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I Put a Spell on You is a side quest in Fallout: New Vegas. Camp McCarran has been compromised and the agent is feeding information to Caesar's Legion about NCR troop movements.
Quick walkthrough (NCR)
- Travel to Camp McCarran and speak to James Hsu or complete The Finger of Suspicion.
- Speak to Captain Curtis and then to Carrie Boyd.
- Once you've got adequate information, head to entrance of the control tower.
- Between midnight and 2 a.m., the spy will wander over calmly (armed with a 9mm pistol).
- Remove the disarming codes from the spy.
- Head to James Hsu, and report the incident to him.
- Head upstairs, directly over Hsu's room, and run for the monorail.
- You must defuse the bomb. The quest will glitch and send the monorail to its death anyway even if you defused it. Follow the steps below to prevent this and complete the quest right.
Detailed walkthrough (NCR)
(In order to complete this mission properly, and being able to also complete No, Not Much)
At some point, you will be asked to speak with Captain Ronald Curtis, who is located on the first floor of the Camp McCarran Terminal building to the west (right) of the escalators. He will then ask you to speak to Carrie Boyd and Contreras. Talk to Boyd, and then ask her about break-ins. She will say that there have been break-ins at the control tower every night. Ask her for an access key.
Go out to the control tower. The most direct route is to go out the back door between the escalators on the ground floor. The entry to the control tower has a monitor beside it, but it is not needed. Move back by one of the planes and Wait until about 1:00 or 1:30 a.m. You may want to save the game prior to doing the Wait.
Sometime after 1:00 a.m., Curtis can be seen walking towards the tower. It is very important that you remain hidden, otherwise he will confront you and ask why you're there. If you end the dialog successfully, he will then walk back into the base and you will need to wait until the next day. (Or go back in, talk to him, and run outside and hide. He might come back if it's before 2 am.) If Curtis starts shooting at you, run outside to the tarmac, then run back to the tower without opening fire on him. Enter the tower and when you exit, Curtis will "forget" he tried to kill you moments earlier.
If Curtis doesn't see you, he will walk into the tower. Follow him inside, and stay hidden at the bottom of the stairs while you listen to him talking on the radio. The quest will update and tell you to disarm the monorail. If you have a high explosives skill or high science skill, you can choose to go directly to the monorail. Otherwise, you will have to pickpocket/retrieve an Activation Code item off of Curtis for a loss of karma points.
At this point, DO NOT go talk to Hsu; If you do, the monorail is doomed no matter what you do. Go back in the first floor door of the Camp McCarran Terminal Building, up the east escalator, and down the hall to the east to the door to the monorail. Walk inside the monorail, and turn left. The bomb will be inside an air vent. Disarm the explosives using Science (>45), Explosives (>35) (magazines and/or Mentats are handy here) or the codes you "borrowed" from the spy's pockets. You may end up being transported to The Strip by the monorail - if that's the case just hop on and head back to McCarran.
Once the bomb is defused, if you have not already killed Curtis you may wish to return to the control tower and finish him off for the extra experience and his equipment. (Note: You can get the equipment anyways, for Col. Hsu tells you he wants to arrest Curtis, if that one even lets himself getting arrested, which obviously isn't the case. You can loot his body in the tower after speaking to Hsu, all you'll miss is the extra-experience.) Then return to Colonel Hsu: he'll reward you with some caps and a reputation boost. All done!
You can also complete the quest and gain the Experience Points with killing Curtis in the tower before hearing the radio conversation. This way, when you report it back to Hsu, he will be surprised and tell you Curtis could not be the spy as he was the leader of the investigation. After that, it will be revealed that there's a bomb on the train, the explosion of which you won't be able to prevent. After the train exploded, you can report it back to Hsu, and then the quest ends, with you gaining nothing but the XP. This is a good solution if you run into the same problem as I did: there was no radio conversation, and the quest did not update itself, even after waiting hours at the bottom of the stairs. (Walking back outside and entering the control tower again should fix this. If not, save the game, exit the game, start it again and load the save; using an Auto Save will do.)
- I don't know who added the above, but killing Curtis is NOT recommended (I just tested, if you kill him IN THE TOWER, it hurts nothing, as the person above said), either before or after his radio call, as it will lower your standing with the NCR (gain infamy) which may turn the NCR at camp McCarren hostile. If Boone (or any other companion) is with you he will kill any hostile NCR you encounter, including Hsu, thus lowering your standing even further. If Hsu is killed you will not be able to complete the quest, if Boone kills any other party required for any quest (such as Lt. Boyd) you will immediately fail them as well.
- Just in case you fail to wait until Curtis talks about the bomb, it's ok, you can still save the Monorail. Go ahead and go to Hsu and tell him you took out Curtis. He will tell you to go disarm the bomb. Hurry to the Monorail and AS SOON as you get out the door bring up your Pip Boy and use the Chem Turbo under "Aid" if you have it. This will give you the boost you need to get on the train and defuse the bomb. This only works if you have turbo, and it may take a couple of tries, but it saved me after I was a bit too hasty. (Tested on 360. Does not work because you are unable to board the monorail, there is an invisible wall preventing you from entering)
- Alternatively, if you use the response "Hsu wont trust me enough to let me investigate." you can help The Legion to blow up the monorail.
Quick walkthrough (Legion)
Talk to Curtis, and choose the option Hsu won't trust me enough to let me investigate. Go through the speech options untill you get the quest to blow up the monorail.
Follow the map marker to the garbage bin in front of the ticket counter, and get EVERYTHING inside it. I made the mistake of only taking the explosive charge and monorail sabotage plans, and then couldn't get inside the monorail to plant the charge. You need all the other items (Fission battery etc) to frame Crenshaw.
Once you picked up all the items in the garbage bin, go to Hsu and tell him you will investigate the information leak. Then go to the monorail. If your reputation is high enough you can just walk past the soldiers. If not, then there is a change of guards at 9am and 6pm (please confirm times), which should give you a short time to sneak to the monorail without getting any problems with the guards. (Or snipe them while hidden for the extra xp.) Alternatively, don an NCR uniform and the guards will let you pass without attacking. Now enter the monorail, go left, and there is a vent on the wall which you can activate to plant the bomb. The quest tells you to leave the monorail and watch it depart, so enjoy the show! ;)
Next enter the building, stay upstairs and go into the Concourse. Go left and head to a footlocker that your map marker will point to. Put Abraxo Cleaner, Conductor, Fission Battery, Monorail Sabotage Plans and Wonderglue in the footlocker. Take a left and head outside following the map marker to Crenshaw, who you can just kill and then head back inside and tell Hsu that Crenshaw blew up the monorail. The first option telling him about the evidence will reward 100 caps, so will the second option using speech, and both are still repeatable, which is a bug but a nice way to get a repeatable 100 caps if you need them. The third option doesn't give you anything.
Head back to Curtis and tell him he's in the clear. Rewards 550 xp and 150 caps.
Journal entries (NCR)
Notes
- If the NCR has branded you a terrorist for working with Caesar, Captain Curtis will attack you on sight, even if you are dressed as a member of the NCR. This can be quite common if you are doing the quest Render Unto Caesar and you received the quest from Vulpes Inculta. This will render the quest impossible to complete. Also if you kill him next time you go to The Fort all Caesar Legion Members will be hostile. Wait 3 in-game days and they should not be hostile anymore.
- If you are stuck on the quest I Put a Spell on You but you manage to get in the monorail tram and you also have the quest No, Not Much you can defuse the bomb and while still in the tram, go into your pipboy and fast travel back to Camp McCarran and talk to Colonel Hsu and he will send reinforcement's to Bitter Springs but, it will not give you the option to talk about the monorail. Go back to the monorail and watch it explode. Go back to Hsu and tell him it is destroyed. Congratulations you have done the quest and "getting reinforcements". ::IMPORTANT:: Only do this if you are 100% sure that the monorail will always be destroyed and have no choice but to do this!
- If you complete this quest siding with legion and effectively frame Private Crenshaw by planting the evidence and go unnoticed in sneak attack killing him. As long as you don't kill Colonel Hsu then after this quest return to Colonel Hsu their will still be an speach option for 'I know who bombed the monorail'. Selecting this will give the previous options again to frame Private Crenshaw again generating you another 100 caps you can repeat as many times as you like effectivly giving quick and easy caps. This is a bug officialy but it is a way of generating as much money as you like without much effort ::IMPORTANT:: Do not speak the option about 'He confessed it to me. Right before he died.' or 'You'd be surprised what some people are capable of'.
Bugs
After successfully entering and eavesdropping on the spy, leaving the watch tower causes any followers to stop following. They will wait in front of the tower until you talk to them and tell them to stop following, and then again to follow you.
- It is possible to get the 100 cap reward for framing Private Crenshaw unlimited times, all is required to do this is to talk to him and tell him you found out who sabotaged the monorail and provide him with the speech check as evidence. Once you have done this repeat to keep getting the 100 cap reward. NOTE: this continues to work even after the quest has been completed.
- After you investigate the late-night break-in, the game is not going to let you eavesdrop the conversation, and after a time, the spy will discover you. A possible workaround for this situation is this. Make a save outside the radio tower, after the spy enters it. If you hear the conversation when you go in, it has worked. However, the conversation will stop every time the spy has to give a reply. There are two ways to fix this. You can simply pause the game every time the spy has to reply, to continue the conversation. If this does not work, you must pickpocket one item from him for every reply. It is best to go with the weightless items. He is carrying 2 codes and 9 9mm cases, which you can still steal with a low stealth skill (20). Steal any of those items in any order you wish every time he needs to give a reply, but only steal one item, because the 9mm pistol and ammo are harder to steal.
- There's a bug which prevents you from saving the monorail, even if you get on the monorail and disarm the bomb, the monorail still blows up (still unfixed on the Xbox 360 even after installing the 1.01, and on the PC after the second update patch, confirmed on the PS3 version). Hence, if the player wishes to access the strip easily through the monorail, they should do so before initiating this quest OR the portion of the quest initiated where the player has to save the monorail, until the bug IS fixed. UPDATE: However, this bug can be potentially avoided if the player simply kills Curtis, loots the deactivation codes from his corpse, and ignore the "go inform Hsu" (which is possibly the inconceivable bug) and make a beeline to the monorail. Once there, you can deactivate the bomb without any complication, and can further proceed with the quest as normal. The game will acknowledge that you have saved the monorail, thus completing the quest. (Xbox360 Confirmed) Note: if you've killed Curtis, and complete this quest as suggested, there will be a dialog option that states you've found the spy, and revealed it to be Curtis rather than mentioning you've killed him.
- There is a chance that when you are waiting for Curtis to enter the tower, he will simply walk in and out of the McCarran Terminal Bulding every second from 12 to 2.
- If you do defuse the bomb though, Radio New Vegas will report you foiled the plot. (Foiled, meaning you stopped, this is not a bug)
- If you end this quest without saving the monorail, Hsu will not grant you the reinforcements for Bitter Springs, thus making the Quest No, Not Much unsolvable. (Work around: Reaching 'Liked' status with the NCR allows Hsu to send the reinforcements before completing this quest.)
- If you slide on the rail to the door of monorail after killing a spy, you will be able to enter it as usual, and defuse the bomb. Also, you will get the caps for it. Weirdly, though, it does not affect the dialogue, and might also not affect the explosion of the train (needs verification).
- If you quicksave just before Curtis enters the tower and then reload, Curtis remains standing exactly where he was when you saved, but is invisible and will not respond to either speech or pickpocket attempts. A partial fix is to head back into the terminal building and wait till daylight hours. Curtis will reappear and you can now interact with him, but he will remain in position, thus never heading into the tower and making the quest unsolvable.
- If you decide to leave the tower when you're suppose to listen to the conversation and teleport yourself to some other place and wait there (3 hours?), Curtis will appear and ask you what you are doing there (in another language with normal sub). If You can end the conversation well, he will travel back to the camp. The only problem, you wont be able to listen to the conversation anymore.
- If you're on bad terms with the NCR and initiate this quest with as a Caesar's Legion supporter, then get on good terms and speak to the Colonel about completing the quest for the NCR. Then the explosives in the trash can become non-existent and the Control Tower becomes vacant forever.
- Sometimes no matter what time or day you're there, the spy will never show up.
- If Boyd got locked in the interrogation room during The Silent Treatment, you will be unable to speak to her to complete this quest.
- If Curtis starts a gun fight with you in the tower 10 of Spades may suddenly appear out of nowhere.
- Sometimes the game will bug and not allow you to open the garbage can in front of the ticketing counter, thus rendering the quest useless.
- If you need Col. James Hsu to send troops to Bitter Springs for the quest "No, Not Much", when you get to the monorail part, get into the monorail and defuse the bomb. Then, while still in the monorail, quick travel to Fort McCarran. You should be able to go straight back to Col. James Hsu and ask him to send troops to Bitter Springs, and he'll say yes. If you go back to the monorail, it'll depart and explode. This is just a small workaround if you need to get the "No, Not Much" quest completed without the monorail blowing up. Now, you can just wait for a patch to fix this. Need confirmation from others to see if this works for them also.
- Activating the Pip-boy at the monorail, may cause the game to freeze.
- After discovering the break-ins in the control tower you have the option to inform Curtis about it. If you do this the quest will glitch, Curtis will enter the tower as normal but you'll never hear the radio conversation, preventing the quest to be completed.
- There is a chance that the explosives will not be in the trash can by the ticket counter, when playing the Legion's side and after talking to Curtis.
Fixes
If you've killed the spy and already spoken to Hsu about it, but don't want the monorail to blow up, you can follow the steps here to create a mini-mod which would allow you to stop the explosion and complete the quest (not working to everyone, although following this instructions, it may work).
If you don't want the monorail to blow up on the Xbox 360 version, avoid the event trigger. This trick works by jumping up onto the guard rail right next to the train and fallowing it into the train car.
Notes
"I Put a Spell on You" is a 1956 song written by Screamin' Jay Hawkins, whose recording was selected as one of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. It was also ranked #313 on the Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. The song was also used in the Disney family movie Hocus Pocus
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