Fallout 2 Dev Says There Were Plans For Deathclaw Power Armour

thegamer.com:

Last week, I sat down with Fallout 2 designer John Deiley to discuss all things talking deathclaws, and he revealed a terrifying idea that never came to fruition.

Had they not all been wiped out at the end of the game (which happened behind his back), the intelligent deathclaws would've modified power armour so that they could wear it. Deathclaws... in power armour. It makes Quarry Junction look like a ride on the Primm rollercoaster.

In Fallout 2, we meet a group of talking deathclaws hiding inside Vault 13, but an Enclave secret service member called Frank Horrigan slaughters them all.

"There was going to be an internal conflict with them, the devil within," Deiley tells me. "They were planning, once they were more secure, on altering power armour to fit their physique. And then they were going to pay the Enclave a visit and get as many vials of the FEV virus as they could, kidnap a scientist or two, and make some improvements."

Only two intelligent deathclaws can survive the second game, leaving nothing but stragglers to wander a wasteland that will--out of fear--shoot them on sight. There's nobody left to rebuild, so they never got around to refitting power armour for their monstrous lizard bodies.

However, the mobile spin-off Shelter Online does hint at intelligent deathclaws still being around on the West Coast in some capacity. In the game, we meet the 'Wise Deathclaw' who is revealed to be Kura, a distant relative of our Fallout 2 companion Goris.

So, despite the population being all but wiped out, Goris repopulated the intelligent deathclaws somewhat. It's unclear how well they're doing, but they're out there somewhere in the Fallout universe at least. Let's just hope they don't get any grand ideas about power armour, I'm not sure my heart could take one running at Mach Ten towards me.