Vault 11

Vault 11 is one of the Vault-Tec Vaults, located in the Mojave Wasteland.

Background
Vault 11 was probably constructed along with the other Vault-Tec vaults in the mid 2060s to the early 2070s. As with the majority of other vaults, Vault 11 is a social experiment. In this experiment, the inhabitants of Vault 11 are told that they must sacrifice one of their fellow Vault dwellers each year, and that, should they refuse, all inhabitants will be killed by the computer. In actuality, if the residents refuse, an "Automated solution response" is played. It states that by not sending a sacrifice, they are "a shining beacon to humanity" and they will not be killed. They are also informed that the Vault door is then unlocked so they can come and go as they please but are urged to consult with their Overseer before they do so. By the time Vault 11 refused to continue sacrificing their residents, only five survivors remained.

'Elections' and the Overseer's role
The entire vault has been plastered with propaganda for an election for a new Overseer, but each candidate is expressing outrage at having been nominated and trying to point out not only their innocence but why the other candidates deserve to be Overseer for their sins. Deeper in the vault it becomes clear there has been fighting, evidenced by barricades and some traps.

Evidence gathered from computer terminals throughout the vault indicate that the vault residents were required to select an annual sacrifice from among their members. Therefore, at the end of the Overseer's term of office, the Overseer was required to enter a chamber below the Overseer's Office to be executed by the vault's computers. The computer did not require that the sacrifice should be the Overseer, but if a sacrifice was not selected, the computer controlling the Vault would execute the entire population. Of the original residents, only the Overseer had entered the Vault knowing about the yearly sacrifice. The residents of the Vault, in their shock and anger at discovering this after having already been sealed inside the Vault, selected the original Overseer (whom they viewed as having betrayed them) as the first sacrifice. This decision would marry the positions of Overseer and Sacrifice until the end.

In this Vault, several voting blocs emerged to exercise power and influence over other Vault residents. Prior to the final election, Roy Gottlieb, leader of the most powerful of the voting blocs (the Justice Bloc) confronted Katherine Stone, threatening that, if she did not perform sexual favors for the members of their bloc, they would nominate her husband, Nathan Stone, for Overseer (it is hinted that he may have made enemies of the Justice Bloc because of an unusual winning streak during the poker games he attended). Katherine, fearing for her husband, complied. Much to the shock of the Stone family, the Justice Bloc nominated Nathan for Overseer regardless. Because candidates were typically people who had outraged the community, they were usually nominated by several blocs; in Nathan's case, his nomination was backed only by the Justice Bloc.

Fearing for the fate of her husband, Katherine decided that she had to save him using the only method she felt left available to her: she began to stalk and kill the members of the Justice Bloc, which held a very narrow majority. Upon her capture, she confessed to her crimes immediately, explaining not only her plan but also her reasoning: as a murderer, she was sure the voters would elect her in her husband's stead, because it was a choice "they could live with".

Katherine Stone's first act as Overseer, "Overseer Order 745", dissolved the election process and decreed that the position of Overseer would be chosen using the Vault's computer systems and a random number generator. The Justice Bloc, aghast that they were going to lose the ability to control Vault life by means of election threats, not only feared that one of their own members would be selected, but also worried that the damage to the Vault's social structure would be so severe that they would have permanently lost power by the time one of their own members was elected and could reverse the Order. They decided to stage an armed coup to force Katherine to reverse Overseer Order 745. The fighting that ensued was detrimental to the vault population, and in the end only five people survived. In an act of suicide they defied the vault computer refusing to send any more sacrifices, only to find out that their defiance was exactly what the vault computer wanted. They were given the freedom to leave the vault and congratulated for their selflessness. Too ashamed of their behavior to live with themselves, they opted to commit suicide rather than have the outside world learn of the events that transpired in Vault 11.

The Sacrifice
As is presented by the first audiolog upon entry to the Vault, the fate of the final survivors is to commit suicide as a means of punishing themselves for the events that happened in the Vault. This is not apparent the first time the player listens to the tape as "I'll go first" is interpreted as referring to who gets shot first. In the audiolog, there is an argument between five people: a man referred to as "Voice 1" tries to convince the other four (three males and a female) to leave the Vault. As conversation moves on, it becomes clear that they are the last Vault survivors and refused to sacrifice someone, thereby learning the truth.

Voices 2 (female), 3 (referred to as Harry), 4 and 5 wanted to commit suicide when they found out about the Vault's experiment, while "Voice 1" is having second thoughts and tries to convince them to leave the Vault and spread the word about what happened there. With a single gun, the plan was for a shooter to shoot the other four and then turn the gun on himself; this is not how it played out. Five people survived the Vault 11 experiment, but in the entrance chamber, there were only four corpses. Four gunshots can be heard on the audiolog, followed by the sound of someone dropping a gun.

Layout
In 2281 the reactor of Vault 11 is mainly destroyed along with the water purification system due to aging of the vault and there being a minor civil war between two sides of the vault. Radioactivity, and especially radioactive water, are some of the hazards of the vault. It is therefore advisable to pack some RadAway and Rad-X when journeying to Vault 11. Since portions of the vault are under water, you may want to head over to Nellis Air Force Base and acquire the rebreather (from Volare!) that allows you to breathe under water before entering this vault, although there are also air pockets in the flooded areas.

The entry tunnel is filled mostly with mantises of various sizes and a few bark scorpions, and the open vault door leads to a larger entry room than Vaults on the East Coast. Four skeletons lie on the floor here. A working terminal near the door allows the Courier to access an audio log with some information about the fate of the vault. The next room has exits to the clinic straight ahead, on the left a dead end hallway to a classroom and a cigar lounge on the left side and a hallway leading to stairs on either end on the right.

If you use the stairs nearest the entrance hall, you will go to a floor containing a lab, and more stairs down. The next floor contains a computer room. One of the computers is booby-trapped, and will explode if you try to access it.

Vault 11 living quarters
Stairs lead down to a large common room with exits leading to the male and female dorms and another exit labeled "Admin". This leads to the security office, and to the levels containing the Overseer's office and the Utility room. The dorms are a long series of interconnected rooms, and the only place where Vault 11 jumpsuits can be found. Another audio log can be found on a locked terminal, with the password in a footlocker a few feet away. The security office has a decent stash of ammo but no weapons, and what seems to be a storage room, a door with a terminal, both locked (75) in the same hallway; a mini nuke as well as more ammo can be found within. At the bottom of the stairs opposite the Security office is the door to the Vault 11 lower level. There is a copy of Pugilism Illustrated in the female dorm, second door on the right. There is a stealth boy in the same room. A small cache of flamer fuel and 5.56 rounds is concealed under and behind a large immovable mop bucket in the male dorms as well.

Vault 11 lower level
There is a long hallway, and the Overseer's office on one end. This has a locked terminal and some random loot scattered around the room. The main entrance to the Atrium is blocked, forcing the Courier to go down through the flooded, radioactive engineering level via the Utility room. The totally flooded lower reactor level is the only way to proceed without 50 lockpick to open a door above the flooded level. There is only one air pocket in this area, so one must be careful about getting out of the flooded area alive. It is recommended to open one or two doors then backtrack to the air pocket, and with the way clear you can proceed to the next set of stairs and forward (the rebreather from Volare is also useful here).

For the quest Still in the Dark for the Brotherhood of Steel, the differential pressure controller is in the middle room along the corridor of the irradiated water in a locker.

The Atrium can now be accessed, and the Overseer's terminal password can be learned from the terminal on the upper balcony or a holotape, Prepared Speech of Gus Olson, Ombudsman, for the Annual Overseer Election, on the podium below. This level also features the Vault cafeteria, which has a large supply of food. Be careful when entering the Cafeteria as there are lethal explosive traps in the doorway. In the back of the cafeteria you will find a kitchen in which there is a gas leak and an explosive trap that is triggered upon entering, which will cause a chain reaction.

Sacrificial Chamber
Enter the Overseer's office cautiously as there is a wired trap at the entrance. Accessing the Overseer's terminal with the aforementioned password can open the chamber under the desk. This opens onto a long tunnel. At this point a pre-programmed voice speaks as the Courier approaches a door illuminated by a bright light. At the end of the tunnel is a room with a single chair in the center, along with a projector. The exit door locks as soon as the presentation starts. Pleasant scenes are shown while a voice reassures the sacrifice that they lived a good life and their next one will be better yet. At the conclusion of the presentation, wall panels on both sides of the room slide back, and four robots and eight turrets will simultaneously attack the player. If you remain in the chair till the end of the film you will more than likely be killed as the robots and turrets open fire immediately. Once the automatons are dealt with, the player can then access a small room with the Vault mainframe computer inside. This computer unlocks the door and reveals the true purpose of the Vault: the idea was to see how long it would take for the population to refuse further sacrifices, essentially a test of self-preservation vs. morality.

Notable loot

 * Mini nuke behind the hard locked door in the living quarters (Security section).
 * Pugilism Illustrated inside the living quarters, in female dorm second door on the right, by the fallen dresser.
 * Tales of Chivalrie In the common area between the male and female dorms in a locker (random loot; might not be there).
 * 2 x Milsurp Review In the second room to the left in a locker to the left of the entrance of the room (random loot; may not be there).
 * Around 16 to 25 Vault 11 jumpsuits in dressers in the dorms, take all of these vault suits as you can sell them to Sarah Weintraub as a part of the unmarked quest, Suits You, Sarah in Vault 21.
 * Inside the kitchen area behind the cafeteria there is a storage chest containing many food items.
 * In the lower levels, where you first encounter the knee-deep water (past the locked Reactor door), on top of one of the machines are six boxes of the more uncommon shotgun ammunition, 12ga, each box containing twelve shells.
 * In the male dorms, there is a green janitor's mop bucket in one room against the wall. Hidden behind/under this is 24 flamer fuel and 72 5.56 ammunition.

Related quests

 * Still in the Dark - find the Differential pressure controller, one of the parts needed to repair Hidden Valley's air filtration system.
 * Democracy Inaction - at the entrance lies a holotape, a 10mm pistol and four skeletons. Discovering the fate of these bodies is the objective of the quest.

Appearances
Vault 11 appears only in Fallout: New Vegas.

Behind the scenes

 * Vault 11 was designed by Eric Fenstermaker.
 * The Vault may be a variation on the Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures. The experiment involved assessing to what extent participants would violate their own morals when given an order from an authority figure.
 * The actions that took place in Vault 11 may also be a reference to the short story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. In the story, a lottery is held annually, and the person who "wins" is stoned to death. The stoning is also to ensure the prosperity of the community.
 * The sacrifice sequence in the vault is very similar to the euthanasia scene in the film Soylent Green.
 * The poster with the slogan "I Hate Nate" is a direct reference to U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower's "I Like Ike" campaign.

Bugs

 * In the cigar lounge, after finding the body of the dead NCR trooper, a live NCR trooper may appear and tell you to leave the area. This may be a locating error, as this is similar to the dialogue from an NCR trooper patrolling the nearby El Dorado Substation, who will also tell you to leave the area, unless while donning an NCR outfit.
 * If you pause the game during the Sacrificial Chamber presentation, the audio will not stop. If you resume the game after the presentation, the side walls will open up immediately.
 * You can obtain infinite XP by interacting with the computer in the sacrificial chamber and choosing the last option repeatedly. This will not work after logging off of the terminal.
 * The giant mantis appear to be extremely large here, to the point where they get stuck on the terrain and furniture.
 * The sacrifice chamber causes the game to crash.
 * There is a dresser in the center north area of the male dorm which does not show as empty, but which contains nothing.
 * Once completing the suicide chamber it is possible to fail the mission "The House Always Wins VI" quest leaving your aid to Mr. House at a dead end. This bug occurs when you have companions with you, so it's best to have them wait in the tunnel before entering the suicide chamber.
 * Killing your last opponent with the "cinematic camera" may cause the game to crash (Rex as companion).
 * It's possible that the game overwrites a save file after opening sacrificial chamber (happened to this editor in 2 playthroughs)(Confirmed).
 * It is possible for ED-E to be knocked unconscious and disappear, but still appear on the world map as if in the vault.
 * There are lockers that appear as though they have something in them. However when they are opened, they turn out to be empty. This is similar to the Xbox glitch mentioned above with the dresser.
 * The infinite XP glitch will work by transferring mantis forelegs back and forth from a giant mantis corpse, or between a companion.
 * When saving inside the vault, reloading that save may make companions disappear.
 * Saving after beginning the decent down the stairs to the sacrifice chamber causes the quest to stop responding when you reload that saved game. The first time the quest will trigger and finish, upon loading the saved game, you can walk all the way to the end of the hallway, but the movie will not start and there will not be a blinding light as you enter the final room. (Have not checked by exiting and reentering the Vault. That may reset it entirely).
 * In the flooded room with the first aid box, constantly swimming against the wall will glitch you through it. You can still swim around the void.

Gallery
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