For those you say its easy....obviously you haven't try to use Geck.

Fact is all the I/O is set, unless you use NVSE.....then you need to make animation for all weapon grip to make it more natural....and then you have to somehow load up that melee attack as a weapon on the player actor without replacing the current weapon. And this is just the basic steps.

Hopefully in a future beyond Gamebryo this restriction will not exist. At least in VATS we should be able to select an alternate attack that uses a bayonet, rifle butt, or pistol whip to assault up close.

Alternative move is different from melee attack. Melee/Unarmed weapon have the stats require for alternative attacks, but range weapon doesn't

If it was reliant on your melee skill, and it did damage to the weapon, then yes.

I'm generally against the idea.
I think that if you want to use Melee then you should switch to a melee weapon.
What point is there in using melee weapons when you can just do a pimpslap with your pistol?
You get both melee attacks and ranged attacks.
It makes Melee and Unarmed lose their credibility as useful skills.

It's the same reason I'm against grenades being insta-thrown by a button instead of equipping them.

Doesn't matter how much smoother it makes things, if you want to use explosives then you need to fully equip that grenade and if you want to use melee then you need to fully equip a melee weapon.

/opinion

What if the gun melee attack only deal as much damage as bare hand and rely on MeleeUnarmed skill?

I agree there isn't much point for it in a RPG, but as the game gets more action orientated, it wouldn't be a bad option; that is, after dual wield is implemented.

If it deals as much as bare hand then it would be no point in using it really.
But okay, to balance it out, it does a very small damage and has a knockout chance, the chance of success is depending on character level, enemy level, Melee skill and STR.
For each Gun melee attack the weapon loses 1 or 2%CND. (As a gun isn't really meant to be used as a club.)
This means that using it too much will earn you a lot of trips to the local gun store for repair or spare parts.
And stronger enemies will have lower chance to be knocked out and might only get their breath knocked out but they'll recover far more quickly.
If you have insufficient chance on knocking an enemy then "you" will get your breath knocked out of you or might even knock yourself out due to the poor chance of success.
Low luck increases chance for critical failure which can, even with high level, Melee skill and STR have a good chance of the player getting knocked instead.

I still think that it devalues the usage of melee weapons.
I guess I could just "not" use it.
Just want it to be balanced.

IMO, melee attacks while holding a gun should only push enemy away....but I do enjoy killing things with melee in FPS

Pistol whip with a heavy revolver is a valid attack. I believe Deadliest Warrior (tv series) did a test and they broke the skull they were using. Also This Machine style main battle rifles were designed from the ground up with bayonet fighting in mind.

As for how you'd use it I saw someone suggest you simply have it as an alternate ammo command (ie on PC hit 2 until you've gone from .308 to.308 AP then again to Melee).

The bottom line though is this utility only has a niche appeal. The company isn't going to lose very many fans if they don't implement the idea and if they do it will require a set of animations that takes time and money to develop and, more importantly, as this is a game that has to work on X-Box and PS3 consoles, valuable space on the game disc. Unless we get a developer that's a rabid fan of the idea and willing to push it, it just won't happen.

Unlocked via perk.
Dependent on melee skill.
Lower damage than average melee weapon.
Damages the weapon's condition more than normal.

In short, without making melee weapons obsolete.

well the next fallout game will be made on the skyrim engine and from what i read about that game it has dual weld option with 2 swords or dagger so in fallout terms we could have a pistol in the right hand a combat knife in the left.

as a big big fan of melee as a skill i would hate to see it devalued any further. i would say tho as i also enjoy halo and cod [yes yes i'm a terrible person i get it] the melee in those is great but only because they are fps. i would say make it more like l4d where it would purely be knock back/knock down/fatigue dam. they could even make it perk only and modify super slam to rifle butts only [its over powered at mo] but still governed by melee skill to determine chance of knock down, otherwise push back enough for a couple of secs for the reload to put em down for good. i find the left for dead mechanic would work great and still make melee weapons themselves a viable option and worthy skill

Not really melee already has its place the whole point of the gun is range, very few weapons are designed to stand up to such an impact so it would very likely destroy a functional weapon, I've always seen it as a trade off I get more range but ther less useful at very close distances it helps keep weapon skills balanced what would be the point of melee if a gun could do it half way decent conversely you make it weak to be balanced and no one uses it because its does less damage that shooting, its also a very situational attack I just don't think it would be worth the time to add a feature that is either unbalanced or useless and would be rarely used.