Fallout: New Vegas

[Maria Caliban]

DOn't get me wrong, I'm not opposed to weapon degredation in a crpg if it has some important in-game consequence and ramification.

 

Within any RPG, the vast majority of elements will not have important in-game consequence and ramifications, making that a very limiting rubric.

 

I have no problem with weapons degradation in Fallout 3 because your character is not supposed to be a super-soldier but a scavenger eking a living in the Wasteland. It helps convey the mood of the setting the same way that drinking irradiated water from a dirty toilet does, even if the game itself makes survival a trivial matter. I recall STALKER also had that mechanic and it seemed to fit.

 

Which is not to undermine your point that it's often a mechanic that seems poorly implemented (one's pistol breaks down so quickly, you might as well hit everything with a wrench) or used simply because developers feel they need a limiter to PC power and that's the best they could come up with.

 

I actually prefer gun balance in Left4Dead where you have a limited supply of ammo, can only hold a certain number of weapons, and get a default pistol that always works. I

Edited August 27, 2010 by Maria Caliban

[Wrath of Dagon]

With a name like "Fisto", it would have to be.

[Undecaf]

With a name like "Fisto", it would have to be.

 

Would a "Fistress" go with female, then?

 

About the podcast... I don't know why, but every time I hear Todd talk about RPGs I get immensely depressed.

DLC confirmation doesn't move me, got to be one helluva DLC for me to get it (still crossing my fingers for an expansion). The new F:NV music sounds pretty good though.

Edited August 27, 2010 by Undecaf

[funcroc]

1UP interview with Feargus Urquhart

[funcroc]

X360 Achievements revealed [via Beth forum]

[funcroc]

1UP Cross Country Trip Day 6: Obsidian, Sony San Diego, and Thatgamecompany extras

 

We began the morning at Obsidian, checking in with a few of the team members working on Fallout: New Vegas. They showed off a new casino in the game known as the Ultra-Luxe, a high-end Bellagio-style building where you can choose to help a guy named Mortimer convince The White Glove Society to reconsider their "no cannibalism" policy. Yep, you read that right. It's done with humor, of course, but still one of the weirdest things I've seen in a game recently.

 

 

 

During the visit, lead designer Josh Sawyer gave us the rundown on a road trip of his own that he used for researching the desert in the game.

 

"Basically I just like riding around national parks and going off-road with some of my friends from Colorado," he says. "And I had the opportunity to go out to Utah, and obviously there's a state in-between, so I decided that I might as well spend some time going around the desert and look at some nature that we might use in the game... In Goodsprings [in the game], there's a general store, and I think in real life it's called the Pioneer Saloon. It's one of the oldest saloons in Nevada, and basically the layout inside and out, and how there are motorcycles out front -- that layout I thought was a very memorable thing I wanted to capture."

 

He also passed along a few photos:...

Edited August 28, 2010 by funcroc

[WorstUsernameEver]

Snapshots from the Something Awful forums.

 

From the guy who tried this out : Interesting enough enemies now switch weapons and sorta take cover so its more animated then before where most raiders aimlessly charged at you from out of the blue. Also because I made my guy start unarmed he began the game with boxing gloves as a weapon.

Edited August 28, 2010 by WorstUsernameEver

[sorophx]

boxing gloves in Fallout will be a constant reminder of my long-lost ear. I'd rather have the Power Fist

[Undecaf]

DT for dummies, from Bethboard:

 

This is the very straightforward explanation of Damage Threshold: DT is subtracted from a weapon's listed DAM, but a weapon will never do less than MinDam (in our case, 20%) of its listed damage.

 

The shield appears when more than half of the damage that should be inflicted has been absorbed by Damage Threshold. E.g. you shoot a target with 15 DT using a weapon that does 25 DAM. 15 points are absorbed, which is more than 50% of the initial DAM, so a red shield appears. 10 points get through. Second example: you shoot a target with 15 DT using a weapon that does 10 DAM. All 10 points are absorbed. However, the MinDam GECK setting (0.2) raises the damage to 20% its initial value (10), so 2 points get through. A red shield appears.

 

The broken shield appears when the target's DT is reduced to 0. E.g. you shoot a target with 5 DT using .308, Armor Piercing that reduces DT by 15. 5-15 = -10. A broken red shield appears.

 

If less than 50% of the weapon's damage is absorbed by DT, no shield of any kind is visible. E.g. you shoot a target with 25 DT using a weapon that does 70 DAM. 45 damage gets through. No shield appears.

 

That 20% of damage will always go through, was news to me.

[WorstUsernameEver]

That 20% of damage will always go through, was news to me.

 

I'm honestly not sure what is the design reason for this. Then again, it's easily fixable in the GECK.

[Undecaf]

That 20% of damage will always go through, was news to me.

 

I'm honestly not sure what is the design reason for this. Then again, it's easily fixable in the GECK.

 

Me neither. I've tried to think that it's for a certain group of gamers who just don't understad the system and get angry if they shoot and shoot and nothing happens, but that sounds kinda cheap solution.

[Oner]

The 'death of a thousand cuts' enemies will inflict upon you (well, they'll try) even in power friggin' armor annoys me more.

Not that much, but I liked that you could be invulnerable to inferior weapons in the old games. Sure, farming in all the starting quest xp after the enemies can't touch you is kinda problematic from a balance perspective, but it just felt so good after the D&D AC nonsense.

[J.E. Sawyer]

That 20% of damage will always go through, was news to me.

 

I'm honestly not sure what is the design reason for this.

Because it makes the game boring against certain enemy types once you get heavy enough armor. With MinDam set to 0.0, eventually you can literally just walk around a horde of guys pounding you with low-end weapons and never take any damage. It doesn't really produce good long-term game play. Similarly, I don't think it produced good results in F1 and F2, where near the end game people would go round after round taking 0 damage until an armor-bypassing triple damage critical forced a reload.

 

0.2 MinDam feels pretty good to me. When a weapon's hitting MinDam, that's the equivalent of 80% DR, which is nothing to sneeze at. If some dude pops out with an SMG and starts blasting you in good armor, chances are pretty good that his (for example's sake only) 9 DAM is going to be reduced to 1.8 DAM. A weapon that maybe did 90 (for example's sake only) DPS now does 18. Sure, it doesn't make you invulnerable, but that's a huge reduction.

 

If you disagree and are playing on the PC, you are certainly free to tune MinDam, armor DT, or even armor DR if you are absolutely in love with the old F1/F2 armor systems.

[WorstUsernameEver]

If you disagree and are playing on the PC, you are certainly free to tune MinDam, armor DT, or even armor DR if you are absolutely in love with the old F1/F2 armor systems.

 

Never loved them (though they were better than F3's system) and I'm not sure what I think about this system. Time will tell I guess?

[Slowtrain]

That 20% of damage will always go through, was news to me.

 

I'm honestly not sure what is the design reason for this.

Because it makes the game boring against certain enemy types once you get heavy enough armor. With MinDam set to 0.0, eventually you can literally just walk around a horde of guys pounding you with low-end weapons and never take any damage. It doesn't really produce good long-term game play. Similarly, I don't think it produced good results in F1 and F2, where near the end game people would go round after round taking 0 damage until an armor-bypassing triple damage critical forced a reload.

 

 

 

AS long as critical hits bypass armor for big damage and crippling, no amount of armor is ever safe. A better approach than having a forced and arbitrary min damage.

 

 

Is min damage a constant percentage or does it vary depending n factors such as weapon, ammo type, and skill? That would make it slightly more interesting.

 

 

However, on the plus side, your comments imply that armor DT does not reduce through damage sustained, unlike armor DR in FO3, which reduced as the armor suffered damage.

 

If that's true, I'm happy. That was an annoying armor mechanic in FO3.

Edited August 28, 2010 by Slowtrain

[Slowtrain]

Because it makes the game boring against certain enemy types once you get heavy enough armor.

 

 

I completely agree that this is a problem that needs to be avoided. However, I don't see how being henpecked by a bunch of low damage attacks is any more interesting that not being damaged at all. It's not as if the threat level has been changed. In both cases the threat is 0, unless you happen to have no stimpacks at all. ANd since FO3's combat is basically one of stimpack attrition, it wold seem unlikely any player would not have stimpacks.

 

Critical his that bypass armor and do large amounts of damage and deal assorted limb destroying effects keeps combat interesting because the player can never take anything for granted. SOme of the critical hit damage numbers in FO1/2 were execessive, but the overall mechanic was very effective.

[Undecaf]

I completely agree that this is a problem that needs to be avoided. However, I don't see how being henpecked by a bunch of low damage attacks is any more interesting that not being damaged at all. It's not as if the threat level has been changed. In both cases the threat is 0, unless you happen to have no stimpacks at all. ANd since FO3's combat is basically one of stimpack attrition, it wold seem unlikely any player would not have stimpacks.

 

Critical his that bypass armor and do large amounts of damage and deal assorted limb destroying effects keeps combat interesting because the player can never take anything for granted. SOme of the critical hit damage numbers in FO1/2 were execessive, but the overall mechanic was very effective.

 

Agreed.

 

I'm not opposed to some damage going through against the player (even the 0,2 can turn the tide in certain situations), but this gives an idea that if I choose not to use HC mode (if I decide I'm not into dehydration and stuff this time around), the combat turns back into me standing put holding the trigger down and spamming stims as damage starts to accumulate even when fighting against foes with heaviest of heavy armor.

 

Anyways, I'll see how it goes in two months.

Edited August 28, 2010 by Undecaf

[Undecaf]

doublepost...

Edited August 28, 2010 by Undecaf

[J.E. Sawyer]

AS long as critical hits bypass armor for big damage and crippling, no amount of armor is ever safe. A better approach than having a forced and arbitrary min damage.

I disagree. I think it is a really terrible mechanic because it relies almost entirely on random chance and virtually nothing that the player is doing. Fighting Navarro is probably the best example of this, as you and the Enclave trade nickel-and-dime body blows round after round until a crit wipes out (hopefully) an enemy or WHOOPS! You reload the game!

 

I'm not opposed to some damage going through against the player (even the 0,2 can turn the tide in certain situations), but this gives an idea that if I choose not to use HC mode (if I decide I'm not into dehydration and stuff this time around), the combat turns back into me standing put holding the trigger down and spamming stims as damage starts to accumulate even when fighting against foes with heaviest of heavy armor.

The logical alternative to what you're suggesting is that you shoot enemies and nothing happens while enemies shoot you and nothing happens.

[WorstUsernameEver]

Never thought I'd see an achievement called

in a game. Ever.

 

Yeah, I noticed that just now.

 

EDIT : And I don't really care if what I linked wasn't what the achievement actually references.

Edited August 28, 2010 by WorstUsernameEver

[Oner]

The logical alternative to what you're suggesting is that you shoot enemies and nothing happens while enemies shoot you and nothing happens.

Wouldn't this only happen though if both you and your enemies have the same gear? This usually isn't the case, and even if it were, the player is often outnumbered and outgunned, so minimum damage benefits the enemy more.

I don't really mind either way, just asking for the sake of argument.

[Monte Carlo]

The more I see, the more I like. In fact, because I am a heathen I am digging this more than the original games (except Tactics, of course).

 

I have pre-ordered a CE.

 

And I'm looking forward to DS3, go Obz, GO!

[WorstUsernameEver]

The more I see, the more I like. In fact, because I am a heathen I am digging this more than the original games (except Tactics, of course).

 

Now I'm curious Monte, what makes you more interested in this than the originals?

 

No, I'm not going to rage, even if I do post on No Mutants Allowed to comment news.

[Undecaf]

I'm not opposed to some damage going through against the player (even the 0,2 can turn the tide in certain situations), but this gives an idea that if I choose not to use HC mode (if I decide I'm not into dehydration and stuff this time around), the combat turns back into me standing put holding the trigger down and spamming stims as damage starts to accumulate even when fighting against foes with heaviest of heavy armor.

The logical alternative to what you're suggesting is that you shoot enemies and nothing happens while enemies shoot you and nothing happens.

 

True. There could be some mean control (supply and ammo scarcity for example) to prevent the stand-shoot-stim-repeat situation, if there isn't already, though.

 

I mean, if the combat works how it is explained, there's a world between HC and casual, and I don't know how it feels, even with all the improvements you've done, if the general feel of the casual combat is still the same (with the aforementioned situation in mind).

 

That said, though, I need to experience it before judging. Just giving my impression of the info we've been given so far.

[Slowtrain]

AS long as critical hits bypass armor for big damage and crippling, no amount of armor is ever safe. A better approach than having a forced and arbitrary min damage.

I disagree. I think it is a really terrible mechanic because it relies almost entirely on random chance and virtually nothing that the player is doing. Fighting Navarro is probably the best example of this, as you and the Enclave trade nickel-and-dime body blows round after round until a crit wipes out (hopefully) an enemy or WHOOPS! You reload the game!

 

WHat's wrong with critical hits being based on chance?

 

Over time, wearing better armor will always reduce the amount of damage you take, which is the point, but a critical hit can still cause problems, so don't get too comfortable, since you never know when its coming.

 

 

Critical hits don't have to be insta-kills. FO1/2 had too many of those. A critical hit just has to do enough damage to up the threat level to the player.