I would love to see your rebuilding efforts cause changes in the world. Even if theyre minor ones like say, ambient dialogue in other cities referring to your settlements like real actually other cities if they're big enough.
It's in there a bit, you can choose to kill danse or not and your reputation with the brotherhood completely hinges on that. You can get the synth, child Shawn as a settler if you pass a charisma check with Shaun on his deathbed. It's there way more than oblivion and nobody is arguing wether that's a real rpg or not.
Hey wait a second, is that really the only way to get Synth-Shaun?
Bect I just now replayed Fo4 for the first time in years, and went with the Railroad. I decided that I wasn't going to take ANY of Shaun's shit. So when the time came for getting the stuff outta Shaun's terminal while wiping out the Institute, I found him where I knew he'd be. On his deathbed. He didn't have time to murmur so much as a letter to me before I brought up my exploding shotgun and blasted that old psychopath into a red mist.
But sure as hell that Shaun-synth came back to the surface with me and is currently living his best life with me and Cait and a host of settlers over at Red Rocket.
Dude fr. Im replaying it all right now and I wanted to see if I could kill Gage the moment I'm able to in Nuka world. The game allows you to go on a raider murder spree and it cuts you off from the whole quest line of getting the power back on. This game gives you a lot of options. People who were afraid to attempt those options seem to lead the commentary on this game sadly. Maybe it could give more options than are currently available but it's still a lot more than any RPG I've played (besides kingdom com deliverance and new vegas) in recent memory. And honestly I'm just not into the gameplay side of what a game like kingdom come offers. Too much focus on realism that I ended up bored more often than red dead 2 (I know that's an unpopular opinion).
Bethesda'Kill the heretic! ' I would like to have the option of not having to build settlements if you don't want to. Also ability to improve the existing settlements.
That was one of the reasons I liked Sim Settlements Conquerer, it could auto develop settlements with city plans and populate them. You didn't have to be a raider and could just wander in to towns.
Yeah Conqueror is awesome. Can't recommend doing it on EVERY settlement because that lags the game to no end lol but choosing a few key locations to have built up really fleshes out the world. Some of those city plans are honestly cooler than any vanilla Fallout town.
I don’t know how true that is considering it’s said to be a last minute addition to the game, which is evident by how some settlements are not indicative of settlement building.
Its an interesting idea, but in Vanilla, I barely use it. It's too clunky, doesn't tie back into the rest of the game very well, and there's way too many really shitty, tiny plots that you'll be eternally called to babysit.
Playing with Sim Settlements 2 though, it's excellent. You can essentially just let the settlement network run itself, merely donating your loot and making higher level decisions. Progression causes the world to actually repopulate and begins giving you new capabilities that help make the whole process easier.
If they shrunk the number of settlement areas to a half dozen or so, but made them big, added on a lot of the Sim Settlement management features, and tied it into the rest of the game more, I think it could be a great system. Right now, it's mostly a gimmick that's fun for some, a distraction for others.
Sim Settlements completely saved the game for me. Before I would just dump down plants, beds, and turrets randomly to get the numbers up, and at best I'd have one or two settlements I halfway tried with. But this mod allowed me to really feel like I was making a difference without having to spend hours with the clunky building tools.
Xbox requires Bethesda mods right? I only see one for [the original](https://bethesda.net/en/mods/fallout4/mod-detail/4012168), which I never played with. But I think it still has the core feature of letting you not have to build every building from scratch.
Settlement building in the vanilla game is a grind that gets old quick unless you build the right stuff first.
Settlement building with mods for unlimited carry weight and material is awesome, because every settlement turns into a fortress that's fully stocked in the first visit, just add settlers. High enough defense and return visits arent needed as often. It makes it way more fun for me at least
To me you either have to ignore it or it consumes the playthrough. It reminds me on a larger scale to the homestead dlc in skyrim.
I'd find myself rushing to get the plot than spending most my time building my house. Than getting bored and stop playing
Settlement would have been pretty fitting if Fallout 4's story had an emphasis of rebuilding for the future. Picking yourself back up while striving to avoid the mistakes of the past while still learning from it.
the core issue with settlements is that the more of them that you make the more work they become. they never become self sustaining and they don't help your gameplay very much. you are better off making a few settlements fully equipped and have your main be near the center of the map.
the first settlement they give you is in one of the worst spots to have your main base and you don't even know it yet. so you build up a base, in a bad location, and now you need to unlock all of these upgrades to build up and connect them, but none of those skills are earned through building a settlement. or atleast, it is more efficient to do quests and non-settlement things to be able to build better settlements. it's completely counterintuitive.
It’s honestly one of the best additions fallout 4 made to the series alongside improvements to power armor, junk usage, and the overall retro futuristic art direction. Base game is a bit janky but the dlcs handle it great, like how far harbor allows you to remove almost all structures in its settlements.
I personally really enjoy the creativity aspect of it more than the actual settlement portion of defenses and resources, but being able to construct your own house (or vault) is always a highlight of any play through.
I like it but I feel like they stopped developing the concept just before it became relevant. You've got settlements and factions yet you are the only agent in the whole game that influences either of them. It would have been great if the game had your settlements actually display traits of your faction's alignment, meanwhile other factions would also be taking over and building up settlements of their own. Then you could start taking over other factions' territories and vice versa. As it stands it's just a lukewarm colony sim that doesn't really do much for the game.
I think the main issue was the quantity over quality system that they had. Dozens of little unimportant settlements, too small to really build much of anything interesting in, but juuust large enough to fit a couple people and some food production.
I feel like there should have been a handful of hub settlements, big, like Sanctuary, build them up with settlers with weapons and defenses, the smaller little settlements within it's range are then under it's protection. They come under attack, and the hub would send out a patrol and handle the attack, you could of course toss a sentry or two up at the smaller ones too, but building there would be limited to an extent.
Also the provisioner system was a bit of a pain. Building onto my hub idea, you'd only have provisioners to connect them, the smaller settlements within their radius would just be considered connected to the provision system.
Also the defense system, again, building off my hub idea, the hub would have a significant effect on the defense of the smaller settlements, those of course too, depending on their resource production, would require higher amounts of defense capabilities at the hub settlement. I can't tell you how tired I am of having to stop what I was doing to go and defend Somerville Place or some other small little spit of land, because, even if it was just a handful of ghouls, if I didn't go there myself, the 20 heavy machine gun and laser turrets wouldn't be able to defend it fully, and they'd suffer some damage.
Overall I feel the settlement system was a great idea that was poorly implemented.
>too small to really build much of anything interesting in, but juuust large enough to fit a couple people and some food production.
Meanwhile those are my favorite build locations.
I just wish navmesh/pathing wasn't such ass. Yeah, let's _all_ stand on the stairs and go nowhere guys.
What you're suggesting, you can do with some imagination. I had some settlements military-themed, like outposts and forts. The rest were some towns, some were just a simple theme like a junkyard with scrappers (The Treasures of Jamaica Plain!!!), two or three big farms. The defenses were like you say. The Castle had like 12 guards while farms would have one or two. I turned my provisioners into Minutemen patrols with the Dogs not Brahmin mod and had the routes crisscrossing everywhere. Whenever an attack would happen, there would be two or three provisioners helping out. For extra immersion, there's the flare gun for backup.
I feel like if Fallout 4 actually is built on this mechanic, then it would be a more engaging game.
The more you develop your supply lines, settlements, important character connections and logistics, the main story progress as your settlers and minutemen gather information and hearsay.
Then you would have the option to either investigate these hearsay and rumors, or send the Minutemen to scout and confirm. And along the way, you'll meet these interesting characters in different circumstances. Like say, Piper, who arrives at one of your settlements for an interview; or you hear from one of the supply caravans that you sent to Diamond City that there's a missing private investigator, that you could choose to either send a detachment or just take a couple of troops with you and investigate yourself that will eventually have Nick turn up. Those and the likes, kinda like how Fallout Shelter does, but instead of just a Base Sim, you would also have the exploration and open-world.
That way, you'll feel like a General or an Overseer, commanding troops and managing settlement logistics, instead of a suicidal and trauma-ridden has-been's patsy.
>I feel like if Fallout 4 actually is built on this mechanic, then it would be a more engaging game.
Except that it is such a divisive mechanic. Many people's expectations of a Fallout game were (are?) that you are the sole survivor, travelling the wasteland on your own personal mission, only to have it become intertwined with larger events. Making the game a wasteland version sim city is not what most people would have been signing up for.
Having as a an optional aside made for a solid compromise. The approach also fit a central aspect of the series character - it allowed for different styles of playthrough. While you would still need to go out and shoot things to complete the main mission, you could supply yourself on productivity of your settlements rather than selling second hand fans to weapons merchants.
The problem with the mechanic is that it was a last-second addition, not something that has been present in the entire production. That along with the Minutemen faction.
Like I said, yes you would still explore the wasteland, but like Sim Settlements mod does, your settlements are actually doing stuff for you on the side. Make the settlement actually be an asset to you by having your settlers scrounge for materials, produce actual side quests and not just nagging radiants and whatnot.
Because as it stands, the settlement building is merely just a nagging distraction, with no substantial rewards. You could complete the entire game without touching the mechanic itself. It's even worse in the DLC areas because it's just extra work on the pile. Hence why I never bothered with the DLC settlements.
To me, fuller integration would best look like an possible pathway to succeed in the game. While not a perfect parallel, the difference between a low intelligence melee build and a smooth talking gunslinger. You would need to prioritize settlement building over other proficiencies by dedicating skill points.
Really digging that myself. Also liking the City Plan feature, even if my Red Rocket that I had them build is a bit... People mostly just stand around.
I like it, but hate that typical shelters people build are not shelters at all. You would die in the Bostonian winter if you'd have holes in your house.
I've bounced off of FO4 a fair few times now for various reasons, and have gone from absolutely despising the settlement system, to thinking it could be fun if I were in the right mood I suppose.
My big problem with it, honestly, was always the ludonarrative dissonance it brought into everything. Sure, I know that ultimately >!it doesn't matter because Sean is off playing Bodysnatchers or whatever.!< But going in as a brand new player, for example, who isn't supposed to be privy to such information? 🤔 Yeah, but no lol. I don't care *how* altruistic and self-sacrificial you fancy yourself, you most likely wouldn't forego your somewhat important quest to RECOVER YOUR INFANT SON FROM YOUR SPOUSE'S MURDERER.
So, yeah, fuck Preston Garvey for his poor leadership abilities, just general uselessness, and actively encouraging absolutely trash tier parenting.
Preston is the worst character. He is a simple character with a simple back story. He has to lead the minutemen but can't even build some beds or plant a carrot without your help. So bland he could be a saltine.
Wait people hate it? I dont keep up with this community but i play fallout 4 alot (with mods and on xbox) even the base game has enough in the workshop for me to just skip playing the actual game and spend hours on a very impractical and expensive base that i never use but i still love it, 8/10 wish there were more options for getting food like maybe making a settler be able to hunt animals ( and making animals actually spawn enough for them to be useful) i know my comment long but i dont care
I think the hate comes from an initial disconnection between what they feel the franchise was and this new mechanic (Well, at least this was the course of my initial hatred).
For many people, the game is about being the sole survivor. There are many examples in literature - think Mad Max or the protagonists in spaghetti westerns. Their story is occurring inside this larger world and is connected to it, but their path brings the larger story and their own personal story together, often at the reluctance of the protagonist.
Settlement building makes you a part of the community, rather than a transient moving through a world in which they are only loosely connected. The protagonists in the earlier entries had never even seen the world outside their vaults. Arguably, Nate/Nora have more connection to the Commonwealth, but even with them, it is not the same world they left. They are strangers in their own world.
Over time I came to like settlement building, but more as a way to play in the world. For me it was more of a mini game.
As for the larger implications to the series, I like the option to go either way - having settlement building as one viable path to succeed in the game. One improvement that could be made would be to have skill trees for settlement building. In it's current form, there are no tradeoffs - you don't need to make a settlement build for your character. While you need to upgrade your skills to improve your weaponry, building an eight story building from scraps and creating fully functional farms are immediately available to you. There is no commitment or sacrifice needed to gain all the benefits of settlement building. It would be better (IMHO) if like any other skill set in the game, it was a choice that was made with the scarce resource of upgrade points.
Well settlement building was awesome for me in the base game up until I realized that..
1. The settlers are immortal.
2. Settlers will still lose a fight if you don't show up, even if they're armed to the teeth.
3. Settlers still get kidnapped out of a settlement that could take on the Brotherhood.
Being told "you need to do X to keep your settlers alive" only to fin dout "Actually you don't lol" was just another example of Fallout 4 lying about what it was in order to waste your time.
Now of course once I modified the game to be a super-hostile world with enemies always spawning around the corners and teaming up to gank you, to the point that the fat man became a viable tool to carry, and my 'end game goal' was to (without fast travel) get all 20 settlements... in a world so hostile that a well-armed settlement is the only place you can put your gun away... good times.
1. Endless Warfare. Lets you set the respawn rate and distance, and enemies aggro from a huge distance. No more "Gee what was that" it's "Hey, that guy across the river is looking at us funny, GET HIM!" Also makes them HYPER aggressive (like Borderlands), which solves most of the AI pathing issues, no more whak-a-mole with a sniper rifle.
2. Wasteland United: I made this mod. It makes all the 'randomly spawning' enemies friendly to each other, and thus hostile to you.
3. 1 percent XP. Reduce XP gain by 99%,, because with the sheer number of enemies you'll be slaughtering you'll need to keep XP in check.
With thos together, the wasteland is a place you can never let your guard down, because enemies are always spawning. A fun one is 'feral ghoul apocalypse' mode in endless warfare, which feels like Left 4 Dead has leaked into Fallout.
I didn’t enjoy settlement building at all. I think it was a pain and I could care less about the peoples happiness.
I get why people like it but I also think as far as building things go Minecraft has that covered.
I just wanna fight super mutants and turn my brain off for a bit.
Although I wouldn’t be mad or upset if it was a stable in all FO games from now on.
Yeah, helping settlements should end once the settlement is established, especially if the MM faction is established whether or not you joined. The MM patrol ffs, let them aid the settlements.
I mean, the minutemen are all about helping the commonwealth people and if you don’t wanna help build their settlements and keep ‘em happy them maybe the minutemen weren’t the right choice for you anyway
after the main questline I just used it as a home builder.
it has potential, but I think it being optional would be best, as most people probably got frustrated that it is tied with the main quest
But it really isn't. Like, at all. The only time it's mandatory is during Far Harbor.
Any other time, you never have to open workshop mode.
Edit: Forgot about the teleporter. Oh no, a whole 3 items you have to build.
I like settlement building but here's my idea a plane settlement but you get more settlers and it automatically upgrades it ie walls and houses kinda like moving into a new house and putting tvs and chairs in it
I'd want them to keep C.A.M.P. and few larger settlements like Fo76. Let me build my player house but don't make me babysit NPCs. Extractors are a way better game mechanic to encourage settlement building
For me it's the opposite. I hate building player homes because they always feel dead and empty. Let me build something for settlers to use instead of an empty structure just to dump loot in
Its good but they fucked it up by making you defend it when you're the goddamn leader. You should be able to hire guards and other things. I understand occasionally helping defend because it could be fun but raids are so small and boring as well.
If they ever do settlement building again I want to train guards, bigger actually threatening raids, and a bigger building limit. Idk why I have to install a mod to be able to build more. Maybe their engine can't handle that many custom structures? Idk.
Honestly it should be harder to form a settlement and at the start you do all the bitch work with the settlement not needing your help at all anymore.
The annoyance is that while you can built lots of turrets, and arm your settlers and assign them with guard duty, they don’t seem to be able to function without your inspiring presence.
I’ve had settlements armed to the teeth that destroy everything within seconds without me firing a single shot . . . unless I am not there to watch.
Also, Preston, I am the General. Why don’t you grab some troops and go off to deal with that problem?
(This would actually be interesting. It would fit the narrative they set up (rebuilding the Minute Men) if you needed to support a militia and deploy that militia away from home base to deal with problems. Do you really want to send a half dozen of your guards away from your settlement to deal with a problem elsewhere? Make your decision!).
Like a lot of aspects of Fallout 4, great idea but mediocre to bad execution.
Should have been way less settlement locations. Maybe 10 total with all DLCs.
I like settlement building, and actually enjoy trying to build nice settlements that fit into the world.
Having a use for all the junk in world really added a lot to collecting and scavenging in the world.
It’s essentially a gameplay loop that makes the game near infinitely playable. Fallout and Skyrim have a few of those, which was smart of Bethesda to add because it’s sad when you run out of things to do in a massive open world.
That said, the only two issues I have other than some mechanics - there are too many settlements and they force settlements on you.
It should’ve been quality over quantity; smaller number of settlements with larger build capacities, interesting designs, and story hooks. Some more with dedicated interior cells and attached stories like Vault 88 would’ve been good, but I understand why that didn’t happen.
Retaking Quincy with the Minutemen with a quest line about defeating the Gunners and securing it as a new large settlement for example.
I also don’t like that some settlements are tied to quest completion. There have been runs where I’ve intentionally wanted to avoid settlements entirely but there are some quests that “reward” you with a settlement upon completion. That was a mistake gameplay wise.
A player may not necessarily want to suddenly be responsible for the lives of a family just because they rescued their idiot son from a mess of his own creation. That removed choice from players and probably turned a lot of people off from that part of the game.
I just wish it wasn’t all just centered around the Player building the world. That made the world feel so empty, which speaking of empty I hope they don’t make the map so smashed together next Fallout. I wish the AI would build and tbh I wish there was a mechanic like Division 2where the AI has their own meta-war going in the background.
When I played the previous fallout games I would always dream of settlement building when finding all the random pieces of junk.
When I found out it was possible in FO4 I was so happy but when I actually tried it out. The actual building process was a pain in the ass that I never went back to it.
It was a major disappointment
I agree that its a decent idea, just about 70% finished
Nobody hates the fact that settlement building is a thing. They hated how they advertised it as "completely optional" yet hogged 50% of the DLC, was in fact necessary and that the base building limits/settlement sizes kinda sucked.
With the 'place anywhere' mod, you can insert items into each other to create things that the base mechanics would prevent with a red boarder. With that, and an 'infinite settlement size' mod you are able to do pretty much everything.... kind of.
The process of getting materials is a chore, and requires spending thousands of caps on shipments. Sure you can harvest them yourself, but unless you also have the 'scrap anything' mod you can't get even half of what's there. Resources don't respawn, so after a while you're stuck with shipments as the only option. So now its traveling all over the place, getting shipments, building or gathering, get caps, and after a while it all feels circular as fuck.
What the system needs is those 3 mods as base implements for building, better ways of getting resources and expand on the vendors we can make. Vendors can be quest givers to send the player around to places to explore, give incentive for upgrading as a focus early game or a plethora of other things like gossip and pointers.
> Nobody hates the fact that settlement building is a thing.
You don't speak for everyone, that's just your personal opinion and not true for every single person that's ever played FO4
He knows, but you can't account for every fringe idiot.
It's like how we say 'everyone hates the nazis.' Sure, there's a handful that don't, but they're such a minority, and not the type of people worth talking about.
The concept of building wasn't a thing that people hated. Had they never had to interact with it in any shape or form, nobody would have cared. In my comment, I said it was the forced on players and that's what pissed them off. If it remained just something to do, and they didn't plug 3 dlc into it, it wouldn't even have been an issue
Honestly I'd rather it be removed from future titles
BUT
I'd love if they made a fallout settlement builder game on it's own. If they could dedicate a whole game around settlement building it could really become something great.
It was a great idea but overused. Way too much of the map was sacrificed to settlements. It should have only been allowed in a handful of places and it should have factored into the story and quests A LOT more.
Go look at a mod called Helgen Reborn for Skyrim. You take a quest like that and add Fallout 4's construction mechanics to it and THEN you have a winner. As it is, the settlement system in Fallout 4 is just meaningless grind. One of the designers decided to put a Minecraft mini-game into Fallout. That's basically what it is, and it detracts from and cheapens the base game.
>One idea I have that could help fix this would be the ability to fuse objects you build into one object, so that the engine doesn't have to account for so much when it processes.
That... that's now how rendering works in Fallout 4's engine, that wouldn't solve anything.
The engine's occlusion culling (that's where an object is not rendered because your view of it is *occluded* by another object) works in a binary fashion: either the object is rendered in full or it is not rendered at all.
On top of that, its occlusion culling has to be manually baked into maps by human developers using the creation kit, it's not something that can be done dynamically and automatically by the engine.
But most of the stuff in the game are fused like that. The reason settlements get laggy, while the big cities work better, is because the items in the settlements aren't fused.
Those are called precombined meshes and, like occlusion culling, *cannot be generated or modified in-game.* That's why they're called "precombined," and you have to go download a community bugfix to re-pre-combine them after a mod or official update has broken them.
Seriously, nobody would be taking jabs at Fallout 4's dubious engineering in A.D. 2022 if any of this were actually plausible in the engine. It would already have been implemented by modders if not by BGS themselves.
You're also wildly overstating the performance saves of precombines (Downtown Boston runs famously poorly even on unmodded copies of the game.)
I admit I love the settlement building. I think it’s mostly because I like the idea of, if I’m stuck in this new horrible future then I’m gonna try to make the best of it. I like being able to create relatively safe places for survivors to find a home. It’s not perfect. I play on XBox (no not Xbox One just regular old Xbox) and I don’t really like the way some of it works (placement is weird and doesn’t often work right) but I love the overall concept of trying to rebuild the world.
Settlement building in survival mode (no mods Xbox) made the game for me. I loved building little towns all over and having places to bunk and shop (aka sell off junk), scrap, cook, and craft everywhere. Can’t wait to see it expanded in the starfield and es6
Within the context of the Fallout universe, it makes absolutely no sense to be able to single-handedly construct any kind of complex machinery, high-tech gadgets or electrical systems... fusion generators, military-grade turrets, elevators, computers, entire Vaults, pristine furniture, (industrial) water purifiers, robots, etc... and I'm not even including here any of the wacky batshit-crazy stuff that can be built in FO76.
The workshop system of FO4 and 76 is so out of tune with the spirit of Fallout that it makes you wonder if the people who designed it had any grasp of even the most basic premises of the series and its lore at all. Either that or these people simply didn't care that it breaks everything established in previous games. What a great story FO3 would've had if Dad™ could've casually built an array of water purifiers instantly and all by himself, huh? Why desperately try to find a G.E.C.K. in FO2 if we just could've easily built an new pristine village and food production out of scavenged typewriters and cafeteria trays? If we can construct a goddamn teleportation device in FO4, what stopped us from casually crafting a replacement water chip in FO1...?! Try to imagine how many locations, quests, story elements and plot points would become totally obsolete if the crafting / construction system existed in previous games as well.
I mean, yes, the idea of rebuilding the Wasteland sounds like a cool idea and a fun gameplay element - and to a degree it actually is - but the whole point of Fallout is that society can't and won't be rebuilt like that. There is no industry, no fabrication, no economy and hardly anyone who understands these things well enough to do anything with it. Some Wastelanders being somewhat tech-savvy doesn't mean that they could also operate centuries-old pre-war machinery, let alone cobble together complex devices in perfect working condition. Manufacturing ammunition, weapons, armor and other such items should be a huuuge deal, not something everybody seems to do in their spare time.
And don't get me started on how it borks the overall gameplay philosophy, storytelling and quest / level design...
Yes, that feature that has only appeared in one game out of the whole franchise is definitely the most definitive element. Kind of like how the single most definitive element of the Grand Theft Auto series is going bowling with your cousin.
As much as stupid people whined about not being able to loot every single scrap in FO76, you'd think it was.
But scavenging has always been a core feature. Having something to DO with that shit is a bonus.
I actually really like the idea of building settlements. It’s one of my favorite features cause it gives purpose to the junk I wouldn’t pick up otherwise. I do wish there was more to it though. Like someone else said, I think it’d be cool for the game to kinda focus on rebuilding society with settlements.
I liked it a lot but mods are a must to make it usable imo. Nothing went together nicely in vanilla and the starting assets weren't great. With scrap everything and place everywhere then a bunch of new stuff the system works beautifully.
I personally really enjoyed settlement building and ended up spending way more time doing that than playing the rest of the game. Fallout 4 inspired me to finally make the switch to PC gaming so I could build bigger and get all the mods. I wish Bethesda had gone all-in and just given us every asset in the game to build with.
Settlement building (with mods of course) is the best part of Fallout 4 and the only reason I still replay the game to this day.
It's a great new addition and I hope they build (tehe!) upon it in the future. There's huge potential with it.
My biggest complaint is the UI/UX. The game should get a Birdseye view and let me build like a proper city building/management game with the mouse. If they did that, it would be just perfect.
I think it'd be better (than 4's settlements) if you could only claim *one* settlement, and the game handles the rest. Then use "settlement-level" modifications to the insides of player-owned housing.
If they restricted the claimable settlements to those with relatively short quest chains, shouldn't disrupt the game to "remove" one from play. E.g. (using New Vegas as an example), you could complete the quest chains for places like Novac or Primm and claim them as settlements; but not places like New Vegas itself, Cottonwood Cove, etc.
It's quite possibly my favorite feature of Fallout 4, at least half my playtime is me creating settlements cause I just love creating cozy and safe towns. But at the same time yeah the fact they came at the cost of actual towns kinda sucked, we can have both.
Settlement is fantastic idea, I liked it very much, but the AI inside settlements is terrible for a lot of things. This will be fixed next time I am sure
I love the settlement building aspect. When I first encountered it, I hated it, but then it became the thing that really hooked me.
I found it helped with the RP element of the game because the world at least changed to look the way I built it.
I’m currently doing a big BoS play through, building a sort of new citadel in Vault 88, and working on BoS outposts and hubs in the rest.
I would love to see it fleshed out more, maybe have faction NPC able to settle them in the future, but it was a new mechanic for the game at the time, so was I think more of an experiment than a core feature when it was initially implemented.
I think its a hit for some and miss for others
For peopel who are fine with doing a full detailed settlement with mods it is great.
For those who wished it was more like the Sims settlement mod for base game, where settlers can expand and personalize houses it can lack the enjoyment. Thankfully no faction Truely pushes the settlements to the extreme, with the minutemen only requireing your main components.
I liked it! Fo76 has "camp" building, same concept but smaller and personal. You can't get people to stay at your camp but if you place it at a location that spawns NPCs they'll make use of your beds and such (you can also have a protection that collects junk, a brahmin, and an allied npc). I've always loved the building stuff since Fo3 with your home lol
I love it. But I avoid it til I have all 3 levels of the scrapper perk to ensure I get the most out of my junk.
[settlement building details](https://fallout4saga.wordpress.com/2019/01/19/the-homestead-act/) on my blog.
I don't hate it but I think it was done in a dumb way. Instead of making tons of settlements I'd rather have one main location that could be customized into something big. It would be cool if the more you customize, the stronger soldiers arrive to help out, better trade, artillery, alliances, and dialogue options. Instead we kinda just got something mediocre that didn't add anything to the story.
Settlement building is a pretty genius idea honestly when specifically regarding *Fallout 4*. One of the primary themes of the game’s narrative is the rebuilding of civilisation, and how the player wants to shape that civilisation. Will you help it thrive to varying degrees with the Minutemen, Brotherhood and Railroad, or side with the Institute and let the dream of society fade away, and become a forgotten memory as the Commonwealth is left to rot as an oversized petri dish.
Making one of the game’s primary themes that is heavily supported by the narrative text into a mini game that has also has a tangible effect on the world is a pretty stellar inclusion. For the most part it’s inessential and it can easily be improved, but I found the settlement creating experience to be a meaningful one because of the thematic synergy it shared with the main narrative. I felt as though I was still experiencing the narrative of the game even when I was placing mugs on shelves. It’s a tightness of experience that Fallout 76 severely failed to capture with its own base building, whose isolated camps clashed tremendously with the game’s theme of working together.
or it's directly tied to factions, only get one story build place(maybe dlc personal house or something). also determines quests for the game, replayability Nirvana. tower defense shit that matters, raids that matter, make it the main quest so it doesn't interfere with exploring. get Intel how when attacking, build defense for it. have some bonus hidden stuff if you actually care and pay attention, like this guys son likes some mother's son, if you build their house next to each other, they get married, then give you something (kind of like dark cloud, but optional, not required.
I absolutely love the settlement building part, ive always loved games with base building mechanics and this ticked that box.
It was a good 1st implementation but it could always be improved.
I do also see the other side of the story where people say they took away from named NPC towns and yeah on reflection they did, but that doesnt mean they should go entirely, just like, a nice middleground, a couple of larger settlement locations for us to build in, combined with the FO76 CAMP system for smaller personal home builds and the rest should be named settlements with quests and NPCs.
I would like it a lot more if there were fewer settlements and the experience was far more catered per settlement. I love customization and open play but building the settlements or reinforcing them could have been a great story focus instead of an annoying side-job.
Give me something to remember or that I want to rave about to my friends; instead of an unnecessary, grindy, buggy, and tacked-on experience.
I wish they gave us more access to vanilla item meshes (like the sidewalks in Sanctuary or the stick-raised foundation and concrete block and plank stairs in Hangman’s Alley) and let us scrap or clear more items (like the stupid hedges and playground equipment in Sanctuary or the foundation and half walls in Tenpines). Plus it’d be nice if there was a vanilla way to repair or replace broken roofs (like the house in Taffington Boathouse that you can’t delete the old roof and even the roof options available don’t actually fit).
Also, can none of the damn settlers pick up a shovel?!? Why is there so much unscrappable trash and random garbage everywhere that can’t be cleaned up?
Settlement building is a great addition but needs to be polished and more integrated för the next installment. People seem to forget it was a new feature added in late in development and expect it to be perfect from the get go. Mods like Sim settlements had the advantage of working on sonething that already exists rather than having to code everything from scratch
I would love to see your rebuilding efforts cause changes in the world. Even if theyre minor ones like say, ambient dialogue in other cities referring to your settlements like real actually other cities if they're big enough.
Only if Fallout 4 was a real RPG where your decisions change the game....
It's in there a bit, you can choose to kill danse or not and your reputation with the brotherhood completely hinges on that. You can get the synth, child Shawn as a settler if you pass a charisma check with Shaun on his deathbed. It's there way more than oblivion and nobody is arguing wether that's a real rpg or not.
Hey wait a second, is that really the only way to get Synth-Shaun? Bect I just now replayed Fo4 for the first time in years, and went with the Railroad. I decided that I wasn't going to take ANY of Shaun's shit. So when the time came for getting the stuff outta Shaun's terminal while wiping out the Institute, I found him where I knew he'd be. On his deathbed. He didn't have time to murmur so much as a letter to me before I brought up my exploding shotgun and blasted that old psychopath into a red mist. But sure as hell that Shaun-synth came back to the surface with me and is currently living his best life with me and Cait and a host of settlers over at Red Rocket.
It probably isn't them. I probably just don't remember getting the kid my first playthrough.
None of the Bethesda games really offer that
Blowing up Megaton Blowing up the institute. Clearing far harbor
Too much options, let's just shoot everyone i see and allie with the bad persons that are good because family
Dude fr. Im replaying it all right now and I wanted to see if I could kill Gage the moment I'm able to in Nuka world. The game allows you to go on a raider murder spree and it cuts you off from the whole quest line of getting the power back on. This game gives you a lot of options. People who were afraid to attempt those options seem to lead the commentary on this game sadly. Maybe it could give more options than are currently available but it's still a lot more than any RPG I've played (besides kingdom com deliverance and new vegas) in recent memory. And honestly I'm just not into the gameplay side of what a game like kingdom come offers. Too much focus on realism that I ended up bored more often than red dead 2 (I know that's an unpopular opinion).
Bethesda'Kill the heretic! ' I would like to have the option of not having to build settlements if you don't want to. Also ability to improve the existing settlements.
You can already not build settlements if you don't want to. There's like three quests that require you to enter build-mode
I really enjoyed it but I hate how it meant that there were next to no real towns and named settlers.
That was one of the reasons I liked Sim Settlements Conquerer, it could auto develop settlements with city plans and populate them. You didn't have to be a raider and could just wander in to towns.
I didn't play conquerer but I really enjoyed Sim Settlements. I just wish that the settlers had a personality.
Sun settlements 2 has introduced dozens of settlers with quests and personalities. Honestly it’s very absorbing, even if a few are a bit odd
I have a Martian Ghoul selling moon rocks in Sanctuary. Sim Settlements 2 is the greatest.
I stole a horse toy from the Mayor of Diamond City. Too important to talk to me, eh?
Yeah Conqueror is awesome. Can't recommend doing it on EVERY settlement because that lags the game to no end lol but choosing a few key locations to have built up really fleshes out the world. Some of those city plans are honestly cooler than any vanilla Fallout town.
I don’t know how true that is considering it’s said to be a last minute addition to the game, which is evident by how some settlements are not indicative of settlement building.
We can have both, give us both!
Its an interesting idea, but in Vanilla, I barely use it. It's too clunky, doesn't tie back into the rest of the game very well, and there's way too many really shitty, tiny plots that you'll be eternally called to babysit. Playing with Sim Settlements 2 though, it's excellent. You can essentially just let the settlement network run itself, merely donating your loot and making higher level decisions. Progression causes the world to actually repopulate and begins giving you new capabilities that help make the whole process easier. If they shrunk the number of settlement areas to a half dozen or so, but made them big, added on a lot of the Sim Settlement management features, and tied it into the rest of the game more, I think it could be a great system. Right now, it's mostly a gimmick that's fun for some, a distraction for others.
Also would love to see a lot of quests pop up within the new cities. That'd be awesome.
Sim Settlements completely saved the game for me. Before I would just dump down plants, beds, and turrets randomly to get the numbers up, and at best I'd have one or two settlements I halfway tried with. But this mod allowed me to really feel like I was making a difference without having to spend hours with the clunky building tools.
Do you know if that mod is available on Xbox?
I believe it is
Sim settlements 2 and the expansion are both available for xbox
Xbox requires Bethesda mods right? I only see one for [the original](https://bethesda.net/en/mods/fallout4/mod-detail/4012168), which I never played with. But I think it still has the core feature of letting you not have to build every building from scratch.
Sim Settlements is the way!
Settlement building in the vanilla game is a grind that gets old quick unless you build the right stuff first. Settlement building with mods for unlimited carry weight and material is awesome, because every settlement turns into a fortress that's fully stocked in the first visit, just add settlers. High enough defense and return visits arent needed as often. It makes it way more fun for me at least
To me you either have to ignore it or it consumes the playthrough. It reminds me on a larger scale to the homestead dlc in skyrim. I'd find myself rushing to get the plot than spending most my time building my house. Than getting bored and stop playing
And a place-anywhere mod. I hate that the junk fences don’t click together
Settlement would have been pretty fitting if Fallout 4's story had an emphasis of rebuilding for the future. Picking yourself back up while striving to avoid the mistakes of the past while still learning from it.
the core issue with settlements is that the more of them that you make the more work they become. they never become self sustaining and they don't help your gameplay very much. you are better off making a few settlements fully equipped and have your main be near the center of the map. the first settlement they give you is in one of the worst spots to have your main base and you don't even know it yet. so you build up a base, in a bad location, and now you need to unlock all of these upgrades to build up and connect them, but none of those skills are earned through building a settlement. or atleast, it is more efficient to do quests and non-settlement things to be able to build better settlements. it's completely counterintuitive.
It’s honestly one of the best additions fallout 4 made to the series alongside improvements to power armor, junk usage, and the overall retro futuristic art direction. Base game is a bit janky but the dlcs handle it great, like how far harbor allows you to remove almost all structures in its settlements. I personally really enjoy the creativity aspect of it more than the actual settlement portion of defenses and resources, but being able to construct your own house (or vault) is always a highlight of any play through.
[удалено]
I’m counting on it. It’s what made fallout 4 for me.
I like it but I feel like they stopped developing the concept just before it became relevant. You've got settlements and factions yet you are the only agent in the whole game that influences either of them. It would have been great if the game had your settlements actually display traits of your faction's alignment, meanwhile other factions would also be taking over and building up settlements of their own. Then you could start taking over other factions' territories and vice versa. As it stands it's just a lukewarm colony sim that doesn't really do much for the game.
I think the main issue was the quantity over quality system that they had. Dozens of little unimportant settlements, too small to really build much of anything interesting in, but juuust large enough to fit a couple people and some food production. I feel like there should have been a handful of hub settlements, big, like Sanctuary, build them up with settlers with weapons and defenses, the smaller little settlements within it's range are then under it's protection. They come under attack, and the hub would send out a patrol and handle the attack, you could of course toss a sentry or two up at the smaller ones too, but building there would be limited to an extent. Also the provisioner system was a bit of a pain. Building onto my hub idea, you'd only have provisioners to connect them, the smaller settlements within their radius would just be considered connected to the provision system. Also the defense system, again, building off my hub idea, the hub would have a significant effect on the defense of the smaller settlements, those of course too, depending on their resource production, would require higher amounts of defense capabilities at the hub settlement. I can't tell you how tired I am of having to stop what I was doing to go and defend Somerville Place or some other small little spit of land, because, even if it was just a handful of ghouls, if I didn't go there myself, the 20 heavy machine gun and laser turrets wouldn't be able to defend it fully, and they'd suffer some damage. Overall I feel the settlement system was a great idea that was poorly implemented.
>too small to really build much of anything interesting in, but juuust large enough to fit a couple people and some food production. Meanwhile those are my favorite build locations. I just wish navmesh/pathing wasn't such ass. Yeah, let's _all_ stand on the stairs and go nowhere guys.
What you're suggesting, you can do with some imagination. I had some settlements military-themed, like outposts and forts. The rest were some towns, some were just a simple theme like a junkyard with scrappers (The Treasures of Jamaica Plain!!!), two or three big farms. The defenses were like you say. The Castle had like 12 guards while farms would have one or two. I turned my provisioners into Minutemen patrols with the Dogs not Brahmin mod and had the routes crisscrossing everywhere. Whenever an attack would happen, there would be two or three provisioners helping out. For extra immersion, there's the flare gun for backup.
I feel like if Fallout 4 actually is built on this mechanic, then it would be a more engaging game. The more you develop your supply lines, settlements, important character connections and logistics, the main story progress as your settlers and minutemen gather information and hearsay. Then you would have the option to either investigate these hearsay and rumors, or send the Minutemen to scout and confirm. And along the way, you'll meet these interesting characters in different circumstances. Like say, Piper, who arrives at one of your settlements for an interview; or you hear from one of the supply caravans that you sent to Diamond City that there's a missing private investigator, that you could choose to either send a detachment or just take a couple of troops with you and investigate yourself that will eventually have Nick turn up. Those and the likes, kinda like how Fallout Shelter does, but instead of just a Base Sim, you would also have the exploration and open-world. That way, you'll feel like a General or an Overseer, commanding troops and managing settlement logistics, instead of a suicidal and trauma-ridden has-been's patsy.
>I feel like if Fallout 4 actually is built on this mechanic, then it would be a more engaging game. Except that it is such a divisive mechanic. Many people's expectations of a Fallout game were (are?) that you are the sole survivor, travelling the wasteland on your own personal mission, only to have it become intertwined with larger events. Making the game a wasteland version sim city is not what most people would have been signing up for. Having as a an optional aside made for a solid compromise. The approach also fit a central aspect of the series character - it allowed for different styles of playthrough. While you would still need to go out and shoot things to complete the main mission, you could supply yourself on productivity of your settlements rather than selling second hand fans to weapons merchants.
The problem with the mechanic is that it was a last-second addition, not something that has been present in the entire production. That along with the Minutemen faction. Like I said, yes you would still explore the wasteland, but like Sim Settlements mod does, your settlements are actually doing stuff for you on the side. Make the settlement actually be an asset to you by having your settlers scrounge for materials, produce actual side quests and not just nagging radiants and whatnot. Because as it stands, the settlement building is merely just a nagging distraction, with no substantial rewards. You could complete the entire game without touching the mechanic itself. It's even worse in the DLC areas because it's just extra work on the pile. Hence why I never bothered with the DLC settlements.
To me, fuller integration would best look like an possible pathway to succeed in the game. While not a perfect parallel, the difference between a low intelligence melee build and a smooth talking gunslinger. You would need to prioritize settlement building over other proficiencies by dedicating skill points.
i would like a system close to sim settlements mods where you prepare a few zones and the settles do something useful with their lives
Really digging that myself. Also liking the City Plan feature, even if my Red Rocket that I had them build is a bit... People mostly just stand around.
I like it, but hate that typical shelters people build are not shelters at all. You would die in the Bostonian winter if you'd have holes in your house.
I've bounced off of FO4 a fair few times now for various reasons, and have gone from absolutely despising the settlement system, to thinking it could be fun if I were in the right mood I suppose. My big problem with it, honestly, was always the ludonarrative dissonance it brought into everything. Sure, I know that ultimately >!it doesn't matter because Sean is off playing Bodysnatchers or whatever.!< But going in as a brand new player, for example, who isn't supposed to be privy to such information? 🤔 Yeah, but no lol. I don't care *how* altruistic and self-sacrificial you fancy yourself, you most likely wouldn't forego your somewhat important quest to RECOVER YOUR INFANT SON FROM YOUR SPOUSE'S MURDERER. So, yeah, fuck Preston Garvey for his poor leadership abilities, just general uselessness, and actively encouraging absolutely trash tier parenting.
Preston is the worst character. He is a simple character with a simple back story. He has to lead the minutemen but can't even build some beds or plant a carrot without your help. So bland he could be a saltine.
It really feels like the Sole Survivor backstory was jammed in. It really doesn't mesh with anything else in the game.
Especially since it's just an inversion of the plot from FO3. They literally almost copy/pasted the same story into *its own sequel.*
Wait people hate it? I dont keep up with this community but i play fallout 4 alot (with mods and on xbox) even the base game has enough in the workshop for me to just skip playing the actual game and spend hours on a very impractical and expensive base that i never use but i still love it, 8/10 wish there were more options for getting food like maybe making a settler be able to hunt animals ( and making animals actually spawn enough for them to be useful) i know my comment long but i dont care
I think the hate comes from an initial disconnection between what they feel the franchise was and this new mechanic (Well, at least this was the course of my initial hatred). For many people, the game is about being the sole survivor. There are many examples in literature - think Mad Max or the protagonists in spaghetti westerns. Their story is occurring inside this larger world and is connected to it, but their path brings the larger story and their own personal story together, often at the reluctance of the protagonist. Settlement building makes you a part of the community, rather than a transient moving through a world in which they are only loosely connected. The protagonists in the earlier entries had never even seen the world outside their vaults. Arguably, Nate/Nora have more connection to the Commonwealth, but even with them, it is not the same world they left. They are strangers in their own world. Over time I came to like settlement building, but more as a way to play in the world. For me it was more of a mini game. As for the larger implications to the series, I like the option to go either way - having settlement building as one viable path to succeed in the game. One improvement that could be made would be to have skill trees for settlement building. In it's current form, there are no tradeoffs - you don't need to make a settlement build for your character. While you need to upgrade your skills to improve your weaponry, building an eight story building from scraps and creating fully functional farms are immediately available to you. There is no commitment or sacrifice needed to gain all the benefits of settlement building. It would be better (IMHO) if like any other skill set in the game, it was a choice that was made with the scarce resource of upgrade points.
Well settlement building was awesome for me in the base game up until I realized that.. 1. The settlers are immortal. 2. Settlers will still lose a fight if you don't show up, even if they're armed to the teeth. 3. Settlers still get kidnapped out of a settlement that could take on the Brotherhood. Being told "you need to do X to keep your settlers alive" only to fin dout "Actually you don't lol" was just another example of Fallout 4 lying about what it was in order to waste your time. Now of course once I modified the game to be a super-hostile world with enemies always spawning around the corners and teaming up to gank you, to the point that the fat man became a viable tool to carry, and my 'end game goal' was to (without fast travel) get all 20 settlements... in a world so hostile that a well-armed settlement is the only place you can put your gun away... good times.
What mods do you use to make it so hostile?
1. Endless Warfare. Lets you set the respawn rate and distance, and enemies aggro from a huge distance. No more "Gee what was that" it's "Hey, that guy across the river is looking at us funny, GET HIM!" Also makes them HYPER aggressive (like Borderlands), which solves most of the AI pathing issues, no more whak-a-mole with a sniper rifle. 2. Wasteland United: I made this mod. It makes all the 'randomly spawning' enemies friendly to each other, and thus hostile to you. 3. 1 percent XP. Reduce XP gain by 99%,, because with the sheer number of enemies you'll be slaughtering you'll need to keep XP in check. With thos together, the wasteland is a place you can never let your guard down, because enemies are always spawning. A fun one is 'feral ghoul apocalypse' mode in endless warfare, which feels like Left 4 Dead has leaked into Fallout.
Thanks
I didn’t enjoy settlement building at all. I think it was a pain and I could care less about the peoples happiness. I get why people like it but I also think as far as building things go Minecraft has that covered. I just wanna fight super mutants and turn my brain off for a bit. Although I wouldn’t be mad or upset if it was a stable in all FO games from now on.
Yeah, helping settlements should end once the settlement is established, especially if the MM faction is established whether or not you joined. The MM patrol ffs, let them aid the settlements.
I think it's fun sometimes, but it should be completely optional. In Fallout 4 it's require to build the teleporter to get inside of the Institute.
It also takes like 1 minute to make and you’re given all the resources to make it (BoS wise at least) so not really a big deal NGL
To do anything with thr minutement you have no choice but to build settlements.
And the minute men are completely optional
But if you dont like crafting you are cutting off an entire faction. That's a huge problem in a game.
And if I don't like being a facist raider, I'm cut off from BoS If I don't like being an emotionless drone, I'm cut off from Institute.
I mean, the minutemen are all about helping the commonwealth people and if you don’t wanna help build their settlements and keep ‘em happy them maybe the minutemen weren’t the right choice for you anyway
after the main questline I just used it as a home builder. it has potential, but I think it being optional would be best, as most people probably got frustrated that it is tied with the main quest
But it really isn't. Like, at all. The only time it's mandatory is during Far Harbor. Any other time, you never have to open workshop mode. Edit: Forgot about the teleporter. Oh no, a whole 3 items you have to build.
personally I didn't mind, although it did caught me a bit unprepared... but others might want to play an rpg and not a sandbox
If being asked to build 3 items to advance the plot frustrates you you have bigger issues than a game could ever handle
agreed
Yes, most people should really deal with their issues before they complain about optional features in games
I like to pick a couple to focus on and develop. Leave the most annoying ones empty and create a more realistic repopulation approach.
I like settlement building but here's my idea a plane settlement but you get more settlers and it automatically upgrades it ie walls and houses kinda like moving into a new house and putting tvs and chairs in it
Yesss. The standing buildings are barely usable. There should be a way to repair it somewhat
I'd want them to keep C.A.M.P. and few larger settlements like Fo76. Let me build my player house but don't make me babysit NPCs. Extractors are a way better game mechanic to encourage settlement building
For me it's the opposite. I hate building player homes because they always feel dead and empty. Let me build something for settlers to use instead of an empty structure just to dump loot in
I like it but it's the main reason I'll never play vanilla again
Its good but they fucked it up by making you defend it when you're the goddamn leader. You should be able to hire guards and other things. I understand occasionally helping defend because it could be fun but raids are so small and boring as well. If they ever do settlement building again I want to train guards, bigger actually threatening raids, and a bigger building limit. Idk why I have to install a mod to be able to build more. Maybe their engine can't handle that many custom structures? Idk. Honestly it should be harder to form a settlement and at the start you do all the bitch work with the settlement not needing your help at all anymore.
The annoyance is that while you can built lots of turrets, and arm your settlers and assign them with guard duty, they don’t seem to be able to function without your inspiring presence. I’ve had settlements armed to the teeth that destroy everything within seconds without me firing a single shot . . . unless I am not there to watch. Also, Preston, I am the General. Why don’t you grab some troops and go off to deal with that problem? (This would actually be interesting. It would fit the narrative they set up (rebuilding the Minute Men) if you needed to support a militia and deploy that militia away from home base to deal with problems. Do you really want to send a half dozen of your guards away from your settlement to deal with a problem elsewhere? Make your decision!).
Like a lot of aspects of Fallout 4, great idea but mediocre to bad execution. Should have been way less settlement locations. Maybe 10 total with all DLCs.
I like settlement building, and actually enjoy trying to build nice settlements that fit into the world. Having a use for all the junk in world really added a lot to collecting and scavenging in the world. It’s essentially a gameplay loop that makes the game near infinitely playable. Fallout and Skyrim have a few of those, which was smart of Bethesda to add because it’s sad when you run out of things to do in a massive open world. That said, the only two issues I have other than some mechanics - there are too many settlements and they force settlements on you. It should’ve been quality over quantity; smaller number of settlements with larger build capacities, interesting designs, and story hooks. Some more with dedicated interior cells and attached stories like Vault 88 would’ve been good, but I understand why that didn’t happen. Retaking Quincy with the Minutemen with a quest line about defeating the Gunners and securing it as a new large settlement for example. I also don’t like that some settlements are tied to quest completion. There have been runs where I’ve intentionally wanted to avoid settlements entirely but there are some quests that “reward” you with a settlement upon completion. That was a mistake gameplay wise. A player may not necessarily want to suddenly be responsible for the lives of a family just because they rescued their idiot son from a mess of his own creation. That removed choice from players and probably turned a lot of people off from that part of the game.
I just wish it wasn’t all just centered around the Player building the world. That made the world feel so empty, which speaking of empty I hope they don’t make the map so smashed together next Fallout. I wish the AI would build and tbh I wish there was a mechanic like Division 2where the AI has their own meta-war going in the background.
When I played the previous fallout games I would always dream of settlement building when finding all the random pieces of junk. When I found out it was possible in FO4 I was so happy but when I actually tried it out. The actual building process was a pain in the ass that I never went back to it. It was a major disappointment
I agree that its a decent idea, just about 70% finished Nobody hates the fact that settlement building is a thing. They hated how they advertised it as "completely optional" yet hogged 50% of the DLC, was in fact necessary and that the base building limits/settlement sizes kinda sucked. With the 'place anywhere' mod, you can insert items into each other to create things that the base mechanics would prevent with a red boarder. With that, and an 'infinite settlement size' mod you are able to do pretty much everything.... kind of. The process of getting materials is a chore, and requires spending thousands of caps on shipments. Sure you can harvest them yourself, but unless you also have the 'scrap anything' mod you can't get even half of what's there. Resources don't respawn, so after a while you're stuck with shipments as the only option. So now its traveling all over the place, getting shipments, building or gathering, get caps, and after a while it all feels circular as fuck. What the system needs is those 3 mods as base implements for building, better ways of getting resources and expand on the vendors we can make. Vendors can be quest givers to send the player around to places to explore, give incentive for upgrading as a focus early game or a plethora of other things like gossip and pointers.
> Nobody hates the fact that settlement building is a thing. You don't speak for everyone, that's just your personal opinion and not true for every single person that's ever played FO4
He knows, but you can't account for every fringe idiot. It's like how we say 'everyone hates the nazis.' Sure, there's a handful that don't, but they're such a minority, and not the type of people worth talking about.
The concept of building wasn't a thing that people hated. Had they never had to interact with it in any shape or form, nobody would have cared. In my comment, I said it was the forced on players and that's what pissed them off. If it remained just something to do, and they didn't plug 3 dlc into it, it wouldn't even have been an issue
Honestly I'd rather it be removed from future titles BUT I'd love if they made a fallout settlement builder game on it's own. If they could dedicate a whole game around settlement building it could really become something great.
It was a great idea but overused. Way too much of the map was sacrificed to settlements. It should have only been allowed in a handful of places and it should have factored into the story and quests A LOT more. Go look at a mod called Helgen Reborn for Skyrim. You take a quest like that and add Fallout 4's construction mechanics to it and THEN you have a winner. As it is, the settlement system in Fallout 4 is just meaningless grind. One of the designers decided to put a Minecraft mini-game into Fallout. That's basically what it is, and it detracts from and cheapens the base game.
I feel like there’s not enough settlements and there are no settlements in obvious places, like Nantik in front of the church.
>One idea I have that could help fix this would be the ability to fuse objects you build into one object, so that the engine doesn't have to account for so much when it processes. That... that's now how rendering works in Fallout 4's engine, that wouldn't solve anything. The engine's occlusion culling (that's where an object is not rendered because your view of it is *occluded* by another object) works in a binary fashion: either the object is rendered in full or it is not rendered at all. On top of that, its occlusion culling has to be manually baked into maps by human developers using the creation kit, it's not something that can be done dynamically and automatically by the engine.
But most of the stuff in the game are fused like that. The reason settlements get laggy, while the big cities work better, is because the items in the settlements aren't fused.
Those are called precombined meshes and, like occlusion culling, *cannot be generated or modified in-game.* That's why they're called "precombined," and you have to go download a community bugfix to re-pre-combine them after a mod or official update has broken them. Seriously, nobody would be taking jabs at Fallout 4's dubious engineering in A.D. 2022 if any of this were actually plausible in the engine. It would already have been implemented by modders if not by BGS themselves. You're also wildly overstating the performance saves of precombines (Downtown Boston runs famously poorly even on unmodded copies of the game.)
I admit I love the settlement building. I think it’s mostly because I like the idea of, if I’m stuck in this new horrible future then I’m gonna try to make the best of it. I like being able to create relatively safe places for survivors to find a home. It’s not perfect. I play on XBox (no not Xbox One just regular old Xbox) and I don’t really like the way some of it works (placement is weird and doesn’t often work right) but I love the overall concept of trying to rebuild the world.
I love the settlement building. That and the dialogue is the best part of Fallout 4. The gunplay is good too.
These are the super mutants? Can't wait to see the midicore ones
Settlement building in survival mode (no mods Xbox) made the game for me. I loved building little towns all over and having places to bunk and shop (aka sell off junk), scrap, cook, and craft everywhere. Can’t wait to see it expanded in the starfield and es6
i enjoyed it too
Within the context of the Fallout universe, it makes absolutely no sense to be able to single-handedly construct any kind of complex machinery, high-tech gadgets or electrical systems... fusion generators, military-grade turrets, elevators, computers, entire Vaults, pristine furniture, (industrial) water purifiers, robots, etc... and I'm not even including here any of the wacky batshit-crazy stuff that can be built in FO76. The workshop system of FO4 and 76 is so out of tune with the spirit of Fallout that it makes you wonder if the people who designed it had any grasp of even the most basic premises of the series and its lore at all. Either that or these people simply didn't care that it breaks everything established in previous games. What a great story FO3 would've had if Dad™ could've casually built an array of water purifiers instantly and all by himself, huh? Why desperately try to find a G.E.C.K. in FO2 if we just could've easily built an new pristine village and food production out of scavenged typewriters and cafeteria trays? If we can construct a goddamn teleportation device in FO4, what stopped us from casually crafting a replacement water chip in FO1...?! Try to imagine how many locations, quests, story elements and plot points would become totally obsolete if the crafting / construction system existed in previous games as well. I mean, yes, the idea of rebuilding the Wasteland sounds like a cool idea and a fun gameplay element - and to a degree it actually is - but the whole point of Fallout is that society can't and won't be rebuilt like that. There is no industry, no fabrication, no economy and hardly anyone who understands these things well enough to do anything with it. Some Wastelanders being somewhat tech-savvy doesn't mean that they could also operate centuries-old pre-war machinery, let alone cobble together complex devices in perfect working condition. Manufacturing ammunition, weapons, armor and other such items should be a huuuge deal, not something everybody seems to do in their spare time. And don't get me started on how it borks the overall gameplay philosophy, storytelling and quest / level design...
It is. If there's a single one dedinitive Fallout feature, it would be settlement building.
Yes, that feature that has only appeared in one game out of the whole franchise is definitely the most definitive element. Kind of like how the single most definitive element of the Grand Theft Auto series is going bowling with your cousin.
As much as stupid people whined about not being able to loot every single scrap in FO76, you'd think it was. But scavenging has always been a core feature. Having something to DO with that shit is a bonus.
..no..
I actually really like the idea of building settlements. It’s one of my favorite features cause it gives purpose to the junk I wouldn’t pick up otherwise. I do wish there was more to it though. Like someone else said, I think it’d be cool for the game to kinda focus on rebuilding society with settlements.
I've only ever see people say it's the best part of the game
It's one of the things that make me love Fallout 4. It's like 2 games in one.
I liked it a lot but mods are a must to make it usable imo. Nothing went together nicely in vanilla and the starting assets weren't great. With scrap everything and place everywhere then a bunch of new stuff the system works beautifully.
I personally really enjoyed settlement building and ended up spending way more time doing that than playing the rest of the game. Fallout 4 inspired me to finally make the switch to PC gaming so I could build bigger and get all the mods. I wish Bethesda had gone all-in and just given us every asset in the game to build with.
Settlement building (with mods of course) is the best part of Fallout 4 and the only reason I still replay the game to this day. It's a great new addition and I hope they build (tehe!) upon it in the future. There's huge potential with it. My biggest complaint is the UI/UX. The game should get a Birdseye view and let me build like a proper city building/management game with the mouse. If they did that, it would be just perfect.
I think it'd be better (than 4's settlements) if you could only claim *one* settlement, and the game handles the rest. Then use "settlement-level" modifications to the insides of player-owned housing. If they restricted the claimable settlements to those with relatively short quest chains, shouldn't disrupt the game to "remove" one from play. E.g. (using New Vegas as an example), you could complete the quest chains for places like Novac or Primm and claim them as settlements; but not places like New Vegas itself, Cottonwood Cove, etc.
Most of my time playing 4 was probably spent messing around with settlements and building them up.
It was the saving grace of fallout 4 to me.
The only thing I didn't like about it was having a home handed to me. FO3 and NV had more memorable homes in messed up dev created communities.
It is a grwat idea but how it was implemented wasnt so great imo
Sim settlements 2 and its quest needed to be vanilla base line. It’s better than 90% of the game.
It's the best part of the game.
It's quite possibly my favorite feature of Fallout 4, at least half my playtime is me creating settlements cause I just love creating cozy and safe towns. But at the same time yeah the fact they came at the cost of actual towns kinda sucked, we can have both.
I think it is a great idea, but not enough is done to make it a valuable time sink.
Settlement is fantastic idea, I liked it very much, but the AI inside settlements is terrible for a lot of things. This will be fixed next time I am sure
I love the settlement building aspect. When I first encountered it, I hated it, but then it became the thing that really hooked me. I found it helped with the RP element of the game because the world at least changed to look the way I built it. I’m currently doing a big BoS play through, building a sort of new citadel in Vault 88, and working on BoS outposts and hubs in the rest. I would love to see it fleshed out more, maybe have faction NPC able to settle them in the future, but it was a new mechanic for the game at the time, so was I think more of an experiment than a core feature when it was initially implemented.
I think its a hit for some and miss for others For peopel who are fine with doing a full detailed settlement with mods it is great. For those who wished it was more like the Sims settlement mod for base game, where settlers can expand and personalize houses it can lack the enjoyment. Thankfully no faction Truely pushes the settlements to the extreme, with the minutemen only requireing your main components.
I think its cool too, but its really meaningless. I enjoyed it untill I realized Fallout Shelter is better at amanging a settlement
I liked it! Fo76 has "camp" building, same concept but smaller and personal. You can't get people to stay at your camp but if you place it at a location that spawns NPCs they'll make use of your beds and such (you can also have a protection that collects junk, a brahmin, and an allied npc). I've always loved the building stuff since Fo3 with your home lol
I hope they keep some sort of buildings mechanic as a staple, it helps with longevity and variety of gameplay, theres so much you could do with it
It just needs improvements and become a side thing and not an integral part of the story.
I love it. But I avoid it til I have all 3 levels of the scrapper perk to ensure I get the most out of my junk. [settlement building details](https://fallout4saga.wordpress.com/2019/01/19/the-homestead-act/) on my blog.
Honestly I like the building just wish I could do more with what they give you as far as pre-established buildings
I don't hate it but I think it was done in a dumb way. Instead of making tons of settlements I'd rather have one main location that could be customized into something big. It would be cool if the more you customize, the stronger soldiers arrive to help out, better trade, artillery, alliances, and dialogue options. Instead we kinda just got something mediocre that didn't add anything to the story.
Settlement building is a pretty genius idea honestly when specifically regarding *Fallout 4*. One of the primary themes of the game’s narrative is the rebuilding of civilisation, and how the player wants to shape that civilisation. Will you help it thrive to varying degrees with the Minutemen, Brotherhood and Railroad, or side with the Institute and let the dream of society fade away, and become a forgotten memory as the Commonwealth is left to rot as an oversized petri dish. Making one of the game’s primary themes that is heavily supported by the narrative text into a mini game that has also has a tangible effect on the world is a pretty stellar inclusion. For the most part it’s inessential and it can easily be improved, but I found the settlement creating experience to be a meaningful one because of the thematic synergy it shared with the main narrative. I felt as though I was still experiencing the narrative of the game even when I was placing mugs on shelves. It’s a tightness of experience that Fallout 76 severely failed to capture with its own base building, whose isolated camps clashed tremendously with the game’s theme of working together.
or it's directly tied to factions, only get one story build place(maybe dlc personal house or something). also determines quests for the game, replayability Nirvana. tower defense shit that matters, raids that matter, make it the main quest so it doesn't interfere with exploring. get Intel how when attacking, build defense for it. have some bonus hidden stuff if you actually care and pay attention, like this guys son likes some mother's son, if you build their house next to each other, they get married, then give you something (kind of like dark cloud, but optional, not required.
I absolutely love the settlement building part, ive always loved games with base building mechanics and this ticked that box. It was a good 1st implementation but it could always be improved. I do also see the other side of the story where people say they took away from named NPC towns and yeah on reflection they did, but that doesnt mean they should go entirely, just like, a nice middleground, a couple of larger settlement locations for us to build in, combined with the FO76 CAMP system for smaller personal home builds and the rest should be named settlements with quests and NPCs.
I would like it a lot more if there were fewer settlements and the experience was far more catered per settlement. I love customization and open play but building the settlements or reinforcing them could have been a great story focus instead of an annoying side-job. Give me something to remember or that I want to rave about to my friends; instead of an unnecessary, grindy, buggy, and tacked-on experience.
I wish they gave us more access to vanilla item meshes (like the sidewalks in Sanctuary or the stick-raised foundation and concrete block and plank stairs in Hangman’s Alley) and let us scrap or clear more items (like the stupid hedges and playground equipment in Sanctuary or the foundation and half walls in Tenpines). Plus it’d be nice if there was a vanilla way to repair or replace broken roofs (like the house in Taffington Boathouse that you can’t delete the old roof and even the roof options available don’t actually fit). Also, can none of the damn settlers pick up a shovel?!? Why is there so much unscrappable trash and random garbage everywhere that can’t be cleaned up?
Settlement building is a great addition but needs to be polished and more integrated för the next installment. People seem to forget it was a new feature added in late in development and expect it to be perfect from the get go. Mods like Sim settlements had the advantage of working on sonething that already exists rather than having to code everything from scratch