Fallout 3: Teishisei Na Senshi

The Ninja uses his words first, then his sword. He is charismatic, and has lots of friends. The kind of friends that would DIE for him.

(Speech, Melee Weapons, Science)

Pros: Lots of caps because you can sell the plentiful small gun weapons and ammo and the valuable energy weapons. Melee is fed by the Strength S.P.E.C.I.A.L., which is derived into carry weight. "Infinite" ammo, only need to keep weapons repaired.

Cons: Must get close to fight. Cannot become over encumbered or else you cannot charge enemies to drop dem bombs on 'em, son. You will be at a disadvantage until you get followers

Tips and Strategies

• This build is meant to use lots of followers as you will have a TOUGH time handling the endgame solely with you running up on mzrfzrs (but it'll still be bad-ass to put the Shishkebab on Deathclaws). Use the glitches (easier on PC) to get Dogmeat and one of the following combos:
  • Charon, Star Paladin Cross and Fawkes (good karma)
  • Charon, Jericho, Clover (bad karma)
  • Charon, Butch, Sargeant RL-3 (neutral karma)
• Be prepared to take some damage as you must charge most enemies. I supplement this character with Explosives. You will need to spend caps on grenades--good thing you can sell ammo and small guns. Spend skill points into Explosives as I'm not tagging it.
• Side-quest Those! is difficult for the in-your-grill player due to flame-throwing ants. Buy up some explosives or prepare to stimpack it out.
• No need for ammo means lots of caps--spend on Stimpacks and explosives.
• Save all Big Guns for followers. Stow them in your residence. Also plan to gather up the schematics. Refer to this list to determine the stuff to hang onto (stowed at residence).
• Difficult when surrounded by shooters (like fighting your way out of Megaton after committing murder)
• Your modus operandi should be to get close. Either duck behind cover if there is only one adversary shooting, to wait for them to run up in range for a slice-job. If multiple shooters are coming or there is no cover, just run for the closest. At least running doesn't use AP, so you should recover points running from smackdown to smackdown (and the other shooters will mostly miss you while you are running unless you are running straight at them).
• With speech checks (and perks), you should have a good haul of bonus reward caps/goods.
• With a decent strength, you get a damage bonus to Unarmed for free. If you find enough skill books and get the Bobblehead, you should be able to do some things with the Deathclaw Gauntlet.
• I'm clunky with the controller so for X360/PS3 based games, I use V.A.T.S. a lot. My choice for Perks is geared that way (getting criticals in V.A.T.S. can end a person quickly--useful when you got a gang o' bros to dispatch). Put another way, V.A.T.S. gives you more smackin for the action (points).
• The tough kills (Yao Guai, Deathclaws and Super Mutant Behemoths) would do well for you to use the Dart Gun. Seek out the schematic and wear Small Guns enhancing clothing (or spend a few points or go on a bobblehead/skill book hunt). This will let you slow them down, so when you go toe to toe, you can back away if you are getting it handed to you. Just target the highest percentage body part, the Dart Guns poison ALWAYS cripples both legs (rear legs in case of Yao Guai) unless the creature coming at you has greater than 1000 hit points in each leg (none I've seen having finished the game once). This tip is universal though--slow down the big boys.
• For the followers try this. Early on in the game you should be close to neutral, no matter how you're gonna play it. Close enough you could get down or up easily to Neutral to go ahead and purchase Sargent RL-3. If on a console, you can use the Sargeant RL-3 hack to get all the followers before AND after Raven Rock, so fill up early. The DC Mall area is tough for Melee / Unarmed types. If on a PC, go ahead and use the Console hack to use the Dogmeat cheat. By the time you get Fawkes, you will be fighting to get your XP, so be sure to have gotten a ranged skill in addition to Explosives or you'll miss lots of XP because your army will kill lots of things before you can Shishkebab them. An alternative is to tell all your followers to use Melee tactics, but it's so sweet to see SPC/Charon with Vengeance and Fawkes with his Gatling just mowing down suckers.. By Fawkes, you should plan to have gotten up to level 20, so you aren't trying to level up anymore (unless playing Broken Steel).
• I'm playing "good" with this one, and thus will save Megaton to get the apartment there. Store your Big Guns, unique weapons, custom weapons and power armor there so you can tote more loot.
• In addition to junk/AID to keep, here are some weapons, ammo, you should keep some of:
  • 5mm Rounds. These are used by the Minigun/Eugene, and SPC is awesome with it. Just keep all of these as they are expended quickly.
  • 10mm Rounds. These are used by Sydney's "Ultra" SMG, a fine Small Gun. No need to keep a whole lot, because they are cheap and plentiful. Charon and Jericho are good with Small Guns, so give the SMG to them.
  • Missles/Nukes. Goes without saying that a Fat Man / Missle Launcher is great if you want to go Behemoth hunting. Nothing satisfies quicker than a great big explosion.
  • Darts. These are used by the Dart Gun which is essential to keep Behemoths and Deathclaws slowed down so you can run if need be. The nature of "any hit cripples" means you can trust a small gunner (Jericho, Clover, Charon) with this or use it yourself. Hotkey it, use it for your first shot, then switch back to your primary. It doesn't do enough other damage to use as a primary weapon (not for this character build).
  • Multifusion Cells (MFC). These are used by the A3-21 Plasma rifle-a killer Energy weapon. Give this to a follower so it doesn't decay. Green Goo piles will abound!
  • Railway Spikes. These are used by.... the Railway Gun.. If you spend points into Small Guns somehow (bobblehead/skillbook hunting, levelling up points), it can also cripple limbs, but you must target the limb you want to cripple, which makes this useful (killer for small gun specialists with rifle perk), but not as much as the Dart Gun, which you could give to a follower since it doesn't matter where the dart goes for the crippling effect.
  • Alien Cells. It goes without saying that you won't be able to purchase these. IF, and only IF, you are going to spend some points into Energy Weapons (levelling up points, skill books--the Bobble Head is unreachable until well into the Main Quest), find the alien blaster or firelance (probably the best gun in the game). It breaks down, though, and the ammo is limited, so maybe use for sneak shots and "save" it.
• Never, ever, EVER become over encumbered. You should consider running around without armor on, too (but carry some for quickly putting on if you are outgunned). You need to be fast so you can get close (once you enter the [DANGER] zone). Or, you need to be quiet--and armor adds to your "noise" when sneaking.
• Hang on to skill books until level 5. Then you will be getting twice the bang for the buck.

Custom Weapons of interest

• Shishkebab (schematic as reward from Blood Ties side-quest, some travelling merchants). With the right perks and high Melee skill, it becomes worth it to have to run into fire to swing this and you will be DEADLY.
• Others mentioned in Tips, but non are essential to this build.

S.P.E.C.I.A.L.

(#) = "balance"

   S - 8 (2)
   P - 4 (3)
   E - 4 (4)
   C - 7 (3)
   I - 7 (1)
   A - 5 (1)
   L - 6 (0)

Tag Skills

1. Speech (Charisma). You will be able to angle for better rewards and sometimes access shortcuts.
2. Melee (Strength). You will be slicing and dicing once you build the Shishkebab
3. Science (Intelligence). Helps you shut down turrets.

Perks

(Advantage) (Requirements, if any. Bold indicates you have to take action in the game to satisfy the requirement)

2. Intense Training (+1 PER)
3. Thief (+5 Sneak, +5 Lockpick)
4. Educated (+3 skill points / level)
5. Comprehension (+2 instead of +1 per skill book read) (hang on to all skill books until this!)
6. Iron Fist 1 (+5 Unarmed Dmg) (STR 4)
7. Toughness (+10 DR) (EN 5)
8. Iron Fist 2 (+5 Unarmed Dmg) (STR 4)
9. Strong Back (Carry 50 more pounds) (STR 5, EN 5)
10. Finesse (+5% Critical Chance)
11. Size Matters 1 (+15 Big Guns) (EN 5)
12. Iron Fist 3 (+5 Unarmed Dmg)
13. Silent Running (+10 to Sneak and no sound penalty sneak-running) (AGI 6, Sneak 50)
14. Fast Metabolism (+20% using stimpacks)
15. Size Matters 2 (+15 Big Guns) (EN 5)
16. Cyborg (+10 DR, +10 Poison Res, +10 Radiation Res) (Sci 60, Med 60)
17. Better Criticals (+50% Critical Damage) (PER 6, LUCK 6)
18. Paralyzing Palm (V.A.T.S. paralyze for 30 seconds) (Unarmed 70)
19. Action Boy/Girl (+25 AP in V.A.T.S) (AGI 6)
20. Grim Reaper's Sprint (if you slay foe in V.A.T.S., you get all APs back)

• Ninja was considered at 20, but the requirement of Melee 80 makes it unsuitable for Unarmed because that's 50 skill points or so that could be spread among other usefulness like repair and/or for science and medicine to satisfy reqs for Cyborg. My "Ninja" (using a sword / nunchuck is melee, after all) is here.

Quest Perk Choices

• Those!: Ant Might (+1 Str +25% Fire Res)
• Wasteland Survival Guide: Give the Snide response to Moira to get the Critical Chance bonus (along with PR and RR)