I'm ideally looking for a first person single player action RPG in the fantasy/ medieval world (though the first person view is optional). I loved the complexity of the story and quests in Fallout: New Vegas, the background to the game, the deep choices and consequences, the insight and humour of the dialogue, while still having the action and drama. In short, moments where I had to pause the game and think about which was the best option to resolve a quest or situation

Some history: I got into Bethesda through Morrowind, then Oblivion but have also played Lord of the Rings Online, Fallout 3 and New Vegas, and going back a bit Ultima Underworld 2: Labyrinth of Worlds, and Wizardry 7: Crusaders of the Dark Savant.

I'm currently looking at Pillars of Eternity, though this would mean a new laptop to replace my 2009 version. But are there any other recommendations?

You can try balders gate series or never winter nights series planes scape torment is good I heard none of those are first person though. But a lot of the people who made those games help make new vegas.

While good games, they are turned based party combat games, not the FPS style David is seeking

I do not know of any that fit that particular bill, though. TES series is as close as I can come. I have not played a lot of games, so I am sure someone can get closer that that

Edit: Of the list below, only the last suggestion, Bloodlines, is close to what you originally asked about (it's over the shoulder third-person). But you mentioned Pillars of Eternity, so I included these others.

Planescape:Torment is widely considered the best RPG, ever, with Baldur's Gate 1 & 2 close behind. PST is unique, has a great storyline, and a lot of choice in terms of character development (roleplaying-wise). BG 1 & 2 have better tactical combat and good stories.

Ultima 7 is great and available on gog (as are the others I mentioned above). And there are both the original and enhanced editions of the 2 BG games, which purists hate, but I think are fine (you can do most of what the enhanced edition does with mods for the originals, FWIW).

I'm a big fan of the recent Shadowrun games. Shadowrun Returns was good, Dragonfall was great, and the recently released Hong Kong was decent. These are linear, though, so they may not be to your taste compared to New Vegas.

Also to get on the Obsidian track (the studio behind Pillars of Eternity and New Vegas), you might want to look at Alpha Protocol, Neverwinter Nights 2 + DLC, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2. KotOR 1 is a good, linear RPG by old-school Bioware. KotOR 2 is, IMO a flawed masterpiece. There are some mods that really need to be installed to fix bugs and finish incomplete parts of the game. Obsidian has had a lot of problems with being pressured to ship too soon, and a lot of their older games show it. But if you're a fan of well-written RPGs, you won't be disappointed. They also recently released The Stick of Truth, a South Park RPG that has gotten a lot of positive reviews, but I haven't played it.

My last suggestion is Vampire the Masquerade:Bloodlines. This is one of those titles that wasn't particularly successful (Troika went out of business shortly after shipping, and were unable to provide bug fixes), but is loved by a lot of RPG fans. There's a well-regarded fan patch that's been getting updates for years, with purely bug fix or bug fix plus extra content versions.

Is this a good moment to recommend Shadowrun games again? I don't care if they don't fit your requirements, they're fantastic and you should go play them.

Maybe the Witcher. Or Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, lots of RP possibilities there. I'd suggest Arcanum, it's a mess, but a delightful one - but it it's not first person and might look too old for you.

Omphaloskepsis, how do you define non-linearity?

In the case of the Shadowrun games, I said that because there's not really much in terms of choices and consequences. and you're going to do almost exactly the same missions every game. You have a little bit of choice about the order you do them in, but it doesn't really matter. The only optional content I can think of in the three games (off the top of my head, there might be a little more) is the Black Lodge missions. There are a few moral choices that are pretty good (MKVI), but they don't really affect the story. So in terms of replaying the Shadowrun games, you do it for trying out different tactics with a new character, rather than for character- or story-related reasons.

But to be honest, most of my list was linear. Maybe the existence of rails is a little better hidden when you have more content to confuse the issue?

Pillars of Eternity obviously came to mind first. Personally i don't like it, real time with pause is not something i like and the music svcks, but other people seem to like it I play Divinity Original Sin instead, great combat system and awesome music, but it's plot is extremely predictable and there's no decisions at all

And yes, the three Shadowrun games are pretty awesome, but yes, very linear, and not much important decisions there Dragonfall has nice twists, though And even though there are fantasy races, magic, and other elements, it is a cyberpunk setting.