Enemy scaling questions

[Greg]

I'm not entirely sure how the enemy scaling system works in the game, I've visited forums regarding this and I found that as you level up to higher levels, stronger versions of enemies start to appear. When you visit a location and low level enemies spawn and you come back at higher levels do they stay low leveled or respawn at higher levels?

[Greg]

Also if anyone has a high level character at levels 50, 100, 200, or even 500+ did the game get any harder for you to the point where you lost a significant amount of ammo from just a few enemies?

[nobody willsee this video right?]

i don't know the answer to your question, but here is a link to a mod that deals with that, and even if you don't want the mod the person that wrote the mod probably knows the answer to your question so you might go to their forum area and ask there.

good luck.

https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/7580

[Ficelle]

Most enemies are lvl capped (around 30-50 or so it seems)
Some, way more rare, scale with you and there doesnt seem to be a limit

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Fallout 4 uses a system called "Rubber Banding" which is a bit hard to describe, but I'll try.

Basically, every area in the game has a "Threat Level" base. The Threat level dictates the Minimum and Maximum level of enemies that will appear. For example, the area around Sanctuary, Tenpines Bluff and Sunshine Tidings Co-Op is the Lowest Threat Level. With one notable exception (A boss spawn inside the Quarry), you won't find encounters over level 15 (Specifically the lowest tier of Threat which is approximately level 15). Contrary to popular belief, Cells are not "Locked" Permanently, they will recalculate if the cell refreshes and scale up if possible, within their threat level.

Here's where it gets tricky:

Enemies are classed by level and then sorted into the threat categories. For example, the lowest level Deathclaw is around level 20, and despite the threat level around Sanctuary being T1 stopping at around lvl 15, Deathclaws can spawn (usually in the form of Random Events) in these areas, as this is the lowest level type of Deathclaw. You won't see a Mythic Deathclaw up north though. Or, for example, a Radscorpion hunter, which despite being the same level as a Deathclaw, is the second-tier of Radscorpion.

What I've said here is sufficient for basic guidelines, but shouldn't be treated as Gospel. Exceptions, either through bugs or the game just being itself surely exist. For your purposes, if I'm reading it right, you're worried about "over-exploring" early and "Locking" areas to certain levels. Don't worry, certain areas will never go LOWER than a certain level (For example Glowing sea min level 30) and no area that scales indefinitely permanently "Locks" to a certain level (IE: If you visit glowing sea at lvl 1, and then, after cell resets at level 150, you'll find appropriately leveled enemies)

Most enemies are static, however for a few classes of enemies, there is a "Leveled" Type which starts at a set level, and matches your level once you reach and then pass their starting level.

For example, the Charred Feral Ghoul is always at least level 64(I think?) but once the player is level 65, the Charred Feral Ghoul will match the player's level, indefinitely. (At least until around level 1000 with the 64bit integer overrun causes the game to crash lol)

Some "Leveled" enemies include

Super Mutant Warlord

Vampiric Bloodbug

Charred Feral Ghoul

Bloated Glowing One

Mythic Deathclaw

Deathskull Radscorpion

Assaultron Gorgon (Automatron only)

Annihilator Sentry bot MK2

Sentry Bot Reaper (Automatron Only)

Protectron Golem (Automatron Only)

Mr. Handy Annihilator (Automatron Only)

Quantum Scrapbot, Tankbot, Robobrain, Swarmbot (Automatron Only)

Dusky Yao Guai

[Doombringer]

Originally posted by The Courier:

Also if anyone has a high level character at levels 50, 100, 200, or even 500 did the game get any harder for you the point where lost a significant amount of ammo from just a few enemies?

Stronger enemy types will spawn once the player is equal to (or higher than) their level.
Top level enemies have autolevel, which means they are always the same level as the player.
They gain 5 hitpoints for every level they gain.
For example: supermutant warlord first appears when the player is level 68 and has 1350 hitpoints.
If the player is level 268, then supermutant warlords gains 200 level and will have 2350 hitpoints.

As noted above, some areas have minimum and maximum levels, which limit the types of enemies that can spawn there (this has no effect on autolevel though, just what base enemy types can spawn).

[Hobo Misanthropus]

Originally posted by Doombringer:

Originally posted by The Courier:

Also if anyone has a high level character at levels 50, 100, 200, or even 500 did the game get any harder for you the point where lost a significant amount of ammo from just a few enemies?

Top level enemies have autolevel, which means they are always the same level as the player.
They gain 5 hitpoints for every level they gain.
For example: supermutant warlord first appears when the player is level 68 and has 1350 hitpoints.
If the player is level 268, then supermutant warlords gains 200 level and will have 2350 hitpoints.

Just as an anecdotal aside, Super Mutant Warlords have -Effective- Double HP because of passive damage resistances (not armor, but flat damage resistances that negate a portion of all incoming damage) That means that 2350 HP feels more like 5,000 when you try to kill it. As far as I know, one damage type ignores this, and that's Bleeding damge. Making things like Wounding Scatterguns exceptional for killing Supermutants.

it makes Super Mutant Warlods quite the ammo sinks starting around level 150.

[Doombringer]

On very hard you do half damage, then they have 139-168 armor so little pop guns don't hurt them much...(80-100 energy resist)
(160 armor is 50% damage reduction vs 160damage shots, 61.5% vs 80 damage shots, 69.8% vs 40 damage shots, etc.)
(Note that unlike normal damage, energy damage/energy resist calculations are done before perk damage multipliers instead of after)



EDIT: I'm not seeing the 'they take half damage' perk/effect that you mentioned anywhere in creation kit. Where did you see it?
(Warlords do have crDamage20, so they do 2x normal damage. They are also immune to radiation. The base 135/80 damage/energy resist that warlords have is just an armor bonus).

2nd EDIT: Tested, supermutants do NOT get any special perk/ability/whatever that reduces damage. A 31 damage 10mm did 31 damage to a warlord that had his armor (damage resist) set to 0. (test was in normal mode, no damage perks/mags/etc.)
(Note: setav damageresist is bugged, so have to getav damageresist, then modav damageresist <negative of whatever getav returned> to set it to 0)

[Hobo Misanthropus]

This is why I love my Two-Shot Laser Musket lol. Can scale its damage with the threat. 1 crank for raiders, 6 cranks and a sneak attack for Super Mutant Warlords (Which it still manages to 1 shot with a headshot, though I suspect that'll stop around lvl 175)

[Greg]

Are there any mods you know that can keep enemies at their entry level that works on all dlc? I checked out the link to the mod "nobody will see this video" posted and it doesn't affect the dlc automatons.

[Doombringer]

You can make a mod by unchecking autolevel (Actor - stats tab at the top - PC level mult) on all the enemies with it enabled.

[Bored Peon]

Fast exploring can cause lower level versions to spawn in the areas. Simply because of your level you entered those areas at. For example if you run through Cambridge at a low level the majority of those mobs will spawn for that levle and remain at that level until you clear those cells or the cells refresh (as they pointed out above.)

Slow exploration while leveling consistantly can cause big difficulty jumps on mobs. So when you enter a new cell the difficulty of the mobs can jump to a point all of a sudden it takes 2-3 shots to kill something rahter than one shot. This is where the perks you bought so far are going to make a big difference. If you bought mostly combat the difficulty would not be a big jump. However if you spent a bunch into non-combat perks that difficulty jump is pretty significant.

For example, this weekend I had cleared Vault 88 and built in it. When I came back out the random encounters and some of the mobs jumped to that next bracket of difficulty which led to a bunch of deaths.

Also when the game spawns a group of mobs there is always a big variation in levels on the mobs if you are higher level. Like you might have two worht 30xp, a couple worht 50xp, and a few at 120-180xp.

Honestly if you disable mob leveling you will probbaly get bored quickly because you basically one shot everything. It cna also cause issues of legendary armor spawning because you capped their level, as in always getting normal or sturdy, and never heavy versions.

[Greg]

Personally I think stronger enemies are fine but I don't want them to get too strong that I have to blast through most of my ammo just to take down a few of them. And I don't know how to create mods I started using mods like a couple weeks ago and I some don't work the way I thought they would.

[nobody willsee this video right?]

part of the problem seems to be that your enemies scale up with your level.
that's fine and as it should be.
your weapons don't.
damage done with gattling laser is the same at lvl 50 as 150.
best mods and all.

don't tell anyone but this is how i learned to use FO4 edit.
i'm not very good at it [yet] but i can increase the damage of Heathers laser in just a few moments now.
my serious armour[www.nexusmods.com], is quite so.

[ⓀⒾⓦⒾ‰]

in my game right now it takes like 15 direct hits point blank with a shotgun to kill a cricket


... the insect, not the npc

[Greg]

If you don't want me to tell anyone about that then why would you post it in this public forum?