Fort Constantine

Fort Constantine is a large military base containing atomic bomb storage and launch facility in the northwest Capital Wasteland, between the SatCom Array NW-05a and SatCom Array NN-03d. By 2277, it is heavily guarded by a wide variety of robots, including sentry bots, Mister Gutsies, Robobrains and Protectrons, inside and out.

Background
Fort Constantine is a military base built by the US Army in 2043. It was used to build and store nuclear bombs, and also the top secret power armor that was under development at the time. In 2257, Allistair Tenpenny hired 5 mercenaries — Mister Crowley, Dave, Dukov, Jeff Strayer and Tara Fields — to retrieve a rare weapon from the fort. It is unknown what weapon Tenpenny was after, but the mercs completed the mission goals and were paid. In the bunker, Tara was killed by a group of feral ghouls and Crowley was locked in the same room (from this we learn feral ghouls do not attack sentient ghouls which is how Crowley escaped). Crowley supposedly found the T-51b power armor in Fort Constantine, at which point he became obsessed with it. The rest of the group, knowing Tara was dead and thinking Crowley was dead as well, went their separate ways.

Years later, Mister Crowley, now living in Underworld, wanted the Lone Wanderer to find all the other surviving mercs (except for Jeff Strayer, whose son, Ted Strayer, holds the key required by Crowley) and shoot them in the head, then return the keys.

Layout
The area contains three buildings:
 * CO quarters house to the northwest.
 * Personnel offices building to the west.
 * Bomb storage building to the north.

The doors to the bomb storage (warhead storage) are both locked with a Very Hard lock, but the bomb storage basement can be alternatively accessed through an underground path in the cellar of the CO quarters. (The floor plan picture for the launch control bunker has been mislabeled. The north door connects to the CO's quarters, the southern one leads to the bomb storage section.) The Fort Constantine bunker door can be opened only with Ted Strayer's special key and cannot be lockpicked. Also, the only access to the T-51b power armor is through this pathway, as the door can't be opened from the other side in the bomb storage, because Tara holds the key. However, the cellar grants access to the launch control bunker, eventually leading to the basement of the bomb storage. The door to the bomb storage requires Dukov's special key. In here is Tara's corpse, (which holds the warhead storage key), two Very Hard locked doors and a door (can be accessed only with Dave's special key) on the opposite side which finally leads to a room with the T-51b power armor.

The CO quarters contain the Fort Constantine launch codes stored in a small safe in the cellar next to the Big Guns bobblehead. These can be used to launch the ICBM from the Fort Constantine launch control terminal in the launch control bunker. After attempting to launch the ICBM, the launch terminal reports an error and mentions that the missile's tracking system is damaged and the navigation data is corrupted. The alarms will sound and the doors will shut, but only for a few seconds and open again afterwards, or they can be opened manually (they do not lock).

CO quarters

 * Bobblehead - Big Guns in the basement in an open safe, and the Fort Constantine launch codes are in the back left corner.
 * Chinese Army: Special Ops Training Manual and a Stealth Boy right next to the safe in the basement.
 * Two pre-War books, one on a shelf near the entrance and one on the table or floor beside the queen sized bed.
 * Nuka-Cola Quantum in the kitchen in the broken refrigerator.
 * Guns and Bullets on the queen sized bed as you enter the bedroom.

Personnel offices

 * Grognak the Barbarian in a Hard locked storage room on the ground floor in the east, near the back entrance.

Launch Control bunker

 * Duck and Cover! in the office on the desk with the Fort Constantine launch control terminal.
 * Big Book of Science in the office on a desk near a broken terminal.
 * A pre-War book and a Stealth Boy on a desk in the living quarters, next to a radio (which might be on. This will make it easier to find the correct desk with the items on it as there are two radios in this area).

Bomb storage

 * The unique T-51b power armor, inside a stasis field. The stasis field must be deactivated using the terminal mounted on the console before the armor can be taken.
 * Note: can't be accessed without the three special keys mentioned above.
 * A Fat Man, two mini nukes and a D.C Journal of Internal Medicine skill book on a table right beside the T-51b power armor stasis field. Another mini nuke on a table just right around the corner after entering.
 * Another mini nuke on the desk in the room at the top of the bunker stairs, near the locked storage room.
 * A Guns and Bullets skill book is behind a Very Hard locked door. This door must be lockpicked.
 * Another rake behind a Very Hard locked door.

Related quests

 * You Gotta Shoot 'Em in the Head

Appearances
Fort Constantine appears only in Fallout 3.

Behind the scenes
The launch codes found in Fort Constantine are "00000000," a reference to the American nuclear launch codes which were created in 1961 during the Cold War and weren't changed to legitimate codes until the year 1977.

Bugs

 * It is possible to find a bugged Enclave soldier in the vicinity of Fort Constantine, generally located between the fort and the Outcast shack. This particular soldier appears and respawns well before the Enclave arrive in-game, regardless of whether Broken Steel is installed.
 * Sometimes accessing the Pip-Boy inside Fort Constantine will trigger the bug where only half of the Pip-Boy screen displays. This can be remedied by returning to the Capital Wasteland and equipping a different weapon.
 * Sometimes the door cannot be opened with the keys which will cause Mister Crowley to run at the wall where the sentry bot is located.
 * In some games, Crowley will not show after 3 days of waiting. The bomb storage door will be perma-locked, making it impossible to get every bobblehead.