While playing fallout 4 for a bit I noticed the mysterious stranger seemed to be a little suspicious even though the game tries to give you the "just go with it" attitude I did a little digging... After watching a video on top 10 facts about fallout by: lemmino I learned about vault 11.

Vault 11 was an experiment to that took 1000 people and told them that if they don't sacrifice 1 person then all of them will die. They began with a democratic system by voting on who died. later on people demanded a lottery to randomly pick who died... after pandemonium broke out and there were only five survivors. They agreed to not sacrifice anyone else and when the time of death came they would kill themselves...

A year passed by and nobody was killed. They finally found out that that's what the experiment was truly about, it wanted to see how long it would take for the people to revolt... after seeing that everyone sacrificed was for no reason four of the survivors killed themselves leaving one survivor that survivor then left the vault and was never heard from again. That one survivor is the Mysterious Stranger. Any thought on this?

The Mysterious Stranger is implied in FONV to be the father of The Lonesome Drifter from Montana. During the quest where he is involved, you can persuade him to gift his gun to you as payment. His gun is called the Mysterious Magnum, and whenever it is unholstered in the game, it will play the tune that accompanies the The Mysterious Stranger.

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/The_Lonesome_Drifter

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Mysterious_Magnum

He's a mysterious guy said to be a "guardian angel" that kills anything in one hit with his magnum. That's bout all I really care about the guy.

Well, he is as old as the Fallout Universe itself.

Either he is an incredibly well preserved Pre-War Ghoul or something FAR more interesting.

Think about it:

-He is seen everywhere in the US.

-He has been reported many, many times over hundreds of years.

-He only shows up long enough to make one single, seemingly random, kill.

-He disappears again just as fast.

Baring 'A Wizard Did It' there is only one real explanation for this:

The Mysterious Stranger is NOT one man, but rather a Faction of some kind, even more secret than the Institute. One that sends lone operatives out into the world to take one single decisive action for a reasons that are beyond our understanding. Operatives that are never seen until it is too late, who never fail, and are never defeated. And they seem to have a vested interest in keeping the various Heroes Of The Wasteland alive.

So, who could this Mysterious Faction be?

They must be even more advanced and shadowy than the Institute, yet they do not seem to involve themselves in the World beyond saving the various Heroes.

They must have access to superbly trained and equipped personnel.

They must have SOME way to predict where and when they are needed.

If we limit our search to 1950's era organisations, two jump out:

D.A.R.P.A. :https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA

They would be the source of the most advanced technology in the world (barring the next one) and have access to the finest personnel in the world (barring the next one). They could have perfected the technology that the Railroad uses with P.A.M. allowing them to identify individuals who will play an important part in the reestablishment of human civilisation and provide them the protection they need when they need it. They could be motivated by altruism or, more likely, their predictive models show that any overt action on their part would end it total disaster.

The Manhattan Project: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project%C2%A0

The finest collection of the finest minds the world has ever seen. Somehow, the very Founders of all that is Fallout are never mentioned..........strange, that. Perhaps the Project never ended, researching ever more powerful and terrible weapons of war until the inevitable, bitter end. The resources they would have access to would be unimaginable. And so would the GUILT. Picture it, a Faction of near unimaginable power, so traumatised by past abuses of that power that they are nearly paralyzed. Only intervening when the fate of the world rests in the balance, and then by doing as little as possible. It would be Issic Assmoves' First Foundation.

The mysterious stranger was originally supposed to be the first guy sent out to find the waterchip. They had a whole cut plotline about it.


What do a bunch of scientists have to do with anything? Darpa and the Manhattan project had nerds not assassins.

Dread Pirate Roberts well thats what I think......... Or a rather funny new spin Since Nick is so interested.... NICK, well versions of him since he is well an oddity for synths (HUman memories transfured) there certainly could have been a ton of him made...(maybe)

UAF would also be a contender if following that line of thought. Especially so, since there is lore about them in the Fallout Universe (they were planned to get some airing in Van Buren's)

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Unamerican_Activities_Force

The UAF armour mentioned, is actually a stealth suit, which could account for his sudden appearances.....

All speculation tho, and I think Bethesda will keep him this way, as a guardian angel thing, for the SS only, and not multiple heroes. Just as the perk Miss Fortune in FONV is a spin-off of that same concept (altho, you could have both, I think, just not appearing simultanously).

What about Miss Fortune?

Has nobody ever wondered about her?

Both are Military Projects.

Headed by Military Personnel.

As such, they would have access to plenty of firepower and the right People to use it.

The Manhattan Project was headed by a full 2-star General. They had, what amounted to, an entire conventional army protecting them.

I'm just working under the assumption that that would have contained at least one person who was not at 'nerd'.

Having a general head up scientific research doesn't mean they are using soldiers as scientists. Research is far removed from field work. It doesn't matter anyways because the idea of him being anything but a single man makes no sense.