Is EVERYONE at Covenant Guilty?

[molten]

(spoilers)

I just did the quest "Human Error" where I saved the synth and killed everyone at the Compound and Covenant. While I was okay with killing the guards at the Compound, I felt bad killing everyone at Covenant. It makes sense to kill the perps such as the mayor but what about the settlers? They got in by going through the SAFE test right? So they may have been just like the Sole Survivor. Regular wastelanders who needed a place to call home. But they opened fire at me as soon as they saw me, along side with the actual perps of the tortures and murders of the innocent. Is it implied anywhere that all the people living in Covenant are at fault for this? It doesn't feel like Fallout at all where you HAVE TO kill people to get something done. Especially killing an ENTIRE SETTLEMENT no matter how evil they might've been. I mean... no speech checks to convince the doctor and her followers that her ways of exposing synths is immoral and unjustified? You can tell her this; but it doesn't lead anywhere other than the Sole Survivor killing either Honest Dan or everyone else with the Compound. I didn't like this quest one bit. What are your thoughts?

[DouglasGrave]

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

So the dilemma stands for either sacrificing human lives for one android or aiding Dr. Chambers and in turn maybe Covenant will prosper even farther, maybe even better than the settlements under Minutemen did.

Dr. Chambers is unfortunately endorsing the use of a test which will always produce human casualties that equal or exceed the number of synths found (her best case scenario is one or two false positives for every one synth).

Spreading that further would just mean more settlements using the SAFE test and routinely killing passersby over it because the test incorrectly registers them as a synth.

[Warlock]

Originally posted by DouglasGrave:

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

So the dilemma stands for either sacrificing human lives for one android or aiding Dr. Chambers and in turn maybe Covenant will prosper even farther, maybe even better than the settlements under Minutemen did.

Dr. Chambers is unfortunately endorsing the use of a test which will always produce human casualties that equal or exceed the number of synths found (her best case scenario is one or two false positives for every one synth).

Spreading that further would just mean more settlements using the SAFE test and routinely killing passersby over it because the test incorrectly registers them as a synth.

One or two failures out of many though? The synths tend to infiltrate settlements anyway with some being open Institute plants to attack it eventually. The SAFE test would prevent it at best, second it only exists in Covenant and hasn't been used by any other place, third is that the test isn't forced on anyone, anyone can walk away from Covenant anytime without getting hit by Compound.

[DouglasGrave]

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

Originally posted by DouglasGrave:

Dr. Chambers is unfortunately endorsing the use of a test which will always produce human casualties that equal or exceed the number of synths found (her best case scenario is one or two false positives for every one synth).

Spreading that further would just mean more settlements using the SAFE test and routinely killing passersby over it because the test incorrectly registers them as a synth.

One or two failures out of many though? The synths tend to infiltrate settlements anyway with some being open Institute plants to attack it eventually. The SAFE test would prevent it at best, second it only exists in Covenant and hasn't been used by any other place, third is that the test isn't forced on anyone, anyone can walk away from Covenant anytime without getting hit by Compound.

It's one or two failures per successful synth detection, so for every one synth you detect, you're killing one or two normal humans.

In addition, it's going to favour detecting mindwiped Railroad synths who don't know their own nature, while potential Institute infiltrators (who know that they're synths) are the most likely to just avoid the place. We also know from both Bunker Hill and University Point that the Institute doesn't depend on having an infiltrator to make a direct attack.

Worse, they also don't know the failure rate for the test's detection since they only capture and test those that fail, so it could still be missing 90% of actual synths.

[globefish23]

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

One or two failures out of many though?

However, the test has proven to be imperfect and frequently inaccurate; about one-quarter of those who take the test turn out to be failures. Not to mention there is no mechanism for determining false negatives, and anyone who takes the test and passes is not tested again. Therefore it is unknown how many synths the test actually catches or how many humans that pass the SAFE test are replaced later.

Not only are 25% innocent humans killed, they also don't know how many synths can slip through.

Covenant gets eradicated!
After buying the Justice shotgun and the Destroyer helmet, of course.

[Warlock]

Originally posted by globefish23:

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

One or two failures out of many though?

However, the test has proven to be imperfect and frequently inaccurate; about one-quarter of those who take the test turn out to be failures. Not to mention there is no mechanism for determining false negatives, and anyone who takes the test and passes is not tested again. Therefore it is unknown how many synths the test actually catches or how many humans that pass the SAFE test are replaced later.

Not only are 25% innocent humans killed, they also don't know how many synths can slip through.

Covenant gets eradicated!
After buying the Justice shotgun and the Destroyer helmet, of course.

Nice of you of killing refugees and survivors who fled from Institute, but sure that's your choice. Comparing to what Institute does to wastelanders of Commonwealth, Covenant is lesser evil.

Also, the test is in its infancy it needs to be improved upon and that's what Chambers hopes for to avoid more casualties from humans. If it will eventually lead to only rooting out synths, would it be that bad? It's androids not actual humans in any capacity.

[Warlock]

Originally posted by DouglasGrave:

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

One or two failures out of many though? The synths tend to infiltrate settlements anyway with some being open Institute plants to attack it eventually. The SAFE test would prevent it at best, second it only exists in Covenant and hasn't been used by any other place, third is that the test isn't forced on anyone, anyone can walk away from Covenant anytime without getting hit by Compound.

It's one or two failures per successful synth detection, so for every one synth you detect, you're killing one or two normal humans.

In addition, it's going to favour detecting mindwiped Railroad synths who don't know their own nature, while potential Institute infiltrators (who know that they're synths) are the most likely to just avoid the place. We also know from both Bunker Hill and University Point that the Institute doesn't depend on having an infiltrator to make a direct attack.

Worse, they also don't know the failure rate for the test's detection since they only capture and test those that fail, so it could still be missing 90% of actual synths.

Yeah and Institute kills more than one-two people usually, sometimes even replacing them while experimenting on captured ones. The test's in its infancy, it was created from scratch and overall it's still surprising the wastelanders can manage something like that when rest of Commonwealth is illiterate but Covenant has capable doctors and workers.

Well, it's not really clear because there are synths like X8 who can avoid the place and simple plants that usually come to settlement waiting to eventually attack or simply replace someone like the case with Sammy or Roger Warwick.

It's not really clear here. The other doctor named beside Chambers mentions reevaluating on another test subject and it appears the subject was a synth and gave some unique results while Amelia is eventually revealed to be synth when following Chambers plan. So, it could also be that from time to time they make mistake, but most of the testing proves right.

[DouglasGrave]

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

Yeah and Institute kills more than one-two people usually, sometimes even replacing them while experimenting on captured ones.

Dr Chambers reports "hundreds" of kidnappings over the years, but given the time scale you're looking at a few people per year on average. Covenant's plans to test people routinely are likely to produce a higher death toll.

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

The test's in its infancy, it was created from scratch and overall it's still surprising the wastelanders can manage something like that when rest of Commonwealth is illiterate but Covenant has capable doctors and workers.

The test's current results (four or five times as many false positives as true, and no testing of negatives at all) are no better than selecting people entirely at random, and killing them on the basis that sometimes you'll be killing a synth.

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

The other doctor named beside Chambers mentions reevaluating on another test subject and it appears the subject was a synth and gave some unique results while Amelia is eventually revealed to be synth when following Chambers plan. So, it could also be that from time to time they make mistake, but most of the testing proves right.

I don't remember that offhand; what exactly did the other doctor say?

[Warlock]

Originally posted by DouglasGrave:

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

Yeah and Institute kills more than one-two people usually, sometimes even replacing them while experimenting on captured ones.

Dr Chambers reports "hundreds" of kidnappings over the years, but given the time scale you're looking at a few people per year on average. Covenant's plans to test people routinely are likely to produce a higher death toll.

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

The test's in its infancy, it was created from scratch and overall it's still surprising the wastelanders can manage something like that when rest of Commonwealth is illiterate but Covenant has capable doctors and workers.

The test's current results (four or five times as many false positives as true, and no testing of negatives at all) are no better than selecting people entirely at random, and killing them on the basis that sometimes you'll be killing a synth.

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

The other doctor named beside Chambers mentions reevaluating on another test subject and it appears the subject was a synth and gave some unique results while Amelia is eventually revealed to be synth when following Chambers plan. So, it could also be that from time to time they make mistake, but most of the testing proves right.

I don't remember that offhand; what exactly did the other doctor say?

Institute kidnaps way more people from all Commonwealth while Compound kidnaps people entering the Covenant, it can't be hundreds of people from the lore point and also the game point since there are very little NPCs living in the settlements, even largest of them and safest has like less than 30 people in the least to say.

No, there's a difference because 3rd generation synths are still rarely encountered outside of Institute, Railroad locations or meeting the infiltrators. It's not random selection because then there'd be more human casualties since humans have bigger numbers over synths on surface. The captured synths can range from freed to Institute spies and human victims, but whole point of SAFE test is to end paranoia and not selecting people at random. Guards in Goodneighbor guessed that Sammy was a synth, but will end up killing more people just on a guess, Covenant will end with less casualties because they are researching for a way to avoid human deaths.

There's a short convo between Doctor Blythe and the main Compound guard, the doctor is reevaluating the results on former subjects and the last subject had some interesting breakthroughs, but since there was no regret or negative comments it can be theorized that Blythe is studying a synth subject than a human. So, often the doctors are looking over their past mistakes and experiments and trying to cover loopholes they might've had before.

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

Institute kidnaps way more people from all Commonwealth while Compound kidnaps people entering the Covenant, it can't be hundreds of people from the lore point and also the game point since there are very little NPCs living in the settlements, even largest of them and safest has like less than 30 people in the least to say.

Honestly the scale is off in the game.
The map scale is definitely way off. So if the map scale is off so would the building counts.

The NPC counts are also way off. Think about the number of synths the Institute has walking around and then count the number of escaped synths. How do you have such a large percentage of the synth population escape.

Diamond City has a population of maybe 30-50 or so? A city of refugees that has existed two hundred years and has that low of a population. The nearby raider camps outnumber them, lol.

Even the Minutemen. Preston left Quincy with 30 after losing a battle. Yet Quincy did not even have living space for thirty, not even including an unknown amount of casualties. Yet meanwhile not a single NPC mentions losing a family member at the battle of Quincy.

The BOS Prydwen is like one of them clown cars you see at the circus because there is no way all those people and equipment traveled together in it along with Liberty Prime.

The Railroad looks like a small organization (as a cell organization should ) until you do Battle of Bunker Hill where all of a sudden they have an entire army.

All the disappearances around Covenant should have triggered rumors long before Honest Dan came looking for Amelia. Of course that would have required Bethesda to actually write better rumor dialogues for NPCs. Every settler can tell you about Greygarden or The Slog, but only Preston can mark it on your map, lol.

In other words anyone trying to tell you how few or how many exist in any organization is feeding you brahminshit opinion to fuel an argument.

[Warlock]

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

Originally posted by Knight of Revan:

Institute kidnaps way more people from all Commonwealth while Compound kidnaps people entering the Covenant, it can't be hundreds of people from the lore point and also the game point since there are very little NPCs living in the settlements, even largest of them and safest has like less than 30 people in the least to say.

Honestly the scale is off in the game.
The map scale is definitely way off. So if the map scale is off so would the building counts.

The NPC counts are also way off. Think about the number of synths the Institute has walking around and then count the number of escaped synths. How do you have such a large percentage of the synth population escape.

Diamond City has a population of maybe 30-50 or so? A city of refugees that has existed two hundred years and has that low of a population. The nearby raider camps outnumber them, lol.

Even the Minutemen. Preston left Quincy with 30 after losing a battle. Yet Quincy did not even have living space for thirty, not even including an unknown amount of casualties. Yet meanwhile not a single NPC mentions losing a family member at the battle of Quincy.

The BOS Prydwen is like one of them clown cars you see at the circus because there is no way all those people and equipment traveled together in it along with Liberty Prime.

The Railroad looks like a small organization (as a cell organization should ) until you do Battle of Bunker Hill where all of a sudden they have an entire army.

All the disappearances around Covenant should have triggered rumors long before Honest Dan came looking for Amelia. Of course that would have required Bethesda to actually write better rumor dialogues for NPCs. Every settler can tell you about Greygarden or The Slog, but only Preston can mark it on your map, lol.

In other words anyone trying to tell you how few or how many exist in any organization is feeding you brahminshit opinion to fuel an argument.

True, Bethesda did very poorly with Fallout 4, it's like a bad version of Skyrim but in Fallout. The quick responses from the guards, many NPCs are essential and can't die, you are given radiant quests as a leader to do legwork and some treat you as broke, though not on the worse level as Dragonborn who is insulted every now and then by NPCs.

Yeah, the population number is dumbed down so the game wouldn't be glitchy but doesn't change from lore perspective that there'd be more humans and more escaped synths yet synths couldn't outnumber humans. Also, I don't think Covenant existed for so many years, it was created like... years after Broken Mask incident when Chambers grew up.

[Xenon The Noble]

Originally posted by SkunkPlaysGames:

Trying to whitewash the Institute's activities with the gen 3s is pointless when the world swarms with gen 1s killing everything in sight. You come across many settlements completely genocided by gen 1s.

It's a braindamaged take.

You come across University Point. What are the others?
The Fallout info on the wait screens says that the Institute tried to work with the Commonwealth, but it failed because of "mutual distrust". That's pretty much solid Fallout 4 lore. The Synths weren't sent there just to shoot people.
One of the reasons Father sent SS out to Libertalia was to clean up the Institute's image as they were getting blamed for Gabriel's malfunction. I don't see how that would be, tho, given that no one but the Institute and the Rail Road that wiped his memory knew he was a synth.

[Xenon The Noble]

We know of 4 people replaced by synths. Two of them we know the reasons: information gathering and the declining mental health of the other endangered their experiment and his family. The rest is a presumption.

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by Xenon The Noble:

Originally posted by SkunkPlaysGames:

Trying to whitewash the Institute's activities with the gen 3s is pointless when the world swarms with gen 1s killing everything in sight. You come across many settlements completely genocided by gen 1s.

It's a braindamaged take.

You come across University Point. What are the others?

Well they do attack your settlements.

Both of these had squatters:
Sandy Old Folks Home was overrun.
The Mackara fish packing plant.

Do Railroad bases and safe houses count? They did have a population.

Then you got two military facilities, but no evidence of a prior population.
- The surveilence bunker in edge of Glowing Sea
- Fort Hagen

[Warlock]

Surveillance bunker, Fort Hagen and the Mayor's Bunker had no evidence of life after nuclear war, the places were abandoned eventually with some remnants of government dying out within there. Institute is very similar to Enclave in a way which is why they hang around in the US government facilities and reworking on them to be Institute outposts. This might've been some indication of Institute wanting to restore US just like Enclave or that the two worked together, but nah, the motives are never explained and "better live underground".

[Xenon The Noble]

I agree that Type 1 & 2 synths were sent to the surface to scrounge for materials.
I agree that T1&2 shoot most people on sight, as most people shoot at them too.
I've never known synths to attack a settlement other than The Castle, and that's only when the MM and Institute are at odds; that is, the MM were out to nuke the Institute. When I played Institute/MM, the castle was attacked by Supermutants. I've had settlements attacked by all kinds of creatures, raiders and supermutants tho.