J.E. Sawyer on Fallout weapon skills

[Jabu]

Uh, no, Sawyer doesn't lean towards every build being viable, he leans towards making every skill useful and communicating clearly what the world is about. If a player makes a build that ignores combat skills, while the game communicates that the world is a lawless wasteland where combat is commonplace, then it's an informed choice made by the player and the developer can't be blamed for not making gameplay as a non-fighter as easy as a fighter.

Again, strategic failures should be possible, but they should be the result of the player making informed bad decisions, not bad decisions as a result of lack of information.

Then don't you think a disclaimer during character creation warning about the late appearance of EW would be enough, in so far as your complaint here is concerned?

Questions of balance and viability should be separate considerations. It's a hard thing to manage because you don't want a min/maxed build to be able to plow through the game without any challenge, whilst making sure that a less optimal allocation of skill points still results in a viable, mostly frustration free experience. For all the faults of the old SPECIAL system, I think it pulled off that aspect rather well.

 

[gumbarrel]

I was not talking about that and you know it. Dont insult your and my inteligence here. Bugs are a completely different thing.

I know you were not talking about bugs, that's not the point. Point is, the same logic you use to excuse potentially broken game design, can be used to excuse other potentially broken things, like buggy Skyrim. How many times have you seen people excuse Bethesda games by saying "But I didn't have a problem with the bugs"?

Just because you didn't have a problem with something, doesn't mean that it's all fine and dandy.

A system has to give you room to "test". If a game does not allow you to fail then you will not feel progress nor will there be a reason to feel that you achieved anything.

In Deus Ex almost every single aug and skill was useful and supported in the game. Sure, swimming was a bit of a waste, but it was cheap and it wasn't so much that it was useless by itself, but that swimming parts could easily be handled by items and augs.

Hell, it's pretty much impossible to make a gimped character in Deus Ex. Does Deus Ex not allow you to test and fail?

Then don't you think a disclaimer during character creation warning about the late appearance of EW would be enough, in so far as your complaint here is concerned?

Then why have the skill unlocked in the beginning at all? Why should the game treat one skill differently from anything else? Why not do what has been proposed and organize these skill by some other criteria?

 

[Sub-Human]

In Deus Ex almost every single aug and skill was useful and supported in the game.

As you mentioned, swimming was a complete waste, as was environmental training and medicine. Three out of ten - quite a big number, huh?
Don't get the point you're trying to make here.

 

[Stanislao Moulinsky]

As you mentioned, swimming was a complete waste, as was environmental training and medicine. Three out of ten - quite a big number, huh?
Don't get the point you're trying to make here.

Mastering them was useless but getting one or two rank wasn't a bad idea. Also, as mentioned, the upgrade cost of those "inferior" skills was reduced compared to the more useful ones, unlike some of the skills in FO1-2 that were useless AND the cost of the upgrade was the same as the useful ones.

 

[gumbarrel]

In Deus Ex almost every single aug and skill was useful and supported in the game.

As you mentioned, swimming was a complete waste, as was environmental training and medicine. Three out of ten - quite a big number, huh?
Don't get the point you're trying to make here.

Almost any guide for the game advises you to level both swimming and medicine to level 2. Level 2 Medicine gives you twice as much HP from medkits and I think level 2 of swimming give you twice the speed and time as well, but I am not that sure. And environmental training is an underrated skill, since there are a fair bit of suits to be found in the game and with some conservative use, you can actually get the benefits of 3 different augs - ballistic protection, invisibility and radiation resistance from just one skill!

And as I said, these skills cost less then the other, more major skills, and they are still reasonably supported throughout the game. There is swimming to be had, lethal environments and suits to put on, and lots of med kits.

Now, imagine that you didn't encounter a single place to swim, a single med kit and a single environmental suit, untill halfway through the game. THAT is the problem.

And my point was, that you pretty much can't go wrong with anything in Deus Ex. Even if you leveled NO SKILLS WHATSOEVER, you could still beat the game just fine. You simply couldn't have a gimped character at all.

So did Deus Ex no let you fail? Did the game not allow you to test things out?

 

[Sobboth]

In F:NV the weapon system was great in term of balance but very poor fluff wise.
And it was unintertsting to pick both gun and energy weapon because with only one of those skills you were able to do everything.
Moreover energy weapons were too common ( raiders with EW, well...).
I think it would have been better to create those three skills instead :
Single shot two handed weapons
Automatic two handed weapons
One handed weapons (so pistols and SMG : both single shot and automatic weapons here but weaker than in the 2handed categories).
So you can finish the game with only one developed combat skill and energy weapon/big gun are no more a problem.
But by doing so you will lack automatic shots power or single shot power unless you go one handed weapon where you have both but weaker.
Also one skill for close combat is enough IMO.