Lore books remain one of the most requested features in Fallout, ever since Bethesda acquired the IP. They are a staple of the Elder Scrolls series, whose library is full of little gems that expand on Tamriel’s setting. In some cases, they might be even more interesting than some parts of the game itself.
However, despite developing and/or releasing more games than Interplay ever did, none were created either in the game or as merchandise. The closest we got is with fragmentary newspapers, like the ones included in some of the Chryslus fusion car models.
Rather than wait for someone else to pick up the slack, I’ve decided to try my hand at making such a lore book. It’s been a while in the making, required me to (re)learn DTP, Scribus, and spend more time than I wish to admit poring through old United States technical and field manuals.
Here’s the result: The NCR Brotherhood War Manual.
What this is
This lore book is a 100-page publication intended to be an in-universe technical manual issued to New California Republic Army soldiers, to familiarize them with the Brotherhood of Steel. As such, it covers a summary of their history, society, tactical and strategic considerations, plus a breakdown of their most commonly used equipment and other useful stuff.
It’s written from the perspective of an NCR analyst, keeping in mind the limits of their knowledge about the Brotherhood and access to information. Figuring out what the Republic might actually know and what it’s unlikely to have access to was an interesting challenge, especially given the privileged access most of our protagonists have does not mean everyone would have such knowledge.
The tech manual also expands greatly on the Brotherhood’s tactics and strategy, trying to put everything we know in order and frame them in a more or less coherent way. There’s a discussion of tactics the Brotherhood employs, dictated by its limited manpower and industry, but superior individual combat technology, there’s a discussion of strategic considerations and how the order might perform in a war against an actual, well-organized enemy, rather than scattered mutant remnants or disorganized raider warbands, trends in equipment, and of course, touching on power armor.
Yes, this includes the T-60 power armor and trying to place it in a broader context within the universe.
The manual is also intended to be a bit of an indirect warning to the Brotherhood of Steel, since the NCR assumes the order will acquire it. In short, it’s 100 pages of We Know.
The whole thing is in an A3 format, with a glued spine. I’ve considered using binding but decided against it. Plastics aren’t really in tune with the setting’s backstory, while metal rings would make the whole thing too bulky and impossible to slip into a uniform pocket. I’ve settled on glue: Brahmin are, after all, the great resource of the Republic and their hooves would produce glue in ample quantities, while paper is widely produced and used in the NCR, especially for propaganda.
The entire manual is based on available lore through to Fallout 76 and Steel Dawn (I’ve deliberately delayed releasing it for that reason), and uses assets principally from Fallout 76 to represent pre-War equipment of the Brotherhood, using clever camera angles and framing to make the shots look like New California, rather than Appalachia.
The biggest sources of inspiration are two vintage Army technical manuals: TM-E 30-451 Handbook on German Military Forces 1945 (digitized on Hyperwar and Archive.org) and TM-E 30-480 Handbook on Japanese Military Forces 1944 (Hyperwar and Archive.org). Both of these helped create the structure, set the tone, write down strategic and tactical analyses, and figure out the illustrations.
What it is not
It’s not perfect by any means. There are errors there – many are deliberate, to reflect the limits of NCR’s intelligence gathering – and some of the illustrations might be worth taking a second look at. However, if I kept fiddling with it, it’d never get released and forever languish on my hard drive.
Also, it’s not meant to be a 100% perfectly-true-to-games encyclopedia, confined by a straitjacket of references. That’s what a lore book is supposed to be, after all.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my friends in Fallout for their continuing support – especially Rob, Dave, Hunter, and everyone else I collaborated with on anything – especially for reviewing this manual before publishing. You guys rock my world and I’m honored to count you among my friends.
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