Mr. House

clanky4

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This thread is dedicated to discussing the greatest leader of all time, in fallout. Robert Edwin House.
 

Link to video.

I can't believe this has been around for a month and I'm just now finding out about it. I do remember reading a post about it back in February and then kind of forgetting about it.
 
So with pretty much an entirely new build is there any chance of finally seeing a Mr. House, or other factions?
 
I still want to finish building all the core concepts into the game, then getting the existing factions diversified from each other.

You can however feel free to start building, a road map of what Mr House and his faction of Vegasites would look like, because I never had the umph to slog through Vegas on the FPS engine..

Also was he the Voice of Mr house? Oh wait... nevermind he answered! :D

I do have some thoughts on how to build some other new civs, from the information I have gleaned from others, or from what I want to do, like House and the Legion.

I am thinking, now that we have a home for it, of making a thread for each faction to describe, discuss, and develop their Unique styles within the game.

This will probably begin with me putting my thoughts down about each in the game description thread that I want to keep clean and purely for reading about the game.

Then once I have started that process, it seems like a good idea to have for each of them a thread of their own for discussion and planning so people can be involved in shaping their favourite factions, probably with a link to them from their section in the game description thread, so you can always find them without having to sticky 10+ threads.

So if you like you could volunteer to be the curator of the Mr House New Vegas Thread, and take charge of gathering thoughts, descriptions and design ideas here for the purposes of their eventual arrival in the wasteland.
 
The game is still going to be that unique? Not that Mr.House isn't unique but I'm not sure if he is every unit and building unique.

Anyway I guess he could be comparable to New Reno in some aspects, I haven't played Fallout 2 but I've read a bit about it. With a few major exceptions. Mr.House DOES NOT take direct profits from any drugs. New Vegas's economy is pretty much entirely powered by tourism, which doesn't seem to make much sense in a post apocalyptic world. But when you note that your closest neighbor is a Sudo-New America with an ultra consumerist population Mr.House's economic set up actually makes sense, it is also one of the reasons that despite wanting to push the NCR out of the Mojave region he still wants to maintain some form of diplomatic relations with them.

Mr. House's plans for the future are incredibly humorous to me. In his dialogue he says that after he secures New Vegas and the Hoover Dam he plans using New Vegas economy to kick start the development of new technology. With a long term goal, about 100 years, of sending colony ships into space to colonize distant habitable worlds.
Spoiler :
I wonder what victory hes going for

I mean I like the character and his ambition is one of his key character traits but that is a bit much. Although I am confident that eventually he could achieve that particular goal. He was the man responsible for preventing Las Vegas from being completely obliterated. There were ~77 nuclear warheads aimed at New Vegas, he was able to prevent all but around 4 of them from getting through.

The general organization of New Vegas is somewhat interesting. New Vegas is basically set up in a manner in which Mr. House is, obviously, the leader and takes a cut of all profits from the casinos and any other enterprises that happen in New Vegas. The 3 families control the 3 major casinos on the Strip and are pretty much allowed to do whatever they want as long as they do not directly challenge Mr. House's authority. People are only allowed into the strip if they posses a passport, I presume something issued by House to any of his "Employees", or if they posses a large amount of currency. Note that you don't have to pay to enter the strip simply posses enough money.

The military of New Vegas is somewhat confusing to me. In the beginning when Mr. House first "emerged", sent Securitrons, out of the Lucky 38 Las Vegas was in a state of Decay, not from nuclear fire, simply from the fall of society. He used his relatively small force of Securitrons to recruit three tribes, which would eventually become the 3 casino families, to join his fledgling City State. He had also attempted to recruit at least 2 other tribes in the area, the Great Khans and the Kings, but was denied. Eventually Mr.House's forces came into conflict with the Great Khans over territory in out New Vegas. Then the NCR forces showed up in the region. The Great Khans assumed that Mr.House would never give up his precious city and thus attacked the NCR in hopes that House would join in. Mr. House knew his small force of Securitron and reconditioned tribals couldn't stand up to NCR and thus signed a treaty ensuring New Vegas independence for a time.

By the time the game actually starts the 3 families no longer seem to be inclined to serve Mr.House as fighters, not that he would need them in that regard at this point. By the end of the game, if you go with Mr.House, his military consists of a large army of Securitrons mass produced before the Great War specifically for the purpose of serving Mr.House. One of the interesting things about the Securitrons is that Mr.House is in constant contact with all of them. He knows exactly where they are, what they are doing, and can even use one as an interface with which to talk with someone.
 
The factions won't be absolutely everything unique, there are lots of things that will more or less be the same for everyone... probably.

It will be more a case of, not being limited to the standard unique system of 1 building, 1 unit.

The factions are more diverse than that in fallout.

So do you ever actually meet Mr. House? How old is he supposed to be? Is he actually a real person or some kind of uploaded personality now?

In fallout 1 (Co-founder with her father of the NCR) Tandi was a girl, in F2 she was a very old woman, by F3NV it seems she is a distant memory(because the NCR has become a real corporate america type, at least that is the impression I get from what I have gleaned from F3NV).

He can't still be alive?!? Or does he have some kind of stasis chamber/anti ageing process, or are these the sorts of questions you never know the answer to.

In F2 there is a group (I think they were connected to the Huboligists or maybe it was the Chinese rulers of San Fransisco, doesn't matter) but they had a space shuttle that they were trying to launch into space too.

So his is mostly a Science Industialist right? That is the sort of thing he was doing before BOOM time? From either what I read or what you told me....

Do we get any information about how he stopped the Nukes?

So far the Kind of Unique qualities I see coming out of the New Vegas Faction would be:

Growth/Food Negative:
Because of his policy of 'Super Rich Only'. He will have much smaller population cities than the other factions.

Poor Human War Machine:
So he is going to be able to produce less human fighters, because his pop. is low/slow.
They will also in some way be weaker than most others due to a lack of motivation and loyalty, maybe incurring extra costs or some such as well, owing to the need to 'encourage' their cooperation.
His Human Fighters will also probably be more focussed on the DOps side, as they are mostly 'Legitimate Businessman'...Cough...cough..

Improved Robotic War Machine:
The Securitron Mk2 was always ear marked by us to become a House unique unit, so they will have that.
Robots will also be easier to build/acquire by them.
Things like requiring a lower minimum population to build them.
If he is the Science/Industrialist/Software Developer type, he will probably also have some good unique robot boosting buildings that will see his robots are better trained than average, as well as probably some kind of production boosts to robots, either with a unique civic(if we get that modcomp working) or through unique buildings.

'Legitimate Business Partners':
So he will have some stuff that links in with the eventual criminal elements of the game that I want to bring in, the big difference between Vegas and Reno will be Defensive Vs Offensive.
Vegas is more interested in simply 'keeping the strip' business is booming and the money comes to them.
The Reno's would be more expansive in their designs.
(After all they invented Jet for this purpose)

Tourism and High Rollers:
The Strip will have access to a host of special high end tourist facilities, Casinoes, Restaurants and Hotels. I am thinking I will probably add a specialist type like a 'High Roller' that Vegas will have an almost exclusive access to.
These guys will generate lots of money, and again will probably recieve some benefits from some Unique Vegas Civics.

Any other info you can think of?
 
So do you ever actually meet Mr. House? How old is he supposed to be? Is he actually a real person or some kind of uploaded personality now?

He can't still be alive?!? Or does he have some kind of stasis chamber/anti ageing process, or are these the sorts of questions you never know the answer to.

Mr.House is an actual person. He is the founder of Robco Industries which was responsible for the unified OS in fallout, Protectrons, Stealth Boys, the Pip Boy, Sentry Bots, and apart of the effort to build Liberty Prime. I think by the time of new vegas hes like 260 something years old. He was able to stay alive by an interesting type of stasis chamber which basically acted as an advanced life support system which allowed him to remain completely conscious. Needless to say I think he could realistically afford it :lol: Unlike all of the other pre-war crazies who avoided death.


So his is mostly a Science Industialist right? That is the sort of thing he was doing before BOOM time? From either what I read or what you told me....

Do we get any information about how he stopped the Nukes?

Pretty much aside from robotics and computing Mr.House was also investing in Rocket technology, Repconn. He did a whole load of planning before the war.

He evidently somehow disabled the bulk of the nukes headed for Vegas in flight and then used Laser Cannons, mounted on the roof of the Lucky 38, to destroy the remainder.

Any other info you can think of?

You pretty much summed up most of what New Vegas is in terms of gameplay. Maybe some boost to culture or whatever its called, and obviously something to represent New Vegas's gambler based economy. That specialist would be an interesting way to do that. Maybe have the specialist enabled by a UB casino or something.
 
If you want to include the other odds and ends around New Vegas. There is also New Vegas Steel, Angelos Workshop, Vault 22(Mr.House striped it all of useful technology filled it with concrete and converted it into a motel), the three Casinos: The Tops, Gomorrah, and the Ultra Lux.
 
They could maybe be some kind of Unique National/World Wonders...

I don't think increased Culture(Safety/Security) is right for NV, I get the sense they are not that interested in expansion, as Vegas seems to be enough to keep them happy, they are more about keeping what they have rather than taking everything else.
 
They need something to keep other people's culture out of their land. Not sure what though.
 
Oh yeah something I forgot to mention. No one, other than Mr.House obviously, has entered the Lucky 38 since a couple years before the Great War.

 
It would be cool, btw, to have a Space Victory in the mod - one harder than in vanilla, I imagine, requiring the near-total focus of an advanced end-game nation's industry, and defenses to stop all the other nations from ganging on you (to steal your lands, and even your ship!).

(A SMAC-style economic victory would also be cool)

Lore tidbit: The Enclave's original post-war plan was to simply leave Earth for Alpha Centauri, but they lacked the starship - destroyed, never completed, rendered inaccessible, or something like that. So they settled for second-best, which was recolonizing the surface (then added the "killing everyone else with death gas" part - which would be a cool enclave-only victory condition).


Growth/Food Negative:
Because of his policy of 'Super Rich Only'. He will have much smaller population cities than the other factions.

Well, House's policy ins't so much "Super Rich Only" as much as it is "Rich guys inside, poor people outside". Then again, if you see New Vegas end-game, it becomes clear that the reason New Vegas ins't better protected is because Mr. House lacks the manpower for that. Once he gets his full-on Securitron army, he enforces more tight control.

Maybe he should get a Safety minus instead?
 
I don't know about the specialist victory condition, just because it is hard work reinstating the space race, etc.

I am not far enough along with the mod to think about that sort of thing yet.

I remember reading that bit of Enclave Lore.

There was also a group in San Francisco in F2 that wanted to launch a space shuttle, I can't remember if it was the Hubologists or the Chinese though.

We could do something like a space race event quest, that requires you to build X buildings or something that then gives you a special event achievement..

It will prob be a combination of low safety/population and maybe something like 'shanty towns' that will maybe provide some production boost at a cost of health/food, again forcing him to rely on specialist robot units.

We could also have something like a uniwue world wonder that allows him to make a special cheap securitron, so he can then mass produce his army.
 
Hi, long term lurker, your mod finally got me to register :). Oh and the faction you were thinking of with the space shuttle were the Hubotologists (who wind up dying of asphyxiation in orbit if you do help them reach space if I recall).

On the subject of New Vegas, I'm surprised no one has mentioned the Hoover Dam in much detail, given it is what caused Mr. House to wake up and form New Vegas in the first place. Not only does the Dam give the strip electrical power, a rarity in the wasteland, it also gives Mr. House a powerful bargaining chip. In exchange for trading them electricity, the NCR protects New Vegas, which is useful with Caesar's legion nearby and also allows Mr. House to play the two factions off each-other. While House himself is not as powerful or expansive as either faction, he can act a kingmaker, manipulating both powers to his advantage. Perhaps House could be a more diplomatic/trade focused faction than New Reno?
 
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