The White Wash is a side quest in Fallout: New Vegas.
Quick walkthrough[]
| Side Quest: The White Wash | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reach Camp McCarran and speak with Col. Hsu and Cpt. Curtis during I Put a Spell on You, and then Lt. Boyd; ask about the missing base personnel. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| (Optional) Acquire Corporal White's journal from his locker in the concourse. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reach Gomorrah on the Strip and speak with Dazzle in the courtyard. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reach the NCR sharecropper farms and speak with Trent Bascom, and then Lieutenant Romanowski; (Optional) Pickpocket the reprimand recommendation from Romanowski. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reach Westside and speak with the Follower, Tom Anderson in the Casa Madrid Apartments. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Pass a 6 Intelligence attribute check or Smiling Troublemaker Followers reputation check to convince Anderson to reveal the truth behind White's disappearance. | Look for evidence around Westside. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Speak with Hector; pass an 80 Speech skill check or follow him undetected to the north cistern and confront him. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Agree to keep Westside's secret in exchange for a 10% cut of profits from the Westside Co-op (20% with 50 Barter). | Turn Anderson in (turns him hostile) and then take Anderson's confession from the body to give to Boyd. | Agree to keep Westside's secret and lie about White's disappearance. | Convince Anderson to turn himself in, in exchange for keeping Westside's secret. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Return to Lt. Boyd. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reward: 650 XP Access to the MP confiscated goods trunk Anderson remains free: Followers fame Anderson turned in, secret kept: Karma gain Anderson's confession turned in: NCR fame, 10 maize, 10 banana yucca fruit and 10 coyote tobacco chew from Trent Bascom Westside Co-op agreement: 250-400 caps every 24 in-game hours from Clayton Ettienne | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Detailed walkthrough[]
Gone AWOL[]
The leadup to the quest starts by reaching Camp McCarran and speaking with Col. Hsu first to offer to look into the intelligence leaks at the camp, starting the side quest I Put a Spell on You, then advancing that quest to speaking with Cpt. Curtis about his investigation into the leaks, at which he will suggest speaking to Lieutenant Carrie Boyd. From there, one must find Lt. Boyd in the interrogation room on the floor directly above Curtis' office, where she is attempting an interrogation of the captured centurion Silus; it is not required to complete the unmarked quest as one can go directly into asking the Lt. about noticing strange occurrences around the base.
Among the issues she lists are members of base personnel going AWOL, including Bryce Anders (though Boyd knows the Ranger was sent on an assignment by Hsu). Asking about others leads to her mentioning Corporal White, known as an up-and-comer looking to join the Rangers by any means; the only lead to work off of is that White was known to frequent the services of Dazzle, a prostitute at Gomorrah on the Strip. Boyd also suggests going to White's locker in the concourse and looking for anything there; doing so will turn up Corporal White's journal which documents his investigations into the NCR's irrigation system pumping water from Lake Mead, in particular anomalous occurrences of water being diverted to Westside.
From the entrance into Gomorrah in the northernmost section of the Strip (after disarming with the doorman), cross the casino and go through Brimstone to the double doors leading into the courtyard; Dazzle normally stands next to her tent by the left poolside. Speaking with her, mentioning White gets her to reveal that during his paid sessions, White would talk at length about the NCR's water and she overhead him mention the name of a farmer, Trent Bascom in relation to the sharecropper farms maintained by the republic outside the east wall of the Strip.
- If Dazzle was killed for any reason beforehand, the note from White to Dazzle can be found on her body that will yield the same information.
From Freeside's east gate, go directly south to the chainlink fence, which has a gate on the east face but also at least one hole on the north and south sides. Trent is normally tending to the fields to the south side of the irrigation pipes during the day, and sleeping in the sharecropper barracks at night. Speaking with him, mentioning Cpl. White will get Trent to say that White tried to talk with him about computers linked to the water system, but he as a farmer knew very little though got the impression White's investigation wasn't exactly sanctioned by his superiors. He also mentions that the last time he saw White, he was speaking with Lieutenant Romanowski, the NCR's military overseer at the farms.
- If Trent was killed for any reason beforehand, the note from Corporal White can be found on his body that will yield the same information.
Lt. Romanowski typically resides on the stone foundation of the central tent in the farms. Speaking with him about Cpl. White, Romanowski reveals that White's investigation was trying to figure out how the sharecropper farms' water supply was being undercut and putting their crop yield at risk, and when he got no help from the Lt., White himself went to Westside to speak with Tom Anderson, a Follower of the Apocalypse residing there that has closely interacted with the locals and helped them maintain their own crops. One can optionally pass a 6 Intelligence attribute check to indicate a connection between the water shortage and Westside's crop wealth, but Romanowski doesn't pay it any mind. One can also ask additional questions about White, which gets Romanowski to admit his disparaging opinion of the Corporal and his glory-hound aspirations of being made a Ranger and a cut above the rank-and-file Army troopers.
- If Romanowski was killed for any reason beforehand, the reprimand recommendation can be found on his body that will yield the same information.
Conspiracy in Westside[]
Upon entering Westside, the objective will direct the player character to enter the Casa Madrid Apartments, inside of which Anderson's apartment is on the north side on the first floor. Speaking with him, one will have the option to immediately discover the truth about White's disappearance by passing either a 6 Intelligence attribute check or a Smiling Troublemaker Followers reputation check.
If both checks are failed/unavailable, Anderson will refuse to speak further about what he knows and suggests they look elsewhere around Westside to find out what happened to Corporal White. Nobody else has anything to say about White other than Hector, a young boy working on the farms; the marker will point directly to him, in fact. Speaking with him, mentioning Cpl. White gets Hector nervous and dodging the question at first, but one can pass an 80 Speech skill to get him to admit that Anderson confronted White, but he doesn't know what happened after. Alternatively, if the Speech check fails, one can instead observe Hector during the day, eventually following him into the north cistern where it's discovered he is stealing some of the water. When confronted, Hector gives up Anderson, saying the water was to supply the co-ops; when Cpl. White caught Hector before as well and interrogated him about Anderson, Hector implies that Anderson made a hasty decision to "plug the leak" before NCR looked too closely at Westside.
The objective updates to then speak with Anderson again and confront him about Cpl. White and the water theft. Resolving the situation can be accomplished via one of the following methods:
- Turn Anderson in. Choosing this path will turn Anderson hostile, and one must kill him. Afterward, take Anderson's confession from the body to bring it to Boyd. With Anderson's confession, the Lt. wraps up White's case and promises to send troops to cut off the water supply to Westside, garnering NCR fame. One can then return to the sharecropper farms and talk to Trent again, where he comments on the sudden in the water supply and offers a reward of 10 maize, 10 banana yucca fruit and 10 coyote tobacco chew.
- Killing Anderson will incur Followers infamy.
- If Arcade Gannon is an active companion, after killing Anderson, he will comment on how his death was unnecessary; one can then pass a 7 Intelligence check to justify how it was for the better which will earn 2 "history" points towards triggering his companion quest For Auld Lang Syne.
- Agree to keep Westside's water theft a secret and tell the NCR that White was killed by the Scorpions gang, garnering Followers fame. If Arcade Gannon is a companion, he will also comment on the issue. Return to Boyd and either go through with lying about White's fate, or betray Anderson and tell her the truth (she will react the same as if she received Anderson's confession). If one still lied to Boyd, when returning to Trent again, he will comment on the increased water rationing by the NCR and how he and his fellow farmers are packing up and heading back to New California to find better work.
- Convince Anderson to turn himself in, by lying to Boyd about a fall out with White over Dazzle (there is no option to tell the truth about the missing water) in exchange for keeping Westside's secret and receive good karma. Trent still complains about the water shortage and talks about leaving.
- An alternative outcome can be found when agreeing to keep Westside's water secret; instead of simply agreeing, one can negotiate to receive a 10% cut of the co-op's caps profits as compensation (this can be increased to 20% by passing a 50 Barter skill check). The caps are then paid by Clayton Ettienne in the Westside Co-op near the Casa Madrid Apartments, at a total of 250-400 caps (depending on one's Barter skill) every 24 in-game hours; however, finishing the quest by speaking to Boyd will end this arrangement. Trent will also still complain about the water shortage and mention the plan to return west.
Regardless of the option chosen, after returning to speak with her, Boyd will reward the key to the MP confiscated goods trunk, located across from the interrogation room, in the jail, which contains a random assortment of loot including magazines, a super stimpak, doctor's bags, Mentats and possibly Antivenom.
Quest stages[]
Notes[]
- The dialogue path with Lt. Boyd about Anderson asking to increase water flow to Freeside and taking it to Colonel Hsu, that may get someone else to stumble into the water numbers discrepancy, has no noticeable effects in the game.
 | The following is based on Fallout: New Vegas cut content. |
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- This quest originally involved a step that required the player character to speak to a cut character named Wrench to learn more about the water shortage. The character and his quest stage were removed for unknown reasons.
- Westside thugs were meant to harass the player character after they confronted Hector in the north cistern but were eventually cut from the quest. The thugs are still in the game's files, alongside their dialogue for accosting the PC and potentially attacking them based on player choice.
| End of information based on Fallout: New Vegas cut content |
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Behind the scenes[]
- This quest was designed by Jeff Husges and Joshua Sawyer.[Non-game 1]
- The quest's story has many parallels to the 1974 film Chinatown. Additionally, Lieutenant Romanowski's name is a portmanteau of Roman Polanski, the film's director.
- The quest name is a play on Cpl. White's name and the term "whitewashing," which describes the act of obscuring information and/or activities that the acting party does not want known; the term in turn comes from the practice of using calcimine, the eponymous "whitewash," on walls for paint renewal, which obscures the previous layer of paint.
Bugs[]
Boyd won't talk about the missing people if the unmarked quest Silus Treatment is completed. For PC users, the quest can be started with the console command setstage f0629 10. [verified]
- It may still be possible to receive and finish this quest after completing Silus Treatment if I Put a Spell on You is not completed, as speaking with Boyd about this quest will open up multiple dialogue options with her in spite of the initial, "Haven't you done enough," greeting. [verified]
- For some reason, if choosing to turn Anderson in (or letting him turn himself in), he can be seen walking around Camp McCarran some days later. He can be talked to, but is also found in the cells relentlessly pacing. [verified]
- If one acquires Corporal White's journal entry before speaking to Boyd, the optional task "search Corporal White's personal locker" cannot be completed. This might lead to a savegame issue where the loading screen dialogue says that the memory device is no longer present due to inaccessible DLC objects. The game will then restart upon loading dialogue confirmation. This repeats with the next loading attempt, rendering the savegame useless. [verified]
- Tom Anderson can disappear into the wall, though he still shows up on the radar. Without talking to him, the quest cannot be completed. This MAY however be resolved by normal reloading procedures or even exiting and re-entering the building. [verified]
- Upon triggering a hostile conversation option, such as telling him that the Courier won't keep Westside's secret, or they'll "take him out", Anderson will say the Courier has "left him no choice", and turn hostile. However, if he is seated during this encounter, he will simply stand up, turn hostile, and then sit back down before turning non-hostile again. He can still be talked to as though he were a normal non-player character, and he will not attack. If one wants him to turn hostile and have one of their companions kill him without losing any reputation with the Followers, then attack him until he turns hostile. [verified]
- In the German version, Lt. Boyd won't have a dialogue to tell her that White was killed by a gang. This happens if the truth is uncovered about White via both dialogue options with Anderson, as well as following Hector. Not tested on other platforms. [verified]
References[]
- ↑ Question: "I really like "The White Wash" quest. It was really well done and left with a moral dilemma that still screws over someone (The NCR, who's approaching a food shortage or Westside, who're trying to be self-sufficient). Can you give props to who wrote it?"
Joshua Sawyer:"Thanks. Jeff Husges and I created The White Wash. I like how the dilemma played out, but the mechanics/flow of the quest were not that great (my fault, not Jeff's)."
(Joshua Sawyer Formspring posts/2012)
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