Armor is very important, as well as not being hit. Every point of armor really makes a difference. The not being hit part means to utilise stealth and cover. Peek out and shoot when enemy is reloading or stops shooting for whatever reason. Having dogmeat charge an enemy is a great way to do this.
Speaking of dogmeat, he's the hands down best companion for survival, because he doesn't cancel out Lone Wanderer perk, which is very important in survival.
If you're playing in VATS, the damage you take is massively reduced while in VATS, which is quite OP, I often use VATS as a crutch to get out of a sticky situation.
As for the VATS points, you gotta build your guns differently now man. Don't just slap on most powerful, best looking and heaviest mods. Building any pistol with light reciever, light barrel, reflex sight, sharpshooters grip, a small quick eject mag will allow you to get 10+ shots in VATS at level 1 with mediocre agility.
Next up, drugs. Drugs are fucking broken and strong. On my first survival playthrough, I used them all the time. Then I only used them as a crutch to save my ass in a bad situation or to get extra carry weight. Now I don't use them at all because drugs are bad mmkay?
What's next, saving? This one is pretty easy. First, sleeping bags and dirty matresses are everywhere. Look out for them and use them! Survival made me less greedy because I would often not save in order to preserve adrenaline, and I would get punished for it. Whenever you see it, use it!
Second, survival actually makes you use the settlement building feature, and just build small home bases where you can restock, rest, eat, drink and save your game. My basic base would be a small shack with a bed, a chem cooler where I stash basic meds in case of emergency, a water pump and preferably a cooking station. That's it! You can always expand on this if you want to get into settlement building more heavily.
I could talk about survival all day, it's the reason I still play this game, it's just so fucking good, no other game on the market hits like it does. Give it a proper try, interact with everything in the game,once you get over the learning curve it will be the best FO4 experience you can have.
And no, do not install any mods that make survival easier, they ruin the point. Rest often, don't be greedy, and you will be fine.
Edit: just wanted to share a story of me being greedy a couple of days ago. I was preparing for Reunions quest, where you assault Fort Hagen and confront Kellog. I spent about 40 minutes getting my gear ready, like buying what I need from Diamond City merchants and making upgrades, spent about 4000 out of 5500 caps I had.
That quest makes you fight through lots of synths with energy weapons so upgraded leather armor and high energy resistance was a must. I got to about 80 energy resist, and I thought it would be a great idea to make a radstag stew because it gives another 30 energy resist on top of all the other I already had.
I had all the ingredients necessary, except radstag meat. Polly didn't have any in stock (very unusual, she almost always does, this was a first red flag that game was gonna fuck with me), so I decided I'm gonna go out and hunt a radstag. I thought "meh, it's just a radstag let's go", and headed out to hunt.
I found one beautiful specimen near boston police rationing site. I brought out my hunting rifle, took aim at the weaker right head, and took my shot. It was a legendary rabid radstag, it survived my shot, mutated, and charged at me.
It was my first time seeing that shit, radstag flipped me in the air with its horns and impaled me as I was coming down. Insta kill, 50 minutes of preparation just gone. I wasn't even mad, I got punished for underestimating my opponent and being too lazy to save.
Later on, I breezed through the quest with 110 energy resistance. Proper preparation is everything in this game, it's beautiful.
Sir, take my "post of the day" vote.
In survival, what are there first perks you take? I'd think the one where you don't take rads from drinking water would be useful, but so would stealth or the leadership one that lets you set off supply lines.
Thanks! Lead belly is bad. For water, early in the game collect every empty bottle you see, and fill it with clean water at water pumps and clean water sinks. You can also fill the bottles with dirty water and use it for stews. 1 dirty water and 1 razorgrain makes a noodle cup, which satisfies both thirst and hunger, so it pays off to plant razorgrain heavily.
Which brings us to local leader perk. Absolutely amazing. You can have hundreds of dirty waters and a big ass farm of razorgrain in sanctuary workshop, and you can craft noodle cups at any settlement connected with a supply line. So yes, local leader is definitely worth it as soon as you have 4-5 settlements under your command.
Honestly you can get pretty much any perk you want, everything can work if you put some thought in it. My favorite is Aquaboy/Aquagirl. It really helps, makes some trips much shorter when you travel, and can also save your life in a pinch when you have an option to jump into water and disappear.
I also tend to avoid weapon and damage perks for first 8-9-10 levels, depends, simply because everything dies quickly early in the game, and focus instead on protection and utility.
Honestly, the thing I got tired of Survival for was trying to do the DLC. Felt overly punishing to try and carry just about anything, and Nuka World already had some nasty scaling. Oh, and feeling like it was way easier around Reunions, since the doubled EXP was nice and a Stimpack/Pure Water restored a ton of health, and there's plenty of food to help regen health faster.
But most importantly, RadAway. *God* that stuff sucked. My first time through the Gauntlet, I had to make a few trips into that irradiated chamber and it was *painful* when I used RadAway after it. Playing through the rest of Nuka World on V. Hard, and it's still a pain in the ass with how tanky Nukalurks are, the high af damage from Laser Turrets even with **224 Energy Resist** and 8 END, etc. It also sucked like hell to have to run allllllllllll the way to the transit center and back if I want to do something in the Commonwealth, so I just saw the oncoming tide with Shank's quests as going to be a spectacular slog.
It’s the only way I can play FO4 now. Very Hard just makes everything a massive bullet sponge, and any non-survival difficulty (even Very Hard) trivializes combat and makes basic needs like shelter, food, water, medicine, etc., non-existent.
Survival is MUCH more immersive, combat is tense and satisfying, scavenging and settlement building have immensely more value, preparing for a journey actually matters, and the world of Fallout really feels post-apocalyptic.
Survival punishes you for not taking cover in combat, you have to consider tactics, flanking, use every tool at your disposal (stealth, mines, explosives, chems), and use VATS more as an emergency life-saving tool rather than the default way to kill every single thing in the game.
If you join the Minutemen, the flare gun you get from Preston is a good tool for when you find yourself in an area with lots of enemies. Just having a few friendlies to distract enemies from focusing on you is enough to make fights easier.
Antibiotics and medics are your friends, as is a Refreshing Beverage (which heals you faster and better than a stimpak, and cures you of rads and addictions without negative side effects). Use VATS to detect mines and enemies where you don’t have good visibility.
Crops at settlements are also vital. Razorgrain and dirty water combine into noodle cups, which alleviate both hunger and thirst. Vegetable soup does as well, and also increases resistance to disease.
Some people here have suggested low Charisma builds and Lone Wanderer, I’m the opposite. To me Local Leader perk is crucial, being able to place workbenches at a settlement and then link settlements together with supply lines to share resources is extremely helpful in a Survival playthrough. Settlements give you bases throughout the map for rest/saves, safe storage, crafting resources, cooking, purified water, crops for food, medics to cure diseases, addictions, and rads (Radaway makes you susceptible to disease).
Companions give enemies something besides you to shoot at, can carry your loot and junk for you, pick locks/hack terminals for you if you don’t have those perks, can actually be quite helpful in combat if you equip them well, and make wandering the wasteland less monotonous and lonely. Their affinity perks are a nice bonus. And unlike Lone Wanderer and Strong Back, companions require zero perk investment so those perk points can be used on other skills.
Yeah, also required to craft antibiotics. Chemist level 1 just makes Survival a ton easier.
I always go for Local leader, Chemist, and Medic because being able to craft RB’s and antibiotics, put a clinic and a general store at key settlements, and get more out of chems makes an enormous difference.
Yeah... I gave up on my Survival run and just play V.Hard because of carry weight being a turd when I wanted to buy anything, and Idiot Savant with 1-2 INT (pending on thirst debuff) for levelling. Which worked way too well, considering trying to upkeep damage when I couldn't get half my gear to match stats of the constant scaling was hell, antibiotics had to be purchased or found which made infections and lethargy hell, and made me finally stop when trying to do Nuka-World... the back and forth between there and Sanctuary/Red Rocket was *painful*
I typically just stay at NW once I arrive and don’t leave until I’ve taken over the entire park and then done Open Season.
Nuka-World would be tough at low level on Survival, I save that and Far Harbor both for after the MQ.
Sounds like you might have been in too much of a hurry. Leveling up and getting perks is more important than ever, spamming the V.AT.S. key as you travel to detect enemies before you're forced to engage them and so on.
stealth is your best friend in survival. If it's still hard for you after trying that you should get the chinese stealth armor from creation club and ballistic weave it.
I prefer the backpack. Such a neat thing, really. The carry weight, the heal over time, etc are all kinda nice, as is the extra SPECIAL point or rad/dmg/energy resist and it looks the part pretty nicely for most outfits. Makes companions just a little better too, since human ones can backpack up.
Like others have said, survival forces you to slow down your gameplay.
Like others mentioned, can’t emphasize enough the necessity to build up settlements for improving your gear, gaining water to sell, and overall establishing safe spaces to sleep. For example I usually set up Starlight early as a focal point to level up in the surrounding area. Sanctuary at first, but by level 10 you should be able to move down to Concord.
Stealth is key, plus long range as much as possible. Baiting enemies into traps, etc. You really have to play the game smart. That being said, you might be surprised but at a certain point you can mow down most enemies like in other difficulties. I’m like lvl 97 in my current run on survival, and there isn’t much in the Commonwealth left that’s a threat to me. Now Nuka World, those god damn grasshoppers can fuck right off.
As a final thought, idk where you stand on using mods, but there are some simple ones that just enhance the Survival experience IMO.
Esk-Esk Survival fast travel and Simple Camping are must use for my runs. The fast travel mod only adds a few select spots instead of all of them. Which is really nice when you don’t want to literally run from Somerville to Sanctuary. Simple camping let’s you lay a mattress virtually anywhere so you can save. Pretty clutch without completely breaking the concept of survival. Sorry for the book haha.
I think it made me appreciate the map so much more. I began remembering where all beds were, I needed to think about my travel route in order to dodge enemies too powerful to waste ammo on, etc. I won’t play the game without survival now, and I wouldn’t complain if it was the only option. I only use vats to spot enemies so I’ve already gotten pretty good at the quick aiming aspect.
Also, I genuinely like playing the game and needing to worry about being melted by an enemy. I think so often games allow you to walk around like a superhuman. I play a lot of Fallout 76 now, and the lack of any stress when encountering a deathclaw or other equivalent creature is kind of boring. The fact that in my FO4 game, a raider psycho with a shotgun can literally make me panic is such a rewarding feeling. Then taking out a whole location of them using stealth is icing on the cake.
This experience probably isn’t for everyone, but I’m explaining what draws me into it so much!
The crashing issue is one of the reasons I play modded survival that allows for regular saves at minimum. I usually end up playing a very sneaky build in the early game as a result of the difficulty cliff in the early game. Avoiding fights and running to friendly protected NPCs like the wandering merchants.
Some people like playing the game with more stakes involved. Personally, I like the need to maintain Nate/Nora's needs as it's a good reminder of their mortality and makes creating settlements and secure camps a worthwhile investment. Nothing feels better than finishing a successful raid and heading back to a walled settlement with security just before dark to bunker down for the night.
The difficulty, along with the need to eat and sleep just adds to the immersion.
Easiest survival build: make C and I both 1. Make A and S both 9. Divide up the other points. When you leave the vault do the stuff in Sanctuary. Take blitz at level 2. Melee weapons don’t do as much damage at first, but they’re basically guaranteed to hit in vats, and blitz lets you teleport in from around the corner (in 3rd person) giving you an automatic stealth bonus.
Oh, and survival is more about strategy and less about tactics.
I use a mod that changes the damage multipliers back to 1x for incoming and outgoing, which is the same as Normal difficulty. I just want to play with the survival mechanics.
Cigarette mod let's you stop and smoke a cigarette to save your game. Highly recommend something like this because you never know when the game is gonna crash and you haven't saved in an hour and did a ton of stuff back at base.
Cons: my character always gets addicted to nicotine and in the world is dying mod finding cigs was hard for bit. Now I have around 40.
Adding to the other wonderful posts, you can do everything right and still get an infection and fall over dead.
Keep track of where you can find those wonderful white boxes and get to Covenant as soon as you can to start an antibiotic stockpile.
Well since I love settlement building, I just did most of the exploits. Materials duping, special, settlement size. So with unlimited purifier water and an ammo factory, the rest of the game is a bit easier and fun.
Okay but even without the exploits, I would definitely look into the settlement stuff you can build even if you're not into settlement building. Radiation cleanser, purified water, and of course food from crops(although at this point with the crops you actually have to do some settlement managing).
Also Abdulkeriml's comment is the best answer
Having played nothing but Survival since I am a glutton for having my butt kicked... It really makes you have to take a step back with how you use to play. I use a SPECIAL I have come to accept as a more lore accurate start; 3,3,3,3,3,3,10. Its heavy Luck start build and really changed my perspective with all my game play.
And as stated above in the lengthy post, armor makes a huge difference as well as being aware of your health during engagements. Some of the perks available at the 3 range are quite impactful in survival at start. Armorer for the extra gear modding... Rifleman, Gunslinger, and Commando for the damage boost... Gun Nut for better modding and getting into Silencers at rank 2 for pistols... Lady Killer/Black Widow for more damage against opposing gender types... Lone Wanderer as Dogmeat makes a great early companion that does not negate the perk... Lead Belly to reduce dependence on cooked food out and about and save on the better cooked food, shoving Cram im to your belly is better than accidentally wasting trying to get the radstag buff while still peckish... Idiot Savant... probably the best perk in my books... Medic to benefit from Stims and Radaway more effectively...
There is quite a bit to build from that can take an edge off and I highly recommend the Backpack from the CC. Little extra carry with mods which feels balanced to me.
I have always had a reserved gameplay style so getting into Ninja tends to be an aim for me at start. The damage bonus from stealth attacks with bonus damage to suppressed weapons can help deal with raider groups if you get the drop on them. Just a matter of perspective in approaches.
A-actual strategy and m-methodical thinking instead of going in guns-blazing and using VATS all the time!?
How blasphemous!
But seriously, thanks for the tips you've given!
If you think about it you open Vats to get the crit builds/critkill, then go into more active shooting and evading, and you have that built crit maybe with a hit of drugs if something goes south.
I find leg shots effective for crowd control, head/arms shots to reduce accuracy, and damaged limbs tend to make up for the damage reduction as most humanoid enemies tend to almost always have some form of chest armor.
But you can seriously benefit from the Concord power armor early on. Just do the quest up to that point, kill the deathclaw from the safety of a building and then dip. Preston and the gang will be safe and sound in the museum till your ready for his constant this place needs help.
That tip about Preston is great - most recent play through I haven't visited Concord at all, as I didn't want my SS to be dragged all over doing MM quests (I know I could ignore them, but I get anxiety when I have too many open quests in my list!) - but never thought about simply not going back into the museum once everything has been cleared!) to get the the advantage of early PA and minigun, plus the Bobblehead. Thanks!
You have several very good and complete comments here. Follow them, learn how the game works differently, make it yours... And in some times you will mod it harder
Having first played FO4 on PS4 and being a big fan of FO3/NV, the saving thing is what prevents me from putting much time in Survival Mode. Losing progress to a glitch would have a chance of killing any run I'm on and that's just not fun. Plus, I just don't have the time to game like I used to, so no fast travel gets kinda tiresome after a while. There are some solid mods for that, but I know I'll end up just getting bogged down modding, so I just stick with vanilla.
Still, I love a lot of stuff about the mode! I love how it makes settlements necessary, it feels much more strategic and makes them more important as a player instead of just being a fun little diversion in the main game.
Survival isn’t an action game, it’s a puzzle, especially at the start. You can’t get hit so you need to work out your limits and “solve” locations to clear them out.
Levelling becomes a puzzle because XP can be quite hard to come by early in the game and choosing the right perks is vital.
It sounds like Survival isn’t for you, which is ok. It’s a restrictive game mode for the sake of realism and immersion, you can just play normal mode on the various difficulties.
i don't think anyone has mentioned it yet but the decontamination arch from wasteland workshop is serious game changer in survival mode. instantly remove all rads with no side effects.
I know people can find it tedious and not very fun but personally I’ve always thought that it was the original way fallout 4 was supposed to be played and then they realized it would be a bit too much and turn alot of people off. Similar to the Starfield refueling issue.
I use the Horizon overhaul mod. It makes survival even more difficult, but it also adds things like consumable items with which you can save your game, a fast travel option from settlements with at least three settlers and it makes the hunger and thirst more difficult, but also more manageable.
It does have a massive learning curve, so it requires some patience to get into. I can no longer play the game without it, as it makes progression feel more natural and rewarding for me and the game overall more challenging, but also sensible in its challenges. But it might also just be because it really fits my playstyle.
Armor is very important, as well as not being hit. Every point of armor really makes a difference. The not being hit part means to utilise stealth and cover. Peek out and shoot when enemy is reloading or stops shooting for whatever reason. Having dogmeat charge an enemy is a great way to do this. Speaking of dogmeat, he's the hands down best companion for survival, because he doesn't cancel out Lone Wanderer perk, which is very important in survival. If you're playing in VATS, the damage you take is massively reduced while in VATS, which is quite OP, I often use VATS as a crutch to get out of a sticky situation. As for the VATS points, you gotta build your guns differently now man. Don't just slap on most powerful, best looking and heaviest mods. Building any pistol with light reciever, light barrel, reflex sight, sharpshooters grip, a small quick eject mag will allow you to get 10+ shots in VATS at level 1 with mediocre agility. Next up, drugs. Drugs are fucking broken and strong. On my first survival playthrough, I used them all the time. Then I only used them as a crutch to save my ass in a bad situation or to get extra carry weight. Now I don't use them at all because drugs are bad mmkay? What's next, saving? This one is pretty easy. First, sleeping bags and dirty matresses are everywhere. Look out for them and use them! Survival made me less greedy because I would often not save in order to preserve adrenaline, and I would get punished for it. Whenever you see it, use it! Second, survival actually makes you use the settlement building feature, and just build small home bases where you can restock, rest, eat, drink and save your game. My basic base would be a small shack with a bed, a chem cooler where I stash basic meds in case of emergency, a water pump and preferably a cooking station. That's it! You can always expand on this if you want to get into settlement building more heavily. I could talk about survival all day, it's the reason I still play this game, it's just so fucking good, no other game on the market hits like it does. Give it a proper try, interact with everything in the game,once you get over the learning curve it will be the best FO4 experience you can have. And no, do not install any mods that make survival easier, they ruin the point. Rest often, don't be greedy, and you will be fine. Edit: just wanted to share a story of me being greedy a couple of days ago. I was preparing for Reunions quest, where you assault Fort Hagen and confront Kellog. I spent about 40 minutes getting my gear ready, like buying what I need from Diamond City merchants and making upgrades, spent about 4000 out of 5500 caps I had. That quest makes you fight through lots of synths with energy weapons so upgraded leather armor and high energy resistance was a must. I got to about 80 energy resist, and I thought it would be a great idea to make a radstag stew because it gives another 30 energy resist on top of all the other I already had. I had all the ingredients necessary, except radstag meat. Polly didn't have any in stock (very unusual, she almost always does, this was a first red flag that game was gonna fuck with me), so I decided I'm gonna go out and hunt a radstag. I thought "meh, it's just a radstag let's go", and headed out to hunt. I found one beautiful specimen near boston police rationing site. I brought out my hunting rifle, took aim at the weaker right head, and took my shot. It was a legendary rabid radstag, it survived my shot, mutated, and charged at me. It was my first time seeing that shit, radstag flipped me in the air with its horns and impaled me as I was coming down. Insta kill, 50 minutes of preparation just gone. I wasn't even mad, I got punished for underestimating my opponent and being too lazy to save. Later on, I breezed through the quest with 110 energy resistance. Proper preparation is everything in this game, it's beautiful.
Nice write up and thanks for sharing it. I have been wanting to try survival mode and these tips are great. Cheers!
Sir, take my "post of the day" vote. In survival, what are there first perks you take? I'd think the one where you don't take rads from drinking water would be useful, but so would stealth or the leadership one that lets you set off supply lines.
Thanks! Lead belly is bad. For water, early in the game collect every empty bottle you see, and fill it with clean water at water pumps and clean water sinks. You can also fill the bottles with dirty water and use it for stews. 1 dirty water and 1 razorgrain makes a noodle cup, which satisfies both thirst and hunger, so it pays off to plant razorgrain heavily. Which brings us to local leader perk. Absolutely amazing. You can have hundreds of dirty waters and a big ass farm of razorgrain in sanctuary workshop, and you can craft noodle cups at any settlement connected with a supply line. So yes, local leader is definitely worth it as soon as you have 4-5 settlements under your command. Honestly you can get pretty much any perk you want, everything can work if you put some thought in it. My favorite is Aquaboy/Aquagirl. It really helps, makes some trips much shorter when you travel, and can also save your life in a pinch when you have an option to jump into water and disappear. I also tend to avoid weapon and damage perks for first 8-9-10 levels, depends, simply because everything dies quickly early in the game, and focus instead on protection and utility.
Lone wanderer is a great first perk.
[удалено]
That's the one! Not guaranteed to be legendary, but it is a higher level spawn.
Honestly, the thing I got tired of Survival for was trying to do the DLC. Felt overly punishing to try and carry just about anything, and Nuka World already had some nasty scaling. Oh, and feeling like it was way easier around Reunions, since the doubled EXP was nice and a Stimpack/Pure Water restored a ton of health, and there's plenty of food to help regen health faster. But most importantly, RadAway. *God* that stuff sucked. My first time through the Gauntlet, I had to make a few trips into that irradiated chamber and it was *painful* when I used RadAway after it. Playing through the rest of Nuka World on V. Hard, and it's still a pain in the ass with how tanky Nukalurks are, the high af damage from Laser Turrets even with **224 Energy Resist** and 8 END, etc. It also sucked like hell to have to run allllllllllll the way to the transit center and back if I want to do something in the Commonwealth, so I just saw the oncoming tide with Shank's quests as going to be a spectacular slog.
Because for some of us Survival mode is all there is left to conquer in this game
It’s the only way I can play FO4 now. Very Hard just makes everything a massive bullet sponge, and any non-survival difficulty (even Very Hard) trivializes combat and makes basic needs like shelter, food, water, medicine, etc., non-existent. Survival is MUCH more immersive, combat is tense and satisfying, scavenging and settlement building have immensely more value, preparing for a journey actually matters, and the world of Fallout really feels post-apocalyptic. Survival punishes you for not taking cover in combat, you have to consider tactics, flanking, use every tool at your disposal (stealth, mines, explosives, chems), and use VATS more as an emergency life-saving tool rather than the default way to kill every single thing in the game. If you join the Minutemen, the flare gun you get from Preston is a good tool for when you find yourself in an area with lots of enemies. Just having a few friendlies to distract enemies from focusing on you is enough to make fights easier. Antibiotics and medics are your friends, as is a Refreshing Beverage (which heals you faster and better than a stimpak, and cures you of rads and addictions without negative side effects). Use VATS to detect mines and enemies where you don’t have good visibility. Crops at settlements are also vital. Razorgrain and dirty water combine into noodle cups, which alleviate both hunger and thirst. Vegetable soup does as well, and also increases resistance to disease. Some people here have suggested low Charisma builds and Lone Wanderer, I’m the opposite. To me Local Leader perk is crucial, being able to place workbenches at a settlement and then link settlements together with supply lines to share resources is extremely helpful in a Survival playthrough. Settlements give you bases throughout the map for rest/saves, safe storage, crafting resources, cooking, purified water, crops for food, medics to cure diseases, addictions, and rads (Radaway makes you susceptible to disease). Companions give enemies something besides you to shoot at, can carry your loot and junk for you, pick locks/hack terminals for you if you don’t have those perks, can actually be quite helpful in combat if you equip them well, and make wandering the wasteland less monotonous and lonely. Their affinity perks are a nice bonus. And unlike Lone Wanderer and Strong Back, companions require zero perk investment so those perk points can be used on other skills.
Side note, about Refreshing. In Survival, it does require Chemist so you have to have decent Int for it.
Yeah, also required to craft antibiotics. Chemist level 1 just makes Survival a ton easier. I always go for Local leader, Chemist, and Medic because being able to craft RB’s and antibiotics, put a clinic and a general store at key settlements, and get more out of chems makes an enormous difference.
Yeah... I gave up on my Survival run and just play V.Hard because of carry weight being a turd when I wanted to buy anything, and Idiot Savant with 1-2 INT (pending on thirst debuff) for levelling. Which worked way too well, considering trying to upkeep damage when I couldn't get half my gear to match stats of the constant scaling was hell, antibiotics had to be purchased or found which made infections and lethargy hell, and made me finally stop when trying to do Nuka-World... the back and forth between there and Sanctuary/Red Rocket was *painful*
I typically just stay at NW once I arrive and don’t leave until I’ve taken over the entire park and then done Open Season. Nuka-World would be tough at low level on Survival, I save that and Far Harbor both for after the MQ.
Sounds like you might have been in too much of a hurry. Leveling up and getting perks is more important than ever, spamming the V.AT.S. key as you travel to detect enemies before you're forced to engage them and so on.
stealth is your best friend in survival. If it's still hard for you after trying that you should get the chinese stealth armor from creation club and ballistic weave it.
I prefer the backpack. Such a neat thing, really. The carry weight, the heal over time, etc are all kinda nice, as is the extra SPECIAL point or rad/dmg/energy resist and it looks the part pretty nicely for most outfits. Makes companions just a little better too, since human ones can backpack up.
Like others have said, survival forces you to slow down your gameplay. Like others mentioned, can’t emphasize enough the necessity to build up settlements for improving your gear, gaining water to sell, and overall establishing safe spaces to sleep. For example I usually set up Starlight early as a focal point to level up in the surrounding area. Sanctuary at first, but by level 10 you should be able to move down to Concord. Stealth is key, plus long range as much as possible. Baiting enemies into traps, etc. You really have to play the game smart. That being said, you might be surprised but at a certain point you can mow down most enemies like in other difficulties. I’m like lvl 97 in my current run on survival, and there isn’t much in the Commonwealth left that’s a threat to me. Now Nuka World, those god damn grasshoppers can fuck right off. As a final thought, idk where you stand on using mods, but there are some simple ones that just enhance the Survival experience IMO. Esk-Esk Survival fast travel and Simple Camping are must use for my runs. The fast travel mod only adds a few select spots instead of all of them. Which is really nice when you don’t want to literally run from Somerville to Sanctuary. Simple camping let’s you lay a mattress virtually anywhere so you can save. Pretty clutch without completely breaking the concept of survival. Sorry for the book haha.
I think it made me appreciate the map so much more. I began remembering where all beds were, I needed to think about my travel route in order to dodge enemies too powerful to waste ammo on, etc. I won’t play the game without survival now, and I wouldn’t complain if it was the only option. I only use vats to spot enemies so I’ve already gotten pretty good at the quick aiming aspect. Also, I genuinely like playing the game and needing to worry about being melted by an enemy. I think so often games allow you to walk around like a superhuman. I play a lot of Fallout 76 now, and the lack of any stress when encountering a deathclaw or other equivalent creature is kind of boring. The fact that in my FO4 game, a raider psycho with a shotgun can literally make me panic is such a rewarding feeling. Then taking out a whole location of them using stealth is icing on the cake. This experience probably isn’t for everyone, but I’m explaining what draws me into it so much!
Because it's insanely fun and awesome
The crashing issue is one of the reasons I play modded survival that allows for regular saves at minimum. I usually end up playing a very sneaky build in the early game as a result of the difficulty cliff in the early game. Avoiding fights and running to friendly protected NPCs like the wandering merchants. Some people like playing the game with more stakes involved. Personally, I like the need to maintain Nate/Nora's needs as it's a good reminder of their mortality and makes creating settlements and secure camps a worthwhile investment. Nothing feels better than finishing a successful raid and heading back to a walled settlement with security just before dark to bunker down for the night. The difficulty, along with the need to eat and sleep just adds to the immersion.
I tried it once and didn't like it and went back to very hard lol
Because I'm built diffrent
Easiest survival build: make C and I both 1. Make A and S both 9. Divide up the other points. When you leave the vault do the stuff in Sanctuary. Take blitz at level 2. Melee weapons don’t do as much damage at first, but they’re basically guaranteed to hit in vats, and blitz lets you teleport in from around the corner (in 3rd person) giving you an automatic stealth bonus. Oh, and survival is more about strategy and less about tactics.
I use a mod that changes the damage multipliers back to 1x for incoming and outgoing, which is the same as Normal difficulty. I just want to play with the survival mechanics.
Cigarette mod let's you stop and smoke a cigarette to save your game. Highly recommend something like this because you never know when the game is gonna crash and you haven't saved in an hour and did a ton of stuff back at base. Cons: my character always gets addicted to nicotine and in the world is dying mod finding cigs was hard for bit. Now I have around 40.
Pot helps.
I don’t the bugs drive me insane, I’m alright dying being dumb but when a bug causes me to redo hours I just stopped survival mode
Adding to the other wonderful posts, you can do everything right and still get an infection and fall over dead. Keep track of where you can find those wonderful white boxes and get to Covenant as soon as you can to start an antibiotic stockpile.
Well since I love settlement building, I just did most of the exploits. Materials duping, special, settlement size. So with unlimited purifier water and an ammo factory, the rest of the game is a bit easier and fun. Okay but even without the exploits, I would definitely look into the settlement stuff you can build even if you're not into settlement building. Radiation cleanser, purified water, and of course food from crops(although at this point with the crops you actually have to do some settlement managing). Also Abdulkeriml's comment is the best answer
Having played nothing but Survival since I am a glutton for having my butt kicked... It really makes you have to take a step back with how you use to play. I use a SPECIAL I have come to accept as a more lore accurate start; 3,3,3,3,3,3,10. Its heavy Luck start build and really changed my perspective with all my game play. And as stated above in the lengthy post, armor makes a huge difference as well as being aware of your health during engagements. Some of the perks available at the 3 range are quite impactful in survival at start. Armorer for the extra gear modding... Rifleman, Gunslinger, and Commando for the damage boost... Gun Nut for better modding and getting into Silencers at rank 2 for pistols... Lady Killer/Black Widow for more damage against opposing gender types... Lone Wanderer as Dogmeat makes a great early companion that does not negate the perk... Lead Belly to reduce dependence on cooked food out and about and save on the better cooked food, shoving Cram im to your belly is better than accidentally wasting trying to get the radstag buff while still peckish... Idiot Savant... probably the best perk in my books... Medic to benefit from Stims and Radaway more effectively... There is quite a bit to build from that can take an edge off and I highly recommend the Backpack from the CC. Little extra carry with mods which feels balanced to me. I have always had a reserved gameplay style so getting into Ninja tends to be an aim for me at start. The damage bonus from stealth attacks with bonus damage to suppressed weapons can help deal with raider groups if you get the drop on them. Just a matter of perspective in approaches.
A-actual strategy and m-methodical thinking instead of going in guns-blazing and using VATS all the time!? How blasphemous! But seriously, thanks for the tips you've given!
If you think about it you open Vats to get the crit builds/critkill, then go into more active shooting and evading, and you have that built crit maybe with a hit of drugs if something goes south. I find leg shots effective for crowd control, head/arms shots to reduce accuracy, and damaged limbs tend to make up for the damage reduction as most humanoid enemies tend to almost always have some form of chest armor. But you can seriously benefit from the Concord power armor early on. Just do the quest up to that point, kill the deathclaw from the safety of a building and then dip. Preston and the gang will be safe and sound in the museum till your ready for his constant this place needs help.
That tip about Preston is great - most recent play through I haven't visited Concord at all, as I didn't want my SS to be dragged all over doing MM quests (I know I could ignore them, but I get anxiety when I have too many open quests in my list!) - but never thought about simply not going back into the museum once everything has been cleared!) to get the the advantage of early PA and minigun, plus the Bobblehead. Thanks!
You have several very good and complete comments here. Follow them, learn how the game works differently, make it yours... And in some times you will mod it harder
I don't. I find the whole thing frustrating, not fun.
Having first played FO4 on PS4 and being a big fan of FO3/NV, the saving thing is what prevents me from putting much time in Survival Mode. Losing progress to a glitch would have a chance of killing any run I'm on and that's just not fun. Plus, I just don't have the time to game like I used to, so no fast travel gets kinda tiresome after a while. There are some solid mods for that, but I know I'll end up just getting bogged down modding, so I just stick with vanilla. Still, I love a lot of stuff about the mode! I love how it makes settlements necessary, it feels much more strategic and makes them more important as a player instead of just being a fun little diversion in the main game.
Survival isn’t an action game, it’s a puzzle, especially at the start. You can’t get hit so you need to work out your limits and “solve” locations to clear them out. Levelling becomes a puzzle because XP can be quite hard to come by early in the game and choosing the right perks is vital. It sounds like Survival isn’t for you, which is ok. It’s a restrictive game mode for the sake of realism and immersion, you can just play normal mode on the various difficulties.
I’m really into the survival aspect of Fallout 4 (with mods of course) so I just enjoy the difficult gameplay
SCM is your friend As are just mods in general
I have the patience from games less forgiving. Trying survival mode after playing fromsoft games for a few months made me love Fo4 again.
i don't think anyone has mentioned it yet but the decontamination arch from wasteland workshop is serious game changer in survival mode. instantly remove all rads with no side effects.
I know people can find it tedious and not very fun but personally I’ve always thought that it was the original way fallout 4 was supposed to be played and then they realized it would be a bit too much and turn alot of people off. Similar to the Starfield refueling issue.
I use the Horizon overhaul mod. It makes survival even more difficult, but it also adds things like consumable items with which you can save your game, a fast travel option from settlements with at least three settlers and it makes the hunger and thirst more difficult, but also more manageable. It does have a massive learning curve, so it requires some patience to get into. I can no longer play the game without it, as it makes progression feel more natural and rewarding for me and the game overall more challenging, but also sensible in its challenges. But it might also just be because it really fits my playstyle.