The Gun Runners almost certainly manufacture ammunition along with weapons.

Agreed that there's too much random loot in easily accessed buildings.

My mod should work fine with saved games . . . but your HPs and carrying capacity are both going to drop somewhat. You're still going to have to use a LOT of bullets to take dow a RadScorpion or a Deathclaw, because of their DT. I reduced their DT a bit, but only 10 to 15% . . . which was just to keep it balanced with my Threshold Resistance changes. You need pretty powerful weapons, along with decent weapon skills to go up against those armored creatures.

First of all i want to say i like your mod a lot!

But why have you reduced the DT on armors?, at least on the Reinforced Metal Armor that I'm using now.
In v1.3 it has DT=14 and vanilla is DT=16, it's hard enough to fight and with the reduced DT on armors it is not fun at all

Thanks!

But you really should look at my v.1.3 changes, posted here (in the opening post) and on my mods NV Nexus description, before asking about why I changed something. I try to be pretty clear about what each update changes/adds. It is the second bulleted item:

"DT was increased for most helmets, while reduced for the associated body armor. Generally the helmet DT will now equal 50% of the body armor's DT (default was usually 25% or less), with the total DT (armor + helmet) still close to default . . . this will make wearing helmets MUCH more important."

The Reinforced Metal Helmet now has 6 DT (default was 4); so if you're wearing the full armor + helmet, you have the exact same total DT as default (20 DT). PLUS my mod increases the Threshold Resistance to 15% (from the default 20%); which increases your armor's protection. The idea was to make helmets a greater factor in protection, since the biggest HP damage is with Head shots.

Hey Arwen,

Any chance of making a version that doesn't affect character creation? I like playing a character that is 'heroic,' and five less starting points really limits that. If its balance you're after, rather than limit the character, make other things tougher. I've changed it in mine already, since I play your mod / very hard and I never really thought those special points were what was making characters overpowered. Its the skills system.

Just my .02, keep up the good work!

The SPECIAL points are only reduced in the (yet to be released) hardcoe module, I'm pretty sure it's not present in the Realism Core.

You still have 5 SPECIAL points, at least i got 5 at the start

If you're OK with using the console, just type 'addspecialpoints 5' into it.

Sorry, but I'm not making two versions of my mod . . . making one version of an overhaul is more than enough work (plus I'm still working on my FO3 Tweaks). As for SPECIAL points, my mod does NOT reduce them . . . yet.


As povuholo has already pointed out, my Realism Core does not reduce SPECIAL points . . . that will be part of what my Hard-Core module does . . . which I'm currently using a beta of in my own game. Plus I reduce the SPECIAL points through my own global modifier, so the console command would likely cause problems.

The whole idea of my Hard-Core module is to make things . . . well, more Hard-Core, so it is pretty pointless to use that module and then use console cheats to make it easier. I mean, the whole idea of releasing separate modules, is so that users can decide how tough they want their game to be.

Whoops! My mistake. I had another mod enabled that was doing that.
/facepalm

This is for Everyone:

I'm about to tackle the default weapons, which will be part of my next release (v.1.4) . . . the problem is that I'm not a big user of weapons.
I can go though this all mathematically (like I did with FO3) . . . which mostly turns out ok; but I sort of need a good base to start from.

So what do you guys feel are the weapons that are:
1.) currently pretty balanced
2.) way under-powered
3.) way over-powered.

I'm not looking for a long list, and I do NOT want this thread to get sidetracked, with a debate on weapons.
But I would appreciate a little help, as it will save me a LOT of time, and you'll likely end up with a better balance than if I just did this entirely on my own.

I'm curious as to how people will respond to this. Currently, I feel most of the ranged (non-energy) weapons are actually pretty well balanced and, really, the only thing that comes to mind as insanely overpowered is the Ballistic Fist.

But I think that's the whole point of the weapon...

1. Unarmed and Melee weapons are pretty balanced however there is a huge desparity between good and bad melee weapons.
2. Energy weapons and explosvies. Damage per shot and item health are the real issues with energy weapons, your way of breaking DT is supposed to be doing enough damage to rip through it, if they had higher base damage and item health they would be better all around and they wouldnt have as many problems against DT. Energy weapons overall need a large overhaul. Explosives just lack the damage they had in fallout 3 not to mention the velocity of explsove projectiles is way too slow. Don't forget that the firing speed on the grenade launcher is too slow (1.5 Shots per second) seems to be the most realistic and balanced.
3. Guns are overpowered in this version of the game.

I don't know, I think they're pretty well balanced, as in, you still need the right ammo and weapon for the right target to be effective, and they're still mostly useless in any kind of close-quarters situation.

Maybe the Guns skill could scale accuracy/damage more drastically than the other skills? And possibly raising the required skill for most guns, while making the penalty for not having a high enough skill more harsh (this would also reinforce the RPG elements).

Thanks guys! This is very helpful.

In v.1.3 (my current released version) I made some changes to projectiles and explosives. I'm limited in how much I can increase stuff like DAM and Radius to some things like Dynamite, as the Powder Gangers will just blow themselves up (dumb AI). The best I could do was increase the Range and DAM 25 to 30%.

And I will be adding and raise some skill requirements, since I increase the penalty for using a ranged weapons when your skills are not high enough for it.

Might I ask what setting(s) you changed/tweaked here? I've looked all over in the GECK and can't seem to find this.

I'm almost exclussively a guns user and I think they're pretty balanced. First time I got my hands on an Anti-Materiel rifle my jaw dropped when I saw how much damage it did (I had level 100 guns mind you) and I thought "this is overpowered!" but then I realized that it has some major drawbacks: it weighs 20 lbs and and 40 rounds for it weigh 10 lbs (and I usually carry around about 100 sniper rounds between the different ammo types 50 normal rounds and 50 special rounds) Cost wasn't really an issue since you can swim in caps if you literally play your cards right XD Of course on normal this isn't really an issue but I don't play on normal. Given your carry weight edits this can make carrying one and the ammo for it a bit of an issue if you want to have space to haul the loot you want to sell as well. So it's balanced IMO. AS a personal preference I'd give the 9mm weapon a bit more damage btu that's ebcause I like the design of it

I used to hate shotties since they just didn't have that "oh shi-" factor but when I picked the shotgun surgeon perk thigns changed. Popping turbo (or using DK's bullet time mod, whichever you prefer) and using the riot shotgun can clear out entire rooms of baddies

I'd make explosives a bit more deadlier (when a nade lands next to me I want to go "Oh shiiiii-" *reload*) but that's just personal preference. I don't mind the current state of explosives either.

But what really needs a de-nerf are the energy weapons. Now I don't know if you tackled those yet since, like I said, I'm almost exclusively using guns (and grenades) but the general opinion among the community is that they're pretty much useless when compared to guns. A lousy 9mm pistol is more effective than a laser pistol and IMO that should be the other way around.

1) Rifles(and guns in general) seems to be fine,but this could be due to high base damage which seems to be in check with the increased DT or armors.
2) Energy weapons in general and plasma ins specific, long travel time plus big consumption of ammo is pretty bad and I second RoadReaction that damage per shot and item health are the real issues with energy weapons and that Energy weapons overall need a large overhaul.
3) Melee for NPCs, Boone two shoted Nightkins in melee with rebar club (repaired to max with repair skill 49), while I could empty clip after clip or 10mm or plasma pistol (skill 40 in both energy and small guns). Another example is Tire Iron for convicts in Primm did more damage to my health then them shooting with 9mm pistols.(I was wearing 7 DT leather armor that I bought from Chet in Goodsprings) Nightstalkers (normals ones not the ones near Jacobstown) seems to one/two shoted me if hit in the torso or head, not sure if they are just powerful and trait small perks makes my head injury that more important or just out of balance. in any case it seemed weird to me.

P.S.
Powder Ganger Guard Armor reduces max carry weight instead of increasing it.

After your armor changes, guns feel pretty good. Shotguns are still pretty worthless due to how DT works. With NVSE you might be able to work on a system where DT < 10 means they get full damage, DT over 10 means they do normal, DT 20+ they do 1/4? That way, against lightly armored folks (leather, raider, etc) shotguns would have a very high DPS indeed, whereas against someone wearing combat armor or above, not much at all. This would not only make them more viable, but more realistic as well. Leather doesn't provide any protection against buckshot... (that's literally the point... buck... shot...) Actually an easier and just as flexible model would have shotguns look not at DT, but at armor type, as with a low penetration ordinance like buckshot the material type is the most important factor.

Energy weapons need some love across the board. There aren't as many varieties, they do less damage in general, fire slower, etc. I don't really like the idea of giving them straight numbers buffs, because then they would just be guns with fancy animations and worse iron sights. They need something to do something to make them unique. Perhaps after hitting a body part, they gain a significant damage bonus with each subsequent hit, as that area 'heats up'? Maybe they are more much more effective against metal and power armors? A straight negation of X% of DT against all armors? I dunno, but with all the creativity here in this thread we should be able to think of something.

The issue with the above implementation of shotties is how would you make them work with armors added by other mods? How will the game know what my character is wearing? It could APA version over9000 or it could be a string bikini. Even in the default game shotties aren't very useful till you get the Shotgun Surgeon perk so if you're using them I recommend getting it.

since there are now light, medium and heavy armors in the game, there might be a way to make weapons affect different kinds of armor differently. im thinking that piercing weapons (spears, for example) might do well against light armor but practically bounce of metal (heavy) armor, while blunt (sledge) and energy weapons do well against heavy armor. it seems to me that PA might have been developed as a defense against normal guns then energy weapons developed to counter PA.

Very interesting idea, I like it. Shotguns could cause more damage to light armor. But again you'd have the same issue. How do you know a weapon added by a mod is a shotgun? Look at what kind of ammo it uses might be the answer but what about custom ammo from mods (although usually custom ammo mods tend to be included in CALIBR type overhauls so it would be a matter of compatibility patches)?

Kinda like Dungeons and Dragons armor rules where youve got scale, (full)plate and (studded)leather armor and they all protect differently against the three attacks blunt, pierce and slash. Yes would be realistic.
And remember Fallout 1 and 2? You could set the type of attack you would use with some weapons, like thrusting (piercing) or slashing with a knife.

Here you go: ?fWeapSkillReqPenalty
The one for strength requirements is ?fWeapStrengthReqPenalty, but this seems to be broken or was never implemented in the game


I'm going to decrease both the DAM and the 100 Guns skill requirement. The Dam, because, with my mod, if you have 100 Guns skill you have a 2X Dam multiplier. and the skill requirement, because no weapon should require 100 skill, and I'm greatly increasing the penalty for this (which was like nonexistent in the default game) . . . so, if you don't have the required skill, you're going to waste a lot of ammo.


The Laser Pistol is actually the first weapon that I've modified, so I have been using my own version in my own game for a couple of days now . . . and mine is no longer nerfed, but now it feels balanced. Lets see . . . what exactly did I do? Ok, here it is: I set both the Base and Critical damage to 16 (up from 12); I set the Fire Rate at 3 (up from 1); and even gave it a little Kill Impulse kick (so your victims no longer look like they are just inflating). What I did seems to work really well for me. Now if I can just fix the rest with this same sort of balance.

3) Melee for NPCs, Boone two shoted Nightkins in melee with rebar club (repaired to max with repair skill 49), while I could empty clip after clip or 10mm or plasma pistol (skill 40 in both energy and small guns). Another example is Tire Iron for convicts in Primm did more damage to my health then them shooting with 9mm pistols.(I was wearing 7 DT leather armor that I bought from Chet in Goodsprings) Nightstalkers (normals ones not the ones near Jacobstown) seems to one/two shoted me if hit in the torso or head, not sure if they are just powerful and trait small perks makes my head injury that more important or just out of balance. in any case it seemed weird to me.

Melee is a problem, and it is going to be a challenge to fix in a balanced way, that doesn't nerf the NPCs who use melee. I'll see what I can do . . . at the very least, I'll reduce the DAM on some.

P.S.
Powder Ganger Guard Armor reduces max carry weight instead of increasing it.

Thanks. Hmm, I'm pretty sure I fixed that in v.1.3 . . . are you still seeing this, with v.1.3?

After your armor changes, guns feel pretty good. Shotguns are still pretty worthless due to how DT works. With NVSE you might be able to work on a system where DT < 10 means they get full damage, DT over 10 means they do normal, DT 20+ they do 1/4? That way, against lightly armored folks (leather, raider, etc) shotguns would have a very high DPS indeed, whereas against someone wearing combat armor or above, not much at all. This would not only make them more viable, but more realistic as well. Leather doesn't provide any protection against buckshot... (that's literally the point... buck... shot...) Actually an easier and just as flexible model would have shotguns look not at DT, but at armor type, as with a low penetration ordinance like buckshot the material type is the most important factor.

DT is tricky . . . MUCH more difficult to balance than AR . . . I'm probably going to add Threshold Resistance settings to my options menu. But I might try scripting something like what you're suggesting as well.

Energy weapons need some love across the board. There aren't as many varieties, they do less damage in general, fire slower, etc. I don't really like the idea of giving them straight numbers buffs, because then they would just be guns with fancy animations and worse iron sights. They need something to do something to make them unique. Perhaps after hitting a body part, they gain a significant damage bonus with each subsequent hit, as that area 'heats up'? Maybe they are more much more effective against metal and power armors? A straight negation of X% of DT against all armors? I dunno, but with all the creativity here in this thread we should be able to think of something.

They will be getting some love, as I happen to like using them.

The issue with the above implementation of shotties is how would you make them work with armors added by other mods? How will the game know what my character is wearing? It could APA version over9000 or it could be a string bikini. Even in the default game shotties aren't very useful till you get the Shotgun Surgeon perk so if you're using them I recommend getting it.

I'm not finding shotguns to be nerfed . . . the single shotgun has a base DAM of 50, which means that with 50 Guns, you will inflict 63 DAM (and at 100 Guns, you'll do 100 DAM). Yes it is slow, and the spread is sort of high (like it should be), but Shotguns are not really meant to be used for long-range shots.

I totally agree with that. Melee is a little bit unbalanced I guess. On the other hand I think a general tweak is not o good idea. If I can explain with an example from Fallout 3, a mighty sledgehammer hit by a master supermutant will crush anyone's head with power armor or not. There we need to think and hit the enemy from legs then finish him off before taking a hit. Some melee weapons are always effective against armor since medieval times.

An addition to that, I think 10mm pistol is both overpowered and overpriced.