Bethesda Softworks Fallout Shelter Tips

 I wanted to know which skill was relevant to open locks in Bethesda Softworks’ Fallout Shelter. Fallout Shelter is my latest gaming obsession after getting bored with writing bots for Red Robot’s Life is Crime. The makers of the game don’t document this, so I reversed the code to see what I could determine in the way of game tips.

In the PC Fallout games, lockpicking was based on perception and agility. However, what I’ve found so far in Fallout Shelter is that wasteland events are tied to only one special stat. I’ve yet to reverse the list of events and the effective stat for each event, but I’ve found the following rules in the code:

• A Stimpack heals 50% of max health
• Radaway removes 20% of max radiation
• Mr. Handy area is limited to connected production zones in one level in the vault
• To revive Mr. Handy costs 500 caps
• Dwellers gain 1 health per minute if food is at min requirements, up to 20% of their total health
• Dwellers lose 1 rad per minute if water is at min requirements, with no cap
• A dweller’s proficiency is the first stat with the highest value
• Dwellers can carry up to 100 items on wasteland trips before they’re automatically recalled
• Every 40 seconds there is a 1% chance of an emergency in the vault with a 240 second cool down time (1800 for deathclaws)
• Fires start appearing after 5 dwellers
• Radroaches start appearing after 8 dwellers
• Raiders, molerats, and deathclaws start appearing after 12 dwellers
• There’s a max of three radroaches/molerats per room merge level
• Radroaches do almost no damage to mr. handy, with damage increasing in order for fire, raiders, molerat, and deathclaws
• In the wasteland, caps found is based on luck, radiation damage is based on endurance, and encounter occurence is based on luck
• Once you have 15 dwellers you’ll get the pet giveway popup
• Will get a lunchbox for a rating of 100% for the day
• Wasteland event success is based on level of dweller, the effective stat for the event, and the min and max damage of dweller weapon

Based on my success at opening chests with the vault dweller armor, which raises perception, I suspect that perception is the effective stat for most lockpicking events, but I haven’t confirmed it.