Agreed!

It's still your choice. You know how bad AI is, so you compensate for it, and the companion might still die, because of you.

That's babysitting; I'd much rather just play the game than have to constantly worry about my companion getting killed for some stupid reason. And doesn't it completely defeat the purpose of companions to leave them behind in dangerous scenarios?

Bethesda's talked about their logic for making companions essential. And it's pretty much the same reason any game where the party members actually matter doesn't let them die outside of story scenarios. Nothing interesting from a narrative standpoint actually happens from random companion death - you just lose out on a ton of companion content (and Bethesda is actually trying to make their characters interesting this time, to boot). Sure, you can make up interesting narratives for your character on companion death - but does Bethesda really need to cater to that crowd? They seem fully capable of taking care of the storytelling themselves, and it would be at the cost of everyone else who doesn't give a damn - not to mention, we'd no doubt have to deal with companion deaths in our RPs multiple times, even on the same character, and I imagine that just gets old.

(1) It ruins any kind of challenge and turns into more of a waiting game. Dogmeat and Piper will eventually defeat that Super Mutant while you, Howard/Nora, hide behind a rock. Just give them time and -- oh drat, they fell unconscious again. Eventually.

(2) It ruins the roleplaying. What if I had Nora fall in love with Piper and in their first heated battle against a Deathclaw, Piper dies and Nora barely escapes with her life? For RP purposes, that would make for a great character development sequence. What kind of outlook would Nora get after that? Will she become jaded, prefer to work alone and focus more on stealth and surprise?

(3) It ruins the immersion. Gameplay/storyline aside, this is a game series about survival, about trying to make it one more day in a blasted wasteland. Anyone can die, even Howard/Nora. So to see your companion just crumple into a coma for a few seconds and spring back up kind of makes you wonder why they aren't fighting every enemy faction themselves. I mean, they can't die, right? Why don't we just give them all our gear and let them take care of business?

Though for me personally, I don't really care one way or another. I just want them to have better AI and learn how to avoid easily avoidable deaths.

That's not babysitting. The companion AI doesn't svck THAT MUCH. People are just exaggerating.

Nothing interesting happens? Of course, if you completely ignore that the slideshow changes and that the loss of companion quest is a change itself.

Bethesda only needs to make AI better and leave them not essential. If people have so many problems why not just shove one of those 100 stimpaks (because yes, you will have 100 stimpaks) on them once or twice? It's not like companions like Fawkes needed that much help anyway: and since we're talking about him, do you remember how strong they were? That, and imagine it if they couldn't die.

At least mortal companions will make you do something. And I'm judging this thinking about Fallout 3 and Skyrim, where anything wasn't hard at all.

I don't think anyone who seriously cares about role-playing or immersion is just going to wait in a corner while their companion spends half an hour whittling down a Super Mutant Master between getting incapacitated - and that's assuming that they get up on their own, and aren't KO'd for the rest of the battle or until we Stimpak 'em.

And yes, nothing interesting happens when a companion dies. They just die. New Vegas's slide-show entries were something, I'll give you that, but they didn't make it "worth it" to forge ahead without reloading. The loss of a companion quest is one hell of a lame change, too; maybe if NPCs other than us actually noticed or cared that the companion died, and it changed the outcome of other quests or triggered new events, I'd be okay with it - but Todd Howard actually emphasized that they're only essential when they're with us, so Bethesda can have their cake and eat it too.

Bethesda's logic was that they wanted to avoid failstates other than player death where our best recourse was just to reload a save - they want to give us reasons to deal with that loss and forge ahead. Skyrim had Radiant Story events that would only trigger if a non-essential NPC died or if you got caught committing a crime, which was a good step in making those worth it (better than a slideshow eulogy, and for much less important characters). But they probably decided during development that there wasn't anything they could do with companion death that could make it as interesting as keeping them alive - and if Bethesda's MO is that they don't want companions to die, they're just going to nip that problem in the bud by making them essential and then worry about other things.

Yeah I agree with you 100% the Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) really is not that bad as some people say.

If their companions die a lot then they should just babysit their companions.

People who want followers to die are a minority. Just like people who want all npcs to be killable.

And the dozen or so other changes a small number of people want.

Bethesda needs to craft their game for the majority. And the majority do not want to have their

follower killed out of hand. It really is that simple.

The problem with catering to the small number of people that want these changes ( and yes you are a minority

compared to the millions who will play the game) is that planning by committee eventually needs to transition to

the actual building phase. As with any project EVER some things will not work and need to be removed. It may

not be ideal for everyone but a cohesive whole is much more desirable.

But wait. For those who want to change things Bethesda has created the ability to mod your game.

So despite it being practically cliché the answer is mods. And yes that IS a valid answer with a

Bethesda game. It is why they made the creation kit available and why some people love their games

even more.

I don't believe that at all.

I think both sides are even.

Look at The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt for example people said they praised The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim because armor and weapons degradation was removed, but the people who purchased The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt praised CD Projekt RED for adding armor and weapons degradation.

So far The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt has sold over 6+ million copies.

When CD Projekt RED does their next financial report I'm willing to be they have sold a total of 8 million copies of The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt or even possibly 10 million copies.

I like my buddy being immortal, it would upset me if they died. However it would be nice to have them die in some sort of hardcoe mode, for realism sake. But in the Normal Base of the game I'd like to keep them immortal for the most part. I most likely to play the Normal mode more than the hardcoe mode so this works out fine for me. Or maybe just have the option available in the game options.

I like my companions in all game modes to die because of my choices and consequences that happen depending on the choices I make.

What I'd love to toggle is their level of aggressiveness. Two modes: a ) attack as soon as a hostile is detected b ) attack only when told to do so via the commands system. This simply change would prevent a lot of unnecessary deads.

It's an easy way to fix bad AI's suicidal tendencies, like charging a pack of Night Stalkers armed only with a Power Fist.

Quote-time! (They're elitist quotes too! It's too good an opportunity to miss and I can't resist myself.)

"An intelligent person may understand the logic of a bandit. The bandit's actions follow a pattern of rationality: nasty rationality, if you like, but still rationality. --- You can foresee a bandit's actions, his nasty manoeuvres and ugly aspirations and often can build up your defenses.

a) one is generally caught by surprise by the attack; b ) even when one becomes aware of the attack, one cannot organize a rational defense, because the attack itself lacks any rational structure." - Carlo M. Cidique: The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity

"Against stupidity even the gods contend in vain." - Friedrich Schiller

I've had experiences like that (Fallout example: friggin' Radscorpions, Shogun 2 example: hastily withdrawing all my armies to my capital for a desperate defense because I really underestimated the AI) and they were nice (well, as nice as giant insects can be). But in those situations there was the possibility of retreat. With companions (at least in previous games) there isn't a practical way to retreat from a situation. Once combat starts, companion's AI is pretty much limited in attacking the nearest enemy, with no regard to the bigger picture. They might cower and run sometimes when they're low on health, but with fast melee enemies it's always too late. There is no way to yell "Run! I'll hold them off! Meet you at the base!"

Plan on doing the lone wanderer thing and not run around with a companion been shafted so many times by their unwanted threat generation or foolish ooh you are running up that hill does not compute boss I will run down this road to get to you and run right into this big patrol you just set down mines to ambush like stuff .

But as far as the companion being immortal that is fine some people can F up something and have to run off and companion keeps fighting and ends up getting bum rushed would be annoying if it dies.

Perfectly put.

Immortal the better. I can't be bothered to reload a game because of their incompetent AI got them killed.

I personally think this is a great thing. I lost followers in the most annoying way in bethesda games (TES included).. I had many followers that don't create distance, go into cover, rush in for some reason or decide to get knocked off cliffs.. which all results in a save game reload for me.

I for one one will be finally using dog/dogmeat in a game, in FO3 i never dared take him with me because he was so fragile and would get killed so easily.

Same goes for other human followers, i will finally take humanoid characters with me without fear of them constantly dying, falling of cliffs, friendly fire and other stupid ways to die.. for me it will be the first 3d Fallout game where i'll be using followers again.

On the other hand.. i can see it getting pretty OP if you have followers that can't die and simply get knocked out til after the fight.. We don't know everything yet, there might be a system
to it:

a follower gets knocked out x amount of times on a trip it will return to base and be unavailable for say several days (in-game)

or

After getting knocked out is limping, have terrible accuracy etc and needs to return to base before properly healing.

To me the alternative to having a companion immortal is to reload when they die and start the fight all over again. You can only do that so many times before you start to wish your companion was immortal. I have no problem with them being knocked out, but just being dead will always mean a reload. What fun is that?

The goal is not to reduce the risk of a companion dying. The goal is to keep the companion alive. Accomplishing this through "better" AI is impractical, and would probably be unreliable.

Fallout 4's method works. For role-playing purposes, your companion is mortal. The game provides a plausible explanation for his surviving deadly events.

If a player wishes to experience losing somebody as a consequence of his (the player) not having zigged when he should have zagged, then there are plenty of other, destructible NPCs to give it to him.

I don't think of NPCs, in-game, as being immortal. Rather, if they take enough damage to "kill" them, they are on the ground, out of the fight... and now whatever attacked them is chasing after ME. If they manage to kill me, then I never know whether my companion eventually died or not. I can believe that the monster ate my bones then went back to my companion and chewed him up, too. Not so immortal now, are we, Companion?

But if I manage to defeat the foes that "killed" my companion then I can race over to my ~badly wounded~ companion and apply meds and bandages and save their life...

As noted many times, mods can make Companions kill-able but for the vast majority of folk, I imagine having a Companion die (assuming the PC survived) is a reload scenario. That doesn't mean the companions are ~immortal~ in the context of the game world. It just means that they went down FIRST ---- few foes would STOP fighting the PC to "finish off" the Companion if the PC were still a threat. Once the Companion is no longer a threat ("killed" aka down on the ground unable to act) then the PC becomes the immediate target.

I wouldn′t mind the option to make them killable.

I guess most players will revert to previous saves if their companions get killed, so this way is less of a hassle

I really don't understand this at all, But I am trying to see the side of those that dislike it.

Can you not just dismiss them as a companion If they ever fall in combat ? And just never talk to them again be done with it like they died, (OR) maybe dismiss and kill them yourself (if this is allowed ) Heck this could even be a great RP sorry buddy but you were zombie bit mercy killing.

I have had a horrible track record with keeping these guys going, and am actually glad my normal idiocy is not gonna cost me.

The fun of your companions dying is the choices and consequences, the consequences happening on the choices you make.

Your companions die tough luck continue on to the next adventure doing the next quest or exploring the next area of the video game world map in Fallout 4.

Immortal NPC's make video games more boring to play.