http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/06/17/e3-2015-fallout-4-director-discusses-companion-functionality-immortality?utm_source=IGN%20hub%20page&utm_medium=IGN%20(front%20page)&utm_content=2&utm_campaign=Spotlight

With Howard's logic, the PC shouldn't die either because then we gotta reload. How inconvenient for the player if we had to reload upon death!

At this point I get the feeling that they learned nothing from NV. Howard has been referring to the choices we get to make as "Do it" or "Don't do it". Either for quests and now companions.

Instead of branching choices for quests, the only choice you can make is to walk way and never do it.

You beat me by three minutes, thereby insulting my honor.

I hereby challenge you to fisticuffs, good sir. But I must warn you, I tagged Unarmed.

I would accept your challenge, good sir, but The Cloud ate away my entire body.

I don't know. He has a point. If you're going to reload anyway if they die, why NOT make them immortal? Basically, you have to make the decision that you're okay with a companion dying to let them stay dead. Otherwise, if you like the companion, you're just going to reload - especially if that death was out of nowhere or stupid. (I.e. your grenade bounced back under their feet, etc.) Having companions not die is no more immersion breaking than reloading all the time.

And I've been reloading for companion deaths since FO1. Ian shoots Dogmeat to death in the back with a SMG? Reload. Dogmeat rushes a Super Mutant? Reload. Dogmeat keeps rushing into damn laser doors in the Master's base?!! Reload. Reload. Reload! Relooooaaaadddd!!! "Dammit, Dogmeat!!"

This can be handled well if they don't just treat your companion like an essential NPC like in past games. If they just ragdoll unconcious and get up afterwards ... yes, that's stupid. But if they go down until combat is over, have a wounded animation, and inform you they need to go back to base to rest up and they'll meet back up with you later .... that could be awesome. You wouldn't have to worry about losing them permanently, but you might get deprived of them for the remainder of a quest until you went back to pick them up again.

I laughed waaaay harder than I should've. Well played, 10/10 roleplaying.

Companions were immortal in NV, when not playing in hardcoe mode.

I did not know that. I've ALWAYS played NV in hardcoe mode, and I've never had a companion die. I thought they were immortal....... of course, I play a Sneak Sniper 90% of the time, so my companions rarely get to do anything besides mumble, "Good shot."

Mod just locked my thread, but here's a blatant copy-paste from the discussion there:

It was optional. Todd doesn't mention an option here, and also expresses a design philosphy that heavily implies this extends to quest-giver NPCs. He's saying "if the player might re-load for this situation, then we shall prevent it entirely." A huge chunk of the playerbase reloads if a quest NPC dies, so...

While I would be inclined to agree the majority of the population reloads, I also find it odd that the man who likes to get up on stage, hype people to Oblivion and back and mask "streamlining" with phrases like "enabling player freedom"....and here he is discouraging the freedom and the desired playstyle of those that don't reload. Like why not make this optional? It worked in New Vegas. Just give it a toggle option. Cause as it stands, that's not enabling player freedom for those that don't reload.

The only reason to turn hardcoe mode off is to hear their https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZUFezkE6yY for when https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oL5X4wl0Kok

Weren't companions immortal in NV but could die in Fallout 3?

Not surprised, nor do I mind, less busywork babysitting my companions.

Because it takes away the choice, and any consequence; and any that risk you might lose.

Imagine gambling with unlimited funds; imagine doing that https://youtu.be/mcMCyyurpFM?t=17m.

You didn't have an option specifically for companion deaths, you had a hardcoe option that changed how you play as well as add companion death. Fallout 3 had companion deaths, none of them were truly immortal, even Fawks could die if hit enough. Another damned if you, damned if you don't situation.

If all companion are immortal and can never be killed this will just not be enjoyable for me to play Fallout 4.

If there is no hardcoe mode in FO4, that's what's worth complaining about, not the companion immortality.

Edit: Just to be clear, I want a hardcoe mode too and will be disappointed if they never give us one.

I don't have to imagine, because when gambling in New Vegas, the F9 key was my best friend.

I don't see the problem. Several iconic Bioware and Obsidian RPGs had immortal companions; you'd only get a game over if everyone in the party was felled, and that's still more merciful than Fallout 4 will be, since here, if you die, it's game over.

If there's a hardcoe mode I'd consider it essential that they're killable.

I prefer that my companions don't die because I usually just go back to the last save (happened a lot in Skyrim goddamit Lydia move the [censored] out of the way of my incoming blow) but at the same time I don't want them being overpowered in that they give me too much support which was an issue in Skyrim it became too easy at points even on the higher difficulties (Vanilla) because of my companions.

Well we always have mods

I don't mind in the slightest. I mean, if I counted every time Boone charged into a fight with Deathclaws wielding a half-broken Combat Knife that I gave him to hold onto, the number would be really super bignormous. If immortal companions bothers you, well, I wish you the best of luck.

I agree it would've been cooler if each hardcoe option got it's own on/off switch, but it still existed. I'm arguing why doesn't the option exist here.

Also what do you mean "damned if you do, damned if you don't?"

Lolwat. How on earth did you manage this lolllololol. Boone is both supposed to be a sniper, and even with his infamous machete glitch (which is a delay in most cases, nothing more), human NPCs will wisely take cover and over rush once the enemy is close. Rex is the one you gotta worry about being a derp and getting himself killed every 5 seconds. Lily and Veronica (and Boone) both hide behind you until the enemy gets close enough to rush down.

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...I hope they have that "Hard Mode" because I really like to lore really hard in my decisions or the death of my companions. I remember in FO3 that I decide to help a lady that wanted to go to river city, she got killed because I got into a gun fight. And I never reload, I just let it go but that is jut me right playing in that kind of way.

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Anyways I hope there will be the hard mode to expirience gaming like that.

This is kinda ironic considering how he kept on talking about how FO4 is about player freedom and doing whatever you want then turning around and saying "no you can't kill this" They should leave the just leave the choice, and just let people reload if they want to or not, I only ever did in the originals when Sulik and Dogmeat were beating down a mole rat and marcus thinks its a good time to use the minigun. Freakin Marcus

It's a good lark if you can get it as an NPC in these games! Ever wonder why you have NPCs handing out those simple "There you go boy go and fetch that stick for me, there's a good boy (I mean player), I've got a nice doggie treat for you when you get back", it's because these NPC's they're not dumb they have worked out in these games if they give the player a quest they become immortal.

And maybe they get their slippers back without the player slobbering on them.

I hate all video games that have essential NPC's.

Imo this philosophy just takes away my freedom to fail.

Something almost all games do nowadays.

You know, now that mods are confirmed on consoles I find myself able to care a lot less about the essential NPCs debacle. Like, I guess I really could have cared less last week. I know that just moots this entire discussion, though, so I'll still play nice in this thread. I will say though, for those saying Bethesda should make it an option, that mods can do that in a much more robust way than Bethesda could ever hope to do.

This would be ideal, but if it reaches a point where the player would rather just reload anyway wouldn't the purpose just be defeated?

I think when Todd Howard was talking about "failstates", he doesn't necessarily mean you can't have failure whatsoever. It seems more like, if failure is going to be an option, he'd rather it introduce a new scenario that doesn't instantly motivate you to reload your save. Of course, creating back-paths and alternate scenarios for every possible failure might not rank high in the developer priorities list; I'd rather the not-failure options were good to begin with.

Wow, http://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/2167/4607/original.jpg in the article's comments section totally predicted this.

Not that i don't see the issue, but an easy work around is that if they get knocked out, tell them to kick rocks, cause they're dead to you.