Incline Fallout 2 Mechanics Overhaul Mod Discussion

[Boxer]

ECONOMY:
Map-Based Supply and Demand: Now items get cheaper the more of them are in a map (because Gecko skins should be worthless in Klamath and traders shouldn't be willing to pay a fortune for the 10 Deagles you're lugging around).

Thread tldr. Is the "map" global and calculations are distance based? Cause if not, you can create and exploit artificial supply shortages.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

ECONOMY:
Map-Based Supply and Demand: Now items get cheaper the more of them are in a map (because Gecko skins should be worthless in Klamath and traders shouldn't be willing to pay a fortune for the 10 Deagles you're lugging around).

Thread tldr. Is the "map" global and calculations are distance based? Cause if not, you can create and exploit artificial supply shortages.

Local of course. Clearly it's exploitable if you set it to a high enough value and then in two or more map towns take items from traders in one map to the other, but in practice buy prices have been set so high in FO2 that you'd need to set the supply and demand thing pretty damn high for it to become exploitable (I think/hope).

 

[dunno lah]

ENERGY WEAPONS:

I really think we need to differentiate laser, plasma and pulse weaponry in ways that make all of them equally useable through the game. I'm still unsure on how to go at it.
[/spoiler]

Maybe a "Charged Shot"? One that consumes 2x ammo, costs +1/2 AP, but deals 50% more damage?

Also, from a wiki search on plasma weapons (LOL?), maybe Plasma weaponry could have reduced damage at further ranges, y'know, to make laser weapons (somewhat) viable?

 

[DraQ]

Well, realistically laser should have good accuracy, range and decent firepower, but abysmal penetration.
Then again, FO laser is magical 50's laser that cuts everything in half like butter.
Maybe give laser additional independent chance of blinding?

Plasma should have shitty range, but compensate in other areas.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

ENERGY WEAPONS:

I really think we need to differentiate laser, plasma and pulse weaponry in ways that make all of them equally useable through the game. I'm still unsure on how to go at it.
[/spoiler]

Maybe a "Charged Shot"? One that consumes 2x ammo, costs +1/2 AP, but deals 50% more damage?

Also, from a wiki search on plasma weapons (LOL?), maybe Plasma weaponry could have reduced damage at further ranges, y'know, to make laser weapons (somewhat) viable?

Interesting ideas... all of the energy weapons have a spare attack left, so the charged thing might be an idea.

Well, realistically laser should have good accuracy, range and decent firepower, but abysmal penetration.

But that's exactly how they work in the game, isn't it? That's always the big complaint against them, namely that they can't penetrate for worth shit, and that the tradeoffs (good accuracy/range) aren't worth it.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Yeah, iirc metal armor and above laugh at laser weapons because they deflect it. I'd make laser cost very little AP to use, since the light weapon / ammo weight and lack of recoil means anyone should be able to use it with little difficulty (even if they are as accurate as a Star Wars' stormtrooper).

Maybe you could add a "poison" effect for plasma shots, since it must corrode / burn like a bitch.

As for pulse...eh, a bigger chance to make you fall down on hit, making you spend your AP to get up (or simply drain AP on hit, if possible)? I always envisioned being hit by the pulse shots as receiving a horse kick to the chest.

 

[DraQ]

Yeah, iirc metal armor and above laugh at laser weapons because they deflect it. I'd make laser cost very little AP to use, since the light weapon / ammo weight and lack of recoil means anyone should be able to use it with little difficulty (even if they are as accurate as a Star Wars' stormtrooper).

Increased chance of crippling eyes would be welcome too.

Maybe you could add a "poison" effect for plasma shots, since it must corrode / burn like a bitch.

Better idea - give it small, plasma grenade like splash.

As for pulse...eh, a bigger chance to make you fall down on hit, making you spend your AP to get up (or simply drain AP on hit, if possible)? I always envisioned being hit by the pulse shots as receiving a horse kick to the chest.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

I think all these kinds of things would have to be part of some big critical hit changes, probably overriding the original system. Separate everything out that was originally lumped together (damage multipliers, armor penetrating, knockdowns, etc.). All these will have separate rolls (among other things to avoid the 10mm-pistol-hits-an-8*-crit-on-your-APA-with-armor-penetration-for-1458-damage thing happening as often as it does now):

Damage multipliers (when hitting a vital organ, that sort of thing): higher chance of critting when hitting torso, head, eyes (and groin?).

Armor piercing (originally decreasing DT/DR by 4/5 on a good critical or with a weapon perk): more chance if hit in place where armor has joints/unprotected areas (arms, legs, groin, eyes), and if the armor is poorly maintained. Also affects the degree of armor piercing.

Knockouts (miss at least one turn lying prone) is increased by bodypart hit (only head?), damage type (pulse, and maybe electricity and explosion?) and if melee/unarmed attacker strength. Chance is decreased by target endurance.

Knockdowns (lose a couple of AP's next turn while getting up) is increased by bodypart hit (head, legs, groin), damage type (pulse, and maybe electricity and explosion?) and if melee/unarmed attacker strength. Chance is decreased by target strength and endurance.

Backwash (getting thrown back without losing AP... maybe this should cost AP anyway) I'm not yet sure what to do with, though it wasn't even strictly part of the crit system anyway.

Drop Weapon is increased by bodypart hit (arms), damage type (pulse, and maybe electricity and explosion?) and if melee/unarmed attacker strength. Chance is decreased by target strength.

Crippling is of course dependent on the bodypart hit. Chance when using bladed weapons is less dependent on attacker strength than when using blunt weapons in melee/unarmed. Other than that I'm not sure what should affect the chance. Laser has huge chance of blinding when hitting eyes (small extra chance when hitting head?). All crippling chance decreased by endurance.


Finally, there's also plasma and fire, which should have some type of delayed effect as well (DraQ, I think the small splash explosion is impossible), but poisoning wouldn't be a good idea as that gets affected by poison resistance. Should be possible to do something independent from that though. There should also be a chance of losing your next turn due to having to deal with being partly on fire/corroding.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Poison effect only works with the PC, if i remember right.

Really? Um...I remember toxic waste affecting the dog from Arroyo and the trapper from the Toxic Caves / Klamath, maybe there's a way to add that other type of "continuous damage" instead?

 

[DraQ]

(DraQ, I think the small splash explosion is impossible)

Why? There are already rocket launchers in game, as well as explosives, grenades and plasma grenades. The idea is basically to make a plasma bolt effectively a weak rocket using plasma bolt sprite that explodes using plasma explosion sprite and does limited amount of AoE plasma damage.

As for the pulse weapons they technically should be hampered considerably by all sorts of metal armour (far more than lasers, in any case). Maybe give them really high chance of knocking down, out or backwashing to compensate?

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

- Bro, the two-handed script doesn't work if the two-handed weapon goes in the second weapon slot. First slot it works.

Damn, I'll check it out.

- Can't find the XL70E3 on the weapon script.

It's the INDEPENDENT. I just used the PID names, so that ends up a bit confusing sometimes (I'll try and add a "translation" at some point). One other one that's hard to find ones is the pipe rifle, which is the SPRINGFIELD.

- What makes certain types of items appear in certain places? I like seeing, for example, Vault City guards toting guns they didn't before (I saw 10mm smgs, H&KG11s, FN-FALs, Assault Rifles and even a plasma pistol). In the Den gang quest fight, I saw both gangs sport weapons they never did before (10mm smgs, 14mm pistols, Lara had a sawed-off shotgun). This made the fight more surprising than the usual desert eagle/10mm pistol/spear/hamer/knife. Cassidy now has a assault rifle instead of his usual saw-off shotgun. Would be interesting to see foes ocasionally get a grenade or a molotov as well.

They do. You can find a step by step breakdown of the way it's done if you unspoiler the NPC randomization thing in this post..

- People are fleeing in combat against my character, for some reason. They don't even react if I run up to them and attack. Not even if they are cornered and WILL die if they don't attempt to do anything. You might have a idea of what is happening.

Makes sense. Saw that happen for a short while during one of my million bouts with Klint. The problem is that some AI Packets (like Grisham's Peasant one, and Klint's Arroyo Warrior), have relatively high to hit requirements before they give up and run away (34 and 30 respectively). I wasn't sure how they calculated it first, but now I realize why the AI always runs an extra to hit calculation at the beginning for an unaimed shot: to see if it can hit the target before running away. Because unaimed shots are now snapshots, the AI will give up a lot sooner.

I'll have it fixed in a while. Guess I'll just drop a lot of values in the AI packets... real shame I can't do anything substantial with the AI.

*are Needler darts supposed to do 0 damage, then a messsage saying "0tohit damage" or something to pop up in the message window? They poison the player fine, through.

Yeah, my script checks if it does > 0 damage and then drops it to 0 and replaces it with poison damage.

No, it is very weird, I am seeing no pattern, sometimes my armor scores are correct, other times they return to low repair level default.

Goddamnit... I'll try and see what's wrong, but I was planning on replacing it with a system to decide Armor Penetration frequency/heaviness anyway on the long run, so wouldn't be a disaster if I can't find the problem.

Maybe you could add a "poison" effect for plasma shots, since it must corrode / burn like a bitch.

Poison effect only works with the PC, if i remember right.

Works just fine with other critters (otherwise I couldn't have done the Needler Pistol changes). I think you're thinking about radiation.

(DraQ, I think the small splash explosion is impossible)

Why? There are already rocket launchers in game, as well as explosives, grenades and plasma grenades. The idea is basically to make a plasma bolt effectively a weak rocket using plasma bolt sprite that explodes using plasma explosion sprite and does limited amount of AoE plasma damage.

As for the pulse weapons they technically should be hampered considerably by all sorts of metal armour (far more than lasers, in any case). Maybe give them really high chance of knocking down, out or backwashing to compensate?

What I meant was that the "small" part would be impossible. Don't know much about AoE but I'm fairly sure it's not terribly flexible/sophisticated in FO. But I'll ask at NMA if one of the veterans thinks your idea is viable.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Well, I've finally realized that the weird AI-only-calculates-unaimed-shots-when-deciding-whether-to-flee thing is a real blessing in disguise because it allows me to finally put the AI morale system into practice I talked about months ago. This one:

Just to outline how I would do the new AI morale system, so it's clear why I think it won't result in more, only better, fleeing (I noticed I hadn't made it very clear in the other posts). Old system:

- Can't hit (so will run from agile but weak opponent).
- Too hurt (so will run when hurt, even if only opponent left is unlikely to kill the AI and the AI'd be better off continuing the fight)

New system:

-Can't hurt (so enemy's armor is too strong for my weapon)
-Absolutely can't hit
-Could get killed by next attack.

Also, I think I've found a way to ensure the AI keeps running after fleeing so you don't get those annoying enemies standing around and initiating combat just to flee situations.

Thoughts? (Also about the proposed changes to the way crits/knockdowns/etc work I talked about a couple of posts ago).

edit: just realized that I could do something similar with the enemy as I did with the player and utilize their morale meters in some way. Have them become more hardy after drinking, that sort of thing... not sure though.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Now that I've finally decided to do the final big calculation (the damage one), I've spent some time thinking about how I would change perks and traits to make more than 10% viable/interesting. I've put my ideas (alongside the original effects) in a pdf and if people would read it and give some comments/come up with new ideas (a lot of them I simply didn't have a clue), then I'd be much obliged.

You can view it here.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Cool! That said, how are you going to fix this current problem? And won't it lead to Dodger types like my current char to get enemies running from him all the time?

It'll replace the current system of course, so less running away due to not hitting, more due to not being able to damage.

Also, I think I've found a way to ensure the AI keeps running after fleeing so you don't get those annoying enemies standing around and initiating combat just to flee situations.

Nice, at least the AI doesn't half-ass its flight anymore, and if the player lets them leave, his own fault. C&C, I say! (sucks a bit for the HtH crownd, but then again I say its more appeal for a HtH/ranged hybrid character.

A funny side effect is that more npc's will also join the fight (I'm pretty sure it's the same value that affects both), so instead of those fights in Reno where 8 prostitutes would gang up on you, you'll probably end up with 16 prostitutes fleeing the first combat turn (so best speed that shit up with sfall). Will have to do a lot more testing though.

Cool, but how are you going to make the AI know its time to hit the bottle?
Talking about morale system and exaustion... should't exaustion last more time rather tha ending immediatly after each battle? Seems exploit-rific to fight, kill, end combat, INSTANT RECOVERY, fight again, repeat. I like the idea of going through a long gauntlet and then ending tired as fuck or hopped on drugs, which has its own perils (Stim use is SCARY now).

Problem is that exhaustion (unlike morale) isn't a stat, but simply something calculated on the fly using amount of combat turns and endurance. So that disappears after there's no more turns. But I'll see if I can change that in the future (I might replace the AC counter with an exhaustion meter, that'd allow that).

Damage calculation? What's going to come from that?

Mostly the stuff I mentioned earlier, namely breaking up the crits into separate rolls for armor penetrating, damage multiplying, etc.

Cautious Nature works how? Perception gives some dodge bonus, yes? How much it is?

Pretty big actually now that I check it again (2*PE again unarmed/melee, 1*PE against ranged), might need to drop that a bit.

Comprehension still seems useless.

Yeah, you're right. I'm thinking now also that I might make some big changes to NPC level ups: remove the different levels and have them increase skills as you level up, and add some dialogue where you can tell them to concentrate more on a particular skill so they level up in that more. Comprehension or some other perk could factor in that.

I like the extra bonus to Cult of Personality, maybe a bit of extra DT for party member?

Bit cheesy maybe. I already thought the to hit bonus was pushing it a bit.

Fortune Finder might be nice once you insert some systems that stop the player for accumulating too much wealth easily early on.

Yeah, probably should find something more interesting instead.

Harmless giving a bonus to sneak on injection of drugs is a nice idea, might make a sneak assassin/poisoner a viable build (IMHO any wannabe doing sneak super stim killings is ridiculous).

Yeah, I have to find some way of putting more poisons in the game without it becoming silly. Sneaking/stealing/traps is really still bugging me out, all the thieving skills are so mechanically broken (especially traps of course) that I can't think of anything to do with them.

Hmmmm, nice bonus on Karma Beacon, just afraid its going to get cheesy at the end game (entire cities joining the player in casual firefights, makes sense if everyone loves the player, through), its too easy to get lots of good/bad karma.

I think I'll restrict it to a couple of scripts anyway (so Metzger won't ever join you, but some of his grunts might).

Lifegiver... do you replace the bonus or add to it? Need to balance that with your static HP system and whatnot.

Every time it says "Original +" then it adds to it, otherwise not. So yeah, this'd just add a static bonus.

Light Step bonus is not very useful. Its what Sawyer said on the VB times: Nobody likes skill points perks, because they're useless.

Completely agree, but you try thinking of thinking of dozens of perks that don't add to skills or stray too far from the drawing (seriously: try and think of some, that's why I posted the list, I'm running out of ideas).

Living Anatomy was already a cool little perk, but a bonus like that also helps.

Replaces it, I don't like the flat +5 bonus: you should be able to do more damage because of your knowledge of weak spots if you can hit them.

Can you make the Mysterious Stranger pop up in cities?

Think so, there's already an intact script for making him appear in the caravans section, so just copying that should suffice (he might end up in weird places like bathrooms or whatever).

Presence seems nice... unless it indulces annoying "The AI always runs from you" issue, which sucks when you're looking for a fight.

Yeah, I'm also worried about that.

Pyromaniac - How will the player make the molotovs? You will add the Mr. Fixit to the game?

Nope, just allocate a key: you have rot gut in your inven? press p for pyro and it's a molotov.

Ins't New bonus from Slayer a bit cheesy? You kill A LOT of people in this game (unless you're going pacifistic), won't it end with the end-game player going around and killing people and going to the enclave and dealing ludicrous damage?

It's fucking cheesy, but I have no idea what to do with it. If you have an idea, let me know.

New Animal Friend seems like a nice, if quite weird, idea. Can you make the animals area-based?? Having Deathclaws spawn you to help fight a Enclave patrol sounds awesome.

Heh, yeah, cool idea. Will see what I can do.

Will Bruiser have the old bonus? I like the idea of less MOVEMENT AP instead of less AP, seems like a more decent trade-off. And more ST + more knockdowns and knockouts is a goodi idea, seems to properly diplsay the idea of the perk.

So, again, no old bonus/penalty, just the replacement.

I'm not sure the new penalty to Fast Shot is a good one. The thing with fast shot is that you're limiting yourself in exchange for enhancing a existent capacity. But a severe enough penalty might work too.

Yeah, you might be right. I just never really liked how it makes aimed shots completely impossible.

Kamikaze seems useful, weirdly enough, for snipers to eye-crit people from over the screen. Would't it better to add more damage instead, like in Fallout Tactics?

Good point, never played Tactics TBH, should look into its perks and see if it gives me some ideas.

Why are you lessening One-Handed penalty?

You're right, probably shouldn't.

No change to Gifted? I would't mind a pretty hefty penalty, Gifted is the most IMBA trait of the game, you essentially get +6 statpoints for free in exchange for some shitty skillpoints you're not going to need. Nobody even plays with it anymore, seems cheating. Give it some extra, HURTFUL penalties and it could become a useful alternative.

What kind? Wouldn't know really.[/quote]

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

New version up peepz.

1.45

New Additions:

- Exhaustion, which was always calculated on the spot, has now replaced the redundant AC stat. This means you can now keep track of it in the UI, and it also doesn't abruptly drop to zero once you leave combat (it drops by 1 per second, though you can change this). Also, (super) stimpaks now temporarily drop your exhaustion. Note that the AC counter doesn't reliably update outside of combat, so if you want to check your exhaustion in that situation, briefly enter combat.

- Two- and One-handedness now changes based on the wielder's strength. So, with extremely low strength, you now no longer get a penalty for using the lightest pistol (10mm), but you do then have to wield it with both hands, which costs an extra AP. The switching is automatic at the moment, but you can customize when it switches through the .ini to some degree.

- The AI now extremely rarely flees because it has a too low chance of hitting you. This had become extremely problematic for my mod, because (a) the AI calculates this based on unaimed shots, which have become less accurate, and (b) it operated on the assumption that bigger armor equaled more dodge, like in the old system. So, instead I've added a system where the AI flees if either (a) its "main threat" (either the one shooting at him the previous round or, if nobody did, his target) has a damage threshold that exceeds the max damage of his weapon (could be unarmed with strength modifiers), or (b) this threat has a min damage that exceeds the AI's current hit points + his damage threshold (i.e. he probably would be killed in the next attack).

-Psycho finally does what it was supposed to do for a while now: raise max hp by a good number temporarily (instead of the weird DR bonus that was useless against explosions or lasers). To make this possible the INT penalty is gone, which was really only an exploit anyway.



edit: btw, The Brazilian Slaughter, I can't find that bug in the two handed fix you've been talking about. Are you sure it was a two handed weapon and if so are you sure you were carrying something in the other hand?

edit2: in case the one person who already downloaded this is reading: had to do a quick minor update for the exhaustion system (same version).

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Also, what's next up is:

- Traps! Setting them! With the traps skill! Timeslip has given me an idea on how to do it, so hopefully it'll end up swell.
- A general assassination system; I want to do something where if you poison/blow up someone with the new tools offered (so without the auto-hostile stuff), everyone on the assassinated's "team" comes investigate, and if you're spotted by them it's on (though I'm also thinking of a kind of bluff mechanism where if you're spotted some distance from the killzone and your charisma is high enough, you can appear casual enough not to arouse suspicion). Anyway, not sure what'll work and what won't, but that's the general plan.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Seems incline. Suggestion: Exception for Floaters. Why? Because they can poison. I've actually died once after a brush with Floaters, barely scratched my power armor but the poison got me during travelling. This was in vanilla, through.

Hmm.. well if it pierces the armor then he won't book; if it doesn't pierce the armor, then I don't think it should poison in the first place. But I'll check it out.

A funny side effect is that more npc's will also join the fight (I'm pretty sure it's the same value that affects both), so instead of those fights in Reno where 8 prostitutes would gang up on you, you'll probably end up with 16 prostitutes fleeing the first combat turn (so best speed that shit up with sfall). Will have to do a lot more testing though.

Weird, I will kept watch.

Cool, this will also you to tailor crits better according to weapon/stats/repair/luck, right? I like the idea of doing something to protect me from crits, always felt that Fallout 2 was a bit cruel when it came to crits, only protection you had was mainly lots of HP and prayer, sometimes not even that.

Yeah, like I've said the main thing I want to do is avoid is the *6 armor piercing crits that'll kill you no matter your armor or the weapon the enemy is using. It just makes no sense that your armor'd be most vulnerable in the places where a bullet could instantly kill you.

Should've put it on the readme, now I'm starting to think I should've put more on my unarmed character, but then again it doesn't work as well against ranged. Seems very good for a ranged dodger, through.

Yeah, sorry, trying to make up in clarity now, but a lot of old stuff I don't have documented yet (mostly because I'm still not sure whether I should keep them that way).

That's a bit complex. Also would't it be better to add NPC perks? Always wanted to see Sulik with 3 levels of toughness, slayer and Bonus HtH attacks. But I think there's actually a mod for that, and it might be cheesy. (or not, due to fixed hp)

Don't really like the idea of NPC perks, not just for balancing reasons. Don't think it would be complex though, it's essentially the same as it is now, only instead of max 6 levels, NPC's have as many levels as you have. Plus, you'd be able to influence in very broad strokes what they concentrate on improving (so if you're tired of always ending the game with Vic and Cassidy carrying Gauss Rifles, have Vic focus on energy weapons and Cassidy on melee instead).

Lessening default weapon sell prices might help for a start if you want to make the economy more rigorous with the player. I yet have to test the game with a gunslinger character, through, so there's that.

Yeah, economy's gonna be a tough one.

Pity, I like Mr. Fixit, but it might fall under "adding too much stuff and deviating from the original", nevermind that FO2 was planned to include a crafting system.

Maybe I'll end up stealing it (after asking the author). It does seem like you're right and that crafting's gonna play a larger role than I expected.

Cool, that key was getting a bit unreliant to me. Also going through a veritable gauntlet should be a nice challenge, I like to think of the idea of the player getting tired after going through a lot of battles.

Wonder if you could make certain weapons/damage types/aimed attacks on bodyparts sap out extra exaustion every time they attack?

interesting idea... just not sure if it's feasible.

-Psycho finally does what it was supposed to do for a while now: raise max hp by a good number temporarily (instead of the weird DR bonus that was useless against explosions or lasers). To make this possible the INT penalty is gone, which was really only an exploit anyway.

Wans't working?

Wasn't included yet... no idea why.

Yes, it was a Assault Rifle and a spiked knuckles.

Hmm... weird, that should trigger it. I'll look into it.

Are items going to be involved and how?

Currently I'm thinking in terms of various types of spike traps (sharpened poles, spears, etc.), poisoned spike traps, explosive grenade traps, and explosives traps. Your traps skill affects how easy your traps are spotted and whether you can set them in the first place: takes less skill to set a spike trap outside, etc. Might also make it either affect damage or the number of spikes/explosives you can use for the trap. DraQ, maybe some ideas here?

town reputation

Ideally, yes, but I can't deal with that sort of thing systematically, unfortunately.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Bro, did you alter the Weaponsmod in any way? I got my own weaponsmod customised, so I want to know if I'm going to lose out on any new feature if I don't put the new version of that file.

I didn't. I think it´s a later version just because I was testing some values.

I like to think that the attack doesn't pierce to the point of harm, but pierces enough to splash poison into the body.

Ok, but it still wouldn't make sense if it did poison damage regardless of armor (not sure yet how it works atm).

Yeah, like I've said the main thing I want to do is avoid is the *6 armor piercing crits that'll kill you no matter your armor or the weapon the enemy is using. It just makes no sense that your armor'd be most vulnerable in the places where a bullet could instantly kill you.

Agreed, sometimes its just first round and LOL CRIT and to heaven you go.

Interesting idea, but bear in mind most NPCs can only use a few weapons due to animations, so Marcus is pretty much the only one who can use the best energy weapons and big guns because of the animations, he's pretty much a special snowflake because of that..

Yeah, he'd be limited to energy pistols. Though that might be an interesting option all the same (wish I had more control over weapon animations though,...).

Lessening the selling price of items in general (especially weaponry) is a good way to start, through. This is the Wasteland, people should't be willing to play bloodied shekels for a gun they might not even be able to find ammo for. If you include lootable armor (I think you had some ideas on it), then even more lessening is necessary.

Not sure yet, I remember always thinking that the selling price (especially in FO2) was already pretty damn low. Of course this only hurt in the beginning (I always had to scrounge like mad to buy my first leather jacket), because by the end game you're swimming in loots. So preferably I'd do more or less the same thing as with the to hit formula: turn an upside down difficulty curve into something more steady.

Lootable armor was never one of my plans (that was Nirran, implemented, and .Pixote, planned). I always felt like an idiot in FO1 lugging around Leather armors, so that doesn't really appeal to me. But might be an idea at some point.

Did you fix the armor repair problem?

Can't figure out the problem. Will replace it when I get to the combat damage calcs though. Sorry if the delay messes up your build.

What about that idea I had with the random encounters?

Well, what you can do is that as long as you have enough PE to not have immediate combat (that's possible in most situations right?) then you can sneak up to them, lay traps and engage them afterwards. Not sure what more I could do.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Game crashing bug ahoy! Will try to have it fixed ASAP.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Whoa, good quick spotting! What's causing it?

No clue yet.

Bro, people are STILL fleeing from my character, could't post this yesterday. Vault City guards should't run away from some loser out of the wasteland with measly 12 levels, a combat leather jacket, 150% unarmed skill and some tribal buddy with a knife.

I think the problem is that with RP it doesn't overwrite the AI file. Tell me, how is RP installed? I take it not with the Patch000.dat?

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Hmm... might have to bite the bullet and install RP at some point and test things out that way.

Goddamnit, was hoping to be able to get to the fun trapping and assassinating stuff. Fucking bugs.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

The Brazilian Slaughter Found the problem. The to hit formula had a bug in it where ranged enemies thought they were unarmed. Hilarious.

Works now (tested it with the VC guards, 150% unarmed, 10 agility and combat leather). Though, as I was testing I still noticed an enemy or two running when they maybe shouldn't; this wasn't because of a bug, but simply because they got negative to hit rates... I might have to change the formula to make hits over distance easier or something... not sure yet. Or maybe I should take out the can't hit fleeing altogether...

So, new version!

Bugfixes:

- Fixed issue in to hit formula where ranged attackers thought they were unarmed.
- Set armor repair system off by default. The system works like ass and causes crashes for some reason I can't discover at the moment. Will eventually replace it with something better anyway.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

The Brazilian Slaughter New version! This should finally fix the fleeing problem once und for all.

1.48

Bugfixes:

- Fixed bug in exhaustion system where exhaustion would increase exponentially, instead of linearily.
- Fixed bug in exhaustion system where NPC's would still have their "stamped" AC bonus as a constant exhaustion penalty.

Changes:

- Added a flat 10% bonus to the to hit chance (applied before the nerfing stage, so the effect should mainly be to help critters get basic to hit chances if they're extremely low, not considerably higher ones if they're already high). This bonus is customizable.
- Changed the way the distance modifiers worked because (1) they were way too punishing and (2) they made no sense. For some reason I made them increase exponentially in the old system (so first couple of hexes had penalty of x, the next couple of x+1, etc). Made no sense, and I probably just did it to feel smart. Now the formula is (relatively) straightforward (see the .ini to view it) and results in a max penalty of 7.5 per hex when using an unaimed shot with a short barreled weapon and 1 PE, up to no penalty at all for a 10 PE character aiming with a scoped weapon.
- I've given human and ghoul critters a bonus of 10% to all combat skills. The main reason for this is that their skills are ridiculously low in general (nearly all leather armor enemies you encounter have their relevant skill at 50-60%, metal armored ones at 60-70%). This isn't a difficulty concern, but a balancing one: it's damn hard to make a to hit formula that takes into account the player having at least twice the skill of most enemies he encounters. Still, I've kept the bonus relatively low to avoid the game becoming too hard (I think). So, consider it somthing of a customizable difficulty slider.
- I've again drastically lowered the value for the AI fleeing due to not being able to hit its opponent. I already did this earlier, but because of the problem that in my to hit formula, the AI believes it gets a hefty distance modifier when targeting far away enemies while carrying a melee weapon (doesn't matter when the AI actually attacks, but it does very much matter for the AI's fleeing), it still flees regularly. This measure, combined with the to hit increases mentioned above, SHOULD make the fleeing problem everyone's been complaining about go away.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Hey, Dropbox is working on my firefox now, must've fixed the problem!
Cool, gonna get it, didn't even test previous version, through. Was playing Geneforge 1 and Arcanum with a rebalance mod.

What are you planning to substitute the armor repair system with? It was a important part of my character idea, I wanted to pump it high to make my armor stronger, to compensate for the fact I would have to go around in Leather Armor MKII because of the agility penalties of metal, combat and power armor. Does the Bridgekeeper's Robes get the AG penalty?

No problemo dude. I'm gonna try the stuff with the traps/assassination first (already made some progress in that), then I'm getting to the damage formula so you can continue your playthrough. Because I'm going to make the repair skill (and science and traps skills, in the same way as previously), decrease likelihood/severity of armor penetrating hits (which is calculated in the damage formula). I always liked this better than the (buggy as hell) current system, because it nicely simulates how you're incapable of fixing the damage to your armor, rather than the entire armor becoming, say, 10% less effective, as it works now.

Did people complain about the chances to hit? I played only with a unarmed character, so I can't know, especially because I spent a good part of the game shadowboxing.

Well, they still complained (over at NMA) about fleeing enemies, even with the later versions you didn't test. And as I was testing it, I noticed so insanely many missed shots that I started seeing some problems with the formula. As I tested the new system (with the Den Gang War), it felt a lot better (besides nobody running anymore).

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

I have the feeling I've found the holy grail for "solving" the economy, which probably means I'm wrong. here's the plan:

FO2 of course has the same stupid inverted difficulty curve with its economy as with its combat (and any other crpg). In the beginning you think you're having to scrounge like hell for a leather jacket, by the end you're never in any kind of loot troubles.

The first thing I did with sfall was a "supply and demand" mod, but that works like ass. The big problems with this extremely simplistic system are that (1) it doesn't have anything to do with demand (just because a village doesn't have any plasma rifles doesn't mean they are willing to pay their collective savings for it) and (2) that it doesn't differentiate between selling and buying party (just because I have a ton of water to sell to you in the desert doesn't mean I'll be selling it cheap).

Solving the second issue is easy enough, but doing only that makes the script completely pointless. So, what's most important is the first point: by doing some kind of demand model, I can make sure that later areas are less interested in lower level equipment (Tubby is willing to pay a relatively nice price for that 10mm pistol you want to sell him because he can offload it on Metzger for a profit, but Eldridge needs something more valuable). This could address the economic imbalance: no more exchanging 12 Desert Eagles for a Vindicator Minigun (or, though you'd of course never do this, the other way around: what the hell would Tubby do with a Vindicator minigun?).

Should be easy enough to give each map this type of demand sim (even if it's just this difference of advanced/primitive). I think/hope that if you can basically only buy primitive weapons using primitive loot and advanced gear with advanced loot, especially in a cash starved world like FO2, then the economy might just get a bit balanced. Am I off here, or would this turn out annoying?