I'm a loot-monger. If Grandma has a gun I need- It's mine.

I don't waste karma on tin cans and a few caps however. Pushing your karma too far in either direction had direct consequences that made your life more difficult.

All you people talking about being good...yeah...just wait till you see how that nice, old lady owns a unique comic.

I agree - well, kind of (don't go around stealing stuff I can loot when killing any raider - I am more inclined towards stealing things that only the really well off and powerful have in Fallout (Energy weapons and the corresponding ammunition, guns you have a hard time getting, types of armor (including power armor and stuff like chinese stealth armor) etc.)) I don't bother stealing food (then again: I don't play hardcoe - don't want the tedium/be in a situation I might have to do this as I am kind of a goody two shoes in video games (good almost to a fault but ruthless if betrayed and terrifying for certain kind of enemies (raiders, criminals, slavers...))

greetings LAX

ps: No I would not steal less if characters got depressed over it (as those I steal from would not lose enough to warrant getting depressed...come on the BOS will not get depressed if I "liberate" a few things from an armory (they might not like it but they will not all die just because there are a few things missing -.-))

When I play I'm usually telling myself a story. Many times I've tried to play an evil character, but I never succeed. The simple fact is that in order for me to enjoy someone's story I have to actually like them and the more sleazy things they do, the less likable they are to me. My evil characters all get abandoned.

Quite an intriguing thought that you brought up. I never really thought about compassion really. Considering it properly it just did not came up in the previous games and I think a revamp is in order to really make a difference and enhance the roleplaying character.

First of all, while I think the Karma system is a good thing to indicate good and evil things it is not nearly complex enough to mimic any kind of alignment you might have. Yeah you lose karma each time you steal something that is considered owned, but the system is not context sensitive. Let us say I help the people of Goodsprings to get rid of the Powder Gangers by forming a militia, then I have a good standing with Goodsprings and a worse with the Powder Gangers. My Karma likely went up too. Then I kill all the powdergangers in the prison, and my karma goes up even more, but if I take their stuff my Karma goes down again. That is counterintuitive.

Furthermore I arrive at Goodsprings, I steal everything I need, but people do not seem to be able to connect me with the thefts. Same with stealth kills or similar things, I appear in an area and people are killed. But nobody gets suspicious and my reputation does not lower (yet my Karma does). I do not want to make the system overly complex, but a bit more differentiating would be nice. Plus if I help Goodsprings and Primm with a couple of more quests, why does my standing with the Powder Gangers not decrease and vice versa?

What I would do is connect Karma with reputation locally. So you steal or kill in a location and people react there by change in reputation. Also you could flag some itmes or persons as being particularly poor, so stealing from them decreases Karma more.

I would also seperate Good and Evil Karma from each other. This always irked me. When I blow up Megaton for negative Karma and then kill Alistair Tenpenny and Roy Philipps settle in the tower for good Karma, this does not make me neutral. This makes me, in D&D alignment, chaotic evil. You do not become neutral by weighing up bad stuff with good deeds. This is a fact. A true neutral would defuse the bomb because it is a danger to him and a he is offered a reward. A good person would do it solely to help Megaton, and even an evil choice would let it blow up.

What I am saying is that, whilst travelling the Wasteland you will do stuff that is the right thing to do for you, yet people do not seem to react properly and that is because the system is too simple.

If they didn't want it stole they should leave it on the ground

Yeah! or in that locked safe I need the exp from!

First thing i did in FNV?......................Steal the Revolver in that shot glass. No i dont realy think about the npc involved at all, i steal what i need and when i need, even from npc's that i consider friends. There is for me no emotional or rational connection to doing it, unlike in real life where i dont steal. (cause the one time i did it i felt bad for a week consience wise, ......he i was a kid. )

Now if they added some feedback to stealing from a npc that had actual impact on you as a player, beyond the "their pissed at me" attitude, then i might think twice about it. But in the end i realy doesnt matter much to me.

That's the spirit!

Some day, after games are fully integrated into our lives, an electronic crime will be a crime in real life.

Fetch, Dog!

You're implying that they already are not! A false implication...

http://frequentspew.com/2015/10/20/9-people-arrested-for-cheating-in-starcraft-2/

Although I doubt stealing in a single player game would ever be a crime.

What a world, eh?

I'm with Yhatze on this one
"Games have spent the last 20 years ingraining into me the instinct that being the stalwart hero of the land over rules societies petty ownership laws" ZP

Depends on the personality of the NPC. If they're cool and treat me with respect, they're good. If not, I'm taking everything. If I'm role playing an antagonist or grey area character, my character may even kill the NPC when he or she feels that NPC no longer serves a purpose for existing.

As a side note, I hope Fallout 4 does away with negative karma for stealing. Especially if no one is around to witness the theft. It's pretty lame to get negative karma in those type of occurrences.

Your idea could be interesting for a philosophical essay. But I role play evil characters, staying in character She wouldn't care any dramatic stuff shoehorned to her. And it would be so tiresome that I probably ended killing instead of stealing to don't listen npc. Ideas such that sounds cool for good characters that never steal or murder so when They did a scene like you describe could be cool. But if your character is a black widow cannibal that steal and cheat using 10 charisma everyone. That drama stuff would be a problem each five seconds a drama npc ... It would be less annoying kill them all. And I don't like that my character is an evil cannibal but she is subtle, she uses charisma and fake being a normal citizen in the city. Until she blow up Megaton because tempeny tower it was more luxurious and she always get lost in the Megaton maze labyrinth.

My guy will steal once in awhile. He was kind of a thief before the bombs fell, so old habits die hard.

My bad guy character, interestingly enough, wont be a thief at all. Hes a genius. He doesnt steal. He'll figure out another way to get what he wants. (Also, if the persons dead, its not really stealing)

My Characters always end up turning a bit Klepto, despite best intentions

Playing FO3 the first time, I never intended to become a thieving scumbag but when exploring the house Silver was staying in, well I had to investigate it properly you know?

Unfortunately she caught me poking around and whipped out her pistol and it all went south after that.

In FO4 I`ll no doubt be attracted to anything shiny, and ammo especially. Will I kill for it though? that`s the question.

As for NPC reactions and whether I would feel guilt, it would be brilliant if you saw them react accordingly. I could well feel guilty seeing an NPC hanging from their ceiling after nicking their prize stuff.

In Skyrim, there`s that certain quest via the Dark Brotherhood that can send a certain NPC over the edge and commit suicide after all the tragedy she`s had to experience with her family.

That made me feel bad and I applauded the Devs for doing that.

It depends singly on the mindset and personality and circumstance of the PC I was playing at the time. What I would do in the same situation doesn't really factor into it ~it's not me in the situation.

I think it could be superb... A welcome return to form ~sorely missed, for the series. No I don't expect it to happen. This would impinge on the player's illusion of unfettered freedom; them not being able to have their cake and eat it too.

I usually play as moral characters, with the exception of the Thieves guild and Dark Brotherhood in TES. Those are usually characters created for the specific role. The exception would be skill books in the Fallout and Elder Scrolls games ~ even some of my morale characters 'borrow' the books to read.

I like the idea of stealing having consequences in the game. Even more, I would like the idea of being able to barter for an item we want to get from an NPC. Fallout New Vegas did this with some quests, and it was really nice to have different options for obtaining quest items.

There were a couple of quests in Skyrim where your character is sent to steal a skill book (not Thieves guild quests), though when you take the quest you have no idea it is to steal. This was a bit frustrating. Usually there are copies of the book elsewhere in the world but the quest marker would lead you to the stolen one. Also opening locked chests is considered a crime, while taking stuff from an unlocked chest in the same room is not? Morality is a bit fickle in an RPG.

Steal, steal, steal. That's how I generally play Fallout. Sneaky little bastard.

But it can get boring when it's so easy to steal. There was lots of stuff in the Silver Rush lying about, by crouching in certain positions you could nick most of it, despite the fact it'd be blindingly obvious what you were up to. The guards would blatantly be able to see you, yet there you are crouching awkwardly behind the owner shoving plasma rifles in your pockets like they're going out of fashion.

If I'm saving the world, it's funds for the greater good. One should be happy with living even when they're missing a couple hundred caps. They can think of it as taxes paid to the only one giving a damn about them.

What's absurd is a couple vendors on top of a cursed cathedral which houses the very devil that is about to bring hell to everyone and they're scamming the only volunteer who can save their bacon.

Guards in Bethesda rpgs are only for protect chickens from harm. If you kill half a village guards maybe notice it if they watch you doing it sometimes there are blind. But in the moment you touch a chicken they enter in patrol mode, In my first play of Skyrim at beginning i killed a chiken in Riverwood well all guards pursuit me almost to reach Whiterun. Chicken > people for Bethesda moral

I steal everything from everyone on my most moral characters. I also collect food I never end up eating. Yes kids are starving outside and yes I have over 200 squirrels on sticks I never share. Honesty until I read this I never thought about the morality of it all.


Still gonna do it.

In the TES games I looted everything not bolted down except items with a big red STEAL against them. It wasn't out of any sense of doing what was right or wrong though. It was in case I accidentally did something to raise the ire of the guards where I'd pay a 50 or 100 septim fine and lose anything marked as stolen from my inventory. Like a certain Gold Dragon Claw that you can only get back if you use the console commands.