The problem with Super Mutants is that at extremely high levels (+100) the games leveled list just spits out groups of Warlords at you. These guys are typically just huge bullet sponges (think Behemoth levels of health with a laser rifle) and just not interesting to engage with. Even with rank 5 damage perks & Bloody Mess they take forever to kill without an extremely powerful weapon or a legendary that grants bonus super mutant damage. I had to kill six or seven at Big John's Salvage the other day and it was stupid.


What needs to happen is that lower level enemies need to level with your character more than just level 35 or so, and they need better guns. That would be a start. I mean let's get real, no variation of pipe gun is going to be a notable threat to you once you hit level 40. They're just spare parts at that point.


The other problem is that player health has no cap. I've intentionally left my Endurance at 4 to use Chem Resistant, and at level 110 I still have like 650 hit points. I'm already essentially unstoppable besides poison damage, if I raise it to 11 I'll have around 1300 HP. That's as much as a low level Behemoth. I suppose I could use console commands to cap myself at 500 or so.


I have thousands of hours sunk into FO3 & Skyrim, so I knew that at a certain point I'd hit critical mass and turn into the Grim Reaper incarnate. I took steps to avoid this as long as possible, like leveling up damage perks together evenly, avoiding all of the VATS perks that will be stupidly overpowered when combined together, staying with 4 endurance for over one hundred levels, and playing on Survival since level 40 where the games difficulty took a nose dive.

They don't spit out Warlords at all locations though.

At higher levels you can visit other places where the foes are accompanied by lower ranks.

Maybe one or two or no Warlords.

That was the point I was making about finishing the game and revisiting locations.

For me Big John's was a hard battle earlier in the game and it remains so later on.

Regular SuperMutants are dead with one swipe of my machete.

I make the game more fun by reducing my armour to near zero by choosing appropriate (or perhaps inappropriate) clothing.

I would like to see a revamp in how the survival difficulty works out.

Aside from basic needs, i mean, there could be things added to the AI in a way that they play smarter, more often grouped up and such.

In some areas they are actually doing it, or it is just me but eventually in areas like Corvega (early levels tho), Saugus or Wilk Atomatoys they seem to force you out of covers and focus fire heavily on you, while in other areas they're walking over and letting you easily pick them one by one.

Eventually gunners aren't that much threatening when it comes in teamplay, they're even worse than raiders sometimes.

I see why some people stating "explosives spam is annoying" but is also the only way the enemies do have to actually get you down while you sit in sniper's nest or well covered areas.

I am also spamming grenades when i find *too much* resistence, HP itself doesn't cut it, sneaky crits are actually too strong and it really breaks the game after few perks, forcing (at least me) to entirely trash away the sniper approach.

Also there is too much of everything, expecially stimpaks and fusion cores are way too many and way to easy to be found, expecially considering their weight of 0 i can go as far to use a stimpak before i actually engage any fight, to anticipate any incoming damage.

Let alone drug-spam abuse of med-x for resistance and other healing / consumables like blood bags, purified water and such, on a proper device you can launch 4/5 healing effects together and insta-heal even on survival, if you'd want to.

P.s. Power Armor is overpowered as well, but thats intended to be, i guess.

I disagree with this and also take some offense to the comment preceding that. You can piss off with your attitude on "training wheels" Roachor.

The point of the HUD is you are wearing a PipBoy, did you notice you had no HUD while you were in the vault? It is an advanced computer including an area scanner. The various features on the HUD reflect the fact that you are wearing it, so no, turning it off to gimp myself is not IMO a good option.

Also . . . I've seen some users say "VATS" is cheating . . . no, no it is not. You are wearing a PipBoy, and the amount of accuracy and action latency you get in a round of VATS is dependent on your stats. Also your effectiveness in VATS can be boosted by good planning, good tactics, effective use of drugs etc. There was absolutely zero hand-eye-coordination or reaction time in FO1, FO2 and many other classic "tactical RPG games," which have often been turn-based. VATS is a brilliant mechanic that they came up with so that Fallout 3 bridged the gap between FPS "twitch" style game and the older "turn-based" dynamic. It might be less "intense," less dependent on rapid cognition and action, but it is no less dependent on players' effective mastery of game mechanics and then effective action within the frame of those game mechanics. It is no more cheating than is pausing the game or using stimpacks. It may indeed make things easier, but without a character design that is tailored to excel in VATS it will be of diminishing value as one levels.

None of which means that anyone has to use VATS or leave the HUD on or any other specific measure. Play it how you like it. But don't be confused that you should "not use VATS" or "not use the HUD" because they are "cheating" or "using training wheels." If you follow that erroneous line of thinking to its ultimate conclusion then you could say that: "unless you have your screen set far away across the room and the brightness and gamma down so that everything is hard to see you are using training wheels."

I'm now doing a hard playthrough and handling it fine, but the same problems as with Normal exist: as you level EVERYTHING gets easier. Found an explosive hunting rifle. That plus the chems and stats to excel in VATS = "win button" . . . virtually, at least for many engagements. I generally one-shot most mid-tier enemies (with torso shots, not even with head shots) and I'm only level 15. Not that that is necessarily bad, mowing down badguys is quite edifying. But the problem is when the game becomes almost nothing but mowing down enemies and one can do absurd things like sprinting through the whole of downtown just shooting everything in sight and virtually oblivious to risk, sneaking or cover. The problem is that, as you master it, it becomes too predictable and doesn't throw enough curve balls at you. It is perhaps not as noticeable on Hard as on Normal, but it is still there. I understand why Bethesda made it this way: they wanted a popular game, but in terms of replay it undermines now.

My main problem with using damage modifiers for "difficulty" is that it undermines the rest of the immersion. When a baseline enemy needs 6 or 8 direct hit head shots to take it out that is just stupid and very difficult. A civilian human who takes 4 to 6 head shots to kill them with a 10mm pistol at close range is just an unacceptable breach of believability to me.

Regarding the issue of "stuff." I have a profound mixture of feelings on this. I seem to recall that Fallout Wanderer's Edition imposed severe penalties on the availability of stuff and that it was a very effective and satisfying dynamic. Again I can see why Bethesda chose to do it this way for the vanilla game, but the abundance of stuff DOES make it rather easy to build and level up. My one concern is that, it feels like 'finding and collecting' stuff is so essential to the game play, I'm not sure how FOWE style limitations will feel to play.

I have come to the conclusion that I need to do a good bit of play on all the difficulty settings before I embark on trying to create any mods that change the dynamics. Good excuse to play more, at least until GECK comes out!

Your loss then kiddo.

You have no idea.