Why all the filth?

[vermillion73]

Been watching Jeremiah and I have to wonder why the masses havnt gathered technical plans to start making new equiptment, not every technical plan in the whole of the united states could have dissapeared. Looms, waterpumps, generators, sewage systems and plumbing. Should be much more of this stuff aorund after several hundred years. Theres also a complete lack of newly constructed buildings. I do like the wasteland as it is, but the cores of towns and citys should be way more populated and totally rebuilt. Buildings from the past wouldnt even be safe to live in after 250 years of negelect, so why they havnt been pulled down and rebuilt is strange, even for the fallout world.

[Malkut]

Been watching Jeremiah and I have to wonder why the masses havnt gathered technical plans to start making new equiptment, not every technical plan in the whole of the united states could have dissapeared.

 

Some of them probably have. We don't get to see everything in the lore, just the parts that can fit into a game. I doubt an organization the size of the NCR could get by for 100 years on purely scavenged things.

 

But for the most part, I imagine scavenging old things is easier and more efficient than building new things, especially in small settlements without many people or much technical aptitude.

[Moraelin]

It IS in the Lore. The Gun Runners supply the NCR army with guns, and they've been using a pre-war factory to produce new guns for over a century by the time of NV. They were at it for many years before even the guy from Fallout 1 ever stepped out of the Vault. The Van Graffs make energy weapons. Etc. At least one of those must remember how to cast a lead pipe, if they know how to make a steel pipe for a new gun.

 

As for concrete, it's even NV lore that they built new stuff in New Vegas when Mr House decided to remake it. IIRC that girl from the vault in New Vegas actually tells you that they got kicked out of half the vault and it's been filled with concrete for a foundation.

 

But generally, it's not just about finding plans. There are a ton of ghouls around who were doctors, engineers, scientists, etc, before the war and didn't go feral.

[drakeelvin]

This is an excellent topic, I have been thinking exactly the same thing for quite awhile, that I would never want to live in 95% of the places because of the grime, broken glass, broken everything. Victor's Shack is cleaner than 95% of the places out there and he's a robot.

 

It is true that some people can and would live that way but most people would be busy fixing up their places and making them livable.

 

People especially wouldn't be having broken down and filthy bathrooms and filthy bedding, those would be priorities to clean up. They'd improvise better and cleaner solutions if they could not get replacements for broken bathroom fixtures like sinks, tubs and toilets.

 

As some previous posters said, health would be important, and at least the cores of old towns would have been torn down and rebuilt into decent living space.

 

Given the probably lack of wood after the great war, and particularly in areas like the Mojave, I think more people would have torn down old wooden structures and salvaged what they could, and would have adopted more brick and stone housing by now ... use some wood for trimming things, but it would be rare.

[Klipperken]

They might not even been torn down, just cleaned up and have running water, even.

In a post apocalyptic environment, I can see many live in ruins, basements for instance that survived a blast.

 

But soon, health would become a SERIOUS issue, right after safety, thirst and then hunger.

In that order, I imagine, even.

 

Hygiene: Moraelin said in another topic that in the dark ages, "smelling good" could be seen as vanity, a sin.

True!

BUT!

FONV can not be seen as a Dark Age time.

I bet that in the dark ages, not many knights had things like miniguns, powered armor, computers or maybe even robotic helpers...

The time setting of FONV makes it so that people DO know about hygiene.

 

Now, as mod for instance, I'd like to see actual working bath tubs in populated areas (cities like NV, or big villages), showers that work in lesser populated areas like small towns, all having working sinks, ...

 

Radioactivity in water: the people in FONV have Rad X, Rad Away.

Why not add a purifying tablet, for hygiene (thus not for making soup for instance)?

In many cases people on this planet use water that is not consumable for things like bathing, washing their clothes, ...

 

Would seem logical to me that humans that know about/can cure radiation sickness, also have a purifying system/tablet?

Edited June 28, 2011 by Klipperken

[Moraelin]

Well, no, it had nothing to do with their having lances instead of miniguns. It was just that making soap and heating up water in the northern Europe winters was seen as a waste of resources, and the medieval mentality was less about caring for number 1 and flaunting what you can afford to waste, and more about being a part of the community.

 

Now add to that a bunch of idiotic religious ideas. The whole 7 deadly sins list, for example, were thought crimes. If you got depressed, for example, that was the deadly sin of sloth, because you selfish sinner you're focusing on your own problems instead of on the awesomeness of God's creation. Everything you thought or did was supposed to be about God, not about yourself, see? So caring about your appearance to others instead of on pleasing God was similarly the deadly sin of Vainglory, a.k.a., vanity. (The list varied, sometimes it was just the most grievous vice, sometimes an actual deadly sin.) And if you do that, God is insecure and emo and all passive-aggressive and ain't talking to you no mo'. That's what made them deadly sins. If you actually went and killed someone, well, that you could just pray off. But if you thought about your own problems or appearance instead of God, now that needed a priest to get you off the hook, 'cause God ain't talking to you no mo'.

 

Add a Jesus tantrum (and I'm not kidding: it's in both Mark and Matthew) against washing the hands or dishes before eating, and, yeah, now you probably know why plagues wiped out half of Europe at times. They didn't take those parables as metaphors. If the big JC said that whatever goes into your mouth doesn't make you unclean and doesn't matter, that's that, then dirty hands and dishes are ok 'cause the Son Of Man personally said so.

 

None are factors that can't happen again. In a resource-starved wasteland people can again decide to just disconsider those who waste clean water on washing instead of sharing it with thirsty people. And dumb religious ideas seem to thrive in dire times. Lots of people end up deciding that the best way to solve their problems is to brown nose whatever deity they think can help them, or even to please that deity by killing whoever isn't holy enough or worshipping the right way. It's no coincidence that burning people at the stake was called "auto da fe", which means, "act of faith". They did that to show God how faithful they are.

 

Mind you, that's just the history geek speaking. I frikken hate running around the Mojave looking like I just mud-wrestled a pig, so I'm all for soap. The mention in that other thread was merely saying that it's not a given you'd get such a gigantic bonus to charisma, if you look at history. But charisma be damned, I wanna be clean anyway :P

[Klipperken]

I understand, and I never said that you said there were miniguns in the Dark Ages.

I added them into those ages, as a point I made.

 

In the FONV setting people no longer are possessed with religion (except for some), and other things became a lot more important.

Being a survivalist once (my military period), I was bloody consistent when it came to hygiene, though where I was, that was not really a necessity.

Actual survival was a lot more important, especially under fire.

What doesn't mean that I had my very regular wash-up.

 

Where ever I could (and this was not pretty often there) I was bathing in a stream, or took a shower under a lone small waterfall.

Puddles were a good resource for washing up, to me.

And not just me, many followed my example, just not that extreme.

 

What I meant to say is that I can see this in a FONV setting very well...

Edited June 28, 2011 by Klipperken

[flib]

Basically, it's because Fallout NV is just an expansion of Fallout 3, so rather than making a whole bunch of new models and textures, they reused pretty much everything from Fallout 3.

[Klipperken]

Wow, now THAT is filthy.

 

They even reused the filth, then? XD

[Moraelin]

Technically it's true too. Almost all the meshes and textures from FO3 are in there, including junk, broken glass, dirty beds, etc. You name it, chances are it's in those BSA files.