But no one has even seemed to notice that somehow an AIRCRAFT CARRIER HAS MANAGED TO GET DOWN THE POTOMAC!?!?!?!?!?! Rivet City? Big freakin boat? No one has a problem with this? Ok so I don't really know if this is possible or not but it seems pretty far fetched to me.

Well the big boat called Rivet City can be there. If it was there before the bombs fell it may stayed there. ^_^
And I have no problem with the Mirelurks and the Yao Guai

I'll be honest here. I don't care about the yao guai or mirelurks. I'm sure they have their own special reasons as to why they became what they did. Obviously we know what yao guai are and how the got changed so that's a no-brainer. Mirelurks are weird but they remind me of those weird ancient fish things, you know the ones with all those feeler legs or some such. They're a shell-fish of sorts anyways. As for Rivet City-it was probably sitting in the harbor when the bombs hit which would explain why the aircraft are still present there. It also means that people in DC had no idea what was coming, otherwise all those jets would have been dispatched to attempt to misdirect the bomb or bombs.

EDIT: Perhaps the mirelurks come from something like this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fossilmike/2660602184/in/pool-trilobites

It could have been washed ashore by a large wave caused by bombs going off.

You do realise that it is a proper shipyard, right, well, was in our timeline until the 1960's. Is it so unreasonable to believe that instead of becoming office space in our timeline, it instead continued to be a shipyard?

There's a destroyer there at the moment, I know its not quite as big as an aircraft carrier, but its still a big freaking boat.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Navy_Yard

Not to mention ITS THE FUTURE, and who knows how many massive works projects they could have undertaken to expand the river to allow an Aircraft Carrier to enter.

It was probably there to protect D.C. airspace from Chinese bombers, but unfortunately could do little against nuclear missiles.

Now this is the ONLY thing that would explain a carrier being over 100 miles inland. I have to think about it this way as well. D.C. is no where near a shore and they would have to expand the river the allow something this massive to get near it.

Oh and Agent C...you could fit about 10 destroyers in the space you could put one carrier. Destroyers don't house even 100 crew (if I remember correctly) but a carrier can house over 2000. They really are cities on the water.

Yao Guai are like super-rabid bears to me. No problems there.

Mirelurk shells appear to be like Horseshoe crabs, which live on the Atlantic Coast apparently, and the gulf of Mexico!

Mirelurk kings, however, are quite odd. And scary. I remember my first encounter with one at the Oasis cavern. Frightening thing.

yao guai are easy to understand, mirelurks well radiation's a hell of a thing I'd like to know where the A bomb in megaton came from how the hell did it survive nuclear war and still be in existence right in the open for so long

I think people are more prone to complaining about the NAME Yao Guai and the sheer prevalence of the chinese in the Capital Wasteland area.

I mean the Chinese got no where near DC during the war so it leaves people scratching their heads a little about it all...

well, as we know, there are a few chinese soldiers left from the time of the chinese invasion, and now, 200 years after that, who knows. imho, there is a possibility that some chinese guy woke up one morning, saw this rabid thing tear up his comrades and ran like the devil to the next encampment. because the people didn't understand him correctly, somehow the words "yao guai" must have stuck to their minds, similar to the kangaroo, which, too, was just a misunderstanding. so that could be an answer, i guess.

A better anaolgy is the River Avon. There are 20 or so in the Uk because the Romans didnt realise that the Celts didnt differenciate between different rivers, they were all just "Avon" (River)

Those are my thoughts too, as to how an aircraft carrier could have gotten to where Rivet City is, maybe there were some projects made to widen the river, we have no indication as to what the Potomac looks like at the present time in Fallout 3, quite possibly, some projects were made to expand it, which allowed the carrier which is now Rivet City to reach its present location.

As to mirelurks, it's already explained that they are descendant from the crabs in the area, at least that's what the player character can say when reporting about them after helping Moira research them, to me though they look most like horseshoe crabs than anothing, at least the normal ones and hunters. The mirelurk kings don't look much like other mirelurks at all, they don't even seem to have the same color of blood, and when dismembered, the broken parts of their limbs look the same as on other red blooded creatures, which makes me have to wonder if they ARE in fact mirelurks and not a different creature that people mistake for a type of mirelurk due to their tendency to frequent places where mirelurks are found. Either way though, they don't bother me at all, Fallout has lots of crazy mutated creatures anyway, adding a few more won't hurt, neither do Yao-Gui bother me, it's pretty clear what they are, and given that the player can find a number of signs of a Chinese presence in D.C., it isn't hard to guess where their name comes from.

Good theory. Although trilobites are extinct, in our timeline, they might not have been during the Great War in the Fallout timeline. Most likely, however, the mirelurks arise from the descendant of the trilobite, the horse-shoe crab. It looks very similar to a trilobite and is not extinct. I'm a biology teacher, so admittedly I have to operate under a strict suspended disbelief train of thought when playing fallout. Neither option, considering the fact that the game is science fiction, is that unbelievable.

Why would they need a carrier for that when they have Andrews Air Force Base?


Or they are descended from Maryland blue crabs.

I thought they came from Horseshoe crabs...

http://nintharticle.com/horseshoecrab.jpg

http://www.harrysaarinen.com/8%20%20%20horseshoecrab.gif

Mirelurks come from deep underground....
crab people - walk like crab, talk like people

sorry couldnt resist

I'm still leaning towards blue crabs due to the limbs and that Blue crabs are known for their aggressive tendencies.

All I can say is; it is a game, and I really don't care as long as I have fun.

Then you, my friend, should not be in the lore forums. Surely there are better ways for you to get your postcount up, aye?

More on topic-the blue crab theory for Mirelurks seems more plausible. The mirelurk kings are another story altogether. If I had to give a theory as to what they might be, perhaps a more advanced mutation of the same creature OR a different fish completely. They are more human-like with humanoid facial features and they look more like a normal (non shellfish) fish or possibly some sort of eel?

One thing to remember here is that while some of the creatures they may have come from lacked specific limbs and other features it is possible the radiation and/or FEV made them more humanoid. I can't really say as I am only theorizing.

... and that's why threads should be named properly.

*cough* the guy was talking about Rivet City, not Mirelurks OR Yao Guai

Being not from the US (or that hemisphere as a matter of fact), I don't know whether or not a carrier is/was/should be able to go up that river.
However, it indeed looks odd - all jets on deck, whereas one is left with the impression that in case of a /nuclear/ war, warning systems go off and all available aircraft is scrambled - either to carry nukes, or, to escort the nuke carriers, or just to stay up there.

It starts to look somewhat odd - a fallen -own- nuclear missile, the jets on the carrier... and the bomb in Megaton, that looks pretty much american made (OK, so the chineese could have stolen the design...)... hmm... ?

My take on the Yao Guai...Corrupted form of Yogi...Smarter (And more dangerous) than the average bear. :tops:

Kthanid

My theory is Yao Guai was a term picked up on by westerners shortly after the bombs fell. Beleiving these monsters were created by the Chinese, they named them after a Chinese term for evil spirit monster. And similar to the word Sputnik it became part of normal lexicon. Afterall, nobody could really know. And if the Chinese bombed my city and I stumbled out of the ashes and met some enormous mutated monster my first guess would be it was a crazy Chinese mutation weapon similar to Deathclaws..

As for Rivet City, given that the aircraft on it are 50s-era REAL LIFE jets that certainly wouldnt be in service in 2077, my thoery is that the ship was a floating museum with those ships on the decks and hangers mainly as displays. That, or, when the bombs fell, the carrier was split in two and sank, which would have set off enormous explosions and set huge fires from fuel and munitions. Any survivors on the ship would have fled immediately. Those jets would not have been used (though standard compliment for a large aircraft carrier is 80+ aircraft, maybe some of them were...) Also, given the existence of the P-51 in that old guy's museum inside the ship, it being a museum ship is quite possible.

i always figured the mirelurks were the result of what happens when you mix a very drunk wastlander, a crab and a lot of radiation.

Aircraft wouldnt even be able to touch a Nuke...
The time line breaks after WWII so we know that VII rockets where still made by the Germans, in the Fallout timeline Nuclear research is put far more funding into it that in the real timeline...
It is then certain they made a "Unstoppable Nuke" using the same concept as the VII...