"Why go down with the ship when you can try to fix it?"
Repair is a Fallout, Fallout 2, Fallout Tactics, and Fallout 3 skill. In Van Buren it was renamed to Mechanics.
The practical application of the Science skill. The fixing of broken equipment, machinery and electronics.
Fallout, Fallout 2 and Fallout Tactics
Initial Level: Starting Repair skill is equal to 20% + (1% x Intelligence). Average characters will have a 25% skill.
Fallout 3
Initial Level: Starting Repair skill is equal to 2 + (2 x Intelligence) + Luck/2 (rounded up). Average starting characters (Int 6, Lck 5) will have a Repair skill of 17.
Repair can be used to fix damaged equipment, this is done by having 2 of the same armor or weapon, the user sacrifices parts from one item to bring up the condition of the other. However, the items don't need to be exactly the same, just similar (i.e. Brass Knuckles will repair Spiked Knuckles, etc). Repair also determines the starting condition of custom equipment.
As the Repair skill improves, two largely noticeable effects occur:
First, the condition of the equipment can be brought up to the player's Repair skill level — a skill level of 70 allows items to be repaired up to 70%. This is important because weapons and armor in poor condition are not as efficient and their value is decreased. Low quality weapons have less accuracy and damage, which reduces effective range and often causes more ammo to be used to kill enemies when using ranged weapons or more hits when using melee weapons. Ranged weapons in low condition are also more likely to jam, which lengthens the reload animation. Armor in low condition has a lower damage resistance (DR) rating. If the condition of a weapon or armor/clothing is completely neglected, the item will break, making the item unusable until it is repaired (armor and clothing will remain on a character after it breaks, but can not be put back on if taken off).
Second, repairs become more efficient. This means that when using parts from one item to repair another, you get a larger boost to the item's condition than you would with lower condition. For example, with a low Repair skill, when combining two 20% condition miniguns, you might end up with a 25% minigun. With a high Repair skill, that situation could yield a 35% minigun. Keep in mind when combining items of greater conditions or items with high damage or damage resistance, the benefits are considerably higher.
Other uses of Repair
- A Repair skill of 30 is necessary to fix the water valves in Megaton during the quest, Treatment.
- A Repair skill of 45 is needed to disarm Rigged Combat Shotguns.
- After using the artillery switch in Takoma Industrial a few times, it will short-circuit. Players with a high repair skill can repair the switch and continue using it.
- During Rescue from Paradise one of the two manners to spring the children requires a repair skill of 40.
- During Stealing Independence you can disable the turret power generator with a high enough repair skill.
- A Repair skill of 40 is needed to fix a robot at a random encounter. If you repair it, the Scavenger will give you two Energy Cells. With a speech check, you can convince him to give you 100 caps and the energy cells.
- A Repair skill of 85 is required to disarm Laser Tripwire Emitters in Raven Rock.
Notes
It is useful to get this skill to at least 50 to eradicate the need for repairs on common weapons by NPCs, saving potentially thousands of bottlecaps.
Repair is also used to disarm some traps (non-explosive traps like tripwires and pressure plates).
In addition to assigning Skill Points at level up, Repair can be permanently raised by taking the Gun Nut Perk, finding the Repair Bobblehead (behind an Average lock in Evan King's house in Arefu), or reading Dean's Electronics.
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