Anyone else tired of the old factions?

[Warhawk]

DC may be pointless, but you have any number of other major areas on the Eastern seaboard. Escape from New York, anyone?

No! No New York, it's too overdone and I really don't want to see anymore for awhile.

Not even a New York made of 100% art deco? Empire State Laser? Come on. Besides, more room for expanding divergence lore, like Communists doing 9/11, or Wall Street being replaced by some other portion of the city where all the energy conglomerates are headquartered.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Sorry Warhawk but H3rw00d1 is right, New York city is overdone as a PA cliché
Plus there is little of interest to use for a Fallout story campaign, no major research facilities, military bases, and so on.

 

[General Garbage]

Sorry Warhawk but H3rw00d1 is right, New York city is overdone as a PA cliché
Plus there is little of interest to use for a Fallout story campaign, no major research facilities, military bases, and so on.

We don't always need research facilities or military bases to have a story. Not everything in Fallout stems from the pre-war era. Why not have cultural heritage as a theme? Capitalism and its demise? A new kind of society that is so unlike anything from before the war?

I'm not opposed to New York entirely. Doomsayers would say that Bethesda will fuck it up anyway, but New York can be done nicely. It's also one of the remaining Vault hubs in the Fallout world (I guess since Washington and New Vegas, we can assume that Vault hubs are a given in Fallout, although if that's the case, San Fran and LA should have some more in it's surroundings)

 

[H3rw00d1]

I'm not opposed to New York entirely. Doomsayers would say that Bethesda will fuck it up anyway, but New York can be done nicely. It's also one of the remaining Vault hubs in the Fallout world (I guess since Washington and New Vegas, we can assume that Vault hubs are a given in Fallout, although if that's the case, San Fran and LA should have some more in it's surroundings)

It's not that New York can't be done nicely, in fact I wouldn't be surprised if a good Fallout game could take place there. It's the fact that New York is too overdone period.

Pop culture makes it seem to be Tokyo is the giant monster capital of the world, yet I've seen SO MANY monster flicks that take place in NY and only a handful of ones that take place in Japan alone. And that's just monster movies, that's not getting into other random media that takes place in NY simply because it's the "default location" of any story.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

I definitely wouldn't use that place, no interest in doing stuff with places like Wall Street or the Tourism. Only Sillicon Alley seems of interest to me.
Fallout IMO has always tried to be a mix of both pre war and post, just doing one without the other makes it feel like half a package.
But another reason why I do not want it is because I really dislike this 'one location and its surroundings' approach, I want them to go back to map nodes and multiple locations spread over a state.

To me that seems to work the best, it means you can take the most interesting parts of every former city/settlement or new settlements/locations, and focus on that without adding all kinds of pointless guff to fill the map up.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Fallout is not about the aftermath of the disaster, but the societies that were rebuilt afterward.

I think it's both of these things together: yes, it's about the ethics and the dynamics of societies, but in the context of a post-nuclear world. I've always seen the title of the series as a play on words: "fallout" both in the sense of radioactive particles from a nuclear blast, and in the sense of the adverse side effects or results of a situation (in this case, the Great War).

The further ahead we forge in the timeline, the further away we get from "fallout" - in both senses of the word.

I guess I see the PA as a genre that's setting dependent - kind of like the Western. If we had a Western series where the timeline went past the year 1915 or so, is it still a Western? You could argue that because it's still set in Texas or wherever that it's still a Western, but I think we would agree that past a certain point in the timeline, we are not looking at a Western in the traditional sense. I just feel that the same is true for a post-nuclear setting; past a certain point of societal rebuilding, it just isn't "post-nuclear" any longer, even if technically there was a nuclear war five hundred years ago.

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

Hey guys, I do think we are straying of the subject, the discussion about Fallout sequels, what constitutes a Fallout game, and how far should the timeline go is better served with its own thread.
Lets go back to the subject.

I like BigBoss' suggestion of new factions that rather than trying to be like organizations, groups or governments before the great war are instead experimenting with new ideologies to create a new kind of future for humanity.
In my own setting I try to tackle the subject of transhumanisn, humans using genetic engineering or merging with cybernetics in order to transcend the human limitation, perhaps one day developing into self optimizing machine intelligences.

We have also have seen the Master's idea for humanity's successors, had the Super Mutants not been sterile or intelligence level be so random they could have replaced humanity as they are better suited for the hardships of the wasteland.

Any other ideas for other new ideology driven groups?

I also really like the idea of cargo cults like the scrapped Iron Rails(or was it Iron Roads?), tribals who have developed a misunderstanding about something pre war related and have developed a whole culture around it.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

HI like BigBoss' suggestion of new factions that rather than trying to be like organizations, groups or governments before the great war are instead experimenting with new ideologies to create a new kind of future for humanity.

I also prefer groups that strike off in a new direction, without any conscious attempt to recreate a pre-war society.

In terms of ideology, I think I like groups that don't necessarily have a fully developed program for all of humanity, but are just trying to survive and are fighting over the things that humans always fight over: territory and resources.

Aesthetically, I think it would be cool to have a group that re-purposes random junk like street signs into weapons. I'm not sure if there was ever a set of concept art for the 80s tribe that is mentioned in Honest Hearts, but I always imagined them using things like this:

I also really like the idea of cargo cults like the scrapped Iron Rails(or was it Iron Roads?), tribals who have developed a misunderstanding about something pre war related and have developed a whole culture around it.

Cargo Cults are an interesting idea. I'd be especially interested in a group that isn't necessarily "primitive" technologically speaking, but that just has a complete misunderstanding of some pre-war object or idea, which would play a central role in their lives. I would give this idea bonus points if it was done in such a way that the PC doesn't have any way of knowing the original context of this thing, any more than the cultists, even though player obviously will.

 

[Cave Bear]

Any other ideas for other new ideology driven groups?

I've been writing out ideas for a Fallout-themed tabletop game I want to run using the BRP rules set.
One of my factions, called the Myrmidons by others, owes its livelihood to the subterranean ecologies of mutated insects. They don't control the bugs like that... AntAgonizer character from Fallout 3, but they do breed and harvest them for resins, biofuels, drugs, poisons, and carapace. They go so far as to model their society on the behaviors of eusocial insects. You can kind of think of them like a warrior culture of hive-minded eco-terrorists bent on military expansion, the destruction of pre-war artifacts, and environmental reclamation.

Their warriors patrol the wastelands in suits of hardened carapace armor wielding poisoned spears, firebombs and rudimentary flame-throwers loaded with fire-ant venom, and hallucinogenic "neuro-grenades".

 

[Warhawk]

The sore lack of vehicles or any mounted transportation puts a big dent into Mad Max-ish roving bands in southern deserts or great plains. Not that this can't be changed... Cults forming around technology they 'don't' understand would be fascinating to see, a cross between Warhammer 40k and the Children of Atom.

 

[Adam Place]

You know who we haven't seen much of, the Russians?

 

[The Dutch Ghost]

^^^^

Because the Soviet Union apparently stopped being a major player before the great war, being supplanted by the People's Republic of China as the major opposite super power to the United States?

All we know is that they had an embassy in the US from the bio of one Pre Made Player Character.
I wouldn't be surprised to hear from the original developers or the guys at Obsidian that the relationship between the Soviet Union and China was the reverse before the war than it was during the 20th Century, the Russians actually being supported by the Chinese after their own economy and military might declined, especially after their fossil fuel source ran out.

 

[Cave Bear]

The sore lack of vehicles or any mounted transportation puts a big dent into Mad Max-ish roving bands in southern deserts or great plains. Not that this can't be changed...

Why doesn't anybody use bicycles in the post-apocalyptic future?

Cults forming around technology they 'don't' understand would be fascinating to see, a cross between Warhammer 40k and the Children of Atom.

...And a Canticle for Leibowitz.

 

[TheChosen1]

Why doesn't anybody use bicycles in the post-apocalyptic future?

Ever tried riding a (even mountain) bike along rocky/sandy terrain while wearing kilos worth of equipment and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?

 

[DustyTraveller]

Why doesn't anybody use bicycles in the post-apocalyptic future?

Ever tried riding a (even mountain) bike along rocky/sandy terrain while wearing kilos worth of equipment and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?

A lot of armies around the world had infantry fitted with bicycles until they got replaced with cars, motorcycles or armored vehicles.
Bikes don't need to be refueled and do allow you to cover a greater distance.

 

[H3rw00d1]

Why doesn't anybody use bicycles in the post-apocalyptic future?

Ever tried riding a (even mountain) bike along rocky/sandy terrain while wearing kilos worth of equipment and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?

A lot of armies around the world had infantry fitted with bicycles until they got replaced with cars, motorcycles or armored vehicles.
Bikes don't need to be refueled and do allow you to cover a greater distance.

That's true, the world did just fine with bikes at one point, no reason why they couldn't make a comeback.

Also, aren't mountain bikes made for rocky terrain anyway, what would be the problem there?

 

[Harken]

Why doesn't anybody use bicycles in the post-apocalyptic future?

Ever tried riding a (even mountain) bike along rocky/sandy terrain while wearing kilos worth of equipment and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?

A lot of armies around the world had infantry fitted with bicycles until they got replaced with cars, motorcycles or armored vehicles.
Bikes don't need to be refueled and do allow you to cover a greater distance.

That's true, the world did just fine with bikes at one point, no reason why they couldn't make a comeback.

Also, aren't mountain bikes made for rocky terrain anyway, what would be the problem there?

Balance (physical balance, not gameplay or whatever) of course. It wouldn't apply while focusing on navigation, but TheChosen1 did say, "...and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?" So there's that.

 

[Cave Bear]

Why doesn't anybody use bicycles in the post-apocalyptic future?

Ever tried riding a (even mountain) bike along rocky/sandy terrain while wearing kilos worth of equipment and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?

A lot of armies around the world had infantry fitted with bicycles until they got replaced with cars, motorcycles or armored vehicles.
Bikes don't need to be refueled and do allow you to cover a greater distance.

That's true, the world did just fine with bikes at one point, no reason why they couldn't make a comeback.

Also, aren't mountain bikes made for rocky terrain anyway, what would be the problem there?

Balance (physical balance, not gameplay or whatever) of course. It wouldn't apply while focusing on navigation, but TheChosen1 did say, "...and then trying to shoot someone when you get attacked?" So there's that.

Didn't stop the VietCong. They used bicycles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viet_Cong_and_Vietnam_People's_Army_logistics_and_equipment

True, you can't shoot while you are on a bike. That's why you use them as part of a convoy.

 

[Emperor]

Rideable four legged mutants could be an option as well but the question would be where to find one suitable for the job. Didn't the NCR used horses in the All Roads comic?

 

[Cave Bear]

Didn't NCR have a scientist who could make cyber-dogs? Is that canon?

Could officers get cyber-horses?

...Naw, not on the NCR's budget. :/

I bet the NCR would have the experts and the know-how to make things like that but not the public funds or the stable infrastructures to mass-produce them.