Liberty Prime - The Fallout Numidium

[FlukeboxHero]

In the Elder Scrolls 2: Daggerfall, the player is tasked with finding a component to activate an massive automaton (Numidium) which was built by a civilization that no longer exists (Dwemer). The automaton has the power to reshape the world politically. There are several powerful individuals or factions that want the component to use for their own ends or to activate the automaton. The activation of the Numidium ends the game.

In Fallout 3, there is a massive automaton (Liberty Prime) which was built by a civilization that no longer exists. This automaton has the power to reshape the world politically. One faction already controls this robot, and it renders the player useless.

Rather than being a plot device to make the player say "WOW! This is so badass! I love having nothing to do in the finale!", Liberty Prime could have been the finale. Use whatever factions you want (though I'd recommend using the ideas from @The_Proletarian and Atomic Postman here). Let the Talon company squash the rest, let the Vaults bring their vision of a new world to fruition, or give the heart of Liberty Prime to James to complete Project Purity (as the original game intended or as a means to "cleanse" the Wasteland).

In Daggerfall, Numidium is activated with the Mantella, a magical double-heart McGuffin. I have no idea what would be a decent/interesting device to activate Liberty Prime.

Thoughts?
Improvements? (definitely needed)
(If this is in the wrong forum, please let me know. I tried to pick the one that was the best fit for this.)

 

[PaxVenire]

That’s a very interesting idea. I never played Daggerfall enough to know of the Numidium, but the comparisons you draw are definitely interesting. I agree with you that Liberty Prime renders the finale of the game lame as you’re just following a giant killer robot and watching it do all the work for the faction you were forced to join. In my rewrite of Fallout 3 I left Liberty Prime out entirely because of that exact reason.

In Daggerfall, Numidium is activated with the Mantella, a magical double-heart McGuffin. I have no idea what would be a decent/interesting device to activate Liberty Prime.

How about its AI processor? Something that you’ll need to program Liberty Prime to attack your enemies, otherwise activating Liberty Prime without it would effectively frenzy it as it sees everyone as American invaders.

 

[FlukeboxHero]

That’s a very interesting idea. I never played Daggerfall enough to know of the Numidium, but the comparisons you draw are definitely interesting. I agree with you that Liberty Prime renders the finale of the game lame as you’re just following a giant killer robot and watching it do all the work for the faction you were forced to join. In my rewrite of Fallout 3 I left Liberty Prime out entirely because of that exact reason.

I completely understand!
Liberty Prime is a bad idea, and he's poorly implemented.
I also completely missed your rewrite (and am using several of the ideas from you Flora and Fauna article).
May I get a link?

How about its AI processor? Something that you’ll need to program Liberty Prime to attack your enemies, otherwise activating Liberty Prime without it would effectively frenzy it as it sees everyone as American invaders.

That's great! I like how it creates opportunities for intrigue and betrayal with choosing which AI to add for a given faction.

 

[PaxVenire]

I also completely missed your rewrite (and am using several of the ideas from you Flora and Fauna article).
May I get a link?

I haven't posted anything online yet for the rewrite projects, it's still a massive WIP that I've admittedly neglected recently in favor of playing Atopic Postman's TTRPG with my RPG group.

If you'd like to talk about what I got I can PM you.

Also I'm glad to hear you're making use of the Flora/Fauna thread, that's really cool.

That's great! I like how it creates opportunities for intrigue and betrayal with choosing which AI to add for a given faction.

Thanks, yeah I figured something like Liberty Prime should be able to be tweaked to player discretion. Something like that would be tide turning, such as pointing the Boomers in New Vegas towards your enemies during Hoover Dam.

 

[The_Proletarian]

@FlukeboxHero that was very interesting to know since I haven't played Daggerfall yet.

Bethesda must have been aware of the similar plot elements between that game and their attempt at Fallout 3?

This redeems Liberty Prime somewhat for me. It's a cool thing but at the same time a stupid idea.

 

[FlukeboxHero]

That's the real tragedy of it all!
Bethesda had the opportunity to copy their own material for an interesting political angle, or go completely off the wall with it, and they chose the most boring, uninteresting way to treat it.

Really, the point of all this is to highlight the potential to use Liberty Prime as the be-all end-all for a TTRPG campaign/rewrite of the capital wasteland. Plus as a "some things are better left alone" idea for old world tech in a follow-up campaign.

 

[PaxVenire]

Really, the point of all this is to highlight the potential to use Liberty Prime as the be-all end-all for a TTRPG campaign/rewrite of the capital wasteland. Plus as a "some things are better left alone" idea for old world tech in a follow-up campaign.

Are you doing a TTRPG rewrite of Fallout 3?

 

[FlukeboxHero]

Are you doing a TTRPG rewrite of Fallout 3?

Maybe! If a 1/4 page of notes counts.

My current one I'm planning is on the Red River (between Texas and Oklahoma). The players will have a boat as their home base of sorts, and it allows the campaign to transition from the more familiar elements (desert, Caesar's Legion, the more expected animals/foes) to a more alien world as they get closer to New Orleans (post-apocalyptic name still undecided).

Set up post FNV, where Caesar marched west with his best troops, and...... nothing. Either he won and is losing the east (as the Courier warned Lanius), or him and the pride of the Legion strength were butchered by an angry mailman. Caesar's lands have fractured. The players can be from one of the usual factions and are enslaved in Amari (Amarillo) when a boat full of new slaves and opportunity arrives...

 

[PaxVenire]

Maybe! If a 1/4 page of notes counts.

Hey, you gotta start somewhere. I started mine on the iPhone notes app. If you ever decide to make it into a full thing, I hope you'll talk about it/upload it on the site.

My current one I'm planning is on the Red River (between Texas and Oklahoma). The players will have a boat as their home base of sorts, and it allows the campaign to transition from the more familiar elements (desert, Caesar's Legion, the more expected animals/foes) to a more alien world as they get closer to New Orleans (post-apocalyptic name still undecided).

Love this, Texas and Louisiana is a perfect geological bridge from the familiar to the exotic. @The Dutch Ghost has also been working on a Fallout: Texas setting and I myself am in the midst of doing a Gulf Commonwealth adventure anthology for Atomic Postman's PnP ruleset that starts in Florida, move to Alabama, then Mississippi, and ends in Louisiana.

Set up post FNV, where Caesar marched west with his best troops, and...... nothing. Either he won and is losing the east (as the Courier warned Lanius), or him and the pride of the Legion strength were butchered by an angry mailman. Caesar's lands have fractured. The players can be from one of the usual factions and are enslaved in Amari (Amarillo) when a boat full of new slaves and opportunity arrives...

I love that it's set post-New Vegas, you don't see many fan projects being set after that game because the game feels like the ending to Black Isle/Obsidian's Fallout. But unlike a lot of people who think continuing after New Vegas and even providing a canon ending to New Vegas is sacrilege, I for one love to see that explored. Atomic Postman and FudgeMuppet on YouTube have crafted something along the lines of what I would personally love to see for a post-New Vegas game.

 

[Yossarrion]

In the Elder Scrolls 2: Daggerfall, the player is tasked with finding a component to activate an massive automaton (Numidium) which was built by a civilization that no longer exists (Dwemer).

It occurs to me that this is Dagoth Ur's plan in Morrowind with Akuklakhan who now that I look deeper into his lore is called the second Numidium lol

 

[FlukeboxHero]

It occurs to me that this is Dagoth Ur's plan in Morrowind with Akuklakhan who now that I look deeper into his lore is called the second Numidium lol

Yup!
The original Numidium was also powered by the Heart of Lorkhan, and the Mantella was created to replace that. Since Dagoth Ur has the original power source, he can create a new Numidium from the flesh of his followers.

 

[Norzan]

The whole sequence with Liberty Prime is literally kill stealing, it's like the robot and the BoS members are party members and they kill everyone before you can do anything.

In a game all about being a power fantasy, that is some conter-productive game design.

 

[FlukeboxHero]

In a game all about being a power fantasy, that is some conter-productive game design.

Hoo boy, you ain't kidding. It's *rough*.

Hence making Liberty Prime the end goal. All the factions want control of this giant robot to shape the world in their image.
The game ends with Prime's activation, because, like Daggerfall, what the hell do you do after you turned on the ancient angry killbot?

 

[Norzan]

Hence making Liberty Prime the end goal. All the factions want control of this giant robot to shape the world in their image.

That would be significantly better and still allow the robot to be a "wow" moment for the casuals.

 

[PaxVenire]

I agree that Liberty Prime is way too powerful for anything less than an endgame objective like Hoover Dam, but what if he were limited in power? Something you can use only once and so you must choose wisely. Akin to the Boomers in New Vegas where it's a one and done spectacle like seeing the B-29 drop a payload, perhaps you can activate Liberty Prime to grease your enemies in the end with a laser and then it overheats and falls apart as to not let an OP robot roam the wastes after the end.

 

[Norzan]

My suggestion would be that you choose a faction, assist that faction in getting to Liberty Prime, but towards the end your faction starts to lose and your character does a desperate attempt to reach the robot to turn it on and change the tide of the battle. That would give the last quest a lot of stakes, allow the player to actually feel like a participant in the fight, and still have the robot do cool shit to make the casuals go apeshit.

 

[FlukeboxHero]

I agree that Liberty Prime is way too powerful for anything less than an endgame objective like Hoover Dam, but what if he were limited in power? Something you can use only once and so you must choose wisely. Akin to the Boomers in New Vegas where it's a one and done spectacle like seeing the B-29 drop a payload, perhaps you can activate Liberty Prime to grease your enemies in the end with a laser and then it overheats and falls apart as to not let an OP robot roam the wastes after the end.

Ahhhhh, that's smart.
I was stuck on that point, as once you let the nuke throwing genie out of the bottle, well..... yeah.

 

[PaxVenire]

To give credit to Bethesda where it’s due, instead of making the entirety of Broken Steel just a “Follow Liberty Prime” mission, they had him destroyed at the beginning thus taking away the OP robot… until Fallout 4.

 

[FlukeboxHero]

Thank you both!
I think I've got something.

Liberty Prime was developed to break the stalemate in the Gobi campaign. The best minds of the day (Robert House, Klein from Big Mountain, Victor Presper, etc.) were brought in to develop Prime, his armaments, and his power core.
Prime's power would allow the US to spread freedom and democracy to China!

Of course, that's what the real power in the US wanted Congress to believe. Their oil rig off the coast of San Francisco needed a stronger power source than had ever been developed, and Congress wouldn't approve such R&D spending unless it was wrapped in the American flag. In December 2076, the power core was completed and secreted away to California for "further tests". Prim was finished, but without the power core, he had no way to activate.

In the Fallout: Capital Wasteland rewrite, the player(s) could find an alternative that could power some faction's base from 100 lifetime, or something really big for 30 minutes. They can choose what to do with this power core.

 

[Hardboiled Android]

Thank you both!
I think I've got something.

Liberty Prime was developed to break the stalemate in the Gobi campaign. The best minds of the day (Robert House, Klein from Big Mountain, Victor Presper, etc.) were brought in to develop Prime, his armaments, and his power core.
Prime's power would allow the US to spread freedom and democracy to China!

I'm pretty sure that the point of Liberty Prime in Fallout 3 was as a propaganda setpiece to be deployed in the liberation of Alaska, not mainland China. Of course Anchorage was already liberated before Liberty Prime was complete, and perhaps it would have ended up being deployed in Mainland China, but what's the point in changing it's original purpose?