No one is asking for Tenpenny to give a thorough history of post-apocalyptic Europe. They're just asking for some basic information about the character. I seriously doubt anyone would've complained about a character mentioning Europe and if they did they're idiots and their complaints should not be taken seriously. On the other hand complaints about the fact that an entire character who is explicitly mentioned as being foreign is just kinda there and left hanging? Yeah those are valid.

I don't believe that would be the case. I haven't seen anyone say that there is no one left alive in Europe. It's just that no European nation survived the Great War. There would still be survivors there just like there are in America. There are those that think that the only way people suvived was in the Vaults, but that is very far from the truth.

If anything there would be an increase of "what about Fallout going to Europe" topics if a character described what his town was like before he left. I agree with Okie, people such as myself are upset that basic background information about Tenpenny wasn't given. I am not asking for a detailed history of all of Europe for the last 200 years. I just want to know the Who, What, Where, When, Why and How's.

All we got his "This is Tenpenny, he is a crazy guy and oh yeah he is from the UK."

You're acting as if they had no choice in the matter of making Tenpenny from Great Britain, which is certainly not the case. Assuming what you are saying is true (which I believe Styles and Okie pointed out correctly that this wouldn't be the case) it was Bethesda choice to put themselves in that position in the first place. Where's the logic in purposefully mentioning that a character is from a foreign land and then saying "well we can't give him a backstory because people will get angry with us, but if we don't give him a backstory they will anyways."

Tenpenny's supposed "Britishness" adds absolutely nothing to his character at all. It would have been better off if he was just some regular wastelander who struck it rich rather than alluding to some epic "New World" emigration story and then not expanding on it at all.

No NCR are curropt, i nuked them too dont worry.
Actually yeah some are asking for Tenpenny to tell us what happened to Europe... read the posts first and then comment dude.
My opinion is, that not everything has to have a background. So he is from England, maybe he doesnt want to tell anyone that walks in and works for him he′s story. IS IT REALLY THAT BIG OF A DEAL. i wanna know what happened to England and the outside world, but i dont see why Tenpenny is that important. Some are claiming that no character in fallout 3 actually has a background, well some do, some dont live with it.

It is when one is trying to build a cohesive story in which random characters just don't pop in, announce they are from some far-away land, and then never mention it again or have any sort of character development.

I understand the curiosity, but not everyone wants to tell their life story. Tenpenny is a old bored man, that doesnt care about human life, why should he give a [censored] if the Lone Wanderer is curious about he′s past? Sure he answers some quiestions, but i find it fun that there is a little mystery in the game, instead of just all quiestions answered.

Where? All I see is some hope that Tenpenny might talk a little about what is home is like. Him talking about post-war Shropshire or something is not the equivalent of filling us in on the entire European situation.

I think the he must have had he′s reason to leave England... Maybe England was much much worse then America and he had to flee. I really hope they explain it, but i did not expect Tenpenny to do it.

No one is asking for him to tell us what happened to Europe. People are only asking for him to tell us what happened to the area he came from.

Yeah its your opion that it doesn't matter that we get Zero information from Tenpenny and you are ok with that. But that is no reason to over react to what people are saying. All we are saying is he could have given us some info on his home town. No all of Europe for the last 200 years.


Yeah and to bad we didn't get a reason for why he left England, hence why I called Betheda's writing lazy. Which is my way of putting it nicely.

Sure their writing is lazy in sometimes (they do suprise me sometimes) but surely i dont see a background necesarry. its ok we dont see eye too eye, and im sure it makes u curious, but not everything has to be like HERE IS MY LIFESTORY. In new vegas Doc Mitchell said I KNOW WHAT ITS LIKE TO HAVE SOMETHING TAKEN AWAY FROM YOU, and i was wondering about that a few times without knowing anything, so i just said [censored] that. Wait for Fallout 4, im sure some info about the outside world will come at some time in the series.

Again you miss the point. I am not asking for everyone to have a life story. Just those that are clearly important people in the game. A perosn like Tenpenny should have had a life story. The devs wanted him to be from the UK, there should have been a story there.

Again what would New Vegas be like if Caesar, Mr.House, Joshua Graham, Rose of Sharon, Arcade Gannon and many others didn't have the stories that they have?

I can tell you what it would be like, it would be like Fallout 3:

"I am Caesar I am an Evil bad guy."

"I am Mr.House a face on a Computer Screen."

"I am Jashua Graham mummy man."

"I am Rose of Sharon I am a drunk."

"I am Arcade Gannon I am an effeminate science guy."

If Bethesda wrote New Vegas that is all we would get, that is how much depth they would have put into those characters.

Main characters should have a backstory. Again I am not saying every NPC in the whole game needs one. But I will say the more the better.

Also HAVING EVERYHING IN CAPS like that can be seen as flaming so you should stop doing that.

They did explain that in New Vegas, just not directly through Mitchell's dialogue.

Mitchell says that he grew up in Vault 21. If you go to Vault 21. You find out that Mr. House filled most of the Vault with cement, and that the Vault 21 Dwellers were very angry that their home was taken from them. Use the law of detachment. Find out what Doc Mitchell had taken from him. There is another explanation as well, and that is that it was his wife who was taken from him. I don't believe this is what he meant when he said "I know what it's like to..." though, since his wife died of illness, and no person really "took" her from him, whereas Mr. House literally "took" his childhood home and filled it with cement.

That's a good example of good writing. You can find out pieces of an NPC's life story by talking to the people they've influenced throughout their lives. This is true for a lot of characters in New Vegas. For example, before you ever even talk to him yourself, you know that Joshua Graham was the Legion's first Legate, that he was captured by the Blackfoot tribe along with Edward Sallow, that he was the toughest man Hanlon had ever seen, that he lost at the first battle of Hoover Dam, and that he was lit on fire and thrown into the Grand Canyon by order of Caesar. Joshua Graham's dialogue just fills in the pieces, giving us deeper and clearer view of who he is, how he views the world, and what motivates him.

It'd be very disappointing if they didn't take it to that level. American life, culture, humor, etc. are what makes the Fallout universe what it is....but that doesn't mean it should be kept within American borders all the way. Info and references to the outside world would add a great deal of depth and interest.

And we also know he has a mole on his butt. How's that for backstory!

Caesar's Legion is often considered evil, and I scoff when people say they killed Caesar.
Caesar is a thousand times better and safer as a leader than any of the alternatives. Killing him is basically ensuring that Lanius takes over, and Lanius is a religious zealot for Mars. If not Lanius, than someone even less experienced will take over. Caesar on the other hand has a philosophy that probably should live on if you EVER want to see the Legion at peace, and Lanius can even be talked down to reconsider his zealot-like worship of war, potentially changing him as a person and having a big impact on his outlook on life.


Visit Vault 21, talk to people about it, then go back. Then you can confront Doc Mitchell about "what he lost" and he admits you're right for suspecting it's Vault 21 and explains his thoughts on the matter.
One of my favorite things about New Vegas is there's literally no loose ends. Sure, I'm sure someone could manage to find a couple here and there, but off the top of my head, I can't think of an NPC that implies a story or backround and then there's literally nothing more to that comment they made. No, EVERYTHING can be researched and there's ALWAYS a story you can dig up on the matter.
Fallout 3 on the other hand, as we're saying, Tenpenny is one of the most influencial people in the wastes, and he's nothing but a walking loose end with zero (ZERO!!) answers....

I feel he reflects the writing/development of Fallout 3. Lazy and old fashioned.
As much as I'd like to have been the whole of Fallout 3 fleshed out and giving a more morally grey stand, he is what he is, a snobbish Englishman happily playing with his stereotype. Shame he didn't have a right good ol' cuppa beside him

Another thing that bothers me about him....

Currently there's a discussion in the Skyrim forums about how great and well-written the Thalmor are, because "you love to hate them."
WTF no I don't, they're just so unbelievably cliché that they annoy the snot out of me. They're not even TRYING to make them the least bit human; they literally kick puppies and twirl their curly moustaches.
Tenpenny is the same. He's pure evil to the point where it doesn't even make any sense anymore.

I wouldn't have said he was evil, nor would I say he's anywhere near 'good'.
Seems just like a spoiled child that has other people do his work, does that make him evil?
E.g, He dislikes a metal lump in his view, he employs Burke to blow it up, Burke then instead of doing the 'good' thing, (attempts to)employs you.
I'd figure Burke (and you if you accept) are the evil ones.

That's another one, like Tenpenny, that just doesn't make all that much sense

How does that make Tenpenny innocent?
If I tell you to go take care of someone and you do it, I've still broken the law.

Either way, you get my point. Bethesda doesn't seem to be able to do grey; only pure black and white. And with "evil" especially (whether you think he's evil or not is kinda besides the point, I'm talking about what Bethesda considers evil) they stop making any friggin' sense to the point where the characters are downright comical, whether it be Tenpenny randomly deciding to blow Megaton up or the Thalmor roaming Skyrim telling you they're better than you are and inventing excuses to kill you.

Exactly, that's how Bethesda writes villians because they can't write these things; they have to rely on people getting annoyed at being talked down to by pricks. It really exposes them as the bad writers and hacks that they are.

Personally I didn't think the Thalmor were that bad at all. Not much worse than the Imperials/Storm-cloaks anyway. The High-Elves were always supposed to be stuck-up and elitist. Oblivion rarely showed that side. The Thalmor is what you get when you give them a powerful state and an army that sacked the Imperial City.

I actually rather liked them. Not for being villains (which I don't think they are) but for what they are as a faction.

Which is exactly the problem. ALL of their villains are stuck-up and elitist and all the bad words in the world, without exception.
No what bothers me is, from a gameplay perspective, try to sympathize with the Thalmor. Try to sympathize with Tenpenny. Try to sympathize with any Bethesda villain since Oblivion, and you'll find it's practically impossible because they all ONLY present bad personality traits, never good ones. There's no reason the Thalmor can't be elitist and snobbish and still make good points or still present other good qualities, but no, they're just bad.
The only exception that comes to mind is Ashur from the Pitt, but even he, while normal, was completely oblivious to how ruthless and hateful his entire empire was, going against what he wanted.

I'll admit, unless you are a playing a high-elf who shares their ideas (which I've been playing a elitist high-elf since oblivion) you really can't. Although I suppose you could play a character who is wishing to get into their good graces for political or economic reasons.

However I think we need to look at it from a certain perspective. The Aldermeri Dominion, by virtue of being a High-Elven empire, is going to be inherently elitist in its function and attitudes. The Thalmor agents in Skyrim however, don't represent the average citizen or even soldier of that realm, they are essentially what is equivalent to the inquisition in our world.

Can you find sympathy with the inquisition? Not unless you agree with their goals of eradicating heresy.


You're absolutely right with regards to Tenpenny, but well, I've been sympathizing with Eden and Autumn since Fallout 3 came out. True, Bethesda did a poor job of fleshing out their characters, but there is enough there to understand and even agree with their goals if you look for it. Eden for instance, (nominally the worst "bad guy" in Fallout 3) is simply treating the problem of the Capital wasteland like the response to a pandemic. Instead of risking lives trying to fix a problem which is nigh-unfixable regardless, he just wants to clean the slate of everything (super mutants, ghouls, raiders, and unfortunately wastelanders) and start afresh and give the Enclave a home. Certainly doesn't seem totally evil to me. Ultimately his plan would kill far more hostile creatures than it would innocents, and he doesn't have an agenda beyond what he sees as the preservation of humanity and the rebuilding of society in a pocket of the world. I would say that gives him at least a healthy shade of gray.

Even the Mythic Dawn in Oblivion, to a degree, could be sympathized with. Not Mehrunes Dagon or Mankar Cameron, but the individual mythic dawn individuals. Ultimately they were svckered in my religious zealotry and paid dearly for it (Mankar's Paradise). Overall their goal was not good, but then again the Dawn ultimately convinced quite a few people that it indeed was.


Well they do have impeccable taste and style.

"One does not gather the most important people in Skyrim, and then serve them cheap wine and stale Bread."-Elenwen

But your arguing point itself is redundant, isn't it?

I say Bethesda only makes cartoonish dark black evil characters.
You say that for the Thalmor it actually makes sense for them to be cartoonishy dark black because of who they are, lore-wise.
....But Bethesda designed them. Bethesda wrote their lore. The Thalmor aren't an exception to the rule, Bethesda always produces these cartoonish dark black evil characters and groups that you simply can't sympathize with.