FO:NV

[Dark_Raven]

Gromnir, Boo and co. will cry.

Gromnir has a thing for Boo. So I heard.

 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited September 28, 2009 by Dark_Raven

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

Its Fallout name only until they have some hot lesbian sex or even boy boy sex. This is Vegas after all.

 

I agree. This is what Fallouts are all about: gay sex. Preferably done in turn based and with S.P.E.C.I.A.L.

 

Prefferably with groin shots.

 

And this time around every body part is a good option instead of just aiming for the head all the time.

Edited September 28, 2009 by WILL THE ALMIGHTY

[Purkake]

[bhlaab]

I think what that guy meant was, you better un-f*** it up

Edited September 28, 2009 by bhlaab

[Killian Kalthorne]

I use to get all hung up about turn base but now I hope they don't make it turn base at all. It would kind of ruin the new gameplay style. VATS is good enough for me, and if they improve it to allow groin shots and able to target body locations in melee then all the better.

[Slowtrain]

lol. I remember all those TB vs RT arguments of bygone days. Can't say I really miss them but they were kind of fun.

 

 

Honestly, Visc I never though I'd see the day when you embraced a RT FO.

[Killian Kalthorne]

Well, Fallout 3 is just that fun, though I have to admit it is more fun on the console than the PC. Maybe that is because I don't have a PC worth enough to piss in.

[Dark_Raven]

Well get a dream machine. PC are way cooler as everyone knows. Consoles suck.

 

Actually I find turn base kinda slow now that I'm used to real time. But you have a better change of survival in TB.

[Slowtrain]

Well get a dream machine. PC are way cooler as everyone knows. Consoles suck.

 

Actually I find turn base kinda slow now that I'm used to real time. But you have a better change of survival in TB.

 

 

Are you back for good? Or just briefly borrowing the internet again?

[Dark_Raven]

Borrowing the internets. Some day it shall be mine again.

[Slowtrain]

Borrowing the internets. Some day it shall be mine again.

 

 

Well, it's always fun having you around.

[Syraxis]

PC are way cooler as everyone knows. Consoles suck.

 

+100 Faction: Syraxis

Edited September 29, 2009 by Syraxis

[TwinkieGorilla]

is "wingdings" considered a gameplay topic? i want to see more wingdings. that is all. see you all next month.

[Undecaf]

Ok, I got bored and wrote a wall of text on along which lines I would like some aspects of Fallout: New Vegas to be made. There is a lot of text and typos and possibly some inconsistencies, but I think the ideas are pretty clear. Whether or not all the following would actually work in the game, is beyond me - I'm no game developer; but at least to me it sounds decent on paper. I wrote this in Bethesda F4 thread, but I think it fits here too.

 

So, here goes for TL;DR

 

 

Map and Travelling:

 

A return to the classic worldmap system. The actual FPP/TPP playground World be roughly about 1.5-2x the side of Fallout 3; and the area is divided into 7-10 smaller sections which vary in size and content and are scattered on the worldmap. General gameplay in those would be about the same as in F3, run around and do local quests. No teleportation fast travel, since the places aren't that big.

 

Outdoorsmanskill is reintroduced and works similiarly to Fallout 1&2 with the difference that nonhostile encounters are always avoidable should the player so decide (to decrease the amount of loadscreens).

 

The worldmap itself is zoned in couple of ways:

- The farther away from the starting position, the harder the enemies and vice versa; but there is still a chance to encounter harder enemies on starting grounds and vice versa.

- The map is zoned into territories, which each have their set of unique enemies as well as a few commonones that can be found on every zone.

 

Each zone has about 5-7 small maps for random/special encounters, which are either hostile or nonhostile.

 

The visitable locations on map would be as follows: A settlement - with explorable wasteland around it to provide smaller sidequest and exploring. Or just a visitable location like a majorsized building, militarybase, factory etc. They could even include two settlements, but in general all towns would be much bigger than those in Fallout 3.

 

Each settlement has its own set of architecture (not too different from other settlements, but so that one can tell the difference), clothing and mindsets. These are small things, but they can add a lot to the game. At least some visual variety.

 

Entering worldmap from a node would happen through the edges of the map. In Fallout 3 you get a popup message that "you cannot go further that way" - now it would be like this: "e) enter worldmap".

 

To not have to always run to the edge of a map, pressing (for example) the mousewheel would open up a minimenu (similiar to Operation flashpoint and Arma) beside the cursor that would have various commands (this will be referenced a couple of times again if you keep reading), one of them being "Enter worldmap", which could not be used during combat or if there are enemies nearby. However, escaping combat through the edge of the map would be possible.

 

 

 

Repairing:

 

Repairing happens with repairkits, that repair 10-20 points/use; or by gunsmiths in towns/caravans. The kits would have 5 uses each and their weight would be dependant on how much uses they have left. Success of repairing is dependant on repairskill (a diceroll happens). They would not be too common or cheap.

 

One would now be able to repair guns and armor beyond his/her skill, but after the guns/armors condition is above the skill, the amount going above is turned into percentages that is taken away from the skill. IE: skill = 30 and rifles condition = 80. Condition - skill = 50. 50% of skill (30) is 15. So trying to repair a weapon in condition of 80 with a repairskill of 30 would lower the skill to 15. This is not necesserely realistic, but it is assuming that the more shiny the condition gets, the more difficult it would be to repair it further.

 

Guns and armor would also have a complexity stat, which is a number of percetages that tells the chance of critical failure if an attempt to repair fails. Critical failure, instead of repairing the gun, has a reverse effect. The number would be from 1 to 10 if a trait doesn't raise it (yes bring the traits back).

 

So now you no longer need a duplicate to repair, but you would be able to sacrifice a duplicate in order to boost the amount of repairing a bit if you wanted to, but of course you would loose the gun and the money it is worth.

 

There would also be a possibility to repair broken robots or computers or what ever could be repaired, by pointing the target opening minimenu (explained partly in the map & traveling section) and selecting repair.

 

 

 

Healing & drugs:

 

Stimpak usage would be animated, so no more smashing a quick key for dozens stims in few seconds. More over stims now would always heal the same amount (no skill effect in there), but they would come in two variations: stimpaks and superstimpaks. Both of which would be rare and expensive and superstims much more that ordinary stims.

 

The player would have a tolerance meter which would measure how much the player can medicate him self before overdosing. Overdosing would cause an instant loss of health according to how much the limit is surpassed and would also cause some visual distortions and statloss. The effect would last for a while and the time would be depending on endurance and doctor skill. The tolerance meter slowly lowers itself after the medication is done, and the magnitude it is filled is dependant on the drug used (powerful drugs - like Jet and superstims for example - obviously fill it more quickly). Using food as a healer would not affect the tolerance meter, but food would have a heal-over-time effect.

 

Doctorskill would be reintroduced and so would be manual healing. Manual healing would be similiar to Fallout 1 & 2 (only a few uses/24hours - they would take few hours to be completed - success is determined by skill), and couldn't be used in combat or when enemies are nearby. Healing cripples wouldn't be possible with stims or sleeping, but would require manual healing and the ability to heal cripples would be enabled via a perk (with proper skill and stat requirements), otherwise a doctor is a must see.

 

Manual healing would be entered by the minimenu, which would also have the "heal other" option to heal a companion or other alive being.

 

Healing through sleeping would work similiarly to Fallout 1 & 2.

 

Addiction would need a doctor. And radiation needs a doctor or radaway (which would be rare and expensive).

 

 

 

Gunplay & VATS (should it be implemented):

 

Skills would now have much heaver effect on waivewring than what it is in F3. In addition, the players stance, movement and weapons recoil also would affect it.

 

The normal (according to skill) situation would be standing still and aiming through iron sights (yes, iron sights). Crouching would give a small bonus to accuracy and going prone would give a big bonus. The tradeoff with going prone and being accurate would be extremely slow moving and turning, and it would take its time for the player to get up and ready the weapon again. Firing from the hip would cause bigger waivering. Movement would also give a hit to accuracy -- the faster you move, the bigger the waivering. Recoil would throw the aim off a bit, especially while bursting.

 

Guns would do generally more damage and the damagestats would be static. IE: Huntingrifle - dmg 11-20, like in Fallout 1&2.

 

In vats you would now have an option to choose a firing mode. Rapid fire - a hastily aimed rapid shooting towards the target; or aimed shots, which would be the opposite of rapid fire.

 

Rapid fire would lower the accuracy a bit and you could only target a foe as a whole; and it would spend less actionpoints, while aimed shots would cost more and calculate the accuracy without minuses.

 

One could now choose a stance. Standing, crouching and prone as in realtime play. The bonuses and hits would be similiar to those in realtime. Changing stance in vats would cost actionpoints.

 

Going prone in vats would force you to choose a firing sector (so that the player doesn't spin like a dreidel in all directions while being the most accurate he can). Prone position would also be the most expensive stance to move to and fire from.

 

There would be a possibility to use simpaks in vats (at a cost), and also some basic evading moves like rolling a bit left or right (this would affect accuracy inside vats, should the player choose to fire after rolling).

 

 

 

Lockpicking:

 

- Success is determined by skill so that you can try to pick any lock from very easy to very hard and NO minigame involved. It would work like repairing; lock level - skill (if the skill is under the lock level) = percentual number that is taken from the skill. If the skill surpasses lock level, the chances are purely skillbased with maximum chance of success being 95%.

 

- The lockpicking would be animated so that you either see your character hands foing the job (FP view) or seeing your character from behind (TP view). You would have the ability to turn your head (or the camera) some ways left or right to see if someone is coming - so the game doesn't pause during the picking.

 

- Picking locks would take a certain amount of time depending on your skill and level of the lock. When attempting, there would be a timebar similiar to what Vampire - The Masquerade: Bloodlines had. Skill would give bonuses to the time it takes to pick a lock so that you don't get bonuses to picking hard locks before your skill surpasses maximum level of normal locks.

 

- Each lock would have a certain amount of tries before (if you keep failing) the lock jams for a certain amount of time (preferably at least for some weeks, so that your attempts at just waiting at the lock for it to become unjammed would be a tedious job). Moreover locks would have a complexity stat that would determine a chance for a critical failure that would immediately jam the lock despite if it was you first attempt.

 

This would also fit for hacking if it will be implemented in the same way as it is in F3.

 

...and they all lived happily ever after until someone nuked them. The end.

[Slowtrain]

Bethesda should have hired you. It would have improved the game dramatically.

[Masterfade]

Ok, I got bored and wrote a wall of text on along which lines I would like some aspects of Fallout: New Vegas to be made. There is a lot of text and typos and possibly some inconsistencies, but I think the ideas are pretty clear. Whether or not all the following would actually work in the game, is beyond me - I'm no game developer; but at least to me it sounds decent on paper. I wrote this in Bethesda F4 thread, but I think it fits here too.

 

So, here goes for TL;DR

 

...

 

A lot of your suggestions actually make the game easier to produce technical wise (not seamless world, no mini-game, using repair kits instead of maintaining a database of what repairs what, etc), so Beth probably had made a conscious decision to do it the hard way. And for most part I'm glad they did.

 

A seamless world makes exploration more immersive, fun and rewarding, landmines stomping on a overmap doesn't, at least not for me. Fallout 3 had two of the best designed mini-games in any CRPGs, replacing them with stats-based check will make the game less involving and less fun.

 

I consider Fallout 3's repair system to be great, why? Because it add a whole layer of strategy into the game. When you're choosing a weapon, before you just think how powerful and versatile the weapon is and how rare the ammo are, now you also need to consider how hard is it to find another weapon of the same type to repair it. This design also has some additional benefits

 

a) Make combat/exploring more rewarding for players while maintaining a carry weight limit. Most weapon and armor loots are in a low condition, so players can combine them via repair skill instead of reaching the carry limit quickly then leaves a trail of loots behind.

 

b) Partially solved the loot placement problem in an open-world game without completely resort to leveled lists. In Oblivion, just about everything from chests to quest rewards are leveled, which removed a lot of 'wow' factors from exploring and questing. Where as in Fallout 3, you can occasionally get very powerful rewards from exploring/questing without completely unbalancing the game. Because you can only use it for a number of times before it breaks down and you're unable to find similar weapons to repair it. During my gameplay, I got the unique plasma rifle when I was level 7 or 8, from a quest where combat can be completely avoided with a high stealth/speech skill. It's one of the best weapons in game but I didn't go out and turn everything into green goo because I know I have no other plasma rifles to repair it, so I reserve it for the toughest situation.

 

As for gunplay, the whole accuracy vs damage argument had been debated to death. Mathematically they're equal, skill-based accuracy is more realistic and for most people I dare say, skill-based damage is more fun. It's really a matter of preference and I prefer skill-based damage.

 

I do agree health recovery mechanism need some work, especially food. Food just gives too little health boost in Fallout 3, and it's not scalable with skills therefore pretty much useless. My idea is making foods give a 'fed' buff and resting without 'fed' only restores, say, two-third of health and you won't gain 'well-rested' buff when sleep hungry.

 

I think a well-designed health system should give penalties for cripples without making players reload everytime they're crippled. If cripples are too hard to cure (requiring NPC doctor/ certain player perk), then people will just reload.

 

You've got a lot of very good ideas in your post, but I think most of them just make the game different rather than make it better.

[Slowtrain]

I consider Fallout 3's repair system to be great, why? Because it add a whole layer of strategy into the game. When you're choosing a weapon, before you just think how powerful and versatile the weapon is and how rare the ammo are, now you also need to consider how hard is it to find another weapon of the same type to repair it. This design also has some additional benefits

 

 

The repair system is horrible. It's probably the worst part of the entire game. It's probably the worst repair system I've ever encountered in a game. Better to have no repair then just a system of annoying busywork.

[Masterfade]

The repair system is horrible. It's probably the worst part of the entire game. It's probably the worst repair system I've ever encountered in a game. Better to have no repair then just a system of annoying busywork.

 

Well, I gave three reasons why I think the repair system is one of the highlights of Fallout 3's gameplay design. Care to tell me why you hate it so much?

[Slowtrain]

The repair system is horrible. It's probably the worst part of the entire game. It's probably the worst repair system I've ever encountered in a game. Better to have no repair then just a system of annoying busywork.

 

Well, I gave three reasons why I think the repair system is one of the highlights of Fallout 3's gameplay design. Care to tell me why you hate it so much?

 

 

It adds nothing to the game yet is highly annoying?

[jero cvmi]

Map and Travelling:

 

A return to the classic worldmap system.

+1

But i'd be happy with less changes than what you're proposing.

I'd like to just be able to fast travel to any location even before visiting them for the first time, and always have the chance to encounter someone/something while fast travelling (so that fast travelling doesn't work like a cheat), and the ability to skip encounters depending on outdoorsman skill. Also i'd like to automatically discover locations while fast travelling depending on Perception, and have the option to stop there instead of initial destination.

Repairing:

 

Repairing happens with repairkits,... or by gunsmiths in towns/caravans.... Success of repairing is dependant on repairskill (a diceroll happens). They would not be too common or cheap.

 

One would now be able to repair guns and armor beyond his/her skill, but after the guns/armors condition is above the skill, the amount going above is turned into percentages that is taken away from the skill....

... Critical failure, instead of repairing the gun, has a reverse effect. ...

There would also be a possibility to repair broken robots or computers or what ever could be repaired,...

+1

I never understood why wearing a mechanic's outfit increases repair skill, while carrying a wrench in your inventory doesnt. I'd like to see tools etc. instead of magic clothes.

 

Healing & drugs:

 

Stimpak usage would be animated, so no more smashing a quick key for dozens stims in few seconds.

..and give the ability to heal in VATS at the cost of action points.

More over stims now would always heal the same amount (no skill effect in there), but they would come in two variations: stimpaks and superstimpaks. Both of which would be rare and expensive and superstims much more that ordinary stims.

YAY! Superstimpaks with their side effects, ofcourse- Death By Superstimpak.

The player would have a tolerance meter which would measure how much the player can medicate him self before overdosing. Overdosing would cause an instant loss of health according to how much the limit is surpassed and would also cause some visual distortions and statloss. The effect would last for a while and the time would be depending on endurance and doctor skill. The tolerance meter slowly lowers itself after the medication is done, and the magnitude it is filled is dependant on the drug used (powerful drugs - like Jet and superstims for example - obviously fill it more quickly). Using food as a healer would not affect the tolerance meter, but food would have a heal-over-time effect.

Interesting ideas there, but i'd be fine if they just brought the old addiction system back, it worked perfect IMO.

Doctorskill would be reintroduced

Naw, that was redundant i think.

and so would be manual healing. Manual healing would be similiar to Fallout 1 & 2 (only a few uses/24hours - they would take few hours to be completed - success is determined by skill), and couldn't be used in combat or when enemies are nearby. Healing cripples wouldn't be possible with stims or sleeping, but would require manual healing and the ability to heal cripples would be enabled via a perk (with proper skill and stat requirements), otherwise a doctor is a must see.

 

Manual healing would be entered by the minimenu, which would also have the "heal other" option to heal a companion or other alive being.

 

Healing through sleeping would work similiarly to Fallout 1 & 2.

 

Addiction would need a doctor. And radiation needs a doctor or radaway (which would be rare and expensive).

+100000

Gunplay & VATS

tl;dr, too much detail-micromanagement IMO. But yes, i aggree about the part on skill affecting accuracy not damage, it's been discussed a lot here.

If i just had the option of spending action points in VATS moving-healing-inventorying instead of just shooting, i'd be fine. Oh and the ever popular request of called shots in mellee/ unarmed mode.

 

AND THE GROIN SHOT. DONT FORGET THE GROIN SHOT.

Lockpicking:

.

.

.

This would also fit for hacking if it will be implemented in the same way as it is in F3.

I disaggree, the minigames were well implemented and quite the funnest part of the game for me. They just got old after the millionth time. I think some variety would help, like having different kinds of locks that work differently, and different kinds of riddles for hacking instead of playing mastermind all the time.

I miss the geeky terminal riddles of Fallout 2.

Then of course you should always have a character skill based chance of skipping the minigame if you're bored to play it, i don't know why they didn't implement it in Fallout 3.

 

My own contribution to your suggestions: Bring back the critical failure concept please. I want to be able to play a character with Luck = 1 and just CRITICALLY FAIL AT EVERYTHING.

[Gorgon]

The repair system is horrible. It's probably the worst part of the entire game. It's probably the worst repair system I've ever encountered in a game. Better to have no repair then just a system of annoying busywork.

 

Well, I gave three reasons why I think the repair system is one of the highlights of Fallout 3's gameplay design. Care to tell me why you hate it so much?

 

 

It adds nothing to the game yet is highly annoying?

Weapon condition should not be scalable to damage at all, 3 or 4 stages of disrepair is quite enough, we don't need the full range of 1-100%. If those stages had separate animations, weapon jamming and forced reloads, even skins, that would be something worth having.

[Lady Evenstar]

I never understood why wearing a mechanic's outfit increases repair skill, while carrying a wrench in your inventory doesnt. I'd like to see tools etc. instead of magic clothes.

 

I think the essential differnce here is "equipped" vs. "in inventory." You lose a layer of choice if you get bonuses from items in your pack. If you don a mechanic's outfit you don't get the benefits of wearing another type of armor.

 

I also liked cannibalizing similar items for parts. It's a bit like the choice you make when buying a car: do I choose a model that can be repaired most anywhere or do I go for one that will need "big city" parts. Repair kits are painfully generic in comparison.

Edited October 5, 2009 by Lady Evenstar

[jero cvmi]

I never understood why wearing a mechanic's outfit increases repair skill, while carrying a wrench in your inventory doesnt. I'd like to see tools etc. instead of magic clothes.

 

I think the essential differnce here is "equipped" vs. "in inventory." You lose a layer of choice if you get bonuses from items in your pack. If you don a mechanic's outfit you don't get the benefits of wearing another type of armor.

No, i don't think so. "equipped" vs. "in inventory" is 2 clicks away, right before attempting to use the repair skill. Which is fine, you could force the player to holster their weapon and equip a tool to get the repair bonus, would be the same thing plus some more clicking. Anyway, all i'm saying is being able to look like Bob Builder or a scientist in white robes was nice; But clothes having skill bonuses, when there are so many tools lying around that don't play any role apart from being junk, was a little ...frustrating.

[Undecaf]

A lot of your suggestions actually make the game easier to produce technical wise

 

I'd say that's a good thing.

 

A seamless world makes exploration more immersive, fun and rewarding, landmines stomping on a overmap doesn't, at least not for me. Fallout 3 had two of the best designed mini-games in any CRPGs, replacing them with stats-based check will make the game less involving and less fun.

 

Oh, but you would have the exploration. It just would come in smaller doses and with more variety.

 

And I'd suppose you wouldn't encounter a horde of landmines as a random hostile encounter while travelling the worldmap.

 

I'm not a big fan of minigames. Granted they are nice in F3, but they just feel somewhat... well, pointless since they don't offer the challenge I think they were supposed to. Ziggy has a good idea for it, though.

 

You've got a lot of very good ideas in your post, but I think most of them just make the game different rather than make it better.

 

Thanks for the feedback. And thats the point... to make it different. Whether or not it would be good - or better than the one it is compared to - is always up to the player to decide.

 

I disaggree, the minigames were well implemented and quite the funnest part of the game for me. They just got old after the millionth time. I think some variety would help, like having different kinds of locks that work differently, and different kinds of riddles for hacking instead of playing mastermind all the time.

I miss the geeky terminal riddles of Fallout 2.

Then of course you should always have a character skill based chance of skipping the minigame if you're bored to play it, i don't know why they didn't implement it in Fallout 3.

 

Good points and idea. And thanks for the feedback.

 

I also liked cannibalizing similar items for parts. It's a bit like the choice you make when buying a car: do I choose a model that can be repaired most anywhere or do I go for one that will need "big city" parts. Repair kits are painfully generic in comparison.

 

The idea is nice and would be good if you wouldn't swim in supplies to cannibalize from, imo, and even with that method I'd still add the skillcheck instead of determining how far you can repair your stuff. But that's just me

[Slowtrain]

Wearable overalls that enhance your repair skills is simply dumb. Happily skill points in FO3 were so bloated that I never had to bother with any of that skill enhancng gear since even low int characters were done with important skill point distributions by level 10.