Items

We keep three location lists for the Mojave: skill books, which raise a skill for good; skill magazines, which lend 10 points to a skill for a while; and unique weapons, of which the page walks forty-two. The two collectible lists run alphabetically by title and the weapons list in no particular order, which is fine for a checklist and useless for a trip. So this guide turns the three around and sorts by place: the more different pickups a location holds across all three lists, the higher it sits, and the fewer times you need to go back. For the ordinary versions of those guns, the weapons page groups the whole arsenal by the skill that governs it, gives damage, ammunition and requirements per weapon, and names the vendor for each.

The places that pay for the walk

The counts below are ours, taken by lining the three pages up by location, and they count distinct titles rather than copies: a place with five Locksmith's Readers scores one for Locksmith's Reader. Where a page names the same site two ways, such as the Sierra Madre Casino and its Executive Suites, the entries are pooled under the name the page uses most. One entry is left out on purpose: the books page files a Grognak the Barbarian under a bare Police Station with no town attached, so it is not credited to the Villa or to anywhere else.

Two things fall out of the table. The richest single address on our lists is inside a DLC: the Sierra Madre Casino alone accounts for four book titles and eight magazine titles, the Villa's clinic and police station sit close behind with eight pickups of their own, and our magazines page keeps sending you back to Vera's bedroom in the Executive Suites for one thing after another. The other is that the two army camps are magazine libraries. Camp McCarran and Camp Golf carry eight and nine titles each with no permanent book between them, and McCarran adds three unique guns on top: Little Buster's Cram Opener, Corporal Sterling's La Longue Carabine and This Machine, which is yours for keeping quiet at the end of Dealing with Contreras. The last row is the one place that only reaches six when you walk all of it: Hopeville's armory and women's barracks hold a book each, and its silo bunker and base headquarters two magazines apiece.

Below the table, the places that earn a detour are the ones with a gun attached. Broc Flower Cave stacks four magazine titles with the Ratslayer against a desk. Camp Searchlight has a Chinese Army manual in the chapel basement, a Meeting People, the fire axe Knock Knock in the fire station restrooms and, with the right trait, Holy Frag Grenades. Cottonwood Cove pairs a Grognak the Barbarian with two magazines and Recompense of the Fallen on Aurelius's desk. REPCONN HQ keeps two Nikola Tesla and You, a Big Book of Science, the Q-35 Matter Modulator in a locked shipment room and Driver Nephi's golf club. Vault 22 has a Junktown Jerky Vendor, a Programmer's Digest and the AER14 Prototype in a common room reached only through the food production level. Mick and Ralph's has three magazine titles upstairs and, outside in Freeside, Max with Euclid's C-Finder. Charleston Cave holds a Fixin' Things, a Lad's Life and Oh, Baby! near a broken Stealth Boy at the far end.

The two collectible pages, and what each title is worth

The books page states the rule that makes it the priority list: a book's bonus is permanent and a magazine's is not. It walks 79 pickups under fourteen headings, nine of them Big Book of Science and eight Chinese Army manuals, down to four Workbench Crates in the caves near Joshua Graham and Cueva Guarache. Two of those pickups are rewards rather than finds: HELIOS One hands over a Big Book of Science when you finish That Lucky Old Sun, and the X-13 Research Facility gives up a Chinese Army manual after the stealth suit tests, on top of the one lying in the chest plate room.

Magazines are the renewable half. Our page puts the total at 213, says the 10-point bonus does not stack (a second magazine read straight after the first is wasted), and points out that the magazine vending machine dispenses a random title forever if you run dry; the Strip has one to the left of the Las Vegas Boulevard station. Treat the numbered entries as route notes rather than a tally, because the page describes a few spots twice. The bonus each title carries is fixed, so it is worth knowing which is which before you read one.

A handful of magazines are handed over by people instead of found, which matters if you are working through our doctors, vendors and repairers guide anyway: Sunny Smiles gives a Locksmith's Reader in the Prospector Saloon, Julie Farkas sells Lad's Life, Programmer's Digest, Salesman Weekly and Today's Physician at the Old Mormon Fort once Friend of the Followers has fed her enough supplies, Carrie Boyd at Camp McCarran pays out a Patriot's Cookbook and a Locksmith's Reader for The White Wash, and Emily Ortal gives a Today's Physician for planting the bug in The Moon Comes Over the Tower. Two perks on our traits, perks and SPECIAL guide change the arithmetic for both lists: Comprehension doubles a magazine's points and adds one to every book, and Retention stretches how long a magazine lasts.

Unique weapons: who is holding them

Sort the forty-two entries on the weapons page by how you get them and the list splits cleanly. Twelve are carried by a named person, so the weapon is a conversation or a fight: Benny has Maria at The Tops, Legate Lanius carries the Blade of the East, the Lonesome Drifter near El Dorado Dry Lake has the Mysterious Magnum, Old Lady Gibson keeps Big Boomer at her scrap yard, Dead Sea carries Liberator in Nelson, Sergio at The King's School of Impersonation owns Figaro, the Viper Gang Leader at Bonnie Springs drops Love and Hate, and a sniper on the Black Mountain summit holds Annabelle, alongside Little Buster and Corporal Sterling at McCarran, Driver Nephi at REPCONN and Max outside Mick and Ralph's. Three arrive at the end of a quest: Pew Pew on Allen Marks's body after Legend of the Star, This Machine after Dealing with Contreras, and Dinner Bell for finishing Bleed Me Dry. Three exist only with the Wild Wasteland trait, which is described on our traits page: the Alien Blaster at the Hovering Anomaly, the YCS/186 at the Mercenary Camp, and the Holy Frag Grenades. The remaining twenty-four are simply lying where the page says, from Lucky in the cashier's area of the Vikki and Vance casino to That Gun in Novac's Dino Bite gift shop storage room.

Two entries on that page are worth a second look before you plan around them. The Fat Man at Quarry Junction is labelled as a .44 revolver in its heading, which does not match the name, and the Gobbi Campaign Scout Rifle and Tesla Beaten Prototype are spelled as the page spells them. Where a weapon and a repairer share an address, Old Lady Gibson and Raul at Black Mountain both do, the trip is covered from the other side on the doctors and repairers guide, and the wider picture of what the Courier is built from is on our Fallout New Vegas guide.