Lore Question: working vehicles and TV's?

[Perraine]

The one thing that bothers me the most (and this will sound wierd at first) is the historical innaccuracy. By that I mean - How long did it take humans to "civilize" the environemnt when they first encountered a new land? How long did it take immigrants to build farms, homes, towns, cities in Amercica? or Australia? And that was with hand tools. So how long would it take humans, with sometimes extremely advanced technology, and certainly "modern" machinery to "re-civilize" an environment?

 

But of course let's not forget, that all that dirt, grime, damage and garbage hides all sorts of shorcomings (read laziness) in Bugthesda's game environment building.

[taryl80]

I like the world we see in the most Fallout's (not what I have seen of F76 because I think a game needs human npcs and personally I like more the "desert" theme for a game like Fallout, what F76 delivers not by all the green landscape).

 

The Metro series btw. is exact the same - humanity lives in tunnels, or small communitys that fight each other and get attacked by critters over and over again.

 

Under normal circumstances humanity would fast recover - I think and after the radioation has gone away, but if everytime someone destroys your progress... Things need more time^^. Some people may didn't like to see always a "static" world like we always see in Fallout, but it makes sense with the problems of this world in mind.

 

Just think as example on the ending of Fallout 3 - The people had finally clean water - free from radiation, but what had happened? The Brotherhood of Steel abondend this project and leave it alone - free for the taking for Raiders, Supermutants and so on and on top of that, they have maybe take Rivet City's Power Source to use it for their Airship. If that is true (I don't know, they have take it from an Aircraft Carrier, but hey... We talking here about a more militarised USA as in our world... So it is possible that more Aircraft Carriers have lay around somewhere in the Washington area), then they have left the strongest Fallout 3 Town left for dead, because without a Powersource they wan't make it long in that Aircraft carrier (not counting in, that Rivet City surley not give their Power Source "just" away without a fight...).

 

We all have surely different tastes as players, but that the world of Fallout makes sense in this point seems to be clear for me.

 

Edit: Imo, the greatest error Bethesda had make with Fallout 4 is to show not enough of the settlers' struggle for survival. So the people start to asking those questions, while we had not to do that in Fallout 3 or New Vegas. Because in those games, wee see powerful evil factions (that not hide kilometers under the earth *cough*) and see in every edge how the wastelanders struggle to survive.

 

Not only and always against those "big evil factions" like the enclave or caesar's legion, but also that they just can't find clean water sources, or food, or they getting kidnapped for the Pitt, or what other reason is possible.

 

I think Fallout 4 should have shown that more.

Edited February 24, 2019 by taryl80

[Moraelin]

The one thing that bothers me the most (and this will sound wierd at first) is the historical innaccuracy. By that I mean - How long did it take humans to "civilize" the environemnt when they first encountered a new land? How long did it take immigrants to build farms, homes, towns, cities in Amercica? or Australia? And that was with hand tools. So how long would it take humans, with sometimes extremely advanced technology, and certainly "modern" machinery to "re-civilize" an environment?

 

But of course let's not forget, that all that dirt, grime, damage and garbage hides all sorts of shorcomings (read laziness) in Bugthesda's game environment building.

I think there is nevertheless still a case to be made for then just turning back the clock. If this is the kind of world they can make, or fits their artistic vision, or whatever, then just set it 20 years after the bombs fell, not 220.

[HeyYou]

The one thing that bothers me the most (and this will sound wierd at first) is the historical innaccuracy. By that I mean - How long did it take humans to "civilize" the environemnt when they first encountered a new land? How long did it take immigrants to build farms, homes, towns, cities in Amercica? or Australia? And that was with hand tools. So how long would it take humans, with sometimes extremely advanced technology, and certainly "modern" machinery to "re-civilize" an environment?

 

But of course let's not forget, that all that dirt, grime, damage and garbage hides all sorts of shorcomings (read laziness) in Bugthesda's game environment building.

Well, ya also gotta keep in mind, that the original settlers of America/Australia were pretty much all on the same page. I.E. They all wanted the same thing. In the case of post world war three USA, you aren't starting 'fresh', you are trying to build on the ashes of a once-advanced civilization. It also is not empty..... the previous inhabitants are still there....... Granted, I would think after 200 and change years, it would be more likely to have 'settled' to something akin to feudal lords, and the territory each controlled....... Folks whose sole purpose was to prey on others, shouldn't have lasted quite so long.....

[Moraelin]

Well, that's kinda the point. Even if a democratic commonwealth government failed, some raider or another would get delusions of grandeur and try to conquer as many vassals as he can. We have plenty of cases in history of exactly that happening.

 

But even without going into high level organization, as I've said before, normal people would for example fix the frikken roof and walls. The MAJORITY of days in MA are rainy. The idea that for 220 years straight, generation after generation of lemmings would never figure out how to melt some asphalt and fix the roof, or get a bunch of dry grass and thatch it, is stretching my suspension of disbelief.

 

In fact, as I was saying in another thread, the current Fallout setup is a second-order idiot plot. Defined as one where not only the main characters, but everyone in that society has to be a grade-A idiot, or the story couldn't happen.

[taryl80]

I think 1 thing is also really underestimated:

 

The post war insects (if we like to call them so).

 

Imagine you wake up in a land with very big insects, like Cazadors, Fireants and cave crickets and so on who are still multiplying like their predecessors before the war.

 

When a huge Cazador would fly in front of me... I maybe would pee my pants... If I have time for that, but then I would die.

 

Btw. Moraelin. for things you have write, people would need a new and fresh iron/steel source (to really fix those problems), but everything that produces iron or steel is also always a target for raiders. The entire The Pitt dlc is there a example, or also saugus ironworks in Fallout 4 together with the dunwich mine (the raiders there are a group of saugus raiders if I remember correctly).

 

Maybe Ashur was successful in Fallout 3. If that is the case we would maybe see new rails and possible trains in Pittsburgh again (if Bethesda would ever make a Fallout/dlc again in Pittsburgh) - with a bad taste in mouth because he is the leader of a huge raider army :wink:.

Edited February 24, 2019 by taryl80

[Moraelin]

Not really, no.

 

E.g., asphalt melts even in a strong sun. You can literally put a few chunks from a nearby road in a bucket, light a fire with some twigs, and melt it. Then spread some cloth or old newspapers on that roof and tar it. There you go, a roof that won't let it rain right on the bed you sleep in.

 

Or, as I was saying, you can just take a few armfuls of dry grass and thatch it.

 

E.g., to patch the holes in the walls walls, you just need some mud. Adobe was used extensively in human history, and that includes some pretty wet climates like north-eastern Europe. If you have a roof over it and whitewash it, it's even resistant to rain.

 

You don't really need a source of steel or really any modern technology for that. The most primitive tribes we ever encountered could still figure out thatching a hut, or making a teepee out of animal skins.

 

 

And I'd think that the hazards would just make that an even better idea, rather than being a reason to procrastinate fixing the roof and walls.

 

E.g., when you don't just get a snowstorm through those walls, but radstorms blowing nuclear fallout into your bed, I'd think the incentive to get off one's butt and do it just went up.

 

E.g., when you don't just get normal cockroaches and mosquitoes, but giant ones that can suck a brahmin dry... yeah, you don't want to have a huge hole in the wall though which one can crawl in.

[Moraelin]

Also, resources being a target for raiders kinda makes a case for why realistically sooner or later some raider chieftain would want to control them. Yes, like Ashur did. Then they'd use those resources to try to conquer someone else who has some other resource they need. Be it food for their raider army, or more steel, or even just a cannery like Longneck Luchowsky's. War for resources is the most common excuse for war in human history.

 

Raiders wouldn't just hang out and get drunk in some abandoned factory, and just occasionally go see if they can find anyone whose crop they can steal. Or such a gang would only last until some smarter gang comes along.

 

It's not even just a matter of greed, but it makes the difference between guaranteed survival or not. To be sure you don't starve or resort to cannibalism next winter, because someone else came and stole those settler's crop, you'd want to CONTROL those resources. Which also means defend them.