It has been suggested in another thread that the underlying theme of fallout 4 is freedom, which I believe to be true. This ties in with the way that the devs have explained various aspects of gameplay, with the entire point being to allow the player as much freedom as possible. If this is true, then why would they force us to have to use such an exacting system just to unlock anything other than the first rank in each perk? The simple answer is that they wouldn't. First of all, this would create a bias for the 4 perks that have only a single rank. Secondly, it would seriously restrict, and even dictate, our play style. Say I wanted to play as a stealthy character who will eventually use a sniper rifle. I sneak around taking pot shots with my hunting rifle that I found early on, but instead of modifying it just yet, I choose to gather resources instead. Why should I be prevented from unlocking subsequent ranks in Gun Nut as I progress just because I have not yet modified my weapon? Again, the answer is fairly obvious.

And so, it would seem that I have not over complicated anything. All I have done is applied common sense, as well as the universal principle known as Occam's razor. When a journalist who works for an official magazine says something that is completely different from information already confirmed by those who are actually making the game, logic suggests that they have misunderstood something along the way.

I'm a little confused by your response. At no time did I ever say anything about needing to spend perk points to unlock additional ranks. In fact, I explicitly said that perk points were for unlocking new perk lines. If I wasn't clear enough, they then rank up based on usage. That doesn't favor perk lines with only one our two ranks. Quite the opposite, in fact, as it means there are fewer ranks to contribute the overall level. Not does that restrict you. There is nothing preventing you from using that sniper rifle, you just haven't chosen to specialize in it yet.

My point is that there is no evidence whatsoever of individual perks having their own associated XP that is unique to that specific perk, unless you count the above mentioned article that has very clearly taken 2+2 and has somehow come up with 8. There are a very specific range of in-game actions, including killing enemies and crafting items (which are both shown in the E3 footage), that each award XP at a rate determined by your Intelligence level as well as any ranks you may have in the Educated perk. What you are suggesting means that, in the case of Educated, you would gain XP for gaining XP, which is completely nonsensical. Also, there are no perks that have 2 ranks. Apart from the 4 mentioned in my previous comment, all perks have either 3, 4, or 5 ranks. This is evidenced by the overall figure of 275, which happens to be highly significant, as well as the way that various perks on the chart function in terms of numerical increments or decrements.

As for your suggestion, as well as that put forward in OXM, here's what Todd Howard said in http://www.gameinformer.com/games/fallout_4/b/playstation4/archive/2015/07/26/fallout-4-quakecon-presentation.aspx?utm_content=buffer11c8a&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer&PostPageIndex=2 article, which has been confirmed by a number of QuakeCon attendees:

"We have a whole bunch of perks and those are tied to your S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats. Every time you level up, you get to pick a perk. You have this Vault Tech poster with all of your perks, and there is a separate perk for each S.P.E.C.I.A.L. and each value of that S.P.E.C.I.A.L. from 1 to 10. Each perk, except for a few exceptions, has multiple ranks. We have combined the previous skill system into this as well. If there are 70 base perks and you add all of the ranks, you're getting around 275 of those. We've found that this gets us some really cool different play styles. It's a very very cool and fun leveling system in the game."

If there is an individual XP count for each perk, then why has Todd never so much as mentioned this? Also, the sentence I have highlighted above would mean that, if you are correct, then there would be exactly 70 levels, and that we would be forced to pick a totally different perk at every level. And so by level 70, we would have to have taken the first rank in every perk whether we wanted to or not. The explanation Todd has given, as well as the footage we have all seen, suggests that there is only one 'XP count', and not 71 as you have proposed in your comments.

If the xp doesn't allow you to unlock new perks you wont be able to progress by using it. By what we've seen it looks rather easy to make some modifications and turrets are built in the same way as all the settlement parts which has lot's of parts, you'd gain xp exploring the world for the resources. Crafting and the settlement building is also a side show so not sure if it will be a big xp gain from it as that would make it rather important.

General xp would unlock new perks not necessarily "perk xp" if there even is such a thing. You must have certain levels of the Science! perk to make a laser turrets, for example, and all the necessary parts. Maybe it won't be a "big xp" gain, but you should get some XP for doing it.

I'm pretty sure they'll leave "improve through use" to the Elder Scrolls, and have Fallout work on the more traditional "XP for everything" model. New perks would unlock new opportunities to gain XP, like passing a perk-check in dialog or crafting an item gated behind a perk, and whatnot.

Doing a weird mix of the two would just add an unnecessary layer to character development, and I'm pretty sure Bethesda's goal with overhauling the leveling system in the first place was to keep it all on one layer.

Agreed.

I wonder if they could be talking about some sort of challenge and special perks like Lord of Death in FONV?

I'm kind of hoping they will return.

The bonuses were small enough to be fun but not overpowering and it was always fun to see which challenges you had completed for the current Courier.

I'm not sure about this now. These guys aren't noobs. There's no reason to say there's perk XP if there is no perk XP. I'm getting used to the idea now just for the fact that I can have most of my perks unlocked before level 15 or so.

Unless they're mistaken. Following the links, the quote is attributed to OXM, not Bethesda. So it looks like this could be a case of somebody messing up and the rest of the internet taking that screwup and repeating it ad nauseam.

Even if you only had to purchase the first perk rank with a level up perk and you could use perk XP for the other ranks, it would take you 70 levels to get the first rank of every perk plus you would have to max your stats and that would take another 42 levels.

"According to a Bethesda Representative". Again, these guys aren't some random bloggers. No one with any sense could get it that wrong.

It makes sense to do it that way for several reasons. At higher levels it would take a lot longer to level up meaning that it would take a lot longer to level up a perk. So it wouldn't be worth it to take perks at level 50. Instead you would be better off just increasing the SPECIAL stat and taking the attribute bonuses. Especially for Luck and Perception. If increasing ranks for a perk isn't tied to general leveling then it wouldn't take nearly as a long to rank up a perk at higher levels. So even if you are a 200 hours into the game you would still have character progression that isn't super slow.

"You'll still level up via XP, and each level increase will still give you a point to spend on a perk, but now those perks have varying XP levels of their own," says the Bethesda employee.

I meant just the perks I want not all 28 perks available to me. I only care about 10-15 perks.

Follow the source and you'll see why I have my doubts (besides the quakecon stuff making it sound like a much more straightforward system). Here's a quote from the article linked earlier.

"Speaking to Official Xbox Magazine (interview posted in the latest issue), Bethesda rep said:

'You'll still level up via XP, and each level increase will still give you a point to spend on a perk, but now those perks have varying XP levels of their of their own. It's perk-ception, essentially, and means that, should you theoretically play long enough to max out every tier of every single one gaining untold buffs and no doubt all kinds of horrendous real-world illnesses in the process – you’ll top off with a total of 275.' said OXM.'"

So the Bethesda rep quoted OXM according to the article. The game developer is quoting a magazine to cite what's in the game that the game developer is developing. Seems legit.

Now if we follow its source:

"According to OXM, 'you'll still level up via XP, and each level increase will still give you a point to spend on a perk, but now those perks have varying XP levels of their of their own. It's perk-ception, essentially, and means that, should you theoretically play long enough to max out every tier of every single one gaining untold buffs and no doubt all kinds of horrendous real-world illnesses in the process – you’ll top off with a total of 275."

Notice how it doesn't put this forth as a direct quote from Bethesda itself, and attributes it to the magazine. Also, notice how the first article actually screwed up in formatting its direct quote, which was to this article and not to the OXM article. This article says nothing about this being a quote from a Bethesda employee. That's a liberty taken by the other article, which is very evident because it attributes a quote to them that ends with them saying "said OXM."

I don't have OXM, so I can't see if that quote actually comes directly from Bethesda itself or if its written by the writer of the article. I'm guessing the latter.

Let's just simplify it. Basically you are saying that OXM talked to a Bethesda rep and completely misunderstood what he was saying about how leveling works in the game. That's the sort of boneheaded mistake someone would make who's never played a Fallout game or any other modern RPG before.

And what are you really saying? That there is no Perk XP at all?

The OXM guy does not say that there is perk XP. He says that perks have "XP levels." In this instance, XP is short-hand for "experience", not for "experience points."

Ranks are experience levels (XP levels). A rank 3 Gun Nut is more experienced than a rank 2 Gun Nut. There are no experience points for ranks, just experience levels, which we acquire by claiming additional ranks in perks as we level up.

I like the planning that went in to F4 character advancement.

By level 20 you should have boosted your Sole Survivor's Special stats up enough to reach the 10 to 15 perks that really define him and have taken at least the first rank of each.

But it will take you till level 60 or 70 to acquire all ranks for those 10 to 15 perks and fully max them out.

And 10 to 15 perks is only a small fraction of the 70 perks available.

I would much sooner believe something like this if it was said by a dev during a video interview. The fact that the wording has been interpreted several different ways is a problem in and of itself.

There is no reason to disbelieve it. As we already know, perks have ranks. That is all OXM is saying.

Hmm, that's strangely worded if what you are saying is true.

It really depends on what those perks do. If the first rank of commando is the equivalent of a 20 gun skill then your character is failing miserably at level 20. Same thing with Science! if you are locked out of most of the better weapon mods. I would be lucky to max out 2 or 3 skills by the time I'm at level 20 just because you have to balance the perks you pick at least somewhat. Commando/Rookie, Lifegiver, Toughness, and Science are absolute musts. That doesn't leave much room for anything else when you have to invest 5 perk points into each. Hell, every build would be focused on maxing out the same 3 or 4 perks if it was done like that.

What I mean is the concept of each perk having a separate XP count. This is what many are suggesting due to the wording of the article.

I'm saying taking the poorly written third hand source that was linked as gospel is a mistake. It's clear to me that the person who published that didn't know what they were doing, because there article is a mess. It's also a good example of the clickbait I talked about earlier, and has been used as a source to help spread things (like someone's thread that has been locked). Even the original quote from OXM is poorly written and confused sounding.

As for how I've interpreted the system: On level up you get a perk. Various perks have ranks, meaning that you can level up that perk multiple times. The perks themselves aren't gaining experience and leveling up independently, but working like a lot of the perks in Skyrim did and some perks such as Animal Friend did in previous Fallout games, with new benefits being gained per rank. We already know that perks have ranks, and I don't believe they develop independently of you choosing to unlock a new rank. I'm pretty sure that's the way the system was explained by Todd Howard at Quakecon. There might be some perks that do that similar to the challenges in Fallout 4, but I don't think the major perks in the game do.

Look at the quoted part again. Where does the 275 come from? From an estimated amount of levels that you would have to gain to unlock all the perks in the game (70x3+49=259, plus we know there are some perks that are quest related). You wouldn't need that many levels if the perks gained experience and leveled up independently of your character's level.

As for OXM getting everything wrong in an interview with Bethesda, you're assuming that they actually did interview Bethesda. Remember, the only source for that information coming directly from Bethesda is the third hand knowledge of an article that quotes Bethesda as quoting OXM. I don't know the context of the quote in OXM's actual article. It may not have even been an interview.

Edit: Found scans of the article (not sure if I can post links here due to piracy and whatnot), and turns out it's not an interview, though it does have some quotes from Pete Hines. It also turns out that the passage being quoted here isn't from anyone at Bethesda, but is just the language of the article itself. Are you surprised? I'm surprised. Not really though.

You are right. You wouldn't need to reach 275 if Matty's theory was true. I hope leveling is a lot faster than it was in Fallout 3 because I won't have the perks I need to be maxed until I'm 100+ hours into the game.

I'm positive. The wording is awkward.