Except, that's exactly what BGS is doing. They removed the level cap. You can master everything now. Again, I don't care to master everything. However, I hate the fact that if I do not have a high intelligence, my character will be at a disadvantage. Yes, I can still master a few select skills, or perks in the case of Fallout 4. However, I will have a lot less flexibility and will not have as many choices due to this debilitating fact.

You aren't getting it. I should be able to play how I want. I want to be able to level efficiently irrespective of some arbitrary stat. The problem is intelligence is required to level efficiently, period. That is taking away player choice from me. If I had a choice, I wouldn't put points into intelligence at all. To be quite frank, besides the experience issue, I think it's largely a worthless stat. However, the experience gain is the very reason it is mandatory and far more important than anything else in the SPECIAL system.

That is a lack of choice, not a choice. Forcing the player to have to play a certain way is taking away choice and freedom from their experience. It limits and confines the players to operate on the terms of the developer and not themselves. This isn't about completing the game. This is about having an efficient progression for your character that isn't railroaded by the need of having high intelligence. One final time, I'm not trying to make "an uber-character." I didn't care for half the skills or attributes in Fallout 3. I was still limited, however, based on the fact I had a low intelligence. Outside of a handful of areas, my character was worthless and restricted me from a wide variety of activities in the game.

This isn't about min-maxing. This is about having rational progression in a way that is not impeded by an arbitrary stat.

You are right in that Bethesda encourages player freedom. However, according to what Todd Howard and other employees at BGS have said about the game, they also encourage players to create multiple specialized characters so that they can obtain more replay value as well as form their own experience unique from other players. Thanks to all the multiple items and skills in Fallout 3 and New Vegas, many players have made multiple characters who are proficient at different skills and stats. Seeing as how that all returns in Fallout 4 in some fashion, I highly doubt Bethesda does not want players to enjoy the game in varying perspectives. If encouraging multiple playthroughs was not the goal, then why would the developers create many different weapons, stats, perks, and skills in the first place?

There are some people who enjoy being good at everything for one character and that is fine. Bethesda will give those players that choice. However, I am one who likes it when games place restrictions in certain ways. It helps to make games more challenging and replayable, which what makes games fun for me. If the restrictions of not having a 10 INT character puts you at a disadvantage, so what? Every playstyle has advantages and disadvantages.

Also, I still do not see how INT diminishes player freedom. I could see how some people would view it as the most valuable stat, but I do not understand how that restricts the ability to play the way you want. Requiring 10 Intelligence to max out all skills is just like how 10 Strength is necessary to get the highest possible melee power, or how 10 Agility is required to be the best at stealthy gameplay. Also, i am familiar with Intensive Training. Using that multiple times can increase all of your stats to 10, but you end up missing out on many good perks such as Ninja, Laser Commander, and Commando. With that said, even someone with 10 INT still cannot max out a character in every single way. Fallout 4 might make this possible, but it might take a very long time to accomplish a 100% Mastery character seeing as how its level would have to be very high. I don't see many players even using characters long enough to achieve that.

Also, if you had issues playing low INT characters in previous games, then that is your fault. You can still get your skills to higher levels in the games, but it will simply take a longer time to do so. You're not meant to tackle every problem at the exact moment you come across them. If your lockpick skill is not high enough to walk into a room, then leave the area and return once your level is high enough. For me at least, I always had enough patience to level up skills to access areas of the game that were once previously blocked off. If I unable to access something with my character, then I would simply do so with another character. As I said previously, restrictions make it so that each character you make has a experience different from the others. What you are suggesting would hand out more rewards for less work and patience.

Perhaps if you grind away, well past the main game. But that is still a choice to play for that long. It is something that is actively done to continue leveling up. So, not the case of just accidentally maxing out, as in my post.

Play how you want, sure. but there have to be rules. Sorry. I'm not mad at that.

My point is BGS wants people to play the game as they choose. They aren't encouraging a single playthrough over multiple playthroughs or vice versa. More than likely, most of the gamers who will buy Fallout 4 will only play through it once and never touch it again. Those who mod, make multiple characters, or play the game for hundreds and hundreds of hours are the minority and not the norm by any stretch of the word.

As far as providing "different weapons, stats, perks, and skills," that has more to do with appealing to as many different playstyles as possible and not necessarily encouraging re-playability by making multiple characters. Some players only care to make stealth characters. Some only care to make tanks or melee wielders. Some want to focus on crafting or science. The game gives players the choice to play how they want, but it's not about necessarily going back to make a dozen different characters. That's largely a roleplay thing, which is a minority of the community.

The difference is that having maximum strength or maximum agility only affects that one area of progression. Maximum intelligence affects everything because of the experience gain. It's the difference between just getting a standard license to drive a car, versus having a license to drive or pilot any vehicle, whether its a motorcycle, tank, aircraft, boat, etc. That is why a "low intelligence character" is so incredibly wasteful and will lead to an unenjoyable experience. This has been somewhat resolved by the removal of a level cap, but a high intelligence character is still the way to go.

How would that lead to an unenjoyable experience? Is it because you won't able to proficiently tackle every single situation early in the game? Playing a high INT character is not necessary to enjoy or beat the game. The ONLY time it would be necessary is if you want to max out your perks/skills as soon as possible while acquiring whatever perks and skills are associated with that stat. I've played many characters with each having certain skills or stats they were lacking in. I also experimented with one "jack-of-all-trades" character. With each character, my level of enjoying the game did not differ in any way and I managed to beat 3 and NV with every single one of them. If my characters were not able to pick a certain lock or persuade a specific NPC, then I was content with that because I did not design them to be skilled in that respective stat or skill. Since I enjoy roleplaying, I would either increase the skills the character lacked in or use other characters to access areas which my others could not. This made it so each of my playthroughs introduced me to new and unique experiences. If you were not able to beat the game with low INT characters then you did something horribly wrong and that is entirely your fault.

To address your license anology, you are right that those with multiple licenses to drive a large array of vehicles do have more versatility than those who only have a class C license for driving cars. However, some people do not have any desire to obtain licenses for planes, boats, or motorcycles. They are content with their class C license and are able to get by just fine in life. It's not as if they are unable to lead fulfilling lives just because they are not certified to fly a plane.

If leveling up fast and being able to tackle every situation are the only ways you can enjoy the game, then by all means, max out Intelligence. If you don't care about level progression and want to play as a stealth sniper, then don't max out Intelligence. Choosing one playstyle over the other will not block you from playing the game. I will be making a high intelligence character for Fallout 4, but not for the purpose of speeding through the leveling process. I simply want to design a pseudo genius who uses energy weapons and is good at science, medicine, and crafting. Each playstyle has their own advantages and disadvantages. Without those, there is no true distinction between them and it hampers the desire to create unique characters. It almost sounds like you want to do whatever you want without experiencing any drawbacks whatsoever.

EDIT: I also want to add that you don't seem to understand that Intelligence does not directly affect all the stats, but the rate in which you may develop them. Lets say that you maximized Intelligence to 10. Even doing that, you still must invest points in the actual stats themselves to fully maximize your character. Otherwise, you are locked out of high level perks. If you wanted to increase the Stealth perk which requires 4 in Agility, then you could max it out. However, you still need to raise Agility to 10 to max out Sneak as that stat is what governs the Stealth perk. You could use points to increase your stats instead of perks, but you end up occurring an opportunity cost in doing so, as that point you spent to increase Strength could have been used to boost the Science perk.

One of the things I'm excited about is that by using Special Stats as the basics for your chance to succeed with VATS, stealth, persuasion, and the like, Builds actually matter and matter the entire game.

If you start the game with a one in Agility and don't spend any perks to raise it or to improve your stealth, than your chance to sneak will be about the same at the of the game as at the start.

No more starting the game with a one Charisma and ending it with a 100% in Speech and Barter.

Every Sole Survivor should play very differently if you have the will to not max out their stats.

My first play though will be an former soldier that used the GI bill to get a degree in computer science who is a real survivor favoring small arms and heavy weapons (high Perception decent Charisma and enough Int to get hacking).

My second play though will be Nora as a very intelligent Power Armor engineer favoring energy weapons (high Int and Luck with low Charisma).

My 2 cents on the whole delete Inteligence thing................nope, dont do that.

Without the whole S.P.E.C.I.A.L system, the core of what is fallout is gone, you would litterly turn it from a semi-RPG into fullblown FPS. (it's FPS'ie enought thank you )

As for playing a mentaly challenged player character, i doubt it. Funny thing about emancipation and social evolution, we seem to get less and less tollerant instead of more. While quiping jokes about mentally challenged individuels was fine 10-20 years ago, nowadays you cant make a single joke without someone, somewhere on this green earth taking offense at it. Most Dev's thus dont/fear putting such things in. Even in FO3 and FNV the low intelligence speech options were like 4 out of 6000 dialog options, so you only rarely saw the result of being low int. in a conversation. In FO1 and FO2, low intelligence had tremendous effect on conversations and quests, to the point of not being able to finish said quests because you were to dumb to be taken serious.

Right now there are people playing and anticipating new games in a classic RPG series that believe this.

u are over rating INT to much, i never max out my Int on any of my Fallout 3 characters, and still i was a god, removing Skills that it wasnt remove it just a more active system, where it auto level base on how much u use a skill, isnt the same as removing a main stat that what do is to give u a bigger amount on exp u get and probably on this new Fallout game will speed on with u get new skill levels when u use something.

INT not only is part of the main "core" of the game, but have work that way on most RPG or action RPG since i been playing game.

Min/Maxing isn't for everyone.