Heist of the Centuries is a main quest in the Fallout: New Vegas add-on Dead Money.
Quick walkthrough[]
| Main Quest: Heist of the Centuries | |||||||||||||
| Find a way to recreate the voice of Vera Keyes to unlock the elevator to the Sierra Madre vault. | |||||||||||||
| Obtain recordings of Vera's songs from the sound archive terminal in the lobby. | Speak with Christine in the executive suites and ask her to help break the lock. | ||||||||||||
| Enter the vault and navigate through speakers and holograms to reach the central chamber; enter the vault chamber and access the control terminal. | |||||||||||||
| Deal with Father Elijah; choose permissive dialogue options or pass three skill checks of 75 Explosives/Science/Repair/Speech/Barter/Lockpick/Sneak to compel Elijah to come to the vault personally. | |||||||||||||
| Attack and kill Elijah. (Cash Out achievement/trophy) | Trick Elijah into entering the vault by sneaking out of the central chamber undetected. (Safety Deposit Box achievement/trophy) | ||||||||||||
| Escape the vault before the explosive collar detonates. | |||||||||||||
| Reward: Father Elijah's robes (optional) 37 gold bars (optional) Abandoned BoS bunker as player character housing Unlimited supply of Sierra Madre chips (delivered in batches of 100 to the dropbox in the BoS bunker every 3 in-game days) Unlimited supply of complimentary vouchers (delivered as a single instance to the dropbox in the BoS bunker every 3 in-game days; usable only if 7,500 chips were won in the casino before leaving the Sierra Madre) | |||||||||||||
Detailed walkthrough[]
Cracking the vault[]
After finding and shutting off the signal interference from all three of the other team members' collars (either by keeping them alive and disabling them or killing them and letting their collars detonate) in the previous quests, Elijah instructs the Courier that it is now time to unlock the way into the Sierra Madre vault where the infamous Old-World treasures are believed to be kept. To achieve this, they must find a means to replicate the voice of songstress Vera Keyes to use on the special audio-lock bult into the elevator leading to the vault from the executive suites.
There are two options for accomplishing the objective, with one dependent on the outcome of the main quest Last Luxuries:
- Obtain the holotape of Vera's audition and return to the lobby. Go to the reception desk and access the terminal that is connected to the resort's sound archive. Select each option to collect the sound bites of Vera's song recordings. Then return to the elevator in the master suite and interact with the speaker box next to it to play the recording.
- If one completed Last Luxuries by keeping Christine friendly and alive for the entirety of Dead Money, the option is available to return to her in the executive suites and ask for her help in using the voice of Vera Keyes she was surgically implanted with to speak the code phrase into the audio-lock; this will still require obtaining the sound bites from the archive terminal in the lobby. One can also converse with her about the nature of the Sierra Madre and her worries about the Courier being able to stop Elijah for good; passing a Perception 7 stat check gets her to reveal she intended to ambush the rogue elder when he came to the vault entrance. One can then convince her through dialogue to hold off and instead allow Elijah to follow them into the vault or choose to betray and kill her instead (invalidating this quest option).
Taking the elevator into the Sierra Madre's vault, reaching the central chamber containing the actual vault itself requires navigating a maze of ducts and catwalks laden with a combination of every hazard faced up to this point in Dead Money: security holograms, multiple shielded speakers, and every lower part of a room covered in the toxic Cloud.
From the entrance into the sheltered area looking into the central chamber, turn right and use the wall-mounted Vault maintenance access terminal to undo the lockdown. One can also find a note warning about the interaction between the vault security protocols and the elevator's access.
Follow the passageway around to the first room. Entering the first chamber, an unshielded speaker is visible immediately in front and just above a long pipe. Reaching the opposite sheltered area will enter the range of another speaker in the next room. Jump down the broken walkway and then to the right to enter the sheltered area. There is a safe spot in front of the table in the enclosure, where one can find a worker's note complaining about safety and Sinclair's ignorance of the vault's maintenance issues. There are also two ammo boxes next to the note.
Open the door into a corridor leading to another sheltered area. In the next room are four speakers, two of them unshielded. Exit the sheltered area to the right, go up the stairs, jump over the broken walkway and enter the safe spot in the corner. Directly behind the player cjaracter above the door they came through is an unshielded speaker. Slightly to the right and up high above a doorway is the second unshielded speaker. Destroying them both reduces the unsafe areas in the room.
A third, shielded speaker is high on the wall just a bit further along the catwalk. If one holsters their weapon, it is possible to move fast enough to run down the left side of the upper walkway and reach the wall terminal to override the speaker system in that room.
Note: On the right broken section of the top walkway, one can actually jump onto the beam and then onto the section with the exit. If timed right, this serves as an easier way to get through the room than to follow the left path. If one lands on the beam and run to the right towards the wall, they can step out of the speakers' range and reset the bomb timer.
Once the alarms are off, standing next to the console walk to the edge to see the roof of the shelter one just ran from, fall onto that shelter's roof and there will be a duffle bag and inside will be a random weapon and some other Items.
The next room is occupied by three security holograms with good coverage of most of the room. The hologram control computer is in a workers' hut to the left of the entrance to this area across a walkway with a gap in it. The 3 hologram emitters in this room can be destroyed or disabled with a Repair 100 skill check:
- The first is on top of the enclosed structure to the left (when entering the room). One can push a barrel onto the catwalk to the left, jumping on it and jumping in the air while on the barrel will allow them to shoot the emitter on the roof of the first structure (after moving said barrel, it will disappear and become visible again after touching it and will repeat in this way), alternatively this can be achieved by exiting the room towards the gap in the walkway one came from, hopping onto the rail and attempting a jump shot into the emitter; this will likely make the remaining holograms hostile.
- The second is on top of the metal beam almost directly on top of the door with the force field. One will need to run along a beam and jump up onto the roof of the structure in the southeast corner of the map to reach these.
- The third is on the ceiling (not the roof like the 1st, but inside) of the control structure in the northeast corner of the map. One can also use 2 or 3 carefully tossed hand grenades to blow up the emitters without having to get close to the holograms or the speakers (one can get up to 9 frag grenades by passing an Explosives 30 skill check to disarm the grenade bouquets in the Residential District during Find Collar 14: Dean Domino).
Alternatively, one can run from the southeast structure to the northeast structure and shoot the emitter there, then running back quickly. However, this method places the player character in the range of a radio for under a second less than the time needed for the collar to detonate (or one could run past the last security and turn off the alarms first, then run into the adjacent room where the emitter is). After dispatching the three hologram emitters, one can turn off the security system at the workers' hut terminal. There is a terminal in a shelter on the lower catwalk on the other side of the room that also allows them to turn off all alarms.
Before leaving the room, drop down to the lower catwalk amidst the Cloud and grab the Vault turret terminal password tape. Activate the hologram control terminal in the southeast corner of the room, as this shuts down the last set of force fields and speakers.
After entering the hall past the force fields, there is the vault security terminal which can be used to shut down the remaining security. Note: When initially accessing the terminal, there will only be two options: "Vault Security Protocols Information" and "Vault Security Protocols Warning." Only after reading the first entry does another option appear to disable the vault security and lower the force fields, also obtaining the Vault security protocols note.
Dealing with Elijah[]
Immediately before entering the vault, on the exterior platform, one can find a toolbox and next to it, a holotape containing a venomous message to Vera Keyes. Looking below that spot, one can see a skeleton lying on a pipe (identified as "The Founder's Remains" and implicitly being those of Frederick Sinclair) next to a duffle bag containing a copy of Nikola Tesla and You. If one goes to acquire the skill book, returning to the platform before dying to the Cloud requires following the pipe away from Sinclair's bones and hopping up on a corner pipe.
Use the wall mounted terminal beside the vault chamber door to open it. Stepping inside the vault itself, one will discover an assortment of weapons, armor, chems, money, casino chips, and most importantly, the fabled "Treasure of the Sierra Madre": 37 gold bars worth approximately 10,539 caps each, for a total of 389,943 caps in total - while at the same time weighing 35 pounds each, for a total of 1,295 pounds. Checking the gun cabinet to the right of the gold stack, one can also find high amounts of .357 Magnum rounds and microfusion cells as well as one or two sets of reinforced security armor.
At the same time, after entering the vault door, it will seal within seconds and alarms will blare outside. Lift the lockdown using the left-hand security terminal.
Accessing the terminal on the desk sitting in front of a Sierra Madre seal, the entry "Vera Keyes" will only deliver an error message as the contents were extracted. The second one "Vera" reveals a heartfelt message from Sinclair regretting that he allowed his rage to blind him to Vera's suffering and being used as a tool by Dean, with a warning not to try and access his personal accounts as that will trigger the trap he set for them, now meant only for Dean.
Note: If one ignores the warning and chooses the option to access Sinclair's personal accounts, a unique game-over will take place with an ending slide stating how the Courier was trapped in the casino vault, eventually dying inside. Afterward the game will then load back to an autosave automatically created before accessing the terminal inside the vault.
After reading the "Vera" entry and avoiding the "Sinclair's Personal Accounts" entry, the player character will be stuck in place as Elijah appears on a video screen behind the wall seal. He proclaims the Sierra Madre's treasures belong to him alone and demands the player character stay put until he arrives. One is then given the opportunity to ask numerous questions regarding Elijah's history and motives for unlocking the Sierra Madre. At least one of these topics will contribute towards the Things to Come! challenge as well.
Once the conversation arrives at the topic of Elijah entering the vault, the rogue elder will initially refuse due to paranoia over other hidden traps including one of the Courier's own. Getting him to show up in person will require choosing the following dialogue options and passing any subsequent skill checks (all of which will requires a minimum 75 skill level ):
- "Unless you come down here, I'll destroy the vault, everything in it." - Skill checks for Explosives, Science, Repair
- "I'm not interested in the vault, I only want to leave." - Skill checks for Speech, Barter
- "Then I'll find a way to unlock the secrets of this vault, take them for myself." - Skill checks for Lockpick, Sneak
- "If you want me to wait, I'll cooperate. The Sierra Madre doesn't matter to me." - Non-skill option. Elijah appreciates the cooperation and prompts the Courier to leave the vault and wait where he can see them. Stand at the forcefield barrier nearest the elevator and he accuses you of attempting to steal the vault contents, or remain out of sight and he belittles your cowardice first. Elijah activates the security turrets, and once the Courier initiates combat, a fight to the death ensues.
Note: If one's reputation with the NCR is low enough, one will have a unique option to propose an alliance with Elijah against their common enemy. This leads to another ending slide detailing how the Courier and Elijah conquered the Mojave with an army of holograms, carpet-bombing Hoover Dam with Cloud bombs and ensuring none in the Mojave gain control of it. This will also result in a game-over and restart at the autosave before accessing the vault terminal. This option is available only if one previously spoke to Veronica about Elijah and exhausted all relevant conversation options with her.
With any of the skill-check options, around a minute later, Elijah will enter from the elevator doors and deactivate the forcefields to walk directly to the vault door.
Kill Elijah[]
Hacking the Very Hard-level encryption on the right-hand security terminal in the vault chamber will cause the turrets outside in the central chamber to turn on Elijah. However, if they kill him, the player character will not receive the Cash Out achievement/trophy (credit is only awarded for a direct kill). Destroying the turret generator (requires a Melee Weapons/Unarmed 50 check) next to the terminal will disable the security turrets and cause Elijah to become hostile when he gets to the vault door.
Elijah is immune to direct damage while approaching the vault, up until combat is initiated and he reactivates the forcefield barriers blocking access to the elevator. Once Elijah has entered the room, he becomes instantly aware if the player character steps across the mid-line of the catwalk section that lies between the arcing coils and the elevator exit; one can only pass this midline without Elijah activating the security fields if the midline is passed before Elijah enters. Even with Sneak 100 and using a Stealth Boy, they will be always detected before Elijah begins to path toward the terminal next to the vault door in the former scenario. Once he begins to move toward the terminal, it takes about 9 seconds before Elijah will notice if the player character is not in the vault and re-enable the forcefields and security doors. Elijah can pass through the forcefield even if it is active, before or during the fight.
- If one remained friendly with Christine and she was kept alive during Last Luxuries, she will call out over the speakers and help out by deactivating the hostile automated turrets.
- If one remained friendly with Dean Domino and he was kept alive during Curtain Call at the Tampico, he will call out over the speakers and help out by deactivating the vault's remaining speakers, giving the Courier more ground to walk on without having to worry about their collar exploding.
Note: Dog and God does not provide any beneficial help during the fight with Elijah if kept alive during Put the Beast Down.
Trap Elijah[]
Alternatively, it is possible—though very challenging—for the player character to sneak through the same shielded door Elijah uses to enter the room outside the vault, and, from there, to travel quickly and directly to the exit elevator without having to go back the long way to the vault entrance. (This is one way to escape while encumbered e.g., by the gold bars inside the vault.)
There is one such entryway to the left (the player character's left) of the door through which Elijah enters. Sneak through the hallway directly across from the vault door and then go up the stairs. Then sneak along the gantry and into the entryway. One must make it past the middle of the room immediately outside the vault before Elijah enters, and sneak into the "entry" hallway. If Elijah notices the Courier as stated above, the security fields will activate and one will be locked into the fight with him.
As long as the Courier has made it inside the "entry" hallway when the fields activate, travel to the exit elevator will not be blocked by the security fields when Elijah activates them; if the Courier is still outside the hallway when Elijah activates the security fields, the fields will block access to the "entry" hallway and prevent any direct exit by that route.
When Elijah triggers the trap that seals him in the vault, he will realize the Courier tricked him and activate their collar. It will take about one in-game minute to explode. Both entrances on the side opposite the elevator will remain open until Elijah activates security; the forcefield on the entrance that Elijah enters through near the elevator will activate automatically if approached, but the forcefield for the other entrance near the elevator will not. If one remains within the confines of the barriers, whether undetected or not, Elijah eventually activates security, turning the turrets on and locking into the fight with him.
Escape![]
Once Elijah is killed, or he realizes he's been tricked, the entire vault level begins to fall apart and the explosive collar is activated; it will detonate within a minute unless the Courier boards the elevator to the surface.
Upon entering the elevator doors, the player character will be transported to the fountain in the Villa. At this point, one can then revisit any location in the Sierra Madre including the Casino & Resort itself with the exception of the vault itself. Travel between the Villa and the casino, which was previously barred, will now be available. The explosive collar will have been automatically removed upon arrival in the Villa, which makes navigating the outlying areas easier and allows exploration of previously unavailable locations.
Interacting with the exiting gate near the fountain will give a message indicating that one will not be able to return to the Sierra Madre again, so any lingering business such as getting all unique rewards and being banned from the casino should be completed at this time before leaving. Choosing the option to leave will trigger the ending slides for the add-on.
On completion, the player character will be deposited at the abandoned BoS bunker and normally unable to return to the Sierra Madre (using console commands allows one to find a steel "Door to Villa" that does allow this). The radio found in the bunker will also play a new broadcast recorded before the bombs by Vera Keyes, reflecting on the experiences in the Sierra Madre, the soul put into it by Sinclair, and an earnest hope they may return again.
By completing the Dead Money add-on, the previously locked security door in the bunker is now accessible, allowing access to Elijah's laboratory. The gun case at the foot of the bed will contain a copy of Father Elijah's robes (if not taken from his body). The chemistry set on the main table will deliver a single sample of Cloud residue. The tiny wall safe just outside of the lab entrance in the bunker will also have a deposit of 100 chips and a complimentary voucher which can be used on the vending machine in the corner (only if the player character won a minimum of 7,500 chips in the casino and acquired the original voucher from the cashier to turn in at a vending machine; otherwise the vouchers found in the bunker will not reward more chips). The chips and voucher deposit and the chemistry set's Cloud residue will refresh after 3 days and 1 day respectively, for an unlimited amount.
Upon reaching the top of the stairs near the ladder to exit the bunker, any and all equipment the player character had on them upon starting the add-on will be returned automatically.
Quest stages[]
Behind the scenes[]
If the player character chooses to read Sinclair's personal accounts, at the end of the letter to Dean Domino, it says "...and I will raise my glass and say Fortunato." This is a reference to Edgar Allan Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado," in which the protagonist Montresor (believing himself slighted) lures his victim, Fortunato, to an underground crypt with a ruse about sampling the titular wine, chains him to a wall and seals him inside a hidden chamber by covering the entrance with bricks so he is never found for decades after. It is signed "in pace requiescat," Latin for "rest in peace," the phrase with which Poe's story ends.
Bugs[]
There is a glitch where dying after speaking to Elijah but before reaching the elevator can cause you to reload an autosave infront of the vault monitor, but the second it loads you die. This causes a reload of the same autosave, which creates an infinite loop of dying and reloading. Saving before speaking to Elijah should fix the problem. [verified]- If you are over-encumbered upon using the terminal in the back of the vault, speaking with Father Elijah will cause the dialogue to auto-skip. This bug continues to occur even if you reload from the terminal auto-save, and are not over-encumbered. [verified]
- There is a bug when opening the computer in the vault, after completing the mission and the slide show you will be locked in the vault, unable to get out. [verified]
- A bug has been reported preventing the player from leaving the abandoned BoS bunker after finishing the quest. (workaround) go to the Xbox dashboard, then to system settings, select memory, hit Y on the drive your save is on, then clear system cache. Go back to reload the game and say No to downloading the update then load your save game and you can then exit the bunker. After which you can reload the updates. [verified]
- As of 5/15/2011 with patch 1.3.0.444, when trying to return to the Mojave Wasteland, the game will freeze on a black screen forcing you to reset your Xbox 360. Deleting patch 1.3.0.444 will allow you to return but the Villa will lose its "aged" texture and the slideshow will be removed. Edit: Tested on PC with most recent patch and game also crashes. [verified]
- On player, before trying to leave back to the Mojave, go to the console and type tcl to turn clipping off, then use the gate. When the slideshow appears, there will be no narration. Go back into the console and again, type tcl to turn clipping back on. The narration should now play and will put you back in the BoS Bunker.
- A bug may cause you to continue to be poisoned for the rest of the game despite being outside the toxic cloud, if upon entering the room with the three hologram guards, you turn immediately right and go down the steps to a platform within the toxic cloud where you can find a toolbox and a holotape with the vault turret terminal password. Should this happen, you will not be able to leave the Sierra Madre despite achieving mission success (with enough stimpaks) as you will die during the ending slide show which one cannot skip through. If you wish to get the holotape, you should save your game before going down the steps and should the bug occur, reload that save game and try again. [verified]
- Bug will act as if maintenance door is still locked and closed, even if opened (Invisible Wall), effectively trapping the player until their collar blows up. The best thing to do is wait it out for a few moments and it will then let you walk through it. [verified]
- A glitch might occur after you've taken all 37 gold bars and leaving the vault the ending won't appear, to fix this go back into the vault then leave again. [verified]
- Another workable variant of the above bug- purchase demolition charges from the Vending Machine inside the vault (15 should do the trick). Hurry out and meet Elijah before he exits onto the walkway. Then crouch on the top step next to the forcefield and toss all the Demo Charges onto the stairs you just came up. You WILL have to endure turret fire while you do this. Then proceed as noted; press against the forcefield as you destroy turrets, eventually falling in as Father Elijah runs out. Elijah hits the charges, you are protected by the forcefield, Elijah dies and you exit with plenty of time to spare. [verified]
- If you save near the toolbox outside of the vault and die, you will respawn and immediately go into a death loop. Your character will appear to die from falling damage despite respawning on the gantry. Furthermore, this death loop occurs for any Sierra Madre savegame. To break this cycle, it is necessary to load a Mojave-based savegame, or exit the game completely, restart, and reload. [verified]
- During the ending slide show, the narrator will repeat, "We've all heard the story of the Sierra Madre" at least two times times before continuing on through the scripted sequence explaining the fate of your comrades. [verified]
- When Elijah comes to meet you in the vault, if you equip a Stealth Boy and sneak, unseen, into the shield of the doorway that Elijah stands behind you will be thrown through the shield to the other side of the doorway and Elijah will appear on the vault side of the doorway. The elevator will be locked and require a key until Elijah is dead. But if you find a way to kill him from that side of the door(you can use mines or plastic explosives) the Elevator will become unlocked. [verified]
- If you stand close enough to the forcefield where Elijah enters, you can get him to glitch you through the forcefield. It is also possible to glitch through the forcefield with all of the gold bars too. The only problem is that you have to kill father Elijah and since he cannot walk through the force field you cannot complete the quest and take the elevator back up to the hotel.(Unconfirmed)You might be able to kill Elijah with the use of land mines near the force field or if you can lure him to the force field you can shoot him through it. [verified]
- Sometimes, if you disable the turrets before Elijah comes into the vault, he remains behind the forcefield, and you cannot kill him, thus preventing the DLCs completion. Regarding the above bug (dropping gold by the door, destroying turrets to bring Elijah into the vault and falling through the forcefield), he may remain behind the forcefield and shoot at you with his Gauss rifle, which still injures the player. You cannot damage him through the field. [verified]
- There is a bug where if you sneak past Elijah and get to the elevator safely through the ducts, the game will crash to the desktop, losing your achievement. To fix this, you must restart the game, and load your last save. [verified]
- After killing Elijah, the elevator may take you to Vera's suite, rather than the Villa's Fountain. If this happens the quest will not advance as it should. At this point if you try to re-enter the vault, or leave the casino your collar will explode. If you can revert to a save that was made before you exited the vault, and enter the command set "xx00AE1E".bSecurityAltInfo to 1 immediately before you use the elevator door it should prevent the bug from occurring, and everything will continue as normal. Alternatively, if you use the console commands tgm and unlock on the casino's doors, you will be taken to the fountain. Head to the Mojave Wasteland gate, and change your view to third person. Then, open the console and type showinventory, then select the player. If you now cannot see the collar id on the console, drop items until it is visible. Remove the collar using player.removeitem X # (X=item id #=amount of item). With the collar removed, pick up your gear and use unlock to open the Wasteland gate. This will allow the ending slides to play, and you will be taken back to The abandoned BoS bunker. When back to the bunker, you can unlock Elijah's terminal, Elijah's footlocker, and the footlocker beside the ladder with the unlock command. Console commands can be used to complete the quest afterwards. You will then be able to continue the game, still gaining the perks and items you would have if this bug had not occurred. [verified]
- After escaping the vault and returning to the Mojave Wasteland, you can lose most of your inventory. Meaning most of you weapons, ammunition, clothing, armor, stimpak etc., will disappear from the game.You will still receive some items, 8 stimpaks 5 drained microfusion cell and some doctor's bag. To prevent this you can store all of your equipment before entering the Sierra Madre in the storage box inside the abandoned BoS bunker. [verified]
- Sometimes after you kill Elijah the force fields will remain up, trapping the Courier in the vault until the Explosive collar detonates. [verified]
- Opening the "personal accounts" will cause an instant game over, giving player a bad ending, and the game itself might crash, force the player to restart the computer. [verified]
- After activating the vault control terminal, the green screen will open and close again with the message "There is no response in the intercom", making the player lose controls and not finish the quest. There is one way to fix this, by pulling up the console, and entering player.setstage 01000FC1 100. It will complete the quest, setting you free. It may be necessary to use movetoqt, as well if you cannot leave the room.(Make your load order is correct, with New Vegas first, and dead money second, or this might not work)
- After killing Elijah the quest marker would not update.The marker would point to his body even after it said to escape. Prior to removing the collar with commands and leaving the Madre, approaching the exit would play Elijah's warning about leaving without doing what you were told.After playing the slideshow and arriving back in the bunker, the marker for the quest remained pointing towards the room with the speaker playing the broadcast. [verified]
- When talking to Elijah on the screen in the vault, if you choose "There's something else I wanted to know," Elijah will say "Ask! You still have time." However, his voice will not be muffled as if through a projection, but will sound like he's talking to you face-to-face. [verified]
- When going back to Christine after threading Vera's music at the Reception Terminal, there is a possibility to get infinite XP if you have Perception of 7. Initiating conversation with Christine and selecting the first dialogue option each time will get you 70xp per conversation, when passing a Perception 7 check. The conversation can be repeated infinitely.[verified]
- After requesting Christine to open the door, she glitches and refuses to move. [verified]
- Prior to patch 1.5, upon trying to get back to the Mojave Wasteland at the end, the game may have crashed to desktop, rendering the save game useless. The aforementioned patch fixed this. [verified]
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