Good morning, everyone!

I began wondering about the population of New Vegas and the size of the NCR Army, both in the Mojave and in total.

I'm going to argue that the population of New Vegas is between ten and twenty thousand people. I base this off the size of Shady Sands shortly after the founding of the Republic, the rather high standard of living in New Vegas (as in, electricity, clean water, security by House and the comfort of the hotels), and the large number of tourists the Strip would attract.

Now, the population of the NCR is in the millions (a fact I've seen disputed in this forum before). I think that 2,000,000 is an acceptable estimation. From that, one can safely assume that the NCR Army numbers roughly at 100,000 (5% of the total population, a large proportion). I'm going to have to say that an NCR force of roughly 15,000 deployed to the Mojave is relatively accurate. Since Caesar's Legion is made up of 87 tribes, with a few hundred people in each tribe, I'm taking a guess and saying his forces are around 20,000.

Anyway. I open this thread up to discussion. My guesses are pretty lowsy (since it's 4:20am), so let's discuss!

Only 2 million? A lot of territories that were independant in the Fallout 2 era, roughly 40+ years ago, are now a part of the NCR. It's expanding north into Oregon, East into parts of Nevada, and South into Baja California, that's a LOT of prime real estate, and who knows how dense these areas are populated. For their army, I suppose 5% of the pop. seems accurate, considering they are still fighting the BoS, while expanding outward, not to mention keeping the Legion at bay. Also, their long history of being surrounded and besieged by enemies would undoubtedly compel them to maintain a sizable military. Plus, their military enlistment is open even to ghouls and even conquered peoples (Manny Vargas and Bitter-Root were once Khans, I believe.) which would give them a MUCH bigger pool to recruit from.

As for the population of the Mojave, I think 10-20 thousand seems about right, depending on how Outer Vegas is populated (I don't think most of the people that can afford the credit check to get into The Strip itself are locals). The rest of the Mojave is largely unsettled frontier land, with only a handful of major settlements in the desert.

As for the Legion, it's tough to say. They are a largely pre-industrial, agrarian state as far as we know, and without modern medicine available in sufficient quanatites amongst the general population, it's reasonable to assume that they have pre-industrial lifespans (in other words, short) and therefore a smaller population that requires the constant assimilation of tribes in order to keep its numbers up. But since in-game there are no indications that they are outnumbered by the NCR, I would say their force in the Mojave is somewhat higher than 20,000. Considering the NCR's massive advantage in firepower, the Legion would actually have to outnumber the NCR in-theatre by quite a bit to pose the threat they appear to in the game. I believe Lanius did say something about how it took them three years to aquire enough ammunition to launch their assault, so they might be investing a disproportionatley large amount of their military into this campaign.

I figure the population of NCR probably around the 3 million mark. I base this on a couple of things.

As of 2241 the population of NCR was 700,000 people. NCR had yet to take over all of California. At the point of 2281, NCR has expanded all of California, into Oregon and Baja Mexico and parts of Nevada. That expantion alone would double to population so that would be 1.4 million people. Double the population in 40 years 2.8 million. High standered of living would attract more people to live in NCR, so that would add another 200,000 people.

As for the population of New Vegas? I would say 2 to 5 thousand people. I say this because New Vegas didn't have such a high standered of living for as long as NCR. People didn't start coming to Vegas on mass until Mr.House came along, and most of those people are from NCR. Before Mr.House, the people's of Vegas were mostly nomadic, example "The Boot Riders" aka The Chairmen.

Edit: I wouldn't be surprised if it was closer to 5 million.

@Arclight808

What chapter of the Brother of steel are the NCR fighting?

Where you guys get this 700,000 etc from? In the FO2 survival guide it says NCR is like 20,000.

How are you guys putting them at almost a million circa FO2????

Note that Reno is several thousand, so like 6-7. Most other settlements are in the hundreds. Taking over all of them puts NCR at about 30k.

Edit: It is the Vault City travel log that while a census was conducted, they do not have access to the numbers, but estimated tens of thousands of citizens. Tens of thousands, not hundreds of thousands, so anywhere from 10-90 thousand, in FO2.

I put their numbers at maybe, 300,000 tops. And that could be high. Most towns are not big.

Vault City Travel Logs say:

"http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/New_California_Republic: The territories of NCR are located far to the south of http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Vault_City. Trades mechanical equipment, gold, and various surplus products in exchange for Vault City medical technology. NCR has recently stepped up efforts to absorb Vault City as a border territory, so Vault Citizens should exercise extreme caution when traveling to NCR.

• Population: Though a census has been conducted, we do not have access to the figures. NCR is believed to have many tens of thousands of people."

But where the 700,000 comes from? I would like to say the Fallout Bible, but I can't remember the last time I saw that. Damn wiki keeps changing every time I look at it. It used to have a foot note beside 700K that everyone including myself quotes.

Edit: I had to do some digging but I found it ==> http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/NCR_history_holodisk


NCR is at war with the entire Original Brotherhood.

The NCR around the time of New Vegas is much, much bigger than they were in Fallout 2. And there are ample signs in New Vegas of rapid growth, from the Vault 22 quest to increase agricultural productivity, to Hanlon mentioning the lakes "drying up" or something like that, and NCR pioneers settling vast tracts of uninhabited land, like in Hanlon's story about the village in Baja that shot up people coming for their well. If I can recall, he said something along the lines of "it dosen't seem very far away now, but back then it was", meaning that isolated little cluster of shacks in the desert is now an established, growing town in the NCR, indicating signficant expansion. None of this seems to point to a sparsely populated NCR, in fact, it's quite the opposite. We have no idea what 2280's NCR looks like, but there are plenty of indicators in New Vegas that make it clear it is a much larger and more advanced place from when we saw it back in Fallout 2, but if you have some evidence that points to the contrary, feel free to correct me.

In fallout 2 when you are in shady sands you can find some NCR flyer or propaganda. It says the NCR is 700,000 and growing.

And here it is ==> http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/NCR_history_holodisk

I don't know why I thought it was the Fallout Bible. I am forgetting the little details. Need to play Fallout 2 again, it's been about a year since I last played it

Well that holodisc and a 3 mill NCR makes absolutely no sense, at all, and defies logic.

Shady Sands are descendants of Vault 15, I believe.

Los Angeles formed from people who used demo Vault.

Junktown, Hub.

Roughly 150 years from Great War to FO2 and this holodisc.

Now, I don't think Shady Sands was founded by everyone from Vault 15. But, we can pretend they are.

1000 people. By FO2, 8,000.

Junktown, lets say in FO1 was 3,000, which seems a high estimate. So, by FO2, that population of people could be about 7500.

Hub, Vault Dweller says bigger than junktown and shady combined. So lets estimate 10,000 in FO1, again, a high estimate. By FO2, about 25k.

That puts NCR pop at 35k by FO2. Lets pretend a full 1000 people survived in the demo vault, and you have another 8. Maxson is a new city, formed sometime after FO1, lets assume that 10k, and with super high population estimates, that gives 53K people in FO2.

Now, there is about another 10k of people, again the high estimate in all the other towns in FO2, but those are not NCR yet, as far as that holodisc goes. So where are these other 650,000 people? Dayglow??????

From FO2 to NV you looking at one double in population, so 106,000.

That is a major screw up, imo, the holodisc, and we have two contradiction pieces of lore, from tens of thousands, to hundreds of thousands.

Unless every female is a octomon, it is just impossible.

My phone screwed up. But, as far as expansion, if NCR added 10 states the size of the Hub, the biggest, you are still nowhere near 700,000.

I almost have to think that disc is a total lie. Completely impossible that in FO2 they are 700K.

Especially when logic puts the pop at 53K.

First of all Vault City only had about a hundred people. So how would they be able to do a complete census of NCR? They most likely did a census of Shady Sands (NCR) and didn't go further south where most of NCR is located. They even say that NCR has states down South and they can't get the full information they need. So they simply said "many tens of thousands."

Second: Shady Sands was founded by people from Vault 15.

Third: you seem to be talking as if Vaults were the only way people survived. Fallout 2 takes place 164 years after the Great War. That is plenty of time for it to reach approximately 700,000 people.

I'd imagine a lot of the populace of the US moved away from cities, so tons of people would be all over the place, not subjected to 5 towns across half a state.

Just think of the math. I svck at math but here are some numbers.

As of last year California had 37, 691, 912 people. America had: 311, 591, 917 people

Fallout 2077 America had 400 million people. So that would mean California would have what? 40 to 50 million people? Again I svck at math.

So for the population of California to be 3 million or so people in the year 2281, 200 plus years after a nuclear war isn't unrealistic at all.

Edit: Just in case. No I am not being sarcastic I think 3 million is a realistic number.

Yes, and the world's population didn't explode in size after discovering how to farm their own food, and mortality rates didn't drop off exponentially in the West when modern medicine put an end to many preventable ailments that killed thousands of people every year. /end sarcasm.

I wouldn't be surprised if California had 250,000-500,000 people survive right after the great war.

No it is not. How much more South can you go??? Brazil??

Fact, 1000 people in a vault. Fact, shady formed from a vault, LA formed from people using a vault. Those numbers are solid. Dunno about Dayglow, but need to assume they from a Vault seeing how they near one of the most radiated areas in FO.

Sure, there pockets of people who survive and form their little communities.

But yer talking 650,000 people. That is A LOT if little pockets. In FO2 all these small town are like 500-1000 people. Other non-vault survivors would have an insane job of surviving, let alone doubling their population, with no water.

It makes no sense at all.

I took into account the 164 years, I used high estimates, for example Shady Sands and LA prolly not formed by 1000 people.

Like I said, 10 more states the size of the Hub still wouldn't put them ANYWHERE near 700,000, and there are not that many.

There is Shady, LA, Hub, Dayglow, and Maxson. Even octomoms couldn't get it to 700K.

First of all Vaults weren't the only way people survived the great war. In fact given that the Vaults weren't meant to save anyone, very little would have survived the great war by Vaults. Tens of thousands if not a couple hundred thousand would survive by other means.

Second: Not all Vaults had 1000 people. Some had less and some had far more. Example would be Vault 8, "Vault City" only had a hundred or so people. Vault 15 had severe overcrowding issues.

Third: The game tells us that there was approximately 700, 000 people within NCR territory at the time of 2164. So you can argue it all you want but it isn't going to change people's minds.

As I said 3 million people 200 plus years living in California, parts of Baja, Oregon and Nevada is a realistic number. Consider that the population of that area on October 23, 2077 was approximately 50 million people.

I'm using modern, everything is awesome, population doubling.

What is population LA 2077? Cuz they, save for the people who got to the demo vault, are all dead. San Diego? All dead.

Most people, are all dead. Radiation was lethal for 10 years. How many of the initial non vault survivors actually lived? So, add up populations of the largest cities, and mark them up as all dead, save for the, again max estimate of 1000 who got in a vault.

Vaults weren't the only way people survived the Great War! Out of 50 million people a couple hundred thousand people could have easily survived the great war.

Again Evilbastrd you are talking as if Vaults were the only way people survived. Also see my last post. Vaults didn't just have 1000 people and Vaults weren't meant to save people in the first place.

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1363672-new-vegas-population-ncr-force-size/page__view__findpost__p__20578079

No, a holodisc that could be propoganda crap says it, and another piece of in game info contradicts it.

And logic makes it look ridiculous.

And ya, the mighty Vault Experiment. But for not saving people, they sure did a good job, as many people you meet, came from a vault.

My ancestors came from a vault. My parents came from a vault. I came from a vault.

States are different fyi in FO NCR than real world.

There is a mystery 650K people. That makes NO sense.

The people of LA aren't just going to sit there and take it, those not killed by the blasts would get the hell out of there. Believing that all the 5 millionish people (it's 3.7 million right now) would just die is foolish. The metropolitan area is 12,000,000 right now so it would be higher then. They wouldn't just all die. Thousands would most definitely survive, and LA would have the most. I wouldn't be surprised if 100,000 people survived from the LA metropolitan area.

Just when I started thinking you were half way normal person Evilbastrd you start pulling crap like this. You encounter a fact you don't like and you go off, saying everyone else is wrong, because "your logic if far superior and your opions are fact!"

Serioulsy, there is no debate here. It is approximately 700, 000 people as of 2241. Vaults weren't the soul means of surviving the Great War. The people came out of Vault 15 and built Shady Sands and others from the wasteland would have come to join them.

There are people living in DC and yet no one there came out of a Vault. There are people living though out the Midwest and none of them say they came from a Vault. The Den, Klamath, New Reno, San Fransisco, no Vault in sight. There was only 122 Vaults. All those lacations founded by people who didn't come from a Vault!

New Vegas, none of them came from a Vault. Until after Mr.House kicked out the people of Vault 21. The tribes on Honest Hearts, and I am betting those 87 or so tribes Caesar tookout didn't all come from Vaults.

You do not have to lecture me on Vault or non-vault survival.

People outside of a vault who survived are going to face umm difficulty actually living if they survived the nukes.

Says it right in game, everyone in LA dead except the people who got to the demo vault. Most people in major cities are going to be instantly or close to it, killed.

Most population is in big cities. Rural people have a better shot at survival, which is why, in FO and FO2, these non vault towns, are SMALL.

It almost like you forget there was a nuclear war...

650,000 mystery people is not a small number, and my population numbers from fo1 and 2 are pretty darn good and generous numbers. NCR in FO2 has not expanded that much...yet they claim 700,000 based on 5 city states, 3 of which we know a great deal about.

Funny how you act like so easy to survive, thrive, and multiply following nuclear war when game gives us example after example of the opposite.

It says right in game NCR has 700,000 people.