Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Birds of a Feather

Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Birds of a Feather
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Birds of a Feather - Guard Duty

Birds of a Feather is a decent quest to raise money for the credit check into New Vegas, even if you hate the Van Graffs. Note that they’re a pretty good match up for evil characters (or just amoral characters), and it’s a decent way to earn a lot of caps and get access to good equipment by the end.

Start the quest by going to the Van Graff store in Freeside. If it’s your first time, you’ll need to wait at the entrance until they’re done with their “meeting.” You should be able to start the quest by talking to Gloria Van Graff at the main counter. For your test, you’ll be in charge of providing door security.

Make sure that you have some room in your inventory for a plasma rifle and metal armor. You’ll have to put on their unique armor and use their energy weapon while you’re on guard duty. You can pick between the laser rifle and the plasma rifle. Although, you don’t exactly have to move that much, so you can probably just ignore the encumbered effects during the shift.

Just like your partner says, you need to keep out drunks and make sure that no one brings any weapons into the store.

The first guy is just a drunk, so turn him away. The second man should consent to the search just fine. The third man, the lucky gambler, will get indignant about the search. If you can’t pass the Speech check you’ll have to either turn him away or let him in. You’ll lose your bonus either way, even though he’s not a danger and won’t consent without the check.

The fourth and final customer is the big decision, especially for people who want to take out the Van Graffs. His plan boils down to admitting that he has a magnum to try and get around the search. If you stand your ground, he’ll panic and open fire. You shouldn’t have any trouble turning him into a pile of plasma. He’s got C4 on his body. Take it (C4’s rare and expensive) and loot whatever else you want.

If you let him go, he’ll go into the store and suicide bomb it with the C4. This will kill Gloria and Bastille along with all her guards. It will also destroy a fair bit of the inventory (which is worth a lot of money and one of the best sources of energy weapons, so think carefully

Birds of a Feather - Fallout: New Vegas Side Quest

about choosing this option), but it can take care of “Heartache by the Numbers” without any real pain. If you want to kill the Van Graffs, it’s certainly an option. Note that letting this happen will turn the remaining Van Graff faction members, which should just include the door guard and the caller, hostile to you. Stay alert as you go through town and take them out when they attack.

Pacer should drop by, if he’s still alive. Just talk to him and send him away. That should end your guard duty.

If you protected the store, just go in and report your successful guard shift to Gloria for 150 caps (200 if you passed the Speech check for the third guy).

Birds of a Feather - The Delivery

If you continue the quest, the next step will be a simple messenger mission. Since you’re a courier, this is pretty easy. You just need to go to the marked location on your map and find a “Strange Man” waiting there. Just hand over the package. If you have Speech above 75, you should be able to convince him to pay you some extra caps for your messenger service. Report the successful handover for a few hundred caps.

Birds of a Feather - Cass’ Fate

Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Killing Cass for the Van Graffs

The third step is the tough one. You have to make a decision here. Jean-Baptiste’s quest is simple; You need to bring Cass to him. Apparently the latest patch made it impossible to do both quests, so you really have to pick your side.

In order to get Cass to follow, you need to do the Crimson Caravan quest “You Can Depend on Me” to buy out her caravan. This will convince her to seek a new adventure and allow you to pick her up as a follower. Just have her tag along and report in to Jean-Baptiste. If he didn’t make his intentions clear already, he’ll officially hand out her death sentence. If you try to protect her, all of the Van Graffs will attack you. They will also probably grab some nice plasma weapons from around the shop. Bastille should hopefully be in that back hallway by the bathrooms (he was for me in my first game). If he’s in the main shop, try waiting around for a bit. If he won’t move, just begin the fight and try to run to the back left hallway. Since you do have some C4, remember that you should be able to reverse pickpocket it onto someone or just drop it by Jean-Baptiste. You can then fall back to the bathrooms and set it off to get a few easy kills at the start. If you can’t/won’t do that, then try to take Jean-Baptiste out with some slugs or another strong close range weapon. Once he’s down, try to take cover in a side roome. Use grenades and ranged weapons with area attacks to wear away at the remaining guards.

That said, you should probably just do Cass’ quest “Heartache by the Number” if you’re going to turn them down. There really isn’t an advantage to doing it this way.

If you let them vaporize Cass, you will be able to move on to the fourth and final step of the mission.

Birds of a Feather - The Big Deal

Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Birds of a Feather - The Showdown

Talk to Gloria and state that you’re ready for the final trade. She’ll do a bit of a time skip and make your equip some Van Graff combat armor. Make sure that you have room for it, if you don’t want to be encumbered. Also, try to travel light. There will be a lot of loot lying around, but you will have to leave through a scripted time skip. You only really get one chance, unless you want to risk some bugs going back.

Once the level loads, you’ll regain control in a warehouse with Caesar’s Legion counting a bunch of weapons. Just wait a moment and Gloria will point out that things are about to get a little crazy (If you’re a supporter of Caesar’s Legion…well just read below because it’s even more crazy). In a moment, a smoke grenade will land by the Legion soldiers in front and knock three people out. You can join the attack if you want, but honestly you’re probably better off just hanging back and letting the NCR troopers take the soldiers out. I don’t believe that I received Legion infamy for killing these guys, but there’s also not really a benefit to taking them out yourself. The NCR and the Van Graffs have them outnumbered and overpowered, and they both have a tendency to step in front of your shots. Just walk around and pick up dog tags and ammo from the dead soldiers on both sides. Check the back area of the warehouse for any surviving Legion soldiers and then report back to Gloria. She’ll take you back to the Silver Rush and you’ll find out about her double dealings and receive your fairly rich rewards.

If the NCR hates you, because you allied with Caesar’s Legion, then you are really in for a good time. It may just be impossible. You can’t really wear a NCR disguise because you’ll spawn wearing Van Graff armor. You may have luck letting your companions massacre everyone or using melee weapons, but it’s going to be pretty difficult to get the quest to finish out right. Hopefully you’ll be able to hide in a corner and let the NCR and Legion take each other out. The Van Graffs should be fine.

This post is part of the series: Fallout New Vegas Walkthroughs

Take a look at this large collection of Fallout New Vegas walkthroughs to save time working your way through the game.

  1. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Ant Misbehavin’
  2. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Killing Motor-Runner
  3. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Hard Luck Blues
  4. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Anywhere I Wander
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  6. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - The Finger of Suspicion
  7. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Lily’s Companion Quest
  8. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Captain Parker’s Investigation
  9. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Pressing Matters
  10. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - You Can Depend on Me
  11. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Birds of a Feather
  12. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - No, Not Much
  13. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Flags of Our Foul-Ups
  14. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Ranger Morales’ Body
  15. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - I Fought the Law
  16. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Boulder City Showdown
  17. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - We Are Legion
  18. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - My Kind of Town
  19. Fallout: New Vegas Walkthrough - Can You Find It in Your Heart?