Denver design document / 1 This is part 1 of the Denver design document for " Van Buren " , the canceled " Fallout 3 " by Black Isle Studios . Overview . Denver is a pre - War city that was being rebuilt when the War started ; prisoners on work release salvage what they can from the city while evading huge packs of hungry dogs that roam the streets . The city consists of 3 - 4 large maps , with 10 - 15 smaller maps or floorplans ( covering various buildings and high - rise floors ) . The salvagers are about 20 NCR former prisoners on a special work release program , salvaging stuff for NCR in exchange for their eventual freedom . The dogs are the now - feral descendents of local pets and specially - bred police dogs . Rats , giant cockroaches , mutant bat s , and climbing lizard s are common hazards , as well as robot police dogs sent to enforce the " quarantine " on the PC . The salvagers were forced out of their original camp by the dogs and now are struggling to get by in their new , temporary camp . Tensions are high because the dog threat is constant , they ' ve heard nothing from NCR in quite some time , and basically the only thing for them to eat is dog meat . There ' s also a rival group of salvages trying to steal claims , and a mysterious group of military guys here as well . The salvagers live in the partially - constructed buildings of Denver , several stories up and clear of the dogs ( who can ' t climb ) . Special Art Need : We ' re going to need to deal with the skyscraper - ness of the city with skyboxing and fog effects in order to handle the horizon . Denver has its own world map , from which you can access multiple local maps . In addition to the areas below , it can also be flagged with the claim areas of the various salvagers ( so you know if you ' re in another salvager ' s territory and thus shouldn ' t take things , or if you can take stuff because it ' s free for the taking ) . The area is composed of 11 primary maps and 11 child maps of those maps , plus random blasted city maps . Old Salvager Camp ( Medium Map ) : This is in the western part of the city . Some structures built under a freeway overpass , surrounded by walls of chain link fence and stacked tires . New Salvager Camp ( Medium Map ) : Two fortified buildings . The salvagers live in the upper floors , connected by a catwalk . The ground floor is surrounded by chainlink fence . Union Station ( Medium Map ) : A station building , sets of train tracks , a road , and some blasted buildings nearby . Police HQ / Mint / City Hall ( Med ) : Three multistory buildings with a park nearby and some ruined buildings , too . Bombay Jack ' s Canyon ( Small ) : A multistory building surrounded by open lots and rubble . Heavily trapped with explosives . The Box ( Medium ) : Fortified robot factory within the shell of a normal factory . Surrounded by ruins . Caesar ' s Legion Camp ( Med ) : An old roadside hotel ( like a Motel 6 ) , just off the freeway . Building , parking lot , safety ditch , freeway . Lowry Hospital / City Park ( Large ) : Multilevel hospital adjacent to a park . Has a large parking area . Washington Park ( Large ) : A large park with two small lakes , overrun with dogs . Boardwalk Brewing ( Small ) : A small brew pub / restaurant ( a la Rock Bottom ) , with some ruined buildings nearby . Rival Salvager Camp ( Med ) : A partially - ruined but well - fortified building surrounded by rubble and ruins . Random City Maps ( Med ) : Various ground and skyscraper - levels of buildings , some more complete than others . South Denver ( Medium Map ) : This is the southern part of the city . Cherry Creek ( from the Lodo map ) continues here . Has a small park ( more dogs ! ) , short buildings , medium buildings , and some skyscrapers . Police Chief ' s Fallout Shelter ( Small Map ) : This is a secret location . You have to find records of the shelter elsewhere in Denver before you can find this travel trigger ( unless you ' re really lucky , in which case you can stumble upon it ) . Has a stash of weapons and supplies . Map Flowchart for Denver . Note : This Denver map is actually a smaller " world map " of Denver . There will actually be smaller areas maps within each of these regions ( a couple or more city blocks ) that you can actually walk on that have set geomety , and going outside of those areas will just drop you into random maps of ruined cities with random encounters , just like wandering into a ruined city in FO or FO2 . Area Background . Game Tie - In : Denver is a place that is rich in resources , they ' re just hard to acquire . There ' s a lot of looting to be done but it ' s spread over much of the town , other people have claims on parts of it , and vicious dogs are everywhere so it ' s not safe . Story / Plot Foreshadowing : Denver is also the location of an outbreak of the New Plague in the War era , so the PC can find some clues about plague , its spread , and what was done to contain it ( not the BOMB at this point , just standard quarantine ) . History : Denver is a wreck . It was in the middle of a building boom shortly before the war , as many new jobs were opening there are the city was swollen to bursting . Most of the construction was housing for these immigrants . When the war with China started , resource rationing occurred and suddenly the construction workers didn ' t have anything to build with and weren ' t getting paid . Union riots and strikes occurred because the city couldn ' t pay and the federal government wouldn ' t step in to help . When Mexico and the Midwest started to suffer food shortages < nowiki > [ < / nowiki > FYI , I will be breaking up the pre - war U . S . into its thirteen distinct " zones " . One of these zones is the Great Midwest Commonwealth , which was responsible for the majority of pre - war agriculture across the country . However , the U . S . as portrayed in my fakey history will be slightly more economically libertarian , so it ' s conceivable that the GMC actually had food to trade , but was being stingy with it / jacking up prices in the southwest . – Josh < nowiki > ] < / nowiki > , Denver was hit hard because of its high population . Food rationing began . Food riots started because of the rationing , and some buildings were set on fire . The National Guard was called in to contain the rioting , using InstaPens ( aka " bullpens " ) to contain and imprison rioters . Some people deliberately attacked police and National Guard troops so they would be imprisoned and fed . Rioters , National Guard personnel who disobeyed orders , and other military folk who refused to help contain the riots were sent west and east . Then an outbreak of the New Plague hit the city . Rioters burned down large parts of the city in their fear of contamination and anger at their treatment . Many panicked and fled the city by car , clogging the freeways when they ran out of gas and trapping everyone behind them . And then the bombs fell , destroying some of what was left and killing everyone who had managed to live through everything else . Post - War , Denver has been abandoned by civilized folk , mainly because of lingering radiation ( which is gone by the time FO3 starts ) and huge packs of wild dogs that have taken over the town . Small groups of scavenger s have holed up here from time to time or tried to loot some of the buildings but it has never been a concerted effort until now . Recently a bunch of work - release NCR prisoners have come here to salvage stuff as a way to buy off their sentences , and some slavers from Caesar ' s Legion are waiting out the midwest ' s seasonal huge radioactive duststorms keeping them from getting home . And there ' s another gang of salvagers that have moved in and have been raiding claims from the NCR salvagers . Critical Path : PC visits area meets with NCR salvagers explores the area deals with the dogs gets some loot finds out about the plague outbreak finds out about Boulder makes a foray into Boulder finds out about Presper / NCR expatriates / sleeping scientists uses Denver as a source of supplies for later stuff in the game ( building a rail , using the salvagers as workers in New Canaan , etc . ) Economy : The salvages have a lot of supplies to trade . If they get the brewery up & running they ' ll have beer , too . They desperately need some variety in their food , and could use some good medical upkeep too . They ' d be happy to trade their stockpiled supplies ( or sell claims in the city ) for nonperishable food and medical supplies or the services of a medic or doctor . Relationships with other Communities : The salvagers are prisoners from NCR on work - release , and they were treated badly by the administration while in prison , so they ' re not too friendly to NCR and thus not likely to befriend the folks at Hoover Dam . They don ' t care one way or the other about the tribal s , though the Hangdogs ( of the Blackfoots ) would be happy to come here and trade for some dogs ( which the salvagers would be happy to do , since to them the dogs are pests at best and dangerous predators at worst ) . They could strike up a deal with the BOS as long as they didn ' t try to claim any cool tech for themselves . They ' re used to work and would probably get along fine with the people of New Canaan as long as they were treated well . They could also move to Fort Abandon with their loot and set themselves up as rich folks there , which would strengthen FA but leave Denver open to others . The timing of this will need to be careful , as the arrival of the NCR soldiers will screw them up . Notes on the Salvagers : The scavengers in Denver are like a tribe of blue - collar workers , working 40 , 50 , 60 hours a week for little or no reward , desperately trying to crank out a life for themselves and their families back West . It ' s like a blue - collar colony , and everything in the camp is designed to reinforce this , including the bus that takes them to and from their claims . They may have only 2 - 3 really good Mechanics , and the rest are just good builders , scavengers , demolishers , and laborers . And there may not be a good electrician among them ( except for Wagner , and he ' s not very good ) . Make sure the PC knows why the salvagers stay . They ' re not really skilled , most of them are just laborers , so it ' s not like they can go anywhere else and make a good living for themselves . Plus , they ' ve been here for 2 years or more and have a financial investment in what they ' ve been doing . To leave now means throwing away 2 years of their lives and two years of work . Salvagers get their power from various confiscated generators . They get water from underground tanks , and from the river through Denver , run through several filters , and even boiled with various purification tablets . Even though they are sick of dog , the dogs in Denver are a ready source of food . The scavengers in Denver have to make do with dog meat ( of which there is plenty , but cook it well ) and canned food , if they can find it ( which is rarer than they thought ) . As for trading , the salvagers used to trade with no one until Galenski and his truck made his way south and struck a deal with them . The Denver salvagers haven ' t seen a woman in a very long time , so any females that show up are going to have some trouble . Porter may even assign a guard to watch over the female , maybe Jimmy , since no one in their right mind would fight him , and he might as well not have a dick . Some salvager sites have a stash of ammo and supplies in case they get trapped there – and one salvager gives up the location of some of them in exchange for info . The Denver scavengers talk about what the best buildings to scavenge are – hotels aren ' t worth shit , but hospitals and some office buildings with high computer connections are great . The following areas are gold mines : post office , construction building , manufacturing building , police station , gun stores , sporting good stores . It ' s impolite to talk about past crimes or inquire too deeply into a character ' s history in Denver . And you really can ' t do without a high Speech skill . ( Same as in Black Canyon itself . ) Salvagers do not like to be called scavengers – that ' s what ghouls are , they ' re parasites ; we ' re doing good work here . Calling someone a " scav " is fighting words in the camp . " Digger " as an acceptable term . " Building Crawling . " As a joke , might want the scavengers to say that " we ' re doing a basement crawl , a subway crawl , a skyscraper crawl , " basically scav talk for a " dungeon crawl . " Slang : When solidifying a deal , they may say , " Will you guarantee it ? " ( Which reinforces the idea of " claims " in Denver ) They often call Denver " Dog Town " " What happened at the old campsite ? " " Well , one moment , we ' d just gotten off our shifts , when suddenly , there were dogs all over the 25 tier of the campsite . They were fucking insane - we must have shot dozens of them , but they didn ' t stop to tear up their own dead , like they usually do . So we had to ditch the crane and the generator . We lost one of our crew getting out ( Dogbody ) , figure he ' s dog food , and a bunch of us took some nasty wounds - Jimmy patched us up . Thing is , even after we fled , they kept coming , and coming , some of them even jumped off the freeway to get after us , and they ain ' t never been that rabid . We lit the tires on fire , threw grenades , and nothing fucking scared them off . Now , we ' re just holed up here . " " What do you know about Boulder ? " " We didn ' t even know there was anyone at Boulder until a couple of months back , when Jimmy T came rolling and was dumped off by Galenski . No idea what he done up there . Galenski told us that we wouldn ' t be welcome in Boulder . Boulder claims it ' s a genetic free zone , and the people there are really antsy about anyone who ' s been spending time in Denver . . . says we ' re all diseased . They ' ve agreed to trade with us , but they ' ve threatened to shoot any scavenger who shows up within the borders . . . so for now , we just let things lie . As long as the shipments keep coming , no worries . What do you know about Galenski ? He somehow got a huge truck working , so we ' re able to send him supplies of material north in exchange for some new food , medical supplies , and other shit we need to survive . " Timeline : Many new jobs in Denver for industrial and scientific work . Building boom in Denver to make offices , labs , and housing War with China begins . Resource rationing occurs in Denver , and riots happen because of that . Midwest USA and Mexico start having food shortages and can ' t supply Denver with the food it needs . Food riots occur . National Guard called in . Plague outbreak in Denver . Massive fires . The War . A bomb ravages Denver . - 5 years : Back in the West , " the 370 Raid " occurs . Foreman Porter ' s group try to rob the NCR Storehouse and Bank to sieze the payroll to pay his men . They were caught by NCR and ended up " blowing " the vault and totally ruining the future ability to settle the payment problems in the area ( exact circumstances are unknown , Porter ' s group didn ' t actually steal the money , but it ' s gone nonetheless ) . Captured , sold out by Spineless Stan Lowery ( a man in the 370 team who didn ' t participate in the raid because he was afraid they ' d be killed trying ) . Porter still feels guilty about his role in the collapse of the eastern part of NCR , since his actions blew any chance of the economy stabilizing . Porter and his gang arrested and imprisoned in Black Canyon . - 4 years : Member ' s from Porter ' s team escape many times , though there ' s nowhere to run and they are caught or surrender . At least once escape was planned by NCR Lt . Gov Dodge ( Dodge hoped that Porter will loop back to pick up the money from the blown vault , but the escape he arranged only resulted in the 308th getting free , not the 370th , and since Porter didn ' t steal the vault money anyway he wouldn ' t know where to find it ) . - 3 years : Porter ' s gang ( the 370th ) and the 308th put on work - release to Denver . The work - release also made more room in the prison for some more dangerous prisoners , as the place was getting overcrowded . The prisoners travel with hobos , dodge tribals , lose about half their numbers ( from clashes with slavers , tribals , radscorpions , and other monsters ) , and finally . . . - 2 years , 1 month : Porter ' s gang reaches Denver . Goals : Once there , they were to see about scavenging as many building supplies as possible , establishing a track outpost , and pave the way for NCR occupation . They make camp . - 2 years : Dogs overrun the old camp . - 5 weeks : glowing ghoul s start wandering in from Boulder - 3 weeks : Subgroup discovers the Box and plan to sieze it for themselves . - 2 weeks : In response some comments from Hardin , Bombay Jack flips out and goes off on his own , seizing a nearby claim and guarding it with explosives . PC arrives in Denver . Emotional Porn . Drama . Tensions between the salvager " factions , " the mysterious rival group of salvagers , the Caesar ' s legion guys , and the small military group that went north to Boulder . The play can try to end the growing schism between the salvagers , or split them further apart . These guys have been screwed by NCR and were punished for trying to do something ( illegal ) about it . You can help them out ( and hurt NCR ) or treat them like criminals ( yet you ' re a former prisoner yourself , are you just perpetuating a criminal stereotype ? There ' s the rival gang of salvagers , more likely to kill you than to talk to you . What ' s their beef ? The guys from Caesar ' s legion are a mystery . What are they up to ? If you ' re allied with the Blackfoots you have an in with them , but they mainly want to keep away from the " primitives and assholes " who live in this part of the continent . You can find out a little bit about them and get some hints about the direction of the next game in the series . The frequent use of radios by the salvagers mean that radio communication and updates are pretty common . You might even be able to do dialogues over the radio . However , ARGOS sends updates to ODYSSEUS via radio , so if ARGOS is nearby you ' ll hear an occasional thrumming ( like the space signal in " Contact " ) that gets louder the closer he gets to you . The damn dogs , they ' re everywhere . And then you meet the cyberdog s . If you ' re lucky , you can reprogram them ( such as to drive the other dogs out of the city ) . If not , fight or run . They ' re the toughest things in this city and they ' ve been reprogrammed to use lethal force to stop you , Mr . Prisoner . The PC should see the cyberdogs as the smart super - mutant s of the dog world , a smaller - scale but similar threat as ARGOS . Then there ' s Bombay Jack , who ' s crazy but not an evil guy . As long as you leave him alone , he ' ll probably leave you alone . Then there ' s Dogbody , who ' s confused and sides with the dogs . Anyone who hurts the dogs is going to have a human - intelligence creature plotting revenge against them . And there ' s always the chance that you ' ll run into some of Presper ' s flunkies from Boulder who have their own agenda in Denver . If they feel the PC is getting in the way , they might actually use a radio to " call " ARGOS to their current location , then flee , leaving the PC to either fight ARGOS or flee as well . NPC Ally Drama . Bringing a female human to Denver will make the salvagers go crazy , as they haven ' t been around a woman in quite some time . A female ally of the PC willing to spend some intimate time with the salvagers would earn the PC a lot of brownie points . A super mutant ally might be able to make friends with Jimmy T . The salvagers have a low opinion of NCR folks and wouldn ' t react well to any obviously - NCR NPC . Salvagers might want to buy a robot NPC to salvage it for parts ( or , if it had combat capability , use it to guard them and their camp from dogs ) , or simply steal it from the PC and scrap it for parts . Bringing a ghoul to Denver may make the salvagers suspicious that he ' s about to turn into a glowing ghoul , or is allied with them ( since glowing ghouls have been migrating in from the north recently ) . It took them a while to trust Wagner ( the only ghoul in the group ) and if the PC can get Wagner to vouch for them the rest will grudgingly accept him ( as much as they accept any outsider ) . Bringing Arcade Gannon ( an Enclave Guy guy who ' s been hanging out with the FoA in Hoover , and thus comes of as an NCR associate ) with you makes the salvagers really suspicious . Measles will question Wagner about what he ' s been up to , since Willem sent Wagner out here to see what ' s going on and Wagner didn ' t report back . Other Role - Playing Tests and Epithets . Claim Jumper : Much of the city is marked off in various claims belonging to the salvagers . If you wander into another salvager ' s claim and take stuff , you ' re a claim jumper . Plus they ' ll be pissed at you . Ties to Overall Game Themes . Civilization vs . Anarchy : Denver is a remnant of the old civilization . The salvagers are a remnant of NCR , the new ( but dying ) civilization . By sifting through the refuse of the past , the salvagers are helping maintain the present civilization , though in the end their efforts are doomed . Optimism vs Pessimism vs Pragmatism : How can you have a positive outlook amid such horror - or is the solution simply to be practical at all times ?