FO:NV

[Amentep]

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?

 

I dunno, I didn't mind it that much, but I did think weapons degraded too fast for the most part, necessitating carrying around dozens of weapons and millions of ammo.

 

How would you improve the system?

 

I wouldn't mind seeing some thing like repair allowing a slower rate of decay (indicating maintenance). Or a maintenance option in the menu that would cause time to pass but increase the durability of the weapon, extending its life (but then time passage would have to matter, I think, for that to really work).

[Slowtrain]

How would you improve the system?

 

 

I would just drop it. Repairing weapons and armor has never been that important to a good crpg.

 

 

However, the repair skill SHOULD be used in the gameworld, for dialogue checks, quest options, item modifications etc and so forth.

 

 

But Bethesda has never been about that. their concept of a repair skill has always been nothing more than busywork. At least in Oblivion and Morrowind the busywork wasn't terribly annoying. In FO3, it is.

[Amentep]

How would you improve the system?

 

I would just drop it. Repairing weapons and armor has never been that important to a good crpg.

 

However, the repair skill SHOULD be used in the gameworld, for dialogue checks, quest options, item modifications etc and so forth.

 

But Bethesda has never been about that. their concept of a repair skill has always been nothing more than busywork. At least in Oblivion and Morrowind the busywork wasn't terribly annoying. In FO3, it is.

 

I kinda know where you're coming from - I hate games that have an eating requirement (which explains why I've never finished MotB) as I always feel like I spend all game trying to make sure I have enough food to travel 2 foot from town. I didn't feel the repair stuff was that bad, since it didn't result in my starving to death every 30 minutes.

 

 

That said I'm all for more use to skill checks.

 

I know there was some talk about adding Gambling back into the game, and to me if it were added as a skill, it would be a good example of a skill which to make reasonable to add would have to have some utility beyond the obvious. Sure you can use it to help the odds in gambling, but it'd be neat to see it applied in other situations as well. Like being able to add gambling to certain skill checks giving you the potential to do really well or really bad at them (with a higher skill lowering the chances of the really bad).

[vault_overseer]

I dunno, I didn't mind it that much, but I did think weapons degraded too fast for the most part, necessitating carrying around dozens of weapons and millions of ammo.

 

How would you improve the system?

 

I wouldn't mind seeing some thing like repair allowing a slower rate of decay (indicating maintenance). Or a maintenance option in the menu that would cause time to pass but increase the durability of the weapon, extending its life (but then time passage would have to matter, I think, for that to really work).

 

That would be interesting, use tools to perform maintenance on the weapons, or forfeit the maintenance altogether and deal with quicker decay and having to cannibalize weapons to repair. That might be too complex though.

[Undecaf]

How about a simple cleaning kit consumable that reduces the weardown for a certain amount of bullets/usage?

[Slowtrain]

Yeah, I just don't see how a highly complex repair system for weapons and armor makes a crpg any better, unless a huge focus of the game is on repairing weapons and armor, like some kind of repair sim or something.

 

 

Barring that it just becomes busywork, stuff the developer puts in to justify the skill but which doesn't actually add anything to the game.

 

 

I've played too many good crpgs that had no item/armor/weapon repair and I never even noticed the absence of such, so I'm all for just dropping it in NV.

 

 

WHich won't happen, though.

[kirottu]

Repairing was really simple. You just had to carry a spare with you. I really don

[Undecaf]

I'd agree that repairing isn't necessery nor does it necesserely make the game better. But it does give some extra depth to it - not much but nonetheless (if it is well implemented that is). Fallout 3s idea is nice but, imo, somewhat poorly implemented.

[J.E. Sawyer]

I think Repair ties into the economy pretty significantly. It's true that eventually the F3 economy gets blown out, but at least for a while Repair has a big impact on it.

 

Also, COND affects about seven different stats (damage, rate of fire, spread, value, chance of jam, and two others I'm forgetting).

[Undecaf]

I think Repair ties into the economy pretty significantly. It's true that eventually the F3 economy gets blown out, but at least for a while Repair has a big impact on it.

 

Also, COND affects about seven different stats (damage, rate of fire, spread, value, chance of jam, and two others I'm forgetting).

 

Whats your take on how it could be implented? For examples sake, without giving away anything you're not allowed to. I had an idea earlier in this thread, but I think I got a bit carried away, now when I look it afterwards.

Edited October 5, 2009 by Undecaf

[vault_overseer]

I think Repair ties into the economy pretty significantly. It's true that eventually the F3 economy gets blown out, but at least for a while Repair has a big impact on it.

 

Also, COND affects about seven different stats (damage, rate of fire, spread, value, chance of jam, and two others I'm forgetting).

 

Awesomeness and immershon?

 

Wait a sec, F3 has weapon jams?

[Slowtrain]

Also, COND affects about seven different stats (damage, rate of fire, spread, value, chance of jam, and two others I'm forgetting).

 

 

But does it need to? Does that make the game a better CRPG?

 

I suppose with enough time and effort anything can be written into a gameworld deep enough to make it useful, but aren't there better ways to utilize a repair skill than weapon damage and bullet spread?

[Slowtrain]

Repairing was really simple. You just had to carry a spare with you. I really don

[kirottu]

Repairing was really simple. You just had to carry a spare with you. I really don

Edited October 5, 2009 by kirottu

[Morgoth]

I can't remember repairing anything in F3. I usually threw away the defect weapons because I found plenty new anyways.

[entrerix]

i VASTLY preferred the mod where repairs could be made with the junk you find around. scrap metal became very valuable to the wandering scavenger. i personally like the idea of using "bits", like a repair kit type thing which can be scrounged but also can be converted from other things. you can break down an item into "bits" and then use those to repair a different item. high tech items require lots and lots of bits to repair. blammo! balance AND you dont have to carry a bunch of spare weapons around like a crazy person.

 

 

it also helps with the economy aspect too, as those high tech weapons can require LOTS of bits... those plasma rifles sure got lots of small parts in there dont they...

[Slowtrain]

Repairing was really simple. You just had to carry a spare with you. I really don

[kirottu]

Repairing was really simple. You just had to carry a spare with you. I really don

[J.E. Sawyer]

Whats your take on how it could be implented? For examples sake, without giving away anything you're not allowed to. I had an idea earlier in this thread, but I think I got a bit carried away, now when I look it afterwards.

In general, I like systems that are simpler and more coarsely granular ("chunky") than ones that are "fiddly" -- with many fine inputs and outputs into a single system or subsystem. This would include a system like Repair/COND, which is pretty fiddly in F3. If COND affected fewer stats and were "stepped" more coarsely, I think the effects of it would be more apparent to players.

 

In F3, Repair is used for:

 

a) Optimization of weapons and armor (given any level of weapon skill you will never get as much out of a COND-affected weapon with a 50 COND as you would with 100 COND -- firearms being affected more than melee/unarmed).

b) Inventory optimization (Repair limits max COND, which promotes carrying duplicate weapons and armor for inevitable repairs).

c) Optimization of repairs (Repair affects efficiency of repairs, meaning it takes more items to reach a given COND with a lower skill)

d) Optimization of economy (b and c naturally promote this, and higher COND weapons/armor are worth more than lower COND weapons/armor).

e) Scripted interactions (e.g. Megaton water leaks)

 

Maintenance is really a secondary concept/task, created mostly by Repair limiting max COND. Because Repair and COND affect so many statistics with such fine granularity, it means that they have a large effect but most of those effects are not perceptible to the player except in extremes. If you take a 10 COND 10mm SMG and compare it to a 100 COND 10mm SMG, it's really obvious what's going on (especially with 100 skill).

 

Wait a sec, F3 has weapon jams?

It has reload jams. Also, the other two stats I was thinking of were actually things affected by Repair: max COND and efficiency of repairs.

 

But does it need to? Does that make the game a better CRPG?

 

I suppose with enough time and effort anything can be written into a gameworld deep enough to make it useful, but aren't there better ways to utilize a repair skill than weapon damage and bullet spread?

I think scripted interactions with Repair tend to feel the most rewarding, though they are pretty shallow in terms of gameplay. PRES BUTAN --> ur reward.

[Slowtrain]

[Your reasoning aplies to every skill in the game.

 

 

No it doesn't. CRPG's are about quests, talking with people, making choices, seeing neat places, and meeting interesting characters. When skills are used to effect those ends, then its a useful skill. When a skill just exists to govern a self-contained minigame, then its a waste of time.

 

Now, obviously, if someone belives that item repair is an important part of the crpg experience then they are going to want a repair skill. I don't happen to believe that. Obviously.

 

 

It

[Slowtrain]

I think scripted interactions with Repair tend to feel the most rewarding, though they are pretty shallow in terms of gameplay. PRES BUTAN --> ur reward.

 

 

I don't disagree in that I've never really seen a Repair skill really well utilized in terms of gameplay. I understand its just easier to tie it to something like weapon/armor condition and be done with it.

 

From my point of view, crpgs aren't about repairing equipment. It doesn't interest me. If its a fairly abstract and simplified system such as Oblivion's, where I could just go to an armorer, buy some hammers, carry them in my inventory, and click on them as neccessary to effect repairs, then its not such a big deal. It is still not interesting, but the inconvenience is so minor, that it is not much of an issue.

 

 

But in Fallout 3 I had to spend time chasing down spare weapons and armor, for no reason other than to repair the ones I was already using. It was time I wasn't interested in spending on something so tangential to the rpg experience. I would have been quite happy with a rifle and armor that never lost condition and getting on with the parts of the game I enjoyed.

 

It was inconvenient and uninteresting and not really avoidable.

 

 

Again, if some people like repairing stuff, then it won't be a problem for them obviously.

[kirottu]

[Your reasoning aplies to every skill in the game.

 

 

No it doesn't. CRPG's are about quests, talking with people, making choices, seeing neat places, and meeting interesting characters. When skills are used to effect those ends, then its a useful skill. When a skill just exists to govern a self-contained minigame, then its a waste of time.

 

Now, obviously, if someone belives that item repair is an important part of the crpg experience then they are going to want a repair skill. I don't happen to believe that. Obviously.

 

 

It

[Slowtrain]

That said, repair skill was part of my science boy character with science(obviously) and energy weapons.

 

 

Sure, why not.

 

 

I'm not arguing against the CONCEPT of a repair skill, I'm just saying that the limited way Beth has used it since MW (I don't think Daggerfall had a repair skill, weapons just wore out unless you took them to a smith for repair), isn't all that interesting to me. And in FO3 it became annoying.

[Amentep]

[i don't disagree in that I've never really seen a Repair skill really well utilized in terms of gameplay. I understand its just easier to tie it to something like weapon/armor condition and be done with it.

 

From my point of view, crpgs aren't about repairing equipment. It doesn't interest me. If its a fairly abstract and simplified system such as Oblivion's, where I could just go to an armorer, buy some hammers, carry them in my inventory, and click on them as neccessary to effect repairs, then its not such a big deal. It is still not interesting, but the inconvenience is so minor, that it is not much of an issue.

 

But in Fallout 3 I had to spend time chasing down spare weapons and armor, for no reason other than to repair the ones I was already using. It was time I wasn't interested in spending on something so tangential to the rpg experience. I would have been quite happy with a rifle and armor that never lost condition and getting on with the parts of the game I enjoyed.

 

It was inconvenient and uninteresting and not really avoidable.

 

Again, if some people like repairing stuff, then it won't be a problem for them obviously.

 

I'd love to have wider use of the repair skill or more versatility in it - and I'd really, really like for condition degradation to degrade slower - but I can't say the idea of being forced to go back to town rather than continue on because all of your two century old equipment broke doesn't add in some way to the RPG experience.

[J.E. Sawyer]

I think you can really divide this into two mini-debates (though one is pretty hard to refute, I think):

 

1) Should a Repair skill be in Fallout games? If so, in what capacity?

 

2) Is Repair valuable in F3?

 

The second question is kind of obvious: yes, it's extremely valuable. It can be part of "science boy"-oriented builds as easily as it can be part of combat-oriented builds. If you use weapons and armor or at least sell them, Repair is a Good Skill™.