Fallout series

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:disagree: Doubt, most the robots are not capable of anything beyond rudimentary duties, either as security (eye-bot, sentry bot, turrets ) where they are still limited strictly by their IFF and can be reprogrammed or basic manual labor ( mr. Handy ), the only instances of AIs that are capable of actual intelligence are ZAX and Skynet, both of them are supercomputers, and latter one is optionally uploaded into a robobrain, which technically makes him a cyborg, since his capabilities are tied directly to the quality of brain material provided.
Idk ED-E is pretty human like in its thoughts and actions for a security eye not 🤔 🤔 🤔
 
You're making a lot of assumptions now about what the death of the President entails. If Kimball being killed leads to some rich NCR senator declaring himself Emperor of California and toppling the corrupt state I would call that an interesting and logical progression. But the rich class of California serving the nation to Caesar on a platter makes no sense. They're among the people with the most to lose if Caesar wins.
Not really. Caesar would more than likely allow them to retain their wealth, especially since he did discuss with the Courier his plans to create a synthesis between the Legion and the NCR. That, and these same rich folks could probably expand their enterprises to the east, without having to pay for protection, since the Legion already chased away all the raiders and the monsters. Traders from Arizona find good business with the Legion, and the corrupt senators and brahmin barons would probably do only what makes money for them. Spending all their resources to save the NCR isn't it. But taking advantage of the Legion protecting trade routes would be on the platter.

Also Lanius is not going to automatically make the rest of the Legion submit to him. In fact that's why you can persuade him to leave the Mojave. To stop wasting men fighting the NCR and instead march back to Legion territory to crush any would be pretenders. Which was the same reason why the Mongols left eastern europe and the levant when Genghis Khan died
You do realize that's just the Courier bullshitting, right? The Legion soldiers are all in awe of Lanius and are too scared to fight against him. The only person with reservations towards him is Vulpes, but he dare not say it out loud for fear of getting beaten to death. Also, you have your history wrong. The Mongols were about to pancake the HRE when Ogodei Khan died and that led to them retreating.
 
You do realize it is fun for people to play as a mustache-twirling bad guy, right? Part of the fun of playing evil characters is just being that merciless son of a bitch who kills people at the drop of a hat.
I mean, yeah, my thing is more about the writing than anything. Bastard Lone isn't a very good villain. Some games made a well written villain that was also fun to play and rewarding. I'm not claiming that being a thoroughly unreasonable, borderline insane villain categorically isn't fun. I'm just saying it doesn't make much sense to act that way.

It's telling that his ultimate mission is either "Assist on Dad's water purifier anyway, probably sulk and pout while doing it" or "Spike the water purifier with FEV that'll kill literally anyone who drinks water, including Lone."

I'm not saying being a piece of shit slaver isn't fun (In Minecraft) but I am saying that being a piece of shit slaver should probably have some better buildup than "Daddy left me and I am sad." Fuck, I dunno, maybe just some better outcomes. In the day you had stuff like Cole MacGrath being an all-powerful piece of shit, but Bastard Lone just kinda sucks as a villain.

I guess they just really weren't trying to implement a moral system with real impact outside of roleplay and fun purposes, which would be entirely on brand. Nothing like Red Dead 2 where you kinda wanna try to be good but it's really hard to do so. Everyone around you is such a fucking dick, and Arthur could just wreck their shit in a heartbeat. Might as well do so.
No shit. Both sides get a karma follower, it's just that yes, being good means the world will reward you for it, while being a son of a bitch means that people will go after you just for being a son of a bitch.
All three sides get a karma follower, Jericho's pretty good early on, Fawkes is crazy good in the end. RL-3 has a lot of issues but he can hang, mostly middle of the road. The world doesn't straight up reward you for being good outside of maybe a warm fuzzy feeling, either. Far as I remember at least. Turn on the water purifier and die, buddy. It Is YoUr DeStInY. No, you fucker, you go in there, you're a super mutant/ghoul/robot. You're gonna be okay. I'm not! Being self sacrificial is only a good thing to do when there is legitimately no other option.

Fawkes is great and he's a massive crutch if your build isn't amazing but to be honest Lone's such a fucking invincible manmode tank that you hardly need the guy. He IS nice to have. And the world doesn't go after you for being a bastard either, I mean sure, regulators, but that applies to positive karma as well with Talon Company, and Talon Company's even worse.

In general I felt the karma system had very little impact outside of "Get follower." I'm not against the game having it, even if it was very minimal impact. It was all the rage at the time. Much like it mostly did nothing for the game, it really also did no harm.
Because some people derive fun and pleasure out of it. Like how some people who play New Vegas derive pleasure from being cannibals. There's no sense in it, no real reward; hell, your character will probably get sick from doing it, but the option's there anyways.
Fair. It's really the only reason. Cannibal in New Vegas, though, is pretty damn good with Dine and Dash. Human remains are light and a very respectable heal. Human enemies are plentiful and each of those is pretty much a full heal. Stuff's valuable in Hardcore. There's also Meat of Champions, even though that's kinda meh.

Then again, you know, Cannibal's a perk, morality I'm pretty sure was shoveled in because every game had a morality system, and Fallout 4 did away with it entirely.
Yeah there is. It's fucking hilarious. My last run of F3 was as an evil character and it was a blast.
Granted, it can be fun. Pretty much already responded to basically this so no need to reiterate. It's about why it would make sense in universe to act this way. Out of universe, yeah, it's fun. I go on rampages in GTA as well. As a player fucking up the game world is one of the most fun things. In that sense, it gives the player a lot of liberty to be a piece of shit.
People say they represent 8 million different things. The truth is they don't represent anything at all.
Agree to disagree here. There's clear intent on the writer's part to present an adapted in-game character. Coop does drugs to boost his power, Maximus only really grasps the very basics of power armor because he's lacking the perk to wear it, Lucy talks about her tagged skills and goes around doing speech checks. They are also adapting some game mechanics, like criticals. Everyone's free to think what they like, though.
 
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I'm just saying it doesn't make much sense to act that way.
Half the shit in evil playthroughs on most games don't make sense. They're just there for TEH LULZ.

It's telling that his ultimate mission is either "Assist on Dad's water purifier anyway, probably sulk and pout while doing it" or "Spike the water purfier with FEV that'll kill literally anyone who drinks water, including Lone."
Well, you can choose to be an evil son of a bitch and NOT poison the water. I mean, you do have that freedom.

Fair. It's really the only reason. Cannibal in New Vegas, though, is pretty damn good with Dine and Dash. Human remains are light and a very respectable heal. Human enemies are plentiful and each of those is pretty much a full heal. Stuff's valuable in Hardcore. There's also Meat of Champions, even though that's kinda meh.
But again, realistically, your character would fall sick and die from eating so much human flesh out in the wild, where there's probably even more contamination.
 
Has anyone played the hoi4 fallout mod as NCR. How do I prevent the vote deadlock, I've tried this shit like 4 times. Am I retarded?

I spam all the options use all my money and political power, but every time the ai rigs the election at the last second causing it to deadlock and start the civil war chain.
 
Not really. Caesar would more than likely allow them to retain their wealth, especially since he did discuss with the Courier his plans to create a synthesis between the Legion and the NCR. That, and these same rich folks could probably expand their enterprises to the east, without having to pay for protection, since the Legion already chased away all the raiders and the monsters. Traders from Arizona find good business with the Legion, and the corrupt senators and brahmin barons would probably do only what makes money for them. Spending all their resources to save the NCR isn't it. But taking advantage of the Legion protecting trade routes would be on the platter.


You do realize that's just the Courier bullshitting, right? The Legion soldiers are all in awe of Lanius and are too scared to fight against him. The only person with reservations towards him is Vulpes, but he dare not say it out loud for fear of getting beaten to death. Also, you have your history wrong. The Mongols were about to pancake the HRE when Ogodei Khan died and that led to them retreating.
Turning over the NCR to the Legion makes no sense moneywise. The Legion doesn't exactly present itself as a center of commerce. Do you also think it was logical for Vault Tec to nuke the world to increase their profit margins perchance? I also doubt Caesar's vision for Rome involves keeping a bunch of backstabbing and corrupt Junkers in power. Exactly how often in history has the nobility in a nation welcomed a barbarian invasion force into their lands?
Also you call it bullshitting, I call it historical precedence. I might have gotten the wrong Khan, but point was as soon as the leader is dead everyone will scramble back home to fight for the heartlands. It happened constantly during the Roman Empire for example. Lanius doesn't even want the NCR, that's Caesar. Who without the courier will be dead. With Caesar gone Lanius has no actual motivation to waste his legion fighting the NCR while people like Vulpes can seize power back home. Lanius only has the allegiance of his immediate legion, which he would squander trying to pacify the west.
 
The issue with the NCR in New Vegas is pretty obvious. Who do they send to get to work for them? Some fucking trooper. Caesar sends one of his TOP GUYS and asked you to be his TOP GUY in New Vegas. The Legion actually is better at intel gathering, there is less politics in command. Everyone fighting understands why they want to take Vegas, there are resources and it’s a a tangible border for them with the Colorado.

The NCR butts heads. They can’t feign a united front even amongst people who’ve been serving in the region for a decade. The Legion can mostly depend on each other (I think Vulpes gets the fuck out of dodge if Lanius takes over). Crocker gets undermined by Moore. Hsu can’t do dick. Hanlon and the Rangers are effectively being hamstrung by Oliver, Kimbel, and others.
 
The issue with the NCR in New Vegas is pretty obvious. Who do they send to get to work for them? Some fucking trooper. Caesar sends one of his TOP GUYS and asked you to be his TOP GUY in New Vegas. The Legion actually is better at intel gathering, there is less politics in command. Everyone fighting understands why they want to take Vegas, there are resources and it’s a a tangible border for them with the Colorado.

The NCR butts heads. They can’t feign a united front even amongst people who’ve been serving in the region for a decade. The Legion can mostly depend on each other (I think Vulpes gets the fuck out of dodge if Lanius takes over). Crocker gets undermined by Moore. Hsu can’t do dick. Hanlon and the Rangers are effectively being hamstrung by Oliver, Kimbel, and others.
I think Caesar said it better than anybody.

"The NCR has all of the problems of the ancient Roman Republic - extreme bureaucracy, corruption, extensive senatorial infighting."

The NCR is weakened from within, they don't have long-term planning on any of the operations they do in the Mojave. Oliver and Kimball, only threw the money and wait for the problem to fix itself somehow. Many people like to think at them as the true saviors of the Mojave and there will live happily ever after, but with the extreme corruption they have in the higher ups, they'll only weak themselves over time. And the decent people in the NCR like Chief Hanlon, Hsu and Crocker will only get screwed again and again.

The fact that they were still fighting with all of those problems against people as ruthless as the Legion is a miracle.
 
Half the shit in evil playthroughs on most games don't make sense. They're just there for TEH LULZ.
Pretty much. Some games worked it in a more impactful way, is all. I don't know if it would have been better for Fallout 3.
Well, you can choose to be an evil son of a bitch and NOT poison the water. I mean, you do have that freedom.
Bastard Lone swept his bangs off his eyes to look up from his slouch at Colonel Autumn. "Fuck you." He said coldly. Colonel Autumn was so shocked by Bastard Lone's badassitude that he left then and there. Bastard Lone look at Sarah and said "U look cute bby." They frenched. Hard and fast. Lone cracked his knuckles and smiled warmly at Sarah. "It's time for me to one up my loser dad." Taking one last look at his doggo Dogmeat, clad in his black doggo Breaking Benjamin T-shirt, he took a little break to tighten his black Converse shoelaces, so as to not trip and look like a fucking mong, he walked into the water Purifier. He took one cigarrete out of the pocket of his black leather vault jumpsuit and smoked it. His black nail polish was ruined because of all the badass fighting he had recently done.

He blasted his favorite song on his Pipboy, loud. I never told you what I do for a living by My Chemical Romance. Man, he was born in the wrong post-war century for sure. As he punched in the code for the purifier, he grinned happily. "Fuck you, dad." He muttered under his breath. "I'm better than you. Or whatever. Nothing really matters. But I am become the ubermensch. I lived for myself, free of rules."

Then he got 600 Karma for doing this instead of sending Sarah or a follower in and he immediately ceased to be Bastard Lone, mutating into Wonderbread Lone, or even just Jesus Lone straight up. When he woke up in Broken Steel he had to grind some more bad karma by shooting random wastelanders with his Junk Jet, which he used to fire skulls almost exclusively.

See, that's the thing, to be Evil your character has to not be self involved, selfish, lazy or whatever else could actually make a person evil: He's just gotta be consistently stupid. When a character's decisions consistently fuck over everyone involved including himself, you can't so much really call them evil. It's the classic Stupid Evil allignment.

To make matters worse, I'm pretty sure at this point he knows he's a wastelander so poisoning the water is just a really fucking weird and indirect way to kill yourself and take all of the Wasteland with you, which I suppose is on brand for how destructive and dumb Bastard Lone can be, but like, just, fuck. It is a natural stopping point to no longer be Nonsensical Bastard Lone at least.
But again, realistically, your character would fall sick and die from eating so much human flesh out in the wild, where there's probably even more contamination.
I see the point, I personally chalk it up to stimpaks being black magic and Courier being a bullshit lobotomite super cyborg with a Sandevistan. Plus you know, acceptable breaks from reality. Getting radiation poisoned and slowly dying as your organs melt into slurry with nothing you can do about any of it wouldn't make for a great videogame :lol:

EDIT: Fucked up between revisions.
 
Fallout has three RPG games. 1, 2, and New Vegas. Everything else is basically a different genre. Usually involving shooting and looting. With superficial at best or nearly zero at worst actual RPG mechanics. If Fallout 5 is anything like 76 then expect things like multiplayer, zero lore consistency, extreme emphasis on shooter based combat, and almost no dialog or story beyond "find enemies and shoot them for their loot".

Most likely we have already seen the future of the Fallout franchise. In Starfield and Fallout 76. So if you didn't like those games you are not going to like anything from Fallout moving forward. Either play the old games or get invested in Wasteland Warfare for the tabletop.

Just accept that Fallout is dead and appreciate New Vegas, Fo1/2 for what they are.
 
I think Caesar said it better than anybody.

"The NCR has all of the problems of the ancient Roman Republic - extreme bureaucracy, corruption, extensive senatorial infighting."

The NCR is weakened from within, they don't have long-term planning on any of the operations they do in the Mojave. Oliver and Kimball, only threw the money and wait for the problem to fix itself somehow. Many people like to think at them as the true saviors of the Mojave and there will live happily ever after, but with the extreme corruption they have in the higher ups, they'll only weak themselves over time. And the decent people in the NCR like Chief Hanlon, Hsu and Crocker will only get screwed again and again.

The fact that they were still fighting with all of those problems against people as ruthless as the Legion is a miracle.
It’s more the issue that competent people are effectively being punished in the NCR. There’s petty rivalries going on for no reason. Hanlon’s the only person who see’s the Legion as an existential threat on their borders that they haven’t secured. Hanlon’s choices in the game are awful, but he’s going off of fear. The NCR never has fought an enemy that wasn’t in decline or just jumped up gangs. The Legion does have manufacturing and recruits. They have tactics and adapt to the NCR faster than the NCR reacts to them.

The terror attacks the Legion carry out in-game typically aren’t just “you aren’t safe” attacks. They always undermine the NCR. The monorail ensures they can’t easily transport troops into the Strip for both presence and R&R. The Gas attack lets the New Vegas residents fell that the NCR is impotent. The Ranger Station attack and kidnapping is using rape as a threat and a weapon beyond slaughtering a bunch of rangers.
 
fallout 3.png

Feels good to be king of the wasteland.
 
It’s more the issue that competent people are effectively being punished in the NCR. There’s petty rivalries going on for no reason. Hanlon’s the only person who see’s the Legion as an existential threat on their borders that they haven’t secured. Hanlon’s choices in the game are awful, but he’s going off of fear. The NCR never has fought an enemy that wasn’t in decline or just jumped up gangs. The Legion does have manufacturing and recruits. They have tactics and adapt to the NCR faster than the NCR reacts to them.

The terror attacks the Legion carry out in-game typically aren’t just “you aren’t safe” attacks. They always undermine the NCR. The monorail ensures they can’t easily transport troops into the Strip for both presence and R&R. The Gas attack lets the New Vegas residents fell that the NCR is impotent. The Ranger Station attack and kidnapping is using rape as a threat and a weapon beyond slaughtering a bunch of rangers.
Legion Supremacy baby.
 
Turning over the NCR to the Legion makes no sense moneywise. The Legion doesn't exactly present itself as a center of commerce. Do you also think it was logical for Vault Tec to nuke the world to increase their profit margins perchance?
Actually, traders from Arizona make good money because the Legion provides protection for them. Brahmin Barons would be able to sell their meat to a brand new market in Legion lands, and they won't even have to pay anything for protection since the Legion pays for it. And the caravan families would obviously support a sovereign who protects trade interests, makes their job of trading a lot easier when the Legion watches their back. With both the brahmin barons and caravan families benefitting from Legion control, they would more than likely persuade the NCR senators to accept a surrender. Especially since they stand to gain so much from it.

As for Lanius, he's an army man, he'll have more than a use for caravan families and brahmin barons to ensure supply transportation and food for his army, once it swells to a larger size after conquering the Mojave, so he'd also have a place for them in his Legion.

I also doubt Caesar's vision for Rome involves keeping a bunch of backstabbing and corrupt Junkers in power.
Yes, Caesar knows well of the corruption within the NCR. And using that to his benefit wouldn't be new for him at all. He already does the same thing with the White-Gloves if you sign on with him.

Exactly how often in history has the nobility in a nation welcomed a barbarian invasion force into their lands?
A lot of times. The original Rome welcomed barbarians and made them the soldiers after the Crisis of the Third Century made Roman Citizens suspicious of joining the army. Then later, the aristocracy of the Byzantine Empire, the so-called ''Second Rome'', dismantled their own citizen-army that answered to Basil II after said Emperor died, and replaced them with more barbarian mercenaries from the Latin West and the Muslim East, mercenaries that the Imperial bureaucracy can hire or fire at will.

Also you call it bullshitting, I call it historical precedence.
It was not historical precedence. None of the Legates or Centurions wish to challenge Lanius because he scares the shit out of them. He already does when Caesar was around, once he dies from his brain tumor, they'll be doubly-scared of him because their men won't support them if they went against Lanius; the myth of Lanius is stronger than the actual man. Caesar programmed his Legion to fear this man and obey him without question. That won't change even after the man dies.

So yes, it is bullshit, since nothing in FNV indicates that Legion officers will rebel against Lanius if he's in control. Hell, it's more likely that they will rebel against him if he LOSES in Hoover Dam, since his myth of invincibility would be shattered by his cowardly retreat. Running away from a mailman, no less. How embarrassing.

Lore-wise, it makes no sense for Lanius to retreat from the Dam no matter what the Courier says. He should've been the Legion version of Frank Horrigan; ready to kill you no matter what, with your words going in one ear and out the other. General Oliver, Colonel Autumn, they're rational military men who can be talked into retreating. Lanius is a savage whose only desire is battle, and whose myth grows with every victory. He'd be the kind to risk everything in war instead of retreating, because if he does retreat, THEN the question of his strength and supremacy would start to emerge.

I might have gotten the wrong Khan, but point was as soon as the leader is dead everyone will scramble back home to fight for the heartlands. It happened constantly during the Roman Empire for example. Lanius doesn't even want the NCR, that's Caesar. Who without the courier will be dead. With Caesar gone Lanius has no actual motivation to waste his legion fighting the NCR while people like Vulpes can seize power back home. Lanius only has the allegiance of his immediate legion, which he would squander trying to pacify the west.
LOL, again, no. Caesar programmed his Legion to fear this man, and nobody in the Legion wishes to challenge Lanius. Even Vulpes is scared of the idea of Caesar dying, since his Frumentarii are in no position to stop Lanius' followers from cementing his hold on the Legion. Also, Lanius does want to conquer the NCR. He even says so at the end of the Legion campaign; he's hoping for the chance to conquer California itself, probably to cement his legend. The first Caesar founded the Legion and unified the tribes, the second Caesar conquered the hated NCR and brought order and civilization to the Mojave and California. Lanius wishes to be the Augustus to Edward Sallow's Caesar.

The issue with the NCR in New Vegas is pretty obvious. Who do they send to get to work for them? Some fucking trooper. Caesar sends one of his TOP GUYS and asked you to be his TOP GUY in New Vegas. The Legion actually is better at intel gathering, there is less politics in command. Everyone fighting understands why they want to take Vegas, there are resources and it’s a a tangible border for them with the Colorado.
My point exactly. The Legion functions like an actual military. The NCR is overwhelmed, overstretched, they have 9000 problems that they don't have the crew to solve, and they can't even guarantee that their victory would be permanent. Hell, the won the previous battle for Hoover Dam, and they've done nothing but suffer in the last 5 years. You'd think they'd consolidate their holdings and prepare for the next assault just fine, but that didn't happen.

The NCR butts heads. They can’t feign a united front even amongst people who’ve been serving in the region for a decade. The Legion can mostly depend on each other (I think Vulpes gets the fuck out of dodge if Lanius takes over). Crocker gets undermined by Moore. Hsu can’t do dick. Hanlon and the Rangers are effectively being hamstrung by Oliver, Kimbel, and others.
And from what I gather, the Senators and Brahmin Barons back in California are worse, plundering the state for all it's worth, forcing the best soldiers to guard their interests while the soldiers of the rabble get massacred by Roman weeaboos. Crocker is happy when you get the Brotherhood to sign on with them, Moore is furious. Meanwhile, their best tactician became a doomer because he thinks the war is lost.
 
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It's made pretty clear that losing the dam would likely cause a domino effect that would upend large parts of the NCR system. Even House banks on it, directing ire for losing the dam back to Kimball to cause internal strife while he tightens his grip over Vegas. It probably won't lead to a total collapse of the nation but it won't do them any favors.
Politically, mostly. The NCR has been on an expansionist kick for decades with Kimball being a prior veteran and proponent of that. But either way that's going to end, either after getting kicked out of New Vegas or simply at the Colorado itself. They don't have the means to push across the river into that desolate territory, not with what's left of the Legion doing a scorched earth campaign as they retreat, and the most likely desire from the people back home after hearing that the Dam has been secured is "Good. So, can we deal with the Brotherhood once and for all, finally?" There's no reason for them not to focus on affairs closer to home with the Nevada and Arizona deserts being an insurmountable obstacle for the time being, and further north runs you into the Oregon and Utah mountains which are almost as bad. The juice just won't be worth the squeeze anymore thanks to simple geography.
The fact that they were still fighting with all of those problems against people as ruthless as the Legion is a miracle.
As Caesar says, none of the Legion's cities are anything like New Vegas. And New Vegas, even with Freeside, isn't all that much. Compare it to something like Hub or Shady Sands that has been undergoing slow but steady urbanization before the Vault Dweller showed up, and drastically intensified following the Master's defeat. You can talk with someone who mentions there's more people than jobs unless you feel like shoveling Brahmin shit, and Jas Wilkins mentions there's plenty of work at mills and farms, so the NCR is definitely in the consolidation/industrialization stage of civilization. They've got the cash and the manpower to spare.

People really short-sell just how powerful the NCR is because they don't realize that their only real supply line into New Vegas, the I-15/Long 15, is one of the worst things you can traverse on foot. To get to New Vegas from NCR lands you've got at least one mountain pass several thousand feet above sea level followed by a dip into the southern end of Death Valley at Baker, California. Even with the food supply from the local sharecropper farms and water from Lake Mead easing things there greatly keeping the replacements coming and everyone supplied with ammo and medical supplies from back home is a monumental chore. And on top of that they've started to rebuild the old water and power lines that lead from New Vegas back into California, which would inevitably follow the same route.

Again: the NCR, both the government and private citizens, have the means to operate a massive caravan chain that goes all the way from Los Angeles, through Death Valley, and into New Vegas, and have enough private citizens showing up to keep House and the casinos in business. Keep in mind all of those Service Rifles and all that 5.56mm the NCR issues are built at home in the Gun Runner factories in the Boneyard, not salvage from the ruins of the Old World.
 
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