Why do people think Fallout 3 was actually good?

[Alphons]

Even West Coast morons aren't bloodthirsty psychopaths like East Coast mutants.

Supermutants in 1 kill people, but they don't do it for fun and aren't pointlessly cruel.

Even Tabitha and her crew of crazies that murder random travelers, because they hate humans, don't eat them or keep their body parts in "gore bags".

This is such a bizarre decision by Bethesda- stripping entire species of their humanity.
Imagine if TESVI had Orcs or Argonians act like East Coast SMs.

 

[Hardboiled Android]

It's likely that these settlements were established initially without awareness on behalf of the super mutants. Megaton was just a hotspot for traders that was protected by the crater initially. Rivet City was once just a lab for Pinkerton where he met a group of settlers. By the time these settlements had trade routes established around them they had become advantageous enough to exploit. Consider that the super mutants back then would've also likely been less dangerous because they aren't provoked by the lack of FEV and the possibility of extinction.

FEV not yet running out yet is a good point, but still as people accumulate and start to work on these grand projects (fortifying Rivet City or Megaton) that ought to have attracted the attention of mutants.

He's smart enough to recognize the faults of his kind and detach from them even at the risk of his own life. A less intelligent mutant would be more easily influenced.

It could represent intelligence, but it could also just be a generally pacific attitude or some kind of personality "disorder"

The fact that they have a coordinated army with a loose hierarchical structure proves that they're intelligent enough to form such a cohesive force.

I don't think we ever see anything that could be called a "coordinated army." And the "loose hierarchical structure" really isn't that much more sophisticated than dominance hierarchies in dogs or apes, especially since as you've admitted it seems to be centered around the oldest, strongest, and dumbest members.

https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Rivet_City_terminal_entries#Council_Meeting_Minutes

I stand corrected.

Megaton was established by scavengers and traders though.

Yes, this is what we're told, but it doesn't really make sense.

Manya Vargas tells us that her father was one of these people and who was the one that convinced the others to build the wall surrounding it. The wall itself is built from scrap taken from a nearby air station. Plenty of the people in Megaton including the ones that initially started the settlement are actually quite wealthy. It's stated that Moriarty inherited his wealth from his father, Manya Vargas and her husband Nathan inherited her father's wealth and Jericho is rich enough from his time being a raider to the point where he can settle down and retire. These people are obviously wealthy enough to trade with caravans for food and exports.

An economy made up entirely of frittering away inheritances on trade, with no investment to speak one, is not a real economy or one that makes sense.

Moriarty is engaged in a potentially productive industry, but I don't think there's any firm evidence that he produces his own alcohol or exports any. He seems to be purely a local barkeep. Moira is engaged in potentially productive industry, but it seems like her tinkering is at this stage on a more individual basis, it doesn't seem like she's making anything for export. She is involved with the caravans, but again in an essentially parasitic function, a middleman and an organizer. There's a doctor, who purely trades in services to those who can reach him. There's a water purifier that is having difficulty supplying the inhabitants of Megaton, so exporting looks to be out of the picture. There's one cow standing in the town square that I guess someone uses for something. And then there's a lot of people just wandering around doing nothing of value.

What we have in Megaton is a small service economy with no productive or extractive economic basis. Its only possible reason to exist lay in being a hub of caravans (one of two in a small geographic area that's economy is oriented entirely around being a hub of caravans). To establish that center, a tremendous amount of manpower had to be martialed at a timed where, in spite of what the game tells us, it doesn't really make sense that there would be enough traders to be organized to haul giant planes from miles away to build such a thing. Things were presumably even worse in the Capital Wasteland 50 years ago, and there wasn't even the little Rivet City Hydroponics lab - in fact, there wasn't even a Rivet City!

Compare the basis for a caravan hub in Megaton, which is as follows - 1) a crater is somehow good protection from dust, and 2) a bunch of whacko cultists, to the Hub, whose basis rests largely on the fact that it has a fuck ton of water. And in its actual implementation, we see agriculture, productive industry, and actual complex social and economic dynamics that we would expect from a place that centers entirely upon a trade system supposedly rich enough to sustain it.

Entire caravans are established with the sole purpose of selling scrap, see Crazy Wolfgang. There is certainly a niche for scrap and junk because scrap metal can be used in the service of repairs and construction.

Again, just because it happens in the game doesn't make it make sense. Scrap economies would exist in Fallout, but not ones like we see in Fallout 3.

It's quite possibility the safest place to hide in the immediate vicinity, especially in the case of these people who have just been denied entry to Vault 101.

In terms of hidign from a dust storm, a crater is probably the absolute worst place you could hide. Any building would be better, Springvale would be better.

New Vegas had more means to build it's economy on. It's a tourist hotspot which was protected from most of the bombs via House's missile defense system. The casinos are still intact and House's oil and electricity reserves exist. The Capital Wasteland was far more bombed out. We've also already established that super mutant and raiders were far more present and influential in the area due to the existence of largely unoccupied land.

Even if we remove the casinos entirely from New Vegas, its economic system still makes a thousand times more sense than Fallout 3's, for the simple fact that people are engaged in agriculture and productive industry, and each settlement is host to sensible dynamics rather than cartoon characters.

 

[Norzan]

Even West Coast morons aren't bloodthirsty psychopaths like East Coast mutants.

Supermutants in 1 kill people, but they don't do it for fun and aren't pointlessly cruel.

Even Tabitha and her crew of crazies that murder random travelers, because they hate humans, but don't eat them or keep their body parts in "gore bags".

This is such a bizarre decision by Bethesda- stripping entire species of their humanity.
Imagine if TESVI had Orcs or Argonians act like East Coast SMs.

That is the worst part about the Super Mutants in Fallout 3. They took an interesting take on mutants in fiction and turn them into mindless ogres, really boring mindless ogres. Nothing would change if the Super Mutants in Fallout 3 were replaced by some other mutant type that only cares about killing humans because Super Mutants in Fallout 3 don't have any ideology or anything that makes them unique.

In fact i would have taken them being replaced by something else new instead of having Super Mutants being dragged through the mud and being made into a joke.

 

[Copey]

It really is just a strange creative decision on Bethesda’s part to take the Super Mutants, Enclave, and BoS, simply placing them directly on the east coast with busted lore. Why buy a franchise if you care about it so little that one of the major ‘factions’ you fight are left so barebones and butchered that people make up extensive head cannon for their motivations, all because they cannot accept that Bethesda intended for them to be brainless orcs.

 

[UNATCO Agent]

They already have 20 Supermutants hanging out in the Murder Pass, couldn't they hang out near the main entrance? Little Lamplight is literally next to their main base.

Yeah but you suggested making them grow their own food. That implies some sort of intervention. They're not just simply "hanging out" near the main entrance. They would be hypothetically monitoring these children.

And the consequence could be Big Town population getting kidnapped by Supermutants. But Bethesda decided that Supermutants kill them all.

There's actually no evidence for this according to what you've told me. And let's say theoretically, that they did kill everyone in Big Town. It's not like that's always the case, because we know that they abduct people from there too. This actually has a reason if you read my earlier posts. They're running out of FEV. They're putting less people through the joining because they don't have an abundant supply of what turns them anymore.

Where's all that stuff about them having a highly organized society with different hierarchies

In the game guide:
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Fallout_3_Official_Game_Guide_faction_profiles#Super_Mutants

life full of fear knowing that they're sterile and their species will end unless they build an elaborate network of outposts to kidnap enough people to sustain their population

Literally in those links you posted where they talk about the "green stuff" (FEV). They can't reproduce naturally. They either know this or they haven't considered it because they know it's impossible and the only way to make more of them is to use the FEV.

elaborate network of outposts to kidnap enough people to sustain their population, but not enough to destroy the human settlements or scare away all travelers

If you played the game you would know that several mutant outposts lie on the fringes of areas with settlements. It's either completely coincidental then that they have prisoners in these outposts OR (as I say) intentional. Not every super mutant outpost has hostages, but the ones near settlements do. That implies that the populated nature of these settlements is benefitting these mutants.

It's still two out of several dozen. And you can't befriend Super Mutants because they aren't interested because why would they? They are following orders.

Can you evaluate what you just said for me? You just said that "two of several dozen" is not enough to humanize these super mutants, but none is okay as long as they have orders? Fallout 3's depiction of the mutants HAVE orders. The two that we see are not part of the group. It's like you're treating these two games with some sort of double standard.

I said he's hardly above Harry, not the same as. Fawkes would get mocked at by the West Coast Super Mutants.

He gets mocked by the East Coast Super Mutants too. I think you're overstating the intelligence of West Coast Super Mutants. We get told by Willow upon entry to Underworld that the super mutants let the ghouls live peacefully, and every super mutant we see that is part of that contingent attacks us on sight which implies that they are still able to make the distinction between human and ghoul. Harry on the other hand is not able to. It's a fun little gag, don't get me wrong, and I love Fallout 1. But you're really not helping your argument here by mentioning him and comparing him to Fawkes, a character who actually recognizes the difference in player characters.

You're forgetting the West Coast Super Mutants can go on fine without the Master by the fact Marcus founds Jacobstown. The fact is that West Coast Super Mutants are the very least not morons unlike their East Coast counterparts.

First of all, it's explained in lore why they're generally less intelligent. I've explained this multiple times so there's no confusion. The FEV strain they are subjected to is an experimental one. It destroys their cognitive processes and doesn't stop even as they age, it only diminishes their intelligence. Fawkes is far more intelligent than most of them, but there are still few in their ranks that are able to question their leadership like Uncle Leo. And yet, even in New Vegas, the differences between Marcus and the rest of the super mutants are only even more present. On entry into Jacobstown, we find Lily who is quite literally insane and thinks she's still a 70 year old grandma. Marcus tells us that Keene is a "smart" Nightkin, and yet when we meet him he can barely speak in full sentences. Jacobstown was a post-unity endeavor. We don't see any mutant in Fallout 3 build super mutant sanctuaries because it's a pointless endeavor. Majority of super mutants are part of the greater group. There's no breakaway that could consolidate popularity in these zones, and considering how they treated Fawkes and Uncle Leo, other super mutants wouldn't discriminate between a human settlement and a rogue mutant settlement.

Because Bethesda wrote an extremely contrived reason for such. It was only done to have the player fight orcs.

How is it contrived? I would expect the FEV to have these kinds of side effects just from what we are told and shown in earlier Fallout games, especially an experimental variant.

Which they don't because the game never claims as such. You can extrapolate anything you want from any implications, the fact the game doesn't say it in any way proves it's not a thing. And this is definitely one of the things the game should tell the player if it was an actual thing.

See the above link. It's literally mentioned how their hierarchy functions and that they do indeed have hierarchies depending on age. This information is readily accessible.

This literally happens in Fallout 3 because a Super Mutant at any time can pull out a grenade and kill themselves trying to kill you.

The fact that the enemy type doesn't exist in Fallout 3 proves that this is a fault of the gameplay and not intentional.

 

[UNATCO Agent]

FEV not yet running out yet is a good point, but still as people accumulate and start to work on these grand projects (fortifying Rivet City or Megaton) that ought to have attracted the attention of mutants.

Which is why I suggested that they established outposts close to these settlements around the same time they recognized them.

It could represent intelligence, but it could also just be a generally pacific attitude or some kind of personality "disorder"

Considering that both Fawkes and Uncle Leo were outcasted for essentially the same thing, we would have to believe that these two characters shared the same personality disorder, which I heavily doubt.

I don't think we ever see anything that could be called a "coordinated army." And the "loose hierarchical structure" really isn't that much more sophisticated than dominance hierarchies in dogs or apes, especially since as you've admitted it seems to be centered around the oldest, strongest, and dumbest members.

We do see them entrenched in the middle of the The Mall between the Washington Monument and the Capitol building (which they control). That implies some kind of coordination having some set up on the frontlines while others defend the building.

Yes, this is what we're told, but it doesn't really make sense.

It a small culture of people initially. It's not like Megaton became a massive trade hub overnight. Plus, they had support from the Children of Atom who had convened around the bomb.

Moriarty is engaged in a potentially productive industry, but I don't think there's any firm evidence that he produces his own alcohol or exports any

Leo Stahl mentions that he "pisses in his own still", so he does brew his own alcohol. He also makes money off prostitution too, so he doesn't exactly need to pay to export goods in order to return a profit.
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/AndyStahl.txt

Moira is engaged in potentially productive industry, but it seems like her tinkering is at this stage on a more individual basis, it doesn't seem like she's making anything for export.

She runs a general store and repairs old equipment she finds to sell. She actually mentions that she trades this stuff for food shipments.
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/MoiraBrown.txt

. There's a doctor, who purely trades in services to those who can reach him.

He's the town doctor. He only needs to offer his services to the town because what we are led to believe about Megaton is that it's a popular trade hub which attracts many visitors, caravans, and traders. We don't know whether or not it would be more profitable for him to roam the wastes, but considering that he would have to hire guards and purchase his own equipment and firearms, I'm going to hazard a guess that it's not viable for him. The town needs a doctor, so his services are adequately rewarded.

To establish that center, a tremendous amount of manpower had to be martialed at a timed where, in spite of what the game tells us, it doesn't really make sense that there would be enough traders to be organized to haul giant planes from miles away to build such a thing.

They didn't have to haul a giant plane back, we are only told that they hauled scrap metal back from an airfield.

Again, just because it happens in the game doesn't make it make sense. Scrap economies would exist in Fallout, but not ones like we see in Fallout 3.

How so?

In terms of hidign from a dust storm, a crater is probably the absolute worst place you could hide. Any building would be better, Springvale would be better.

It's an easily recognizable rendezvous point. They wouldn't want to be out in the open against an enemy they couldn't see, and Springvale is full of destroyed buildings with not a lot of cover or concealment. The one building there we know of likely hadn't been built at the time, because we only know of the 2277 Capital Wasteland.

Even if we remove the casinos entirely from New Vegas, its economic system still makes a thousand times more sense than Fallout 3's, for the simple fact that people are engaged in agriculture and productive industry, and each settlement is host to sensible dynamics rather than cartoon characters.

I never doubted that. In fact I confirmed what you are saying in that post. New Vegas's economy has more reason to thrive, because it was virtually untouched by the war. In comparison to the rest of the wasteland, New Vegas is supposed to be a paradise. What I'm trying to say is that Bethesda made a major mistake when they wrote the game before optimizing it for contemporary current gen consoles. New Vegas could circumvent this. It was a sequel after all, which direction and advice likely granted by Bethesda.

 

[Hardboiled Android]

Considering that both Fawkes and Uncle Leo were outcasted for essentially the same thing, we would have to believe that these two characters shared the same personality disorder, which I heavily doubt.

I'm not suggesting that they share the same non-intellignet personality disorder, quite the oppositte - that it is possible that Fawkes is intelligent and that's why he doesn't comply, and Uncle Leo is simply pacific for some other reason. My basis for saying this is that in our conversation with Fawkes he seems intelligent, whereas Uncle Leo does not.

It a small culture of people initially. It's not like Megaton became a massive trade hub overnight. Plus, they had support from the Children of Atom who had convened around the bomb.

It relied on martialling together a large number of traders to build its walls in the first place, by dragging severla airplanes worth of junk from miles away. It had to have been decently populated therefore (or able to martial decent manpower) prior to its defenses being built, despite having no economic basis.

Leo Stahl mentions that he "pisses in his own still", so he does brew his own alcohol. He also makes money off prostitution too, so he doesn't exactly need to pay to export goods in order to return a profit.
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/AndyStahl.txt

Good point re:Moriarty's still. However it still seems to be the case that he's not producing on a large enough level, and again, services are great once a town is up and running but the town needs to have an underlying economic basis to start with, or exist within a milieu in which there are already a number of settlements with sensible economic bases up and running.

She runs a general store and repairs old equipment she finds to sell. She actually mentions that she trades this stuff for food shipments.
https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/MoiraBrown.txt

General store I did not mention because it's not a productive industry, so it's irrelevant to my point about the economic basis of Megaton. I did mention her repairs ("tinkering"), but again this seems to be on a small scale and largely individual basis, not forming the economic basis of the town.

He's the town doctor. He only needs to offer his services to the town because what we are led to believe about Megaton is that it's a popular trade hub which attracts many visitors, caravans, and traders. We don't know whether or not it would be more profitable for him to roam the wastes, but considering that he would have to hire guards and purchase his own equipment and firearms, I'm going to hazard a guess that it's not viable for him. The town needs a doctor, so his services are adequately rewarded.

I mentioned the doctor because he is the only other proprietor in town, but my point was not that he would be better off as a travelling doctor - rather, my point was that his services cannot form the economic basis for a town such as Megaton. Nor can Leo Stahl (who is a drug dealer in the sense of like the guy you buy pot from, not a manufacturer or a distributor) or the rest of the Brass Lantern gang (who make noodles from...)

They didn't have to haul a giant plane back, we are only told that they hauled scrap metal back from an airfield.

Buddy, have you seen Megaton? Are you suggesting they reconstructed the several whole sections of planes (and plane hangars) piece-by-piece? Let's be real here.

How so?

Scrap economy as a vital industry spurring trade makes sense in two instance: 1) The breaking down of buildings and scrap at large scale into raw materials, essentially mining. 2) Hunting after specific and rare components, commodities, or curios. The sort of scrap we see being traded in Fallout 3 is largely just junk that anyone could pick up anywhere, not being traded either at implied scale or at sufficient rarity (though admittedly WOlfgang does have a few genuine curios in his inventory). Fission batteries make sense, literal piles of scrap metal do not unless at large scale.

It's an easily recognizable rendezvous point. They wouldn't want to be out in the open against an enemy they couldn't see, and Springvale is full of destroyed buildings with not a lot of cover or concealment. The one building there we know of likely hadn't been built at the time, because we only know of the 2277 Capital Wasteland.

We've gone from "protection from dust storms," which does not make sense, to "easily recognizable rendezvous point," which does make a good deal more sense, but is not what is said or implied by the game.

As to SPringvale - if a city like Megaton can be built from scraps from miles away, I don't really see how it would be much of a problem to repurpose the buildings of Springvale into shanties in the same manner. And what is the one building that you are referring to?

II never doubted that. In fact I confirmed what you are saying in that post. New Vegas's economy has more reason to thrive, because it was virtually untouched by the war. In comparison to the rest of the wasteland, New Vegas is supposed to be a paradise.

New Veags would make sense even if it HAD been nuked. For a cleaner comparisons, just look at the settlements of Fallout 1. Of course this is over a larger land area blah blah, there will never be an apples to apples comparison, but generally speaking the dynamics of that world are about a billion times better thought out and more sensical than Fallout 3.

What I'm trying to say is that Bethesda made a major mistake when they wrote the game before optimizing it for contemporary current gen consoles. New Vegas could circumvent this. It was a sequel after all, which direction and advice likely granted by Bethesda.

Like if you're discussing it purely in terms of the represented size of towns, yes I agree Fallout 3 was likely held back to some degree by consoles. But even if they had managed to represent settlements closer to scale, this wouldn't solve the broader worldbuilding problems: Unless you can demonstrate that there is an enormous amount of cut content touching on these issues, it would actually only make matters worse.

If you're saying that console limitations prevented Bethesda from putting a few springs of corn or more than one brahmin per town... well I'm afraid I just don't buy that, and I would point you towards Oblivion.

 

[Copey]

Just going to hop in here.

Yeah but you suggested making them grow their own food. That implies some sort of intervention. They're not just simply "hanging out" near the main entrance. They would be hypothetically monitoring these children.

If they are smart enough to monitor other settlements for sustained growth and time their raids so the populations just don't leave, they are smart enough to trap a bunch of children and wait for them to grow up. The kids already take care of everything on their own, all the muties would do is wait. This could have been shown in game with a scripted mutant ambush when escorting Sticky but there is nothing.

There's actually no evidence for this according to what you've told me. And let's say theoretically, that they did kill everyone in Big Town. It's not like that's always the case, because we know that they abduct people from there too. This actually has a reason if you read my earlier posts. They're running out of FEV. They're putting less people through the joining because they don't have an abundant supply of what turns them anymore.

There is plenty of evidence. Saying there isn't any doesn't make it so. Not only do the residents of Big Town tell you explicitly its mutants who will attack, if you wait-mutants attack. If you do nothing and leave then come back, often there will be a mutant picking though the place and I'm pretty sure Three Dog says it was mutants who killed em too.

If you played the game you would know that several mutant outposts lie on the fringes of areas with settlements. It's either completely coincidental then that they have prisoners in these outposts OR (as I say) intentional. Not every super mutant outpost has hostages, but the ones near settlements do. That implies that the populated nature of these settlements is benefitting these mutants.

Judging by all the idle chatter, Vault 87 has been out of FEV for a while now. They just eat them.

Fallout 3's depiction of the mutants HAVE orders

Kill. Loot. Return. The 'humanization' the mutants receive is what their favorite meat is (human), how much they love smashing, how stupid they think humans are, HUNGRY, and green stuff. Oh yeah, the only two out of potentially thousands that you encounter simply say that, "yeah, thats how they are". Not exactly a nuanced and complex group of characters if I'm honest.

How is it contrived? I would expect the FEV to have these kinds of side effects just from what we are told and shown in earlier Fallout games, especially an experimental variant.

Its not contrived in the sense that FEV shouldn't work that way, its contrived that super mutants and FEV is on the east coast in general.

See the above link. It's literally mentioned how their hierarchy functions and that they do indeed have hierarchies depending on age. This information is readily accessible.

While the game guide is cannon, none of that information is presented in game at all. Fallout 4 presented the mutant hierarchy decently with mutant warlords, but all the 'ranks' in 3 are for gameplay reasons. None of them behave differently in combat or are placed in dungeons to suggest seniority. If you can find an in game example, please share it.

On entry into Jacobstown, we find Lily who is quite literally insane and thinks she's still a 70 year old grandma. Marcus tells us that Keene is a "smart" Nightkin, and yet when we meet him he can barely speak in full sentences

Those are all Nightkin, where "prolonged stealth boy usage led to neurological degeneration". Marcus and Neil are both more than reasonable and articulate. Mean Sonofabitch had his tongue ripped out so he has an excuse.

Scrap economy

Every time you say that I hear "junk economy" and "dynamic scavenging".

 

[Copey]

We do see them entrenched in the middle of the The Mall between the Washington Monument and the Capitol building (which they control). That implies some kind of coordination having some set up on the frontlines while others defend the building.

Pretty sure the brotherhood dug those. Overall there is no clear answer, but the brotherhood corpses in the central bunker and the target dummies shaped like muties implies that the Brotherhood built and occupied that area prior to mutant attack.

 

[5545Trey]

But we can actually see this happening in the game. On the route to Rivet City, we encounter a super mutant base with a hostage there. They attack on sight. The only other way to Rivet City involves going through the Metro Tunnels, which is the far safer option all things considered, but the far less obvious one.

That confounds the issue with the East Coast SMs being at least "intelligent" enough to do this strategy, but if that's the case, there should be numerous examples for this, and not just a vessel that was founded just four decades ago. Doesn't matter if Megaton was originally just a crater; it's a crater placed in the center of the map, and people supposedly spent months taking apart a bomber plane and salvaging these parts in said crater.

It really doesn't. On my end it makes my aim worse. I don't like the zoom-in from Fallout 3, but the crosshair in the middle was of far more use to me than the iron sight, since I could line up shots and anticipate them hitting without having to squint through a tiny curve in the metal or an ugly aperture obstructing my view.

Again, that's an issue with New Vegas. The guns are misaligned, so it highlights how rushed the development of the game was, not an inherent issue with the mechanic, itself.

Because modern military shooters like COD popularized this unnecessary trend. It's bottom of the barrel for FPS games, so it shouldn't be accepted in RPGs either.

Okay, but not every game with ADS is going to play or be implemented in the way it is in CoD. Comparing things to CoD is so last decade.

If the iron sights feature was so pivotal to the design, Fallout 3's combat wouldn't have worked at all, even in the semi-functioning state it is in.

Fallout 3's combat DOESN'T work, though. It wouldn't matter what you put in your game if the gunplay is complete wank.

The game really did NOT need iron sights, it was thrown in because it was 2010 and Call of Duty was everywhere.

No. It was introduced because people didn't like a game where bullets still swayed away from the barrel of their gun and it felt awkward having the camera zoom in while their character aimed down the sight. It wasn't added because it was the "hip" thing to do at the time.

So? I mean at least we got some degree of personification out of it.

That's not really a good thing when two out of the dozens upon dozens of murderous Super Mutants you'll come across are the only two representatives of SMs who are treated with any sort of characterization.

I love Fallout 1, but I can't recall any times in that game you could befriend a super mutant.

But you can become one in that game.

In all seriousness, I have to assume this is trolling at this point. The latter half of the game hinges on you STOPPING them. You're not tasked with trying to be all buddy-buddy with an opposition that actively wants to convert humanity into their ideal race, so there's no reason why any player would. Also, you're missing the point that he was trying to convey with how irrational and hostile SMs are in relation to the ones in the West Coast who, were still dumb and unfriendly to humans, still had more interaction than just, "Die, stupid human!".

This isn't true. You could bullshit Harry by telling him you're a ghoul. He's literally blind and stupid. Fawkes on the other hand will only join you once you reach a certain karma level, which shows that he is intelligent enough to discern between the kinds of people he meets.

Though I disagree with @Norzan's comparison, it needs to be mentioned that trying to convince Harry that you aren't human isn't exactly easy for players with average-to-low persuasion capabilities. Also, Harry is probably the stupidest Super Mutant in the game, probably in the entire West Coast continuity (I chose continuity because the East and West Coasts might as well be set in different timelines or whatever), and he's written as a character, not a one-dimension orc that wants to gore humans for the fun of it, as almost every other Super Mutant is in the East Coast.

You just said that "two of several dozen" is not enough to humanize these super mutants, but none is okay as long as they have orders?

Don't put words in his mouth. No, it's not enough, and the Unity was greatly humanized because they had a plan that could've work, and the motivation was one of a noble cause, unfortunately done at the suspense of everyone around them. That's a faction being humanized. They still had orders, but they still thought it was for the good of humanity. How do you miss this, and then brag about how subtle Bethesda's writing obviously is not?

 

[KingArthur]

Even West Coast morons aren't bloodthirsty psychopaths like East Coast mutants.

Supermutants in 1 kill people, but they don't do it for fun and aren't pointlessly cruel.

Even Tabitha and her crew of crazies that murder random travelers, because they hate humans, don't eat them or keep their body parts in "gore bags".

This is such a bizarre decision by Bethesda- stripping entire species of their humanity.
Imagine if TESVI had Orcs or Argonians act like East Coast SMs.

Or East coast raiders. I find it so weird that EVERY East coast raider until 4 was just a sociopath that didn’t care for anybody else. Caricatures and not characters.

Weirdly enough, 4 improved on that by making idle and battle dialogue with raiders seem more organic and human. More opportunistic people just trying to get by than every single one being the Joker.

 

[TorontoReign]

Until Fallout lets you be a raider and beat the game as a raider and have it tie into the plot I don't like it no more.

 

[The_Den_Resident]

Until Fallout lets you be a raider and beat the game as a raider and have it tie into the plot I don't like it no more.

Until Fallout 3 has more than just 4 dialogue options, I'm not playing it either.

 

[TorontoReign]

Good for you man. Stick it to Todd right in the butt. Never relent. Also don't buy Starfield no matter how big the hype is.

 

[The_Den_Resident]

Also, don't buy Starfield no matter how big the hype is.

Oh, I have experience with falling for the hype in the past. I can assure you

Good for you man. Stick it to Todd right in the butt. Never relent.

As for Todd, I don't buy Bethesda games anymore, going on for 7 years now.

 

[Copey]

Weirdly enough, 4 improved on that by making idle and battle dialogue with raiders seem more organic and human. More opportunistic people just trying to get by than every single one being the Joker.

Definitely this. For all of the awful dialogue and writing decisions in that game, the most interesting part for me was reading all the raider warlords' terminals and seeing their thoughts and reactions to other gangs. It showed various thought processes and struggles of choosing to set up in the various dungeons they do, making what would be just Fallout 3 dungeons much more rewarding to go through. Imagine finding out how and why evergreen mills even has a behemoth, why raiders are at the Satcom array, any information about the wheaton armory, and much more. It wouldn't fix the game but it was the strongest part of fallout 4's world building IMO, it definitely needed it.

 

[Hardboiled Android]

Definitely this. For all of the awful dialogue and writing decisions in that game, the most interesting part for me was reading all the raider warlords' terminals and seeing their thoughts and reactions to other gangs. It showed various thought processes and struggles of choosing to set up in the various dungeons they do, making what would be just Fallout 3 dungeons much more rewarding to go through. Imagine finding out how and why evergreen mills even has a behemoth, why raiders are at the Satcom array, any information about the wheaton armory, and much more. It wouldn't fix the game but it was the strongest part of fallout 4's world building IMO, it definitely needed it.

Agreed, the terminals and some of the raider lair concepts showed potential.

But even still, I don't like how all of the raider groups on Fallout 3 and 4 read as gangs, when at least some if not most should read as tribal.

 

[Copey]

Agreed, the terminals and some of the raider lair concepts showed potential.

But even still, I don't like how all of the raider groups on Fallout 3 and 4 read as gangs, when at least some if not most should read as tribal.

Oh without a doubt, but it was a step in the right direction. The fiends got a much better treatment, would’ve been even better with the cut dialogue.

 

[KingArthur]

cut dialogue.

 

[Alphons]

Definitely this. For all of the awful dialogue and writing decisions in that game, the most interesting part for me was reading all the raider warlords' terminals and seeing their thoughts and reactions to other gangs. It showed various thought processes and struggles of choosing to set up in the various dungeons they do, making what would be just Fallout 3 dungeons much more rewarding to go through.

They're better fleshed out than FO3 raider dungeons, but they're still dungeons.

Fallout 4 has 2 major factions, 2 smaller ones and 2 towns. Fallout 1 is absolutely tiny and has so much more in that department.

It's stupid that they wrote so much stuff for different gangs and made them always hostile. They even made an arena and a race track, only to make them into dungeons!