If you could make one change to the Fallout Lore, what would it be?

ElloinmorninJ

ElloinmorninJ

Where'd That 6th Toe Come From?
Let’s say you could make 1 change (or a few changes) to the Fallout series lore, what changes would you like to make?




IGNORE BETHESDA LORE
 
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You might want to put a disclaimer saying barring Bethesda lore because otherwise this thread is going to get real boring, real fast. So I will just be considering 1,2 the Fallout Bible and New Vegas in my answer.

My gut reaction was the Vault Experiments, but actually disregarding Bethesda lore and just taking the West Coast games into account, they're not bad. Vault 22, Vault 11, Vault 34, Vault 19 and Vault 21 are all actually good uses of the premise, and the ""retcon"" of Vault 15 into being an experiment regarding multiculturalism is good too.

My actual answer then would be the Enclave's creation of intelligent Deathclaws. I think talking Deathclaws are massively stupid (and considering how the Fallout Bible tries to wipe them under the rug, so does the Word of God) and Navarro's experimentation would have been better served as the human kind. Or at least, human to us. Not in the eyes of the Enclave.

My change would then turn the occupants of Vault 13 into the 2nd Generation Mariposa Super Mutants. A large group that migrated and decided not to stick around in the caved-in ruins of the Enclave mines. Confused, mentally deranged, I imagine they would have been outcasted and attacked by local Wastelanders without the temperance and wisdom of the Unity Remnants. They'd be reclusive same as the Deathclaws, and request the Chosen One find them a component same as the Deathclaws. It'd add a nice dramatic irony onto Fallout 1's story and its potential "bad ending" too. Perhaps you could guide them into staying in Vault 13, or abandoning it and moving to Broken Hills.

It would also add some nice context to the combat dungeon at the Mariposa Ruins, since you could say those that stayed behind were too far gone and completely bonkers.
 
Atomic Postman said:
You might want to put a disclaimer saying barring Bethesda lore because otherwise this thread is going to get real boring, real fast. So I will just be considering 1,2 the Fallout Bible and New Vegas in my answer.

My gut reaction was the Vault Experiments, but actually disregarding Bethesda lore and just taking the West Coast games into account, they're not bad. Vault 22, Vault 11, Vault 34, Vault 19 and Vault 21 are all actually good uses of the premise, and the ""retcon"" of Vault 15 into being an experiment regarding multiculturalism is good too.

My actual answer then would be the Enclave's creation of intelligent Deathclaws. I think talking Deathclaws are massively stupid (and considering how the Fallout Bible tries to wipe them under the rug, so does the Word of God) and Navarro's experimentation would have been better served as the human kind. Or at least, human to us. Not in the eyes of the Enclave.

My change would then turn the occupants of Vault 13 into the 2nd Generation Mariposa Super Mutants. A large group that migrated and decided not to stick around in the caved-in ruins of the Enclave mines. Confused, mentally deranged, I imagine they would have been outcasted and attacked by local Wastelanders without the temperance and wisdom of the Unity Remnants. They'd be reclusive same as the Deathclaws, and request the Chosen One find them a component same as the Deathclaws. It'd add a nice dramatic irony onto Fallout 1's story and its potential "bad ending" too. Perhaps you could guide them into staying in Vault 13, or abandoning it and moving to Broken Hills.

It would also add some nice context to the combat dungeon at the Mariposa Ruins, since you could say those that stayed behind were too far gone and completely bonkers.
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What do you think is wrong with the East Coast Vault experiments?
 
They're too hyperbolic/exaggerated. Stuff like Vault 11, Vault 21, Vault 19 are the sort of "experiments" or social conditions a hyper-paranoid and unethical cold war government might run on its population. Gary Clones are not. Similarly, whilst pulp sci-fi gone wrong isn't necessarily bad for Vaults either as shown so well in Vault 22, at its base Vault 22 was still just "What if we experimented with developing plants that could thrive in irradiated soil"


It's why I didn't list Vault experiments as something I'd scrub because they're a matter of writing quality. If done well, you get Vegas where you have a plethora of interesting and varied dungeons to explore whereas if vault experiments didn't exist they'd all be rather boring. If done poorly, you get Fallout 3.
 
I dislike the idea that wanamingos are extinct now because of some random kill-switch. I'd also like to pretend the deaths of Ian and the first Dogmeat were very different and that the Vault Dweller collected Katja and Tycho. Dogmeat should've died of old age in Arroyo, and Ian should've shared the same fate, or at least a similar one. Tycho and Katja could die after they departed the Vault Dweller in some way that doesn't interfere with the possibility of them continuing their bloodlines.
 
No proof of the occult.

Additional confirmations that Necropolis was the site of the one (and only) fluke event of the war that created all known ghouls.
 
Gizmojunk said:
No proof of the occult.

Additional confirmations that Necropolis was the site of the one (and only) fluke event of the war that created all known ghouls.
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It was never implied all ghouls came from Necropolis, in fact that assumption was outright discredited by Harold and Talius, was it not?
 
Ugly Kid said:
I dislike the idea that wanamingos are extinct now because of some random kill-switch. I'd also like to pretend the deaths of Ian and the first Dogmeat were very different and that the Vault Dweller collected Katja and Tycho. Dogmeat should've died of old age in Arroyo, and Ian should've shared the same fate, or at least a similar one. Tycho and Katja could die after they departed the Vault Dweller in some way that doesn't interfere with the possibility of them continuing their bloodlines.
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Dogmeat dying made sense; they live in a Wasteland, people die, animals especially die. Having him survive would be going against the actual gameplay; dogmeat is hard to keep alive.
 
ElloinmorninJ said:
It was never implied all ghouls came from Necropolis, in fact that assumption was outright discredited by Harold and Talius, was it not?
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Harold & Talius are not ghouls, they are FEV mutants.

The ghouls of the Necropolis came to be during the Great War, after their vault failed. Typhon describes himself [ghouls] as, "There ain't any ghouls but old ghouls. We're all sterile, see, but we're incredibly long-lived. We're the first and last generation of ghouls".
 
Gizmojunk said:
Harold & Talius are not ghouls, they are FEV mutants.

The ghouls of the Necropolis came to be during the Great War, after their vault failed. Typhon describes himself [ghouls] as, "There ain't any ghouls but old ghouls. We're all sterile, see, but we're incredibly long-lived. We're the first and last generation of ghouls".
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So you’re saying replace too the Ghouls in Fallout 3, (and Raul in FNV) with some new creatures?
 
Why would they need replacing? (Except in cases of new ghouls; Moira should be residue after the bomb explodes.)

(I have never encountered Raul in-game.)

Ghouls can move around place to place a lot in 200+ years.
 
Gizmojunk said:
Why would they need replacing?

(I have never encountered Raul in-game.)

Ghouls can move around place to place a lot in 200+ years.
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Wouldn’t ther only be a few of them though? Like, under 1,000 (especially after they got slaughtered all those times)
 
Yes.

That's how it always was.

Technically they should not have happened, but the game is done. FO3 [assuming it had to be made] should have focused on an entirely different East coast setting—with no Enclave, no Ghouls, and no FEV... and of course no bottle cap money; all of which were local to the Midwest.
 
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Gizmojunk said:
Yes.

That's how it always was.

Technically they should not have happened, but the game is done. FO3 [assuming it had to be made] should have focused on an entirely different East coast setting—with no Enclave, no Ghouls, and no FEV... and of course no bottle cap money; all of which were local to the Midwest.
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But aren’t those a lot of things that make Fallout...fallout? Those are a lot of classics!

well not the Enclave and SM, but at least ghouls. They act as first-hand accounts of the Great War
 
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I do not think so. The premise is simply that the world was nuked to utter wasteland, in a future [past!] that more or less matched the assumptions of the 1950's pop culture. It's not a magical place, it's a weird-western [actually more of a diesel-punk] place.

They could have adapted that to any region's local folklore, and being DC, they could have further developed the uber-patriotism—borderline Warhammer40k political environment.

I think that Bethesda paid for the IP assets, and were going to use them all whether it made sense or not; it allowed them to dress up Oblivion as a Fallout sequel.

The bottle caps were result of the water merchants paying their debts with caps which they could later trade for liters of water.
There is no reason for that in DC; there are Banks & currency exchanges in DC, there are real [even gold] coins there—without the sharp edges to them.

There could have been minted money from as late as 2077; even official (or unofficial) commemorative coins.

Commemorative-coin_.gif


Bethesda did okay [IMO] with the Mire-Lurks, and could have extrapolated the premise further on their own, instead of wholesale reuse of out-of-place local assets.

*And given the time span, there is no reason an errant supermutant (or a few) couldn't have made it to DC; even Enclave too, they at least have an incentive to go there. But certainly not entrenched factions with local backstories for the area. Bethesda even used JET! Jet in first aid kits, and other prewar containers, when Jet was invented by a post war teenager in New Reno.
 
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The only thing I would change about the east coast is the bottlecaps. Lyons BoS and Ghouls never bothered me as much as the writing and quest design based around them existing. FEV being on the east coast never sent me into a nerd rage like some people. No offense Gizmo. I just think that if Obsidian wrote the story of Fallout 3 it would have worked, even with such things being in the plot.
 
To me I think the FEV and BoS being in the East are contrived, and the Bottlecaps moreso just lazy. I really don't understand taking issue with the ghoul thing, especially considering that was going to be "retconned" by Van Buren anyway with the Reservation.
 
Because Fallout got worse with every followup title. The original team left the studio early in Fallout 2's development; around the time that they had just got the car working in the game.

After that it was all down hill. They just did not 'get' it. There is King Arthur in the game, and articulate Venus Flytraps. There is Melchor the [supermutant] magician in Fallout 2.
 
I know that's your favourite topic to ramble on about every other post but that's still got nothing to do with why the Ghoul thing is meant to be a problem
 
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