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| I prefer having one elevator, dwellers can get around more quickly |
1. Start your vault, build all the necessary starter rooms the tutorial will get you to do (Power, Water, Cafeteria, Bunk Room, Store Room etc.) and assign your dwellers to them, don't worry too much about who goes where for now.
2. Now, over a period of a couple of days do this: open Fallout Shelter, collect the resources then quit out, never stay in the game long enough for Raiders to turn up. Remember that you actually have to force quite game, in IOS double-tap the home button then swipe the Fallout Shelter upwards to properly close it down... 'Droid users - refer to your documentation on how to do this.
3. When you've got enough Bottlecaps collected, slowly, bit-by-bit, add resource rooms based on resource demand, try to keep an even balance but ALWAYS make sure you have enough power, otherwise rooms will start to shut down.
4. When you have reached the required population numbers, build an infirmary and assign a dweller to start making Stimpaks. When you have collected 15 Stimpaks AND have a nice collection of Bottlecaps in the bank give a dweller 2-3 Stimpaks and send him/her out into the wilderness, leave them for about 2-3 hours but keep checking periodically to see if him/her is still alive... have them return when they've collected 4-5 items of loot (having sufficient Bottlecaps is to pay to get them revived if they die). Remember to keep quitting the game to prevent Raider attacks. Rinse and repeat this over a few days and you should have a nice collection of weapons and outfits. Also build a Chem Lab once you've unlocked it and add RadAways to your dweller's wasteland loadout.
5. Start equipping your dwellers with guns and outfits, this is important, NEVER leave your dwellers unequipped, they simply cannot handle Radroach and Mole Rat infestations with their fists!
6. Assign female dwellers to all your living quarters and start sending processions of male dwellers to them, you'll be increasing your population in no time. Also, when you have them spare, assign two dwellers to the vault entrance, make sure they are equipped with decent guns.
7. I'm going to repeat this here again, make sure that you're quitting the game as soon as you're done your collecting/dweller room assignments/checking dwellers in the wasteland etc, don't forget to check your inventory and junk/sell outfits and weapons as you see fit, keep any junk collected for now. Raider attacks can seriously hamper your progress, this is why I'm banging on about making sure the game is closed down properly. Don't worry, resources will still be generated and will be waiting ready for collection next time you load the game.
8. At this stage you should have two well equipped dwellers guarding the door and every dweller on that floor equipped with pistols. If Raiders attack whilst you've got the game open, the two dwellers guarding the door will 'thin' them out before they head to the next room and any dwellers from there on will finish them off. Raiders rarely (in my experience) head downwards, they always seem to concentrate on attacking the top floor rooms. This doesn't mean you should leave your dwellers on lower level unequipped, ultimately you need to have ALL your dwellers appropriately equipped, just prioritise from the top down. As you gain more powerful weapons, assign them that way. In my vault every dweller has a weapon that has 5 or more hit points.
9. Once you've unlocked the weapons room, build it and assign a dweller, now you can use all that junk you collected, start making shotguns and assign them appropriately (top floor downwards). With every dweller packing heat, Radroaches and Mole Rats won't stand a chance.
10. As your population increases, more room types are unlocked, including training rooms. Build one of each of these - Weight Room for Strength (Power Room), Athletics Room for Agility (Cafeteria) and Armoury for Perception (Water Processing). Start rotating your dwellers through each of them based on what room that dweller came from (i.e. send a dweller from a Power Room to the Weight Room). As they level up their appropriate SPECIAL stat send them back to the room they came from, eventually you'll have rooms full of the right qualified dwellers and the resources will come flowing in in large quantities.
11. When you're happy that your resource rooms are full of properly qualified dwellers and you have the spare capacity, start to rotate your dwellers through the other training rooms, this is important because you may need to substitute dwellers and you'll want the sub to be nearly as good as the one that's being subbed. By now you should be confident enough to leave the game open longer and shouldn't be worried about raids (assuming your sentries are there, well equipped etc.)
12. Ultimately, at this stage, your vault should be self sustaining and you shouldn't be getting any resource shortages. It's all about balance and matching dwellers with the right SPECIAL stats to the right rooms. Have fun, try different things... but keep your dwellers in the right rooms and make sure you have an even balance of resource production
Things to note:
It's best to have large rooms on your ground floor, that way, Raiders/Deathclaws will be mobbed by gangs of Dwellers and subsequently killed more quickly.
Raiders level with your vault population, so at higher numbers they will attack with bigger, better weapons. Make sure your first floor dwellers are equipped appropriately, they are of a high level and that their Strength SPECIAL stat is as high as possible.
At 60+ dwellers Deathclaws start attacking so you'll really need to make sure your dwellers have high level weapons. Get your weapons room upgraded so you can manufacture rare weapons, you'll need to save up for it though as it costs 8000 Bottlecaps! Keep sending dwellers out to find rare weapon recipes.
Don't bother wasting Bottlecaps on upgrading your vault door in the early stages of building your vault. The Raiders will still get in even when the door is upgraded to it's maximum level, they just take a little longer to get in. If you've got well equipped guards and dwellers on the first floor the raiders will be easily dealt with.
I tend to use my two sentries for wasteland sorties, I send one out at a time, that way, if there is a Raider attack there's still one left to deal with them. It's also easer to 'drag' them out past the door, rather than having to scroll around the vault whilst potentially accidentally 'dragging' dwellers out of rooms.
Training dwellers is a great way to earn Bottlecaps as they are generated every time the dweller increases their SPECIAL stat.
The longer you leave a dweller out in the wasteland, the greater chance he/she will discover rare recipes, so make sure they're stocked up well on Stimpacks and RadAways.
A Dweller with maximum SPECIAL stats survives longer in the wasteland and has a better chance of finding rare and legendary loot. I've got one Dweller called Harold, he is level 50, has 7-8 on almost all his stats. I give hime 15 Stimpaks and Radaways and can confidently leave him out in the wasteland for 24+ hours, during that time he will find rare stuff AND still have 8 or 9 Stimpaks left!
Raider attacks can be useful as Raiders will drop loot when they are killed, occasionally that loot will be weapon or outfit recipes. Even if loot isn't dropped a dead Raider will generate Bottlecaps.
Hopefully you'll find this useful, it's not the 'ultimate' guide and, to be honest, my method does require a shit ton of patience! But, hang in there and you'll have a happy, well populated vault :)
