Fallout 4: All Endurance Perks, Ranked

Fallout 4

By Matthew Weideman

Published Jun 23, 2024

Thread 1

Fallout 4

Highlights

The Endurance stat in Fallout 4 affects health and sprinting, crucial for survival on Survival difficulty.
Cannibal perk lets players heal by eating corpses, but beware of "Dark Craving" debuff.
Solar Powered perk boosts stats during the day, including health regeneration and longer sprinting.

Endurance is one of the seven stats in the Fallout series. In previous games, Endurance governed damage resistance as well as maximum health points. In Fallout 4, however, it only governs the Sole Survivor's maximum Health Points and the rate at which Action Points drain when sprinting.

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Vault 111 Wastelander next dogmeat, surrounded by vault boy icons

Fallout 4 Perks to Unlock First

With 70 perks, Fallout 4 gives players plenty of ways to build their characters, but some are practically essential at the start of the game.

The perks for the Endurance stat remain true to the stat's original uses earlier in the Fallout franchise and generally help players survive radiation and other types of damage. Most of these perks don't shine unless the game is set on Survival difficulty, which adds the need to eat and drink in addition to a few other challenges like not being able to fast travel and taking limb damage while over-encumbered.

10 Rad Resistant

Take Fewer Rads Without Using Armor Or Aid Items

Vault Boy wears a hazmat suit and sits in an irradiated barrel

6 Endurance
3 Ranks

Radiation damage causes the player’s health bar to shrink by having a red radiation bar replace it. Whenever the player gains rads, a red bar starting at the maximum point of the health bar, slowly encroaches on the range of their health bar, causing death if all health points are replaced with rads.

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The Rad Resistant perk slows down the progress of radiation damage by granting ten resistance with each rank. While this flat bonus is nice, players can easily find other ways to deal with radiation such as using Rad-X, Radaway, or just paying a doctor. Armor can also help with radiation, especially Power Armor and Hazmat suits. The range of methods to deal with rads makes this perk significantly less useful than others.

9 Cannibal

Heal By Eating Corpses

Vault Boy holds a bony leg up to his face with an evil look on his face

8 Endurance
3 Ranks

The Cannibal perk is a great perk for a specific type of roleplay since it allows players to devour the corpses of humans to restore health. Ranks two and three add the ability to feast on ghoul and Super Mutant corpses, and then increase the amount of health gained from doing so.

While eating the remains of these enemies is an easy way to stave off hunger in Survival mode, it also inflicts the "Dark Craving" effect upon the player character, which renders regular food useless. Cannibalism is frowned upon by almost all of the companions in the game as well, which means players who want good relationships will have to keep their new tastes to themselves.

8 Ghoulish

Heal From Radiation

Vault Boy, turned into a ghoul, walks away from a mushroom cloud

9 Endurance
3 Ranks

While the game does not let players take on the appearance of a ghoul, this perk is as close to being a ghoul as one can get in Fallout 4. The first rank makes it so that gaining rads also restore lost health (although the player's maximum health still shrinks from radiation). The second and third ranks increase the amount of health gained and then adds a chance that feral ghouls can be friendly. This is a great perk to have when exploring areas infested with them like Kiddie Kingdom, Cambridge Crater, or Wildwood Cemetery.

The final rank of this perk is its most useful because it causes the player to start slowly healing radiation damage while also recovering health points in the process. There are indeed many other ways to protect oneself from radiation, but this is a fun way to do so while roleplaying as a ghoul in their early stages.

7 Lead Belly

Decrease Negative Effects Of Eating And Drinking

Vault Boy drinks water from a faucet as his belly glows green

2 Endurance
3 Ranks

Typically, eating food and drinking water are optional ways that players can regain health and gain temporary buffs. Some players don't like to do this, as they also gain rads from consuming anything. The Lead Belly perk offsets this by reducing (and eventually eliminating) rads from food and drink.

This perk shines when playing on the Survival difficulty since eating and drinking are compulsory and there are negative effects from stimpacks and Radaway. Survival players should invest in this perk early on, while all other players can decide if they really want to invest in it or not.

6 Aquaboy / Aquagirl

Move Through Water With Ease

Vault Boy stands in a shallow pool with a smile

5 Endurance
2 Ranks

The Commonwealth’s waterways are heavily irradiated. Swimming in the sea or even stepping through a puddle can cause the Sole Survivor to gain some rads. The Aquqboy/Aquagirl perk offsets this and makes it easy to use the rivers and ocean to traverse the map without hassle by removing radiation and allowing the player character to breathe underwater.

Since Survival players cannot fast travel, using the Charles and Mystic Rivers to cut across the map is the safest and fastest way to go great distances. This, along with the aquatic areas of the Far Harbor DLC map, make this perk very useful for some players.

5 Life Giver

Gain Health And Health Regeneration

Vault Boy stands in a robe with a beard and halo

3 Endurance
3 Ranks

Health points are tracked a little bit differently in Fallout 4 than for previous games in the series. While there is a small gain from each level-up, the fastest way to gain a larger health bar is to invest points in the Endurance stat.

Beyond increasing the Endurance stat or grinding up levels quickly, the Life Giver perk is the only way to gain permanent increases to a player's health points. Each rank grants 20 permanent health, and the final rank also adds a slow health regeneration for the player. While this will not help much during combat, it lets players save up their stimpacks and other Aid items for when they are needed most.

4 Toughness

Gain Damage Resistance Early On

Vault Boy stands in a Superman costume as things bounce off him

1 Endurance
5 Ranks

Unlocking a rank of the Toughness perk grants the player character 10 damage resistance, maxing out at +50 at its fifth and final rank.

Damage resistance works differently in Fallout 4 than in other Fallout games, since it reduces incoming damage based on a ratio of the weapon's potential damage and the Sole Survivor’s total damage resistance. This makes extra resistance worthwhile in the early game but sees diminishing returns later on. This makes Toughness a good perk for low levels, but not as worthwhile if players wait to unlock it later.

3 Chem Resistant

Remove The Downsides To Taking Chems

Vault Boy stands with stimpacks around him on the ground

4 Endurance
2 Ranks

Chems are a divisive mechanic in Fallout. On the one hand, they can give great boosts to the various protagonists of the series. On the other hand, some players are turned off by the idea of playing a junkie character or having to deal with the drawbacks of chem usage.

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The Chem Resistant perk takes away some of the negative parts of using chems by reducing the likelihood of addiction by 50% at rank one and eliminating it entirely with rank 2. With this perk, players can rely on Buff Out to boost their strength and carry capacity, or use Mentats to get the best deals with merchants without negative consequences.

2 Adamantium Skeleton

Reduce And Prevent Limb Damage

Vault Boy's skeleton shines green from under his skin

7 Endurance
3 Ranks

In Fallout, damage is not just a flat reduction of health points. Instead, the game tracks how much damage has been done individually to the head, torso, and limb. These parts of the body can become crippled if hit too often, with negative consequences ranging from slowed movement to reduced accuracy.

Each rank of the Adamantium Skeleton perk reduces limb damage by 30%, significantly reducing the chance that players will have crippled limbs. The final rank removes limb damage entirely. Like most Endurance Perks, this is especially useful in Survival mode since players on that difficulty take leg damage over time when over-encumbered.

1 Solar Powered

Boost Stats During The Day

Vault Boy basks in a sun that smiles down on him next to a beach chair

10 Endurance
3 Ranks

With the first rank of the Solar Powered perk, players gain a +2 bonus to their Strength and Endurance stats between the in-game hours of 6 AM and 6 PM. This means that players have stronger melee attacks, more carry weight, more health points, and can sprint longer for a full twelve hours out of every day, which is a great combination of buffs to have for such a long amount of time.

The second and third ranks of this perk bolster the sun's impact on the player's character and make it so that radiation damage and lost health slowly regenerate when the player is outside during the daytime. Players with this perk can save up any stimpacks and Radaway to be used only during combat situations or at night when they lose the perk, making this a great perk to have.