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So you want to try bringing fists to a gunfight...

Being a tough guy is hard, but being a badass can be even tougher unless you follow my lead, of course. Anyone can claim to be badass, but more often than not their badassery can’t hold up when it’s truly tested. I, however I am the complete embodiment of all that is badass in video games, and it’s time for me to share some of my knowledge with you all. You may think you’re hot stuff, and you may think you’re tough, but in reality you’re only an apprentice.

Oh, you beat Dark Souls? Well I’ve done that too, with a low level run-through.

You managed to beat Skyrim? Good for you, I did it with my fists while running around naked.

You beat Ninja Gaiden 3 on Master Ninja Mode without being hit?
Well screw you; I haven’t done that yet, but I will just to prove that I’m better than you at some point whenever I feel it’s necessary.

Badassery comes in many forms, and I’m going to guide you weaklings into a world of treachery and deceit all while punching heads off in the Vegas Wastelands. That’s right; I’m going to teach you how to properly bring fists to a gunfight in Fallout: New Vegas.

When you begin, Doc Mitchell is blabbing about saving you after you’ve been shot in the head like a complete loser. So stop crying, toughen up, and let’s seek some revenge. Go through the measures and customize your character (picking the most intimidating mustache available if you picked a male character of course) and move on to the Vig-O-Matic Vigor Tester. This is probably the most important part of the build. Skip past the Strength, Perception, Endurance, and move onto Charisma and Intelligence. Kick those two characteristics down as low as possible. You’re a badass, you don’t need to be well-liked or Einstein. No one is going to give a crap when you’re punching their head off and kicking the neighborhood dog. After you’ve knocked down your Charisma and Intelligence, go back to the beginning of the menus with your extra points and max out Strength and Endurance. You’ll also want a decent amount in Perception and Luck so throw a few points into those as well. In the end, your stats should look something like this:

Strength: 10

Perception: 5

Endurance: 10

Charisma: 1

Intelligence: 1

Agility: 7

Luck: 6

If you allocated your stats correctly you should be in pretty decent shape to wander around the wastelands of Vegas bearing nothing but teeth and fists like a rabid Rocky Balboa. Next, Doc Mitchell is going to ask you a bunch of stupid questions. Simply answer them like a complete psychopath while staring at him with your soulless eyes. Your answers ultimately won’t matter since you can change everything on your own afterward, but you might as well stay in a badass frame of mind during your questioning. Once you call bullshit on his irrational opinions of you, pick your own stats and tag Unarmed, Survival, and Medicine as your primaries. You may think you’re ready for this now, but you’re going to take a lot of damage through this escapade, so you’ll need to heal quickly. A lot of people may try to recommend the Sneak ability so you can grab the Ninja perk later in the game, but real badasses don’t sneak around. Oh no, we walk with our heads held higher than the heavens and fists clenched tighter than our father’s wallets.

After the psych exam administered by Doc, we’ll be able to select two traits, each with a positive and negative side effect. Even though we selected to start with 1 Intelligence, we’re still not dumb enough to pass on the Heavy Handed trait. This deals more damage, but lessens our critical damage, but forget that, we want to ground and pound our enemies, not one-shot them (At least not yet anyhow). The second trait you should pick is Wild Wasteland, because the others suck and have absolutely nothing to do with what we are trying to accomplish along our path of hand-based destruction, and it’s always fun to have more random events and Deathclaws simply to keep things interesting.

Now as we leave Doc’s house, we’re asked if we want to play the game through on Hardcore Mode. If you’re not sure what to do, just remember what you’re trying to accomplish. John Wayne probably died with twenty pounds of undigested meat and a gallon of irradiated water in his guts, so pick Hardcore mode and (wo)man up, you wuss. Why would anyone ever want to waste such a great build only to be a whiney little girly-man? If you’re worried about dehydration and hunger, then rest assured: there are plenty of Bighorners to kill and eat like the savage you know you truly want to be.

As soon as you’re outside, head down to the local watering hole and pick up a few quests and the tutorials. This is easy XP and you’ll also be able to collect some items to sell. Since you’re fisting everything, make sure that you sell every item you come across, and if you have two of a certain item, make sure you ‘repair’ it before you sell it so you make more caps. Essentially, caps are going to be fundamentally worthless. The only things you’ll ever want to buy are Doctor Bags, Stimpacks, Super Stimpacks, and fist-based weaponry. We’re badasses, so we’ll be drinking the dirty radiated water we find, sleeping in bed rolls, and eating raw meat from the carcasses of Bighorners. Whenever you have enough caps (somewhere north of twenty depending on your bartering skill), buy some boxing tape from the shop in Goodsprings and prepare for light travelling.

After you’ve taken care of a few local quests, you’ll begin to finally level up, and with leveling up comes perks and increased stats! For the most part, the earlier perks are as worthless as a drill without a bit, but later perks do come in handy.  The initial perk you’ll want to pick up is Intense Training so you can increase your Luck in the game. Luck has a huge advantage with fist-builds since it increases the chances to land a critical attack. Until level 6 though, you’re mostly going to be dumping any extra perks into your Intense Training/Luck until you’re able to pick the Toughness perk to increase your Damage Threshold. While it seems boring and drab for a while, once you hit level 8 you really begin to build your character with perks such as Stonewall and Superslam.  Other later level perks you want to pick up are: Fast Metabolism, Piercing Strike (the most useful perk for fist-builds), Adamantium Skeleton, Purifier, Paralyzing Palm, and Slayer, but most of these won’t come until later in the game, unfortunately.

As for the stats, keep leveling the three skills you tagged (Unarmed, Medicine, and Survival) while dumping a few points into Science and Lock Picking. Science and Lock Picking aren’t really too big of a deal, but you’ll need them in order to complete certain quests and to find specific items. As long as you keep raising your three primary stats, you’ll be tanking yourself gradually with extra damage and extra HP while being able to heal yourself efficiently enough to stay in contention.

Now that you’re leveled up a bit (at least kill enough Geckos and do enough side quests to hit a minimum of level 3 or 4), it’s time to hit the road. From Goodsprings, you’ll want to head directly south and find Primm. Primm is filled with members of the NCR, and you’ll want to kiss their ass harder than you kiss your practice pillow. While in the area, make sure to kill all the bandits until you find a Hockey Mask and some Metal Armor. Not only does the Hockey Mask give +5 to Unarmed, equipping it along with the Metal Armor make you look like an absolute psychopath, and that’s exactly what we’re aiming to do. Do any and all quests offered here so you gain favor with the NCR and continue onward towards the south west corner of the map, where you’ll find the Mojave Outpost. This may be one of the most critical parts of the adventure since this is the first place in which you’ll find a real fist weapon that actually does damage. The Bladed Gauntlet will be your new best friend for a while, so make sure that you take it to the Main Building in the Mojave Outpost and have it fully repaired for max damage and durability.

Once you have the Bladed Gauntlet fully repaired, you should be ready to take on a few of the main story quests. Complete the main story until you find yourself in Novac where you’ll be able to find a secret Ranger Takedown Technique offered by the retired Ranger Manny Vargas in a run-down trailer near the giant Dyno statue. This technique is great since it allows you to push enemies down to the ground in order to gain some breathing room if you ever find yourself in a pinch.

Before you continue along the main quest line, head to the south east corner of the map to Cottonwood Cove. Directly south and on a ridge is an area named Cottonwood Outlook, where a truck is hanging off the side of a cliff. Make sure your Lock Picking Skill is up to 50 and open the backdoor of the truck, releasing all of the Radioactive Barrels to roll down the hill and kill everyone in the village below. No worries though, they were Legion soldiers and no one should ever care about people affiliated with Legion. After they’re all dead, loot away, consolidate items via repairing, and sell for a hefty amount of caps at various vendors. Before you leave though, pay a visit to the Captain’s Quarters and grab the two Power Fists from the footlocker. Now that that’s out of the way, continue onward in the story.

Further along in the main quest line when you find yourself in the New Vegas Strip, you’ll have to recover the Platinum Chip from the Legion gang at The Fort. This will be the most rewarding, and also the hardest part in becoming a total badass. Make sure your armor and weapons are fully upgraded, because this is going to be one hell of a battle.

As soon as you enter The Fort, a guard is going to prompt you to turn over your weapons. For this one instance, let us put the ego aside and hand over your weapons--we’ll kill that guy later with immense amounts of personal pleasure. Head into Caeser’s Tent and speak with the man in the back room to learn yet another Unarmed technique. As soon as you learn this technique, leave The Fort entirely and come back. Whenever you’re prompted to turn your weapons over again, promptly tell the guard to suck on your Power Fist. This will in turn make the entire encampment more hostile than a scorned ex-wife, but this is exactly what we want to happen. After you have taken out a few guards and moved closer to Caeser’s Tent, you’ll find the ultimate fist weapon on the body of your fallen enemies: The Ballistic Fist.

The Ballistic Fist essentially looks like a Nintendo Power Glove infused with steroids and shotgun shells. As you’re taking out the Legion members and gathering more and more Ballistic Fists, combine them through repair and watch the damage grow. If you have maxed out Strength and Unarmed along with a fully repaired Ballistic Fist, you should be able to deal 108 damage per punch, and if you add the Slayer perk (30% increased attack speed for unarmed) you’ll be deadlier and quicker than Bruce Lee on cocaine.

If you’ve done everything the way I taught you, Super Mutants will bow to you and Deathclaws will run away with their ugly tails between their legs. You are now the ultimate badass who can’t be trifled with in Fallout New Vegas.

You’re welcome.