Vault 34

Vault 34 is one of the Vault-Tec Vaults.

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 they 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.

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.

Preparation & Disclaimers

 * 1) Vault 34 has several map errors or oddities.
 * 2) There are two entrances on the World Map (one is a fence gate on the ground, another is a black pit on the top of the hill).  Both seem to take you to the same spot inside the hill though.
 * 3) The main level is called "Vault 34 - 1st Floor".  However, there will eventually appear an unmarked zone door that takes you to a previously-flooded portion of the 1st Floor, yet on the other side of that door, when you hover your cursor over it, it says it will take you to the 1st Floor.  So, a door to the 1st Floor, that's on the 1st Floor...
 * 4) There's a zone door in the 1st Floor that takes you to the Reactor zone, but if you put your cursor over it, it says Overseer's Office.
 * 5) There are only 3 Local Map zones in Vault 34:
 * 6) Vault 34 - 1st Floor
 * 7) Reactor
 * 8) Armory
 * 9) The 1st Floor zone actually has 4 floors (to avoid confusion, from here one I'll refer to them as "levels" instead).
 * 10) There are several doors (I've encountered 5 so far, though only 4 open I think) that, when you hover your cursor over them, they do not have a name and simply say [INACCESSABLE].  This is not technically true.  At least 4 of those doors lead to rooms.  3 of them you unlock through interacting with computers, and 1 (Behind which are 3 trapped Ghouls) opens behind you after you pass a certain trigger.
 * 11) The walkthrough below assumes your reason for entering Vault 34 is to reach the armory.
 * 12) The whole area around the entrance and throughout the Vault is irradiated.  The vast majority is light (only 1 Rad/Sec.).  No matter what gear you wear or meds you take, you will not be able to get rid of that single rad/sec.  However, once you reach the Armory zone (or the lower level of the Reactor zone), it ticks up to 3 Rads/Sec.  That is when Rad-X and a radiation suit will come in handy, as each will knock off one of those rads/sec, returning you back to just 1 Rad/Sec.  Since you can't avoid all of the radiation, RadAway is essential.  Depending on how quickly you move through the vault and your medicine skill, you could easily blow through 20+ RadAways.  Luckily, there is a Average-Lock safe mid-way through in the Clinic (see below) that has 14 Rad-X and 10 RadAways, so that will help, but you'll need to bring more Rad-Away with you before you enter.
 * 13) There are scripted events that spawn 2 Glowing Ones dressed as security guards behind you when you enter certain rooms.  They scared the crap out of me (I hate irradiated vaults) so I'm just putting them here for likeminded folks.  Those rooms are:
 * 14) Office
 * 15) Diner
 * 16) Systems Room
 * 17) Utility
 * 18) Overseer's Office
 * 19) There may have been 1-2 more
 * 20) This place wreaks havoc on your companion's pathfinding.  First, if you have ED-E, he will get hung up on the archway of nearly every doorway in here.  This seems to be especially true if you're sneaking.  My solution was to tell him to wait just inside the vault entrance.  I was able to get to the armory and back without ever losing his Enhanced Sensors perk and nothing spawned on him to kill him.  Second, because "passive" doesn't really mean passive, your companions will often run off ahead of you to track down Ghouls that somehow hear you through several concrete walls.  Sometimes these ghouls are behind INACCESSABLE doors.  If those ghouls see you, your companion will be forever stuck in front of that door, or worse yet, will magically teleport inside, kill the Ghouls, but be unable to teleport out.  If you want to bring one with you (and you will need at least 1 to haul everything out of the armory), then be a good sneaker, save often, and try to keep your companion on a very short leash.  Hopefully, one day soon, a mod will come out that gives you a true "passive" setting so your companions will actually be passive and ignore enemies.
 * 21) If at all possible, bring the Rebreather from Nellis AFB.  You're going to be swimming a bit and it helps take one more worry off your mind.

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.
 * I think 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.  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 orange Glowing One and appears to be squating on the desk.  Clear the room, deal with the 2 Glowing Ones that pop 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 McCarron, 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 survied, 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

 * Combat Armor
 * 6xVault 34 Security Armor (7, although one is unobtainable without console commands or explosives)
 * 6xVault 34 Security Helmet
 * 10x 10mm Pistol
 * 4x 10mm SMG
 * 2x Assault Carbine
 * Marksman Carbine
 * Missile Launcher
 * 2x Grenade Launcher
 * Minigun
 * Riot Shotgun
 * 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.
 * Detonator
 * 3x C-4 plastic explosive
 * 2x Sniper Rifle
 * Guns and Bullets On the small metal table between the sofas by the pool table, in the Armory Common room.
 * Vault 34 jumpsuit
 * 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
 * Render Unto Caesar

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).

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.

fell outside of the map whilst walking up the stairs on the 3rd floor.