Fallout: New Vegas – Walkthrough

The 4th part of Fallout series takes us to post-nuclear Nevada and California where the huge Mojave Wasteland is located. Fallout: New Vegas offers a lot of main and side missions than the previous game, so prepare for the long journey. And remember about spoilers!

There are 3 training objectives which are designed to help players to understand the game. Next main quests act as an introduction to further events. You can skip the first main mission and reach the Tops in New Vegas without visiting intermediate locations. After completing the second main task, you can select the desired route:

1. Yes Man story. It’s also can be titled as Independence story so far as you are going to refuse all factions and battle for the independence of New Vegas on your own.
2. House story. During it, you will side with the mysterious ruler of New Vegas and protect the city with powerful securitrons. Neutral alignment suits this story the best.
3. NCR story. It offers you to join heirs of the pre-War government, lawful New California Republic. This story is designed for all who follow the way of good karma.
4. Caesar’s Legion story. Main rivals of NCR, various bloody tribes led by charismatic Caesar, are ready to bring the barbaric order to Mojave. The way for bad guys.

Remember that completing missions for one faction will reduce the reputation for another one. For example, quests for NCR and Legion cannot be completed together so far as these groups are archenemies. Each faction and each storyline has points of no return after which you cannot change the chosen path. We will mark these points in further paragraphs. However, Yes Man story can be completed at any time, means you can choose this arc even after significant progress for other faction.

We suggest deciding wisely which group is the best. Probably, you want to beat the game several times to enjoy all endings. That’s fine and our walkthrough will help you.

Training

Here we have 3 crucial for every newcomer missions. They will guide you through the basics of Fallout and new features of New Vegas. Players who are familiar with Fallout 3 can skip all tasks except the first one. But they are pretty simple, so you can grab some valuables and caps as well as gain experience.

• 1st tutorial.

The story of the Courier begins here. Strangers almost killed you and buried but securitron Victor was so glad to help. Kind doctor in Goodsprings now wants to reveal your personality with various devices. Feel free to grab all useful items in Doc’s house in addition to his gifts including Pip-Boy, outfits, and cool equipment based on your tag skills.

The very first mission is always the same. You should customize your appearance, invest points in S.P.E.C.I.A.L. attributes, and choose preferred skills and traits. The last feature is analog of perks from Fallout 3 but traits in New Vegas grant the hero not only benefits but also penalties. Choose all features wisely so far as you cannot change them later without DLCs.

• 2nd tutorial.

It’s the optional mission. After the tutorial, you should leave the house and go to the saloon where your new friend Sunny Smiles is. She offers you training. Accept it, grab a rifle and ammo from Sunny, and proceed to the improvised polygon in the backyard. There are a few bottles which you have to knock down. After bottles, you will face a few groups of hostile geckos. Slay them all, loot bodies and talk to Sunny to finish this task and get rewards.

• 3rd tutorial.

The last stage of the training focuses on surviving tips, campfires and workbenches. Sunny asks you to bring some specific ingredients which can be found right south of the campfire. Come back to your friend to create healing powder which can restore HP at the cost of PE. This tutorial objective is the easiest one but you should take it because of valuable tips on using campfires, new places that weren’t presented in Fallout 3.

Starting main quests

Further missions are common and basic for all players no matter which faction they want to choose later. The first quest here can be skipped by visiting the Tops immediately after completing the tutorial. However, we recommend beating this part as it provides a lot of XP and items which will be useful during next missions.

• 1st main quest.

During this line, you should follow the trail of your offenders through various cities located across the Mojave: Primm, Nipton, Novac, Boulder City.

Primm is located down the road from your starting location, southeast of Goodsprings. There you want to find Beagle who is held by hostiles in the hotel. Simply follow My Kind of Town side mission or free Beagle on your own.

Nipton is the place marked in Beagle’s journal. It’s located again southeast of your current place. There are two NPCs ready to the dialogue with you. To continue this line, you only have to speak with Boxcars in the shop on the left of the entrance.

Novac is northeast of your location and you can reach it simply following the main road. Look for the giant dinosaur statue and enter it to find Manny Vargas. He offers the info for completing another side task but you can also find this data on his computer in the motel.

Boulder City is directly north of Novac. Start the secondary objective related to Great Khans, NCR and this city to success in your particular quest. Try to finish it peacefully to receive a quest item from Khans. It will help you to finish the next story.

• 2nd main quest.

Finally, you know where your main rival is. Benny, that man who tried to kill you, relaxes in the Tops in New Vegas. It may be difficult to enter the city, so prepare for at least one side mission. There’s also an option of paying 2000 caps to enter New Vegas but we strongly advise completing secondary objectives for more loot and experience.

Once you are at the Tops, speak to Swank who is the right hand of Benny. 45+ Speech level or various quest items found near your grave or received from Great Khans in Boulder City can help you neutralize Benny. Don’t try to kill him immediately so far as the entire casino will become hostile to you. Try to side with Swank or lure your target to his suite, so you will have to confront only Benny and, probably, his guards.

There are a few possible finals of the main intro, e.g. killing Benny and retrieving the platinum chip or saving his life and finding him in Legion’s prison later. More bloody decisions mean less experience and caps, some ways like killing Benny without cooperating with Swank also mean negative karma and a lot of hostile NPCs around. So try to finish this mission elegantly. It’s also better to grab the chip which will facilitate further missisons.

All in all, you will receive the key from the suite in the Tops where Yes Man waits for you. This robot starts his unique quest arc. From that moment you can decide which faction to work with or ignore them all and accept missions of Yes Man to remain independent. Other stories can be started after receiving messages from factions.

Yes Man story

The storyline features cooperation between the hero and the strange reprogrammed robot called Yes Man. It allows to become a real ruler of New Vegas and to free this city from all major factions including NCR, Legion and Mr. House. Don’t forget that you can start this arc almost whenever before the last battle. So, it’s possible to finish some quests for other groups and then come back to your robotic friend.

Here are 6 missions with 5 of them united under the prefix Wild Card:

1. This shortest and easiest task only requires entering the apartments in the Tops and interacting with Yes Man there. The robot will tell you about his ideas and offer next missions.
2. During this, your main goal is to kill or disempower Mr. House at his office in Lucky 38. Enable the computer on the right of Mr. House’s main display in this room. Then proceed to secret chambers and find his capsule. It’s obligatory to install Yes Man into the system but you can spare Mr. House. Note that the chip is needed to finish this mission. This objective makes entire Mr. House story unavailable.
3. Reach Cottonwood Cove in the far southeast corner from where you can move to the Fort which is the primary Legion’s base. It’s better to combine this objective with the first Caesar’s quest so far as legionaries will be friendly. We don’t suggest fighting with this powerful army in its den. After the dialogue with Caesar, proceed to the hidden vault where you have to upgrade robots. Don’t destroy them as Caesar wants if you want to follow Yes Man story.
4. Your friend wants to know which minority groups are dangerous and which ones will help him. To complete this task, interact with leaders of main groupings: White Glove Society, Omertas, Great Khans, Brotherhood of Steel, and Boomers. The first two groups are in casinos across the Strip. Khans live in the canyon slightly west of the city. The military base of Boomers is northeast of Vegas. The secret location of Brotherhood is directly east of Goodsprings. You can simply reveal their stories or complete side tasks to cooperate with groups. Completing this makes both stories of NCR and Legion unavailable.
5. The final stage of Wild Card missions requires installing a special chip to enhance the broadcasting range of Yes Man. To do this, reach El Dorado substation north of HELIOS One and south of Vegas. There can be optional stages if you have a positive reputation with NCR – look for 4th NCR quest – or Followers. However, this mission is really simple, you will face only a few NCR mercenaries inside the location.

The last objective is to start the last battle. Go to Hoover Dam east of Boulder City and southeast of New Vegas. There you should activate your army of robots and accept the help of minor groups encountered during Wild Card: Side Bets. At the end, kill or spare Lanius from Legion and Oliver from NCR so far as you should deal with both rivals. This quest can be completed without victims if you have high levels of Sneak and Speech.

Mr. House story

After reaching Vegas you will be invited to Lucky 38, the main office of strange Mr. House. He is an elder man who was born before the Great War and protected Las Vegas from devastating bombs. Now he rules New Vegas and tries to remain neutral without cooperating with NCR or Legion. But powerful factions are going to begin the new war, so Mr. House wants to enhance his army and keep the city away from armies.

There are 8 missions called The House Always Wins with numbers from I to VIII.  Also, there is the ending called All or Nothing. Many tasks are the same as missions for Yes Man because you don’t cooperate with major groups:

1. This is similar to 2nd main quest. You have to return the chip to your new employer. This stage can also be completed during the next one.
2. This one is similar to Wild Card: You and What Army? Travel to Caesar’s base and open the vault. Use your chip to enhance securitrons for Mr. House.

• These missions are similar to 3rd Yes Man quest. Your task is to convince Boomers, Omerta, and Brotherhood to help Mr. House during the final battle. Otherwise, you can eliminate these factions.

1. This is similar to 4th NCR quest. During this mission, President Kimball visits Hoover Dam and wants to declaim the speech. Mr. House wants President to die. Your task is to reveal dangers for Kimball but don’t prevent them and don’t warn President. There will be 3 assassination attempts, so just enjoy the action. You want to kill Kimball on your own to complete the mission surely, although.

• This is similar to 5th Yes Man quest. It’s enough to install the given chip and come back to Lucky 38. NCR armor will prevent soldiers from attacking.
• Probably, the shortest mission. It starts automatically after finishing the previous stage and you only have to confirm that you’re ready for the last battle.

The last mission called All or Nothing is the same as the ending of Yes Man story. Your goal is to hack the system of Hoover Dam so Mr. House can control it. Then win the battle with the help of minor groups and/or securitrons, deal with Lanius and Oliver, and enjoy the final scripted scene. 

NCR story

The New California Republic wants to bring the order to the Mojave and you can help. Troopers will interact with you after the first visit to Lucky 38, follow them and speak to officers at the office located in the farthest part of the Strip. This storyline suits good guys who want to make the Wasteland a bit more lawful. NCR followers aren’t innocent girls, they are ready to cover Mojave in blood but reach their goals. Other factions aren’t better, although.

There are 5 missions related to NCR:

1. Your first task in the service of Republic is to convince Boomers to help NCR. Find Nellis AFB and beat the quest related to this group. It’s pretty simple as you even don’t have to make difficult choices, just follow objectives.
2. The next task is related to Kings, the main gang of Freeside. NCR officers want to stop crimes in this location, so you have a lot of options. Firstly, find Pacer in the main office of Kings. The easiest way is to kill Pacer but only with an energy weapon, so NCR will not be affected. It’s better to finish Kings’ quests before killing Pacer. As well, you can talk with Kings and ask them about favor received after their storyline. Another peaceful option is to visit Camp McCarran and then interact with Kings politely. After all, there’s a way of failing this mission and proceeding to next ones only with a little negative reputation for NCR.
3. Here we have another mission related to minor groupings. Your task is to reveal stories of Great Khans, Omerta and Brotherhood, so these parts are the same as 4th Yes Man quest and III-V Mr. House stages. During this quest, you also should deal with Mr. House like during 2nd Yes Man quest. The storyline of Legion will be unavailable after interacting with Omerta and the one of Mr. House fails after disabling him, obviously.
4. This task is the part of the previous one. Despite it looks the same as VI Mr. House quest, where your goal is to save Kimball. Look for several assassination attempts: a sniper in the NCR outfit inside the tower, a fake-engineer with a knife which will appear during the speech, and a bomb on the helicopter placed by another engineer. If you have a good NCR reputation it will be easy to explore all rooms and prevent all attempts.

The ending features the battle for Hoover Dam again. Cooperate with NCR forces and start the final combat, then find Lanius and eliminate him or convince him to surrender. Minor factions and NCR troops may help you depending on your previous decisions.

Caesar’s Legion story

The last but not least quest arc offers you to join vicious tribes led by Caesar. This story features probably the bloodiest missions with cruel moral choices, slaves, and various murders. So far as Legion is the main rival of NCR, this path may be considered as the least awful. However, legionaries aren’t awful beasts as Republic claims, so you choose any side. Be ready for early failure of other storylines.

There are only 4 main missions:

1. The longest mission for Legion features several stages. During the first one, Caesar will invite you to his Fort and ask for a little service. He desires to destroy the base of securitrons. Open the bunker which you can remember from previous stories and where you can enhance robotic armies or disable them. If you want to gain Legion reputation, do the latter action.

The next stage requires killing or disempowering Mr. House similar to the same quests from Yes Man and NCR stories. After that, convince White Glove Society and Boomers to join Caesar, you remember how to do it from Yes Man story. Surprisingly, Brotherhood cannot be convinced, there’s only one option of destroying this faction at all.

Remember that the story of Mr. House becomes unavailable after the second stage of this mission and NCR story fails after the fourth stage, the one related to White Gloves.

2. Caesar is near his end, so you should cure him. Either find the pills, try to operate on your own or ask your follower Arcade to cure Caesar. To succeed, your Medicine and/or Luck levels must be high. As well, you can find Vault 34 slightly east of New Vegas and grab the part of Auto-Doc there. Yeah, that’s possible to kill Caesar now but be aware of angry followers.
3. Do you remember the speech of President Kimball? When NCR forces want to protect their leader, Legion is ready to destroy him. It’s your task. There’re a lot of options depending on your skills. For example, Kimball can be eliminated with bombs if you have high Explosives level or in close combat if you have high Melee or Unarmed levels.

The ending of this story features the combat on Hoover Dam again. Prepare for it, place Legion forces, and join them. Minor groups may help you if you convinced them to join Caesar during previous missions. At the end, kill or spare Oliver to beat the game.

DLC quests

All add-ons for Fallout: New Vegas offer entertaining missions but they are less intriguing and easier than ones from the original game are. To start the story of certain DLC, simply react to the radio signal which will appear after installing the add-on. Then follow your new mates or hints to reveal mysteries of DLC.

Enjoy the game and choose the best storyline!