History FalloutNewVegas / TropesEToH

* EarnYourHappyEnding: Regardless of who ultimately gains control of the Mojave Wasteland, typically the ending has some communities prospering, while others suffer (with much more suffering and less prospering if you sided with the Legion). However, it actually is possible to get a positive outcome for almost every community and character on the NCR and (to a marginally lesser extent) House and Independent routes. Doing so is ''difficult'', however, as the conditions to bring about a community or character's positive outcome are not always obvious (and in some cases are even counter-intuitive), and often involve difficult speech checks or extensive exploration.

** Caesar's best Elite Mooks are his PraetorianGuard; hand-to-hand masters armed with the best punching weapon in the game. Next are his Centurions, who aren't quite as tough as most of the game's Elite Mooks, but come equipped with the best armor and weapons available to the Legion. Finally, if you really piss the Legion off they'll send a squad of crack assassins to end you.

** If you're working for Mr. House or for Yes Man, have saved the NCR president and/or done some good for the NCR, their troopers will actively help you out in fighting the Legion. However, this is because they genuinely don't know that you're no longer working for them.
** Also, it's possible to get the Great Khans, the Brotherhood of Steel and [[spoiler:the Enclave Remnants]] to fight for the NCR despite historically being some of their greatest and most hated enemies. This is especially significant for the Khans, who have been the bitter enemies of the Vault dwellers who founded Shady Sands (the settlement of which the NCR originated from) ever since they were rival factions within Vault 15.
*** This trope is most prevalent specifically with [[spoiler:Orion Moreno]], who hates the NCR with a burning passion, and won't forgive them for the events of ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 2}}''. You have to ''really'' convince him to go along with it. The other four Remnants know that they can do their job without him, but wouldn't be as effective since he's the muscle of the group. It comes down to having him put aside his hatred in order to focus on the fact that he'll be once again using his beloved heavy weapons and bloodlust to kill bad guys again like he loved to do in his glory days.

* EquippableAlly: The aforementioned Cyberdog guns, and the Stealth Suit from ''Old World Blues''. A slavishly loyal RobotGirl who reminds you to turn off your Pip-Boy lamp when sneaking, feeds you medicine when you get hurt (50% HP), and is brokenhearted when you take her off.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: The slave traders encountered during the quest ''The Coyotes'' are freaked out by Cook-Cook's psychotic tendencies.
** Certain individuals like Heck Gunderson are made out to be corporate monsters of the worst caliber. Yet, it's hard to fault his anger when his son is kidnapped [[spoiler:by cannibals masquerading as hotel staff]].

** Perhaps the game's crowning example, Dean Domino [[spoiler:planned the heist of the Sierra Madre that doomed his rival Sinclair and his lover-turned-stooge Vera, all because Sinclair was ''happy'' and Dean wasn't, deluding himself into thinking Sinclair was a self-righteous upstart rubbing his success in everyone's nose to justify his vendetta.]] 204 years of living in the hellhole that became of the Sierra Madre did nothing to dull this attitude either; he's still the self-absorbed, sniveling, perpetually unhappy prick he was the day the resort closed to the world (with more survival skills of course). If he lives through the events of ''Dead Money'', he doesn't change all that much either [[spoiler:except for setting his sights on the splendor and riches of Vegas instead]].

* EvilVersusEvil: The entire [[spoiler:''Lonesome Road'' DLC]], if the player character is evil.
** An evil Courier who sides against Caesar's Legion can count as well. You don't even ''have'' to side with the NCR, you can do the Yes Man or House ending as long as you're a horrible person killing other horrible people.
* EvilWillFail: Caesar's Legion is a raider slaver-state with little agriculture and no industry to speak of, paired with an ideology that rejects most post-industrial science. Only the sheer charisma of Caesar keeps the whole thing together, and if Caesar dies (either from [[spoiler:his brain tumour]] or the actions of the Courier) then his successor struggles to keep the state functioning.

** Both NCR and Caesar's Legion are Balanced, with a slight differences in their strengths. NCR has superior technology but the majority of their forces have only received basic military training. Legion eschews advanced technology, but even their average footsoldier has trained heavily.

** Due to how [=SPECIAL=] stats work, you can sneak by [=NPCs=] in broad daylight provided that their perception is low and your sneak skill is high enough. Compounded with what the game considers "dark area," you could potentially stand next to a high-perception NPC against a brightened backdrop, provided you're in the shadows.
*** This can be averted when the developers don't want you to sneak past some enemies and give them incredible perception, so they can find you when invisible.

* FakeDifficulty: Cazadores have an ever-present bug (no pun intended) that makes targeting their heads in VATS impossible unless it's already targeted when you go into VATS.
** Cazadores as a whole can end up being FakeDifficulty because of one easily exploited, but never mentioned trick: Shooting their wings slows them to a crawl, to a point where they're only marginally faster then the Courier backpedaling. Not only that, but their wings tend to be extremely easy to cripple. These tricks help make the once nightmare-inducing Cazadores into easy 50 XP shots. Too bad [[ColdSniper Boone]] never tries this.

%%* FastForwardMechanic: The "Wait" action.

** The Canyon Wreckage, located west of Primm, oozes this.
*** At first, the Canyon Wreckage just looks like a pile of rusted vehicles with some coyotes denning near them... until you see the graffiti, which mentions "Lonesome Road" (now the confirmed name of the last DLC), the Divide, and the cryptic message, "You can go home now, Courier." And, if you look on the map, you'll see that the canyon the wreckage is blocking is the only path through the western mountains.

*** The setting of ''Old World Blues'' is also alluded by Christine as she was trapped and experimented on within the Big MT. She also mentions the aforementioned Ulysses as the courier who rescued her. Sound familiar?

** In addition, the player may end up wiping out the Brotherhood of Steel after being made a member, given that wiping the Brotherhood out is a required part of the “Render Unto Caesar” and “The House Always Wins” questlines, and it becomes unavoidable in the “For The Republic” questline if you replace McNamara with Hardin.

** It might not completely derail the story of the game, but if you complete Thomas Hildern's sidequest at Vault 22 before Rose of Sharon Cassidy becomes a companion, then while delivering to him for Alice McLafferty of Crimson Caravan, he has no dialogue options allowing him to receive it, meaning Alice can never update her quest to the stage where you have to go and buy Cassidy Caravans and thus it is impossible to recruit Cass unless you start a new game and complete her recruitment quest beforehand.

* GayOption: Fallout 3's male-only [[TheCasanova Lady Killer]] and female-only BlackWidow perks are joined by the new male-only [[HoYay Confirmed Bachelor]] and female-only [[LesYay Cherchez la Femme]]. A Courier who is so inclined can take [[AnythingThatMoves both]].

** [[spoiler:It's heavily implied through the investigation that the whole reason Jeannie sold Boone's wife to the Legion was because she critiqued her hotel.]]
** Dean Domino [[spoiler:planned the heist of the Sierra Madre that doomed his rival Sinclair and his lover-turned-stooge Vera, because Sinclair was "happy" and Dean wasn't.]] Exactly 204 years later, and he's still the selfish, petty, and unhappy prick he was the day the Sierra Madre closed to the world (with more survival skills of course). He doesn't change after leaving the Sierra Madre either.

* GadgeteerGenius: The Jury Rigging perk, which allows you to repair any weapon or armor with a somewhat similar piece of equipment. A PowerFist with some boxing tape? A shishkebab with a rolling pin? A PowerArmor helm with a pair of sunglasses? You can do that. [[TooDumbToLive The reverse is also true]].

** The NCR, Caesar's Legion, and Mr. House are competing in a high-stakes tournament with New Vegas as the prize, and they're all trying to stack the deck in their favor -- and you're the WildCard. The core conflict is NCR and the Legion both fighting for control of the Dam and New Vegas. Beyond this basic plot, [[spoiler:House has an army of robots waiting to swoop in and steal the land literally right from under the Legion. The NCR and Legion both know this, and potentially have him assassinated. On top of that, Benny is planning to take over New Vegas by overthrowing House, as are the Omertas, except they plan on allying with the Legion first. You, the Courier, can at the same time also be planning to take over New Vegas by overthrowing House and stealing his army with the help of Yes Man, while either aiding or foiling the Omertas. Then the DLC just adds more gambits; Father Elijah of ''Dead Money'' manipulates the Think Tank, Courier, Dean Domino, and Dog/God into helping him obtain experimental pre-War technology in his attempt to conquer the Mojave by killing most of post-apocalyptic America's remaining population, and can potentially succeed in bringing what's left of the world under his control (though unlike other options, this gives a NonStandardGameOver). The Think Tank of ''Old World Blues'' manipulates the Courier and Mobius in hopes that they'll be able to break out of Big MT and cause trouble in the Mojave, while Mobius already has an long-running scheme going on to make sure that The Think Tank aren't going anywhere while making sure the Courier is able to retake all of their removed body parts. And on top of all of this, Ulysses from ''Lonesome Road'' is planning on nuking both the Legion ''and'' the NCR’s supply lines to prevent them from bringing further reinforcements to the Mojave in hopes that with both being cut off from their nations, they’ll be forced to create a new society in the Mojave instead of trying to recreate societies that failed.]] That's about ten gambits, all trying to top one another. You decide which one (or combination of them) comes out on top.
** The Sierra Madre opening was a giant gambit pileup. [[spoiler:The maintenance crews embezzling money away from the construction; Vera and Domino planning to rob the casino; Sinclair's attempts to foil them, as well as him forcing employees and visitors to visit the vending machines for food and drugs, creating black markets; Big MT testing out incredibly sharp knives, faulty hazmat suits and auto-docs, and deadly gas. All this resulted in the guests getting trapped inside the casino, and subsequently massacred by the holograms, Ghost People, or the Cloud.]]

** Though it doesn't break the rest of the game, a glitch can completely screw over the town of Novac -- Chris Haversam randomly runs away and/or vanishes, preventing the player from finishing "Come Fly With Me" and thus getting anything other than a negative ending for the town as the ghouls in the nearby [[spoiler:help the town defend against or evacuate from Caesar's Legion]].

** All the legendary creatures (including the [[BonusBoss Legendary Deathclaw]]) are accompanied by other, non-legendary (but by no means weak) normal creatures.

* EternalEnglish: Zig-zagged. Most people from the NCR to Caesar's Legion speak an English that's recognizable to their Pre-War ancestors, with the likes of Raul speaking Spanish as well. Tribals like the ones in Zion on the other hand speak a sort of creole based on their original founders native tongues--the Dead Horse language, for example, is a mashup of English, German and Navajo.

* EternalEnglish: Zig-zagged. Most people from the NCR to Caesar's Legion speak an English that's recognizable to their Pre-War ancestors, with the likes of Raul speaking Spanish as well. Tribals like the ones in Zion on the other hand speak tongues that, while descended from English and whatever other languages said Tribals' founders spoke, are nigh unintelligible.

** You will fight a large amount of these guys in the final battle depending on the side you choose. Thankfully, you will be helped by Securitrons or Elite Mooks on your side.

** Downplayed with the Kings, who set up shop in an Elvis impersonation school. While the man's name is lost to time, there's enough left over for the Kings to figure out more or less what their hangout was used for and who "the King" was, though they think it was a place for ''[[AllHailTheGreatGodMickey worshipping him]]''.

* ExactWords: How Fantastic convinced the NCR to put him in charge of Helios One despite his complete incompetence:

* FanDisservice: Beatrix Russell, a cowboy-type with a taste for [[WhipItGood whips]] and domination. When you recruit her to work as a dominatrix at the Atomic Wrangler, she dons a {{Stripperiffic}} outfit consisting of a [[BlackBraAndPanties Black Bra and]] [[HellBentForLeather (leather)]] [[BlackBraAndPanties Panties]], a [[OfCorsetsSexy Corset]], cowboy hat, and chains. Only problem? She's a ghoul, though. You can sleep with her as well. The screen fades to black out and you don't see anything but you can hear...[[HellIsThatNoise sounds...]]

* GrayAndGreyMorality: [[spoiler:NCR and Mr. House both plan to drive each other out of New Vegas.]] Neither of them are any more villainous or altruistic than the other.

** The NCR, Caesar's Legion, and Mr. House are competing in a high-stakes tournament with New Vegas as the prize, and they're all trying to stack the deck in their favor -- and you're the WildCard. The core conflict is NCR and the Legion both fighting for control of the Dam and New Vegas. Beyond this basic plot, [[spoiler:House has an army of robots waiting to swoop in and steal the land literally right from under the Legion. The NCR and Legion both know this, and potentially have him assassinated. On top of that, Benny is planning to take over New Vegas by overthrowing House, as are the Omertas, except they plan on allying with the Legion first. You, the Courier, can at the same time also be planning to take over New Vegas by overthrowing House and stealing his army with the help of Yes Man, while either aiding or foiling the Omertas. Then the DLC just adds more gambits; Father Elijah of ''Dead Money'' manipulates the Think Tank, Courier, Dean Domino, and Dog/God into helping him obtain experimental pre-War technology in his attempt to conquer the Mojave by killing most of post-apocalyptic America's remaining population, and can potentially succeed in bringing what's left of the world under his control (though unlike other options, this gives a NonStandardGameOver). The Think Tank of ''Old World Blues'' manipulates the Courier and Mobius in hopes that they'll be able to break out of Big MT and cause trouble in the Mojave, while Mobius already has an long-running scheme going on to make sure that The Think Tank aren't going anywhere while making sure the Courier is able to retake all of their removed body parts. And on top of all of this, Ulysses from ''Lonesome Road'' is planning on nuking both the Legion ''and'' the NCR while leaving the Mojave to die.]] That's about ten gambits, all trying to top one another. You decide which one (or combination of them) comes out on top.

** [[spoiler:Nuking the NCR or Legion home territories]] in ''Lonesome Road'' has no effect on the final battle at Hoover Dam, aside from royally pissing off the factions in question (and both factions will forgive you no-questions asked if you do this before you get their [[GetOutOfJailFreeCard Get-Out-of-Jail-Free Cards]]).