I've been hearing some rumors from friends, mostly anecdotal indicating that skills, when gone past 10 (such as initially having 10 in one skill, then finding a bobblehead or skillbook), actually improve past 10.
I can't find any proof of this yet, and my current character right now is slightly incapable of maxing any stats soon to 10 and testing it out. So I'd like to understand if SPECIAL stats increased past 10 show any benefit?
Can SPECIAL stats be increased past 10?
If a stat is already at 10 when a SPECIAL raising Bobble-head is picked up it can raise it to 11 if you really want to have a stat of 11 you must wait till you raise it to 10 naturally before picking the Bobble-Head up. The You're SPECIAL book that is found in your house after you leave the vault on the other hand can NOT raise your stats above 10. Things that provide temp boosts such as perks ex. Night Person, drugs, clothing or other items will raise it above 10 as long as its equipped or in effect but since its just a temp boost you can NOT use it to get perks you normally wouldn't have access to but it does give you all the other advantages of having a higher stat an example would be for strength being able to carry more.
I already looked this up a bit ago when I was looking up the Bobble-Head locations for someone elses question it came from a guy on reddit who wanted to test this specific thing several others also supported his comment so it is most likely true.
To boost your stat past 10 with the You're S.P.E.C.I.A.L. use drugs or what have you to temporarly lower your stat below 10 then use the book on the desired stat, once the effects wear off you either be at 11 or 12 depedning if you had used the Bobblehead when you were at 10 or not.
By first getting the desired stat to 10 then getting a drug to give it a temporary debuff you can use the You're Special! book to increase it back to 10 but then when the debuff wears off you will have 11 in that stat and then you can increase it to 12 by getting the corresponding bobblehead. and why i say do it in this order is because it is easier to find a -1 debuff than a -2. don't know exactly wich stats you can do this for as i believe you can't do this on some not sure wich ones though. afterwards you can then of course also use items and clothing to increase past this. I've heard of people able to get their charisma far enough to get 40+ settlers in a settlement.
I tested it with the intelligence bobblehead and was able to boost it to 11 permanently, by starting with 10 in that stat. The SPECIAL book only would boost stats that were not already at 10. So to really maximize things if you want to take the time you should start with 10 int and end and go get those 2 bobbleheads ASAP and then work your levels to boost other stats up.
To max your SPECIAL stats you need a total of 42 points over starting one of which you can get through the SPECIAL book in your house. Not seen or heard of any other books though so the soonest would be L42.
It would only make sense that you can exceed stat cap since that you can exceed 10 stat base cap as if you look into Endurance the last talent "Solar Powered" increases endurance during the day by an additional 2 so if you could not exceed 10 it would become quite useless.
however i would not suggest using the bobbleheads to perma cap as it could be used to unlock talents so leave the capping to temporary buffs instead.
The Perception & Intelligence bobbleheads which are fairly easy to find
From what I can tell, there is no hard cap for SPECIAL. I'm playing with a mod that lets me craft You're Special! books (for 100 pre war money each), and I started with 10 intelligence. I've used 3 books (including the real one), after using a combination of alcohol and survival dehydration, and I have a base of 13 Intelligence without the bobblehead. With chems and apparel, I've gotten it as high as 21.
It is possible to make your special stats in Fallout 4 (and also Fallout 1-2 but thats not important right now) go higher than ten through various methods. The easiest method is through console commands, but I would recommend saving before possibly making a mistake that cant be fixed without a backup save. I don't know how far it can go without reaching the literal limit that the game has itself. Also, there are other things in Fallout 4 that can be enhanced for all characters using Fallout 4 console commands. I will not explain how to, because I don't have the time to but, I know this stuff works as long as you back things up and never save over the original backup save under any circumstances unless you like starting a new game.
If you want to permanently increase over 10, you will have to use S.P.E.C.I.A.L book first because it won't show up if you have it at ten already then use a bobblehead, it increases as soon as you pick it up.
Also if you didn't know special means strength, perception, endurance, charisma, intelligence, agility and luck. The seven special stats.
This tread looks old but you can actually get them well past the 10 and bubble head Must always be used lastly Since it increases the point even if you already passed the 10 points, use alcohol or any temporal drugs note that drug withdrawal does not work yo lower you points then use the dog meat glitch or factory glitch yo duplicate then you are special book , int is lower i think by 1 with normal alcohol but u think the dirty wastlander can lower it by 2 tjen there is a drug that can lower int i think cant remeber the name , then when your INt is as low as posible use those duplicate books when effect were off youll be able to past the 10 by Many points i have 16 base int without bubble head
