Fallout 76: A hacking guide

Fallout 76 allows players to hack terminals, scattered around the open world. To become a hacker, you need to acquire Hacker perk cards of 3 levels.

When a character gains level 5, he can get Hacking as the perk card for the Intelligence slot. This allows you to hack terminals of level 1. To be able to hack level 2 terminals, the character needs to equip a Hacking perk card, plus one of the following: Expert Hacker or Master Hacker. Level 3 terminals are available for hacking only if you have all 3 Hacker perk cards equipped.

Hacker perk cards can’t be combined, and it somewhat diminishes their effectiveness. Developers might intend players to carry those cards in the backpack and equip them only when hacking is needed. This strategy cuts in the diversity of cards you can have because with 3 Hacking perk cards you also need to get another pack of 3 Intelligence perk cards. This makes big sense for groups, where one player can specialize in Intelligence, while others acquire different roles.

How to hack a terminal in Fallout 76

Hacking in Fallout 76 is the same as Fallout 4: you need to find the correct word on the screen. At first, you pick a random word and the terminal tells how much it is like the one you need. If the word you chose is “Play” and the Terminal says its likeness is “3”, you want to find another word with 2 same characters in the same position. The word “Clay” would be the likely candidate you need.

The groups of special characters on the hacking screen give additional hacking attempts and remove duds (wrong words).

If you have only one attempt on your terminal, just move away from it and begin interacting again. You will have all your attempts replenished. It will also bring back every dud, but, if you were paying attention, it’s not a big deal. Losing all the attempts will lock out the terminal for some time.

Good luck hacking in Fallout 76!