I just bought New Vegas as I used to be a big fan of Fallout 3 and so far it has been really good (other than the constant glitchy walking! What's with that?!)
But just a few questions...

I've gone for a standard gun class just so I can get used to the storyline, etc and put my S.P.E.C.I.A.L as something like:

Str: 8
Per: 4
End: 8
Chr: 5
Int: 9
Agility: 5
Luck: 1

(I think, not sure as I'm not on the game atm)

I'm currently putting all of my skill points onto Guns, Repair and Medicine but I find I'm really struggling to breeze through quests as they seem to require a lot of speech or barter where as I usually see these as a pretty useless point usage. So have you got any hints or tips as to what I should do? Do I need to start over or will my stats be fine? I've only put about 3 hours into it so starting over wouldn't be a huge issue. Also I put my first perk into intense training and added the point onto Int as well. I planned to put my next perk into Swift Learner. So am I doing it fine or is my character a disaster?

Speech and Barter are arguably as important as battle type skills such as Guns and Medicine; You wont really need Barter though because you will be rolling in caps toward the end of the game, But speech is very, very important it opens up new things that otherwise you wouldn't be able to access, its kind of like a masterkey - so to speak. I advise starting over and putting serious thought into your character because you don't want to be playing the game with the constant thought running through your mind of ''I shouldn't started again''

P.s - No character is a disaster, you can and will have to play through the game at-least 4 times anyway to fulfill its potential.

You will need these:

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas ------- dont use it too much, dont spoil your game

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/forum/40-fallout/ -------

Good luck, have fun.

I think you've put to much into strength, it isn't necessary early on because you don't have much stuff and later it just makes you lazy about taking stuff to a vendor, which in turn means they don't have enough caps to buy everything you want to sell and you end up with a house stuffed full of things you don't need. Plus your companions can carry heavy stuff for you.

I think that you'd need a little more luck
And your tags are fine (Even if Guns makes you a boring person)

It depends on how you intend to play the game!
Do you want to shoot/kill and generally smash your way through or would you rather talk things out and be diplomatic?
You could make your charecter big tough,strong and kinda dumb.. or you could go for someone maybe less tough, with less endurance but with high intelligence and speech. etc etc.

I'm on my first playthrough and I ended up building a charecter who was stupidly strong and very aggressive, and found myself beating people up rather than talking with them. Later on in game you'll find if you're strong there will be more options to use your strength rather than speach skills, ie to beat the truth out of people. or punch them in the face till they pay up the caps they owe..

Next game I'll maybe build a smaller smarter charecter. Good thing about New Vegas is the companions, so whatever build you decide on there will a companion just right to suit you and your needs.


Luck isnt *particularly* important if you dont plan to do much gambling, but that is of course my own oppinion. Later on in game you can take a perk to increase your luck of finding good stufff in boxes and crates. I've never really understood perception. Surely being able to see a red blip on your radar when it's several km away and is not really any threat isnt so important?

Why do you think guns are boring? Not starting a fight, I'm just genuinely curious!

(Have you ever hooked your games console up to a subwoofer and then gone on a killing spree with a grenade launcher, minigun and a fat man? The police were called..)

My starting stats (for a small gun, sneak based (sniper) char) were:
S 4
P 6 (7 with 4 eyes trait)
E 6
C 1
I 8
A 6
L 9

I think Int and Luck is very important: The first for extra perk points and the latter for critical hits.

My final stats are:
S 6
P 9 ( with 4 eyes, 10 with headgear)
E 7
C 1
I 8
A 10
L 10

Charisma isn't usefull for me at all. But I can pass any speach check (100) also, if needed:
With the appropriate clothes, drugs and magazines (Speech currently at 68).
The same counts for Repair (100), Lockpick (80) and Science (80). All ckecks possible with magazines.

I excessively used the Intense Training perk and neglected all VATS based perks.
I think I just like the new Iron Sights and smoother gun-play of NV too much.