todd said that, when enemies are a higher level than you, the game will only force you to run away

I disagree. I think it's nice to have the areas that will absolutely wreck you if you go straight for them after starting a new game. I don't think it makes sense for you to go somewhere that's legendary in-universe as being a dangerous place only to find it teeming with enemies that die the second you look at them, and you shouldn't be able to go toe to toe in direct combat with a Deathclaw and walk away the victor, so there needs to be some things that don't scale with the player. At least, up to a certain point. I don't think a Bloatfly should grow to level 50, just like a Deathclaw shouldn't start at level 1.

Some places and side quests should be damn near suicidal for low level players, and a logical way of building the world is to have settlements usually give you an indication of how dangerous a place is. If people have been living in an area for 100 years, it's probably pretty safe, but if you go out to the stretches of the game world where nobody seems to live, it should have more dangerous wildlife and potentially, more dangerous enemies in general. I'm not saying that it has to be a really restrictive thing that has to be done with every possible location. But there should be some rhyme and reason in the game world that level scaling can screw over if it's overused.

I agree there should be places that you shouldn't be able to get to lvl one, let alone complete quests there, but I'm not a fan of beef walls that block off entire chunks of the map for arbitrary reasons. You could get past the deathclaws in NV, but there really was no reason to. They were just a wall of nope that existed to push Benny, and thus the player, south at the beginning of the game. I'd be more forgiving if we could cut north through the nope and actually cut Benny off before he gets to the strip, but that sadly isn't the case.

Having some areas be impossible to do at high levels makes sense in any rpg, and it has existed in every modern Bethesda title save oblivion.

What's not ok is putting those high level enemies on roads as a way to stop you from walking that direction like in NV. If you're going to discourage travel in that direction, why put the road there at all?

The cazadors and deathclaws north of good springs serve no function save to guide you to the south east. They even added linear quests guiding you from location to location.

Edit: Unless you do some extremely gamey nonsense, every play through of NV is going to start the same exact way; you're always going to go to prim and on to Nipton. Even if I have no interest in Benny, I'm going to end up following his footsteps.

I think we're mostly on the same page, actually, so maybe I didn't choose the right words. You're right; but Fallout 3 and Skyrim both do this. Skyrim's got locations you can visit as soon as you get out of Helgen, like High Gate Ruins or Avanchnzel, that you really shouldn't visit as soon as you get out of Helgen. And you can encounter plenty of non-leveled enemies in the world that will give a newer character hell, like Sabre Cats, Bears, or Trolls in some areas. Fallout 3 does this, too (Old Olney, Evergreen Mills, Downtown DC), but I use Skyrim because it's level scaling is a bit more sophisticated. And because I've actually had a closer look at leveled lists and encounter zones in Skyrim; I haven't dug through Fallout 3's editor for that yet.

Thanks to everyone who gave a kind reply and did not insult me. I have 279 hours in Fallout New Vegas, been enjoying the series since 1997 and I really am not a 'noob' about Fallout. I think you all just misinterpreted my question, I got the idea from this video by MrMattyPlays: (don't have permission to post links).

My #1 Fear For Fallout 4

this made me extremely angry as I have enjoyed all the games and I just came on here to reach out to the developers.

I also think all of you are the laughing stock as you thought rubberbanding was when 'sprites can stretch like Plastic Man and Mr.Fantastic'. Thanks Remmus for explaining my idea indepth.

I hope it's not like Skyrim, so many areas you could go to and not have any issues.

...was the only fallout game you played FO3, OP? Because 1, 2 and New Vegas definitely didn't let you go anywhere you wanted at the start.

I think that may be your issue, as he's not necessarily a very well informed source. Otherwise you would have known a majority of Fallout games aren't based on level scaling, which is what you're asking for.

In which case, I personally much prefer enemies and areas being leveled. It provides a sense of progression in the game as you run into highly difficult enemies that you cannot face, only to come back later more powerful and able to triumph that enemy. Whereas the alternative is everything scales with you and you're constantly running into overpowered damage sponges left and right like in Oblivion, which was quite annoying.

Although I can understand why some would have an issue with it. It can restrict player freedom which is an issue in Bethesda games that emphasize a lot on freedom and exploration. Or the complaint that by endgame enemies are no longer a challenge because you're such a high level. Although I would argue that's what endgame is all about in a RPG. You're suppose to feel powerful.

given the other persons posts elsewhere I seriously suspect they were being sarcastic

all of http://imgur.com/a/huYe9 are in vats, i don't see how seeing an enemy level in vats necessarily indicates rubberbanding? it's just no more far off than being able to see how damaged his knee is

and for a possible explanation why some enemies seem to have their level displayed while others don't, maybe you gotta see (or feel) them attack first to get an "idea".

(might just as well be stg story related though, like, certain enemies got, dunno, implants you can read out remotely or whatever (we'll get androids for all it seems after all)

just walk east past the yang tse memorial and then head up north...

(my usual first route in nv, got a mole rat pet to get to the laundry

I prefer this system. I liked it in Morrowind, NV, and the old Fallouts.

Thank you BGS.

I agree. You have to make sure that you mix it up. It wouldn't be good to always be fighting scaled enemies. I like being able to one shot things that once gave me trouble while also coming up on a challenge that I have to pull out all the stops to beat. And in between those there are your bread and butter, enemies scaled around your level. I feel fine with this system.

I vaguely remember Todd Howard saying they were using rubberbanding. Not entirely certain if it was for FO4 or not. I'm 60% sure it was a recent interview.

I did at level 1. It wasn't easy, but I had the choice to do so and I did. It's free and open in the sense that you can actually do it if you want to. That's how I play my games. I like to test the limits of my character, go on a "real" adventure, not follow some artificial rails that keep me "safe."

That's not true at all. There are TONS of areas that were specifically for high level. There's a dremora stronghold near Gnisis. The guy summons storm atronachs and all kinds of crazy stuff. I killed him at level 2 or 3 to get his ring. It wasn't easy, but I did it. It was a very satisfying adventure experience to be sure.

i really find it hard to imagine. enemy leveling is close to perfect as is in beth's engine, any npc (leveled or not) can be so ridiculously strong he'd finish you up anyway, totally no rubberbanding needed.

but other than with such a brainfart of a feature, you still HAVE the chance to kill that opponent -

which i actually do pretty frequently on low levels: find absurdely superior enemy, find save place, poke it with arrows or sniper bullets until it drops, and if it takes half a day. that's how i level stealth and ranged skills.

so "rubberbanding" isn't only totally unneeded and good for nothing, but by pointlessly breaking the rules of the game world, it also breaks immersion. there just _is_no_such_thing_ as "not killable now, but killable later".

not even thinking about the endless annoyance of hitting arrows in an opponent for quarter an hour just to find it won't die because your banana peeling skill is 1pt too low.

it's just ramshackle bs for devs not up to come up with a proper leveling system, nothing more.

it's only hard for people who for all means need to fight.

if you just slide by without them li'l critters even noticing, it's just a silent walk in the moonlight

this.

this kind of satisfaction would just be killed by rubberbanding. pointlessly.

I'm kind of wondering what you think "rubberbanding" refers to?

From what I've gathered from these interviews, some areas in the game will feature enemies that fall within certain ranges of levels (area A will have enemies level 1-10 depending on your own level, area B enemies 10-20 depending on your level, and so on. I would also imagine other areas having a larger range of values.) There's nothing stopping you from trying to attack an enemy in an area that you're not leveled for, it's just not encouraged.

Personally, I think in the New Vegas example - there's just no way that a level 1 PC should be able to take on a pack of Deathclaws from the get-go. If you could go wherever you wanted at the beginning of the game and expect to be able to deal with whatever you ran into, then what's the point of leveling up and gaining experience anyway? Isn't that one of the primary tropes of an RPG? If I could just go straight to the Evil Overlord's Evil Tower of Evil, kill all his minions, and then best him in single combat as soon as I started up the game, then why bother with all the upgrading and leveling anyway?

I rather believe the idea of an RPG is that you aren't the most capable person in the world when you begin the game. You need experience and maturity if you want to face whatever awaits you in the end-game, and the various parts of the world are the challenges you pass through to test your mettle (following the standard "Hero's Journey" narrative, at least.)

I'm hoping that in Fallout 4 all the leveled areas make sense, and especially that they use some creativity in defining those challenges (ie, some places being irradiated and needing special equipment, other areas being more about being populated by powerful creatures rather than just "Level 20 Raider" or whatever.) But myself, I like having some places where if I go in there unprepared I'm going to face a tough challenge so I can feel like I'm advancing my character rather than just grinding for it's own sake.

There was nothing stopping me in New Vegas from going through Deathclaw territory - it was just extremely difficult. But I knew I'd actually grown as a character when I got to the point that I could actually roam in there and try to hunt down the Legendary Deathclaw, for instance.

Man its so weird to have "rubber banding" refer to a levelling system. Its been ingrained in my head so long that that word is for racing games, and not something I have to deal with not being a fan of those.

With the subject at hand though, it seems to cut down on a problem I really noticed in the New Vegas DLC, especially Honest Hearts. in HH, you had the White Legs whose signature weapon was the Thompson Submachine Gun, or the Storm Drums. But their inventroy is levelled so intensly that you rarely see them. At low levels, assuming you can even make it to the north edge of the map before levelling past it, you'll run into Varmint Rifles. Save the DLC for level 50, and you're being shot at by Brush Guns and AMRs. The lore states that their signature weapon is this new thing unique to the DLC, but gameplay wise you're given different weapons to provide a greater challenge. This is one instance where personally I think that lore should trump gameplay, although its arguable if its lore thats trumping it in the first place. I would say it makes for a more interesting encounter to have the White Legs be wielding Storm Drums at all levels, and in large amounts, and the rubber banding system seems to be a step towards making that a reality.

Say a similar situation is in Fallout 4, there's some small wasteland society out in the middle of nowhere that worships the bolt-action rifle as the weapon of the before-spirits. They have fortified their lands with WW1-style trench networks and can do The Mad Minute and fire off accurate shots with their rifles much better than the PC or other NPCs can. With the rubber banding system they would be locked into being level XX, say 15 or 20, and their weapons and skills would reflect that. By going to the bolt-action tribe you know what you are up against by what is told to you by various sources. You are told that they have bolt-action rifles, that they have this or that training with them, and that they aren't going to pull a white leg on you and start shooting at you with the best lever-actions in the world when everyone else says 80% of their armoury is .45 SMGs.

So if you stomp on over to that tribe with your lightly armoured vault suit and 10mm pistol you're going to get stomped. Come back with five different weapons all geared towards different ways of wiping out everything that dares shoot at your combat armoured self and you're going to be doing the stomping. The problem of having everything scale to your level in absolute terms was cut back heavily since Oblivion, although there were small areas where it crept back to the surface. The new system seems to do a great job of doing exactly what I want from a level scaling system in the Falloutverse: Make the piddly raider encounters relatively easy, make the power armour equipped army encounters relatively hard, and I guess this hypothetical rifle worshipping tribe would be moderate. I should be able to do a good job at early levels with raiders and have it remain that easy, and have the power armours kick my ass until I am finally able to deal with them.

from what i get it means that, when i'm, like, level 1, all opponents above level 20 would have a red thingie floating above their head meaning i can't kill them whatever i do, unless i level up.

correct me if wrong.

if not wrong though, i'd find it hard to come up with anything i see less point in. it'd just be an immersion killer of first degree.

what you describe, that's just normal enemy leveling for me, and was just like this in any beth rpg, wouldn't see why they'd suddenly call that "rubberbanding" now

and i think it's perfect like this. in practice, it mostly means enemies leveled down to your level anyway, but you can just as well have one that's always 17 times your level, but it still would NOT have a red thingie floating above him and i COULD kill him, even if it might take me 3 days and 5 trips back to town to buy ammo . THIS is how it SHOULD be. enemies i can't kill because they're to strong though certainly are NOT.