In the years since its inception way back in 1997, the Fallout franchise has established a dedicated fanbase and cemented its position as one of the most influential RPG video game series of all time. The most recent installment, Fallout 76, sees developers Bethesda Game Studios take the property in a bold new direction, abandoning Fallout’s single-player roots in favor of online multiplayer action.
The reaction from gamers and critics to this reinvention of the Fallout formula has been decidedly mixed, thanks in part to a messy open beta testing phase and the multitude of bugs present in the finished product. Nevertheless, plenty of players have enjoyed returning to the franchise’s post-apocalyptic setting, revelling in the fun that comes from exploring Fallout 76’s hyper-detailed West Virginia-inspired environments.
As you’d expect, long-time veterans of the series are leading the charge in this regard. Indeed, they’ve already unearthed a considerable amount of secret content and Easter eggs squirrelled away within Appalachia, where Fallout 76 takes place. They’ve also solved all of the game’s puzzles, exploited its many hidden means of progressing faster, and just generally tackled gameplay in ways that newcomers to the Fallout series wouldn’t even think of. We've provided you with a handy checklist of the skills you’ll need to master and bonus content you should be on the hunt for, if you want to live a long and healthy (digital) life in Appalachia!
Eager as ever to help gamers in need, here's a list of 20 Things Only Experts Know You Can Do In Fallout 76.
20. Discover Kent Connolly's Terminal Messages
Part of the appeal of the Fallout games is the rich history that supports its fictional world. Much of this is related to players through text discovered by reviewing computer screens, handwritten notes, and other old, discarded documentation. That said, Fallout 76 takes a fairly liberal approach to the series’ existing continuity.
We’re assuming that only committed Fallout regulars will know this, because we’re pegging them as the only players willing to go the extra mile and diligently locate every available source of in-game information. The pay off for all their hard work is a prose piece purportedly drafted by Fallout 4’s Kent Connolly, which provides sly commentary on the continuity errors contained within the narrative of Fallout 76!
JOIN THE ORDER OF MYSTERIES
Fallout 76 continues the franchise’s proud tradition of introducing different competing factions that the player can sign-up with. Some of these exclusive cliques are harder to join than others – with the shadowy Order of Mysteries arguably the toughest of the bunch. See, the trigger for this questline can only be found by searching random Young Woman NPC corpses scattered throughout the sprawling game map!
Rookies will likely be too overcome by the sheer size of Appalachia to make pit stops in every single game location to indulge in a bit of targeted grave robbing. Experts, on the other hand, will tirelessly frisk every deceased female NPC in their vicinity until they launch the Order of Mysteries missions – the completion of which promises highly upgradable weapons and armor.
18. Take A Nap In Vault 76
Fittingly, Fallout 76 kicks off in Vault 76 – the shelter that lends this latest instalment its name. Crucially, once players leave the safety of their strongroom abode, they cannot enter it ever again. Anything they want to do there, they need to do before making tracks for Appalachia.
Many newbies will rush out of Vault 76 pretty much straight away – and we don’t blame them. Who doesn’t want to start exploring a fully-realized, dystopian environment as soon as they can? Expert gamers, that’s who! These pros will anticipate the irreversibility of the decision to leave the vault, and sneak in a bit of shuteye before they bail. Seriously: players who take a quick nap in their bed before departing Vault 76 will gain the Well Rested effect for their troubles.
17. Embrace Your Inner Musician
An action/role-playing outing like Fallout 76 is hardly the first video game you’d expect to encourage players’ musical inclinations – but it totally does. Head out to The Forest, and search around until you find a dilapidated shelter. Inside, you’ll discover a harmonica and a banjo.
Casual Fallout fans will make the mistake of dismissing both instruments as set dressing, without any actual in-game value. They couldn't be more wrong. Playing either instrument for 30 seconds – something we expect hardcore devotees of the franchise to do – will bestow upon the player the benefits of the Well Tuned effect.
16. Encounter A Cryptid
Mutated monstrosities go hand-in-hand with Fallout’s post-nuclear war milieu – and Fallout 76 really ups the stakes on this score. In addition to the run-of-the-mill beasties prowling the great outdoors of Appalachia, there are Cryptids on the loose, as well.
Cryptids are the most bizarre creatures Fallout 76 has to offer. They count among their number the likes of the legendary Mothman – whose glowing eyes send shivers down the spines of even the most fearless gamers – and are well worth observing in the wild. However, these elusive NPCs only show up under specific circumstances, which makes encountering one a truly rare treat.
15. Change Your Character's Appearance Mid-Game
Virtually every modern day RPG game starts off by allowing gamers to customize the appearance of their in-game avatar. Fallout 76 is no different in this regard: upon booting up the game, players are confronted with a series of sliders with which they can modulate their character’s looks to a borderline-ludicrous degree.
At this point, rookies will fuss over the various physical attribute options presented to them, stressing out over getting their character looking just right before the fun begins. Not experts, though – these guys and gals will have already dived right on into playing the game, fully aware that cosmetic changes like these can be made on the fly mid-game!
TRANSFORM INTO SLENDERMAN
Bethesda Game Studios is notorious for releasing products riddled with bugs, a dubious trend that continues with Fallout 76. One such unfortunate (and at times, game-breaking) glitch, that – as of this list, at least – hasn’t yet been fixed occurs when players don power armor.
As those who’ve been playing Fallout 76 since the open beta testing phase can attest, suiting up in power armor carries with it a high level of risk. There’s a decent chance that doing so will transform you into a Slender Man or Woman. We’re not kidding around, here: equipping power armor has a habit of distorting the proportions of players’ avatar models so that they resemble the paranormal subject of Internet legend. Worse still, in some cases, their avatars are left wearing just underwear, as well.
13. Raid The Overseer's Office
The Overseer’s Office isn’t quite a secret area according to the strictest definition of the term. Nevertheless, it’s easy to overlook this spot in your haste to leave Vault 76 and begin roaming the rest of Appalachia. Ignore the Overseer’s Office at your peril, though – as any patient expert who’s visit this site will agree.
For starters, the room has a holotape which serves up greater insights into the overarching storyline of Fallout 76 – and as an added bonus, ticks the box for one of the game’s optional objectives, too. More importantly, there’s also the opportunity to pilfer a variety of Perk Cards that litter the Overseer’s table, which can be put towards boosting your S.P.E.C.I.A.L. attributes!
12. Join The Brotherhood Of Steel Early
The Brotherhood of Steel is one of the easier factions to join the ranks of – if you’ve completed the entire Raider Faction questline, you’ll be shunted in the Brotherhood’s direction next. That’s extremely convenient for rookie gamers happy, but pros are going to want the freedom to do things within their own accelerated time frame.
Fortunately, this is possible: experts who head straight for Abbie’s Bunker will be able to bypass the Raider Faction missions and enlist with the Brotherhood of Steel. This in turn puts them on the fast track towards earning a suit of Ultracite power armor – the reward for finishing the Brotherhood questline.
10. Scrap Fertiziler
Scrapping – the process of breaking down an inventory item to its basic components – is a vital habit to develop if you want survive for long in the world of Fallout 76. While there’s no real skill required to actually scrap an item, where experts outshine rookies is in their ability to identify items that can be scrapped in the first place.
Fertilizer is a prime example of this. Environments like Wixon Homestead have mounds of the stuff all over the place – which makes these areas untapped goldmines for more astute players. That’s because fertilizer can be “scrapped” into acid, one of two ingredients need to create gunpowder, which in turn brings you closer to manufacturing your own ammunition!
9. Hack Nuke Codes
Perhaps the most exciting gameplay mechanic introduced in Fallout 76 is the ability to bust into one of the many silos that pepper the game map and unleash a nuclear warhead on your fellow gamers. As designed by Bethesda Game Studios, launching a nuke is supposed to be a suitably involved process. Players are not only required to track down the necessary launch codes, but decrypt them as well.
But who has time for all that searching and decoding? Savvier (or busier) gamers will know to employ fan-made programs, like NukaCrypt, which automatically decipher the launch code fragments on their behalf.
7. Launch Their First Nuke Early
For less experienced players, the safest way to access Fallout 76’s Enclave faction questline – which culminates in the launching of a nuke – is to finish the Brotherhood of Steel missions first. Not only does this plan of attack make it clear where to find the Enclave, slogging through the Brotherhood’s assignments will ensure they’ve levelled up enough for the challenges ahead.
Experts won’t need to follow such a rigid path, however. For one thing, experts should make their way to the Abandoned Wastes Dump in the Mire well before taking a stab at the Brotherhood’s missions. What’s more, when they do skip straight ahead to the “Bunker Buster” mission, their character’s stats will almost certainly be sufficient to get them through, and before you know it, it’s “Bomb’s away!”
LOCATE AND USE CATAPULTS
Fallout 76’s game map is a sizable bit of business, and there are more than a few pleasant surprises dotting the landscape. Arguably the best of these unexpected treats are the catapults which can be found in the wastelands situated within Appalachia’s outermost southern reaches. Perched atop the mountain ranges that characterize this largely uncharted region, these medieval siege weapons were just waiting for players to find them.
Fortunately, it was only a matter of days before experts tracked them down, and it wasn’t long before skeletal remains could be seen hurtling through the sky. Indeed, the only disappointing aspect of these otherwise outrageously fun devices is that they can’t be used send rival gamers airborne!
4. Visit Final Pam's House
For those unfamiliar with Monster Factory, it’s a comedy web series co-hosted by Justin and Griffin McElroy which uses video game character creation tools to engineer hilarious character models. Of these, one of the weirdest (and by extension, beloved) was Final Pam, who was created using assets from Fallout 4.
It seems the team at Bethesda Game Studios were among those who found Final Pam endearingly gross, considering there’s a homage to her in Fallout 76! That’s right: experts who comb over every inch of Camden Park will discover a house chock full of Easter eggs – yes, that’s “eggs” plural – that relate to the most popular NPC to never actually appear in a Fallout title.
3. Encounter Pied Piper EyeBot
This entry represents easily the most random item on this list – which doesn’t make it any less worthwhile. Indulging their more whimsical side, the Fallout 76 developers inexplicably included a nod towards the Pied Piper of Hamelin popularized by German folklore. You read that right: there’s a unique EyeBot NPC that randomly spawns throughtout Appalachia, leading a trial of vermin whilst blaring flute music from its speakers!
As with the other spontaneously occurring oddities in Fallout 76, rookies and experts alike have a shot at crossing paths with this rat-catching drone. However, if we were the gambling sort, experts are likely to lay eyes on it first, just by virtue of how much time they’re inclined to spend immersed in the game’s virtual environment.
TRIP OVER THE REMAINS OF THE MOTHMAN CULT
Something that characterizes truly great video game world design is creating the convincing impression of a pre-existing reality for the player to step into. One way that developers achieve this is by sprinkling a game’s map with unexplained content to be found and pondered over. Doing this emulates real life, where we come across things we don’t fully comprehend all the time.
Take the deceased Mothman cultists in Fallout 76: expert players have reported seeing their corpses atop a ridge out in an unmarked location in the wilds of Appalachia. There’s no in-game explanation (yet) regarding what happened to these guys, but their inclusion is a nice little touch – especially the added detail of handwritten note one is carrying in their pocket.
FIND THE BREAKING BAD EASTER EGG
Breaking Bad may have wrapped up back in 2013, but AMC’s award-winning crime drama still has plenty of admirers. This includes the developers behind Fallout 76, who squeezed a Breaking Bad-themed Easter egg into the game, proving that there’s room for mirth even in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
Eagle-eyed experts who thoroughly explore the wilderness surrounding Hawke’s Refuge will spy a truck laden with suspicious-looking chemical barrels, adjacent to some semi-buried barrels of money. Completing this unusual tableau is a skeleton in a lab coat, with a gas mask and shovel lying nearby. Fans of Breaking Bad will immediately recognize this as an obvious shout-out to lead character Walter White and one of the show’s most famous scenes!
8. Ace The Knowledge Exam
Joining the Raider faction in Fallout 76 is less like enlisting with a bloodthirsty cadre of ruthless scavengers, and more like graduating from high school. After all, to become a card-carrying Raider, you need to pass three exams, one of which quizzes players on their knowledge of Appalachia and gauges their survival skills.
Luckily for more casual gamers new to the Fallout franchise, they can always find the answers in an online guide, earning them Raiders membership. It’s a different story for seasoned veterans of the series, though. Thanks to their familiarity with Fallout continuity and extensive gameplay experience, they’ll pass the Knowledge Exam with flying colors – without turning to the Internet for any pointers!
11. Examine The Mysterious Swarm Of Cargo Drones
Fallout 76 hasn’t even been (officially) live for a month yet, but hardcore fans are already engaging in intense speculation on online message boards regarding potential hidden content in the game. While some of this theorizing has already paid off – or is bound to yield results in the future – some of it seems destined to end in disappointment.
Take the unexplained phenomenon near the Mothman Museum that expert players were quick to note. For some reason, cargo drones continually flock here in numbers, hovering over an inaccessible area near the landmark. Of course, there’s an extremely high probability that the drones’ unusual behavior is simply the unintended consequence of a bug in their AI programming. Many fans aren’t buying that line of logic, however – insisting that there’s more going on here than meets the eye!
1. Acquire The Excavator Power Armor
Power armor is really important in Fallout 76 – in fact, gear like this can very often make all the difference when you’re in a tight spot. As such, players should be willing to go the ends of the Earth (or Appalachia, at least) to get their hands on a special suit of power armor.
Over the course of their travels, experts will eventually journey to the Ash Heap area, where the “Miner Miracles” secret mission can be accessed by interacting with an otherwise unremarkable poster. The main goal of this quest revolves around a crafting a suit of power armor: the Excavator Power Armor – an otherwise unobtainable item that bestows several significant benefits on its owner.
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What are some other things only experts know how to do in Fallout 76? Let us know in the comments!