I always thought he was just trying to complete his rounds, and your house was like, number 10 out of, who knows how many.

Wanted the registration so he could get an early off the shift.

Let me explain. What I was saying was that Vault-Tec itself had something to do with the bombs dropping. I was thinking that the PC was actually the last individual in the nation that needed verification. It seemed weird to me that the guy was fairly normal when you first meet him, and got progressively stranger as the conversation went on. The whole thing didn't quite sit well with me.

It made me wonder if he was "just" some random employee. I'm probably reading too much into it, but it just seemed strange.

I'd be willing to believe he was trying to use your forms as his own ticket into the vault. He does look like the same person arguing with the two power-armored soldiers guarding the chain-link fence to the vault. But at the same time I think if he knew something definitely was happening he would have pretty much bolted after he got the forms, instead of giving the whole "Prepared for the future!" sales pitch as you slam the door in his face.

If I had to guess, the whole world knew that liberating Alaska wouldn't be the end of it, and assuming the vaults really were as big as they were drempt up in the lore, he just wanted to get lost in the city till everything on the surface was safe.

That's so much of a stretch though, and it's pretty sloppy in terms of a plot.

He's actually the Vault Overseer... and is the one who knows all the plans that are to go on inside the vault. Using Black hole technology and theories of relativity to make things go 'slower in the vault' so that when like 3 days pass... 200 years have gone by. LEGASP!

Theory Confirmed by the illuminati.

Most likely this, or he could have been the android we see later in the reveal.

http://cdn.idigitaltimes.com/sites/idigitaltimes.com/files/styles/image_embed/public/2015/06/05/android.jpg?itok=_cdtA7Zv

If the salesman was human, he might not have known exactly when the bombs would fall, but you can bet your bottom dollar, he knew about or at least had some knowledge of what people were unknowingly signing up for.

It would be cool if Fallout 4 dives more into Vault Tech employees actually planning out these sinister experiments.

The idea he knew the bombs would drop is silly. Why would Bethesda make you play around in the pre-war world when they would know all of you would straight away come on here and [censored].

I think it was just movie magic. Needing info and the main character somehow just getting info a min before he needs it. I do agree with you though that I did feel a weird vibe from the whole back and forth the first time I saw it

Maybe it's nothing.

I would just like to point out 2 things.

1.) if you look at the Fallout 4 reveal trailer. At the part were he says; War, war never changes you see the vault-tec salesmen standing ouside the fense looking very pissed cause he can't get inside.

2.) Vault-Tec did not actually know about the nuclear war. The purpose of the vault was solely for experimentation purposes. The vaults were taking advantage of people's fear of nuclear war. Vault tec did not actually beleive the war would happen. If they did why are there no remnants of vault tec and they made no effort to protect themselves from the blast cause, you know every member of vault-tec is dead.

Maybe he's worried about getting a shotgun in the face, you know rough neighbourhoods etc.

Rumor has it Vault-tech themselves launched the nukes in order to ensure that the funds spent on the vault construction were not wasted.

Though the Courier was shot in the damned head (!) - the new protagonist probably was not!

greetings LAX

ps: Yes, most RPGs do that, still some give at least an explanation as to the why (like New Vegas did by having the protagonist shot in the head)

No, they didn't die - they had ties to the Enclave (you can see that in the games - various Overseers communicated with the Oil Rig for example) and they have their own Vault (one without any experiments going on), too

Sure they didn't take every employee (probably only the top of the pyramid, but still, they ensured at least that those at the top survived!)

greetings LAX

*note to self, make a very scary-looking Sole Survivor*

Vault-tec personnel would be under a lot of stress, have you seen how short their bathroom breaks are? (Fallout 3 reference)

I doubt that breaks would be the only things strictly controlled.

Did anyone notice that the voice actor seemed to be doing an impression of Don Knotts?

Unless Vault Tec was the one launching nukes, I doubt the salesman would've known, mainly because there would be too little time. If I recall, during the Cold War, the Americans installed a detection station in the UK which would give a grand total of 14 minutes worth of warning if the Soviet Union launched a nuke (and 4 minutes for the Brits, for reference), which is a short timeframe. Using that as a guideline, from the West Coast, unless they installed stations in China or any nearby allied nation, still likely wouldn't have given the much warning either, and any station in the US would likely get the 4 minute warning (or more, or less, I dunno).

I just got the impression he was supposed to be one of those salesmen from the 40s/50s for whom we will hear of nothing again.

^ That's my main theory. He's just a throw-away character whose sole existence is for us to put in our name and stats. If there's anything else to be interpreted by his 'nervousness', it's that he is trying to keep a cheerful attitude while mentally crapping his pants at the prospect of War looming over the horizon.

well the mans living in a time where nuclear warfare is a very real possibility and not just propoganda scare tactics. heck his job is signing people up for mass fallout shelters of course hes gonna seem nervous unlucky for him tho his worst fears are realised on the day we see him.

The worst part of it? We never see him ever again. Poor guy probably never even MADE it to Vault 111 when the world ended.

oh i think we'll see him again as a charred skeleton in his car on the road probably still in that tacky suit.

Or maybe he could become a Ghoul traveling around the map to sell items to wastelanders.

saw that more as the protag being lucky tbh. because if the vault tech sales man hadn't shown up when he had, the protag & his family could've ended up being barred from entering the vault in that scene at the bridge. Looks likely only the ones who signed up were being allowed in when the bombs were falling.

But I totally buy the scam part of his sales pitch. I'm betting vault tech was a fear mongering defense contractor which was profiting millions off of people's fear of the ongoing cold war. Like a profitable insurance company, Vault tech probably oversold many of its vaults. Basically gambling that fallout would never occur. Until the actual moment when the bombs fell. Then it was all mass panic and mass rush to enter the vaults. Not hard to believe since so many ppl appeared to have tired of whatever vault tech bomb shelter drills, or media & politicians crying wolf. Because the majority of the population appeared to have been caught off guard and so none of the vaults were ever filled to max capacity.

Then again and ironically, didn't Todd select Luck as his highest SPECIAL stat in the character creation menu?

never say never. He couldn've been the vault 111 overseer......