Three-Card Bounty

Three-Card Bounty is a side quest in Fallout: New Vegas.

Walkthrough
The Courier is tasked by Major Dhatri to assassinate 3 Fiend leaders operating around the South Vegas ruins, and bring their heads back to the Major as proof of the deed. The full reward is only given for an intact head. Killing with a headshot (or having the Bloody Mess perk) increase the chances of damaging the head.

Though each section of this quest is distinct, in that Dhatri assigns each portion individually, you can kill any of the Fiends at any time. Dhatri will accept their heads and give you the reward even if you didn't specifically ask to hunt them down.

Cook-Cook
Cook-Cook is the closest of the bounties to the airport, located just north of the South Vegas Ruins West Entrance in a makeshift camp built out of a broken-down building. He is surrounded by four to eight Fiends at all times, as well as his pet brahmin, Queenie. Cook-Cook himself is distinguished by his use of metal armor and an incinerator, as well as a flamer.

Killing Queenie causes Cook-Cook to frenzy.

Once you have the head, turn it in to Dhatri for your reward. Additional rewards can be gained later by speaking to 1st Recon Sniper Corporal Betsy at McCarran and Pretty Sarah in Westside, who will reward you for your "service to humanity".

Violet
Violet has no other Fiends to support her, but she does have a pack of dogs. Her camp is due south of the Poseidon Gas Station, which is a short distance southwest of Cook-Cook's camp. Her camp is built on top of an abandoned trailer park, allowing both Violet and her dogs to see you from a fair distance. The number of dogs varies. However, among them is Violetta, a unique dog with more health than the other dogs. Violetta's brain can be taken as part of Nothin' But a Hound Dog. Violet is dressed in standard raider armor, and does not have significantly more health than regular Fiends. She's armed with a hunting rifle, and is fairly accurate with it. Once you have her head, return to Dhatri.

Driver Nephi
Driver Nephi is the farthest away of the three, located northwest of the Samson Rock Crushing Plant. He will be guarded by Fiends, usually more than Cook-Cook had, and probably better-armed as well. Like Violet, Driver Nephi is not particularly tough because he wears raider armor and is armed with a melee weapon. However, Nephi's skill with his namesake golf club is considerable. Take him down before he can do any damage with it.

Prior to this section of the quest, you are given the chance to assemble 1st Recon at the Samson Rock Crushing Plant. They will take up position at the plant, and will fire upon Nephi if you lure him into range. Merely assembling them is enough to get a 300 cap bonus, even if you don't let them take a shot at Nephi. There is a minefield along their path to the plant. 1st Recon tends toward headshots, so they may prevent you from getting the full reward if allowed to do the job for you.

Upon completing this portion of the quest by claiming Nephi's bounty, the entire 1st Recon will move to Camp Forlorn Hope.

Journal entries
* The assassinations can be performed in any order, which will change the order of the journal entries.

Bugs

 * After killing Driver Nephi and returning the head to Major Dhatri by choosing the option to reclaim your bounty, Dharti may ask to see the head but nothing happens and the conversation ends. You must keep talking to him until the head is removed from your inventory and your bounty received. This may take several attempts.
 * After completion, Major Dhatri will no longer speak to you, making it impossible to talk to him about Bitter Springs.
 * Dhatri may say that there are two targets left when there is only one and other slightly bugged phrases, caused by killing a target which you had not told Dhatri you were going to kill yet. This has no effect on gameplay, but can make speech options difficult to navigate.

Behind the scenes
The title of this quest is a play on the name of the confidence game, Three-card Monte.

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