Helpful tips to avoid catastrophe in Fallout Shelter

It's safe to say that since the release of Fallout Shelter, a fair portion of our daily hours are spent managing the fickle, bitchy and sometimes glitchy addiction that is Bethesda's new, hit mobile game. We’ve previously given you a guide on how to buck the system by getting unlimited lunch boxes, but now we are offering up some tips for those lambs amonst us who are too pure for this world and still believe in honesty and skill. Here’s our suggestions for making a streamlined and thriving vault while at the same time giving you something to do that isn’t engaging with Aunt Gladys and her favorite topic- the finer points of breeding fancy goldfish.

Take it slow!

Rome wasn’t built in a day, but it damned sure burnt in one. Rapid expansion is an easy temptation to fall prey to, especially with the early glut of lunch boxes the game’s objectives hand out pretty generously at the start. These, of course, peter off pretty quickly and you can find yourself starving, dehydrated, unhappy, without power and with no hope of salvation. Sometimes this happens all at once. Pace yourself and you won’t throw your phone or have to talk to Aunt Gladys as a result.

*This ain’t Deliverance!

Growing up in the South, I’ve heard my fair share of trite cousin kissing jokes. Presumably someone at Bethesda shares a similar background and finds them just as annoying, because in the game you’re not able to breed relatives off of each other. Place bloodkin vault dwellers in the living quarters together and instead of jokes about cholesterol and awkward dancing, you’ll get commentary about how nice it is to hang with family. I mention all of this because what you don’t want to do is use the same overly charismatic stud to impregnate all your lady dwellers. You’ll hit a generational bottle neck pretty damned fast if you fall for that mistake.

Birth Control!

The incest situation leads to another major suggestion- don’t get all your lady dwellers in the family way all at the same time. Between radroaches, raiders and your vault’s tendency to inexplicable catch fire, your pregnant womenfolk’s habit of running around screaming in the event of an emergency effectively makes them absolutely useless for the duration of the crisis. So it’s best to keep a rotation going, which sounds morbid as hell, but this is the end of civilization as we know it. If Battlestar Galactica taught me anything, it was the terrifying need make babies and repopulate in just such a reality (even if it’s only to have enough occupants to justify a Nuka-Cola bottler).

Knock Knock!

One of the best moves you can make is placing two of your strongest dwellers at your vault’s door and equipping them with enough fire power to kill every last Mad Max extra that wanders in out of the wastelands. Yes, as much as you’d love to see these lazy schmucks put to good use cooking you grilled cheese and purifying your peepee into potable water, having specific individuals assigned to the door will save you precious time for the inevitable raiders that will come banging at your vault’s entrance. These guys are also easily dispatched to help quell the other crazy crap that can happen within the vault before returning for regular duty.

Baby, Come Home!

Don’t forget to recall your dwellers from the wastelands. They’re easy to forget about, but regardless of how many StimPaks, RadAways and gear you give them, they’ll eventually get killed by something out of a John Carpenter movie at some point. Call them back in, collect their wares and play at having some empathy like the good Overseer you’re pretending to be. I keep forgetting to do this and they are all dead. I do not practice what I preach.

If all else fails, there's always the lunch box trick we covered previously. God speed, shelter dwellers. God speed.