- “We arrived at dawn. A welcome sight. It's been almost a month since the beginning of the Revolution. [...]”
- —Terminal Entry
Jacobstown is a Super Mutant settlement in the Northwest Mojave wasteland.
Background[]
Jacobstown was a Super Mutant community established by Marcus prior to 2281 following Tabitha's seizure of control over the Mutant population at Black Mountain. Though principally inhabited by Super Mutants and nightkin, Humans and Ghouls were welcomed so long as they behaved themselves. Jacobstown waited out the second battle of Hoover Dam and the Fall seemingly without incident. However, roughly a month after the Freeside rebellion, a group of survivors led by Lucky Jim and Pacer made their way to Jacobstown with the intention of regrouping before mounting an expedition back into Vegas. This never materialized and the survivors remained at Jacobstown for the next 13 years.
Pacer's Play[]
Over time, tensions began to grow between the human refugees and the native Super Mutant population. To Jim's consternation, Pacer had aspirations of taking control of Jacobstown, ostensibly to the exclusion of the mutants. While Jim was adamant that he would support Marcus in the event of such an occurrence, Pacer was not deterred. Eventually, these tensions came to a head and both Marcus and Pacer along with several other of the human and mutant survivors were killed in the fighting. Following this, Lucky Jim and the remaining Freeside rebels retreated in the direction of camp Searchlight in hopes of resurrecting the revolution. Since then, Jacobstown has remained as a community of unhinged and violent Super Mutant survivors.
Overview[]
Jacobstown is a barely-functional mutant community due to a combination of nightkin schizophrenia and 2nd generation mutant thickness. Eschewing Marcus' aspiration of peaceful coexistence, the Mutants have taken to hunting human survivors in nearby camps for food, bringing the threat of retaliation to the town. Adding to this, the road to Jacobstown is heavily occupied by tunnelers and cazadores, making it a dangerous trip for even the best equipped survivors.
Tactical Considerations[]
Jacobstown is not to be entered lightly, if at all. The remaining mutants are incredibly resilient and can kill a human in a matter of seconds if they manage to close the distance. Heavy ordnance is a virtual necessity. As far as prospective loot, Jacobstown boasts a decent variety of chems and food items, though the weapons to be found are mediocre at best. Based on the potential risk, the only real reason to visit Jacobstown is curiosity.
Once the player leaves the lodge, a group of four well equipped, highly skilled survivors appear on the main road out of town. Other than the obvious fight, an option is to sneak out of the gate and move northward toward the mountain peaks, then skirting wide of the road, avoiding this fight entirely. Sneak southward then westward doesn't work because of terrain, too likely to get spotted by a survivor on the wing, unless you have a max Sneak stat and or a stealth boy.
Insanity[]
An insane survivor will encounter Shadowclaws on the road outside of Jacobstown. An attack by one of these will induce a fugue.
The Jacobstown lodge is populated by plague victims. An attack on either a survivor or the mutant inhabitants will also induce a fugue.
The bungalows on the west side of Jacobstown are occupied by shadowy apparitions of dead Freeside rebels.
Trivia[]
- Jacobstown is home to the only surviving bighorners in the Mojave wasteland, though they are in obvious poor health due to the mutants' inability to maintain a functional society.
- Despite notes claiming that the mutants were abducting and eating the humans, there are no fresh corpses or gore bags anywhere within Jacobstown.
- A band of survivors with various weaponry and armor will spawn once the player leaves the lodge, blocking the main road out of town. One has a note detailing how they trained for this attack to rescue their captured families.
- This group is reused from the mercenary group that accosts the player in the base game, so killing them will decrease your reputation with the NCR.
- The lodge's medical terminal details the project about the research prototype stealth boy and how Keene, the Nightkin leader, heard of it. It's safe to assume that without Courier to help them research the issue, Keene very quickly confronted Doctor Henry and Calamity about it, resulting in their deaths.
- The nightkin wearing different clothes in the Lodge (Keene template) always carries a Nuka-Breaker.
- The fate of Jacobstown could be seen as analogous to the fate of Broken Hills, another town once governed by Marcus.
- Just like Jacobstown, Broken Hills also fell to infighting between its human and mutant inhabitants.