I'm just about to finish the final quest with my first character (well, 2nd but the first only lasted about 3 hrs and only just finished When Freedom Calls). This has been my Do-Everything character that I always start with in these kinds of games, so I've seen a good portion of what the Commonwealth has to offer.

As I contemplate my first Replay, I'm thinking about trying to limit myself to a single death. That is, like hardcoe in Minecraft, dead is dead and saves are only for quitting for the night. I would probably play at Normal or Very Hard difficulty as I find Survival's bullet sponges a bit off-putting, and I think its reduced healing might just make the game unplayable if I enforce the Single Death rule. I would probably also run the Storms and Darker Nights mods to enhance realism a bit, as well. The mod to make weapons more deadly might work as well, but I'm concerned it might make the Sole Survivor into Kenny a bit too easily.

My goal with this playstyle would be to increase the sense of danger and consequence. Don't power through that iffy encounter and count on restoring a save if you fail, run away and come back when you're more confident or better equipped. Don't horde stimpacks and food for a never-realized "rainy day" (because when it pours, you re-load) but make sure to keep that health high at all costs! I would off-set this vulnerability at beginning stages a bit by using console to add a combat rifle or hunting rifle and limited ammo at the SS house in Sanctuary, with appropriate RP explanation based on character build - hunter or survivalist with a gun stashed in the house before the War. I might even add a free perk in Rifleman, I don't know.

What do you think? Has anybody else done a Single Death playthrough? Anybody see any considerations that I might have missed? My one big hesitation is that this setup practically demands a cautious, stealthy play style to ensure survivability and I've basically just done that with my Prime character.

Nope, I die too much and and spend too much time doing trivial pointless things to do that >.>; On my 5th restart now and just have gotten all the settlements up and running without starting the main quest I'm about level 55 already haha....

One death, on survival mode. Sleep is a crutch.

Final quest? My character is up to Level 50, and I've not even sniffed the final quest. What the heck is it - chasing down the kidnappers?

That's how I typically play, too. If I don't do the single death thing, it will instead be the Frantic Parent angle who heads straight for Shaun without distractions. I wonder just how quickly and how low a level it could be accomplished, since there are definitely a couple of bottlenecks that I think rather enforce some level floors.

No, I just don't die cause I got Endurance, even tried Survival, only good thing is I heal slower still don't die though.

Why?

I can't imagine having to restart so often.

And, if you don't have to, you really should move on. Nobody is that good.

Lucky you. The rest of us die. Obviously you're doing something that the rest of us simply can't.

There has been an active http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1561910-dead-is-dead-perma-death floating around here since release.

running up to deathclaw with the deathclaw gauntlet and beating them to death because I'm the Alpha now.

Wish I could weir cloths that lowered my stats cause I tried taking my armor off and nothing changed :/

Guess I should just take off the gauntlets and beat them to death with my fists instead.

The idea is to see if I could keep from dying. There's no way I'd try this more than once. I would abandon the idea and restart with a different idea.

As to the OP question, no haven't tried that.

Would be funny as heck to see MMO players have to start from scratch each time a character perished.

Go for it. Dead is Dead can be a lot of fun if you're the type of person who enjoys that sort of challenge, and Bethesda games lend themselves very well to the playstyle. Try to strike a balance you're comfortable with between challenge and feasibility (if that requires mods, so be it). Too hard makes it an exercise in frustration, too easy and it removes all the risk (and therefore the fun) from the experience.

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Edit to add:

A group of guys I hung around with in LotRO started a permadeath kinship (AKA "clan"), with the intent of hitting all the instanced content in the game at proper levels and seeing how far we got. Took us a few low-level deaths before we got it through our thick skulls that we weren't immortal and actually had to pay attention, but once we got the hang of it it was doable. We made it past the first two dungeons no problem, but got a bit overconfident on the third. One of our six characters made it out alive. Was a hell of a lot of fun, and some of my best memories of that game are from that group.

I like to play DiD in survival games where the bulk of the game's fun is in starting with nothing and acquiring all you need. Once your established the fun tapers off so it makes sense in those games. Sandbox survival especially because there is no content really outside of the gather/build/defend mechanics.

Bethesda's games however are a different animal. For me the most fun part is the exploration and getting killed. The fact that I can get smoked at anytime makes exploration more fun but it takes a very long time to explore the world(100s of hours). If i played DiD right from the start in Beth's games i could easily spend 10 years playing it not have seen half the game. Even if i did it after i played normally it would still remove a lot of the fun from the game for me.

I do, but found out it's kinda pointless. Raiders with fatmans + SM suiciders + bethesda bugs = good luck. But it does give extra replay value. I never played DiD in previous fallout games, nor beth games; but for me it's the only thing that keep me playing F4.

Again. Good for you. I would love to see some video of that though. Beating a Deathclaw to death with your fists while in your skivvies would be great! Oh! I know! I'd like to see the same thing, but with a Sentry!

Seriously! I'm not being a smarta** at all.

I admire folks that can do that kind of thing and I've watched a few videos of other folks doing it (there's a great one of a Japanese player going through the entire game using only his fists - okay PowerFist - the takedowns are amazing!). One of my favorites was a guy going through the game with a pool cue wearing a tuxedo and a formal hat. I have no idea how he did it.

I think a one death playthrough would be very boring. The fact of the matter is: It's very easy to die due to things that have nothing to do with player skill. Very easy to step on a mine or turn a corner with a bunch of super mutants standing there. To stay safe you'd have to stick to the northwest of the map for way longer than would be fun.

I suppose you could stack your odds with a long range sniper build but that's still a lot of work just to get yourself out of the northwest. But, if you do that then you're really not getting the enhanced sense of "danger and risk". All in all it would be boring. (IMO)

For me it would be skeevers... oh sorry... Giant Naked Molerats with mines strapped to them. They get me every time.

I wonder who keeps strapping those mines to them though. That guy/gal is seriously demented (and talented).

I made it through survival 2nd play through with DiD but with self allowance any death from game glitch didnt count..


Suffered zero combat or environment deaths, but did die exactly once due to graphic glitch where it appears weapon disappeared but is kinda there, but no way to aim. Super mutants killed me while trying to tab and 3rd person view cycle to fix.


However, since this was 2nd PT after exhaustive completionist 1st PT, i dont think this accomplishment means much because if you know what you are doing amd learned the game, then basically rushing asap the railroad ballistic weave pretty much makes rest of DiD a cake walk.


Yes you can still die, but unlike pre BW, nothing will one shot you. Therefore only real death risk is death by stupidity because as long as nothing can one shot you, retreating to heal is always possible and safe. Given game surplus even with no settlement water farming, just random loot you sell - heals are essentially infinite. So only real DiD risk of death in my opinion is before you get BW. And if you know the freedom trail quest plus few followups to unlock BW, there's little danger in through the unlock.

its kinda dumb to play "one death only"...there's deaths you cannot avoid, if you're really exploring everything you're gonna get one shotted, there's raiders with mini nukes, one guy is near lexington and the first time its hard to find him, there's lots of buildings and he's way up high and one nuke shot and you're done, also an assaultron at the police station down south will jack you up if you fast travel there, she's invisible and the moment you fast travel there you're totally under attack with some heavy plasma beam and its really not easy to avoid death in fallout 4, you can sometimes but to start all over because you die, no to me thats [censored] but if you're into it have fun, sometimes a sniper will one shot you out of nowhere, thats happened to be several times, i got shot from like the 3rd floor inside some school through the floor board, you're overwhelmed sometimes and its not real easy to be looking up, down all around all the time, i don't see anyone playing fallout 4 and not dying, to me its not possible, unless you're limiting what you do and maybe have a ton of endurance and armor, but crusing around with an endurance of 2 or 3 and only wearing a couple pieces of light armor you're not gonna be indestructable.