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[Teneb]

Okay, just verified that, but it stinks of Houses tendency to self aggrandize, there is nothing in Vegas worth nuking.

Vegas itself is a big cultural centre. A lot of rich people, some with a lot of influence, tend to be in Vegas. Nuke it, and you cause some serious trouble. There was also House himself, who, egocentric self-aggrandizing aside, was a genius when it came to robotics. Considering he could've been capable of shooting down all nukes, the chinese could've rated him pretty high on the "Nuke This" list.

In the end though, it doesn't really matter why, only that it did happen.

[Neonivek]

Okay, just verified that, but it stinks of Houses tendency to self aggrandize, there is nothing in Vegas worth nuking.

Vegas itself is a big cultural centre. A lot of rich people, some with a lot of influence, tend to be in Vegas. Nuke it, and you cause some serious trouble. There was also House himself, who, egocentric self-aggrandizing aside, was a genius when it came to robotics. Considering he could've been capable of shooting down all nukes, the chinese could've rated him pretty high on the "Nuke This" list.

In the end though, it doesn't really matter why, only that it did happen.

In the 1950s though? I thought it didn't start becoming important until like... the 60s

[Shadowlord]

Considering it's an alternate reality which diverged and has alternate science and physics, there's nothing saying it can't have become important earlier.

[Guardian G.I.]

Okay, just verified that, but it stinks of Houses tendency to self aggrandize, there is nothing in Vegas worth nuking.

Hoover Dam, the airfields of Searchlight, McCarran Intl, Nellis AFB, Black Mountain (actually nuked - there's a giant radioactive crater right in the middle of Tabitha's supermutant settlement)...

[NullForceOmega]

All not Vegas.  Those are separate and distinct targets from Vegas.  Vegas is a city, not a region.  Also, even Russia and China know there is no point in trying to nuke Hoover, the damned thing would take a fifty megaton device to the face and smile at you.

[Jarvis]

In the 1950s though? I thought it didn't start becoming important until like... the 60s

The Great War happened in 2077, though. Vegas had probably changed a lot since then.

[Neonivek]

In the 1950s though? I thought it didn't start becoming important until like... the 60s

The Great War happened in 2077, though. Vegas had probably changed a lot since then.

Yes but remember that the Fallout series is a game where the 1950s stretched on.

[KingofstarrySkies]

Nnnno, we just advanced massively. America became a lovely happy 'Every 50s show ever' universe. Also lots and lots of nuclear power.

[Guardian G.I.]

All not Vegas.  Those are separate and distinct targets from Vegas.  Vegas is a city, not a region.  Also, even Russia and China know there is no point in trying to nuke Hoover, the damned thing would take a fifty megaton device to the face and smile at you.

McCarran International Airport is well inside Las Vegas city limits.

Also, I almost forgot - in the Fallout universe, Las Vegas housed the main headquarters of REPCONN, the company specialized in producing rockets and missiles for the American war effort. I'm not even talking about their research facility in the area.

[Culise]

Okay, just verified that, but it stinks of Houses tendency to self aggrandize, there is nothing in Vegas worth nuking.

Hoover Dam, the airfields of Searchlight, McCarran Intl, Nellis AFB, Black Mountain (actually nuked - there's a giant radioactive crater right in the middle of Tabitha's supermutant settlement)...

Don't forget RobCo Industries, one of the States' largest robotics companies, and REPCONN Aerospace's primary headquarters and testing sites in the region.  If someone leaked the true nature of the related Helios and Archimedes projects, then that might have added even more impetus as a viable target.  Otherwise, I'd say Las Vegas likely qualified as a secondary target, something to lob a few nukes at to disrupt any reconstruction, but not something worth completely glassing.  Given the size of historical nuclear arsenals, however, a few extra nukes here and there were probably perfectly fine.  It's probably fortunate for House as well; his system held up well enough, but against a total strike, it probably would have been overwhelmed. 

All not Vegas.  Those are separate and distinct targets from Vegas.  Vegas is a city, not a region.  Also, even Russia and China know there is no point in trying to nuke Hoover, the damned thing would take a fifty megaton device to the face and smile at you.

Not with a groundburst, and you can bet that they tailor the attack to the target instead of adopting a one-size-fits-all approach.  Drop a sufficiently powerful warhead in the reservoir close enough to the dam, and let water shock do for you what the barrel bombs did for the Ruhr dams.  Besides, the goal isn't to destroy the dam, but rather just to render it unusuable by the enemy; irradiating it would accomplish the goal as effectively as structural damage would.

[NullForceOmega]

Barrel bombs were designed to use fluid shock as an insulator to direct the majority of the blast force towards the damn, effectively creating a gigantic shaped-charge, can't be done reasonably with a  deliverable nuke.

I agree that denying use of the dam would be a moderately useful goal, and might cause power interruptions to the cities already reduced to ash by full nuclear bombardment.  But the military would just send in scrubber and engineer teams and use the damned thing anyway, so I guess that's not valid.

[Krevsin]

Except that the military would in the case of a full-on nuclear war be busy everywhere across the US and could only send marginal assistance to Vegas. That is if their communication gear worked and they were still in touch with the entire country. Otherwise it's just the Army doing what army do to the best of their ability until they get tired of getting irradiated and move to a bunker to create the Brotherhood.

As far as DC goes, my headcanon has always been that while DC was extensively nuked, its defense system prevented most of the nukes from detonating and most of what came through was air-detonated instead of ground-detonated, thus not creating a massive glassy crater. Streching it thin, I know, but I always kinda understood why Bethesda went for the East coast and chose the area as-of-yet-untouched-by-lore to give themselves some creative freedom.

[Virtz]

Streching it thin, I know, but I always kinda understood why Bethesda went for the East coast and chose the area as-of-yet-untouched-by-lore to give themselves some creative freedom.

Gave themselves creative freedom and then just regurgitated what was there in Fallout 1 and 2? Like seriously, even the storyline is a bad mishmash of things that happened in FO1 and 2. And they transfered all the most iconic factions to the East Coast with very poor lore explanations. They should've made up new factions. Like you can have the iconic power armour, the BoS didn't make it. Just have some other tech-savy faction scavenge and get it working.

Real reason they went with East Coast is cause Bethesda studios is physically in the East Coast.

[Krevsin]

But if they remained on the west coast they couldn't have done any of that thing because then it'd be a literal redoing of FO1 and 2. Also if you think the lore to FO3 set on the east coast is butchering Fallout canon, you'd have probably loved it if it remained on the west coast.

[Virtz]

But if they remained on the west coast they couldn't have done any of that thing because then it'd be a literal redoing of FO1 and 2. Also if you think the lore to FO3 set on the east coast is butchering Fallout canon, you'd have probably loved it if it remained on the west coast.

No to any of that.

They're free to move to the East Coast, just don't transfer everything from the West Coast. No super mutants, no BoS, no Enclave. Do something original that keeps with the theme. As I said, a different faction could've picked up the iconic power armour. The BoS didn't make it, they just slapped their logo on it.

And a story in the West Coast could still be much more original than what they came up with. The West Coast has moved on and rebuilt. They're no longer fighting for survival, they've formed governments and are expanding into the East (as seen in New Vegas). Meanwhile, the East Coast is apparently filled with people too stupid to rebuild anything, even though it's been 200 years. They're less developed than people in Fallout 1 were. And that was 100 years ago.