Can we all agree Bethesda did power armor right?

[Artemis]

Bethesda is really just concern with the shooter gameplay when it comes to Fallout, so lore and roleplaying take a back seat and whilst I agree that they should've given PA later and made fusion cores rarer but last longer, Bethesda probably did what they thought was right and, understandably for once, left this kind of tweaking issue to modders

I came to the Fallout because of the lore and post-apocalyptic atmosphere. You can simply say that Bethesda just want to milk the money from the well known name, creating mass aka Call of Duty garbage.

First thing first, do you want to balance the game? Start with the Fusion Core, right now it's cheap, change the prize from 400` to 10000 caps, it's pre-war tech, it need to be expensive and also limited on the wasteland.

But it's one thing that Bethesda don't understand, for example, RadAway cost in Fallout 1, 2 and Tactics 500 caps, while Fallout 3 - 20, Fallout 4 - 80 caps. So I won't even start on the Power Armor cheap prices.

 

[Ninja]

First thing first, do you want to balance the game? Start with the Fusion Core, right now it's cheap, change the prize from 400` to 10000 caps, it's pre-war tech, it need to be expensive and also limited on the wasteland.

But it's one thing that Bethesda don't understand, for example, RadAway cost in Fallout 1, 2 and Tactics 500 caps, while Fallout 3 - 20, Fallout 4 - 80 caps. So I won't even start on the Power Armor cheap prices.

Part of the issue is also the abundance of these things. RadAway, Fusion Cores, and Power Armor are ridiculously common finds in the wasteland, often the end result of a "dungeon", so to speak. Add in the fact that fucking everything in this game oozes radiation, and it would be nearly impossible to play the game without ending up fully radiated by the time you reach the Institute (if RadAway wasn't cheap and plentiful). It's a huge problem, but I guess Bethesda just assumes that the player doesn't have the patience to wait for Power Armor, or that not everything retains and releases radiation like they seem to think.

 

[Scipio the Elder]

I think Fallout 1 did a good job at making certain resources scarce. Not sure on Fallout 2 as I've yet to sit down and advance farther than the first town.

So when I see how common place these fusion cores are it just makes me wonder why or how they're not been taken by others. I'm sure they could be re-purposed as an energy source for other materials. I remember combat armour being pretty pricey in Fallout 1, around 15,000 scripts I believe, so why wouldn't power armour components cost an arm and a leg in Fallout 4?

Given how abundant items simply are, not even going to touch weaponry and armour, I believe balance might be a tad bit.. Difficult.

Onto the topic. I voted other. Yes they made power armour what it should be. No they did not do the fusion core thing right at all. They make it seem like I can simply pop it off the suit, take some electromagnetic spring out of it, and throw it like a grenade from how unstable it is. I honestly believe it would be a moot point to make a walking tank be so easily fucked up by a single shot to the outside of the core.

 

[Spacemunkey]

Part of the issue is also the abundance of these things. RadAway, Fusion Cores, and Power Armor are ridiculously common finds in the wasteland, often the end result of a "dungeon", so to speak. Add in the fact that fucking everything in this game oozes radiation, and it would be nearly impossible to play the game without ending up fully radiated by the time you reach the Institute (if RadAway wasn't cheap and plentiful). It's a huge problem, but I guess Bethesda just assumes that the player doesn't have the patience to wait for Power Armor, or that not everything retains and releases radiation like they seem to think.

I agree, the entire FO4 economy is broken so raising prices wouldn't matter. Not once did I have to buy a stim, radaway, or fusion core, in fact I cant remember really buying anything with caps as I was swimming in "legendary" items and ammo I didn't use. I do like the PA though, later in my playthrough of a character that didn't use the PA taking on BOS was a challenge and them being bullet sponges felt justified; however as stated above it shouldn't be used outside the BOS and just laying around waiting for the player felt so theme park.

 

[Brivoo]

The existence of raider armor is what bothers me, honestly. Power armor is supposed to be the absolute peak of Pre-War technological achievement. It should take a high level of knowledge to properly mantain or reverse engineer. The fact raiders can just take pieces of power armor and some scrap then jury rig it to something that works is odd. The fact it has low stats helps, but it doesn't seem like they should have the knowledge to even make it walk functionally.

Raider Power Armour to me doesn't seem like reverse engineering so much as them just strapping a bunch of junk to the PA frame. Though the frame itself is shitting all over the lore, so hush my mouth I suppose.

I came to the Fallout because of the lore and post-apocalyptic atmosphere.

Bethesda turned the series around. It's no longer about lore, it's about gameplay now. Same reason why there's so much radiation everywhere; it's a way to challenge the player a la Dark Souls, reducing your max health. They don't give a shit about proper consistency, not even between their own games.

You can simply say that Bethesda just want to milk the money from the well known name, creating mass aka Call of Duty garbage.

I mean, yeah.

 

[vonVince]

The so called "T-60" sure isn't right at all. The "T-60" power armor appears out of nowhere to be everywhere and being the most advanced pre-war power armor inspite of T-51 having been established (even in Fallout 3 by Bethesda) as the pinnacle of pre-war power armor technology: when exactly was this "T-60" developed to see "extensive use after the Battle of Anchorage" if T-51 was just ready for service in 2076 to be rushed for the Battle of Anchorage; which ended in January 2077 and the world was wrecked by nuclear war just nine months later :/

 

[ZigzagPX4]

The so called "T-60" sure isn't right at all. The "T-60" power armor appears out of nowhere to be everywhere and being the most advanced pre-war power armor inspite of T-51 having been established (even by Bethesda in Fallout 3) as pinnacle of pre-war power armor technology: when exctly was this "T-60" developed to see "extensive use after the Battle of Anchorage" if T-51 was just ready for service in 2076 to be rushed for the Battle of Anchorage; which ended in January 2077 and the world was wrecked by nuclear war just nine months later :/

I don't understand why they would want to make it a "T-60" at all. There were plenty of models they could've made it - any of the T-series from 40 to 44 and 46 to 49. That was some potential insight into the T-series they wasted. Not to mention apparently the T-45a, T-51a and T60-a series only differ from all the other ones visually in that they're more rusty - and that's it. The T-series from the letter "b" and on all look identical.

 

[Hassknecht]

I don't understand why they would want to make it a "T-60" at all. There were plenty of models they could've made it - any of the T-series from 40 to 44 and 46 to 49. That was some potential insight into the T-series they wasted. Not to mention apparently the T-45a, T-51a and T60-a series only differ from all the other ones visually in that they're more rusty - and that's it. The T-series from the letter "b" and on all look identical.

The T-60 would have made sense as a BoS-developed improvement over the T-45, hence the similar look. But no, Bethesda also wanted their "featured armour" to be in the pre-war sequences (heavily shown prior to release), so it had to be pre-war.
It's also fun how the loading screen description of the T-51 still claims that the T-51 is the pinnacle of pre-war power armour technology. Communication.

 

[ZigzagPX4]

The T-60 would have made sense as a BoS-developed improvement over the T-45, hence the similar look. But no, Bethesda also wanted their "featured armour" to be in the pre-war sequences (heavily shown prior to release), so it had to be pre-war.
It's also fun how the loading screen description of the T-51 still claims that the T-51 is the pinnacle of pre-war power armour technology. Communication.

Which made even less sense - they had a fully designed T-51 model irregardless, so why not feature that in the game? That way the Brotherhood's signature T-60 could appear even more unique.

Still, the T-60 has a valid reason for looking like the T-45. Maybe the defense contractor each 10 models in the T-series was designed by were all different. Say Contractor A designed the T-40 series, then Contractor B designed the T-50 series, but then Contractor A is then put back on the assignment for the next series...

It would make sense if the lore hadn't already confirmed for sure that the T-51 was the last one. So it really is a blatant retcon. There would've been so many ways to make it subtle, and they really should've put in more effort into the retcon than one loading screen's worth of lore. At least if they're going to make a big change, they should be spending more than one paragraph on it.

 

[Hassknecht]

Which made even less sense - they had a fully designed T-51 model irregardless, so why not feature that in the game? That way the Brotherhood's signature T-60 could appear even more unique.

Still, the T-60 has a valid reason for looking like the T-45. Maybe the defense contractor each 10 models in the T-series was designed by were all different. Say Contractor A designed the T-40 series, then Contractor B designed the T-50 series, but then Contractor A is then put back on the assignment for the next series...

It would make sense if the lore hadn't already confirmed for sure that the T-51 was the last one. So it really is a blatant retcon. There would've been so many ways to make it subtle, and they really should've put in more effort into the retcon than one loading screen's worth of lore. At least if they're going to make a big change, they should be spending more than one paragraph on it.

Especially if that one loading screen actively contradicts another loading screen...
They wanted "their" style of power armour to be most prevalent in the game. I noticed that T-45 and T-60 armours are much easier to get than T-51 suits, and not just because the game hands you one or more suits of each for free. The T-51 only spawns in a very small window of player level, before and after it's much more likely to find a T-45 or T-60, respectively.

 

[Korin]

Let me first say that I didn't read any posts in this thread, not even the original post. I think how the power armour works now "makes more sense" as far as how it works mechanically when you get into it but as the polling option says, you get it way too early... not just that but power armour, which is supposed to be the pinnacle of pre-war technology... a real treasure... you find it everywhere. I have something like 15 suits of power armor parked in Sanctuary Hills. So many sets I'm tripping over them.

To make it an even bigger joke they added the Atom Cats which are like a greaser gang of people that just fuck around in flame painted power armour all day... how ridiculous. Half the people in the wasteland can't even find food or water but apparently power armour grows on fucking trees.

 

[DVL]

Bethesda did power armor right?
Yes and no... They finally made Power armor be like the personal tank vehicle it was supposed to be so I give them props for that and then messed up everything else about it .

• They messed up by saying there was a new superior Pre-war power armor (T-60) totally out of the blue
  
• They messed up by saying power armor is powered by some new thing called Fusion Cores
• They messed up by making anyone be able to equip and use a power armor without any training at all, even driving an automatic car needs months of training for example
• They messed up by making Raiders have their own strange power armor
• They messed up by making the most powerful and armored armor in the whole pre-war world being able to be repaired with crushed coffee cups and other junk
• They messed up by leaving suits of power armor just sitting in random nonsense places (specially since there is not hard to just find or buy a Fusion Core and take those armors home)
• They messed up for making the Hotrod power armor enthusiasts (what the hell Bethesda!)
• They messed up by giving power armor too soon and for no good reason at all (unless you count unleashing a deathclaw at the player in less than one hour playing a good reason)
• They messed up by allowing totally different power armor model parts to fit seamlessly with each-other on a non altered or custom frame

Just my two cents

I would actually say most of those ideas are actually good ideas with poor execution. Minor lore retconning is not going to bother me. T-51's had fusion power plants that supposedly last centuries. So okay, make it a power core. Whatever, that's not really important to the plot.

Hot rodding paint jobs can also work. It's campy in Mad Max Road Fury without being stupid The Warboys have customized steering wheels and paint their face with chrome spraypaint before going kamikaze to Valhalla. But then again, their culture shows itself to be surprisingly sophisticated in the establishing shots of the movie despite their apparent crudeness. Their whole religion centers around the maintenance of cars and they have farms, water and factories to justify their technology.

Just tone it down to the one high-status raider with an aging T-51 or at least justify their tech level.

Fallout had Smitty's mod for the plasma gun and hardened power armor, but you're given the impression that these modifications were the exceptions and not the rule. So just finding a few prototype T-60's in small artisanal labs would make sense. Like say, the Brotherhood has a blueprint for it and dug up a few parts.

It's just easy to pick on small stuff like that when everything else is done poorly.

 

[Artemis]

One more thing, why does the Elder Maxson using T-60? Shouldn't he using most advanced armor that the Brotherhood got? I mean, even in the Quartermaster there is X-01 helmet, why the highest ranked person don't use it? Beside, I remember the assault on Institute, where he even don't wear one at all, running only with his jacket.

 

[TorontoReign]

Don't ask for things to make sense in the Bethesda Falloutverse. They can't be bothered to worry about lore and consistency.

 

[Artemis]

Don't ask for things to make sense in the Bethesda Falloutverse. They can't be bothered to worry about lore and consistency.

Guess "Mod will fix it" once again.

 

[TorontoReign]

Not this time.

 

[Walpknut]

I don't even get why they felt the need to add a new "model" that looks exactly the same as the one they introduced in FO3 as a separate piece of armor and then went back to retcon shit about that being the standard issue armor despite the T-51 being stablished as that in all the previous games? Even FO3 said as much with the t45 being outdated and just something the BOS were forced to wear due to lack of anything better.... the T-51 was even an unique piece of Armor in FO3... Why not just make it so that the T60 is just something the Brotherhood recently developed after seizing shit from the Enclave base in Broken Steel? They keep makign all the factiosn of the wasteland feel like unproductive and static jackoffs who continuosly live off 200 year old scrap.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Have you seen inside out? I think the outro explains rather well what goes on in Todds brain, and why ... certain things are just ... there. You know, like a cat and and their attention span.

 

[Walpknut]

I am increasingly disturbed by how many times I actually have said "Even FO3 got thsi right" nowadays.... what the fuck is even happening? What has Fallout 4 done?

 

[mrchaos]

What has Fallout 4 done?

Failed to bring anything new to the franchise.

Oh wait. So did fallout 3.