MSFD on rats and enemies

[Mr. Teatime]

<strong>[Community -> Update]</strong> - More info on <a href="http://wikipocalypse.duckandcover.cx/in ... itle=Steve Meister">Person: Steve Meister</a> | More info on <a href="http://wikipocalypse.duckandcover.cx/in ... e=Bethesda Softworks">Company: Bethesda Softworks</a> | More info on <a href="http://wikipocalypse.duckandcover.cx/in ... le=Fallout 3 (Bethesda)">Game: Fallout 3 (Bethesda)</a>

<strong>Saint_Proverbius</strong> let me know that <a href="http://www.bethsoft.com">Bethesda</a> developer <strong>Steve "MrSmileyFaceDude" Meister</strong> has been <a href="http://www.rpgcodex.com/phpBB/viewtopic ... 6">talking about enemy levels on RPG Codex</a>. Saint's of the opinion that anything done in <em>Oblivion</em> will carry over to <em>Fallout 3</em>,
and whilst I don't necessarily agree with that on all aspects, I think
this particular topic will be common between both games. <blockquote><em>[MSFD on Oblivion]
This means that enemy encounters will get HARDER as you level up. It
means that you won't be able to beat everyone down just because you've
got a 75 blade skill and 100 strength. The idea being to keep the game
challenging as you progress. From your comment, it seems you've
misinterpreted the article to mean just the opposite.



[Saint Proverbius]
Oh boy! A game where a mole rat will always be a challenge!



[MSFD]
Hey, those mole rats can inflict a wicket scratch!



Actually what it'd do is replace the low-level mole rat with tougher
creature types, be they mole rats or something different, depending on
circumstances. It's a very flexible system that expands on the concept
as used in Morrowind. And it's also flexible enough not to be used in
all cases. If you want a leveled encounter, you drop in a leveled
creature. If not, you just drop in a "normal" creature.



...



</em><em>
Not if the Big Bad Guys were set up to be Big Bad Guys. Leveled enemies
don't have to start at level 1 -- they could start at level 30 and go
up from there, for example.</em>

</blockquote>
It's an interesting idea (that apparently goes a lot deeper than what's
being talked about publically), but it has to be carefully balanced,
and it sounds like it's an expansion of the <em>Fallout</em> random encounters which scaled according to level. On the
one hand I like the idea of a designer being able to specify,
regardless of player level, 'this area should be hard for the PC to
complete'. However, there should be some areas that a
low-level PC will die in, and others that a high-level PC can easily
wipe out.


Perhaps it's best to have fixed enemy levels unless the player is
within a certain level range which is deemed suitable for the location.
In that case, the enemy scaling comes in, adjusting the difficulty
slightly.


Thanks for the news tip, <strong>Saint_Proverbius</strong>.

[St. Toxic]

Sounds bad. Can't say I approve.

[Retlaw83]

I thought the point of say, earning Hardened Power Armor and a Turbo Plasma Rifle was so you could be a massive badass?

Sounds alot like the scaling system Anarchy Online uses for the enemies in its randomly generated missions.

[St. Toxic]

Seriously, a rat can only be so so dangerous. Maybe its radiated and poisoned and carrying a virus, but if you're well armored and have meds thats it. So long rat, you're not a threat to me anymore.

A human body can only take a certain punch before it breaks. Same with any goddamn mutie, and any other creature. Only separation is how well equipped they are, and then maybe a 'slight' ( very slight ) 'veteran' bonus to hp, if the thing in question is 'well traveled'.

Rather they just make things harder to kill altogether.

[S4ur0n27]

Sounds like shit.

[Fez]

Auto-levelling all the enemies leads to blandness.

[Blargh]

I suspect this will lead to much greater linearity.

[Wolfman Walt]

Does the rat community have a grudge against your character or something?

as used in morrowind

Newsflash: Morrowind sucked, get over it.

I hope I'm not the only who is A. frightened by that comment and B. wondering what else was "as used in morrowind."

[Blargh]

Concepts. I, you and others are entitled to be disturbed, I think. Fallowind, oh dear.

[MrSmileyFaceDude]

Concepts. I, you and others are entitled to be disturbed, I think. Fallowind, oh dear.

The discussion is about The Elder Scrolls games, and has nothing to do with Fallout. They are different games.

[Wolfman Walt]

Can you assure us that it only has to do with Elder Scrolls or is that just to ease our minds?

[Mr. Teatime]

Can you assure us that it only has to do with Elder Scrolls or is that just to ease our minds?

Chances of getting a straight answer to that question are very low, understandably. I'd guess that there will be crossover in the way certain things are done between Oblivion and Fallout, though of course I'd like that crossover to be as minimum as possible (if at all), because we've all said how the ES and FO are very different types of games...

[Wolfman Walt]

Which was the point I was getting at. Despite the fact that they are different games they might be handled in similar ways, and until we get confirmation if it won't have anything to do with FO, nothings really been answered and speculation won't cease. I trust MSFG and Bestheda wish to make the best game possible, however our definitions may vary as to what the best game possible is with the Fallout franchise.

But as been illustrated before, they're still in like the pre-pre-development phase still, so speculation is just that, speculation. Though I would like abit more news then just "Trust us, we're doing a good job."

[Mr. Teatime]

Yeah, there won't be much solid info for a while yet, but since I believe that the devs are reading these forums and taking in our ideas (something Bethsoft have a reputation for and are always keen to point out that this is how they like to work), it's always good to get some discussion going about topics like this.