Hardin isn't quite as open as McNamara. That's all there is to it. They're both relatively close minded, but Hardin is the more so.

Hardin isn't really the problem here.
Telling Moore 'No' is the missing option. The Courier is a civilian doing the NCR some mighty BIG favours! (plenty of the other Quests have a no/later option.) No, I am not going to attack the BoS, I have run around the Mojave for a long time with one of their members and they have trained me to use some mighty good gear.

I guess there's a point in there. You can't help the NCR without doing everything the NCR wants. From a perspective, Moore is under no obligation to continue giving you quests if you start telling her you won't do stuff she wants. From another perspective, it would be nice to help a faction without having to be approved to help them.

"I'm here at the dam to fight Caesar and keep you guys in power. I know you don't trust me because I wouldn't handle the BoS. Deal with it."

I just slaughtered the BoS. You would think that their army of power armored boy scouts would pose a threat, but a dozen or so pulse grenades begged to differ.

Nobody says you "have to" kill the brotherhood. Yesman is the "wildcard" option. That is the quest line that allows you to choose who lives and dies among all of the factions you have met. (Which has it's own consequenses) Besides, all of your choices have consequences. Much like tenpenny tower, the seemingly good intention can come back to kick you in the butt. If you decide that the NCR is the best option, then you have to play by the rules of the NCR. There are many examples throughout the game of why the NCR are not always the "good guys". They might just be the least bad. This is what makes the decisions in fallout so compelling.

that's choice and consequence. svck it up. you were the one who decided to oust mcnamara, and have him replaced by an aggressive hardliner, so don't complain.
your basic point is, that a game character doesn't behave in the manner you want him to, but so's live, and so are people. you can't have them act and feel like you want, and the game reflects that.

The NCR 'Idolise' me, it's not like I'm a new boy in town - I taken care of Mr House and Caesar!! OK, penalise me by lowering my faction status but not allowing me to decline? That's railroading.

So you didn't actually read my post, just decided to have a pop at me? Grow up.

Hardin isn't the problem.

Not being able to tell Moore 'No' is the problem. NPC's decisions are meant to work with your actions and behaviour - not being able to choose your own character's behaviour isn't 'choice and consequence' it's an RPG fail.

Woah woah woah, You mean I HAVE to kill BoS to side with NCR?

[censored] NCR, Yes man here i come...

They do allow you to decline. They just won't give you further quests.

That's what I've spent the past couple of hours trying to do but she wont give me that option - she keeps asking if I've taken care of them yet

telling moore 'no' would be a quest failure in the mq.
you have to prove your trustworthiness to moore in order to proceed through the ncr branch of the quest. moore is hardin's counterpart in the ncr. aggressive, stubborn and as full of hatred towrds to bos than hardin to the ncr. so, if you refuse to deal with moores' most hated enemy, you really think the game should still allow you to proceed with the ncr?
if your decision is 'no', then walk off and side with yes man, easy as pie.

Consider it an open proposition.

Some people seem to be angry at others who are having trouble with the Brotherhood/NCR schism, especially after helping Hardin. I think those people are missing some salient points.

For most other factions, you can reach towards a reconciliation - even between extremely bitter enemies like the NCR and the Khans, or long-time rivals like the Kings and NCR. There are also usually multiple ways of completing quests like these. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that some sort of option will be presented for the NCR and Brotherhood.

I also disagree that Hardin comes off as a fanatical hardliner; in early dialogue, he's pushing for McNamara to reconsider lockdown, and wants to be more engaged in the Mojave. He's also more receptive to new ideas like Veronica's. (It's also no good to point to Hardin's subsequent quests, since these aren't part of the context you're given when you make the decision to help him or not.) If he dislikes the NCR, it's certainly not portrayed to the extent that helping him assume power will obviously impact the game's ending in the fashion it does.

I know in my own game, I helped him out very early on, before entering the Strip, in order to hopefully help Veronica in her quest. I certainly would not have done so if I had believed that it made any alliance between NCR and the Brotherhood literally impossible. Finding out the consequences of that decision 30 hours later with my earliest save after that point svcks and has really turned me off this game. I have no real interest in killing off one or completely alienating the two factions I've been helping out for so long. None of the remaining game-end quests even approach an acceptable solution, based on my character's actions, which is a problem for an immersive, open-ended RPG predicated on choice. At this point, I've put the game away and have no plans on returning to it.

Regardless, the general point here is that many people were surprised by this turn, and were unhappy with it. I think at the very least that suggests that the consequences were not at all as clearly laid out as they should have been, considering the stakes at hand.

Apparently you don't understand that the option is DON'T COMPLETE THE QUEST TO KILL BOS and go find another way to advance the main quest.

Moore will not give you the option to say no because the NCR and BOS in California are bitter enemies (fun fact, if you keep McNamara, when you ally the NCR and BOS you actually get NCR infamy), and Hardin will not give you the option to form an alliance, because he absolutely hates them, specially after Helios One. You're basically stuck between two giant egos, staring each other down, and neither is willing to blink.

there was a full scale war going on between the ncr and the brotherhood, with known consequences, just sayin'
i'm pretty surprised that you were actually thinking you would come to peaceful solution between those factions. the fact that you get an occasion is the actual surprise. but only, if you've made the right choice at a certain point in the game, here when choosing a calm over a tempered nature(to me, hardin was a stinker from the first second).
that is the basic concept of choice and consequence. if you were allowed to reverse all the decisions you've made before, they would become trivial, if every npc offered the same choices, they'd become trivial,and we would end up at the water beggar, aka karma dispenser again.
that of course, includes the chance to make actual mistakes, and the willingness to accept that.

Choice implies forseeable consequences. I completely disagree with the assertion that it was clear in advance that Hardin was too hawkish to be reasoned with, even if it meant the destruction of his entire faction - and as I mentioned earlier, he was quite rational in other regards prior to making that decision. I also don't think that the hours I spent aligning myself with the NCR and Brotherhood had a clear, forseeable consequence in the game that I would have to betray both of them, or side with one and kill off the other. I have no problem with accepting mistakes, and I'm not asking for the chance to reverse decisions and render them trivial. That's the antithesis of the argument I have been making. I would like to have enough information to make a decision laid out in advance, without nasty surprises in store down the road.

Both factions are presented as opponents of the Legion. Other factions could be reconciled (with a similarly nasty past relationship approximating that between the NCR and Brotherhood) based on their mutual distrust of and animosity towards the Legion. I definitely did not expect to forge long-lasting, best-friend-forever type relationship between the two, but I don't think it was unreasonable to expect that a temporary pact could be formed - or that, at the least, it would not be necessary to kill off friends and potential allies in order to combat the Legion.

Yeah, I'm an NCR guy and I found out too late that siding with Hardin would result in a botched alliance attempt. Really pissed about that. Wish I would have known earlier. I was sitting on the fence whether to help him, and read you could become a Paladin if you do and there's really no downside. Turns out, there totally was a downside.

I thought maybe Veronica could bring him around in her quest, but it failed miserably.

no, it doesn't. obviously in your case it didn't. you've chosen to do what hardin wants you to without knowing the consequences, likely by just taking his story as granted.
but, whether or not, we often make choices in our lives, expecting no or different outcomes, when the reality turns out to be different...



to me, he had the typical troublemaker attitude from the get go. somebody who's setting up political intrigues to seize power is never to be trusted, but that's just me.
you could very well have a bad feeling about this hardin guy, even at the beginning, not knowing where this would lead to.




no, the brotherhood hasn't had any business with the legion yet. they've been bunker dwelling for quite a time. of course, CL is not the type of organization the BoS would get along with well, but so far, there's no open conflict.
caesar wants them away because of his fota past, true. but for the time being, this is a one way thing.
from hardins perspective it sounds pretty reasonable to let the other factions weaken each other, and then to deal with what is left





i understand your disappointment, but the option was there, just not under every circumstance if a different a bos management wouldn't lead to different politics, what would be the point of the whole thing?

It seems to me McNamera's policy was the wisest based on the tactical situation.....the BoS had no hope of kicking out the NCR...and Hardin was hell-bent on using the Courier to usurp his office to reverse it. If Hardin was so in denial about the Brotherhood's power in relation to the NCR before he took power, why would anyone think he would change his mind once he had the Big Seat? You had your shot to disobey Moore....you blew it when you helped Hardin usurp McNamera. Moore...based on her past experiences...is honestly convinced the BoS is a threat to the NCR and must be wiped out. You cannot talk her out of it. The only way you can defy her successfully is to go over her head. And the only way to do that is to give her superiors a good reason to overrule her, such as the BoS offering to renounce thier claim on Helios forever...effectively accepting NCR sovereignty over the Mojabe...and sending troops to fight at the dam. The courier's missions for McNamera consist of two things...getting the components to repair the bunker's life support system and helping him collect intel on the NCR and the wider situation by collecting the scout reports and giving them the ability to access the comm arrays at Black Mountain. Based on what he learned, he responded to you telling him what Moore had ordered you to do by asking you to convey his proposal to the NCR...a "offer they couldn't refuse". Moore would have probably rejected him out of hand if she were in command, but she wasn't....and Hsu, Hanlon, and Oliver (not to mention Kimball) were well aware they needed every body they could get to win. So when she sent his proposal up the chain..no doubt with a strong recommendation against it...they decided now was not the time to look a gift horse in the mouth and leaped on it just like McNamera knew they would. Hardin lacked the wit and vision...why else do you think McNamera started those missions behind his back in the first place?...to see that was the only way out. In denial and convinced he can still win he goes all-in on the idea whoever wins at the Dam will not be able to stop him...by the time he finds out he is wrong it would be too late.

I guess i was the only one who was extremely happy to have the option of exterminating the Brotherhood from the Mojave. Just because my character was forced to help a less xenophobic chapter in the last Fallout game (until I sent a bombardment right on top of the Citadel) didnt mean I had grown fond of them. In fact, I can't stand them. They are no different than the tribals you are killing everywhere else across the wasteland...except the loot from their carcasses holds more value. I wouldnt have risked my alliance with the NCR for the Brotherhood.

The brotherhood are only interested in one thing. Technology. They have zero interest in helping out their fellow man (unless, he wears power armor too...), or, furthering the recovery from the effects of nuclear war. That hasn't changed in the 200 plus years since the war. Also, the BoS, and NCR, have been at each others throats for at least 30 years.... (since FO2), and god only knows how long even before that. Expecting them to ally with the NCR at this stage, is a pipe dream, and that it is even possible at all should be some cause for questions.

Also, expecting your choices to have readily apparent consequences in the future is extremely unrealistic. Quite frankly, it is a rare occasion indeed that you actually KNOW what is going to happen because of something you do/don't do. The fact that the game does this, isn't out of line. In fact, it is quite "realistic".

Multiquote seems to be getting messed up, so I'll just do it this way.

Tiberius, you wrote "You had your shot to disobey Moore....you blew it when you helped Hardin usurp McNamera." As I think I've said a few times by this point, I don't think it was at all clear that Hardin was going to prove so intractable, or that McNamara would suddenly become the less close-minded leader. The little conversation Hardin has available prior to the power change does not give the impression that he's a power-thirsty hawk, and I suspect some of the things you're discussing come from dialogue he has available after the decision. (I don't know, because Hardin and McNamara both effectively froze up after that point in the game, rather than moving on, so I couldn't unlock either subsequent quests. Which I suppose in retrospect means that I wouldn't have been able to sign a truce anyway, because both ceased to offer any dialogue at all via scripting errors.) Regardless, I made the choice to support Hardin dozens and dozens of hours before even coming close to the end game quests.

Freqnasty, I strongly disagree that you can have a meaningful choice without having more-or-less forseeable consequences, and I'm not alone in that assertion. It's even part of our legal system. To give an example, willingly taking a few drinks before driving, then killing someone as a result leads to criminal charges. But if you took a spiked soda and drove, and killed someone, you would be immune from criminal charges because the consequences could not reasonably have been predicted from your actions. I think what happens in game is anologous: the end result and the apparent choice are at best very distantly related.

I suppose you could argue that in life, we make do with choices that have uncertain consequences, or that, in other words, there's an arbitrariness to our daily lives. I agree. But that doesn't mean that I want that to be an integral part of a video game like Fallout. Perhaps it's more 'realistic,' but then again, we're talking about a game with Super Mutants, and a main character who can carry 200 pounds of crap without even a backpack, then enter an almost undetectable sneaking position by squatting.

I had to wonder why Hardin was so eager to remove McNamera....what he was doing seemed entirely reasonable to me. They had been nearly annihilated at Helios, with NCR troops pouring into the Mojabe in anticipation of another Legion push on the Dam, the Lockdown was a good idea. He also was actively working at dealing with the BoS's short term (the failing life support in the bunker) problems and getting intel on the 'Big Picture', specifically NCR activities and planning. The only issue I could see is that he seemed to have little to no confidence in Hardin as he was running multiple critical operations behind his back....the pretext Hardin uses to force his removal if you choose to help him. The more missions I did the more it came apparent to me that this was less about whether or not McNamera was incompetent or not and more about a battle of personalities....Hardin wanted to resume the war with the NCR, and since McNamera wouldn't go along with it he had to be pushed out of the way.

i can't say anything against that. not everyone likes the concept obsidian is pursueing.
i for myself like it very much, BECAUSE your actions and decisions have consequences!, even if i don't always like them.
the developers had a certain vision for each npc and his views on the world, that implies of course, that not everybody is going to act in the same manner.
perhaps, bethesdas approach is the better one for you, where you can nuke a city for the karma price of exactly 200 bottles of purified water in order to be a saint again.