I decorate homes in game, I rarely loot dead people because it feels wrong and I use lots of survival mods, but I still end up super rich without stealing really anything. For me, thousands of caps is already getting into the silly numbers for the fallout world, let alone tens of thousands. But still, I keep all the caps because they are weightless and I keep thinking "maybe I will need this later"

I guess I am kinda a "powergamer" in that I like to consider the limitations in my game world. When going max-min I don't try to make the most powerful character ever, but I do try to understand the limitations of a specific element of the game world. For example, my first character in Skyrim looked like a caveman and used his original rags and wooden bow for the entire playthrough, but I wanted to see the limitations of alchemy. I was disappointed at how powerful I got, I guess because I like strategy and it was too easy. I get there are some people who only roleplay, so balance isn't an issue. I'm more of a 50/50 roleplay and strategy gamer.

As for the barter system, I can see it being fairly efficient. If you have ever played civilizations, it could be like the diplomacy trading system they have, allowing you to make quick trades but also involved negotiations if you want.

397 times. You were close though!

Exactly my point. Doesn't matter how complex the modelling, it doesn't come *near* the complexity of something you exist in every day, and your mind screams that its a terrible substitute. This is why I'll be satisfied with "good enough" from Bethesda.

Economics will never feel right in an open world single player game because there's no economy... just a heuristic pretend one. There's only one entity's decisions in the entire system. That entity (the player) doesn't experience scarcity because scarcity is solved with game time. There is also no necessity. No absolute necessity for lodging, food, water, clothing, personal hygiene, rest. There's literally no forced money sinks. Further, to model such necessity sinks would create simulations of the banolity of real life... which nobody really wants to play.

Interesting points about why it is difficult to make an economy that is life-like, but I'm a bit more optimistic about a games potential regarding economy design. I think Bethesda designs their economies as a kinda classic RPG tool for unlocking loot, which makes perfect sense for them to do and I think that is what you mean by an economy that is "good enough". I don't expect Bethesda to design their economies any other way, just like I do not expect them to make in-depth survival components.

My favorite parts of Bethesda games are the sandbox, story and the environment. I also enjoy character design and strategy regarding game mechanics, but I don't care a whole lot about leveling up and upgrading gear and all that. So my ideal economy is one that creates interesting sandbox, strategy and environmental potential, which I think is very possible, although if it might mean sacrificing some things that people come to expect from RPG games - so it would be my ideal economy, but certainly not the ideal economy.

The economy in games is usually something that you will "experience" early in the game. Then after a while, you, the player is the entire economy of the game instead.

But I guess this is where settlements come into play. Hopefully there will be things there that will cost you money, maybe over time even that will reduce your wealth. Or just make it so that money also have weight.

Skyrim became a fun game as soon as I got the "weighted gold" mod, since carrying around 100.000 gold coins is just not realistic. I suppose you could carry 100.000 bottle caps if you wear a power ar mour, but every time it's time for a fight you will need to drop them if you want to be able to fight, right?

EDIT: Carry weight is one major ruin of ingame economy. If you can carry 12 shotguns, 4 hunting rifles, 3 steel armours and 145 stimpacks plus 23553 bottlecaps there is something wrong. Limiting the carry weight usually make you take decisions and you will only bring the most valuable loot from each fight.

My latest playthrough of Skyrim I deciced that I sould only loot stuff that realistically could fit in my pockets and then maybe 1 or two weapons, or a few smaller armour pieces or one bigger. So basiclly I ended up looting gems, jewellery, magic weapons and maybe magic armour, maybe some spell books or whatever. Made the game much more interesting and it actually became an effort to buy a house since I never really gathered so much gold.

If I remember correctly in Fallout Tactics if you sold 1 shotgun to a vendor you could get q nice pile of caps, but if you sold him several shotguns over time the value of the shotguns would decrease drastically. In the end it was no point in looting them even.

What I want is an economy that makes you work for your caps and gives you good reasons to spend them. New Vegas did it quite well as there were lots of unique weapons to buy, Gun Runners Arsenal expanded it even more with guns that changed your combat style rather than just increasing your damage.

I think with the settlement system there will very likely be something that a lot of money can be spent on

I didn't go so far on the encumbrance. I usually just assumed my horse had packs. What I did was restrict looting to items with 10:1 value-to-weight ratios or higher. Only exception was items I liked collecting for the hell if it. Once I made that decision I had a bit of a gaming renaissance since I wasn't constantly shuttling to vendors or waiting for their cash reserves to replenish.

Barter value is the only thing I'd like about an equipment condition system. It always baffled me why someone would purchase the armor I looted from an opponent that stepped on a plasma mine. Wouldn't it be half melted? What good would armor be that's been Swiss cheeses by mini gun fire?

What if I start battled by sharpshooting weapons out of people's hands. Is that gear any good anymore?

With weapon/armor condition, one might have extra reason to be a headshot sharp shooter, or Marlee enthusiast. Get to the unarmed bits and preserve the loot for a high resale value

For me, if it ain't nailed down philosophy lol. The dead have no use for anything, if it helps me survive then it's mine. Though I don't kill indiscriminately.

Ah yeah, I forgott the collectibles. Those I could carry if need be. Found a cool mod for a box you could carry and then display some of the collectibles inside it.

Yeah, this is an interesting point. Durablitiy should definatly affect value of an item. Totally agree on this!

...really? How interesting. I find that to be kind of a major feature/point of all these RPG/adventure games - gathering loot! Kill the badguys, take their stuff! Explore the abandoned place, take it's stuff!

And even if it wasn't in general, this is a "struggle for survival" post-apoc situation. Yeah, it svcks that the people whose bodies you just discovered, got killed by starvation/disease/mutants.... but they don't need those supplies anymore, and all the living do. Grab it!

(Not quite the same thing, but this reminds me of a thread I saw awhile back on some other fantasy game forum - some guy complaining that you couldn't play a "good" character.... because you had to kill things. In his view, "killing badguys" was a non-good act. That just made me stare blankly for a second, if only because I've been happily going along slaughtering legions of orcs/goblins/skeletons/bandits/etc in RPGs, as "good" aligned characters, for decades, without it ever occurring to me to look at it like that. )

In a black and white world that would definitely be the case. Sometimes you have to do some bad to do a lot of good. Killing Raiders for example. These guys can not be reasoned with, so you either kill them or sneak by them. The blood of those they later kill can be seen as being on your hands just as much as theirs, if you really want to get technical.

One of the problems with economy in these games (TES/Fallout) is that the PC never has fixed expenses, i.e. all you monnies are disposable income. There's no incentive to loot other than if you really want to buy that sniper rifle (which you know you'll be able to loot for free anyway at some point). As soon as you've bought a house, you're more or less set, no further costs on the horizon.

This is where eating/sleeping/drinking also comes in, along with weapon condition. There needs to be expenses, and not all loot should be able to be sold (at least not at full value).

And that's problematic because modeling necessity like that tends to make game mechanics that aren't fun (for most). I'm generalizing a bit here, but there's a reason why eating, drinking, personal hygiene, shelter, clothing, rent, taxes, insurance etc aren't modeled in most single player games.

The best we can hope for is "good enough".

I agree, and I'm not saying it should or will be in the Vanilla game, so I'm willing to wait for a mod. The one thing that ruins any game for me is the feeling of being overpowered in one way or another. That's where the fun stops for me. Especially in a post-apocalyptic setting.

lol, my bad, I should have been more specific. I meant I don't loot the clothes/armor off of dead people because it feel wrong leaving them there naked.

But yeah, I have no problem doing most "evil" stuff in game. I guess most "Bethesda" rated evil stuff.

Same here, although I am kinda sorta hoping these things might be in future Vanilla fallout games at some point, maybe after mods on consoles help to make it more mainstream. I was never interested in this stuff until I tried the mods.

Unless someone is vaporized I usually just hide the body....makes me feel better...

I'd actually like a mechanic to let us bury corpses lol.....Have you're own grave yard in a part of the world...

Morrowind had a function to dispose of corpses. I wouldn't mind seeing that return.

Fallout 4 has a function to dispose of corpses too. It's called the Cannibal Perk.

Wow, now I'm picturing instead of the usual whole bodies lying there after you chow down, there will be a few bloody bones in a pool of blood!