NCR dogtag

NCR dogtags are a quest item in Fallout: New Vegas.

Background
Some of these were irradiated in the Camp Searchlight incident.

Characteristics
These military identity tags are carried by NCR soldiers. Generic troopers will always have their tags in their inventory, but named characters will not. The tags are weightless and count as quest items, making them impossible to remove without console commands. Furthermore, the NCR dogtags won't be removed from the player character's inventory upon entering the Sierra Madre.

The dogtags have several purposes in the game. The two most singificant ones are turning them in to either the NCR Army (Tags of Our Fallen) or the Legion (Arizona Scavenger).
 * For the NCR, Quartermaster Mayes at Camp Forlorn Hope will accept these dogtags. His tent can be found to the right of the command tent. He will pay with a minor increase in NCR fame and two caps per tag.
 * For the Legion, Aurelius of Phoenix at Cottonwood Cove will accept them in exchange for Caesar's Legion fame, and a reward of 10 caps each. Passing a Barter check of 35 with Aurelius of Phoenix grants the opportunity to turn in dogtags to Decanus Severus for ammunition and supplies. The dog tags offer an easy and convenient method to increase Legion fame: For example, turning in 30 tags at one time will increase reputation by a staggering 60 points. For details, see Arizona Scavenger.

Finally, they can also be used to create the dog tag fist, after the appropriate schematic has been acquired from Pvt. Halford at Camp Guardian. Since dogtags are not removed upon entering the Sierra Madre, it's possible to exploit this bug to craft a weapon with a slightly higher DPS than the bear trap fist.

Locations

 * Living characters
 * Virtually all NCR soldiers carry them and about 50 NCR dogtags can be stolen from unnamed NCR soldiers in Mojave Outpost, Camp McCarran, New Vegas Strip, Camp Golf and Las Vegas Boulevard station. They can be pickpocketed with little chance of failure, as they are weightless.
 * NCR soldiers carrying dogtags may be found fighting Fiends south of Camp McCarran, and near The Basincreek Building and Allied Technologies offices.
 * Troops called with the NCR emergency radio carry dogtags.
 * Dead characters
 * Three dogtags can be found on NCR corpses inside the collapsed overpass tunnel.
 * Camp Guardian caves: 11 dogtags can be found on the fallen soldiers. One more tag may be taken from Private Halford in the caves. There is no Karma or NCR reputation loss for killing him.
 * Hills northwest of the California Sunset Drive-in, near the Canyon wreckage: A dogtag may be found on a dead NCR soldier in this location.
 * Nipton Hotel: Four dogtags can be found on the dead NCR soldiers inside. The hotel is located to the west of the Nipton town hall. These four corpses will de-spawn if the Courier has visited the Nipton Hotel before.
 * During the mission Restoring Hope 3 dogtags can be found on dead NCR Troopers around the supply shipment.

Related quest

 * Arizona Scavenger
 * Tags of Our Fallen

Behind the scenes
They are identical in appearance to their Brotherhood of Steel counterpart. However, when turned into a dog tag fist they change appearance, lacking the glowing blue holographic section and having half of the black trim removed.

Bugs

 * Most troopers and named soldiers at Camp Forlorn Hope are set up to receive a set of dogtags when killed, this in addition to the dogtags most already carry, meaning corpses of Forlorn Hope personnel will frequently be found with two sets of dogtags.
 * It is sometimes possible for known corpses carrying NCR dogtags to be found alive. This is an issue with the Gamebryo engine. If the player attempts to kill the non-player character who has been found alive, it will result in the usual Karma/reputation penalties as with killing any other non-player character.
 * Skirmishes between the Legion and NCR soldiers between Camp Forlorn Hope and Nelson may not occur, forcing the player to look elsewhere for dogtags.