Master or Enclave, Which is the better Protagonist/Villain

BigBoss

BigBoss

Your Local Scrub
Which one did you think was the better protagonist or villain, the Master (FO) or the Enclave (FO 2)?

Who was worse? Who was more capable of destroying humanity? Which was more evil? And most of all, which makes for a better villain overall, not just for the storyline, but for the villains character itself?
 
Good job, friend. The trap is set. Now we just have to wait for the few mad men that reply "The Enclave > The Master" and we can smash them to smithereens.
 
Izual said:
Good job, friend. The trap is set. Now we just have to wait for the few mad men that reply "The Enclave > The Master" and we can smash them to smithereens.
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Bring it on! :evil:
 
One wanted to "unite" humanity by erasing the differences between them and make Super Mutants of them all, if you go for Marcus explanation. One wanted to erase all life on the planet except for pure-strain humans.

I don't know about anyone else thoughts about this, but I consider the Enclave to be a very evil and capable organization (though not an actual villain per se, as it is an organization and not a person, which would be required for the whole 'villain' thing).
 
Fallout 2 sucks when it comes to end sequence... no speech way to deal with them, and they were so evil (recurrent, boring thing in most of games...), not like grey Master.
 
Exactly.

Also, you are asking the wrong question: it's either Enclave or the Unity, or The Master or Frank Horrigan.
In both cases, Fallout 1's antagonists win easily. The Enclave, as Languorous_Maiar stated, is way too "evil", and the normal player shouldn't ever want to join them (and even in that case, he couldn't). They're basically just dark techno-nazis.
The Unity, on the other hand, is much more subtle, and even if the player starts to fear them (and then fights them) early in the game, you eventually realize that they only look evil (but even then, it's a much more interesting evil than the Enclave's one), that they have feelings and faith in some goal that aims to bring peace to the wasteland (at the cost of necessary evils, like, killing the vault dwellers). The reason why you have the possibility to join the Unity is because you can actually believe in their choice and support it. However, even if you support it, by the end of the game you should have realized that you have to stop them anyway, not because they are evil, but because they made one mistake: the mutants are sterile, and thus their plan can't work at all. Your job is to make sure they realize that mistake or to stop them.
In the first Fallout game, you're fighting a perverted utopia. In Fallout 2, you're fighting a plain dystopia.
 
Exactly. The Master brought a very real air of pathos to a position that most games (Fallout 2 included) were satisfied to just assign a few lines of taunting, pompous dialogue and a hit point total. Richard Grey had no control over what he became, and did not set out with master plan or agenda. He was a good man, robbed of his humanity by one of the most appalling weapons humans had ever devised, but even then still bent, through long years of isolation and debasement, on his faith that the species could be brought to heed the better angels of their nature. When he did evolve a plan, it was nuanced and multifarious, involving infiltration of surrounding communities, a puppet religion, and even public relations elements (and let it not be overlooked that although much of the good that the CoC did, like any religion, was meant to bring glory (and followers) to their creed, they still (like The Master himself) did it out of a genuine sense of altruism). The Enclave, by comparison, were bog-standard puppy-kicking genocidal fascists.

The Master (and The Unity) also carried a sinister aura of The Other that The Enclave notably lacked. The mutants were horrifyingly inhuman, made all the worse by the fact that, essentially, they were human. That's intimidating on a much more instinctual level than a guy in Power Armor, however menacingly-designed, can manage. (Yes, even if you make him really, really tall.)
 
So much self-adulation in all these "Master, duh" responses, it's disgusting...

One wanted to "unite" humanity by erasing the differences between them and make Super Mutants of them all, if you go for Marcus explanation.
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You don't need to go as far as Marcus in the sequel to get these details; they're in the original game from the very start. Sneaky enough characters can find out all the details of the Master's plan before ever laying eyes on the monstrosity. He even describes exactly what he plans for humanity, in plain detail, in one of the few logs you can recover from the Military Base.

Fallout 2 sucks when it comes to end sequence... no speech way to deal with them, and they were so evil (recurrent, boring thing in most of games...), not like grey Master.
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Because appealing to the humanity of soldiers and their fight or flight instinct and needing to be VERY convincing to get them on your side isn't a speech approach, right? Because cutesy pet names from scientists for their soldier girlfriends and head geneticists waxing poetic regarding their contemplation on how they're (essentially) taking their own life is "so evil" with no grey, right? We saw PLENTY of good in the Enclave, which is precisely what made them so terrifying. (That's just from FO2, that's not even counting the ADDITIONAL "good sides" we got to see of them with the Remnants in FONV!) They were BELIEVABLE. You could see anyone falling down their path of genocide if they were so isolated and self-obsessed for long enough and placed under extreme circumstances. That's the very problem this topic (or at least, its responses, thus far) has: self-obsession. "Well OF COURSE it's only our way of thinking. There can't be any other, naturally! Fnark fnark fnark! ^.^"

The fact of the matter is, from a pure storytelling standpoint, both forces from both games are equally capable plot-advancing antagonists. Both have their virtues and their flaws, both can seem pointlessly evil from the proper angle, and yet endearingly human from another. Which is "better" is ENTIRELY an issue of preference and taste, not a matter of outright superiority, whatsoever.
 
Matthews said:
(though not an actual villain per se, as it is an organization and not a person, which would be required for the whole 'villain' thing).
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Yeah, I meant that in the plural sense of the word (if there is one).
 
But wouldn't the Enclave be somewhat similar to... Almost /any/ real example? They aren't outright evil in /every/ way, they think. They just cross moral lines. They want to force the idea of purity and humanity on the wastes. America wants to force Democracy on the world. Most religions want to force their ideas on others. Some just don't cross the lines like the Enclave. I liked the Enclave for crossing morale lines because I never liked said lines. They stopped progress in my opinion.
 
mvm900 said:
But wouldn't the Enclave be somewhat similar to... Almost /any/ real example? They aren't outright evil in /every/ way, they think. They just cross moral lines. They want to force the idea of purity and humanity on the wastes. America wants to force Democracy on the world. Most religions want to force their ideas on others. Some just don't cross the lines like the Enclave. I liked the Enclave for crossing morale lines because I never liked said lines. They stopped progress in my opinion.
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Good point, and yes, many irl do cross the line, especially depending on various opinions.
"Evil" is subjective.
Even in this real world of seriousness people use "evil" to describe organizations whos goals are simply different or crossing moral lines. Morality depends from culture to culture as well.
Even the implementation of the idea of "evil" varies from culture to culture. It is not uncommon for American politicians to describe people or organizations as "evil" "badguys" or even "bogeys", while in many other countries the use of such words by official representatives would be unthinkable (as in, immature/irrelevant wording)
 
The Enclave is pretty murderous, outright writing off everyone else in the wastes because they aren't genetically pure. The Master atleast wants to help the people of the wastes (via dipping), and when he learns it's all for naught, he gives up and blows himself up.
 
Shoot first and ask questions later? That's been done before. We outright call everyone who looks like an Islamic Extremist a terrorist. "YOU HAVE A BEARD, DARKER SKIN, AND SOMETIMES WEAR A TOWEL ON YOUR HEAD. TERRORIST!" When, in fact, that's a completely different religion. And even region. We judge verbally. The Enclave judges... Well. With guns.
 
Re: Master or Enclave, Which is the better Protagonist/Villa

BigBoss said:
Which one did you think was the better protagonist or villain, the Master (FO) or the Enclave (FO 2)?
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Antagonist. The protagonist would be you, the player.

Who was worse? Who was more capable of destroying humanity? Which was more evil? And most of all, which makes for a better villain overall, not just for the storyline, but for the villains character itself?
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For reasons already mentioned the Master (the Unity) is a far more interesting foe than the Enclave.
 
Super mutants: brutes with intelligence slightly higher than animals. Hell, average talking deathclaw is usually smarter than average super mutant.
Enclave: Sociopaths with access to the most sophisticated technology in the world.
Master: unmovable mass of flesh.
Frank Horrigan: /thread
 
The Master. While I don't agree with his plan I can see where he was coming from. Also once you convince him he was wrong, he stops. He gives up and unable to cope with what he has done kills himself.Something you rarely see in antagonists.
 
You don't really tell the Master what he did was wrong, but more that it was all for naught and a waste.

And yes the Legion is pretty great, but they're not outright villainous motherfuckers, they just don't get enough facetime.
 
The major problem I had with the Legion was that a bunch of schlubs in sporting gear (seriously, where did they find all those hockey pads?) had managed to spread so rapidly and effectively. Not entirely unrealistic, and I thought they made decent villains, just not as good as the ones from the first two (or, at the risk of sounding like I'm toeing the "Black Isle or nothing" groupthink line, Van Buren's Presper). It would be like if the main villain in F1 had been the Raiders.

They probably would've been more palatable if their theme hadn't been played to the hilt. Fallout's traditionally run with a "spawned from the shadows of the past" theme for their villains, but this one was a little too literal for my tastes. It's common knowledge that the Raider clans slated for the first Fallout were based off of hordes out of mist-shrouded history, but those were interpretations, not misguided recreations.
 
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