I can hear that giggle down south from you. Congrats for a good deal done.

Woot woot, Trail

Cool weapon find!

In my current game I have yet to come across my favourite weapon in the last game, Joanie's PACS. I can't remember what my acronym stood for except that it was an AWESOME combat shotgun that ended up with a damage of 198 or thereabouts once upgraded. It was loot, I think.

I recently looted a very good gooifying combat rifle, 90 regular plus 90 plasma damage, definitely worth the carry weight. And it has a very satisfying boom that lets my enemies know I mean business.

Ouch, that sounds like an ultimate close quarters rifle!

I find myself relying more on the short combat rifles and shotguns lately, they seem to be the most efficient in terms of the damage to ammo expenditure ratio. Although I do miss that Spray and Pray rifle I found on the previous gameplay I had going. That was fun It burned through a ton of ammo, but I loved the fact that it made everything shake when the bullets hit and raiders around the target would sometimes fall to the ground. I'm not making as many caps in this current game, but I may have to visit Cricket once I make enough to pick up that rifle.

I'm chronically broke this time, too, so I took the perks that increase the caps and ammo you find in containers. That way I don't have to buy ammo, or not very often, and I have enough cash to keep going.

My newest companion seems to be able to carry a TON of stuff. Very handy.

EDIT: And of course I need to see Cricket, too. I do have enough cash on hand. Gotta try that Spray and Pray. It just sounds like too much fun to miss!

It's especially fun to use at night because the exploding bullets heat everything up around them. Oh, and the best part, it's suppressed so you can cause stealthy chaos. I was using it at the lower levels so the damage specs didn't read that high, but if you use it while sneaking in controlled bursts it can be devastating.

Cool. When I get back from my nasty 3 hour dental appointment I'll be looking for Cricket.

I've cleared and scrapped Sanctuary Island in order to build some of my other communities. I will eventually build on the Island, since it's the nicest place by far, but not just yet. It's at 87 happiness right now, with a tiny bit of food, three beds, a water purifier, and one resident. I really wish there was a way to lock things, so I could make Madeleine a nice cabin in the woods, but every time I do that, some ratbag of a settler is in my space when I want to use it!

I am tempted to get one of the mods that give you unlimited building materials, but not until the end of the game, just so I can play a bit more. I find myself always far too limited by what is available. Still, I now have several communities with excellent walled fortresses, restricting enemy access to one small, well-defended chokepoint.

Bring up the console, click on the door to bring up it's item ID and type lock 200. That's the equivalent of barring the door from the inside. You can do it with containers too. To unlock, just do the same as before and type unlock.

Aha. Luxury beachside mansion coming up!

I do it to the chest where I keep my "chems" to keep Cait out of them. That girl, I tell ya'

Cait's gone missing. She may show up at the vault, or not. I figure she's gone off on a spree.

EDIT: Take that, sulky settlement!

I gave you sturdy walls, lights, a restaurant, clothing store and trader, and a clinic at huge expense. I gave you REAL beds and powered turret guns. You had far more of everything than you needed, and yet you sulked at 65 Happiness and dropping, even though I rescued you from several attacks. There was no making you happy.

Oberland Station, goodbye! Your settlers have been sent elsewhere, your poor Brahmin must find a new home, and your remaining original settlers can defend themselves as best they can without me. The Minutemen don't need you. We're through!

(This is just after Madeleine discovered the "scrapall" command )

LOL! Yes, Oberland is not a happy go lucky settlement. Sticking around that same level for me too. Also, Grey's Garden keeps dropping for no reason. The level is flagged, I go there, no one says that anything is out of place, but it never goes back up...weird. Sanctuary Hills has also been a little odd lately too, I keep getting Raider quests, but there is no way they could get attacked unless the Raiders are in power armor. I've got a ton of guns and lasers around that place.

Oh and I forgot to mention if you get that rifle Spray and Pray, don't use it against bad guys if they are in close proximity to good guys you don't want to anger. The explosive damage it does is an area effect so if they hit the ground it damages everyone around them.

So, when you scrap a settlement like that and move the settlers, does it stay on your data/workshop pipboy menu?

When you scrap a place, everything vanishes but the original settlers and structures. You only get about a third of your resources back, but I need more for other places.

For some reason, a few settlers would not re-locate. I built a tiny place for them to live, five beds, a wall, and just enough food and water. One turret gun. Now their happiness is almost 80. Go figure.

It doesn't look as though that lock code is working for me. When you use it, does the door actually say that it is locked? The console accepts my command, but the door is not locked.

Just in case, here are the steps again
1. Open Console
2. Click on the door, it's ID should show at the top of the shaded area that comes up when you open the console
3. Type [Lock 200] without the brackets and hit enter. The console should state what's been locked.
4. Drop the console.

If your curser is still sitting on the door, you may have to pull it away for a second for it to show the door is locked, but usually it shows right when you drop the console. In this case it will say [Barred]. Chances are the click is registering a different ID, like a shadow or even a container through the door. Occasionally, I have an issue bringing up the door ID and will have to restart the game, then it works, no clue why. Usually the door ID's start with a "000" or "ff" although so do some containers and other objects, I know...big help there . If you get the message that says something like "Selected non AV Object" or something like that, you're clicking on something that's part of the background. If nothing comes up after you hit enter it might be a shadow or something like that and you'll have to experiment a bit.

EDIT: As an FYI, the reason I always use 200 as the lock level is because that's the equivalent of the door being barred or chained from the other side or a container being locked from the inside (impossible, I know, unless you are really small and have a transporter, but it works) as a result NPC's and companions that have lock-picking skills can't get into it. I used to just block the doors with stuff until I saw an NPC follow the navmesh right up to the door, put their hand through the door, open it and "phase walk" right through my barrier. Soooooo, that's when I decided to start using the console. I really don't consider it a cheat. It's just silly that Bethesda never thought of a way to allow the player to lock away stuff in a room or container. I feel the same way about the "disable" command. If I want something out of the way, there's no reason I shouldn't be able to dismantle it like everything else I can scrap.

No, not working. I can't seem to use any of the console commands. Nothing happens.

EDIT: Now I see. Very handy. I wish I'd figured this out before I scrapped the doors at Covenant. So, back to my Island retreat.


Further Edit: I managed to figure out how to lock the door and not have to lock/unlock it all the time. I placed the settlement mat (where you fast travel to) outside the hut. I made a weapons workbench inside the hut and stood it right up against the wall. I can reach the weapons workbench through the flimsy wall from the outside. I click on the workbench, then exit it, and presto! I am standing inside my locked cabin. To exit, I just fast travel to the mat outside my cabin.

You're brilliant! I had noticed that the tanks in the back of the weapons benches can be pushed through walls, even went through the workshop wall in the drive-in, but never thought of using it like that. I forgot about those fast travel mats, that will give me what I need to access my new Drive-in fortress. I said, "the heck with it." The Red Rocket just didn't have enough room for me and the Power Armors I've been finding, plus all the containers I wanted to use to keep my loot sorted. So...I decided to make another fortress over at the Drive-in location, but I kind of...er...well...er...cheated. Well, only for part of the time. I engaged god mode while surrounding it, to make a huge wall all around the place without getting dinged for resources. I want some place I can almost totally barricade and not have to worry about attacks while I'm gone.

I got taught a lesson by a "smart" group of Raiders at Sunshine Tiding. I had the place pretty well defended, but a gang of raiders, every stinkin' one armed with a portable missile launcher, blew my defenses to smithereens. I got there just in time to defend the settlers, good thing I had power armor on. Still came within only a few points of getting my noggin knocked off though. As a result I've changed my strategy a bit. I'm placing cheaper machine gun turrets around the perimeter below the lasers and missile launchers. I noticed that both raiders and mutants go after the machine gun turrets first for some reason, probably because their rate of fire is so much higher than the others. While they are banging away on those turrets, the lasers finish them off and the machine guns aren't as expensive to replace

As an aside to all the building etc I just got to the ending of this game and I don't want to include spoilers so I'll just say I was totally surprised.

Oldman, I got to the end of my first game with the Minutemen. What faction did you finish with? This time I think I'll go with the Railroad.

Hagatha I went with the minutemen mainly because I was just following the story line and that's where I ended up.

I don't particularly like the Brotherhood (can't explain why) so this time around it will probably be railroad. I'm taking more time on the second go through to pick up quests that I missed the first time, which were many.

Wait, there's a main quest line?

Thanks for keeping spoilers under wraps. Being that this is still a relatively new game it's good not to get too involved in questline/storyline discussions.

I'm glad for the settlement and crafting elements in the game. I like being able to talk "shop" on-line about weapon and armor mods or settlement building since I honestly haven't delved too far into questing yet. When I found out that the game doesn't have a hard ending and that the levels are almost nearly infinite, I decided to take my time and really explore the crafting and settlement elements. Next play though, I may concentrate on questing more and be a minimalist when it comes to the crafting elements.

I can understand your aversion to the Brotherhood oldman. Other than a few of the associated characters from Fallout 3, they tend to be somewhat grey when it comes to ethics. They aren't very cuddly.

I thought my second run would be more quest-oriented, but somehow I'm at level 49 and haven't done much of anything at all except a couple of Minuteman quests.

In my first game by accident I got my charisma level up to 11 because I didn't find the Bobblehead until after I reached 10 points. I didn't realize that this is what allowed my settlements to reach 23, 24 and even 25 settlers. Now I have that 20 cap, which is annoying. I think I can overcome that using chems, but still... dumb mistake.

Maybe I'll try that god mode and rebuild some of my less interesting communities.

FYI, you don't get XP points for building in god mode, that didn't bother me though. I thought getting XP for putting up walls was kind of a bummer anyway.

Yep, too many experience points for doing nothing, in my books. But since there's no cap, it doesn't really matter.

Found me a Gauss Rifle that does 430 damage PLUS 3 poison damage, AND long range. Basically, game over for most opponents, especially as I now have 5 levels in rifle. I'm going to rename this one, as I somehow lost my great combat rifle a while back.



edit: Soooooooo, how do you turn god mode off once you're done? I built a huge barn of a Restaurant/bar at one of my settlements just for fun, but enough, already.

Also, if you build something in god mode using the unlimited supplies, and then you scrap it, does the scrapped stuff go into your workbench? As in, a cheatp way to gain free supplies? Inquiring minds want to know.

Just type tgm again and hit enter. It's a "toggle" (tgm = toggle god mode)command so the same code turns it on or off.

Not sure about what happens when you scrap after building in god mode. I didn't really scrap much when building "the great wall" around the drive in. Plus I've collected sooooo much stuff since the weekend I probably could have gone around the place twice. Dang, I noted a factory I came across that had a really good stash of concrete and can't find the note now....sorry. If I find it I'll post it up later.

Apparently there's another exploit that allows your companions to carry unlimited amounts. I haven't tested it yet, so can't guarantee that it works or if this is the exact sequence. From what my friend tells me, if you load up a near by container, even a body, with a ton of junk, your companion will happily pick it all up on command without complaint. You just have to keep them below their limit before commanding them to check out the container.

Thats wierd, I heard the Gauss Rifle was supposed to be pretty powerfull and I was excited to find one, only to be dissapointed again when I found it did very little damage to enemies. It's been stuck in my gun chest ever since, along with dozens and dozens of other weapons I havent got round to selling:-)