I want help choosing the SPECIAL correctly and maybe guidance on what perks to go for too. Also what are the best skills to pick at the beginning where you choose if you want to be more accurate or fire quicker etc..
I want him to be a good shot with atleast one gun specialization so i can deal with difficult situations relatively easy.
I want him to be a bad guy as my last play through i played a goody two shoes and kissed ncr's ass all game.
I want to be good melee fighter too and good with his fists.
He needs to be a survivalist too as hes going to make a lot of factions mad so he needs his own base of operations.
Also, and this is quite important, i want something that would maybe change the dialogue with npcs, as in doing things differently and things of that nature. For example having a higher speech? or maybe super low intelligence? or charisma, thats the thing i dont know where to invest my SPECIAL points, i like intelligence for the skills points but i like him to be charismatic too and i cant invest heavily in both, i wanted a lot of strength for melee reasons too.

Is this possible? Any ideas will be appreciated.

Many thanks!

I would do something along the lines of...(check my math)
S-8
P-8
E-7
C-3
I-3
A-6
L-5
Also I would choose Heavy Handed and Trigger Discipline or Fast shot(depending on what you want) as your first perks. Also I would tag Guns, Melee, and Unarmed as you skill traits. As you said you want "different" dialogue options, so I would recommend Confirmed Bachelor or Lady Killer as your first level up perks, but I would stay away from XP perks because there is plenty of XP out there. From then on just pick perks that fit your characters skills so pick perks that involve Guns, Melee weopons an unarmed.

S-5
P-5
E-9
C-1
I-5
A-7
L-8

Then +1 to each from implants will get you the reqs for pretty much all perks needed for such a character
Can drop a couple from luck and/or agility into strength if you want to use heavier weaponry such as the LMG, or into charisma if you'll use companions

Traits:
Fast Shot
Skilled or Heavy Handed

Could use trigger discipline instead of fast shot if you're going to use high spread weapons

Tag: Guns, Melee, _your choice_
For more dialogue options, can buff your speech to around 40-50 early on. Just keep track of what the skill requirements you need for perks instead of tossing everything into tag skills.
Make sure to buy the naughty nightwear from Mick and Ralph's in Freeside for +10 to speech checks when you can equip it. I also buy moonshine from Goodspings' bar which gives another +4 via +2 charisma. Party time mentats, when you can make them, can give you even more.

Perk options:

Confirmed bachelor and similar perks can give you thematic unique conversation options with a small damage boost
Cowboy and/or Grunt can buff guns and melee weapons with up to +50% damage for knives if both - if you go this route I'd skip heavy handed since the knife weapons benefit more from crits
Super Slam, Piercing Strike, Slayer are a given for melee (unfortunately requiring you to get high unarmed and melee skill)
Finesse and Better Criticals are no brainer damage boosts
Hand Loader can be great for certain guns, depends on what you decide to use though
Silent Running is great if you go for sneak attacks with melee
Stonewall, Toughness, and Adamantium Skeleton are good perks for making you more durable which is important for melee
Comprehension, via doubled skill magazine bonus, can help you gain access to much more dialogue options early on

EDIT - after some thought, I figured out a way to swap things around so you'd still get what you'd like:

S - 8
P - 4
E - 5
C - 9
I - 9
A - 1
L - 4

Traits:
Fast Shot
Heavy Handed

Perks:
Confirmed Bachelor and similar pirks
Stonewall
Toughness
Adamantium Skeleton
Grunt/Cowboy

Can't think of much more perks as most, if not all of my characters are ranged combatants.

Ok great some good ideas, thanks.

Doesn't charisma or intelligence affect the dialogue at all? Is charisma mainly for companions?
Which SPECIAL stat is the most useless?
I would maybe prefer to drop some points out of luck as that's all it is..luck, no guarantees.

From what I've gathered if I go melee endurance is what I'm going to need the most of, but I would not go with 1 in agility as requiem suggested, I still want to use vats a lot.

There are a few dialogue checks that require certain SPECIAL, but the vast majority are just skill checks. Speech is much more important than charisma for dialogue.
The most useless SPECIAL stat will depend on the build, but if you aren't going to use companions it is charisma.
Luck is more than just luck actually, luck increases your critical chance by 1% per point(which adds up with perks and items) and slightly increases ALL skills.

For example, with 10 luck, finesse, and light touch a character will have 20% chance to crit. With 1st recon beret 25% chance. Using a weapon with 2x critical chance that becomes 50% chance to crit. It is most valuable if you're going to use weapons with over 1x crit chance, but still a solid damage stat.

Agility is the most important gun stat though. It reduces the time it takes you to reload fairly dramatically, which is very important with guns. It also reduces time it takes to draw weapons, and gives more action points.

Strength increases melee damage, but in my experience it's most important to meet a weapon's requirements and anything above that is minor.

Charisma doesn't effect dialogue aside from speech checks. Intelligence can effect the dialogue, low INT characters will have access to dialogue high INT characters won't, ande vice versa. There are also other miscellanious speech checks that require various skills, guns, mediccine, etc.

And useless is a subjective term.

Strength - Most of my characters are ranged specialists, the only reason most have 7 strength is to be able to effectively use the heavier weapons. Otherwise I don't get much use out of it.

Perception - Perception at best effects how soon enemies appear on your compass, at worst it does nothing else, save for boosting stats from the get go.

Endurance - Increases the amount of health you have, useful for a lot of obvious reasons.

Charisma - Unless I roleplay a savvy talker, this stat for me is always at 1. I never use it. It doesn't carry the weight it did in the originals. Wasted potential and wasted SPECIAL points for me.

Intelligence - Increases the amount of skill points you get per level, to a maximum of 15 @ 10 (17 with educated), and is needed for some speech checks. One of the SPECIAL stats I use the most.

Agility - Increases AP, decreases reload time. Most of my builds revolve heavily around scouts, snipers, or just a jack-of-all-trades that are of an agile build. I always make it a point to get my character's AGI to 10 from 8 (Agile frame + Implant). I also rarely use vats so, take it as you will.

Luck - Increases Crit chance by 1%/Point for a total of 10%. This is, by far, my favorite special stat. Expecially with the mayhem that it can cause. I have a build for Ruin, where he has 10 luck, and is an EW specialist; namealy, Lasers. He uses Meltdown and Laser Commander (favorite perks) exclusively.

And here is why Luck is my favorite SPECIAL stat:

This build for Ruin revolves around his chance to Critically hit.

10 Luck adds a 10% chance to critical hit.
Add in the trait Built to Destroy thats another 3% for a total of 13%.
Add in the perks Light Touch, (+5%) Finesse (+5%), Laser Commander (+10% with Lasers), and Set Lasers for Fun II (+4% with EW), for a grand total of a 37% critical chance.

Right now we're at achieving Meltdown once every .37 shots.

Now we get into equipment; add in the 1st Recon Beret (+5%), Ulysses' Duster (+5%), and Lucky Shades (+1%) and that turns into a 48% Critical Chance, for a Meltdown almost every other shot.

Now add in consumables and VATS; True Police Stories (with Comprehension for a +10% bonus) while VATS gives a static +5% bonus. That brings us up to a 63% Critical Hit chance, which is just over a crit every other shot. Now; even without true police stories you'll still have a 53% chance to critically hit. Which is still over a critical every other shot.

It's worth noting that many good perks will require certain SPECIAL, you can't completely neglect perception if you want better criticals(requires 6 luck and perception) which is one of the best damage boosting perks available.

As I always say I find strength and endurance hugely overated. Figure out what weapons you must have and set your strength 2 points less because there is a perk that lessens strength requirements. I don't know your playstyle so endurance is of great use but with armor and high endurance makes you a bullet sponge able to endure tons of damage. I almost never use companions but I like a high charisma even though it's almost utterly useless. I also use vats a ton so high agility is a must. This is what I usually play with but I use heavy stealth builds and if I take direct combat die really fast.

S-2-4 depending on weapon choices
P-6-for better crits perk. A must
E-1, I like realistic gun fire and 1or 2 shots from
any gun will kill me
C-8
I-8-9, high intelligence means more skill points.
I use Logans Loophole so I cap at L30
A-9
L-9

With this build raise sneak high and bu level 12 take the perk that makes you sneak quietly. Its my favorite character build

Ok thanks guys this is all really helpful, i say this as i only get to play 5-6 hours a week and i didnt want to look back in 2 months time and realise ive got the wrong character set up, i've been debating for weeks what character to make so all this help is appreciated.

Requiem and Hermit you've changed my mind on Luck, so i think ill go with a high luck and as i've really never liked using companions i'll go with a 1-2 in charisma and just boost speech with skill points instead. Im still debating if i should go with low intelligence too and boost agility and strength, i suppose i'm kind of going to make him to be a bit of an old fashioned brute and adding intelligence doesn't seem right for rp purposes.

I would like to play on harcore too as my last playthrough became very easy in the long run and would like to experience everything fallout has to offer in terms of realism. The only thing im concerned about is, does playing on hardcoe make enemies stronger in anyway or give them more hit points? If the answer is no then i think im pretty much set and ready to go


Again thanks for the detailed responses

From RP viewpoint, I agree with your SPECIAL, I wouldn't boos intelligence either, I'd invest in strength, endurance and perhaps agility, few points to luck of course. About charisma...in most of my playthroughs I set it to 6, because I can use Animal friend perk at level 10, which is really useful, at least I think so. It makes exploration easier and also more interesting in some places, like Big MT.

Glad to help.

As for your questions about hardcoe. I don't believe it makes enemies any harder. It just adds realism in the form of Water, Food, and Sleep meters that need to be kept in check.