Fallout V: Old Thread Blues

[Mutazoia]

Then go with a support bot build. Sniper laser and heavy flamer. Long engagement range keeps them out of your line of fire. I personally have the opposite feeling. I'd rather see them in front of me, because I've had too many stupid deaths to friendly fire through out the series.

Unless I'm inside where range is limited, I'm usually engaging from far enough back that the Bot just sits there while I line up a shot and give a baddie a serious case of head-splosions. Once the sneak attack is over and done with, I don't mind the bod charging in and being a bullet sponge.

With that in mind, I go with the Laser-head, sent. body with shoulder launchers (mortars work just fine) and a gat. laser with a flaming sword. This give me the most cargo space bang for my buck, with out getting stuck in doorways, it's fast enough to keep up, and has long, medium, and close range combat abilities. Tack on a shockey-mod and it's good to go.

[Balmas]

Ah, I see. I don't play Survival mode, so I just keep pretty much everything I own in the workbench at Red Rocket.

In other news, I finally got around to finishing up the main quest. That nuclear explosion was so satisfying. Now on to Far Harbor, where my #1 objective is "Get a lever-action rifle," followed by "do detective stuff" and "rescue somebody's daughter, I guess? IDK."

I'll be honest with you: the lever action rifle isn't all that good. Don't get me wrong, it does decent damage, and fully modded it only weighs something like 15 pounds.

The problem is that the reload animation is completely broken. In New Vegas, the disadvantage for tube-fed weapons like the Brush gun or cowboy repeater was that you had to feed ammo in one by one. This usually took longer than weapons with magazines. However, that could also be advantageous, as you could feed in only enough ammo to deal with whatever animal was getting up in your face.

You can't do that with the lever action rifle in Fallout 4. Whenever you reload your lever action rifle, you will always reload five shots into the tube. It's not a problem of not being able to interrupt the animation; it's that you will always load five shots, no matter how many shots you actually fire. Shoot five? Reload five. All good. Shoot one, reload five? Shoot two, reload five? Boy, that tube must be getting full...

[Triaxx]

I find even not in Survival that the regeneration mod on the robots is handy. I suspect it'd be even better in Survival. Though it's looking like I might try out an unlocking bot instead.

[Mutazoia]

I find even not in Survival that the regeneration mod on the robots is handy. I suspect it'd be even better in Survival. Though it's looking like I might try out an unlocking bot instead.

There is also a mod...."Conquest" I think, that lets you carry around a sleeping bag, so you can rest up anywhere, rather than having to hunt for a mattress to save. Comes in very handy in Survival mode. (That mod also lets you start a settlement pretty much anywhere on the map.)

[Balmas]

You know, late-night ranting seems to have become a thing for me. It's like only right when I'm brushing my teeth, getting ready for bed, do thoughts hit me that I need to record or I'll forget them.

In this case, I feel that one of the major problems that Fallout 4's plot suffers from is that there isn't an overarching theme to it. Or, rather, there are a dozen different themes, none of which work together, and none of which receive the focus they need to really shine. Paired with the schizophrenic art design, it makes the game feel stilted and awkward.

Spoiler: I'm tired and have no idea what I'm saying ignore this

Show

One of the major themes of the game is change--how everything can change in an instant, how you can lose your world and find a new one, how you need to adapt to survive that new world. The problem is that this theme isn't really explored very well, if at all; you get dialogue options about how the world is so different, how you don't remember things being like this, explaining how you were frozen to anyone who will listen. But this theme isn't explored anywhere in-game. Ironically, gameplay is almost the exact opposite of the theme; no matter what you do, your actions do not meaningfully change the world except in who's shooting at whom.

Then you get the theme of what it means to be human, what it means to be a synth. Who decides? How can you tell whether you're a human or a synth? Admittedly, this is explored somewhat in gameplay. Unfortunately, it's done almost exclusively in cutscenes, and any and all philosophical implications are glossed over because Bethesda is terrified of making its players think. Instead of discussing what it means to be a synth, we just get Synth settlers, Art vs. Art, and a throwaway line from the Railroad, of all people, about how even they're left scratching their heads.

On a slightly related note, anachronism stew is a thing that Fallout 4 suffers from. You have a noir detective from the 40s, Italian mafia from the 20s, minutemen cosplayers, all rubbing shoulders with synths and power armor. Even for Fallout, it's a bit much.

It's like Bethesda looked up Boston's wikipedia entry, copy-pasted every fifth word, and threw it into a blender. I mean, I love the game, but I can also recognize that it's about as subtle as a half-brick in a sock. "Hey guys, just in case you forgot, we're in BOSTON! Here, have the Minutemen. Have the Constitution. Oh, and the only major established town in the area is in Fenway Park! All the guards wear baseball gear as armor, and did I mention that it's Boston? Just in case you forget that we're in Boston, how's'about we throw in a merchant who all he sells is baseball gear, who asks you to collect baseball memorabilia, and who speaks in an inexplicable Boston accent that literally nobody else in the game has! After all, we wouldn't want you to miss the fact that it's in Boston.

"Did I mention it's Boston?"

[factotum]

Your problem, Balmas, is that you appear to be putting a lot more thought into this than the writers at Bethesda ever did.

[GloatingSwine]

Your problem, Balmas, is that you appear to be putting a lot more thought into this than the writers at Bethesda ever did.

Five minutes then?

[Mutazoia]

You know, late-night ranting seems to have become a thing for me. It's like only right when I'm brushing my teeth, getting ready for bed, do thoughts hit me that I need to record or I'll forget them.

In this case, I feel that one of the major problems that Fallout 4's plot suffers from is that there isn't an overarching theme to it. Or, rather, there are a dozen different themes, none of which work together, and none of which receive the focus they need to really shine. Paired with the schizophrenic art design, it makes the game feel stilted and awkward.

Spoiler: I'm tired and have no idea what I'm saying ignore this

Show

One of the major themes of the game is change--how everything can change in an instant, how you can lose your world and find a new one, how you need to adapt to survive that new world. The problem is that this theme isn't really explored very well, if at all; you get dialogue options about how the world is so different, how you don't remember things being like this, explaining how you were frozen to anyone who will listen. But this theme isn't explored anywhere in-game. Ironically, gameplay is almost the exact opposite of the theme; no matter what you do, your actions do not meaningfully change the world except in who's shooting at whom.

Then you get the theme of what it means to be human, what it means to be a synth. Who decides? How can you tell whether you're a human or a synth? Admittedly, this is explored somewhat in gameplay. Unfortunately, it's done almost exclusively in cutscenes, and any and all philosophical implications are glossed over because Bethesda is terrified of making its players think. Instead of discussing what it means to be a synth, we just get Synth settlers, Art vs. Art, and a throwaway line from the Railroad, of all people, about how even they're left scratching their heads.

On a slightly related note, anachronism stew is a thing that Fallout 4 suffers from. You have a noir detective from the 40s, Italian mafia from the 20s, minutemen cosplayers, all rubbing shoulders with synths and power armor. Even for Fallout, it's a bit much.

It's like Bethesda looked up Boston's wikipedia entry, copy-pasted every fifth word, and threw it into a blender. I mean, I love the game, but I can also recognize that it's about as subtle as a half-brick in a sock. "Hey guys, just in case you forgot, we're in BOSTON! Here, have the Minutemen. Have the Constitution. Oh, and the only major established town in the area is in Fenway Park! All the guards wear baseball gear as armor, and did I mention that it's Boston? Just in case you forget that we're in Boston, how's'about we throw in a merchant who all he sells is baseball gear, who asks you to collect baseball memorabilia, and who speaks in an inexplicable Boston accent that literally nobody else in the game has! After all, we wouldn't want you to miss the fact that it's in Boston.

"Did I mention it's Boston?"

I'm just waiting for you to realize that:

• Cait is the only person in the entire "Boston" area with an Irish accent.
• Every female in the game is dressed in dirty clothes, but still manages to don a clean pair of tighty-whities and over the shoulder bolder holders every momrning.
• There are no Super Mutant Females (according to FO3, all supermutants are female). So with out any breeding, the rate that you kill off SM's during the game means that you should be able to totally de-populate Boston in a matter of days...but they're always popping up.
• The Gunners are a mercenary group that doesn't actually seem to work for anybody, apart from the occational gunner escorting a merchant. Must be some hefty escort fees to support the entire gunner orginization.
• Forget the skeletons....people setting up settlements can't even rake a pile of leaves.
• Papers have been plastered on the roof of Red Rocket (and elsewhere) and exposed to everything nature in its altered state has to offer, and are still there. What did they print on 200 years ago? Asbestos?
• There are only 2 non-mutated dogs in the Commonwealth: Dog Meat and the dog the wandering pet salesman sells you. Where did they come from?
• Apparently, everybody's heard of the Quinzy masacre (except you), but Piper gets Danny to open the front gate to Diamond City by telling him your a trader up from Quinzy. Ghost Traders?
• When you first pop out of your popcicle box, you learn (if you read the notes on the terminals) that everybody abandoned the vault after six months. Yet the Vault door is still closed and locked from the inside. How did they get out?
• Mr. Handy robots need fuel to run, apparently. Or at least to hover. I doubt Codsworth has been getting regular deliveries of fuel for the past 200 years (considering we can assume production has fallen off somewhat).
• You tell Preston that you've been frozen for 200 years and just woke up. He then asks if you've heard of the Quinzy masacre. Get CNN hardwired into your cryo-tubes in Quinzey do we?

On a side note:

Am I the only one who, on their first play-through as Nora, got to the part where Virgle says "Sure, I'll help you. But you've got to do something for me first", instantly heard cheap '70's porno music queue up in their head?

[GloatingSwine]

[*]There are no Super Mutant Females (according to FO3, all supermutants are female). So with out any breeding, the rate that you kill off SM's during the game means that you should be able to totally de-populate Boston in a matter of days...but they're always popping up.

I am not sure that Fallout 3's opinion on supermutants is to be taken seriously.

What actually happens is that it doesn't matter whether the person who goes into the FEV vat is male or female, young or old, what comes out is a Supermutant. If the person who goes in has relatively intact DNA, you get a smarter more capable supermutant out of it.

They still, however, retain the idea of gender. Hence why you can have Marcus, Lily, and Tabitha. (They're also all sterile).

[Mutazoia]

I am not sure that Fallout 3's opinion on supermutants is to be taken seriously.

What actually happens is that it doesn't matter whether the person who goes into the FEV vat is male or female, young or old, what comes out is a Supermutant. If the person who goes in has relatively intact DNA, you get a smarter more capable supermutant out of it.

They still, however, retain the idea of gender. Hence why you can have Marcus, Lily, and Tabitha. (They're also all sterile).

In FO3, when you explore vault....damn, can't remeber ATM....but you get to read all the experiment notes on the creation of the Super Mutants. The notes tell of all the male test subjects dying, and the Female subjects mutating (eventually becoming Super Mutants).

Of course, that would make Virgil a statistical anomaly.

[Yuki Akuma]

In FO3, when you explore vault....damn, can't remeber ATM....but you get to read all the experiment notes on the creation of the Super Mutants. The notes tell of all the male test subjects dying, and the Female subjects mutating (eventually becoming Super Mutants).

Of course, that would make Virgil a statistical anomaly.

It's not inconceivable that amongst the several groups producing Super Mutants, some might be better at it than others.

[Triaxx]

Then again, considering according to Virgil, they have been continuing to test and develop FEV even though they get the same results forever and ever. I wonder if perhaps the Institute itself is stuck in the same sort of recursion loop as Big MT, but self-imposed. For all the synth terror, they never actually seem to get anything done, until you turn up and help them.

On the other hand, A) nothing says that Institute Super Mutants are sterile, and B) the mutants themselves were working on a cure for sterility in Tactics, so nothing says a group of super smart survivors couldn't solve the issue.

[Blackhawk748]

Fallout 4 Issues

Most of this makes more sense if it was only 50 years. I always thought 200 was a bit much.

[DigoDragon]

On the other hand, A) nothing says that Institute Super Mutants are sterile, and B) the mutants themselves were working on a cure for sterility in Tactics, so nothing says a group of super smart survivors couldn't solve the issue.

They're super mutants. The cure is a .44 round to the head.

[factotum]

Most of this makes more sense if it was only 50 years. I always thought 200 was a bit much.

Pretty sure Bethesda themselves originally intended the setting for Fallout 3 to be only a few decades after the bombs fell--hence there being a still viable but very much unexploded atom bomb in the middle of Megaton, for example--but changed their mind quite late in development. Obsidian did a much better job of showing us civilization getting back on its feet after 200 years in NV, of course, which is why it beggars belief that Bethesda went back to the same illogical setup from F3 when they developed F4.

[Triaxx]

Bethesda just suck at writing is all. Frankly, I still hope this rumored FNO is actually another Obsidian title, and they are denying it, just because they can't talk about it yet.

I don't know about .44. Marcus is cool, and so are a few other Supermutants.

[rooster707]

• When you first pop out of your popcicle box, you learn (if you read the notes on the terminals) that everybody abandoned the vault after six months. Yet the Vault door is still closed and locked from the inside. How did they get out?

Minor nitpick: IIRC, the terminals in 111 say that pretty much everybody WANTED to leave, but the overseer wouldn't let them out because they hadn't received the all-clear signal yet. So I'm pretty sure they didn't leave, they just starved to death.

[LuckGuy]

"Did I mention it's Boston?"

Sure, these are the same people who saw the need for the first place you see after exiting the Vault to be a town named Megaton sitting in a bomb crater made of old airplane parts hauled from a nonexistent airport with a door powered by a jet engine who worship an unexploded atom bomb, instead of building from all those bricks nearby (or just fortifying the airport).

"Did I mention it's post-apocalyptic?"

I used to think Megaton was the result of executive meddling, but after 4 I really do believe that Bethesda thinks we are so dumb as to require that kind of thwack to the head.

[Mutazoia]

Minor nitpick: IIRC, the terminals in 111 say that pretty much everybody WANTED to leave, but the overseer wouldn't let them out because they hadn't received the all-clear signal yet. So I'm pretty sure they didn't leave, they just starved to death.

But there are only 4 bodies (skeletons) in the vault (Not counting your Neighbors). One of which is the Overseer. Given all the people you see just walking in, there should be far more bodies than that piled up somewhere.

[GloatingSwine]

In FO3, when you explore vault....damn, can't remeber ATM....but you get to read all the experiment notes on the creation of the Super Mutants. The notes tell of all the male test subjects dying, and the Female subjects mutating (eventually becoming Super Mutants).

Of course, that would make Virgil a statistical anomaly.

As I said, Fallout 3 is not a source to be taken seriously when it comes to determining what supermutants are like, because, well, Bethesda don't know what Supermutants are like, Bethesda think they're just orcs but dumber.

[Brookshw]

Bethesda don't know what Supermutants are like, Bethesda think they're just orcs but dumber.

In fairness that was the general depiction of them in F1 & F2, not withstanding Broken Hill (iirc the name). Wasn't an early exchange w/ Marcus something along the lines of "oh, so you don't eat people here?"

[Avilan the Grey]

As I said, Fallout 3 is not a source to be taken seriously when it comes to determining what supermutants are like, because, well, Bethesda don't know what Supermutants are like, Bethesda think they're just orcs but dumber.

Bethesda is WOG. That you don't approve of it is irrelevant. They not only own the franchise now, but they have released (or published) more Fallout games than the original publisher.

[veti]

In FO3, when you explore vault....damn, can't remeber ATM....but you get to read all the experiment notes on the creation of the Super Mutants. The notes tell of all the male test subjects dying, and the Female subjects mutating (eventually becoming Super Mutants).

Uncle Leo would like a word with you. I'm pretty sure Fawkes also self-identifies as male, but can't remember any specific dialogue.

What I took away from FO3 was that males and females were indistinguishable (and sterile) after exposure to the FEV, so it's reasonable to assume (1) those you see were originally a mix of sexes, and (2) it makes zero difference to anything now anyway.

[Triaxx]

Broken Hills. But yeah, Marcus is awesome.

I don't mind Bethesda being the Word of God, as long as they're consistent about it.

[factotum]

But there are only 4 bodies (skeletons) in the vault (Not counting your Neighbors). One of which is the Overseer. Given all the people you see just walking in, there should be far more bodies than that piled up somewhere.

Couldn't the others have forced their way out of the Vault and then the remaining four locked it all behind them? Or is the idea that the others must have killed those four while making their exit? It's been a while since I read all those terminals...

[Calemyr]

Fallout 4 didn't so much treat super mutants as stupid so much as... well... different. A different culture with different standards. You see a bit of it with Strong. Possession is communal, so being greedy is bad and giving people what they need is good. Relying on outside strength is bad, so power armor is bad. Is it cannibalism for Super Mutants to eat humans? If it is, they were never taught any prohibition against it and practicality takes the lead.

They're still a race of disposable one-note cannon fodder, but so are the raiders. You'll find one or two in a dungeon with some inkling of intellect, while the rest are on a permanent psycho high with nothing on their minds but killing any outsider that gets close.

[Triaxx]

Not that it slows down even the intelligent ones from trying to kill any outsider they see.

[Calemyr]

Not that it slows down even the intelligent ones from trying to kill any outsider they see.

Nope. Raiders and super mutants are on the same list as robots, insects, aliens, zombies, and Nazis for targets players can massacre en masse without a twinge of guilt.

[Blackhawk748]

Personally i think itd be great if Bethesda and Obsidian collaborated on Fallout from here on in. Let Obsidian write it, have Bethesda program it and have them both work on the specific features and mechanics.

Im still amazed at how stable Fallout 4 is, it has yet to crash for me.

[LibraryOgre]

I'd love to see a total conversion of FO4 called "Vaultless", where you're some of the people who didn't get into a Vault, trying to survive in the Wasteland before the Super Mutants, at the beginning of ghouls, etc.