To fix that you could have Charisma affect Speech checks as well. Just because I can't hack a Terminal doesn't mean I can't [censored] my way into the situation by say having a high speech skill. And just because I'm repulsive doesn't mean I couldn't convince someone that I can.

Well i had lots of speech skill in fallout new vegas as in fallout 3, but i realised that even i had speech option to avoid something i would rather kill him with my guns as its more fun.

Lots of those are useless, like first aid, traps, throwing, doctor..i never used those skills. Expecially traps i dont even know what it does or is that skill any use. Its good that bethesda combined it with explosives as it was pointless to have so focused skill that was basically completely useless. Also doctor and first aid into Medicine was great move too.
Steal and sneak was also smart thing to combine into one sneak skill.

Basically they merged all useless skills to more useful skills.

And i think that speech skill merging to charisma attribute would improve gameplay too.

First Aid would be like what Medicine is now, it decides how well you can treat others with chemical components like Stimpaks or drugs and allows you to fix hp-values instantly.
While Doctor would be about how well you can heal broken limbs, internal bleedings and other NPC-injuries.
Traps would be about how well you can see, disarm, avoid setting off, crafting and planting traps. With a low Traps skill then a lot of traps would be completely invicible to you and you're going to walk straight into a lot of them, while with a high Traps skill you have a better % in disarming and avoiding setting them off.

All of those could work perfectly fine with the newer game design.

Only one that is hard is Throwing.
Needs more throwing weapons, and grenades have to be either Throwing or a split between Explosives and Throwing.
But it could still work.

[Charisma 10] Me, you and a romantic picnic in the fields.
...
[Charisma 2] *Creates forum thread*
[Charisma 1] You! [Gender]! Food! Give me or I...Smahs purdy flowers!

[Intelligence 10] Nice try, but everyone knows Haggis and neeps with a side of Scotch isn't a romantic picnic!

@Vajan- I'm not quite sure what you're getting at.

Yes, it's quite clear that I didn't articulate my point and what you said is pretty much in line with the point I was trying to make.

Let's separate two things: the Speech skill and Speech tests.

In New Vegas, the new spin on speech tests were a great change, moving away from percentages and requiring the user to have a particular SPECIAL, perk, or skill high enough to pass it. However, New Vegas also gave the user two ways to pass it in most cases.

Let's take asking for more money for whatever task for instance. Almost always you could achieve that with either a high barter or high speech. Another example, convincing the bar owner of a plan to snuff out the Powder Gangers in the first town. You could either pass a speech test or sneak test. So while speech was a good standby, you could in many cases get around using it.

Now let's talk about RP:
Does it make sense for someone with a Charisma of 1 to be the most clever, skillfully persuasive talker just because they're speech skill is high? Not at all. If your intelligence is 1, and your science is low (although why would it be?), how could you possibly come up with a plan that involves technical know-how just because you're a good talker? So removing the speech skill doesn't hurt RPing, it actually improves it. Barter becomes much more important (especially if they reducing how easy it is to make a fortune) and Charisma becomes more important to if you place speech test directly dependent on that.

There is another option though that involves keeping the Speech skill and it's returning to the mentality of Fallout 1 and 2 (mind you I'd still like to stay away from percentages), where speech tests can only be passed with the use of the speech skill. This is an ok option, but I'd still like my first proposal more. Also, I want to point out that I said remove the speech skill to make room for more skills. I want to see more skills, not less.

I think it could've offered some interesting opportunities with the NV speech thresholdsystem if, when persuading someone to your will with other than logic reasoning (e.g. give me more money from this task), it still, after the thresholdcheck, would've allowed for a slight - only slight - chance for failure based on the characters disposition towards you, or your charisma, or something like that. So as to represent a momentary whim from the NPC's part. That would've made the NPC's feel more alive - more human - through reasonable (but not excessive) amount of added randomness in their behavior.

I do think that the SPECIAL system needs to become more important and directly involved with skills then choosing how high they are. Though Speech is still completely necessary because its mostly about bluffing your way past situations.

That's exactly my point. Speech is the one skill you can use to circumvent all of these other skills so you don't need Sneak to convince Trudy, you don't need the evidence to convince Swank of Benny's adventures, you don't need Medicine to convince Doc Mitchell to give you some Stimpaks, you can use Speech to bluff your way past all of these obstacles.

Absolutely not, Speech was an exceptionally valuable skill in places where the writing is heavy like in Dead Money or Lonesome Road. Besides, it should always have a place as the alternative to fighting through the end game areas.

Yeah but no matter what you do, your success chance with ex-wives is 0%.

Always keep it in. It's the first thing I max so I can talk my way out of situations I stupidly got involved in, at least till I'm strong enough to fight my way out. I prefered the FO3 version to FO:NV though. There's always a chance something I say could resonate with a character, so why my speech skill being 19 means I don't get a chance, while 20 persuades a person completely is laughable.

The problem with the percentage chance in Fallout 3 is that it's very open to exploitation. One thing I did a lot in Fallout was save just before a conversation and reload if I failed. The set Speech amounts in New Vegas don't allow any exploitation.

What I'd like for Fallout 4 is if there's neither a "[Speech 45%] Blah blah" nor a "[Speech 38/55] blah blah". Of course you're not gonna pick that speech option in FNV if you know you're not gonna pass it, and in Fallout 3, of course you're not gonna pick it with that low of a chance but it's still a much higher chance you'll succeed than in FNV, where the chance would be 0.

Dunno how to change this system, as by removing the showing you the chance and just having "[Speech] blah blah" would piss people off, them not knowing if there's a great risk of failing or not. Guess you could go with the old system where the speech options doesn't even show up if you don't have the required skill... but I still like the stupid options you get sometimes, like when you talk to House and you can say "Then I guess you're, uh, chip out of luck" or something and he replies "Is that an attempt at... humor?". It's just that people would never pick them because you only get bad reactions :/ It'd be funny if speech options like these could actually be more desirable or people are fooled to pick them, hehe. Oh, how I love the Stupid Speech options in Fallout 2, like saying "You big meanie! Me gonna have big party with cake and ice cream and clowns and me not invite stupid mean people like you!" or something, that line is just gold! (too bad the NPC doesn't react to it, just like being stupid in FNV at Helios One with that FotA guy. "Pizza!")

I'd say let people exploit it if they want. It's their experience they're changing. I'll play it straight, with the consequences, how other people do it doesn't matter to me.

A bumbling fool with very low speech skill should still have a chance of persuading someone. It's got to be very unlikely. But occasionally fools will come out with some wisdom that might sway someone. I'd actually take it further and have certain responses based on how good your speech/intelligence is. Ranging from 'You know your stuff, clearly yours is a talented mind!', to 'It has taken a simple fool to show me the err of my ways' (something like that, you get the jist).

[censored] no.

I don't think that people who don't put points into Speech should be allowed to complete Speech checks. It undermines the one use of the skill, by allowing a person with Speech skill of 10 to persuade just as many people as a person with a Speech skill of 100.

The way I see it is that someone with a Speech skill of 100 should be a Nick Naylor(http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0427944/) and someone with a Speech skill of 10 should have the persuasive capacity of a http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Pinus_nigra_cone.jpg.

I agree that a completely new Speech system would be ideal, but I think New Vegas' system is far better then Fallout 3's.

My favourite response to a dumb PC:
"Most people have evil spirits. You? You have stupid spirits. Go see shaman, get hole in head... Big hole... Very big... Huge" - Sulik

That's the thing, you wouldn't have the same chance to suceed even if you both get the same options. You as a 100 speech player should have a far easily time completing a check than I as a 20 speech check player(I normally put mine to 100 as soon as possible anyway when I play) should. I just don't think I shouldn't have a shot at getting it right. It's more that it annoys me that if you're right at the required value for a speech check, it's all dandy. If you're one measly point below it, it's like 'Lol, shut up foo' '. That's not right in my eyes.

Sure, it's possible to exploit it, but let people do what they want with their own copy.

A person with 10 Speech certainly doesn't have the persuasive ability of a person with 100 Speech skill, but they do both have the ability to complete every single Speech check which completely undermines the usefulness of the skill. A person would never have to put a single point into Speech, but still be able to get every single Speech check. I find this unacceptable for a Fallout and incredibly unfair.

A percentage check is just one example of Bethesda's attempt at Elder Scrollizing Fallout. A percentage check allows anyone to get a check, one thing that Bethesda hates is blocking allowing people from doing things. A fixed check does what Fallout does amazingly well, it gives consequences for your actions. If you had low Intelligence in the originals a lot of missions would be cut off because people just wouldn't talk to you, if you had a low Speech then you'd only get the basic responses. Obsidian pushed New Vegas more towards the originals with the fixed check because it blocks things off based on your choice as a character. These consequences based on character choice add huge amounts of variety.

No, speech should stay. I believe however that it should be expanded on. I love Speech and when I convince bosses to step down, it's a sweet victory (Yeah, I'm talking to you, Lanius). Also convincing both the Overseer and Amata that it was Alphonse/rebels who ruined the Vault was priceless (and I did it without saving and reloading).

I guess we're just not going to agree on this! I do see where you're coming from, I just think everyone should have a chance. With the lesser people having an extremely reduced chance. Maybe even for example an anti cheat thing like on the gambling in NV.

Speech should be expanded, especially when made by Bethesda.

Why especially, that's like the opposite.

Like others already said: Speech should be expanded.

I'd like to see checks which require more than just one skill / attribute.

Examples:
Charisma: 7 + Speech: 50
Intelligence: 7 + Science: 75 + Speech: 30
Intelligence: 6 + Medicine: 50
etc.

What do you think about that?

It would make sense to do this. Not only does it give an even greater importance to Speech, but it also adds another degree of realism. A person might know a lot about Explosives, but he'd also have to be a fairly savvy speaker to convey how much he knows.

Why should a gun nut be forced to have speech if he knows the ins and outs of every gun ever made? Why should (s)he have to have a silver tounge to talk about weapons?
I don't like it, at all, having X or Y on the other hand could work, but I'd hate it for the game to use a lot of X AND Y.
Those moments should be rare, not the status quo.

Same with other things, even if I can't even persuade a bum to give me some information and my charisma is so low that people in bars actually spit on me, then why should it affect my medical knowledge? Why should the game demand I have X and Y to use Z when Z is at 100 (Z being Medicine).

So no, I don't like it.