...but it WAS intended to rebuild society. A society of super humans who could resist radiation, or whatever. It just went horrifically wrong

The government seemed to have pulled out of the core well before the bombs dropped, having anticipated the war, and established Raven Rock to keep all their archive material etc. As far as I understand, Vault-Tec was working for the government/the Enclave, and as such, whether or not people survived to "rebuild society" wasn't a concern. The Vault doesn't annotate but if I recall correctly, the conversation with Braun reveals that even though he invented the G.E.C.K. it doesn't really sound like he was confident in its ability to work or for those who had one to be able to use it properly.

Braun was totally [censored] insane and evil. Why wouldn't he have assigned a single GECK to the one Vault he knew would definitely not be able to use it?

but super mutants technically are superior (in terms of combat) to a run-of-the-mill wastelander. So it makes sense that they would severely hinder progress in the wasteland if they were left unchallenged. I mean, what would the west have looked like if the master hadn't been contained?

Super Mutants are also stupid. There would have been a lot more humans than super mutants. I don't know how many vaults there are in Fallout 3, but let's assume there's 10. We'll subtract 1 from that because of vault 101 and pull 87 aside. Each vault can support up to 1000 people at max capacity.

V87: 1000
All-others: 9000

Then we have to consider that there is a good chance of dying during mutation so we'll assume that 200 died off.

SMs: 800
Humans: 9000

Even if Super Mutants more tough, they are still incredibly dumb, so humans have a huge upper hand as far as tactics goes. Even if you were to cut down that number with the amount of arms available, there is still a lot more humans fighting the super mutants.

Most of the Vaults weren't filled to capacity, for one. For another, they were mostly civilians who were plucked from their every day lives. People with office jobs or stay at home housewives who would likely crack under the pressure of aiming a fire arm, if forced to.

but you're assuming that all vaults we're filled to capacity (which they weren't) and that all the vault dwellers in the CW survived (which they didn't, in fact most died in the vaults)

you're also assuming that all vaults opened at once (which they didn't, and what if vault 87 opened first and the mutants were allowed to spread quickly?)

finally you're assuming that tactics mattered as if this were 1800's Napoleonic style warfare. The fact of the matter is that intellengence doesn't count for crap if you're scared, disoriented (which I imagine that most would be after experiencing the shock of the wasteland), effectively unarmed (or just what you could scrounge up in the wastes), and split up (which most residents who escaped from the vault would be).

we're talking about citizens and wastelanders, who do not an effective army make. Just the fear factor that a group of Super Mutants would instill upon them must have quickly thrown out the door any chance of fighting.

plus you didn't answer my question. :thumbsup: what would the west look like if the master hadn't been contained?

Andronicus, I am a little scared at how much we are agreeing, here... :unsure:

The Master was different, the Master's army was far out of sight, and out of care. The Master's Mutants were also more intelligent, better armed, and far better organized. Also, the Master's army had better logistical tools and could use holotapes and short-wave radios.

great minds think alike I suppose :disguise:

This Enclave meatheads got a head on his shoulders don'cha know. :grad:

Edit:

but that just illustrates my point. While they may have been more "advanced" I doubt they gave a crap about agriculture and making "progressive communities." (NCR territory would not look like it does now that's for sure) Do you remember the "evil" end cutscene in Fallout 1? Does that seem like a regime that is "advanced"? Is it reminiscent of the CW in any way?

I also don't think they were "out of sight, out of care"....whats the point of the plot in Fallout 1 then if defeating them didn't mean crap?

Enemy of my enemy?

I think I'd still have to shoot at you if we crossed paths in the Wasteland, though...

Fair enough. I think Enclave power armor provides adequate protection, and this plasma rifle allows me to hold my own in combat....i've "field tested" it myself...

You might want to ask your comrades about that...they seemed to have had hard time surviving my missile launcher... :whistling:

Mmm...I'd ask http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1y1neKU87Uk about that issue. :celebration:

*Starts singing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=znEePD1nJxo&feature=relatedwith all his Enclave comrades* :foodndrink:

Edit: haha, just realized on that "stars and stripes forever video" look at the 2nd highest rated comment for a non-fallout related video! :disguise:

....meathead.

But, after your excellent display in this thread this evening, you can be President Meathead of my heart

Edit: that is why I thought you had posted it, ahaha.

Good enough.....mutie tee hee :biggrin:

*starts right back up singing* OHHH! "Let martial note in triumph float
And liberty extend its mighty hand! A flag appears 'mid thunderous cheers,
The banner of the Western land!"

You are managing to stay motivated? I've been thinking about returning to my mod, which will also probably take an eternity to finish, but I can't help thinking that with NV taking all the limelight there'll be no-one to play it.

Yeah I really love making mods at least as much (if not much more) than playing the games. I mod when watching TV or listening to the radio, and take it to paper when away from the home computer to map out this or that. Outside of work and getting my Fo3-Rig back up, getting character buffed for Gunmaster95s mod (and a few others I really want to experience again) - I've spent the last 2 weeks slowly going through the entire database to update my Object Palettes for the final push on the level design (I'm on "R"). lol

I don't actually "play" the game very much at all, usually only to go in and test stuffs. I really liked F:NV too and played very hard for the first month when it came out, racked up 258 hours according to Steam and that was that. I still think about it too, but just as much about Fo3 memories I had when in-game. Modding is my knitting.

Motivation is not the hard part for me - the hard part is wondering whether all of this will svck, or be fun to play. :whistling: A question only time will tell.

Miax

Well it will put you to sleep if you've done everything (me). There's nothing to do after Broken Steel except save a game and kill everything in sight the re-load your game again. Don't get me wrong, that's pretty fun, but not as much as fun and excitment as Take It Back!. But New Vegas will make you yawn one way or another. It's really boring after the first day or two. But anyways, go play the hell out of Fallout 3.

I absolutely loved Fallout 3. It was my first real sandbox game and from the moment I stepped out the Vault and my eyes adjusted to the outside light, I was hooked.

Played the game 3 times on the trot to complete it in Evil, Good and Neutral and completed every quest/achievement necessary to gain the Platinum Trophy on the PS3.

Played and completed every faction path on New Vegas but, compared to Fallout 3, I found it lacking.

A pity some elements of New Vegas couldnt be back ported to Fallout 3, namely hardcoe mode and crafting ( Weapon kits... )

Now, even though there is nothing left to gain from playing Fallout 3, I am playing again. Nothing quite beats leaving Megaton in the morning, picking a direction and venturing out into the Wasteland.

:wave: Hi! Allow me to introduce myself: my name is Ghouls and I am yet another of the many players who wandered off to NV for a few hours and came right back home to FO3. Don't worry about there being nobody around to play your mod. Mod because you enjoy it! There will be people discovering FO3 for the first time for years to come and plenty of us old-timers who won't give up our copies of FO3 to save our lives.

WHOS AFTER MY FALLOUT 3 COPY?!! COME ON *branishes previously hidden plasma pistol* I'LL TAKE YOU ALL ON!!!

No but seriously I fit quite nicely under the "right back to Fallout 3" category of people. In fact I went back to Fallout 3 after only a week or so of vegas. Fallout 3 just seems to feel like "home" to me, can't explain it. Though I may play Vegas occasionally, Fallout 3 is where its at.

Time doesn't really mean anything when a game is good and Mods are well made. Doom has been around for about 15 years and people are still modding it. I imagine that Fallout 3 will be modded(and played) for many more years to come.

After I finish Fallout 3, I'll be playing it with the DLC. After that I'll give NV a try(hopefully with another patch added to it). When I am done with that, I am going to get a grab-bag of Mods for Fallout 3. I'll ask a few of the members whose opinions I trust as to which Mods I should get(and whether they will be compatible with each other).

Unfortunately any new Fallout, made my Bethesda, won't be out for a good while, I fear. Skyrim is going to take up all their time for another 18-24 months at least. Kinda with I'd bought FO3 GOTY earlier than 3 weeks ago as it is particularly good. Unlike Oblivion, it doesn't seem to have any glaringly poor game design choices (like the level scaling / levelling system)

I'm hooked! :bowdown:

Hello Ghouls! Thanks, that's encouraging!

Exploratory value combined with story being so loosely tied with general gaming, results in an amazing lot of replay value.

I wouldn't worry too much about that. I put in almost 170 hours on New Vegas before I took a couple months' break from all things Fallout. I've just started another playthrough on Fallout 3, my first one with FWE and MMM installed (my previous game had MMM only). I was very interested in seeing how this compared with playing in hardcoe mode in New Vegas, so I installed FWE, replaced some other mods I had been using, and I'm off and going again through the Capital Wasteland.

In a nutshell, the two don't even compare - hardcoe in NV seems like a joke in comparison. It has huge potential, but once again, as with FO3, it's going to be up to the modders to make NV realize that potential. And frankly, I'm probably going to be waiting quite a while for some really good NV mods to come out, as well as a couple more NV patches to fix stability issues, before I start playing it again.

So I'll still be using good Fallout 3 mods for some time to come.