Hey guys, phathod here. I have been thinking about getting the meltdown perk, but I am on the fence about it. I've watched videos and read the wiki but I still can't decide. The damage boost seems like a great addition for energy weapons, especially the weaker ones that are so fun, I love the Laser RCW!. However, I am worried about frequently killing myself and random npcs that are nearby. So, for those of you who use it, what do you think of it. How's the damage boost? Do you kill yourself frequently? Overall would you say it's worth it?

Thanks to those who contribute something useful! Cheers.

It isn't that easy to suicide in normal difficulty.......in higher difficulty you should also get Perk "Hit the Deck" to minimize its damage.

Meh, it's fun to see, not that useful practically.

Enemies don't generally crowd THAT close together for it to be super useful.

I haven't chose it yet but i saw a vid on youtube where a guy managed to vaporise himself, screw that!

Critical hits and sneak attacks seem to carry over into Meltdown. This is a very painful experience. I had to start pumping up melee weapons for if enemies got close to me.

On the upside, a single meltdown is usually enough to wipe out a group of enemies. I found it really useful fighting gangs of Legion in the final battles.

This turns your energy weapons into de facto explosives weapons. So your average Plasma Caster will become a Grenade Launcher - and you will have to play accordingly. It screws somehow Flamers and other "in the face" weapons so be careful about Pyromaniac and a romance with Explosives many Flamers fans commit. You will have to backtrack quite a lot when fighting and do more kills at mid-range meaning this isn't really for Fast Shot characters who need to get really close to get their 95%. You will drop your companions quite a lot too when trying to help them so better have those who get extra life and/or armor rather than extra damage - might be problematic for hardcoe, for Normal it isn't a problem at all. In corridors you want to have a secondary weapon in case you are crowded, Unarmed for example with Piercing Strike and Paralyzing Palm (there's space for 2-3 extra perks in Energy builds and Unarmed is solid even with lower Str - and there's a lot of great "energy" weapons in Unarmed so you won't break immersion of your character, Pushy, Paladin Toaster, Displacer Glove, Power Fist).

Having done the game 2 times as an energy build, if I ever had to go third time, I'd do exactly that: Trigger Discipline, Meltdown and Unarmed as a secondary skill. Play a Brotherhood of Steel Paladin basically. I'd also give up on Weapon Handling and try to get up to 8 "normal" STR with such a character, starting at 6 STR (at expense of Charisma (easier) or (harder) Agility if I also wanted to give up on Slayer), implanting to 7 and Intense Training to 8 at lvl2 for bonus unarmed damage more than anything. Being Unarmed first part of the game is easier than being energy after all.

Thanks for the responses guys.

I watched my friend play on his unarmed/melee build, and I am not really a fan of it. His strategy is essential button mashing, which is surprisingly effective. Additionally, I don't think that I many points to spare for unarmed or melee, since I wish to max or near max speech, barter, energy weapons, lockpicking, and science. I really wish this perk only affected hostile npcs, then it would be a no brainer to get.

Does hit the deck really affect it? I was under the impression in only affected explosives, but is the explosion from meltdown considered explosive damage, or energy? And if its considered explosive damage, does that mean increasing my explosive skill will increase the damage of meltdown?

From what I hear, the explosives damage perk doesn't affect it. I also hear the AOE of meltdown damage is depends on the weapon used. You just have to time your shots a bit, when the enemy lunges forward step back and shoot.

Its a rather usefull perk in my opinion but it does take some practice. For the first little while you might find it hard to use or even just plan useless but once you get used to it. Oh My. Plus it open up new ideas for strategys.

Its useful specialy when sniping with a modded laser rifle.. I nuked an entire pack of fiends and thier dogs all with one shot.

Yes I do blow myself up from time to time a smidge.. you HAVE to have toughness 2x and the implant and good armor or else this perk will realy rip you up alot.

- Demolitions Expert doesn't affect it. In GECK it has a very tight list of 14 weapons it boosts.
- In GECK I see that Hit the Deck adds +50% to DT against explosions (so theoretically could reduce damage by extra 10-15 points and maybe prevent it alltogether) but there's no way of telling if it affects Meltdown explosions or not. I will cheat a character and test it one of these days before I go as energy.
- Meltdown explosion damage is derived from weapon's damage, bigger the gun, worse the explosion. So if you have to shoot in the face, don't shoot with Gauss.
- Those break limbs just like normal explosions, Adamantium Skeleton seems in order, especially on hardcoe.
- If you go hardcoe, you won't be carrying unlimited ammo so it's good to have a backup plan just in case. I typically take Cowboy (so many cool weapons on the list) and some basic Melee - but for Energy I'd pick Unarmed due to all the "energy" fists.

EDIT, before I start even testing, you need 70 Explosives for Hit the Deck. Worth it?

I can remember one situation vividly where meltdown was priceless. (in ceasers tent, fighting his elite guards.)

Definitely could be worth it if using Spray and Pray and Hit the Deck. It could negate a large portion of friendly fire and self inflicted damage. If that is the case, I could definitely see pumping explosives and neglecting a little science and speech.

With that synergy you could also go for Flamers while you're at it. If you don't smoke them fully but let them burn on their own into death you can use Flamer up close... Still, 5 Cazadores surround you and you've got nothing to defend yourself with.

The Meltdown perk is useful and problematic at the same time. If you are single focus energy user and all of your weapons both close and far range are energy weapons I def don't suggest choosing this perk to be honest. Guns like the Laser RCW and the Multiplas suddenly become extremely dangerous to use to both you and your companions. While it is nice to see things go boom you don't want to be in range of the blast or you will either die or easily get crippled. However this perk at mid-range and long range is extremely effective. This is especially the case with the Gauss rifle and its unique variant the YCS/186. Its effectively a long-range, super accurate, high velocity grenade. With one shot as long as you kill the object your targeting you can end up seeing an entire crowd of enemies get sent flying sky high. It was especially satisfying killing a crowd of deathclaws as I detonated Mommy Deathclaw and watched the entire pack of baby deathclaws around her die and set off a huge chain explosion with bodies flying everywhere.
Unfortunately I am unsure whether or not meltdown is considered explosive or energy damage. Also unsure if the power of the weapon your using affects the power of the blast. All i know is that if your sniping with an energy weapon this perk is a lot of fun. :celebration:
Im thinking of cheating a character to see if Spray and Pray, Hit the Deck, and Demolition Expert all affect it.

But if you pick Explosives as your secondary - what the hell do you need Meltdown for then. You get more than enough ways to blow people up with Explosives alone - so you rather want Energy for an Explosives build as a backup up close when you can't toss a grenade...

But if you pick Explosives as your secondary - what the hell do you need Meltdown for then. You get more than enough ways to blow people up with Explosives alone - so you rather want Energy for an Explosives build as a backup up close when you can't toss a grenade...

Oh i know. Im just cheating the character to see if those perks do work out of simple curiosity.

If Meltdown worked with Explosives perks it'd suggest devs wanted to synergize both those skills via Meltdown - the way Melee and Guns synergize via Cowboy perk. A cool idea, but did they actually pull it off properly?

To really know we'd need the code behind Meltdown, how the size and damage of explosion are exactly calculated - but it isn't in GECK. You can measure damage done by it to some degree - but can you measure size of the explosion for example whether the range of it is increased or not?

It's a cool perk. I like it. It's fun. But I wish I hadn't got it. Very rarely does the explosion actually hit another enemy because rarely are enemies that close to each other (great on Mojave wildlife such as radscorpions and geckos since they're always bunched up). It becomes very detrimental when enemies manage to get close as it Puts you in harms way. Often. Especially super mutants and ESPECIALLY nightkin as they pretty much ALL run up to you in seconds. As cool as it is, there are more negatives than positives.

Only use the YCS/186 as your energy weapon and swap to unarmed, shotgun or whatever your weapon of choice is for closer combat. If you are sticking to pure energy weapons, then ya, mistake.

If you want to use just Gauss, why even bother going Energy...

I had to take it out via console-commands, I kept killing myself.

The best way I have found to use it involves playing on normal and not hardcoe.
Pretty much you use your companions as bait and when all the enemies bunch up you blast them all the hell from a distance.