Robert Joseph MacCready

Robert Joseph "RJ" MacCready is the former mayor of Little Lamplight in 2277 and a mercenary operating in the Commonwealth in 2287.

Fallout 3
MacCready was born in 2265. He has served as the mayor of Little Lamplight for three years (since he was ten) when he was chosen by the other residents due to his smarts, toughness, and the fact that he doesn't take guff from anyone. He has no fear of adults and is a perfect representative. He is belligerent, small (even for his age), very distrustful of adults, and willing to blow someone's head off to defend his young charges, but MacCready is also very loyal to those he considers friends.

MacCready came into office in 2274 shortly after the five-minute rule of Princess. According to Sammy, when Princess demanded the title of Mayor to be changed to Princess, MacCready punched her in the nose and said that the children of Lamplight needed a leader, not a princess. He was then elected to the position of Mayor.

Daily schedule
Unlike most of the residents of Little Lamplight, who tend to remain in a specific area, MacCready wanders around the whole town. He doesn't seem to adhere to a scheduled or fixed location path.

Fallout 4
During the decade between 2277 and 2287, MacCready ended up marrying a woman named Lucy and had a son with her named Duncan. When he first met Lucy, he lied to her about his occupation, telling her he was a soldier and concealing the fact he was a hired gun. He never told her the truth. At an unknown point in time, feral ghouls killed Lucy while MacCready fled with Duncan. Some time later, Duncan contracted an unknown disease, prompting MacCready to travel to the Commonwealth to find a cure.

He was employed by the Gunners for some time, but left, and has ever since been hounded by them for continuing to take jobs in their territory. He is still skilled with rifles and can make precise head shots. When the Sole Survivor meets him in The Third Rail, he's talking with two Gunners. After they leave, he can be hired as a companion for 250 caps (can be persuaded down to 200 or 100, depending on the size of the player's caps purse.) After becoming good friends with him and completing his quest; he will give the Killshot perk, which grants a 20% accuracy boost for head shots in VATS.

Quests

 * Picking Up the Trail/Rescue from Paradise: When first met, MacCready will threaten to shoot unless leaving the Little Lamplight cavern entrance. The Lone Wanderer has to pass a difficult speech check, use the Child at Heart perk, or complete the Rescue from Paradise quest in order to gain entrance to Little Lamplight. After gaining entrance to Little Lamplight, the Lone Wanderer will have a new dialogue path with MacCready which reveals the entrance to Vault 87 through Murder Pass.
 * Fungus Deal: After speaking with either Eclair or Lucy, the Lone Wanderer can convince MacCready to enter a trade agreement: swapping either strange meat (to Eclair) or Buffout (to Lucy) for cave fungus.
 * Those!: The Lone Wanderer can convince MacCready (using the Child at Heart perk) to accept Bryan Wilks into Little Lamplight.

Effects of player's actions

 * Speaking to MacCready in quick succession too many times will raise his ire. Eventually he'll refuse to talk and will tell the Lone Wanderer to leave Little Lamplight. Although one can still talk to him, they must wait twenty-four hours.

Quests

 * Long Road Ahead: MacCready asks the Sole Survivor to help him take care of the Gunners who were harassing him, and later, to help him find a cure for his son.

Effects of player's actions

 * MacCready can join the Sole Survivor as a companion for a price of 250 caps. He can be bargained down to 200 or 100 caps, depending on the size of the Sole Survivor's caps purse, though the latter persuasion attempt is very demanding.
 * If MacCready likes the player character enough he will give the perk Killshot, which boosts hit percentage for heads in VATS by 20%.
 * He will occasionally give few ammo of random types, including fusion core.
 * He and Cait are the only companions in the game that will steal for the Sole Survivor. This can be used as an exploit as they are able to steal items undetected right in front of people.
 * Commanding MacCready to enter power armor can prove difficult, especially in tight spaces. This is due to his AI being unable to find a path to the back of the armor frame.

Fallout 3

 * Unlike the other Little Lamplight characters, there's no interaction possible with his inventory when trying to pickpocket him

Appearances
Robert Joseph MacCready appears in Fallout 3 and Fallout 4.

Behind the scenes

 * "R.J. MacReady" is the protagonist from the 1982 John Carpenter horror film, The Thing, based on the novella "Who Goes There", by John Campbell. In the 1982 movie, MacCready is played by Kurt Russell. MacCready, like his Fallout 3 counterpart, is a no-nonsense, resourceful survivor who rises to a leadership position among his peers.
 * The quote "Let's be careful. No human being would possibly pile books this way." is referring to a line said by Bill Murray's character, Peter Venkman, in the 1984 movie Ghostbusters.

Fallout 3

 * Mayor MacCready is prone to disappearing. He tends to wander into obscure and dark corners. He may appear near the front gate if going outside and fast travel back to town, or standing on the platform where he first stood when he let the Lone Wanderer into town. One can move to his current position with the console command.
 * Sometimes MacCready will not give the option to open the gate, even if one is at that point and have followed the advice outlined in this wiki. One way to make sure that this does not befall is to click all of the grayed out speech options when speaking to MacCready. The dialog option to open the gate comes after a line that is often grayed/dimmed.
 * It's possible for MacCready to not open the gate after being instructed to do so. He will run to it, and climb up to the catwalk but will not activate the switch to raise the gate. This is because the scripted sequence requires Princess to be on the other end, and she may not run with MacCready to perform this function. Short of using the console to activate the gate/toggle clipping, the solutions are to: use the other entrance, reload from a previous save, or attempt to move Princess in range of the event with the console command followed by.
 * Doing DLC quests before opening the path will end "Picking Up the Trail" resulting in MacCready's and Joseph's dialogue options to vanish and making entry into Vault 87 impossible. The only solution is to resort to a save that still has "Picking Up the Trail" as an active quest, and redo whatever progress has been lost or to use the console command and go to the Citadel to start the quest again.

Fallout 4

 * MacCready may vanish from your settlement when you arrive there after selecting Paladin Danse as your companion on the Prydwen during the quest Shadow of Steel.
 * Sometimes you may not be able to talk to MacCready or open up his inventory.