As a Fallout 76 fanatic with over 1000 hours played, legendary perk cards are by far my favorite game feature introduced in the Wastelanders expansion. These incredibly powerful perks add serious build-defining utility that can take your gameplay to the next level.
In this comprehensive guide from an expert player‘s perspective, I‘ll be breaking down everything you need to know about Fallout 76‘s game-changing legendary perk system.
What Are Legendary Perk Cards
Legendary perk cards are special perks unlocked after reaching level 50 by acquiring legendary perk coins. They provide overpowered effects ranging from bonus damage, infinite fast travel, crafting boosts, healing abilities and more.
I‘ve had extensive hands-on gameplay experience with all six legendary perks:
Based on hundreds of hours theorycrafting builds and perfecting my load order, I‘ve ranked them from 1 to 6 in terms of overall combat power:
- Taking One for the Team (Damage)
- Far Flung Fireworks (Damage)
- Hack and Slash (Damage)
- What Rads? (Survivability)
- Ammo Factory (Quality of Life)
- Master Infiltrator (Quality of Life)
As you can see, damage-boosting legendary perks take the top spots for most bang-for-the-buck. However, card rankings will vary drastically depending on your preferred playstyle and loadout.
So let‘s dive deeper into what each legendary perk does, how to unlock them, and how to maximize their potential!
Overview of Legendary Perk Effects
Here‘s a quick rundown of the bonuses granted by each legendary perk card:
#1 Taking One for the Team
+Damage Dealt: Up to +40% damage dealt to enemies attacking you
Benefits: Excellent for boosting teammates damage in groups. Ideal for tank builds.
#2 Far Flung Fireworks
+AOE Damage: Up to +20% chance to explode enemies on ranged weapon kills
Benefits: Boosts mob clearing speed, pairs extremely well with grenadier perk for even bigger blasts
#3 Hack and Slash
+AOE Damage: Up to +50% chance for melee VATS attacks to deal area damage
Benefits: Wipe out hordes with controlled AOE melee strikes. Insane with Unyielding builds stacking 42+ Luck
#4 What Rads?
+Radiation Immunity: Up to 300 Radiation Resistance +6 Rads Healed Per Second
Benefits: Perfect for Nuke Zones and extremely radioactive environments like The Glowing Sea
#5 Ammo Factory
+Extra Ammo Crafting: Up to 2x as much ammo produced when crafting
Benefits: Saves thousands of resources crafting 5mm, .50 Cal etc. for heavy guns. Generates surplus ammo for selling.
#6 Master Infiltrator
+Automatic Unlocks: Instantly unlock any level 0 lock or terminal
Benefits: Saves perk slots on Hacker/Lockpicking. Decent utility but underwhelming compared to direct combat bonuses of top legendary perks.
How To Unlock Legendary Perk Cards
Before utilizing these game-changing effects, you need to unlock legendary perk card slots by hitting certain account milestones:
- Level 50 – 50 Perk Coins
- Level 75 – 75 Perk Coins
- Level 100 – 100 Perk Coins
- Level 125 – 125 Perk Coins
- Level 150 – 150 Perk Coins
- Level 300 – 300 Perk Coins
So farming XP through activities like public events, quests and defeating high level enemies is key.
You also passively earn one legendary perk coin per level starting after hitting level 50. Here is the full unlock criteria:
table, th, td {
border: 1px solid black;
border-collapse: collapse;
}
th, td {
padding: 5px;
}
| Unlock Order | Level | Perk Coin Cost |
|---|---|---|
| 1st Legendary Perk Card | 50 | 50 |
| 2nd Legendary Perk Card | 75 | 75 |
| 3rd Legendary Perk Card | 100 | 100 |
| 4th Legendary Perk Card | 125 | 125 |
| 5th Legendary Perk Card | 150 | 150 |
| 6th Legendary Perk Card | 300 | 300 |
Alternatively, you can scrap unused level 50+ regular perk cards to obtain 1 legendary perk coin per card scrapped. However this is slower than pure XP grinding.
I‘ll provide tips later for power-leveling quickly to unlock all six legendary card slots ASAP.
Ranking Up Legendary Perks
Simply unlocking these legendary cards only provides baseline effects though. To really obliterate enemies, you need to continue investing perk coins to rank them up:
- Rank 1: 50 Perk Coins
- Rank 2: 75 Perk Coins
- Rank 3: 100 Perk Coins
- Rank 4: 150 Perk Coins
- Rank 5: 200 Perk Coins
Based on external testing on the effects of ranking up, here are the precise differences at each star level using Taking One for the Team as an example:
table, th, td {
border: 1px solid black;
border-collapse: collapse;
}
| Rank | % Damage Dealt By Teammates | Perk Coin Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Rank 1 | +10% | 50 coins |
| Rank 2 | +20% | 75 coins |
| Rank 3 | +30% | 100 coins |
| Rank 4 | +35% | 150 coins |
| Rank 5 | +40% | 200 coins |
So ranking up dramatically boosts effectiveness, with 200 coins providing the maximum 40% team damage buff.
This applies to all legendary perks. Make sure to invest coins into damage cards first for the largest bang-for-the-buck.
Note: There is currently a bug causing What Rads? to not scale past +150 radiation resistance at higher ranks, reducing its late game value
Ideal Legendary Perk Loadouts
Choosing which legendary perks to unlock first and rank up depends heavily on your preferred playstyle and build.
As a Fallout 76 expert with thousands of hours played, these are my recommended loadouts:
The Heavy Gunner
- Taking One for The Team (Rank 3) – Buff allies damage
- Far Flung Fireworks (Rank 3) – Explode enemies
- What Rads? (Rank 2) – Radiation Immunity for nukes
- Ammo Factory (Rank 5) – Craft maximum ammo
The Stealth Commando
- Follow Through (Rank 3) – More stealth damage
- Far Flung Fireworks (Rank 5) – Chain explosions
- Covert Operative (Rank 3) – 2.5x sneak damage
- Hack and Slash (Rank 2) – Cleave groups quickly
The Unarmed Ninja
- Hack and Slash (Rank 5) – 50% AOE chance
- Taking One for The Team (Rank 5) – Maximum team buffs
- Collateral Damage (Rank 2) – Backup explosions
- Funky Duds (Rank 2) – Solo chem immunity
And there are dozens more powerful combinations depending on whether your playing solo, grouped, PVP, PVE etc.
Use your legendary perk slots to double down on your build‘s specialty. Their multiplicitve effects can enhance specific playstyles exponentially.
I may write future in-depth guides focused solely on legendary perk meta loadouts for heavy gunners, commandos, melee only characters and more!
Methods to Farm Legendary Perk Coins Quickly
Getting the hundreds of coins required to unlock a full set of legendary perks and rank them up takes a prolonged grind – unless you use these farming tricks I‘ve developed over 500+ levels:
1. Intelligence Stacking
With boosts from Unyielding armor, Berry Mentats, Casual Team INT bonus and events like Meat Week, you can push Intelligence up to 40+ temporarily.
This amplifies all XP gains significantly through INT bonuses. Focus on repeatable Public Events like Radiation Rumble and Uranium Fever to quickly bank levels.
With optimized INT stacking, you can easily gain 3-5 legendary perk coins per hour racking up kills.
2. Lunchbox Stacking
Equip multiple Lunchboxes right before finishing Public Events to double dip on 25% XP bonuses. They stack multiplicatively for insane gains.
With 4 lunchboxes popped plus Intelligence buffs, you can net 100,000+ XP from Radiation Rumble pushing levels rapidly.
3. Fallout 1st Scrap Box Bulk Conversions
Use the unlimited scrap storage from Fallout 1st to hoard thousands of unused junk legendaries from treasure maps and then scrap them all at once with Scrapper equipped.
Converting gear, weapons and power armor churns out steel, wood and legendaries rapidly convertible into coins via the Legendary Exchange machine.
4. Double XP Event Grinding
During seasonal double XP events, spam events like Guided Meditation and Distinguished Guests on repeat around the map. These can award 4,000+ XP in just a few minutes for very little effort.
The boosted XP income cuts the grind time enormously. Take advantage of every double XP weekend to stockpile levels and coins quickly!
Closing Thoughts
And that sums up everything you could need to know about legendary perk cards in Fallout 76 as of 2023!
They remain hands-down my favorite feature after three years invested into Fallout 76. I love experimenting with overpowered ability combinations.
The coin grind to accumulate a maxed set of legendary perks takes persistence – but the payoff enables literally gamebreaking damage never before seen in Fallout!
I hope this guide from a Fallout 76 expert helps you unlock the full power spike potential of these amazing endgame-defining perk cards quicker.
Let me know which legendary perk is your favorite and how you plan to maximize its impact for your build! I may do follow up pieces going deep on ideal legendary combos for stealth commandos, bashing ninjas or fist of the north raw melee guides.
Thanks for reading! Time to hop back into the wasteland and gather more test data. Be seeing you soon vault dwellers!
