Roleplayer's Off Topic Thread #38

[Centurion]

10 hours ago, The Good Doctor said:

@Centurion I’ve had the random Fallout talk itch lately and you seem happy to entertain it so here’s more.  

Top three faction soldier/unit types? 

Mine are:

1) Desert/Veteran Ranger
2) Legion Frumentarius
3) Unity Nightkin

BoS Field Scribes and Circle of Steel assassins get honorable mentions. 

1. Desert/Veteran Ranger. They don’t use power armor, they don’t use Gatling lasers, and they don’t fuck about. These men and women are the baddest of the bad. Imagine what one could do with a suit of T-51b and a wattz laser rifle. They even put shame on the best fighters in the legion including an “elite” centurion with a standard ranger named Stella in the arena using nothing but her fists

2. Star Paladins/Sentinels. They are the cream of the crop when it comes to the Brotherhood of Steel. The report only to an Elder and trusted to handle whatever mission they see fit to undertake, single-handedly.

3. Sigma Squad, Capital Division, Enclave. Y’all have already talked about this one. You know, I know, we all know they are some bad motherfuckers

[The Good Doctor]

10 minutes ago, Centurion said:

3. Sigma Squad

I started an origins post involving these guys a long while back. Never finished it.  

[BigBossBalrog]

 

Video games have movies and TV beat out in tacticool military units 

[Elden Clown]

Hi boys I still exist.

[TheCzarsHussar]

3 minutes ago, Elden Clown said:

Hi boys I still exist.

Good of good

[Centurion]

@The Good Doctor on a pure hypothetical, since Microsoft owns all the companies they work for, a joint project happens. They get Tim Cain, Josh Sawyer, Chris Avalone, and all the original devs they have working for them together along with Bethesda (since Bethesda understands their engine the best) and they make a sequel to New Vegas/the West Coast. It’ll use Bethesda’s new Creation 2 engine (remains to be seen if it’s any good). Where would you like it to be set and what options from new Vegas would you like to be canon/effect the world of this game?

[BigBossBalrog]

So...this...is...the...power of...game...journalism....

[The Good Doctor]

 

1 hour ago, Centurion said:

what options from new Vegas would you like to be canon/effect the world of this game?

Vegas is independent, House or Wild Card, doesn’t matter. "Sallow" Caesar dies, Lanius lives and becomes the new Caesar. Kimball lives but gets impeached. None of the Divide’s nukes get launched.

1 hour ago, Centurion said:

Where would you like it to be set

Colorado or Oregon. Or, since we are already dealing with an incredible fantasy timeline, a game for each, set during the same year or so.

Colorado follows up on Caesar’s Legion and would make use of some Van Buren factions and story concepts, modified to accommodate the lore changes in New Vegas. It would be a more "epic" game spread over a large area, with big factions and major world consequences like NV.

Oregon follows up on the NCR, but the main focus would revolve around New Arroyo and more local, small-scale matters that maybe aren’t so earth-shattering in consequence, but are very important to the people who live in the region. Like the fates of tribes who the NCR pushed north under Kimball, the last holdouts of the Brotherhood of Steel, and the cultural future of Arroyo.

I’ve written a lot about both concepts in the past, but I’ll have to wait and dedicate a post to each if I get the time. 

[Centurion]

2 hours ago, The Good Doctor said:

 

Vegas is independent, House or Wild Card, doesn’t matter. "Sallow" Caesar dies, Lanius lives and becomes the new Caesar. Kimball lives but gets impeached. None of the Divide’s nukes get launched.

Colorado or Oregon. Or, since we are already dealing with an incredible fantasy timeline, a game for each, set during the same year or so.

Colorado follows up on Caesar’s Legion and would make use of some Van Buren factions and story concepts, modified to accommodate the lore changes in New Vegas. It would be a more "epic" game spread over a large area, with big factions and major world consequences like NV.

Oregon follows up on the NCR, but the main focus would revolve around New Arroyo and more local, small-scale matters that maybe aren’t so earth-shattering in consequence, but are very important to the people who live in the region. Like the fates of tribes who the NCR pushed north under Kimball, the last holdouts of the Brotherhood of Steel, and the cultural future of Arroyo.

I’ve written a lot about both concepts in the past, but I’ll have to wait and dedicate a post to each if I get the time. 

I’m interested in seeing some dedicated posts

[BigBossBalrog]

The entire western game industry needs to be purged 

Joking aside why aren't we allowed to shit on games anymore 

[BigBossBalrog]

Apparently Last of Us Factions got its scale and budget heavily reduced. I imagine Sony was sick of them spending ten years on it.

[The Good Doctor]

"The game was delayed"

Yeah, no shit.  

[BigBossBalrog]

11 minutes ago, The Good Doctor said:

"The game was delayed"

Yeah, no shit.  

What's hilarious is they posted the message before Bloomberg put out there story like they were desperate to control the narrative 

[BigBossBalrog]

Holy fuck inter-Sony drama 

 

[The Good Doctor]

Did Sony acquire Bungie and then set them to the task of appraising the viability of their other studios?  

[BigBossBalrog]

3 minutes ago, The Good Doctor said:

Did Sony acquire Bungie and then set them to the task of appraising the viability of their other studios?  

Its kind of fucked up  But to be fair; Bungie does have quite a bit of experience with huge multiplayer experiences. Maybe it was specifically for this one thing? 

[The Good Doctor]

22 minutes ago, BigBossBalrog said:

Its kind of fucked up  But to be fair; Bungie does have quite a bit of experience with huge multiplayer experiences. Maybe it was specifically for this one thing? 

Oh yeah, I wasn’t knocking them. It would actually be a smart business move on their part if so. No telling how much money they have already lost waiting on ND to get their act together.

I’m not even a fan of modern Bungie, but they’re kind of the badasses in this story.  

[BigBossBalrog]

Even after my misgivings with Part 2 and the Remake; the way they described it; a persistent open-world battleground that had dynamically changing wars, detailed factions, and a heavy focus on story was super, super ambitious and very cool; but even then I was like "I don't think ANYONE could really pull this off)" 

[The Good Doctor]

Just now, BigBossBalrog said:

a persistent open-world battleground that had dynamically changing wars, detailed factions, and a heavy focus on story was super, super ambitious and very cool;

I hate to say it, but you just described ESO.  And to be honest, it probably does all of these things better than Naughty Dog would’ve done too, except maybe the story (but since TLoU2, my money would be on Zenimax in that category too).

[BigBossBalrog]

1 minute ago, The Good Doctor said:

I hate to say it, but you just described ESO.  And to be honest, it probably does all of these things better than Naughty Dog would’ve done too, except maybe the story (but since TLoU2, my money would be on Zenimax in that category too).

Except in the format of a shooter with (Very light) RPG mechanics and stealth. Not an MMORPG 

[The Good Doctor]

14 minutes ago, BigBossBalrog said:

Except in the format of a shooter with (Very light) RPG mechanics and stealth. Not an MMORPG 

Yeah, I’d much prefer a shooter to an MMO. Don’t like ESO’s gameplay. But it did pull off all the stuff you named like dynamic battles and detailed story-rooted factions.

[Celan]

[The Good Doctor]

22 hours ago, Centurion said:

I’m interested in seeing some dedicated posts

Colorado

 

The game would draw heavily from the Van Buren design document concepts, but modified and used to tell a new story set 10-20 years after New Vegas. Major themes would revolve around tribalism, cultural and technological entropy, and societal collapse. Think of a Southwestern "Bronze Age Collapse", with most conflict revolving around preservation and choosing what to save instead of progress. Would probably be the most "bleak" Fallout game, as it would be centered on making the most of a bad situation rather than actively taking a bad situation and making it good.

The game would use a map node system like Fallout 1&2, Outer Worlds, Starfield, etc. With it being a collection of unique small-mid sized maps that the player fast travels between, rather than one large one that is completely filled out. Any given node might range from as small as Megaton to as large as The Pitt or Far Harbor.

I think I’d make the PC start out as a prisoner as a nod to Van Buren. You can choose in character creation if you were guilty or innocent of your crime. Maybe even a Legion prisoner, starting the game on a cross.

Some of the companions from Van Buren would feature, such as Measles (a ghoul with a secret agenda), Alexandra (a runaway Canaanite doctor turned bounty hunter), and Devil Dog (rabid mutant dog from Denver who can be tamed). Would also bring back Follows Chalk from New Vegas as an older now and much more world-weary traveler.


Faction stuff

 

Major factions would include Caesar's Legion, the Children of Hecate, and the Reservation.
 

-Caesar's Legion -

Caesar's Legion would be the biggest presence, akin to the NCR in FNV (even the main currency is Legion coin). But without Sallow's vision, they have been on a decline ever since the Mojave campaign. The death of the original "Caesar" -once believed to be divine and infalible- and the withdrawal from Nevada raised many questions about Lanius's perceived strength and the truthfulness of Legion teachings, resulting in numerous slave revolts and rebellions by former officers who decided they could take men loyal to them and do a better job on their own (most raider types in the game are in fact Legion deserters).

Many of the larger ongoing conflicts in the game will be traceable back to Caesar's Legion. In just a few decades, over a hundred tribes and communities got absorbed or obliterated. And while the Legion have brought about their own kind of development, they have also been the biggest contributors to preventing natural or cohesive growth and cooperation in the Southwest. Where once there were many cultures both peaceful and violent, there now remain only a few holdouts, and almost all of them are on the back foot. 

The Legion do their best to maintain peace and order, but their grip is slipping. Ironically, the majority of communities and settlements that seem most "normal" will be in Legion lands, as all the more colorful factions and primitive tribes will have long since been removed. The Legion's brutality will also be less prominent this time around, as they are no longer in "total war" mode against 90% of the map, and possibly even easier to stomach when it occurs as the victims will often be equally barbaric in their actions.
 

-The Children of Hecate-

The Children of Hecate are a coalition of tribes and former slaves who banned together under the religious and matriarchal leadership of a former Legion slave who has taken the name "Hecate". She was among the first to revolt against the Legion following the Second Battle for Hoover Dam, and despite Lanius himself leading the pursuit, she was successful in slipping through their grasp.

She fled into the wastes, where what she did for the next couple of years are a mystery but many nonbelievers say that the sun and thirst drove her mad (and that may be the case, to a degree, but in-game the player would be able to discover that she unearthed a ZAX computer, whose knowledge she combined with her own to form a warped tribal religion that she does appear to believe in).

Whatever the case, she returned to Legion lands with the new name "Hecate" and started allying with groups who opposed them, in the freeing of more slaves, and spreading her new faith revolving around strength through pain and adversity. Many of her followers view her as a prophet or goddess, and her closest followers, all former slaves known as the Daughters of Hecate, are the chief missionaries of this religion 

Over the years, the Children of Hecate have grown into a full blown movement, bringing in entire tribes, rebel legionaries, slaves, and so on. The core unifying factor of their movement is resistance against the Legion with a main goal to topple them. Secondary to this is an attempt to restore a certain degree of tribal identity to those cultures who have had theirs stripped away, which can be good or bad, as many of these tribals were never above engaging in raiding and slaving of their own. As such, many member groups within the CoH are not above engaging in raiding and slaving of their own, albeit in a less systematic fashion than the Leigion.
 

-The Reservation-

A faction of ghouls and mutants who have made their home in an irradiated place were only they can survive, which has kept them safe while so many other groups have fallen to the mighty Legion or CoH. Their population started small but grew over time as word spread of it being  one of the few places where nonhumans are not looked down upon.

Many of the ghouls were prewar, making the place a sort of bastion for prewar knowledge and sensibilities in the otherwise mostly brutal and primitive Southwest. They even established a trade partnership with a faction out of Vault 0 who call themselves the "Brotherhood of Steel" in an effort to acquire, restore, and refurbish old world technologies for their own use. Unfortunately, they lack production capabilities and so every year they lose a little more than they gain.

Over time, the group started inviting in super mutants as well, seeing the mutants as fell outcasts who never chose to lose their humanity. This had the unforeseen side effect of the mutants' philosophy as taught by the Master taking root among them. This led to a sort of "neo Unity" movement in the Reservation with mutates seeing themselves not as outcasts or mistakes, but as actual superior beings to humans. This has damaged their relationships with other factions over time. What’s worse, the influx of ghoul and mutants to their ranks has resulted in a population that is much too large for the Reservation location to contain, and so they have in recent years begun to branch out and claim new territories, sometimes aggressively. And some of the locations they claim seem to be very deliberate. Prewar science and medical facilities, manufacturing plants, and even a couple military sites.

The Reservation are not open enemies with any major faction, but pretty much everyone keeps a weary eye on them, and vice versa. They clearly have an agenda or several, but their secretive and insular nature (and the fact that a faction of mutates is almost impossible to infiltrate) makes it difficult for outsiders to learn what their leaders are up to.

The player will be able to discover during the MQ that they are working on creating a world for themselves. The "born ghouls" concept of Van Buren would be their great secret project. The creation of a new species, essentially. A future for their people. However, another aspect of their plan is to use a single nuclear bomb at their disposal in order to cripple whichever rival faction has the most power by the end of the game. If not prevented, which faction they decide to nuke would be determined by the player’s actions.

Minor factions would include:

-Vault 0 Brotherhood of Steel. They went native generations ago and are barely recognizable. By now, even their connection to the rogue Chicago chapter has been lost. Basically Reaver-esq. tech tribals who have power armor and a really secure base.

-Followers of the Apocalypse. Missionaries who can be found among the Children of Hecate, trying (often in vain) to educate them and steer them in a positive direction.

-Desert Rangers. Rangers who were too far east to join the NCR with their comrades, and decided to fight the Legion on a different front. Once allied with Hecate and were even instrumental in her initial success, but came to regret this when the Children of Hecate grew zealous and brutal.

-Salvagers. Prospector groups who operate in the more dangerous parts of Denver "Dog City", Colorado. Caesar's Legion has destroyed most factions in the area and planted their flags on the city, but certain districts are still quite dangerous from all the dogs, and -more recently- an inexplicable increase in the feral ghoul population (Reservation’s doing, an effort to ward people away from the university area so they can work there in peace). "Salvagers" is a catch-all term for groups of mercenary  scavengers who the Legion has commissioned to stake out these dangerous parts of the city and pick them clean of resources. They are paid well for this service. Though the different groups do have a tendency to fight with each other over the areas where they’ve staked their claims. 

-The Dead Horse tribe. Allied with the CoH against Caesar's Legion, though their veneration for the ghostly "Burned Man", keeps them from following Hecate or seeing her as anything more than a witch. To become chieftain, the greatest warrior among them must burn his own face and wear bandages from that point forward.

-Offshoots of every faction. Legion deserters will often become raiders and petty warlords. Children of Hecate will go on to try and reestablish their old tribes. 

[BigBossBalrog]

The thing I missed most about Metal Gear is back; the batshit fucking conspiracy theories for upcoming releases.

[TheCzarsHussar]