How in the hell can they say this game is Faction balanced?

[Nalano]

Caesar's Legion proves what the Romans and Mongols know: It's easy to suppress dissent in the outer districts when, if forced to act, you simply kill everybody.

The NCR is unwilling to do that. So that means the NCR will find themselves in more difficulty in such scenarios, but it also means that the NCR is a nicer place to live in for the average citizen.

It's not a tough decision for the people of the Mojave: The vast majority of them will die and a great swath of the survivors will be enslaved if the Legion runs through. This is not a controversial statement; merely an observation of what will happen.

Meanwhile, the NCR already owns most of the region, and the only thing most people complain about are taxes. Well, nothing is certain but death and taxes and I prefer taxes.

 

[Crni Vuk]

But this is because House "walled" New Vegas and expelled everyone that didn't conformed with him.
Also, the money that comes to Vegas from the NCR goes to House, not the city itself, so you don't have much of development with him.

When the courier arrives on Freeside and start to help things out you can see that some sort of development start to happen, so if House didn't make it everything only for himself, the region could develop in a better direction.
I bet that Shaddy Shands didn't grown up in a day
[ ]'s

Letz not start with house. There is a whole own topic about him with the conlcusion that his "targets" are just as unrealistic like he is disillusional.

I didnt said if the NCR has the right or not to anex the mojave desert and vegas. Thats not the point that I want to make. But you see many signs either by NPCs or what the game shows to you that the NCR as whole is simpley the bigest economical source in the Vegas region. With or without house. That places like Freeside are still a shithole is more a contribution of house as he decided to throw anyone out without money. We can argue about the legion and NCR all day long but its fact that the NCR plays the most important role in Vegas I guess simply because the developers have been runing out of time and could not work more on the background of the Legion.

Maybe Shady Sands wasnt build in one day but as community it did most of the time better then Vegas (in my eyes, but thast because Vegas is doing a poor job from the visuals engline limitations or such other nonsense I guess ...)

Caesar's Legion proves what the Romans and Mongols know: It's easy to suppress dissent in the outer districts when, if forced to act, you simply kill everybody.

That didnt helped them. If the roman culture proved us something then that its not more stabile then other powers or empires. The Roman empire was not one clear structure which lasted for 1000 years, it has been anything from a kingdom, to a republic, militaristic dictatorship with many civil wars and with a seperation in the end where the east part of the roman empire survived the west rome with somewhat 1000 years (I think) as byzantine empire ending with the conquer by the ottomans (more or less).

You know the people in the Legion dont believe so much in the "legion" or the "roman culture" behind as they do in the person of Caesar. If Caesar is gone the Legion would disband in a timeline of months maybe some years. Why do I think that ? Its when you see the characters around him. Its hard to tell who would be his direct follower which means most of them would end in fights trying to find out who is the one to lead the Legion (happend with the real rome a few times as well).

 

[ramessesjones]

Freeside is a tough area, but it was in the process of improving before the events in the game. The leaders of the community, King, Julie, the Garrets are all fairly young and all working hard to improve the area in their own ways and are having success. The area was unable to thrive until more recently because it needed House to pacify the most dangerous local tribes first. A group like the Followers can't operate very well if the former White Gloves, Chairmen or Omertas are terrorizing the area.

House essentially plays a similar role in Vegas that the Vault Dweller played in Shady Sands, making it a safe enough place to actually build a society, unfortunately for Vegas it didn't happen until over hundred years later (but it is better off than the Legion lands which are still in longer more painful process of becoming safe, because they lack the combination of leadership and technology to revolutionize so quickly, which ultimately is what Caesar is after).

 

[brfritos]

But this is because House "walled" New Vegas and expelled everyone that didn't conformed with him.
Also, the money that comes to Vegas from the NCR goes to House, not the city itself, so you don't have much of development with him.

When the courier arrives on Freeside and start to help things out you can see that some sort of development start to happen, so if House didn't make it everything only for himself, the region could develop in a better direction.
I bet that Shaddy Shands didn't grown up in a day
[ ]'s

Letz not start with house. There is a whole own topic about him with the conlcusion that his "targets" are just as unrealistic like he is disillusional.

I didnt said if the NCR has the right or not to anex the mojave desert and vegas. Thats not the point that I want to make. But you see many signs either by NPCs or what the game shows to you that the NCR as whole is simpley the bigest economical source in the Vegas region. With or without house. That places like Freeside are still a shithole is more a contribution of house as he decided to throw anyone out without money. We can argue about the legion and NCR all day long but its fact that the NCR plays the most important role in Vegas I guess simply because the developers have been runing out of time and could not work more on the background of the Legion.

Maybe Shady Sands wasnt build in one day but as community it did most of the time better then Vegas (in my eyes, but thast because Vegas is doing a poor job from the visuals engline limitations or such other nonsense I guess ...)

I'm not too comparing House with NCR or Legion, that's not my intention. What I'm saying is the region could have developted a lot better without him, look the resources on the area around.
Hell, it needed the NCR to pump clean water to New Vegas and surroundings, because the man was busy with himself alone and "...fuck the rest of the world". And you have a friggin lake next to the city with pure water and fish!
So the NCR is not the devil that everyone paints.

[off topic on]

BTW, why we don't have fish being served? There's a lot of them in Lake Vegas.

[off topic off]

As the economical force in the region, NCR is the biggest but not the only one. Maybe that's what New Vegas needed to wake up and raise, competition.
The courier is the force that is needed to break the stallment, for better or for worse, he's not a bad thing like I read so many times.

As for Legion background I agree too that it was the devs timeline that left them so shallow, after all, FO3 had five years of development and FNV only two (or it was one and a half?), something that people usually forget. And let's not compare the two games, thanks.
Having this in mind, I think that Obsidian did a good job from what they had available. Sure, New Vegas, Freeside, The Fort and other areas could be better graphically speaking, but the intent showing a poor community that was spelled and isolated from the rich part was preserved and it works.
This has to count. Or not?

What I didn't understand is why they used the old engine instead of iDTech 4 or 5.

And I don't buy the whole conspiracy theory that "Bethesda throw a bone for the old FO fans" or they sabotaged their own investment.
It's insane.

[ ]'s

 

[Tagaziel]

To quote some bits from the official guide's collector's edition (with info taken from the design documents themselves):

The most recently captured slaves tend to be pretty skeptical. But they aren't vocal in their criticisms and their children are raised not by skeptical parents but by priestesses appointed to that task by virtue of their knowledge of and adherence to the state religion.

Nearly all physically capabl, compliant males are compelled to serve in the armed forces. The primary value of pre-menopausal females is to serve as breeding stock (with Caesar or a legate governing how they are assigned to males), though they, like older females and less physically capable men, are also used to perform a variety of other tasks.

Yeah, a real fucking paradise compared to the horrid conditions people in the NCR live in.

Take note that there's not one word - not one word - about how cities in Arizona are organized or how civilians fare in those areas. Raul is pretty sensitive as far as raiders are concerned - if Arizona was only slaves and slavers, then he'd have told you that.

Life in the Legion is terrible compared to NCR or Vegas. Its pretty obvious and even Caesar seems to know it. However, if we are to believe Raul life in the Legion is better than life in pre-Legion Arizona and New Mexico, because those areas didn't House or the Vault Dweller to help pacify those places like Vegas and California, so within the context of where they came from, they aren't necessarily bad, but become bad when they push out from there to more civilized areas.

Caesar's attempted selling point is that Legion won't be as bad once it merges with some more civilized people, but that is a awfully big risk to take considering the alternatives are already much better.

It is pretty obvious that the Legion would change. It's unforgiving, yes, but certainly an interesting route to take.

Except to the NCR there is not much if any other kind of economy in the mojave desert as they do most of the farming are responsible for many of the traders (as I assume they came at the same time with them) and most of the visitors to the strip are NCR citizen. So as said. As sad this might sound for some but the Strip or New Vegas would not hold long without the NCR (not in its current state). And even Yes Man hints at that when he talks about a potential assasination with the president that the NCR will simply blame New Vegas which means a huge drop in resources for Vegas.

You're confusing The Strip with actual Vegas that surrounds it. House and the casinos rely on tourists - Vegas citizens do not. Westside, Freeside, North Vegas etc. are communities that survive without NCR's aid and couldn't care less about their presence. If the NCR is forced to retreat, Vegas still holds their most important asset - Hoover Dam - and can dictate the terms under which NCR continues to receive power and water, with an army of upgraded Securitrons protecting its interests.

In short, Vegas doesn't need NCR (contrary to what they might want you to believe), it's NCR that needs Vegas.

Not entirelly. What information aside the Legion being a nation of slavers that pacified Arizona by killing and conquering everyone we have? They secure the roads for merchants, this we know, but how other aspects of them?
The cities are developted? The people are better than before?

When ruling Britain (Britannia) I bet that romans weren't too kind with the locals either, but you have texts and even examples in the present indicating that the region bolsted a huge development in agriculture, industry and architeture.
Sure, ruled by the Caesar's, but none the less I bet that some britains thinked life was better than before.

That's the problem with the Legion in the game, we don't have nothing of this, showing that they have a different yet viable or better way.

Yes, they have a well developed industrial base and functioning cities. Otherwise, traders would not go to Arizona to trade, as it would be a barren wasteland with nothing to offer.

1. The Legion has a well functioning textile industry. Just look at the amount of undoubtedly fresh red cloth they use for tunics, standards, capes and tents.
2. The Legion has good stonemasons. Eg. Caesar's icon above his tent.
3. The Legion has a well functioning weapons industry. In order to supply an army with firearms, you can't rely on scavenged weapons, you have to manufacture them, plus the ammunition for them. And since the Legion is massive and pretty much every Legionnaire has some kind of ranged weapon equipped (even if they parade with machetes; tested) and ammunition for it, that means they have a stable source of weapons and ammunition.
4. The Legion has a massive and stable network of farms. An army has to eat; it's even more important if it's an army that shuns modern medical technology. Malnourished legionaries can't fight properly.

And seriously, do you honestly believe that traders would go to Arizona if it wasn't a well functioning land where real profits can be made?

 

[Surf Solar]

Don't want to disturb your twist, but I have some questions and thought this might fit here.
First - is it beknown to someone what Caesars "real" name was before he adapted this ridiculous disguise? I also read that "Caesar" ( ) sees Vegas as his "Rome", to adapt from a more barbaric leader of the gauls-like thing to a real empire. Now what I am asking myself, if one doesn't count the hoover dam in, what is so special about vegas? Casinos? Yeah, really a great use for a huge emperor. Why doesn't he settle in Arizona first for his "Rome"? I am sure there are enough big cities to install his "empire". The way it looks to me is just that he wants to fight "the bear" because the writers thought it's cool.

 

[Ausir]

Nope, his name before he became Caesar is unknown.

 

[Surf Solar]

Bollocks. :/ I'd prefer calling him his real name to show how stupid his whole idea went. Maybe we'll get to learn it eventually.

 

[Tagaziel]

He was called Scrappy Crumpet. Can't blame him for changing it.

 

[Surf Solar]

The level of calling oneseelf Ceasar or Scrappy Crumpet in this setting is pretty equal in stupidity in my book.

 

[Ausir]

I'll add it to the wiki, then everyone will assume it's canon.

 

[Little Robot]

I'll add it to the wiki, then everyone will assume it's canon.

Well, if Beth makes the next Fallout game then there will certainly be something about it in there!

 

[DirkGently]

The Legion also has the means to transport all that food. And guns. And ammo. They can also afford to have some somewhat exotic ammo, like the 12.7mm Pistols that they are known to carry, and the marksman carbines, along with their undoubtedly expensive and complicated to produce scopes.

Also, I think Caesar wants New Vegas to be his "Rome" because it's a fully functioning goddamned city with luxury. It has plenty of clean water, plenty of electricity and Security. It's the closest thing to an old world city in the Wasteland.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Bollocks. :/ I'd prefer calling him his real name to show how stupid his whole idea went. Maybe we'll get to learn it eventually.

Kaizer Soeze is what I call him. Usualy.

You're confusing The Strip with actual Vegas that surrounds it. House and the casinos rely on tourists - Vegas citizens do not. Westside, Freeside, North Vegas etc. are communities that survive without NCR's aid and couldn't care less about their presence. If the NCR is forced to retreat, Vegas still holds their most important asset - Hoover Dam - and can dictate the terms under which NCR continues to receive power and water, with an army of upgraded Securitrons protecting its interests.

In short, Vegas doesn't need NCR (contrary to what they might want you to believe), it's NCR that needs Vegas.

We cant say much about how Freeside (and the rest outside) survives as the game doesnt really show anything about it nor does it really give much of a explenation. All we can say is that its a shithole and chance is big that even without the NCR it might just stay that. Thinking about it what might happen without the Courier is that one of the families on the strip (omertas?) might have simply killed or otherwise removed house from the picture. Which would not have left freeside in a that well situation either.

I think the farming the NCR is doing in that area (or somewhat of it) and the water source they have is doing some good to freeside as well. ~ again I can only assume that. The game to me at least never really has told me what kind of conection economicaly freeside and the NCR have. But if we assume that what ever the "Strip" has to offer eventually is in some way payed by the NCR. Really, the NCR is more or less the only source of a stable economy in those area and chance is high that this will increase for most of the other locations over time.

I dont like or disslike the NCR I just try to go with what the game shows and what might be realistic (at least from my point of view).

I mean of course if you or others have some informations I would be more then glad to hear/read them.

 

[Tagaziel]

We cant say much about how Freeside (and the rest outside) survives as the game doesnt really show anything about it nor does it really give much of a explenation. All we can say is that its a shithole and chance is big that even without the NCR it might just stay that. Thinking about it what might happen without the Courier is that one of the families on the strip (omertas?) might have simply killed or otherwise removed house from the picture. Which would not have left freeside in a that well situation either.

I think the farming the NCR is doing in that area (or somewhat of it) and the water source they have is doing some good to freeside as well. ~ again I can only assume that. The game to me at least never really has told me what kind of conection economicaly freeside and the NCR have. But if we assume that what ever the "Strip" has to offer eventually is in some way payed by the NCR. Really, the NCR is more or less the only source of a stable economy in those area and chance is high that this will increase for most of the other locations over time.

I dont like or disslike the NCR I just try to go with what the game shows and what might be realistic (at least from my point of view).

I mean of course if you or others have some informations I would be more then glad to hear/read them.

The game tells you (via the King and a few quests) that the NCR is not involved in Freeside; actually, some NCR citizens come to Freeside and unable to either enter the Strip or return to the Republic, stay there. Referred to as "squatters" by Freeside inhabitants, they are almost universally vilified and tensions run high between locals and citizens. As you can see in one of the King's quests, NCR does organize some relief efforts... only for NCR citizens. They ignore Freeside entirely.

In terms of food and water, Freeside has its own water pump (although access is somewhat limited by the Kings), small agriculture and a few hunters. However, there's still not nearly enough meat to go around - children chasing the rat around in order to eat it are proof of that - so there are certain supply problems. Medical concerns are handled by the Followers, who also provide free education.

Furthermore, Freeside would be joined by Westside and North Vegas in creating a stable New Vegas. They aren't alone.

 

[UncleSlappy]

The game tells you (via the King and a few quests) that the NCR is not involved in Freeside; actually, some NCR citizens come to Freeside and unable to either enter the Strip or return to the Republic, stay there. Referred to as "squatters" by Freeside inhabitants, they are almost universally vilified and tensions run high between locals and citizens. As you can see in one of the King's quests, NCR does organize some relief efforts... only for NCR citizens. They ignore Freeside entirely.

Actually [spoiler:f18ca5e020]the NCR wanted to include all of Freeside in the relief program but Pacer beat up the NCR's messenger without the King's knowledge and the NCR naturally assumed this meant the Kings weren't interested.[/spoiler:f18ca5e020]

Granted their motives for doing so almost certainly aren't wholly humanitarian but they do want to help Freeside.

 

[Requete]

I completed the four runs of FoNV and NCR run was longest and most satisfing of them all; Legion was the worst Yes Man and House were in between, The factions are indeed unbalanaced but this is the mark of entire Fallout series: in Fo1 you were were encuraged to Destroy Master (which is not fascist like Keizer Soze but outright nazi) help Shady Sands and enlist the help of BoS. The Master joining ending was crtiticall mission error as you ended as supermutant killled by Overseer's miniguns. Khans were only to comitt first Bitter Springs on them (well they were tranasformed partialy from raider gang of murderers and rapist into peacefull indian tribe persecuted by bad America ) . Very unbalanced factions. In Fo2 you fought another nazi like enemy the enclave this time unjoinable at all for good reasons. The only choice was to either back VC or NCR in their manifest destiny expansion. BoS was marginalised, HUbologists were social satire and NCR were intruduced. FT was strategic game which railoroaded you to back MW BoS. Other endings were bonus. I wont even metion FBoS or F03 they were chinese copies of Fallout IMO. Point is Legion is not first black and white painted nemesis and FNV continues to favour the iconic factions NCR and BoS form first part to the last . Which is good thing INMHO. The forced moral relativism is the lanst thing iradieted wastland needs. So yes NCR F... Yeah!

 

[Nalano]

And seriously, do you honestly believe that traders would go to Arizona if it wasn't a well functioning land where real profits can be made?

That reminds me:

I saw California and Mojave traders heading out to Arizona, but I didn't see any Arizona traders heading into the Mojave. I can't help but wonder if it's a one-way trip.

 

[Plautus]

I always thought Caesar's real name was Reginald Kennith Dwight... or Salmon Rushdie...

All joking aside, some excellent points about the Legion's infrastructure have been brought up.

As for the Romans and their colonization techniques, the game is far off from the truth (but then, that's expected, because the in-game Caesar doesn't exactly have a replete library of classical documents at his disposal).

While the Romans were especially brutal towards the Gauls, Germanic Tribes, and Britons, they did not brutalize societies they viewed as civilized as much as the societies they viewed as "barbarian".

Case and point: When Julius Caesar invaded Gaul in the first century BC, he did so for reasons both personal and political. While his primary goal was to obtain personal wealth to get himself out of debt from his less-than-reputable political dealings, the Gaulish tribes also posed a particular threat to the Roman Republic on its northern border. For over a century, many Gaulish tribes had been attempting to cross into Italy and take Roman farmland around modern day Venice. Since this land was already taken, and Romans generally despised the barbarians, wars broke out easily. Right before Caesar, they culminated in the Cimbrian Wars, in which populist idol and general Gaius Marius waged a series of decisive battles against the Cimbri and Teutones tribes with the result of hundreds of thousands dead on the barbarian side and minimal casualties on the Roman side. Caesar acted similarly in Gaul. Since the Gaulish people were of little value to Caesar free and their cities were of little value to the Roman people as they were, he decided to assault them, enslave the majority of the Gauls and burn the majority of the cities. Caesar went into an area populated in the range of 4.5 million and reduced the population to about 2.5 million. While he left an awful streak of carnage behind, he also left order, and the opportunity for new, superior cities to be built, for example Lutetia, a highly organized and clean city now known as Paris. Where there was once squalid infighting and illiteracy, the Romans brought sanitation and culture.*

Let's look at that conquest side-by-side with the Roman conquests of Greece and Egypt. The Romans assaulted Greece after the close of the second Punic War. Once Carthage was destroyed, the Romans decided to expand West, mainly because taking such cities as Athens would result in an incredible economic boost. To understand the comparison between mid-Republican Rome and its contemporary Greece, one must understand that the mid-Republican Romans were not the cultured master engineers of the Empire during the Pax Romana. After the conquest of Carthage, the Romans controlled a good bit of the Mediterranean sea; however, their wealth was new-found, and their culture was extremely weak. Greece, conversely just recently saw the conquests of Alexander the Great, whose generals dragged all the riches of the Orient back to the Occident with them. Thanks to both Alexander and previous great leaders, philosophers, architects and the such (for example men like Pericles -who was responsible for building the Acropolis we see in modern Athens-) Greece was already a cultured, rich and great land. The Romans, themselves barbarians at this point, invaded under the command of famous generals like Scipio Africanus and Marcus Marcellus. Unlike in Greece, the Romans here did not burn and enslave everything in sight. Rather, they annexed the already-established and thriving cities of Greece, and took whatever they wanted back to Rome. The result was a new flourishing of Roman culture, based on that of Greece.

Something like this, I would imagine, would happen between Caesar and NCR. The in-game Caesar has already likened New Mexico and Arizona to Gaul, and he has treated the tribes of the area as such. As Tagaziel deduced, Caesar has improved his lands' economy and infrastructure, as well as their general safety, much like the real Caesar in his Gallic Wars. Perhaps, Tucson could be likened to Lutetia for him. I would imagine that the lands of the NCR would be much like Greece, rather than Gaul for the in-game Caesar, because its cities -San Francisco, Shady Sands, Vault City, New Arroyo- are much like the historical Athens and Corinth. While the Romans did assault those historical cities and did plunder them, they did not massacre all the Greeks, but rather allowed them to maintain their culture and flourish. Likewise, I would imagine the in-game Caesar would allow these in-game NCR cultures to flourish.

I apologize for such a long post, and I am sure that all that I just wrote was already known by some. Please know that I am not trying to lord knowledge over people, just let those who don't know in on it in a relatively abridged fashion. Like I said, I'm not assuming everybody here doesn't know this stuff, it's just that ancient history is my academic passion.

----------
* The Gaulish tribes already had complex socities before the Romans; however, the societies were marred by a lack of real architecture, engineering, or written language. These three things allowed in part allowed the barbarian Gauls to turn into the ultra-cultured French.

 

[Walpknut]

And seriously, do you honestly believe that traders would go to Arizona if it wasn't a well functioning land where real profits can be made?

That reminds me:

I saw California and Mojave traders heading out to Arizona, but I didn't see any Arizona traders heading into the Mojave. I can't help but wonder if it's a one-way trip.

Maybe they don't need to go back? If they carry enough merchandise and get into the Legion security programa they wouldn't need to go back to those raider filled places and just continue touring Arizona? They would probably only need to g back every two years or so.