@Wertologist There is no reason to believe that tunnelers are pre war, again, the only word on that is from some nut, as you said

@Sonichu_fanboy But we don't have reason to really doubt it. I'm not saying they are pre-war, but it's still a possibility. We simply don't know enough to really say where they came from so why are you so certain they aren't pre-war? It seems you're dismissing it entirely solely because Ulysses says it. He's nuts, but that doesn't mean everything he says is wrong.

@Wertologist They're mutants. Plain and simple, it's the FEV, it's always the FEV. You're way overthinking this

When I was playing the first time, I genuinely thought that Ulysses was just a babbling lunatic who needed to be "shut up." It wasn't until looking at the internet later that I saw that people could take his words as truth.
My courier wasn't, in my mind, from anywhere nearby. But rather from far, far away. No friends, family, or even acquaintances. The courier could ask about who the NCR and Legion were, and one lieutenant expressed surprise at how strange it would be to not know who the NCR is. My courier was NOT a long-time hero of the region. In the case of amnesia, tracking down one's potential family and past would have been top priority, certainly more important than going after benny or delivering a poker chip, but it never really even comes up other than Ulysses rambling.
I don't think he had actual factual knowledge of who the tunnelers were anyway, but was just guessing.

So people really wouldn't want a new sentient organic species of any sort added to fallout, ever? And I'm not talking about molerats.

@Sirdanest Yeah, pretty much. There was a lot of 4th wall breaking in LR, the lead developer wanted this to be the "Reset" for the fallout universe, so he introduced the tunnelers to bring the universe to it's post apocalyptic state, as the NCR and vegas were too civilized for his tastes. People shouldn't take ulysses seriously, he's just some nut

Maybe it's a good thing there's no sequel then, that would be a mass-effect level riot.
If we want to shake up the NCR, continue with the story already in place, and that history repeats itself, and give them a civil war. Don't just "reset."

@Sonichu_fanboy But we see no evidence of FEV. FEV isn't involved with every creature. Mainly just Super Mutants, Mutant Hounds, and Centaurs. Deathclaws are not FEV creations, but there were some intelligent Deathclaws that were FEV, but that just shows that they aren't FEV creatures by default. They had to be administered FEV. In fact, most creatures are not FEV. We don't have any evidence to the Tunnelers being FEV creations. Them being able to breed suggests that they are not FEV as most FEV creations become sterile. I'm not sure how I'm "over-thinking" it when it's part of the subject of the whole post and all I'm doing is saying we don't know. That's not overthinking. That's pretty much the opposite. I'm still not sure why you keep making the claim despite there being no real evidence. If you've got evidence to support it, I'd like to see it.

When I'm suggesting that Lakelurks and Tunnelers (and maybe even the ghosts) could talk, it doesn't have to mean English, but even just their own ways of communicating with each other. When I look at them, I see something that _looks_ like it might have some kind of intelligence. The lakelurks have near human faces, quite weird if it's just a random mutation, if they aren't spliced with human genes.

I'm not convinced that we know anything beyond guessing about Tunnelers, but I don't see why they MUST have animal intelligence, especially if they're mutated humans. They do avoid the courier on the way out of the divide, with the possible suggestion that they learned respect. Rabid, violence crazed animals never would do that.

Ghosts can make spears, apparently. That alone implies that something is going on beyond what we see. They do behave strangely when they haven't spotted the player yet, like they have some kind of goal or culture or personality or something. We never really find out what exactly, if I remember. I was really annoyed that I couldn't cut off the mask to see what was underneath.

These three candidates are what I call "plausibly smarter than a dog" and "possibly having some kind of primitive tribal culture" while the molerats... uh, not so much.

@Sirdanest Well, I'd still lean on Tunnelers being more animalistic than intelligent. Staying away from a threat doesn't mean an animal is necessarily intelligent. A rabbit will run from a bear after all and I'm sure deathclaws would learn to avoid Tunnelers as more of them were killed. In the animal kingdom, animals tend to know about their natural predators and how to avoid them. It doesn't mean they are of a higher intelligence. I'm not sure the Tunnelers avoiding the Courier is a sign of respect, but more of adaptive instinct and self preservation. Afterall, the Courier killed every single one that came near them including the queen. He/She has proven to be a dangerous force. Animals adapt. Not really a stretch to assume that the Tunnelers just avoid the one thing none of them could kill. If a pack of wolves attacked an armored man and lost a few, they'd more or less move on if they know they can't win. I'm more sure that Tunnelers are the same level of intelligence as most animals. They're pack animals. We never see them with weapons, using tools, or anything showing signs of a greater intelligence. Not just in the sense of near-human level, but they kind of just swarm things. Almost like wolves in a sense, but also seem almost similar to some rodents like the naked mole rat in terms of how they live in a community/hive with a hierarchy.

My stance is really that one could go either way on the Tunnelers. That they are just what they appear, no more, or, that there is a little more depth to them that we haven't entirely seen yet. I wouldn't go so far as making them "people," though. A sequel would be a good place to give them some kind of origin story to discover.
Lakelurks, well, their face is so human, its hard to believe they don't have human genes somehow mixed in, although "culturally" they appear completely savage. Were they ''raised" as savages, or is the human-like face a total coincidence and they're animals no matter what?
The ghosts make spears. I really want to know what they are. I'm sure we'll never find out.
if they do aliens again, it really needs to be more than a shooting gallery. Space has too much potential to just shoot it.

I don't think the the talking deathclaw is toooo out of place, they're supposed to be incredibly intelligent, and it's not like Fallout is all about realism. There's all sorts of crazy stuff. Now I do think just making new creatures randomly talk would be silly

@farlas816 They aren't really intelligent. Only a small batch were and they were only smart due to FEV administrated by the Enclave. The rest are just animals. No real notable intelligence. The intelligent ones made by the Enclave could mimic words like a parrot, but did not actually speak.

Nah they were originally engineered to be smart to be more effective in battle. Not necessarily self aware or anything, but at least at "clever girl" levels.

Gruthar, Goris and Xarn, made by the enclave, could definitely speak and carry on full conversations, much more than parroting. Goris was a scholar and sometime wore a robe.

Sonichu_fanboy wrote:

@Sirdanest Yeah, pretty much. There was a lot of 4th wall breaking in LR, the lead developer wanted this to be the "Reset" for the fallout universe, so he introduced the tunnelers to bring the universe to it's post apocalyptic state, as the NCR and vegas were too civilized for his tastes. People shouldn't take ulysses seriously, he's just some nut

It's why I've hoped more than a few times that some ingenious modder will someday do a major redux to Lonesome Road. It was the only DLC that I disliked, despite the awesome visuals -- probably because I interpreted Ulysses as a confused, babbling idiot who thought I was someone else, rather than a profound truth speaker.

@Sirdanest LR is a nice piece of DLC if you do it for the loot and combat. Otherwise, why are you there? It's a mission to track down a psychopath, nothing else