I haven't seen a topic on this yet, so I'd like to start one to go ahead and get it out there.

We learn from Virgil, and later from the Institute, and that the FEV program at the Institute succeeded in creating a viable, working cure for the super-mutant condition. As horrible as the tests were at the Institute, they did something that nobody has done before in Fallout (despite several attempts), and which has HUGE implications for Fallout lore.

According to Virgil the cure only works for a specific strain of FEV, presumably the FEV-87 strain, but that's still absolutely earth-shattering. Everyone ever turned by super-mutants on the East Coast has the potential to be cured and reverted back to normal humanity.

What are people's thoughts on this?

Given that the Vault 87 super mutants were being written off as being dying off even in Fallout 3's time, it wouldn't bother me much.

They weren't made to stick around really, and this wouldn't change anything o nthe west coast due to strain differences.

On another note, while I'm not very far in the main quest, I have to ask is it ever said WHY the super mutants are in Boston? I've explored basically the entire map, and cleared most areas, except a few in Boston proper, and have yet to find anything on why they are in Boston, or even where their main base in The Commonwealth is.

Its not so much the matter of the Vault 87 mutants dying off, its that now you can suddenly cure everyone who's affected. The super-mutants have gone from hostile creatures, to treatable victims.

That has massive implications both for the morality of killing them, and for what happens after these people inevitably start becoming human again. I mean, how do you reintegrate them? Are they going to remember who they were? Is some sort of punishment/confinement in order?

Nothing that I've seen has even mentioned why they are there. We really have no idea if they are Vault 87 or if its some sort of new strain/FEV source. For all we know, they are coming from somewhere else.

One of the worst parts of Fallout 4 IMO. And a glaring issue in the setting.

I see that as a positive.

Wasn't one of the biggest complaints about Fallout 3 was that the Vault 87 super mutants were just "orcs"? Big, green, fodder for the player to kill.

This actually introduces some kind of depth to their situation. The Super Mutants in Fo1/2/NV had the catch where they could still think, and generally be peaceful with humans, but there was all this racism and mistrust against them.

Fallout 4 introduced a cure, which has the moral dilemma of killing them, instead of curing them, and what will happen after. IMO. It brings the east coast super mutants up to the same kind of narrative level as the west coast ones, but does so in a different way, fitting of their different existence.

What I want to know is, why he's gone hostile after I go back and check on him