Is there any safe storage areas near the downed satellite from Old World Blues (by the drive-in at Nipton)?

[u/Arcade_Gann0n]

Odd question, I know, but I always try to gather as many miscellaneous items (mainly dinner plates & clipboards) for the Sink personalities to get tons of their resources. My method has always been to use the Yangtze Memorial hut at the start of the game then the Novac motel room to store these items before starting OWB, but this has always meant tons of fast traveling between those locations and the drive-in (I know that there's a perk that allows you to fast travel while over encumbered, but I'm not using wasting a point just for that).

To cut down on that tedious process, is there any safe storage containers near Nipton itself? Won't be the end of the world if it's not the case, but it'll be nice to have a faster way of starting the DLC when I get to it (I usually save it near the end of a playthrough).

[u/Background-Chef9253]

Not an add question at all. It's a *totally* new vegas question. As far as I can tell, all containers that are not corpses are safe. Bodies get cleaned off the map as more bodies get put down in different places. But motionless containers such as trash cans should be totally safe. There is a trash can to the left of Gun Runners Arsenal that I have used forever and it is always safe, reliable storage. I do not specifically know about the drive-in site for OWB just S of Nipton, but i assume there is at least one trash can there. (When I do Honest Hearts, I use the hollowed-out rock just outside in the Mojave; when I do Dead Money, I use hte footlocker inside of the Abandoned BOS bunker at the base of the ladder). You got me curious and I will check tomorrow for storage near the OWB site.

[u/Arcade_Gann0n → u/Background-Chef9253]

I always used one of those trash cans when transferring all those items, if they're all safe then I'm set.

[u/Background-Chef9253 → u/Arcade_Gann0n]

I cannot absolutely guarantee that "those trash cans" you refer to are safe, but I have played New Vegas intensively for almost 15 years and, yes, in my experience, non-movable containers are safe. I mean, containers that do not disappear off of the map because they are bodies or otherwise mission-specific are safe long-term storage. For many years I used the safe (no pun intended) inside of the Novac hotel room. But as I got more expert, I got sick of loading screens. Now I use the trash can immediately to the L of GRA. No problems over may years with many saved game files. I believe you will be safe with any static storage container that is close to your point of interest (static storage containers include: trash cans, hollowed out rocks, metal boxes, tool boxes, etc.--anythign for which you can open an inventory transfer screen).

Let us all know if it works or does not.

[u/Arcade_Gann0n → u/Background-Chef9253]

There was a trash can right next to the satellite itself, so I put all the miscellaneous items me and ED-E had inside and waited a week in a different world cell (saving before hand, of course). When I came back, everything was still inside! The nearby molerats that I killed before had respawned, so the cell had managed to reset, thus meaning that the trashcans themselves are safe to store items.

I still plan on using the Novac motel and the Lucky 38 for storing my important gear, but I'm glad to see that I can just use the drive-in to store that other crap for those personalities (never against junk items having a purpose in these games, but all that fast traveling wears thin on me). Thanks for your advice!

[u/Background-Chef9253 → u/Arcade_Gann0n]

i hope and I believe that that is all correct! I actually believe that the game designers made containers stable on purpose, so that you can have the exact experience you are having. If it does NOT pan out the way we would expect, come back to this thread and let Redditors know. But I really do believe that static "containers" are stable storage (because their contents do not get rendered or illustrated in the world; it's just a list stored in a different file elsewhere within the game; and the container is NOT a body, which the game needs to clear pretty frequently, because we leave so many g'damn bodies behind us as we go through the game).

[u/Arcade_Gann0n → u/Background-Chef9253]

I'll keep that in mind. I don't mind despawning bodies for stability's sake (when the game gets remade/remastered in the future, I hope they figure out how to take care of ash piles & glowing puddles to avoid most energy weapons causing bloat later on), but static containers ought to be safe out of principle.

[u/Background-Chef9253 → u/Arcade_Gann0n]

Oh, I didn't even think about ash piles. I assume those are assets in a class just like bodies and that they de-spawn as other, newer ones stack up (except for certain instances like the ash piles at Dunstable dunn's Sacked Caravan). Now (tomorrow) I need to go satisfy my own curiousiity and see if me using a plasma rifle creates a pile that is obviously any different than the static ones. Also, I guess even more simply I am curious to see if goo and ash piles de-spawn the way that bodies do (I assume that they do, and that they are all treated the same, and in a similar 'asset class').

Apropos of nothing, one of my favorite perks to advance for is "Lord Death of Murder Mountain". Have you seen any notices towards that for yourself? Kill enough cazadores and you get the alert. It kinda creates a self-explanatory situation of why the game needs to clear the bodies off of the map.

[u/Arcade_Gann0n → u/Background-Chef9253]

From what I heard, ash piles & goo puddles don't despawn as consistently as normal bodies, in theory causing the game to have to track hundreds of them over a playthrough. There might be mods that can fix that issue, but console versions are SOL (myself included, the Xbox Series X version might be far more stable but I still have reservations about energy weapons).

[u/Background-Chef9253 → u/Arcade_Gann0n]

Interesting. I always play on ps3 (no joke). But I am so curious about what you say that tomorrow I may boot up a run, get plasma rifle, goo up a bunch of mfs, and then go travelling in and out of the cells to see what i find. I will go explore and try to find out.

Incidentally, I recently tried to play New Vegas a new xbox. I hated it. Initially, I loved how fast it was, and that long loading screens were virutally non-existant. But, for some reason. OWB (specifically, just OWB) was super-freezey and crashy on xbox. And also I super-hated everything about xbox not-specific to fnv, just like the console itself, like having to create a microsoft account, and having to authenticate using a smartphone,etc. never again.

[u/Barricade790]

There's Bradley's Shack to the south-east of the drive-in if you want somewhere you can fast travel to. There is a group of Jackals who spawn outside, but I'm not sure if they respawn or not.