Fallout 3 The Wasteland Survival Guide

This is Part 11 of our complete Fallout 3 Walkthrough, featuring Fallout 3 The Wasteland Survival Guides Chapters 1 and 2.

The Wasteland Survival Guide

The Wasteland Survival Guide itself is a book that Moira Brown, a Megaton resident, is looking to create in order to help people survive in this harsh post-apocalyptic world. You can speak to her over at the Craterside Supply shop in Megaton.
Moira will ask you to talk about your life in the vault. You can answer however you want as it doesn't make much of an impact on the outcome of the quest. She'll give you an armored Vault 101 Suit and will ask if you're interested in helping her with her book. Agree and you'll start the quest.
IMPORTANT NOTE: This quest is structured as follows: There are three chapters with as many sections. Each part has a main and optional objective. If you complete all of the optional objectives, you will get the highest quality version of the Wasteland Survival Guide and will therefore receive the best perk as a reward. Your prize is also based on what you tell Moira at the end of every section. If you reply mostly with an intelligence response, you will get bonuses to your medicine and science skills, strength responses will give you a bonus to damage resistance, snide responses will give you a bonus for critical hits, sly responses will give you bonuses to sneak and speech, and standard responses will give you a bonus to your health.
ANOTHER IMPORTANT NOTE: There is actually a way to complete this quest without having to complete the guide. If you have a high speech skill, you can convince Moira to give up working on the guide and become a caravan trader. If you do this you'll get the Dream Crusher Perk which will lower the chance of an enemy getting a critical hit on you by 50%. You can do this by talking to Moira during chapter two or beyond and asking her about why she wants to do this guide. Continue through the conversation and you'll get a chance to use your speech to tell her to stop working on it.

The Wasteland Survival Guide - Chapter 1

Moira will give you three topics to research for chapter 1. You can find out where it is or isnt safe to find food, research the dangers of radiation, or discover how to avoid and profit from landmines.
Dangers of Radiation:
Radiation can be the quickest and easiest one to take care of. All she wants you to do is become sick with radiation poisoning so she can learn how to fix you.
Considering that there is a radioactive bomb sitting in a puddle of irradiated water in the middle of town, this is a pretty simple task. Just go next to the bomb and start drinking the water until you come down with Critical Radiation Poisoning.
Return to Moira and tell her how you're feeling. You have now gained the Rad Regeneration Perk and will now heal your limbs whenever you suffer from Advanced Radiation Poisoning. Something to keep in mind in case you're running low on stimpacks. Objective Completed
Food Locations
The next task to take on is finding food. For this part of the quest, you'll have to travel to the Super Duper Mart and see if it still has any food or medicine.
With your destination in mind, make this your active quest and leave Megaton. Follow your compass east.
Once you reach the parking lot, be prepared to deal with a couple of raiders. This should give you an idea of the kind of opposition you'll be faced with once inside the Super Duper Mart.
NOTE: Before you go into the Super Duper Mart, travel up the road south west for a bit to find a little kid running towards you. Talk to him to take on the quest "Those!"
Head inside the market and start to investigate starting from the left side. Check the bathrooms for some chems like Jet, Buffout, and Med-X.
When you reach the back of the market, hop over the counter and take care of the nearby Raiders. You'll find a Tales of a Junktown Jerky Vendor skillbook on the counter along with several frag grenades and assault rifle ammo.
If you have 25 points in science or 50 points in lockpicking at this point, you can unlock the Pharmacy door over here. If you don't, it's not a big deal. You can find the key in the next room.
Head through the doorway to the north and proceed down the corridor.
Check the boxes here to find the key to the Super Duper Pharmacy. Check the counter as well to find two bottlecap mines and a box containing 4 frag grenades. Head back down the corridor and open the previously locked door.
There are lots of goodies in here, so scour the place thoroughly. Examine the First Aid Kit and take everything to fulfill the optional objective.
When you reemerge from the pharmacy, more Raiders will enter the market, so don't feel safe just yet.
Work your way to the northern wall and follow it eastwards to reach a storage room with a refrigerator. Open the fridge and take the food to complete your main objective.
Don't leave until you take all of the valuables from this storage room. You'll find another bottlecap mine, energy pistols, cartons of cigarettes (which are great for selling), and more ammo.
You're now ready to leave, so head back out into the wasteland and fast travel back to Megaton.
Return to Moira to complete the objective. She'll give you a Food Sanitizer which will reduce the amount of Rads you take whenever you eat an irradiated food source. Objective Completed
Playing With Mines
Your next task is to journey to the minefield and make it to the playground inside without getting blown up or shot by the sniper overlooking the area.
If you check your map, you'll see that it is an extremely long walk to the Minefield. If you don't mind the eventual reward at the culmination of this quest being a little weaker, you can simply lie to Moira about going to the minefield and just give her any mine that you picked up along the way. Objective Completed
However, if you want to do things honestly, leave Megaton and start following your compass northeast.
NOTE: Just a bit south of the Minefield is a Scrapyard where you can find your canine companion Dogmeat. Talk to him after he fends off a group of Raiders and ask him to come with you.
When you see a bunch of destroyed houses, you'll know you've reached the Minefield. Stay crouched and move slowly north into the town.
When you see a mine, slowly approach it with your crosshairs on it at all times. If you're quick enough, you can press A to disarm the mine before it goes off. Once it's disarmed, it's yours to pick up.
TIP: Be careful! Mines aren't the only hazard here. There is a Sniper named Arkansas the large broken down building at the north end of town. While you don't have to worry about his bullets that much, you do have to worry about him causing the cars to explode. As soon as you see a car catch fire, get the hell out of there.
Keep pressing north and you'll eventually come to the playground. Once your quest objective is satisfied, retreat the same way you came and fast travel back to Megaton. Talk to Moira and tell her about your experience. Objective Completed

Wasteland Survival Guide - Chapter 2

This next chapter will have you gathering some information on the beasts that roam the wasteland. Namely the Molerats and Mirelurks. Oh, and you'll also have to beat yourself up or break a limb so Moira can put you back together.
Let's start with the Molerats since you're probably used to them by now and because it gives us a location that makes completing the section after this easy.
Molerat Repellent
Moira will give you the repellent stick and it is your job to use it on three Molerats to satisfy the main objective. If you're just looking to do the bare minimum for the quest, you can easily find three Molerats in the area surrounding Megaton and don't even have to travel to somewhere with a higher concentration of Molerats.
Once you make three Molerats heads explode with the repellent stick, you can return to Moira to complete the objective.
However, if you want to satisfy the optional objective of killing seven Molerats, then you might want to make a journey to the Tepid Sewers.
If you don't have any nearby locations to the Tepid Sewers like Dukov's Place or Georgetown, you can fast travel to the Super Duper Mart and head straight southeast, following the road until you reach a bridge that is lined with frag mines. Cross the bridge, go up the stairs on the right side, and then continue traveling north east until you see a small door that leads to the Tepid Sewers.
Once inside the Tepid Sewers, switch to your repellent stick and scour the area for Molerats. You should easily be able to find seven of the little buggers inside.
Once the optional objective is completed, backtrack to the sewer entrance and fast travel back to Megaton to talk to Moira. Objective Completed
Mirelurk Research
Your next task will have you sneaking into a Mirelurk lair and placing an observer in one of their spawning pods. If you want to fulfill the optional objective as well, you'll have to do so without killing a single Mirelurk inside.
It's recommended that you have a fairly high sneak skill or a stealth boy for this, but it's not required as long as you're quick enough.
What you want to do first is fast travel back to the Tepid Sewers. Turn west and head towards the metal door on the rocks across the small river.
The door should have a very easy lock, so you should be able to pick it. Stay crouched when you enter the door.
The spawning pod that you're looking for is straight ahead past the junction. There are two Mirelurks on both sides of you, which is why it's recommended that you use a Stealth-Boy or have a fairly high sneak skill. If you see Danger flash on your screen, then stop crouching and just make a run for the spawning pod, place the observer inside, and run the hell out of there.
NOTE: If you have a follower and you're trying to sneak around inside, you better tell him/her to wait outside of the memorial or they'll ruin your stealth.
Once the observer is in place and you're out of the memorial, return to Moira at Megaton to complete this section of the guide. Objective Completed
Doctor Moira:
The third and final section for this chapter has you getting yourself severely injured and/or crippled and then returning to Moira so she can fix you up.
The optional objective is to get yourself crippled as well. You can do this simply by completing another quest and then coming back when you're crippled, but you can also do this immediately right here in Megaton.
The first thing you want to do is make sure you have enough health to survive a high fall. 290 or 300 hp should be more than enough. If you don't have that much, you can probably get there by taking a Buffout.
Right when you leave Craterside Suppy, jump on to the top of the Children of the Atom building to your right, Walk off the edge, don't jump, and aim to get as close to the bomb as you can.
If you lived but didn't cripple a body part, eat food and water to get your HP back up without healing your limbs. Once you get your health back up, try it again.
If that doesn't work for you, then you could also fast travel back to the minefield and purposefully walk over a few mines until your legs get crippled.
Once you're under 50% health and have a body part crippled, return to Moira to let her heal you up and complete this chapter.
Objective Completed