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Reminds me of this scene from DS9 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qv3Ex5kG2go See also: all of legend of galactic heroes
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Oct 29, 2020 16:08
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Lord Lambeth posted:Reminds me of this scene from DS9 Eddington might have had a leg to stand on if the Maquis weren't just the worst.
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Oct 29, 2020 16:10
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Don't remember that episode, was Eddington really too stupid to understand the political ramifications of allowing non-state terrorism to run rampant? Or was he just another hypocrite?
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Oct 29, 2020 16:18
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By popular demand posted:Don't remember that episode, was Eddington really too stupid to understand the political ramifications of allowing non-state terrorism to run rampant? Or was he just another hypocrite? That's from the Season 4 episode "For the Cause" where Eddington defects to the Maquis. Later in For the Uniform (season 5) the Maquis starts bombing Cardassian freighters, openly attacking Starfleet vessels and gassing planets. They might have had a point back when the Federation and Cardassia had a messy DMZ established where colonists on both sides were left out to dry by their respective governments, but they lost the moral high ground when they went fully militant. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGcAbI-4_io I don't agree with the video title but Eddington was arrogant enough to assume he could get away with war crimes because he was betting on Starfleet playing nice and following rules of engagement. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 16:30 on Oct 29, 2020 |
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Oct 29, 2020 16:25
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Oct 29, 2020 16:40
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I think the show implies that life under Cardassian rule was very terrible for the maquis, but never bothered to elaborate on how. The 90s were the most sympathetic time for terrorism in America, because politically the US was fresh from supporting the guerilla war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union, we were busy trying to memory-hole Vietnam (or at least, we had forgotten that the Vietnam war started as an independence movement from French colonization), and the Terminator and Star Wars franchises were going and themed a lot around the idea of a scrappy resistance against an overpowering force. I don't particularly know what US opinions on the IRA were at the time though. Berke Negri posted:house always gets it, die little poo poo I don't remember the Robco terminals, but I do remember H&H having a bunch of entries about House's paranoid idiot brother constantly expecting some kind of reprisal for kicking him out of the family business that never actually came. Unless you count not warning him about the coming apocalypse as revenge. Internet Wizard posted:House deserves death for being a monstrous imperialist that has destroyed multiple societies, and forced others into cosplaying for him in order to remain alive. House is literally the only power in the game that is fine with (and in fact, prospers from) the existence of other states. That's the exact opposite of imperialism. He may expand his control to most of the Mojave and destroy a couple groups in the process, but you can't establish peace in the Mojave without using some force, and the Mojave's better off without the Brotherhood of Steel anyways. His grand plan of trying to colonize space may be a pipe dream, but it's a better goal to push for than manifest destiny.
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Oct 29, 2020 17:52
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SlothfulCobra posted:I think the show implies that life under Cardassian rule was very terrible for the maquis, but never bothered to elaborate on how. Except that the DMZ was never under direct Cardassian control, only implied control after the lines on the map were redrawn. It was easier for the Federation and the Cardassians to ignore the DMZ colonies because direct interference would lead to a political incident. Both the Federation and Cardassia had elements who had an interest in destabilizing the region to justify a takeover. The federstion sympathizers coalesced into the Maquis while the Cardassians collapsed into civil unrest after their intelligence agency was wiped out and they lost control of the situation in the DMZ. The Maquis went on the offensive.
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Oct 29, 2020 18:01
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Remember when the Brotherhood of Steel fought the Klingongs and the Burgs?
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Oct 29, 2020 18:05
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[What can you tell me about Freeside?] The King: To understand Freeside, you have to look back a few years. Originally, we were all just tribes making a living in this area. That all changed when Mr. House came around. He made an offer to the three biggest tribes that were willing to listen to him. Today, everyone calls those tribes the Three Families, and they live in luxury and run their own casinos in the Strip. The rest of us were left to fight over the crumbs, living in the shadow of those more fortunate. Things got pretty nasty for a while. But we wanted more. A place of our own. A place where no one could tell us what to do. And we didn't want to go elsewhere to find it. So we took control of this place, and made it our own. And that's really all Freeside is, the best of a bad situation. [What's your opinion of Mr. House?] Beatrix: Before the war, Mr. House was a famous captain of industry - robotics, to be specific. Seemed charming in interviews, until he became a recluse. Since the war, though? Didn't make a peep for near two hundred years - but when he came back, he came back strong and killed a lot of people. [Tell me about Freeside] Beatrix: What starts in misery tends to stay there. Freeside wasn't Freeside until six or seven years ago. That's when Mr. House's robots rolled out of the Lucky 38 and started pushing everyone who wouldn't join him off the Strip. Lots of folks died. Some scattered to the winds. The rest wound up in Freeside and seem never to lose the habit of living like refugees.s (I literally just looked these quotes up the other day and saved them for just such an occasion.) He is very much an outside invader. JustaDamnFool posted:If you wanted to make the arguement, House is geographically close, but in all other ways extremely distant from the actual people of the Mojave. This is very true. I had a great time talking to Caesar and Vulpes but it's evident a lot of people just killed them, understandably. But it means you never even get the chance to see the "emotional appeal" of the Legion A safe town would have helped but ultimately you have to be swayed by the god-emperor and his charisma. It seemed to work for House. Also the "aesthetics" of him and Caesar differ; Caesar will lash you to a cross which is unforgivable. House will just shove you into a ditch to starve to death which is more acceptable for some reason.
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Oct 29, 2020 18:18
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Imagine if Constantine awoke from his ancient slumber beneath Istanbul to conquer all of Turkey.
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Oct 29, 2020 18:49
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Oct 29, 2020 18:58
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SlothfulCobra posted:Imagine if Constantine awoke from his ancient slumber beneath Istanbul to conquer all of Turkey. 
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Oct 29, 2020 19:03
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Reworking a few old posts from a past version of this discussion: It's worth acknowledging that a big part of why we get these discussions every month or so isn't just because the game is well written (or badly written). It's also because big chunks of the material intended to contextualize each of the factions got cut, so our intuitions about each leader, along with our prior beliefs and rationalizations, are filling in the gaps. We have a pretty clear sense that the Legion is doomed to collapse no matter what...and info about how the Legion works internal to their territory is conveyed secondhand by one talking head in their camp. But hey! guess what! If there is one thing that we don't need, it’s a genuine AAA attempt at appealing fascists. The users generate enough of that poo poo on their own, tyvm. We have several people saying that the NCR is going to fail because they are repeating the mistakes of the past (admittedly, it fits narrative themes and one of the people saying this is Avellone's garbage metaphor fountain Ulysses, but he's not a very unbiased source). NCR appears not to fail when they succeed at the dam...but other scenarios make that less clear. At a minimum the NCR is failing due to its success (even if it's failure by the martial standards of Lanius); they provide better lives for a lot of their people than would otherwise have occurred, and they are gobsmackingly incompetent in the Mojave in no small part because the game needs them to give you quests. You, the player, are the only person who even knows what House's scheme is, and even then it's only if you really pry. Although it sort of fits the narrative conceit of the game that House is similarly caught up in the past, we can't really cleanly judge because: a) a lot of details about House are cut, b) we're not given anywhere near as much information to suggest House's incompetence/weaknesses, and the stuff that did make it into the game intact has him as plot-device-tier competent, c) the overarching ouroboros everybody's trapped repeating the past metaphorical structure of the game has irreconcilable internal tensions with player agency, made worse by a) cutting of content and b) the fanfiction wild card plotline. The only thing I can say doesn't work for House is equating him with Elon Musk or Trump. House is established as not only actually genuinely self-made, but prescient, skilled, and all-powerful on a level that pushes the credulity of even the fictional setting. House may be amoral, he may be unethical, and he's arguably some flavor of futurist (messing with the rest of the game's themes), but he's not incompetent. Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 20:28 on Oct 29, 2020 |
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Oct 29, 2020 19:55
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I choose to believe that House will eventually turn into a more extreme eccentric like his clear historic influence, Howard Hughes. The best ending is actually Dead Money's 
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Oct 29, 2020 20:01
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I don't think anybody doubted House's competence; his being a magical capitalist is the only reason the Mojave is in such a pristine state, he was able to shoot down most of the nukes heading their way. But he does have a few major flaws, even discounting possible mental instability. He's a dictator who has horrific track record with his subordinates. No despot, no matter how fantastically capable, can do everything on their own, and that goes double for a man who is imprisoned in a machine that is the only thing keeping him alive. As I recall, House's chosen apprentice was Benny and look how that worked out. The Omertas are also betraying him. Mortimer is one meal away from returning the White Gloves to cannibalism. The Courier betrays House in 3/4 endings. House is far and away the weakest party in NV, to the extent that he's already lost at the start of the game and it's entirely up to you to maybe make him a player again if you wish it. And he's lost because he's more machine now than man, twisted and evil, and his human social skills don't measure up to his mechanical ability. It's one of the best parts of NV's writing, this clear and intentional parallel between Caesar and House. They're both self-made dictators who hate democracy and think their superior intellect gives them the right to rule over everyone. They just express their despotic impulses in opposite ways. I imagine House having more machine 'friends" then real, human followers was an intentional contrast with Caesar's fanatical army. Whereas everyone is betraying House, everyone in the Legion will rush to their death for their Caesar.
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Oct 29, 2020 20:34
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Lightningproof posted:My vision for the Mojave is gay communism so this works out. That's what a Legion victory is, though?
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Oct 29, 2020 20:50
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House does have some uncomfortable parallels to Elon Musk, complete with some family drama where supposedly he lost access to his father's resources and only had the best education that money could buy to bootstrap himself up with (although I think Musk's story may be much more heavily embellished, while House's story is definitely true). The biggest difference though is that while House is definitely charismatic, he has no cult of personality or any wish to create a cult of personality. He's bad at working with people. He genuinely is an introverted dork underneath all that affectation. He chose one guy to try making into his number two and wildly misjudged him and didn't inspire any kind of loyalty. He has no interest in having much of a personal hand in any of politics of the city, much less convince them to worship him. That's why he imported some tribes to run the place for him. There's a good chance that the courier would have a lot of free reign even under House to guide Vegas however they wanted so long as House still got his cut for his own projects. I wonder what House was like in the rare cases where he does speak in public, because you hear about him doing a lot to set up Vegas. NikkolasKing posted:But he does have a few major flaws, even discounting possible mental instability. He's a dictator who has horrific track record with his subordinates. He only really ever had the one direct subordinate. That's not much of a track record.
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Oct 29, 2020 20:55
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i thought the whole deal with house is that he's not even half as smart as he thinks he is, he's just lucky and sharp? wasn't the whole subplot w/ his brother that he basically stole all the smart poo poo from his brother and then hosed him over because Capitalism??
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Oct 29, 2020 20:56
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quote:That all changed when Mr. House came around. He made an offer to the three biggest tribes that were willing to listen to him. Today, everyone calls those tribes the Three Families, and they live in luxury and run their own casinos in the Strip. This whole plot line always struck me as really goofy. Like I'd accept the casino tribes having maintained their weird little casino subcultures since the war because that's a kinda cheesy post-appocolypse trope. Or I'd accept House having maintained and molded them for many many decades for some reason of his own. But the idea that just a couple years before the game started he took over a bunch of tribals and completely overwrote their entire culture and way they even spoke is just.... bizarre.
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Oct 29, 2020 20:57
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Fereydun posted:i thought the whole deal with house is that he's not even half as smart as he thinks he is, he's just lucky and sharp? His stats include Luck 10 and Intelligence 5, which seems to say something.
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Oct 29, 2020 21:02
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He said that he found tribes that already resembled the types of casino he wanted to run. Can't say I disagree with the idea of fancy high society types being only a couple steps away from cannibalism.
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Oct 29, 2020 21:42
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Fereydun posted:i thought the whole deal with house is that he's not even half as smart as he thinks he is, he's just lucky and sharp? Their father founded H & H Tools and after Dad House's death, Anthony House used his lawyers to steal Robert's portion of the inheritance, including Robert's share of the company. Robert went on to found RobCo to great success, at which point he started a hostile takeover of H & H tools, likely more out of spite than any potential financial gains.
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Oct 29, 2020 22:37
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And Anthony had severe mental health issues. Hilarious mental health issues, but in a black comedy kind of way. Also his employees were all kinky.
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Oct 29, 2020 22:43
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Fintilgin posted:This whole plot line always struck me as really goofy. Like I'd accept the casino tribes having maintained their weird little casino subcultures since the war because that's a kinda cheesy post-appocolypse trope. Or I'd accept House having maintained and molded them for many many decades for some reason of his own. But the idea that just a couple years before the game started he took over a bunch of tribals and completely overwrote their entire culture and way they even spoke is just.... bizarre.
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Oct 29, 2020 23:39
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House stomping out the 3 families identity entirely to force them to reenact a facsimile of old world culture always struck me as extremely creepy. I can't remember who exactly, but I remember one of the Chairmen being upset that he basically wiped out their culture. I suppose that's another parallel between House and Caesar, the destruction of cultural identities.
Vagabong fucked around with this message at 23:55 on Oct 29, 2020 |
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Oct 29, 2020 23:52
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Fereydun posted:i thought the whole deal with house is that he's not even half as smart as he thinks he is, he's just lucky and sharp?
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Oct 29, 2020 23:55
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TheLoneStar posted:I mean if his Platinum Chip arrived a day earlier he'd literally have saved the entire region from any nuclear bombs through devices he apparently made by himself. If that's not enough to be smart, I wonder what would be. True intelligence is realizing three dog fights the good fight with his words over the radio.
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Oct 29, 2020 23:57
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Oct 29, 2020 23:59
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JustaDamnFool posted:House stomping out the 3 families identity entirely to force them to reenact a facsimile of old world culture always struck me as extremely creepy. I can't remember who exactly, but I remember one of the Chairmen being upset that he basically wiped out their culture. I suppose that's another parallel between House and Caesar, the destruction of cultural identities. I don't think Swank really lamented their culture being wiped out, but it's not entirely gone either. The Chairmen loving hate the Omertas with a passion and talking about the Omertas is the only time Swank drops his Chairmen slang and speaks plainly. It's a cool moment where you see the veneer if Vegas slip just for a second and show how close "civilized" groups like the Three Families are to their tribal origins.
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Oct 30, 2020 00:03
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I've been replaying New Vegas again and a question came to me when playing through Honest Hearts. Are Joshua and the rest of the New Canaanites under the impression that Zion National Park is the Biblical Zion?
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Oct 30, 2020 00:07
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JustaDamnFool posted:House stomping out the 3 families identity entirely to force them to reenact a facsimile of old world culture always struck me as extremely creepy. I can't remember who exactly, but I remember one of the Chairmen being upset that he basically wiped out their culture. I suppose that's another parallel between House and Caesar, the destruction of cultural identities. Caesar is mocked for being delusional and having Roman cosplayers but I seldom hear about how Mr. House has set up a giant doll house with real life people who have to make believe they are 50s mobsters. Maybe it has to do with the whole it wasn't properly explained or people missed how this situation all came about while Caesar making the Legion look like that is pretty in your face. I was talking to somebody just the other day about the origin of Freeside and the Strip (hence why I had the quotes on hand) and he said he completely missed how it all came into being a few years ago at robot laser point.
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Oct 30, 2020 00:10
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Dumb nerds relate to House because think they’re actually scorned geniuses
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Oct 30, 2020 00:12
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I don't remember the Legion assassin hit squads spawning quite so much, I slightly regret taking out the Nipton crew. This Very Hard/Hardcore playthrough almost ended when I barely took out a squad at level 5 and only then by kiting them down to Helios One (rip Lt Haggerty), only for another to appear almost immediately afterwards. I've had three or four in the couple of hours since. Easier since I picked up Veronica, she and ED-E rarely die before I do, but I'm level 8, just found Freeside and thought to explore a bit before going in. Nope dead. Guess it's the Strip next!
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Oct 30, 2020 00:14
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I don't really know why you need to bother with the battle at the Dam, at 4 well stocked troops per day all you have to do is hang out in the Mojave for a few months and the Legion will run out of dudes and guns.
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Oct 30, 2020 00:16
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House's whole rebuilding New Vegas scheme is explicitly so he can control the dam and extract funds and power from the NCR for the later parts of his plans.Fereydun posted:i thought the whole deal with house is that he's not even half as smart as he thinks he is, he's just lucky and sharp? No, it's that his brother stole all of the money from House, then House founded a company through which he developed about half of all advanced tech in the prewar era. House's common trait is having nigh-perfect foresight and inventions and incredibly complex, sophisticated plans that get screwed over by tiny inconsistencies left over due to the sheer ambition of his plans, and needing to rely on other people. The one time House really, truly loses it is when the courier comes to him with the chip, then refuses to hand it over. JustaDamnFool posted:I suppose that's another parallel between House and Caesar, the destruction of cultural identities. All of the factions do this- it's one of the themes pushing the player toward the independent new vegas. Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 00:23 on Oct 30, 2020 |
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Oct 30, 2020 00:17
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Suppressing the three families identities seems like a good thing, since they never were anything more than common gangsters - or worse.
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Oct 30, 2020 00:19
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So I got this one mod, More Perks, and I tried this one perk called Bring It On! -> You either kill fast or die early. Both you and your enemy's damage threshold are reduced by 5. I never really understood DT and DR. Is this why I'm killing everything with ease? I took down the NCR CF full of Powder Gangers with just me at Level 4, Sunny Smiles and Cheyenne. Also I can't just not play a close-ranged fighter so pistols are kinda wasted. Maybe I'll try Unarmed, there are a few Unarmed mods.
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Oct 30, 2020 01:09
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ToxicAcne posted:I've been replaying New Vegas again and a question came to me when playing through Honest Hearts. Are Joshua and the rest of the New Canaanites under the impression that Zion National Park is the Biblical Zion? All that said, Daniel is attached to the preservation of (his romantic notion of) the Dead Horses, and clearly doesn't care about holding Zion, he's the guy who wants to leave it. Graham, for his part, seems primarily motivated by the incursion of the White Legs. You can take him at his word that he believes Zion's beauty makes it a naturally sacred place (whether it's a singular place, who knows) and thus that he takes their presence as blasphemy. Or you could argue that Graham is simply charismatic, circumlocutive, and monomaniacal, and it's the fact that the White Legs act on behalf of Caesar (and that Caesar won't let him be) that motivates his ire. It's also possible that he's insane, and both are true.
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Oct 30, 2020 01:13
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DT reduces incoming damage by the number it shows(eg 20 damage vs 10DT leads to you doing 10 damage), DR reduces incoming damage by the percentage it shows(eg 20 damage vs 10DR leads to you doing 18 damage). Powder Gamer armour has DT of 5, which means that perk is negating their armour entirely- you're doing full damage every single hit. Those poor bastards...
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Oct 30, 2020 01:15
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Basic Chunnel posted:Does it matter? It's helpful to remember that the New Canaanites are / were tribals, with all the attendant "backwardness" and lack of historical awareness that the term implies in this particular setting. Daniel and Joshua can quote scripture but there's nothing to suggest that either of them are even aware of Mormon history (the term is never uttered), let alone the existence of the Levant or Abrahamic religions broadly. Exegetic / hermeneutic questions are beyond academic. I assumed Graham was aware of prewar mormon history after mentioning the M1911 being created by an ancestor but I guess that's more legend than any factual knowledge.
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Oct 30, 2020 01:32
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