Balancing Gameplay?

[Morticia]

Searched but couldn't find an old thread on this topic to resurrect as I'd prefer. So just thinking about this and posting ideas here. Some old, some new.

Balancing gameplay is something people have been trying to do for a long time it seems.

In my times playing, the beginning is always the toughest. For example: Trying to play different types of characters, I've died many times without ever getting out of the Temple. Searching for Smoke and fighting the little Geckos in Arroyo has been another frequent graveyard for me, along with getting mauled by Keeng Rat in Klamath. Several times I've been on the losing side of the Den gang war, or tried to take on Metzger too soon, but usually the next most common graveyard is somewhere between the Den and Vault City, ambushed and gunned down by a gang of Raiders.

Once you make it to V.C. it starts to get a little easier. Cassidy is really the first decent backup against armed opponents. You probably have a Combat leather jacket and a rifle or maybe SMG, and you don't have to try and see if you can run to the exit grid before your entire party is massacred. That seems to be the most balanced it ever gets. Building and equipping your party, and going back to take on those foes that were way too powerful before.

Anyway, everyone knows how the game goes from there. By the time you are ready to take the Tanker to the Enclave, none of the shopkeepers have enough money to buy the 40 Combat shotguns or 50 SMGs you have been collecting, and they have nothing to sell you that is any better than what you already have. Looking at game difficulty on a graph would be like starting at 10 and going to 1 down at a nearly straight angle from beginning to end.

So, what are some real ideas to solve the balance problem?

1. An ammo/damage mod, whether changing just ammo/weapon damage or modifying armor, it makes the game easier (or more difficult) at the start, and the same the rest of the way through. It doesn't change the balance any. The difficulty curve remains the same.

2. One of the incorporations in Megamod changes the amount of ammo available. Instead of picking up 20 shells, you are really only picking up 8 or 10. The idea being that you won't be able to accumulate 1000-1500 rounds of any ammo type. Downside is that all the containers on every map need to be changed for the numbers to show up correctly. And the upside is??? Maybe someone will actually need to buy ammo rather than being able to scavenge so much from fallen enemies.

3. Another idea is to scale the random encounter difficulty to match the level of the player. Not sure if this is even possible, but as somebody pointed out (sorry I can't remember who, so speak up if you remember this), "Wandering the wastelands, you are always going to run into weak enemies and powerful ones no matter what your skill level is" so it's not at all realistic.

4. Making every corpse 'non-lootable' would force the player to spend money all the time instead of only visiting shops to sell stuff. This would add more balance, but is even more unrealistic and ridiculous than the first idea. Making every corpse have lootable armor seems like it would work in reverse and unbalance the game even more, but you DO have to beat the enemy before taking their armor, so the prize is somewhat offset by the risk - same as lucking out and picking up that first SMG from the opponent who brought you down to 8HP with it.

5. What would it do to increase the cost of items in shops by some multiple? Could this be done without changing the formulas for how much they pay you for stuff you sell or trade? Other than the car, there are only three things I ever need to purchase: .223 pistol and Combat armor in NCR, (only because I'm not strong enough yet to go and survive where I can find them for free) and Power armor for the party members that don't already have a set that was found somewhere.

6. The car is also a major factor in the latter imbalance of the game, by zooming around the map and avoiding many encounters you would have on foot. First of all, it seems to me that it should cost 10x as much as it does, being as it's the only one in the known world. Secondly, it might be possible to make it run on the black fuel instead of energy cells, which would be much more difficult to find and more expensive when you did. "Car outta gas" would appear on the map more often, and force you to walk for fuel, (and maybe have to hope all that stuff is still in the trunk when you get back).

 

[hakimio]

In my times playing, the beginning is always the toughest. For example: Trying to play different types of characters, I've died many times without ever getting out of the Temple. Searching for Smoke and fighting the little Geckos in Arroyo has been another frequent graveyard for me, along with getting mauled by Keeng Rat in Klamath. Several times I've been on the losing side of the Den gang war, or tried to take on Metzger too soon, but usually the next most common graveyard is somewhere between the Den and Vault City, ambushed and gunned down by a gang of Raiders.

Most of the problems you mention here can be solved by starting with high agility and tagging the right skills.

Anyway, everyone knows how the game goes from there. By the time you are ready to take the Tanker to the Enclave, none of the shopkeepers have enough money to buy the 40 Combat shotguns or 50 SMGs you have been collecting, and they have nothing to sell you that is any better than what you already have. Looking at game difficulty on a graph would be like starting at 10 and going to 1 down at a nearly straight angle from beginning to end.

Agree that shopkeepers are not that useful, because most of items can be found.

1. An ammo/damage mod, whether changing just ammo/weapon damage or modifying armor, it makes the game easier (or more difficult) at the start, and the same the rest of the way through. It doesn't change the balance any. The difficulty curve remains the same.

Like Combat Overhaul?

2. One of the incorporations in Megamod changes the amount of ammo available. Instead of picking up 20 shells, you are really only picking up 8 or 10. The idea being that you won't be able to accumulate 1000-1500 rounds of any ammo type. Downside is that all the containers on every map need to be changed for the numbers to show up correctly. And the upside is??? Maybe someone will actually need to buy ammo rather than being able to scavenge so much from fallen enemies.

Sounds like REALLY a lot of work to change ALL the containers...

3. Another idea is to scale the random encounter difficulty to match the level of the player. Not sure if this is even possible, but as somebody pointed out (sorry I can't remember who, so speak up if you remember this), "Wandering the wastelands, you are always going to run into weak enemies and powerful ones no matter what your skill level is" so it's not at all realistic.

Don't think that's needed, because with higher agility you can easily run from every encounter.

4. Making every corpse 'non-lootable' would force the player to spend money all the time instead of only visiting shops to sell stuff. This would add more balance, but is even more unrealistic and ridiculous than the first idea. Making every corpse have lootable armor seems like it would work in reverse and unbalance the game even more, but you DO have to beat the enemy before taking their armor, so the prize is somewhat offset by the risk - same as lucking out and picking up that first SMG from the opponent who brought you down to 8HP with it.

Wouldn't agree with 'non-lootable' corpse idea too. Talking about lootable armor, skill check was added so that it wouldn't unbalance the game.

5. What would it do to increase the cost of items in shops by some multiple? Could this be done without changing the formulas for how much they pay you for stuff you sell or trade? Other than the car, there are only three things I ever need to purchase: .223 pistol and Combat armor in NCR, (only because I'm not strong enough yet to go and survive where I can find them for free) and Power armor for the party members that don't already have a set that was found somewhere.

You can easily acquire Combat armor from toxic caves once you have the electronic lockpick which can be found in Eldrige's basement.

6. The car is also a major factor in the latter imbalance of the game, by zooming around the map and avoiding many encounters you would have on foot. First of all, it seems to me that it should cost 10x as much as it does, being as it's the only one in the known world. Secondly, it might be possible to make it run on the black fuel instead of energy cells, which would be much more difficult to find and more expensive when you did. "Car outta gas" would appear on the map more often, and force you to walk for fuel, (and maybe have to hope all that stuff is still in the trunk when you get back).

Travel speed can be changed by changing WorldMapFPS variable in ddraw.ini

 

[fortyseven]

What I do to make the end game more challenging is to not take perks like sniper and start out with very low endurence (normally 2). In addition, I avoid any perks that add to your health count. You might think this is crazy and yes you get shot dead a lot especially in the start if you pick the wrong fights. But, it adds greatly to the realism as you tend to be as vunerable as an enemy of your level. This forces you to use strategy, like hiding behind objects, walls, in caves etc. This way the rat king in trappertown for example is a piece of cake, even with very low health. Also, with RP you can collapse the mine shaft and kill it that way. With the low health you are also more greatful for the weapons that you find as you really depend on them. Although, I would prefer if wasteland raoming groups and factions outside of the brotherhood and enclave weren't as well armed. I think it would be more realistic if ammo and guns especially the better ones were scarce.

 

[Blackened]

Try starting with very low endurance, not taking Lifegiver, start with ST 10, Melee Weapons/Unarmed and not high Intelligence. This way you'll be strong at the beginning, but not so much at the end. Also, try taking Throwing.

However, I think that Fallout suffers from another kind of imbalance - the player choice - so that some stats/skills/perks/traits/such are (much) stronger than others.

 

[Josan12]

So, what are some real ideas to solve the balance problem?

2. One of the incorporations in Megamod changes the amount of ammo available. Instead of picking up 20 shells, you are really only picking up 8 or 10. The idea being that you won't be able to accumulate 1000-1500 rounds of any ammo type. Downside is that all the containers on every map need to be changed for the numbers to show up correctly. And the upside is??? Maybe someone will actually need to buy ammo rather than being able to scavenge so much from fallen enemies.

Yeah - this little tweak by MIB88 is awesome. In fact, i might just PM and ask him if he has the script changes he made so we could tweak the RP 1.3 scripts and release a general mod. I do agree that reducing the amount of dropped ammo by say, 50%, and ALSO reducing the amount that shopkeepers carry by 50% would make the game much more interesting.

But, of course it wouldn't affect the ridiculous amount of money the player can make from selling the guns they collect, even if they can't get ammo to USE those guns as easily. So the the player would still be able to amass TONS of money, but they would have constant ammo problems which i think would be fun.

Anyway, i think reducing the amount of ammo available is a great idea Mort!

3. Another idea is to scale the random encounter difficulty to match the level of the player. Not sure if this is even possible, but as somebody pointed out (sorry I can't remember who, so speak up if you remember this), "Wandering the wastelands, you are always going to run into weak enemies and powerful ones no matter what your skill level is" so it's not at all realistic.

Yeha , from my limited nowledge i doubt this is possible. Plus we'd heading down a Bethedsa road there ...

5. What would it do to increase the cost of items in shops by some multiple? Could this be done without changing the formulas for how much they pay you for stuff you sell or trade? Other than the car, there are only three things I ever need to purchase: .223 pistol and Combat armor in NCR, (only because I'm not strong enough yet to go and survive where I can find them for free) and Power armor for the party members that don't already have a set that was found somewhere.

I was thinking about this, but of course any increase in costs works both ways - if you make guns cheaper the player can buy them earlier from shops by selling other stuff, if you make them more expensive the player can make more money selling looted ones. I think it's safe to say changing the costs of guns will have no effect.

We could change the cost of ammo, however, but then we'd have to reduce the amount of ammo the NPC's carry, and that would significantly impact gameplay meaning they'd run out of ammo after only a few shots. But i think that would be interesting as it'd make the game more like the book 'the road' (awesome book if you haven't read it) or 'the road warrior' where every bullet is precious - like gold.

6. The car is also a major factor in the latter imbalance of the game, by zooming around the map and avoiding many encounters you would have on foot. First of all, it seems to me that it should cost 10x as much as it does, being as it's the only one in the known world. Secondly, it might be possible to make it run on the black fuel instead of energy cells, which would be much more difficult to find and more expensive when you did. "Car outta gas" would appear on the map more often, and force you to walk for fuel, (and maybe have to hope all that stuff is still in the trunk when you get back).

Great idea - i agree the car should be x10 expensive. I think it should also run half the speed, use twice as much fuel, and break down all the time requiring a repair check to get it going again. Also the trunk should have 1/2 the capacity (IMO) I also totally dig the idea of being able to fuel it with precious gasoline (again like in the road warrior) Micro fusion cells should be sooo fucking rare and valauble finding one should be party time - and then the quesiton 'do i use it to fuel my gun or my car'?

Here's a few other other game balancing ideas to add to your list:

1) I've doubled the weights of all items in my game. This means you can *only* carry around 10 combat shotguns rather than 20 (every little helps)

2) Ages ago i asked timeslip if it's possible to link worldmap travel speed to the % of your carry weight that's currently in your inventory. She said no. But recently i thought one of the Russian chaps here posted he'd figured out how to do it.

I think it would be awesome because it would mean the more you carry - the slower you travel. The slower you travel, the more encounters you have - and the more guns you get that you can't carry !!! Now THAT would be a challenge!!

 

[Kanhef]

3. Another idea is to scale the random encounter difficulty to match the level of the player. Not sure if this is even possible, but as somebody pointed out (sorry I can't remember who, so speak up if you remember this), "Wandering the wastelands, you are always going to run into weak enemies and powerful ones no matter what your skill level is" so it's not at all realistic.

This can be done by editing the encounter tables in data/worldmap.txt . It's already used to make strength of bounty hunters increase with the player level. You could make higher level characters find harder enemies, or just more of the same ones. (Manti aren't very dangerous in groups of 6, but a pack of 20 could be more threatening – or a good time to get out the frag grenades.)

Not being able to loot corpses would make the game quite a bit more challenging. The supply of money and items becomes much smaller, just what's placed on maps or given as quest rewards, so a good barter skill is important.

 

[MIB88]

That was me who pointed out that even a high level character would run into pig rats and spore plants. I was against doing any sort of level scaling to remove easy encounters. But, as pointed out, it really is simple to modify.

As for ammo available, this is easy to change. No scripting involved... just need to change the relevant proto files.

I did have one come to mind regarding scripting and ammo/weapons. It can be scripted so that any critter that is killed won't have any ammo on them except what is in the weapon already. Or, just like with the lootable armor mod, weapons might only be dropped under certain conditions to simulate that the weapon was damaged (and therefore unusable) in combat.

Or, as pointed out above, critters can be made 'unlootable' altogether.

 

[earthdude]

Along with the lootable armor concept of requiring repair/science skill checks, may all weapons/ammo should have the same? Maybe the actual level of repair/science skill would be scalable depending on the type of primary damage used to kill its former owner? For example, if you kill a Hubologist with a plasma grenade when he/she has 8 of them in their inventory, the chances I would think would be high that those grenades would likely explode, too.....

Another idea which I suspect would be rather hard to deal with would be to leave everything in the inventory, but in a damaged state. If you have sufficient skill, maybe you can fix it. But maybe Eldridge or that dude in the Bazaar in NCR will have to fix it (not just be able to upgrade weapons)? The presence of manuals or fix-it stations would temporarily increase your repair chances. I'd think that SAD or maybe EPA and BoS base in SF could have weapon/armor repair workshops. It may just not be possible to repair a plasma rifle or PA without these.

 

[Morticia]

@ hakimio,
I must admit I haven't tried your Lootable Armor for RP yet, but feel you're doing it right or I would have posted something in your thread. I personally feel the lootable armor in MM is great, and balanced. If we want to spend valuable skill points on repair and science, then we need all the help we can get.

I must also admit that I haven't tried Glovz' Combat Overhaul yet either. I did complain to him that the older AP Ammo mod in RP was rather irritating. Spending 30 minutes fighting Tyler's gang, wasting all my ammo on critical hits to the eyes that did "1" damage was crazy. Magnus Ammo and Weapons Redone were more than I was ever interested in either. I was not specifically referring to anyone's mod, just saying that whether it is easier or more difficult they don't change the balance.

I think it is "New Vision" mod that changes the ammo amounts (among other things) in MM, and does add some real game balance. You got the point though - bloody awful lot of work fixing all the maps to accomodate it, and probably rather low on MIB88's list of things to do. {We could all help him out of course. Even I can use the Mapper well enough to change what is in a container or on a critter, but we really would need some kind of special forum or file repository, as you suggested, so we weren't duplicating each others efforts.}

Regarding the car, it might very well be Sfall that would be used, but I was thinking of changing things a bit more than just altering the travel speed.

@ fortyseven, and Blackened,
I love anticipating the sniper perk, but low endurance is an interesting idea that you both had.

Fallout suffers from another kind of imbalance - the player choice - so that some stats/skills/perks/traits/such are (much) stronger than others.

@ Blackened,
So is this something changeable or another case where we have to 'choose' to play a different way in order to not cheat or exploit the weaknesses of the RPG engine?

I was thinking about this, but of course any increase in costs works both ways - if you make guns cheaper the player can buy them earlier from shops by selling other stuff, if you make them more expensive the player can make more money selling looted ones. I think it's safe to say changing the costs of guns will have no effect

@ Josan12,
That was what I was wondering about - change the ratio between buy and sell values, so you're saying it's in the game engine? An SMG could not be 1200 to buy and 80 to sell?

Love these other ideas also!!! Very much thinking "Road Warrior" (the film) when thinking of the car, now you give me more... Like scavenged ammo might go 'pffft' and do nothing but make a bit of smoke when you fire it.

Of course, I imagined I had enough time to post a reply before needing to respond to any more...

@ Kanhef,
I remember now that was the file (worldmap.txt) I was working on, and MIB88 that told me that and it stuck with me, (Though, I am ashamed, his name did not.)

@ MIB88,
I'm sorry...

@ earthdude,
Great idea! I know if I melt an enemy with a plasma rifle there is nothing left to loot. Never used a plasma grenade as never raised throwing skill enough to hit anything, but wouldn't it do the same thing? Does it?

 

[Message621]

one or two shot kills for everything. and a way lower hit percentage for every npc. that would make it hard. exp if your trying to beat the enclave. just be good if you missed way more then you hit, and a hit causing life threating damage, be good if always crippled if you got hit. that would make the game hard and balanced

 

[MIB88]

Love these other ideas also!!! Very much thinking "Road Warrior" (the film) when thinking of the car, now you give me more... Like scavenged ammo might go 'pffft' and do nothing but make a bit of smoke when you fire it.

Oh, man, I gotta work this in! Make a new proto, give it the same info as the original, but when in combat, the gun doesn't fire. That is evil! Need to figure out exactly how to do this...

 

[Kanhef]

Making critters completely unlootable could cause problems with some quests and such (e.g. the dog tags on the raider captains, presidential pass key). Using scripts to remove just the items you don't want the player to get is safer. That would also let you leave some items such as money, drugs, or rocks.

 

[MIB88]

Making critters completely unlootable could cause problems with some quests and such (e.g. the dog tags on the raider captains, presidential pass key). Using scripts to remove just the items you don't want the player to get is safer. That would also let you leave some items such as money, drugs, or rocks.

That's what I meant when I said 'unlootable'. It is easy to script that certain classes of items (weapons, drugs, ammo, etc.) would disappear from the critter when it is killed. Other items would not have to be affected. Also, though, special critters with special items would not have to be affected... they have their own scripts and would not have to be affected by any modding. This lootable armor mod is more for those general critters.

 

[Kanhef]

Yeah, I just wanted to be clear about the method. There is a flag that sets critters as completely unlootable – mostly used for robots – which would be a quick and easy way to do it, but also cause problems.

 

[Blackened]

I mean, usually in games (especially online games), everything is balanced, so that you can't be unfairly strong.

Also, making some stats stronger than others spoils the fun of having an unique character, which is roughly as strong as other characters. Like, if you decide to go for Outdoorsman or Stealing tag, no matter what your character is, he will always be better without them. Or if you want to go for some perk - like Snakeater - no matter what, there will always be better ones (if you're less than 40 level).

Anyway, there is a good thing about this - it's easier to make your character perfect and be sure that this is the best possible combination.

But that's not necessary, since you can beat the game even with the worst character, providing that he has a combat skill at 100+ or speech at 160+ and you know the shortcut technique. I'm not sure if activating the turrets for your side requires Science.

 

[Ashmo]

If armour would be damaged in combat, the armour you can loot from corpses would be in various states of disrepair, depending on what kind of damage they took -- much like blowing people up works now.
There'd have to be a careful balance to avoid the hassle of having to repair your armour every couple of minutes (ala Diablo). However if the damage would be scaled down too much, the system would be pointless.

Another idea would be making scavenged armour intrinsically worth much less than bought, but that's just stupid.

Making ammo scarcer and more expensive would be a twist. You could still make money from selling it, but you wouldn't have much to sell because it's harder to come by.

In turn, guns could be less expensive or just scarcer.

 

[Cubik2k]

In 2006 year I made an Damaged Armor System, with Lisack2k's help.
It works very good but there is one big problem.
In random encounters, i.e 5 robbers in Leather Armor (normal dmg stats 2/25%), the stats of armor are added I mean that any critter has armor stats like this:
DT:= 5*2 = 10
DR:= 5*25% = 125%

the same with AC stats of armor. It multiples by number of critters in random encounter (critter who has the same armor).

So I do not continue work on this system and stopped this.
If anyone is interestig in sources I can give it.

Short description about this system:
Any critter has an armor.
Each kind of armor has points of life (i.e. Leather Jacket has 100 points, Combat Armor has 750 points).
During combat the armor is damaged. After hiting the target, his armor is:
- damaged by 1 point if is in very good condition.
- damaged by 1-2 points if is in good condition.
- damaged by 1-3 point if is in not good condition.
- damaged at all if his condioton is below 20%

This is the same for armor which Dude has worn.

All values are as example, because I do not remember them at all. It was few years ago

Any damaged armor could be looted from corpses and can be repaired by player (the repairing time is based on repair skill)
Or can be repired in mechanic for a cash.

This is your choice to repair or buy new armor in shop.

I'd like to tell, that the system is working good but only those random encounters :/

 

[Grayswandir]

Personnaly what I would like as gameplay balance improvment is the steal script from the Last hope mod of Forgotten Knight. Stealing is waay too easy in the normal version, with 30 in steal and a little save/reload thing, you can steal everything from everyone.

The second balance improvement concern the stuff you can loot from random encouter, for example in a fight between robber and caravan guards, the guards win, and you can loot the corpses from the robbers, getting you a shitload of money and weapon already at the beginning of the game.
I think it would be better if after the end of the fight, the guards would loot them for themselves. (and combined with the stealing script you wouldn't be able to get it back ).

Of course, the best way would be that it's the one who kill the guy who get the stuff. And that if you loot a corpse killed by a guard and not you, then he comes to you and to give it back or else...
But I don't suppose it is possible to do that...

Well, just my little contribution.

 

[Morticia]

@ Cubik2k,
I can't find that mod at your website so I am guessing it is not there. Other things look interesting though. 7 different ammo/damage mods I have never seen before. No one ever figured out why the random encounters are affected that way? That is too bad.

@ Grayswandir,
Steal is one of those personal preference things, I think, and it does unbalance the game. I tag steal skill and can be almost level 5 before I leave Klamath if I steal from everyone. Stealing gives experience points also. Like Per says though, f5/f6 until you succeed is not the way the game should be played.

I think I was writing something to MIB88 about this and he was working on what could be done. For example, you can steal from all of Metzger's guards and get nothing, but you can steal Metzger's shotgun. In New Reno, I can go through all 3 floors of Bishop's casino "collecting" pistols, SMGs, ammo, Jet, Stimpacks, so when I start the fight there it's just a massacre.

There is a script, I think, or some part of a script, that can prevent this. In Chinatown, you cannot steal anything from those red and blue guys. Try to get behind one and he turns to face you. What is that? and why isn't it used more? Somebody runs up and stands behind me and I would turn around. "What are you up too?"

Regarding the random encounters, I think that is just luck, though you can exploit the game this way when it happens. Cave full of robbers when you are lucky enough to find it. Leave the party waiting outside because they'll just get killed with the AI they have. Get the attention of the robbers and head back to the entrance, then count your AP. They have powerful weapons and Combat armor, but only 3-5 notice me. Stand there next to the exit grid and hope for criticals, then RUN! Heal up and go back in. Take out a couple more.

If it happens in RP I end up with several Gauss rifles, Turbo plasma rifles, powerfists, and a bunch of money. In MM I have 15 looted Combat armor also. This is exploiting the game since they can't chase you out of the cave.

Interesting if others loot for themselves. Yes. More of that, please. Not just NPCs but others, like in some encounters when an enemy picks up a weapon from a fallen one. That is what impresses and surprises me so many times about the game.
Vic actually comes alive during a battle and 'Boom, boom, boom'! I gave him an Assault rifle. "Where did that Jackhammer come from? Oh, I jus picked it up, Boss. Had a full clip"

You got me sidetracked, Grayswandir. What you are writing about is "a caravan fighting raiders" and we can just sit back and let them fight it out. I agree. Dumb guard. "I have 3 HP left and no ammo, but I can't go pick up the stimpack from that corpse." What triggers the looting script, if there is one?

 

[Cubik2k]

@ Cubik2k,
I can't find that mod at your website so I am guessing it is not there. Other things look interesting though. 7 different ammo/damage mods I have never seen before. No one ever figured out why the random encounters are affected that way? That is too bad.

Mod was never finished (because this random encounters issue) and is not on any site. I could send you remnains of this mod but ... heh I watch at this today and there is a lot stuff in Polish :/ and some bugs to fix.
Maybe I will translate this to English and try to fix some things and then put on the site to download. Well, this takes few days, so wait.