Bloody Mess is fun, but makes searching bodies a pain in the arse. Three days of messing around led me to rediscover my old Magic Numbers for rinsing through the first game with minimal hassle, if not necessarily at top speed:
Traits: Gifted
Tagged: Small Guns, Energy Weapons, Speech
Perks: Action Boy (2 ranks lets you fire the Turbo Plasma Rifle three times in one turn), Fast Learner (useful for counteracting the skill deficit inflicted by Gifted)
S 6-7 (S7 is enough to use any weapon in the game but isn't really necessary until it's time to play with the Turbo Plasma Rifle, by which time I've already got the Power Armour and thus boosted myself to S9; once the chip's been recovered, I usually get the Brotherhood op to get myself up to 10)
P 8
E 4-5 (there're more than enough Stimpaks in the game to make a high starting HP unnecessary)
C 4 (it's really not necessary to go any higher than this with this character, especially with Speech tagged)
I 9 (so so so important)
A 9 (a lot of people advise against odd-numbered Agility values because they don't improve your AP, but it's worth it for the AC until you can get the Brotherhood op)
L 6-7
This isn't the character I'd use for a speedrun, but as an all-round arsekicker it's a tough combo to top. Once you've availed yourself of some Hardened Power Armour and the Turbo Plasma Rifle, you're pretty much laughing - assuming you've been sensible about skill points. For me, that basically means not putting any into First Aid or Doctor (you can learn First Aid from books if you really want this worthless ability, but as I said, there's a veritable embarrassment of Stimpaks around), Thrown or Unarmed (thrown weapons in Fallout are useless, and you're better off using melee weapons than your fists - especially as you can get the Super Sledgehammer reasonably early), being conservative with Sneak and Lockpick (generally I can fight anything I can't sneak past with a skill of about 35%, which is only necessary to nick all the doctor's gear from his shelf in Shady Sands; I get by with a Lockpick skill in the mid-50s and dynamite any other troublesome doors) and ploughing the hell out of my tagged skills (Small Guns is usually about 110%+ when I get the Plasma Rifle; Energy Weapons tends to end up at about 120-130% by the end of the game).
I'm not terribly far into the sequel yet - which, unlike the first game, I didn't play to death years ago - but I'm getting the feeling that this setup isn't going to be quite as unstoppable as I'm used to,
