#disko asks

[mellowdisko]

Vulpes Inculta headcanons 👀👀

oh gladly! i've been waiting for this moment.

vulpes is young—far younger than most would expect. like in his early twenties. his age leads people to often mistake him for just another low-ranking legionary, dismissing him outright until he reveals his rank as summus frumentarius. but rather than seeing this as a hindrance, he uses it to his advantage in espionage: disguising himself as a farmboy from arizona or a green NCR recruit.

as I said in this post, i do believe vulpes to be a religious man. he was raised by priestesses, within the cult of mars and knows no other way of life. his faith is absolute, a fanaticism that drives him to follow its teachings without question, gladly committing atrocities in the name of his gods. yet, he does not make a spectacle of his faith when it comes to personal practices. he prays in silence, visits temples alone. and he prays a lot, especially in battle or before undertaking a dangerous task.

he also prays for his own men—asking that they return from their missions both victorious and alive. maybe he cares for them; maybe there is a small part left in him that aches when he sends them into the bear's land, a part that keeps him up at night, a part that makes him smile when they radio in for report. maybe they’re the older brothers he never had growing up, maybe he does want them to survive, maybe there is some love in that. or maybe he just hates losing any reliable tools of the legion, simply hates being wasteful with his resources. no one really knows.

as said in the post he is superstitious too, especially when it comes to "omens" he sees in nature. like he'll rather walk all the way across the mojave than to go through a shortcut a vulture flew over. lucius constantly mocks him for this (also like I mentioned in the linked post my hc for lucius is that he's too old to have grown up into the legion's religion. he was raised with science rather than cultish teachings, making him far more rational than the younger legionaries.) vulpes acts indifferent about lucius’s skepticism, but deep down, it unsettles him. like a lot.

he dislikes working in the strip or any other urbanised areas like that. he's more of a “child of the desert”, the city doesn't suit him.

he probably doesn't enjoy enclosed spaces overall, doesn't feel too comfortable with a roof over his head. unlike most other frumentarii assigned to new vegas, he has no fascination with luxury or comfort. he'd prefer to sleep on the desert floor rather than wake up to a greasy casino ceiling. he hates the neon lights and the tall buildings. hates the noise, the crowd, the "degeneracy". he doesn’t belong to vegas. he loves the wasteland, that untamed emptiness waiting to be conquered; he loves wandering, trekking through it—taking the fox act a little too seriously.

but that does not mean he disregards the old world as a whole, no, I think he'd find it interesting, alluring even—collecting every small piece of it he's allowed to have in legion land. novels, cassettes, maps...nothing radical enough to be seduced by a world outside the legion but faded fragments of a forgotten era just loved enough to be cherished and be tucked away into a corner of his tent.

vulpes has a natural aptitude for languages. he is probably fluent in multiple tribal dialects and has used that talent for the legion's benefit since we know the frumentarii do act as ambassadors. caesar secretly hates this part about him because it reminds him of a particular someone with blue eyes who too was also good with languages.

definitely hates chess with a burning passion. he thinks it is redundant and naive because warfare is not two neat lines of soldiers marching toward each other on an even playing field. the structure of turns, limited moves and pieces frustrates him. he thinks you have to be unfair in war, deceive, be unpredictable, and strike when the enemy least expects it, win by cheating basically. he's also terrible at it which is definitely not a reason for this dislike.

[mellowdisko]

Is it really ooc for women to be working with/in the Frumentarii considering how flagrantly hypocritical the Legion are? Caesar bans medicine but owns and uses an auto-doc. He is also more than happy for a female courier to secure him victory at the Dam, even if she receives verbal abuse from the legionnaires around her.

Sure, it would have to be off the record and I highly doubt they're positions in the network were secure. A misogynist society like the Legion would probably see a woman in their intelligence network as the prime scapegoat for anything going wrong, faulty information, infiltration by the enemy, etc.

However, given what the game tells us about the Legion/what we can infer, I think there's absolutely potential for it.

honestly, my main reasoning for the whole idea was martina. she obviously does not know shes working for the legion but vulpes is still willing to use her, even going so far as to ask you, the courier, to ensure her safety. and like you said, accepting help from a female courier is a major hypocrisy but they still do (plus technically she already functions as a frumentarius)

they look down on women, but they’re still willing to accept their help when it's convenient. however, i do feel like these women holding unofficial but respected roles within the frumentarii might be a bit ooc, or at least doesn’t really have much support in-game since there is very limited information about the legion. i've always headcanoned the frumentarii as being more normal about gender, since they’re constantly exposed to a world where women are treated as equals and have the opportunity to accomplish great things. but again, none of this is told in the game. still, there is potential for it and its certainly very fun to think about :D

[mellowdisko]

Your writing abt mandatory conscription in the legion has me thinking about differences between the military careers and social status of conscript legionaries vs slave legionaries… The legion profits off of selling slaves for labor, but they seem to assimilate a lot of slaves into the ranks of their military as well. I was thinking the legion operates partially off a ‘sponsorship’ system between slave owners and the army during times of intense conflict. Slave owners can offer up male slaves to be trained as legionaries, develop their own military careers, and serve in nearly ‘equal’ military positions as conscripts if they are proficient, but they have to send their earnings in to their owners and go back to being slaves when conflict subsides. Living as a legionary is still better materially than living as a slave, so slaves are often extra incentivized to do well in battle or face being sent back to live as a slave. It would be interesting if even the contuberniums are segregated, consisting of slave legionaries or conscripts. Slaves would still face more obstacles moving up in rank than conscripts would ofc, and maybe can’t rise past the status of decanus and only hold authority over other slave legionaries. It would definitely create interesting dynamics within the army between serving legionaries who were born free and conscripted vs. captured vs. born into slavery… what are your thoughts :p ?

ty for the ask this is very interesting!! honestly while writing my post i haven't really thought about the difference between slaves from captured tribes vs those born into slavery but wish I had because its all so very interesting. again thanks for the ask! okay, so I'll try my best to write all my thoughts without rambling too much.

the sponsorship system idea is genius. It creates a very interesting distinction between former tribesmen and slaves who were born into the legion. i really like the idea of them sending their earnings back to their owners (as legionaries do have earnings; the courier can find money in their footlockers.) Also, regarding going back to their owners after the conflict subsides, I'd say it would depend on their performance. I doubt military officials would choose to lose useful men just because they have a contract with some elite of the city. if a slave shows outstanding performance in battle they can be "freed" from their owners and instead become property of the army. this would create significant competition among soldiers since the army would likely take only a limited number of slaves from each owner. like imagine these unfortunate men betraying one another to escape a terrible system for a slightly less terrible one. It's devastating!! maybe I'll write a oneshot or something about this.

about segregated contuberniums, I think that wouldn't really be an institutionalised practice but instead something that has developed over time naturally likely because of the fact that conscripts are usually sent to less intense fields (unless a particular frontline needs extra men like mojave during the battle of hoover dam) while slaves are pushed to the frontlines. naturally, peaceful and secured areas like idk Flagstaff would have a conscript-heavy force while more dangerous places have more slave soldiers. for equality among soldiers i do remember writing a post about legion women and in there i remember briefly mentioning family authority dynamics: the oldest living male has absolute authority over the women in the family and his own children however this does not include sons who have finished their legionary training and have become a part of the army as they are considered property of caesar's legion. so when a male is chosen as a soldier, regardless of his origin, I'd like to think he is regarded as equal to others of the same rank under legion law. HOWEVER, this is only equality on paper because I believe there would still be societal/cultural/religious biases against slaves, which would make it much harder for them to advance in ranks and gain status. additionally, their survival rate would be lower, as they are often pushed to the front lines, so the chances of them dying before they can rank up are higher.

but also both the administrative class and the people of the legion are fond of creating myths. I think stories of slaves becoming high-ranking officials would be favoured and pushed as propaganda. like "this centurion was a slave once, but he is a legendary figure now. YOU can achieve what he has achieved because all soldiers have the same opportunities. YOU can be like him, all you have to do is work harder." of course this isn't true but its good motivation. I think about legion propaganda a lot, it must be based on religious ideals, idk like Mars sees all legionaries as sacred or some shit or that every soldier who dies in battle is a martyr, you can't build a successful cult without propaganda.

hope that answered everything, i really liked your ideas!

[mellowdisko]

If you haven't talked about it already, do you have any thoughts on Caesar's Legion weddings. Personally i view them as classic property or status exchanges. Women get married off in exchange for money, cattle, a good political position, etc for her family, while the Groom's family gets a daughter/baby maker

hi, thanks for the ask! i have talked about women's place in caesar's legion before but never really about marriage as an institution.

as you said, marriage in the legion wouldn’t be about two lovers making their union offical with a ceremony. instead, it would be a form of business, trade.

for the families of high-ranking officials marriage is primarily a tool for forming political and economic alliances. the focus is on status and the bride or groom would be chosen based on how well they fit into these strategic family connections. for example, the daughters of centurions etc. wouldn’t just be seen as potential mothers; they would be valuable assets that unite two families together. however, this doesn't really make things better, doesn't really grant them more rights since once the daughters marry, they leave their own family behind and essentially become property of the groom's family.

now this is entirely stolen from ancient rome: in caesar's legion, marriage grants the husband control over his wife and her property. according to legion law (which definitely exists and is a systematic thing instead of the batshit insane system we hear about in game. yeah yeah) the oldest living male in the family has absolute authority over his wife, his mother and his children— this does not include sons who have finished their legionary training and have become a part of the army as they are considered "property of caesar's legion" the second they become soldiers. the household is under him and he has the right and duty to find a good and honourable match for his children and might arrange a child's marriage long before they came of age. 

so, if two families agree on a marriage, neither the bride nor the groom have a say in the matter; the wedding will simply happen.

still, I can't help but think that there might be some people out there who truly love their spouses. while happy and healthy marriages are definitely NOT common i’d like to believe that some couples do grow to be content with each other. lucius is a certified wifeguy, personally.

also, the legion definitely bases the idea of reproduction on a religious foundation. even though the og mars was never associated with this, caesar and the other founding members created myths to ensure their primary deity is not only involved but also commanding the people of the legion to produce offsprings. though i don't think caesar would bother to create "holiness" in marriage himself. he doesn’t care, neither did the founding members. all they want is more men to send to frontlines and you don't necessarily need marriage for reproduction.

but the people care, they have a need for alliance. so as it happened with the religion, I think the civilians have created their own myths and cultural practices around marriage; some based on old world mythology, some based on tribal beliefs that they never truly left behind. they have formalities and norms about marriage, they have made it a part of their sacred—maybe not particularly holy for the bride and groom, but for the families. its a holy union between clans, its an institution with its own rituals and ceremonies.

i haven’t thought too much about the specifics of the ceremonies but I just have a small hc that once in a blue moon, caesar attends the weddings of high ranking officers or their children, and gives “blessings” to the bride and groom. his blessings would be something like smearing blood on their foreheads with his thumb (real cult shit yipee). it would be considered as the HIGHEST honour. like people would talk about it for MONTHS.

yeah, thats all i have in mind for now :D

[mellowdisko]

Thoughts on the visual design of a Legion priestess? Been meaning to draw one myself and would like to hear some ideas :3c

pls pls pls draw them it would be so cool omg i would actually go insane

honestly, while caesar's legion has completely bastardized the roman empire, I think they’d be fairly loyal to its aesthetics as much as they can, given the whole radioactive wasteland situation. so the priestesses would carry an air of ancient mysticism but also the usual fallout survivalist aesthetics.

they'd probably wear a lot of cloth, like a version of a palla (a large draped shawl), something flowy and baggy both for "modesty" and to protect themselves from the desert sun. the colours ofc would be muted, made with natural dyes from plants. im also very big into head covering, i think long, flowing veils would look really really pretty. younger priestesses might even wear thin veils that cover their faces.

i'd say their jewelry would be made out of bone, rough gemstones, or scrap metal plus some little charms or amulets for protection and symbolising faith. some of these could be made from old world technology, like pieces of broken terminals and energy weapons. personally, bone earings would go hard.

and since resources are scarce, priestesses wouldn't wear like actual makeup in the traditional sense but they’d probably use kohl made from ash and soot, and lipstick from mulberries etc.

also if you want visual reference for drawing :D

Eumachia of Pompeii, the public priestess of Venus Pompeiana as well as the matron of the Fullers guild.

Plancia Magna, high priestess of Artemis and also a decurion and a benefactress to Perga.

[mellowdisko]

I’m actually like foaming at the mouth for your legion posts.

Could you dive more into some legion cities like you mentioned in the women’s role post? I’d like to hear your thoughts on some cities they’d have established’

- ☢️🍑

ah thank you! hyperfixation is ruining my academic life but im glad you're enjoying my endless ramblings about fictional fascists.

before i start anything pls note that im not american, and the only knowledge I have of that country is from badly dubbed cowboy movies and fallout. +im taking this map as my reference. idk how true it is, but it's the only one i can find that actually has names on it.

I'm only going to cover two cities bc otherwise this post would be unethically long.

Flagstaff, the capital city!!

i imagine flagstaff as the only city in the legion with a properly structured city plan. the fallout wiki describes caesar as having "established a capital of sorts amid the ruins of flagstaff." ruins. keep that in mind.

the capital of the legion carries roman urban planning principles and also is a city that is built around pre-war ruins. at the heart of flagstaff old world lies: the focal point of political, economic, and social life. this centre is where key buildings stand—antebellum structures repurposed as government bureaus, alongside a grand temple dedicated to mars. next to these is the economic heart of the city: the bazaar. the bazaar is organized around specialized niches, with different sections dedicated to specific trades. alongside it is an ottoman-style merchant inn providing paid shelter for traders arriving from west.

they have a theatre, too. i know it’s out of character, but let me have this.

as the city expands outward from the town square, the zones transition from administrative and commercial to residential and rural ones. the inner city, just beyond the square, is wealthy, mostly housing the families of high ranking officers. while the main trade is at town square. the inner city also has commercial areas such as general stores + communal spaces like bathhouses.

further out is the industrial zone where freeborn working-class citizens live. this zone is mostly workshops like small textile factories. the legion definitely doesn't have large-scale industries, but small, manual production is reasonable enough to assume.

and at the outermost zone are the pastoral settlemets, farmlands, and brahmin ranches. the number of houses is sparse, mostly resembling small mojave towns. this region supplies food and raw materials to the city, yet most of those who live and work here have probably never set foot in the pre-war side of the capital.

Yuma

okay, so i don't know much about real life yuma, and all we're told in the game is that this city has a us military base that folks and merchants scavenge from. i have written a fanfic before (vulpes brainrot) and described this city as "the smallest saddest town in arizona."

yuma is an unremarkable city, very close to the border of NCR, always under the looming threat of becoming an active warzone. it is a harsh, rural place with very few civilian settlements. most of its population consists of legionaries garrisoned there, living beyond the city’s main walls in nomadic military camps, like cottonwood cove.

yuma is a city of funeral, countless soldiers are sent off from there to campaigns in mojave, and they never return. death clings onto this little city. it is in a constant state of mourning. its proximity to the Republic breeds paranoia among the people, sorrow lingers over every home, every camp. yuma is a small city, a sad city.

it is caught between the grandeur remnants of old world and the melancholia of a fallen age—like post-roman europe, where people gazed upon ruins, knowing they would never have that greatness again. yuma embodies that same despair. those bases of america, the grand monuments of a power they can't even comprehend is reduced to cattle pastures and people scavenge within the decayed husk of america. yet unlike flagstaff, they do not try to make a city out of the ruins, they only reduce that bygone glory into sources of scrap.

+ my pre-canon decanus vulpes hc is that he was also stationed at this city before the insubordination incident. i want him to be sad

[mellowdisko]

Idk how you feel about this as someone who seems to have a lot of Vulpes headcanons but I like to think that boys in the legion aren't just normally conscripted into being frumentarii like they are other military positions.

I think there's at least one frumentarius in each town (or even each school) that scouts out intelligent, athletic, and charismatic boys and grooms them into the position. It starts with an extra-curricular math test and nothing more, but soon you start getting extra homework and encouragement to join certain extra curriculars. Mainly gymnastics and adjacent sports on top of more intellectual activities (chess? Debate club???). Then one day you're sat down with the school master and your frumentarius guide and you're given the opportunity to travel to Flagstaff and meet the frumentarii officials. There you stay with other prospective Frumentarii until you're fully trained up and ready to be deployed.

And like, some schoolboys are super aware of it. Like there's probably a school in one of the smaller villages that's known to produce results where anyone who's anyone wants that golden ticket to Flagstaff, so the recruitment process needs to be modified every year to be less conspicuous (it needs to be secretive to maintain the image of the Frumentarii, and Caesar is clearly obsessed with imagery and symbolism). Then there's other schools that aren't as clued in. One day the teacher's pet up and left and no one has seen Julian or his parents ever since. Teachers say they were ambushed by rebels while visiting family, and based on what they've been told the poor kids have no reason to believe otherwise. On that note, I feel like if your son is selected to become a Frumentarius you are either disappeared or relocated with new names. Either way, the child is almost definitely separated from the parents

ah, i always thought of the frumentarii being picked within soldiers, lower-ranking and young ones noticed for their wit on the battlefield and then chosen by officials to serve in their ranks. to be fair, I never really thought much about education in caesar's legion.

but I do like the idea of schools in the legion. they definitely wouldn’t be up to NCR or Followers’ standards and would function pretty much like a prison: they'd be boarding schools, with students seeing their families only during holidays (a small hc I have is that the legion does not have a concept of weekends, they only have religious days off). they’d also be VERY strict, especially about uniforms, and full of religious teachings.

the teachers would be priestesses who also help the frumentarii find standout students. and like you said: caesar, too indulgent in his noir espionage bs, would constantly change the system to stop anyone from “cheating” into the ranks of the frumentarii.

and obviously, if schools exist in legion land, the rivalry must be brutal—both among the students and between schools. imagine the sports tournaments, god...

the students would have insane rivalries, especially those aiming towards the frumentarii. they would do anything to rise above each other and it wouldn’t just be limited to physical harm or plain bullying. like these boys would be smart about their cruelty. blackmailing, defamation, accusations...and the priestesses wouldn’t even interfere, letting a “survival of the fittest” attitude rule. this kind of vying would even be encouraged by secret frumentarii officers within the school's administration pushing students to compete harder and to climb up academic rankings, to destroy their competition through clever means.

of course, all this only applies to those lucky enough to be born into the legion. the ones taken from conquered tribes are thrown right into the millitary and do not receive any education except religious indoctrination.

[mellowdisko]

Obsessed with your legion worldbuilding. Chefs kiss. This might be the first of many questions. Do you think there any underground countercultural movements?

Obviously they couldn't be too prominent because the Legion as they exist in New Vegas requires a lot of stability - Literally the strongest argument you are given in game for why they should rule is because they bring the most order and stability of the four factions - but surely, particularly in Flagstaff, there's at least one group of rebellious youths, maybe just enough to count on one hand, that are sharing contraband and blaspheming the name of of their God(s), right?

Like I don't think there'd be something in the scale of, say, the Railroad in Fallout 4, but maybe closer to the Tunnel Snakes (also thinking about this in terms of Queerness in the Legion. Obviously a lot would be unsaid or more likely repressed but queer people don't stop existing because a fascist is in power. We've always been here and we aren't stopping)

i'm glad you're enjoying the legionposting ! AND HOLY SHIT, you can't believe how much I appreciate this ask !!! honestly, I have not thought about any countercultural movements within the legion but you're giving me ideas. it's a very very interesting premise, i would absolutely be delighted to hear your takes on it if you have any :D

i should probably think about this more but heres the things I have in mind rn:

i can say that it's reasonable enough to assume some sort of opposition to the legion would exist. arizona is a huge place with a big population. the small group of counterculturists would be the youth: the soldiers, the workers, those who have grown up under the state’s fascism and are tired of it. they latch onto half-remembered radical philosophies of the old world, smuggled histories of past movements and bastardized versions of dead ideologies. they lack a coherent plan but have righteous anger and a strong desire for change.

and like you said the heart of the underground would be flagstaff, as the capital city is the centre of trade making people much more likely to interact with those coming from west.

the "punks" i have in mind are bigger than an amateur gang, hiding in shadows yet also prone to reckless acts of defiance because most youth-driven movements are. they meet in abandoned ruins of the outer city or at the back rooms of workshops. the underground existing outside flagstaff is mostly in the military, those radical members sneaking out from their posts and holding meetings at night in caverns or storage rooms.

the underground's communication relies on classical means: passwords and coded language. maybe they twist latin phrases from state propaganda into slogans of their own. they use smuggled books from the west and word-of-mouth to spread their ideas. overall, their tactics are naive and unorganised—a small group scribbling anti-state graffiti, distributing handwritten pamphlets, and giving out secret speeches.

they are cool but are they successful?

absolutely not.

the majority of the population is too broken by militarism, too scared or too devout to the state religion. most see stability more preferable to change. some might even betray the movement, leading to crackdowns.

and, the state infiltrates the underground; the frumentarii—they pose as sympathizers, intellectuals wanting to join the movement, passionate young men ready to fight for change *cough vulpes inculta cough* they feed false information, create paranoia, driving the people into desperation. the frumentarii don't just crush the rebels—they take on their mask, live with them eat and sleep in the same barracks, fight alongside the movement for months. and then they manipulate, crack the cause from the inside.

the members who are caught face brutal interrogation, some break under torture and name names, then eventually all get crucified. their bodies are left as warnings at towns square or at the entrance of military camps.

the ones that are still free grow too paranoid, executing their own in fear of spies. as crackdowns increase, the underground fractures. false accusations by the frumentarii fly. people kill each other. the movement tears itself apart.

but maybe, maybe some part of it survives.