Volare! is a side quest and achievement/trophy in Fallout: New Vegas.
Quick walkthrough
| Side Quest: Volare! | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Reach Nellis Air Force Base and follow Raquel to speak with Pearl; agree to assist the Boomers with various problems. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Complete side quests and unmarked quests around Nellis AFB until achieving 40+ reputation with the Boomers. (Liked to Idolized) | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Return to Pearl. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Speak with Loyal about the "lady in the lake"; agree to complete the plan to raise the aircraft from the bottom of Lake Mead. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| (Optional) Speak with Jack and either obtain a pressure cooker or pass a 45 Science skill check to acquire the rebreather. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Locate the crashed B-29 on the bottom of Lake Mead and interact with the highlighted areas to place the ballasts. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Go to the marked spot near Callville Bay and equip Loyal's detonator, then "shoot" it to raise the aircraft. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Return to Nellis AFB and speak with Loyal, followed by Pearl. | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Reward: 500 XP Boomer flightsuit & Boomers helmet Boomers fame The Boomers will appear during the Second Battle of Hoover Dam. | |||||||||||||||||||||
Detailed walkthrough
Breaking down barriers
Regardless of whether one travels there independently or because they are recruiting the Boomers for the NCR, the Legion, Mr. House, or Yes Man, all routes will require getting inside the perimeter of the Nellis Air Force Base, in the northeast corner of the Mojave Wasteland, to trigger this quest. Approaching Nellis from the road leads to an encounter with George, who will offer a 600-caps wager that the player character can make it to Nellis' gates without being blown apart by the Boomers' defensive artillery volley; he provides the Nellis artillery timing details note for additional information. The Boomers fire high-damaging explosive artillery in 14-round barrages, in-between which is a brief span of 10 seconds before they reload. This is when one must travel along the northwest side of the destroyed town outside the gates, stopping and sheltering in the nearest building once the volley restarts. An alternative route to bypass the artillery involves gaining access to the Very Hard-locked entrance of a train tunnel to the southeast from George's position.
Upon making it to the front gate, a Boomer guard holds the player character up with a missile launcher until the tribe's master-at-arms Raquel arrives and escorts them into the base where they meet with the tribe's leader, Pearl. She expresses her joy that an outsider was finally able to penetrate Nellis and forcibly bring a small part of the outside world to them; Pearl is wise to the changing times in the greater Mojave and she's wanted someone from that world to come in and change her people's minds about interacting with outsiders, or else fears their eventual destruction. She requests the player character provide aid to the Boomers around Nellis until their reputation is high enough to be entrusted with a final task.
Community service
Achieving fame with the Boomers can be accomplished by completing quests and special interactions with certain Boomers in the vicinity of Nellis AFB.
Quests
- Young Hearts (Jack)
- Ant Misbehavin' (Raquel)
- Sunshine Boogie (Loyal)
- Bear Necessities (Lindsay)
- Malleable Mini Boomer Minds (Mini Boomers)
- Missing a Few Missiles (Raquel)
- Iron and Stealing (Jack)
Special interactions
- Argyll needs help with his patients in the Nellis medical station. Completely healing all injured Boomers requires a Medicine skill of 60.
- Pete at the museum has a story to tell, which is worth listening to. Leaving at any time during the story will earn Boomers infamy.
- The Boomer teacher's curriculum can be improved by passing a variety of skill checks.
The last hurdle
After accumulating at least 40 points of fame (10 points shy of Idolized), report back to Pearl in her barracks. She directs the player character to ask Loyal about the Boomers' dream of flight, where he gladly tells a story about the submerged "lady in the lake" and how he wants it to be raised from the bottom of Lake Mead. To achieve this, he hands out two deployable ballast devices, as well as a detonator to activate them.
Before heading to Lake Mead, Jack can optionally be asked for a rebreather to allow for underwater breathing. To obtain it from him, passing a Science check of 45 or bringing him a pressure cooker is necessary.
Travel to the map marker to find the old aircraft, near Callville Bay. Quickly dive under and attach the ballasts between the two engines and underneath the wings, on each side of the bomber. A hollow 3D image marks the exact spot where to place the devices. Once both of the ballasts are attached, swim over to the stone ramps at Callville Bay, where Loyal's detonator will start to beep, indicating that one is in the correct position. All that is left to do is to equip Loyal's detonator as a weapon and fire it to raise the plane.
Travel back to Nellis and speak with Loyal (he has an optional Intelligence check of 7, with no impact on the outcome), then return to speak with Pearl, completing the quest and earning XP and a Boomer outfit including flightsuit and helmet.
If one came to Nellis for any "official" reason other than simple curiosity, a dialogue option is unlocked with Pearl to ask her for the Boomers' assistance in the coming battle, for which she will gladly agree.
Quest stages
Notes
- Killing Pearl at any time fails the quest, and immediately drops reputation with the Boomers to "Hated."
- Completing this quest before starting No Gods, No Masters will unlock a dialogue option to bluff General Oliver into backing down, with the threat of the Boomers bombing the dam.
- Going underwater with the rebreather poses no threat to any companions (they stay on the surface).
- Loyal's detonator is required to raise the B-29, no other detonator will work.
- Rocket souvenirs or dino toys can no longer be given to the Mini Boomers once this quest is completed.
- Mr. New Vegas will indirectly mention the B-29 on Radio New Vegas on two occasions after completing the quest.[1][2]
- Talking to Pete is a fast way to advance this quest, as a good amount of fame - enough to take the player character from Neutral to Accepted - can be gained simply from listening to the story of the Boomers and then exhausting all the dialogue options with him afterward. Every dialogue option has a skill check, which can be passed for additional fame each time.
Behind the scenes
- Volare! was outlined by Joshua Sawyer and later fully implemented by Akil Hooper, who fully developed the quest and its main objectives.[Non-game 1] Area designer Robert Lee also provided some scripting support and worked on the sub-quests/objectives, such as Ant Misbehavin' and Argyll's patients.[Non-game 2]
- The crashed B-29 is a reference to a real-world incident where a Boeing B-29 crashed into Lake Mead on July 21, 1948.
- "Volare" means "to fly" in Italian.
- The quest name also serves as a reference to Italian singer-songwriter Domenico Modugno's song "Nel blu, dipinto di blu", also commonly known as "Volare." The song was a #1 hit on the Billboard charts in 1958, and was subsequently covered by many artists, including Dean Martin, who recorded a version titled "Volare (Nel blu dipinto di blu)" in August of the same year.
Bugs
Sometimes, after completing the quest, the bomber in the hangar will not be repaired. It will look the same as if the player character did not start the quest. For a fix on PC, see the Nellis hangars bugs section.[verified]-
Sometimes, when starting the history lesson at the museum in Nellis, Pete will begin talking about the Boomers, then when he finishes his first part of the speech, he won't move and will stand still. The bug seems to be triggered by activating Pete's other dialogue options. To avoid it, select only the second dialogue option (the one that activates the story).[verified]
- Other possible fixes include pushing him a short distance by walking into him, sleeping in a bed for a couple of hours, leaving and re-entering the building, or loading a previous save.
- Sometimes, Loyal will not be in the hangar after this quest, which effectively stalls Raul Tejada's side quest, since it requires to speak with Loyal.[verified]
- Sometimes, the quest is activated after the first conversation with Pearl, regardless of reputation with the Boomers or Karma.[verified]
- It is possible to enter Nellis at the gate by entering a conversation with an NPC in the middle of an active artillery barrage. However, after doing so, the barrage may continue when one is leaving Nellis later on.[verified]
- If choosing to kill Pearl and Loyal while Jack isn't present, there is a chance that he will not be hostile. He will behave as though the player character helped to raise the B-29 bomber and can still be given scrap metal. If Young Hearts has not been started, the dialogue to initiate the quest will still be available, even though one will immediately fail the quest due to killing Pearl.[verified]
Gallery
References
- ↑ Mr. New Vegas: "Witnesses report a huge object or creature surfacing in Lake Mead. So far, photos of the so-called Lake Mead Monster are grainy and underexposed."
(Mr. New Vegas' dialogue) - ↑ Mr. New Vegas: "A large unidentified aircraft has been seen circling the skies above the New Vegas Strip."
(Mr. New Vegas' dialogue)
Non-game
- ↑ "Who thought up the Boomers, Nellis and the "Volare!" mission? They're by far my favorite faction and missions of the games. Great job guys."
Joshua Sawyer: "John Gonzalez came up with the Boomers. I came up with the basics of Volare! and Akil Hooper did the actual development of the quest."
(Josh Sawyer Formspring May 8, 2011 answers) - ↑ "Nellis AFB" on Robert Lee's website
