The HAM Radio, located underneath the dead Chinese commando
The Chinese radio beacon is a radio station found in a random encounter in Fallout 3.
Characteristics
The radio beacon is tied to a random encounter and its signal will grow stronger as the player gets closer to the source of the beacon — a dead Chinese commando.
The commando carries a full set of Chinese equipment, including a Chinese pistol, Chinese officer's sword, and a dirty Chinese jumpsuit, all in good repair, as well as assorted medical supplies.
If the dead Chinese commando spawns at a location such as Super-Duper Mart with raiders present, the raiders will loot the commando's body for weapons and equip them. This only applies to weapons, as characters do not collect apparel, only weapons that deal better damage than they already have (and since both the pistol and the sword come repaired, they usually do). If the body appears empty except for the suit, these raiders are usually the culprit.
Transcript
- The message repeats twice, then there is a short pause then the message repeats every few seconds in a loop. The message broadcast over the radio is bǎishèng (百勝), which is Chinese for "to win every battle", and originates from the idiom bǎizhànbǎishèng (百战百胜), which literally means "to fight a hundred battles and win a hundred victories" and is found in Sun Tzu's The Art of War chapter III, verse 2: To win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill..
Behind the scenes
If the player uses the tcl console command or use the console command player.moveto 000a0a4d, they can go underground where they will find a ham radio labeled "Chinese Radio Beacon" underneath the commando. The radio can be spoken to like any non-player character. If interacted with, the player will hear "Hello?" or "Hey there" in English through the radio, to which the only reply available is "See you later." or "Time for me to go." Upon choosing this, the player then hears "Bye" or "Later" or "Whatever" in English as the dialog ends. Unlike other radios, this radio cannot be turned off.
Bugs
If the player already has a given Chinese object in their inventory the Commando may spawn without that particular object in his inventory. [verified]- Sometimes the dead Chinese commando doesn't spawn. The player can still noclip underground and find the ham radio, but there will be no corpse above it. [verified]
- A workaround on the PC is to use the console command player.placeleveledactoratme a0a4c. [verified]
- Sometimes the beacon will become available only at a far edge of the world-map, indicating the commando's body is somewhere far off-map. [verified]
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
