We Want Your Mission Ideas

[simplycorrect]

Hard Choices

Scenario #1 - Water

The Rangers are escorting a caravan with valuable cargo across the wasteland. There is not enough water for everyone in the group to make it to the destination alive.

The group consists of the other guards, merchant and his family, support staff, as well as the horses. If two sections of the group were eliminated, everyone else would have barely enough to make it.

The merchant advises that the guards and support staff should go, which would allow him to carry his valuable cargo on its expected course. He promises great rewards for delivering his family and cargo to safety.

The guards and support staff think the merchant and his horses should be eliminated, leaving the valuable cargo behind. The guards eventually attempt a forced alliance, threatening to attack if refused.

The merchants daughter is having an illicit relationship with one of the men in the support staff and they each beg the Rangers to save the other.

Without the other guards, it will be harder to protect the group in the very likely event of an attack. Without the horses, the valuable cargo must be abandoned. Without the support staff, an array of useful skills are lost and everyone has to carry more supplies. While the merchants family don't have any immediately useful skills, it is the only section of the group to include women and children.

Scenario #2 - Victim

The Rangers are on a mission in a dangerous, predator filled area far from any civilization, when one of their companions falls and badly breaks his leg. While field dressings can stabilize the victim, he will need attention from a doctor to survive. Rescuing the victim will be a herculean effort in itself and may mean abandoning the mission.

The victim is well liked; he is the only member of the group with a sense of humour. The other NPC Companions in the group passionately advocate for rescuing him. The victim stoically offers to be left behind. The Rangers could also leave someone behind to guard the victim and then double back after completing the mission, or split their group in two and try to rescue the victim while completing the mission with just the Rangers.

The mission and the predators in the region are tough enough that splitting up the group would be dangerous.

Scenario #3 - Homicide

While away from civilization on a dangerous mission, two companions in the group get into an argument which leads to a fight in which one of them is killed.

The argument was over a pink "hello kitty" the killer was wearing on his weapon, which the deceased was making fun of.

The killer has useful skills but a well known volatile attitude. Making fun of his hello kitty rifle was extremely poor judgement for anyone. Nevertheless, companions who were close to the victim are demanding that the Rangers in authority deal with the murder. Failing to do so could alienate some members and lead to a breakdown of discipline in the group.

[mysterymovieguy]

Gavin's Army
Gavin is a man that can be found in Las Vegas. He is currently is building an army to take over Las Vegas, and make him the established power. At the same time the people at Guardian Citadel are worried of Gavin's growing army. At this point you should be able to join Gavin, or Guardian Citadel. 1. If you join Gavin you will first do some tasks for him to get support for his cause before doing a full scale invasion of Vegas. The first mission that Gavin requires you to do is to send a letter of support to the following locations... Highpool, Agricultural Center, and Quartz. I feel that depending on how well you've helped these locations that will decide whether they will give support to Gavin. Depending on what locations decided to help you you, your companions, and Gavin's men will get a certain bonus(s) to aid you in this fight. After this Gavin should say before we fight we should find some extra supplies, and he will tell you to raid the Las Vegas Armory, and Medical Clinics. After this Gavin should be ready for the final fight, and you will be able to accompany him in an invasion of Las Vegas. Guardian Citadel will fight against you in this invasion. Depending on how much support you received Gavin should win or loose. If he loses you should be taken prisoner by Las Vegas, and Guardian Citadel. When taken prisoner they should throw you out of both locations not to return. If he wins you Gavin will rule Las Vegas, and he will thank you he will reward you with... I thought this should be up to the developers. 2. Guardian Citadel... They should tell you that they want to you to get help fighting against Gavin. You will go to the same locations to receive help from. Except this time you will get different bonus(s) to aid you against Gavin. After this Guardian Citadel will tell you that they hear Gavin has already started the fight. This time fight with Guardian Citadel to kill Gavin. Guardian Citadel should be able to win or loose this fight. If they loose Gavin will take your prisoner, and exile your from Vegas. If they win Guardian Citadel will take control of Las Vegas. I feel that in after 200 days they will find a new leader for Las Vegas, and reward you. ONE MORE THING! I was thinking of adding that Gavin will want to kill all of Guardian Citadel, and he will want to take control of other areas. I thought this should be left off for the developers to decide because I'm not a developer so I'm not going to make big decisions like this for them. Will hope you guys found this interesting I will write more, but hoped you guys liked this!

[Dkay]

Dear Fellow Wastelanders and Wastland creators!

I have personally not yet played Wasteland. However since Fallout 1 and 2 still are 2 of my favorite games and Wasteland 2 is on the Horizon, I'm trying to get myself a copy and play through it.

Now I've just read through the first post of this topic and I was thinking, well, moral dilemmas, that's great. We should definitively have that. It's what made Fallout 1 and 2 great for me. But I personally think it might be time to take it just 1 step further. So bare with me for a second.

In Baldur's Gate you had a system called alignments, basically a good aligned character would not participate in evil actions. In my opinion the downside of this system was that it is static.

What I would like to see introduced is a dynamic system that writes a piece of your playable character's personality (for the ending) every time you make a (moral/immoral) decision. Resulting, by the end of the game, in a fully developed human being.

And it is hereby that the question that I would like to see answered arises, how do the characters I've created over the course of my play-through interact with the world around them after the game has finished?

EXAMPLE

Here are just a few personality traits/flaws and how it would result in the ending for that character.

Mission -> Moral Decision -> Characteristic Discovered -> Patient or Impatient
Mission -> Moral Decision -> Characteristic Discovered -> Courageous or Cowardly
Mission -> Moral Decision -> Characteristic Discovered -> Loyal or Rebellious
Mission -> Moral Decision -> Characteristic Discovered -> Passive or Agressive
Mission -> Moral Decision -> Characteristic Discovered -> Justice or Revenge
Karma: Good, Neutral or Evil
Alignments: (picking a few fallout ones here) Raiders, Brotherhood, Police or perhaps a city (examples given)

Ending:
Character: John Doe

Patient: patiently waiting for the perfect moment
Impatient: impatient and quick about his decisions
-
Courageous: continued his journey
Cowardly: settled down in Base Alpha
-
Loyal: exercising the law
Rebellious: breaking all the rules
-
Passive: jail every ____ (if good scumbag if neutral one that stands in his way evil do-good-er).
Aggressive: shoot every ___ (if good scumbag if neutral one that stands in his way if evil do-good-er) in the face.
-
Justice: for Justice.
Revenge: for Revenge. (after losing his wife and daughter to the evil bunny rabbits of doom).

Now let's say we made the Impatient, Courageous, Rebellious, Neutral, Passive, Revenge choices, the ending would be:

John Doe, impatient and quick about his decisions continued his journey breaking all the rules to jail every one that stands in his way for Revenge. (after losing his wife and daughter to the evil bunny rabbits of doom).

You could even add the city with which the character has the best standing as his home, where he or she went to live, stuff like that! (This does mean that every city should have exactly the same amount of obtainable karma of course). And this could have positive or negative effects as well!

Now what would be absolutely even more AWESOME is that if
-every mission had a DIFFERENT set of traits/flaws.
-every mission can have the same traits/flaws but never the same SET.

example given:
Mission 1: Impatient or Patient or Justice
Mission 2: Impatient or Courageous or Justice
Mission 3: Patient or Courageous or Justice.

Now the easy way to incorporate this system would be to say, which ever trait on the spectrum get's picked most often defines the personality. What would be even more awesome if you could make it so that someone could be either
Extremely impatient, impatient, patient or extremely patient. (and write endings accordingly).

Now I know there's still a few holes in the idea, I JUST thought of it, kinda popped into my head, and figured I'd write it out. If there's anything you've read which you think could be done better, post it! I think this idea is awesome, if you can contribute and make it even more awesome, that would be appreciated!

This brings me to the mission idea's and their moral dilemma's I've got three for you!

Mission 1:
Escorting the little girl you've recently rescued from a cave infested with mutated wolves back to town you pass a group of people screaming at each other will hiding behind a piece of wall from a house that once was. The little girl points to the farm a few hundred yards ahead and tells the party of rangers that this is her house. You decide to talk to the group of people to investigate the problem.
It seems that a group of raiders have kidnapped the woman living in the house, the woman, who's husband died a long time ago, turns out to be the mother of the little girl you are accompanying.

Once you reach the house however you notice that 1 of the 2 kidnapped persons is your instructor (who you met beginning game) or maybe even a squad mate. (Let's just say a good, close friend that is a positive influence to possible outcomes in the game). You can only save 1. End of game elaborate decision

Mission 2:

You meet a girl who introduces herself as Jane Doe, she is the wife of John Doe, a cadet who trained with you.

In some town in a back ally during night you catch a rapist in the act. He notices you, quickly raises his pants and runs away. You are briefly in pursuit but quickly find out that he is no where to be found. You did see his face however and remember that he was one of the cadets you trained with back when you where still training to be a ranger, John Doe.

A few towns up ahead you meet the cadet rapist again, it's midnight and this time he is just wandering the streets and spots you too late, you end up chasing him for the next (2 hours of in-game time?) You choose how to make this exciting xD)

The next day you wake up and when you reach the town square there is a lynching. To your surprise it is the rapist. He is being charged with the murder of his wife Jane Doe who was murdered last night around midnight. You remember you where chasing him during that time, which means it couldn't be him. John Doe is crying about the loss of his wife, screaming that he didn't do it, and obviously in very much pain. What do you do? (Maybe have one of the party members note the fact that you chased him during that time).

Mission 3:

When trying out a new gun on the gun range one of your bullets ricochets of a wall and you accidentally shoot the wife of one of the townsmen in the face. A kid, who picked up a gun from the stall when no one was looking, accidentally dropped said gun and it went off. He picks the gun back up and just as he's holding the gun properly people notice him aiming in the direction of the woman who was just shot in the face. When investigated a bullet seems to be missing from the chamber of the boys gun. Fortunately for the boy he is 13 years of age and the rules clearly state that the penalty of murder for a person below the age of 18 is 10 years in jail, whether it being an accident or not. However the penalty for someone over the age of 18 is death. What will you do?

With Kind Regards,
Dkay

P.S. If needed I'd gladly help researching and writing for such a system btw. Just p.m. me.

[lostmyoldnick]

Not really a mission idea, just some random thoughts. you could sacrifice a team member at some point, maybe have one die at the worst possible time. break the assumed cycle of feeling "hey, i have 5 tough nuts and just go from one point to the next shooting cockroaches", i think nothing should be taken for granted. break the usual game habits which are so common and trivial in today's games ( e.g. scripted events ). anything that's unexpected or unpredictable makes the player unsure about what is going on, so he has to be way more careful and alert to what he does. have some rock fall on him or whatever, the more bad surprises the better, it keeps the whole thing fresh. put some randomly generated surprises in there, the game's replay factor should not be neglected ( ok, maybe not a rock ). also, some trashy dialogue is always nice ( 4 machos and a girl? perfect mix for some hilarious shit ), just my 5c

[asafe]

I don't have a specific mission in mind since I kind of tend to get my inspiration from the story and setting and I don't have much background on Wasteland 2 to contribute in that manner.
But what I did notice all over the forum and it's the thing that always bugs me while playing games is "Choice"!

I think 'Wasteland' & 'Fallout' gave you some pretty interesting choices but I really think we can and need to expand on that.
Every situation should have (as is often the case in life) more than one solution and it should take into consideration your character's choices up until that point.

What the hell am I talking about?
Well, imagine you arrive at the a mysterious cave. you hear voices inside and proceed to explore it.
Being a survivalist and a realist you know not to stroll into the cave and shout "Hello?! Anybody home?" and decide to go in quietly.
Cave is narrow and long with a few branches into dark and what seems like lifeless caverns.
When you reach the end of the tunnel it opens up into a big rounded room who seems different from the rest of the cave, this is actually a room and not just more "cave".
At the center you see a group of robed individuals conversing in quiet voices, you are not sure about the language and can't make much details from your position at the opening, concealed by the shadows you watch...

Now we are getting some where!
We got what I hope is an interesting setup into an encounter, at this point you are faced with a few choices:
1. Stroll out and announce your presence in a non threating or alarming way
2. Watch, I like to watch sometimes.
3. Silently attack, never knew what hit `em.
4. Just F*ing attack, I don't care! I'm rambo!
5. Back out of the cave

We still have no idea what's going on but we should be able to decide what to do at this point.
Why this point? Well, because I designed this encounter and I'd like to know what you would do in this situation with so much little info! (obviously when role-playing wasteland you might feel different when approaching an encounter based on your playing experience up to that point.)

In my mind any of the choices above has a flow chart to them that will take us to the next level of this encounter, EVEN number (5).
Image you decide to back out, at this point I can decide you made a noise and are discovered (which will be silly) or that you encounter something on your way out that might lead to more choices or just let you back out and allow you to return at a different time to discover a different scene.

What I loved and hated about fallout is that it always made me imagine "what if...", there were so many options I just didn't get to play because the game had this 3 more or less options for everything.
I'd love to have more options! I'd love to demand certain things as rewards instead of just saying "thank you" or "no reward is necessary".
I know it might not be easy to implement but mostly it will just involve more writing in order to give us more choice.

I hope the game will be rich in story and choices.
I'm curious and always found my self wondering at even some of the pure graphical locations of fallout or wasteland and wanted to know more about them, I hope the game will allow to explore it in-game in-character instead of just reading everything I can about later on to make for the gap. (well mostly, I'm trying to be realistic )

[simplycorrect]

The Wasteland Comic Strip

There is a man in the Wasteland who draws dark humor comic strips... about the Wasteland. The strip is reproduced in other towns by artists there so many can enjoy them. As a result, the strip is extremely popular. When he meets the Rangers he has writers block and asks if they have had any adventures he could use for material.

Whenever the Rangers complete a major quest, they can tell the artist about it. He always thinks the stories are hilarious, regardless of how tragic the outcomes of some missions might be. He then quickly gets to work and produces a 'dark humor' comic strip related to the mission that was just completed. The party is provided with a physical copy of the strip, signed by the artist with a little personal note for each one.

The artist also provides sketches for monsters in the Rangers journal in return for the stories to base his material from.

There could be side quests related to the artist:

Scenario #1 - A Wasteland comic strip fan will not stop pestering the artist. The Rangers must figure out some solution to the problem - they can intimidate him but all that does is make him even more annoying than before because now he hates the artist and wont shut up about it. Killing the man is an increasingly attractive option as all other solutions fail in hilarious ways.

Scenario #2 - The artist knows of a dangerous place where there are better materials to use for the comic strip. If the Rangers can return them to him, the strips will have better quality colour.

Scenario #3 - Someone has stolen the artists materials. Who would do such a thing? Everyone loves the Wasteland comic strip. The Rangers follow a series of clues which leads them into an ambush. Someone who wants the Rangers dead used the artists materials to try and assassinate them.

Scenario #4 - The same group from the previous scenario kidnaps the artist when their initial plot fails. Rescuing the beloved artist draws the group deep into the enemies domain and a direct faceoff against their shadowy adversary.

Scenario #5 - Eventually word gets around that the Rangers have a set of special original strips on them. This precipitates a series of encounters in which collectors employ various tactics to try and acquire them. They can be sold, stolen or otherwise lost, but can also be given to the fan from Scenario #1, who happily diverts all the Wasteland comic strip attention away, solving both scenarios.

If the artwork was simple enough something like a rage face maker could be included in the developer toolset so new strips could be made for mods.

[1FSTCAT]

Building off of this idea.. Other games let you pick perks when you level up. With something like this, you could gain perks with the completion of each mission, or specific missions. Not only will the end game movie be based how you completed missions, but your character and the gameplay would directly be affected by that as well.

People don't generally choose less desirable perks, but attaining them after royally screwing up a mission could be interesting.

Not terribly original, but I was thinking something along lines of the concept used in A Clockwork Orange.

The Rangers come across a location where someone is experimenting on bandits, outlaws and other scum of the wastes where the treatment repulses them from performing any kind of violent act, curing them of their perceived evil nature, but at the same time making them unable to defend themselves from the dangers of the wasteland potentially becoming victims from the same people they used to be.

Someone approaches your group asking them to help stop these experiments claiming that they know how to reverse the procedure. Not getting involved could run the risk of someone the group knows (an old friend, influential figure etc) becoming a test subject themselves, while putting a stop to it could see one of the "patients" reverting to their old ways and becoming a major threat elsewhere.

Of course this could also include a ruse by the person asking for help so they can move ahead with their own agenda.

[1FSTCAT]

It could be interesting if, as a Ranger, you had the power to arrest criminals, instead of just killing them. Then you could perpetuate your own series as you constantly deal with the same villains who manage to evade justice time and time again.

Then you could include mechanics like the judge or the jury or what-have you. You could decide whether to have the death penalty or not, etc. etc.

It would give you more stuff to build in your base, if you decide to go with base building.

[tuluse]

It could be interesting if, as a Ranger, you had the power to arrest criminals, instead of just killing them. Then you could perpetuate your own series as you constantly deal with the same villains who manage to evade justice time and time again.

Then you could include mechanics like the judge or the jury or what-have you. You could decide whether to have the death penalty or not, etc. etc.

It would give you more stuff to build in your base, if you decide to go with base building.

This sounds like a really cool RPG, but I'm not sure it's Wasteland.

Also, this sounds like a concept for an entire game, not a single mission

[scampbell124]

Maybe a mission regarding your dog?
I'm thinking a scenario where you come across a random encounter at some point during the story where you find a large wild dog surrounded and fighting off some large beasts/wastelanders. After helping the wild dog out, you discover that the dog was a mother protecting her litter of pups in a nearby cave/cavern (five or so pups?). The mother appreciatively wags her tail, barks, and then runs off with her family into the wild.
Later in the game when the pups have grown, you cross paths with the dogs again. They are snarling and ready to fight. Suddenly, one or all of the dogs pick up your scent and they recognize you. There could be a situation where one of the dogs remembers you and wants to stay with his/her new pack. I'd like a set up where you could choose from the dogs who each has their own special benefit. (i.e.-- scent for finding things, fighting skills, additional storage--pack mule--, better hearing to avoid encounters, comic relief, trap finder, etc.)

[scampbell124]

I also like how the old school turn based RPGs would bring back characters you met during the story to help you later in the game. It'd be cool to have a series of battles at the end of the story to reach the end. In one or some of these battles, you'd be fighting some really strong or monsterous thing or character and getting your ass kicked all over the place. (The end has to have a great challenge, right?) What if some of these characters (if you've befriended them) could come back during a certain battle (or battles) to help out or sacrifice themselves --while not necessarily being part of your controlled team?

[crossfirex]

I would want missions that include a lot of "bounty hunting" whether hunting people, monsters or objects, it seems that there'd be a lot of that going on in this sort of setting. Not to mention crime, or guns for hire. It just seems like that would have a strong feel in this sort of game.

[AWAC]

Arizona is where this game should take place and California thats Fallout Territory. You already have four games that take place there. I like the new music also

[pid]

Resources are scarce, but this doesn't mean there aren't any.

Imagine a small group (some "conclave") with many resources and a large group ("crowd") that hasn't enough to survive and you in the middle of those two parties. The conclave wants to corrupt you to do their interests, the crowd asks you to defend their moral right for suvival and have some spare resources (food, water, medicine, books/knowledge, whatever).

What is more important to the player?
A: Having more resources (the stuff he has been corrupted with), or
B: being a benefactor to many people?

The consequences of option A:
- SHORT-TERM: more ammunition, food, water, medicine IMMEDIATELY;
- no more resources from the conclave later on (it's a one-time thing);
- access to the conclave-questline, leading to the crowd's demise;
- no access to the crowd-questline;
- in the end, the conclave will get what it wants and ban the player (he will not be seen as a hero but an outcast);
- single survivors of the crowd may show-up later to take revenge;
- LONG-TERM: no access to the crowd-services.

The consequences of option B:
- SHORT-TERM: no resources from the conclave, not now not later;
- no access to the conclave-questline;
- access to the crowd-questline, leading to the conclave's demise;
- in the end, the crowd will cherish the player (he will be seen as a hero);
- single survivors of the conclave may show-up later to take revenge;
- LONG-TERM: access to the crowd-services.

Those crowd-services could be:
- a doctor that can heal group members;
- a library with lore-books the player may read;
- farmers gifting some produce from time to time.

Thinking about it, those "crowd-services" could also be found in the conclave.
Furthermore, the player will miss out on the alternative questline, whatever he chooses.

Those two concerns have brought me to this idea:
- ONE inital quesline, at the end the player has to decide for the conclave or the crowd;
- whatever the player chooses, there will be some crazy "revenge" killers chasing the player later on;
- whatever the player chooses, there will be immediated resources (but of different kind);
- whatever the player chooses, there will be long-term "services" (but of different kind);
- whatever the player chooses, one faction will call him a hero, the other an outcast to kill.

This means the benefits/consequences will be balanced between the choices, it is just a matter of taste or preference.
The absence of imbalance means that there is no "right" way to choose.
This also means there is no real "dilemma".

So, to spice this up, we introduce a final concept that is "dilemma":
- whatever the player chooses, he will have to sacrifice something important.

To "sacrifice" something could be a group member... but this seems a bit too harsh to me.
Maybe both parties should give the player a gimmick that is very cool, but in the end the player has to sacrifice one of the two, and this decision is bound to all the above.

I wrote the whole "reasoning" because the simple conclusion doesn't explain why there should be just one questline and a choice that is a matter of taste and not a "right/wrong" decision.

[pid]

I've just re-read my own post and came up with something different:

The two parties don't give an item (gimmick) to the player but "force" a member upon the group. This is, both parties do it at the same time. The player has then to play that single questline (which is double the size) and see how those two behave (more about that later). In the end, the player will decide for one of the two parties and consequently be left with one group member (the other will be dead/unavailable). The chosen group member will also leave the party (contrary to the player's expectancy) but "survive". The player may return to that dude and access his services. During the questline the dudes will have their way to show their feats, the player will not be able to contrl them fully, they keep their autonomy. The two will spice things up by expressing contrary opinions and aggroing each other verbally. During those exchanges of words the player will have a way to understand/know better both parties and get a hint on what to expect. Neither party should be totally good/bad, but they should simply be not comparable because fundamentally different.

Example parties and dudes:
- farmers/engineers;
- farmer gives produce and water/engineers give salvageables.

- doctors/soldiers;
- doctors give hospital service/soldiers give ammo.

- clerics/scientists;
- clerics buff some attribute/scientists buff another attribute.

- rich people/poor people;
- rich give teleportation service (instant fixed destinations)/poor give bio-oil that can be turned into fuel for car (any destination but slower travel than teleportation).

- mine workers/history researchers;
- workers give valuable ore/historians give valuable books.

[crossfirex]

Arizona is where this game should take place and California thats Fallout Territory. You already have four games that take place there. I like the new music also

I think it should take place in more than one state. I mean.. it just gets boring when you only get to explore one type of terrain. There should be cities and forests and all that, as well as desert. And the current concept art has a lot of good scenes in a "forest city", as well as a few with a "desert" feel.

[Drool]

Arizona is where this game should take place and California thats Fallout Territory. You already have four games that take place there. I like the new music also

Four? 1 and 2 are in California. Isn't Tactics in the midwest? 3 was in DC and New Vegas was in Nevada.

I guess Brotherhood of Steel is in California, but who the hell counts that?

[pid]

Style the text/quests/missions in a way that it is a valuable story.
Avoid idioms and stereotypes, write the quests as if it were a book, with a good story to tell.
Take the guidlines to write a novel and apply them to those quest texts.

What I dislike in books is the kind of uninspired stories where you get the impression you're reading a newspaper or a sports blurb. Good books have drama and they are based on what people think and do in difficult or extreme situations. Often, boundaries are blurred between good and bad and characters are fleshed out (see Stephen King, who is a master in fleshing out characters in one or two pages).

What I'd like to see are missions where NPC characters capture your attention and you tag along to "live" their story through your party. It would be interesting to see:
- the underdog of a group growing in confidence and overwhelming the overdog, leading to a better (or worse) future for the group;
- a character making choices, survivng a harsh experience, doubting his choices and finally undoing them to make new choices different then those before the change (again, for the better or the worse);
- a character not living up to expectations, needing help to lift-off and then grow beyond expectations, because "it was already in him, he only needed to gain consciousness of it" (good/evil, works both ways);
- two characters in contraposition ruining the future of a group of people because their personal interests take priority, entering a third overwhelming party risking survival of the group, the two characters putting their interests aside because they are not really different, but the third party is far more different, and joining forces to rebuke the third party, finally learning that together they are stronger (think about USA-CCCP cold war, both thinking the other is "so different" and then an alien invasion happens, USA and CCCP realise they have more in common then they thought (earth and being human) and the true "different party" are those aliens);
- other NPCs (from more then one place, to enforce the concept) telling stories about an NPC protagonist being courageous, good, smart, whatever -- later on you encounter him by chance and don't see all that courage/strength etc. -- he accompanies the party in a mission and you wonder "what makes him so special, there's nothing at all" and suddenly the mission goes south and total disaster is striking, the party is "paralyzed" and incapable to do anything but that NPC hero turns angry and takes out the ba**s (much like Bruce Willis would) and all alone takes the situation under control sacrificing himself -- that's why people were talking about him and you got the privilege to know his human side and now you know that all the other stories are probably true;
- find hints in myths and legends about powerful items, build up expectations and after a while (not immediately, it has to be "cooked" very slowly) THROW that item at the player, giving him a one-time chance to wield true legendary power and exceed expectations (the legends didn't tell the full story, they were even underrated) -- then remove it from him for game-balance reasons, but first let him have a good time with it;
- let the player "know" (read in books/told by NPCs/experience in cutscenes) how awful pestilence (Black Death anyone?) is, let him get concerned... a lot... then infect him (again, first "tell" him, get expectations up, then let him live it) but, obviously, give him a way to get rid of it and survive (high-tec antibiotics in a secret medical bunker?)... the point is while he'd infected he has to "feel it", based on the prior build-up;
- let a group (citizens of a small town) talk trash about a neighbouring town, telling stories about skirmishes and giving the player reason to hate those, then lead him in that other town and see how they do the same ("look at both sides of the story"), let the player stir up or calm down the waters and then let the story go the opposite way (if he stirs up => they become good neighbours, if he tries to calm down the parties => they nuke each other), all this meaning that you can't always decide everything and some things have to get out of your hands, deal with it.

That's just for starters. The story aspect is as powerful as human literature so there's practically no limit to it.
I'd rather have interesting situations like these instead of "kill 10 rats" missions.

[pid]

New idea: at some point you hear about a party that takes missions on and roams the wasteland.

The player should wonder who those guys are, because the stories sound so familiar (they are the quests YOU already did).
Later on, the player encounters that group and... with a mechanic/algorithm make it look just similar to your own, with similar outfit, similar names, similar everything, they're just... different (kids, aliens, mutants, elderly women, koreans, whatever).

By talking to them the player realizes that they are ***NOT*** impostors, but a legit party that just happens to be similar to your own. Just for the laughs, show the player how silly his party would look like if he could look at himself through a kind of "distorted mirror".

This idea comes from an initial scene in Spaceballs, where "stunt doubles" are captured instead of the real party:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwV61t_Tec8

[crossfirex]

Arizona is where this game should take place and California thats Fallout Territory. You already have four games that take place there. I like the new music also

Four? 1 and 2 are in California. Isn't Tactics in the midwest? 3 was in DC and New Vegas was in Nevada.

I guess Brotherhood of Steel is in California, but who the hell counts that?

Lulz, Brotherhood of Steel.