Nipton

"City of the Dead"

Nipton is a small town of the southern Mojave Wasteland ravaged by Caesar's Legion in 2281.

Ranger Ghost, an NCR sniper found on the roof of the compound at the Mojave Outpost, may ask the Courier to investigate the lack of traffic from their direction, but the smoke could already be seen from a distance by anyone.

Background
Before Caesar's Legion hit the town, it was populated by gamblers, thieves, and prostitutes under the leadership of the corrupt and vainglorious Mayor Joseph B. Steyn. The town maintained a kind of neutrality, offering its services to NCR soldiers in the night and Powder Gangers in the day. Even men of the Legion were allowed in, so long as they paid. Mayor Steyn had hatched a plan with "Mr. Fox"- actually Vulpes Inculta- to trap some NCR soldiers and Powder Gangers for the Legion in return for a sum of 8,000 caps. What Steyn didn't know was that Vulpes had come up with the brilliant idea to have a lottery to "educate" all of Nipton. The winner was spared, the runner-up was crippled, the third and fourth place winners became slaves, the "Lucky Losers" were decapitated for a quick death, some (including Mayor Steyn) were burned alive on a pile of tires, and the rest were crucified.

Layout
Upon arrival the player is greeted by Oliver Swanick, an ex-Powder Ganger who won the lottery to save his life. Alternatively, if the player stumbles upon the town hall first, Vulpes Inculta (Gabban appears if Vulpes is killed before the player enters Nipton) either greets the player or becomes hostile if the player is wearing NCR gear. Venturing through the settlement, the player will see multiple crosses holding the losers of the lottery. The rest of the town is in ruins and burns as you walk the streets.

Outside of Nipton Hall is a crucifix along with skulls on a post and a pyre. Vulpes Inculta meets the Courier outside of the hall and tells them to spread the word of Caesar's Legion. After speaking to him the quest Cold, Cold Heart begins. Alternatively, if the Courier is clothed in NCR faction armor, Vulpes and the other legionnaries will be hostile and attack on sight. Inside the hall itself, one will find many Legion mongrels. They are automatically hostile, even if dressed as a member of Caesar's Legion, but do not give the player character Legion infamy.

A man named Boxcars sits inside the Nipton General Store. He will speak about what happened, and the quest Booted can start. Even though both of his legs are crippled from the "lottery," Boxcars will still engage in combat if attacked.

Nipton Hotel is a small establishment with four NCR Trooper corpses dumped unceremoniously inside.

The house with the sand bags in front of it is heavily booby trapped; there are frag mines in the corner of the living room, kitchen and the bathroom. Both of those doorways conceal shotgun traps. There is a cage with three bark scorpions inside once entering the house. There is an Easy-Locked safe with a grenade rifle in it; if the pressure plate on the way to it is triggered, the scorpions will be released. The Average-Locked cabinet in the kitchen contains some provisions, and there is a dead legion recruit with a machete, armor and a helmet.

A campfire can be found in the trailer area, proceeding south by south-east of the Nipton General Store.

Buildings

 * Nipton General Store
 * Nipton Hall
 * Nipton Hotel
 * Nipton house

Nipton town hall

 * Worn key - Upon entering Nipton Town Hall, directly to the right, behind the counter. Beware of a mine behind the counter. The key unlocks the first door on the right down the hall which leads to a basement.
 * Big Book of Science - On the Town Hall's third floor in the mayor's office, on his desk.
 * Nuka-Cola Victory - Behind the locked door (average) in the mayor's office on a shelf.

Heavily booby-trapped house

 * Note titled Declaration of Vital Essence - inside the heavily booby-trapped Nipton home with sandbags lined up in front of it directly east of Nipton General Store "Trading Post". This note can be found in the tool cabinet in the kitchen.

Other locations

 * Sunset Sarsaparilla star bottle cap - in the wooden house directly south of Nipton General Store, on the bookshelf next to the Sunset Sarsaparilla bottle in the bedroom.
 * Sunset Sarsaparilla star bottle cap - on the main road to the east of Nipton, across the train tracks, inside a wrecked truck with a Sunset Sarsaparilla case. The star bottle cap is laying on top. The traffic cones here are booby-trapped with mines.
 * A larger than usual red plate is on the table right after entering one of the Nipton Houses. Taking the plate and dropping it once will keep it the same unusual size, but picking it up and dropping it again will cause it to become a normal sized red plate.
 * The house directly in front of the Wild Wasteland Easter egg contains a Prototype Mister Gutsy robot (although the terminal in the house states that the previous owner had two), and is a good source of a few damaged weapons (2 x .357 Magnum, plasma pistol, laser rifle), various metal/electronic parts and items needed for weapon repair kits. (e.g wrenches, scrap metal, wonderglue, duct tape). The robot respawns every three days, and counts towards the Man-Machine Interface and Benefit Or a Hazard challenges.

Appearances
Nipton appears only in Fallout: New Vegas.

Behind the scenes

 * The real Nipton is an unincorporated town in California, and is located just west of the California/Nevada state line (a sign showing the border can be found in-game). The Legion Lottery may also be a reference to the fact that Nipton once had the highest lottery ticket sales in the California state lottery, due to the fact that the Nevada constitution prohibits state lotteries, before a new office opened up just outside of the real world equivalent of Primm.
 * There are two signs on the road directly southeast of Nipton: one, facing west, welcomes travelers to Nevada; the other facing east, welcomes them to California. This is a reference to the real Nipton's immediate proximity to the border between the two states.
 * The Legion's sacking of Nipton could be an allusion to Shirley Jackson's short story The Lottery, in which the winner of the lottery is murdered by the other townsfolk. This is mentioned by the Caesar's Legion patrol; Mayor Steyn's office corroborates this, as well as the abundance of lottery tickets strewn across town hall. There are also strong parallels between Jackson's story and the social machinations of experiment conducted in Vault 11.
 * If you have the Wild Wasteland trait and look around in front of a destroyed building near the eastern entrance of the town, you can find the charred skeletal remains of two people named, respectively, Owen Lars and Beru Lars. This is a reference to a famous scene from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, in which Luke Skywalker returns home to find that his uncle and aunt of the same names have been incinerated in a similar fashion by Stormtroopers.
 * The Declaration of Vital Essence may be a tongue-in-cheek reference to the film Dr. Strangelove, in which the character of Gen. Jack Ripper is highly and vocally paranoid about guarding his "precious bodily fluids" and "Purity of Essence." Admittedly, in the film he spoke of his essence as though he were referring to his own vigor "in the bedroom."

Bugs

 * There's a glitch that prevents you from being able to speak with Vulpes Inculta, even when he triggers the conversation. The camera will zoom in on him like it would usually do when initiating conversation, but will then quickly retract, bringing the player back into control. Reloading doesn't seem to fix this issue. To Fix this issue you must go back to an earlier save.
 * Boone or ED-E will not enter the Town Hall (First Floor) but will teleport to the Assembly Floor when the Courier enters that floor. This can take place after killing all the legion personnel outside the hall.
 * Sometimes, when fast traveling to Nipton, you may find a crucified prospector instead of a Powder Ganger. He can't be removed from the cross but he can be interacted with. He will most likely be killed by the bark scorpions by the next time you travel there.
 * Standing near the entrance of the Town Hall may trigger an attack from a Jackal Gang Member. It is unknown whether or not this attack was scripted or if the member had simply walked close enough to detect the character.
 * The people on the crosses can be removed from them in the event that you enter and suddenly exit the Nipton Town Hall. They will not walk but just stand there in front of their crosses. Some can be interacted with and some can be pickpocketed.
 * A generalized version of the above: the game may freeze or crash upon leaving Nipton in any direction, either on foot or by fast traveling. This tends to happen after a prolonged period of play, like an hour or more. Supposedly Nipton is heavy on memory, and the engine is so "optimized" it uses raw pointers to moveable or even freed heap chunks, causing all sorts of corruption after a disk swap. This issue is not specific to Nipton, it's just very prominent here.
 * If the Courier activates the mine in Nipton Hall, the worn key may glitch and get to an inaccessible place. This can be fixed using an explosive on the counter, resetting the worn key position.

Gallery
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