How Fallout 76 Aims To Stop People From Being Jerks

@freedom01: What we *think* we know about this title - stay tuned for changes - is that when the game is finished, virtual servers will be user-configurable. You'll be able to claim a virtual server for yourself and let in only the people you want to invite, or no-one. Likewise, you can accept invitations from other virtual server owners.

There will be some totally-open-to-the-public servers, but they'll be constrained as to number of people, 'dozens' not 'hundreds' or 'thousands.' On a map four times the size of FO4, random encounters will probably be rare, though there will likely be tools for joining up with other players for co-op play. Or to issue challenges, I suppose.

Details are sketchy at this point, but it's clear that Bethesda has given thought to annoying troll behavior and intends to make it quite easy to avoid it.

@tibua: You're just gonna send me to the other side of the map and then hide behind a bush and laugh at me!

@tibua: A very large question looms in my mind: will this title include Dungeon Master (DM) tools for the virtual server owner (player)?

If so, then you could be more than a quest giver; you could run campaigns, using the game as a virtual playground for your stories. Such tools might permit the player-DM to observe invisibly, play different characters, spawn monsters or remove them,create objects on the fly (like dropping a note on the ground), ban players, and so forth.

The last game that had player-controlled servers and DM tools was Neverwinter Nights. There were some differences: graphics were primitive back then, areas were small, player-developed free mods were available in the tens of thousands, and the server was hardware controlled by the player-owner, rather than a virtual server operated centrally. FO76 is shaping up to be rather different: a gigantic seamless open world where the only mods are from the Creation Club (and probably amount to little more than cosmetic microtransactions). Nothing has been said about DM tools, but the title would make more sense if it includes them, because otherwise, story-telling in this title will be awfully limited. No NPCs and only dozens of players (at most) means story-making will be almost entirely emergent.

I have nothing against emergent stories. The FO franchise has been full of emergent stories since FO3. But in previous games there was still a narrative structure present. This one appears to have none, other than what the players themselves will provide. It just makes sense to me that if you're going to hand-off the story-making power to players entirely, that DM tools would be part of the hand-off.

@jenovaschilld: Yea. For players who like immersion and want to lose themselves in another world, multiplayer almost never mixes with that. I find it nearly impossible to be anything but painfully aware, that I am playing a video game when it is always online. On the other hand, there are single player games I've played in the past that genuinely would immerse me and make me feel like I was in that world. Not all players want the social experience in video games. Some people play video games because the social experiences in life bore/tire them, and they want to get away from that for a while.

@addoryan: Bethesda evolves very slowly.

They are still using the same fucking engine and now they are shoving netcode into this mess? what could possibly go wrong?

And this time we have no modders to fix the game since it's always online.

@whoknows: It depends on your definition of the word answer.

@nz: I don't think there's any campaign. Not a single player game, but you can play "solo". Run around and kill/buy/whatever with other people around the world. Yay.

@Sgt-Damain: Wash it down with a glass of pi**.

@idakooz: look at it this way... 4 months ago we weren't expecting a new fallout game.. and for many of us, we still aren't expecting an actual fallout game.. just a game in the fallout universe, not for us. :)

sorta like fallout shelter didn't ruin my experience in fallout 4... i would really have liked a new fallout single player game, or even co-op fallout rpg(ish) style... fallout 76 is not that.. so we just wait for something else. (like elder scrolls 6 in a couple years evidently)

@idakooz: I'm with you. Was wanting a deep, single player RPG, but not gonna happen. Looks like I will pass on this too. Oh, the answer to why? C'mon you know already know the answer. Begins with 'M' and ends in 'Y'

@idakooz: Because of Fortnite, PUBG etc etc... I'll wait for Fallout 5.

@gamingdevil800: nope... there isn't any building settlements either.. no npcs, so no settlers, so no settlements.

you can build YOUR camp, mini town (and it's portable, so obviously not to big).. that's about it from what we've seen.

there will be quests and areas to explore, resources to collect.. but meh.. wait for something else.

@gamingdevil800: I don't know. You could be entirely correct. But...

There is a way forward for this title that might be interesting.

Back in the day, when Pen and Paper dungeons were literally the only option for RPGs, my group used to dream of a computer game that gave us a visual playground for our player-invented stories. No more arguing about how many steps across the paper grid you could take in how many seconds! No more arguing about what was in range or not! Arguing over the details used to take up *so* much of our time, no foolin'. A game environment that handled combat resolution would have been great.

Neverwinter Nights was the only game title ever produced that even attempted to provide this kind of virtual playground for player-run story-making. It was less than ideal, but quite a few campaigns were operated over the years on that platform, and some are still operating.

If that is the direction Bethesda is going with FO76, then they'll have to furnish some Dungeon Master tools. The way you would gain access to the tools would be to create your own virtual server world and become its owner, invite the players you want to entertain into the server, and use DM tools to craft the stories you want to tell.

The tools would have to include ghosting (invisible movement around the world, so you can observe without interacting), spawning or removing monsters, creating objects on the fly, creating and inhabiting characters to interact with the group, banning players, that sort of thing.

At that point, the quality of the game experience will depend largely on the quality of the DM.

I can see that being a very worthwhile thing, and something no other game does, except for NWN, and that title is ancient, creaky, low-graphics, involves tiny world spaces, and runs on player-owned servers. This one would be a huge, seamless virtual world, a much more ideal space for player-crafted stories.

We have no indication whatsoever that DM tools are intended by Bethesda. But if they are, then we have to look at FO76 as something more than a mere soft-survival title with no story structure and no NPCs. It could be an answer to a PnP dungeoners' wish list from decades back.