NCR v Caesar's Legion v House v Anarchy (obviously spoilers)

[Azrael the Cat]

I'm finding New Vegas starts with what seems like a boring faction plot, with 'obvious but flawed good guys', where despite their flaws the evilness of the Legion seems so overbearing that any flaws of the NCR (like Boone's PTS about the massacre he was ordered into, where he has reasonable reason to suspect that they were raiding a civillain camp of non-militarised women and children) are just insignificant compared to the guys who go around literally crucifying towns who they don't like. Admittedly, if you look into the Nipton situation, they don't crucify all such towns (most they sell as slaves, who have minimal rights and can work their way up from slave status in the legion) - they crucify Nipton and similar towns if they fail a series of moral tests (will you sell out the NCR for bribery? interesting. What about your town, will you be happy to let us take that over, slaughtering a few no doubt, for some gold? Most interesting indeed - and you're the man the town elects? The one they voluntarily choose to reflect their values? Interesting, indeed. And you'll be happy to cooperate and not warn your compatriots so long as you are spared? Oh, very interesting....

But still, for a good portion of the game it's NCR>>>>>Caesar.

Then you remember something - or at least the game starts to do a better job of making clear.

This is the world of Fallout 1 and 2, and to a lesser extent 3 (though in 3 they bizarrely steered away from that by giving the player no choice to choose the enclave over anarchy - the Brotherhood couldn't govern more than a minute section of the wasteland, and by the morals of the first games, the Enclave would at least have a shot at being better than what there was).

Even in 2, when civilisation is starting to rebuild, it's made clear that the worst thing that could happen - the REAL threat of the Enclave arriving and remaking all the mistakes that they made last time - is that civilisation could be snuffed out just as it has restarted against all odds (that's why the Brotherhood help - aside from the traitors in FO3, the Brotherhood lay low and help no-one, except by confiscating any weapons tech that could lead to researching WMDs).

Now, as NV goes on, it starts to become clear that NCR aren't just not living up to their ideals - they just aren't doing a good job of governing the place at all. Khans are running riot in sight of Vegas and they are too incompetent to stop them. As Rose Cassidy says, she hates the Legion, but she has to admit - caravans who side with the Legion get perfect 100% protection and are never ever attacked, while those who side with NCR get mugged 10 metres from the gates of Vegas!

House is neither corrupt, nor incompetent - but he is interested in Vegas and only Vegas. He'll guarantee Vegas's security, but nothing else.

The point of the western half of the FO setting is that anarchy is hell. Anarchy means people getting butchered and raped by drugged out gangs, who then starve to death because there are no farmers left. Anarchy means the potential extinction of mankind.

And in THAT world, the Legion are efficient, and shown to be increasing efficient as the game goes on. By the end, you feel like you're choosing NCR because you'd rather let the world die at the hands of the well-meaning (well-meaning, but not a democracy when all of their presidents descended from Shady Sand's Mayor), than let it survive by butchery. It starts to look like maybe, just maybe, in a world of barbarians, the Roman Empire is exactly what we need. And by Roman law, they don't even trample on foreign cultures, so long as they are noble. Sure, the Khans are judged to be drug-peddling scum, but there's no sign that others wouldn't be accepted (and Roman law - which Caesar follows - strictly stated that those who joined voluntarily kept their own command structures and laws, so long as Roman law took supremacy).

I'm late in the game now, and what looked like an easy choice, now looks damn hard.

So, what are your thoughts people? I'm excluding the obvious 'take over yourself' option, because it doesn't really solve the dilemna.

Is anyone else starting to feel at least a little swayed by the Legion, or does everyone see them as 'the evil choice'

 

[MajinDevil65]

I think the legion were presented as to moustache twirling evil for me to side with. If they had a little better presentation I probably would have sided with them on the grounds that they are what the Fallout world needs... Probably.

 

[Zykon TheLich]

I would have

 

[Wanderer787]

I totally understand your attraction to the Legion. I actually helped them take over in my second play through. (As an aside, in my first play-through I set myself up over New Vegas to protect the Supermutant colony and the Boomers. It bothered me that they would most likely be exterminated or their culture erased if either major faction took over. That, and I wanted the Followers to have a decent shot of establishing their humanitarian utopia, even though I knew it was more or less doomed to failure.)

Part of my reasoning for siding with the Legion the second time around was that the Legion was frank and open with its faults. They appeared as conquerors and intended to be exactly that and tread all over those who would not join them. They engaged in openly brutal tactics to force submission from those who stood defiant against what the Legion viewed as the only chance humanity as a whole had for surviving. I most certainly found some of their tactics disturbing. Ultimately, however, they governed the way I believed to be best, especially given the situation: allow local regions to govern themselves, provided they ultimately recognized the Empire's authority. They stood by their promises, and didn't make any promises that they knew they wouldn't be able to fulfill.

Contrast that with the NCR, a grim parallel of current decadent Western "democracy." They made plenty of promises they were unable to keep and ended up exploiting their own citizens more than protecting them -- see the Boulder City incident as well as Cass' situation at the Outpost. Also, the NCR certainly engaged in similar brutalization tactics while denying that they had done so with a straight face. For example, talk to Boone about the Bitter Springs incident. Ultimately, the NCR claims to care about freedoms while taking them away. It is a bureaucratic setup, and the point of all bureaucracies is to tax people to build bigger buildings to increase the size of the bureaucracy.

I think that J.R.R. Tolkein said it best (and I paraphrase) that "The best monarch is one who provides for justice and defense, but otherwise is more interested in collecting stamps or building model railways." Some will argue that there would be a greater threat of the Legion showing up on your doorstep if you did something they didn't like, but there is an equally great threat of the NCR doing the same thing as both groups are interested in control. However, there is a difference between the two regarding how much control each group wants and for what reason. Also, another thing to consider is that while the Legion is massive, it cannot be everywhere at once. This is a factor limiting the Empire's central power, increasing the chances for greater freedom under a unified whole.

As for siding with House, the outcome would ultimately be the same as siding only with yourself -- a standoff, and simply delaying an inevitable conflict that may lead to greater possibility of total extinction of humanity.

My two cents.

 

[Stormcloak117]

NCR all the way. Although I would like the Fallout series to last as long as possible, the point of each game is to help get closer to rebuilding society and its as plain as day that the NCR is the faction for it. Yes it is very corrupt and isnt the absolute perfect way to go but with the choices given its the best. Plus the NCR has Rangers and Rangers are freakin awesome!

 

[Popadoo]

I usually go with Mr. House. The NCR have too many restraints, but I do like to role-play and I almost always replay a good character. Mr. House seemed like the only logical option for someone who didn't want to be a complete dick but wanted to have some god damn fun.

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

I went with NCR. Alternately, I would have gone with Mr. House.

I saw Caesar's Legion and (especially) anarchy as being completely toxic to the region. The point of the Fallout games, from my perspective, is humanity making progress toward recovery. NCR and Mr. House have their flaws, definitely, but at least their goals include letting people have rights and freedoms that would be completely nonexistent under Caesar, and anarchy would almost certainly lead brutal warlords, turf wars, and eventually a slow extinction.

I'll take a flawed but progressive government over a perfect but brutal one any day.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

As a woman my stance is simple: Any nation that strips all women (and many men) of all their rights and turns them into de facto slaves who's only reason for existing is that they can give birth and potentially serve as pack animals and "amusement" to the men who are in army and thus gain rights is not a nation I'd root for under any circumstances. It is always kind of sad to see this discussion on gaming boards, because so few tend to consider what actually happens to women in the CL (if I was a really radical and crazy feminist I'd say it is also an indiation of privelige, but I won't go there).