Imagine this. You’re out in the wasteland and you come across a cobblestone house. “Fancy,” you might say. In Fallout 76, grime and industrial aesthetics permeate everything, so stumbling on a clean, well-lit house with modern design is out of the ordinary. Curiosity brings you through the wooden door.
Inside appears to be just a normal, albeit expensive-looking house. The second floor, you could see from outside, has a gorgeous greenhouse. The main bedroom has an attached gym, one of many smaller details that make the abode seem actually livable.
As you examine the real estate, you might notice a door leading out to the back. Through it, there’s some oak-stained stairs leading up to a bubbling jacuzzi. To set the mood, there’s a small rock garden that’s flush with a variety of succulents and even a Pip-Boy bobblehead. Likely, you will then do what everyone does: step into the bath. It practically invites you in. The post-apocalypse isn’t exactly running over with luxury arrangements like this, so it’s almost a reprieve.
But, surprise! The jacuzzi is a trap. The moment you step into it, a plate activates, and a hidden mechanism absolutely blasts you with radiation. Within seconds, you are dead.
Player @vault101manguy recently posted a montage of such kills on social media, and he tells Kotaku that at least a few dozen people have bit the dust this way. That he knows of, anyway. The camp is available when he’s not logged into Bethesda’s quasi MMO, so folks can fall prey to it at any time.
If putting a pressure plate in the hot tub and then hiding a bunch of connected radiation emitters underneath it is wrong, I don’t want to be right.#fo76 #fallout76 @fallout pic.twitter.com/VFgjEJ4fYW
— aswiftkickinthejunk (@vault101manguy) June 14, 2021
“I will occasionally receive some kind of message about it (mostly positive or surprised) or find a loot bag in the tub when I return,” he said in an email.
The genius of it lies in the fact that every part of the underlying contraption is hidden. There’s a small generator and a whopping 16 radiation emitters. By his estimation, the trap releases about 200 points of radiation, which can often kill players in a matter of seconds — especially if they make the mistake of sitting in it. Then, they’re stuck watching the animation play out as the Pip-Boy’s radiation sensors go off. They never get a chance to stand up.
Part of it, he suspects, is that the hot tub is a fairly new item in Fallout 76. Folks don’t immediately perceive the jacuzzi as a danger, and since it’s a novel item, it might be exciting to see it be put to real use. But as the apparently bloodthirsty maker of the viral Death Claw maze, vault101manguy saw the item and immediately thought of ways he might use it to drown people.
“If putting a pressure plate in the hot tub and then hiding a bunch of connected radiation emitters underneath it is wrong, I don’t want to be right,” he wrote in the original upload.
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