Kill everyone inside?

It's like the release of the Super Mutants.

It's pointlessly dikeish.

Which is bizarre given their methodology.

Were they svcking power from Vault 111 and they only reserved enough for the Sole Survivor's pod?

What?

It doesn't make sense on multiple levels. If prewar genetic material is what you need, vault 111 is the golden arc

The only explanation I've seen in game was 'orders', which means it came from the top. It's pretty clear that the pre-Father Institute was more 'evil' overall.

Two potential things I see:

- It could be a mercy killing, because waking up into hell would be very traumatic. Institute could want them dead, painlessly in their sleep, to prevent them from almost certainly experiencing a far more painful and grisly death later

- It could be a means of conserving resources...either siphoning power as you suggest or leaving more power/cryofluid/ect for you as the backup so that you can be sustained there longer. As the others aren't viable condidates, there is no reason to let them consume resources that would be better utilized for the backup.

Perhaps both were considered.

Because they simply had no reason to keep them alive.

They already had Shaun, and Shaun's parents as backups in case Shaun died or something.

They didn't need anyone else, so they got rid of the excess.

Why would they need Shaun or me for that matter? All they need for DNA is blood samples. Killing everyone made NO sense, they could have sneaked in, drew blood and got out without anyone being the wiser. and the supply would have been there whenever they needed it. This entire story line makes very little sense to me anyway.

EDIT ADDED: Besides from a science stand point much better to have a broad sample from many people. Why the focus on Shaun??? Just a story so full of holes. I would strongly recomend that for the next Fallout they find a real Sci-Fi writer and let him make the story they build the game around. This story just plain blows.

Because he is a child, and thus the one most likely to not have any sort of mutation from radiation exposure, as even pre-war people got a lot of radiation exposure from all the nuclear powered stuff they had everywhere.

Because Shaun was an infant, and the least likely to have had a life-time of radiation. Yes, even in the pre-War world, people were exposed to radiation. We ourselves are exposed to radiation everywhere we go. Our character and his/her spouse were the backups in case he died. Not the Institute's fault Kellogg was trigger happy.

Considering they woke everyone up and only refroze you and just left everyone else trapped to eventually suffocate I am pretty sure the above wasn't a motivation...

Yep in the Memory playback you can walk around and see them inside thrashing about trying to get out. Real merciful

Yeah, the Institute isn't exactly a moral beacon of goodness. Even you believe the Synths are just toasters, you might find it difficult to join the organization that basically killed your wife and everyone in your neighborhood and...yeah. :/

Shaun held contempt for everyone outside the Institute.

The former Director may have outright hated them.

Well, if it was the Director's order. The Director of two years later was very pissed when the "Broken Mask Incident" occurred so I don't think this Director was very trigger happy (though they may have been paranoid so they killed the Vaulters and wanted to avoid killing civilians in Diamond City). However, whoever released that Synth who committed the massacre upon the Diamond City civilians may have been responsible for this as well. Maybe whoever was in charge of the Robotics Department at time just hated humans? And when the Director found out who was behind the "Broken Mask Incident", they did what they promised.

Now that I think about it, this would make a good DLC: find out who sent Kellogg and who caused the "Broken Mask Incident" and make them pay.