Couldn't the Master's Plan Still Work?

FlashBash64

FlashBash64

The High Roller
It seems like the master's plan could've worked despite super mutants not being able to reproduce. Couldn't they just have farmed humans for more offspring? It just seems strange to just give up simply because of one inconvience that has a workaround.

Just curious if I missed something in the game, or I'm just stupid.
 
Isn't the FEV limited in quantity and cannot be reproduced?

In that case once it ran out it would game over for Master.
 
Also, isn't your only source for intelligent super-mutants "people who grew up in vaults" which are also an extremely limited resource? People who grew up in the wasteland suffered radiation damage that lead to them becoming "dumb-dumbs".

A whole society of enormously strong brutes with the intelligence of children isn't going to work out all that well.
 
PossibleCabbage said:
snip
Click to expand...

Yes, the ONLY people that can make intelligent mutants are Enclave members (as shown through Frank Horrigan) and Vault Dwellers. Literally anyone else will make Dumb Dumbs. (Which, interestingly enough, must mean that Marcus and Tabitha are both from vaults just like Lily)

This also means that in FO3 there should probably be a lot more intelligent mutants running around besides Uncle Leo and Fawkes since all the SMs in that game originated from Vault 87. Then again that Vault did have a nuke dropped on their vault door, so perhaps even though they were in a vault all the radiation from the nuke effected them anyway?
 
Ragemage said:
Yes, the ONLY people that can make intelligent mutants are Enclave members (as shown through Frank Horrigan) and Vault Dwellers. Literally anyone else will make Dumb Dumbs. (Which, interestingly enough, must mean that Marcus and Tabitha are both from vaults just like Lily)

This also means that in FO3 there should probably be a lot more intelligent mutants running around besides Uncle Leo and Fawkes since all the SMs in that game originated from Vault 87. Then again that Vault did have a nuke dropped on their vault door, so perhaps even though they were in a vault all the radiation from the nuke effected them anyway?
Click to expand...

More likely Bethesda just never thought it through. But yeah, the insane radiation right outside is as good a headcanon as any.
 
I think another problem with the Master's plan was that, even if he continued it once he found out Super Mutants were infertile and started trying to farm humans like you said, they'd still need to wait at minimum 20 years before they could dunk those humans. Children and teenagers die pretty much immediately if they're dunked in FEV as their bodies can't handle the strain FEV would put it through. (this was mentioned with Lily's grandkids)

So even if the Master did something like Immortan Joe in Mad Max and just opened up a breeding farm, it would still take an extremely long time to make more mutants. And that's if the children/teenagers survive to the age of 20. On top of ALL that, in order to achieve the perfect Mutant, the Master's breeding stock would have to come exclusively from a Vault. And as we see from the ending of Fallout 1 where you join the Master, his Super Mutants completely destroy the population of Vault 13 with miniguns because, well, they're idiots.

Without Vault 13 the Master would probably have to travel extremely far to find more Vault stock to make intelligent mutants with.
 
FlashBash64 said:
Makes more sense now. Still, it's kinda weird how fast he gives up.
Click to expand...

The master spent decades, or possibly more than a century, perfecting the super mutants, until the vault dweller gave him information about the infertility and he/it realized that is work was for nought, plus, he/it was insane.
 
The Master would've had more issues anyway.

The Enclave would still show up a century later as they clearly wouldn't be affected by mainland affairs. It's likely they would've developed the Curling strain anyway and wipe everything out.
 
I doubt the Enclave would be able to capture a village of Mutants to experiment on, seeing as how that was the Master's goal, to replace humans with super mutants and, if he had succeeded then Arroyo (and any other tribal villages) wouldn't exist (same principal applies to the vaults).
 
Do we know how long Super Mutants live for?, From what we can tell they are practically immortal, and tough enough to take a punch or too. Does it really matter if a species cannot reproduce if they have a society in which the residents don't die to begin with?
 
In Fallout 2 we see that even if Super Mutants seem to be able to live for a very long time, maybe even being 'immortal', this just applies to their bodies - their minds seem to be affected by aging. Not much use being immortal if you're senile. Also, regarding the 'human farm' approach to get new subjects, I don't think the Master would find this to be a satisfactory solution. He wants 'Unity', i.e. only Muties, and he also seems to regard his plan as a kind of 'greater good'. The Master doesn't see his plans as evil, he sees them as necessary. If he needs to breed humans to make new mutants, then the harmonious world he is striving for won't come to pass, so the whole point of what he is sacrificing the human race for is lost. At least that's what I've taken away from it. And said plans chances of success certainly aren't helped by the fact that he is an insane monster with a serious messiah complex.
 
JO'Geran said:
Do we know how long Super Mutants live for?, From what we can tell they are practically immortal, and tough enough to take a punch or too. Does it really matter if a species cannot reproduce if they have a society in which the residents don't die to begin with?
Click to expand...

It does matter. As you said, the Super Mutants have an unknowable life span, but they can be killed just like everything else. Deathclaws, Wanamingos, and eventually the Enclave itself will whittle their numbers down astronomically, if not completely! The Enclave especially pose a threat, as their base of operations would be unreachable to the Mutants--and sooner or later they'd have their own FEV to release into the atmosphere that would wipe out any and all mutants it comes across.

Even if they survived all that, eventually the remnants of the Master's army would die off. That's why reproduction is so important, because no matter how long they may live, they can still die.
 
The Master seems like a huge idiot in hindsight. I mean when you're trying to develop a new master race shouldn't the ability to reproduce be one of the first things you check?
 
Vergil said:
snop
Click to expand...

To be fair, he thought they were. I mean, the guy's unable to move first of all. The only way he can really communicate with people is directly, through telepathy if they get close enough, or through the computer monitor he's attached to.

His cult followers (the guys in purple robes) were lying to him and saying that the Super Mutants were reproducing just fine, probably not wanting to incur the Master's wrath. You can find this out if you tell him Super Mutants are infertile without evidence from the BOS. He'll call up one of those cult members and ask them how Super Mutant reproduction is coming along, and they'll lie and say just fine.

That's why he thought his plan was working until you gave him undeniable proof that it was a falsehood. He isn't stupid, he's just limited in how much he can actually see, kinda like Mr. House.
 
It could have worked, if he knew how to produce more FEV. As we know it was man-made that means the ideas of creating it is... somewhere. Possibly destroyed, but somehow I doubt it. Then again, if we take Fallout 3 at lore value he could just find that vault and make shit tons of Super Mutants.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top