Check out V.A.T.S in Fallout 4’s Perception Tutorial

Bethesda is continuing their frankly incredible series of videos explaining all the parts that make you S.P.E.C.I.A.L. Last week we got a look at Strength – the attribute that governs how much you can carry, how hard you can hit and how beefy your vault dweller will look when walking around the wasteland in his favourite deep v-neck. This week is a little less about brawn and a little more about brains – especially if you’re in the market for splattering them across the walls behind your enemies.

P is for Perception, and in Fallout 4 it’s a rather notable attribute. Perception lets you take in more information from the world around you, as well as analyse certain situations so that you can suck out the most benefit from them. That means you’ll have more options in conversations should you be caught stealing, or find more adventurous ways to pick pocket the living daylights out of anyone you come across with relative ease (you can even leave a live grenade in their pants too).

More importantly though, Perception determines how effective you are with V.A.T.S (or Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System). Just like Fallout 3 and New Vegas before it, Fallout 4 will let you pause time and take aim at specific parts of an enemy’s body, allowing you to stack attacks and execute them with brutal efficiency. Efficiency which is almost entirely determined by your Perception, which could mean the difference between a full on decapitating headshot and a slight flesh wound.

So that leaves us with another five informative videos to go, with Bethesda tackling Endurance next week. That’s going to govern things like your Health and Ability points, but we’ll just wait for Bethesda to churn out another delightfully quirky cartoon. It’s a far better way of learning these things before launch in November.

Last Updated: September 17, 2015