ThreeDogs Weird News Flashes

[Alehazar]

I noticed a strange phenomenon in Three Dogs News Bulletins, where he comments on your actions throughout the Fallout 3 Universe. I usually am quite willing to help people and to go to any lengths to do the Right Thing.

When Bryan Wilks asks for my help (and he always says "Please Mister, find my papa", even when I play as a girl character) I won't turn him down and I even find him a new home with his cousin Vera.

But as the game progresses -and I spend perhaps too many hours questing through the Wasteland- I start to get really annoyed by people commenting "Yes, that's locked for a reason. And yes, I can see you eyeing it. Don't think of breaking into that". Especially when I have absolutely no intentions of breaking and entering, or robbing someone blind. I just -after a business transaction- pivot away from a counter and my crosshairs are whisked passed a cash register that is flagged as private property, and someone almost immediately makes a remark that it is "locked for a reason", or something similar. That really grates at my -roleplaying- soul. I have established myself as a Very Good Karma character and people still treat me like a thug or common criminal. It even becomes so annoying that I silently vow that the next person who dares utter such a comment is going to eat a bullet; maybe even several bust of gunfire. Of course that doesn't go well over with some of those sanctimonious [use your favourite expletive] and before you know, the whole of Megaton -or Underworld- becomes hostile and they all need to be put down -I mean, I'm not gonna roll over and die. And I will not yield!

So, my karma plummets from the Very Good extreme to the Very Evil extreme.

Still, I have helped the people in Big Town, I have recovered the Declaration of Independence and dozens of others noble deeds before my change of Karma. I actually started out being hunted by Talon Company; and later the Regulators had a contract out on me.

But here's the funny bit: while Threedog condemns my character as "Evil Incarnate", or as that "female dog from Vault 101", he then sings my praises for having done good deeds: "Nice work 101". That just doesn't make a lot of sense. I guess that's an angle that Bethesda chose to ignore. Starting out Good and then simply being dragged down by the unrelenting stream of human weaknesses that are thrown your way: Raiders, Slavers, and kids with serious attitude problems. With surreal comments as a result.

 

Afterthoughts:

- The Grayditch Quest "Those" is one of my favourite quests, when I first stumbled into Grayditch -quite by accident- I was completely flabbergasted by the Giant Ants that roamed the streets; and actually breathed fire on to me. That teaches me not to sneak through those streets and alleys. I now use building ledges and snipe those male without a father ants from on high. In the Marigold Station tunnels I use frag mine and frag grenades to deal with most of them -as well as my custom TRG 42 to obliterate those chitinous bodies.

- At the Temple of the Union, when my character's fed up with the common human trait that other Wastelanders want me to do their poo, I decline to clear the Monument of Supermutants and/or Slavers. He then has the gall to call me a coward or utter some other derogatory remarks. I really miss the possibility of dialogue options to confront Hannibal Hamlin with his sanctimonious poo: he has these wonderful dreams of a FreeZone for Ex-slaves, but he simply refuses to do something about it himself. No let some total stranger do all that, I'm needed at the Temple to coordinate and oversee how we all sit on our thumbs and stare at our bellybutton. I really want to rant at him that if he wants to see his dream or his vision fulfilled that he should do something about it himself. And then he dares call me a coward. Shame on you, Hannibal!

Unfortunately, such dialogue options are not available -for a lot of different quests and different people- and the only way I can show my disgruntlement is by killing them all. Seems a bit drastic. But I really resent such remarks when people themselves are unwilling to further their own causes.

- In the Quest "Blood Ties", where Megaton inhabitant Lucy West asks me to investigate the settlement of Arefu to see whether her letters as arriving at her relatives or not, there's a bit of a weird twist.

I was on my way to Arefu when I came to BigTown and decided to help those poor sods first. My wanderings took me to Meresti and I chose to investigate. When confronted by the guy who guards the entrance to Meresti Proper, I had a dialogue option "That I had a letter for Ian West"; how could I have known that Ian would be held at Meresti, without having first gone through Arefu and having had an informative chat with Evan King. There's no way I could have knwon that Ian West would be here; there was not even a remote possibility that I even knew that Ian West existed.

And having talked to Vance, I must then investigate Arefu to find out what happened. And only then does Evan King ask me whether Ian West's body was on the floor with his dead parents, when I report their deaths. Now I know that David West had a son and that Lucy had a brother. And still I'd been able to get past the Meresti Guard, saying I had a letter for Ian West, before ever having set foot in Arefu. Yeah, right.

- When failing a Speech Challenge where I ask for more money to accept a job or a quest, I always say I'm not interested in doing them a favor if they won't meet my price. I can only later accept the quest for the official amount they were willing to pay.

Why can't I re-negotiate, or haggle. If I have to do ajob soley under their terms, then I won't accept. Which means a lot of quests are terminated before they even had a chance to begin. If people are so terribly eager to send me off on some suicide mission for a few measly caps, they they can do it themselves. Failure to renegotiate, usually means I terminate the job giver and take his caps regardless and without having to put my ass on the line. When Tenpenny failed to fork over some serious dough for me not to fulfill Crowley's Contract, I shot the silly *censored*. Being cheap, got him killed.

- Same goes for the Overseer when my character needs to escape Vault 101. I want his password and key and he simply says -rather defiantly- that he'd rather die than compromise the Vault's integrity again. Whereas when I threatened to kill him for having killed Jonas, he was quick to point out that the Vault needed his guidance, that the Vault would be lost and in chaos if i would kill him -and it wouldn't bring Jonas back? So I agree with the silly male without a father and all I want are his password and key and then the silly twit is prepared to die after all.

- And overall, Wasteland people are not easily intimidated: Ken Ewers in Arefu is telling me to get the *ban me* out of his home; when i reply -with the award winning phrase- that he'd better calm down before I put him down, he doesn't flinch and so I shoot him and his demented wife and fail the Arefu quest altogether.

- Dukov is not impressed that things will get ugly if he doesn't hand ove his key; no, he wants some caps on the table, or I get no key. Is my character such a woos that people are willing to gamble their very lives for a measly couple of hundred caps?

- And do I really have to kill Tenpenny with the Sniper Rifle that Mr. Crowley supplies; I blast his head to mush with a powerful handgun and then I tell Crowley that Tenpenny is dead, but not with a headshot? I shredded his skull into a fine red mist of blood, bone and meat, but I failed to kill him with a headshot? Uh-huh.

- And all those ingrates who get my purified water, or whose lives I save from Supermutants or Slavers. As I turn to leave I kick over a tin can, or decrepit shopping cart. "Why don't you watch where you're going?", in such a derogatory tone of voice. Immediately after they thanked me profusely for having saved their lives. F**k that! At that stage and progression through the game I really get seriously annoyed by such remarks -especially as my Good Karma has gone through the roof. They really pee me off and they will have to pay. Since I don't have a dialogue option to give them a piece of my mind, I blow a piece of their minds out the back of their heads. I need to vent all that pent-up rage by ventilating those motherlovers.

 

Maybe I do play for far too long in one gaming session.

I consider myself to be pretty reasonable, and that's how I like to play. But lacking certain dialogue options to argue or debate, I'm unable to vent my anger and failing in anger management the only other recourse seems to be violence. Especially with all those weapons so readily available.

But I guess the Wasteland is not really a place that favours debate. That's pretty shitty for someone who grew up in a Vault where it was exactly the other way around. No need for violence, let's talk about it instead. Quite a culture shock.

And in the beginning I try to cope as best as I can. But in the end it almost seems inevitable that the Wasteland wears me down and wears away the thin veneer of civilized behaviour and I spiral out of control. All my good intentions gone to waste.

(Maybe I rolepay a bit too zealously).

 

Anyway, Threedog's comments are all reduced to contradictions in terms. It just doesn't sound logical anymore.

 

Time for me to call it a night.

[kailieann]

I always get a kick out of Three Dog's increasingly nonsensical broadcasts. The Karma system is so readily abused that you can easily make every evil choice in the game and still have him praise you as the savior of the wastes.

 

As for the behavior of others, well, let's just say there's a reason I always quicksave whenever I go near the Outcasts. Encounters with them tend to get really bloody, really quick.

 

"Great, here's some of the local wildlife."

"Why don't you go bother the Brotherhood or something?"

"Hey local, shouldn't you be banging rocks together or something?"

[gsmanners]

I stopped listening to 3D a long time ago. He's a just a judgmental fool, so why bother?

 

That said, I actually don't like Those! (tedious and somewhat unrewarding), and I like Head of State (although I'd prefer if I could get the two groups to pass each other like ships in the night). Blood Ties is annoying (filled with lots of long, pointless dialogue with those blow-hards). If it wasn't on the way to getting the Repair Bobblehead, I'd never do it. By the time I do You Gotta Shoot 'Em in the Head, I have so many caps I really don't care whether I get 10, 100, or 5000 caps. I just enjoy following Crowley through the wasteland. With Dukov, there's no point in discussing his stupid key with him. I always convince Cherry to get it for me and take her promptly to Rivet City afterward. You can kill Tenpenny if you want, but I never do. I prefer to keep things as they are at the tower.

 

You really shouldn't have a short fuse over a few tense remarks. It always pays to smirk it off, I say.

[Chemix]

Why bring the keys to Crowley at all? Or can give them to him, get payed and still grab the goods while he's there?

[kailieann]

Unless you're being really anal about karma, there's nothing stopping you from killing/pickpocketing Crowley as soon as he leaves Underworld, so really, there's no reason not to turn the keys in.

 

And as long as you don't grab the T-51b, there's nothing stopping you from raiding the fort first, then turning the keys in. Then fast-moving back to the fort and taking the T-51b before he gets there.

[rebel28]

I agree, with you on the quite a few points.

The ones that bug the most are when people say "Why don't you watch where you're going" or "That's locked for a reason", etc.

 

Now the interaction system is complicated, but not very clever.

And I also quicksave before talking to Outcasts (Or that dude that meets you before your dad dies).

[evilhippo]

"Hey local, shouldn't you be banging rocks together or something?"

 

In my case I don't quicksave...

 

""Hey local, shouldn't you be banging rocks together or som..."

 

At which point Mister Outcast and his patrol of wandering fools meet Mister VATS. Truly, I'm not evil, I'm doing it for the good of the gene pool. I am wearing a Chinese Stealth Suit and carrying an Alien Disintegrator, so anyone stupid enough to insult me clearly cannot be allowed to breed :whistling:

[Rossum]

At which point Mister Outcast and his patrol of wandering fools meet Mister VATS. Truly, I'm not evil, I'm doing it for the good of the gene pool. I am wearing a Chinese Stealth Suit and carrying an Alien Disintegrator, so anyone stupid enough to insult me clearly cannot be allowed to breed :whistling:

 

It is a shame that the VATS doesn't allow you to use groin shots to make people curl up into a helpless ball of agony on the floor. Instead we have to blow their brains off. Wouldn't it be nicer to just remove a sensitive part of their anatomy with a shotgun and let them live to reflect on the importance of good manners? Or even if we could get multiple copies of the slave collar. If brotherhood outcasts insist on telling me to go beat rocks together, maybe they would appreciate the irony of being sold into slavery where they have to scrounge through the trog-infested filth in the Pitt to get steel ingots for the Mill for the rest of their lives.

 

Remember, murder is bad. Selling people into horrible slavery is marginally less bad. Choose slavery!

 

Though personally I tend to avoid killing people who don't physically attack me first... except Roy and his gang because they killed the Tenpenny residents when I tried being good to them. And Weirner in the Pitt... because apparently all the self-depreciation I had to go through to find a cure for people was him wanting me to kidnap a baby. I mean I would probably kidnap the baby if he had told me what his plan was but holding back that vital fact is just too much. Plus, if I want to kill off the Pitt Raiders who are making derogatory remarks at me then I'll do it myself instead of flooding the streets with naked pink gremlin people thank-you-very-much.

[Alehazar]

Unless you're being really anal about karma, there's nothing stopping you from killing/pickpocketing Crowley as soon as he leaves Underworld, so really, there's no reason not to turn the keys in.

 

And as long as you don't grab the T-51b, there's nothing stopping you from raiding the fort first, then turning the keys in. Then fast-moving back to the fort and taking the T-51b before he gets there.

 

Well get this, I'd collected all of the keys, then decided to help the Outcasts with Operation Anchorage and grabbed the Winterized T-51b afterwards and the entire Gotta Shhot 'em in the Head quest updated and was considered completed. WTF?

 

Alehazar

[TheWatchman]

Well get this, I'd collected all of the keys, then decided to help the Outcasts with Operation Anchorage and grabbed the Winterized T-51b afterwards and the entire Gotta Shhot 'em in the Head quest updated and was considered completed. WTF?

 

Alehazar

 

Very common bug with the winterized T51B.

 

As for getting pissed off over the "watch where you're going"/"Lock for a reason" stuff , I'm actually pretty clumsy at times and a little light fingered (Weird combination, I know) so these remarks hardly faze me.

 

What really POs me is that jerk off poor excuse replacement of a overseer Allen Mack at least I understand Amata's dad's reasons.

 

Outcasts also annoy me but their usual punishment is having no weapons or armor (I'm using the HornedReaperMJL's Magic Fingers perk mod)

But if I'm in a really bad mood I place suitcase nuke (Neela's suitcase nuke mod) next to them and run like hell - the blast radius is pretty damn big.

 

The ironic thing is these guys are technically more true to the West Coast BoS than Lyon's group, though the original BoS weren't a bunch of elitist snobs.