Fat Man (Fallout: New Vegas)

The Fat Man is a weapon in Fallout: New Vegas.

Characteristics
The tactical nuclear catapult returns in Fallout: New Vegas. It has the same appearance to the Fat Man in Fallout 3, but unlike its predecessor, its effectiveness is governed by the user's Explosives skill, rather than phased-out "Big Guns" skill.

The Fat Man is an effective mortar/artillery weapon, allowing the player to bombard a large area with good precision and deadly force. However, most power armour can withstand mini nuke blasts, even direct ones.

It has a greater range than the Fallout 3 Fat Man, with the projectile traveling further before dropping. This effect should be taken into account when using the Fat Man.

Mods

 * Fat Man Little Boy kit: Decreases its weight by half (30 lbs. to 15 lbs.)

Locations

 * A Fat Man can be found on a dead prospector in Cottonwood Crater with a few golden geckos surrounding the crater. Cottonwood Crater can be found at the south of the map on top of a mountain at X-15.5 Y-1 (counting colored ticks, not individual ones), to the east of Searchlight Airport. When coming for the airport, you have to make your way around the mountain a little in order to get up to the top.
 * There is also another one with a mini nuke in the Quarry Junction (in a radioactive puddle of water), though it is guarded by a lot of deathclaws, including a mother and the alpha male.
 * Another is located in Nopah Cave on the dead body of a super mutant master. The cave contains fire geckos which can swarm you and do a lot of fire damage. Upon return several days later, this super mutant master will be found alive with another Fat Man and only a small amount of health. He continues to respawn every few days thereafter.
 * Can be bought from the Brotherhood Armory in Hidden Valley after you are granted full access.
 * A Fat Man and 3 mini nukes can be pickpocketed (or looted) from a Boomer while they are sleeping in one of 3 tents to the southeast of the mess hall & munitions storage at Nellis Air Force Base. If killed, this Boomer respawns every 3 days, providing a steady source of mini nukes.
 * Can be bought in the Boomer munitions manager in the mess hall & munitions storage at Nellis Air Force Base in good condition. However, the player first needs Pearl's permission to trade with him by gaining fame with the boomers.
 * A Fat Man can be found on the body of a super mutant master near a cazador nest directly south of Jacobstown. You go here to gather cazador eggs during the quest Bleed Me Dry. The area is accessible by going west from Red Rock Canyon, over some very steep trails (the player might need to do some tricky jumping on the rocks in the side of the trail to get up the initial slope).
 * Two Fat Mans can be randomly purchased from Blake at the Crimson Caravan Company.
 * At high levels one can be found on a legionary blacksmith at The Fort.

Behind the scenes

 * The names of Fat Man and its mod Little Boy are references to the code names of the atomic bombs dropped by the United States on Japan in World War II. Little Boy was dropped on Hiroshima while Fat Man was dropped on Nagasaki.
 * Just like in Fallout 3, the weapon is renamed the Nuka Launcher in the Japanese translation of Fallout: New Vegas due to its relation to Japanese history. However, the Little Boy mod still has the same name.

Bugs

 * There is a glitch where if you kill an enemy that had his/her weapon equiped, then equip your Fat Man and go pick up the dead enemy's gun (from the ground, not their inventory). The ammo from his/her dead body will transfer into mini nukes and be put into your inventory. Example: Kill a fiend shooting at you with a laser rifle, then on his/her dead body you will see their hands still clutching their weapon. Shoot the arm that is holding the weapon and it will pop onto the ground. Proceed to equip the desired gun needing your prefered ammunition, then pick up the laser rifle. How ever many microfusion cells were on the fiend's body will be transfered into the amount of mini nukes/alien powers cells/etc... put into your inventory. This can also be done with the alien blaster and almost if not all other ranged weapons. (This glitch works the best with a Laser RCW so that you can get up to 60 mini nukes at a time. Tested Xbox 360, works if done correctly) Note: In order for this glitch to work you must have the patch deleted (pre-patch).
 * Sometimes when a second mini nuke is fired to a distant location, an explosion will not be seen.
 * There is a bug where non-hitscan projectiles with explosions on impact do not apply projectile damage, only explosion damage. Since the Fat Man does not shoot hitscan projectiles, it is affected by this bug.
 * If you cripple your legs and go into third person, it will look like your character is holding the fat man, but there will be nothing there. Instead, it will be laying on the ground near you or floating in the air. If you fire it the nuke will go in whatever direction it is aiming. Confirmed on Xbox 360.