what hes holding at 6 is a small goldish blob at roughly shoulder level with a white thing over it.

Edit It may be the comprehension perk (Coper for the base and white for the light part)

I'm talking about the guy below the guy with the white coat, bulb, and light (that guy is #5 on the Intelligence column). The number 6 guy has what looks like could be a pistol and is in vault-boy gear much like the Science perk we've seen.

EDIT:

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1526182-what-are-those-perks-and-what-do-they-do/

Also, I have made this thread awhile back as a place for discussion about what perks are likely to be called and do, with additions from the Quakecon reports.

8 may be http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Robotics_Expertwith the table "leveled"?

This.

I want hard choices, personally. Someone posted somewhere that "you could be a God in New Vegas too." Yes, but with two differences: there were 20 different ways to feel like a God, and your offensive abilities were godlike while your defensive ones had clear limits, so even a God could bleed.

The offense vs. defense aspect is another topic, but what is relevant is how you become overpowered.

The real issue is that this risks being TOO limiting. As REL pointed out, you could argue that essentially the game will have ~7 playthroughs if it truly is as limiting as it seems. It creates a conundrum where, if you get 10 Luck? By god you're taking that 10 luck perk. There is no consideration of "well tbh I don't really need this perk for my character build," where for example Better Criticals might be available to a Heavy Handed character or one that uses Explosives, and you might simply prefer an alternative perk instead. In this case? We can presume that EITHER the luck 10 perk is worth taking 100% of the time, or it's a terribly designed perk.

The issue is that with perks at the top being THAT exclusive, they have to be amazing to warrant taking. If all the level 10 perks svcked? Then 10 stat builds are totally nonviable. The problem that then arises is that if we assume all the perks are well designed, AKA you take 7 Endurance because you truly want that 7 endurance perk, then what ends up happening is that ALL characters take ALL available perks to them ALL the time. This means character diversity suffers, and the result is that you could probably do a STR-END, PER-AGI, CHA-INT, and LUCK-PER playthrough, from there deem which playstyle you like best, and take it. That's about ~5 playthroughs. For the average gamer that might be plenty, but for RPG fans and fans of Bethesda games...? 5 playthroughs hits too close to home to the ~3 I'd expect you'd need in order to experience all of Skyrim's content.

Alternatively...

You point out it seems too limiting and too difficult. Thing is....Bethesda does not have a track record of telling the player "no." Bethesda does not know how. Usually in their games, you can "go anywhere and do anything" because Bethesda's too scurred to tell you otherwise. Given that? The limitations we've seen feel VERY out of character. I would actually bet money that what's going to happen is we'll discover that either SPECIAL stats are very much available to the player and easy to get, there absolutely isn't a level cap, or some combination of both. The result would be that all of your choices in character design only effect the beginning of the game.

To give you an idea, I actually don't like the Courier's Stash in New Vegas because it makes the beginning of the game too easy and too similar for all playthroughs, whereas the base game without it has limitations to ammo, stims etc and thus the characters are prone to more diversity without all the sweet free gear. Despite not liking it, I've never bothered voicing complaints about it before because it's never felt warranted. Why? Because it's just the beginning of the game. It effects the first ~8 levels only out of 50 levels total. I sincerely don't mind, in the grand picture of things.
Conversely, if my suspicion is correct and SPECIAL is easily enough increased while level has no cap or goes extremely high? Then your choices would only effect the first ~8 levels of the game, after which point all characters begin to merge and feel samey.

Lastly, as a side point, it's been shown that many of the basic perks are actually skills. For example I think Medicine is the INT 2 perk. This feels akin to Skyrim, where "perks" are just skills in disguise, and taking one does not actually make your gameplay feel drastically different. My beef with Skyrim's 20% cooler perks was that often times, you took 20% more damage and the highest-tier enemies you'd encounter would gain 20% HP. Yes, all the hirelings on the way to the boss of the dungeon are weaker, but this doesn't matter when my goal is all the leveled enemies in the final room. Here I fear the same could happen. You could get 25% more healing with a perk while enemies are now dealing 25% more damage.

Skyrim's system...the flaws were that when I get perks, I basically want something to spice up gameplay and change the way I play. Perks define my characters and make them perform differently and handle situations differently. In New Vegas I could encounter a deathclaw with 5 different characters and, depending on their builds, I could have one character using a shotgun, another using his fists, another using a golf club, another using a laser rifle and another using a brush gun. All five of these characters could be designed in such a way that, were the guy with the shotgun to trade weapons with the guy using the laser rifle, BOTH characters would die because they're both inexperienced with that new weapon type and don't have the proper perks to make it effective.

But in Skyrim, my level 30 hits for 80% more damage while fighting 80% stronger enemies. My level 13 only increased his damage by 40% and faces enemies that increased their threat by 40%. In both scenarios, both of these characters fight the exact same way OR if they don't for the moment, could eventually. The weapon swap idea still functions as you could have a one-handed and two-handed character swap weapons.....however, the thing is they mathematically get screwed over. The above example, the guy using the fists is using his fists BECAUSE he can paralyze with them: his fists truly ARE the best option for him. Same goes for the guy with the shotgun: he can score knockdowns with it. If these guys swap...? They can survive, it's just absolutely not ideal and will demand much greater performance from them as players. The fist guy would quickly load the shotgun with slugs instead to bypass DT since he has no knockdown chance from buckshot, whereas the shotgun guy with the fist is probably going to try to score a crippled torso and keep his opponent staggered by repeatedly punching it, with much greater risk to himself than the other guy had. With the Skyrim example....it's just painful. You end up swinging for days or spamming health potions to compensate for not having your damage perk'ed. You're punished for not taking a perk, and the perk is practically a requirement to take just to make the game any fun. It's not a requirement, but perks effectively have the function of "make the game 20% less tedious."

In short, perks should diversify gameplay, not feel like something that if you don't take it, you're punished when the enemies got 20% better at something and you didn't, and the punishment ISN'T that the game will kill you (honestly I'd prefer this), but rather it'll make you sit through a tedious as hell fight.

I have to disagree, I like the fact that Fallout 4 is going with more choices in terms of Special being more important this time around. I want choices this time around, Skyrim had no choices because you could get everything and that is my one fear with this system because of no level cap which is good but also a double edge sword.

My only fear with this system is that Beth will be like "Let's have a good number of Special Books like Skill Books for Special so that we can have MOATS for the people who want to be MOATS". Since Skills are basically merged now with perks, they probably put a good ton of Special Books to raise your special. I'm ok with this if it's like Fallout New Vegas or even Fallout 3 where there is only 1 special increasing Bobblehead/Book and a couple other ways to increase special. However if it's also like Fallout 3/Skyrim and even New Vegas, I think 3/4 of those books or even more per Special stat, would be too much. If it's optional to pick up and it's like Fallout 3/New Vegas where we have to physically read it in the menu then it's fine. I'm hoping we don't get the ability to get all 10 and have to pick and choose our perks, past history says MOAT will happen but it could be different this time around.

I think this system is a huge improvement over Skyrim, if we can't get all 10 in Special. I want Choices, I want Replay value, this gives me replay value assuming we can't be a MOAT.

Again you claim things about nv compared to fallout 3 that just isnt true.

In nv you could be incredibly defensively powerful.

The combo of DT and over 50 DR (after dm i got so much med x i always could have it up, stacking it hundreds of time etc), alongside with very very long lasting bullettime that could be stacked i can easily kill the last boss without taking a single point of damage. But if he did hit me, the damage would be tiny. Not only that because of bullettime i could just step aside with low reflexes and skills as a player. With bullettime stacked 10 times, chemist, daytriper, rad child etc im sure i could afk vs the last boss on the hardest difficulty, go to the bathroom and when i come back the courier would still be alive and well.

I love nv, i love fallout 3. But you are not honest about how identical the two games are. Very very overpowered builds existed in both. Both for defense and offense.


If anything new vegas allowed more op builds both for defense and offense.

Bullet time is a mod, just pointing that out, although I do agree with the point in question. In Fallout New Vegas you could be a God, Fallout 3 as well. New Vegas is easier to prevent being a god because of low skill books and Logan's Loophole. Tools that are suppose to prevent you being all powerful. Fallout 3 is a lot harder especially if you have Broken Steel which literally breaks the game. One Of The many reasons why I don't have that DLC installed.

No its not.

Implant grx is 2 rank perk in nv at lvl 30 with 8 en


It is the best perk in all the fallout games. It gives you matrix power pretty much.

I can dance between a pack of deathclaws and cut them to shreds with a blade in the flanks etc, id take 0 damage. If i did get hit that hit takes so long to deliver it would equal many hits if bullettime wasnt on. So it both makes all dps on you much much lower but it also makes that dps very very unlikely to hit you if you got basic movement skills.

It gives you insane defense and offense. Neo vs normal people in the matrix.

Sure enough both games give you the ability to abuse drugs and become unkillable.

But if you avoid abusing the system and compare FO3 has a much higher godlike quotient than FNV does. In FO3 with T51 power armor you have 60 DR which effectively multiplies your hit points by 2.5X . If you add in cyborg perk and toughness you have 80 DR just walking around, no buffs required, which makes your effective hitpoints 5X higher.

The best you can get in FNV is 46 DT with Enclave power armor, two toughness perks and a sub-dermal implant. A deathclaw, just a plain jane one, does 125 damage. With the best DT you can get you still take 79 damage per hit. Your armor has effectively multiplied your hit points by 1.6X. You are far from godlike and still in considerable risk of being killed in short order.

Again abusing drugs will greatly change the above scenario and make you unkillable. Just beacause you can do something does not mean that you should or that the game should be balanced around the abuse.

The GRX implant is pretty much godmode as you've pointed out. Use of that pretty much throws any concept of balance out the window.

Back on the FO 4 discussion - the fear that we are voicing is that the SPECIAL will be easily raised during gameplay and then all perks will eventually become available rather than a system where you only have your starting SPECIAL, perhaps a few can be raised, and you are locked out of any perks that you do not qualify for. This would force you to make tough choices and deal with the consequences - you'd be the greatest sniper the world had ever seen but be unable to both pick a lock and install a weapon mod.

Your comparison of DT and DR isnt correct since new vegas has both.

But i dont want to bash new vegas, which alongside f3, is my fav game ever.

Anyways i also dont want special 10 in all stats and all perks on a single character. That would be boring and limit reruns


But what ive seen sofar about the special system is just crazy good.

Im really excited about no pause: pipboy, hacking, lockpicking, dialogue

I just hope healing is done over time.

I will be so happy if you cant pause abuse so you can freeze time and go to full hp at any split second

actually folks over at the ign live blog who where attending the showing confirmed gameworld pauses while you have the pip boy up.

One thing these revelations will do, I think, is make it easier to construct a build (once we know all the perks). To wit, if you know you want a Sniper, then you KNOW you have to get AGI at rank 9 (or whatever sniper perk is unlocked). If you know you'll never bother with settlements and don't care about the price of goods, etc then you can make do with a 1 or 2 Charisma (2 Charisma looks like Black Widow kind of perk, so you could easily lose that +dmg boost for some other perk that's more varied / useful than straight damage increase).

Like, Endurance... I don't care about perks that increase my regeneration or give me rad resistance or whatever --- I try to avoid damage by being sneaky sniper. So as long as there isn't an END perk that I ~do~ want then I can set it to 1 and not sweat it. Or if I know I'm not going to mod weapons, and just use whatever I happen to loot.... then I don't need an INT that high.... except, wait, I DO want to be able to hack, so I have to unlock at least that much, which also unlocks Gun Nut. But I don't have to take Gun Nut if I don't want to be able to mod weapons. It's just -available- to me, because I had to get an INT high enough to get the perk I ~did~ want (hacking).

Only thing that worries me is that there will be some perks so useful (like Local Leader if I ~do~ want to work on Settlements) that would require me to get a stat boosted that I would not otherwise care about (Charisma, in this case). Perks that unlock core features like being able to expand your settlement, or being able to mod weapons or being able to hack.... those are going to be hard to ignore ranking up. The perks in that SPECIAL line that you do not want are still available just un-selected.

Another "concern" is that, if there are no level requirements... and yet we only get one perk per level, how do you decide whether to get the INT-9 perk or the STR-6 perk or a third rank in your PER-2 perk? Some decisions will be easy --- no point in getting the settlement-building perk from Charisma until you actually GET into settlement building; until you get to that point, you're better off sinking perk points into perks that are immediately useful.

Releasing a full, detailed, perk list would certainly go a long way toward giving me something to occupy my time until November.

Every new bit of information makes me like this system more. It's going to allow a good deal of customization.

I'm seeing a lot of needless fretting about the possibility of MOATS and overpowered characters. I don't understand why this is happening. In the previous two Fallouts (regardless of Skill books, Intense Training, Implants, Bobbleheads, etc) the player had to TRY and WORK at being a wasteland demigod. It was optional. I'm guessing F4 will have the same options - those who want to grind their way up will find ways to do so and those who practice a bit of self-control (you don't need to pick up, read, buy, etc) can have more challenging characters. Everybody wins, based on their personal preferences.

Of course, long-winded neophobic armchair game designers will still eloquently wail about game balance.

The healing better be over time then or im mad.

Oh im not complaining about the possibility of master of all things in f3 and nv. I prefer if its not possible but its no biggie at all for me.

But healing over time is a big deal for me. I hate that you can pause f3 at any split second heal to full while time is frozen and then resume. This can be done over and over. That i think is a design flaw of epic proportions. Im so glad nv fixed this (and why i always play hc mode)

I need that to be in fallout 4. That is very important for me.

Or just do the easy, modless solution of binding your healing items to the quickbar and only use healing via that, vola, instant solution whether the insta heal via the pip boy is in or not.

I did this in f3 but since stimpaks are without animation or cooldowns the effect was almost the same.

I need healing over time.

And i think bgs is the best game designers around so id like to play vanilla many many times before mods. But if healing over time isnt there then i will wait until a mod does and never ever play vanilla.

But i will be majorly disappointed in bgs

Becoming a MOAT seems to be a moot point to me, personally, if there are ~275 perks/ranks and 42 points of SPECIAL between chargen and max; reaching level 317 doesn't sound easy in any RPG I've played. And this is assuming we get to raise our SPECIAL indefinitely (which will probably be true); I'd prefer being able to raise SPECIAL to some degree after chargen, but I'm indifferent beyond that.

Stimpaks healing over time will be the FIRST thing I mod into the game IF it is not in already.

Instant healing via spamming stimpaks while paused just feels like cheating IMO.

So are Tag skill's gone do you expect?? Or do you think there just replaced by 3 starting perk choice to define you character. ( I feel this would be nice but who knows it may be a bit much).

Also has anyone noticed if there are still Str regs for weapons, this might make starting stat choices even more heartbreaking.

No indication of tag skills/perks or ST requirements, no. But I'd hope that there's a high ST perk that improves using heavy weapons in a way.

I could not agree more.

The more I think about it the more I like it. We get 28 points to work with so we can max out 2 skills and get another one to 9. The only problem I see is with jack of all trades characters. You won't average at every skill but below average. Besides that I don't see much problem as long as the perks aren't like Skyrim 25% more damge crap.

That "25% more damage crap" allows for a better variety of character builds. If you need the extra damage, then take the perk. If you don't need the extra damage, then don't take it.

Math is wrong.

You can max out two Special, have 4 in one and then 1s in the others.