Ian (Fallout)

Ian is one of the iconic Fallout companions, a former Crimson Caravan guard and a part-time Shady Sands guard. He is found at the eponymous village .
==Background==
Ian is a short, stocky caravan guard who adopted Shady Sands as his new home. He was working for the Crimson Caravan Company during a routine caravan route to the small settlement. However, routine does not mean safe. He was shot by raiders and stayed in Shady Sands to recuperate.The Vault Dweller: "{137}{}{Can you give me directions to the Hub and Junktown?}"Ian: "{1106}{}{Most caravans come from the Hub. They travel all over the place. I worked for a group called the Crimson Caravan before my untimely injury.}"(Ian's dialogue)The Vault Dweller: "{129}{}{Tell me about the rest of the world.}"Katrina: "{136}{}{I know very little of the outside world. I escaped from a Vault when it was attacked. Unfortunately, I was very hurt and do not remember much of what happened. But Dharma was watching over me, and I was found by the people of Shady Sands. I live here now. Have you spoken with Ian, yet? He is a merchant guard who was hurt. He is recovering in the guardhouse over there. [She points to the east] He is more widely travelled than I.}"(Katrina's dialogue) The Shady Sands townsfolk helped him recover and ultimately Ian decided to stay with them. His experience and skills helped him contribute, as very few of the townsfolk ever left its safe walls. He occasionally makes a run to Junktown and the Hub to do trading. He is strong, confident, and independent. A perfect wastelander.The Vault Dweller: "{109}{}{What do you do here?}"Ian: "{112}{}{I was a guard for the merchants of the Hub. However, I was shot during a raid by bandits. I've been staying here, since the people have helped me recover. Still, my knowledge of the outside world and my experience make me useful here. Shady Sands is my home now. Occasionally, I even get to visit Junktown or the Hub to do some trading, since I'm the only person here who has ever really left town.}"(Ian's dialogue)
These traits endeared the Vault Dweller to him. Together, they scouted Vault 15, learning that the water chip was in another Vault.Fallout 2 manual: "With their knowledge, and the help of a man called Ian, I continued on my way to Vault 15. The ruins of Vault 15, to be more specific. Ravaged by the elements, scavengers, and time itself, Vault 15 was no help for my people. The control room that contained their water-chip was buried under tons of fallen rock, and I had to move on." Following a long trek through the wastelands, the two finally reached Necropolis. Engaging the super mutants at the Watershed in battle, Ian lost his life. A flamer unleashed by one of the super mutants burned him to death. The smell of Ian's burning body would haunt the Vault Dweller for years to come.Fallout 2 manual: "The Hub was a larger city than both Junktown and Shady Sands combined. You could drop the Vault in there, and you probably would not notice. But the people of the Hub had no life, and it was a desolate place just the same. It eased my mind, however, to hire some merchants to bring water to the Vault. Looking back, it was probably a mistake to do so, but I was still innocent of the evils that lurked through the ruins of civilization. A small clue led me to the city of the ghouls, the place they called Necropolis. It was there that I encountered large mutants, armed with weapons of an unknown origin. It is with heavy sadness that I say that Ian lost his life in the city of the dead. A super mutant burned him to death with a flamethrower. The passage of time is no proof against the memory of burning flesh. His sacrifice was not in vain, as I did find the water-chip buried beneath the city. It was with easier steps that I returned to Vault 13."
==Interactions with the player character==
===Interactions overview===
===Quests===
* Recruit Ian: Ian can be recruited as a companion for 100 caps, or for free if the Vault Dweller has an Intelligence of 6+.
===Companion===
* Ian is the first companion NPC available in Fallout. As a companion, he is skilled with small guns and his animation frames allow him to use pistols, large handguns (i.e. the 10mm SMG, 14mm pistol, and .223 pistol), knives and unarmed weapons (e.g. power fists), greatly increasing the player's ability to fight wasteland threats. The best handgun he can wield being the .223 pistol.
* He is effective with a 10mm SMG early on but becomes a liability with it when more companions join, due to friendly fire from the burst firing mode on the gun. He is very capable with the .223 pistol and 14mm pistol.
** Ian was commonly considered by fans to be as much of a threat to the Vault Dweller as to their enemies. The most likely reason is that players collect the 10mm SMG from Vault 15 and give it to Ian. The AI will opt for bursts, and does not check for the presence of friendlies in the cone of fire, leading to frequent incidents. If given semi-automatic weapons exclusively, Ian is much safer to be around, and a lot deadlier.
* Despite having the Big Guns skill tagged, Ian cannot use large weaponry like miniguns due to a lack of animation frames.
* His sprite is shared with raiders that can be encountered while wandering the wasteland and the Skulz leader Vinnie making distinguishing him from an enemy difficult without an examine.
===Other interactions===
* Because of his experience from being a former caravan guard, Ian can mark Junktown and the Hub on the worldmap, and has a lot to say about the places visited - especially at the Hub. 
* Ian will turn hostile if the people in Shady Sands are attacked without his company.
===Comments===
He has unique float dialogue for locations around the northern wasteland;
Ian's comments 	Ian's comments
Location 	Comment
Darkwaters 	This is Killian's, a general store. Killian's a good man, and they have plenty of stock.
Gizmo's Casino 	Gizmo's casino. A hive of gambling and underworld activity. Careful; they say the games are rigged.
Beth's Weapon Shop 	This is the Weapon Shop. It's run by Beth. She's good for guns, but better for gossip.
Jacob's gun shop 	Jake's weapons. High prices, but really good guns.
Water Merchants 	Office of the Water Merchants. They're the big movers and shakers of the Hub, since they supply the water that keeps everything going.
Crimson Caravan 	This is the Crimson Caravan. I did some work for them. They do a lot of high-risk jobs.
Far Go Traders 	Far Go Traders, run by Butch Harris. He's ot-nay oo-tay ight-bray, if you catch my meaning.
Maltese Falcon 	Ah, now the Maltese Falcon is the place to be. Good music, good drinks, and good company.
Vault 13 	Heard about some of these places before, but never been in one. Seems nice and clean . . . a little too clean for my taste.
West Tek research facility	What the hell happened here?
Mariposa Military Base 	This is gonna be a tough nut to crack.
Necropolis 	This place gives me the creeps.
===Tell me about===
Ian's Tell-Me-Abouts 	Ian's Tell-Me-Abouts
Query 	Response
Followers, Cathedral, Master, Unity, Set, Watershed, Hall, Library, Overseer, Vault, Vault-13, Vault13, Boneyard, Deathclaw, Exodus, Initiates, Paladins, Scribes, Brotherhood, Vats, Military, Base, Morpheus, Alya, Diana, Gwen, Petrox, Tolya, Zimmerman, Regulators, Scavengers, Blades, Nicole, Lieutenant, Experiments, Police	Sorry, bud. Don't know much.
War 	Happened a few decades back. Basically, a bunch of countries got kind of antsy, and everything went BOOM!
Junktown 	A medium-sized town made of junk, overseen by a sherrif named Killian. It's just a few days southwest of Shady Sands.
Hub 	The Hub is the biggest trading center in the New West. It's run primarily by a group called the Water Merchants, but there are some other traders there, too. It's a booming town, but there's a lot of political fighting between the traders.
Raiders 	There are several different groups of raiders out there. The most organized group is called the Khans; they seem to think they can conquer the world or something.
Caravans 	Most caravans come from the Hub. They travel all over the place. I worked for a group called the Crimson Caravan before my untimely injury.
Chip, Water 	No idea what a water chip is. Sorry, friend.
Sands, Shady 	A small and peaceful village. Probably the most promising community in the wastes.
Garl 	Garl's some dumb-ass who thinks he can take over the world with his crummy raiders. Yeah, whatever.
Necropolis 	Isn't that the mythical city of the dead?
Medic 	Razlo's a great doctor. You should see him if you're hurt.
Healing 	Razlo does a good job of fixing people up, and his junja juice is well worth it!
Killian 	Killian's mayor of Junktown. He also runs a store there. He's a decent fellow. Never did any work for him, but he seems okay.
Gizmo 	Gizmo runs a casino in Junktown. I hear that it's rigged, though.
Casino 	The casino is Gizmo's big project in Junktown. Brings in a lot of tourists and money, but problems come with it.
Store 	Killian runs a good general store in Junktown.
Children 	Yeah, there's some kids in Shady Sands. So? None of 'em are mine.
Apocalypse 	You know, we'll always have war. Just the next one's gonna be fought with sticks.
Mutants 	I saw some weird things when I was guarding caravans for the Hub. Mutated coyotes and mantises and scorpions and such.
Khans 	They're a sorry group of raiders who attack Shady Sands and think that they're gonna take over the world or some such crap.
Tandi 	She's Aradesh's daughter. She's pretty sweet, but I've got someone waiting for me back home.
Booze 	Got any beer?
Chems 	I used some Psycho once on a caravan raid. It made me twitchy. Odd.
Seth 	Seth is the captain of the guards. Between you and me, he couldn't guard a fruit if it was nailed to his leg.
Aradesh 	Aradesh is the leader of Shady Sands. A kind and patient man, although he's kinda looney.
Razlo 	Hey, if you need help, Razlo's the man to see. He's a great doctor.
Psychics 	I dunno. I think there's something to it, yeah, but there's just not enough evidence.
Merchants 	Some merchants come from the Hub to trade with Junktown. That's all I know.
===Fallout: New California===
Ian can be acquired at the shop by any player character that has Charisma. Prior to starting a fight with him as the active companion, the player character can exhaust him in order to lower the enemy's level by one, to a minimum of 1. However, he also damages the player character in the process, dealing two points of friendly fire.
When the player performs the camp action, he will become unexhausted. However, if the player character does not have Luck at this time, he must be discarded.
==Inventory==
==Appearances==
Ian appears in Fallout, the Fallout: The Board Game add-on New California, and on the Magic: The Gathering card "Ian the Reckless" included in the Fallout-themed Scrappy Survivors Commander deck.
He is mentioned in Fallout 2 (including the Vault Dweller's memoirs in the Fallout 2 manual, and in the Fallout Bible.
==Behind the scenes==
===Fallout===
* Jesse Heinig, a designer on Fallout, mentions that he pushed for a few things during the game's design, including the ability to have companions, such as Ian.Jesse Heinig: "I also lobbied hard for a couple of things that did make it into the game ...... companions who could join the Vault Dweller (since they were in the initial design doc but got cut, but I figured out a way to 'fake' Ian into the game and the programmers decided to make it stick)"(NMA Fallout Developers Profile - Jesse Heinig) He was a test case character designed to see if the engine could handle non-player-controlled followers who would move from map to map with the player's character. Though the initial implementation required some troubleshooting, it functioned well enough for the team to decide to implement followers.
* Ian is also based on Ian Dunteman, one of Jesse Heining's best friends at the time.Fallout: The RPG - Winter of Atom: Behind-the-Scenes Creator Chat (1:21:21):Jesse Heinig: "For me, it's, uh, Ian from Fallout 1, because at the time that I put him in the game, he was based on one of my best friends from that era."Chelsea "Dot" Steverson: "Oh, cool!"Jesse Heinig: "The actual Ian is still alive and doing well, and has never shot me in the back with a submachine gun."Jesse Heinig's edit on Nukapedia
* Ian's line when asked to tell me about "Apocalypse" is a reference to a quote by Albert Einstein: "I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
===Fallout 2===
* In Fallout 2, a Chosen One with an Intelligence below 4 can say to Angela Bishop that they traveled with someone named "Iam," who kept burst-shooting them from behind. This is a reference to Ian's reputation of accidentally causing fire with SMGs.
* Chris Avellone first mentioned in the Fallout Bible that Ian was to appear in the Den after the Abbey was cut,Fallout Bible 6: "In FO2, the random encounter Café of Broken Dreams Tandi says Ian is some ware in FO2 is this true and if so, where?" but was later corrected when his dialogue file indicated he would be in Vault City.Fallout Bible 8: "Ian was actually slated for the Abbey and the Den that I know of, but something that Ausir (I think) pointed out, he was actually in Vault City before he was cut from the game."
* At one point in the planning for Fallout 2, Ian had survived and was living in Vault City under the name of Old Joe. According to his dialogue, Ian would mistake the Chosen One for the Vault Dweller and would reminisce about events from Fallout before realizing the mistaken identity. Commenting on the prejudiced nature of Vault City's citizens, he would give the Chosen One a gun, apparently, his old Colt 6520 10mm pistol before sending them away, encouraging the Chosen One to make the Vault Dweller proud. The Chosen One: "{124}{}{What's going on here?}"Old Joe: "{125}{}{Well, the Vault Citizens think very highly of their bloodline and don't care much for people like me and you. You take this gun. It'll protect you if things get a little out of control. You probably shouldn't be seen talking with this crazy old man. Best get on your way.}"(Old Joe's dialogue) This would contradict the Vault Dweller's memoirs in the Fallout 2 manual, according to which Ian died in Necropolis. At the Café of Broken Dreams, Tandi mentions that she believes Ian is at the Abbey, a cut area.
===Tabletop games===
* Despite his in-game sprite in Fallout (not unique to Ian but shared with other characters) seemingly having long hair, illustrations in Fallout: New California and Magic: The Gathering portray him with short hair and a beard.
* Ian's abilities in both New California and Magic reference his reputation for hitting the Vault Dweller with friendly fire.
==Gallery==
NMMAXXIA 1 SE.png|Ian's in-game sprite
Ianfnc.png|Ian's Fallout: New California card
Fallout Magic Ian the Reckless.png|Ian's Magic: The Gathering card
==References==
Non-game
Category:Fallout human characters
Category:Fallout companions
Category:Fallout 2 mentioned-only characters
Category:Fallout: New California companions
Category:Fallout Bible human characters
Category:Shady Sands characters
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