So I had an idea to write this massive post with all my suggestion (which I'll include the link to the 7,500 word topic below).

One of the pet peeves I had with this app is the lack of dweller development.

What I mean by this is all the dwellers are in essence the same. You can train them all up to 10 in each SPECIAL stat and at the moment there are no perks/traits to differentiate/specialize each dweller.

I was wondering what people would think if Bethesda were to take away training rooms and bring back Character Creation like in the rest of the FO universe? Character creation being the screen that makes you set up the player's SPECIAL using the 5 points in each special stat and the extra 7 you get. Also you get to choose two (optional) traits.

I have noticed that the follow features are the overarching goals of the game:

1. Collect resources


2. Keep Dwellers Happy


3. Get all Weapons, Gear, Dwellers


4. Max Dwellers To Level 50


5. Max All SPECIAL On All Dwellers


6. Build All Rooms Possible


7. Get Max Dwellers

Looking at these it is easy to see that the game is very bland. With points 1 and 2 taking the majority of your time, 3 and 5 just happening without any real thought needed, and 4 being sort of an automatic thing that just happens. The only thought provoking aspects are how to achieve point 7 (pregnancies or radio station) and point 6 (when to upgrade rooms and where to place them) with both being pretty much predetermined by the situation. You only have so much room to build on each floor and you only have two ways to populate your vault, one of which attracts deathclaws.

Simply put, the implementation of character creation would be using the already established G.O.A.T. that we found in Vault 101 (FO3). When a new dweller enters the vault or a child is ready to become an advlt a green GOAT icon would appear above their head and you would then get the screen to administer the GOAT, assigning them their SPECIAL and traits. I think this would make the interactions of your vault more personalized and each dweller would be 'special'.

This would obviously need other aspects alongside it to make it bring out more and better aspects and goals in the game. Taking out training rooms would make the game more than just maxing out everything but actually considering what the vault's needs are and how to best fit those needs.

I'll let the discussion roll from here. The two questions are:

1) Would you rather have Dweller Creation and a limit on SPECIAL, or keep the training rooms?

2) What features would be a nice addition to FOS if Dweller Creation was implemented?

And to see my full thoughts on what FOS needs you can view them here:

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1534394-improvements-to-fos-forward-looking-to-fos-2/

I am actually happy with full SPECIAL. My dwellers are unique by name and gear. On the other hand, it would be supergood if authors woul implement perks somehow. (Maybe some can be gained only in the wasteland, some in production rooms etc.)

So we have one way to populate the vault?

In all seriousness I think they wanted to avoid a huge micromanaging nightmare for keeping up with 200 vault dwellers.

This would be fine for 20-30 dwellers but getting into the hundreds just would get tiresome especially for the casual audience the game is geared towards.

I'm slightly disappointed as well but I realize how tiresome it would get to assign stats to 200 people and have them set in stone.

As the game stands now, any person is interchangeable as long as you train them. It's less of a hassle this way. Even if it is uninspiring.

I'd love to see something as well but I'm not sure what form it should take.

It would make sense to me that exploring dwellers for instance could come back and increase their stats due to the experience they accrued.

Or make it based on level so your level 1 dweller can't train everything to 10 and then go out into the world. Each level could give you the ability to train one more special stat. That would be compelling. But also a micro managing exercise which may not be the goal of this game.

Yea you are spot on, it would be a daunting task but that is almost the idea, though I haven't brought my full thoughts up here.

My thought is that resources take up too much of our focus. I'd like to see it reworked so that the only time you spend worrying about resources are when you expand or when you are attacked. At the moment it is central to your ultimate goals and you have to tap the rooms every 90 seconds which is too frequent. If they reworked the game to you tap it every 10 minutes then you'd have a ton of down time in which you could mess with the dweller creations.

Also to answer the set in stone part, I think that a good answer would be the ability to retake the GOAT. Maybe it could be an item you could purchase for $$ but also it could be a frequent item you find in lunchboxes, def not a rare item though. It'd have to be among the common ones.

Also any rare/legendary dweller could already be set up with their SPECIAL and traits and you can have an initial opportunity to give them the GOAT to change it but these unique dwellers would have unique traits you can't get with the GOAT.

So if they reduce the mundane task of collecting resources then you would have more time to be creative. Also the casual players would be able to enjoy this because you don't have to administer the GOAT until you are ready.

I'll stop there, I can be long winded and I think that will help shed light on what direction I see the game going.

I see where you're going, there'd be some concerns with that system though.

You'd take the goat at level one and put endurance to max. Level to 50 and retake the goat and respec into a useful stat afterwards.

Also having to go through a menu to get to the Goat isn't a UX decision I would make at least.

The existing character status screen could just have + and - icons next to the stats and integrate into what is already there. Just add a button Named "Retake Goat" and enable the buttons

Still feels like there wouldn't be much to do though after you had everyone configured. You'd have dry spells where everyone is setup and ready to go. I still think every level should grant another special point to allocate. So you have something to go around and do.

What happens to the training rooms though? What purpose would they serve? Perhaps perk tracks?

Answering you in reverse order, the training rooms would all disappear and be replaced with crafting rooms, the goat examination room, and other unique rooms that would afford you more features to enjoy. I think watching your dwellers train is boring and Bethesda bragged that this game was fast pace but the training rooms are the exception.


Your right there isn't much to do after you've configured all dwellers, but this configuration affords more in the way of crafting systems, mini games, and more interactivity when exploring. By reducing time spent focusing on resources and also removing training rooms that lock down dwellers, this gives Bethesda the opportunity to create hurdles for the gamer that are more than the one dimensional "you need strength" play style.


For example, by adding interactive mini games into the objectives that require you to assign a dweller with X agility, Y perception, and Z intelligence or any multi level mix of the special stats, you now have the stats playing a role throughout the game. When a problem arises in the vault you need to find a dweller with stats that match or exceed the prerequisite for the objective to have a chance at playing the mini game.


Also you wouldn't necessarily start with 10 endurance because retaking the goat would recalculate your other stats effected by your special. So in this case switching from 10 end to 1 would recalculate your hp.