BOS Real Intention?

[pjedilord]

Did BOS real intention ever wanted to take control of the commonw?
They have troops in the city, if they wanted, could they taken over if Institute
allowed?
They could defeat railroad, Dcity MM, and use there resources.
What was BOS like in other Fallout games?

[fluxtorrent]

They don't care about the commonwealth. They will take what they want, destroy what they cant take and move on.

They are zealots who horde technology and want no one else to have advanced tech.

[Chaosium]

Probably not take control, simply suck the place dry of any technology and leave the people rot to their end

[Sayla Massochist]

Someone will correct of highlight my mistakes but in general the Brotherhood of Steel started as remnants of the US Army after the war. At the point of Fallout 4 you have the Western Brotherhood and Eastern Brotherhood, and they are very different in their ways.

In Fallout 4 we have the Eastern Brotherhood which brook away from the Western decades before and moved east across the US to the Capitol Wasteland. Where the Western Brotherhood has a strict code that only those born into the Brotherhood can be members, the Eastern Brotherhood recruits regular Wastelanders. As such the Eastern Brotherhood is much more of an open, diverse, and accepting organization compared to the Western.

The Brotherhood of Steel isn't interested in building an Empire. They want to secure and collect dangerous technology. In the process of doing this in an area they create an economic boom for the local areas and caravan businesses and such, but ultimately they don't really care about the local populations outside of potential new recruits.

So the reason they don't wipe out the Railroad, Diamond City, or the Minute Men is because they ultimately don't care about them. As long as they don't get in the way of securing technology in the area they can be left alone. The reason they had an issue with the Institute right away is because the Institute has a lot of advanced technology, more so than even what was possible pre war.

[Ilja]

Oh boy. I feel the long freight train stopping on this station.

Everyone has their own opinion about BOS.

My own is that they are so focused on their ideology that they do not see the damage they can cause. Good intentions are managed by extensive military movement and securing technology that could help Commonwealth (East Coast, New California...) to recover. They have decided being only force that can manage certain technology responsibly - and that means dropping guys in power armors to kill and destroy everything that does not fit in to their narrow idea of pure humanity.

What they wanted from Commonwealth was to oppose the Institute. They didn't really knew what they were after, but were alarmed there by signals and signs of highly developed technology, which they naturally didn't want to exist outside of their control. And if they can not control it, then they blow it up.

And of course they knew to look for Liberty Prime from previous military central of northern East Coast.

BOS knights are brave. I give them that. They are happy to do their duty and in their own minds they are certainly saving the Commonwealth. But at the same time, they are happy to deprive it from attempt of development and democracy - repeating the same action by their occupation than Institute synth did by infiltrating the council and killing them all.

There are no good guys in Commonwealth. Each faction has more or less lost it. Minutemen were the best shot they had, until their own internal politics corrupted the movement and caused their fall. Of course they were volunteers and not actual military under civilian government. They could have formed the body though, if Institute synth had not executed people in governing meeting.

BOS rules by force, not by diplomacy.

[EolSunder]

Previous fallout games, the BOS basically was a tech hoarding faction who didn't want higher tech in the hands of the civilians because they didn't believe they could handle it, basically idiots destroyed the world, so the BOS wants to keep the higher tech to themselves to keep others from abusing it. That was their only goal really, they didn't want to get involved with society, just stay away and gather up all the tech they could find. In terms of things, they were highly advanced, but not involved with much in the world.

During fallout 3, a faction seperated and started doing things different under Lyons, trying to help people, getting involved in the day to day world, fighting bad guys, etc. But most of the brotherhood were basically they old version and didn't like that.

Fallout 4 now, much of the brotherhood has changed. They switched from their hiding/tech gathering methods and adopted more of Lyons beliefs to get out into the world and do stuff. Their goals are a bit different, instead of going out and protecting society, their method in their eyes will do that by killing the enemies of humans such as super mutants, synths, ghouls, etc anything that isn't human. They consider all of that as "bad stuff" made by the people who got the world into this mess. They are a military faction dedicated now to wiping out all non-humans that were "created" from the war, monsters (deathclaws, etc) and on the way, bad humans like raiders, bandits, etc

Taking over the commonwealth, mmm depending if they wanted to set up a chapter there or not. They probably would considering there is a lot of technology in big cities and the BOS loves that. If not in the commonwealth, somewhere nearby. After defeating the Railroad and the Institute, only you and the minutemen would stand against them, and if you sided with the BOS, they probably didn't have you to really worry about since you were really one of them.

Nothing wrong with having the BOS in charge, unless you weren't human.

[Ilja]

Originally posted by Sayla Massochist:

So the reason they don't wipe out the Railroad, Diamond City, or the Minute Men is because they ultimately don't care about them.

They do wipe out Railroad. Minutemen is no notice of them, because they consider them as civilians.

[unweptbuzzard16]

Basically they are there to gather any dangerous technology, wipe out super mutants, synths, feral ghouls, and other mutants that are found in the glowing sea. Destroy the institute, and leave, most likely leaving some troops in the commonwealth to patrol for super mutants or synths.

[unweptbuzzard16]

Originally posted by Ilja:

Originally posted by Sayla Massochist:

So the reason they don't wipe out the Railroad, Diamond City, or the Minute Men is because they ultimately don't care about them.

They do wipe out Railroad. Minutemen is no notice of them, because they consider them as civilians.

They pretty much leave civilians alone, danse says if you leave the brotherhood alone the brotherhood will leave you alone. In a way they are helping the commonwealth by wiping out super mutants, gunners, raiders, feral ghouls, and institute synths. I never take the quest where you steal crops, its just not my characters personality.

[Vexov]

BoS are like the kind of people that keep shouting about justice to justify everything they do.

It isn't that they are evil, but they're not actually nice or good for anyone.

I mean, they talk about how tech is the devil. Then they decide they will nuke Boston to save it. What really is going on is the BoS is just securing their own power. They take tech away from everyone, and clearly abuse it themselves.


Really, just think of BoS as Nazi's.

[fluxtorrent]

I would not go so far as Nazi's per se but they are definitely facists.

[unweptbuzzard16]

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

I would not go so far as Nazi's per se but they are definitely facists.

They can't possibly be either, fascism is a political ideology of ultranationalism and absolute servitude to the state, the bos is a military not a authoritarian government. They are a technocratic military organization. Their evil ending is where they become an over zealous techno religious dictatorship, the east coast bos is based on the west coast bos, and the Canon ending is that they stay the normal brotherhood.

[AndrewRyan]

The BOS are a neo-feudal knightly organization similar in respects to the Teutonic Knights. fascism is an economic principle which involves a nation state and corporations and their respective relationships - the brotherhood do not form a nation state and they do not base their methods on the principles of workers and economics. people use these words too interchangeably - the brotherhood is just an organization which forms its own society outside of what everyone has going on - they can be considered highly religions and dedicated on martial prowess as is their centuries old custom. the eastern BOS thanks to Lyons cult of personality lead to the new pandering about good and evil and protecting people, which keeps them slightly more favorable in the public eye gaining them more cooperation and potential recruits. lets not forget that at least half of the people in the wasteland are lawless cutthroats anyway i mean this is an apocalyptic wasteland after all

[unweptbuzzard16]

Originally posted by BriskCopyPasta:

The BOS are a neo-feudal knightly organization similar in respects to the Teutonic Knights. fascism is an economic principle which involves a nation state and corporations and their respective relationships - the brotherhood do not form a nation state and they do not base their methods on the principles of workers and economics. people use these words too interchangeably - the brotherhood is just an organization which forms its own society outside of what everyone has going on - they can be considered highly religions and dedicated on martial prowess as is their centuries old custom. the eastern BOS thanks to Lyons cult of personality lead to the new pandering about good and evil and protecting people, which keeps them slightly more favorable in the public eye gaining them more cooperation and potential recruits. lets not forget that at least half of the people in the wasteland are lawless cutthroats anyway i mean this is an apocalyptic wasteland after all

Finally someone who understands fascism

[fluxtorrent]

Sorry but no.

Facism
often capitalized : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

So lets break down each point.
Do they qualify as a Philosophy, movement or regime?
Yes. All 3 actually.
Do they exalt their "nation" and race above the individual?
VERY much so.
Do they feature a centralized, aurocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader?
BOY HOWDY!
severe economic and social regimentation?
To the point that they make the Nazi's look disogranized!
Forcibly supress opposition?
With the exception of Lyons brief sojourn as a man of the people where he played nice because he had no choice... Yeah there is really no argument against them not being facist.

The fact that Lyons ENTIRE doctrine has been INTENTIONALLY purged by Maxson only reinforces that
(and for the record Lyons didn't "break off" they were marooned, isolated, and cut off. His entire doctrine evolved because he was FORCED to look for local support or die. The moment Maxson was able to restore contact with the west they went full blooded facist all over again and rejected Maxsons principles.)

[unweptbuzzard16]

Originally posted by fluxtorrent:

Sorry but no.

Facism
often capitalized : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

So lets break down each point.
Do they qualify as a Philosophy, movement or regime?
Yes. All 3 actually.
Do they exalt their "nation" and race above the individual?
VERY much so.
Do they feature a centralized, aurocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader?
BOY HOWDY!
severe economic and social regimentation?
To the point that they make the Nazi's look disogranized!
Forcibly supress opposition?
With the exception of Lyons brief sojourn as a man of the people where he played nice because he had no choice... Yeah there is really no argument against them not being facist.

The fact that Lyons ENTIRE doctrine has been INTENTIONALLY purged by Maxson only reinforces that
(and for the record Lyons didn't "break off" they were marooned, isolated, and cut off. His entire doctrine evolved because he was FORCED to look for local support or die. The moment Maxson was able to restore contact with the west they went full blooded facist all over again and rejected Maxsons principles.)

You don't understand, they aren't a nation state, they don't have citizens, fascism has an economic aspect too, where the citizens economically serve the nation state and the military. The brotherhood is a technocratic military with social benefits, or a stratocracy. You don't understand what fascism is.