Automatic weapons have a lower critical modifier, so perks, traits, and equipment that increase your critical chance won't benefit you much. Most of the time, you'd only have a final critical chance of only 1% or less.

Light Touch's added critical chance is a flat value not affected by the critical chance modifier of a weapon but is added after the modifier is applied. VATS also adds a flat chance value but automatics only have one chance to inflict a critical hit in VATS and tend to cost more action points. Fight the Power adds another flat critical chance value, but only works against the Legion, NCR, or Brotherhood of Steel. Laser Commander and Set Lasers for Fun also add a flat value, the former for laser weapons only, the latter for all energy weapons.

Obviously, Grunts would use the Light Machine Gun, Gun users take the CZ57 Avenger minigun for the best damage, and Plasma users equip the Smitty Special. Laser users can take the Gatling Laser, though the Sprtel Wood 9700 has a slightly higher critical chance and deals higher critical damage?

With all this in mind, is it still worth it to make a build that uses automatic weapons and critical hits? If so, other than Light Touch, and Laser Commander if using laser weapons, what else is useful? If armour that increases critical chance isn't as valuable with this build, what's the best choice of armour and helmet? Which is the better laser weapon, the modded Gatling Laser or the Sprtel Wood 9700?