I miss the Random Encounters in FO3.

They were one of the elements that added so much to replayablity: you just never knew what you'd see out in the wasteland. About any direction you went would have interesting events/battles/encounters. Now in NV there's 5x the story/quests, and that's ***AWESOOOOME***, but as I trot across the desert, I know exactly where every single enemy is going to pop up, and the one guy you encounter randomly tells you about the bottle caps and runs off...



Hm, I never got around to trying this, but it's sort of in line with what I've been thinking...

so anyway, random notes blowing around, random wasters running up to you with quests or maps, random fights between wasters & bandits & beasties, random robbery attempts, good deeds, etc, etc, etc.

*****

Also, I have an ambitious, multi level quest idea that would involve this randomness, so I bet I'll have questions. I'm assuming that since the devs made it so Helpful Bottle-Cap Advice Guy and various Kings run up to you in the game that it can be done, but anyone try messing with this?

And lastly, anyone try animating a really big explosion and it's aftermath? Maybe stealing the one from Megaton or from the mansion in PL? Just wondering... heh, heh...

There's an alternate route, if you hang by the cliff face you can avoid the fire..There's an alternate route, there's an opening in the canyon to them, I wanna say east or north of her, that you can find if you go around.

You know, I pointed out above/on the last page that there's freaking 79 MARKED SIDE quests, fallout 3 had 17, around 30, if you counted the UNMARKED and MAINQUEST LINE ones. In terms of areas, 315 in New Vegas, according to the vault, and for Fallout 3, 314. Why does it seem like you are exaggerating the lack of content.

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Fallout_3_locations
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Fallout:_New_Vegas_locations
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout:_New_Vegas_quests
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Fallout_3_quests
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Fallout_3_quests
http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Fallout:_New_Vegas_quests

Here's the thing about NV compared to FO3, you can go through the game and not complete any more quests than what Yes Man gives you. Even then, you can KILL everyone(bar children) other than Yes Man(the only non-child who is marked essential), and still win the [censored] game. Now imagine if that had been possible in FO3, "Oh hey Dad, Bang Bang, you dead." Then continue on and kill everyone else(bar those monsters in LL), till eventually Ron Pearlman starts up, "In the year 2277, there lived an AFGNCAAP who waged genocide on the entire DC wastes, he killed his father and his vault, then he destroyed Megaton in nuclear fire, he was kind of an [censored]. War, War Never Changes. I'll take my paycheck now, thank you."

You do also realize that DC was in a box canyon as well? As was Cyrodiil. Morrowind was an Island. The DC wastes just felt more open, because they didn't try to make natural barriers(EG the deathclaws and Giant Rad Scorps and Cazadores in certain parts of the map) and instead made most things entirely homogeneous, relying on a leveled system to make everything a null challenge. Obsidian worked very hard to create a difficulty curve that was nearly unnoticeable, rather than a difficulty curve that wasn't there. About the only major challenge you are likely to get in FO3 is going into the DC mall area for the first time. Now think onto the NV areas, you have these really careful increases in scale. A group of bandits with the aid of the townsfolk, a group of bandits on your own, a prison full of bandits, a Legion Raiding party if you choose that route, a few shoddily equipped nightkin, a group of Khans or NCR, a group of fiends coming into NV, the floor staff of the Tops, or Benny's guard, or both, again if you choose that route. House's Guard Bots, once more with feeling, if you choose that route. Very careful increases, that just kind of fall to the wayside unless you anolyze it more closely, all building up to the end game. Allot of it can be conquered by exploring some or by having the proper skills. And all those I just listed, that's just the main quest, you're going to be doing sidequests as well, which further aid the curve.

As to Karkeys,

The encounters in FO3 weren't random at all. I knew that every time I went to the grocery store, I was going to get the Ant Kid to chase me down and ask me for help. I knew that in the store I'd find a single dude on the shelves with 2 more in the aisles, 1 wandering around in front of the store, and 2 behind the counter. Outside of the store you'd find 1 person milling about near the buss and 2 in front of the door. About the only thing that FO3 had that NV doesn't, were the pseudo random patrols and people, and even those weren't all that random, as you'd generally be able to find them following a very set route, and killing very set enemies, or guarding/fighting over very set fridges and miscellaneous things. Mods however added those interesting battles and faction conflicts, things like MMM and FWE were perfect for those things.

Now FO1 and FO2, THOSE had random encounters.

That was a great mod...If someone could/would bring that over to new vegas, it would be much appreciated.

I just thought of an awesome mod....Fix ALL the roads. Remake cars to not look dirty. Rebuild houses to be as good as newly made ones, Delete all the weapons ever, and then make up the story that the platnium chip was installed at perfect timing and all of the US is still surviving. Replace NCR with the Military.
Just a spark of thought in my head. If this seems too dumb, then atleast fix the roads.

For sure some weren't random-- as you describe-- and lots of fights over fridges etc. did repeat themselves if you played enough times.... but it took a while, and they weren't quite ALWAYS the same: once I strolled down to that store --straight out of Megaton at about level 3-- and there was a Deathclaw killing the raiders, and me with my 10mm pistol scuttling around that one big tree trunk by the bus. Anyway, the encounters would pop up with enough variety to keep me curious, however they were plotted out. Between some pretty clever routing for "very long patrols" by Strange Meat Hunters and Uncle Leo and the like, and some things that were set to happen only once or sometimes not at all, like the Firelance flyover, it did seem to add some good flavor to the world. In NV, bless it's complex, lovely heart, there's next to none of that.

I still haven't gotten around to FO1 and FO2, but do you think the Random Encounter setup that worked in those could be adapted to the FO3/NV engine? Sounds great to me!

For fast travel encounters, sure, that's just a random chance of a person being spawned, you'd need a way to tell if an area was a city or not though. For the variety of other encounters, been tried, doesn't work in the bethesda engine. The primary difference is that FO1 and FO2 procedurally generate the terrain between main areas, so while you have a map depicting 140,000 or so miles, only an incredibly SMALL SMALL SMALL, portion of it is made by the artist. Primary locomotion by the player is taken out at the map screen, which acts as the fast travel screen. So you can have a percentage call that says, "hey if the player has 10 luck, he's got an X percent chance of the Tardis spawning when he enters a new grid space. He's also got an x-y percent chance of a group of enemies spawning when he enters a new grid space, based upon his survival skill." with Bethesda's engine, you can't do that, I imagine it may one day be possible with FOSE/OBSE, but you run into problems, like, "How does this fit in the area without clipping" that would be a nightmare for any scripter and would likely cause a severe drop in performance on even the heaviest of rigs when entering a new cell.

Now what you could do, is have a variety of locations in the wastes, like in FO3 that have random chance variables to activate. That would be a relatively simple thing to do, and wouldn't take a competent modder more than about 10-30 minutes to do each one depending on complexity. But it wouldn't be random, and would grow predictable over time.

Thanks for explaining that, dakorma. ... and that's exactly the effect in FO3 after enough playthroughs: the guy fighting the YaoGuai/Deathclaw and then telling you he's had enough adventure to last a lifetime, so here's this map and good luck-- it pops up in different locations, and only once per PC, but it's still the same story line. You'd have to make maybe 30+ (40+?) of them to keep it fresh for a few playthroughs. hmm...Thus the "very long patrol" idea might work better, with all factions, critters and robots, so they might cross each others' paths and fight, either when you're there to see it or even to leave dead bodies scattered around to find.

Well, for the quest idea I had, just a few npc's approaching the PC would do nicely. Do you know where in the GECK the prompt for "spawn this guy, and have him run up to the PC-- wherever he is at the moment-- and start this dialogue" is located?

Companions:

Ghoul/Supermutant (who was once a peroxide airhead bimbo) who joins the PC because she mistakes the "platinum chip" for a "platinum card" (something she has looked for for 200 odd years). She will settle for "implants " however.

Rich Arab ghoul whos family came to the US and bought a private vault with the funds, only to realize the shoddy workmanship when the door didn't close fully. He now has a grudge for Vault Tec personell and frequently goes on virolent tirades about how his father/uncle would have them all flogged. Also he has a fetish for gambling and chasing "peroxide blonde ghouls" like the above... preferably with implants.

The above could work for European Royalty/blue blood. Or Japanese business tycoon with a samurai fetish and a constant chip on his shoulder because his funds were seized when he was suspected of spying for the chinese on account of his appearance alone.. The voiceover work could be fun for other people to take part in especially if they get to curse in their local / native tounge .

_________

Gambling: Poker? Could that be implemented?

Official / unofficial extreme high end tournaments in Blackjack or Poker. After getting barred you could be invited to a high end game/tournament. Maybe in Vault 21? Here you meet "Damsel in distress" who is trying to win enough money to buy the freedom of her Lover/kid/family. You could take her to the cleaners and she would either try to seduce you to get you to attempt a rescue, or knock you out and she would leave a note, a cigerette butt or a shoe as she runs off and then you have to chase her down. Lots of possibilites here. Think "bond movie". Bond always finds info or gets into trouble when gambling. Could be a brahmin baron you take to the cleaners/loose an obscene amount of cash to invites you to a "real" high stakes game (where you have to shoot your way out to avoid having to pay/find out its a ruse by the legion to get you outside vegas and flatfoooted). Also why doesn't a single person try to be your best "Friend" after you clean out the casino? There would be bimbo's and conartists lining up behind you even before you left the casino IRL.

Cooperating with dixon to get more NCR strung out on dope? Khan sidequest ?

After killing House, Setting the Lucky 38 for (high rollers) gamblers / grand reopening? Setting up a new casino in Freeside? Hirering the kings/van Grafs as protection.

There is plenty Id like to see but I havent really got a clue if any of it is even feasable.

From the top, Feasible, Feasible, though the VO isn't, not feasible minigames aren't able to be implemented, unless they've changed something in this version of the CS, Feasible, Feasible, Feasible but hard.

-Sorry about "feasible". . ESL here.

I'd find the bimbo quite fun though. Vegas should have a fair amount of them around and finding a ghoul or Supermutant of the sort could bring all sorts of "Anna Nicole Smith"-esque dialogue into play.

Also... something that bothers me in Vegas: Why was House so bent on having Vault 21 filled with concrete? What was down there that he didn't want anyone else to discover? A pod of a kind, some sort of Vault Tec artifact that could render his robot army useless, some hint at a machiavellian scheeme for the future of Vegas? So how about having someone blast/drill a tunnel to the central computer / artifact storeroom to find out what precisely it was we aren't supposed to know? That should be possible. Could even be Mr Houses second female robot that he got tired off or something . I'd prefer it to be some sort of good history and not "imba-weapon_2001".

I think Destiny's comment kinda summarizes my response to yours, dakorma. There are plenty of mods, but alot of them I can do in minutes, and they really dont change anything. I get 10 minutes (mostly of me running to some interior of a building) then maybe a thanks and an item or two. So many of them are too short. I would love (and yes I plan on spending alot of my time making quest mods for this game, partly because I love doing so, and partly because I feel they are in such dire need) mods that add bigger quests to the game, taking maybe like half a hour to beat. And once your done you feel like you've changed something, instead of just getting some stuff.



Great! I don't believe I have personally played any of your mods, (I spent most of my time making my FO3 mod, not playing others mods for the game) but from various posts and whats-whats I know about you, I know they are some high quality stuff.



Yea well, I did spend a year on my Fo3 mod, but that adds like 4 freaking hours of gameplay. (See siganture, shameless plug) I'm talking some mods that quests that take maybe 30-45 minutes to play. I could make one of those like every 2 months if I worked semi-casually on it, and like every 4-5 weeks if I worked as hard as possible. There were few quest mods for Fo3, but some really nice ones. I just hope the people who make them keep doing so, and a few more people who are good at it get into it. I hate pointlessly wandering around in Fallout (either one) and LOVE having very directed gameplay and a quests to do, so I frenquently find myself without any to do, until I wander around to the next one, which gets annoying. Especially when I beat it in 5 minutes, then have to do another 30 minutes of wandering. :/

-I hear you. Having a gameplay where the "flow" of the quests just seems to fit seamlessly makes for a much more immersive experience. In Vegas I find myself metagaming and scooping up all quests I can find once I enter a new questhub area, just to get some sentation of a flow.

1. An addon to allow mininukes to be used with the detonator, increase detonator range, have a 'detonate single' and 'detonate all' option (single would blow up the oldest to newest on each time its activated...swapping between single and all could/would be done by hitting '2' ). Should also increase the spawns of mininukes at merchants a bit.

---
2. 'Dr. Doolittle' perk. Must have the perk that makes animals friendly first. Pacifies more animal types and allows you to open dialog and issue simple commands to them (up to and including deathclaws...).
Commands would be

'bring back the nearest food/aid/ammo/weapon/misc item you find', requiring you to stay roughly where you are til the critter comes back

kill the nearest creature (other than me and my companions!).

Dance for me! ).

Follow me!

Fight for my amusemant! Would cause the creature to 'call for' then fight another of its type while you watch. Fight is to the death.

---
3. Moar crap in water! I would love to see the entire wasteland crafted with some kind of 'random' spawns for wrecks, footlockers, dead bodies with inventories, et al in the various bodies of water. More fish...huntable, eatable, cookable fish with recipes would be great too.

---
4. A fix for rad suits and rad-x to COMPLETELY prevent you from being irradiated up to the threshold of the gear/pill. Would also add 'improved' and 'ultra' rad-x. :

-Rad-x would protect up to 2 rad/sec for duration. Same for standard rad suit.
-Improved Rad-x/advanced rad suit would protect up to 4 rad/sec.
-ultra rad-x would protect you up to 10 rad/sec AND cause you to slowly regen health and AP while recieving radiation.

---
5. Something like the Regulators as a faction. This would be like the expanded regulators mod from FO3 (cant remember name) that gives them a base, missions, and makes them actually show up in the wastelands. Player could join faction .
---
6. More heavy weapons! Up to and including arm mounted autocannons and the infamous 20mm Soviet Flak Cannon!


-but hey, thats just my Christmas wish list

Aequiss made http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2928; Jarhead_Writer and I are cooking up something similiar for New Vegas, but as a previous poster mentioned, producing quest mods is quite a time vacuum. The issue with the Regulators is balancing the lore - my intent is to actually re-introduce the http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Regulators_(Fallout) from the Core Region. However, that will play out in New Vegas Bounties III, which will probably take place in a new worldspace in a frigid, alpine setting (that's the pre-production brainstorming, anyway - by the time it's produced, it could end up in the [censored] Great Plains).

But before episode III, I'm hell-bent on making that damn boxing mod. Bethesda/Obsidian should've included prize fighting, and there's no indication someone is going to make it, so I'm determined to see that the Mojave has a proper boxing venue (immediately after finishing episode II). That's enough of my expatiation - merry Christmas, all! I think this is shaping into a very nifty thread.

-A securitron companion. But not just any securitron companion. I'd wan't one that was essentially "Nordom" the Modron from Planescape: Torment converted to the wasteland.
A line could like: "I estimate that "Charname" would be 51% more effective as a Securitron. Give or take 5,2%." would be a funny spoof.

-A Vault-tec computer with a red blinking eye who insists on calling you "Dave" and telling you "I am afraid I can't let you do that" whenever you try to enter a command.

http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=121

If someone could make a mod like this for FONV, I would be greatly appreciative.

Any ideas for new factions and quests unrelated to any faction?

I'd like to see more ending epilogues. It feels like after I complete the game 2 or 3 times I'll start ignoring the quests without epilogues because in the end they don't really matter. It doesn't really even need to have voice acting, and the images could be simple screenshots, so it wouldn't be very hard. You could have epilogues covering everything from healing snuffles' leg to what happens to the New Vegas families... could even cover things that aren't quests like random encounters or clearing certain areas of enemies.

Personnaly, I would like to see (Only for Xbox live right now, I have NO idea on how to do it for PC or PS3) an add on for 400 MS Points that allows an off map/ New map, area that is supplied AFTER you side with one faction, called *EMPTY LOT* As to speak it is a Blank area located around mountains, that has no nothing what so ever and installed at the entrance (High tech meatl vault like wall with a Metal gate) is a terminal allowing you to buy certain types of houses, (Ex: Legion, NCR, Raider, Vault/built into mountin.....) interiors, (My first Infirmary, My Sunset Saspirilla despencer, an area to keep and show your star bottle caps....) Enviroment, (Lushious grass, Snowy, Nuked, wastland.....) and other misc Items. (Firing Range, Seprate armoury being custamisable....) I know it sounds like the G.E.C.K. but it would allow non-pc players to *sorta* use a G.E.C.K.

Send me a pic of a G.E.C.K. made area and I'll tell you if thats what I hade in mind.

Also, the area around, (Mountins) could be changed to other types of enviroments, Ex ruined city, Brotherhood of steel/ Enclave look, raider camp, Cave, etc....

The mountain would be the default area, when moving, the gate will change, by choice, to blend in with the scenery.

Personally I would love to see more NPC's, they don't actually have to do anything or have any dialog or quest just standing around, smoking, drinking working...whatever.
Remember that mod for Oblivion that had travelers moving between towns during the day, something like that would be great, make the world feel like it is moving around you instead of you and the critter you're killing at the moment being the only creatures in the universe.
Would really add to the atmosphere and in those odd moments of boredom when you know you have a save to go back to they would make great targets for testing new weapon mods!

I have to agree with Shad on that one... wandering the wasteland is fine... but really, am I supposed to honestly believe that... with the exception of maybe one or two other NPC's... I'm the ONLY person who has to do any kind of traveling whatsoever? Oooh... wow... look over there! The exact SAME traveling merchant I bumped into yesterday! And over there! I remember that guy! I think I shot him by accident!

It's kind of jarring... being out there all alone, despite the fact that we're supposed to be in one of the least-damningly destroyed places in the United States.


Oblivion had the right idea, I think, in having their NPC's travel. It was a bit of a pain, sometimes, when you were looking for someone... but it's not really that big a deal if you just make your travelers randomly generated, nameless, respawning NPC's for whom death would impact the player very little. Sure, have some of them be willing to trade with you... have some of them be caravaners, even! But they don't even really have to do anything.

Just, for the love of all that is holy and shiny and overwhelmingly destructive... please... please put SOMETHING out there!

Oh yes... and I want a kitchen sink. Like this one: (http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://santhoffplumbingco.com/images/Kitchen-Sink.jpg&imgrefurl=http://santhoffplumbingco.com/houston-residential-plumbing/kitchen/sink-installation.htm&usg=__IgEnjG2zvTqu3-8InuofGC2rPvA=&h=300&w=300&sz=7&hl=en&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=wiOvfX73cBpisM:&tbnh=129&tbnw=123&prev=/images%3Fq%3DKitchen%2Bsink%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26biw%3D1280%26bih%3D830%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=118&vpy=95&dur=674&hovh=225&hovw=225&tx=76&ty=163&ei=kAMfTe6QFo3InAe3m5jsDQ&oei=kAMfTe6QFo3InAe3m5jsDQ&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=27&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0)

Preferably, it should come with a version of that lowerbar counter thing... that has a hole... cut out for the sink to fit in.

post inspired by Shad's & colonel's post. ( Don't want anyone to think I'm belittling their ideas, just musing, yeah know?) :

For me it's actually quite the opposite. I see people and I figure, okay let's go meet them! and then having them just spout off random stuff that the 5 people aroundthem also say is very jarring for me. I'd actually prefer a mod that expands on some of the vanilla characters more (most of them are pretty good, definitely better than Oblivion's, but there's always little tweaks and additions that can be made.), or adds characters that actually have some personality.... probably why I love quest mods so much; with quests you often times have to have some story and believable character with believable motivations giving the task. (though of course not all quest mods do this; some have rather horrid characters)

Anyway it doesn't even have to be a quest mod, it could just be a few random NPCs added that have a little to say like http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/No-Bark_Noonan (Granted No-Bark does have a lot to say, and he does comment on quests, but he was the first I could find)... even something as simple as a unique greeting and possibly one or two topics would do. I'd even be happy with cliches or characters copied out of books, other games, movies, etc. in this case.
Let's look at what we can add to say the Gomorrah for instance:

A stripper dressed up as a nurse who will small chat with you for a few caps talking about how she only dresses up as a nurse on the weekends and makes enough money to work on her novel the rest of the week.

A drunk office worker from the NCR embassy drunkenly cheering the strippers on.

a bar tender that will get into a philosophical debate with you. (a little too cliched?)

A down on their luck gambler offering to have six with you to make a few caps (Okay... I stole this one from a mod that actually makes that happen randomly)

An addict offering to sell you random junk for chems, or caps.

A wary girl warning you to watch yourself with the family. One of her friends hit one of them and went missing shortly after (a comment on one of the Gomorrah quests)

And so on....

As for travelers for one thing you could just steal the 4 or 5 travelling merchants from fallout 3.

As for legal issues(because I said the word copied...) there really aren't any.... so long as you don't port a character's exact appearance, voice (if it's a movie/game), and naturally no one can really sue over dialogue, even if they were really desperate for money and tried a simple setting change would cover that (like the word "caps' instead of "dollars")

I don't know it just feels like if I want extra atmosphere/filler characters just for the sake of them adding atmosphere or filling they might as well just be 2d props that you can't interact with, and a random "pvssyr" sound effect to make it seem like they're talking and making noise.

EDIT: Note that I'm just rambling and giving random examples, I'm not actually saying I'd want a mod where someone just copy/pasted random character traits/cliches/personalities from other sources and just dropped them in New Vegas... Basically just that I wouldn't expect Shakespeare to come back from the grave and make his newest masterpiece a New Vegas mod. Essentially it goes like this:

I'd take one cliched NPC with a unique greeting and 2 'barks' over 10 generic NPCs sharing the same exact lines.
A NPC that actually has unique topics is worth like 15 generic NPCs
A NPC that you can talk with about how/who they are, what they're doing there, a little bit about them is worth like 35 generics.
etc.

Granted generics aren't all bad, I mean it'd be pretty bad if New vegas had only.... ***Uhh about http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Fallout:_New_Vegas_quests, times say about 3 NPCs per quest, carry the 5, rotate the 6, subtract the remainder, do a rain dance....*** 279 NPCs at all.
Generics make great cannon fodder to kill, and make forces/allies look formidable. For militarily bases I'd say about half the beds should be able to be filled, A town... 80% of the inhabitable buildings should have at least one person. bar/casino... ranging from 10% to 50% of the seats/beds.

To me that's about what is needed for filler generic NPCs... it's something that's kind of hard to balance. You have too little generics and everywhere you go looks like a ghost town, too many and it looks like a town of brain-dead zombies.

I like the idea of random events in the wasteland, faction fights, creature fights, robbery, someone needing aid etc.

I'd like to see a land expansion of some sort, maybe area 51 related.

I would love to have more miscellaneous junk to work with... the same goes for meshes for food and aid items and the like.


More models, really. More stuff.

As it stands, the world is great... but there's this certain lack of... stuff... to fill it with. Things are missing... like Microwaves... and dish washers... and individual flasks and vials and what-not for the sciency nerds. There are meshes for creating 'completed meals'... and I mean really, there's not even a sealed, filled MILK bottle food item! Brahmin everywhwere... and they don't think to MILK them? Doubtful.

These are the kinds of things that make the game for me... mods that add ATMOSPHERE... because the SETTING has been nailed. Now it just needs the right atmosphere... and it'll be sweet sweet music to my ears.

Added to the list of things I would like to see? A port of the mod which added in all the rest of the missing pool balls!


Who the hell thought it would be a good idea to make a game with only SOME of them, anyways? Good lord, have mercy...