Fallout 3 SPECIAL

This page describes the SPECIAL implementation

Character creation
During the birth sequence, the player chooses their character's name, gender and appearance. Later, as a child in Vault 101, they receive a book titled "You're S.P.E.C.I.A.L.!," whereupon they can set their character's seven primary character points. Answers given during the G.O.A.T. determine which skills get tagged, resulting in a 15 point increase. Alternatively, skills can be manually tagged via dialogue options with Edwin Brotch. All the selections can be changed when exiting Vault 101.

Primary statistics
The player's attributes default to 5 points, with an additional 5 points being available for distribution in any attribute, resulting in a total of 40 points. The minimum for each primary statistic is 1 and the maximum is 10. Each statistic directly modifies certain derived statistics. In addition, every skill is tied to a primary statistic. As a result, each point added to the primary statistic results in a bonus of 2 points to the associated skill(s). The only exception is Luck which only adds 1 point; in turn, all skills are affected by this stat. Some perks require certain minimum attribute values as well.

Increasing attributes

 * The Intense Training perk increases one attribute, and can be taken up to 10 times.
 * Bobbleheads improve their associated attribute by 1.
 * Various armor and clothing, items and consumables.
 * The No Weaknesses perk raises all attributes to 5.
 * The Almost Perfect perk raises all attributes to 9.

Derived statistics
Derived statistics are attributes of a character that are based on (or derived from) the character's primary statistics or attributes that the player cannot influence directly.