From The Vault
Nuclear Anomaly is a perk added to Fallout 3 with the Broken Steel add-on.
With this perk you erupt into a devastating nuclear explosion whenever your health is reduced to 20 or less. Note that any allies in the vicinity will also suffer the effects of the blast!
- The perk is similar to that of "Nuclear Man", a runner up in Bethesda's Fallout Anniversary Contest.
- Pacifistic players or players who don't use high DR armor should choose this perk as it is rather fun to run away from enemies while exploding.
- You will be healed by a certain amount of health when this perk activates. The amount of damage dealt and healing received is determined by your damage resistance. Radiation is reset to 0 after exploding (although you're likely to collect some radiation from the mushroom cloud you just set off).
- Note that you do not die from the explosion, but everything else around you might (including companions, NPCs, etc.) unless your npcs are strong enough to kill you.
- If you trigger this perk near vehicles, you will be harmed by the vehicle explosions after you're healed.
- If an enemy is attacking you from the top of a ledge, but within distance of the explosion, they may not be harmed depending on how far up they are. This can even occur when the NPC is standing on slightly higher ground than you.
- Using this perk on a higher difficulty causes the damage done by enemies to kill you before the explosion detonates (or kill you just as you explode), rendering this perk useless on any higher difficulties (very hard or possibly hard).
- This perk can almost make you invincible on Very Easy difficulty, as when you lower to 20 HP you explode and heal 20 hp, which will cause you to explode again if you are shot, healing you yet again.
- Most enemies trigger this perk, Deathclaws will just kill you without allowing the perk to activate, and Sentry bots can survive the blast.
- When playing a character with low Damage Resistance it is possible to effectively set off multiple consecutive explosions on Normal difficulty. The key to this is to first eliminate any nearby damage per-shot combatants (Deathclaw, Giant Radscorpion, those wielding a Hunting Rifle, Combat Shotgun, Tri-Beam Laser Rifle, etc.) and leave damage per-second combatants (Mark I, III, V and VII Automated Turret, those wielding an Assault Rifle, Chinese Assault Rifle, Flamer, etc.) to set off the explosion. Because the damage dealt with this latter group of weapons is far more incremental, you are substantially more likely to hit the 1-20 hit point sweet spot.
- IMPORTANT! Will wound high powered allies such as Fawkes, but not kill him unless on easy difficulty or below.
- If you wish to use this perk to kill people in a non-combat zone (e.g. Megaton), you can use the Heavy Incinerator to damage yourself to pull your health down in order to very loudly assassinate someone of your choice.
- You will continue to explode every 10 seconds until your health is 20+.
- Causes limb damage and damages armor. This is important if you have rare kinds of armor, or if your repair skill is low.
- When playing on Normal+ difficulty, you can be killed by the explosion before the health regain activates. This makes choosing the perk dangerous. (Confirmed on 360, PC)
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