FO: NV

[entrerix]

i guess I'll throw in my 2 cents on it as well. Yours is a fine sounding suggestion to me bhlaab, though I confess I prefer a roving sight like in deus ex, coupled with a slight affect on damage but a large effect on critical hit chances, so that with a high skill you have a much higher chance of one-shotting enemies. it doesnt hide the ball that way, though some people may dislike the moving sights, when the skills maxes out and it stops roving you really feel like an expert marksman. I may just feel this way because I'm in love with deus ex though.

[bhlaab]

i guess I'll throw in my 2 cents on it as well. Yours is a fine sounding suggestion to me bhlaab, though I confess I prefer a roving sight like in deus ex, coupled with a slight affect on damage but a large effect on critical hit chances, so that with a high skill you have a much higher chance of one-shotting enemies. it doesnt hide the ball that way, though some people may dislike the moving sights, when the skills maxes out and it stops roving you really feel like an expert marksman. I may just feel this way because I'm in love with deus ex though.

 

The roving crosshair would be good for iron sights. But just wandering around, it would be really distracting. There's already a system in Fallout 3 where the sniper scope will wobble according to the skill level, I'm not sure if it works 100% perfectly though.

I'd also prefer a mass effect stlye camera where you can fully rotate around your character, unless you have a gun readied in which case it goes over the shoulder.

 

For VATS, here's a list of my deman- uh, dreams:

-You press the VATS button (for example, right bumper on Xbox 360), and the camera zooms out to an overhead view.

-The enemy you were most likely aiming at will be highlighted in green. You can swap targets with the D-Pad or by selecting them with the mouse

-You can do untargeted shots with Right Trigger or the Left Mouse Button, producing a die roll. This will cost AP.

-You can walk around with the left joystick or WASD, but you will be locked on to the highlighted enemy Zelda-style. This will cost AP

-You can zoom in and out of the action with the right joystick or mouse wheel. You can toggle back to first person by clicking in the right thumbstick or the mouse wheel, but you won't be able to move around while in 1st person during VATS due to complications with the "lock on" movement.

-You can reload or holster your weapon (to move more efficiently) with the X button or R key. This will cost AP.

-You can access your Pip boy with the B button or Tab Key. This will cost AP.

-You can switch between two "hot" weapons with up and down on the D Pad or with the number keys. This will cost AP.

-You can zoom in for a targeted shot on the highlighted enemy with the left bumper, resembling "classic" VATS. These shots will cost more AP than untargeted.

-You can jump and crouch for AP costs.

-You can use objects in the environment just like in realtime gameplay to trigger traps, drink water, etc for an AP cost.

-You can hit the right bumper again to exit VATS and zoom back in.

 

I'm not sure how to deal with the enemy's turn. Either give them a full fledged turn or, after exiting VATS, make the player stuck in one spot unable to do anything until their AP is charged up.

[J.E. Sawyer]

Sorry, I should have written, "coordinate researching the viability of".

[Slowtrain]

I'm not sure how to deal with the enemy's turn. Either give them a full fledged turn or, after exiting VATS, make the player stuck in one spot unable to do anything until their AP is charged up.

 

 

Make enemy shots do 2x damage when the player is in VATS or while AP's are recharging. There needs to be some penalty for using VATS. Right now, its just game supported cheat key.

[Aristes]

Yeah, that sounds like a way to go. If you penalize folks for using VATS, you're going to shoot yourself in the foot.

 

As for the ideas regarding the skill impact on accuracy/damage, why change it at all? It sounds like a lot of work for something that won't matter to the vast majority of gamers. Retooling VATS might be worth it, but if they make VATS unusable, they might as well remove it from the game. I'm not a VATS fan, but that certainly doesn't seem worth it.

 

The skill points problem has much more obvious impact on gameplay and balancing. Personally, they could by and large keep combat the same. Sure, in principle I think ranged attacks should use stats for accuracy with minor bumps for damage. In practice, they'd either have to make the changes so minor that the end user would neither notice nor care or make the changes so significant that folks who've gone through the original game and the DLC will be irritated. I don't think it's worth it in either case. Great general theory from folks who want to show off their mad modding skilz though.

Edited June 18, 2009 by Aristes

[bhlaab]

Yeah, that sounds like a way to go. If you penalize folks for using VATS, you're going to shoot yourself in the foot.

 

As for the ideas regarding the skill impact on accuracy/damage, why change it at all?

 

 

Personally, I don't like the fact that you can pull off awesome shots straight out of the vault. You should start off as a total gimp at level 1-- especially when it comes to headshots and limb crippling since being able to perform those are the so-called carrot on a stick of focusing on guns.

 

One more thing. I'm not sure about this, but I don't think Perception factors into accuracy at all. I'm not sure what it does besides provide the base for stealth skills and put the little red blips on your compass.

That is something that DEFINITELY needs to be fixed in New Vegas: Perception and Charisma being completely and utterly useless.

Edited June 18, 2009 by bhlaab

[Aristes]

Ahh, now I understand. So you don't want folks to front load their mad weapon skills for balance reasons. Makes a bit more sense, then.

[HoonDing]

Imo weapon damage should only be dependent on the condition of the weapon, hence on repair skill. When you're out of the Vault, you normally have a pistol in 100% condition so it's normal you can do a fair amount of damage on petty enemies like Raiders. That's actually how I thought it was until now. *shrug*

 

I can't think of any viable explanation for weapon damage increasing with skill for ballistic weapons.. at least for melee/unarmed one can say that damage increases with skill because as skill increases one gets to know where to hit where it hurts the most..

 

IIRC Morrowind's weapon damage was determined by a roll, the 'to hit' depended mostly on attributes like strength & agility and less on skill - Oblivion turned this around and fixed the weapon damage.

Edited June 18, 2009 by virumor

[bhlaab]

Here are the formulas fallout 3 uses for damage

 

Gun Damage = PerkModifiers(BaseWeaponDamage * DamageMultiplier * GunConditionPenalty * SkillBonus) + CriticalDamageBonus

 

Melee Damage = PerkModifiers(BaseWeaponDamage * DamageMultiplier * MeleeConditionPenalty * SkillBonus + (fAVDMeleeDamageStrengthMult * (fAVDMeleeDamageStrengthOffset + ActorStrengthValue)) + MeleeArmConditionPenalty) + CriticalDamageBonus

 

And here's the gun accuracy formula

 

Spread = PerkModifiers(IronSightsBonus * CrouchBonus * (ConditionPenalty[none in vanilla] + SkillBonus) * (WalkPenalty + RunPenalty) + ArmPenalty)

 

And the problem with me trying to mod it is that the "skill bonus" for melee and weapon damage both share the same variables! Argghh

[Slowtrain]

Here are the formulas fallout 3 uses for damage

 

Gun Damage = PerkModifiers(BaseWeaponDamage * DamageMultiplier * GunConditionPenalty * SkillBonus) + CriticalDamageBonus

 

Melee Damage = PerkModifiers(BaseWeaponDamage * DamageMultiplier * MeleeConditionPenalty * SkillBonus + (fAVDMeleeDamageStrengthMult * (fAVDMeleeDamageStrengthOffset + ActorStrengthValue)) + MeleeArmConditionPenalty) + CriticalDamageBonus

 

And here's the gun accuracy formula

 

Spread = PerkModifiers(IronSightsBonus * CrouchBonus * (ConditionPenalty[none in vanilla] + SkillBonus) * (WalkPenalty + RunPenalty) + ArmPenalty)

 

And the problem with me trying to mod it is that the "skill bonus" for melee and weapon damage both share the same variables! Argghh

 

 

That's awesome.

 

Is armor not factored into gun damage?

 

What is the Damage Multiplier variable?

 

How is the weapon condition varaible derived? Is it a percentage of the weapons's current condition? (Ie a weapon at 50% condition has a value of .5 for a gun condition penalty)

[bhlaab]

To be honest, rather than seperate variables I'd be much happier with Melee accuracy based on skill just like I think weapons should. Pretty much, yeah, just like old fallout. I'd be happy with melee/unarmed misses and also with dodge chance based on agility for all weapons.

[Slowtrain]

if you have skill numbers in a game they have to affect either sccuracy or damage. What else is there?

 

In a first person action game, I would prefer the skills affect damage only, since to me it just feels clunky when you are aiming right at something and keep missing it. That kind of thing (forced misses) works better in a isometric/overhead kind of game.

 

If you have to do it, the variable crosshairs such as in DX is a better way of tying accuracy to skill in a first person action game. It requires a HUD of some sort of course, which might make it a little weird in some game settings.

Edited June 18, 2009 by CrashGirl

[bhlaab]

That's awesome.

 

Is armor not factored into gun damage?

 

What is the Damage Multiplier variable?

 

How is the weapon condition varaible derived? Is it a percentage of the weapons's current condition? (Ie a weapon at 50% condition has a value of .5 for a gun condition penalty)

 

-Armor is a different formula. Weapon damage figures out the number that appears when you're highlighting the weapon in the pipboy (for example, 10mm pistol: 15 DAM)

Armor has a similar number, labelled DR for damage resistance. I haven't checked but I presume that it takes the two formulas and mashes them together to figure out actual damage done.

 

-I'm not quite sure but i think it's just to easily adjust all damage done with one variable. For example, its default is 1.0, and if you wanted to make a cheat mod "ALL WEAPONS DO A BAZILLION DAMAGE" you just set that variable ridiculously high without having to fudge with all the other ones.

 

-fDamageGunWeapCondBase + (fDamageGunWeapCondMult * WeaponCondition)

You're right, 1.0 is 100% repaired and 0.5 is 50%. But there's a little bit more to it than that, with a base value (default 0.5) and a multiplier (also default 0.5)

So a weapon with a condition of 70% affects the damage done within the formula

 

0.5 + (0.5 * 0.75) = 0.875

 

The base is for whether you want the idea of weapon condition to affect things more across the board, and the multiplier is for setting exactly how much you want the condition to affect it

[bhlaab]

if you have skill numbers in a game they have to affect either sccuracy or damage. What else is there?

 

In a first person action game, I would prefer the skills affect damage only, since to me it just feels clunky when you are aiming right at something and keep missing it. That kind of thing (forced misses) works better in a isometric/overhead kind of game.

 

If you have to do it, the variable crosshairs such as in DX is a better way of tying accuracy to skill in a first person action game. It requires a HUD of some sort of course, which might make it a little weird in some game settings.

 

I agree that it does look sillier in a fully realized 3d environment from an Action game perspective, but damn it this is Fallout and any step towards making it play like a fallout game is worth its weight in gold. *raises lighter into the air*

 

It's pretty obvious at this point that we're never going to see an isometric TB one again so I'm willing to forgo the cigar as long as it gets as close as possible

[Slowtrain]

if you have skill numbers in a game they have to affect either sccuracy or damage. What else is there?

 

In a first person action game, I would prefer the skills affect damage only, since to me it just feels clunky when you are aiming right at something and keep missing it. That kind of thing (forced misses) works better in a isometric/overhead kind of game.

 

If you have to do it, the variable crosshairs such as in DX is a better way of tying accuracy to skill in a first person action game. It requires a HUD of some sort of course, which might make it a little weird in some game settings.

 

I agree that it does look sillier in a fully realized 3d environment from an Action game perspective, but damn it this is Fallout and any step towards making it play like a fallout game is worth its weight in gold. *raises lighter into the air*

 

It's pretty obvious at this point that we're never going to see an isometric TB one again so I'm willing to forgo the cigar as long as it gets as close as possible

 

 

I'm not opposed to tying accuracy to skill. Its a pretty traditional way of doing it. It just feels a little clunky to me in some games. FO3 being one of them.

 

Ideally, I'd prefer that neither damage nor accuracy be tied to a skill number in a game like FO3. But if not, then what is the point of the skill number? I suopose you could create some gun handling variables such as reload speed and weapon raise speed and focus speed and tie them all into a skill. Probably that makes more sense really, but who is going to bother when it is so much easier just to tie it to accuracy and damage.

 

Also, thanks for the formula stuff.

 

Just out of curiosity do you happen to know if npcs in Fallout 3 have seperate skills for weapon usage similar to the pc? For example if a raider is carrying a hunting rifle, but then picks up a laser rifle that gets dropped by a dead Outcast, does the raider use a different skill number when firing the laser rifle than he did when using the hunting rifle?

Edited June 19, 2009 by CrashGirl

[Tagaziel]

In a first person action game, I would prefer the skills affect damage only, since to me it just feels clunky when you are aiming right at something and keep missing it. That kind of thing (forced misses) works better in a isometric/overhead kind of game.

 

And isn't it even clunkier to see your guns magically deal more damage as you sink points into a skill?

 

Deus Ex nailed the skill system. And it wasn't even an RPG.

[Slowtrain]

Deus Ex nailed the skill system. And it wasn't even an RPG.

 

Yeah, I pretty much agree. DX did it well.

 

Again, I'd prefer neither damage nor accuracy tied to stats, but that's not going to happen.

[bhlaab]

Just out of curiosity do you happen to know if npcs in Fallout 3 have seperate skills for weapon usage similar to the pc? For example if a raider is carrying a hunting rifle, but then picks up a laser rifle that gets dropped by a dead Outcast, does the raider use a different skill number when firing the laser rifle than he did when using the hunting rifle?

 

Checking right now, it appears so. But things are split up into 3 camps:

 

-Generated based on templates (This is typical for random encounter enemies and people in clearly defined factions such as slavers) Templates are like named characters but can be used to affect multiple people at once.

 

-Auto Calculated, probably for level scaling purposes (This is most named characters, like Bannon in Rivet City) This seems to mean that you can set their Level, and they will automatically decide where to place the skill points they earn. I'm not sure what affect SPECIAL has on auto calc, but I think it might influence what skills are chosen.

 

-and a very few have set in stone skill sets that (afaik) never change ever, like Caleb Smith (who I think is a caravan trader?)

 

So yes.. Bannon, for example, is great at Melee weapons and Bartering (don't know when that comes in handy for him as an NPC...) but he stinks at small guns. His Auto calc also seems to be selected to give him more stimpacks and better armor.

Edited June 19, 2009 by bhlaab

[Aristes]

Ideally, I'd prefer that neither damage nor accuracy be tied to a skill number in a game like FO3. But if not, then what is the point of the skill number? I suopose you could create some gun handling variables such as reload speed and weapon raise speed and focus speed and tie them all into a skill. Probably that makes more sense really, but who is going to bother when it is so much easier just to tie it to accuracy and damage.

 

You would rather have a system in an RPG that relies on player reflexes more than character skills? Brilliant move. You hear sound of distant howls? Those are players who are going to pollory your game. Good luck with that.

 

Character skill should trump player reflexes in an RPG. ...And I've played my share of FPSes, so it's not like I have a hard time running and gunning either. In fact, it's very easy to exploit movement in Oblivion to win combat, especially as a mage or ranged PC. That doesn't mean it's good.

 

I can see the benefit of balancing out the skills in the early game. Fair enough. You can probably improve the game without drawing undue attention. However, the farther you move from character skills, the less of an improvement. Yeah, you might not have liked Fallout 3. Good. I did and I don't want some sort of Frankensteinish monster that tries to use mechanical gymnastics to make my weapon skills useful. Weapon reloading speed? Good God, bro! You don't actually shoot better or do more damage, but you can reload that puppy in a jiff!

 

Of course, none of this addresses the real problem with skills in the first place. I guess it'll all balance out. I'll have six skills at 100 by the end of the game but none of them will really be useful anyhow. CG, you're nuts on this issue.

[bhlaab]

Of course, none of this addresses the real problem with skills in the first place. I guess it'll all balance out. I'll have six skills at 100 by the end of the game but none of them will really be useful anyhow. CG, you're nuts on this issue.

 

*ahem* if i may self advertise...

 

Classic Skill Point Overhaul: http://fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=6984

Classic fallout 1 formula, divided by 2 to compensate for 100 skill limit, then multiplied by 70% to compensate for there only being 13 skills instead of 18

Also tagged skills grow twice as fast and get a 10 point bonus

 

I really hope NV raises the skill ceiling to 200

Edited June 19, 2009 by bhlaab

[Slowtrain]

You would rather have a system in an RPG that relies on player reflexes more than character skills? Brilliant move. You hear sound of distant howls? Those are players who are going to pollory your game. Good luck with that.

 

 

FO3 is 80% shooter and 20% crpg. Maybe 10%. Maybe 5% Anyway, so yes, more player skill less character skill. Far less clunky. Playing FPS combat in Fallout 3 feels like taking a broken down jalopy out for a drive. Sure it gets you there, but its hardly enjoyable.

 

If VATS didn't completely suck, I might not care so much. But VATS does completely suck. So.

 

Actually, I don't really care at all. It would just be my preference.

Edited June 19, 2009 by CrashGirl

[bhlaab]

You would rather have a system in an RPG that relies on player reflexes more than character skills? Brilliant move. You hear sound of distant howls? Those are players who are going to pollory your game. Good luck with that.

 

 

FO3 is 80% shooter and 20% crpg. Maybe 10%. Maybe 5% Anyway, so yes, more player skill less character skill. Far less clunky. Playing FPS combat in Fallout 3 feels like taking a broken down jalopy out for a drive. Sure it gets you there, but its hardly enjoyable.

 

If VATS didn't completely suck, I might not care so much. But VATS does completely suck. So.

 

Actually, I don't really care at all. It would just be my preference.

 

Turning Fallout into a pure fps sounds like the absoloute worst thing a person could do, their heart would have to be coal black and covered with thorny ice.

 

As opposed to making it an rpg/fps hybrid, which requires a grey heart with half-melted nubbed ice

[J.E. Sawyer]

I can't think of any viable explanation for weapon damage increasing with skill for ballistic weapons.. at least for melee/unarmed one can say that damage increases with skill because as skill increases one gets to know where to hit where it hurts the most.

Firearm shot placement tends to matter a lot more than caliber or raw energy.

[bhlaab]

I can't think of any viable explanation for weapon damage increasing with skill for ballistic weapons.. at least for melee/unarmed one can say that damage increases with skill because as skill increases one gets to know where to hit where it hurts the most.

Firearm shot placement tends to matter a lot more than caliber or raw energy.

 

So if you get good enough at shooting a pistol, you can make a shot to the kneecaps damage your opponant just as much as a headshot did when you were bad at it?

 

Anyway, I take that to mean you aren't planning on changing it :\

[jero cvmi]

I can't think of any viable explanation for weapon damage increasing with skill for ballistic weapons.. at least for melee/unarmed one can say that damage increases with skill because as skill increases one gets to know where to hit where it hurts the most.

Firearm shot placement tends to matter a lot more than caliber or raw energy.

not in burst mode, and not with explosive ammo like rockets.

 

and since we're talking about a game that supports called shots, i think a better way to represent how skill affects shot placement which in turn affects damage, would be to make the skill govern the chance to hit or critically hit specific body parts that have better damage tables. it's a fairly good abstraction.