You are speaking from a standpoint of someone who knows the ins and outs of FNV. If you are new to FNV and try to go North in the beginning, you're pretty much [censored]. If these high level zones were more spread out all over the map, and not just concentrated in one huge portion of the map, early off rail exploration in FNV would have been more fun. Meaning you could still go North, 1st time, blind playthrough, and run into some cool [censored] early on without being forced from going North period early game.

The reality is, for inexperienced, 1st time players, FNV pretty much punishes you for going North early game period. So it does equate to a somewhat linear path of exploration if you're only chance of survival early on, is to head South and follow the main quest for a few levels in.

I agree. I think Todd would have pointed out that the same area would re-scale with the player later in your playthrough when you revisit that area. Otherwise, I would assume Todd is referring to two different areas when he said 'and then this area'.

You are also speaking from a standpoint of an experienced player. There is a difference from being challenged and being punished because you decide not to follow the main quest early game.

New, inexperienced players will have no choice but to avoid going North of Goodsprings period, thus limiting freedom of exploration since basically most of the Northern part of FNV features high leveled zones and impassible mountains forcing you to stealthboy and glitch run your way past death claws and cazadores before you have room to breathe and have fun exploring.

If these high leveled zones were spread out across the map and not concentrated mostly North of Goodsprings, freedom of exploration early game, would feel more rewarding and less of a need for youtube videos showcasing a 10 - 15 minute stealthboy run heading North of Goodsprings early game.

I'm fine with authentic dangers and getting my ass kicked early game. In fact that's what I want, as long as the high leveled zones are not concentrated in one half the map high leveled off basically forcing me to only explore the other half the map like in FNV. At least in Skyrim, high leveled zones and enemies were more spread out, allowing to have more freedom of exploration early game.

What bothered me about the beefgates in New Vegas wasn't so much that they were there, and sure, you could go past them. It was more that Obsidian actively discouraged you from going there, and if you did somehow manage to get to the Great Khans or the Strip at a low level, it didn't really matter much since all of those quests are not designed for a lower level character. It sort of vindicates why Bethesda goes with level scaling - they won't know when you finally get around to Morthal or Canterbury Commons, so they decide "how weak is the weakest character that can handle this quest?" and "at what point should this quest stop being challenging for players?"

It was actually one hell of an ordeal getting to Canterbury Commons early in the game.

I can't blame Obsidian for making some areas clearly more dangerous than other.

There was plenty of warning and by the time you reach New Vegas by the long way, you were fairly tough.

I mean if I exit the vault with my SS and immediately head in to the Glowing Seas, I deserve what happens to me.

I reserve my opinion until I have experienced it.

I have absolutely no issues with FONV system. Plenty of warnings for not heading north, through signs and dialogues, and if you still did it you deserve what happens to you. You're also warned to not stray off the roads due to wildlife, even if you did go the intended route. And yet, if you know the game well enough after quite a few playthroughs, you're able to take certain shortcuts to get to New Vegas and obtain all upgrades before even reaching level 2 (ED-E as melee, lure fiends into NCR territory and strip them clean, obtain a few expensive items and sell them at DLC vendor with plenty cash - exploitative and minmaxing as hell, but kinda fun).

The system reminds me on how we did tabletop RPG back in the day. If game master had something prepared, warnings would flurish for straying too far off that plan, and we'd get severely punished if we did. The only thing I don't like about FONV is the inability to get away if you mess up. Enemies of all kinds (I'm okay with deathclaws and cazadores) charges you until you are dead, and usually impossible to get away (those bulls are okay though, they warn you not to get too close). That did not happen in tabletop times, where we could often talk our way out of extremely sticky situations.

Least sense is Oblivion - low level bandits patrolling the roads at low level is okay, scaling them up also kind of okay. But turning them into Minotaurs when you're scaled way up is just stupid, even if you're fast enough to ignore them and just rush through. I would rather have the bandits cease to exist, with some story based explanation (not safe anymore due to some hero, whatever) or some quest to finish them off once and for all.

Not too sure if possibilities should be locked out completely by area this way though. Obtain all required special parts that enables super mods for your weapon by either:

1) Fight through one high level area with same level opponents.

2) Fight through several low level areas with level+10 opponents.

Same with shortcuts. Wouldn't be intuitive to "know" about these in a FONV first few playthroughs. Maybe similar approaches in FO4 - "you can, but there is no way anyone would know".

I believe what "rubberbanding" means is, for example, you begin in an area that's lvl 1-5 (the creatures start at one then carry on to five to follow you). Then you move into the next area and it's five through ten, and so forth. Sure, you "can go anywhere", but you'll get butt-jammed. Like in FO:NV, it's a "level-wall" that forces you to a certain path.

"Rubberbanding" means, imo, the level range in an area streatches depending on the user, but it stays within a range.

What proof I have of this thinking is all the Charisma abilities tied to manipulating creatures and people of a level lower than you. This could only exist in a world where their level eventually becomes static.

It's like this; you start in Generic Town and spend some time doing things there. It's tough, but you eventually move on to Experienced Town where you knock some stuff out. Eventually you need to travel back to Generic Town, and you discover you now rule there.

This system kinda makes sense, in a role-playing perspective.

I use this tactic in my own tabletop RPG that I run when me and some my friends have the time. The reason I use it is because if my friends decide to ignore paths 1, 2, 3, and 4 and decide to go off randomly in another direction, I'm left making something up on the spot, which I'm happy to do, but the consequences of this usually means (for a number of reasons) a boat load of extra work for me to do later before the next session. Therefore I give them options 1-4 and if they go randomly with number 5, they get drastically powerful monster warnings or something along those lines and much time and effort is saved on my part.

In my opinion, this tactic is very useful for a single person who only occasionally makes these stories in the limited amount of free time that they have. If it was my actual job to create a rich and detailed world, using this tactic would be inexcusable because under these circumstances I would have the time to actually put something interesting for path 5. I enjoyed the hell out of New Vegas, but in my opinion, using this tactic (whether they successfully used it or not) was simply a bad game design choice on their part.

Good point. Otherwise many of those Charisma perks would eventually become useless.

What I do know is when I first played FNV, it definitely felt limited as in terms of having a little fun doing random exploration. I'd rather fight through one high leveled area with same leveled opponents, or even one or two levels higher for a more intense challenge other than being bullet sponges dealing quadruple damage.

FNV is what I would call a somewhat 'linear sandbox'. The warning signs about not heading North were just a poor excuse to explain away the laziness Obsidian used in designing. Granted they may have been under a pressured time table to complete FNV, it's still no excuse to punish exploration in an open world game, especially when we're talking about half of the map.

The horrible level scaling in Oblivion deters me from investing any time for a serious play through. I'm honestly perplexed as as to how anyone can play that game unmodded.

Exactly what about having a difficult-to-go-through area at low levels in the game either punishes exploration or is lazy? Having all areas be equally difficult to travel through is a horrible idea and is what punishes exploration; having areas that are dangerous to people who are unprepared is not punishing them. It's making a game that doesn't cater to people who want to be able to do everything in the first five minutes of gameplay.

Just a friendly reminder. NV is not made by Bethesda, it's made by Obsidian. Different team, different design philosophy.

Did not readf everything, but an hybrid system is the best thing.

- some creatures would level with you (-+5 levels) ; Raiders, BoS, (high end creatures so deathclaws are always chalenging

- some creatures stay the same level but have different tiers (bigger molerat grouped with level 1 molerats at high levels)
- medium level creatures that would always spawn with the same level depending on their tier (mirelurks, Yao (bears), ghouls, etc)

- leveled creatures for quest and locations (faction monster, i would not mind 'XXfaction Mirelurks Tribe)

There should be different rules for different creatures keeping the player on the edge of his seat. Do i know this creature? Is is just gonna [censored] me? makes a good roleplaying game.

EDIT: could polish this a lot more. Hopefully you guys see the mechanic behind it.

To be clear, my problem with New Vegas's map isn't that there are difficult areas. Morrowind, Fallout 3, and Skyrim all have areas that will kick your ass if you dare approach them when you're not strong enough. My complaint with the Mojave is that it's just not really open. Your choices walking out of Goodsprings are either to take the road south through Primm, then Nipton, then Novac, then Boulder City, then New Vegas in that order; or, bust your ass going north through the Cazadores and Deathclaws to make it to New Vegas early. Whereas in any Bethesda Game Studios game, you exit the first dungeon and you're free to go basically anywhere, in any order - if you tried going straight to the D.C. Ruins, or Red Mountain, you'd regret it. But the major settlements aren't designed to be reached in a certain order, and at a certain level.

There's nothing technically wrong with the way the Mojave is laid out - it's actually consistent with the first two Fallout games, and plenty of other RPGs follow the same path. But I much prefer Bethesda's open worlds, and it kinda proves why they need level scaling to keep the difficulty level consistent. And getting rid of the beefgates and invisible walls in New Vegas won't suddenly open it up.

I wouldnt worry, bethesda tend to have a more run around tactic then NV makers (bah cant remember the name). FO4 will likely have a diagonal path to Fenway Park and then have you run around the wastelands like FO3.

This is a story about a man named Stanley...

Upon leaving Goodsprings, you can also just travel directly to north-of-Novac (you come out around Helios One) through the Hidden Valley canyons area - it's not a particularly difficult journey, either; if you want, you can go Goodsprings-Hidden Valley-188-New Vegas pretty easily.

Going straight to the DC ruins is a perfectly legitimate way to play Fallout 3 - it's set up to be your second stop after Megaton, when you're still level 2-5 or so. It's also laughably easy; there are no 'beefgates' there. That's one of the main problems with Bethesda's method of doing things - there is no sense of progression, no areas that are more difficult than any other. This isn't the case with Morrowind because they only started doing their serious level scaling stuff with Oblivion (though I don't remember Red Mountain being all that difficult either).

Try to do Olney, or the Deathclaw Sanctuary, or the Yao Guai caves, at level 1-5 in Fallout 3.

In Skyrim, the named dragon priest tombs were set to a minimum level of 25, so, even if you entered them at level 1, the monsters would still be at least level 25. Similarly, most Falmer hives were set to level 18-20 minimum. Indeed, I recall numerous complaints from people who tried to do the companion's questline at level 1, only to get sent to Shimmermist cave, a nearby Falmer den, and got thoroughly stomped by the Falmer there because they were such a higher level then the player.

The entire "there is no area more difficult then any other" [censored] is a meme, one that has been objectively wrong since people first started spouting it during the Oblivon days, and has debunked more times then I can count.

Ok, yes, there are a few dungeons that are slightly more difficult than others in Skyrim (level 25 really isn't that high; you should be around level 10 by the time you hit Whiterun if you do even a minimal amount of questing). But there aren't areas of the map that are any more difficult than others - you can still travel everywhere, so long as you avoid the dungeons. That is what I was referring to.

EDIT: There are also no indications that those dungeons are any more difficult than any other in Skyrim, which is a similar but different problem.

The only thing between Helgan, where the game begins, and Whiterun, is Riverwood, which has one side quest, and one misc objective. Unless you intentionally deviate from the MQ, you wouldn't be anywhere near level 10 by the time you get to Whiterun, maybe level 3, tops.

Actually there are, and Todd even described how the system worked in Skyrim several times.

Generally, the higher up into the mountains you went, the higher the level of the monsters/bandits/whatever. So yeah, there were AREAS of the map more difficult then others. Almost everything in the mountain areas was harder then everything in the valley areas. Dungeons or not. Similarly, the north and west sides of Fallout 3's map spawed deathclaws even as early as level 1, making them difficult areas of the game world.

Also an objectively wrong meme.

You could go north of Goodsprings early by way of mountain climbing (jumping), sneaking, and dynamite (gained from Easy Pete and Goodsprings scavenging). I did it on my first playthrough and gained excellent items from that one place where the raiders have Love & Hate, Trail carbine, and Reinforced Metal armor everytime they spawn for the 1st time. From there you can clear that one Vault of escaped convicts for Plasma weapons and your good to go.

I support Bethesda's "rubber banding" concept and will enjoy seeing and overcoming it in-game. As for enemies levelingnup with us, I believe this is great as it will provide continual resistance throughout the game.

I liked FONV soft walls. Granted I didnt care for the fact you hit one immediately.

But I appreciate a good bit of story. FO 3 was just too easy at low levels.

Heck it wasn't until my second play through that I actually found 3 dog. I always would find rivet city first through exploring for the wasteland survival guide.

Huh. You may be correct - it's just not at all noticeable in the game.

(also, I don't think I've ever been less than level 7 or 8 when I hit Whiterun after doing 'Escape the Beheading' (1-2 levels) -> Embershard Mine (1 level) -> Riverwood -> Barrow (3+ levels) -> Whiterun (0-1 level), though I may be misremembering)

Which is why all those people had problems with places like shimmermist cave?