Fallout Bileball #8

Killzig · Post by **Killzig** » Thu Oct 03, 2002 3:34 am

[ -> N/A]

Straight from <a href="http://www.blackisle.com">the horse's mouth</a>:

<blockquote>

Fallout Bible Numero 8!!! 

That's right kids, and here's a few words from Chris Avellone to share some 411 on this latest nifty installment:



Here's Fallout Bible #8. This exciting update contains an interview with Fallout designer Scott Bennie,

a crapload of questions, the original draft of the EPA, the fury and flurry of nuclear winters,

a little bit about the old Wasteland "sequel" Meantime, why the Corvega Highwayman has a fat ass,

a bit on tribal societies, a new mind-bending contest, the winners of two others, and more random

irradiated crap from the Fallout universe.



For your viewing pleasure, we have it in a "<a href="http://feedback.blackisle.com/downloads ... OB8.pdf</a>" for those with Adobe Acrobat,

and a classic "<a href="http://feedback.blackisle.com/downloads ... OB8.doc</a>" for Microsoft Word users. Have fun. </blockquote>

Thanks Dan.

Spazmo · Post by **Spazmo** » Thu Oct 03, 2002 6:11 am

That wasn't so bad. Some good stuff, but two things bugged me. First off there was a question that basically resumes itself to "Why does everything look like it's from the 50's?" Another thing that bugged me was the numerous repeated questions, especially the Cassidy/McRae thing.

OnTheBounce · Post by **OnTheBounce** » Thu Oct 03, 2002 6:23 am

Spazmo wrote:...[T]here was a question that basically resumes itself to "Why does everything look like it's from the 50's?"

I chuckled at that one, but I have to say that they really should have explained that a bit better. A blurb on the box, or something, would probably tip more people off to what they are getting into. You know, something along the lines of, "We know you're used to playing games that can be reduced solely to eye-candy, but that's not why everything looks the way it does in the FO universe."

Spazmo wrote:Another thing that bugged me was the numerous repeated questions, especially the Cassidy/McRae thing.

Yeah, MCA should edit some of those emails a bit. But people should make their emails "edit-friendly", too, and not lump everything into one paragraph/run-on sentence.

OTB

Megatron · Post by **Megatron** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 1:23 am

the EPA seemed good...but I'm glad they didn't do it though (centaurs and floaters created by a doctor? GAAYDOUDAHEYAAAA!)

yeah

Jolly · Post by **Jolly** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 5:06 am

WAH?! EPA idea was crap. Mad scientist making mutants in post-nuclear world?! Now how is that supposed to make me interested? Superaddictive chems are useless, even the 'regular' drugs are pretty addictive as it is.

'Meantime' storyline had nothing to do with Wasteland, sadly. While the premise was interesting, it just doesn't cut as a sequel to WL (not that I'm a big WL fan, mind you).

The interviews with important FO/WL people and real facts (as opposed to CA's fiction) are the main reason why you should keep on reading FO Bible.

Post by **DarkUnderlord** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 9:31 am

Jolly wrote:WAH?! EPA idea was crap. Mad scientist making mutants in post-nuclear world?! Now how is that supposed to make me interested?

Yeah, no one would play that.
Either you're being sarcastic, in which case I apologise, or you're being stupid, because that's essentially the plot for Fallout 1.

Saint_Proverbius · Post by **Saint_Proverbius** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 5:54 pm

Spazmo wrote:That wasn't so bad. Some good stuff, but two things bugged me. First off there was a question that basically resumes itself to "Why does everything look like it's from the 50's?" Another thing that bugged me was the numerous repeated questions, especially the Cassidy/McRae thing.

Welp, I just read it. Not sure why I still read them, it's more a sore point with me than anything else. However, here's what I noticed just from a brief skim:

In the answer to Marcin's question about why the vault dweller didn't know about Fallout Tactic's Vault 0, he basically dodged the question. Given what Vault 0 is, there's no way in hell the Vault Dweller wouldn't have known about it. Vault 0 is a HUGE CONCEPT. The answer should have been, "Fallout Tactics screwed up there."
Steam truck question.. Hell, the very idea of steam trucks in Fallout is ludicrious. Where do they get the fuel for them? Not every town is going to have coal mines, so what happens if you run out of coal in an area where there aren't coal mines? You'd be screwed.

Furthermore, pure water is pretty sacred in Fallout. If you're running a steam truck around with irradiated water.. YOU'RE DEAD.

Let's not forget how unruly a steam train was. You have to continually give it coal to keep it going. Let's see you do that and steer at the same time. There's a reason that steam cars never caught on, even in times better than Fallout had.

Mr Carrot · Post by **Mr Carrot** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 6:37 pm

Hes kind of hinting that the FOT universe is different to the FO universe thus he can discount it.

And i got a pimp! which is nice (with Red).

Red · Post by **Red** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 7:31 pm

Saint_Proverbius wrote:Welp, I just read it. Not sure why I still read them, it's more a sore point with me than anything else.

Well, he extra-Fallout questions are interesting... Specially finding out Meantime would have sucked... Although since it didn't come out maybe we should have been left blissfully ignorant about it.

coal mines, so what happens if you run out of coal in an area where there aren't coal mines? You'd be screwed.

Steam-run stuff needn't run on coal (though it's much easyer)... Anything which burns can be used and I'm mainly thinking of normal wood here which seems rather plentiful looking at the various random encounters in the wood.

Furthermore, pure water is pretty sacred in Fallout. If you're running a steam truck around with irradiated water.. YOU'RE DEAD.

Why do you need to use pure water? I mean sur it boils faster then "dirty water", but it'd be just stupid...
Thinking it over, boiling water is a very good way to clean the water actually.

Let's not forget how unruly a steam train was. You have to continually give it coal to keep it going. Let's see you do that and steer at the same time. There's a reason that steam cars never caught on, even in times better than Fallout had.

Yeah that's the main culprit. I juist can't imagine something which can handle stearing running on steam...

<hr>
Well, I'm glad we convinced CA. He never actually published his answer in the discussion we had on the forum and no we know he sides with Tim. Yey!

VasikkA · Post by **VasikkA** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 4:51 pm

Why the hell use steam when fusion has been invented? That's a lot more efficient use of water in my opinion. I fear he's trying to justify his NCR theory here. Cars should be scarce, hell it's not Mad Max. Saint P is right about pure water, it should be sacred, important for the survival of distant cities in the wastelands and an important item of trade. They'd never use it for steam trucks. And it's not very 1950's either.
MCA, if you're reading this, please stop inventing things outta your ass.

Red · Post by **Red** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 5:26 pm

Well he didn't pull it out of his ass, it's stated somewehre (I fail to recall). It should have been left to an odditie (like say, they found a steam engine locomotive in a museum someone managed to put it on tracks, but there's only 10 miles of it and they use it to haul stuff. or something just as insignificant - although then why bother with steam as you mentioned... anyway)

I'd also like him to just forget about the whole ordeal but you're probably right in that it helps support his annoying car theories.

As a sidenote (sad note?) there's another point helping his theories where some european guy (either france or italy, can't remember) which did in fact invent a steam car, which worked just dandee, about the size of a suburban. Although I doubt it could have pulled much more then it's own weigth and driver... I'm sure there are other odities throughout the world too. but that's what they are: oddities!

spyder07 · Post by **spyder07** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 9:05 pm

I believe it was a french guy during WW2. And if you were boiling irradiated water then wouldn't there be a big radioactive cloud behind you where ever you go?

Saint_Proverbius · Post by **Saint_Proverbius** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 2:43 am

Red wrote:Steam-run stuff needn't run on coal (though it's much easyer)... Anything which burns can be used and I'm mainly thinking of normal wood here which seems rather plentiful looking at the various random encounters in the wood.

There's a reason steam trains ran on coal rather than wood. Coal burns hotter, and is a shitload lighter than wood. A steam car is impractical with coal. It'd be impossible with wood just because of the weight required to get the same sustained burn.

spyder07 wrote:I believe it was a french guy during WW2. And if you were boiling irradiated water then wouldn't there be a big radioactive cloud behind you where ever you go?

Yeah, it would. If you boil radioactive water, you get radioactive steam. That was my point, and why Red needs to learn to READ FOR COMPREHENSION.

PS: Red, boiling won't make radioactive water "pure" either. You boil water to kill microbes in it. That's all boiling will do. That's also why Vault 13 needed a new waterchip, rather than just boiling radioactive ground water.

Rex Exitium · Post by **Rex Exitium** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 2:57 am

Steam-run stuff needn't run on coal (though it's much easyer)... Anything which burns can be used and I'm mainly thinking of normal wood here which seems rather plentiful looking at the various random encounters in the wood.

I don't disagree completely with you here, but you need to be realistic. You can use pretty much anything combustable in a steam engine. But anything besides fossil fuels (petrol, coal, etc) tend to burn up in a few seconds, hence the reason why you can't just use firewood or garbage. That wouldn't be powerful enough to keep the engine running. Therefore, steam engines are just as incompatible as petroleum engines in the Fallout universe.

Why do you need to use pure water? I mean sur it boils faster then "dirty water", but it'd be just stupid...
Thinking it over, boiling water is a very good way to clean the water actually.

Here's a short lesson on radiation:
You can't boil it out of water. You'll die from radiation poisoning. Inhaling a single radioactive molecule can kill you. It just takes a matter of time.

Yeah that's the main culprit. I juist can't imagine something which can handle stearing running on steam...

Incorrect. I addressed this in the first paragraph.

Red · Post by **Red** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 5:14 am

Saint_Proverbius wrote:Red, boiling won't make radioactive water "pure" either. You boil water to kill microbes in it. That's all boiling will do. That's also why Vault 13 needed a new waterchip, rather than just boiling radioactive ground water.

It's quite true that boiling radioactive water will yield to radioactive steam, though if I recall correctly, the mutants don't give a hoot about that.

However I think in the Fallout world most of the radiation has receeded. (A site I found which explained a shelter build somewhere in the US you linked yourself explained how radioactivity subsides, though there is always some left. I don't recall the specififcs, but it's something along the lines for every X time unit, the radioactivuty level dimishes by 2 (ie: 1.2 it's previous level. And this X wasn't years nor months nor even weeks).

Now I'm sorry, but the Vault dweller doesn't carry around his PIP-Water-Purificator and he seems to get along finding good water just fine since the rad level doesn't increase when travelling. Maybe they just forgot about it?

So well, for the most part water should be as un-radioactive as the normal wasteland - I always though that the water chip was actually something which recycled the used water (in the vault) so it was clean again (as simply boiling it isn't enough, you need an extra cleaning filering process) - for the most part anyway, possibly also clean other water since one would eventually still run out of water... In any case, it's probably just the "controller chip" for the whole process and they already have the (non-working) extra installations - obviously - do work with it.

Rosh · Post by **Rosh** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 8:03 am

Red wrote: Now I'm sorry, but the Vault dweller doesn't carry around his PIP-Water-Purificator and he seems to get along finding good water just fine since the rad level doesn't increase when travelling. Maybe they just forgot about it?

Um...back in Fallout, there were canteens with a water supply. Minus those, you sometimes had an "encounter" where you'd stop on a small location and get some minor damage or lose time that you'd need to find water, if you didn't have those. I believe that a significant skill in Outdoorsman would reduce or even elminate that, I've not tried it so far.

So well, for the most part water should be as un-radioactive as the normal wasteland - I always though that the water chip was actually something which recycled the used water (in the vault) so it was clean again (as simply boiling it isn't enough, you need an extra cleaning filering process) - for the most part anyway, possibly also clean other water since one would eventually still run out of water... In any case, it's probably just the "controller chip" for the whole process and they already have the (non-working) extra installations - obviously - do work with it.

Well, yes, it was said to be the control chip many times, mainly (I believe, could be wrong) by the Overseer. It was said to be the thing that controlled the whole process and keeps it going; without the chip, everything else was pretty much useless.

Red · Post by **Red** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 8:39 am

Rosh wrote:Um...back in Fallout, there were canteens with a water supply. Minus those, you sometimes had an "encounter" where you'd stop on a small location and get some minor damage or lose time that you'd need to find water, if you didn't have those. I believe that a significant skill in Outdoorsman would reduce or even elminate that, I've not tried it so far.

Yup, totally right... Howere you never got radiated for it... So you'd rather die of thirst then drink radiated water? As for the water flasks... in the game they'd be endlessly full? (well, either that or always empty...)

Rosh · Post by **Rosh** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 9:21 am

Red wrote:Yup, totally right... Howere you never got radiated for it... So you'd rather die of thirst then drink radiated water?

Even with Rad-Away...you don't know much about the effects of radiation, even that depicted in the 50's sci-fi? Who knows what would happen? You could mutate into some seriously twisted freak or grow a 6th toe!

As for the water flasks... in the game they'd be endlessly full? (well, either that or always empty...)

Uh...no. They would eventually be used up if you travel for too long without visiting a city or "civilized" location.

Red · Post by **Red** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 5:40 pm

Rosh wrote:Even with Rad-Away...you don't know much about the effects of radiation, even that depicted in the 50's sci-fi? Who knows what would happen? You could mutate into some seriously twisted freak or grow a 6th toe!

The 6th toe can only be grown if you step in the Toxic Caves goo. And anyway it's just a lame/neat (depending on your point of view) addition in the rather flawed FO2.

Uh...no. They would eventually be used up if you travel for too long without visiting a city or "civilized" location.

With a low outdoorsman skill I take it as I never brought mine along and thus never noticed that. It hardly matters anyhow.

Rosh · Post by **Rosh** » Sun Oct 06, 2002 8:54 pm

Red wrote:
Rosh wrote:Even with Rad-Away...you don't know much about the effects of radiation, even that depicted in the 50's sci-fi? Who knows what would happen? You could mutate into some seriously twisted freak or grow a 6th toe!
The 6th toe can only be grown if you step in the Toxic Caves goo. And anyway it's just a lame/neat (depending on your point of view) addition in the rather flawed FO2.

Really? *gasp!* I would have never known that!

It's beside my point, really, and not much to do with the topic. Yes, you do get it from the goo. But that's really irrelevent as to why the Vault Dweller isn't going to chug some irradiated water. Would you be stupid enough to drink poisoned water instead of looking for clean water? Regardless of drugs or not, it's really stupid to do the equivalent of walking barefoot in a rattlesnake pit and believe that the antivenom that you brought along in going to save you.

Game mechanics of being able to cure things without fail if you have the drugs aside, nobody in their right mind is going to take such a stupid risk.