Fallout 4 Eliminates Skills From Character System

[zerragonoss]

I definitely used to be more interested in more complex systems. Fallout 2 was one of my favorites for a long time also, and I can still play it, but it's a lot harder to find the motivation to do so due to the pace and length of time a game can take. Over time, as my commitments and responsibilities have grown, picking apart a complex (or worse, convoluted) statistical system has become significantly less appealing to me, which is probably why most of the gaming I do for my own entertainment consists primarily of arcade-style action games these days.

A lot of it in my experience as well is that most of these "complex" systems are actually very similar to solve. If you have balanced attack speed, crit chance, and base damage once it gets easier and easier to do it again. Most of the more complex systems people obfuscate this a little but, it still ends up being the only calculation you are really making. So calling them more complex is like calling 1+6+8+9 more complex than 10+14, while technically true it?s just making you do the same thing more times.

 

[Erttheking]

Well at least we're moving back to the old kind of shitstorms.

Already we're seeing the good old "No True Scotsman" fallacy being trotted out in terms of what constitutes an RPG and a genre being declared dead because of changes because apparently the old ways were always better.

I feel like people put too much into certain systems.

 

[kenu12345]

On the plus side, I look forward to Skills inevitable return when Obsidian gets licensed to make an actually decent Fallout sequel again.

I know right? I can't wait to see what Obsidian does when they get a chance at the wheel again. Hopefully it isn't that technically flawed though. For all my love of New Vegas, I can barely play the base game anymore with out crashes or frame rate slower than slide shows

 

[happyninja42]

Welp, Fallout has now officially lost its RPG status. How great it is!

Like "RPG" has been so specific and defined up until now.

I know right? I don't know about anyone else, but I barely paid any attention to my perks in FO3 or NV. They were seriously an afterthought, and I would usually pick the one that seemed the least useless of the available ones. Skills were what it was all about, get that skill to 100 and everything else is cake. With a perk system, you actually will have some variety to your build, that will require you to actually play the game in the playstyle you chose. I'm looking forward to it a lot, I like this change immensely.

Really most of my playthroughs were going through a different playstyle on vegas. Did you only go guns on every playthrough?

No but I ended up dumping skill points into stuff I never planned on using because I had to spend them.

Ah, not knowing how to set it up and such? I see that sort of problem occasionally. Its tricky when you start a new build but when you see the potential. On my bb gun run and my drug addict, I don't think that I had a single wasted perk

Well I wasn't referring to perks in my comment, but the skill point system, since that's the issue of this thread. What I mean is that even if you don't max your INT to 9-10 at start, just going through the content and DLC's, you end up with so many skill points, that you have to dump them somewhere, if only to get off the Level Up screen. My most recent playthrough was a Dr. McNinja build. He always ran around in a lab coat, I found a particular Legion mask that looked kind of like a ninja mask, and he used a katana for all his fighting. I would just run in, shoot up drugs and hack n slash my way through people. It was great fun. But even for his build, which didn't include guns at all, I ended up with points to burn.

I know right? I don't know about anyone else, but I barely paid any attention to my perks in FO3 or NV. They were seriously an afterthought, and I would usually pick the one that seemed the least useless of the available ones. Skills were what it was all about, get that skill to 100 and everything else is cake. With a perk system, you actually will have some variety to your build, that will require you to actually play the game in the playstyle you chose. I'm looking forward to it a lot, I like this change immensely.

Im with Chozo Hybrid. I don't think there's enough info to really know if this is going to be good or not. It really does depend on how it plays out in the game. Are the builds really going to be unique? Maybe. Is it good? Maybe. We'll see.

I'm just amazed at the "not an RPG" crowd.

Oh sure, I don't know if the system will be good or not, I'm just optimistic. Based on what I've seen, it seems like they are replicating what you get for having a high skill at something, with the perks. For example, boosting your Small Guns skill makes your accuracy go up, reducing the spread radius of your shots. It's likely that the shooting related perks will do this very thing. So that someone who invested heavily in shooting perks will be a much better shot than someone without them. Thus tailoring them to be a sniper/trickshooter/etc, compared to the guy who put his points into the social related perks. Which makes 2 totally different characters. One is the Lone Gunman concept, who can shoot his way through any challenge, the other is a person who talks his way out of trouble, and relies on guns as a fallback. I feel very confident that Bethesda will make the system work really well. As Jon from Many A True Nerd put it, in his list of things he wanted to see in FO 4, I want to be bad at things. I don't want to be able to do everything in the game, because then I don't have to actually try and think my way through the problem.

 

[WonkyWarmaiden]

How about the doomsayers in this thread actually wait to see more info on the system before you guys actually judge it? I get being wary but I don't think judging something without seeing an in depth example is a good idea.

 

[vallorn]

No skills, eh? Doing away with unnecessary clutter, eh? A radical change for the series, eh?

Well, in the words of the Blue Raja, "I say what the fork, let's do it!"

Ok, if you are the Blue Raja then currently this news has made me... Mr Furious!

 

[kenu12345]

Welp, Fallout has now officially lost its RPG status. How great it is!

Like "RPG" has been so specific and defined up until now.

I know right? I don't know about anyone else, but I barely paid any attention to my perks in FO3 or NV. They were seriously an afterthought, and I would usually pick the one that seemed the least useless of the available ones. Skills were what it was all about, get that skill to 100 and everything else is cake. With a perk system, you actually will have some variety to your build, that will require you to actually play the game in the playstyle you chose. I'm looking forward to it a lot, I like this change immensely.

Really most of my playthroughs were going through a different playstyle on vegas. Did you only go guns on every playthrough?

No but I ended up dumping skill points into stuff I never planned on using because I had to spend them.

Ah, not knowing how to set it up and such? I see that sort of problem occasionally. Its tricky when you start a new build but when you see the potential. On my bb gun run and my drug addict, I don't think that I had a single wasted perk

Well I wasn't referring to perks in my comment, but the skill point system, since that's the issue of this thread. What I mean is that even if you don't max your INT to 9-10 at start, just going through the content and DLC's, you end up with so many skill points, that you have to dump them somewhere, if only to get off the Level Up screen. My most recent playthrough was a Dr. McNinja build. He always ran around in a lab coat, I found a particular Legion mask that looked kind of like a ninja mask, and he used a katana for all his fighting. I would just run in, shoot up drugs and hack n slash my way through people. It was great fun. But even for his build, which didn't include guns at all, I ended up with points to burn.

Well, thats only really an issue in later levels honestly and there is still a good variety of skills to invest in to the point where its only an issue near dlc cap. This system is no better since they already stated there is unlimited leveling and you can up your special. Min-maxing actually seems easier here. 3 you had to abuse the bobbleheads, which are going to be in 4 too, and New Vegas was just a case of adding too many levels.

How about the doomsayers in this thread actually wait to see more info on the system before you guys actually judge it? I get being wary but I don't think judging something without seeing an in depth example is a good idea.

I am seeing the info right now and I am not liking it. I hate this sort of argument. Its not productive at all.

 

[Callate]

I'll wait and see (and I'll probably buy it, specs permitting), but I rather liked the skill system and I'll be sorry to see it go.

 

[immortalfrieza]

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I have to mention that no, homosexuality/bisexuality is in, all human companions can be romanced by any gender despite the fact that both options for the protagonist are in a straight marriage. Also, it's highly likely that perks that are like Cherchez La Femme and Confirmed Bachelor are simply rolled into perks like Lady Killer/Black Widow, as each perk has multiple levels that do what individual perks used to do. There's actually far far more perks than there used to be as a result.

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That would be a lot better of an idea than what we're getting. While I will live with and possibly even come to see it as better, Fallout 4's perk system appears to lack the nuance that the skill point based system had. People love to say "there's no difference between X skill if it isn't at X points" but this simply isn't true, they just aren't noticing. For instance, picking an average level lock requires a skill level of 50 yes, but forcing the lock becomes more likely at higher skill levels, and more importantly the margin for error for the sweet spot in the minigame increases as the skill levels go up, there's less words to pick as your science skill goes up, Gun sway decreases and VATS hit percentage also increases as the player increases the guns skill, etc. Every skill in Fallout 3 worked like this, as it was increased you got slightly better and chances improved at whatever it was the skill affected. This was great because it created a middle ground between being bad at something, good at something, and great at something, thus creating an actual sense of progression, the Perk based system that Fallout 4 is using won't have that. Sure, up until this point it was far too easy to become an master at just about everything with enough skill points, levels, and books but that's simply the result of the developers being far too generous with skill points than they should be and thus easily fixable.

Regardless, I'm just glad they aren't going with a use equals skill increases equals levels as the Elder Scrolls uses. I hate that system and greatly prefer the experience based system because it ensures the player has to, you know, actually PLAY THE GAME to become good at it. The use system may seem more realistic on paper but the reality is all it does is become far far too easy to exploit that system and just do the same thing over and over and over again to raise those skills and thus become an all powerful master of everything without having to actually do anything else to get that powerful.

 

[secretkeeper12]

Actually not a bad idea. The skill system was designed for an isometric turn-based RPG, so most of the skills translated poorly into into a live-action first-person shooter with RPG mechanics. Then there were the arbitrary cutoffs for what you could do when it came to lockpicking, hacking and probably most importantly speech checks. Far too often speech checks were based in speech only, meaning you could have a 10 Intelligence, 10 Charisma and 10 Perception character that can't pass a pretty simple speech check over something rather obvious. Then there was stealth which was hilariously inconsistent for a live-action game, so something more consistent would probably be appreciated and less likely to be abused.

The only problem I can forsee is how you'll get past skillchecks. Skyrim approached lockpicking well in that you could try any chest, just that you'd probably lose all your lockpicks on a high-level one, but I don't really see how they can adequately do speech checks without making them tied to SPECIAL. That wouldn't be a bad idea actually since Intelligence loses value in this change, so making Intelligence tied to speech checks can restore some lock value. Then there's the weapon proficiency speech checks, although admittedly most of the time they felt arbitrary.

Fun fact: Intelligence was an essential part of communication in the original Fallouts. Making it your dump stat would result in hilarious interactions with other people.

Oh man... I just imagined a voice acted low intelligence character. All my yes!

 

[happyninja42]

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Well, thats only really an issue in later levels honestly and there is still a good variety of skills to invest in to the point where its only an issue near dlc cap. This system is no better since they already stated there is unlimited leveling and you can up your special. Min-maxing actually seems easier here. 3 you had to abuse the bobbleheads, which are going to be in 4 too, and New Vegas was just a case of adding too many levels.

I never bothered with the bobbleheads in that game, as they were usually annoying as hell to try and find, and fall under what I call "easter egg hunting" as far as game mechanics go. And I hate that shit, so I don't do them. I still had more skills than I had use for by the end. And yes, having too many skillpoints is an "end game" problem more than a starting problem, but that's the whole point of this discussion, the pros and cons of skill points in the game. I don't really see the downside to not having them, they are simply a game mechanic to reflect your characters improvement over time. If the perk system replicates this just fine, then who cares if I don't have a skill system? I have no personal vested interest in the skill system itself, it's just a mechanic for the game, and I'm more interested in the game. Bottom line, if investing in the right perks, makes me better at the things I want to get better at, then whether it's reflected by a 1-100 skill counter, or simply what perks I bought, I don't care. I'll be happy with it no matter what. Do the perks accurately make your character better in an incremental way as you level? If yes, then groovy. If no, then the system is messed up and needs to be fixed. And if the entire character progression system is based around perks now, I find it highly unlikely that they won't put the manpower/resources into making sure it actually works.

 

[Randomvirus]

Fun fact: Intelligence was an essential part of communication in the original Fallouts. Making it your dump stat would result in hilarious interactions with other people.

Oh man... I just imagined a voice acted low intelligence character. All my yes!

IIRC, Fallout 1 this didn't matter, but in Fallout 2 it was gloriously implemented. Not only was a 1 INT character barely able to speak, but people treated you entirely differently.

The village elder, to a normal character "You must venture out, find Vic, find Vault 13, save us all, Chosen One!"

Make that INT 1 and... "FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13!"

As well as people in Arroyo going "You're the chosen one? Oh god..."

As a long time fan of the franchise though I'm of course a little put off with the change, but interested to see it applied. The Elder Scrolls way of leveling up skills always made more sense to me (it improves with use, not because you put points into it.)

 

[kenu12345]

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Well, thats only really an issue in later levels honestly and there is still a good variety of skills to invest in to the point where its only an issue near dlc cap. This system is no better since they already stated there is unlimited leveling and you can up your special. Min-maxing actually seems easier here. 3 you had to abuse the bobbleheads, which are going to be in 4 too, and New Vegas was just a case of adding too many levels.

I never bothered with the bobbleheads in that game, as they were usually annoying as hell to try and find, and fall under what I call "easter egg hunting" as far as game mechanics go. And I hate that shit, so I don't do them. I still had more skills than I had use for by the end. And yes, having too many skillpoints is an "end game" problem more than a starting problem, but that's the whole point of this discussion, the pros and cons of skill points in the game. I don't really see the downside to not having them, they are simply a game mechanic to reflect your characters improvement over time. If the perk system replicates this just fine, then who cares if I don't have a skill system? I have no personal vested interest in the skill system itself, it's just a mechanic for the game, and I'm more interested in the game. Bottom line, if investing in the right perks, makes me better at the things I want to get better at, then whether it's reflected by a 1-100 skill counter, or simply what perks I bought, I don't care. I'll be happy with it no matter what. Do the perks accurately make your character better in an incremental way as you level? If yes, then groovy. If no, then the system is messed up and needs to be fixed. And if the entire character progression system is based around perks now, I find it highly unlikely that they won't put the manpower/resources into making sure it actually works.

Its Bethesda so I highly doubt it. It took Obsidian fixing there stuff before to add weapon sway at lower levels of skills which was reflected by your skill level so yes it did put a noticeable difference and I like it like that

 

[vallorn]

Fun fact: Intelligence was an essential part of communication in the original Fallouts. Making it your dump stat would result in hilarious interactions with other people.

Oh man... I just imagined a voice acted low intelligence character. All my yes!

IIRC, Fallout 1 this didn't matter, but in Fallout 2 it was gloriously implemented. Not only was a 1 INT character barely able to speak, but people treated you entirely differently.

The village elder, to a normal character "You must venture out, find Vic, find Vault 13, save us all, Chosen One!"

Make that INT 1 and... "FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13!"

As well as people in Arroyo going "You're the chosen one? Oh god..."

As a long time fan of the franchise though I'm of course a little put off with the change, but interested to see it applied. The Elder Scrolls way of leveling up skills always made more sense to me (it improves with use, not because you put points into it.)

Fallout New Vegas didn't have much of this but it included a bit of it. Telling Veronica that the Brotherhood shot lasers from their eyes while a low int character was always hilarious.

 

[Amir Kondori]

I hate to be that guy, but this is looking pretty bad.

Basically, if this is how it seems, the game will be significantly less of an RPG than its predecessors.

Unless they set up a perk system where you have to take proficiency perks to be able to use or be good with certain things, every character will be able to do anything like in Skyrim.

It's like how Yahtzee describes games that are RPGs vs games that have RPG elements. If I use a type of gun that's unlike any I've used or been trained in, I should be shit with it, plain and simple.

This looks like they're going the other way and making it a shooter at core with simple RPG elements around the edges.

It's too early to tell for sure, but this just gives me bad vibes.

Bethesda hasn't made real RPGs for a while now. Skyrim certainly wasn't. They make sandbox action games with RPG elements. I called this, Bethesda's design direction for a while now has been to simplify, streamline, remove complexity and difficulty, and appeal to as wide an audience as possible.

Great for moving tens of millions of copies I guess, but for people like me who want a more hardcore experience each new game they release appeals to me a little less.

 

[Grampy_bone]

Kinda odd how with Skyrim they ditch stats, but with Fallout they ditch skills and make everything based on stats. I'm fine with this though, as long as there are diverse vectors for character improvement I'm not adverse to altering the individual mechanics.

Fun fact: Intelligence was an essential part of communication in the original Fallouts. Making it your dump stat would result in hilarious interactions with other people.

Oh man... I just imagined a voice acted low intelligence character. All my yes!

IIRC, Fallout 1 this didn't matter, but in Fallout 2 it was gloriously implemented. Not only was a 1 INT character barely able to speak, but people treated you entirely differently.

The village elder, to a normal character "You must venture out, find Vic, find Vault 13, save us all, Chosen One!"

Make that INT 1 and... "FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13! FIND VAULT 13!"

As well as people in Arroyo going "You're the chosen one? Oh god..."

As a long time fan of the franchise though I'm of course a little put off with the change, but interested to see it applied. The Elder Scrolls way of leveling up skills always made more sense to me (it improves with use, not because you put points into it.)

Hands down, the best thing about playing a low-int character was talking to Torr, the simpleton in Klamath. Normally he's a dumb, unintelligible brute, but speak to him as a low-int character and his grunts become Shakespeare. Hilarious.

 

[AgedGrunt]

Fallout 4's perk system appears to lack the nuance that the skill point based system had.

With lockpick and science, the hard targets (25/50/75/100) made nuance pointless (and forcing is a lock-out risk I never took, it's also pointless when you can just keep resetting; if you fail the force you're either save scumming or walking away), but outside of that I can agree. Even so I don't think many people will miss subtle differences.

Sure, up until this point it was far too easy to become an master at just about everything with enough skill points, levels, and books but that's simply the result of the developers being far too generous with skill points than they should be and thus easily fixable.

Fewer skill points would fix the late game problem but would starve characters in early and mid game. Grinding levels just to get some decent skills doesn't sound like fun. I like the sound of a wholesome perk system that gives me tons of choices without complication and sacrifice.

I'm just glad they aren't going with a use equals skill increases equals levels as the Elder Scrolls uses.

A use system would be welcome, minus the leveling part, for accuracy and making you efficient with everything. Enough time with a revolver should make you the fastest gun in the wasteland, but you should still have to learn the finer points of rifle shooting.

Fun fact: Intelligence was an essential part of communication in the original Fallouts. Making it your dump stat would result in hilarious interactions with other people.

That's how it should be. I think SPECIAL should change function and interaction with the world while perks are for specialization and abilities.

 

[otakon17]

Also is no one going to bring up that this game has less perks due to this system? I really ain't confident for the amount of fun perks in this game. I always loved the skill system and it was especially awesome in New Vegas since it made it possible to make any sort of build

It has 1 perk per point of SPECIAL, that's 70 unique perks(not counting ranking up, we don't know if that adds new dimensions to each perk yet). That...doesn't seem like less to be honest. And there's always expansions to add more perks.

New Vegas had 87 perks not including follower perks,challenge perks, or dlc perks and they all had an additional effect. Without skills, most of these 70 are probably variations of more damage. I would also like to point out to everyone while it was possible to min max in previous games, its actually easier here since leveling is infinite and its all perk/special based now

And how many of those Perks only just boosted Skill point gain or Skills? Remove those and I bet the number dwindles down a lot. Them merging Skills and Perks together is not necessarily gonna be a bad thing, only another month or so, so let's give'em a shot.

 

[Vicarious Reality]

Why do you look like my dad...

Basing combat efficiency in this kind of FPS game on skills is rather stupid to begin with

 

[Something Amyss]

This change is shite, fellow escapists.

I still maintain that it's too soon to know that. However, whether the change is shite or not has nothing to do with whether it's an RPG or not. This sounds more like a "they changed it, now it sucks" argument than whether or not it is an RPG. Which is fine, thought I personally find it needlessly reactionary. Just don't dress it up as "this isn't an RPG."

As Jon from Many A True Nerd put it, in his list of things he wanted to see in FO 4, I want to be bad at things. I don't want to be able to do everything in the game, because then I don't have to actually try and think my way through the problem.

I can get behind the concept. I just question whether it will happen.