As said before we havent seen the entire tutorial.. traits could come after the vault part.. or even during the run to the vault (parts of it were skipped completely in the trailer and probably for a reason) i mean we still havent seen the part of the tutorial where we learn combat/VATS or most of what happens between leaving the house and reaching the vault.

The only saving grace is that the GECK can add all of that stuff again.

I thought it would've been cool if selecting the small frame trait actually made your character Sunny Smiles' size.

What I'm saying is that I like there being some inherent aspects of your character, instead of having literally everything able to be either maxxed out or changed on a whim.

Wait for Fallout 5. Or Fallout: Another good Obsidian game.

I'd say that traits and skills are gone for good. Bethesda never used traits in FO3, and they were only included in FO:NV because Obsidian wanted to use them. Though, it's possible that if there's enough backlash from fans, they'll be brought back in the next installment of the Fallout series. Or just see if a modder can make you a mod that adds traits and skills back in the game.

I'm pretty sure you don't mean make the traits act like standing stones in that you can change them at any time, because that would be silly

But yeah, I'd be happy with traits that had a truly significant impact upon the game.

Well, they wouldn't be TRAITS in the traditional sense, but more like implants that offers both postive and negative effects.

Traits are just perks in the Geck.

Hope they could also be mutations/wounds...

Yup, in reality they are almost like glorified perks with added permanency and different flavour text...

Wild wasteland was my favorite and should have had more encounters, but I think it's too early to rule out traits.

That's probably exactly what it means.

With skills gone, why not traits too.

But no worries, you can build a house and connect some lines to make your lightbulbs work. Now that's Fallout.

It could be they just didn't show that menu during the presentation as it would have given away a lot.

Don't worry! It's Fallout indeed

I am seriously growing concerned about you. This has to be the fourth time you've willingly adopted a stance that's total and utter fiction.

Two examples, one involving traits and one involving birthsigns:

First example is http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Heavy_Handed

Heavy Handed single-handedly defined which melee or unarmed weapons you would use. Prime example? http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Old_Glory In the hands of a character with Heavy Handed, this thing is worthless. Without Heavy Handed? It can arguably be the single best melee weapon in the game on a crit build. I remember the New Vegas forums got curious one day as to how much damage you can deal with a single attack with each weapon type. Old Glory won for melee weapons, and I believe the damage it could score exceeded 1000. Crits are less frequent, but the game features more opportunities to drastically up crit damage, such as Better Criticals and Elijah's Ramblings.

Several weapons within the game sold themselves as crit weaponry, boasting superior crit rate, crit damage or both in exchange for modest base damage. http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Embrace_of_the_Mantis_King!_%28GRA%29 is another that is rendered worthless on a Heavy Handed character, but becomes exceedingly strong on a high luck character that lacks it. Hell, it's practically broken it's so powerful; this thing can easily exceed 60% crit with 90% crit being entirely feasible, thus getting over 100 damage per punch that way.

Characters with Heavy Handed however will see great benefit from the traditional base damage weapons like Oh Baby and the Ballistic Fist however. The entire trait functioned to encourage you to experiment with different weapons and find one you liked. You might prefer the greater potential of not having Heavy Handed, OR you might enjoy that Heavy Handed gave you more reliable damage while also feeding you an excuse to not bother pumping Luck up too high. Trigger Discipline and Fast Shot are two other traits that functioned similarly, with each having either a positive or negative effect on snipers or full auto weaponry.

Second example?

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:The_Atronach#Atronach

You cannot regenerate magicka. You trade a very basic character function for an excessively large magicka pool. This birthsign single-handedly changes the way magic functions, turning it into something that you can absolutely spam in any singular battle, but discourages regular use, as that'll become exceedingly expensive for you. It becomes an ace in the hole that, yes, any singular battle, you can break out the spellbook and become a freaking god, but you won't be able to reliably use spells as much as you might like. Even on pure melee characters with no interest in magic, this birthsign awarded the single largest amount of spell absoption in the game. It was a ridiculously sized defense that could be tempting to pass up. Oblivion and Morrowind both bolstered instances where it was possible to create stupidly powerful spells....BUT they required you to have a very high magicka pool. Atronach was one of the ways you could access the stupid strong ones like some AOE 10 second stun spell or something....at the cost of never regenerating magicka.

Think the cost is too high?

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:The_Atronach#Apprentice

Now you regenerate magicka and you got a boost to your magicka pool (though not as big as atronach), but magic attacks are your kryptonite. You will easily get oneshot by any half-decent magic spell. Congrats, you are now a glass cannon and you will need to make specific efforts towards achieving full magic resistance at level 25 or 30 or higher in order to make this investment pay off. I don't recall if permanent passive 100% resistance was possible in Morrowind....I only know it required some dedicated Oblivion gate closing to get it in Oblivion.

How you would claim any of the above "get negated by level 5" is beyond me. Yes, both had examples of "weaksauce" traits and birthsigns with more minor or "safer" changes, but one, there's nothing inheritly wrong with this (not my cup of tea cause I find them dull and their scope limited, but not neccesarily bad design, I'd just personally develop more meaningful ones), and two? The existence of such traits and birthsigns =/= "THE ENTIRE CONCEPT IS FLAWED, TIME TO AXE IT COMPLETELY." No, it means the developers should get off their butts and dream up some more meaningful ones. It's actually not that hard and some of the stupidest or most suicidal sounding concepts could turn out to be some of the best.

A grim reminder: The game is close to finished -w-'

Guess we just have to wait and see...

Not really, even a simple glance back at TES debate from Morrowind's era has most people agreeing birthsigns were jokes.

As for the examples you give
-Atronach is negated by the fact that magicka potions, and magicka restore items, are EVERYWHERE in the game, Morrowind - Skyrim.
-Apprentice is negated by the fact that magicka resist items are EVERYWEHRE in the game also, Morrowind - Skyrim.
-Heavy Handed was negated by the fact that weapon damage was so high in New Vegas, and DT didn't do much of anything to negate any high damage weapon, that getting MORE damage was just overkill added on what already amounted to overkill, and losing out on critical damage meant nothing as you did so much base damage to begin with that criticals were just overkill added onto overkill.

You keep building up these fictions of importance. It honestly makes me wonder if you have actually played any of these games, and are not just basing your arguments on the theoreticals behind how they should work, rather then how they actually did in the games in question.

And again

If they're not in it's just more dumbing down.

Also, it's pretty clear when someone has never even played New Vegas or Oblivion for that matter.

I loved the traits in NV. They were a great addition.

But making decisions that change the way I play the game is scary!!

Possum has a point, that these traits can be exploited easily making them useless, but he's missing a major point: why not just fix the system and rebalance it instead of getting rid of it? The answer is simple: because Bethesda isn't interested in making characters make important decisions about their character. If it isn't something that can be totally maxed out, or changed whenever you want to, then Bethesda isn't going to put it in.

Yeah, we only need one weapon, one skill, one everything. Nothing is important.

Wait a sec, this is suppose to be an RPG, not a min/max action game.

As for TES, Birth signs worked great and had an effect all game. Stones in Skyrim are not Birth signs.

I was suggesting a means to fix it actually, but people always somehow manage to glance over those parts of my posts.

You have this terrific habit of posting empty statements like "most people" or "it was everywhere" without providing actual citations. I cannot count on my fingers and toes how many times you've boldly claimed "everyone agreed that..." without actually citing anything.

Relevant info is here:

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Resist_Magic

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Resist_Magicka

The only race that consistently got easy resist magic was obviously Breton. In Oblivion - exactly as I described - the meaningful resist magicka items do not appear until 20+, the best method being the Mundane Ring plus, I would imagine, custom-enchanted gear via Sigil stones. Stuff like the Savior's hide meant lower defense while other items could eat up your helmet slot or necklace slot, which was not desired as many of the best enchants in the game for various effects used helms and necklaces; you wanted those free up to use elsewhere since you could alternatively enchant your boots, gloves and greaves to get the remaining magic resist you needed.

Morrowind, again, unless you're a Breton, you find yourself constrained to very specific gear at all times. And again, those items are not available lickety-split. (and I also wanna highlight the 100% magic resistance ring was given to an NPC they basically didn't want you killing. Doing so broke the main quest of an expansion entirely. Killing him to get it is of course a task in and of itself)

Magic regen potions being EVERYWHERE for Atronachs though? No, that's not how I'd describe it. I recall a nice little jump in potions when doing the final quests for the Mage's guild as all enemies carried a bottle, but that supply would quickly run dry. I recall learning very quickly which alchemy ingredients regenerated magicka and needing to learn those by heart, collect them and level my alchemy in order to keep my character supplied.

Even if you say "YA BUT THAT'S EASY," it doesn't matter: you have benefited from taking the trait. The trait has changed the way you play the game for the better. It is not something that became obsolete at level 5, no, it's something that benefited you long-term. Which leads to this:

Thank you. For sake of argument let's pretend for example that everyone in Oblivion pissed restore magicka potions and littered the streets with them. This does not make Atronach inheritly flawed, this simply means the devs need to work on the abundance of them while perhaps improving upon the alternative birthsigns. Instead, Bethesda in their infinite wisdom did what they always do when someone highlights that a system "could be better:" they remove it completely and never speak of it again. Thanks Bethesda.

And to say "damage doesn't mattur in new vegas lel," I mean....well, that pretty much sums up how thorough and believable your "arguments" are.

Your "fix" was half-hearted, lazy and lame. Your system would not "fix" the fact that you could purposefully take the standing stone for Apprentice once you achieve 100% magic resistance, thus bypassing all of it's negative consequences entirely. There's a reason you see people referring to standing stones as streamlined, dumbed down and/or casualized: they are. Permanent stat changes carry consequence and weight. Temporary ones can be thrown out like an old pair of shoes.

Let's cut everything except for one weapon and one armor. I mean we don't need skills, or perks or even SPECIALS for that matter. That just gets in the way of run/gun mindless action and going through the motions of beating the main quest so we can all move on to the next AAA title.

Or, perhaps, some people actually ROLE PLAY!!!

Your argument ignores the fact that magica resist effects can be enchanted and have custom spells made of, and enchanting/spellmaking was hilariously overpowered and easy to use in Morrowind and Oblivion. You talk about the pre-made items as if they are the only ones in the game, they are not.

That isn't actually what I said at all, I would like it if you didn't blatantly strawman me.

I said weapon damage was so high that it didn't matter if you got more damage, not that weapon damage didnt matter at all.

>One should never be able to overcome thier flaws, or turn them into postives, through hard work.

What a negative view on life.