FO3 had the samething. I did not notice really good weapons in the hands of enemies till after broken Steel and even then it was not much. A lazer gattling here and there but by broken steel enemies were super stronge. Maybe they could do something like Tactics, where enemies are armed very well (M2 brownings, M60, Saws, Gattling guns, M72 Gauss rifles, AK-47s and Rocket launchers. When you kill them you can loot the weapons but they don't have much is any ammo on them. New Vegas and FO3 also have weapons degradation so it would not be so bad (unbalancing) for looting powerful weapons of "enemies" because they would be in bad shape and they would have little to no ammo on the dead NPC. That would balance out the game imo.

Its one of the reasons I like Tactics. The NPC are very well armed :gun: . They are the most well armed of all the Fallout games. Fallout 1 and 2 have some well armed NPC.

Better fire power and armour is alot better then Bullet sponge "enemies" with hunting rifles or the odd gatling gun. It does bug me in Fallout 3 and New Vegas that the game has some great fire power like the Light Machine Gun, Anti Material Rifle, Bushmaster and the Fatman but no NCR have them. At least one NPC should have a fatman and use it.

:fallout: yeah i agree, its a real bad game combat philospophy, to not give enemies good weapons because we'll end up with em, that makes for very weak combat, thats kinda stupid, by level 20 or so i already have loads of all the weapons i need plus tons and tons of caps so to not give enemies good weapons it makes me not want to play the game, i get tired of raiders running at me with a pool que, or a powder ganger with a 9 mm or varmint rifle, or ceasers legion with a spear or machete, that doesn't work for me at all, its very dissapointing actually, none of ceasers legion have energy weapons, they don't use marksman rifles till the end of the game, ncr troops only have service rifles, the rangers have better firepower but thats about it, no energy weapons from them, so this is huge drawback to the game and its not even funny, they don't mind deathclaws doing major damage cause they don't have gun we can take after but most human enemies get peashooters to fight us with, this combat philosophy has to be changed, i'm not gonna play new vegas anymore until they fix this, if they don't i'll wait for ESV and play something else until then.

Giving the raiders stronger weapons =/= having bullet sponges.

Stronger weapons in a mass quantity would most likely have you running for cover, pulling out a strong weapon to dispose of enemies quickly.
The strong weapon on the raider will be in horrible condition/broken most of the time to prevent you from getting too many "OverPowered" weapons.

Create a group like the BoS (Advanced Weapons mostly.), have them be on random patrols or spawn randomly, and the higher level you are, the better their weapons will be, while only gaining a small HP bonus. (+20~60 in my opinion.) They will also have a be more skilled in certain areas that you are not. (Or maybe not, if someone really wanted to go with having every weapon skill maxed, such as explosives, energy weapons, guns, etc.)

This group will always be hostile, as they are raiders. They only do want to hurt you, and take what is rightfully yours. They should not be spammed across the wasteland, only in deeper parts of the Mojave will they appear.

Though, it is my idea, and could use tweaking.

God please don't do that devs. I hate factions that are just there for target practice and shiny toys. End up with Factions like Talon Company and Fo3 Enclave which had such potential but became nothing more then random things to kill.

I think a lot of us old fans can remember how the Enclave patrols could more than easily kick your ass. It was hard, but the amount of money you could make is oh so worth it.

the enemies in new vegas have peashooters, seriously, obsidian went out of their way to make sure enemies did not have any good weapons, as a matter of fact they made the main villian all melee fighters, how is that fun? i like enemies shooting at me, it makes the game a lot more fun and challenging, there is a war going on the game supposedly but you can't really find it anywhere except for nelson, most of the enemies are armed with basically the equivelant of bb guns, pool ques ? machetis ? 9 mm's ? varimint rifles ?.. i want more quality enemies when i'm level 20+ not enemies with pool ques and 9 mm's, this is way underbalanced, the two major factions aren't even armed with ANY energy weapons, they use melee weapons and service rifles for the most part, both of which are weak as hell, the fiends are better armed than ncr and ceasers legion, whats up with that ? no enemies with sniper rifles ? no marksman rifles ? well this needs to be fixed bigtime. or i won't ever play an obsidian game again and doubt bethesda is gonna let em make another fallout game at this rate.

Uh, because YOU are not happy Bethesda isn't going to license a Fallout to Obsidian?

I agree with you on NPC needing better weapons. I am against creating random spawn enemies just for target practice. I am against entire factions that are just there to kill. I hate Talon Company for that reason. All they are are random spawning, enemies with some okay firepower that are just there to shoot at. At least with the fiends we can talk are way into their base and talk to their leader. I am also against bullet sponges.

Give the factions that area already in the game, weapons like the Light Machine gun, Anti material rifle, assault rifles, grenade launchers, missle launchers hell even a fatman or two. Increase Legion Patrols a bit. Have more fiends and powder ganger spawns in their areas. Give NCR some better fire power. I would love to see some mounted M2 browing .cal machine guns.

well i agree also thats it does need some ceasers legion patrols, and a few more ncr patrols, but back to how the enemies are armed, obsidian could easily fix this, there is no good reason why we have to be deprived of fighting some well armed enemies, maybe not all of em, but there needs to be more enemies armed with the same type weapons we use, tri beam lasers, plasma rifles, multiplas rifles, gauss rifles, sniper and marksman rifles, gatling lasers, heavy machine guns, 50 cal, etc. if they're worried about us getting those weapons as loot which is obviosuly the real reason why they only give enemies peashooters 90% of the time and made the rest of the human enemies melee fighters, they could always make sure they are in low condition when we loot the enemies, but a game combat philosophy that says we shouldn't be fighting well armed enemies because we'll get the weapos is a real bad philosophy, i won't ever buy another obsidian game unless i know the enemies are gonna be a challenge, sure deathclaws and cazadores can tweak you out pretty good but human type enemies should be able to do that kinda damage also with certain weapons.

I keep going back to Black Mountain to have a chance to fight the Suoer Mutants. They at least have a bit of a challenge and some good equipment. I agree with the original poster though. Combat is much less frequent in NV.

In Fallout 3, a lot of the combat was easy, but you at least could run into Super Mutants or Enclave who could put up a decent fight with some equipment worth grabbing. Plus, there was a lot of careful sneaking around in buildings, on city streets, or in subway tunnels while stalking enemies. Not nearly as much of this in NV. Picking off a feral ghoul in the subways or a Super Mutant standing around a corner on a city street were fun. Not just because of the shooting and pretty much obvious outcome. It was the stalking of the enemy that added some excitement.

And where are the irradiated, mutated, giant spiders? Radscorpions, but no Radspiders?!? That would have made for a dangerous adversary. Imagine how creepy a cave with a bunch of them would have been?

you're totally right on your comments, i agree with you 100%, obsidian did so much to improve from FO3 but didn't give us a lot of good fighting opportunites, they fixed the skill/perk.special system, put in more quests, made a huge game, a greaty story, more weapons with mods, but not a lot of good combat unless you count fighting powdergangers armed with hatchets and 9 mm's, at least enclave and supermutants from FO3 put up a decent fight and like you said you could stalk em and set up traps etc, snipe em whatever, thats missing from new vegas pretty much, except for a couple spots maybe, FO3 had tons more good battlezones with half way decent enemies.

Hrm with regards to the human foes being equipped with 'better' weaponry and armour, a possible method of ensuring we don't end up swimming in them (although I fully expect some would complain bitterly about this method) is for there to be a chance that the weapon and or armour has a chance of being broken beyond repair.

the combat philosphy obsidian has, and that is to "NOT let us fight well armed enemies because we'll end up with their weapons" is gonna backfire, because i won't ever pay 60 dollars for an obsidian game again, FO3 enemies had gatling lasers, enclave had plasma rifles, heavy incinerators, the supermutants and talon mercs,had chinese assault rifles, laser rfiles etc, so i will buy future bethesda games because i know the combat and exploration will be very good, on the other hand i am not going to spend any more money on obsidian games, not for their future fallout games or DLC for new vegas unless they change this stupid combat philosophy, "we don't want the player to have to get the enemies weapons so we'll just give most of the enemies pool ques and varmit rifles" what kind of nonsense is that ? so they put a lot of melee enemies so we don't get their weapons, i want enemies shooting at me, plain and simple, its way more fun, it ain't fun when someone is running at me with a pool que or hatchet etc, thats lame.

Go back to how FO1 and FO2 have it. Can't loot armour off of bodies but I doubt they will every go back to that system. I don't see what's wrong with "swimming" in good weapons. Other then the chance it can break the games economy. The game has weapons
degradation and armour degradation. So when you kill the guy with the Light machine gun and combat armour the weapon and armour will be in poor shape and they can make it so he has little if any ammo for it. This balances it out. With hardcoe Mode it will be very hard to walk around with a stockpile of all the games best weapons and armour.

westoftherockies I must point out that its not just Obsidian that made it so the NPC are lightly armed. Many raiders in FO3 attack me with nothing but their fists. Super Mutants with nothing but hunting rifles. It does bug me that New Vegas has the Gun Runners store and the 188, Mick and Ralph's as well as Van Grafts but no one has their awesome weapons.

i totally agree, even in FO3 a lot of enemies were not very well armed, you're right, but it was a little better, maybe because there were more enemies etc, but you would run into some heavier armed enemies, but i totally agree and even in FO3 there should of been much better armed enemies, i just can't get over the fact the game designers actually say "oh we don't want anyone getting too may good weapons so lets arm the enemies with hatchets, macheties and pool ques" i just can't believe they would actually subscribe to that philosophy of making games, none of ceasers legion has marksmen rifles till the END OF THE GAME, none of em have energy weapons, none of NCR has energy weapons, the rangers have ok weapons but thats it, their is a lack of human enemies to fight in the first place and and to arm the rest of em with pool ques, varmit rifle and 9mm's makes for a low a very low quality combat experience and i WILL NOT ever buy another obsidian game again or forget about the 4 more dlcs etc that are coming out, they arne't getting my 40 bucks. i was planning on buying all the dlcs for new vegas but not now. its obvious their game philosophy is too worried about us getting good weapons from enemies so its just not fun to play the game once you're at level 20 or whatever, it just becomes too boring to keep fighting powdergangers with hatchets and ncr with service rifles.

The Devs made the game with a robust modding system built in, and a set of strong modding tools released free to the playerbase.

I'd say modding the PC version is pretty strongly supported by the Devs. :biggrin:


Edit: as for combat.... Don't know about you, but outside the obviously civilised areas, combat was around every other corner. And I died a heck of alot more in FO:NV than I did in FO3. (There were a couple areas in NV that I never did beat - like the irradiated town in the south. Didn't try to explore that until long after lv30, and the first thing I ran into was a swarm of over half a dozen "hardened" Sentry and Gutsy bots. Didn't have remotely strong enough weapons to take those svckers out.) And then there was the fight through the dam at the end - those packs of Legion elites kept making me & Cass have to reload saves constantly. On Normal.

yes in new vegas i never see any legion patrols or ncr its boring and i just keep seeing these easy enemies there needs to be more so there is actualy a challenge so obsidian should be listening because this will help the gamer experiance and people will actually want the game then

not sure what game you're playing, i don't ever run into ceasers legion elite units and i've been playing the game since it came out, as far as the sentry bots, yeah they're in one spot on the map, thats it, action around every corner ? not really, unless you count fighting cazedores or powdergangers good combat, there's only a few spots where you really run into tough enemies, to be honest its more challenging to fight heavliy armed human type characters than it is to kill deathclaws or cazedores, they don't shoot bullets at you and i prefer enemies actually armed with weapons, i'll wait for ESV to fight melee enemies. as far as human type enemies other than the fiends and the few rangers at outposts, all the human enemies are very poorly armed and use NO tactics at all, none, FO3 the enclave were more tactical and had more firepower, the enclave were the best fallout enemies ever, not because they were the hardest to kill, but they put up a decent fight and were a bit tactical and just plain fun to fight, and there's almost no supermutants in new vegas, and the ones on black mountain aren't too hard to kill once you have enough ammo, all they do is charge at you, in FO3 they were a lot more fun to fight, it was fun taking lots of time to stalk em, laying traps, etc in all the buildings they were in or just outside areas like la enfant plaza, so i know some people like less quality combat and are more into the story and obsidian did make imporvements like a better skill/perk system, more quests, good story, more wepaons etc, but for exploration and enemies to fight new vegas is weak, there's no places to explore, all the buildings take like 30 seconds to explore, they are mainly just one room, all the caves are pretty small, there were dozens of good battlezones in FO3 inside and out, in new vegas, there's no good battlezones really.

yes i agree and i hope they patch it to put more enimies in it because it just gets boring with no combat its like ohh look a building mmmm a fiend wow thats real tough now to next building and so on

Just throwing some suggestions out. Nothing too fancy.

1. One thing I saw is someone mentioned "Don't add more factions without reason!" This makes sense, as having random factions to just beat the crud out of that are there for no other reason than taking up space is just a lame way of saying "Here is some more stuff to kill. Enjoy." Upping the amount of combat is a good idea, but not if it is done in a fashion that is just for the sake of adding more stuff without reason. Now, adding in groups of enemy-type NPC's that are not part of a faction could still happen, as this is not adding a faction such as Talon Company, but rather adding in "generic" kinds of enemies or groups such as the Prospectors. Here is the lowdown:

A. Mercenaries- NPC's clad in Combat Armor of all kinds and equipped with decent to formidable weaponry of all kinds. Mercs are an everyday type of character whether people accept it or not. Of course there can be named groups of Mercs, such as Talon Company, but there are just regular Mercs just doing stuff for whatever reason too (The Courier for example). Having generic Mercs as enemies in certain areas could help liven up the Mojave by filling in some of the empty spots here and there, such as some of the shacks that seem to be abandoned. For example, some Mercs could be placed by the shack near Death Wind caverns, which could make the player think "I guess these guys are here due to the Deathclaws". Again, Mercs are everywhere in some shape or form, so seeing them around the Mojave shouldn't be too much of a ball-buster.

Another great reason for Mercs is that they could be a good source of weapons and armor that would usually require the player to either pay a hefty amount of cash or reputation with a group for. Combat Armor, though not too hard to find, can often be expensive to both procure and repair, so a source of this armor can help players who like using it have a way to get it with a different approach: A cost in combat. Combat Armor has decent DT, so this would give Mercs a good, but not "spongy", defense to players. Weapons like Anti-Material Rifles, 12.7 guns, and even some energy weapons could be on Mercs, and not only could they be a source of these weapons, but they would also provide a challenge due to the fact that they would be using them, thus killing two birds with one stone: A source of rare weapons and expensive armor, and a challenge for players.

B. Hunters- Is it just me, or are hunters non-existent in the Mojave? There has to be some group of people who live off the land in the wild that do not belong to any of the official factions of NV. Sure, the Mojave is more "civilized" than other known areas of the FO universe, but not everyone lives in the areas that are civilized. Hunters would make sense in the Mojave, as there is a lot to hunt animal-wise. Big-Horners, Geckos, insects of all kinds, Night-Stalkers, and some may even be as ballsy as to go for the big-game: Deathclaws. There is also a lot of produce out in the wastes that some would pay well for, but being that the wastes are a dangerous place to travel Hunters would be a natural go-to to procure these items. Point is that there is more than enough to sustain Hunters in both game and produce.

Hunters would probably not be a well equipped as Mercs, but they could still hold their own. Armor would be light, such as leather, and weapons would be of the Hunter variety such as the weapons with the name, and lever-action weapons along with revolvers. Though not as appealing as the Merc equipment, Hunters could have some items that players with a certain play style (such as Cowboy/Survivalist) could benefit from. Hunters would also provide a challenge for the fact that they are skilled in using these weapons, so they're going to put some punch in those shots.

Now what is the incentive for these groups to be hostile to the player? Many things: Competition, being a stranger/unknown person (it's a wasteland, so a "shoot first, ask later" policy would make sense for these groups), or even Karma influences (Mercs being hostile to Good players, and Hunters being hostile to Bad players). There could be any number of reasons for them to attack the player, and the player can just make their own conclusions if they need a reason in the first place.

And that's it. Not a "glamorous" idea, but I think it would get some of the job done. :tops:

I'm not trying to be insulting, but..... if you're looking for a game packed with combat, perhaps an actual FPS like one of the Halos / Gears of War / etc might be a better fit?

I don't want to see enemies peppering the map within every available square inch of space like in FO3, where I couldn't start one fight without backing into another (and of course, none of the NPCs paid any attention to one another or anything). One of the things I hated about fast travel in FO3 was that it dropped you right on top of mob pop zones so there was like a 60% chance you were going to be insta-dead the second the game loaded.

New Vegas feels "right" when it comes to enemy placement.

What they could do, though, is introduce a major optional patch or as part of an expansion that includes heavy AI tweaking to make NPCs more "tactical" and use group maneuvers. This is a nice alternative to "MOAR GUNZ!" Everything doesn't need to involve miniature atomic bombs raining down from the sky.

As for the OP, if you really feel you're not happy with combat as is, and you're open to mods, then go grab one of the "realism" mods or get behind one in development -- some of these seek to make gun damage more "real world"... meaning they are HIGHLY deadly, and I think one in particular gives NPCs bonuses over you.

The problem I have with "more combat" is it becoming unavoidable. I should have the ability to not have to fight.

I almost wish I had sided with the Legion, since there would appear to be a lot more NCR enemies to eliminate. More Nightkin invested areas or buildings would have been interesting. I don't need combat every 5 seconds, but at times the combat is almost non-existent.