Is New Vegas crippled by bad writing?

Fallout 3: an RPG where no matter what character you WANTED to play, you'll always be a bullied vault-kid with daddy problems.

Great writing, I like how it makes me feel like I'm playing a role-playing game.
 
Actually, you CAN often play how you want, but the game would always suppose that you did what you were supposed to do.

It is a social experiment make you question yourself if you actually played the way you intended to do.
After many reload, seems you are endlessly thinking you did something while the game aknowledged something else.
 
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Eh, I get what you guys are saying, but you seem to misunderstand me (which may be my fault).

FO3 has bad writing, which makes playing it in a "screw the main quest, let's just wander around" fall flat. You can visit stuff, but what's the point if most of it is dull and uninspiring. That's a negative (but kinda accurate) way of looking at it. However, if you DO wander around, you're not very likely to "break" anything. There's no point to it, though, as it's just a free range FPS, but if it had a good story, that aspect of it wouldn't be that terrible.

FO2, on the other hand, has a much more worthwhile world to explore, but having both quests and challenges not scale in any way makes exploration kind of counter-productive when it comes to balance. And by this I mean exploring just the cities and the different societies and getting involved in quests and politcs. Those are actually something the game is praised for, but the way the game handles loot/XP distribution (or availability of shop stock, lootable container areas or quests) can seriously mess stuff up when it comes to player power level. And this doesn't have to be adressed by making stuff scale automatically at all but it could be adressed in other ways.

For example, one of the most egregious examples of when this can "break" balance is when you get the NCR scouting quest in VC. A trip to NCR at the time you can get the quest to do it can get you so many advantages that most fights afterwards will take very little resources, most quests will award very little XP, and most loot will not be better than what you already have and will just cause you to stockpile stimpaks and never run out. The games "story" (or rather the VC NR NCR) story assumes that you can and have to visit NCR, but the economy/combat/XP distribution system breaks down horribly if you do it.

This is mainly because of the way NCR as a city is designed - there's a semi-end game weapon/ammo shop right in front of your face, and another one inside, and at both of them you can, and probably will, buy stuff that's much better than most if not all of the stuff you can find in VC, NR, Broken Hills or even Redding. Now if the stock of these shops required you to do stuff in NR, BH and/or Redding before it allowed acess to end-game toys, you'd be exploring those places at a more appropriate time with more appropriate gear thus making all the challenges (and rewards) there more enjoyable. Many interesting and challenging-if-done-at-the-right-time quests in those cities have guns and stuff which would be really cool if you didn't already get better ones from a shop. This is especially true for shotguns, since they all use the same ammo and have a very linear progression - once you've got the best one, you'll never have a reason to use any other one.

A different kind of example is the legendary "talk a cop out of suiciding" quest in NCR which gives out as much XP as the entirety of the VC reactor questline + books for a single conversation. Sure, it's fine and dandy if you're skipping the entire midgame as a means to "catch up", but if that load of quest XP was distributed differently, into anywhere between 4 to 8 different quests/conversations you could make those quests unlock in a way which checks if you've at least explored a few other places where the rewards for such a quest are 500 XP rather than 1000's upon 1000's.

An example of loot not scaling to your level, the most definitive overkill in that regard, would be the SAD, where you can with little effort get unbelievable amounts of ammo, guns and grenades (and a lot of other stuff). If some of that stuff was under a lock of some sort, kind of like the electronic lockpicks only "exploration gate" in the toxic caves, then you could get some of the loot whenever, and some only if the game checked if you've at least visited locations which this loot would make too easy for you.

Now if various things were adjusted this way, there wouldn't be a need to grind, just to explore, and you wouldn't have to rely on "beef gates" as much. And exploration (or rather interaction with people in cities) would be much more rewarding, as you couldn't mess up the fixed challenges as much by just talking to people and getting to know the wasteland. AND there'd be more interconectedness between various communities bringing out the strenght of FO2 worldbuilding.

What I'm wondering is, how much of a problem does NV have with this? FO3 lets you explore but for no point, FO2 lets you explore but gives out too much of a good thing in terms of XP/loot/power for it. How's NV about this? Do you get significantly more powerful if you randomly decide to explore stuff and stumble into a loot/xp bonanza of some sort?
 
To rephrase my answer on that matter, i don't think you are supposed to go to any city in any order. Not only you would mess with the order of rewards, but the orders of things you learn about the main quest. Basically, by going backward, you will get some informations that you don't need anymore, so it would break the immersion of that main quest. Also, not quest related, but if you start the game by doing firstly to New Reno & Vault City, then other cities, it would feel like all of them would become disapointing in terms of complexity, number of factions, size of the town, number of NPCs, number of quests. You have to go first to little cities, then increase slowly the numbers of things to do in each town, in order to keep things refreshing. That basically what made San Francisco/Navarro disapointing for me in the first playthrough. Coming from Vault City/New Reno/Broken Hills/NCR, i had very high expectations coming to those end game locations, that ended being less interesting and with far less contents than previous cities that were the highlight of the games. If i had to go to Klamath/Den/Modoc in the end, i would have be as much disapointed. So in the end, the loot/XP maybe matters to you, but i think that even without if, it doesn't seems wise to go in those cities in the unintended order.


So basically the way i see the point of messing with cities order :

- Go on purpose in end-game towns, to purposly get your hand on high quality stuff or ton of easy XP rewards, to make you very stronger to fight early game ennemies. You are not breaking the balance, by mistake, but go there with the INTEND of breaking the balance. That's why almost everyone did at least once an early trip from Arroyo to Navarro to get his hands on the Advanced power armor early on. We all know it would break the balance. That's why we did it.
- Skipping town you don't like.
- Leave SOME quests on the side, do everything else, change town, leave some quest on the side, change town, get something that would help you to finish the quest of the first town, comeback. It is not like you explore town in any order, but change do SOME quests out of sequence, while for everything else, you explore cities in the right order.
(in my own quest, i tend to some of the Reno's family's quests in the very end of my playthrough in order to keep the four bosses living as long as possible)
 
^ I kinda do the same, and one of the things about New Reno is that I always whished finally fighting all the mobsters was challenging by the point I do it. It's not built to be the last thing to do, but I somehow always end up doing it rather late.

But as for messing up the story by playing non-linearly - what story is that? XD As long as you allocate some of the existing XP from "later" towns to add 1-2 late game quests to the earlier towns (like the Toxic caves) to give you something tought to do on a return trip, it wouldn't be much of a problem. Redding's kinda a late mid-game town allready, Broken Hills and Gecko have no fights (and the gecko ghouls have AP ammo and can mess you up anyway). The main story kinda trails off at VC anyway, and considering how little of it there is even there, there really could've been a Redding - New Reno - NCR path to take from the Den which would let you skip VC entirely. Add a high-level quest to Modoc and a bunch of low level ones to Redding to even them out, you can allready get a Voice Module in NR, it wouldn't hurt the game one bit...

In fact, seeing how the game steers me to NCR from VC, I often have to remember that New Reno is even there, and Redding is quite simmilar. It's kinda like there was supposed to be content which allowed that route to be more fleshed out but was simply cut. Technically, if you don't talk to a random dude in the street, and don't choose the correct answers, the game never actually steers you towards NR. You can at least end up at redding by doing the brahmin drive at NCR (which I always do and then revisit everything I have left at the start / return the Geck).
 
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In fact, seeing how the game steers me to NCR from VC, I often have to remember that New Reno is even there
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Huh? You learn about NR pretty early - in Klamath, so I wouldn't say it steers you to NCR...
And remember about Moore (who is no more random that Stark), who gives you suitcase for NR, so you should first go there, instead of going to NCR.

In my first 3-4 games I always skipped Redding.
Always.
For first, it was always weird location for me, pretty hard in terms of quests and fights.
And, what's more important, there wasn't any quest from other town connected with Redding.
Even while playing Killap patch I clear Redding before/after Navarro.
 
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I'm not sure but for Redding, you can get information where the friend of Vic got the flask.
he got flask of V13 while bramin drive NCR to Redding.
so it is possible to go Redding to find clue of Vault.
what you actually can do is join Bramin drive to go to NCR.
so it's not wasted place I guess.
 
^ Yeah, Redding is kinda weird in terms of when to go there. You can reach it right after the den, but it's kind of not really built to support that approach both in terms of challenge or rewards. Not to mention that if you do the final sheriff quest, you set yourself up for reeeealy tough encounters down the road... It has a really large "you're not supposed to be here" sign on it if you come from the Den, which is kind of why you're not really enticed to go to NR afterwards.

Also, you do learn about new reno rather early, but the first guy who tells you about it (in Klamath if I remember correctly) tells you NOT to go there, and the main quest tells you to go to VC. And there only Moore steers you to NR and he's technically just a random dude you don't have to either click on or get the quest from if you do (or you can screw that dialogue up). So the first few mentions don't really give you a reason to go there, Moore does, but it's incredibly random (well, he does look weird for VC and they put him next to the vault, that's something, but eh...), and then there's also the mine parts quest in Broken Hills. And finally, if you didn't access and loot the vault, you have to go there once you found Vault 13 for the main quest, except there's no clue to it.

The problem is that the player always gets pointers to other places by more "legit" prople - either quest givers you've worked before to your satisfaction, or people who seem to be involved to the main quest. Early on you get warnings to not go there, or info about it from junkies and such. Then if you head in it's direction you run into a Redding which you can't approach as you approached all the other cities - if you left Metzger for later, you're deffinitely not ready for the Wannamingo's and you'll doom yourself if you even manage to do Frog Morton. If you go towards VC, Modoc will be a completely different experience as it's much more level appropriate, so you're more enticed to keep going in that direction. Then in VC the gecko scouting and the become a citizen quest fit nicely togather, and becoming a citizen seems to be the next step in the main quest. When you get NCR scouting that seems to be the way to go. Deffinitely looks more legit than delivering a suitcase for kind of a random bum. You'll probably do Broken Hills as a sidetrack along the way, since Modoc seemed to work well enough the last time you trekked across the map, it looks legit. And then you have the choice of going to New Reno or continuing towards NCR.

At this point you can have 2 things to do in NR - suitcase and the mine parts. In my experience the following works against going to NR:

- You look at the map and figure that you can do it on the return trip since the NCR scouting requires you to go back to VC.
- You've already made one sidetrack from what seemed to be going somewhere, and NCR isn't very far

And if you go to NR:

- If you've messed up the Moore conversation you can get youself killed easily without having a clue what went wrong
- Your car gets stolen

But if you go to NCR:

- You can get the item/XP load and finish the main quest
- And it's quite self-contained with no hooks to NR

I mean, yeah, sure, we've all played the game many times, but going to New Reno before you go to NCR is kinda sidetracky AND can easily make a new player sorry for making that sidetrack. And possibly shoot the guy who's connected to a very interesting plot that connects the cities right away, or just find your car and gtfo. And if you ignore the leads in favor of NCR, and do stuff there, you'll probably end up at New Reno overequipped and overleveled. I mean, I know you're supposed to get sidetracked and that the NCR rewards/loot/main quest stuff assumes that it's done last, after New Reno, but it kind of only works if you intentionaly aviod it and intentionally go to New Reno.

It could've been done better.

EDIT: In the end it's more about the way NCR is designed than anything else - if it had a different loot/X/shop inventory/random grind drops distribution it'd all work out fine as is. NR kinda works like an alternative to Vault City with a slightly higher power level and a lot more fights, but the main plot kind of doesn't lead there at all, it's like they dropped it during production. And if NR was ment to be a place that's only hinted at with a growing number of sidetrack hooks (VC, BH, Vault 13) it ought to be way tougher than NCR instead of lower in terms of challenges as you can easily ignore it up to the point where you need to finish the geck quest. If THIS was actually enforced by the economy (of challenges/rewards) zhen the main plot makes a nice spiral ending with NR which kind of makes sense. Any other way you'll likely end up at Vault 13 with what you need to complete the main quest allready in your inventory (as you do now). And you'd also be able to find the lockpicks for the Toxic caves after you've done with the GECK, you can take the caravan to Redding from NCR and it works out awesome (as opposed to now when you're likely to find them and infinite free weapon upgrades at really screwy times).

All it needs is a bit of buildup for the mafia bossess until you get to meet them, accounting for NCR being the default destination after VC and a more engaging way to get the final mcguffin from Eldridge than just dumping gold on him. And that's it, everything works out fine.
 
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Call me a Troll but any topic with a title like this that starts off wit h"Fallout 3 was my first fallout and I am gonna use it as a good example" from a person that just registered to post it is incredibly hard for me to even want to read a single line of the text wall.
I kind of get a Arin Matthews vibe from it.
 
I mean, yeah, sure, we've all played the game many times, but going to New Reno before you go to NCR is kinda sidetracky AND can easily make a new player sorry for making that sidetrack.
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Huh? What?
It obvious that Fo2 route is Klamath - Den - Modoc - VC - Broken Hills/New Reno - NCR and then just east to SF and Navarro, with Redding in the middle.

In the end it's more about the way NCR is designed than anything else - if it had a different loot/X/shop inventory/random grind drops distribution it'd all work out fine as is.
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It shouldn't have it, cause NCR is designed to be in late game, after NR and so on?

I'm completely not getting your vision of NR being after NCR, even the game itself denies it by rewards/quests/and the looks of worldmap.
 
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I guess you missed Gecko :razz:.
I think route is like this:

If you become citizen of VC:
Klamath->Den->(modoc)->VC->Gecko->(?)->NCR

IF you ask source of Flask you learn that the brahmin drive is start from NCR and end at Redding.
and friend of Vic found flaks while driving brahmin.
Klamath->Den->(modoc)(actually, this place is ignorable!)->VC->Redding->???->NCR

but the problem is, it is too hard to cross VC to NCR or Redding to NCR.
so, how do with cross the road between VC and NCR?

first, you can get assualt rifle from Modoc's quest.
second, you can get scoped rifle and combat shotgun from quests of Brokenhills(if you luck enough, you can get power fist but if not.....:ugly:).
and finally you can find large selection of weapons(you even can get energy weapon at there!) at New Reno.

so usually, (?) and (???) can be Broken hills and New Reno.

and I think finding Geck([spolier] plus destroy enclave[/spoiler]) is not the only mainquest of Fo2.
I think change the world by solving quests itself is another main quest of Fo2.
Unlike Fo1, you have plenty of time to do that.
and it is much safer to gain exp form quest than grinding strong enemy if your equipment is not good enough.
and you also can get better equipment for free from quests and adventure while doing that(like Sierra army depot).

especially Redding, there are 3 ways to change the town.
you can let them join up to NCR, New Reno or Vault city.
and while doing that, you can learn about good and bad points of all three major faction of Core region.
so I think Redding is wasted place if the change the world is another main quest.

if you only concern GECK, then you probably ignore Raider.
but if you concern how to change the world, it won't be wasted.
 
Languorous_Maiar said:
I mean, yeah, sure, we've all played the game many times, but going to New Reno before you go to NCR is kinda sidetracky AND can easily make a new player sorry for making that sidetrack.
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Huh? What?
It obvious that Fo2 route is Klamath - Den - Modoc - VC - Broken Hills/New Reno - NCR and then just east to SF and Navarro, with Redding in the middle.
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How is it obvious?

If you get to VC you get the "become a citizen" quest which builds onto the main quest (or looks like it will, entering the vault might and does provide info). You also get "scout gecko" quest which goes nicely along with it. You do gecko, you become a citizen. You also find the location of Vault 15 from the vault computer (I think). Next quest you get from the guard captain who had you scout gecko is to scout NCR. No reason to believe this isn't the way to go.

You MIGHT also get the "bring suitcase to bishop" quest, but it looks nowhere as important. The previous scouting quest led along the same way as the quest which had you become a citizen and got you loot and info.

So you go towards NCR and you may or may not stop at either Raiders or Broken Hills. If you're playing RP you probably won't even find the raiders. If you stop at BH, you MAY get a quest to get the mine parts from New Reno, otherwise there's no indication to go there at all. Especially if you walk into the mine and decide you don't have the right armor yet (which you probably don't).

So you continue to NCR.

Languorous_Maiar said:
In the end it's more about the way NCR is designed than anything else - if it had a different loot/X/shop inventory/random grind drops distribution it'd all work out fine as is.
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It shouldn't have it, cause NCR is designed to be in late game, after NR and so on?

I'm completely not getting your vision of NR being after NCR, even the game itself denies it by rewards/quests/and the looks of worldmap.
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Yes, NCR is currently designed to be in the late game, except the VC scouting quest and the lack of solid, convincing reasons to ever go to NR has always, in every playthrough where I didn't use out of game logic, had me reach NCR before NR. If you set out south to scout the route to NCR for VC, and not get sidetracked by either the suitcase or the BH mine parts quest, there's no hook for NR at all.

Yeah, it was designed to be reached before NCR, but it wasn't properly connected to either the rest of the world or the geck quest. VC leaves you with the choice of scouting a location for a legit quest giver and delivering a suitcase for a random bum. Doing the obvious thing gets you to the end game, and delivering the briefcase takes you to New Reno and can get your car stolen and you shot. And the car is stolen because if you're just popping in for the only 2 fetch quests in the game that take you there, you'd have to ask around for it and get involved, since whoever made the game knew that you weren't really given enough reasons to be there by the game at all and at best you just got a bit sidetracked from what you set out to do and thats get to NCR. If you don't get sidetracked, you're at NCR before NR 100% sure.



EDIT:

In fact, without previous knowlegde, it's rather easy to screw yourself out of the hooks for NR which are there:

a) If you don't talk to Moore, and he doesn't look important. He looks like NPC's which often don't have anything to say.
b) If you do talk to Moore, but don't take/get the quest from him
b) If you piss Moore off and still take the briefcase, or ask for a reward. This can in fact lead you to one of the few situations where you can't reload after a conversation to get out of getting shot since you screwed up a while ago. So you're less likely to even take the quest on your next playthrough as you can't figure out what went wrong without a guide.

and in broken hills you can either blow the mine up which I don't think requires a trip to NR, or you can decide to do it on your way back. And the fights in BH are so easy, and most quests just dialogue, that making that sidetrack makes you feel like you really ought to be more ahead in terms of zones, you you're more likely to continue towards NCR than make another sidetrack to NR.

Missing the NCR scouting which takes you from VC to NCR requires you to not talk to a guy who looks like a legit quest giver and ASKING him for somethign to do, after you've previously done something for him which turned out great.

Really, the only thing that indicates that NR was supposed to be done before NCR is the XP/loot/shop inventory and guard power composition in NR and NCR, if those were swapped around everything would make a ton more sense.

And this is IMPORTANT:

woo1108 said:
if you only concern GECK, then you probably ignore Raider.
but if you concern how to change the world, it won't be wasted.
Click to expand...

Ah, see, it's a bit deeper than that. Before you find the geck, you have Hakunin appearing all the time reminding you about your quest. There is nothing in the game that indicates that you have plenty of time (in fact after years of playing I still don't know if I have to do the GECK quest on time). The game creates a sense that you have to find the GECK first, and THEN change the world. There's no reason whatsoever to doubt this (without out of game knowledge). If you play it like this, and there really is no reason to even think it wasn't ment to be done like that, you'll get to NCR smoothly and get involved with NR when the deathclaws ask you to get the voice module (which you can get in NR), or if you have the VM from VC, after the geck quest ends.

If finding the GECK wasn't supposed to be endgame/lategame but just the first thing you do while you're on a clock, which makes more sense than anything, then NCR should've been adjusted to come before NR. Then you'd get the equipment for dealing with the Enclave from SAD or the electronic lockpicks for the Toxic Caves - it all works perfectly without any out of game knowlede.
 
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I am not the best involved to talk about mechanics above writting & worldbuilding, and i rather prefer have this topic on a separate thread but i usually do New Reno/Broken Hills before NCR for the same reason i do Modoc before Vault City, and Redding during the trip from Vault 13 to Arroyo. It is on the way to the next city.

Considering that you travel HUGE distances between cities and that the wasteland is never a safe place, it make sense that you stop to any settlement on the way, in order to rest, replenish your food & water, trade the stuff you found on the way for better gear and have a drink with your buddies. (and would allow everyone to sleep in a real bed instead of taking turn to watch the surrounding during the night)

On a more practical gamer perspective, i usually don't play a combat oriented character, so the travel are dangerous and the random encounter mostly unwanted (at least before the power armor) and i know that there are many quest that can be safely done inside the boundaries of the city that would make me gain some additionnal levels and gear that i would need for the next steps of the road. So, the order of the cities i explore is mostly always without much thinking twice. Not counting RP locations, it is :
Arroyo-Klamath/Toxic Caves-Den-Modoc/Ghost Farm-Vault City/Gecko-Broken Hills/New Reno/Stables/Golgotha/Sierra-NCR/Vault 15-Vault 13-Redding-Arroyo-Vault 13-Mariposa-San Francisco/Navarro-The Oil Rig with some quests temporary left behind until i have the right tool, like coming back in the Den after i got the car part from Gecko.

Also, i don't feel there is the same sense of urgency in looking for the Geck or the Water Ship that you have when looking for dad, for instance.
Of course, if you don't look for them, you won't find them, and if you don't find them, you home settlement will die at some point.
But even if you should take care of your mission as soon as possible, it is not the NOW/TODAY kind of urgency.
You have days/weeks/months to find those. You also have some way around, like the water caravan in Fo1 or imagine that the Arroyo folk will get ressources from other lands at some point. Also, you have no idea where to find those objects, no idea if they exist, no idea about how to live in the wasteland, how to make people trust you. So, it makes sense that you spend some time in the various settlement you stumble across, to find clues about your mission, learn tips about survival, find allies, identify potential foes, earn a living to get better gear for the most dangerous areas, try to guess where you macguffin could be by learning to understand how the world works. If I am not wrong the Vault dweller cannonically spent a whole year between leaving the Vault 13 for the first time and destoying the vats.

Also, if you get your hands on the highwayman quickly, you would spend less days travelling and will get Hakunin dreams later.
While the time you spend in the cities wouldn't be that high. I think it is like 2 days ingame/One hour IRL.
Not couting travel to places like the Stables/Golgotha/Sierra, i don't think you spend more than two weeks to do everything in Reno, the city that has the most contents.
 
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If you really don't know where to seach V13, then the most certain clue of V13 is flaks and Vic's friend who found the flask
not to become vault city citizen.
so what you should do is following trail of brahmin drive.

and if you become citizen of vault city and have high enough perception, you can learn locations of other cities.
even if you know location of V15, that doensn't mean you know location of V13.
in fact, you should deal with New Khan first to find the clue of V13.
if my memory is correct, V15 can be ignored if you search different way.
go to brahmin baron-> there's a job for guarding brahmin-> there you see deathclaws(probably from V13)
or you can search with the informations from servant of brahmin baron.

if you really don't know what is NCR( almost everyone here knows what was NCR: Shadysand), then you don't have any clue that you have to go to NCR to find GECK or Vault 13. so it is necessary to gather informations from other settlement to find GECK or Vault 13.
it is good RPG element: even the simple problem can be hard if you don't have any information.

New Reno, Redding or other settlements are meaningless because you know answer by you get answer by searching other place, walkthrough or spoilers.
so in short, it's not a problem of Fo2 to NR or Redding to be unused. and it's not a problem of you because game itself designed to allow you pass some place if you don't need. but it's totally different from beth's themepark: Fallouts has goals(except fo3) and quests, places and systems are method of achieving goal.
 
@lujo
But you're getting location of New Reno from one guy in Klamath, one guy in Den, 3 people (Lydia, Moore, Ed) in VC (well, even VC computer places it on your worldmap with some overview description)... it's more than enough!
As for NCR and quest about scouting... it is only about scouting, entering and nothing more.... it's like just reason to put NCR on your map, and nothing more, so it isn't more important than Lydia placing NR on your map, to focus you to do NCR before NR...
No one is telling to you about Modoc... but it's obvious to enter Modoc after doing the Den and before starting VC.
And it's also obvious to enter NR before "doing" NCR and after ending VC. (well, ending VC is needing to go to Bishops to get all stuff for final quest, so it's even more obvious).
 
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^ Err, I've decided to break my habit of bringing FO2 stuff into later games threads. I would like to discuss this particular subject to death, then undeath, then beyond undeath into reincarnation. How about I make a new thread about it somewhere where people with other interests don't have to scroll throught my textwalls? Any suggestions where?
 
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