Ratmaxxer
Iron
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2024
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So, I don't know if you guys have played New Vegas, but here's some important details: the appeal of the game is choosing which faction to side with to rule over the Mojave Wasteland. One of the major factions of the game is called Caesar's Legion. They're a vast tribal empire stretching across multiple US states 200 years after the Great War, fashioned in the image of ancient Rome. They're at war with the technologically advanced NCR, a constitutional Republic governing over a rebuilt California. They're very backwards; their legionaries have padded football armour and throw spears and machetes, meanwhile the NCR arms their soldiers with assault rifles and actually has working railways. The Legion manages to fight the NCR by taking advantage of its corruption, sticking to Guerilla warfare, terror tactics against civilians and espionage.
Some of the arguments I've read in favour of the legion are that because their tactics are so inhumanly brutal to make up for their lack of technology or industry, their territories are safe from raider gangs unlike in the crime-ridden NCR. However, I don't think that's the case. Their brutal tactics could eliminate most raider savages... I should clarify, most. They'd kill them all, leaving nothing behind except for the most deadly, most competent and most stealthy criminals. While I can accept that Legion territories are much safer than NCR territories in terms of raiders, the demand for illicit drugs, chems, advanced medicine (which the Legion forbids) would still be in demand. The extreme conditions and threat of torture to death have led to no competition for criminals operating in Legion territory, but also no room for error. Rather than the Fiends or Great Khans, this demand would be fulfilled by a small, extremely well-armed, very competent underclass of professional criminals, who operate a total monopoly on illicit deeds and make gargantuan amounts of caps.
For example, highway robbers armed with energy weapons like the Van Graffs who pillage select caravans travelling along the Arizona desert. Because they're so heavily armed and organised, there isn't really much the Legion can do. Just as a reminder, their common footsoldiers are skirt-wearing roman weebs in red football gear, armed with spears and machetes and occasionally an ancient hunting rifle. What can they really do to stop them?
I think the legion would know about these criminals, but recognise that they have bigger objectives to focus on (Defeating the NCR) that they can't really do anything about them at the moment, so they'd take the Orwellian approach: quietly tolerate them while simultaneously denying their existence.
Maybe in the long run, they can send Vulpes and his spies after them.
Tangentially related, I really wish there was an exploration of Legion territories.
In the game, you'd see plenty of outposts and places governed by the NCR and it isn't too bad. Though, we have nothing to go off for the legion except the word of a few NPCs. It'd be excellent to see the Legion from the perspective of civilians living within its borders, maybe within a town on the outskirts of the Mojave wasteland. There's not as many luxury commodities as in other townships, I'd imagine, with the Legion's obsession with preventing an "overrreliance" on technology. But what they'd atleast have is safety, right? This could also give a great opportunity to introduce the aforementioned professional, heavily armed criminals that terrorise the town periodically, robbing banks and caravans with total impunity which the Legion is totally helpless to stop. Each criminal overpowers their local forces ten times over. Maybe you could even draw a parallel to crime during the post-ww1 years in the USA, where criminals were armed with surplus military guns and were literally better armed than the police sent to apprehend them. Anyway, maybe these criminals trade in illegal drugs, or medicine, or other advanced materials that's difficult to obtain within the Legion territories. It'd add welcome content to any legion playthroughs. Maybe there could be a questline for players put forth by an overwhelmed Legion Decanus put in charge of the Town who's sorely in need of a heavily armed mercenary to get rid of the criminals. As the Legion and NCR are at war with one another, maybe the NCR is doing their own espionage by funding these criminal groups.
So if you're in the Mojave, you'd be getting your fix of psycho or jet from the Great Khans. But if you're in Arizona, you're buying from the NCR-funded mercenary death squads who raid caravans and terrorise entire towns and wouldn't have an issue with committing CJNG level atrocities if people snitch.
Some of the arguments I've read in favour of the legion are that because their tactics are so inhumanly brutal to make up for their lack of technology or industry, their territories are safe from raider gangs unlike in the crime-ridden NCR. However, I don't think that's the case. Their brutal tactics could eliminate most raider savages... I should clarify, most. They'd kill them all, leaving nothing behind except for the most deadly, most competent and most stealthy criminals. While I can accept that Legion territories are much safer than NCR territories in terms of raiders, the demand for illicit drugs, chems, advanced medicine (which the Legion forbids) would still be in demand. The extreme conditions and threat of torture to death have led to no competition for criminals operating in Legion territory, but also no room for error. Rather than the Fiends or Great Khans, this demand would be fulfilled by a small, extremely well-armed, very competent underclass of professional criminals, who operate a total monopoly on illicit deeds and make gargantuan amounts of caps.
For example, highway robbers armed with energy weapons like the Van Graffs who pillage select caravans travelling along the Arizona desert. Because they're so heavily armed and organised, there isn't really much the Legion can do. Just as a reminder, their common footsoldiers are skirt-wearing roman weebs in red football gear, armed with spears and machetes and occasionally an ancient hunting rifle. What can they really do to stop them?
I think the legion would know about these criminals, but recognise that they have bigger objectives to focus on (Defeating the NCR) that they can't really do anything about them at the moment, so they'd take the Orwellian approach: quietly tolerate them while simultaneously denying their existence.
Maybe in the long run, they can send Vulpes and his spies after them.
Tangentially related, I really wish there was an exploration of Legion territories.
In the game, you'd see plenty of outposts and places governed by the NCR and it isn't too bad. Though, we have nothing to go off for the legion except the word of a few NPCs. It'd be excellent to see the Legion from the perspective of civilians living within its borders, maybe within a town on the outskirts of the Mojave wasteland. There's not as many luxury commodities as in other townships, I'd imagine, with the Legion's obsession with preventing an "overrreliance" on technology. But what they'd atleast have is safety, right? This could also give a great opportunity to introduce the aforementioned professional, heavily armed criminals that terrorise the town periodically, robbing banks and caravans with total impunity which the Legion is totally helpless to stop. Each criminal overpowers their local forces ten times over. Maybe you could even draw a parallel to crime during the post-ww1 years in the USA, where criminals were armed with surplus military guns and were literally better armed than the police sent to apprehend them. Anyway, maybe these criminals trade in illegal drugs, or medicine, or other advanced materials that's difficult to obtain within the Legion territories. It'd add welcome content to any legion playthroughs. Maybe there could be a questline for players put forth by an overwhelmed Legion Decanus put in charge of the Town who's sorely in need of a heavily armed mercenary to get rid of the criminals. As the Legion and NCR are at war with one another, maybe the NCR is doing their own espionage by funding these criminal groups.
So if you're in the Mojave, you'd be getting your fix of psycho or jet from the Great Khans. But if you're in Arizona, you're buying from the NCR-funded mercenary death squads who raid caravans and terrorise entire towns and wouldn't have an issue with committing CJNG level atrocities if people snitch.
