Fallout 4’s Character System

[PossibleCabbage]

It's odd that they're bragging about there being both fast leveling and no level cap, since while this does solve the problem that both Fo3 and NV had where you can hit the level cap well before you have run out of things you feel like doing, and a lot of in-game actiivites suffer when you no longer feel like you're advancing meaningfully by doing them (I mean, once I hit level 50 in New Vegas, no way I'm doing Bleed Me Dry if it's not done yet.)

But I would offer that the reason that this is a problem is simply that there's too much XP in those games (alternatively the XP requirements for the higher levels are too low.) So making leveling faster and uncapping it just means you'll have something like 50 hours of game left after you've already become an unstoppable übermensch becoming a more unstoppable úberermench.

Suffice to say the game gets much less fun when your activities feel meaningless since you're not making tangible progress, but the game also gets much less fun when you're simply imposing your will on it and nothing poses any threat to you.

 

[Serifan]

I am very happy with the change. Less rpg stuff means I can just focus on shooting shit.

 

[TorontoReign]

Serifan has went full retard folks. You never go full retard.

 

[Zerginfestor]

I will say that I apologize for offending you. I just get tired of people talking about something when they haven't even taken the time to get the facts. But I am seriously sorry that I offended you.

You say you're seriously sorry but you then post that crap above? It would've been better if you just apologized and NOT show how much of a prick you are. There's a difference to assuming with a small post of what will come to some perks, to a downright giant-ass paragraph of shitslinging ranting. Figure it out, and like me, we shouldn't jump to conclusions now, should we? Let's bury this sudden hatchet of stupidity together and let's walk down this road together, shall we?

 

[Hardboiled Android]

Percentage based Speech checks are dumb, like what? Did my character stutter the first time I picked the dialogue choice? Why did it work now and not before whe nmy character is apparently saying the exact same thing?

Yes. People will phrase and say things differently, and people are fickle. There's no guaranteed formula to convince someone.

 

[raynor009]

So tell us what is the point of having so few perks with no level cap?

Maybe there will be more perks when dlc's come out, but don't quote me on that. Honestly the only reason I want to play Fallout 4 is because of the new power armor. I'm an Iron Man fan but other than that...

 

[Walpknut]

Percentage based Speech checks are dumb, like what? Did my character stutter the first time I picked the dialogue choice? Why did it work now and not before whe nmy character is apparently saying the exact same thing?

It's one of those things that's a holdover from tabletop that hasn't really been thought through all the way apparently. Like the ethos of "you always have a chance to succeed, or fail in a dramatically significant moment" is valuable, but when you're playing a game with other people you have them to hold each other accountable in terms of what the dice or the cards or whatever show. But when you're playing a single player game (particularly one with quicksaves and multiple save slots) there's a strong ethos of "that thing which the game allows to happen, that I want to happen, will happen provided I am sufficiently persistant" basically means that having a (visible) random chance for something to happen basically just adds tedium. Like any time you see a [Speech: 25%] on the screen, the outcome of that is going to happen if the player wants it to, it's just a question of reloading about 4 times.

You can try to get around this by making more elaborate conversation trees with lots of layered checks in order to dissuade players from savescumming, but really you're just making it more tedious to do so.

Well they already fixed that in New Vegas where successfull skill checks had well written dialogue pertaining to the skill of the check, the percentage shit with dialogue is just laziness.

 

[Mr Fish]

Something that bothers me a lot about a system like this is that now every single perk is tied to your SPECIAL score, which means you can't RP as a cannibal unless you have 8 in Endurance. Like, why? Why can't I RP as a cannibal unless I get 8 in END? Why is END even a factor in the first place? Now, I get why 'some' perks would need SPECIAL prerequisites, but all of them? That doesn't make any damn sense. And then we have the tiered perk ranks. Where some of them will do something different with each rank. But what if you want rank 2 but not rank 1? Why should you have to waste an entire point on something you don't want for your character just to get to the thing you 'do' want for your character. It feels like Skyrim's constellation chart all over again.

I do like the idea of skill magazines giving you unique perks though. Rather than just boost up skills or give a little bonus to them temporarily finding a magazine that gives you a unique perk actually would feel like a proper reward. I mean, how often are players truly rewarded in RPGs for exploration and looting? Most of the time we just find more of the same kind of crap we already got or we find a new weapon that serves no other purpose than to replace the one we already got or just more shit to loot and sell or we find nothing useful at all. I want unique rewards for exploration and unique perks from skill magazines sounds like a good thing to me. I don't like skill magazines affecting level based perks though.

Problem with that is, how good are these perks? Cause a magazine perk should not be equal to a level-based perk. Then again, the level based perks look like they all suck now so I guess it wouldn't matter.

 

[generalissimofurioso]

It is Skyrim with guns.

SPACE CHOICES have been replaced with a poster.

Skills are pfft, gone.

Levels handed out like candy bars on Halloween.

Oh, I am looking forward to playing this and shitting all over it.

Because, yes, I kind of hate myself.

 

[Practicat]

Don't forget traits. The absence of them is telling of Bethesda's design philosophy. And there really is no planning and careful consideration into choosing perks this time. If you make a potential mistake, you can go right back to fixing it with the next level up. It's a shame because some of these perks probably are very useful, but they're part of this "no consequences" system.

 

[generalissimofurioso]

Lots of things I liked about New Vegas are gone.

Traits.

Multiple ammo types.

Damage Threshold.

Meaningful characterization.

A lack of Bethesda's bizarre insistence on shoehorning family into everything.

Raiders without Power Armor.

Consequences.

A lack of romantic relationships.

Super Mutants that aren't just orcs.

A sense of world progression.

Making me think about stuff.

Not being burdened by immortal dogs.

 

[thenightgaunt]

...I have to say how they handled speech is also disappointing. Speech is such an important part of fallout and just merging it with charisma and not having any perks/skills that have an effect on dialog options is really bad and not very fallout like. As much as I hate to say it though I do understand why they made that choice, charisma in 3 and new vegas was kind of pointless, most people would just spec into a high speech and leave their charisma at 5 or 6, I still disagree with it though.

I thought I saw a Lady Killer perk on that list and in the video it mentioned opening up special dialogues in the perk description. So they may have perks effecting dialog options.

It's one of those things that's a holdover from tabletop that hasn't really been thought through all the way apparently. Like the ethos of "you always have a chance to succeed, or fail in a dramatically significant moment" is valuable, but when you're playing a game with other people you have them to hold each other accountable in terms of what the dice or the cards or whatever show. But when you're playing a single player game (particularly one with quicksaves and multiple save slots) there's a strong ethos of "that thing which the game allows to happen, that I want to happen, will happen provided I am sufficiently persistant" basically means that having a (visible) random chance for something to happen basically just adds tedium. Like any time you see a [Speech: 25%] on the screen, the outcome of that is going to happen if the player wants it to, it's just a question of reloading about 4 times.

You can try to get around this by making more elaborate conversation trees with lots of layered checks in order to dissuade players from savescumming, but really you're just making it more tedious to do so.

I agree with you on this one. If there's a % chance of success, players will keep trying at it. So why have that % chance? Look at lockpicking and computer use in New Vegas. The % did nothing. It acted as a gateway to restrict access. They might as well have said "must have level 2 lockpicking to try this lock" instead of lockpicking 50%. I'm not saying anyone is wrong for liking a % system, but as it was, it didn't quite work right for certain tasks.

The trick there might be to make the speech checks invisible. Since fallout 1, there's been this tradition of showing (if you had the right perk) which dialogue options had different effects. Blue for options that make the NPC happy, red for the ones that piss them off. But what is gained by showing dialogue options that the player can't choose? Sure it lets you know they exist, but that's a bit odd at the same time isn't it?

 

[Walpknut]

To be fair, we don't know for sure if Alternate ammo types are gone. It's very likely they are but we can't be sure yet.

 

[generalissimofurioso]

I really wouldn't put it past them to strip it out because people were confused by it.

I mean, they were confused by Small Guns v. Big Guns.

These are angrily stupid people they design for.

 

[Walpknut]

Damage Resistance is back too, guys. Great....

Only interesting Perk I can see are the "Local Leader" ones which seem to relate to the Settlement building stuff and the "Intimidation" perks which seem to add some Project Ultimatum type mechanics.

Why is the "Alcohol addiction resistance" Perk in the Charisma Slot? Shouldn't that be an Endurance perk? I mean the icon of the "Chem Resistant" perk is in the perk chart poster so why even divide those two?

 

[Doctor 0]

Lots of things I liked about New Vegas are gone.

Traits.

Multiple ammo types.

Damage Threshold.

Meaningful characterization.

A lack of Bethesda's bizarre insistence on shoehorning family into everything.

Raiders without Power Armor.

Consequences.

A lack of romantic relationships.

Super Mutants that aren't just orcs.

A sense of world progression.

Making me think about stuff.

Not being burdened by immortal dogs.

I actually like the cut "marriage" that had the King marry you and Cass. Sad that was cut.


On the topic of ammo types... They really wouldn't matter in this game since you will be a god in no time.

 

[generalissimofurioso]

I hope they get rid of that pesky 80% DR cap that kept getting in the way of me being truly invincible.

 

[Doctor 0]

Damage Resistance is back too, guys. Great....

"We heard some folks want the game to be difficult, so we made enemies spongy as fuck"

 

[Hassknecht]

I haven't seen speec in action but the Charisma and it's perk descriptions all alude to "Make it easier to persuade" in dialogue. So it's more than obviously working on a Percentage chance, just like it did in FO3.

Hooray for savescumming, I guess.

Hah, tell that to Bethesda. "People were save-scumming their speech-checks, so we made it that they always win".

 

[Deleted member 79804]

Lots of things I liked about New Vegas are gone.

Traits.

Multiple ammo types.

Damage Threshold.

Meaningful characterization.

A lack of Bethesda's bizarre insistence on shoehorning family into everything.

Raiders without Power Armor.

Consequences.

A lack of romantic relationships.

Super Mutants that aren't just orcs.

A sense of world progression.

Making me think about stuff.

Not being burdened by immortal dogs.

Gotta say comparing super mutants in fallout 3 to orcs is really offensive, very unfair to orcs.