We simply havent enough info about f4 so the threads are all over the place

Yeah, really?!

And the OP's question was framed within the context of a video game, wasn't it?

In real life stealing is wrong and there are laws against it. In a video game these things are still wrong (in my opinion) but no real person is going to be enslaved or starve or die because of it. So I guess it would depend on the character I am playing, if it is a role-playing game.

it does equal a villan. but like you said its the wasteland you do what you got to do to survive. no one in the wasteland is "good" they all have done wrong to get to the top. no settlment in the wasteland can say they have never done anything bad to get where they are

No, it's a game, a post-apocalyptic one at that, so stealing to survive is a dog-eat-dog situation, plain and simple. Morality is tossed out the window, when everyone around you starts doing exactly the opposite of what a civilized society would do.

And this too. We're really scratching the bottom of the barrel again.

I can offer a theory or two for that. An individual who steals something from another person has a lack of regard for what the other person may want. That disregard for people leaks through into other facets of that individual's life. It is revealed in some of the individual's public behaviors, and people in his vicinity pick up on that.

You can find numerous examples of this kind of thing in real life. The guy who talks too loud in a restaurants, or who doesn't think to say "Thank you" to the server. The guy who cuts ahead in line. The guy who drives below the speed limit in the fast lane. The guy who glares at everybody just because he hates people. Fictional examples may be even stronger and more fun.

When Clint Eastwood at his grittiest enters a saloon, people in the saloon think to themselves, "This guy is dangerous. He's killed people!" A furtive, shifty-looking individual entering the same saloon might get a reaction like, "This guy looks like he is up to no good."

Building a reputation is good for overcoming the initial impression that others may have of you. Karma is good for handling situations in which your reputation is unknown.

Well with karma your own life is keeping score and the negative causes you make have negative effects.

It should be, of course. There are people doing that now, in real life... and when they get caught, they will likely go to jail.

Not sure; however, is it moral to present a false multi-pass if it's the only way to save the universe ?

Depends on the PC's point of view.

Tell you what, after I steal that food to make sure I don't end up dead, I'll be sure to feel super bad about it. Morality is great up until the point it gets you killed.

These are all roleplay choices.

If my protagonist is happy to slaughter Raiders,

then I'm not going to be a Raider myself.

If I kill someone 'bad' in their home, then you can keep what you kill.

I won't steal from occupied homes or 'theft' marked currently unoccupied homes.

A pseudo-Zen conundrum. If you steal a baby's RadAway, and no-one's around, did you commit a crime?

Should an in-game mechanism record what our characters do, or what they're seen to do?

Hm. One interesting thought. What if more extreme Karma levels, rather than being reflected in how NPCs react to our character (which would be handled by Reputation, derived from observed actions) was reflected in some dialogue choices opening up and others being closed down?

In other words, if you consistently behave like a thorough goody-two-shoes (what an odd expression...) then you lose the ability to take brutal and cruel dialogue choices, and if you consistently behave like an utter monster then saying (and hence doing) the decent thing will be locked off.

I disagree - if you are stealing food in order to survive that's not wrong (in Germany the law even has a paragraph about that and you can't be sent to prison or fined if it's a case of surviving or dying! You can't be punished at ALL and that's how it should be IMHO)

I like the idea about begging though (if one really wants to play hardcoe, why not ask for a bite and get it, if your speech is high enough (and if people like you...meaning if you helped them out in the past then they will help you now!))

greetings LAX

ps: Though I will not play hardcoe (I only enjoy one kind of hardcoe - if you get my drift ), I play for the story and for the fun and dislike any kind of unnecessary tedium in my games (I get to buy food and cook it in RL, so why do it in a game? (no, I am not a bad cook and I quite like cooking...but in a game it's wasted IMHO, as I don't even get to taste whatever I just made!)...hell, I eat in RL so I can justify my game character not having to do it (in a way my character is me, so if I am well fed, so is my character!))

me either, my character will do whatever is necessary to survive and live another day.

Wrong. Jean Valjean got 19 years in prison for stealing bread.

Seriously though, I picked the 3rd option.
I read a book on famine in Africa once though written by a young man who eventually became an engineer; he's about 28 now.
There were men in the streets at first bringing they're pickaxes looking for work.
Corn was scarce and the prices got too high.

When his family was able to get a little bit of food, one of the starving farmers instinctively just ran into their house and took a piece of bread during meal time. When he was done eating, he said "Have any more?" The family was still in shock but they finally said no.

At one point in the book the men were lying dead in the streets, pickaxes still in hand. You can't say they didn't try to get food by legitimate means.

There never seems to be any really negative effect for bad karma. I think if you have bad karma then there's a slight chance each day that an anvil will fall on your head.

Then karma will reset back to neutral.

Such a shame. Its the only way i play New Vegas now.

Don't forget you can always chew on the corpse you shot down earlier. The wasteland is an unforgiving place.

I like this idea but what good karma? Maybe a deathclaw will fall from sky and land in your lap no good deed goes unpunished and all that... The survival aspect should be a important part in any post apocalyptic game its like only having
Tennis in WII sports.

You keep bringing up Batman; you should look into the really early Batman. He was far more of a vigilante than later in his history. http://www.dccomics.com/blog/2014/07/22/batman-at-75-highlights-in-the-life-of-the-caped-crusader

It wasn't until 1940 that "restraint" showed up in his vocabulary. In one issue in 1940 he used a machine gun. It was decided after that he would no longer kill or use a gun.

Choose third option,but it also depends whom I'm robbing from.

I'd like a 4th choice.

Slightly wrong if your theft leaves no one hungry or homeless.

Stealing a loaf of bread to feed your family because you have no other choice is not any where the same thing as cleaning out a farm and leaving the family to starve over winter.

BTW, the Boston Wasteland should be one of the richest in food sources of the Fallout Locations.

It is not a desert like the Mojave.

Fallout 1 and Fallout 2 were not much better.

And most of it was missed by the nuclear bombs so it is a lot better off than the Capital Wasteland.

Other than some bad fallout coming from the west and a nuclear winter, it got off rather lightly after the war and should be very green after 200 years.

Not to mention that the ocean is right there so fishing should be possible.

Do you think Bethesda will include snow and ice in the weather for Fallout 4?

I'm wondering how long till there is a winter wonderland mod for Fallout 4.

"What is right, is what is right for me"

if someone stole food i needed to survive after the nuclear apocalypse i would probably (try) to kill them or at least drive them away, but if i needed food to survive i would be willing steal to get it. it's wrong from the position of the victim but you have to do what you have to do to survive

edit: missed an important word there

Paints a beautiful picture of humanity doesn't it.

I don't see it as wrong, Buuuuut.... only if there are no other means to eat.
If there are other means to get food, then do that. If that means selling something of value, working for it, grovelling/panhandling, so be it.
But if those means are not present, self preservation must be the goal. You can't think, "I did the right thing with not stealing that squirrel on a stick", when you're dead.
To me it isn't wrong in an emergency situation. That's the caveat. If it is a way of life, then this is a completely different conversation about priorities, life goals, maybe too much of the jet(?), and so on...