One minor yet important aspect of Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas was the inaccessibility of power armor early on in both games. In Fallout 3, you had to complete a substantial portion of the main questline and reach the Citadel to gain the power armor training perk (or the Operation Anchorage add-on) . In Fallout New Vegas, you actually have to complete an optional questline with the Brotherhood of Steel to unlock the power armor training perk.

I didn't find either to be exceptionally gratifying, as in Fallout 3 you just ask and the screen fades to black. At least in Fallout New Vegas you somewhat earn it as you join the ranks of the Brotherhood of Steel instead of being made an honorary member haphazardly. However, it appears as if this system has possibly been removed entirely from Fallout 4.

As you all know, power armor is a type of "vehicle" now instead of just a special suit of armor that requires a perk to wear. The reason I question whether a power armor training perk is still in the game is because you gain access to power armor extremely early. This is seen in the game play footage from E3 where the protagonist is first introduced to Preston Garvey.

If I'm not mistaken, with the exception of Codsworth and perhaps the dog, Preston Garvey is one of the first companions the Sole Survivor encounters early on in the game. It's also shown as a way of helping Garvey that the player must use power armor to fend off approaching raiders. Whether this armor set is then given to the player is an entirely different question. However, unless Garvey is ex-BOS, it does not appear power armor training is necessary to use power armor.

If this is in fact the case and we are given access to power armor very early on in its new iteration, what are the community's views on this? Personally, I liked that power armor was somewhat inaccessible, even if the perk was an arbitrary way of showing its rarity and power. If power armor is something we just gain early on in the story, the impact of achieving it won't be nearly as memorable.

Judging by the Microsoft demo, as early as level 2, lore wise I suspect the hinted military background of our protagonist is going to be the way beth explains why, basically we have PA training by default. Of course it′s clear beth will not allow us to use PA 24/7 unlike the old games, so far we seen hints of a battery life mechanic and of course the fact the PA has it′s own health system means we might get a hefty "repair bill" if we use it to often.

There might also be other limiters, one things clear in my book, it is not the go to, end all end game piece of gear it′s been a previous Fallout, now it′s a situational tool, like the car in Borderlands.

Edit: also we do not know if we get to keep the PA in working condition once the mission is over, for all we know it might just be a mission specific taste of power.

Maybe we need training, maybe we don't.

Personally I'm fine with it either way. I don't plan on living in the thing. It's like one of those things I break out for special occassions when I know the thunder is going to be brought. Or it's the me who is bringing the thunder.

I kind of look at it like I do the hidden sniper rifle behind megaton in 3. I get it super early but it's in crap condition. I likely won't be able to use it much and it'll be a while before I find something as powerful. At least that's what I'm hoping for in terms of balance. Maybe we just won't find another PA again for a while?

I don't think you need to worry about that. Beth would never let you have PA early on in the game. As I mentioned in another thread, there's a number of explanations for what you see in the demo.

• Todd Mode. Todd basically just gave him whatever perks he needs to us the PA.
• Quest specific perk. You can use the PA for the purpose of this quest, but will lose it after.
• That quest is way further into the game than the demo let's you think.

I never used PA in FO3/NV, so take this with a grain of salt, I suppose .....

Personally, I find the whole "vehicle" style to be more "special" than it just being another suit of armor. But that's a separate issue from a training perk.

As for inaccessibility - yeah, it seems like Uber Gear should be something you have to earn / only find later in a game / etc. Whether that's perk restricted, plot restricted, level restricted... is an issue for each game to handle in it's own way. On the other hand, the PA in FO4 may be limited in other ways - you may need energy cells (which are hard to find early on), you may need to repair the suit from that intro mission (so, get to try it and understand why it's cool, then get presented with a "and now you need to quest in order to get it back" situation), etc. We'll see.

(Fallout 3 eventually made PA relatively quick to get, via Operation Anchorage. Do the DLC storyline, get a fancy suit of PA + the training.)

I doubt they specially coded the demo so a level 1-2 guy could run through a mid/late game town of raiders, so this point I strongly doubt.

The US had been at war for over a decade and most of the population would have probably served in some way simply to provide the numbers to garrison the US, occupy Canada and invade mainland China. Its very easy therefore to expect that a pre-war cyro frozen protagonist would have served in the military and would have a basic knowledge of Power Armor, in F3 and FNV it makes sense that the Lone Wanderer and Courier wouldn't have had prior experience with Power Armor, for a pre-war veteran not so much.

In Todd Mode you can go wherever you want, whenever you want.

I assume todd mode also armed the raiders with clearly early game guns, as well as somehow changed the quest so we got a clearly early game energy weapon (the laser musket) for this "late game" quest ;p

my theory is that the power armor breaks down after the fight and although you get to keep it.. its in a crap condition and needs repairs before it can be used (needing you to collect parts thruout the wasteland) i mean you do go thru a bunch of bandits and deathclaws with it.. its bound to be in terrible shape after that.

Well, this is a demo, so none of it really has to follow the typical progression, was my point.

You mean the "CHARGE FASTER FOR GOD'S SAKE" gun?

A demo of the full game, as one can expect this close to launch.


Mhm, personally I like it, gives the same satisfying feeling of challenge as using a bolt action rifle in short-mid range combat.

Well I was watching this thing on Youtube, Top 9 Changes to Fallout's combat with a rep from BSG...

And the guy said "We're not saying you start with an alliance with the Brotherhood, as the one you get is piecemealed in your garage..."

So I'm taking this statement to mean maybe the one in that one mission get's busted up, but leaves us with the inspiration to make a new one.

Since its powered by a source it could just simply be "out of juice" at the end of the fight and you wont get another power supply until later in the game..that way you get a nice moment in the game without any imbalance.

In Todd mode you could run through the Bleak Falls Barrow demo with highly advanced perks

Piss on PA...Don't plan on using it. But IMO there should be training, really hope Beth doesn't take the easy way out and just give it to the PC just because he was a soldier at one point.

The demo is in concord, and concord is literally just right past the gas station, the gas station is literally just past your old house, which is literally down the hill from the vault.

Also the protag is a veteran and if we assume the other leaks are true only the male protag can use the power armor in this mission. Either way the husband and wife could both have been military and both have had PA training either for mechanical or combat purposes.

The armor gets banged up pretty bad in the mission, i wouldnt be suprised if we had to toat it back to the garage and fix it up.

Even so, with a full game it's easy to use the console to set up a situation that won't happen in normal gameplay.

Just open the console, set the player's stats high but leave the level alone (no need to waste time going through all the perk-picking and levelling up stuff, and enemies will have low-level weapons based on the low player level), set any specific perks needed, start the quest and warp to the location.

Game testers will be doing this sort of stuff all the time, and recording a demo is much easier if you create a fake situation where survival and success are guaranteed.

I'm not saying we won't get access to the Power Armour early - just that the demo alone isn't evidence that we will .

You are making a huge assumption there buddy.

For one, "Todd Mode" is just Todd Howard making himself a god so he doesn't die in a demo.

Secondly, I already mentioned that the power armor may just be temporary use for that one mission.

Lastly, I can confirm that is definitely near the start of the game. Script leaks and comments from BGS developers have made that abundantly clear. Using power is obviously part of the plot of that early mission.

This would actually make a lot of sense. In fact, I'm inclined to believe rebuilding the power armor may actually be a large part of the game if you decide to go that route. Especially since the variety in power armor seems to be more vast than any other Fallout game, I'm expecting this will be quite a huge experience in the game.

I too am under the impression you'll likely have to repair the suit over time after its first official use. More than likely, as with other games, the power armor is a tease to show the player things to come later in the game.

If you've ever watched BGS demo games before, you'd know that their "demos" are actually the finished game. Todd certainly turned on god mode so he would not die, but the story and plot and level are all really early on. The same was the case with Skyrim in Bleak Falls Barrow. The same was the case with Oblivion in Kvatch. BGS always shows a quest that takes place really early in the game.

Mhmm... Yes and No. I have become more spectical with their demos after Oblivion. With Skyrim and Fallout 3 things are better. Let us say ... there have been less changes to the finally product. But we have seen actually so little from F4 that it is a bit difficult to say anything really.

Maybe it's a trial and error kind of thing? Like Tony Stark trying to figure out the Iron Man suit.

I always wondered why you couldn't do this with the Power Armour from FO3 and FO:NV. Although it would have been more like a skill and as the skill increased the armour would become more effective.

Edit: Sort of like armour use skill in game systems like Alternity.

I don't think you understand. When BGS shows off a "demo" of their games, the actual game is already content complete. At that point, they are just bug fixing and polishing. Todd Howard even stated that the "demo" of Skyrim was the actual game. Everything was there. BGS doesn't waste time or resources making special demos for gaming conventions. I can guarantee you they took footage from the finished game and spliced together what they wanted.

That's an interesting concept. Could you elaborate on that more? I have a general sense of what you may be suggesting.