So, after replaying Fallout 3, I can't help but feel President Eden isn't truly evil, nor is Richardson. While I don't support the Enclave, I found Eden's goal pretty sensible. I mean, look at his actions, he's simply trying to purge mutants so pure strain humans can survive and rebuild America as it was. You can't entirely fault soldiers either, as they all look young so it's not implausible they were indoctrinated into the believe that Wastelanders are a sub-human peoples that are to be executed if they resist or detain/ignore if they are not. The Enclave as a whole aren't so bad, just very extremist.

Now, back to Eden. Eden is a Pre-War supercomputer who spent his his whole life with Pre-War US Government officials and Post-War Enclave, his whole world view is Enclave raised and his goal is, objectively, with good intentions and isn't racist or hateful, but in fact he views all 'exposed' humans outside Vaults and Ghouls equally as mutants and is trying to (I assume) Corral them so they die off akin to how The Master planned or until Pure Humans can firmly keep control of their homes and grow as a people.

So, do you feel Eden is good, ambiguous, evil? Perhaps teetering around on the morality scale?

He's just another character with an agenda. No such thing as good or evil.

An artificial intelligence that took on the identaty and history of a group that one can argue were "evil." So I guess I would call him misguided at best. Given that AI computers in Fallout tended to kill themselves.. maybe becoming Eden was away to stay sain

His plan though made no sense at all so... not that a brilliant AI.

I think you alluded to all the main points I was going to bring up, but I have trouble calling richardson morally ambiguous he really just only cared about purging people with 4 different lines of D.N.A that was about the depth of his plan to rebuild america without these people.

But Eden had a similar ideology to some extent about wanting pure humans but it wasn't the same mustache twirling with manically and beatifically laughing cat stroking menace of richardson as Eden importantly wanted to get rid of the really dangerous abominations like east coast super mutants and deathclaws etc.

He said it was a shame innocent people would die but they where the catalyst so America could rebuild and not be ravaged by these atrocities.

To me richardson walked close to the nazi line while Eden took a calculated decision that wasn't for the faint of heart.I have to say Eden is an excellent character.

I like him as a character, but there's not getting around alot of writing issues surrounding Eden. Although that goes for many characters in Fallout 3.

Personally, my theory was always that Eden never intended to target wastelanders necessarily. Instead, he was going after abominations like the super-mutants and such. Wastelanders, by virtue of their exposure to the virus, were simply a casualty. Not one he would particularly lose sleep over, but casualties non-the-less. Eden alludes to this himself when he speaks of the unfortunate death of wastelanders being for the "greater good." Which is starkly opposed to Richardson who was actively targeting wastelanders because they are a "threat". Eden appears to have no such notions.

Its also reasonable to assume his plan only covers the Capital Wasteland region. As it seems impossible for it to be a world-wide cleansing.

Eden's plan for the CW was that things had gotten to a state where there was no easy way of saving it conventionally. Thus, he wanted to wipe the slate clean and start anew in the area. With the Enclave taking the lead.

Theory? he pretty much spells that plan out to you.

Alot of people disagree with that interpretation though so I say "theory".

He actually says all of it at different times when talking to him there really isn't too much to interpret.

Really Eden was a giant reset button.

To the person that picked other care to elaborate?

An apt metaphor I think, and it really gets to the heart of the distinction between Eden and Autumn.

If the wasteland was a painting that had been royally screwed up by the painter, Autumn's solution is to try and fix the painting by hand. Delicately and slowly trying to save as much of the original painting as possible. Perhaps he might end up making it better, perhaps he could end up making it worse.

Eden's method is to say "screw it" and toss the canvas away and start the painting over from scratch. However, you just lost all that you originally had.

The question then is, whether or not someone thinks that what is currently in the CW (i.e. the wastelanders) are worth working and (dying for) to save. Autumn says yes. Eden says no.

Autumn: "The American people are worth fighting for."

Eden: "Autumn has allowed his humanity to cloud his objectivity."

That was me. I don't think he is evil and I don't think he is misunderstood. As you said he explains himself. I just think he was an AI that took on the identity of Eden to stay sain and his plan made no sense so he wasn't that smart. A misguided AI with a crappy plan, not much to it.

Agreed and you can argue the case for both of them neither is right or wrong or evil or good.

It's a battle of head vs heart.

I would say that both Richardson and Eden weren't necessarily evil. I think they would be considered heroes to some, and evil menace to others. Had the Enclave won, they'd be decorated heroes.

In my point of view, I think they did evil things for what they believed to be right. Unfortunately what they believed to be right meant genocide.

Ok then not much room to be dissuaded I see

I don't really get the whole stay sane argument he didn't really take on an identity it wasn't a jarring transition he or it seem to slowly slip into power with his self awareness growing and soldiers wanted guidance so it seemed to fit, speculation on my part but he was the de facto president so it probably just ended up him having the loudest voice or most authority so people followed I don't think he just woke up/booted up/exited sleep mode/came out of stand by and decided i'm president mother frickers come stop me!

Edit: seen people sticking up for Richardson could someone tell me why they think he is morally ambiguous I struggle to see it with him?

Enclave's goal isn't evil from their perspective, for them it makes perfect sense. If you purge the mutants from the wasteland and only prime normals remain then they could rebuild without any interference from outside threats, it could very well be the fastest way for humanity to rise like a phoenix out of the ashes. Problem is, the cost of that goal is too big to ever be considered "good" for me. I also find it to be a cheap shortcut for the Enclave. Rather than do some actual work towards establishing a nation of the pre-war glory they instead want an easy way out. Instead of actually convincing people that they have the right idea for a nation and fighting outside powers they want to off everyone with the push of a button. I consider that to be weak. I think Caesar has the right idea to make people work towards fixing up the wasteland and unifying everyone under one flag. It ain't pretty but at least it bands humanity together to form a new nation that can thrive in the wasteland which doesn't rely on pre-war ideologies that led to the downfall in the first place. Eden and Richardson are both truly evil for that sake. I'm sure a murderer could explain why he had to murder someone and from hist point of view it might even make sense, but it doesn't take away the fact that he murdered an innocent person for his own selfish gain with no regard to the victim or those close to the victim whom he's traumatized.

Well the staying sain thing is pure speculation on my part. Eden is a ZAX AI and we learned in Fallout 2 that many ZAX AI killed themselves. So maybe Eden's connection to the Enclave command structure, learning from them and interacting with them, he took on the role of Eden to stay sain. After all didn't Eden slowly become self aware? I guess it isn't really importaint. But agree with you guys he wasn't evil. But his plan really made no sense. It all came down to "I hope the Lone Wanderer will help me." It also needed for Project Purity to work... so what would have happened if it never got working? Would they have just stayed in Raven Rock till the end of time?

I wrote this along time ago but I think it works for this question.

Richardson didn't want more power. He was already the President of the United States of America for life. How much more power can one person have? Richardson and the Enclave saw themselves as the last Americans left alive. When they encountered armies of Super Mutants and other mutations such as ghouls, they had to act to save themselves.

For people that think the Enclave are evil Nazis, just do this one thing. Picture yourself as "Average Joe Citizen" living on Control Station Enclave, the only part of America left. The entire American government is stationed on the Rig.

Now your job as "Average Joe Citizen" is to monitor the Vault experiments. Now its just an average run of the mill day watching Vault 17 when all of a sudden a huge horde of Super Mutants bust into the Vault and start killing and capturing everyone

Then you learn Vault 17 isn't the only such Vault to suffer this fait. A huge army of Super Mutants is rampaging across the Western United States, very close to Control Station Enclave. Who knows how big and far this army of freaks has grown.

Then you learn that there is another form of mutant, Ghouls!

Through some research you learn that Ghouls were once humans and they became ghouls through radiation. That you too could become a ghoul. That everyone on the mainland America has mutated in some way, and interbreeding with them could produce some other horrible mutant.

Now as "Average Joe Citizen" place yourself in the 1950s "B" Monster Movie mindset. What would you want your government to do?

Would you:
A ) want them to make peace with the Super Mutants and Ghouls so that you can live peacefully amongst them?

B ) Call in the national guard, the army, marines, airforce and any one else with a gun to kill all the Monsters?

And as "Average Joe Citizen" you would want your government to deal with the Monsters with a wonder weapon that would spare the lives of America boys in uniform and be cheap. So President Richardson came up with his wonder weapon. The FEV Curling-13, which would kill all the Monsters and make everyone safe.

Hmmm... thanks that put it into a better perspective, it's hard at times to look through the characters eyes and not your own.

As for the LW yeah Eden like Mr. House they where dependent on the player character but they both had time on there hands other opportunities would have came around.

I'm not saying it's fool proof or perfect but it wasn't destined to falter either.

Well the one thing I don't get about Eden's plan is he could have just put the FEV into the water sources and it would have killed the mutants because eveyone was pretty much drinking the water anyways. He didn't need project purity.

Megaton and Rivet City had their own water sources right? At least Megaton, so they would have been spared by the FEV virus. No need to have them as collateral damage. They didn't even need the virus, they had the tech and weapons, no one but for the BoS could have touched them and they were wetting the bed in fear over the Enclave.

I think Eden is a wonderful character, in most part due to his voice actor. Even though my characters hated his guts, they still loved hearing him on the radio. Eden himself also said something to this effect - how hearng a soothing authorative voice on the radio helped turn some people to his cause.

This all provides an effective mask for what his plan actually is though: Genocide of the majority of the human race, and in such a clean and efficent manner possible that would make pre-war fascists envious. I think a lot of people forget the plot point that the FEV thing that he has is death to anyone who has stepped into the wasteland at any point in their lives. This includes the Lone Wanderer, who was born outside of Vault 101, and thus isnt in the very narrow group of "pure-stock humans"

As for the nation that they want to build after a holocaust of greater proportion than the nuclear war? Well, I dont think they would have the population to occupy more than a few small bits of the ruins of DC. If the plan is carried through, then it would effectively be a nation without people.

Eh that sort of just comes down to poor explanation on Bethesda's part.

I assume 1. Project purity (for whatever reason) enables the virus to be spread quicker/faster. Or perhaps it had something to do with the interaction between the GECK and PP.

2. They would have got it working eventually. Sarah Lyon's seems to confirm this when she says that even without the code, the Enclave have the ability to get it working regardless. Even if it takes time.

The Lone Wander having to help....yeah I have no good explanation for that. That was pretty much just a shoe-horned way for the player to have a part in the Enclave's side. Otherwise we have to assume that Eden can't get a single Enclave soldier to get the virus to the purifier.

Which doesn't make any sense from the get-go because one assumes Eden had an entire team of scientists at least to develop the virus in the first place. Not to mention the contradiction regarding Eden having a cult of personality.

Eden's plan is only to clear the CW. Not the entire world.

I am thinking more along the lines of the LW never finding James and he gets stuck in Tranquility Lane forever or super mutants killed the team working on project purity. If Eden and his people spent decades designing the virus to work with Project Purity.. then that was a huge gamble.

I think President Eden was Misunderstood or misinformed . In fallot 2 ACE said something about A.I.s that are self aware are altering data . So President Eden could have found the data on Societal Preservation Program or True purpose and the data from the Oil Rig and thought it was the only way to save mankind .

I don't think they did. If they've been working on the virus for 30+ years, it doesn't seem reasonable that they started it out with PP in mind.

But you raise a good point, but to answer that we would have to know how PP and the Virus interact (does it just make it spread faster, or is it actually required etc.). Which we have no idea about because of Bethesda's poor explanation.

It wasn't genocide for the sake of "umm they wear straw hats and we wear tin hats GET EM'!!!" there was tangible reasons to do so people are dieing anyway from the abominations walking the wastes like deathclaws and such.

We also need to remember that "the end of the world occurred pretty much as we expected it, too many people not enough food or resources to go around" it's something like that.

Maybe they just adapted the virus to work with PP and were considering other alternatives?

Again poorly explained by Beth.

Yeah it's just one of those things. Maybe they just thought that it would help it spread faster, that with the water clean it would mean more people would be willing to drink.

But people were drinking the dirty water anyways so Eden and his people could have just gone along the river banks and put the virus in there. This would also mean people of Megaton and Rivet City would have been saved since they had their own water sources. They wouldn't have been collateral damage. which if we are to believe Eden, that is something he wished could be avoided but didn't see how to do that.