I'm still on my first character, but I went for the crafting perks first (I think Gun Nut was my first) or then Sneak and Lockpicking. I think that will be my MO in the future as well. I only take DMG-increasing perks if I start to feel underpowered so as to not overpower myself.

Just never considered getting that perk. I just swim across, pop one of my many Radaway's, and move on. Water itself has never been an issue of any kind even after 100+ hours of playing.

Lockpicking, definitely. And I get the next two levels of it as soon as they become available. Early on, you get as much ammo and weapons from locked safes and containers, as you do from anything else.

It is only useful to level faster. I have no desire for this (but I fully understand others that do want to).

It lets you breathe underwater too. Good if you don't lug your PA around all the time. It's the reason I took the first level in it anyway. The second level is a waste.

Scrounger! Bullets are life in the commonwealth.

I took Stealth perks first followed by Bloody Mess perks, followed by Enhanced Crits, then Sandman and Gunslinger.

Can you not swim on top the water or is there treasure under water I've been missing?

Same here. I never understood the fascination with leveling faster in a never ending game...

Plenty of stuff under the surface. Go diving =)

Yeah, I doubt I'll get it next time either, but I thought that if they actually made a perk that allowed you to breath under water that might mean that there was something worth going down there for. If so, I haven't found it.

+damage resistance/+20 health. I always go for defence first with a low level character. Then Gunslinger, to hit back just as hard.

Like many others, it's lockpicking, then scavenger, then hacker. Later on these are not too critical but in the beginning with low caps ammo and scrounging I find important.

This^

Idiot Savant > everything else for a first perk choice, especially when your INT is sub-par. Even then, it will always increase your XP gained by at least ~6% (additive, not multiplicative).

Idiot savant. Save scumming master race!

Bring a hireling, you will look for traps even if you have the perks. Beep beep beep, dammit it maccreedy, not again...Boom.

But like many others, lockpick first, hacking second. past that it varys a lot by build. Idiot is solid for exp, but the game is easily long enough to get to what you want without the boost. I pushed into sneak, rifleman and the craft skills initially myself.

I can't remember what my very first perk was. I restarted and discarded that character fairly soon, and with my second character who I stuck with it was Gunslinger.

Science was first on my Dalek character

I always pick my weapon of choice and run the first perk that improves damage

Rifleman.

Idiot Savant

I started my second character yesterday, I think I may end up going with an idiot savant build with most of my characters simply because being able to level up faster and get more perks faster feels like the best advantage.

That is something that I love about this new system, is that I finally feel eager to level up in a bethesda game again. I avoided leveling up in Oblivion because of leveled enemies, I avoided leveling up in Skyrim so that I could stack my stats as best as possible, in FO3 I avoided leveling because it was too easy to hit the level cap and max every thing out.

Now it feels like there is always three or four perks that I am wanting to work on and actually get excited to level up for.

Lockpicking, hacking, stealth. Opening stuff, sneaking and convincing people are generallly my holy trinity in any RPG. I'd rather improve my ability to interact with the environement than my combat abilities.

I always start with locksmith and hacker, and this time I went scrounger third.

More perks in the same amount of time. Also, radiant quests get boring so less of those possibly.

I levelled up Sneak to 4 ranks as a priority, because I hate having to crawl around at walking pace when I'm sneaking. Being able to be practically undetected at full crouched speed makes such a difference.

Yeah, Hacking was my first perk choice, but I'm not sure I'd bother with it on a second playthrough, certainly not as a priority. In previous games I mainly liked it so that I could read the extra game-lore in locked terminals, but I don't think there's a great deal of that locked away in higher-than-Novice terminals in this game.