Fallout: New Vegas

Welp. Better break out Robco Certified and make a army of Sentry Bots with Gamma guns.

Nuke 'em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

Break out the Archimedes.

Oh and speaking of Mods. Troubles with my game happened when I tried to play Obscurum, so I am doing a new playthrough, gonna go mostly Energy Weapons.

I've never run a playthrough where that was my first option. Til Dead Money, when I thought that it would be a good idea to spec in. When the best option for Dead Money on PC, for me anyway, not that I've ever been clever enough to do it for some reason, is "Not to play, but console command everything you get in rewards into the game".

When I can be bothered reinstalling New Vegas I may try that for a change. I usually rock Guns.

I never found energy weapons until I was so high level in guns they were useless.

Energy Weapons have been my choice for a while now. With the right perks and gear, every single Laser weapon will crit on virtually every hit.

True. I saw a guy called Jordie Jordan play an Energy Weapons Sneak build on Very Hard, and that's basically what he ended up doing.

I am going for a more science based character so I figured energy weapons would be more in line with their choice.

I started a new game. Courier is shy about giving people his name, so he just has them call him "Six". Woke up in Goodsprings, learned to shoot from Sunny Smiles, overheard Joe Cobb threatening to bring the Wrath of the PG down on Goodsprings. Headed down to Primm, leaving a slew of dead Powder Gangers on the way. Reprogrammed Slimm to be Primm's new Sheriff. Made it to the Mojave outpost, where I met a trash-talking drunk girl, a closeted NCR officer, and a sniper who's frustrated at the lack of combat. She sent me to Nipton, where I witnessed "The Fox" Vulpes Inculatus massacre a village full of people. He told me that the people they massacred were spineless, backstabbing cowards, but all evidence pointed to a good portion of the population putting up quite a violent defence. Read the scumbag mayor's part in everything that happened. Waited till nightfall, then prowled after Inculatus's party. Nothing but recruits. Managed to take two down with sneak attacks with a Cowboy Repeater rifle. The rest gave chase. I left frag mines for them. I don't think Legion soldiers know what explosives are. Managed to take down the entire team. Took over a dozen lottery tickets from Nipton town hall. Laid one on every legion corpse I made. Returned to the Mojave Outpost, where I was rewarded for my services. Returned to Primm, where I discovered a junky old robot in the Mojave Express headquarters. Returned to Goodsprings, where I gathered Sunny, Trudy, and Easy Pete in an impromtu militia to drive off the Powder Ganger threat. In the middle of infiltrating the NCRCF, gaining the trust of Eddie, and am planning to sell him out to Lieutenant Hayes when the time comes. Only level four so far.

So far so good.

Oh duct tape, duct tape, my kingdom for some duct tape!

That video is spot-on. Even if you subscribe to the Legion's dubious morality, the NCR has the advantages of size, technology, organization, and time, which will prove overwhelming in the long run.

It's also kinda obvious. I mean. Really. Raiding societies either settle the fuck down or get hunted into extinction. Rome's fall to the Vandals took several thousand years to happen, and only because it was so corrupt there wasn't an honest person within a hundred miles of the capital. The Mongols, Xiongnu, and other northerners who invaded China either wound up fully integrating into Chinese society, or getting deposed.

Societies that get themselves despised just don't last.

After the political chaos caused by a former mail delivery person kicking their entire army back across the border, after possibly having their top general chucked off of the wall of the Hoover Dam, (and coincidentally kicking the utter shit out of the opposition they've spent much of the previous decade trying to destroy in the process) with the help of a lot of really dangerous people, air support and a huge amount of fully upgraded combat robots, the NCR's not going to be able to pursue its /spit Manifest Destiny to expand to the East for quite a long time, if ever.

Plus you have to remember that they're not going to get the water, hydro-electric and solar energy resources they went into the Mojave for in the first place, and the desperate need for those things isn't going to go away anytime soon. Remember also what Hanlon said about lakes and their absence in the NCR's territories when you have that chat with him at Camp Golf. They may be able to trade for some of the resources with the new ruler of the Mojave, but he or she may not still be able to easily forgive the NCR for being made to do all of the NCR's dirty work for them during the duration of time taken in the game - so the trades may cost the NCR hierarchy more than they're willing to pay.

Well your Courier maybe.

Mine? He's going to help stabilize the region for the NCR.

So, at this point, we can assume East Coast (a.k.a Arthur Maxson's) Brotherhood basically pull an Exodus to (Massachusetts) Commonwealth because situation in Capital Wasteland turned so bad that they had to uproot and settle somewhere safe, and with Minuteman gone and threat from Institute, they expect Commonwealth (baring places like Goodneighbour and The Slog) to accept them with open arms?

Just sayin'.

This is why I hate the definitive nature of ending slides. Because there's so many ways for the story to go that just aren't covered. An NCR aligned Courier who hits their Golden Ending should be a freaking War Hero able to embark on a political career for the sake of the NCR's new resource zone.

A Legion aligned one might be able to do something similar in Legion territory. Maybe not stabilize the whole nation, but carry a group of tribes that have common interests and culture through the ensuing Hell that breaks out when Caesar kicks the bucket.

There's just so many things that could happen, and it's just stupid to lock things down.

A goddamn warhero who set about fixing the entire Mojave by themselves.

Exactly. I understand the whole "consequences to your actions let's wrap this thing up" aspect, but it really shouldn't be there. I'm glad they did away with that bs in FO 4.

It depends on whether you consider the Courier to be, as he/she is in-game, a One-Man Army with unstoppable force of convictions (and arms) who can solely turn the tide of any conflict — in short, a legendary hero who shapes entire civilizations — or just another bloke who happens to be in the right place at the right time and benefits from some Gameplay and Story Segregation.

Realistically, history doesn't turn on the actions of superheroic individuals, but rather the actions of large groups of people under charismatic (or incompetent) leaders. The Courier leaves a lot of people changed in his/her wake, but sooner or later those people have to do things for themselves, and it's those actions that will matter in the long run.

It's interesting how this contrasts with Skyrim, however... in that game, the player character is explicitly a legendary figure descended from dragons who rules both Skyrim (and the Empire) by birthright and could, indeed, shape history for centuries to come. But Skyrim doesn't have ending storyboards.

edited 6th Jun '16 7:13:54 AM by Fighteer

To be fair, being charismatic has nothing to do with being competent. One can be competent and completely lack charisma, or be incompetent but trick people into following anyway.

Even if you go with the whole "right person at the right time" instead of a legendary approach, the Courier could easily have any one of a number of futures that aren't covered by the ending slides. I'm sure those slides were there as a technical thing too, considering it would have taken too many resources to actually change the game itself based on your ending.

To be fair, there's little return for investing massive development resources to portray the changes to the world of New Vegas post-ending, given that most players will quit at that point (or reroll for a different playthrough).

edited 6th Jun '16 9:15:38 AM by Fighteer

Maybe it's an American thing to roll either NCR or Legion. I'd lay good money on those endings being the most popular among American players, with House perhaps being third, but none of them sing to me. I did a NCR run exactly once and I felt dirty afterwards. The others (except Independent) I will not touch with a bargepole - not even for an achievement and I'm usually all about those.

True. It would take a lot of cash and I'm not sure Obsidian's coming back to the Fallout franchise anyway. Much as I would like a sequel to New Vegas.

Dunno, I'd expect more Americans to attempt the Wild Card ending due to our memetic fascination with Libertarian-style individual freedom. I went with NCR all the way, because better a flawed, if stable democratic government than a militaristic autocracy or a John Galt style bastion of controlled anarchy.

John Galt's a dick, though. Given the amount of people you have to, like, help, (all across the Mojave) in the run to the Golden Ending for Independent, Ayn Rand's corpse is currently revolving at 7200 rpm in her coffin just at the thought of the comparison between her pet fuckwit and the Independent!Courier.