NCR vs Legion Opinion

M

mandala

It Wandered In From the Wastes
I recently came across this video, in it the author defends that the legion would never win the war in the long term.

Do you agree?

 
I think the Legion could survive if it went through a form of evolution in its values and structures and move away from the battle focused tyranny that it emulates from Rome into more of a true reflection of how Rome was, but given that Rome basically died with Caesar it is implied that it dies with him in the game.
 
Mr_Beardman said:
I feel like the legion would just fall apart after Caesar died.
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That's because it does. You can see it yourself in game if you let Caesar die and complete the game for the Legion with Lanius in charge. Legate Lanius is a big burly bear of a man and a fantastic general, but a leader he is not. There's a reason real life Rome fell apart once generals started taking over the country instead of politicians. In pretty much every ending slide where Lanius replaces Caesar, everyone dies. Caesar makes peace with the Boomers, he makes peace with Arcade, he makes peace with the Followers of the Apocalypse, etc. Lanius just straight up kills every faction that isn't the Legion with the exception of the Great Khans, who get integrated instead.
 
The Legion doesn't really have a chance of surviving in the long term. The video points out that the Legion is basically a cult of personality around Caesar. It will collapse because Lanius is basically Stalin. The Legion will crumble because they don't have an identity beyond their old tribal identities. The NCR surviving in its current form forever isn't something that is up for debate.
 
All these judgements on the Legion rely on Caesar being an utter retard, we know for a fact that Caesar is planning huge reforms once he takes Vegas, how do we know he won't appoint his (presumably sane, non-Lanius) Augustus then? Besides even if Caesar screws the pooch, the Legion can live through one shitty emperor like Lanius, real life Rome survived hundreds of emperors that were arguably worse than Lanius.
 
Just a point here. The Armor they presented Legion as being in, is from a non-canon mod. I am assuming that only Lanius and high-ranking legates, and Praetorians actually wear anything metal, as opposed to the more leathery gear of your average soldier.

As for what he said, he's assuming that Legion's advantage is soley through guerilla warfare. Legion troops have large numbers, are incredibly well trained, and are picked from the strongest tribesmen. Not to mention they are loyal to Caesar to a fault. NCR Troopers are mostly conscripts with a few volunteers, and are rushed on to the battlefield, and are more hesitant to fight due to not being as fanatic, nor used to struggles as Legion are.

Another point to raise, is that he brings in the Legion being more luddite towards technology. That is a misconception. Legion hate technology that you either rely on, or makes you lazy, as opposed to being opposed to technology. They wouldn't use Mr Handies or Mr Gutsy's, because they'd see it as doing the work for them, and in the same way they won't use Chems because they don't want to build a reliance, however holding a gun wouldn't be an issue, as you're still going in to the battlefield and fighting your own battles, and if you run out of ammo you can still pull a machete.

While the NCR has some technological advantage now, the Legion questline involves interacting with The Boomers. In this questline, you can choose to either persuade The Boomers to give there artillery over to The Legion, or Wipe them out. Either way, the Legion gets access to a lot of Boomer technology.
 
JO'Geran said:
Another point to raise, is that he brings in the Legion being more luddite towards technology. That is a misconception. Legion hate technology that you either rely on, or makes you lazy, as opposed to being opposed to technology. They wouldn't use Mr Handies or Mr Gutsy's, because they'd see it as doing the work for them, and in the same way they won't use Chems because they don't want to build a reliance, however holding a gun wouldn't be an issue, as you're still going in to the battlefield and fighting your own battles, and if you run out of ammo you can still pull a machete.
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They're luddites, alright. Luddism doesn't mean that you're against all tool usage since that would proscribe arrowheads and clubs. And by the same token, if you're using slaves, you're still making somebody else do the work for you.

What makes them Luddites is their fundamentalism. What technology they can or cannot use is holy writ given to them by Caesar himself. It doesn't involve any independent agency, critical thinking or scientific exploration on their part. Everything Caesar allows or forbids, he did so with his own specific goals in mind. And while they make sense to him as a warlord, Legionaries aren't meant to question it.

It's a large reason why I share Gannon's view of Caesar, since I'm inclined to take the Follower view of things. If you tell Caesar that you could use robots to do labor instead of slaves, and that it'd be more ethical to do so, he'd just shrug and say that those dirty peasants aren't good for anything else. He would elaborate, that if left to their own devices, they would live a life of degeneracy and sloth. Because he's the typical arch-conservative reactionary who has contempt for his fellow man like that. In the long run, I think the culture he's engendering is too toxic and damaging to be left alone. Whatever his best intentions are, they don't matter.

To further elaborate on my point, I'm going to go with the textbook blurb defintion of fundamentalism off Wikipedia.
Fundamentalism usually has a religious connotation that indicates unwavering attachment to a set of irreducible beliefs.[1] However, fundamentalism has come to apply to a tendency among certain groups—mainly, though not exclusively, in religion—that is characterized by a markedly strict literalism as applied to certain specific scriptures, dogmas, or ideologies, and a strong sense of the importance of maintaining ingroup and outgroup distinctions,[2][3][4][5] leading to an emphasis on purity and the desire to return to a previous ideal from which advocates believe members have strayed. Rejection of diversity of opinion as applied to these established "fundamentals" and their accepted interpretation within the group is often the result of this tendency.[6]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamentalism

I read that and go, "Yes, that is exactly everything Caesar and his Legion represents."
 
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Just seems a bit silly that the ncr is having that hard of a time with a bunch of machete wielding maniacs.
 
We're talking about guys who use children as live bombs. They'd be a tough enemy to fight. Yeah, a squad of legionaries out in the open might be easy to pick off but there's no way in hell I'd want to fight those machete-wielding maniacs at close quarters.

Which is what we see with Hoover Dam. Up on the roof snipers like First Recon may be able to hold the Legion back, but below in the lower decks of the dam? Yeesh, I'd feel bad for any poor guard sent down there.
 
Personally, I'm not big on "who would win the fantasy fist fight" discussions.
For one thing, it's a fantasy fist fight. You don't know what the rules of the fiction are, except beyond that which is already established.
Secondly, fights aren't really that simple and invariably boils down to long qualified lists of "it depends."
Thirdly, define your win conditions.
 
Legion will win in the long term. Legion is the only faction that does not desperately need your help, and they can obviously do it on there own.
 
superdude34 said:
Legion will win in the long term. Legion is the only faction that does not desperately need your help, and they can obviously do it on there own.
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how?

legion is basically the huns (not mongol empire). its very Despotic in essence that the fall of single person could make slap in the morale. especially for a society which have very little of civilian activity in there
 
superdude34 said:
Legion will win in the long term. Legion is the only faction that does not desperately need your help, and they can obviously do it on there own.
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"The Enclave will win against the NCR and the BOS, they are the only faction that doesn't need you to help them with there plans, they can obviously do it on there own"
"New Reno is better than Vault City and NCR, because they don't need your help them expand."
"Victor Presper will obviously succeed with creating a second nuclear war,because NCR and the Reservation need your help, while Presper will succeed by default."
"The Master's Army will win in the long term. Without your intervention, they can obviously overpower the rest of the West Coast"
"Father Elijah will wipe out the NCR and Mojave, because withotu your intervention nothing stops him."

See why you're reasoning is fallacious yet?
 
"The Enclave will win against the NCR and the BOS, they are the only faction that doesn't need you to help them with there plans, they can obviously do it on there own"
"New Reno is better than Vault City and NCR, because they don't need your help them expand."
"Victor Presper will obviously succeed with creating a second nuclear war,because NCR and the Reservation need your help, while Presper will succeed by default."
"The Master's Army will win in the long term. Without your intervention, they can obviously overpower the rest of the West Coast"
"Father Elijah will wipe out the NCR and Mojave, because withotu your intervention nothing stops him."

See why you're reasoning is fallacious yet?
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Nah, it just seems like they arent desperate for your help. its not exactly as if they cant do it without you.
They have a stable infrastructure, competent leadership, a generally efficient system, and a excellent army. It was only a matter of time until they smashed NCR.
 
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