Who to gank: Brotherhood or Institute?

[Talwyn224]

 

It's just an extension of the same bulls*** of most games these days. Handle the protagonist with silk gloves. Anyone that's rude to the PC will be killed later.

 

I'd react the same way if I was someone who'd been in the BoS for 5 years, working my fingers to the bone for the Cause, then this human popsicle in a blue leotard waltzes in and gets a rank higher than mine in less than two months.

 

Really, I thought this was an 18 game. So why are they going out of their way to soften stuff?

 

 

Todays games appear to be more about bolstering the players ego rather than actually conveying a logical and well crafted narrative which if done right, would at times take the player down a peg or three.

 

I absolutely agree that there is something very wrong with the concept of some complete stranger strolling in and though they turn out to be quite competent, they end up rocketing meteorically up the ranks in a way that makes the whole concept of time served plus hard work irrelevant for anyone else in that organisation. In fact the BoS should have more NPC's grumbling about how quickly the SS gets promoted or be out right blunt about their dissatisfaction at the whole situation.

 

And finally I agree that this game feels more like MA 15+ than R rated. I supposed they wanted to have the broadest audience and teens make up a large part of that sales demographic.

[Athanasa]

Todays games appear to be more about bolstering the players ego rather than actually conveying a logical and well crafted narrative which if done right, would at times take the player down a peg or three.

 

I absolutely agree that there is something very wrong with the concept of some complete stranger strolling in and though they turn out to be quite competent, they end up rocketing meteorically up the ranks in a way that makes the whole concept of time served plus hard work irrelevant for anyone else in that organisation. In fact the BoS should have more NPC's grumbling about how quickly the SS gets promoted or be out right blunt about their dissatisfaction at the whole situation.

 

And finally I agree that this game feels more like MA 15+ than R rated. I supposed they wanted to have the broadest audience and teens make up a large part of that sales demographic.

 

I think the R rated comes from all the corpses strung on butcher hooks around Raider bases, not narrative... unfortunately.

 

Besides, ego bolstering? I haven't finished any of the Main Quests yet, but do any of them give you a good kick in the gut after to make you feel terrible for their decision? The best game that's done that to me was MGS3. I cried throughout the end of that game. I felt absolutely terrible - not because I'd done anything wrong, but because I'd done everything right.

 

I had been a Good Soldier.

 

And so had she. To the very end.

Edited December 29, 2015 by Athanasa

[Athanasa]

On a more cheerful note, it's time to write something based off Watchmen quotes and sound like an absolute psychopath! Given what your character sees in the Wastelands, that's probably a fairly normal state for your character to be in after two months.

 

"The Minutemen are afraid of me. I've seen their true face; they are worse than useless, they give false hope. They are lame and rabid, biting at the hands that offer them salvation. They spread their disease to those they claim to protect. We are the cure."

 

There you go, a mindset for Institute and Brotherhood characters that hate Preston.

Edited December 30, 2015 by Athanasa

[Talwyn224]

Oh hell yeah!

 

And that reminds me of my favourite quote from the Watchmen which can very easily be paraphrased and applied to the game:

 

Dog carcass in alley this morning, Power Armour tread on burst stomach. The wasteland is afraid of me. I have seen its true face.

The streets are extended gutters and the gutters are full of blood and when the drains finally scab over, all the vermin will drown.

The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the settlers and raiders will look up and shout "Save us!"... and I'll look down and whisper..

 

"No.”

[Moraelin]

Oh, I like Preston. I'm grateful for Preston. In my fantasy continuation, his being a recognizable hero and the guy who endorsed me all along would be a great boon to my cult of personality. Being endorsed by a great hero is such a boon that Mao had to embellish some loser into such a hero that endorsed him :p

 

Of course, Preston would have to die a suitably heroic death, even if I have to shoot him in the head myself and make up the details of how many supermutants he held the line against to the last breath. And I'd build a big statue to honor his memory. Better yet, one in every other settlement. I'd name a town and several streets after him. Children would be taught in schools about the great hero Preston Garvey, and how his last words were something like "For the general!" ;)

 

Does that sound suitably psychopathic yet? :p

[Athanasa]

 

Dog carcass in alley this morning, Power Armour tread on burst stomach. The wasteland is afraid of me. I have seen its true face.

 

The streets are extended gutters and the gutters are full of blood and when the drains finally scab over, all the vermin will drown.

 

The accumulated filth of all their sex and murder will foam up about their waists and all the settlers and raiders will look up and shout "Save us!"... and I'll look down and whisper..

 

"No.”

 

It probably applies better to New Vegas or FO3. Then again, I haven't been around Diamond City much. Does that place count?

 

Bleh, I just don't get a feeling of HUMANITY in FO4. Of the 'dual nature of mankind' bollocks - how humans can be great, but simultaniously complete monstrosities. You see it with individuals (mostly the Railroad, I guess) but not on a large scale. Well, Brotherhood I guess, but that's a given... Maybe that's because I've been avoiding those areas, because I don't want to do a full playthrough of the interesting stuff until there are survival mods, graphic stuff, and general immersion improvements.

 

2am. I'm rambling.

[Athanasa]

I wrote a big post, then I found something better.

 

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITQpGKYAXX0

#AdVictorium

Edited December 30, 2015 by Athanasa

[Raycheetah]

To be fair, we see the same sort of "meteoric rise" in Skyrim, most especially with the College of Winterhold questline. It IS lazy storytelling, but at least in Skyrim, it didn't seem perhaps quite so fast, and you could always chalk it up to "magical destiny."

 

In the BoS, it's just silly. Never mind the SS' worthiness of all the honors and privileges accorded them; to allow them that sort of access to the Prydwen and Maxson solely based on a little martial prowess in a tight spot is a HUGE security risk. Of course, to expect "realism" in a game with 6-lb .44 handguns would be futile. And, before anyone plays the "mutants and radioactive zombies" card, I'm talking about verisimilitude, the approximation of a believable milieu, not a faithful reproduction of the real world.

 

Athanasa's post on the previous page with the deleted dialog from Danse provides just another example of where Bethesda simply canceled an idea which might have been interesting to follow. We can speculate about why they chose to do so; too often, it appears that such deletions are simply made in the interest of time, but, in this case, it is plausible that the alternate path would have clashed with the narrative. Certainly, the whole "trial by combat" mechanic would be very silly in a military hierarchy (which would mean the toughest bruisers could, in theory, simply slug their way to the top, no matter what their other talents, or lack thereof). The other issue would be that the results implied in the dialog would make for even more demanding and complicated results within the BoS, including the sort of mess already implicit in taking the Institute line to its rational conclusion, i.e., a leadership role for the SS, and what the SS might want to do with that power.

 

Or, Bethesda may just be saving all that for some DLC. Who knows? ='[.]'=

[Scribblesix]

At a guess, Beth's not going to touch the main factions other than perhaps the minutemen, who are very content empty and pretty easy to fix (perhaps an integrated settlement/minuteman dlc).

My thoughts on the factions:

 

• Minutemen: Least morally complicated faction but also least interesting due to limited content, Also suffer hugely from the radiant quest/Preston design decisions. Really need modding or a DLC.
• BoS: Morally questionable, BUT have are the only faction who has a clear raison d'être whose actions are consistent with furthering that goal.
• Institute: I have no idea what they want, or why they do pretty much anything, very few of their actions correspond with any of their stated goals or even have an apparent sense of purpose. Assuming you want to keep the people being replaced by synths and random patrols the best excuse I can think of would be the institute having being badly savaged by the commonwealth at some point in the past (perhaps reversing cannon it was their delegates at the commonwealth council who where slaughtered by the settlement delegates leaving them paranoid (synth replacements are to control and weaken the commonwealth powers to keep them from being able to threaten the institute).
• The Railroad: Like the BoS they are zealots but they are written to have visceral appeal, (fight against racism! for freedom!). Why do they focus soley on Synths when it is apparent any robot can be made sentient (curie/codsworth) and there are many humans in far more dire states than the synths? They would make more sense if perhaps they themselves where an organisation composed of syths perhaps receiving funding and guidance from a rogue institute faction. It would explain their pre-occupation with androids at the expense of all other concerns at least.

As stated before most players are motivated either by the main quest or to 'help' -their- commonwealth. none of the current factions do a great job with the latter, as it stands.

[Aintiarna]

• Institute: I have no idea what they want, or why they do pretty much anything, very few of their actions correspond with any of their stated goals or even have an apparent sense of purpose. Assuming you want to keep the people being replaced by synths and random patrols the best excuse I can think of would be the institute having being badly savaged by the commonwealth at some point in the past (perhaps reversing cannon it was their delegates at the commonwealth council who where slaughtered by the settlement delegates leaving them paranoid (synth replacements are to control and weaken the commonwealth powers to keep them from being able to threaten the institute).

A lot of people on these forums have said the same thing but most of what the Institute do and say seems fairly coherent to me. Their goal is the advancement and furtherance of the human race. As far as that goes, the commonwealth is already lost. As such they have no real qualms about using it as a test bed for their experiments. All that matters is the Institute. I don't get what is so hard to understand about that. The commonwealth is overrun by mutants, ghouls, raiders and mutated humans that have been exposed to radiation for generations. If the player character cares about the Commonwealth, it's likely only because the game has forced them to spend some time in it. Which brings me on to..

 

As stated before most players are motivated either by the main quest or to 'help' -their- commonwealth. none of the current factions do a great job with the latter, as it stands.

MQ spoilers

 

That is the standard RPG thing to do. But does it make sense for the story background the PC has been given? Maybe, maybe not. You go to sleep in a safe if slightly paranoid world, then wake up in a hell where pretty much everyone and everything is trying to kill you or exploit you. Then finally you meet your son living in a veritable paradise by comparison. From that point of view, I find it fairly easy to RP a character who sides with the Institute.

 

 

Edited December 30, 2015 by tirnoney