Find the Water Chip

Find the Water Chip is a Fallout quest.

This is your first official quest, go and retrieve a new water chip for Vault 13. Although there is a time limit for this quest (150 days), you will almost definately want to do the other side quests that you get whilst searching for the water chip, however this guide is written on the basis that you are ignoring the side quests and attempting to retreive the water chip as fast as possible:

As soon as you leave the vault you will be provided with the location of Vault 15, where there will presumably be a water chip. Before you go into Vault 15 you need to stop off in Shady Sands, which you will discover on the way to Vault 15 anyway, and get some rope. Seth near the entrance has some, and there is also some in a bookshelf in one of the houses. If you cannot find either of these pieces of rope, then most merchants will trade it to you for a relatively low price. You may also want to find the location of Hub and Junktown from Ian, who resides in a house to the left of the entrance. Once you have some rope, fast travel to Vault 15. You will spawn outside an uninhabited shack with a hatch inside on the ground. Open the hatch and enter the cave system below. Follow the caves, which are inhabited by a few Giant Rats, until you reach the destroyed entrance to Vault 15. Once you've entered the vault, go to the elevator shaft in the top left corner and use your rope on it. You can then descend to level two. There is only one object of interest on this level: a locker which contains some more rope. Get this rope, then head to the second elevator shaft and descend to the final level of the vault. On this level there are a few Mole Rats and more Giant Rats, take them out and head to the bottom right hand corner of the level, where you will receive 500 XP and a message telling you that the command centre is buried under tonnes of rock, and that you will have to search for a water chip elsewhere. Yeah, it was never going to be that easy... You must now travel to Hub, the location of which is given to you by Ian (see above). Once you reach Hub, head south until you get to the Water Merchants area. Go into the large building and find the office where there are a number of people crowded around a desk. Behind the desk is the 'master water merchant'. Talk to her, not only will she be able to supply the vault with water for an extra 100 days if you're short of time by this point, she can also give you the location of Necropolis. Whenever she mentions water or Necropolis, press her about the subject and she will eventualy give you Necropolis's location and tell you that for some reason they don't need water delivered there. Now I wonder why on earth that could be...? Long story short, Necropolis has a water chip so head on over there. Once in Necropolis, talk to a few ghouls and eventualy you will discover that they're using the water chip because their pump is broken. Simply fix their pump, and they will allow you into Vault 12 to retrieve the chip. Once you get the chip, head back to Vault 13 and give it to the Overseer. Job done.

Once handing the chip back to the Vault 13 Overseer, this will lead you to part II of the game, stopping Lou and His boss

Tips:

You may (ie will) have to deal with Lennie Small and a couple of his friends:


 * 'Lennie' wields a Laser Rifle so wear some Metal Armour, bring that indiscriminate bastard and you should be ok. Also, one of his buddies hanging out in the back room (Sally I think) will ditch fists and attempt to Roast you, so practice your eye shots or use the cool Energy Weapons in the sewers to help you deal with their tough hides.
 * Alternatively you can use your superior intellect and silver tongue to convince Harry "*bzzt* *whrrr* I am a new model of an-droid *bzzzt*" when his small brain will shut down and you can pass. Just remember to do something to deal with the low-hp 2-3 man groups downstairs and all will be well.  NOTE: once you have gotten the water chip don't come back again after 30 days or you'll find the place a little different to when you left it...