Fallout: New Vegas: In which I ramble on forever

[Krylo]

Originally Posted by Mr.Bookworm

To the north, deathclaws or cazadores. To the west, the game world ends. To the east, mountains. Oh, except for that one mountain pass.

Guarded by a Deathclaw.

You're forced south pretty hard at the start of the game.

It's easy to avoid the deathclaws heading north. Cazadores not so much, but cazadores are actually really really easy to kill with a 9mm once you get good at the game.

Just shoot the wings. They cripple incredibly easy, and a cazadore with crippled wings is completely harmless. It just pathetically limps across the ground at you. I don't think they can even get their stingers at you at that point, but I don't really remember.

Anyway, point is, I did actually head straight north on one character. Walked into Vegas. And then cleaned out every casino before confronting Benny. Completely skipped every part of the story that's to the south/east.

I'm really disappointed that the only option with the Brotherhood is killing them all, if you're not going with the NCR (or even if you are, it's easy to trip into doing something that locks you out of that path).

Seems pretty weird, with all of the choices the game gives you.

Well you can tell Yes Man no and not do it on Wildcard, as well. Though he calls you an idiot for it. But, yeah, the Brotherhood are a big reason that I usually end up wild carding. I don't really like the Brotherhood but Veronika's my bro, and I'm not going to murder everyone she knows for someone else.

[mauve]

You can tell Yes Man no

That's what I did too. I'm pretty sure I managed to make friends with every faction that Yes Man told me to get rid of: The Great Khans and Boomers are my buddies now, and the Brotherhood... doesn't actively want me dead? I haven't done many of their missions because I found their base to be very confusing the first time I visited, plus they constantly send me into obscure and labyrinthian vaults with multiple exits and easy-to-miss items.

But yeah, Veronica is awesome and I should play with her more. Her only issue is that she enjoys jumping directly in front of my bullets so she can punch the guy I'm aiming at.


I was talking to my sister about NV this morning; like me, she got to the final story mission and then quit. My sister is following House for her playthough on the sole basis that she liked his pencil mustache. I'd make fun of her for that, but I originally went Wildcard just so I'd be able to hear more Yes Man passive-aggressive dialogue. THIS IS HOW WE MAKE WORLD-ALTERING DECISIONS, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN! On the bases of mustaches, dialogue, and the potential for Arcade to get a good story ending!

[Overcast]

Originally Posted by Mr.Bookworm

Caesar's Legion is going to fall to pieces, because it's an army, and Caesar thinks that by having them invade the NCR he can magically transform a bunch of militant assholes into a society, because that's what he wants.

Caesar's Legion would be much more convincing in Fallout 1, where everything is fucked and there's no sort of functioning civilization.

Caesar's Legion is a human hive. It is a mass of people who are indoctrinated into a way of life which is meant to value the nation and its leader above all things, especially their very own lives. The heart of this concept is incredibly military, because every man is expected to not only give up their life for this, but to do so with skill and capacity. Every woman is expected to serve in support both in the minor economic fashion, and the military service fashion. All are to consider themselves slaves no matter how high you become in the matter, all equally below the authority of Caesar, and all equally willing to give themselves up for the greater good.

It is highly dependent on having a leader, a queen, whom is able to maintain this kind of society by understanding the precepts and doling out the authority properly. Caesar as a man is incredibly good for this because he built this society on this concept, and he is a smart man that knows how to use a society of unwavering slaves in order to make in 30 years a civilization organized enough that it can challenge the 100 years of the NCR. Oddly enough even Lanius could run this society if he had the right advisory at his side, as can be seen when you are able to dissuade him from expanding in the final confrontation at Hoover Dam. He is savage, but is no less a member of the Legion as anyone else and would give everything for the sake of the greater good.

Still it is more than likely going to fail without Caesar around. But I would argue that this kind of military centric society makes more sense in this game simply because it is a rapid expansion of territory under a charismatic leader in a short period of time in a unbalanced world where there is almost no status quo. In Fallout 1 people were barely picking up the pieces, in Fallout 2 people were just starting to come together, this is effectively Fallout 3 it is when those societies that erupted from after the end inevitably come to clash.

And honestly not that much time has really passed. As I said its only been like 100 years since the NCR started.

They get the dark grey treatment from the developers because they are an encroaching demise on individuality, tearing a child's bear in half is good because it causes her to steel herself for the reality of the world instead of placing her confidence on an object. The Legion abhors consumerism and all that shit.

Originally Posted by Mr.Bookworm

And fighting them was boring, because they were all bags of HP that only did scratch damage to me. I turned it up to Very Hard after a while, but while that made them do more damage to me, it just made the bag of HP problem even worse.

Heh, I always seem to get past this kind of badness only because I have sneak attacks. Nobody ever seems to have that much health when you smash them in the face with massive damage.

Originally Posted by Mr.Bookworm

Eh, the Survivalist doesn't really fall into that trap, because the "tribe" he watches over is just a bunch of scared little kids (I assume they escaped from the Big MT after playing OWB, but I'm not sure).

All of the noble/magic savage bullshit is just kind of weird and gross, because it seems entirely superfluous to the actual plot.

Still didn't really pay that much attention to the magical savages part of Honest Hearts in my head, mostly just because I was too concentrated on the ideological differences between the two personalities at the front and how I felt in comparison to them. The stuff was superfluous, and I was too enraptured by the other junk. xB

Originally Posted by Mauve Mage

But yeah, Veronica is awesome and I should play with her more. Her only issue is that she enjoys jumping directly in front of my bullets so she can punch the guy I'm aiming at.

I typically never have companions because they make sneaking incredibly annoying and most of the time I play sneaky characters. Even Boone is odd at times since he will just haphazardly kill somebody I didn't even see yet at like several miles away and I wasn't sneaking and come on man stop it. For some reason the Dead Money followers were much better about this, might be because one was a mute.

Without companions though I typically go House because he just makes being a minion fun.

Originally Posted by Krylo

Anyway, point is, I did actually head straight north on one character. Walked into Vegas. And then cleaned out every casino before confronting Benny. Completely skipped every part of the story that's to the south/east.

I was able to walk through the meat wall with my meathead character(max STR and max END, fist specialist, smart as a brick) I remember getting love and hate and punching my way through a Cazadore nest. It wasn't easy, but totally possible.

And I know that Yes Man never ACTUALLY stabs you in the back, but every single time I play through the Wild Card I know I am simply attaching a massive nuke to my foot that far in the future is going to explode.