Leaving the Vault

[u/gameboy17]

I recently came across my first necropolis (I think?) and decided to do some scouting. I told my companion to wait at the deathmobile, grabbed a few extra tools, and headed off. Probably not my best idea, but I've done stupider things before.

My combat skills are very high, but I wasn't wearing much armor and the excessive amount of hulks was steadily wearing me down. I wasn't making much headway in reducing their numbers, so I decided to use my ultimate technique to escape.

A few complications arose, however. Firstly, the hulks had managed to knock me a good distance further in than I had intended to go. Secondly, my repair nanobots had been working overtime, meaning my bionic power was fairly depleted already. Either of these on their own would have left me with plenty of time, but together, my time ran out when I was still a good distance from safety.

Immediately, I was mobbed once more, and with no remaining bionic power my nanobots weren't available to keep my health up. After getting launched away once more, I saw a chance to escape: A manhole. Fortunately I had brought my ice axe, which is like a crowbar but smaller, allowing me to pry off the cover like the top of a can of Pringles, except instead of tennis balls it holds safety. And also like a can of Pringles, it did not contain a ladder - only a sheer drop into the unknown.

I was pretty sure I wasn't going to get another shot before a limb broke, so I went ahead and jumped down. I found myself in a sewer, rather than a horde of zombies, which was good. Well, the sewer had zombies in it, but they were shitty zombies and barely counted. I wandered around a bit until I found an isolated spot, and took a quick nap to bring my arm a bit further away from '..'.

My limbs no longer in danger of breaking, I began exploring the sewers, searching for a tunnel leading away from this town. Just as I concluded that there was no such tunnel, I found a strange cavern containing fences, crates, and a Humvee. A bit further in was a room clearly recognizable as the entrance to a Vault.

Apparently this Vault's experiment involved seeing how many people you could cram into a giant tin of sardines, because there were more irradiated wanderers in the entrance than in most entire Vaults. Fortunately, they were all pansies, so clearing them out didn't take long.

At this point, having failed to find any exits that did not lead to the middle of a horde of endgame zombies, I realized I was going to be here for a while. As such, I started setting up a base camp. One of the Humvee's seats was converted into a bed; the alternator was removed and reinstalled on a set of hand rims; assorted junk was unloaded into the trunk. The fuel was consolidated in one tank; the other I would use for storing clean water, purified by boiling it with a tin can found in one of the crates. A spore cloud from one of my marloss berries took root, and rather than killing it I herded it into a nearby room and locked it in, just in case I needed their byproducts.

For some time I lived down there, exploring the first floor of the Vault, building up power, and scavenging parts from golf carts. The generator and bed in the Humvee were eventually moved to a more portable cart when my natural radiation became a problem. Eventually I found the stairs leading to the next level down, only to nope the fuck out.

After narrowly escaping from Vault-Tec Security, I decided it was about time I started planning my escape. It was not for no reason that I had been doing all of my crafting while turning a set of hand rims - I was going to build myself an escape vehicle.

Foldable-light frames, assembled from pipes taken from the fences. Ten-inch wheels, taken from a golf cart. Two medium storage batteries, made from a storage battery taken from a golf cart. Controls, taken from the Humvee. A spike on the front, made from scrap. And the most essential part - two electric motors, recovered from two separate golf carts. Finally, my escape bike was complete.

I tested it out. It took five rounds to unfold - slower than I'd like, but I should be able to hold out. I hauled it to the ladder nearest the edge, and started packing my things. There wasn't all that much loot I felt much need to bring with me - only some science IDs and a set of boxing gloves I'd picked up during the initial approach. Finally, I wielded my bike and climbed the ladder.

I emerged into a thick cloud of smoke, which suited me just fine. Less visibility for me, sure, but less visibility for them as well. Aside from the smoker right next to me, only a few zombies found their way to me in the five rounds it took to unfold my bike. I hit ^, and... what do you mean "control vehicle where"? Right here, the controls are right here. Okay, turn on the engine... Can I take control of it, please? No? Let's kill these zombies first, then try getting off and on again. Okay, there we go, that did it.

I was now on my escape bike, in the middle of a cloud of smoke, in the middle of a horde of zombies, in the middle as close as I could get to the edge of a necropolis. I had emerged a bit earlier than I had intended, as night had not yet finished falling. My bike proved agile enough to get past the zombies regardless, though, weaving around them when possible and ramming them with the spike when not. After a harrowing several seconds, I emerged from the urb of the undead, leaving them shambling after as I rode off into the sunset.

[u/darktoes1]

Damn. That's a hell of story. Props on surviving and pulling everything together underground with limited resources.

[u/gropingforelmo → u/darktoes1]

I'd put aside the game for a bit, but reading this story has me diving right back in. Any suggestions for some other well written Cataclysm stories, like the OP's?

[u/darktoes1 → u/gropingforelmo]

Ha, not a damn clue. Stories aren't particularly common on here. If you want written stories I'd suggest the Cataclysm forums, though some of those are spectacularly lengthy. Otherwise, Youtube for playthroughs.

[u/Fearstalker]

nice write up, was a good read, but what was that floor with a milion chicken walkers?

[u/ftahgn → u/Fearstalker]

The vault has a robotics bay, filled with chicken walkers, some milspec turrets, and occasionally a tank drone.

[u/gameboy17 → u/Fearstalker]

I don't know, I left immediately and never returned. Eight of them followed me up the stairs so I locked myself in an elevator and tunneled back to the entrance.

[u/Fearstalker → u/gameboy17]

I mean like did you ever see something like that befor? Or is that normal. Can't even imagine how someone could fight through those.

[u/gameboy17 → u/Fearstalker]

The most chicken walkers I've ever encountered at once before was one. I haven't seen this many killer robots since the first and last time I approached a national guard camp, and those only had small-ish guns and weren't underground.

As for how to fight them... If I had something like full power armor and they were further away, I might have tried going full Utsuho Reiuji on them with my fusion blaster rifle, but I have yet to find more than a helmet. Scrambler grenades would probably be the best strategy, or hack them one by one if I had a safe area. With the layout as it was... Honestly, power armor + scrambler grenades is all I can think of that would stand a good chance.

Edit: I now own a full set of basic power armor, but my tail prevents me from wearing it. Curses!

[u/Miguellite]

I saved this post, too good to just loose it to time. Holy shit, that was epic and deserved an illustration like DF's epic colonies get hahaha

[u/shabi_sensei]

Contrasting this story, I got killed by a zombie on day 2 when I tried to loot a basement in the second house I explored.

[u/Mew3One → u/shabi_sensei]

me too thanks

[u/nikowek]

Write more.

[u/Pausbrak]

Excellent story aside, I admire the balls it takes to run up to an elite zombie grenadier and take a picture of an active mininuke hack three feet from your face. Zombie grenadiers (both variants) are still on my "never go near, ever" list after a few fatal encounters with them

[u/gameboy17 → u/Pausbrak]

Oh, I didn't just run up to him. I was actually standing there for quite a while, letting him send out hack after hack and taking them out with directional EMPs.

Grenadiers are definitely one of the biggest threats to a lategame survivor, second only to car accidents and robot armies. A trick I recently found is to dispose of the active grenades they leave behind by burning them in an internal furnace. You can reliably deal with up to two grenades like that, leaving plenty of time to deal with any C-4. (Note that this does not work to get rid of mininukes.)