So, reading though a thread got me to wondering something about the Enclave, why would the Enclave choose to set up shop in the Oil Rig? I know there's the whole theory of 'The closer we are to danger, the farther we are from harm', but that's still a huge gamble. Wouldn't it have made more sense to have their base in the Atlantic somewhere? I know the Enclave was meant to be a one off antagonist so they were in the Pacific, but you'd think they'd prefer to go in the Atlantic to be further from China than the one likely place the Chinese WOULD nuke, given that oil rig was once Chinese claimed space before the US sabotaged it and claimed it as their own.

Well the resource wars kicked off the Great War so maybe they wanted their group to be in full control of one of the last sources of fossil fuel post-war?

Why would they do that when nuclear power was much more convenient and commonplace before the bomb?

Well this could get us into the very annoying debate about what was the Enclave if there even was an Enclave before the Great War debate...

I am going to try and side step that debate as best as possible without endorsing one side or the other as best as possible.

We know the Rig was advanced when it was built as a deep sea Oil Rig. I believe the oil it was drilling ran out and the Rig abandoned. A huge advanced structure that has lost it's military target IMO would make for a great secret HQ. That and it is away from the mainland and would avoid alot of the nuclear fallout, radioactivity and whatever else the the people behind the whole thing migh have wanted to avoid. It was also (built or retrofitted, we don't know) to be a selled environment. Miles out to see, it would be hard for any threat on the mainland to attack it.

I think the distance is the main reason for it's choice. The fact that it was away from the mainland when the bombs went would mean absolutely nothing due to the sheer size and scale of the

nuclear dust clouds that were present after everything exploded. The distance does help immensely with staying concealed and out of the eye or reach of any would be attacker, but at the same

time it would be incredibly hard to move reconnaissance teams as well as salvage crews to and from the Oil Rig in order to keep supplies and resources ample in number. It can be argued both

ways that it is a good or bad place for a permanent base and the argument could go on forever making it pointless to talk about, well that is until Fallout 4 comes and possibly gives more insight

into the matter(that is if Bethesda even remotely consider any of the other Fallouts to exist).