This. And let's be honest here, Colonel Cassandra Moore is the uber [censored] in this game... I mean she is even worse than Alice McLafferty.

That's true. Though, I imagine if the Legion would just piss off, the NCR would worry about paying their workers.

I also agree that the NCR should end the whole dollars idea. It doesn't need a complicated explanation -- it's just unnecessary. But I suppose it's to make the NCR seperate from unoccupied areas.

Though, even if the pay is bad, I still believe it's better than slavery.

The forced annexation is by far the NCR's biggest problem, in my opinion. Seriously, if the town wants to be left alone, leave them be -- it's their choice, and possibly their loss, too. I can see why they do it (they need the taxation money to help the war effort), but it really gives off a poor impression.
Primm didn't seem too bothered about it, I guess, but I reckon that's because they were doing all right, anyway.

In any case, I'm not some naive NCR fan boy who spurts out propaganda left and right, but I truly do believe they're the best bet. I can't really comment on House, so I won't, but I can't see what one man could do on a larger scale, even if he is one spectacular man (hopes to earn some Colonel Martyr rep points).

Also, I had no idea that Caesar used to be a member of the Followers of the Apocalypse.

Boone's sidequest establishes exactly what happened to Bitter Springs, in rather chilling detail.

Right down to "We radioed command that there were women, children, and the elderly trying to flee, but I guess they didn't understand, since they ordered us to shoot anyway."



You can also hear much the same from Raul and even Cassidy, who admits that the legion is good for business... So long as you don't have a uterus.



I don't know. McLafferty colluded with the Van Graffs to raid caravans to get a leg up on her competition, despite the fact that there's a war with the legion on. She's a traitor. I think she deserves to be on one of Caesar's crosses more than most.

Moore just wanted me to clean house, and she did accept my compromise with the Brotherhood despite her personal hatred of them, so she earned points there.

Besides, she was rather hot, and I like strong women. I'd have loved a [ladykiller] option with her.

hell thats enough for them to be called good

Sure the NCR are [censored]s at times but its all for a good cause

I wouldnt call the NCR good if there were more faction but seen as there the only one can top CL then yeah there pretty much the good side in this

Either Mr. House or yourself can easily topple both factions if you upgrade your robot army...

Agreed society needs to takes its paces, baby steps.

The NCR just want everything NOOOOOOOWWW!!!!!

A civilization is something to build upon and the NCR way of doing things will crumble underneath.

You gotta take steps- brutal tribal life, purge of dumb tribes and unity of others into an empire, empire revolted by a republic or revolt, monarchy, dictatorship, semi-democracy, dictatorship, communism, socialism, dictatorship, democracy, on and on.....

Results may very.

We didn't start the fire! It was always burning since the world was turning!

double post

NCR suffers most of the problems that make democracies inherently evil, several explanations:

1. It must continously expand so that its current leadership always has a way to muster votes to stay in power.

'Oh no' says the NCR representative to the locals "you don't want to end up being annihlated by the Legion... just give us 50% of what you make in the form of taxes and we'll make sure you are safe". People will do it and will re-elect the same people in order to feel safe, even when those 'leaders' just use their position to steal more of their hard labour. Same with sharecroppers, the sharecroppers themselves are in the minority and the governors of the NCR spread propaganda to the masses about individual private farms not producing enough for the war effort, essentially establishing serfdom. And we can see hints that even if the Legion weren't present the governors of the NCR would've spread the same fear against New Vegas until hysteria was enough to justify an invasion (fears about the Robot Military of Mr. House, although House had never given any inclination that he wants to control any land beyond Vegas... at least directly).

2. Its always a breathe away from tyranny.

Caesar discusses a president that remained in office for 50 years, and makes allusion that to some degree it was through voter intimidation. We can see that its already essentially there in its territories as the military seems to be running the territory at the most basic level, with no independent police force and no apparent civilian infrastructure for governing.

Some other things I'd like to touch on with the 'Republic' as compared to the Legion. I've seen discussed the Legions 'brutality' and I'd say its largely because they are tribals turned professional soldiers. Caesar knows that you have to train soldiers to keep their minds keen and oriented towards being able to accept and deal with violence. Now due to the fact that most of his soldiers (if not all) are former tribals coming generally from some pretty sick tribes. If Caesar demands ultimate loyalty, and put their minds under the strain of constant training for the horrors of warfare, he has to give them some sort of outlet, that outlet is the punishment of criminals in a way that suits their tribal minds. I'ld expect that individual brutality to wane as Caesar establishes a greater civil society (which he alludes to be his plan).
Compare that to the 'Republic's' army which seems to be made up largely of pretty unskilled conscripts. These conscripts have no real desire to fight and so are less willing to go into a fight (Primm, the convicts, etc).

Another thing I've read alot here is the thought that the NCR can move or act as a unified government. It doesn't work that way, it is made up of hundreds of individual actors each acting for something specific. And the system (democracy) doesn't have enough restraints to keep each individual from abusing his/her power once he has acquired it, and so that power is abused and instead of just 1 tyrant acting in a more consistent way you have 300 tyrants with 300 agenda's. Now Caesar is certainly a dictator (yes there is a difference), but he is a single person and he is the state and so you have alot more consistency coming from the Legion.

I believe that if Caesar could guide the early formation of the empire and stay true to his suggestions in speaking with him the wastes would be far better off with him at the helm, while with the NCR at the helm it would continue to expand until it collapsed in upon itsself like a neutron star.

Both Caesar's system and the tyranny of democracy are unstable and near collapse at any given moment. But Caesar's is more stable as long as Caesar is at the helm. The defeat of the NCR at the dam would be the beginning of its end, but the truth would probably be the same of Caesar's Legion.



Some other side notes, the currency system in the fallout universe is laughably ignorant and you can tell that whoever wrote it has no understanding of how currencies are formed and work, but its a game so thats to be expected and I have to overlook it haha. And I used my flamer on Mr. House purging the earth of his filth.


6

Elucidate please.

The NCR is not above brutality if it is the path of least resistance to their objectives. The removal of forces from the correctional facility is just as evil as anything the Legion ever did, because they knew what would happen and put the locals in that region at risk. The NCR may not be pulling the trigger, but they put the guns in the Powder Gangers hands.

EDIT: I also found that playing as a Wild Card results in chaos no matter how well you negotiate with the factions.

Currencies tend to form around useful objects... gold and silver were highly desirable because people used them to make beautiful jewlery. The fact they could be melted down and used to coat those earliest currencies made sense (Roman currencies contained silver or gold watered down with less precious bronze). Bottle caps an item that people would attach no value to (you don't value the bottle caps for decor, or any other sort of use) would never become a currency, in a post apocalyptic world it seems more likely that something lifesafing would be the earliest currency (clean water... iron or steel coins... stimpacks), especially considering there haven't been any governments to back the value of bottle caps.. and the fact that they aren't tied to anything. The NCR has begun to do this they started a gold backed currency, but their gold was destroyed so what we witness in the current setting is the free fall of the NCR dollar (something that does make sense), and the rise of a Legion backed Denarii. Now you may argue that governments today generally don't back their currencies with anything but their word... well firstly I'll say we are seeing how splendidly that is working, and secondly that is only possible because of the immense power governments have assumed today and how generally stable they are. I mean you don't hear about how great Somali or Korean currencies are... nobody wants to hold those.


Basically only stable, valuable substances can back or become currencies. Bottle caps are certainly not valued for any purpose. Even if somehow they became a currency (maybe of a tribe of all 17 year olds), it would not become a 100% accepted currency across the entire post apocalyptic US, more likely you would see many different types of currency arrise. Purified water in desert regions, iron in more industrial regions, etc etc.

Back in Fallout 1, The bottle caps were backed by the merchants of the hub and in particular, the caravans. Each one is supposed to represent a bottle of water. This carries over to New Vegas, where the caravans have gone back to water-backed caps because the NCR dollar is so terrible. The problem is Fallout 3, because nobody in Bethesda thought about why people would use caps in DC so far from the people who backed caps back in California.

Ahhh, never played the first two, I had seen mention of it in NV so thanks for setting me straight. And I remove some of my criticism of the way they've been devised (For NV anyways).

I think most of the factions are well-done in the game, with believable motivations and interesting consequences to their beliefs.

This is also the case with Caesar's Legion, but where I think they kinda fouled it up is that the faction just oozes evil on the most basic plane. The voiceactors seemed to have been instructed to sound as evil as possible (just listen to Vulpes), when you go to their "home" in the gameworld you note the slightly reddish sky which gives everything a slightly apocalyptic feel. The fires roar and even the dogs look evil.
Their methods are certainly brutal but also rational in many ways. I just wish the devs had toned down their "evilness" in the most basic visual sense.

I'm very pleased with how the NCR turned out, a government that may have good values but is in reality stagnating and can't really control itself. Can't remember who it is in game but someone says that the NCR is just as bad as anyone else, just that they would write a law before committing something bad to allow it.

All in all I really like the factions and think they make for a muuuch more interesting game than F3. My only problem is with the portrayal of CL.

Okay, history provides a pretty good lesson on who to back….

Essentially, the NCR and Caesar’s Legion are both predatory national entities. Sure, the NCR is a bit more warm and fuzzy while the Legion operates on terror and fear, but they offer essentially the same deal to those in their path: Join us or ELSE!

So, who should you back? Well, I say back the folks with the best chance at long term success. That’s clearly the NCR, and here’s why…

The names in the game are a bit deceptive… The NCR is really anologous to Rome, specifically the late Republic. By contrast, Caesar and his Legion are really anologous to Alexander the Great and his army.

Sure, the NCR might be over extended, corrupt, and incompetent. Sure, they might be in decline, BUT RIGHT NOW, they have all the institutions that allow real, honest to goodness, legitimate civilizations to survive overextension, corruption, and incompetence.

After the Roman Republic fell, the Roman state survived another 5 centuries of military coups, corruption, and incompetence thanks to the civic foundations/institutions of the civilization. The NCR has a civilian government, a system that allows for peaceful transfer of power and a military that answers to civilian authority. A society like that can survive a great deal of corruption and stupidity.

Alexander forged the greatest empire in history, conquering most of the known world. However, the empire was held together by Alexander’s personal will. It had no civic foundation of its own, and when Alexander died, the empire dissolved into a bunch of petty successor states ruled by his generals.

Likewise, Caesar’s Legion is a civilization without a civic base. It’s just a bunch of tribals held together by terror and Caesar’s personal will. The state is Caesar and Caesar is the state. When Caesar dies, his empire will splinter much like Alexander’s did and the world will be left with many successor legions led by various Legates—little better than raider bands…

Theres a problem using history as a guide... its happened, the present (or in this case a game) isn't fated to following the same path. Alexander died young before he could establish any sort of government mostly because, it seems to me, he had the passions of a young man, battle and conquest were his real interests whereas administering to an empire wasn't. Caesar seems to me to be the opposite of this, his an elder man and he has the temperance of an older person. He wants a 'Rome' to center his administration around... that Rome being Las Vegas.

I think you're anolysis of the NCR is really well done, except that the military situation of the NCR is closer to the late empire (imo). The NCR is paying its soldiers in NCR currency which seems to be worthless, unless they are indeed moving to a water backed currency. If they move to a water backed currency then they should be more or less alright unless they move to poor fiscal policy in order to fund their imperialism.

Of course this is all a game and I'd the NCR ending (I haven't seen it yet) will probably become cannon, so all this speculation (while immensly interesting and fun for considering the game) is probably worthless. :laugh:

Aside from the conflict with the Legion, the story line has many shades of gray. I too was disappointed that you couldn't simply make Caesar leave or disband his army, or even become part of the NCR or other Mojave factions. But the Legion being "ultimate evil" was the only disappointment for me, story wise.

Here's the thing about the NCR, their a realistic government, they have good people and bad people, they have bureaucracy, they have nationalists, corrupt loyalists. They aren't inherently good or evil. The legion is almost entirely bad, Ceaser is able to secure the roads and caravans because he has numbers, when you conscript an entire population into your army it grows rather quickly.


But if the NCR falls it will be because good people refused to help support it, there are good people in the NCR, there are good people who want to make things better.

As Marcus said, the legion followers Ceaser not his ideals, when he's gone the legion will slowly collapse, no new stable government will emerge from his vision, only suffering destruction and death

Do we have to generalize the factions? Really? This is Fallout New Vegas, not Fallout 3. The factions are much deeper than they appear. If you compare the NCR to the Eastern Brotherhood (lol) and the Legion to the Fallout 3 Enclave (again lol), they are not anywhere near close morals wise. The legion cleansed Nipton because it was a brothel, and is fighting the NCR because they believe the NCR to be corrupt, which it is, but not as a whole.

You have to look beyond the whole, "NCR is like Amurica so they must be good!" and "the Legion are slavers so their evil!" mentality.

Come to think of it, Caesar does seem a lot like Hobbes.

If you want an example of the negative effects of NCR expansion, ask Chief Hanlon during the quest you get from Forlorn Hope. NCR soldiers pay the highest cost for the Republic's expansion.

If I recall correctly, at Camp McCarran you meet the guy who was in charge of the operation at Bitter Springs and he says that the intellgence that they got was incorrect, which is why it turned out as it did and when it did happen, the only thing that could be done was to salvage the situation as best as possible (he did adopt on of the kids from that day as his own too).

Lets see Legion is evil, NCR is evil to a degree, and House is evil but to a lesser degree then the other two.

Legion- loves Slavery, treats women horribly, will get rid of technology and go back to tribal type stuff plus the Nipton massacare.

NCR- Believes in good morals however their leaders are corrput, badly corrupt. NCR also takes what they want and they don't care how they do it( The Ends justifiy the Means). The Bitter Springs massacare is a reminder of what the NCR is capable of plus hiring Mercs to do jobs that they won't do (Such as the Marcus situation),

House- Believes in making a profit and doesn't care about the people living on the outskirts of New Vegas. However House wants to try to restore the human race as best as he can.

My answer House is a Neutral choice, Legion is a pure evil choice, and the NCR is suppose to be good but they are evil.

I think Caesar is way more "ends justify the means" than the NCR. His goal is peace through war, basically. Conquer everyone so nobody is left to fight with.