Lore Question: working vehicles and TV's?

[lazloarcadia]

So here are my two lore questions of the day:

FO4 has tire tracks all over the place, and while I'll certainly accept the idea that some of these were baked into the ground due to the heat of a nuclear blast, many of them are in areas that were not (at least directly) hit by the blast. Thus the tracks should not have survived 200 years of wind and rain erosion. Thus the question, is it reasonable to assume that there are at least a few working vehicles around? NOTE: I know there are mods that have recently added vehicles to the game, but that is not what I'm asking.

 

#2) TV's. They are everywhere. Why would someone use a 200 year old archaeological relic as a decoration if it didn't work? Is the assumption that they are still being used as a light source? Or is it a better assumption that at least one of the several tv broadcast stations (Hubris Comics, Gunners Plaza, etc) has worked at some point in the recent history?

[jkruse05]

Working vehicles are definitely a thing in the overall setting. Back in Fallout 2 there was a quest to fix up a Highwayman. All it did was speed up your overland travel, but it did establish that it was possible. The other source of tire tracks that we should really be seeing is wagons, often made from old vehicles. Again, these were a common sight in the elder games, but Bethesda has gone the route of not even implying that there is something besides foot travel and packing things on top of brahmin. As for TVs, well, there doesn't really need to be a working broadcast station if there are in-home media players that can connect to it. So it could be both for light and for entertainment, whether someone got those up and running or not (which I doubt, the commonwealth doesn't really seem to have their s#*! together at the point we jump in).

 

Now, realistically, none of this stuff should be working, and most of Boston should be a pile of unidentifiable rusted hills due to the moisture and high salt content associated with being a coastal location, but, you know, meh.

[taryl80]

The NCR is known to have working trucks. They use them for long distance travel for their soldiers.

 

Besides that and that 1 car known from Fallout 2, no working cars are known in the Fallout universe.

 

Personally, I think that's a good thing, because it highlights a bit more the struggle, ordinary people in the Fallout-Wastelands have.

 

If everyone would have a working car, why they should:

 

-be concerned about mutated critters, or raiders, mercenarys, legion and so on? - They could just drive away from them.

-be concerned about water? They could easily drive to a clean water source, like the lake nearby the Hoover Dam.

-be concerned about the food situation? They could easily drive to a farm.

-and many more reasons.

 

To have working cars would not solve every problem of the ordinary human in the wastes, but it would make it a lot harder to explain, why person X has so much to struggle just for surviving.

Edited February 19, 2019 by taryl80

[Moraelin]

I think the even bigger problem is the scarcity setup. If you had enough engines for everyone to use in cars, then you have enough work that can be done by vehicles and powered tools instead of human labour. And then you have a lot more prosperity.

 

The most trivial example would be that you could produce more than enough food for everyone, with fewer farmers, if you had some vehicle pulling the plough or being turned into a harvester, instead of relying on people with hoes and shovels to do the work.

 

Which, incidentally, is lore conform too. Remember that big corn field in Fallout II? Yeah, that's what the Commonwealth would look like too.

 

The even bigger implication would be for manufacturing, though. And, sure, Fallout 4 has a couple of working factories, but if there were plenty of working engines -- even if you have to take a car apart to get them -- then anyone could start their own manufacturing plant. Kinda like you can with that DLC and related mods. And then it would make no sense to live off scavenged ammo and crudely made pipe guns. A guy with a powered lathe could produce proper high quality weaponry by the cartload.

 

There are other less-obvious implications too.

 

E.g., slavery. In a heavily industrialized and mechanized society, slavery just doesn't work. Slaves only really work for stuff like carrying stuff around or going around the crops with a hoe, but one tractor can do more than a ridiculous number of slaves on both accounts. What you need are educated and motivated skilled employees to work the machines.

 

Essentially the whole premise of the Legion from NV for example falls apart if everyone can get a working tractor. There'd be no more point for those, unless the whole point is to be a caricature of evil for evil's sake.

[montky]

 

Q1) Thus the question, is it reasonable to assume that there are at least a few working vehicles around?

Q2) TV's. They are everywhere. Why would someone use a 200 year old archaeological relic as a decoration if it didn't work?

Is the assumption that they are still being used as a light source?

Or is it a better assumption that at least one of the several tv broadcast stations (Hubris Comics, Gunners Plaza, etc) has worked at some point in the recent history?

 

Great questions, LazloArcadia.

 

this fans prerogative on those lore questions

 

 

A1: Yes, I believe it's fair to assume there are vehicles of many kinds and configurations post-2077.

Vehicles of any kind will likely be scarce, rare things many wastelanders will not know how to operate, much less maintain.

Many will be short range, and ground vehicles and boats will vastly outnumber air or space.

many ground vehicles are go-karts and 'demolition derby' stuff, modified tractors, modified lawn-mowers etc.

boats are overwhelmingly sailing ships.

 

Vehicles seem concentrated to 'nationstate' level factions post-2077,

so it is exceedingly rare to see private or individual vehicles.

 

The specific causes of those tread marks, are likely to be Robo-brains or other stuff.

I believe that the APCs nearby, might also have made some of the tracks, however,

there are no Enclave to be found, and some of the APCs are from the prior Enclave occupation closer to 2180s (during that supermutant raid on DiamondCity).

 

A2: It depends. Most are depicted as being CRT style, so, the imulsive film would be baked.

(the screen would be dull, possibly cloudy brown etc, and non-functional, or not in the proper color-space).

the caps would need re-capping, some chipsets wouldn't last that long (delaminating etc).

Its unlikely that the tubes or MCB would be functional,

let alone broadcaster infrastructure.

 

Incidentally, Glowing-Ones and some RadGhouls and Mutants,

are able to Tele-visually Telepathy, with the TV... they can communicate via the TV etc.

Glowing Ones can also cause nearby electrical equipment to be powered even if unplugged, to the point of overload...

 

However, since 'holo-tapes' etc exist,

other kinds of screen might function, and, if repaired, may continue to usefully read media such as holovids and data-tapes etc.

especially the 'holo-ducted' "optical bijou' style stuff.

 

Many "TV's" however, become more like Marionette Pantomime 'theatre'.

large cardboard boxes or wooden pantomime 'sets'

it's a rich tradition which carries from the Dark Ages through to the Post-2077 wasteland...

hollowed out and used in cobbled-together 'children's jungle-gym' style areas.

 

some are adapted to be used as thermal-ovens --- the parabolic reflector can be used to cook some things etc.

 

-----

in high-end settlements,

They have functional 'local-range shortwave/multi-band' 'broadcasts'. which are more like community-access TV etc.

or Hotel Tourism loops. Perhaps with worn-out fragments of holotapes spliced together in a palimpsest.

There are usually 2 or 3 channels.

Mods such as "Vids of the Wasteland" and vid-surface players,

allow you to put broadcasts on the screens.

Most are to be found at the local "Books" <--- schools in the wasteland,

or at town hall.

There might be 2 or 3 TV's and 4 or so computers, for the entire town. Rather than, many TVs and Pipboys etc.

 

 

 

Or is it a better assumption that at least one ... has worked at some point in the recent history?

I think this indicates that, the Institute in the past, traded with the wasteland a lot more than in 2280s etc.

The Institute might have provided some tech, in exchange for other resources they needed.

They may have also transmitted 're-runs' or other propaganda.

it may have been to placate or throw off those trying to find the true location of the Institute.

 

That may be partly why the Enclave are not present in that part of the wasteland...

[Perraine]

Rather than working vehicles "let's face it, we've seen enough of what "nuclear" power can do) I'd like to see Brahmin teams pulling "makeshift" wagons. Maybe 1 Brahmin for merchants, 2 for settlers and travellers and maybe 4 for provisioners.

[Deleted49413338User]

the lore of this game is pretty dumb.. its better not to question it at all.

 

I find the Frost lore better, only 50 yrs since bombs dropped makes more sense.

 

Or, I like to completely strip away LL's and loot and create an extreme baron environment. There is still BOS with vertbirds, but if you consider the Starwars Universe, I guess its like role playing a character from poverty area while hi tech things exist, they are just nowhere around you to be seen...until they are.

 

If you balance the LL's so that you never find any good stuff but certain faction owned containers and dead bodies have good stuff, its a bit better. plus traders but at higher prices.

 

Overall, I hate the base game and lore, but the options and tools to mod easily is what makes it one of my favorite games.

[taryl80]

The Shoddycast has already made 2 videos about that topic - more or less.

 

To find here:

 

 

and here:

 

 

The most important point is imo, that progress in the Fallout universe always collapse, because it got destroyed, or people just don't like to share their progress.

 

You see it also on the Commonwealth: The Commonwealth was going to recover. But!... The Institute turned their backs on them, the Minutemen broke apart and the dangers of the wastelands constantly destroy everything, what is not part of a big City, like Diamond City or Goodneighboor.

 

And that is just the Commonwealth as example. You see the same in every Fallout game. Sure the actors and reasons why everything is still, like it is are different, but the outcome is always the same - Progress will not happen, or it will be destroyed.

 

You should not let yourself deceived by your own success as Vault Dweller, or Courier.

 

Nobody in the wastelands is strong as the player. We have never saw an enemie there, that can beat us forever. If that happens - we just level up a few level and meet him again.

 

The ordinary wastelander, or settler on the other hand... He levels not up. The chance that he will lost his next fight is very, very, veeery high and when he dies, the progress he has maybe made, dies with him. His house as example will then maybe serve as a nest for some post apocalyptic critters, or raiders maybe find it funny to make some explosive tests in his house.

 

When that happen over and over and overrr.... again... Progress can't be made.

 

The only way out would be a strong faction, that protects his people and the progress that has been made, but such faction did not really exist in the Fallout universe.

 

The only 3 factions in Fallout which could maybe do that are the NCR, Minutemen and Followers of the apocalypse and we all now, that they have all their own problems and also limits.

 

Edit: And we as players should hope, that such a faction never will exist in Fallout :smile:. Why? Because then nobody needs a heroic Vault Dweller anymore^^.

Edited February 23, 2019 by taryl80

[Moraelin]

Well, again, I think it's the scarcity setup, or rather the general Fallout setup. Most of us wanted another Fallout game.

 

If you wake up from your vault about 150 years after society was rebuilt, order restored, the whole cities repopulated, factories work again, everyone has cars, everyone has clean water and medicine, etc, you can probably see the problem right there. I'm not saying there wouldn't be stuff for you to do, but it's not gonna feel very fallout-y, is it?

 

Edit: what I'm saying is that a "post-apocalyptic" setting doesn't just mean that there was an apocalypse at some point in the past, but it's now gone, we recovered, it's business as usual again. I mean, IRL we have the Black Death in our past, which wiped out most people who lived at the time, but we don't consider ourselves to still be post-apocalyptic, right? It kinda has to stay crappy for it to be still post-apocalyptic.

[Moraelin]

That said, I would say that it's somewhat unnecessary to force society to collapse over and over again to keep things post-apocalyptic. You can just stop pushing the date of each game forward instead.

 

I mean, Fallout 1 starts in 2161, circa 75 years after the bombs fell. At that point, sure, it's not 100% realistic that the whole world would still be moping around like they just got nuked yesterday and nothing noteworthy happened ever since, but it doesn't strain suspension of disbelief too hard either. Fast forward to Fallout 4, and now it's 220 years after the bombs fell. You kinda need another implosion of society in the recent past to explain that, because people don't just sit on their ass THAT long just because their grand-grandpa got nuked.

 

I would say that Fallout 76 had the right idea to turn back the clock. The rest of the game was garbage, but that one idea was golden. I hope they keep it for the next Fallout game.