I don't want the upcoming DLC "of the map" like allmost all other big modern fallout DLCs.

Why?

Because having a whole area off the map means that stuff that happens in the DLC only affects stuff on the DLC map and not on the main map. I don't like that. I want the main map to get richer with quests and interesting locations where I don't just have to kill everyone.

I want whatever DLC comes to make the wastleland I already spend so much time in deeper and have new characters, locations, etc natually integrated instead of just being somewhere. Mothership Zeta, Old World Blues, etc could have all been standalone games and it would have barley mattered.

Bethesda hasn't really done (much) in that direction so far. I hope this changes.

I am in full agreement with you. I don't particularly care for "off the map" DLC. For example, I liked how Broken Steel took place in the FO3 main map and continued the storyline a bit, and I *really* liked the aqua vitae quest that was added with all the waterbearing Brahmin caravans everywhere. That's the kind of thing I want to see with quest DLC.

You can have a dlc set in a new place, but still effect the main map. There's no either or.

Absolutely agree. Expand the map if you have too, but I would also like to see everything stay "on the map". If not a quick trip in the commonwealth still to go back and forth to like Martha's Vinyard or Nantuket would work with hopefully a new settlement or two there. Absolutely no pre-war memory den / Operation Anchorage style DLC though please. Keep it in the commonwealth

I agree with that - I would prefer the current map to be expanded ( to the south; north or west ? ) and not a completely new area

Reusing locations inside the city could also be cool (with a good explanation of course). Many current locations are just infested with raiders, ghouls or supermutants. New factions for example could make these places their home (and hopefully clean them up) during a DLC. I really like how detailed most places are but the group that made their home in these places are just renewable XP farms instead of interesting characters.

Nothing wrong with a good old fashioned map expansion. I like that too.

Pretty much this. Dawnguard did both, it offers land outside of the map in a different world space (two actually) but still had stuff effect the base game's map.

Agree with expanding the current map in all directions and add an option to build a floating city on the much maligned empty water filled space.

Disagree. My favorite DLC's have always opened up new places to visit once I had already explored the main map (Shivering Isles, Dragonborn, Point Lookout, all of the big DLC content for New Vegas etc).


There are great DLCs that utilized the main map while still opening up new places (Broken Steel and Dawnguard).


The Fallout 4 map is small as it is, I see no reason to crowd it further by limiting DLC to the existing geography.

They could always expand the map by moving the invisible border around even though that is not my prefered solution.

South east looks like the perfect place to expand the map, glowing sea already extend more south than the main map.

I think they like to do off the map stuff as it don't generate problems in main game, from bugs to unwanted effects like the vampires in dawnguard.

The reason why they dont put DLC on the same map as the base game is mostly due to limitations in how games works.

Its an often stated rule that the base game can effect DLC, but the DLC cant effect the base game. Hence why you can tell people like Wernher and Graham that you know of the Pitt from some guy in the citadel, and that you killed Caesar, but you cant tell Kodiak that you went to The Pitt, or tell Caesar that you killed Graham.

Its basically impossible for them to get all the people they used for all the VAs in the base game to record new lines regarding DLC stuff, so they put DLC stuff on its own maps with its own VAs. Trying to put it on the same map as the base game only results in a Dawngaurd situation where all the new lines for the hold guards were OBVIOUSLY recorded by an entirely different guy then who did the VA work in the base game, making them sound off.

There are also problems with leveled lists. If Dawnguard added new items to say... bandit's leveled lists, then Dragbonron added the stuff it did to bandit leveled lists, the Dragonborn leveled lists would overwrite the Dawnguard ones, making the items from Dawnguard not show up since its edits would get overwritten.

Skyrim actually had some problems like this, which forced Arthmoor and the team to make a combined unofficial patch to fix them, since its impossible to fix with individual unofficial patches for each DLC.

I can see a way around this if Bethesda thought ahead of time and contracted the VAs to work with DLC stuff. I assume they did that with the VAs for the protag so I can see a similar deal with other VAs if they want to do a Broken Steel-esque quest chain for Fallout 4.

They can do that wit the VA's of the protag, given their importance, but its unlikely they managed to get all 70+ Vas from the base game on such long term contracts which hare very costly.

Also Fallout 3 had like 10VAs... literally. big difference.

Broken Steel DLC added loads of stuff onto the Fallout 3 map including new tougher enemes, I believe they can add new content to the base map for Fallout 4 too

I was just thinking the important characters for something like a post-ending thing that expands on the power of the factions but yea I see your point. Also wow, only 10 VAs for fallout 3?

Por que no las dos?

There's a reason Bethesda likes to give us a new worldspace to visit with at least one expansion. It's new stuff to explore and can usually provide a nice contrast with the existing game world, for a new atmosphere. But they've also got a history of adding new content to the base game world, with stuff like Knights of the Nine, Broken Steel, and Dawnguard. I'm hoping for both, personally?

aside: something crazy I'd love to see them do with a separate DLC worldspace, is give us the option to blow it all up at the end of the questline. They can't really let us do that to the base game world, but with a separate smaller setting from the DLC they could totally give us the choice to blow it up.

Definitely more than 10. I'd have to check. For Fallout 4, I hope they at least contracted the companions for any DLC as well.

So is the idea of a questline to blow up the world space to make a more harsh intense area for some people or is it just "blow crap up because plot plot plot plot" because just doing it for plot is pretty weak, even the way Lonesome road did it was really weak.

'Cause it is easier and they don't have to consider more potential situations than they have to.
Well, that sounds like a solvable problem. Aren't the voiceactors all professionals who work for money? Besides this wouldn't effect all possible DLC.

The devs have full access to the code and can thus even create an elegant solution like adding the option to not only overide those lists but to change only parts of those lists. Starbound for example had (at least when I worked with it) the option to add, substract and replace something specific in a file without actually editing/ replacing the file itself. I haven't modded much in Beth's games besides making very few new locations so I don't know how that actually works here but something similar could be made possible for fallout. The creation kit could even be used to automate the whole thing in the background depending on how that stuff works in F4.

I am not saying it is easy. It is most definitly possible to overcome the limitations of the game.

I agree 100%. An "expansion" should expand the original game, not be a "a small stand-alone game that uses the same mechanics."

There were scripts in Skyrim to dynamically add things to leveled lists at runtime, but I'm pretty sure those were from the script extender plugin - don't know if Bethesda put that functionality into Fallout 4 by default, but you know it would solve a lot of compatibility issues that usually require a separate patch to fix.

As for the voice actors, yes they're professionals. Which means if they're not contracted to voice in the DLC, they're probably busy working on other projects.

They aren't all that costly. It's not like you have them on retainer or something and they just sit around collecting a paycheck until the DLC comes out. In their contract it just specifies that they will do VO for fallout 4 and three DLCs.


I'm not saying that Bethesda went ahead and did that, I'm just saying the cost factor isn't near the deterrent you think it might be.

Why not just open Connecticut and Rhode Island? (or hell all the New England area sounds better) Give us some room to explore, I wondered why they picked one of the smallest states in the US for this game.

Because size doesn't really matter. They could make a game in the great plains and have it accurate but due to the fact the great plains are mostly featureless grasslands (so much to the point it actually drove some settlers and explorers insane because they couldn't handle the idea of a vast featureless landscape) it won't make much of a difference because there would be nothing to do. Focusing on a smaller area let's them add more detail, quests, unique flavor to certain areas then having a big world where it's mostly just empty land or nothing to do like Fallout 3 had.

The way I see it, most of what the OP wants in the way of expansion in-map is going to be taken care of by modders. Just like MGE expanded graphis and Distant Land, and Morrowind Comes Alive added whole new layers to Morrowind, and mods like Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul added layers to Oblivion, and while I can't think of their names, there was atleast one in each of FO3, FONV, Somewhere I have a video of my FONV character being chased by about a hundred feral ghouls that Bethesda never dreamed of.

So, the way I see it, new DLC content that is off the map gives us the best of everything... More area, environment, and possibilities for modders to work with along with the new content of the DLC itself. Since Bethesda has laid out a playground in FO4, added a swingset and a see-saw, now modders can add the jungle gym, and the merry-go round. New DLC area off the map means Bethesda can add a slide and modders can add a roller coaster...