Fallout VII - Vault-Tec calling

[Balmas]

You don't have to wait on Tactics on our account. :D

Here's a quick question for you. Is there any way to get rid of the input lag that affects Tactics? I've been toying around with the system, and that little half-second delay between command and result is going to annoy me when I do a full playthrough.

[Triaxx]

I don't see any, except when they're told to run and that's just the game calculating the path. It does seem to be less an issue in Squad Turn-based mode than in Continuous.

[Avilan the Grey]

So, I'm finally playing Fallout 4, and there's one question that - well, it's always been there really, but it's intruding more and more into my mind:

Vault-Tec: why?

I mean, I get that they're "experiments". But generally, experiments have some kind of purpose. You do them to acquire knowledge that you can then apply in future. How in Atom's name does anyone think they're going to "apply" the knowledge, if any, gained from the vault "experiments"?

Even if, and it's a very big if because nobody seems to have given it a thought in the vault design, someone eventually manages to collect data from all of them.

So, Vault-Tec: stupid, insane, or just plain evil?

I thought it was canon that the war started earlier than expected? Vault-Tec / The people that would become the Enclave thought they could run experiments for a few years in order to build a vault / space ship to live on?
(Edit: yes, someone else explained it above).

[Alex Knight]

The only official story about the war is "No-one knows who dropped the first bomb", from the intro to Fallout 1.

Actually, the Switchboard in FO4 has America detecting a Chinese first strike.

[Sharoth]

Also, China had a suitcase nuke that went off in Washington, DC on that day (Fallout 3 info), so my guess is that China shot first.

[factotum]

Good to know that there isn't one scrap of Fallout lore that's so sacrosanct that Bethesda won't trample all over it.

[Triaxx]

That's not entirely fair. House also predicted the start of the war, and thus has to know who launched first. Which is an Obsidian game and so following old lore.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

That's not entirely fair. House also predicted the start of the war, and thus has to know who launched first. Which is an Obsidian game and so following old lore.

That's not exactly true. Oh sure, House knew there was going to BE war, everyone did. But he certainly didn't predict accurately when it was going to happen, or he would've had his platinum chip sent over the day before and obviated the entire plot device of the game. Instead, he spent MILLIONS per DAY on excavations to find it in the rubble (according to Yes Man).

The thing is... there were a LOT of dirty things going on leading up to the day the bombs dropped. It is entirely possible that the US could have bombed China and the American population remained completely ignorant of the fact, and that October 23rd was China's response. It wouldn't have needed to have been a complete MAD launch, just one would've been all it would have taken for China to go into MAD scenario mode. Heck, for that matter, some third party could've fragged part of China, and the US blamed for it. The alien species seen in Fallout 3 and Fallout 4 could have easily managed it, just drop a 'dirty bomb' on a Chinese city, and you would see precisely what unfolded, with the US never knowing that they were being blamed for something that they never did. Or it could've been a 'black project' that no one, not even the Switchboard, knew about. So again, the Switchboard sees China's response.

No one really 'knows' for certain. Sure, it looks, based on all the evidence we see, that China shot first. However, also remember that everything we see is going to be filtered by the people of that time. It could well be a situation in which the left hand did something the right hand knew nothing about.

In other news, I tried CASE, Craft Master, and Craft Pack. I... absolutely hate it. With 100 in Repair and Science, I still couldn't figure out how to craft or otherwise obtain a Portable Cell Charger, and all the Recycler perk recipes were removed, which renders the perk useless. Uninstalled it and never looked back.

[DigoDragon]

The alien species seen in Fallout 3 and Fallout 4 could have easily managed it, just drop a 'dirty bomb' on a Chinese city, and you would see precisely what unfolded, with the US never knowing that they were being blamed for something that they never did.

One recording you can obtain on Mothership Zeta suggests that the aliens were interested in the planet's nuclear weapon stockpile.

[Calemyr]

One recording you can obtain on Mothership Zeta suggests that the aliens were interested in the planet's nuclear weapon stockpile.

That's what Betheda has been doing, I think. Rather than explicitly say that nobody knows who shot first, they provide conflicting evidence. If the aliens triggered it, America likely shot first since it was America's codes they were stealing, but the listening post (and most information we get) suggests it was the Chinese that instigated it. I think that's the point: nobody *knows* who dropped the first bomb, but there are theories and evidence to support them, which is a whole lot more interesting than "non-commital shrug".

The most evidence is against the Chinese, unsurprisingly since the games take place in America. We've got a lot of evidence of Chinese spies, from a group of ghoulified ones hiding out in an old food processing plant (at least, I think it was), a decently long chain-quest in Point Lookout following the trail of a spy, the suitcase nuke in the capitol building, and the captain of the sub in Boston harbor. They were, at the very least, ready to attack at the slightest provocation. They also had the motive: they lost the war and, with it, vital resources to keep the homeland running.

I don't know of much evidence suggesting America itself did it. They took back Alaska (and its resources) and demonstrated their military superiority in the process, leaving them little motivation to kick off a little mutually assured destruction. All of the monitoring data we find suggests that intelligence experts were either surprised by the nukes or had enough foresight to feign being surprised. It also doesn't fit the characterization of the nation (in Fallout or out): America as a nation doesn't really like to strike first, but tends to hold to a "send one of ours to the hospital, we send one of yours to the morgue" retributive mentality. Not unimaginable, especially under the more jingoistic leadership they would have had, but fairly out of character. Had America lost Anchorage, it would be a different story, but they didn't.

The aliens... I really don't know. We've too much evidence to ignore, but not enough context to interpret the evidence. They were interested in America's nuclear codes, but also obsessed with Giddy-up Buttercup! toys. They never speak English or have their lines subtitled, so we can only ever (and rarely) interpret what they say through the reactions of humans around them. They also continue to show interest in Earth 200 years after it was reduced to a smoldering cinder, without ever making an attempt to going down and conquering the place, which makes it hard to say their intentions are purely hostile. The real problem, however, is that US Intelligence didn't recognize the "birds in the air" as being their own. Unless our spooks were so concerned with optics that they sanitized their own logs (possible, of course), it wasn't US missiles that they caught in the air.

Personally, I do prefer the Vault-Tec theory. This works to repaint both sides as twitchy over-reactive nations sitting on a world of hurt and the will to use it if pushed, rather than a villain and a victim. Nothing is ever that cut and dry, especially in the wastelands. Second, it nicely buffs Vault-Tec's reputation for their refuge-in-audacity sociopathy, which is a hallmark of the series. Finally, there's very little avenue for this answer to get out, allowing the narrative to remain the tangled clustercuddle of half-truths, Cassandra truths, and misdirection that makes us shake our heads and, even at the worst of times, take solace in the thought that at least our world's not as screwed up as that one...

[Avilan the Grey]

According to canon China did indeed shoot first.
There has never been confirmed that it was a plot, or a false flag operation before FO4, just hints and guesses. Now Bethesda put their foot down and said "yes, it is confirmed, China actually fired first, and did so much earlier than the US predicted".
Basically China was far more desperate than the US thought, or they had more nuclear weapons still operational at the time of launch than the US though. Remember that the Chinese could not counter the power armored troops ravaging mainland China at that point. They basically had to launch, or accept to be wiped out.

[DigoDragon]

That's what Betheda has been doing, I think. Rather than explicitly say that nobody knows who shot first, they provide conflicting evidence. If the aliens triggered it, America likely shot first since it was America's codes they were stealing, but the listening post (and most information we get) suggests it was the Chinese that instigated it. I think that's the point: nobody *knows* who dropped the first bomb, but there are theories and evidence to support them, which is a whole lot more interesting than "non-commital shrug".

I'll agree that conflicting evidence as to who shot first is the more interesting idea than simply not knowing. Most evidence went up in flames when the bombs dropped and survivors probably have more pressing concerns than some trivia bit long ago. Leaves the interpretation up to the player, if they're wanting to make one.

We've got a lot of evidence of Chinese spies, from a group of ghoulified ones hiding out in an old food processing plant (at least, I think it was), a decently long chain-quest in Point Lookout following the trail of a spy, the suitcase nuke in the capitol building, and the captain of the sub in Boston harbor. They were, at the very least, ready to attack at the slightest provocation. They also had the motive: they lost the war and, with it, vital resources to keep the homeland running.

I wonder how many ghoulified American spies are there in China. Maybe they're hiding in a Chinese sweets factory.

The aliens... I really don't know. We've too much evidence to ignore, but not enough context to interpret the evidence. They were interested in America's nuclear codes, but also obsessed with Giddy-up Buttercup! toys. They never speak English or have their lines subtitled, so we can only ever (and rarely) interpret what they say through the reactions of humans around them. They also continue to show interest in Earth 200 years after it was reduced to a smoldering cinder, without ever making an attempt to going down and conquering the place, which makes it hard to say their intentions are purely hostile.

The aliens seem interested in creating some kind of human/alien hybrid, if the abominations are that... not sure, but it's my guess.

Basically China was far more desperate than the US thought, or they had more nuclear weapons still operational at the time of launch than the US though. Remember that the Chinese could not counter the power armored troops ravaging mainland China at that point. They basically had to launch, or accept to be wiped out.

Possible. If I had to pick which side probably shot first, I'd be inclined to say China for those reasons--the US powered armor tech gave it a big advantage.

[Avilan the Grey]

Anyway, to loop back... All of this does indeed indicate that the American gov. and Vault-Tec were taken by surprise by the launch. After all, the upper-uppers thought they were going to have time to go interstellar before the war broke out.

[Triaxx]

I meant more that he'd survived it and had access to his computer system and any surviving records so he'd be more in a position to know than most survivors. Perhaps more fair to say he had an educated guess about it.

Well, for one thing, it's called a Cell Charger, and should only need 40 science. And the recipes aren't gone, they've been moved to the Cell Charger. It's not helped that his own description calls it at least three different things. It also mentions using it at a workbench when it's an aid item instead.

As for the usefulness of the perk, yes and no. It's less useful certainly, but is also unneeded for the recipes. At the same time it's very useful, because quite a few of the recipes call for the drained cells. On the other hand, you can make them with it, by recharging other ammo types.

When I hit Episode 10 you'll see why I adore it, and why I'm also very careful not to over use it. Still, the best part of modding is not needing identical load orders.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Well, I found a thing I thought I'd share with the class. Not necessarily so much for Fallout as Morrowind.

You see, Balmas released a video on his channel (and if you aren't following him, and like Bethesda product Let's Plays, you really ought to) discussing a mod for Skyrim which does loot like Morrowind. Which got me to thinking about how much I'd like to play Morrowind again. But I use a Linux based operating system (Mint). I found something that opened my eyes, and is something that even Windows users may wish to try out.

It's called OpenMW. It's basically a redesign of the Gamebryo engine and an upgrade of many different parts. Mind you, all of these features are built into the game engine itself.

However, it's basically a rebuild of the game engine... NOT the game itself. Which means you DO need to have a legally purchased copy of the game in order to use it. Consider it a full-conversion engine mod, if you like.

It has, by default, as part of the engine, the following:

* 64 bit, Large Address Aware, multi-threaded engine. So it can take advantage of modern hardware.

* Any resolution. Shaders already natively supported. Fixed a bunch of crap. Much of what you would want MGE XE or MCP to fix has already been natively fixed or improved upon without hacking around the issues.

* Launcher has built-in mod handling capability

* Windows/Mac/Linux compatibility.

Right now, OpenMW isn't compatible with MGE, MCP, or MWSE. However, the native engine already does much of what you'd want MCP or MGE XE to do. However, it has its own plugin extensions thing that is basically MWSE plus. However, many mods written with MWSE support won't work as-is without re-writing because it is much pickier about what it lets work and what it lets screw things up. So you may have to clean up mod code in order to get it to work right.

There's a lot more information here about mod interactions, what works, what doesn't work, and what doesn't need to work because it was implemented in the game engine itself. However, the Morrowind Patch Project (formerly the Unofficial Morrowind Patch) is completely compatible with OpenMW, as well as MANY other mods. Basically, as long as it doesn't need MCP or MWSE to run, it will probably work mostly fine. It might be possible to get mods requiring MCP or MWSE to work, but it would require altering the mod coding to fit the new stricter code requirements. Many mod authors are not willing to do so, and many mods have simply been abandoned over the years, so this may need to be a user edit. However, if you DO get such mods working, letting the people at OpenMW forums know how you did it would be a big help.

Now, the exciting thing? People are talking about Oblivion compatibility. And if THAT happens... well, FO3 and F:NV are both running on the same version of engine that Oblivion is. Which means if Oblivion compatibility happens, then FO3/NV compatibility should follow fairly rapidly. Which means a non-crashy FO3/NV for EVERYONE!

[Triaxx]

Very interesting. Though as I perused the list of compatible mods, a horrible one stood out which was Racer Recursion promising more Cliff Racers. Who could do such a horrible thing? And then saw Trainwiz as one of the authors and had my question answered. :P

That said, I'll have to see how it handles being recorded, then I might have a go of playing through the game yet.

[Caelestion]

I was playing OpenMW back in the summer. Although it still has some issues (no shadows, unoptimised distant land, lag around game physics, etc.), I already wouldn't go back to the original 2002 build.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

I was playing OpenMW back in the summer. Although it still has some issues (no shadows, unoptimised distant land, lag around game physics, etc.), I already wouldn't go back to the original 2002 build.

The land texture thing is going to be folded into the 0.43 release expected before the end of the year, and AnyOldName3 has done some amazing work on making shadows work which might find release in 0.43 as well.

Actually, there's two land texture things. One is the land textures themselves, being worked on by Crassel and kcat is working on the distant land thing. Both should be out with the 0.43 release. Or you can snag the nightly builds if you don't mind a bit of instability and test them out yourself now. There's also a rain/snow particle effect overhaul in the works that should be ready for 0.43 as well.

[DigoDragon]

* 64 bit, Large Address Aware, multi-threaded engine. So it can take advantage of modern hardware.

Guess I should keep an eye on that. It does sound interesting. :3

[Balmas]

Now, the exciting thing? People are talking about Oblivion compatibility. And if THAT happens... well, FO3 and F:NV are both running on the same version of engine that Oblivion is. Which means if Oblivion compatibility happens, then FO3/NV compatibility should follow fairly rapidly. Which means a non-crashy FO3/NV for EVERYONE!

Hmm. The problem would be that a lot of the mods I really like depend on NVSE, so a lot of mods would need to be rewritten. So, Project Nevada and the MCM would be gone, which means that a whole host of mods that hook onto that framework are gone. All of the mods requiring JIP's NVSE plugin would need to be rewritten...

It's good, but I'm not sure how many people would jump onto it from the standard.

[Triaxx]

There were also quite a few under the hood changes for NV to improve stability over F3. As for NVSE, true but at the same time an open source engine would have the opportunity to write a lot of that stuff into it at a much lower level than having to plug in to a finished and compiled engine. Including things that might have been wanted but couldn't be done without source code access, such as being able to read controller button input.

[Balmas]

Let's Play Update: TTW is ready to record. Now I just need to get us to where Charlie was before. Thirty eight hours' worth of Fallout 3 to redo.

[Triaxx]

Total piece of cake. Please remember not to use Nevada Skies. It does NOT like the citadel.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

So, tempted to restart my F:NV Let's Play, starting over again. Still going to do a Guns play, mostly because there's almost zero flexibility about what weapon to use with Energy, which gets kind of boring, and with Energy, there's zero reason to go into any of the Dead Money: AWOP areas, since all they ever have as 'good' loot are the extra ammo codes.

I've gotten the explosion lag thing fixed, so explosives *could* be on the menu, if they didn't suck, but they're going to mostly be a backup weapon, not a primary weapon. I've got EVE installed, which is another reason to NOT have energy weapons (the whole ash-pile explosion thing that is just annoying).

Probably going to have a heavier focus on AWOP this time, doing the entire questline to get rid of the tech raiders permanently after I get done with OWB. Also going to be doing a bit more RP in this playthrough.

Anyone interested in this idea, or have any suggestions?

[Triaxx]

Definitely want to head into the Underground rather than hanging out on the overworld we've seen so many times before.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

So after a couple of tests, it looks like I am able to record in 1080p at 60 FPS with no real issue.

Also, I'm planning on doing a somewhat different style of character than the last one. The last character was mostly a stealth sniper. This one is going to be a bit more... loud and proud. The phrase 'This Is My Boomstick!' may or may not feature prominently. I'm going to see how viable FIDO is with WMX installed. And (*GASP!*) I'm probably not going to stick with light armor for very long. So quite a bit different from my last play-through.

Also, going to be using Underground Hideout instead of Sinkomatic for my base. And yes, I will most certainly be cheezing Dead Money with the teleporter.

"Rassa sassa frassa... you think you're so smart you Think Tank reject? Fine, let's do this. But we're going to be doing it *MY* way. First, I go get my stuff back *use teleporter*. Then, we give you a punishment so fitting, so apropos, that even Christine's vengeance shall be slaked. You want the old world tech? Fine. You can have it. For the rest of your lifespan."

[Triaxx]

Sounds definitely interesting.

If you're going to use FIDO, Quartermaster Bardon at the Dam and the Khan armorers are great people to know.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Sounds definitely interesting.

If you're going to use FIDO, Quartermaster Bardon at the Dam and the Khan armorers are great people to know.

Caravan Online and Handloader. Two great things that go great together.

[Triaxx]

My problem with Caravan Online is that I don't know if it's a good deal, or if Bartering would be a better price.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

My problem with Caravan Online is that I don't know if it's a good deal, or if Bartering would be a better price.

Bartering will ALWAYS be a better price. However, Caravan Online has effectively unlimited supply, which is worth the extra cost. Especially once you walk out of Dead Money with all 37 gold bars...