The exact specifics of computer targeting for any robot in the fallout series is never explained in any game. Rothchild was scathing because they hadn't tested it yet. Dr. Li and himself and only just solved the power problems. The issue was getting Prime to physically work not its programing which If I was Rothchild programing prime to recognize the Brotherhood of Steel as its master would be the first priority before I tried making it functional. Fixing the super weapon BEFORE you program it no to attack you is a really bone head move.

He's not treating them as communists Prime is simply programed to spout off anti-communist slogans in battle. What the BoS should turn it off to avoid hurting the Enclaves feelings?

In a real lfie scenario most of the Enclave technology wouldn't work either so its a moot point.

So far as I can tell the BoS didn't even start fighting the Enclave until after the Oil Rig was destoryed. At which point the BoS was doing the hunting.

It is true that we don't even see that many Brotherhood in Fallout 2. We don't see the two groups fighting, but the Brotherhoos are very aware of the Enclave and their level of tech. They take great interest in Vertibirds. We are asked to give the Brotherhood a copy of the Vertibird blueprints.

So we can assume that the two groups were coming into contact in Fallout 2, but you are right I might have jumped the gun by saying the Enclave were kicking their ass.

It's hardly above any kind of logical reasoning. All the crazy turrets in military bases, your not wearing anykind of ID which we know robots can be programmed to scan for. Turrets in Raven Rock, Eden's assumed direct control to blast his own men.


I am perfectly aware of Rothschild's objection, the robot hadn't been tested and prior to that point had never moved an inch; which is exactly why it's so implausible that it would have been programmed to recognise the Enclave as hostiles. It's kind of taken as read that the Brotherhood are programmed as friendlies, otherwise the weapon wouldn't have been able to be tested; that doesn't effect the fact that Lyon's decision to activate Prime took everyone by surprise yet Prime is just able to assume what he's doing, where he's going and what to shoot.


You know what I mean, walking robots have a pretty large and obvious structural weakness that a trained combat pilot - which we can assume Vertibird pilots are right? - should target. In the opening of Broken Steel three vertibirds just fly past and one purposefully stops in from of Prime to get blown up on purpose. It's stupid.

All three are coming in from behind Prime, they'd blast the [censored] out of his legs and the exposed cabling with rockets and Prime would be done for in seconds. The whole of Take it Back is just a shooting gallery through the streets, so much for the supposedly superior trained Enclave troopers, just be in the road and crouched behind the sandbags.


They were scouting out Enclave positions in Fallout 2, gathering intel before any more action could be desided upon.

Which never comes up in science fiction why should it start now. In a "real life" scenario Prime would be designed differently so once again your point is moot otherwise I can just claim a Vertibird should barely be able to fly.


So the BoS handed out ID's to everyone problem solved.

Well what do you want me to say? People still act and think like people in Fallout. Nothing about Prime apparently being considered worthy of development would negate from the fact that flying in front of Prime and allow yourself to be purposefully blown-up in an action scene is not something that would realistically happen in a battle; it was written that way purely so that the Player could see Prime kill [censored], something which would not occur if the whole battle was based on lore and not for entertainment.

Your assuming the pilot knew Prime's eye was actually a high powered energy weapon. The first time Liberty Prime opens fire is when the Vertibird stops infront of him. The pilot might not have known prime had a functioning high powered energy weapon behind the eyea and assumed he was safe if he hovered out over the water where it couldn't reach.

Or as I said, the BoS are wearing pre-war american soldier armor and Prime maybe was pre-war programmed not to shoot at the soldiers wearing american armor.

But yeah, would've been an awkward moment for Rothchild if that programming wasn't there and Prime shot everyone up instead.

There's no reason that they wouldn't have engaged properly when they had the advantage, he had his back to the birds the whole time and the rack of bombs on his back are clear enough. Look it works in the Brotherhood's and indeed every factions favour, how many situations in Fallout 3 would have worked out diferently if real world logic was in-effect? I just - as you might imagine - only go out of the way to defend the Enclave's perspective because that's all I care about and - as you are aware - have the closing events of Fallout 3 are rather in my fore-thought atm as I plan how they are going to occur in the MS Word doc I have open now.

I just think that the whole of Take it Back - the desiding battle between the Enclave and Brotherhood - is a shooting gallery for a God like PC and a genuinly impossible to kill robot, written primarily as an action scene from the point of the view of the Brothehood.


I would have been more inclined to agree with Lord on that one, some kind of FOB tag that soldiers could wear (exactly like we see at the Enclave Camp RHO) would make more sense to me.

In real life though, if you saw a giant laser shooting nuke chucking robot, chances are you would run in terror, and it would take a few minutes to gather your wits and actually make a plan to destroy it.

Say there is a tank about 50 feet ahead of you, you see a spot on the side where a round hit it and you have the skills to somehow disable it. Would you really run straight at it hoping to get there, or go take cover and find some place to shoot a rocker at it.

I am not a power-armoured soldier of the Enclave, who's choice of last words have been known to include "For President Eden," and "I've failed,"; being terrified is not what the Enclave does. They are highly dedicated soldiers but my point is that they are supposedly - or rather supposed to be - the best trained and equipped professional military in the wasteland and that if this battle was relient purely on lore then the Enclave would have won. After Prime has crossed the bridge they wouldn't be still stood in the middle of the road behind sand-bags. Didn't take more than a few seconds to have an artilery strike on Prime crossing the bridge - because that was dramatically convenient - so I fail to see why an Enclave officer didn't order his men to fall back to a more defensive position.

The Enclave are still humans so they can still feel emotions, and once you see several vertibirds shot out of the sky and all your fellow troopers immediately vaporized, you're going to feel something. Or at least try and save your men by regrouping or something, not just know how to take it down within a matter of seconds. If the battle were going by somekind of lore standards, I would expect Prime to get all the way to that little wall thing. Then while he is distracted and motionless some vertibirds that didn't fly in right in front of him could come from behind him and then done something.

All of which is what should have happened, what exactly is the source of dis-agreement? Point is that they did not pull back in or re-group in the quest, just stood in the open like lemons to be killed. Hell you said yourself that the Vertibird's would have flown behind and done something which is exactly what I said should have happened, I was never expecting the ground forces to do anything other than fall back to a safer location as the majority only have small arms.

You were saying how that Prime would have stepped out, said some anti-communist stuff, then got blown up. I was saying, that wouldn't have been the case.

Well when the actual first few seconds of the quest are http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDZlNgD8LR8&t=4m7s I can't think of any other way it should have went.

EDIT: Why aren't the Enclave shelling the Citadel?

They definately look like they were going somewhere, you can see as the other two just flew right on by. So that one guy who turned around wasn't a very dedicated soldier to disobey orders like that.

And would the those legs on prime really just snap apart like twigs? Of course they would be taken out, but I doubt those lasers would have killed it in a few seconds, enough time for Prime to turn around and zap it.

Apparently an order to fall back was never given by Autumn. Which is puzzling to no end.

Either Autumn was uninformed of the situation outside or by that point he had become delusional. "I beg to differ, the Enclave is at the height of its power." (He makes this statement after losing what is essentially his entire occupying force.)

Needless to say the quest was written extremely poorly. There's no excuse for that sort of deus-ex machinima crap being used.

He was probably an escort or something, though given that they were flying that un-necessarily close to the Brotherhood base... we could probably spend all day trying to figure out what there birds were doing up there but the only explaination is meta - cool set-up for a big battle, just like the Enclave artilery we never see.


Lasers no, but we see Vertibird's drop Mini-nukes and have a rapid-fire missile capability.

Did they really have missiles? And mini-nukes would have been really hard to hit something like that.

And like I said, would Prime really be defenseless to some explosions in its legs. If the Enclave were made intelligent, then so would Prime, so I don't think a missle barage for about 3 seconds would have done it.

The best time would have been when he is deactivating the shields near the purifier since he powers himself down, and he even falls over a bit.

Yeah they did have missiles. Look at those legs, they have exposed cabling wrapped around them; I think you are really under-estimating the power of six air-surface missiles.

Well Horrigan did take out the San Francisco bunker pretty easily. I don't think there's really much question that even in a conventional war without the Curling FEV the Enclave would've easily crushed the Brotherhood in Fallout 2.

To me, it looks like the Enclave attempted to exploit that. Since right after he powers down, the soldiers stationed on the purifier begin to charge towards him. Then, not long after he gets inside the purifier grounds, a vertibird attempts to deploy a squadron of soldiers behind him.

Like I said is it fair to make the Enclave intelligent so they would have a clear advantage over Prime, you would have to even them out, not make one just shoot a couple missles and destroy a robot.

I'm talking about logic here not fairness; if we want to be fair give the Enclave a boss who can freeze time to inject himelf with Stimpaks whenever he likes and take off Prime's God-Mode!

Well then, let me change my wording. If the Enclave had logic applied to it, then so would Prime. SInce some general states that he is combat ready (besides power problems) would they really have those thin legs and arms and exposed wires?

Well fair enough I guess. That's a problem that permiates the whole Fallout series however, in terms of logical design and what not. And really Prime was never anything more than a prototype, he wasn't finished; it was purely a Brotherhood decision to go immediately from "We've just got it working," to "Put it into combabt." Even Rothschild question's Bethesda's writing lol.