Retcons you’d like (excluding Bethesda’s lore)

Sure, but none of it existed until Fallout 3 retards came around. You have to connect the dots whether you jerk off to it or not. How many serious RPG's do you know have degenerate Deathclaws with tits skullfucking vault dwellers to death?

I'm of the opinion the more disgusting the porn of your fanbase is the worse off it is.

I understand you, that is one of the reasons why I do not like when hobbies and franchises that were originally created to appeal to certain audiences such as in this case pc RPG fans are made more mainstream and have to appeal to everyone and their dog.

I know that if gaming had remained for... more serious gamers that it would never have become the big business and industry as it is now, or a lot smaller.
But that might not have been such a bad thing.
 
Is this because I posted deathclaw porn in the discord?
I don't really see why you'd care. I don't like MLP and apart from Equastria or whatever it is called I just don't care if I come across a pony in a vault suit.
Like ok, that exists, moving on. :shrug:
 
Is this because I posted deathclaw porn in the discord?
I don't really see why you'd care. I don't like MLP and apart from Equastria or whatever it is called I just don't care if I come across a pony in a vault suit.
Like ok, that exists, moving on. :shrug:

Huh? Are you saying this to me?
I was just commenting why I can understand why Toront doesn't like what happens when IPs or hobbies become more mainstream because of what some of the new "fans" tend to do.

I don't really care for Fallout porn or that whole MLP-Fallout crossover stuff (more because I find it stupid) but I really don't care if others are into it.
 
Was for either of you.

I can understand it to a degree but I just don't care about anything that much anymore so why bother? Once something goes mainstream you can pretty much kiss it goodbye. Everything I've loved has been ruined or is dead. Getting upset by this is just a waste of energy and personal time since it is never going to change and the more you get bothered by it the worse it'll get as it grows in popularity.

So while I can understand the sentiment I think it's pointless and Toront would be better off to learn how to treat it as white noise and ignore it. Now if I could retcon Fallout bigly I'd also reduce it back to a niché series and hope it never gets mainstream appeal cause I don't much care for a lot of this shit either. The porn I like. The crossover fan stuff, cosplayers, web comics and internet memes that focus on the newer Fallout's do.

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Ooh, I got one. I'd retcon the telepathic molerats in Klamath and Gecko. Either just get rid of them or I'd turn them into S'Lanter that were cut from FO1. At least those made some semblance of sense (as much as talking deathclaws do) but a random molerat being telepathic doesn't. So either get rid of them or change it so that Klamath is plagued by S'Lanter that have been occupying the underground and have been stealing from the residents here and there and allow the player to negotiate peace or just wipe them out and then in Gecko there should just be one singular S'Lanter that were exiled from this group which can give the player information that could allow them to de-throne the group leader back in Klamath and make the S'Lanter move on peacefully somwhere else.

I'd probably retcon the S'Lanter back into FO1 to be honest but I'd need some good retcon on the lore for their experimentation as well. Like a hybrid experiment to see how to single out genetic traits that could be used to mutate humans into getting specific advantages or alternatively mutate something with hands to gain intellect enough to carry out simple plants for the army. (who would suspect a random raccoon to actually be carrying C4 to plant on a chinese outposts generator to cause blackout?)

Oh and this is another yuge retcon but uh... I'd add in a whole new location in Fallout 1 that is a super mutant town. The Master talks a lot about a new society but all we see is a church and a military installation/research facility. So what would life for the super mutants actually be like? Going in there requires robes from Cathedral, information, probably some sort of an item to use as passport or whatever or you need to sneak your way around or alternatively, allow yourself to be captured and do a small little questline where you and other humans who are in the process of being brainwashed before they are to be sent over to Mariposa have to plan an escape, or not, and just follow along and get the dipped in vat ending.

But yeah if I could I'd definitely add in a super mutant town that shows what life would actually be like. It would give context to Unity's goals.
 
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So here's my hot take on Ghouls: I kinda agree that ghouls should be a one time thing,@Gizmojunk has put a lot of effort in to explaining why that is, and I think he does a good job, but I also agree with @The Dutch Ghost that had Van Buren portrayed the Reservation, I wouldn't have much issue with it, despite the fact that Willem's initial crew were not from Necropolis.

I think what this ultimately comes down to for me is two general gripes I have with the way Ghouls are generally portrayed in Fallout
1. Over-reliance on one specific type of mutant as the staple of the franchise.
2. Not respecting the mortality of things

For the first point, as Gizmo pointed out in other threads, it was never stated in any previous installments that "Ghouls are what happen when humans mutate", rather they were a one-time oddity, this strange group of survivors that had mutated to the point that they were barely recognisable, and that Fallout 1/2 can have strange groups of survivors that don't necessarily need a presence in other games.

Since Fallout is inherently based on the aesthetics of pulp sci fi, I feel like mutants should kinda fit in to this framework where seeing in a new type is kinda a one off adventure like "The Chosen One meets the Slags" or "The Vault Dweller's perils in Necropolis", like they'd be written for a pulpy comic book if that makes any sense. Fallout 2 had underground Slags, Fallout Van Buren was going to have mutant biker Trogs in Hoover Dam and creepy Gollum looking mutant cannibals: Hell, the Pitt was so strong because their situation was unique(A deadly disease that turns humans into Trogs), and even Point Lookout had the Swampfolk.

Like, maybe we could have other groups of Ghouls or similar if they're presence is justifiable, but why do they have to be the default mutant?, It's like having a new batch of Supermutants every game: FEV creates monsters, it doesn't create specific types of monster, hell it created The Master. Without the careful work of the Children of the Cathedral scientists, FEV should not create Supermutants purely by accident.

For the second point: one of the many things that makes Fallout 2, IMO, the strongest entry in the franchise to this day, is the fact that it actually puts time and effort in to creating a consistent continuity with the events of the first game, AND it shows that things in the Fallout Universe Age: Bottlecaps have been replaced with Dollars, the Brotherhood play a minor role in this part of the world, the Unity are no longer the bad guys and many people who still share the beliefs of the Unity(Marcus for instance) actively live in peace among humans. Ghouls in Gecko come from the Great Migration

Another key aspect of this mortality is, as Gizmo has pointed out, in the Old Ghouls Home, Tycho literally talks about the irony of being both the first and last generation of Ghouls, living a long time but also being sterile. This creates a tragedy as these creatures are mortal, and the last generation of their kind ever to exist.

I feel like that's one of the reasons I would have forgiven the Reservation for introducing another group of Ghouls: it directly tackles this mortality. The whole plotline would have been about experiments to create "Born Ghouls" capable of carrying on the species, and the ethics of a species being able to reproduce.


Anyway here are my retcons:
  • Heavily rewrite the Vault Dweller statue in NCR. The "Vault 13 has been mythologised" works as a plot point in Arroyo where ideas of the past has been mythologised, but as I've stated before: There's no real reason as to why the NCR believes Vault 13 doesn't actually exist.
  • Put far more detail in to explaining the Industrial manufacturing capacities of the Enclave. Having a faction with their own power armour and vertibirds and advanced tech is cool and all, but I feel like it doesn't really make much sense without explaining where they get the raw materials from. Hell, maybe have entire slave colonies: The Enclave have repeatedly used and bought slave labour, why not put it to use in ways other than minining FEV.
  • Add more detail to Gecko. When you arrive at Gecko, their economy seems to revolve around salvaging from the Junkyard, which is fine, but I'd like to see a far more permanent economy. The Vault City/Gecko trade deal only comes into affect AFTER the game has finished, and it's unclear where Gecko makes their money from.
  • Make the Marked Men their own type of mutant, separate from Ghouls. I like the whole idea of the Marked Men: they feed off of radiation, and are basically too angry to die, kinda like restless spirits. I feel that thematically they are a good touch to Lonesome Road, they are in many ways the literal spirits of the Courier's past. I get that the Ghoul thing was engine limitations, but it'd be cool if they weren't actually Ghouls.
Also just some commets:
My first retcon would be simple: Make it so that Broken Hills was never abandoned after the ending of Fallout 2. Make it so that it became a new trading post city in the North, with Ghouls, Super Mutants, and Humans working together.

Eh, to my mind a Uranium Mining Town being abandoned after the Uranium dried up is entirely appropriate. I get that you like Broken Hills, but I feel it drying up is more realistic.
I'd also make it very clear that the girl up in The Fort is lying just to get you to turn on the Legion and that the Legion does not allow rape in the slightest. It happens as it is a shittier part of human nature but it is not condoned or tolerated and those who step out of line to indulge in the flesh wrongly are severely punished, probably castrated in public or something and left to bleed out. A very extreme form of punishment but it would show a better side of the Legion that for all their faults when you are in their territory and you are not an enemy then you are not to be touched and free to go about your business so long as it does not interfere with the Legion and that again, NO ONE is above the law, ANYONE will be made an example out of.
The Legion is a Slave Society. Unfortunately they do condone it.

There's not a single slave society in history where the abuse of slaves, even if the acts commited directly contradict the sexual morality of that society in other regards, hasn't been completely normalised and justified by that society. It's uncomfortable to think about, but it is the direct consequence of owning slaves.

I do agree with @Atomic Postman that Legion's misogyny does need an overhaul to make it far more subtle. All women taken from tribes being slaves doesn't feel overly realistic. My take would be that in the same way men abducted from the 87 Tribes were all taken as slaves, but a lot of them can get out of this by proving themselves as worthy warriors, and serving as Legionaries, the same would be true of women. Women avoid slavery by marrying high-ranking military officers, or otherwise becoming Priestesses or Teachers, serving as the clergy and educators of the society.

Of course, this type of misogyny is still as sinister, just in a more subtle way. Women being treated as second class citizens and having to marry or otherwise make vows to be priestesses is not a healthy social order, and one that inevitably leads to misery due to lack of agency, and this should not be neglected.
 
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I would retcon the lore so that the vault experiments are cut. I didn't like idea of the vaults just being home to cynical experiments by the government.
 
As others before me have alluded, I too would change the talking deatchlaws in V13 to something else. Although it's admittedly fun to be able to enlist a deathclaw as a NPC, I find the whole intelligent deathclaw story rather implausible and naive. A huge part of the appeal of the franchise is the bleakness with which post-apocalyptic America is portrayed. Yet somehow, when a ruthless faction bent of genocide takes a bunch of ferocious mutant beasts and increases their IQ by genetic engineering, these mutant beasts become mythical creatures more eloquent and morally evolved than the majority of humans, like Fairy Godfurries or something. That's a bit too fairytale-like for my taste, as well as being quite inconsistent with the gloomy overall picture Fallout paints of the post-nuclear world.

It must be conceded, however, that it's not so easy to think of a replacement that would allow as much plot nuance as the deathclaws. A simple solution would be to have a heavy-duty security system complete with traps, turrets and security bots greet the player on arrival. These defenses would have been installed by the Enclave when they departed after kidnapping the vault dwellers. This way, the player would already be wondering "wtf has happened" while fighting his way through, but would not yet learn about the Enclave. However, this kind of obstacle would pretty much preclude any diplomatic solution and would therefore be more unidimensional and less memorable than the deatchlaws are, despite their implausibility.

The Ghost in the Den

This got me curious. What's wrong with the ghost in the Den? Given the overall lawlessness of the Den, I think it makes perfect sense that one of the countless wrongs committed in that place over the years should have resulted in at least one tortured spirit stuck in limbo.
 
Got me. China invades Alaska, a place where their army isn't really going to be able to live off the land, their attrition rates would be horrendous from starvation and disease since their logistics would be stretched past the breaking point and easily cut off by the US Navy and Airforce. At Some point The US invades China while Chinese forces are still in Alaska. it is just silly. don't be silly.
 
Got me. China invades Alaska, a place where their army isn't really going to be able to live off the land, their attrition rates would be horrendous from starvation and disease since their logistics would be stretched past the breaking point and easily cut off by the US Navy and Airforce. At Some point The US invades China while Chinese forces are still in Alaska. it is just silly. don't be silly.

10 years does seem like a long time in that case, but if it was multiple "wars" with the Chinese repeatedly invading, I could see it. I just don't know if that ever was the case.
 
Multiple wars wut? They invaded Alaska, it took 10 years to get them out. Sometime during that 10 years the USA counter-invades China and wrecks their shit. FO4 implies the US reached the outskirts of Beijing when China hit the button.
 
I'd retcon FEV to be back to how specific it was while also fixing a lot of Fallout 2 plotholes to support it (Mainly the Magician super mutant throwing rats into raw FEV which would instantly turn into random creatures)

I miss the old formula for refined FEV where:
Pure Human + Short but substantial exposure to FEV = High success of having an intelligent super mutant
Any Human + Radiation + Long but small dose of FEV = Ghoulified
Human + Radiation + Short but substantial exposure to FEV = Low success rate & low int super mutant
Raw FEV + anything = Random mutations ranging from radscorpions to the Master or Harold

Would love it to be expanded on, always thought the Master's refined FEV was extremely specific and something of his own unique brand. I mean besides the constant testing he also had a lot of scientists constantly working to keep the vats of it functional. I guess i'd retcon most of Fallout 3 for this.

Oh and the Enclave having more strength than what was seen in Fallout 2. While it's not entirely impossible that there were Enclave bases all around the USA, it seems unlikely that they wouldn't have congregated considering how they had the tech to communicate with one another. It's also annoying since the Enclave were clearly written as a one off villain, with them being so incredibly irrationally xenophobic that even though you could join the Master you can't join the Enclave. I really prefer them to be on the verge extinction.

I'd make midwestern BoS canon because it proves Veronica wrong I hate Veronica. "Blah blah blah lets make the BoS into the followers :)" nah you're going to be basically a feudal army lol!
 
This got me curious. What's wrong with the ghost in the Den? Given the overall lawlessness of the Den, I think it makes perfect sense that one of the countless wrongs committed in that place over the years should have resulted in at least one tortured spirit stuck in limbo.

The supernatural being in Fallout should be restrained to creepy easter-eggs and random encounters. Having a literal ghost just wandering around the Den with a full quest is hammy and undermines the setting.
 
The supernatural being in Fallout should be restrained to creepy easter-eggs and random encounters. Having a literal ghost just wandering around the Den with a full quest is hammy and undermines the setting.

Here it should be borne in mind that ghosts/paranormal activity are present elswehere in the series as well, with no apparent hamminess. The Corridor of Repulsion in FO1 is severely haunted and IMHO suits the setting of the Master's Lair perfectly. The intro of FO2 alludes to "ghosts" with "their spirits becoming part of the background radiation that blanketed the earth." Lastly, Anna was well written and never felt the least bit hammy to me -- the developers seem to have taken the character seriously. I have to agree about the talking scorpion and spore plant though, and would add the mythically virtuous and well-spoken deathclaws of V13 to the list of overly cartoonish characters.
 
Here it should be borne in mind that ghosts/paranormal activity are present elswehere in the series as well, with no apparent hamminess. The Corridor of Repulsion in FO1 is severely haunted and IMHO suits the setting of the Master's Lair perfectly. The intro of FO2 alludes to "ghosts" with "their spirits becoming part of the background radiation that blanketed the earth." Lastly, Anna was well written and never felt the least bit hammy to me -- the developers seem to have taken the character seriously. I have to agree about the talking scorpion and spore plant though, and would add the mythically virtuous and well-spoken deathclaws of V13 to the list of overly cartoonish characters.

The Master's hallway was more pulp-sci fi than supernatural. I know that's an arbitrary line to draw but there's a key distinction between magic and science fiction, the "Pysker" abilities of the Master were clearly a product of FEV (creepily hinting at its potential, and that of the human mind) and not the great magic beyond. As for the FO2 intro, I always took the more melodramatic and flowery phrasing of the narrator reflected the tribalistic theme of the game's intro. It sounds like a tribal myth of the Great War.

I'd say the ghost being taken seriously is why it's hammy, it's a really basic and saccahrine ghost story, and it feels totally out of place with Fallout as a whole.
 
there's a key distinction between magic and science fiction, the "Psyker" abilities of the Master were clearly a product of FEV (creepily hinting at its potential, and that of the human mind) and not the great magic beyond

I was gonna say ghost and poltergeists need not have anything to do with the concept of magic (which would indeed be as mismatch); that the horror visions in Master's Corridor are reminiscent of the ones seen in the Shining, which likewise have nothing to do with magic and everything to do with past sins. But then I took a look at the wiki page which reminded me that Anna's background story does indeed involve shopworn clichés about of wizards and magic, which admittedly makes no sense. I guess my memory was selectively retaining only the well-written bits of the story.

With that said, the supernatural is very much present within primitive tribes in the Fallout world, such as the Arroyo tribe, and I don't view this as incompatible with the Fallout world. Hakunin's telepathic visions never bothered me except for the annoyance of suggesting a time limit. Stories about evil wizards and princesses with magic lockets, however, are indeed out of place in Fallout.
 
-Cats being extinct.
-Dogmeat dying at Mariposa (if you count the Fallout Bible as lore).
-Psychic powers in Fallout 1.
-The sillier stuff in Fallout 2 (actual ghosts, aliens, overt pop culture references, etc...).
-A lot of the retro-futuristic aesthetics. I get that it's part of the message, but I find it to be downright ugly to be honest. I would rather have everything redesigned to be futuristic proper instead.
-The blue jumpsuits the vault dwellers use, I find those so ugly.
-Super mutants being green. I find it to be silly and think that it's just an on the nose reference to The Incredible Hulk.
-Ghouls should be sickly and dying mutated humans, not immortal or in any way tougher than non-irradiated humans.
-Caesar and his Legion being so cartoonishly evil and despising technology and robotics. I would rather have him as a well intentioned despot who sees authoritarianism and violence as a necessary evil for the reestablishment of order and civilization in the post-war world. They should also embrace technology as much as any other major faction seeking to attain dominance, as technology could only militarily empower them.
-I would add a lot more references to the post-war fate of the rest the world and make the whole series be about humanity in general, and not so centered on the US.
-I would also add a lot more characters that have philosophically deep views of the world guiding their actions and that are willing to discuss their views at length with the player. More characters like Chief Hanlon, Ulysses and The Master, that is.
-I would try to make the series bleaker in a lot of ways. Add more threats to humanity and turn the fascism up to 11 in all the major factions. Make the wasteland a much more malignant and merciless place.
 
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