Before writing about the mod itself, I want to make it clear that I'm not actually planning to implement it, but I might do it, if I have the time and if I decide it's worth doing. One of the things I will take into account is whether people are interested in the mod, and I will hopefully learn it in this thread. The chance of me starting it at all is about 30-70%, not sure.
Now on the mod itself. It is undeniable that Fallout 2 is strongly imbalanced. It is also very important to note that Fallout 2 is still a great RPG (so is Fallout 1), which means that balance isn't mandatory for a good RPG.
However, Fallout 2 gets quite boring once you figure out that some (most?) of the skills, perks and traits are useless, and you start playing it with a limited combination of skills. There are mods of course, many of which have balanced some of the skills, but they mostly copy the vanilla skills with not too big changes, because they focus on the role-playing part instead.
If all the skills are balanced, there would be a huge variety of possible playable characters. Not only in vanilla, but hopefully in some mods that use the mod in theirs, because it's better than having Steal that is made obsolete by saving/reloading and Sneak that isn't a worthy investment of skill points, because above a certain threshold (95 or something), increasing it does nothing.
Here is a representation of the changes I plan.
I will try to change the maps as little as possible, but some changes are mandatory. I will try to use as little dialogues as possible, because I'm bad at dialogues, and I'm bad at writing, English is not my native language. I'm open to new ideas, and some of my ideas obviously need improvement, but I'm not worried about them, because in the worst case, I can just leave the skill/perk/trait untouched.
I see that it's very long, so here is a shorter version.
ST won't be useless. PE determines the cap for chance to hit (if I manage to code it). IN will have less impact on skill gain. Skills will have benefit until at least 250% skill points are invested. Enemies will have very varying defense - DT isn't tied to DR, enemies are often vulnerable or resistant to a certain damage type. There will be big guns and energy weapon available in earlygame. Each weapon skill will be more different from the other skills - small guns will have a huge variety of weapon stats, big guns and energy weapons would be kept in the same way, most unarmed weapons will differ only in damage while the melee weapons will be various, throwing weapons will be more available but still kind of expensive.
First aid will be for making medications, Sneak is for stealth kills, Repair is for crafting all kinds of things including armors, with Outdoorsman you can tame animals and use them as companions, lockpicking, steal, barter and gambling will help you to obtain items (gambling is only for money), some of which can't be bought with money. I don't like very much the rest of the skills. Traits and perks will be remade because most of them are useless. In many cases, I will simply change the numbers of an already existing perk/trait.
And here is the long version.
SPECIAL:
ST - starting with 9 or so won't be ineffective for the lategame (decrease/remove the bonus from the Power Armors or just decrease it and add alternative late-game armors). Also increase its effect by having weapons with higher ST requirements and maybe have it increase melee damage by a percentage.
PE - determines the cap for % to hit. Also, it determines the quality of the crafted items (yes, I'm planning a crafting system) in a way that the player can't compensate for a low PE by spending more skill points.
EN - radiation and poison will be remade, there will be more radiation and Rad-X won't be useless. I want to remake the critical hit table for the player, so that the strength of the crits depends on the player's EN (for example, a player with EN 1 has a chance of taking an instakill crit) and possible change the HP formula.
CH - it's fine this way. I might slightly decrease the strength of companions, because one companion for 2 CH is too much.
IN - it's obviously overpowered right now, I will change the skill points formula, so that they won't depend so much on IN. If you want lots of skill points, pick a trait for that instead (I haven't got ideas for traits yet, though).
AG - right now, AP is too dependent on AG and no combat character is effective with low AG (sorry, slow and powerful brutes). If I find a way to do this, I will make a play style for combat characters with low AG - I guess that bursting with a minigun/flamer effectively shouldn't require much agility, so it might take a percentage of the AP, or something like that. If that doesn't work, I'll just make sure that AG is balanced by changing the formulas for the things that already depend on it.
LK - I'll change the way that special encounters work (it's too random right now, you might get them all even with low LK and enough persistence). Also, I think it'll have a good synergy with characters, based on using consumables for temporal increase of stats.
Skills:
General - right now, spending skill points in a certain skill after a certain threshold is ineffective or completely pointless. I plan to change this, every skill should be worth raising until at least 250% - the solution for each skill is described below.
Weapon skills - right now, they are too similar, so I plan to introduce a sharp boundary between them. I'll rework the resistances of the critters, so that every damage type has its uses, and some enemies would be less vulnerable to burst or frequent, weak attacks (higher DT, but lower DR). The player will have a way of learning an enemy's resistances. There will be big guns and energy weapons in earlygame. The bonus for reaching a certain skill level for a weapon skill would be an unique weapon (possibly obtained via an NPC or a mini-quest) that is used with that skill, which does not get obsolete later in the game, because of its unique features - for example, an unarmed weapon that can inflict a damage type that no other unarmed weapon can, thus making it the best unarmed weapon against some enemies. This could also mean that a player with a certain weapon skill should pick NPCs with the same skill, because they would take advantage of his weapons. Note also that the skills will continue to work in their previous way.
Small guns will have a huge variety - having many damage types (flamer pistol, etc.), weapons with burst, some with high range, big range of AP costs, and special effects if possible. Obviously, they won't do as much damage as the weapons with less variety.
Most or all big guns will be a flamer/minigun/rocket launcher - notice the lack of aimed attacks. They are also devastating, costly and inflexible.
Energy weapons will be plasma, laser, electricity or possible EMP damage single-shot weapons, except for the Gatling Laser which is burst-fire.
Unarmed special attacks should be remade if possible. New Reno boxing and similar features should be made impossible to win for players without a high unarmed skill, and will have better bonuses. Most or all unarmed weapons will be the same, with different damage and possibly ammo type (3 AP, 1 range, Normal damage).
Melee weapons will have much more variety than Unarmed, but less damage.
Throwing will be remade, with weapons now much more available, but still relatively costly and high-power, except some of them. Has a variety of damage types. Would work well when combined with a skill for money (like Barter or Steal). The unique Throwing weapons, obtained at a certain skill level, will be reproducible - there will be a guy who makes (and sells) more of them once you show him the weapon.
First Aid will be used for making medications - I know that using Doctor for this would make more sense, but I can't think of any use for First Aid that makes sense. Some of the medications will give temporary bonus stats (good for companions or for a combat character), other will heal (in fact, healing in combat with low First Aid will be very ineffective), and some of them will harm the enemy (damage or lowering stats), but most of them will only be usable in combat. Most medications will be obtained by crafting (because using them doesn't require skill), and your skill determines which ones can you craft. It might have good synergy with LK, because LK can't be boosted with medications.
I don't have a good idea for Doctor yet. My best idea so far is to use it to upgrade yourself and companions by creating and applying various implants and modifications. Can be used to change the race of some of your NPCs. It can also be used to create a new companion (like a centaur of a sort), it might be used to use a drug in a town's water supply and change them in a certain way - kill them, make them addicted to something, or something. Still, I might just use the idea for upgrades, it will be better than having the current useless skill, even though it will be (intentionally) too weak and won't be worth spending skill points on.
Sneak will be used for sneak kills, with no other skills required (you don't need any skill in melee weapons to stab someone in the back, once you get behind his back). You can't just go and kill all the NPCs somewhere, because they will know it was you after a certain number of kills - that number depends on your Sneak skill, and you will lose karma and reputation if you exceed it by a little (if you exceed it further will obviously make them hostile). Some enemies require more Sneak skill to be assassinated, and some (darker) areas are easier to sneak in. There will be different sneak weapons, but if you won't care about alarming others, you might just use a 10mm pistol (if it's strong enough). Sometimes when your skill level isn't enough or your weapon is too weak, the sneak attack will only harm your opponent. It will generally be used to kill some of the enemies in an area, and sneak past some of them. The whole idea doesn't sound good enough, so I might change it.
Lockpick - most of the containers in the game are locked (this makes more sense). Some of them would contain "unique, universally useful items" - this is a concept introduced by me, because without it, some skills (like Lockpick) would be only useful for obtaining goods, and that would be rather boring. The purpose of those items is to be useful for every character and to be obtainable in only one possible way. It could be an implant that increases HP permanently, or gives +5 DT, or maybe a unique armor that is effective in certain circumstances (Repair deals with armors already, but not armors with a LK bonus).
For stealing, every NPC will have a certain skill requirement for steal to work, but it will work most of the time. Some of the NPCs will have unique, universally useful items. Also, this and Lockpick would eliminate the opportunity for the player to go directly to San Francisco and get some of the best items in the game at level 3.
My idea for Traps isn't satisfactory yet. The traps in the game will be increased and detecting them will be more useful (like having a map where the locations of the traps are randomized each time you enter it and you can't save your game before you kill everyone there, if this is possible). Otherwise, Traps will be used for killing things - first you set traps and then you lead something into them. Also, you can set a trap somewhere on the world map and then check if you caught something and loot it.
The idea for Science doesn't seem good enough as well. When it's high enough, the player can construct robots for NPCs (I'm thinking of making a location for the player's laboratory, it will be useful for Doctor as well) and modify Skynet. Also, it can be used to modify slightly some weapons. The possible things to do with computers should be increased (I have no exact ideas about this yet), and the number of computers in the game should be increased. Higher skill levels grant an additional party slot, only for robots.
Repair - used to create many kinds of things in the game, some of them can't be otherwise obtained in the current game phase. Can create unique armors and maybe unique types of ammunition. It might give the player the opportunity to create additional copies of unique weapons that can't be otherwise obtained. Has a specific synergy with most (or all) other skills, like crafting better traps for Traps or higher quality syringes for First Aid. Its overall use is to boost combat.
Speech - it's good enough already, I might introduce some unique, universally useful items that can be obtained only in a way that includes a successful Speech check (most likely in place of other awards in the game). At a very high level, it could be used to convince party NPCs to do certain things - for example, convince a certain NPC to turn into a ghoul / super mutant / human or replace some of its organs with robot parts. Or have an NPC in your party that isn't normally available for recruiting, or convince them to give up on some of their superstitions/traditions that prevent them from doing certain actions.
Barter - I will obviously remake the prices and availability of items, so Barter will be always needed and there will be ways to spend tons of money. I will introduce unique, universally useful items that are only available for buying if you have enough Barter.
Gambling - since most people would just reload if they lose money, a gambling limit will be introduced and it depends on how much Gambling skill you have, so the skill will be used to make money out of gambling (in case you like gambling without saving/loading, then you might do it as well, but the skill won't be useful to you - anyway, it didn't used to be useful). Also, I might invent a mini-game that involves collecting different Tragic cards and playing Tragic with certain NPCs. On some occasions, Gambling will win the player unique universally useful items. I know this is kinda lame, but I didn't have any other ideas.
Now, you can tame pets with Outdoorsman! Have a small radscorpion and raise it (later it will grow and become a large radscorpion), or do the same with a mole rat, a gecko or even a deathclaw! They take companion slots and have their own stats, obviously - you wouldn't want to throw your cute rat, once you get access to a deathclaw, because it still has its benefits and you might improve it with various injections (including FEV) and stuff. Also, it has impact on your random encounters - generally makes them more favorable, and lets you to choose to avoid the encounter more often. With Outdoorsman, you can also breed plants in Arroyo and then use them (for herbs, for example).
Traits and perks:
I haven't thought much about this, but in the general case, I'll pick a perk/trait and change its numbers. For example, Gifted will be much more costly (if it seems pointless, I might just remove it), Skilled will give a lot more skill points, uhhhh most of the other traits are either fine or unfixable, but I can add new ones, like Jack of All Trades which makes you better at all skills.
Same applies for perks. All the +skill perks will be removed. The pointless perks that are pointless because they are too weak will have their numbers increased. I will add new perks (I already have some ideas), because I feel that there won't be many perks left after I remove all the unusable perks. I might add a slight bonus to the "Gain ST/**" perks. Slayer/sniper will most likely be removed or reduced.
Also, if I turn out to be good at creating new areas, I might add other endgame areas for players who want to reach very high skill levels.
That was a big list. It would probably take a long time, but if I ever start it, I will do it one by one, starting with the easiest things, like weapons. Do you think it's going to work out nicely and that it will be included in many mods?
Now on the mod itself. It is undeniable that Fallout 2 is strongly imbalanced. It is also very important to note that Fallout 2 is still a great RPG (so is Fallout 1), which means that balance isn't mandatory for a good RPG.
However, Fallout 2 gets quite boring once you figure out that some (most?) of the skills, perks and traits are useless, and you start playing it with a limited combination of skills. There are mods of course, many of which have balanced some of the skills, but they mostly copy the vanilla skills with not too big changes, because they focus on the role-playing part instead.
If all the skills are balanced, there would be a huge variety of possible playable characters. Not only in vanilla, but hopefully in some mods that use the mod in theirs, because it's better than having Steal that is made obsolete by saving/reloading and Sneak that isn't a worthy investment of skill points, because above a certain threshold (95 or something), increasing it does nothing.
Here is a representation of the changes I plan.
I will try to change the maps as little as possible, but some changes are mandatory. I will try to use as little dialogues as possible, because I'm bad at dialogues, and I'm bad at writing, English is not my native language. I'm open to new ideas, and some of my ideas obviously need improvement, but I'm not worried about them, because in the worst case, I can just leave the skill/perk/trait untouched.
I see that it's very long, so here is a shorter version.
ST won't be useless. PE determines the cap for chance to hit (if I manage to code it). IN will have less impact on skill gain. Skills will have benefit until at least 250% skill points are invested. Enemies will have very varying defense - DT isn't tied to DR, enemies are often vulnerable or resistant to a certain damage type. There will be big guns and energy weapon available in earlygame. Each weapon skill will be more different from the other skills - small guns will have a huge variety of weapon stats, big guns and energy weapons would be kept in the same way, most unarmed weapons will differ only in damage while the melee weapons will be various, throwing weapons will be more available but still kind of expensive.
First aid will be for making medications, Sneak is for stealth kills, Repair is for crafting all kinds of things including armors, with Outdoorsman you can tame animals and use them as companions, lockpicking, steal, barter and gambling will help you to obtain items (gambling is only for money), some of which can't be bought with money. I don't like very much the rest of the skills. Traits and perks will be remade because most of them are useless. In many cases, I will simply change the numbers of an already existing perk/trait.
And here is the long version.
SPECIAL:
ST - starting with 9 or so won't be ineffective for the lategame (decrease/remove the bonus from the Power Armors or just decrease it and add alternative late-game armors). Also increase its effect by having weapons with higher ST requirements and maybe have it increase melee damage by a percentage.
PE - determines the cap for % to hit. Also, it determines the quality of the crafted items (yes, I'm planning a crafting system) in a way that the player can't compensate for a low PE by spending more skill points.
EN - radiation and poison will be remade, there will be more radiation and Rad-X won't be useless. I want to remake the critical hit table for the player, so that the strength of the crits depends on the player's EN (for example, a player with EN 1 has a chance of taking an instakill crit) and possible change the HP formula.
CH - it's fine this way. I might slightly decrease the strength of companions, because one companion for 2 CH is too much.
IN - it's obviously overpowered right now, I will change the skill points formula, so that they won't depend so much on IN. If you want lots of skill points, pick a trait for that instead (I haven't got ideas for traits yet, though).
AG - right now, AP is too dependent on AG and no combat character is effective with low AG (sorry, slow and powerful brutes). If I find a way to do this, I will make a play style for combat characters with low AG - I guess that bursting with a minigun/flamer effectively shouldn't require much agility, so it might take a percentage of the AP, or something like that. If that doesn't work, I'll just make sure that AG is balanced by changing the formulas for the things that already depend on it.
LK - I'll change the way that special encounters work (it's too random right now, you might get them all even with low LK and enough persistence). Also, I think it'll have a good synergy with characters, based on using consumables for temporal increase of stats.
Skills:
General - right now, spending skill points in a certain skill after a certain threshold is ineffective or completely pointless. I plan to change this, every skill should be worth raising until at least 250% - the solution for each skill is described below.
Weapon skills - right now, they are too similar, so I plan to introduce a sharp boundary between them. I'll rework the resistances of the critters, so that every damage type has its uses, and some enemies would be less vulnerable to burst or frequent, weak attacks (higher DT, but lower DR). The player will have a way of learning an enemy's resistances. There will be big guns and energy weapons in earlygame. The bonus for reaching a certain skill level for a weapon skill would be an unique weapon (possibly obtained via an NPC or a mini-quest) that is used with that skill, which does not get obsolete later in the game, because of its unique features - for example, an unarmed weapon that can inflict a damage type that no other unarmed weapon can, thus making it the best unarmed weapon against some enemies. This could also mean that a player with a certain weapon skill should pick NPCs with the same skill, because they would take advantage of his weapons. Note also that the skills will continue to work in their previous way.
Small guns will have a huge variety - having many damage types (flamer pistol, etc.), weapons with burst, some with high range, big range of AP costs, and special effects if possible. Obviously, they won't do as much damage as the weapons with less variety.
Most or all big guns will be a flamer/minigun/rocket launcher - notice the lack of aimed attacks. They are also devastating, costly and inflexible.
Energy weapons will be plasma, laser, electricity or possible EMP damage single-shot weapons, except for the Gatling Laser which is burst-fire.
Unarmed special attacks should be remade if possible. New Reno boxing and similar features should be made impossible to win for players without a high unarmed skill, and will have better bonuses. Most or all unarmed weapons will be the same, with different damage and possibly ammo type (3 AP, 1 range, Normal damage).
Melee weapons will have much more variety than Unarmed, but less damage.
Throwing will be remade, with weapons now much more available, but still relatively costly and high-power, except some of them. Has a variety of damage types. Would work well when combined with a skill for money (like Barter or Steal). The unique Throwing weapons, obtained at a certain skill level, will be reproducible - there will be a guy who makes (and sells) more of them once you show him the weapon.
First Aid will be used for making medications - I know that using Doctor for this would make more sense, but I can't think of any use for First Aid that makes sense. Some of the medications will give temporary bonus stats (good for companions or for a combat character), other will heal (in fact, healing in combat with low First Aid will be very ineffective), and some of them will harm the enemy (damage or lowering stats), but most of them will only be usable in combat. Most medications will be obtained by crafting (because using them doesn't require skill), and your skill determines which ones can you craft. It might have good synergy with LK, because LK can't be boosted with medications.
I don't have a good idea for Doctor yet. My best idea so far is to use it to upgrade yourself and companions by creating and applying various implants and modifications. Can be used to change the race of some of your NPCs. It can also be used to create a new companion (like a centaur of a sort), it might be used to use a drug in a town's water supply and change them in a certain way - kill them, make them addicted to something, or something. Still, I might just use the idea for upgrades, it will be better than having the current useless skill, even though it will be (intentionally) too weak and won't be worth spending skill points on.
Sneak will be used for sneak kills, with no other skills required (you don't need any skill in melee weapons to stab someone in the back, once you get behind his back). You can't just go and kill all the NPCs somewhere, because they will know it was you after a certain number of kills - that number depends on your Sneak skill, and you will lose karma and reputation if you exceed it by a little (if you exceed it further will obviously make them hostile). Some enemies require more Sneak skill to be assassinated, and some (darker) areas are easier to sneak in. There will be different sneak weapons, but if you won't care about alarming others, you might just use a 10mm pistol (if it's strong enough). Sometimes when your skill level isn't enough or your weapon is too weak, the sneak attack will only harm your opponent. It will generally be used to kill some of the enemies in an area, and sneak past some of them. The whole idea doesn't sound good enough, so I might change it.
Lockpick - most of the containers in the game are locked (this makes more sense). Some of them would contain "unique, universally useful items" - this is a concept introduced by me, because without it, some skills (like Lockpick) would be only useful for obtaining goods, and that would be rather boring. The purpose of those items is to be useful for every character and to be obtainable in only one possible way. It could be an implant that increases HP permanently, or gives +5 DT, or maybe a unique armor that is effective in certain circumstances (Repair deals with armors already, but not armors with a LK bonus).
For stealing, every NPC will have a certain skill requirement for steal to work, but it will work most of the time. Some of the NPCs will have unique, universally useful items. Also, this and Lockpick would eliminate the opportunity for the player to go directly to San Francisco and get some of the best items in the game at level 3.
My idea for Traps isn't satisfactory yet. The traps in the game will be increased and detecting them will be more useful (like having a map where the locations of the traps are randomized each time you enter it and you can't save your game before you kill everyone there, if this is possible). Otherwise, Traps will be used for killing things - first you set traps and then you lead something into them. Also, you can set a trap somewhere on the world map and then check if you caught something and loot it.
The idea for Science doesn't seem good enough as well. When it's high enough, the player can construct robots for NPCs (I'm thinking of making a location for the player's laboratory, it will be useful for Doctor as well) and modify Skynet. Also, it can be used to modify slightly some weapons. The possible things to do with computers should be increased (I have no exact ideas about this yet), and the number of computers in the game should be increased. Higher skill levels grant an additional party slot, only for robots.
Repair - used to create many kinds of things in the game, some of them can't be otherwise obtained in the current game phase. Can create unique armors and maybe unique types of ammunition. It might give the player the opportunity to create additional copies of unique weapons that can't be otherwise obtained. Has a specific synergy with most (or all) other skills, like crafting better traps for Traps or higher quality syringes for First Aid. Its overall use is to boost combat.
Speech - it's good enough already, I might introduce some unique, universally useful items that can be obtained only in a way that includes a successful Speech check (most likely in place of other awards in the game). At a very high level, it could be used to convince party NPCs to do certain things - for example, convince a certain NPC to turn into a ghoul / super mutant / human or replace some of its organs with robot parts. Or have an NPC in your party that isn't normally available for recruiting, or convince them to give up on some of their superstitions/traditions that prevent them from doing certain actions.
Barter - I will obviously remake the prices and availability of items, so Barter will be always needed and there will be ways to spend tons of money. I will introduce unique, universally useful items that are only available for buying if you have enough Barter.
Gambling - since most people would just reload if they lose money, a gambling limit will be introduced and it depends on how much Gambling skill you have, so the skill will be used to make money out of gambling (in case you like gambling without saving/loading, then you might do it as well, but the skill won't be useful to you - anyway, it didn't used to be useful). Also, I might invent a mini-game that involves collecting different Tragic cards and playing Tragic with certain NPCs. On some occasions, Gambling will win the player unique universally useful items. I know this is kinda lame, but I didn't have any other ideas.
Now, you can tame pets with Outdoorsman! Have a small radscorpion and raise it (later it will grow and become a large radscorpion), or do the same with a mole rat, a gecko or even a deathclaw! They take companion slots and have their own stats, obviously - you wouldn't want to throw your cute rat, once you get access to a deathclaw, because it still has its benefits and you might improve it with various injections (including FEV) and stuff. Also, it has impact on your random encounters - generally makes them more favorable, and lets you to choose to avoid the encounter more often. With Outdoorsman, you can also breed plants in Arroyo and then use them (for herbs, for example).
Traits and perks:
I haven't thought much about this, but in the general case, I'll pick a perk/trait and change its numbers. For example, Gifted will be much more costly (if it seems pointless, I might just remove it), Skilled will give a lot more skill points, uhhhh most of the other traits are either fine or unfixable, but I can add new ones, like Jack of All Trades which makes you better at all skills.
Same applies for perks. All the +skill perks will be removed. The pointless perks that are pointless because they are too weak will have their numbers increased. I will add new perks (I already have some ideas), because I feel that there won't be many perks left after I remove all the unusable perks. I might add a slight bonus to the "Gain ST/**" perks. Slayer/sniper will most likely be removed or reduced.
Also, if I turn out to be good at creating new areas, I might add other endgame areas for players who want to reach very high skill levels.
That was a big list. It would probably take a long time, but if I ever start it, I will do it one by one, starting with the easiest things, like weapons. Do you think it's going to work out nicely and that it will be included in many mods?
)
