Summary

  • Combat in Fallout Shelter consists of automatic and player-controlled fights, requiring good defenses for dwellers to survive.
  • Luck stat affects loot quality and crit rates, making it helpful for finding better items during quests and exploration.
  • Endurance is crucial for dweller survival, increasing health points and reducing radiation damage in combat situations.

Fallout Shelter is a casual live service game that focuses on colony development, rather than the roleplaying and action gameplay of other Fallout titles. It can be downloaded and played for free on both mobile and desktop, but there is a cash shop that sells boosts, loot crates, and other beneficial items.

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Fallout Shelter: Best Armor, Ranked

Armor has always been important in the Fallout franchise, and Fallout Shelter is no different in that regard. Here are the best ones available.

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Combat is a huge part of the gameplay in Fallout Shelter. There are two types of combat. Firstly, automatic combat takes place when a valut dweller is sent out to explore the wasteland. Secondly, quest combat, which is controlled by the player. All combat dwellers need good defenses to survive combat, which will require players to set them up with the ideal defensive stats.

7 Luck

Leveled In The Game Room

Game Room In Fallout Shelter-2
  • Room Bonuses: None
  • Vault Effects: More caps earned as rush rewards and better rush success chance
  • Exploration Effects: Find more loot, and higher chance of legendary junk and loot items
  • Quest Effects: Crit rate speed

The Luck stat has no direct impact on defense or attack rolls during either quest combat encounters or automated combat when a vault dweller is sent out into the wasteland to explore. Therefore, there is little point in training a vault dwell in the Game Room to raise Luck, for combat purposes anyway.

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Fallout Shelter: Best Layouts

Fallout Shelter players should try out the following fantastic layouts that have superb efficiency.

Something to keep in mind, though, is that a high Luck stat will mean that a vault dweller has a much greater chance of finding loot, and the chances of that loot being of a higher quality. Since the goal of most combat is to complete a quest or gather loot in the wasteland, it could make sense to train dwellers to have at least a little Luck.

6 Intelligence

Leveled Up In The Classroom

Classroom In Fallout Shelter-2
  • Room Bonuses: Medbay, Science Lab
  • Vault Effects: None
  • Main Effects: Increased experience gains.
  • Quest Effects: None

Training a dweller's Intelligence in the Classroom before sending them into combat is entirely pointless, as it has no impact on any of the combat rolls they'll need to succeed. This stands true for automatic combat out in the wasteland, and for player controlled combat during quests.

Intelligence directly impacts how much experience a vault dweller receives for completing actions, including combat. It could be argued that, from a defensive viewpoint, leveling up a dweller more rapidly will mean they have more health, and can therefore take more damage. However, from a purely defensive standpoint, Intelligence has no direct impact.

5 Perception

Leveled In The Armory

Armory In Fallout Shelter-2
  • Room Bonuses: Water Treatment, Water Purification
  • Vault Effects: None
  • Exploration Effects: Looting more weapons, outfits, and recipes.
  • Quest Effects: Easier crit arrow use

Perception is an entirely useless stat when it comes to combat in Fallout Shelter. It has no effect on either damage or defense rolls. There is no point at all training the Perception of vault dwellers before sending them out into the wasteland or on quests.

However, Perception does affect how frequently a value dweller will loot weapons, recipes, and armor while they are under player control on a quest. Therefore, for vault dwellers who will be part of the player’s core questing team, it might be worth training a few points of Perception in the Armory.

4 Charisma

Leveled Up In The Lounge

Lounge In Fallout Shelter-2
  • Room Bonuses: Living Room, Radio Studio, Barbershop
  • Vault Effects: None
  • Main Effects: More legendary junk, improved chance of successful NPC encounters
  • Quest Effects: None

As a defensive stat, Charisma offers no direct benefits at all. It has no impact upon any combat rolls, defense or attack. This makes it completely pointless for players to send their vault dwellers to train Charisma in the Lounge before sending them out into the wasteland to explore.

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Fallout Shelter: Best Vault Numbers

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However, when it comes to questing, Charisma could be argued to have a defensive bonus. Not from a pure combat point of view, but because a vault dweller with high Charisma has a better chance of talking their way past a potential combat encounter while on a quest. It's not exactly "defense," but it does help keep dwellers alive.

3 Strength

Leveled In The Weight Room

Weight Room In Fallout Shelter-2
  • Room Bonuses: Power Generator, Nuclear Reactor
  • Vault Effects: None
  • Exploration Effects: Better chance of opening lockers.
  • Quest Effects: None

Strength is an interesting stat when considering defenses for vault dwellers in Fallout Shelter. Strength doesn’t add any defenses at all, but considering the old adage "the best defense is a good offense," training some Strength for combat dwellers in the Weight Room makes sense.

The reason why Strength works as a defensive stat is that it directly impacts how much damage a vault dweller does in combat. Therefore, the dweller will kill enemies faster, meaning that they will take less damage. So, Strength is a good stat to train from a defensive viewpoint, even though it may not seem to be at first glance.

2 Agility

Trained In The Athletics Room

Athletcis Room In Fallout Shelter-1
  • Room Bonuses: Diner, Garden
  • Vault Effects: None
  • Main Effects: Provides damage mitigation
  • Quest Effects: Faster attack rate

Agility is one of the only two stats for vault dwellers that has a direct impact on the amount of damage they can take before they die. The higher their level of Agility, the more damage vault dwellers will mitigate from each incoming attack.

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Because Agility mitigates incoming damage so effectively, it is a good idea for players to train vault dwellers in the Athletics Room for several cycles, and raise their Agility a few points. It probably isn’t worth training all the way to 10, as there are other stats that dwellers need outside of combat-related ones.

1 Endurance

Leveled In The Fitness Room

Fitness Room In Fallout Shelter-3
  • Room Bonuses: Nuka-Cola Bottler
  • Vault Effects: Gain more hit points when leveling up
  • Main Effects: More legendary junk found, provides radiation damage mitigation.
  • Quest Effects: Extra HP

Endurance is the main defensive stat for vault dwellers in Fallout Shelter. Endurance drives the number of health points a dweller has, as well as how many additional health points they receive every time they level up. Of course, more health points means the dweller can take more incoming damage before they die.

Another benefit of high Endurance is that the effects of radiation damage are reduced, and this is very useful for both quest combat and for automatic combat encounters while a vault dweller is out exploring in the wasteland. Put simply, every dweller that is going to be used in combat needs high Endurance. Even legendary dwellers can benefit from this stat.

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Fallout Shelter Tag Page Cover Art
Fallout Shelter
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Released
June 14, 2015
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WHERE TO PLAY

DIGITAL
Checkbox: control the expandable behavior of the extra info

Developer(s)
Bethesda Game Studios, Behaviour Interactive
Platform(s)
Android, iOS, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One
Genre(s)
Simulation