They are the nicest, yes.

They are also the most damn incompetent: their capital was destroyed by the Mirelurks.

The Mirelurks.

Mirelurks.

The other three may not be morally as pure, but they are at least more trustworthy in the long run.

Seeing as they are the only one without their own "End Game Achievement", how unintuitive it can be to get into their MQ route and how poor their MQ Act 3 questline is compared to the other three, I doubt it. Beth seems to have just pushed them as a choosable ending at the last moment.

The only thing that is certain is that they will survive and probably become the military hand of the victor.

Supposedly, you can become their enemy during the Institute's quest "Pinned". Did anyone try NOT to convince those Minutemen to stand down? I know Preston becomes hostile if you ever kill a Minuteman.

Seeing as MM's "Destroy BoS" quest is not just a copy-apste of another quest, I am pretty sure that IF the MM endings becomes canon, they will have destroyed the BoS. Not to forget that the BoS wants to conquer the Commonwealth and the Minutemen, who now rule it, won't stand for it for too long.

Yeah. I finally [censored] cut through his constant quests to get max rep with him and his whole story is that he was about to off himself before he met you.

That's interesting. I managed to convince them to stand down, but was ready to blow their heads off if I had to. I figured it would have just made that group of MM hostile.

I think I have a save right about that point. I'll have to go back and see what happens if I attack them.

Edit: Just tried it. Slaughtered the Minutemen on sight. Doesn't seem to be any change for Ronnie or anyone at The Castle.

You see I'm always torn between the BoS and MM endings.That's why I like this argument lol.

I have a thing against killing of entire factions,so Tactical thinking is a quest i don't like doing.

I mean if the Railroad was killed of by the BoS while I was not watching I would have no problem with that.

I dislike that whole bunch of hippies.I kind of like deacon,but just because of his humor.

I don't like killing them,so MM ending is my preferred choice.

But I also get a hard on for the idea of being the Sentinel of this BoS division.

Decisions....decisions.

If you don't join the minutemen, the minutemen are replaced with Gunners that are auto-hostile.

Nothing good about the Minutemen. They are an expansionist protection racket that has you eliminate every other faction (regardless if they are beneficial or not) in the area to lock down their power base. They are no better then raiders, they just steal in a different way.

The ONLY true good faction is the Atom Cats. Shame they only have 1 and a half quests.

Wha...?

They're a localized ad-hoc militia. Composed entirely of volunteers from settlements who *generally* agree to help each other if there's a problem.

There's no "protection racket." Nobody is forced to pay anything. You help if you want to help, and come to the aid of your neighbor if you expect the same of him or her.

Besides, how can citizen soldiers extort themselves?

You're right.

At least until the Man Out of Time dies.

Then the mafia forms.

I see no makings of Cosa Nostra. They're way to loosely organized for that.

Although that would make The Minutemen far more interesting.

The mafia started as citizens protecting citizens from a corrupt government.

seems to be what you're (or maybe someone else) is suggesting the MM should do, be it the BoS or the Institute.

Nah, I'd prefer if they remained local militia or ceased to exist entirely.

Once the SS dies, assuming he does become the General, I think eventually a second Quincy incident will pop up again. Theoretically, individual bands of MM could form something akin to a protection racket, but I don't think the entire organization would head that direction. There's no clansmenship or bonds between them. No familial ties. The MM are very loosely organized, with a figure-head leader who's only nominally in control.

The MM seem to be the faction that allows a player (who loves settlements and has a high tolerance for repetitive quests) to avoid the Main Quest entirely. The SS can decide that Mama Murphy is a drug addled nut case and that your son is either long dead or living a different life without you (which is basically the truth). You can throw yourself into the settlements and turn the Castle into a proper fortress. The BOS won't show up, and the status quo is only altered by your efforts at early 'Nation Building'.

On the subject of 'Nation Building', it would have been nice if you had some MM quests that involved development of a proper 'Commonwealth' with an actual government and professional army. That effort could then trigger an attack from the Institute and subsequent war without having to interact with the stranger that is your son.

I'd like to be able to do the settlements for the Brotherhood

the brotherhood takes ownership of settlements when you do teagan's quest anyway.

The Minuteman is the hero the Wasteland deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll make fun of them. Because they can take it. Because they're not our hero. They're silent guardians. Watchful protectors. A Minuteman.

If the loading screen is any indication, the Minutemen have been around since 2180. Assuming this is not a typo on Bethesda's part, this means they managed to operate for over a century before beginning to break up, and would imply that despite their loose membership requirements, that they could keep on going, especially if they gain more power than they've ever had, such is the case if they defeat the Institute and/or the Brotherhood of Steel.

If, however, I'm wrong and it was a typo that meant to say 2280, I still think they have a chance to become something greater, especially if they have a few decades to build up under the current general's command.

That's definitely not a typo. They've been around for longer than 7 years - there have been several generations of Generals. This is confirmed by Preston and Ronnie.


But also, agreed. They definitely could become something real. They're no more disorganized than Shady Sands was when it started allying with other settlements and eventually formed the NCR, which is standing strong (at least in the heartland) after more than 100 years. They just need a strong leader to set up a better-designed system of succession and governance so it doesn't all collapse after they die.


Or not die, as the case may be. Because, you know, Lorenzo.

They couldn't protect anyone if they were this disorganizes.

And what would stop me from organizing them? And what would stop me from demanding more and more resources? There is no democracy or division of powers. I could do whatever I want and justify my actions with the an intensification of the danger of super mutant attacks. Do you know the book animal farm from George Orwell?

The minutemen are presented as the best faction in the game, they are even better than Diamond City with the corrupt Mayor. The Consequence would be: Everyone with power will abuse it, except you, keep expanding your empire.

I personally believe that it's impossible to finish the main quest as a straight-up hero. In the Institute ending, you slaughter a group of people whose actions had hitherto been entirely heroic; in every other ending, you commit genocide. Perhaps the moral is that there are no heroes in war, because it never changes, or some such crap.

Sure they can. Its a loose collection of citizen soldiers agreeing to come to each other's aid when help his needed. They have Radio Freedom to help let the others know when a settlement needs help and use flare guns to communicate requests for assistance if they can't get word out any other way.

Its a very simple method of figuring out who needs help when and gathering volunteers. Although it can fail if people choose to not help out their neighbors, as in the case of Quincy.

Sure you can say that you do in head-canon. But you can't do anything approaching that in-game, and its certainly made clear that The Minutemen don't have to do what you say, because it isn't a military. The General has no power to do anything unless individual MM agree to it first.

The fact of the matter is that the Minutemen aren't so much a faction as they are loose collections of independent fighters. With a network through various outlying settlements which agree to assist each other when threatened.

Its hard to seize power when there's no real organization to seize power with in the first place.

It would simply not work if they were that disorganized.

Only one settlement would need to abandon the others once and hell would break lose. The Quincy massacre demonstrated it.

It is simply https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons You need more than the vague promise that others will help them in return and the power of friendship, in order to make people fight and die for you.

One woman told me than she was part of the Minutemen before she retired before the Quincy massacre. How could she retire if they aren't a real military?

Heroes? The Minutemen are just shady military contractors.


"Are you from the Minutemen?"


"Yes, I'm here to help."


"I need some people murdered."


"Why?"


"Excuse me?"


"Oh, sorry. I mean, 'how many?'"


"Like ten? Or thirty or something. We know where they're coming from, because we followed them across the commonwealth but decided not to kill them ourselves because we're just peaceful, simple people in heavy combat armor. But we really only need one of them killed, and they're pretty bad people."


"Bad like how? Have they ever hired anyone to murder you?"


"Um...well no, but they said mean things and he stole my sweet roll."


"Yeah, okay, I can pencil your job in for this afternoon if it doesn't take too long. Gotta sell off this gear I just stripped from some corpses and later I have to look for my kid."


"Thanks, we didn't know what to do." *hefts minigun and trudges back into his walled compound covered in missile turrets*


"AND CLOSE THE DAMN FRONT GATE THIS TIME, SETTLER!"

And yet it does, for the most part.

Its a loosely organized ad-hoc militia. It doesn't have any purpose or goal aside from "protect each other in times of need." If people are responding to calls, and they are, then it works. Simple as that. The people have impetus to help their neighbors, because if they don't, then their neighbors won't help them.

Its a simple matter of "I'll come when you call, if you'll come when I call." Tit-for-tat.

Yes, and a break-down like that is exactly what caused the entire break-up of the Minutemen.

Quincy caused the fall of the MM system. Because once people stopped coming to each other's aid, there was no MM anymore. It was a domino effect. Once faith in the idea of the MM was broken, it was over.

Its like NATO. Just because it can easily break-up (if one country fails to respond to calls from others) doesn't mean it can't work at all.

Don't know what to tell you frankly. The Minutemen say it themselves:

Quote: "http://i.imgur.com/nvwUUIH.jpg" End-quote.

What sort of military allows its grunt soldiers to disobey direct orders from a superior officer? None. Because the MM aren't a military. And you, the player, despite being their so-called 'General' cannot command them.

Ronnie likely means "retired" in the sense that the MM ceased to exist, and she hung up her hat, because there's no "Minutemen" to speak of anymore: the system broke down. Yet, low and behold, when word gets around that the MM volunteers are re-organizing, she decides to head back.

What she doesn't mean, is that she was honorably discharged with official word from her non-existent superior officer in the non-existent organized military.

There are several fundamental difference between the NATO and the Minutemen: the NATO is organized and it's members have treaties. That means if it's members is disregard their duties this nation can be sanctioned.

And the members of NATO of the are rarely attack, if you compare them with the settlements in Fallout4. When was the last time, there was a war that threatened the existence of one it's members?

But the most fundamental difference is that the soldiers of it's members are not the ones who decide whether they come to aid or not and these soldiers are paid and their families won't have to face the post apocalyptic wasteland on their own when they die in combat.

An incapable military.

Obviously. I wasn't trying to say they're the same, or that the MM enforce their agreements through treaties.

Just the general idea that "I will help you, if you will help me." Can break down at even a nation scale if the member states suddenly decide to not support each other if one of them is attacked. Regardless of treaties, the very foundation of NATO is the core concept that an attack on one-member state constitutes an attack on all of them. Article 5. If Article 5 is invoked by a nation, and none of the others respond. NATO, has, in-principle, failed.

Regardless this is getting off-track. My point is that the MM system can work, it is just based upon the faith that if a settlement calls for aid: the volunteers will respond to help if they expect others to help them. Quincy was the point at which the system-broke down, because most of the MM didn't respond to the calls from help. Either because of apathy, or possibly sabotage. Either way, people lost faith in the MM system. And so the MM broke apart.

Not just incapable. Non-existent.