Anyone for a trip to mars?

[greenknightfury]

 

You could have a vault city.... It'd be

kinda nostalgic to see a vault on mars.

 

You could have a "requisitioned" agi dome, we should have at least two.

Then they could have an actual "open air" megaton city....Scrap city nestled inside one of the most

advanced off world structures ever built seems to really follow the

fallout ideal of irony.

 

I really like both these ideas, the Megaton inside the agridome is kind of what I was envisioning when we talked about the people living in it before, a place reminiscent of Megaton/Canterbury Commons since it would be the home and base of the supply caravans that keep any other survivors alive, other than the ones to the Elio/Morlock dome and anyone in the terraforming dome.

 

In fact there's a lot of quest material there for both the megaton in a

dome and vault city. The basic idea of them being somewhat secure inside

their respective cities but very vulnerable outside screams help we need

an outsider to do our dirty work. Retrieve parts for a failing

anti-material turret, a water chip, etc etc. And of course that's not

even touching on the city's internal problems (rebels), so you have a

ton of possible work for the player.

 

Oh yeah this is kind of the whole point beyond background/giving a reason to care whether you nuke the place or not to having people around is stuff like this. *chuckles* If we went with both cities (basiclly the agridome Megaton would be the workers of that dome's descendants just as the Elio are for their dome) it would be a cool contrast as well: Highly structured and rigid xenophobic vaultdwellers that are barely holding on to survival through slave labor of the deformed and/or ghoulified and incredible rigid control of resources (maybe even highly dangerous salvage runs by groups of the warriors through the tunnels to other facilities or maintenance closets/platforms of the facilities, perhaps as a right of passage for the warrior/military leaderships adolescents to prove their worth as leaders. A chance for some quest potential, i.e. helping Lyon's Pride get to and save the GNR building), with the more like any of the Mojave towns feel of the agridome scraptown dwellers (though for flavor a harvest/fertility god[ess] cult instead of a church of atom) that are living well compared to everybody else (though they still depend on a water system, more than others even since the food and air both need it).

 

Oh and on a note about meat: some hints are around that the salsbury steaks were artificial meat or a Soylent Green kind of thing prewar, so if we go with an artificial meat angle it would make sense that they had they grow tanks for it in the agridomes (Nasa actually developed tank grow meat technology for a protein source for space travel so it makes sense).

 

 

In fact trade could be a quest/task for the player. I could whip up a large version of a spider mine model (say size of a small car) clear off the top, to put crates and stuff on and make it follow the player. S/He guards it, escorts it to the agri dome (or if S/He is coming from the agri dome it's vice versa) where the player loads up produce, but gets wrapped up (or not) in teh morlock theme or other quests in that dome. Then when S/He is ready escort the spider mine (looks like a 6 legged platform loaded with containers) back to the vault city (for example). It's a good little quest to connect the two locals.

 

I can see a good angle for this as well, the agridome provides food and the vaultcity provides manufactured goods. The city could have some recycling systems that they almost obsessively look after to turn the waste and scraps they can get and loot from runs on other places into new manufactured products/materials.

 

Also re: the morlocks I'd like to add a morlock king like the 2003 movie (fev infected) and teh AI the actual Diana AI back on earth, teh same one that controls the nursery. Since Derek & Greenway hydroponics will be active on the mars project. That way we have a sort of symmetry, highly intelligent mutant morlock king and his morlocks vs Diana and her noble tribals.

 

I still like this idea especially with the twist of his infection giving him the ability to telepathically control/influence the ghouls.

 

Damaged psychologies resulting in pathological cultures/societies etc. But of

course we'll need other examples to highlight the really F'd up ones, so

that not everyone you encounter is right out of resident evil. We can

fallback on fallout lore for a lot of the more "normal" peeps. Like

enclave will of course be the pure human ideals. But some examples can

be purely a facet of the mars project like a groupd of scientists and

science minded individuals that willingly (yes voluntarily) gave up

their body to place their gray matter in robobrains. Giving up the

sensations of of a lovers caress, the taste of a fine meal etc for the

pursuit of science, immortality or simple survival (maybe they were

dangerously irradiated, infected with FEV or some other result that

would cause their bodies to fail).

 

Ties into the idea I proposed long way back at the beginning about groups that purposely changed themselves from truly human to better survive the conditions, whether through making themselves into robobrains, cybernetics, genetic manipulation. All of which the Enclave types would abhor, so they would not be a vaultcity sight *chuckles* though some scientist that purposely infected him(her)self into a plant/mutant (like the tree guy Harold from FO3 which I understand made appearences in the earlier games too from his dialog and the wiki) might be readily excepted into the scraptown (especially if the fertility/harvest cult idea is gone with).

Okay, so the problem I see here is we have a lot of ghouls.

 

And I should say up front the space ghouls arn't absolutely essential they are just part of my 50's sci-fi homage (which I actually stretched to the 60's as well), specifically the black and white (1968) "night of the dead".

 

Speaking of the 50's sci-fi homage, I was thinking instead of just doing "the fly" and having a scientist with a bloatfly head how about expanding on the OWB gene splicing setup. You know the one where you splice a robobrain and a dog and get Roxie the robodog. Well in OWB she's the only thing that you get out of it other than an exploding robobrain and a lobotomite. But I say we expand it and let our imaginations run wild, with models/assets being the only restriction. Robo nightstalkers,

 

Crap ran out of time, ok I'll try and adress the rest when I get home.

 

As to kibblesticks comment there: Even with the ghoul heavy story we still have variety; ghouls, FEV horrors of various types, robots, Zeta abominations (maybe), gentically engineered animals from the terraforming and bioweapon projectswhich may have escaped/been released, various dangerous plants, and I'd still like something digger/trog-esque for the tunnels which would be one of the mutation types.

 

devin: Love that idea with the 50's homages! It could also be used with the idea of the people that purposely gave up thier humanity to try to make themselves better able to survive.

[devinpatterson]

Okay, so the problem I see here is we have a lot of ghouls. We have; the ghouls from the rocket, which aside from being a different colour offer the exact same experience as normal ghouls.

 

Well I think the experience would be different for several reasons. The first is that they are visually different as much as we can easily/lazily do without digging into the model itself. The origin is different since their creation is via some rather unique cosmic radiation (quick repost Space radiation is a unique mix of gamma-rays, high-energy protons and cosmic rays. The greatest threat to astronauts en route to Mars is galactic cosmic rays--or "GCRs" for short. These are particles accelerated to almost light speed by distant supernova explosions). And the idea of them spreading/being infectious is a nice little back story for the collapse (well part of the collapse) when the S really hit the fan.

 

But that being said, it doesn't have to be the case that it is ghouls. I just like the story. The returning rocket is eerily silent, when it touches down on auto pilot. But desperately needing supplies the staff doesn't question their good luck and rush into the rocket....and the blood letting begins (ie flash forward to just about every zombie movie in existence). After suffering grievous losses the remaining military police put the last one down and transport all the bodies to the morgue. Many of the able bodied are unloading the rocket, morning the dead etc., but back in the morgue a hand begins to twitch.....

 

I also like it because it's part of my 50's/60's sci-fi homage (well not the glowing part, but the rest. A satellite with strange radiation was supposed to cause the re-animation). But of late I'v been somewhat questioning the whole idea of the homage since it's a lot of stories and we already have a ton of stuff going on here. I don't want to make a DLC that's bigger than the whole vanilla game (well I'd like to, just don't want to put in the work that would be required).

 

If you'd feel better with FEV horrors, they can be contagious too. Although it's more work because it will have to be a new model, or several new models if we make more than one kind of FEV monstrosity. I do like the idea of a "forever war" between the ghouls (or FEV's) and the AI/Bots. Something that has been going on, for literally over 200 years.

 

But if you want to go with FEV's for the base that would mean intelligent ghouls for the micro-city/town and ferals for the agri dome.

 

Then if we include the story of a society that casts out it's ghouls (which doesn't really make sense anywhere that isn't as idealic as the agri-dome), we'll have those as well, some of which will be feral (like the situation with Roy Phillips and the metro tunnel he lived in).

 

Oh no, you can have racial prejudicial in the best of places and the crappiest. If you want it in the city it's easy to add a little "pure strain pride" especially with military/enclave descendants. They're not historically the most accepting of people.

 

Also, if the ghouls are

semi-intelligent

(they can't be fully intelligent if they're not perpared to co-operate with the tribals) how on earth are they breaching the dome's defences?

 

The morlocks (ferals) live below the dome, they aren't breaching the defenses they are already in, have been for a long time. The agri domes would have the majority of their defensive weapons set up for an outside threat.

 

Why hasn't the Dome's AI just eradicated the infestation or the tribals fought back?

 

It's just an agricultural dome AI (although I'd like it to be Diana from earth, pulling the same mother earth religion as she does on occupants of hte nursery) it wasn't designed to wage war, it's not the base AI with access to heavy military resources.

 

So how about this compromise? We merge the intelligent ferals idea with the space ghouls, making them a much bigger threat.

 

Wouldn't the result of that simply be removing the uniqueness from the space ghouls?

 

my idea about having them infected by a parasite (not necessarily biological, but sentient to a degree) that controls it's host's body to spread to other hosts.

 

I'd recommend staying away from that plot line mostly because of lore, but also because we have a lot going on as is.

 

I dunno, obviously it's up to you in the end Devin, but in my mind's eye I just can't see random ferals being interesting beyond an initial "oh look, they've been retextured".

 

Well I think the feral ghoul is an archetype for the undead (at least as close as your going to get in fallout). So in our story it's partly the background (ie their origin story-cosmic radiation), partly the past plot line (their absorption of the base) and partly the current story line (where the main frame helps the player survive the ghouls, establishing a relationship with the AI). But it can follow your suggestion of a compromise to make them ferals (or FEV horrors) and still serve two of the three points I'v listed.....so there is flexibility there.

 

The origin story of cosmic radiation just adds a little pizaz to their lore and visually to their appearance.

 

Part of the greatness of ghouls to me is the fact that they retain their humanity, but are spurned by "normal" humans simply because of their disgusting looks. Roy Phillips or Gob are so much more interesting as characters than the umpteenth feral ghoul trying to eat your face.

 

But that part we can have in the city, essentiall covering all our bases in re: to ghouls.

Edited March 30, 2012 by devinpatterson

[devinpatterson]

I really like both these ideas, the Megaton inside the agridome is kind of what I was envisioning when we talked about the people living in it before, a place reminiscent of Megaton/Canterbury Commons since it would be the home and base of the supply caravans that keep any other survivors alive, other than the ones to the Elio/Morlock dome and anyone in the terraforming dome.

 

Thank you, but I think we should just have one city. A single unique city highlights and contrasts the rest of the project, so it really stands out. And if it's a single exception it doesn't really change the mod, more of the exception that proves the rule. But once you add a second city, and or add caravans etc, there's not a lot of difference between the wasteland and the mars project. That's exactly what I'm trying to avoid. And it may be my fault for not articulating my vision earlier in the thread.

 

My idea for the Mars project follows OWB as a sort of spiritual predecessor in regard to it's small number of characters, research facilities, heavy creature/bot presence, folly of man and his continual pursuit of self destruction through warfare etc. Then tack on an much harsher/deadlier environment that will challenge the player both physically (going to need some massive combat skills) and mentally (someone without science skills for instance is going to perish). All in the unique environment of Mars, where you can't just turn tail and go home.

 

.It's obviously expanding far beyond those ideals, so I'm trying to allow some movement in alternate directions while still retaining a majority of the same basic theme. Kibblesticks is making the city relatively self-contained via his plot line, which prevents most cross over to of the rest of the mod, at least initially. It may be that the city dwellers become the new settlers of mars, after the courier takes care of some lingering problems, completing our story arc. But until then, it's possible to continue my vision of the mod in the footsteps of OWB.

 

I want the mars project to stress the long abandoned atmosphere/theme, the lone adventurer with FEV horrors and bots, etc, the sheer desolation of mars. Not communities, caravans etc that you might find in the wasteland. I don't want this to be the Mojave in a paler shade of red.

 

 

Oh and on a note about meat: some hints are around that the salsbury steaks were artificial meat or a Soylent Green kind of thing prewar, so if we go with an artificial meat angle it would make sense that they had they grow tanks for it in the agridomes (Nasa actually developed tank grow meat technology for a protein source for space travel so it makes sense).

 

Oh yeah there will be large varieties of pre-war food (I already have ideas based on our astronauts from tang to meat pase tubes) even if the actual number of items is small. There will also be military MRE's (very valuable). And the meat tanks are copacetic, but I mean actual meat as in animals in the agri domes. Whether planned (cattle that become brahmin) or game that was introduced after the bases fall (trickier to explain).

 

devin: Love that idea with the 50's homages! It could also be used with the idea of the people that purposely gave up thier humanity to try to make themselves better able to survive.

 

I'm kind of questioning it now though, because I had about a dozen movies that would make workable plot lines in our project, but we have so much going on already........

[devinpatterson]

I like that idea with the contruction robots, Von Neumann machines, we haven't seen those before yet...

 

Or a better spot might be something along the lines of Von Neumann machines in the main facility, where the Base AI has been battling either ghouls or FEV horrors continuously for over 200 years. A lot of pieces to pick up and a lot of soldiers to make, to keep up with FEV mutations.

Edited March 30, 2012 by devinpatterson

[VaultPi]

scrap materials for all

[greenknightfury]

I know in part why my mind just keeps wanting to add bits and pieces and touches that seem far from the core idea of a research base for the ruins and terraforming research; the scale and expense of the Mars project would have meant getting not just Government (who's finances were somewhat strained by the war and all the money funneled away by the Enclave, skimming bastages) but corporate funding, which means allot of folks clueless to the original purpose of the place living and working beside those that did and the company they work for footing a chunk of the bill. Of course the deal (which would probably run something like "we'll give you x hundred square miles of Mars, you just help us build and fund our research there we'll even help you set up facilities" with an edge of "whole new world of resources!" pitch thrown in, would still make those footing the bill with company money set up research there (no pesky environmental regulations or "public safety" to think about) so research from them going off into whatever crazy direction they wanted to explore without having to worry about it getting loose in the public or how dangerous it was (they'd just need to seal the dome let out the air then send in cleaner bots if something went wrong).

 

Basically I see it just as scattered all over in scope as the research in OWB, every building was a different type of research, with at least when they operated different scientists running it doing the research (you find some of their bodies in the facilities). So lot's of funding, lot's of leeway (it would take a complaint a while to reach the home office in the best of circumstances, and a simple bribe can cause it to never make it into a transmission packet to Earth) , and given free rein without contrary orders from the home office borderline obsessive scientists. That makes a pretty potent formula for science gone mad kind of insane experiments cropping up.

[greenknightfury]

Or a better spot might be something along the lines of Von Neumann machines in the main facility, where the Base AI has been battling either ghouls or FEV horrors continuously for over 200 years. A lot of pieces to pick up and a lot of soldiers to make, to keep up with FEV mutations.

 

And since they couldn't use any of the building as building material to replace those soldiers ...you might be dealing with some really freaky cyborg soldier types as base defenders.

 

No material to build a new gripper claw or hand laser? that's ok just run some connectors into that arm left over from one of the organic invaders and it's weapon!

 

Of course I know that model and skeleton rig issues make this a pipedream.

Edited March 30, 2012 by greenknightfury

[VaultPi]

heh, experimental gecks, which the Enclave's Corperate (Posidin, Rob Co) minions could have thought as having potential commercial use, as well as weaponized GECK... Think the green bomb from Call to Power.

 

I know I suggested it before, but you could as a karma loss reguardless of who you do it to. quest simular to Megaton/Tenpenny, however it cleans up all the rads, and makes it all green and clorogilly, add some nasty plants....

[devinpatterson]

the scale and expense of the Mars project would have meant getting not just Government (who's finances were somewhat strained by the war and all the money funneled away by the Enclave, skimming bastages) but corporate funding, which means allot of folks clueless to the original purpose of the place living and working beside those that did and the company they work for footing a chunk of the bill.

 

Well typically military contractors are paid by the gov (tax dollars) so they'd be paid to go there and perform services etc from the gov budget. But I think your point about enclave skimming is valid. Lots of projects (vault-tec especially) are black box projects, where X number of dollars are set aside, but details are not given except to select security councils in congress (assuming the gov works somewhat like our world) so it's easy to transfer X number of dollars to these secret activities. But of course money has to come from somewhere so cash spent on the mars project means less available for the war effort. It's part of the reason I went with the base being in such dire straights as teh war kicked off in earnest. Money was diverted to the war effort, the last 3 or 4 years before the bombs fell and especially during the alaskan campaign would leave very little cash for anything not directly related to a military advantage.

 

Of course the deal (which would probably run something like "we'll give you x hundred square miles of Mars,

 

They really can't do that, it's way beyond fallout tech to expect private companies to have interplanetary travel for setting up colonies/facilities etc on their own, so a promise of land wouldn't make sense. It wouldn't be something they could use for decades (maybe longer). I think the confusion comes from assuming what our level of tech by 2070. In the fallout world their space program is actually pretty primitive. Check out some of the USSA notes for a (very) rough sketch of the space program. "The last manned mission to the moon, which recovered the Valiant 12 flag from its surface, occurred in 2052."

 

It's essentially why I'v been trying to push for a very small presence. In the real fallout world (there's an ironic term)/lore they havn't even landed a single man on mars, and even teh moon is a challenge for them (very few manned missions, no base). In 2073 they are working on a rocket to go to mars. So of course even a small number of facilities is really pushing the envelope. Larger endeavors have us just stepping further and further out, essentially loosing our place in the fallout universe.

 

Truthfully the project should probably have been set on the moon, it would have made for more sense in view of the fallout worlds limited space tech and is far more feasible than mars. Almost everything we have would have worked there. But Mars has an attraction all it's own, plus it would have been more difficult to explain the FEV creatures and toxic jungle on the moon. There is a twilight zone between the light and dark sides where the temperatures are no worse than mars, but there is still a complete vacuum that the flora and monstrosities would have to deal with, so they'd probably have to be contained in a dome.

 

So my challenge (our challenge) is to walk a fine line between the smallest presence we can for the sake of lore, but large enough for the player to have an enjoyable experience. If we wanted to we could have colonies, cities, terraforming (fauna, lakes and so forth) etc etc but it just wouldn't be fallout any more.

 

That's part of the reason I thought OWB fit well. No surviving humans (discounting the lobotimites, which aren't characters but simply victims of Dr. Dala's experiments), just bots and creatures. Later as our talks progressed we've expanded from simply having humans to suggestions of large scale settlements. Human survivors aren't needed to tell the story of the mars project, it can be done through traditional fallout techniques (notes, terminals etc).

 

But on the other hand you guys really want to have human survivors so I'm trying to find a way of fitting that in. The vualt city/megaton in a dome or whatever is the final settlement, has a sort of natural division (via the plot line) from the rest of the project, so I think it's workable. And another exception is the morlocks (if we decide to go with one). But I think any humans (as opposed to robots, FEV creatures etc that could survive an indeterminate time) has to be used very sparingly. Not just for the logistics of living in an insanely difficult place to survive, but so as not to change the atmosphere/feeling of the mod itself.

 

would still make those footing the bill with company money set up research there (no pesky environmental regulations or "public safety" to think about) so research from them going off into whatever crazy direction they wanted to explore without having to worry about it getting loose in the public or how dangerous it was (they'd just need to seal the dome let out the air then send in cleaner bots if something went wrong).

 

I don't believe so, since the tech they would be working on would only be of use to the gov/military (they have such a heavy military theme you wouldn't be allowed by the Gov to utilize a civilian market), they can't offer them a swap of land because the corps can't get there on their own or utilize martian land in anyway for decades to come. What your talking about was done with the new world and charter companies under spain (and other European nations), but the parallel is broken in this case. Mars isn't a land a private corp can reach or use on their own.

 

Basically I see it just as scattered all over in scope as the research in OWB, every building was a different type of research, with at least when they operated different scientists running it doing the research (you find some of their bodies in the facilities). So lot's of funding, lot's of leeway (it would take a complaint a while to reach the home office in the best of circumstances, and a simple bribe can cause it to never make it into a transmission packet to Earth) , and given free rein without contrary orders from the home office borderline obsessive scientists. That makes a pretty potent formula for science gone mad kind of insane experiments cropping up.

 

Yep I think we see eye to eye in that regard. The only caveat being that it would only be research that couldn't be performed on earth (or would be exponentially more difficult). So research into terraforming, alien tech, FEV etc are all valid. But a lab with a new atomic laser would have to have a specific reason why it needs to be developed on Mars, otherwise it should be done in the good ol US of A.

 

Of course I know that model and skeleton rig issues make this a pipedream.

 

It's possible to mix pieces and parts. For instance replacing a human leg with a robotic one isn't too bad. Getting the rigging right on a hand though (say a robot claw like the protectron's on a human) is a real *censored* for me. But honestly I'd be more worried about the lore implications. If your doing something that's never been done in the fallout universe I think it should be more of a centerpiece (ie a cyborg in a lab) than a common tactic used frequently to make numerous solders. As a centerpiece you'd have lab notes, terminal entries etc detailing the project and a prototype that would be unique. That uniqueness makes it easier to accept in lore than a common practice IMHO.

 

 

heh, experimental gecks, which the Enclave's Corperate (Posidin, Rob Co) minions could have thought as having potential commercial use, as well as weaponized GECK... Think the green bomb from Call to Power.

 

We will have the result of a mutant geck in a dome, but I don't see us implementing any weaponized gecks per se.

 

I know I suggested it before, but you could as a karma loss reguardless of who you do it to. quest simular to Megaton/Tenpenny, however it cleans up all the rads, and makes it all green and clorogilly, add some nasty plants....

 

Yes there would be a karma penalty if you destoryed the settlement, and I imagine the option will exist. But we'll have to wait a while to more fully develop the plot line for the settlement before that becomes clear.

[TrooperScooperMKII]

The agri-dome sounds like a good settlement idea, though I'm not opposed to a smaller, more "normal" survival colony underground.

Speaking of contagion, what about having the player become infected at some point in the questline? Not only does this presumably bar the player from entering the dome-city (which I see as a Last of Us type quarantine-city) but also opens a Metroid Prime race against the clock...