We spend as much time as we can out west. Trust me when I tell you get the at tires. Today's new at tire options perform amazingly well on highway and are good enough to keep you out of trouble otherwise like at boat ramps (locker will shine here also). In most of our national parks there is lots of traffic and often times like say in Yellowstone for example if you want to view some wildlife there are few pulloffs to do so. So you'll be driving a fairly heavy truck onto soft dirt more times than not. If you are much of an adventurer ( so many places explore out west) that will lead to some really deep sandy roads in places, loose gravel, etc. Depends on what elevation you will be but all with present obstacles for ht tires. I just can't imagine wanting to go the places we have been to date with highway tires. That experience is with a 250 and a 450.
The shocks are the same and equally as bad. I think maybe long ago Ford actually used rancho shocks for the fx4 upgrade? Could be wrong. It was before I owned a Ford. Anyways smart move to ditch the gem shocks and in my opinion they don't add anything to the package.
The skid plates are worth it. That's a fairly large fuel cell sitting under there exposed. No one expects you to go rock climbing in a super duty but how anyone can overlook the amount of debris on any freeway any given day of the week. Factor in traffic congestion which reduces forward visibly or rain and one day you may be thankful for the extra protection. I wouldn't own one without them.
I've used the hill descent feature more times than I would have ever imagined. In the needles area near Custer there was one scenic loop that was a pretty steep winding grade down with lots of traffic for example. Hill descent allowed me to set a speed and let the truck do the work vs the brakes. If you have a significant other that likes to take pics this is a game changer. Definitely not something I would put on a must have list but it is definitely nice to have.

 

I'm a fan of the Skid Plate. So I always want it on my trucks. For several years I skipped the FX4 and just ordered the skid plate as a seperate $100 option. Same with the Locking differential. Then I put shocks and tires of my choice on when the truck arrived. I'm not a fan of the factory shocks ( stock or FX4) For 2011 and 2015 I put the Rancho 9000 shocks on. You can adjust the firmness of those by turning a selection ****. But in reality, I rarely crawled under the truck to adjust the know and after a use of not being turned. They got so stiff you could not turn them. My 2017 and 2020 trucks got the Bilstein 5100. They are firmer than the factory shocks. They needed replacing around 60,000 miles. My current 2023 truck has the Falcon Shocks on all four corners and dual Falcon stabilizers. they are not a stiff as the Bilsteins. And so far at 70,000 miles they are holding up. I'm happy with them.

The AT tires that Ford puts on at the factory are not terrible agressive. They tend to be closer to hiway than to off road tires. They have never lasted me very long and I don't like the look or traction. So I swap them out as soon as I buy the truck. I usually up size at least one if not two sizes. ie LT275/65r20 to LT285/65r20. The 285s give me !/2" taller tire and don't seem to affect my fuel mileage much and they bump my load rating around 200 lbs per tire. They work well on stock rims with no rubbing. But you do give up the option of being able to put chains on your front tires with the plus sizes. Especially the LT295 size. I ran the Mickey Thompson Baja AT on my 2020 and had great results. Getting 60,000 miles out of the set of tires. Great wet traction in rain and snow. I haul my horses year round and that sometimes means dragging a trailer full of horses home in a January snow storm. I didn't really notice any lou road noise from those tires until the last 10,000 miles when the tread was worn down. I currently have Falken AT/4s on my 2023 truck. Not as aggressive as the Baja AT, But they are still Three Peak winter rated. They look like they should also hit 60,000 miles of use.

Since I couldn't buy the skid plates with out the FX package on my 2023. I have the FX4 pacakage. Swapped out the shocks and the tires when the truck arrived. Both I sold on the local classifieds website to recoup some of the cost.

 

Who makes an aftermarket skid plate for the 50 gal. tank on the long bed?

 

Ford shocks suck. FX package shocks suck. Steering stablizer sucks. I replaced all at 400 miles. Asked the 4x4 shop if they wanted them. They just threw them in the trash can. Said they wouldn't put those on any customer's vehicles, 400 miles or not.

That's your answer, Ford shocks=junk.

I replaced mine with 5100s and ran them 100k miles. I just replaced them with a full Carli pathfinder system, but as far as I could tell with the butt-o-meter, they were still working fine.

 

Thanks everyone. I got the Fx4 do I will drive it a bit and then see if they need an upgrade. Love the truck!