http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/06/17/e3-2015-fallout-4-director-discusses-companion-functionality-immortality

What a horrible video game Fallout 4 will be.

Obligatory.

https://www.change.org/p/bethesda-game-studios-todd-howard-get-rid-of-all-essential-npc-s-in-fallout-4

That's a fucking idiotic decision. Sure, sometimes I'd reload, but more often than not, when I'm in a... you know... roleplaying mood, I'd just accept it and continue on. Thanks for taking that roleplay opportunity away, Bethesda. FFS, WTF?

I guess the only silver lining is that their games are usually very moddable, so maybe this can be modded so that companions can die.

Wow, you're quick to pan a game simply because of one design choice you don't personally like. In my opinion, that's a good choice that they don't die. I think Todd Howard is right when he says "Okay, the dog can't die, because you're just going to re-load." I know I would. And I have a feeling I would have to re-load a lot. Would that be any more better? Absolutely not.

Having NPC's to not be killable gives you no sense of failure.

I typically reload when my player character dies, too. Maybe all playable game characters should be immortal.

So many good memories of stupid party members killing themselves in Fallout 1 by running into the military base force fields or taking on a group of super mutants. Removing that mortality means removing the need to play carefully to mitigate such a possibility. I suppose if they don't plan to put much thought into the intelligence of your companions then it could be a good thing that helps to reduce frustration, but ideally, companions would adapt to each situation and only be in danger when you make a stupid mistake. Making them immortal seems like a cop-out.

they are immoral ?

Perhaps, but the sense of failure stems from the fact that you, the player could die. Say you're fighting a group of Deathclaws and the dog rushes them head first, and gets instantly killed. You reload, and it does the same thing. Would that give you a sense of failure? Probably, but it would also drive you absolutely mad. That dog would have to stay home all the time after that.

Quest NPC's not being killable means no failure. Also all NPC's should be killable and you should suffer from the consequences.

Your companions die, tough luck suffer the loss and continue progressing doing the quests or reload a saved game.

I'm pretty sure mods to remove that will come out very soon after release. Nonetheless, isn't true, unless "immortal" means "they have no HP". As long as they can get uncapacitated in battle, that's your failure state right there - suddenly, you have to deal with your oppossition differently, and the game gets more difficult until the end of combat. But we'll see, I mean so far there had been no information on how is this going to be implemented.

In previous Bethesda games, if an NPC "died" (got incapacitated), they would get up with minimum health after the encounter was over. Then you either heal them, or wait for the next possible enemy to appear after which it only takes one blow for the NPC to get incapacitated again. I really don't think Howard meant "unable to be put down" by immortal because that would make no sense.

In FO3 I always used a mod to make them immortal. When their HP went 0 they where knocked out for quite a while. Was a nice offset to the occasional suicidal dumb KI.

Guess ppl will have mods for FO4 to do the opposite.

For only 2.99 $ at the Beth-Mod-Store :D

They should make it an option you can turn on or off.

The invincible super dogs. Can they fly and shoot laser beams out of their eyes as well?

It's Bethesda recognizing the failings in their AI. You genuinely can't expect them to program companions that don't suicide at the first opportunity. Their concession is that the companions won't die all the time and therefore make playing the game a complete pain in the ass.

Bethesda explained this decision by saying, "If your dog dies, the player will automatically reload anyway." But that's not necessarily true. When my dog died in Fallout 3, I felt guilty about not having done a better job of protecting it, but I didn't reload.