Fallout 76: 12 Beginner Tips to Help You Get Started

Just come out of Vault 76? Need some pointers and advice for surviving the harsh wasteland in Fallout 76? Well, we have you covered with an assortment of little things to keep you on track and alive as you progress through your quests.

1. Don’t Get Distracted

When you start the game, you can either start at level 1, or level 20. This will open many doors for other quests you will get. But it is imperative that you focus on your starter quests. There will be some catches to the starter quests, however. As the Overseer quest will lead you multiple factions, but I recommend doing the Wayward quest as soon as you get it. It will lead you to understanding a lot of the nuances of exploring the Appalachia and you will get some cool loot to carry you through the rest of the Overseer questline.

Until you at least get the starting questlines finished for Wayward, Overseer and the Raider and Settler factions you find in the Overseer questline? Do not focus on dailies, or miscellaneous quests. You will lose your caps, stimpaks, weapons and armor along the way if you do.

2. Explore and Unlock Locations If You See Them

While this sounds contradictory to not getting distracted. There is a lot to explore in Fallout 76 and some locations can be very beneficial. For example, you might come across railway stations. While mundane in most games, there will be “Donation Boxes”, a crafting station and even a vendor to sell off various weapons and armor for caps to fast travel around. Other locations when unlocked will give you the opportunity to fast travel as necessary. So go the extra mile and find new locations, but do not get lost in the quests some of them provide until you are in a comfortable state level and gear wise.

3. Do Not Repair Equipment You Get in Fallout 76, Yet

You will find many items as you progress through the game, but you will always find newer and better stuff. So, until you hit the endgame at level 50 and higher? Do not hold onto any weapons you are not using, and do not repair them. Repair kits are essential, so you will need them for legendary items you find later in the game.

4. Do Not Use Stimpaks Often

Stimpaks are a rare and expensive item, and you can run out quickly when doing harder content or exploring late game areas. If you get a hold of Nuka-Cola, or even have a surplus of Purified Water or various cooked foods? I suggest using those and saving Stimpaks for closed off dungeons. As certain boss encounters in dungeons can reset the bosses health. So if you are in the open and get overwhelmed? Respawning in the vicinity is a much better option than wasting all your Stimpaks.

5. Build A Camp in Fallout 76

This part is important and integral for your experience in Fallout 76. You will be picking up various “junk” items, weapons, armor, food and specific types of ammo that will weigh you down. In your camp, even with a modest one floor with walls and the works? You can still get a lot of things going. Such as:

• Building Crafting Benches to make ammo, food, weapons, armor etc.
• Stash Chests so you can store all your junk, excess weapons and armor you do not want to break down or sell. I also recommend using this stash to store missiles, mini-nukes, and fusion cores when you are not using them. These will eat up your inventory space.
• Getting Food and Water resources going so you can have some stuff to take on your way.
• After doing certain quests you can craft stalls for NPCs to be vendors for you.

I also recommend making some turrets to keep your camp safe from NPCs. When building your camp, make sure to place it in a space that will get you to places you frequent, as it is free to fast travel to.

6. Pay Attention to Your Special Perk Cards

This is very important, as perk cards do not just offer more damage for various different weapons. When leveling up and picking special stats you can pick from array of different upgrades. Some perk cards can reduce weight from various items which is very useful when exploring. As well as other very useful upgrades for lockpicking and terminal hacking ranks. But there are some unique perks you can find, such as one that turns your vats into more than just an aim-bot. It will give you the option to target body parts and increase damage to those body parts. So read the special perk cards carefully, and make sure you rank up all of the special traits fairly, as you stop gaining rank ups for special traits themselves after level 50.

7. Do Public Events to Level Up Quicker in Fallout 76

When wandering Appalachia, you will see a lot of different notifications for public events. I recommend doing these as often as you can. As they tend to give out boat loads of XP and is a great way to discover new areas. Some public events will cost caps to fast travel to, while others will not. If you see a gathering of people, join in on the fun and reap some good rewards!

8. Don’t Go in Alone

If you are a solo player and are not jiving with the quests, joining public groups has its perks. You get extra XP and a guaranteed group to do public events with. You can even make friends to tackle on harder activities, such as the Blast Zones that players can start.

9. Pick Up Everything You Can

It’s not all guns, armor and bullets out there. You will find phones, desk fans, pencils, metal parts and other various goodies when exploring. Do not ignore these items if you can, as you can use these to craft items in the game and build more stuff in your camp. At any work bench, workshop, or stash chests at certain locations, you can store all the junk and keep it moving. Trust me, it is not all “useless junk”. You will all the resources you can get!

10. Tune Into the Radio Station

This one is personal to me, as exploring Appalachia can be kind of boring at times in Fallout 76. But at the very final tab in your Pipboy, there will be radio stations you can listen into for some music to get you through long journeys and make fun situations out of challenging ones. For example, when I was watching a Scorchbeast get taken out by robots in a late game area and doing damage to it to ensure I get some loot. The song “Civilization” was on, and I was cracking up at how it made a serious situation into one that was kind of goofy.

11. Turn off Player-vs-Player in Fallout 76

Finally, the community in Fallout 76 is very friendly. So do not try to kill anyone, and frequent other camps to buy stuff from people. A friend of mine found a player who sold him a hundred stimpaks for a hundred caps and he’s had a pretty experience jumping in. Go to your settings and find the toggle and just turn it off, don’t be a buzzkill!

12. Equip the Right Weapon When Looting Enemies

Every ammo box, duffel bag and corpse can drop ammo. But it is not always randomized, when equipped with certain weapons you can find ammo specific to that weapon. When doing a public event, I had a .50 cal heavy machine gun equipped and never ran out of ammo as the enemies always dropped ammo for it.

Closing Remarks

I hope these tips help you get started and keep you going. Fallout 76 can either be a lonely one or one that can help you make a lot of friends to have fun in the massive open world on offer. It can be pretty immersive and have a lot of fun things to engage in.

Co-Author Credits: Senior Author and Community Manager of Lords of Gaming Ty Tano, and Assistant Editor-In-Chief, Nicholas Downie.