up for V.A.T.S. users! If you need multiple criticals in a row, just hammer the space bar (or jump button) in between shots to ensure the second attack is also a critical. The only (minor) drawback is that aside from Four Leaf Clover, you won't gain the normal fill of Critical Meter by doing a Crit.

About Grim Reaper's Sprint: In a big fight, having all your action points completely restored is huge. You can immediately start stocking up criticals again. You can weaken enemies with normal shots if low on AP, then go in for the kill and possibly get all of your points back.

About Four Leaf Clover: This would be nearly useless without at least one point in Critical Banker, but with that Perk it shines. The best part about Four Leaf Clover is that with Critical Banker it gives you a full star, with overfill. So, without it, you would only get the rest of the meter - WITH it, you will get one full meter's worth of crit. It goes off at around 10% at rank 4, which can be seen by viewing my testing through the link above. Very rarely it triggers on an actual critical shot so that you get that crit back immediately. A luck build revolves entirely around taking this Perk to the max along with CB.

About Ricochet: For random hilarity and only in gun fights, this can be interesting but is not that useful most of the time. I've seen 2-3 enemies drop dead in just a second or two because of having this Perk maxed out. Overall the others are more important, but you can do yourself well to take this at high level once the others are maxed. Some players may enjoy this with a melee build, as some ranged opponents will be instantly nullified while you continue your onslaught.