Fallout 3 Guide - A Complete Guide to the New Broken Steel Perks - Levels 20-26

Fallout 3 Guide - A Complete Guide to the New Broken Steel Perks - Levels 20-26
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Broken Steel - Level 22 Perks

Puppies

This one is not too useful. I personally suggest that you just use the console trick to make Dogmeat invincible. If you don’t want to do that, then this does what it says it does. If Dogmeat dies, or is already dead, then a new puppy will be waiting for you at Vault 101. It will have twice as much health as Dogmeat and you will always get another one if the replacement puppy dies.

The thing is, it’s kinda worthless. Dogmeat is useless against the new enemies. If you want to keep him around for sentimental value, then I guess it’s worth it. Otherwise, just forget about him or do your best to keep the original alive.

Do be careful though. There seems to be a weird bug that makes hiring Fawkes impossible if you have the puppy in tow. If you do one of the events that automatically fires your followers, then you may be in a tough spot.

Deep Sleep

Absolutely worthless. If you have this, then you will get the well rested perk whenever you sleep. The well rested perk is something you normally get from sleeping in your own bed. This means a bed at any inn or a bed in your home. This gives you a 10% experience boost for 12 hours.

This perk is worthless. How often will you actually use it? Just level up Swift Learner if you really want another 10%.

Quantum Chemist

You’ll also need 70 points in Science for this Broken Steel perk. It’s worthless. For every 10 Nuka-Colas you find, you will automatically turn them into one Quantum Nuka-Cola. I guess this is useful if you are burning through Nuka Grenades at an absurd rate. If you really, really, really like using them and just can’t find enough Quantum Nuka-Colas, then get this. Otherwise, leave this alone.

Broken Steel Perks - Level 24

No Weakness

I can’t imagine this being useful. If you have any SPECIAL stats below 5, then this raises them to 5. I really can’t see how you’d still have stats below 5 at Level 24. If you do, then you would have probably pushed them above 5 by now with Intense Training. The Almost Perfect Perk gives you 9 in all categories anyway at level 30, so it’s kinda worthless now.

Devil’s Highway/ Karmic Rebalance/ Escalator to Heaven

Why would you waste a perk on this? It just changes your karmic status. Okay. If you need to lower your karma then just steal tin cans, use someone’s computer a bunch of times, use your cannibalism perk, or pickpocket people. If you need to raise it, then just donate caps to the church in Rivet City or the Church of Atom in Megaton. It just takes 2000 caps for a total reverse.

Broken Steel Perks - Level 26

Nerves of Steel

A decent perk actually. You’ll need to have 7 points in Agility though. This just increases the regeneration rate of your action points. It comes in handy for some of the tougher enemies when you’ll need to use VATS as much as possible. Grim Reaper’s Sprint makes it fairly useless for anything but the toughest fights though. It’s one of the better perks in the bunch though, if you already have the necessary agility.

Rad Tolerance

Worthless. You need to have 7 points in Endurance too. It makes you immune to the effects of Minor Radiation Poisoning. That’s all. This means that you won’t take the loss of 1 Endurance point if you have over 200 Rads. It does nothing else though. If you hit 400 rads, then you still get the full effects of the radiation poisoning.

I can’t imagine that you wouldn’t have My First Infirmary or a horde of Rad Away by the time that you are level 26.

Warmonger

This is fairly worthless, especially since you need 7 points in Intelligence to get it. It gives you level 3 schematics for each of the special weapons in Fallout 3. It has some uses obviously. You won’t be able to get the third schematic for a few of the weapons if the traveling merchants are dead. You might also have just not found one and got tired of looking. The benefit just isn’t worth it in my opinion. There are so many other better things you can spend the perk on.

Broken Steel Perks - Level 28

Rad Absorption

You need 7 points of Endurance for this fairly useless perk. You’ll naturally shed 1 point of radiation roughly once every 20 seconds. Again, I think it’d be easier to just get some Rad Away or travel home and use My First Infirmary. I personally had about 50 Rad Away by this point, so I don’t know why you’d need it.

The other problem is that you should already pick up a lot of natural rad resistance through quests. If you also want to get Nuclear Anomaly at level 30, then this drastically reduces the potential strength.

Party Boy / Party Girl

Absolutely worthless. This makes it so that you won’t suffer the negative effects from alcohol addiction. I can’t imagine how a level 28 character wouldn’t have the 800 caps for a My First Laboratory. This can cure any addiction, so that makes this worthless.

Broken Steel Perks - Level 30

Nuclear Anomaly

Fallout 3 Broken Steel - Get Nuclear Anomaly If You Want to Do This Without A Car

A cool perk if you don’t want to get Almost Perfect. If your health drops below 20 you unleash a nuclear explosion that scales up as you have more radiation. This reduces your level of radiation to zero and provides partial healing. It will have a lot of unfortunate effects. Fawkes can usually survive but some of your other allies might be a bit less fortunate. It can also set off chain explosions in cars around you, which guarantees a death anyway.

It’s alright, but not the most useful. It’s important to note that this is worthless against any enemy that can cause more than 20 damage and kill you before you ever reach the appropriate range. Deathclaws can usually do this. Most of the tougher enemies are also able to accomplish this on hard and very hard. It really limits the effectiveness.

Almost Perfect

This is a straightforward perk. It makes all of your SPECIAL stats 9. This basically makes you a god of the wasteland. If you don’t get the bobbleheads before you get the Almost Perfect perk, you can get everything to 10. Luck also works for this. If you get the Lucky 8 Ball after getting the perk you’ll have 10 points in Luck. You can even just drop your lucky 8 ball somewhere safe and get it later to usually improve it.

I personally got this, but it’s a little disappointing. The game has no challenge left to it, so there isn’t really any motivaiton to use this perk for long. You’ll probably just start a new game.

Broken Steel Perks - Changes to Old Perks

Since I’ve just listed most of the new perks as useless, you might be wondering what to use the new 10 spots for in your game. I’ll note that a few old perks are now surprisingly useful.

Entomologist is great for killing the Albino Scorpions that you will find. That 50% extra damage to insects and other bugs isn’t that useful at first. It really helps with your wasteland wanderings at the higher levels though. It’s something to think about at least.

Robotics Expert is also surprisingly useful. That extra damage is great once you start running into sentry bots one after another. The last mission also gives you a chance to use this perk to make all of the robots allied to you, which is a nice change of pace and cool to watch.

Don’t forget that you can also scoop up some of the better perks that are now mid-range. Mister Sandman, Ninja, Paralyzing Palm, etc. are all fun and somewhat useful add ons to use.

Finally, almost all of the skill enhancing perks are useless now. You have an extra 10 levels to upgrade your skills, so it will be rare for you to not have enough points to level up everything that you want.

This post is part of the series: Fallout 3 Perk Guide

Fallout 3 is a complex game, with choices that will challenge you throughout your life in the Wasteland. One of these choices is your Perks - the abilities that make you more powerful than the average survivor. This guide will help you choose the best Perks, so you can not only survive, but thrive.

  1. Fallout 3 Perk Guide: Levels 1-8
  2. Fallout 3 Perk Guide: Levels 10-14
  3. Fallout 3 Perk Guide: Levels 16-20
  4. Survival Tips for Fallout 3: Perks and Requirements
  5. Fallout 3 Guide - Broken Steel Perks
  6. Not All Perks Are Good: Top Perks to Avoid in Fallout 3