Dealing with Contreras

Dealing with Contreras is an unmarked quest in Fallout: New Vegas.

Siding with Lt. Boyd
You can start this quest by either speaking to Lt. Boyd in the Camp McCarran terminal building or by proceeding directly to Sgt. Contreras' computer in the Camp McCarran supply shack and hacking it (Science 50). The Supply Shack is at the back of the terminal building via the Camp McCarran Concourse; enter the terminal and go up the escalators then down the hallway to the concourse. When in the concourse bear left down a ramp, and bear right to the door of the supply shack. Contreras's computer will be on the upper level of the supply shack.

Downloading the weapons manifest and returning it to Lt. Boyd will complete the quest. She will reward you with This Machine and you will receive NCR fame. By turning in Sgt. Contreras you will drastically decrease his weapon, ammunition, and apparel reservoirs and he may be found in the far right un-openable holding cell. However, he can still be interacted with if you aim at him in V.A.T.S. first without attacking. Since he is one of the best weapon merchants in the game, and since the quest reward (the unique This Machine) is awarded to you in two of the three possible conclusions (siding with Keller will not earn you This Machine), you should think carefully before siding with Lt. Boyd.

You can also complete this quest if you have sided with Contreras or even Keller. If you downloaded Contreras' manifest, or ran his errands and noticed that his "medical supplies" could be used to make chems (Medicine 25 with Contreras or Blake), then you can bring either of these to Lt. Boyd at any time to complete the quest and receive This Machine. Sgt. Contreras will wind up in a prison cell as a result, and he will still act as a merchant though he won't restock like other merchants.

Siding with Sgt. Contreras
You can start it by finding Sgt. Contreras in the Camp McCarran supply shack. The supply shack is at the back of the terminal building via the Camp McCarran concourse. Enter the terminal, go up the escalators, down the hallway to the concourse. When in the concourse bear left to a down ramp, and bear right to the door of the supply shack.

Speak to Sgt. Contreras about his supply, and you'll have to pass a Speech/Barter check of 50 or pay 50 caps. Contreras will then ask you to speak to Isaac outside of Gun Runners.

Isaac should be located near or at the reloading bench to the right of the Vendortron at the Gun Runners storefront (If Isaac isn't there, he may be in his house directly to the east of Gun Runners, behind the Hostetler home. If he isn't there either, check the Bugs section for this quest). Speak to Isaac and you'll either have to pass a Speech/Barter check of 80 or you can give him 100 pieces of junk metal (tin cans, hot plates, metal pots, pots, pans and scrap metal). If you must scavenge the metal pieces yourself, the Aerotech Office Park (suite 200) has over 100 tin cans (bent and regular). REPCONN test site has around 30 tin cans and 40 scrap metal. Once you've gathered enough, return to Isaac.

Contreras' next errand will be to obtain medical supplies from Blake in the Crimson Caravan camp. Blake can be found around the center of the camp, next to the shelves with items on them, during daylight hours. With 25 Science or Medical skill you can observe for Contreras that the supplies he's acquiring could be used to make chems, or you can point the same thing out to Blake; however, doing so to either man will have no effect on the quest whatsoever. Once you have the supplies, return to Contreras. At this point you can tell him about the chems and threaten (no Karma loss) to tell the NCR and he will give you 100 caps to keep your mouth shut, after you give him the medical supplies he'll tell you he needs a "couple days" before he has another mission for you. Waiting for 26 hours is sufficient to trigger the next quest.

Contreras will then ask you to deliver the medical supplies to a man named Price in Miguel's Pawn Shop. He'll also give you a pass phrase: "I'm looking for some betting advice" to speak to Price, and he'll tell you what pass phrase Price should say to you in return. When you enter the pawn shop though, Price is nowhere to be found; instead, speak the pass phrase to Keller. Keller will not know the correct response. From here, you have a few options:


 * 1) End the conversation immediately with "Um, well... Nevermind." Return to Contreras to inform him of Price's absence/Keller's ignorance of the pass phrase. Regardless of which you tell him, Contreras will tell you to kill Keller and he'll take back the medical supplies (which you wouldn't otherwise be able to remove from your inventory as they're marked as a quest item). When you return to Keller, you can enter into dialogue, but your only option is to say "Goodbye." You must kill him to complete the quest.
 * 2) Inform Keller he said the wrong response. With a Perception AND an Intelligence score of 7 (which always fails), Keller informs you that Price is in custody and attempts to place you under arrest for being involved.
 * 3) *With a hidden speech check of 70 you can bluff your way out of the dialogue. When you expose him to Contreras afterwards, he will ask you to kill Keller.
 * 4) *If you don't have a Speech of 70, you can choose to hand over the package to Keller. See the option below.
 * 5) Give Keller the package. You can do this immediately, or after attempting the INT/PER check above. Once Keller has the package, he exposes himself as an undercover NCR ranger attempting to shut down Contreras' operation and threatens to place you under arrest. If you want access to Contreras' inventory or This Machine, your only option now is to kill Keller. You can do this at virtually any point in the conversation, as there is always a &lt;Draw Weapon> option from this point on.
 * 6) *Passing a Speech check of 60 will convince Keller you are innocent and he will let you go. With an additional Speech check of 80 or a Barter of 70 (and 250 caps), you can convince Keller to work with Contreras to take down the drug ring.However, this option will not award you with This Machine or access to Contreras' extra inventory.
 * 7) Kill Keller before returning to Contreras. This saves a trip back to Contreras. Choosing this option will not remove the medical supplies from your inventory and Contreras' dialogue will say that you worked things out with Keller instead of killing him.

If you return to Contreras before killing Keller, you can get 150 extra caps upfront with a Barter check of 50.

Killing Keller
If you don't make a deal with Keller, you will be forced to kill him to finish the quest in Contreras' favor. Killing him will result in NCR infamy. To avoid this:
 * 1) Attack Keller then leave the shop. Lure him somewhere where there will be no witnesses to his death (the pile of vehicles outside and to the left of the shop is ideal for this). Alternatively, you won't receive infamy if your companions kill Keller.
 * 2) Sneak while behind him and reverse pick-pocket a grenade or kill him quickly with a silenced weapon so that Miguel doesn't notice.

Return to Contreras after killing or making a deal with Keller.

Settling things in Contreras' favor, he'll award you with This Machine and the next time his inventory restocks he'll have a wider selection of items.

Siding with Keller
If you side with Keller, you will not be able to obtain This Machine from Contreras, but you will still be able to side with Boyd afterward, turn Contreras in and obtain This Machine from her. To complete the quest in Keller's favor you must have already completed Contreras' first two missions, then when he sends you to speak to Price in Miguel's Pawn Shop Keller will be there instead. The most direct way to complete the quest in Keller's favor is to give him the medical supplies.

Once you do this, he'll threaten to arrest you, you must claim you're innocent and blame Contreras. Keller will be pleased that his suspicions of Contreras have been confirmed. You then have to pass a Speech check of 60 or a Charisma check of 7 to convince him you didn't know what you were carrying. Keller will let you go free, but says Contreras will be executed. At this point you can leave, which will get Contreras arrested and you will lose access to his expanded inventory.

With a Speech check of 80, you can convince Keller to have Contreras become his informant. Or, with Barter, you can bribe Keller for 250 caps to throw his lot in with Contreras - despite the bribe, the plan remains him becoming an informant. Lacking a Barter skill of 60, the bribe attempt will fail, but you can then offer Keller 500 instead. Keller will accept and ask you to bring the deal to Contreras. Return to Contreras and inform him that Price is being held by the NCR and a Ranger has taken his place. If you were forced to give Keller the medical supplies, Contreras will demand that you kill Keller (refer to the bug where, even when killing Keller, the dialog option with Contreras is as though a deal has been cut with the ranger - the relevance of this is regarding Contreras' special stock not seeming to become available).

You could return and kill Keller, in which case consult the "Siding with Contreras" section above. If you are determined to side with Keller, then with a Speech of 80 or a Barter of 70 you can convince Contreras to cut a deal with Keller. Contreras will ask you to speak to Keller once again; you must pass a Speech or Barter check of 80 to get Keller on board; otherwise, the only dialog option left is to attack him. Convincing Keller will complete the quest, awarding you 80 XP but not This Machine; Contreras will still deal with you, but it appears that you do not gain access to his special stock.

Bugs

 * Completing this quest may cause Contreras to stop updating his stock.
 * If you buy the medical supplies from Blake and also get Blake to give you medical supplies your inventory will show a quantity of 2 medical supplies. This makes Contreras not have the appropriate speech option.  Even though the "use" button is disabled for the medical supplies in the inventory, the button will use one and then the quantity will be 1. Then Contreras will have the speech option that moves the quest forward.
 * After delivering the medical supplies/chems, when Contreras tells you to 'come back in a few days', you are given the dialogue option to say "So where was I supposed to meet Price, again?" even though you haven't been given that part of the quest yet.
 * Third Errand: After Keller replies to the passphrase (or the player giving the incorrect passphrase), there is a 7 Perception check to allow the player to determine that Keller is a Ranger in disguise. However, the speech option is set to check the Perception of Keller, not the player.  Since Keller's Perception is below 7, the dialog choice will never be successful.  The option is also mistakenly tagged "[PER/INT]", even though Intelligence is not checked for any part of the challenge.
 * Third Errand: Though Contreras has a 70 Barter check option to convince him to offer a deal to Keller, the speech option for Keller to accept the deal is mistakenly set to 80 Barter, not 70 as with all other Barter checks. Keller's requirement is not listed as with normal speech challenges, but instead causes the option to explain the deal to not appear at all if the player does not have the appropriate Barter skill.  This can easily cause the player to try and propose the deal, only to find themselves with no dialog option but to attack Keller—not even the option to exit the conversation.
 * Third Errand: If you pass the 70 Barter or 80 Speech check with Agent Keller before convincing Contreras to work with the Ranger, Keller will tell you to go back to Contreras and offer him the deal, but Contreras will have no more dialogue options, and the player will be locked out of completing the quest and receiving "This Machine".
 * Workaround: If you choose to just kill Keller at this point, the dialogue option to get "This Machine" should still become available. He can be killed stealthily without gaining NCR infamy. Talking to Boyd does nothing, as there is no longer an option to rat Contreras out after making the 70 barter check deal with Keller.
 * Workaround: Before talking to Contreras for the last time, hack his computer and report him to Boyd. You will still get This Machine and the NCR fame, just as if you had reported him in the first place. He will still end up in jail though.
 * It is possible for the NCR troopers to attack you upon your return to Camp McCarran even if you killed Keller while remaining hidden the whole time and if you have a positive reputation with the NCR. This usually happens when trying to kill Keller via pickpocketing a grenade in to his inventory but can also occur if a companion kills him. Walking from a different location to Camp McCarren can fix the hostility.
 * Contreras after completing the third task and obtaining "This Machine" will still sell to you, but will not give you the goods you purchase, but will gladly take your caps.
 * It is possible to not receive This Machine as a reward if you set up the deal between Contreras and Keller. If you kill Keller though, BEFORE speaking with Contreras and AFTER setting up the deal, you still get the setup dialog ("I convinced the Ranger to work with you. You're safe, but be careful.") and This Machine as a reward. It seems that Keller's fate is sealed anyway, if you choose to side with Contreras. The single possibility of obtaining This Machine without killing Keller in aforementioned situations, is to turn Contreras in to Lt. Boyd.
 * Killing Keller will at times have the dialogue option to tell Contreras that you "convinced the Ranger to work with you." Even if you immediately choose to back out of Keller's conversation, then kill him after he didn't know the passphrase. This seems to happen more often if his demise is done silently.
 * Sometimes when going back to Contreras and telling him about Keller he will not take the Medical Supplies from your inventory, though the quest will continue as if he had taken the supplies from you.