So, I was watching the E3 demo (again) and noticed that when Todd Howard says 'this is where you find it (the Pip-boy) when you leave the vault' it shows level 1 with zero 'experience' registered on the experience bar.... as seen here in the video https://youtu.be/D5esyZPt5Jo?t=947

Do you think that whatever happens prior to this both before the big blast as well as any gameplay in the vault will not constitute toward leveling your character? It seems that way to me... thoughts?

Don't get me wrong... I do think you will be able to interact with things and even collect items down in the vault but I don't think this will have any impact on the leveling of the character. Almost like the whole opening is considered one very long interactive cutscene.

I was under the impression that the only thing the PC experiences in the vault is escaping/leaving it. I don't think there will be a gameplay sequence like we saw in Fallout 3.

It does look that way, but we sure start with a heck of an inventory.

Well, and character creation. And tutorial about some of the non-combat commands.

(We got some XP, sure, but we didn't technically "level" until we exited the vault and finished the tutorial quest in FO3.)

Interesting thought.

Say you stash something in your refrigerator prior to the bombs going off... will it be there when you come out 200 yrs later? hmmm...

Please are so going to try this !

Quick, the bombs are falling, stash the Sugar Bombs in the fridge !!

Seeing it's a demo, it's really hard to tell what of anything is going to be the reality of the game. You might level up a couple levels in the vault but they don't want to give any of that away. You might not find anything in the vault but that's not going to stop them from putting things in the inventory so they could show it off during the demo.

The pre-war house/town is most likely going to be in a completely different cell than the rest of the fallout 4 universe. So I'm thinking it's going to be highly unlikely that anything you put in your house will be there after the bombs drop. But who knows.. they could perhaps put in system that transfers some inventory items of certain containers. I'll most likely experiment with this as well. Take things out of the fridge, put other things in, hide things around the house... Of course, it might not actually allow us to do any of that. I kind of hope there's a little fun free roam quest or something before the bomb drops. Something fun and silly.. Mow the lawn, take out the garbage, go to the grocery store.

I'm betting like fallout 3, we'll be introduced to leveling once we exit the tutorial zone.

Probably like Fallout 3, may get exp beforehand but won't level up until you exit the vault.

You can't really tell because as of a few days ago even pete said that he'd be shocked if any more story was revealed which is presumably everything pre-war.
Since special plays a bigger part and can be leveled up in some way (since all perks revolve around it) and your character is (presumably) pre war military, there may be some opportunity to pick a selection of training or play out a combat scenario in stealth, guns blazing, charismatic, ect. for a bonus before the scene at his house.

Or you may spend an entire hour whiping a babys [censored] and listening to a wife talking.
Then *BOOM* heres Fallout 4

I really want to explore that pre-war world, even if it's very limited. Thinking about it right now though, if they let us outside the house, how will they stop us from going out too far? There's nothing around to stop us in what we've seen, and invisible walls would seem really "cheap". So, hmmm, I think we'll be funneled along, like some say, a slightly interactive cutscene.

i don't really think that's indicative of anything. i'd presume tutorial stuff will be done in the vault like in fo3, which includes leveling up at least once. they probably just started there at level 1 for the sake of the e3 demo.

Considering there is no 'GOAT' style test now to determine pre tagged skills (that dont exist) anyway, I think its more than likely you see the bomb explode, then it cuts to when you wake up in your chamber/bed/closet/other with no memory of how you got there.

I don't know, what's to stop me from just avoiding the path and looking around while everyone panics? If the game kills me for it, that would be awesome; but I imagine our "walls" at that point will be parked vehicles in the middle of the street or something.

I was under the exact opposite impression. Watch the E3 demo and listen to Todd. They show the beginning in the protagonists house and whatnot, and the run to the vault. The bomb goes off and the video stops. Todd Howard says something to the effect of, "we aren't going to give away the story, but suffice it to say you survive and are lowered into the vault. Events transpire and eventually you wake up 200 years later ..."

Then video is shown of the protagonist finding the pip boy and exiting the vault. Not going to spoil the story but events transpire and eventually you wake up ... sounds like you play through something down there.

That would be a pretty terrible gap in the narrative if they did that. The guy goes into the vault and the game resumes with him about to exit the vault. What about the family?

As BoomCheese suggested, I'm quite certain that all we will be doing inside the Vault once we wake up is leaving it. That is of course, once we've found the jumpsuit, the 10mm pistol, and the Pip-Boy. Anything else seen in the PCs inventory would have been for demonstration purposes only, otherwise he would have used a more advanced weapon to kill the mole rats outside the Red Rocket garage.

The events that transpire will be to do with having to go into cryogenic pods to prevent you and your family from being killed by overpressure. And the twist, from what I can tell, will be that you have to watch your family 'drown' in the pod opposite you due to the requirement for it to be filled with cryogenic fluid as part of the freezing process. The extreme high pressure would prevent the fluid from solidifying into ice which would kill anyone inside. You would then go through the exact same process yourself, time would pass, and then when you wake up, you find yourself choking on the fluid as it drains from the pod. Military training, from either the US Navy or the Marines depending on choice of protagonist, tells us that if we don't remove our soaking wet and freezing cold clothing straight away, we could die of hypothermia. And so we find and put on the Vault 111 jumpsuit that we see the PC wearing in the footage. This would even explain why we see him catching his breath as he leaves the vault. As for the family, the pod containing Shaun and the spouse would have been removed several years prior by the Institute, who are the main focus of the game, especially considering the original codename was actually "Institute". Again, when the PC speaks to Codsworth, he seems more than a little confused as to the whereabouts of his family.

This is, of course, all speculation. But it does kind of fit what we see before and after.

EDIT: the fridge in the player house even has a viewing window near the top of the door. I have a feeling this will be reflected in the design of the pods.

Wiping? You mean wiping, right?

I think that should be changed by one of the mods lol!

Do you think they will block off the rest of the vault somehow? Debris, locked door, something like that? Or maybe they'll let us explore some of it but make it barren to reflect the fact that it was just a place for our pods and not a "real" vault?

Apologies if you've already covered that at some point.

Vault0: I think we will likely see lots of skeletons and lots of rubble along with Empty beds and so on. Probably a few audio logs (as can be seen already in the E3 demo) explaining what might of happened. More than likely furphy dialogue which explains something but isnt actually connected to the storyline. We wont find out why everyone is dead/ till much later.

I think the dead scientist was either killed by overpressure after being trapped in the door area, or was taken out with a headshot by one of the other vault inhabitants (all either ex or non-serving Navy or Marines), after triggering the vault protocols via the door control panel. This could also explain why we find the 10mm pistol. This would have started a countdown, complete with warning lights, a siren, and a vocal instruction to enter the pods in the lower section of the vault. Even if there were other areas to explore, I don't think there would have been time.

Or he just, you know, starved to death.

lol

That wouldn't explain why he died right next to the control panel.

If he starved to death, he would more likely have been found behind the door to the main vault area, after desperately trying to gain access. Also, being next to the door means that he would stand a far greater chance of being seen. He wouldn't have just sat down next to the control panel and given up. And so I don't think he starved to death. I think he was either shot or killed by overpressure.

Wait, i'm confused. Isn't it implied by the footage that his body is found inside the elevator shaft that's outside of the main vault door? The vault door's have two-way door controls, it's just that the Overseer on the inside can change passwords and lock out the panel on the outside.