Vault 34

Vault 34 is one of the Vault-Tec Vaults located in the Mojave Wasteland.

Background
As part of the Vault Experiment, the armory was overstocked with weapons, ammo and not provided with a lock (although an Overseer's log says he had a lock installed on it after a riot). It was also equipped with a great amount of recreational facilities (such as a full-sized swimming pool), but at the cost of living space. The location of this Vault is in the Mojave Wasteland. By 2281, it still has people living in it, although most have become Feral ghouls. They are, however, still able to speak with some level of intelligence. While in combat they may shout words like 'pain', etc (other ghouls have been observed speaking in combat outside of the Vault, whether they are from Vault 34 or not is unknown). There are still a few non-ghoulified Vault dwellers remaining, being trapped somewhere within the ruins.

According to the Boomers historian Pete they used to occupy the Vault 34, but they got sick of not being allowed to use their weapons so they left and started a community at Nellis. Chris Haversam also claims to have come from Vault 34, so the Vault has fallen into chaos in recent years, perhaps less than a decade.

According to various terminals inside the vault, Vault 34 suffered overpopulation at some point, which the Overseer wanted to "fix". For obvious reasons, the Vault Dwellers revolted, attempting to riot and gain control of the armory. During the riot, the vault's reactor vents were damaged, which combined with the flooding caused by a bomb detonating in the Vault's pool, doomed the inhabitants to a lethal dose of radiation.

Walkthrough
The vast majority of the action occurs in the zone called "Vault 34 - 1st Floor". That zone is comprised of 4 different levels.

1st Floor - Level 1

 * Office

This is the level you enter from the cave inside the hill. After you pass through the the cog-like vault door, you're on the upper level of the standard Atrium. Across the gangway to your left is a room marked Office (not the Overseer's Office) with a computer that gives you some background on what happened but is not necessary to visit. To your right is a staircase that takes you down to Level 2.

1st Floor - Level 2

 * Diner

The only thing on this floor is the bottom of the Atrium and the Diner.

1st Floor - Level 3

 * Clinic
 * Utility
 * Systems Room
 * Operations (where the 3 ghouls are trapped behind the INACCESSABLE door)
 * Flooded staircase 1 (later becomes the way to Security Station A)
 * Flooded staircase 2
 * Door to Reactor zone (marked as Overseer's Office)
 * Door to Armory zone

This is where most of the action takes place. This level is almost completely linear, meaning you can't go in circles. There's basically one windy path with rooms on it. You do have to double-back once or twice, but it's pretty straightforward. Here's the quick path to the Armory:
 * Find the 1st flooded staircase, swim down, find a dead Glowing One stuck under a desk. Loot the corpse and get the Security password.  While you're down there, you may notice an INACCESSBLE door.  This will later become the door to Security Station A.
 * The Clinic is ahead of you. In there is a Average safe with 14 Rad-X and 10 RadAway.
 * Continue through the Clinic to a new hallway and find the 2nd flooded staircase, swim down, find a dead Glowing One stuck under a desk. Loot the corpse and get the Utility password.
 * Continue on towards the door to the Armory. Just before that door, on your left, is the Utility room.  Access the computer there and activate the pumps (Science skill 100).  This will drain the water from the 1st flooded staircase, and a zone door will appear just before that staircase.  This is the door that, technically, just teleports you to another part of "Vault 34-1st Floor", but you do have to zone, and the door on the other side says "1st Floor".  Anyway, Security Station A is now here.
 * Backtrack to the formerly flooded 1st staircase, teleport to the super secret other part of 1st Floor, and now you can get through that formerly INACCESSABLE door. Continue on through Security Station A and find another computer.  This one unlocks the Overseer's Office.
 * Go back to the main 1st Floor zone, backtrack to the Clinic, and around the corner from one of the doors to the clinic is a zoning door that (eventually) leads to the Overseer's Office.

Reactor

 * You are now in the Reactor Zone. Just down the hall will be another INACCESSABLE door on your left that is labled Operations.  To the right is the Overseer's Office.  Straight on ahead is just some windy halls that lead to a room labled Security and some loot and Ghouls, nothing fancy.
 * The Overseer's Room: The desk has already been raised to expose the secret stairway. On the underside of that raised desk are 2 "Vault-Tec Turrets".  The Overseer has been turned into an feral reaver and appears to be squating on the desk.  Clear the room, deal with the 2 Glowing Ones that appear behind you in the hall you entered from, and access the computer.  Use it to unlock the Armory.

CHOICE: At this point you can take a detour. If you go down the stairs under the Overseer's desk, you'll be taken to the actual Reactor room. Again, very linear, you can't get lost. If you didn't trigger it inside the East Pumping Station (a different map location outside but near Vault 34), fooling around down there will trigger a new quest. It does appear in your Quest sheet, but you don't get any XP for finishing it, nor loot or caps. One path will earn you some NCR rep though. In short, you can choose to kill the reactor, which will save the soil (and the farming efforts) outside McCarran, or you can transfer control to a little group of Vault 34 survivors holed up somewhere else in the vault. Killing the reactor earns you NCR rep. Saving the vault dwellers doesn't seem to do anything. They may be found later at the Aerotech slum.

If you don't want to bother with that, just head back to the 1st Floor zone.

Vault 34 - 1st Floor (again)
Head back towards the Utility room, and just past it is the zone door to the Armory.

Armory (finally)
Wind your way through some hallways and maybe an Equipment room but eventually you get to the actual Armory door (which should now be unlocked). There are 3 Ghouls in there. Save before going in of course. Once the room is cleared, so long as your companion survived, you're sitting pretty. There's one of nearly every kind of mid- to higher-level gun in here, plus several bits of Vault 34 Security Armor and ammo. There is a Minigun and Missile Launcher in there, and they're heavy, as is the ammo if you're playing Hardcore, which is why it's good to have a companion, with you. Even if you don't use those big guns, they fetch a good price at market. Much higher value-to-weight ratio than in FO3. There's also the unique Marksman Carbine called the All-American in there.

Vault 34 - 1st Floor
Be sure to grab ED-E on your way out if you told him to wait for you.

Notable Loot

 * 10x 10mm Pistol
 * All-American on an overturned table in the armory
 * Pulse Gun in a Very Hard locked gun case on the floor next to a table, unless you have the key from Nellis AFB from Veronica's Quest. The key can be taken from the filing cabinets immediately to the right when you first walk into Pearl's barracks.  Sneak as this is a crime and will result in karma loss
 * Detonator
 * Guns and Bullets On the small metal table between the sofas by the pool table, in the Armory Common room.
 * 2x Patriot's Cookbooks
 * Fixin' Things
 * True Police Stories
 * 2x Milsurp Reviews

Enemies

 * There are Golden Geckos or Fire Geckos, depending on your level, at the entrance of the vault.
 * Inside the Vault, there are several different types of Feral ghouls named Vault Dwellers, Vault Security Officers, or Vault Technicians and the Vault Overseer, a unique Glowing One with more HP and stronger attacks.
 * The Overseer of the Vault has two Turrets that defend him inside his office.

Location
Vault 34 is located just East of the New Vegas Strip and Southeast of New Vegas Medical Clinic.

Related Quests

 * Hard Luck Blues
 * I Could Make You Care
 * Et Tumor, Brute?

Appearances
Vault 34 was first mentioned in the Fallout Bible and appears in Fallout: New Vegas.

Bugs
Saving inside the Overseer's office will result in a corrupted game save. Clear the Vault but do not enter the armory, unlock the armory from the Overseer's terminal, or save within the Overseer's office. You may go into the Overseer's office but can not save inside. The Armory is completely off limits until a patch resolves the problem. (I encountered no such glitch on the Xbox360. It appears to have been solved as of the latest update, although it's possible mine was a unique case)

Found glitch where the vault technician under the desk has its inventory listed as [Empty]. 'Opening' the technician will show an empty inventory with no password. Could not solve problem via reloading. (Verified on PC when using science skill to hack computer in the utility room and pumping out the water before going to look for the technician). ***You cannot pump out the water before getting the passwords otherwise the notes do not spawn.***

If you have Rex as a companion and tell him to wait for you outside of Vault 34 (or even in other places, such as Novac), he will appear inside the Vault while you are fighting (and probably die).

Boone and ED-E keep appearing in the vault, after having been ordered to stay in Novac. Happened twice. PC, patched version.

Telling your companion to wait outside of the vault may not work, as they may enter a while after you made your way in. This can be problematic if played on Hardcore, since if you didn't kill all the ghouls, they may swarm the companion - resulting in their death, which you had no idea had entered in the first place.

Fell outside of the map while walking up the stairs on the 3rd floor.

ED-E will randomly appear in the vault after repairing him.

Shirtless Vault Dwellers cannot be harmed and are immune to the Console "Kill" command, they however are affected by the "TAI" Toggle AI command and the "Dissable" command.

Videos
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