That is what it boils down to, and what I've been trying to say. All races should be as viable to get through the game, but not as viable at everything there is to do. You pick race X and you're cut out from certain options and possibilities because of your chocie of race, whereas with race Y you can do those things and be cut off from something else. The racial choice is not the be all end all of things, and should not be, but it should be part of the defining factor of how the game rolls out as it is - and should be - the choice for your characters inherent abilities and disabilities and racial alignment before the skills and other ingame choices come to the picture. Consider it like a sort of character class choice. I think we agree more than we disagree, but we're just talking past eachother.

Si, miscommunication can be hell.

But I really wouldn't mind playing as a Super Mutant and have 80% of the world against me, would be quite fun actually.
To get more dialogue and named super mutant characters to make up for it but be completely screwed with most other towns that consist of humans.
A lot of crap would be locked out for you, but it'd be interesting to see just how isolated super mutants become due to hate and discrimination. (Sure you can see this from a humans point of view too, but actually not even having a change to befriend a faction simply for being Hulk would put different perspective on it.)


With viable things I think I went a bit offtrack though.
So let me start over, I think that there should be skills that are less viable than others.
They aren't complete crap, but Electronics for a non-Energy Weapons character is going to be used a lot less than Lockpicking or Hacking would.
So I think that for Fallout there should be more skills, 18 at the very minimum.
And if some skill only has a dozen uses throughout the game then I'd be fine with it.

Cause if I play as a character (no matter the race) who don't pick Psychology then I will be screwed in the occasions when that skill is needed.
Whereas when I play with a character who 'does' have Psychology at 100 I'll be rewarded for it by being able to complete these quests in a civilized manor.

(Sometimes you can't just "talk" people down, you need to actually understand them first and connect with them in order to gain their trust. Psychology would be for those dialogue situations, when a silver tounge simply isn't enough.)

Sure it might not be used a lot throughout the game, but when it is used? Then you'll be glad you invested into that skill.
And I find it realistic to have a skill system like this, some skills simply aren't as useful all the time like others are.
There are tons of locks to pick, tons of enemies to kill, tons of wounds you'll get that you have to heal.
But Psychology? That can't be used with every single character. It needs to be used with the characters where it is fit to use.

(Psychology was just a hypothetical example, I'm not saying it should be implemented into the game, though it would be intersting to see it.)

That's kinda what I meant with viable stuff.
Some choices you make to your character definition won't be as viable as other choices.
Combat skills will always be more important than the other skills, or at the very least more used than the others.
Whereas Traps will only be used when there are traps around, most likely in dungeons.
And Persuasion can only be used through NPC interaction.

Some skills should be more viable than others.
And if a new player plays the game then if they pick Psychology and find it to be worthless then it's their choice and their consequence.
Better luck next time around.

That's illogical, because otherwise Marked Men, who ARE Ghouls, carry Heavy Armours, Heavy Weapons completely throw your logic out the window. I don't understand why you INSIST on claiming Ghouls are 'by lore' weak, when this has never been established. While a Ghoul could in theory become weak with age, it doesnt give viable proof, as not all Ghouls are Pre-War. That said, the only general debilitating things that exist are the usual old age. Ghoulification seems to affect the muscle and tissue, but not the bones, as can be seen with Dean Domino and Raul, who both will complain of knee problems when crouching, and both were relatively young when the War hit.

That said, Ghouls should instead be exposed to radiation, but at 1,000 rads, instead of death, the player goes feral (Which would be the Ghoul PC's version of death) This is because it is explained in game, or at least hinted at, that the more exposure a ghoul has to radiation, the more likely the odds of going Feral. In general, I do believe ghouls can run, as I've seen them do so on Fallout (Or maybe it was 2, I don't remember).

Anyway, I feel your logic is shallow and pedantic in terms of how Ghoul PC's should be dealt with and wanted to counter a major issue I had with it.

Edit @ Styles- You're half right. Ghouls are in a constant state of regeneration. Organs are NOT showing, but the flesh under the skin is, and it's constantly exposed, ergo the 'rotting' odour. I tend to ignore some of Fallout 2's dialogue since it's not exactly that different from one big joke in terms of the dialogue being a bit childish. I think the 'lulz our organz iz shuwing lul' dialogue is one of those childish giggle lines.

That's actually a really good idea. This way Ghouls wouldn't get a edge so to speak on Radiation (Gameplay wise) and allow humans not to be super different from their ghoul counterparts. Plus I could just imagine your Ghoul character go into the feral position wearing power armor .

Could work as a nightkin with the stealthboy addiction they have going on. Think about Nosferatu in Bloodlines. Needing to stay hidden, no sweet talking humans (most of 'em anyway). There'd be some problems in implementing that if the game operated like Fallout 3 and NV, obviously, but I reckon it could be done.


That's where we differ again, because I don't see any point in developing a full skill around an action or a feature that barely gets any uses in the game. It's not practical and investing in it doesn't pay off for the player. It feels bad when you notice that all your skillpoints invested there have gone to waste aside from the couple of uses they grant (this is different from investing in a skill and decidedly not using it for what ever reason, and then being disappointed in wasting those points -- that's the players own fault of skillpoint misuse, and that's fine).

Those kinds of minor tasks and sidetrack features would be better off as perk enabled special abilities not governed by any skill, but a ranked perktree, but with the perktree being opened up by a set of skill/level requirements. Say, Electronics Whiz - ranks 3, rank 1 req's: 5 INT, 30 science, 30 repair, level 3; does what ever it is you'd think the skill does, and improves through more ranks. For a quick example. It's more practical and rewarding to the player.


Of course not. But they should be in relation to the style of play. If I build a diplomat character I obviously am not too capable in combat, but I damn well should have a useful build for talking to people. That's, the way I see it, the point. Not so much that I pick skills that turn out to be useless, get disappointed at not coping with what the game has to offer for that specific build, and rage quit. If combat is at the center of the game, then everyone is, of course going to need to build a character that can fare in combat at least to certain degree which makes combat skills "more viable", but that shouldn't undermine the uses of the other skills.

mind the typos will ya, I have a fever and can't be arsed to tripple check.

Funnily enough, my characters in each playthrough take that style. Diplomacy as my main weapon, and small arms as my back up. Works everytime.

Also, as for the hypothetical Psychology, that's a moot use because it's bookable in medicine as Psychology is the doctoring of the mind.

1. I don't care. The ghouls as they were originally portrayed are weak rotting corpses. Their arms would break if they tried to wield a minigun, their bodies wouldn't be able to carry around a Metal Armor. I simply don't give a crap about the new games' definition of ghouls, they were portrayed as weak initially and I'm going with that lore over the new burn victim lore. I'd say the developers were simply lazy, and forgot or overlooked or perhaps couldn't make it so that ghouls cannot wear heavy armor. But hey, if going by gameplay terms of Raul and Dean Domino, how about this: If a child wears a power armor then it morphs into a smaller size fit for the child, should we make that canon as well?
And Marked Men I would hardly consider "ghouls", and even if they are ghouls there are variations to them. For example, Daywalkers, Glowing Ones and Reavers.
Marked Men could be a ghoul variant who's mutation causes it's regen and decomposition to be of their skins only, allowing them to keep their muscle mass intact.
But normal Ghouls are not Marked Men.

2. When is this ever explained? The ghouls at Gecko loves the power plant because of it's warm radiation. The ghouls at Reservation (semi/non-canon) lived at a place completely filled with radiation. Bright Brotherhood, with Jason stating that if a human went down on the launch pad they'd immedietly die of radiation, hangs around the launch pad casually. There is nothing that proves that ghouls become feral if they get too much radiation in 'em. The Day Walkers and Krazies wen't insane because they got heatstrokes from being out in the hot desert so long. The ferals in the newer versions can piss off and die for all I care, but even so, Bright Brotherhood [censored]s up the "high radcount=feral" theory.
Oh and Charon in Broken Steel can enter the high radiation filled Project Purity to activate it.

3. In the older Fallouts they did. And I consider the older Fallouts a lot more canon than I do the newer ones.

Well it isn't just the dialogue though. I am using my own judgement when I look at Set and Harold. I know Harold is no longer a ghoul (Thanks Bethesda ) but Harold himself calls himself a ghoul. He fits in really well with other ghouls, because other ghouls look alot like him. Set looks like Mr. Potato Head and Harold has a hole in his head. So if other ghouls look anything like those two, and Harold says they do, ghouls would look alot like a rotted corpse. They even act like one. They can't run, they shuffle their feet around.

1. Never played Bloodlines. :/

2. I like that though, it's how life works, and it's suppose to be an RPG, some roles have skills that aren't used as often. I suppose it's agree to disagree. Course, Psychology could be used like 30 times perhaps, and for using Psychology to talk down a Jet-head who's taking a waitress hostage you can get a discount at that café, his Jet supply and a nicer ending slider for that area. Rewards you wouldn't get if you didn't put points into this skill.
Then again, perhaps these "minor skills" could only go to 50? Then they wouldn't svck out so many skill points for how less you get to use them.

3. I don't want ranks back. I want a 1:3 perk ratio and perk ranks don't suit it, after playing New Vegas with others mods and mods I created myself to make it work I can say that ranks should not be used with a 1:3 perk ratio. Could work with a 1:2 perk ratio but I still don't like perk ranks. And yes, certain things could be governed by perks instead, and I think that the perks should open up new dialogue and not just the Speech perks. But Grunt, would be great for speaking to someone who's a soldier in the NCR Army. Hell, it could be used solely for training the Misfits through Grunt dialogue.
Or using Solar Powered to get some special dialogue with Jason Bright.
Or using Chem Reliant to explain to Motor-Runner how to dosage chems to make them last longer and get more caps from him.
That I would love.

4. No skill is useless though. Psychology isn't useless either, it simply isn't used as much but when you get to use it you get rewards you otherwise wouldn't. And hell, since we get so many skill points you can always get it to 50 and see after 20 hours on that character if it's worth investing more points into it, if not, then leave it alone and focus on other stuff.

1. You should.

2. Life also works so that I do not learn to make clay pots just for knowing how to (unless it's some sort of personal quest of mine to learn things I have negligably little to no use for -- remember the expert excrement expeditor, no skill for that ). This is not life we're talking about, but gameplay. And meaningless mechanics are dead weight, bad gameplay. Another thing is, why would you need psychology as a separate skill just for few lines if you already have speech, or persuasion/deception as all those could well contain psychology lines (even by enabling special lines through a psychologist perk)?

3. I want the 1:3 back too. But there were ranked perks in the originals also. I'd say having them in and having them do even more suits that system more than well, as it makes the choice of second or third rank of perk X over an individual or first rank of perk Y matter even more. I agree that there should be more dialog from all the perks, but the speech perks should still be at the helm of it, as they are, afterall, speech perks.

4. It is compared to the others if it only offers few measly dialog lines (plus of course what I said above about the other speech skills). You'll then have a full skill for a couple of lines of dialog, and I know it would feel outrageously frustrating to find out that that was all there is to that particular skill (especially when there could've been so much more had it been handled differently) - unless you make the outcomes for those few uses astronomically rewarding (which, in turn, leads to that skill being so much above others it feels stupid to neglect it). Investing in a skill should be properly rewarded in the skills terms, not punished by saying "you just invested in a useless skill, life is hard deal with it". Like I said, the error should come from the player for not using the skill correctly or at all (there's nothing really preventing giving the player a little mind work for figuring out how some skills work at their best or most practically), but not from the system. The system is there to reward those who use it correctly and punish those who don't, not to punish all with snares hidden within it.

1. Perhaps I shall, when I have money for it, and when I'm done playing what I got already.

2. How does Psychology fit into Speech/Persuasion/Deception? Psychology is about understanding the human mind. Speech and Persuasion are about using your silver tounge, logic and reason to talk others into the most sensible solution and Deception is about, well, deceiving people by lying, smuggling and using disguises. I don't see how Psychology is close to any of these. A lawyer with a silver tounge is gonna be great at persuading people. But that doesn't mean (s)he understands how the human mind works on more... Unstable people.
And again, Psychology wouldn't be as useless as Pottery would be. There are reasons for learning it and could flow well with the gameplay despite having only a couple of dozen occasions of usage. (Fallout has also already done this, remember Traps, Science and Repair in the old games? They had few occasions to use them but you were glad when you did get to use them, where as on other characters you can't.)

3. I know the old games had ranks, I never liked it then and I never liked it now. I'd rather have perks that have a prerequisite perk requirement than to have "ranks". Cause ranks feel like I have to waste 3 perk points to get the entire perk, like I'm only given one third of the perk.

4. I disagree. This part of the discussion won't lead anywhere because I refuse to let go of this design decision and I presume you refuse to let go of yours so... Well... Pretty pointless to discuss something that's at a dead end. Agree to disagree?

But just a final note: The player isn't "punished" for choosing that perk. They are rewarded.
Punished would be choosing to up a skill to 100 and then have the game permanently cripple all your limbs.
"That" would be punishing.
This isn't.
The player makes a choice on a skill they are unsure about and get to see just what it does.
But they aren't punished for it. They are rewarded at the times when they get to use the skill and not whenever it's not used.
Just like any other skill.
Medicine only kicks in when you use healing items or with specific characters.
When not healing yourself or others then the skill is pretty much useless.
Hell, when I talk to Caesar on a Legion PC my weapon skills are useless.
Psychology wouldn't be useless, it isn't. It's just not used "as" much as the other skills are throughout the game.
And there will 'always' be a skill that is least used. If not Psychology then.. Barter maybe?

Players are not punished for picking the skill.
If the player goes "This skill is barely ever used, it was a waste of skill points" then it's their own fault for not appreciating it when it is needed.
And for every character he creates beyond this point he will fail at all those moments when Psychology 'is' used because he finds the skill inferior.
If anything the player is punished for not picking the skill whenever an NPC needs 60 Psychology to get a unique dialogue line.
But they are not in any way punished for picking the skill.
They didn't waste skill points on something useless. Cause the skill 'have' uses, they are just further apart than Persuasion or Deception is.
And as long as there is an adequate amount of usefullness to the skill then it's not useless.
3 dozen occasions when it can be used is an adequate amount of usefullness to me.

I'll keep it short. Need to sleep some.

2. Psychology is a verbally/literally learned trait. How do you do psychology with your hands or feet? How do you practice it without talking? If you're using what you've learned about psychology to affect others, you are going to do it with with your mouth and as that, it would best serve as part of the speech skill or a speech related perk. Because speech is all things spoken.

I remember the very low usage skills from the old games, and I would've preferred them done differently in those too.

3. That, having to waste 3 perks to get the entire package would be the point, however, getting all the ranks is not mandatory. You may do fine with just one, or even you wanted them all, you may consider getting some other perk more worthwhile. It's not to make a night a day, but it's always up to the player if s/he wants further bonuses from there or other bonuses from the rest of the options. And like I said, it would be more rewarding and practical way of handling abilities that are not large and comprehensive enough to be viable skills. I can see your point though.

4. But the thing is, the player may invest in that skill in a firm belief that this is as much a skill as the others, but s/he may never even encounter (all) the few situations where it is used. It's punishing because the promise of a skill is interaction with the game and there's no (should not be) need to assume that picking X will be inferior choice to picking Y when it comes down how and how much that skill is used, and if there are from few to none (compared to otheres), the game has effectively cheated the skillpoints from the player with empty promises. And once again, if the skill has no uses beyond few lines of dialog, why would it need to be a skill to begin with when there are more practical and more rewarding ways of implementig the effects?

And no, "their fault, not appreciating it when it's needed" won't work if the feedback from skill is so minor it practically forces one to think how much more useful would those skillpoints have been elsewhere. It has already failed as a skill if it is commonly noted as (nigh) useless. But I guess you're right, this one isn't going anywhere so better stop here.

2. But if Speech is split into Persuasion and Deception?

3. I will still and always loathe "ranks" in Fallout's perk system.

4. Well Psychology is not a skill I'm really promoting to be implemented. It could work, but it's not something I have part of my suggested skill list. I'm just saying that I like the idea of less viable skills to along with the more viable skills. It was just an example of a "less viable skill", not necessarily one I want in the game. (Though I wouldn't oppose it if it was implemented. I would go and take it every once in a while.)

As to the whole:

"It's punishing because the promise of a skill is interaction with the game and there's no (should not be) need to assume that picking X will be inferior choice to picking Y when it comes down how and how much that skill is used, and if there are from few to none (compared to otheres), the game has effectively cheated the skillpoints from the player with empty promises."

I don't think that a player should just assume that one thing will be as viable than others.
If (s)he does, then I'd consider it his/her fault.
The game never promised anything, it gives a choice, if the player decides to prematurely expect a skill to work just as much as every other skill then the game isn't to blame, it's the player fault for not being careful about skill selection.
If I notice that there is a skill that seems kinda flimsy, like Mountain Climbing, then I'll play the game first for a couple of hours and work up my main skills first and see just how often this skill can be used, and if it isn't used very often I can then decide if it's worth my skill points.
It ain't exactly like we only get to beef up our tagged skills to 100.
We can always give the game a go first and play a couple of hours before we decide if we want to invest in a skill that sounds iffy with it's usage.

i'm glad i came to this forum and brought my ideas with me. the fallout experience is getting stale.. if the future of it only concers MAN it is going to be one great big borefest. it may have the Fallout logo stamped all over it, but who will honestly care anymore? bring on some variation. surely there are enough vaults and such out there that something new could pop up. mutations, things crawling in from Mexico and Canada for instance. who wouldn't love to take on the role of a Deathclaw for a day? why not mix things up a bit? we could see things through the eyes of the wastelands other inhabitants.. each race would have their own perks etc it will be fun. that's what attracts people to fallout, not being pedantic about what happened in what order etc geez..

Not me.
I wanna RP a molerat!
And it's a whole new game once you do play as one.
Your objectives are to find food, find other molerats and help them, breed, fight bloatflies and flee from raiders!
Great fun!


...

Could someone make this a mod for FNV?

I would like that actually.

MOLERAT SUPREMACY. MOLERATS FOREVER.

2. Both are speaking. You can well have psychologylines in 'em. If it feels "odd" for some reason, they can be perk enabled. But it's not very creative or commending the gameplay if there is a skill for couple of lines scattered all around the game, or if you have electronics and only have 10 ham radios to fix throughout the game.

3. Fair enough.

4. If you need to implement abilities that really are inherently and clearly lesser than others in relation to how helpful they are to the player and how much they support any given characterbuild throughout the game, I'd still suggest having them as perks -- or alternatively setting up the skillsheet so that it holds by default a set of primary skills and secondary skills, and adjusting the cost of progression to reflect their actual usefulness.

Cheating was a wrong word. But I know I felt disappointed in the originals when it was clear that all those points I put in repair or science didn't really pay off but in very few occasions. There will always be some separation between skills as some skills will always be used more than others, but the game shouldn't actively strive to create situations where the player is left out cold with his investments. If you have an idea for a skill that sounds it might be cool, you figure how to implement it in a rewarding way that carries out through the game without it feeling too costly compared to its effects. But the key thing is that it has to provide good and worthwhile gameplay in its own line of duty across its scale, the games scale, and in relation to how much it costs to invest in.

One way that I can figure out to implement skills with "lesser value" would be what I suggested as an alternative skillset in the speculation thread big post. It would require something of an overhaul for the skill system, but I think it could better serve with this new gameplay we have where no dices are rolled anymore. Yet another way would be if you made the skills branch out after 50 skillpoints (if you remember that suggestion from some time back), to have those "minor use" skill as branches covering less of the scale (but of course the effects from the uses of the skill would need to be quite hefty as they'd then be specializationpaths than mere skills).

So far, agreeing with the molerats.

I know I liked to discuss things in broad in the older days but now I simply don't like it anymore.
I still disagree with you but I'm out. I need to do other things than to discuss a subject which we've both agreed ain't going nowhere.

Now let's forget that topic and start discussing a Molerat minigame.
So what food should it eat? Xander Roots?

Fair enough.

Shame, though, that debates of subjects which practically ooze flexibility rarely end in a mutual consensus, but are mostly left with the beginning stance of heads vs tails even if there was very little that was actually disagreed over.

Anything. Mole Rats seem to eat anything they find as long as it's accessible.

Radroaches are superior to molerats.

I've been working on a Mole Rat as a companion mod for New Vegas (because I too share a love for mole rats) and if a lot of people are interested I'll put it on Nexus when I'm finished.

I think we should start a Mole Rat awareness club, so that everyone can be aware of how awesome the Moles truly are. Who's with me!


An option to play as Snuffles before Quarry Junction was taken by powder gangers/deathclaws. IIRC the quarry workers said that Snuffles used to help the miners with digging and such.

The lates BBC document Un-Life In the [censored] up World, narrated by the corpse of David Attenborough just revealed that molerats are getting interested in mating with radroaches. Something about the smell. But since molerats have poor vision out in the open, they often mistake a roaches head to it's ass, and try to [censored] their reluctant partner in its mouth. This often grotesque happening usually results in painful castration, and has now led to decreement of the molerat population. This is because the eunuc molerats cannot procreate. Meanwhile the roach population has exploded due to a highly nutritious new food. Not all is lost for the molerats, though, as there have ben sightings of roaches giving birth to some... things, which could possibly go for a molerat if you bend your imagination enough. Furthermore there has been oh god why am I doing this

Maybe races AND factions?

• You could play as a raider in a raider clan or tribe and wreak some havoc in the wasteland, eventually becoming chief and establishing your tribe as a major power
  
• You could play as a Brotherhood of Steel member and make a choice to become a scribe, knight or paladin and join the Circle of Steel, possibly becoming Elder
  
• You could play as a Legionnaire and work your way to becoming the new legate or new Caesar and lead a campaign against opposing factions, conquering tribes and strengthening the Legion
  
• You could be an NCR trooper who works to become a general, and establish relations with, or lead campaigns against other factions
  
• You could be a ghoul and work on a restorative drug to cure ghoulism and fight a separatist faction of ghouls working to sabotage your work and keep the ghoul race alive, or you can work with the faction and keep ghouls separate
  
• You could play lone wanderer style and choose to go independent or help one of the other factions
  
• You could be a super mutant and work to cure super mutant sterility, or go Vault 87 and strengthen your race with captive humans while trying to search for a source of or mass produce FEV
  
• You could join the Railroad and free and recruit androids or possibly use them to establish an android army and betray the ideals of your fellow Railroad members
  
• You could play Ulysses style and work to destroy a faction that goes against your ideals, eventually using powerful pre war weapons to eliminate a faction, maybe in hopes of re-establishing America
  
• You could be a vault dweller and work to serve or overthrow your overseer and establish your vault as an exclusive community similar to Vault City

Each could have its own faction bonus such as a +7 science and energy weps for BoS members, and each faction opens and closes questlines, and even a few factions are outright hostile to you. There could be real, well-deserved rewards for serving your factions, not just becoming leader of every faction your help (*cough* skryim), should you choose to maintain the current faction's way of life and structure and not become leader. Each faction quest line is specific to that faction unless you play lone wanderer and join the faction, but rewards are fewer if you join a faction as a lone wanderer type and not start out as a member.

As a large side quest line, maybe you must work with your faction to stop tunnelers from destroying society in the wasteland