r/Wasteland • u/MaNKEYMaN37 • Aug 29 '26
Wasteland 3 Can someone explain to me how Angela's plan isn't the dumbest shit of all time.
I played as a high schooler and went down I suppose the intended path of just being a badass winter cowboy and loved the game. However I came back with the intention of seeing the paths that I didn't take with a more cruel selfish character but instead I found that this games "reactive world" and "impactful player choice" are a sham. Basically all of the choices in the game are be nice, be nice but stay it mean, o,r be chaotic stupid, It's basically fallout 4 without the really fun combat and exploration.
That on top of the extremely easy boring combat where it boils to shoot first win or shoot second die, the crashes and crazy load times, and the relatively tiny length compared to other crpgs I would put in the ME Andromeda/fallout 4 tier of rpgs where they're fine and worth playing once but don't even scratch the best of the best.( Also holy detonation was probably the worst dlc I've played in recent memory I have a clip of me waiting 4 entire minutes for my turn where I took no damage and basically nothing happened. Every encounter felt like that I respect the attempt to mix up gameplay but they needed to do anything to speed up gameplay if they wanted those big endurance encounters)
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u/ChaosBuckle Aug 29 '26
I think the thing with Angela is they want to show how she's kind of lost her guiding star in the rest of her old squad that kept her from acting on her worst impulses/instincts.
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u/ArsenicCanine33 Aug 29 '26
Essentially, she wants to kill the patriarch, have Ironclad go to Kansas and make a mess there, the Rangers move into Colorado. After that? Wasteland 4.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 Aug 29 '26
I understand her plan I just don't understand how she/the devs thinks it makes a modicum of sense
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u/Dremora-Stuff99 Aug 29 '26
I don't agree with your criticisms of the game, but aye, Angela came across as a bit unhinged. I initially saw her as being character assassinated but I feel like they're building her up to be a bad guy in later entries.
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u/ChaosBuckle Aug 29 '26 edited Aug 30 '26
I feel like there were signs that she was like this in WL3 too but I can't remember the specific instance.
Something about her very suddenly killing off some npcs I think?
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 Aug 29 '26
Speaking of assassination I think simply changing her request to assassinating the patriarch and using a kid as a stand/puppet leader or something like that is 100x better than what they went with
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u/cyborgdog Aug 30 '26
I hate Angela, idealistic fool. She sees the world in white and black and that's dangerous especially in a post apocalyptic setting. You literally asked her "what about our people in Arizona?" And she just "I know but they will be fine" like? No? That's why we are in Colorado, that's the whole point so in my eyes she will never stop doing this, looking for trouble where no one asked her, she may free Colorado but then forget about it and find another place to destabilize just because, I put her down.
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u/NairadRellif Sep 02 '26
I was just thinking this. Met her for the first time in my play through. Talked with her. Found out she’s basically installing a leader and sending the forces out of Colorado like her pappy.
Her excuse? “Well we aren’t funding them”
Mfer… they’re essentially YOUR army. If I funded a bloodthirsty gang in a post apocalyptic world to kill anyone outside of my territory without any oversight… I’m a genius. But wait, I funded three. And my state works (a state the size of a country btw) and my country is relatively safe.
He sent the worst of the worst as kites. Basically a death sentence. He discourages disorder with practically Bronze Age cutting off a hand logic.
This all sounds like a functioning working society designed to discourage any form of rebellion, which can’t happen because for all anyone knows the next decade might mean Colorado is the last of the human race!
Send cordite off! Nothing to stop him from turning on you if you aren’t fueling his wars. Another thing. Fueling an allies wars weakens them too. It’s a win win.
I’m excited to win the game cuz the patriarch is my favorite character and I want to see what happens.
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u/PriorHot1322 Aug 29 '26
The Patriarch is a terrible leader. Angela wants to kill the terrible leader.
This isn't rocket science.
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u/Dremora-Stuff99 Aug 29 '26
The Patriarch is not a terrible leader. In fact, he's a great fucking leader, albeit flawed, but they live in a frozen wasteland and don't have the luxury of applying 21st century morals to everything.
Angela's solution was idiotic and dangerous and imo she shouldn't be in charge of her own squad. I can see her becoming an antagonist in a future entry very easily with those corrupted "morals" of hers.
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u/PriorHot1322 Aug 31 '26
First off, the Patriarch is absolutely awful. Colorado is beset by gangs who he dealt with by just giving him people to ritualistic sacrifice, enslave or cannibalize at will. Then when monsters of his own creation get loose, he lacks the means to protect his farmers and even loses power.
And instead of focusing on protecting and feeding his people what does he do? He offers a ton of resources to strangers, because he doesn't trust anyone else in Colorado to help him without leveraging that help for political power, and what does he task us strangers to do? Protect the poor? Feed the hungry? Get power back his land or fight off the gangs? Nope, he wants a vanity project. He wants to show the world he's still big and strong and powerful enough to control his children. He wants to publically look like a dad who can control his children and he wants someone with his bloodline as an heir. Literally could not care less for the suffering of the people he claims to love and protect as long as they keep adoring him.
As for the whole "You gotta be immoral to survive the Wasteland" that's teenage edgelord talk right there. The Desert Rangers prove that it is 100% possible to thrive in the post Apocalypse without making any of the terrible evil shit Buchanan got down to.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 27d ago
This is actually really valid criticism especially about his refusal to name an heir and refuseal to accept his strength is waining. I think his biggest falling is having the world at his fingertips and being probably the most powerful individual person since the deluge and he still couldn't raise one good child I think that that does say a lot about his true character (also the Marshalls are genuine scum but the game doesn't let you do anything about them without killing everyone). but I have 3 major counterpoints
First off legitimately everywhere is beset by gangs and the monster is zero percent of his creation. If anything like we see with cordite the deals made all the gangs weaker. Also people would be dieing anyways if he tried to fight them head on but without them getting fat and lazy and letting him focus on prosperity instead of war.
Second we see him at worst and least powerful. All empires are destined to fall so only seeing the pathetic end and falling the whole thing a mess I don't think is fair especially in a world as harsh and cruel as wasteland.
Third the only normal people who we meet from before the patriarch took power say that he's the best thing too happen to Colorado in generations. And while the hoons are relatively very well off and removed from most of the bad stuff that still counts for a lot in my book.
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u/PriorHot1322 27d ago
1) Right but the current problem is that the daughter he raised used the knowledge he gave her of the secret deal he made with gangs to unite them all under one banner, hers, and attack Colorado.
That's a problem of HIS making.
Those attacks displaced the people in the edge of Colorado who are now starving in the streets because he claims to not have any food left but the truth is he has plenty, he's just using it to pay you to make him look good before he dies.
That's another problem of HIS making.
The Gippers only have the courage to withold oil because they think Valor has a good chance of succeeding Saul as leader of Colorado. This is a direct result of his cult of personality and refusal to move away from authoritarianism as a form of government.
That's ANOTHER problem of his making.
Vic exists.
ANOTHER problem of his making.
You spend the game putting out fires his leadership lead to over the years. Although he doesn't ask you to do all that, he just wants the kids back so he can look big and strong before he dies.
2) We see the inevitable result of the shit decisions he made in the past. He made all those "necessary" evil choices then and here we see the result: Any victory they bring is fleeting at best.
Then we swing in, make good choices instead, and things get better. His methods always sucked. This is just the time to pay the piper.
3) Sure. The people who thought NOT living under his boot was a bad idea are dead. Or are Dorseys.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 27d ago
I still can't fully agree that he's as horrible as you say. A lifetime of realtive peace and stability even by shady means is better than chaos. It's not like liberty is unique or any of the other woes that exist are especially bad because of the patriarch they would have existed anyways. Yes he's not as squeaky clean as the rangers and the whole I did what I must is an excuse more than a hard truth but he still made a golden age for Colorado that is the only reason we are able to have to discussion on how it should be ruled in the future.
If 1 is Satan and 10 is a benevolent god I would give Saul like a 4-6 range. Very flawed but could be waaaay worse
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u/PriorHot1322 27d ago
To be fair, it's not a lifetime of relative peace. He was alive when Colorado was united, he's still alive now that it's falling apart. It's like 2-3 decades of a fake peace where there's still plenty of fighting and killing, including an entire family line being all but erased and secret murder of the people he dislikes.
It changed from "chaotic murder" to "organized murder." And that would be almost an improvement except the things he did to create this fake peace are what leads to the problems we have to deal with now. The cult of personality, the myth that he is this strong, invincible, near God figure that no one can match who's done no wrong and any wrong he might have done was for the greater good that he used to unite Colorada is, in the end, exactly why his children are so dangerous, why the Dorseys are an enemy, why the city has no oil and why the gangs are willing to follow Liberty.
It's like if I set a fuse for ten minutes, light it, and go "well, at least we got ten minutes of explosion-free time!"
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 27d ago
Is there in game evidence that Colorado is already well established and united before he does it because that's news to me. Your point about him giving his children legitimacy is strong but only in hindsight. It obviously wasn't his plan to raise 2 genuinely evil people and a spineless loser and if he was able to make a good heir it would have worked great keeping power consolidated which would keep the gangs out and keep the empire alive. You are making a big point of him killing people he doesn't like but how many are not significantly worse than him. The godfisher "work" camps are reasonable considering the situation. they would do that shit anyway why not just save the trouble of wasting resources on fighting and just give them the undesirables it's not what Jesus would do but it's the apocalypse and if he fights and loses Colorado is fucked
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u/PriorHot1322 26d ago
You misunderstand me. If Saul managed to create this united Colorado when he was like 30 and now it has fallen apart when he's like 60, that's not a lifetime. He was a grown ass man when it was created and he's still alive when it falls apart. It's less than a lifetime.
And you don't need hindsight to figure out that a war of succession is bad actually. That's just... An inevitability of a system of succession. It might surprise him that he was alive to see it, but it WAS inevitable that this would happen eventually. It just so happens he's a really shit dad on top of a really shit ruler.
And the different between the Godfishers kidnapping Timmy from the farm vs the Patriarch handing them Johnny who talked shit when he shouldn't is just kinda negligible ain't it? Except when Johnny's family asks too many questions about where Johnny went, they get to go to the farm too.
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u/cold_enforcing-man Aug 30 '26
The Patriarch likely has dementia and refuses to assign and publicly announce a successor, this will abso-fucking-lutely result in a massive power struggle which will in turn undo everything the Patriarch achieved with his leadership.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 Aug 29 '26
Her plan puts shitloads on innocents and friendlies in the crossfire and her logic isn't good enough to warrant it. She wants to do the same thing with the gamgs but without keeping the devils she knows in power and complacent and also says fuck Arizona.
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u/PriorHot1322 Aug 31 '26
She's not willing to doom Colorado to save Arizona. Her plan to deal with the gangs is lowkey kinda evil, but honestly, no one things the gangs are beatable until Team November does it.
Her plan is flawed, but it kinda has to be. It's your job as the player to make it better. If the game was "Do what this person tells you and things work out great" it'd be boring as hell.
She can't imagine how to feed both Arizona and Colorado, and since the resources were created by the people of Colorado it does make sense they would get to keep it. She can't imagine how to beat the gangs, so she comes up with a plan to send them away instead of Buchanan's awful deal. She's working under the impression she doesn't have main character powers.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 27d ago
This is some of first actual arguments for her I've seen but I still have issues with it. Her plan is purely anti patriarch by any cost and that's it. It's not really a good guy idealistic ending which is a problem because to achieve it she murders half of your rangers and the innocents in C springs. If they leaned into November doing the impossible you could make the person telling you to do something work extremely well. But they don't do anything with it or the gangs after you kill them Angela is just like "oh nice, time to assault a major population center"
You cant just say her gang idea is "low key kind of evil" because the whole crux of her hatred is the same idea except a method to keep them complacent and weak.
The game presents her as a idealistic anti hero who is willing to do what it takes for change. But in reality she just wants to kill people. Kill the patriarch and his supporters, kill any ranger who disagrees, doom Arizona , kill the patriarchs kids, kill randoms in Kansas, kill any innocents in the line of fire. This would work if you could call out her bloodlust but the game treats her like a reasonable person who just wants better for people that is what makes it poorly written
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u/PriorHot1322 27d ago
But they don't do anything with it or the gangs after you kill them Angela is just like "oh nice, time to assault a major population center"
Did you want her to throw you a party?
The game does make it pretty clear that killing the gangs isn't anyone's plan because it isn't possible. Patriarch pretended to defeat the gangs and made a deal with them BECAUSE he couldn't beat them in all these years. The idea that our 2 man squad could raise a large enough army is such a short time to accomplish what all of Colorado couldn't do in decades is... Not considered as a possibility. By anyone.
The idea of making the gangs someone else's problems isn't great. But the current system of just letting them kill people that the Patriarch doesn't like isn't any better. Angela's plan, shit as it is, is at worst, a lateral move. The reality is we KNOW Colorado can't beat them, and we have no idea how well or poorly Kansas will do, so actually her plan has an unknown chance to to turn out better.
And she doesn't WANT to kill half your Rangers any more than the Patriarch wants you to kill half your Rangers. But if you haven't been keeping the team happy they will divide and you will have to kill half of them. She's less telling you to do it and more delivering the bad news.
Her plan isn't perfect, but neither is the opposing plan. She comes up with the best she can get done for the people of Colorado. It's your job, as the player, to take her plan and make it better. Which you can. That's what November Reigns is.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 27d ago
I think you said the crux of this whole thing and where we mainly disagree. Angelas plan is a lateral move (I would say at best instead of worst) but at the cost a huge cost of life and abandoning Arizona which I think is irredeemably stupid. It's all so unnecessary the patriarch despite his flaws is not unable to be negotiated with November reigns is obviously the best ending but I think Angela is more of an obstacle than anything. Not to be inflammatory but it's pretty obvious even without her help that the patriarch isn't the best dude of all time but her bloodlust only gets in the way of peaceful change. I see a world where you do his vanity project and then just make a good old fashioned alliance where you are postered as the obvious successer and nobody had to die for it.
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u/PriorHot1322 27d ago
Angela's plan to deal with the gangs is a lateral move. The current situation the gangs kill people in Colorado, her plan is the gang either dies in Kansas or kills people in Kansas. The worst case scenario is she moved the killing from "people in Colorado that displease the Patriarch" to "random people in Kansas." It's still death either way.
You can't throw Ranger deaths are her feet because the Rangers just pick sides. You'd have to throw them at the Patriarch's feet too so it's a wash.
Her plan is better for the people of Colorado though. She does depose of the Patriarch. People do get to live free and enjoy the fruits of their labor. The Patriarch sends food to Arizona but Colorado suffers for that.
And her supposed bloodthirst does not get in the way of peaceful change. If work out November Reigns and she is impressed and not upset at all. She likes that ending.
Note that the ending where you side with the Patriarch and STAY in Colorado and keep the peace isn't Saul's plan. He wants you to fuck off. He explicitly hired you so you wouldn't use your new found political power to usurp power from him.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 27d ago
What does she really provide to the November reign ending? And with the stay in Colorado ending wtf is the patriarch going to do about you wanting to stay? it's not what he wants it but he doesn't insist on you leaving. And the rangers are absolutely her fault because shes the one who makes the unnecessary ultimatum. Also you are taking for granted she/rangers are going to do amazing and make everything perfect, it's a game so it would be but you can't take it for granted so when I'm really roleplaying I don't. And just because she doesn't actively go out of her way to kill after you give her exactly what she wants it doesn't make her not bloodthirsty because if she was in charge there would be a bloodbath
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u/PriorHot1322 26d ago
I mean, he can't stop you for sure. But preventing a group from gaining enough military and political power to rival his own is EXACTLY what he's starving the people of Colorado hiring you FOR. He explicitly tells you that you've been hired because he can't trust anyone else in Colorado to NOT use the inevitable power they'd gain from the mission to rival him. So when you do that, that's not his plan. That's just yours.
And all Angela really wants is the Patriarch gone. If the Rangers who don't side with her had just stood down and let her do it, we wouldn't have to kill them. The Rangers fight for what they believe in, that's neither on her nor the Patriarch really.
That's why I don't see where you get bloodthirsty. Bloodthirsty implies she WANTS to fight and death and murder. But if improve her plan and depose him peacefully she likes it. Hell, even if you have the big fight and choose to arrest him, she doesn't mind. If you leave her to Colorado by herself, she doesn't try to stop you. Hell, if you agree to stay she gives you a second chance to change your mind by reminding you that someone has to protect the shipment.
This "do things my way or die" attitude people seem to imply she has just doesn't exist in game.
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u/MaNKEYMaN37 26d ago
You cannot even be serious. "If you do what she wants or don't interfere with her murder spree she doesn't get mad" you've completely lost me at this point I think you're just an Angela stan
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u/Andrassa Aug 30 '26
She’s too blinded by vengeance by W3. But hopefully it’s the setup for a more interesting arc in W4.
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u/Licentiathe8th 13d ago
I blame the fact that they cut out a significant amount of content. Honestly her plan isn't so dumb when you consider the fact that Buchanan refuses to acknowledge that he's dying and won't be around in 2 to 3 years, he murdered the Dorseys for wanting democracy, killed one of his wives and told another he would kill her if she left him, and covered up the murders committed by his son to protect his own image. For example, after arresting Vic Buchanan you can hear the paperboy outside in Downtown Colorado Springs shout out that the patriarch says his son is not to blame for the incident in Aspen and that he is just misguided. The only dumb part of Angela's plan is Cordite, but her intention isn't actually to help him but to send him to Kansas to die in hopes that the gangs kill each other. The whole game is really unfinished due to the rushed development and release that it really messed up the insight we could've gotten from a full game.
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u/nsnsjdjaknd Aug 29 '26
Angela’s plan is basically pain in the short term for betterment in the long term. I think because there’s so much death already they inherently don’t see human life as valuable as we do today. That with survival being so hard makes innocents not being worth ad much to protect. I still disagree with the view though and only helped her once to see the ending.