I totally agree with you on the story telling aspect in a game. I never played Fallout 1 all the way through because I got fed up with the combat system early on. I ran into a pack of 6 mantises on my way to shady sands and didn't manage to kill one before they surrounded me tore me apart, So I never got into the meat of any story. So though you say that the most important part of a game is the story, the game play is still the most important factor in drawing people in to hear the story. Fallout 3 seemed like a game where your actions followed you around. If I destroy a town and all of its inhabitants, I want more people to give a crap about it than Three Dog. Moira Brown doesn't even have a dialogue option about the whole mess.

As the game goes on, it's ridiculous easy to acquire armor and weapons. Maybe split armor up into sections, if I hammer someone in the face with a shotgun that helmet would be unuseable...If I cripple somebody's leg, the leg section of the armor is unuseable.

This way we wouldn't be able to acquire as much armor and would give us the ability to "fix" and combine different types of armor pieces together.

Include a machinist type that could, preferably for a HIGH price, create extras...like silencers, higher capacity magazines, grenade attachments for weapons...lights, stimpack injectors and stuff like that for armor. This guy would be a good source of gossip, missions, and introductions to seedy characters.

Good ideas.

I'd add to the weapon and armor accessories: advantages and disadvantages, to not be able to produce one ?berweapon. Like: attach a scope and you have a sniper rifle, inefficient for close quarter combat and to illustrate this you'd lose your crosshair while wielding the rifle with a scope. Attach an expanded magazine and you don't have to reload so often - on the other hand reloading takes a bit more time and your weapon is more prone to jam (even during the firing). Attach a silencer and you're much less likely to be detected while firing in sneaking, minus is that you lose some damage and rate of fire.

Stuff like that, and same for the armor upgrades.


It would make the modificationsystem much more interesting when you have to weight the consequenses of your choices.

Really, I don't think the "problem" with the stats system is anything to do with streamlining the skills a bit. I actually don't have a problem with them combining some of the skills into one; that's something that could be a bit of trouble with Fallout 1&2. I found in those games that it could lead to some unbalance between character builds. For example, if I really wanted to focus on being a good healer, I had two skills to follow in order to be competent in that area (First Aid and Doctor.) If I wanted to be a thief, I had three skills to work on building up before it could be said I was a very good thief (Sneak, Pickpocket, and Steal.) And of course, focusing on those skills meant detracting focus from other things like being able to shoot a weapon, etc.

As opposed to a character that started out focusing on the combat skills as a primary - you could do very well by picking just one weapon skill as a Tag and waiting for the Extra Tag perk to come up later on. (Because you didn't really need Energy Weapons or Big Guns to be very high at the early stages of the game, you could just work on raising say, Small Guns, to a decent level and it still left you with two Tag skills to pick as secondary specialties.) This gave those sorts of characters a clear advantage in the game, as opposed to other character builds which necessarily had to specialize quite a bit more.

In Fallout 3, I had less of a problem with that. If I wanted a specific focus for my character, that only really cost me one Tag skill regardless of what area I picked to focus on. Combined with the fact that I could do well enough with a low weapon-based skill due to the real-time game mechanics (as opposed to previously, where you pretty much needed to get at least one combat skill to 100 or so as early as possible before you could really hold your own in any real sense,) let me progress my character at a more even rate. That's not the problem, here.

The trouble, really, is that effectively none of the choices I make with my character early on in the game end up having any real consequence. (Especially with the raised level cap from Broken Steel,) I'm going to have all (or nearly all) of my skill maxed out by the time I hit the level cap. And in my experience, I hit that cap before I'm halfway done with the game. So essentially I'm playing with the same character every time - one with no real specializations, and who has mastered all of the skills anyway. So for most of the game, I'm playing with the same character no matter what.

This was (apparently) an unforeseen consequence of lowering the skill cap from (200 in Fallout 1 and 300 in Fallout 2) to 100 in Fallout 3. No matter what I do, I'm going to hit a point in the game where I've hit the upper limit of every skill I've been focusing on - my only reward for specializing specifically in certain skills; tagging them and even using perks to gain extra points, is to be able to generalize earlier on in the game. In my second playthrough, I learned that most of the Perks you gain every level are effectively useless - what's the point of raising a skill by 5 points when I'm going to max it out regardless?

So the problem isn't that they took some of the skills out. It's what they did with the skills that remained, and the apparent lack of balancing those changes out to accomodate the way that it impacted how the rest of the system worked.

More Skills. Firing a pistol is different than a Rifle or SMG. Same goes with a Minigun and Machinegun, Rocket Launcher etc. Heres a sample:
Pistols
Rifles
Carbine
Machine Guns
Sub-Machine Guns
Thrown Weapons
Melee Weapons
Heavy Weapons
Vehicle Weapons
Martial Arts
Unarmed
Primitive Weapons - Home Made weapons (Bow and Arrow, Spear, etc)
Projectile Weapons - Grouped together with Weapon Type Above for firing ability
Energy Weapons - Grouped together with Weapon Type Above for firing ability
Tactics - To give bonus' to followers
Armorer - To make, maintain an repair Armor
Weaponsmith - To make, maintain and repair Weapons
Demolitions - For Demo Packs and making things go BOOM!
Mechanics - For Vehicles
Repair - For defense repairs
Communications - For Calling support
Traps - For Placing and Disarming Traps
Biology - For BIO Weapons
Chemestry - For CHEM Weapons
Physics - For NUKE Weapons
Geology - For Mining
Construction - For Building Defenses
Electronics - For Building Gadgets
Computers - Hacking
Surgery Repairing Crippled Limbs, etc
Foraging - For finding food and water
Cooking - for improving food and water
First Aid - For basic health recovery
Tracking - for finding the bad guys
Hiding - For hiding
Sneaking - For Silent Movement
Camoflauge - To better hide you and your gear
Stealing
Acrobatics - For jumping and dodging
Speaking - General speach
Bartering - Trading
Leadership - Commanding Followers
Lying - Deception
Gambling - Gotta make cash come how, right?

Reappearance of the Enclave. I have a few ideas on them myself, but I already sent those to Oblivion, Bethesda and Zeni-Max. Oh, and Interplay a few years ago. So far, no dice. We shall see though, I am persistant.

More Gear. FO1 and 2 had a wide variety of gear, like M4's, AK'47s, M16's, etc. Not just "Assault Rifle" or "Chinese Assault Rifle"

More customizations. In FO2, you could put a scope on a rifle. In FO4, you should be able to change the buttstock, barrel, sights etc. Same for armor. (I'd love to walk around with spikes on my T51B).

More Armor Slots. You should be able to have a Leather Pants, Metal Chestplate, Combat Helmet and cut off gloves. And Sunglasses. Pretty much an Armor Breakdown like Oblivian would work awesome. How about a piece of broken Power Armor on one Arm?

Difference between Weapon Maintenance and Repair. Maintenance means cleaning and oiling the weapon, repair is fixing the bullet hole a raider just put in my Gatling Laser. Firing a weapon should decrease maintenance. Too low maintenance, and you need to repair it with another weapon. Or scavenged parts.

Oh, and more schamatics please. Pipegun, pipebomb, shortbow, club with nail, something. You can make a weapon from almost anything!

That should do me for a while.

Also note that modern nuclear weapons are designed to have short lived fallout, i.e. those that emit more Gamma radiation than Alpha or Beta. Yes, they are not clean, but they also are not as dirty as older bombs. There would be a major climate change (Nuclear Winter), but that could have already come and gone by the time Vault 13 sent out their savior. I imagine though, with the depleated state the areas of FO1,2 and 3 are in, Canada, Siberia and Northern Europe are probably a huge glacier, or several large ones at least.
Although I do think Australia would be hit. China wouldn't have to worry about Farm Land once all their people were killed, so it goes into the strategy of Mutually Assued Destruction (MAD). If you have enough nukes to take out your enemy and all their allies, why hold back when they can do the same to you?

The US didn't invade Canada, it Annexed Canada. Symantics Really, but remember, the US Anexed Texas, Oklahoma and pretty mych everything west of the Mississippi River. Canada also volunteered to be annexed (As you find out in FO2) for cheaper resources from the US, who had just tapped into the Pacific Oil Basin the the Poseidon Oil Rig. I imagine if the war didn't end the way it did, they would have beed adopted into statehood. Much like every other annexed state in our country.
Brittan has been with us through thick and thin, so I'm sure they'd be nuked as well. The rest of Europe would probably nuke each other, based off the into of FO1 ("Europe was reduced to quarreling, bickering states"). Last time that happened they almost ended up speaking German. And the US still had China to deal with, so no help from across the Atlantic this time.
So essentially, that leaves the third world nations (South America, Africa, soutern Asia) left. They wouldn't have survived intact for long after the world's end. Between the mini-ice age, depleated Ozone and other enviromental effects (Some caused by the release of the FEV), it would have been chaos. Venezuala probably got nuked, since they could still have some oil, but I doubt they had any left.
Also, one big hint in the war. The US Invented the micofusion cell, so their need for petrolium is nil. Why use gas when you can use a nuke engine? The driving force in the war is petrolium and uranium. The US has an ample supply of uranium, but little petrolium. It could be that while the world wa tearing itself apart, the US was sitting back in an isolationist policy, building its resources (and vaults). When the wells ran dry, we had everything that was left. Hense the Chinese Invasion of Alaska. Also a good staging point to invade the posseidon Oil Rig in the pacific. In FO2, you learn about the price of crude oil, several thousand per barrel. Its in the same note you learn about Canada's PM volunteering to be Annexed to get cheaper oil (The US Administration reponds with how their hockey players will be a great addition to the US).
In the end, I think China pushed the button first. The US Pushed them out of Alaska, and probably started making headway into mainland China (Most likely through Siberia). They panicked, and hit the big red button. We retaliated, and when everyone else saw the nukes fly, they launched as well.
Of all the survivors, I'd imagine Africa, South America, The US (Because of the Vaults and large landmass) and south east asia. No government would survive, and people would probably flock to these location from everywhere else. In a few hundred years, I'd imagine the tables would be turned on the world structure, and the former third world would end up becoming the first and vice versa.

I think the midwest would be a good location. Chicago and the great lakes. Detroit.

If set in time frame between 2 and 3 could explain how some things moved from west to east like jet etc.

I don't think the enclave would be wiped out after 3. It isn't very sound military tactics to put all your resources and might in one place. So if time frame was after 3 there could still be enclave.

Bring back more weapons. .44 magnum. Different assault rifles. G11. .223 pistol. Gauss pistol and rifle and new things of course like SAWs. Stationary weapon locations with say a Ma Duece. SAW was kinda in fo2 but didn't feel the same.

That's about all I can think of off the top of my head.

You had the M60 in FO2 not the SAW, the M249 was in tactics... Tactics is all about the midwest area BTW...

why do i keep seeing posts like "FO:T did that already"?


so what if tactics took place in the midwest.. most havent played it, it was only semi canon,and areas werent really in depth.. even if tactics were in canon and the areas well depicted, you dont have to use that timeframe for the game setting..


F1 and 2 were both in the same reigon..... didnt hurt anything, did it?

I don't know so he can like play a game with the area he wants in it already?

The light assault weapon you could get from I think buster in ncr bazaar is what reminded me of the SAW.

Haven't played tactics but I may.

I still think fo4 in time frame between 2 and 3 would be good for a connection to the storyline but I'm not opposed to anything.

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Light_Support_Weapon

that the one your thinking of?

Better storyline.
More compelling NPCs and much less generic conversations.
Romancable team members/NPCs.
Change VATS into bullet time.

There, FO4 saved.

Indeed that is the weapon that reminds me of a SAW.

Would much prefer an actuall SAW. Actually I'd like a weapon that used big guns skill that wasn't a lumbering hunk a junk. I never got down with heavy weapons in any fo because just couldn't see the trade off for weight.

Not necessarily. I agree that the storyline could have been more compelling (and longer), but changing vats into bullet time turns an RPG with shooter elements into a plain shooter. Bullet time should be a separate command outside of VATS.

Also, better dialogue and voice acting sound like simple things to accomplish, but its expensive and time consuming. I wouldn't mind it being underdone as much as I would more "key" components of the game, like fixing VATS or the stats system.

As for the setting, I think the hills and scenery around Philadelphia would've been cool to explore, but new vegas sounds awesome, so I'm not complaining.

Restore the Variable DR and Armor Class mechanics to the combat system, these are what made Power Armor wearers foes to be wary of in FO1 and 2. Alongside this, restore the split between regular and AP rounds for many weapons- this serves the dual purpose of an additional money sink and a (partial, at least) counter to the greatly increased protection offered by such armor.

Make Speech more important. In FO3 there is little non-RP reason outside personal preference to increase either Charisma or Speech since you can simply reload the failed speech attempts and what speech checks there are really have no impact on the related quest (for those that have one). I'd like to see the Reputation system brought back, which would enable a setup where some folks wouldn't even talk to you unless you were able to Speech them into overcoming their initial impression of you based on your current Rep, and said Rep would also be a modifier to the chance of success which would mean you'd want a high Speech skill to overcome this. Not sure what to do about the 'save-and-reload' trick though. Additionally, make it so that failing a Speech check would negatively influence the NPC's disposition towards you thus making it harder to get anything useful out of said NPC.

Rework of the economy, even if that means removing the endlessly respawning NPCs with high-end gear. Take out the flood of expensive items and increase item prices a bit (not TOO much or low-level characters get hosed) and you have a much more stable game economy as well as more reason to increase Barter since you want to get every cap in value you can out of a given item as it's unlikely you'll see another for quite some time. I realize this could prove to be a big headache on higher difficulties, but that would actually make those higher settings worth the bother .

Bring back the old Crit Tables from FO1 and 2, to include the Critical Failure table for when you have low skill in a given weapon class, and remove the current sneak-crit mechanic entirely*. In its place, shots fired from in Sneak mode get a positive modifier on the Crit Tables. Better Criticals would change from a direct damage increase to a modifier to the Crit Table 'roll', and non-torso (head for Radscorps) hits would also gain a modifier. The latter modifier would not necessarily be positive, since different types of critters have different weak spots.

Rework Big Guns slightly, drop a bit of WGT and give them a bit more punch since they will be needed more with the Sneak-Crit mechanic gone, and decrease the horrible spreads on some of them.

Take a page from FO2 and have more quests set up like the group of them in New Reno- if you reach a certain point in one branch the other(s) is/are closed to you from that point on and that/those group(s) may turn hostile as well. Make sure this point is prior to getting the big payoff from that questline to prevent exploitation.




*I expect to get a fair bit of flak for suggesting the removal of the Sneak-Crit mechanic as doing so torpedoes a specific playstyle, however I feel that the efficacy of said playstyle against hard targets negates the reason for including Big Guns and Explosives and I would like to see a system that rewards carrying several types of weapons rather than making one or two vastly superior to the others. I realize that Melee and Unarmed get stupidly good once you have PP and/or Ninja, however PP is rather broken in its own right (in the 'powerful' sense, that is).

As far as I'm concerned, VATS is bullet time. It's a rather fancy bullet time, but it has more in common with that than anything else I can think of. It's certainly got nothing to do with the system from the previous games, beyond the ability to shoot enemies in specific locations (which you don't need VATS for anyway.) I'm not saying that like it's a bad thing, mind you - it's just how I see it.

I mean, it's a button you can press that alters the player's view of time to allow you spend more time lining up your shots in what otherwise is a shooter with RPG elements. (I'm not going to get into a war of the words with this, but when you're in combat Fallout 3 is a shooter game with RPG elements, after all.)

I rather like VATS just the way it is, though. I'm sure there's plenty of room for some polishing on it, of course.

And that's the problem. VATS tried to be 2 things that it wasn't, a turn-based alternative to combat for RGRs, and a Bullet Time mode for shooters. Since it tried to do both of these things at once, it didn't do either of them very well. It managed to take the strategy out of the turn-based style of playing and the skill out of FPS. I really think it will become a more well rounded gaming experience if they separated it in to two mechanics. Again, I do realize it might be unrealistic to insist on both at once, but if they can't manage it they need to pick one and stay with it.

Very good post, and I agree completely. Especially with the likes of the Temple of the Union or Oasis it was disheartening not to learn what became of them.



Then how does that explain the news report in Fallout 1 of "Our Boys in Newly Annexed Canada", featuring two men in T-51bs standing over a man on his knees, and proceeding to put a bullet in his brain?

Canada didn't ask to be annexed. They were forced, as the US needed Canada's resources to fight the Chinese in Alaska.

There can be people who were opposed to annexation in Canada despite having a co-operative Canadian government. There is no evidence either way.

Countries aren't monolithic entities. It's perfectly plausible that the government (and even the vast majority of the population) favored the the annexation, while a few people (the freedom fighters) fiercely opposed it.

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Canada

Not only that, but Chris Avellone also disagrees:

I am not Canadian, but I did live in Canada for a while. While Canada shares a language and has strong cultural links to the USA, there are differences.

For starters Canada is a confederation of 10 provinces who each have considerable autonomy, far more autonomy than a US state. I think Canadians like this autonomy and would not give it up without a fight. Each province has its own elected parliament and prime minister, the central government in Ottawa is only responsible for foreign policy and defence, pretty much everything else is in the hands of the provincial governments. Canada's social structure is more egalitarian than the USA (as far as I can remember) with narrower divisions between rich and poor, although obviously they still exist.

My point is with so many rights and a high degree of provincial autonomy, even if the Canadian central government caved in to US pressure and allowed themselves to be annexed, the provinces and their citizens would have fought to protect their autonomy and their rights. OK they would not have stood a chance against the US army, but they would have made an effort.



Finally Canada is a vast country with low population density and few cities. Even if all the main cities had been obliterated by Chinese nuclear weapons, large parts of the country would have been relatively unscathed. OK, government, law, order and the economy would have collapsed. But with huge areas of potential farmland and a low population Canada would have recovered faster and 200 years on probably has developed small but stable states in various places, although probably at pre-industrial levels of technology and development equivalent to the 17th century AD.

I've gone way off topic so I'll stop now...

VATS obviously IS a compromise system, and the only reason it's there at all is to give something to the turn based folks. If one could move and perform action in VATS...extend it functionality beyond combat, the game might feel more turn based for people. I still probably wouldn't use it much.