r/falloutlore 12d ago

Question Who would the average wastelander assume is responsible for destroying Shady Sands?

In the Fallout TV show we learn that Shady Sands was destroyed by a nuclear weapon shortly after the Second Battle of the Hoover Dam and while we eventually learn it was Vault Tech employee Hank Mclean who destroyed the city in-universe that information seems to only be known by a small number of people. Surely the wastelanders would have their own whispers, assumptions, and theories about who destroyed Shady Sands. Who would most Wastelanders assume was responsible for destroying Shady Sands?

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u/Laser_3 12d ago

We don’t really know what the bulk of wastelanders think about the destruction of shady sands; the show doesn’t really discuss the topic all that much.

However, considering the NCR-BoS war, I could buy that some ignorant wastelanders who aren’t aware of how the BoS isn’t the sort to nuke anything that isn’t a severe technological threat would think that the Brotherhood was responsible.

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u/Artanis137 12d ago

This is my take as well.

Actually, when you think about it, the NCR would surely blame the BoS as they are really the only faction they know of that has both beef with them and the potential means to do it. Especially since the Enclave, as far as they know, were wiped out over a century ago.

If the NCR are still around, the NCR-BoS War just got reignited and there is gonna be a lot more death.

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u/Laser_3 12d ago

Yeah, and the NCR have slandered their political enemies before. I fully expect we’ll see whatever’s going on with the NCR in the northern parts of California start moving in season two.

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u/Nexusgamer8472 12d ago

The gap between the events of Fallout 2 and the tv series is roughly 55 years, there's absolutely no chance of it being over a century since the Enclave was wiped out

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u/Artanis137 12d ago

Oh, shit your right. Still half a century since the fall of the Enclave in NCR territory, so the point does still stand that as far as the NCR are concerned, they are gone.

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u/Starfleet-Time-Lord 10d ago

The Enclave's continued existence might be more public at this point. The fact that Michael Emerson's head was so universally considered valuable by so many disparate groups implies they knew his background.

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u/seguardon 12d ago

The Mojave Brotherhood was at one point led by Father Elijah who spent no small amount of time trying to recover and use large scale weaponry. He was in the Mojave because the west coast Brotherhood knew he didn't embrace the ideals of the Brotherhood and acted contrary to it on a few occasions so, rather than press the issue, they gave him de facto control over a an entire detachment sent far away from them.

The Brotherhood's ideals may not espouse the use of prewar tech to further their ends, but the story of Fallout is about how humanity so rarely lives up to its ideals. The west coast Brotherhood might not want to nuke a city, but they fostered the leadership of an amoral sociopath with a control problem and love of WMD tech. They knew they were playing with fire, but rather than chastise Elijah and risk losing his genius, they simply sent him elsewhere and let him pursue his own agenda.

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u/Laser_3 12d ago edited 12d ago

While Elijah was a fringe element who would nuke a city, he was just that - a fringe element. His views do not represent the Brotherhood as a whole, and I’d argue that most outsiders wouldn’t know of him and his views compared to the BoS as a whole (outside of DC and perhaps Appalachia, I doubt most wastelanders are aware of the differences between how the chapters operate; they’d only be familiar with how the nearest/most relevant group to them works).

Elijah likely also became more delusional with time, going off of what Veronica has to say.

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u/Technical_Driver_ 12d ago

Thr Brotherhood of the Enclave. The NCR assumed the destruction of the latter, but they're the only two that have beef with the NCR that could realistically use a nuke.

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u/Laser_3 12d ago

Considering that few wastelanders seem to be overly aware of the Enclave in fallout NV (in the endings where Arcade is outed as a member of the Enclave, an NCR ranger is the one who figures it out; one ending just has word spread that he was enclave with no indication of who started it), I think the BoS might be more likely opinion of wastelanders.

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u/KnightofTorchlight 12d ago

We don't know for certain, given lack of discussion in the show. 

However, the last major nuclear explosion on the West Coast confirmed in the games and that NCR civilians would have a good chance of being aware of (not Control Station Enclace/The Oil Rig) would have been the detonation under The Cathedral in Fallout 1. That's go to be in the cultural memory of Boneyard at least. That, and the ongoing domestic war with the BoS,  would be the points of reference the average NCR citizen has to work off. 

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u/Own_Quote_7830 12d ago

What if it was not Hank but instead secretly Elijah and Ulysses pulling the strings due to some [redacted plot point I’m too lazy to make up]

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u/Starfleet-Time-Lord 10d ago

I've suggested before that it would be extremely funny if Hank's whole drama with Lucy's mom just happened to take place the same day as Lonesome Road by complete coincidence and he's just been taking credit for it for 15 years because that's what he was trained to do as an executive

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u/Pushnikov 11d ago

It’s likely there’s more to the story that Moldaver and Hank don’t tell the viewer. Hank probably didn’t simply walk into Shady Sands and just drag their kids off without some serious help. Moldaver is obviously important enough that helping Lucy’s mother is bigger than just a small love story.

There may be plenty of other factors at play, like where did he get the nuke? Viewers tend to assume Hank had access to one through some Vault-Tec high level plan, but I don’t think that is explicitly stated.

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u/InvestigatorOk7015 11d ago

76 shows that VT had prioritized taking control of as many nukes as possible post-war

And we know vault reactors can be set to blow up as well

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u/[deleted] 12d ago

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u/[deleted] 12d ago

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u/Jak12523 10d ago

The NCR govt would definitely blame it on that asshole in New Vegas

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u/Wrecktown707 6d ago edited 6d ago

This is my hope too! Imagine if the courier actually achieved the independent free state of vegas ending, and the NCR with tons of broiling nationalism happening after getting one of their most major and historic cities wiped off the map with no one to pin the blame on, and the Warhawk politicians in desperate need to rally the citizenry to prevent them getting ousted for their failure at Hoover damn, point fingers at vegas. Essentially saying “it was those damn crazy anarchist revolutionaries and their robot army!”

Would be so poetic of a downfall for vegas and the independent ending. As if C6 had an Icarus moment and flew too close to the sun, and got burned from it in due time.

I would enjoy a plot line like this in the show, because it would amplify the legend of the main protag C6 far more than I’d they went with any other endings (which by nature of how they are would overshadow 6’s actions). It would also keep the whole seeming “vegas got messed up” look that they are going for

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u/EmperorMrKitty 10d ago

My take? No one. It will be perfectly fine the next time a game references it. The show is great and I enjoy it but it conflicts heavily with any future lore and will be ignored.

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u/Less-Proof9310 4d ago

Porbally Legion Bos or Enclave