Fallout 1 population, and how many are descendants of vault dwellers?

2

2bak

First time out of the vault
Sorry if this has been asked before, couldn't find any threads about it (and nothing on the Wiki or Fallout Bible either as far as I could see), but I'm wondering;

In Fallout, how much of the population do you believe are the descendants of vaults dwellers? It's all of Shady Sands, Necropolis, The Boneyard (with the Followers of the Apocalypse coming from another vault further south) and then there's Harold who's from yet another vault. We know that the Brotherhood descendants survived the war bunkered down in Mariposa, so at least some military complexes survived (Killian Darkwaters father was a soldier, and founded Junktown shortly after the war), and there was probably non Vault-Tek bunkers scattered around, but are there any sources of how non military/vault dwellers survived the war?

My questions are really, what percentage of the general population of California in 2161 do you think are descendants of vault dwellers? And how many were military? Where did the rest come from? And while we are at it, what is the estimated population of the area contained in Fallouts world map?

While I realise that some of the lore has been purposely left unanswered by the developers, I'd still like to hear your guesses and theories :)
 
I think that the vast majority of the population are descended from a Vault.

Everyone encountered north of Junktown is descended from Vault 15 (and 13), with the exception of Ian.

Everyone encountered south of the Hub is descended from the LA demonstration Vault, with the exception of the Master (that we learn in Fallout 2 was from Vault 8), and Talius (Vault 13). I didn’t realize/remember that the Followers are from a different Vault.

Obviously any ghoul encountered is from a Vault. Vault 12 to be exact, with the exception of Harold and Talius, who also happen to be from Vaults.

The Brotherhood of Steel are the only group that we can be sure aren’t descended from a Vault because we get their detailed backstory. But they are also a tiny fraction of the total population, due to typically not allowing outsiders.

So that leaves the Hub and Junktown. Killian mentions that his grandfather (not father) was a soldier, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he survived the war in a military base. He could’ve been retired, on leave, or simply abandoned his post and fled to the LA Vault. Given that the LA Vault opened just a few years after the war, combined with the fact that we know at least some of them left the Boneyard to explore the wastes, I think it stands to reason that most if not all of the founding populations of these two towns came from different groups of wanderers that left the Boneyard. That being said, once the towns were established I’m sure they attracted most of the people who survived the war outside a Vault. I’m just thinking that there weren’t very many, and without the Vaults the post-war world would look a lot more empty.

In later games there are many more populations that are implied or explicitly stated to not be descended from Vaults, but I think in Fallout 1 this wasn’t the case.

Mr Fish said:
San Francisco's asian population is from a u-boat IIRC.
Click to expand...
He said Fallout 1.
 
Iprovidelittlepianos said:
I think that the vast majority of the population are descended from a Vault.

Everyone encountered north of Junktown is descended from Vault 15 (and 13), with the exception of Ian.

Everyone encountered south of the Hub is descended from the LA demonstration Vault, with the exception of the Master (that we learn in Fallout 2 was from Vault 8), and Talius (Vault 13). I didn’t realize/remember that the Followers are from a different Vault.

Obviously any ghoul encountered is from a Vault. Vault 12 to be exact, with the exception of Harold and Talius, who also happen to be from Vaults.

The Brotherhood of Steel are the only group that we can be sure aren’t descended from a Vault because we get their detailed backstory. But they are also a tiny fraction of the total population, due to typically not allowing outsiders.

So that leaves the Hub and Junktown. Killian mentions that his grandfather (not father) was a soldier, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he survived the war in a military base. He could’ve been retired, on leave, or simply abandoned his post and fled to the LA Vault. Given that the LA Vault opened just a few years after the war, combined with the fact that we know at least some of them left the Boneyard to explore the wastes, I think it stands to reason that most if not all of the founding populations of these two towns came from different groups of wanderers that left the Boneyard. That being said, once the towns were established I’m sure they attracted most of the people who survived the war outside a Vault. I’m just thinking that there weren’t very many, and without the Vaults the post-war world would look a lot more empty.

In later games there are many more populations that are implied or explicitly stated to not be descended from Vaults, but I think in Fallout 1 this wasn’t the case.
Click to expand...

Hey thanks for taking the time to answer, this is along the lines of what I had been thinking as well. It's actually a little bit of a realisation for me — in all the years I've played Fallout, being a vault dweller always felt like the vaults were these exclusive, secretive places that didn't fit in with the rest of the wasteland — when in reality, much of the population should have knowledge of the vaults from their (grand)parents.
 
2bak said:
Hey thanks for taking the time to answer, this is along the lines of what I had been thinking as well. It's actually a little bit of a realisation for me — in all the years I've played Fallout, being a vault dweller always felt like the vaults were these exclusive, secretive places that didn't fit in with the rest of the wasteland — when in reality, much of the population should have knowledge of the vaults from their (grand)parents.
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Yeah, I pretty much feel the same way. I used to think Vault dwellers and their descendants were relatively rare in the wasteland, and going off lore from later games this might be true, but if you just take Fallout 1 at face value it seems more like anyone that wasn’t in a Vault perished during the war.
Mr Fish said:
Oh. Then San Fransisco does not have a population as far as we know.
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To be fair, technically San Francisco should be within the bounds of the Fallout 1 world map, despite not appearing on the game.
 
Iprovidelittlepianos said:
f you just take Fallout 1 at face value it seems more like anyone that wasn’t in a Vault perished during the war.
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The Fallout 2 intro actually confirms this as well. Let me quote:

  • the Earth was almost wiped clean of life
  • continents were swallowed in flames and fell beneath the boiling oceans
  • humanity was almost extinguished
  • a quiet darkness blanketed the Earth, lasting many years
  • few survived the devastation, some had been fortunate enough to reach safety, taking shelter in great underground vaults
  • when the great darkness passed these vaults opened and their inhabitants emerged to begin their lives again
Click to expand...
 
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Iprovidelittlepianos said:
So that leaves the Hub and Junktown. Killian mentions that his grandfather (not father) was a soldier, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he survived the war in a military base. He could’ve been retired, on leave, or simply abandoned his post and fled to the LA Vault. Given that the LA Vault opened just a few years after the war, combined with the fact that we know at least some of them left the Boneyard to explore the wastes, I think it stands to reason that most if not all of the founding populations of these two towns came from different groups of wanderers that left the Boneyard. That being said, once the towns were established I’m sure they attracted most of the people who survived the war outside a Vault. I’m just thinking that there weren’t very many, and without the Vaults the post-war world would look a lot more empty.
Click to expand...

Not sure about Junktown, but there's a mention about the vault where the Hubsters came from in the Vault 13 Timeline document. The mutant army takes over it and the few people there surrendered. Only place its ever mentioned, but I think it makes sense the people of the Hub arrived from some vault we never saw.
 
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