I'm sure its bothered some of you why the fiends have energy weapons when they are really just a bunch of junkies. Hell someone put out a mod to change that. So I started thinking why would they have them. And the best reason I can think of after looking into some of they lore and google maps is, the Van Graffs. Now I'm not saying they are selling the weapons to them but if you look at a real world map of Vegas and follow highway 95 up it leads you to Reno or New Reno.

So using my amazing math skills of 1-6=popcorn. The Van Graffs had shipments coming from Reno to Freeside and the fiends say them and attacked, finding some energy weapons. Hell the same could be side for the NCR and gun runners too. They're moving supplies down highway 95 and the fiends attack.

I wish they would of added at least a note or something

Honestly, I just figured there was a black market that sold the weapons to the fiends. Not Van Graffs per say(Although it is possible), but certainly someone could have been selling to them. The Great Khans sell chems to them so I'm sure they could find a weapon dealer as well.

But you could be right though. They could have been ripping off shipments and taking the weapons for themselves. Either way, I'm with you. I wish they left a small note or something to explain why the fiends have energy weapons.

I thought the game mentioned that the fiends were getting energy weapons either through their drug running and or through the Van Graffs? Its been a while since I played the game so my memory of this is spotty at best.

Here's a interesting bit or info in one for the quests for the Van Graffs the legion is trying to buy energy weapons and we know the legion is giving Intel to the fiends about the NCR so they could of been getting the weapons for the fiends.
Thoughts?

I always figured that most of the fiends would of got their weapons in general by either stealing them or robbing caravans and travelers. I suppose that maybe the odd fiend might be able to make up the caps to buy them, but I think that would be rare if it happened at all.

Edit: I guess its also possible that some of them could simply find them on corpses or just around the wastelands in general.

I think this is just for the fact that they’re scavengers. They most likely got these weapons from fallen opponents, scavenging areas, etc. There isn’t really anything in the game that tells us they’re getting energy weapon deals with any weapons dealer. These guys just take what they can get. Though, it does make me scratch my head when Veronica mentions that they don’t use energy weapons when you go to Vault 3. This could’ve been a simple mishap with the leveled lists that Obsidian simply didn’t notice.

I believe a good many of these weapons were scavenged from Vault 3, as a terminal in there does mention a weapons armoury, which you can find, and it seems rather empty, so the fiends having requisitioned these weapons for themselves does make a lot of sense.

I remember a mod, which IIRC, is Buried Fortunes, in which you hunt down Vertibirds. They had a story about how an old Enclave Vertibird transporting weapons was shot down or crashed, and that the contents of the Vertibird had been salvaged by the fiends, resulting in the amount we see carrying energy weapons. Laser weapons I could always understand since they seem pretty accessible in the Fallout universe regardless, but possessing Plasma Weapons, which in Fallout 3 were pretty much unique to the Enclave, not to mention possessing so many of them, always felt kind of weird to me.

Yup... At first it's a bit shocking to see raiders with hi-tech weaponry, but the more I though about it, the more logical it became in my mind.

Always did strike me as odd that coked out raiders had access to high-tech energy weapons that not even the NCR fielded so commonly. In my mind it's easy to chalk up that they've raided it, like from maybe the Van Graffs who I'm pretty sure haul that type of cargo from their HQ in California.

In any event I never had to spend a single cap on ammo or weapons for energy weapons most of the time, just waited 'til the lot of them respsawn and go on a Fiend killing spree, then loot their guns and energy cells lol.

I guess we can chalk this one up to a mystery of the wastes. Or agree they just bought them or stole/looted them from others