FWE Enemy Karma Discussion

[BlueJayPhoenix]

I've been noticing that I keep receiving karma points for killing certain FWE enemies. I've checked the non-player karma values in FO3Edit. Most characters seem to be set at +/- 500 but on some of the FWE enemies there are values that are -900 or less and it keeps giving me karma when I kill them. Vanilla fallout 3 gave karma when you killed very evil characters and it seems that I receive karma even if the new -2000 to 2000 karma system list -900 as only being "evil." Even then there are still enemies that are like -1700. Why are abdominable mutants more "evil" than the other super mutants? Why are the Pit Dogs/Fallen Brothers more "evil" than the other raiders. Obviously this is really annoying when trying role play a neutral or evil character. Was there ever a fix for this or is this just an oversight?

 

This also made me think about morality in the context of the Fallout 3 lore. The vanilla Fallout 3 had a lot of "good" characters that were civilians. The new karma system makes them neutral and in a sense I think this makes sense. The world of Fallout 3 would most likely be full of opportunists. I'd imagine at least 90% the people would be that way. People become jaded about the life they live so they learn to care about themselves. The civilian class of people "the wastelanders" or "settlers" are probably the "lawful opportunists", the scavengers are probably "true neutrals", and the raiders would probably be the "unlawful opportunists." Sometimes I do wonder if the Raiders are actually "evil." They are probably not as evil as Alistair Tenpenny in my opinion since his desire to destroy Megaton was very directed. It comes across as an act specifically done to be evil. There is no tangible gain that he would receive for doing such a thing. This is why gaining karma for killing him is indeed appropriate. The raiders themselves mostly seems to have this aura of "not giving a f*#@." They seem to only be "evil" when people have what they want. They obviously have some level of society within themselves since raiders, at least from what we see in the game, don't seem to attack other raiders. In order for there to be some society within themselves they must be somewhat "nice" or "good" to members of their own. Death itself seems cheapened in the Fallout 3 world much like it was in the prehistorical times of humanity. If we apply our modern values to the Fallout 3 world then many people could be considered evil even though on closer inspection they are not necessarily so.

 

Anyways enough with my philosophical ramblings... :P So do you guys agree that the karma values seem inconsistent? Ignoring the whole morality debate, gaining karma for killing regular enemies doesn't feel right from a strictly gaming standpoint.