Bethesda's Fallout 76 [edited title]

[Push_You_Down]

I’m into this. I wish it was structured more like The Division where the Vault was your homebase and you’d return, rest gear up and then go on supply/reclamation raids. You can go solo or you can go with other dwellers.

Big monster fights are some of my least favorite parts of Fallout but I do like the exploration aspects.

[Skywatcher]

I encountered a problem with New Vegas: something started popping up and minimizing the game. The NCR camp across from Primm and being near the door to the Old Mormon Fort’s interior are triggers but easily dealt with. But when I got near the Sunset Sarsaparilla HQ, the game minimized with every step!

Went looking for a solution and it turned out to be an errant codec. Installing this fixed it.

[Quimby]

Since this is about the announcement as whole I will mention that Elder Scrolls Blades looks interesting. Especially since I just bought a Kindle Fire.

[Johnny_Angel]

It’s possible that you will be able to just build your world on a private server, and cooperate with friends, but I expect the quests they’re talking about are tedious generic buggy ‘radiant’ quests like in Fallout 4. I wouldn’t mind maintaining a world with friends, but if the only enemies to defend against are just monsters and no NPCs or factions, then there won’t seem to be much of a point. Doesn’t seem worth more than $20. If you can’t create an isolated server it’s worth $0. I’d accept it in my Steam library for free, and I might even install it with the intention of playing it, but I would probably never play it.

[Skywatcher]

76 reportedly will have private servers at some point after release.

[clairobscur]

@Mahaloth

They just announced Elder Scrolls VI is in production.

Gotta be 2020 at the earliest.

Hmmm…I guess I really should finish an Elder Scrolls V game, then. I’m going to be running out of time.

[Skywatcher]

Polygon has been keeping abreast of things.

Players will be able to opt into (or out of) player-versus-player and player-versus-environment gameplay as they choose, much like MMOs do. There’s still more to learn about how PvP will work, but Bethesda Softworks has signaled that if players don’t want to take on human-vs-human combat, they won’t have to.

Some of the details to emerge so far include a “bounty system” which levies a price on the head of players who behave aggressively. PvP’s balancing is still being tuned with the ideal of curbing grief behavior while still leaving room for dramatic struggles.

Being killed in PvP (or PvE) for that matter, will never result in progression loss for a character. In PvE, once downed they’ll take a knee, which they can then be revived or knocked out for good (again, like some MMOs). Players killed in action can pick a respawn point and rejoin the game.

For PvE, users can expect to deal with a slew of beasts, mutants, ghouls, deathclaws and the new monsters unique to this game. One is a “Scorchbeast,” an enormous, boss-level mutated bat-like monster that can fly. Scorchbeasts are tied to one of the more intriguing — and difficult — PvE goals, the Nukes.

Four different nuclear missile sites will be located on Fallout 76’s map, from which players can arm and launch a nuke. This is accomplished by obtaining all of the missile keys for a site, which are dropped by NPC enemies in the world. Nuking a site creates “rare and valuable resources” at that location, along with more powerful monsters.

Canonically, nuking a site involves sealing the nuclear fissures in the grown where they are spawned. As far as how this affects other players, there will be a warning before one comes in. Bethesda Game Studios does not intend nukes to be a kind of PvP ultimate strike on others’ bases. And by the way, there will be no offline base raids on other players. When they’re not in the game, neither is their base.

Update, 7/6/18: In an interview with the Italian publication Multiplayer, [Todd] Howard said that Fallout 76 will feature fast travel — somewhat critical given the size of the map — and suggested that low-level players may not be killed in PvE play to prevent “spawn-camping” or other poaching behavior. “Maybe we will change this rule,” Howard said, so that’s not a confirmed boundary for PvE. But Bethesda Game Studios at least seems mindful that it has to take steps to protect newcomers or limit griefing behavior.

Update, 8/11/18: At QuakeCon 2018, Howard said that while human players can hunt down and kill other humans, there are consequences. Players who kill others will get a “wanted murderer” designation that exposes them on the mini-map to other human players, with a bounty paid out of the offending player’s cap total if they are killed. Further, players killed by another human player will be able to seek revenge for double the usual payoff. “We turn the assholes into interesting content,” Howard said.

[RTFirefly]

And here I opened this thread, wondering what the hell had happened in Bethesda, MD.

[Skywatcher]

Rockville, actually.

[dzeiger]

Man, that still leaves me with a lot of questions. If my base is gone when I’m gone, what happens if someone else builds where my base is?

If we’re all in PvE mode, could someone run a train of deathclaws through some noobs and grief them that way?

If PvP, if someone gets a high bounty from killing people, can he run over to a buddy, let the buddy kill him and then split the bounty?

[Skywatcher]

@dzeiger

If my base is gone when I’m gone, what happens if someone else builds where my base is?

I’ve seen an answer to this … somewhere. Players get … something … that enables them to rebuild their base elsewhere with just a few clicks.

[Doug_K]

@Skywatcher

Polygon has been keeping abreast of things.

Players will be able to opt into (or out of) player-versus-player and player-versus-environment gameplay as they choose, much like MMOs do. There’s still more to learn about how PvP will work, but Bethesda Softworks has signaled that if players don’t want to take on human-vs-human combat, they won’t have to.

Some of the details to emerge so far include a “bounty system” which levies a price on the head of players who behave aggressively. PvP’s balancing is still being tuned with the ideal of curbing grief behavior while still leaving room for dramatic struggles.

Being killed in PvP (or PvE) for that matter, will never result in progression loss for a character. In PvE, once downed they’ll take a knee, which they can then be revived or knocked out for good (again, like some MMOs). Players killed in action can pick a respawn point and rejoin the game.

For PvE, users can expect to deal with a slew of beasts, mutants, ghouls, deathclaws and the new monsters unique to this game. One is a “Scorchbeast,” an enormous, boss-level mutated bat-like monster that can fly. Scorchbeasts are tied to one of the more intriguing — and difficult — PvE goals, the Nukes.

Four different nuclear missile sites will be located on Fallout 76’s map, from which players can arm and launch a nuke. This is accomplished by obtaining all of the missile keys for a site, which are dropped by NPC enemies in the world. Nuking a site creates “rare and valuable resources” at that location, along with more powerful monsters.

Canonically, nuking a site involves sealing the nuclear fissures in the grown where they are spawned. As far as how this affects other players, there will be a warning before one comes in. Bethesda Game Studios does not intend nukes to be a kind of PvP ultimate strike on others’ bases. And by the way, there will be no offline base raids on other players. When they’re not in the game, neither is their base.

Update, 7/6/18: In an interview with the Italian publication Multiplayer, [Todd] Howard said that Fallout 76 will feature fast travel — somewhat critical given the size of the map — and suggested that low-level players may not be killed in PvE play to prevent “spawn-camping” or other poaching behavior. “Maybe we will change this rule,” Howard said, so that’s not a confirmed boundary for PvE. But Bethesda Game Studios at least seems mindful that it has to take steps to protect newcomers or limit griefing behavior.

Update, 8/11/18: At QuakeCon 2018, Howard said that while human players can hunt down and kill other humans, there are consequences. Players who kill others will get a “wanted murderer” designation that exposes them on the mini-map to other human players, with a bounty paid out of the offending player’s cap total if they are killed. Further, players killed by another human player will be able to seek revenge for double the usual payoff. “We turn the assholes into interesting content,” Howard said.

Some of this is contradictory. Is PVP optional or not? If you can be killed by other players, it’s not PVE.

[Sicks_Ate]

Look guys, it’s just gonna work, okay?

[Skywatcher]

@Doug_K

Some of this is contradictory. Is PVP optional or not? If you can be killed by other players, it’s not PVE.

Hardcore griefers will always find some way to infiltrate PvE.

[Doug_K]

@Skywatcher

Hardcore griefers will always find some way to infiltrate PvE.

But in a true PVE environment you can swing, punch, kick, throw stuff, cast spells, etc. at another player all you want and the only effect will be to make you look like a toddler throwing a tantrum.

[Skywatcher]

@Doug_K

But in a true PVE environment you can swing, punch, kick, throw stuff, cast spells, etc. at another player all you want and the only effect will be to make you look like a toddler throwing a tantrum.

In which case, the hardcore griefers try dragging high level mobs through lowbie zones. Or, alternatively, bring hapless PUG members into an instance where all mobs con purple and leave 'em there.

[thelurkinghorror]

I have very minimal MMORPG style gaming experience - WoW almost a decade ago. But I recall mobs generally had a maximum range, and they’d turn back after a certain distance. IIRC people were able to kite them farther by using multiple players, but it would seem that that’s a known issue for some time, and fixes are known.

[Skywatcher]

Point is, they’ll always be probing for weak points until they’re distracted by the next shiny thing.

[dzeiger]

@thelurkinghorror

I have very minimal MMORPG style gaming experience - WoW almost a decade ago. But I recall mobs generally had a maximum range, and they’d turn back after a certain distance. IIRC people were able to kite them farther by using multiple players, but it would seem that that’s a known issue for some time, and fixes are known.

But for MMOs, the “fixes” tend more and more towards not having anything particularly interesting going on in the open world, and gating all the hard stuff into private instances.

MMOs are generally designed around PvE as their core, and if maintaining PvE means that open-world PvP is screwed over, well, that’s just too bad.

This game seems to have PvP as it’s base concept, just with the “you can unflag if you want to” claim tagged on. Dragging Deathclaws through your opponents should be a valid PvP tactic, given we’ve established that they will hunt down their eggs, and will react to certain sirens in Fallout 4, I just don’t see a good way to do that and still establish a decent PvE experience.

[wolfman]

Well I kicked off the fallout 76 Beta download. 47 Gigs. I should have it installed around the end of the Beta.