Five Common Misconceptions about Fallout: The Series

[CT Phipps]

Mao said "no investigation, no right to speak," and that's something you need to take to heart.

I mean, I wouldn't use him as an example of good government but I am totally admitting my fault.

I got the details wrong.

 

[Hassknecht]

1. If Vault-Tec didn't nuke the United States then why are there so many craters? Those would only be produced by underground detonations, which is something only Vault-Tec would do. It's also consistent with Hank's nuking of Shady Sands, which produced a big crater.

2. Cooper is definitely the basis of Vault Boy. The whole point is that they appropriated his image when he cut ties with Vault-Tec. Nobody thinks he's "literally" Vault Boy and it's stupid to act as if that's the problem.

3. It doesn't matter if it was nuked or not, the chalkboard says the date of Shady Sands's fall begins in 2077. That wasn't the beginning of the fall of Shady Sands that was the beginning of the fall of the NCR. 2077 is when Caesar's Legion moved in to Fort Hill and started the First Battle of Hoover Dam. It's four years before the events of New Vegas and the 2nd BoHD, yet the chalkboard doesn't mention the war with Caesar at all, it points directly to the nuking. It's blatantly a continuity error, because we can see in the end credits that library cards are last dated in 2076. The show runners thought NCR was nuked in 2077 and got it wrong, or else the production crew wouldn't have done that.

4. Cooper named Wilzig's dog "Dogmeat," therefore she's Dogmeat. That's her name. I don't understand how that's misconcepting anything. Or maybe the theory is that the cyberdogs are based on Dogmeat's original genetic line? That's the kind of stupid interpersonal twist I'd expect from the show runners. Dogmeat is exactly the kind of name Ghoul Cooper would give a dog too! It's in-character!

5. The NCR is absolutely destroyed, or else Sorrel wouldn't be able to declare himself "president" and try collecting taxes with a handful of goons in police uniforms. The NCR also banned slavery and wouldn't have tolerated an organ harvesting operation.

6. It's the Prydwen. It says on the side of the ship that it's literally "Prydwen." Doesn't matter if that was another production error or what. It does make sense for it to be the Prydwen though because they're dispatching knights on direct orders from the high clerics.

7. What does that mean? Lucy is obviously meant to be interpreted as a "good guy" even if she's naive. You could certainly conclude Wilzig is a good guy since he sacrificed himself to literally give the power to the people. Just because almost everyone is written to be morally stupid doesn't mean there aren't any morally sound actors.

8. Who cares?

9. The major plot is for sure as fuck not "wrapped up." We still don't actually know anything about Moldaver or what she was planning, or basically any other faction or character besides the main ones. The show explains nothing. It creates plot threads only to leave all of them either dangling or exterminated before anything is even done with them, and it doesn't actually explain anything about what the Brotherhood or Moldaver's followers believe. We literally see a cult ritual and all it tells us about their beliefs is a bunch of cryptic bullshit. The entire season was just a setup for a reveal that breaks the entire setting and timeline, and completely undermines all of the themes and theses of the games - even Bethesda's.

The Dogmeat name particularly works because Cooper was in a movie called "A Man and his Dog". It's a reference!!!
Just from the titles, all these misconceptions are more like strawmen. Yeah Vault-Tec didn't launch the nukes themselves, what they did was kick off the war. Yeah Cooper isn't Pip Boy, obviously he was replaced with a cartoon, but they made sure they got him to do the thumbs up and imply they'd base it on him.
Yeah the chalkboard doesn't say Shady Sands was nuked in 2277, but it's heavily implied by the way it's written. If Shady Sands was already falling, why would Hank want to blow it up? Just wait, you've been doing that for 200 years.
Not bothering with the rest for now... I didn't watch the video, don't know what the major plot point refers to.

 

[CT Phipps]

The Dogmeat name particularly works because Cooper was in a movie called "A Man and his Dog". It's a reference!!!
Just from the titles, all these misconceptions are more like strawmen. Yeah Vault-Tec didn't launch the nukes themselves, what they did was kick off the war. Yeah Cooper isn't Pip Boy, obviously he was replaced with a cartoon, but they made sure they got him to do the thumbs up and imply they'd base it on him.
Yeah the chalkboard doesn't say Shady Sands was nuked in 2277, but it's heavily implied by the way it's written. If Shady Sands was already falling, why would Hank want to blow it up? Just wait, you've been doing that for 200 years.
Not bothering with the rest for now... I didn't watch the video, don't know what the major plot point refers to.

I mean the war was already going on by the time Vault-Tec got involved, Operation: Anchorage had happened and Cooper was a veteran.

Frankly, nuclear war inevitable already.

 

[Hassknecht]

I mean the war was already going on by the time Vault-Tec got involved, Operation: Anchorage had happened and Cooper was a veteran.

Frankly, nuclear war inevitable already.

Yeah, so why add this silly clandestine meeting about making sure it happened so they can win capitalism?

 

[CT Phipps]

Yeah, so why add this silly clandestine meeting about making sure it happened so they can win capitalism?

Vault-Tec is running out of money and wants to attract outside investors by giving them essentially a bunch of unlimited guinea pig trials.

There's a lot of fucked up-edness in that meeting and it's interesting people are only interested in whether Vault-Tec and the Proto-Enclave are the ones who fired first.

 

[Bradylama]

I'm reviewing the finale right now and the conspiracy makes absolutely no sense. Vault-Tec didn't need to bring in new investors its contracts with the government were already secured. They even had the plan for the triyune management vault already, so that's all they needed to fulfill their agenda! What they actually needed the other corporations to consent to was ending the world. Which is totally bananas and contradictory to their interests. Vault-Tec is the only company with a stake in ending the world!

I mean the war was already going on by the time Vault-Tec got involved, Operation: Anchorage had happened and Cooper was a veteran.

Frankly, nuclear war inevitable already.

No the war wasn't already going on. The Sino-American War and the Great War are two distinct events. The reason they're separated in Fallout's history is because the Great War only lasted for a few hours while involving all the nuclear powers of the world. The details are fuzzy and it's difficult to determine who shot whom aside from China & the US, who shot first. The Sino-American War ended immediately as soon as the nukes started flying. Yes it is true that the Great War was caused by the Sino-American War, but the war between the US & China wasn't global.

 

[CT Phipps]

I'm reviewing the finale right now and the conspiracy makes absolutely no sense. Vault-Tec didn't need to bring in new investors its contracts with the government were already secured. They even had the plan for the triyune management vault already, so that's all they needed to fulfill their agenda! What they actually needed the other corporations to consent to was ending the world. Which is totally bananas and contradictory to their interests. Vault-Tec is the only company with a stake in ending the world!

How do you figure with the trinune Vault? That's what? 3000 people at max? That's not going to be able to reseed the world. It's also not where the upper management is going to be, it's just where Bud is keeping the mid-level managers. Certainly, if the high ups at Vault Tec were going to be there then there wouldn't be much of a series.

Vault-Tec is running out of money and doesn't have enough to keep the project growing and expanding before the Apocalypse so they sell the "bad vaults" (as Mrs. Cooper calls them) to the other millionaires as playtest sets.

I mean, if Vault-Tec actually wants to survive and rebuild the world, they need trillions.

And there's worse things than nuclear war that would happen if they didn't get investors to bail them out.

1. Peace could break out and they'd go bankrupt

2. They could run out of money to run their Vaults BEFORE the Nuclear War.

 

[Risewild]

The bombs in Fallout come from planes, not ICBMs.

No game ever told us that the bombs were dropped and instead they do say stuff that supports the use of or outright mention ICBMs.

Fallout 3 mentions a nuke being on a plane to explain Megaton, but it was never said (even in that game) that the nukes were dropped by plane. Even Megaton's crater was created by the crash of the USA's plane that was carrying that atomic bomb, not dropping the bomb.

Even Fallout 3 mentions the use of ICBMs:
-It mentions how the USA converted the Delta IX rockets into ICBMs. We can even find one crashed outside the Statesman Hotel (so we know that at least some were launched).
-Mothership Zeta, (in a captive log) mentions how the USA had more than 30 ICBMs on alert and ready to be launched.
-There are two instances of USA Orbital Nuclear Missile Platform use in Fallout 3, the "Highwater-Trousers" and the "Bradley-Hercules".
-In Fort Constantine, we can read the transcript of the automated launch system and it specifically states "ICBM RESPONSE/NUCLEAR":

|======================|
|MINUTEMAN XI - CONSTANTINE|
|LAUNCH PROTOCOL 10.77 |
|SECURITY CLEARANCE ALPHA |
|======================|
|EAM CLEARANCE: G 5 S S 1 8|
|* * >> USAF DEFCON |
|* * >> EXEC:'BAGMAN' |
|======================|
|AUTH CODE: 0000000000 |
|======================|
|RESPONSE SCENARIO MX-CN91 |
|ICBM RESPONSE/NUCLEAR |
|BASE COMMAND EYES ONLY |
|======================|

Fallout 2 intro mentions "Spears of nuclear fire rained from the skies.". Missiles are shaped like spears, bombs not so much.

In Fallout New Vegas we can see the USA's ICBMs (in Lonesome Road), Mr House describes his defence grid built for the purpose of saving Las Vegas as a "missile defense grid":

My networked mainframes were able to predict and force-transmit disarm code subsets to 59 warheads, neutralizing them before impact.
Laser cannons mounted on the roof of the Lucky 38 destroyed another 9 warheads. The rest got through, though none hit the city itself.
(...)
The Chip contained vital software upgrades, but not just for my Securitrons. Every aspect of the missile defense grid would have been upgraded, too.

Raul specifically mentions missiles:

I was in Mexico City when the bombs dropped. Even from there, we could see House's defensive rockets shooting down the incoming missiles.

In Fallout 4 we have a US Air Force base tasked with turning obsolete Mark 28 bombs into ICBMs.
Also in FO4, Captain Zao mentions that orders were issued to launch all of the submarine's nuclear missiles, which implies that all Chinese submarines got those orders too:

200 years ago, I launched all of Yangtze's high-yield nuclear missiles. As ordered. For 200 years, I have lived with that guilt. That shame. So much fire. Such bei.

In Fallout 76 the nukes are all ICBMs, and we can even launch them ourselves.


And there are probably more examples I can't remember off the top of my head anymore.

 

[Baron of Arizona]

Vault-Tec is running out of money and wants to attract outside investors by giving them essentially a bunch of unlimited guinea pig trials.

Didn't Vault-tec had cold fusion? Endless source of energy in world that about to run out of all oil would allow them to be the top dog. No need for all this insanity.

 

[CT Phipps]

Didn't Vault-tec had cold fusion? Endless source of energy in world that about to run out of all oil would allow them to be the top dog. No need for all this insanity.

I mean they already have switched to nuclear power to mostly deal with that. Its cheaper, cleaner, and better than nuclear power but by a matter of degrees rather than kind.

It's only in the post-apocalypse it's an absolute necessity.

 

[Baron of Arizona]

I think the most common misconceptions about Fallout TV is that people think that it's actually good.

 

[CT Phipps]

I think the most common misconceptions about Fallout TV is that people think that it's actually good.

Yes, they think it's fantastic.

 

[Iprovidelittlepianos]

No game ever told us that the bombs were dropped and instead they do say stuff that supports the use of or outright mention ICBMs.

Fallout 3 mentions a nuke being on a plane to explain Megaton, but it was never said (even in that game) that the nukes were dropped by plane. Even Megaton's crater was created by the crash of the USA's plane that was carrying that atomic bomb, not dropping the bomb.

Even Fallout 3 mentions the use of ICBMs:
-It mentions how the USA converted the Delta IX rockets into ICBMs. We can even find one crashed outside the Statesman Hotel (so we know that at least some were launched).
-Mothership Zeta, (in a captive log) mentions how the USA had more than 30 ICBMs on alert and ready to be launched.
-There are two instances of USA Orbital Nuclear Missile Platform use in Fallout 3, the "Highwater-Trousers" and the "Bradley-Hercules".
-In Fort Constantine, we can read the transcript of the automated launch system and it specifically states "ICBM RESPONSE/NUCLEAR":


Fallout 2 intro mentions "Spears of nuclear fire rained from the skies.". Missiles are shaped like spears, bombs not so much.

In Fallout New Vegas we can see the USA's ICBMs (in Lonesome Road), Mr House describes his defence grid built for the purpose of saving Las Vegas as a "missile defense grid":


Raul specifically mentions missiles:


In Fallout 4 we have a US Air Force base tasked with turning obsolete Mark 28 bombs into ICBMs.
Also in FO4, Captain Zao mentions that orders were issued to launch all of the submarine's nuclear missiles, which implies that all Chinese submarines got those orders too:


In Fallout 76 the nukes are all ICBMs, and we can even launch them ourselves.


And there are probably more examples I can't remember off the top of my head anymore.

Also the Galaxy News holodisk in the Sierra Army Depot mentions ICBMs

Edit: Maybe it doesn’t. Not sure if I’m misremembering or just being gaslit by the wiki again.

 

[Hardboiled Android]

The bombs in Fallout come from planes, not ICBMs.

There have been ICBMs established in the setting since at least Fallout 3, and they were very prominent in Lonesome Road. And there have been nuclear subs since Fallout 2 with the Shi, which I assume was armed with nuclear missiles. Not sure where you'd get the idea that planes were the only delivery method, there's nothing in the games that should make us think that and realistically it wouldn't make any sense. In our world, today, we don't just have ICBMs as part of our nuclear strategy. The US has the nuclear "trident" - silo-based ICBMs, submarine-based ICBMs and shorter-range missiles, and plane-based bombs and missile. The Russians have (and had during the Cold War) what I suppose you would call a nuclear quadrant - planes, submarines, silo-based ICBMs, and truck-mounted ICBMs that cruise around the Siberian wilderness so they can't be easily tracked.

Also, NCR had slavery in Fallout 2. There's the Hub and Vault City, both of which they're trying to recruit.

The Hub doesn't appear in Fallout 2, it's offscreen and already a part of the NCR. Vault City would abolish slavery in the case that it's annexed to NCR - Indeed, the character in Vault City that leads you into the Bishop-NCR conspiracy against Vault City is a street preacher crying out for the abolition of slavery.

There is a slave market just outside of the gates of NCR city/Shady Sands, but it's only there because of loophole where that ground is not technically NCR territory and they don't have jurisdiction. But nevertheless, the rangers send you on a mission to shoot the slaver in the face anyways, because NCR dislikes slavery that much.

I see after writing this that you've already been lambasted on getting the detail of the Hub wrong, so no need for you to respond on that, but the general thrust of your argument is still wrong-headed.

The Dogmeat name particularly works because Cooper was in a movie called "A Man and his Dog". It's a reference!!!

I liked this reference, provides some actual justification for once for why a dog is called "Dogmeat," whereas in Fallout 3 and Fallout 4 it was just an eternally recurrent coincidence. And the idea of Cooper quoting one of his own movies was fun, the show didn't do enough of that sort of thing IMO.

How do you figure with the trinune Vault? That's what? 3000 people at max?

Minor point, but 3,000 people is definitely enough to re-seed the world.

1. Peace could break out and they'd go bankrupt

But they'd still have all the money they made? And they'd go on to work at some other company? And they'd still be rich in a techno-utopia (or dystopia for some I suppose), rather than in a hellish wasteland or dingy underground vaults?[/QUOTE]

 

[Bradylama]

If a ceasefire had gone through it wouldn't mean the end of nuclear threat, it would mean a return to the cold war. The world isn't filling itself back up with resources. Another resource war would be inevitable, and a cold war would if anything make demand for the vaults go way up. The sales stop coming in when the world ends. But also that's not the actual point of the vault-tec conspiracy, it's actually something even dumber.

 

[CT Phipps]

If a ceasefire had gone through it wouldn't mean the end of nuclear threat, it would mean a return to the cold war. The world isn't filling itself back up with resources. Another resource war would be inevitable, and a cold war would if anything make demand for the vaults go way up. The sales stop coming in when the world ends. But also that's not the actual point of the vault-tec conspiracy, it's actually something even dumber.

Again, that implies that they'll have the money to continue operations. One of the things that has been abundantly clear in capitalism is the reckless spending and robbing Peter to pay Paul means that many seemingly solvent companies are in constant need of new infusions of cash to keep them afloat. This is especially noteworthy in a business model that requires continual maintenance and growth like, you know, building Vaults.

The attempt to dismiss Vault-Tec wanting a nuclear war or the apocalypse being good for capitalism keeps running into the fact it's a very common argument in RL and done by people just like the ones shown.

https://www.businessinsider.com/mar...-are-chasing-bunkers-and-space-travel-2023-12

The fact it's stupid doesn't make it any less real or relevant to RL disaster economics. It's like saying, "Listen, religious fundamentalism makes no sense Biblically, so we shouldn't pay attention when the Speaker talks about the Earth being made 6000 years ago."

 

[Bradylama]

No it's not a common argument in real life. Capitalism drives us inexorably towards ecological collapse because it's existentially compelled by the accumulation drive to achieve profit forever. Capitalism fails in a contractionary economic cycle because if assets aren't generating a profit then people don't make investments. That's a completely different thing from blowing up the world intentionally so you can go back to square one and make your personal ideology rise from the ashes.

Vault-Tec was not a cash starved company. Bud even denies it. Vault-Tec is a key strategic pillar in the Enclave's long term plans. There's no reason why the government wouldn't bail them out if necessary.

 

[Hawkwing74]

Capitalism drives us inexorably towards ecological collapse because it's existentially compelled by the accumulation drive to achieve profit forever. Capitalism fails in a contractionary economic cycle because if assets aren't generating a profit then people don't make investments..

What nonsense. There's been plenty of ecological problems in the Soviet Union or China. Also, what happened to not doing political arguments? Just can't help yourself, can you?

 

[CT Phipps]

No it's not a common argument in real life. Capitalism drives us inexorably towards ecological collapse because it's existentially compelled by the accumulation drive to achieve profit forever. Capitalism fails in a contractionary economic cycle because if assets aren't generating a profit then people don't make investments. That's a completely different thing from blowing up the world intentionally so you can go back to square one and make your personal ideology rise from the ashes.

Vault-Tec was not a cash starved company. Bud even denies it. Vault-Tec is a key strategic pillar in the Enclave's long term plans. There's no reason why the government wouldn't bail them out if necessary.

The company has set out the meeting because they do not possess the resources to continue their plans for the preparation of the "Good Vaults" which Mrs. Cooper mentions versus the expendable "Bad Vaults." Which we know don't have good radiation protectuon from Cooper asking if the suits actually protect against radiation and being essentially dismissed.

The Enclave isn't supporting Vault-Tec at the time of the meeting because, bluntly, what we're seeing there is almost certainly the BIRTH of the Enclave.

It is the alliance of businessmen, politicians, and doomsday preppers that is behind Vault-Tec and company.

What nonsense. There's been plenty of ecological problems in the Soviet Union or China. Also, what happened to not doing political arguments? Just can't help yourself, can you?

A reminder that China has long since become one of the largest capitalist economies in the world under Deng Xiaoping. It is culturally communist, not economically.

And yes, state run industries are by and large not remotely better economically. That doesn't mean that looter capitalism (which is a separate thing) isn't.

Sort of like how regulated capitalism is massively beneficial while unregulated is a complete fucking disaster.

 

[TheGM]

Turns out China was Vault-Tec the entire time.