Vats should be the mean to score critical hits; and generally a method of combat one risks for, not trusts in.

Your complaints are only your experience and do not apply to the majority of players who find that VATS works just fine.

Of course, some people want an FPS... FO is not an FPS, so "bullet time" and the player controlling action is not for an RPG (i.e., outcomes need to be based on character abilities, NOT player abilities).

VATS is balanced and that is why you have some of the outcomes you experienced. For example, you are not supposed to queue up several attacks in VATS if the target is near cover, you are in close quarters, etc., because VATS slows but does not stop time and the target will continue to move and respond to your attack(s).

Learn the system rather than ask it to be an FPS-centered concept. It's an RPG-centered concept.

Re: AI... if you face a ranged attacker using something like a missile launcher or even simply a rifle, the best strategy is to close in to take away their advantage. This is true in real life and games. As a ranged attacker, you want the opposite (i.e., you always want to keep a good distance from your target, preferably the optimal range for whatever weapon you use).

The same tactics apply for long handheld weapons such as spears and other pole arms (i.e., they are very bad in close-range combat).

The majority of the players also do not think beyond their noses (a generalisation, but observed as true and not demeaning), so why should they be a concern. They only lash out if a gameplay method is overly obstructive (which some should be despite that).

That's known as "a personal anecdote" (i.e., subjective experience) and not "the majority of players" (I.e., not generalizable). You would want to back that up with actual data, and the data indicate that the majority of players find VATS to work fine for an RPG. That data being the very successful sales and relaunch of a formerly niche franchise.

Of course, various players prefer not to use VATS, and that's fine because RPGs are supposed to allow player freedom to play their character concepts. Changing the game to an FPS mechanic that relies on player skill rather than character skill is totally pointless unless you want to kill the RPG and make an FPS instead.

No I don't want to back it up with actual data, it is my assumption (and that only), and one that appears to hold true. That a "majority" finds VATS to work fine isn't an indication of anything but that it is deemed "fine" (what ever that word holds within here) as it is, it doesn't say that they wouldn't "be fine" with it if it worked another way. No implication to either direfction what so ever.

Well... not to get overly technical for absolutely no reason at all, but what else is a forum for, after all -

VATS was introduced in Fallout 3. The earlier Fallouts, you just had... aimed shots at the expense of precious AP. VATS was an attempt to keep that aspect of being able to make targeted shots and tack it onto a real-time combat system. I do agree that VATS could use some work, but it still appears to me that if one wants to "fix" the system, we first have to nail down just what it is that it's "supposed" to be doing.

As I see it at the moment, VATS is essentially a form of bullet time. Time is altered from the player's perspective, and really the only difference is that attacks are taken automatically and based on skill level rather than proximity to the aiming reticule.

Where I would see the potential in the system is in making those dramatic shots that would be well-suited for the kill-cam. As a player that doesn't generally go for a lot of real-time shooting games, I also find it a useful "crutch" to help me pause the action, get a sense of my bearings, and plan my next move.

What I'd probably like to see is some distinct systems build from the ground up around that. Firstly, the ability to pause the game and view it more abstractly would be a nice benefit to me. Already does that with the assigned VATS button, so an expansion wherein the first layer of the VATS UI provides more useful information (likely determined by Perception scores and other factors,) would be a good first step, I think.

From there, I really do think that VATS works best when used to exploit moments of opportunity and for more dramatic actions. So we could probably expand upon what's already there. Aimed shots are one thing, but it could be just as useful to make heroic leaps to another spot, or even just be able to plan out a specific or complicated movement order that might be difficult to pull off in real time.

Really, the thing about aimed shots was that it was largely a risk/reward calculation. You'd be making less attacks in a round, in a system that places a lot of emphasis on an efficient action-to-damage ratio; but increasing your chances at a critical hit (remembering that cripple effects in the original system only came from critical hits.) The easy way to expand upon this would be to remove the damage resistance that occurs on your player during the cinematic playback - if you're taking an aimed shot while everyone's shooting at you, then the consequences ought to be pretty obvious.

As well, just overall I think that re-balancing the chances to hit (both within VATS and during regular combat) would be a good thing. It's intuitive to assume that your chances of hitting a target would be the same both within VATS and without (factoring in an accuracy loss for targeting specific limbs, of course.) But one way or another I often don't feel that's the case in many situations. I don't know just how to reconcile that, however.

Further, as a mode of bullet time I think there ought to be a limiting factor so that you're not leaning too heavily on it. AP works well enough but I really don't think it accurately describes what it does any more. Perhaps if there were other uses for AP at the moment, but it's only costing you when you make an aimed shot at the moment, which AGI isn't that much of a deciding factor anyway. Maybe either call it something more appropriate or come up with another system. Allowing you to perform other cinematic or cool actions through the VATS system would be a good step in the right direction, though.

I like having VATS around. I see it as a good thing. But a turn-based game is only ever a turn-based game and you can't just transplant TB systems wholesale into a real-time game and expect them to work the same way. And VATS really has nothing to do with being a turn-based system, so I feel any efforts in trying to apply those concepts would be going down the wrong rabbit hole.

I mean, if I had my druthers, we'd be going back to a full turn-based combat system. But failing that I like having a bullet time system that might serve some of the same goals.

@AiTenshi1

I guess I'm a minority. I dislike VATS and prefer free-fire run and gun. I'm sorry you don't believe this should be included in an RPG. Although by that standard, TES II to V also don't count as RPGs, unless your interpretation of the acronym is "Rule-Playing Game".

Personally, I believe RPGs should be more about the story and your actions and less about fancy game mechanics that interrupt immersion.

This is not to say that VATS shouldn't be in the game, but I feel that like FO3, it should be optional and the player shouldn't be penalized for not using it.

If FO is not an FPS then 3 shouldn't have been designed to be perfectly playable like one. You can't oppose bullet time and the player being in control of combat outcomes on the basis of Fallout is an RPG when this is already how the game works outside of VATS (which was definitely not designed to be the only or even primary way of resolving combat in Fallout 3 and is certainly not the only way or even primary way of resolving combat in Fallout 3). The game is a hybrid FPS/RPG by design.

I think part of the problem is they went from a game where range combat was chucking magic spells one at a time at the other guy and haveing slow loading and fireing bows to guns that put out up to 20 shots a second(30 in New Vegas with that games unique)