Are you happy for Fallout to remain Post-post apocalyptic?

One idea was that ever since FNV the Legion has been failing.
The original Caesar's planned line of succession didn't work as well as he had intended it to be, with several of them being quite weak and ending up assassinated by others who coveted the rank of Caesar.

As a result the Legion is somewhat fractured, there is the main original Caesar but there are also off shoot groups who claim to be the true successors of Sallow's vision. There have been several fights between these groups since the battle of Hoover Dam

This has made it only more difficult for the Legion to hang on to their old territories and conquer new land. Sometimes the smaller groups are not better than well disciplined raiders with archaic and anachronistic gear

NCR itself is not doing better, the victory at Hoover Dam and the annexation of most of the Mojave (in my take New Vegas itself managed to remain independent from NCR though does invest into it) has made the parliament at Shady Sands rather arrogant, sending out expeditions deeper and deeper into the East to claim more resources. All of course under the reason that they are searching for the last remnants of the CL to wipe it out for good.

All this expansion requires a lot of resources and bottle caps and not just from the Californian members but also the settlements that are annexed or set up along the way, and it has caused a lot of political tension.
NCR is risking a civil war as some settlements believe they are better off without an administration that is thousands of kilometers away from them, drains them for caps, and barely understands or acknowledges the problems they have.

 

Just needed to say that you have some interesting thoughts Dutch Ghost.

As do you, Krinkels

 

The NCR is too incompetent to rule anything now. New Vegas explains that. NCR is due to collapse, with the Legion marchs into California. Then Lanius will head back to Denver and march east, uniting America under the legion. It'll remain post-apocalyptic.

 

We could always go Van Buren, with some mad scientist trying to nuke the world again from orbit. Or Ulysses, trying to nuke a certain region from the ground.

 

Truth be told, I don't think plot devices should be reused in sequels or spin offs, it only 'weakens' the impact the original story had.

So please no more 'villain who wants to nuke a target' scenarios anymore.

 

Dutch your ideas are awesome, congrats man!

 

Thank you for the compliment Makenshi but I still feel it can be done better, that there are still untapped ideas for factions and storylines I have not been able to come up with.

I really want so much to come up with stuff on the same level as Avellone and Sawyer.

 

The idea of the Legion going on a conquering spree, then desintegrating quickly reminds me of a mix of the Roman Empire's constant military anarchy combined with the fall of the Mongol Empire into many Khanates (Golden Horde, Ill-Khanate, Chagatai Khanate, Yuan China, etc).

Using the Legion to "primitivise" the gameworld would be nice, and a NCR civil war ins't a bad idea.

A good idea for a Fallout antagonist would be not a army or a nation, but somekind of conspiracy that spans though many armies, nations and trading caravans, and involves many powerful men. Essentially, a sinister conspiracy who, for some reason, is out for your blood. And they're pretty much everywhere, and everyone might be one of them.* The player, knows they exist, so after they ruin his life and start hunting for him, he decides to strike back.

The other factions are there, too, but they're either pawns at some level, totally taken over or still uncontaminated. Some are totally oblivious, others are partially aware of the conspiracy, some want to use the Conspiracy to their own needs (being fools) and some factions actively combat the conspiracy. Those factions get infiltrated more and more as the game goes, and the infiltration is used to weaken their enemies, including YOU, the player. Quests may close, traps may appear, friendly people may not turn out to be so friendly, items may increase in price, your reputation may be sullied, etc.

The game would't simply be won by entering in a place and killing all the people there to win. The goal is to expose the conspiracy for what they're truly are by gathering proof of it and publicaly expose them to the entire wasteland, then purging the entire conspiracy from the power structures and stopping any of their attempts at using their remaining power to cut their losses and run or drag everyone else with them into doom.

If the player doesn't do what is necessary, the Conspiracy takes over and proceed to atack the PC with all their power. Imagine fifty NCR troopers busting your room at night and raining lead on your entire party. THAT would be the kind of thing the Conspiracy would pull, and if that doesn't do it, they would scale up things until you took them out or they took your out first. As you increase in level, power and allies, so would they scale up, so you would't be too surprised if they bombarded a small town you were in with nerve gas shells.

Of course, the conspiracy is very power hungry, and the player is but another pawn in their manipulations against each other. Depending on your choices, the Conspiracy may be totally wiped out, merely defeated yet not destroyed, simply cut their losses and relocate, get taken over by someone else or actually WIN thanks to the player's actions.

*The idea is to make the player paranoid. The kind of paranoid that snipes possibly non-agressive NCR troopers out of fear they're actually working for the Conspiracy and will fill him with lead the moment he drops his guard, and also be afraid of his own NPCs to the point he always LOCKS the door before going to bed. With triple-locks, and the door is made of steel.