good to know. I have avoided making that final faction choice so good to see a positive side for them on that point.

You must have seen something in your playthroughs that I didn't because what I'm seeing is a ridiculous amount of inconsistency on what a Gen 3 synth actually is. The understanding I have is that they are lab made human beings with some type of hardware in the "brain" that allows the Institute to maintain control over their memories, personalities, and to a certain extent, core programming. I mean, that is precisely what I saw anyway when I saw them producing them in the Institute. They have nerves, blood vessels, a skeleton, organs, and muscles like any other human. I mean, from where I'm standing, these things are as human as you can get without actually being born through sixual reproduction, based on what I know anyway. If you did see something I didn't, I'd like to know, because I've still got questions like "Do they age?" and "Do they die?" that don't appear to have been answered in any of my playthroughs.

That was me.

When you meet with Patriot and Z1, they speak of thirteen synths currently at the Institute that want freedom. Patriot has a plan of getting them all out in one go. You bring the information back to Desdemona, and she immediately sees a chance to get ALL the Synths out.

She reasonably rationalizes that rescuing thirteen synths would be a major blow to the Institute. They wouldn't stop until the leak (Patriot) was dead and then they'd go after the Railroad with both guns. To quote her "We wouldn't be a thorn in their side...we'd be a true threat to them."

So if this is to be the Railroad's last huzzah - since realistically after those thirteen get away in one fell swoop, the Institute is going to re-evaluate security protocols and no more synths will ever escape - Des wants to liberate the whole lot of them. You then have the dialogue choice to point out that only thirteen want to escape, not all of them, but Des kind of brushes your observation aside.

I see her point, but it has kept me from advancing with the Railroad because it is a moral quandry. Is it your right to abduct Synths that may be perfectly happy at the Institute?

Also - The Mem-Wipe is voluntary, not mandatory. The Mem-Wipe is encouraged by the Railroad mostly because Synths stand out - the lack of sleeping and eating to say nothing of being about as innocent as a Vault Dweller when it comes to Wasteland knowledge - will draw the attention of the Institute faster then if they go into "Witness Protection" for lack of a better term.

But again, it's the Synth's choice.

They're the most freedom fighter of the choices but it does remind me a bit of the dreadlocked guy from children of men who were like cool liberal freedom stuff until the darkside and personal agendas come out. Or like the rag tag group from the one where Matt Damon had power armor type stuff, was it Elysium? but that counter culture group did end up helping him and storming the stuff so that was alright. Speaking of movie references I like that the x-01 looks like the armor suits from oblivion. I wish they had a voice scrambler so you made weird squawks when you talk.

Synths getting mem wiped is suspicious but they cant live with the constant fear. Think of it less like a robot and more like some other oppressed person and it makes more sense and is quite sad. As for the numbers who knows and it's not like the institute are the only ones making androids, synths or whatever. The factions are all very questionable, people wanted an evil faction to join, they have their choices. The minutemen are the only ones who don't look like insane jerks. I'm sure there's stuff I don't know about them.

I don't even care about the issues of slavery or what counts as life. The big issue is the Institute: You like them, you side with them; you don't, you have Brotherhood or Railroad to choose from.

--No to Institute because the murder of surface innocents, actively hampering their progress, and several members seeing surface dwellers as subhuman impedements leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

--Next option: Brotherhood? They are more aggressive this time around, but do have the best interests of the Commonwealth's humans at heart. As an organization, their policies change depending on who is in charge. Just look at New Vegas: the same faction could be impotent, open allies with NCR, or hostile warmongers. Just recently did Blind Betrayal, and Maxson did show some flexibility and humanity. At this point, however, their Humans Only policy leaves them incompatible with my allies.

--Only option left: Railroad. Is their mission to free synths shortsighted? Yes, but that is literally the entirety of their mission. I'm not siding with them to turn them into a functioning government body to oversee the Commonwealth, but as a least-damaging ally to take down the Institute. I've got interconnected settlements spanning all corners of the map to take care of the Commonwealth.

point of siding with the Railroad:

1- Ballistic Weave
2- ummm..

Glory for sure, I don't think she's even a synth/or cares about synths. She just likes killing stuff

(Anyone notice Glory's Throne in the Poisidon Power raider base?)

You don't need to side with them to get that. You could just work with them up until you betray them for sixy Danse. Other than that, siding with RR has no benefit, they stand for nothing and they die for nothing. A sad and pathetic life is only fitting to end them with a sad and pathetic death.

Maybe you like doing their quests better than the other factions?

Well I enjoyed the two or three I did before deciding that they were a load of dangerous idiots. Although they are probably not as dangerous as the BOS, mainly due to being idiots.

Actually, those thirteen are the ones who want to escape but you can ask Z-1 to talk about if any are willing to fight for their freedom.

And Z-1 comes back saying, "Yeah, enough are in on this, we can start a revolt if we have weapons."

One of the big examples for me was during the Bunker Hill battle. None of the Synths I was sent to retrieve had an actual reason for leaving the Institute. Some said they didn't like it or were scared but they weren't sure why they were, I took that to mean it really was a fault in their programming.

As for how "human" Gen 3s are: from what I was able to gather they are a combination of synthetic and organic materials. I am not sure about aging. The biggest difference, for me, between Gen 3s and humans is that the Gen 3s are bound by their programming. That said, the introduction of an actual human's memories raises the likelihood of a Gen 3 becoming unbound from its programming rather high; at which point I would consider them alive. I will grant to determining if a Gen 3 is alive or suffering from a fault in their programming is ridiculously hard to determine.

Also before someone brings up Gen 3s that weren't made to replace specific people becoming self-aware on their own. It is my understanding that all Gen 3s have memories implanted so the Institute scientists didn't have to figure out how to do complicated tasks.

By that logic, no wastelanders should be allowed to have children in case they grow up to become dangerous raider leaders. Free will is free will. And human beings are only organic machines.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGZkCPo7tC0

Excepting, of course, there's no reason the logic is flawed.

anology =/= Strawman. Your question should be whether it's a strong or weak anology.

Uh, synths become raiders because they're programmed that way. People become raiders because they fall on hard times (or are just evil as [censored]). It isn't the same thing. Not even remotely.

Gabriel became a raider because he wanted caps. That's what he says and I see no reason why not to believe him.

He's also possibly part of Libertalia's group of former Minutemen.

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Gabriel

Can't fact check so won't argue. Fallout wiki doesn't seem to agree though.

Well, there's no entry on him yet.

When you meet him, you ask why he's a Raider and he says, basically, "The caps."

He also doesn't know he's a Synth and adamantly maintains he's not.

To what extent are they programmed though? Programming is something hard to really discern here because, again, the writing is extremely inconsistent.on the one hand, you can readily see how Synths are victims of their programming. Valentine readily admits that a large part of what makes him who he is are the result of the memories of Ofc. Valentine, including when he gives you that mission to hunt the ghoul.

However, we also see that there is a lot that seems beyond the scope of programming. The SRB scientist notes that there is a wash-out rate for the Course program, and it doesn't seem to be the fault of mistakes in programming or hiccups in the hardware. The vibe I got is that not all Synths are cut out for field work, which really shouldn't be problematic if they are entirely programmed beings.

The other thing is that their capacity to "feel" kind of throws a wrench in the whole thing. The romance with Curie, to me anyway, as well as Danse's outburst against Maxson should you choose to spare him, shows that there is something more complex going on there.

I am not a huge fan of drawing the line at the programming thing anyway, unless you are merely referring to the fact that Synths have recall codes and humans do not. Humans are easily programmed too. Bigots don't tend to wake up as bigots, it's often a result of environment. Biases are another form of human programming, the mere knowledge that they exist doesn't prevent you from being susceptible to do it.

If we are to make a distinction between what is or isn't human, I don't think programming is a good way of going about it.

At least they have the most faction quests and pay the best caps in terms of money making faction/side quests. Well at least according to the manual anyways.

edit: What would've made joining the RR worthwhile was giving the PC the option to REPROGRAM as many of the synths they encountered at the institute and in the Commonwealth. Something similar in scope to an ongoing radiant quest. This radiant quest would accumulate in the final showdown quest of the RR v. the Institute. If your PC had been taking advantage of such a radiant faction quest to steadily increase their intelligence and robotics perks, then they would be awarded at the end with a secret army of synths. Which they could command to help defeat the institute and free other synths. And as the newly self proclaimed Father, perhaps usher in a new world order in which only synths would dominate the world (after eliminating what was left of the remaining human factions and BoS).

So, throw away their entire purpose as the extremist good guys?

All factions are bunches of murderous nutbars, apparently that's "moral ambiguity."

To be fair, it all makes sense from their morality.

Sympathy, mercy, and compassion are not things any faction is big on.

Naaah.

If a human suffers from serious retrograde amnesia; has that person suddenly, effectively died?

Of course not.

Besidewhich, as Fallout 3 shows us, the memories of the Synth remain with them even after a memory wipe. Those memories are not truly erased but are instead buried deep inside their cognitive processes.