I think that, given their individual leadership positions (as seen certainly with Garvey) it would make more sense if they were each in charge of a specific settlement. This may even explain the use of vertibirds in-game.

Think of how caravans work in Skyrim. We hop onboard, the screen fades out, and then we magically appear at our chosen destination. When we see our protagonist calling a vertibird in the demo, I would imagine that once we're onboard, we are given a choice of locations including any settlements we have discovered. We are then dropped off at the chosen destination, having witnessed the entire journey in real time! This would tie in with the 'fast travel' system used in GTA V (by taxi), a game which Todd has already admitted to being a big fan.

The cool part would be that, if enemies are spotted en route, we may even be able to engage in combat using the attached minigun!

This idea would stop vertibirds from being cheapened, as well as keeping the map from feeling too small. And besides, the prospect of real time fast travel would actually make it potentially dangerous, and therefore much more interesting!

This is speculation on my part but I'm getting the impression that companions have their own agenda in FO4. Rather than just hanging about they get on with their lives when we're not around. The exception being the dog and butlerbot. That's not to say that we won't be able to put some of them to work for us, but expect to need some investment in charisma to pull it off.

Calling it now.

Companion number five, Arthur Maxson.

EDIT: in charge of, I'm guessing, around four or five of Lyons BoS due to him only being around 18 when we start the game.

Note that this would require a start date of 2285, for which I have already provided a ton of new evidence...

I do think the use of the vertibird is going to be directly linked to the main story and one (or more) of the BOS factions. Basically I'd expect it to become available at a certain point when you have joined one of the BOS factions and your highly rated enough for them to assign you a personal vertibird.

It only makes sense to me to gain the Vertibird once you have traveled quite a bit around the map and discovered the locations of existing settlements, faction locations, new settlement sites etc.

What would be amazing though is if this was also the only way to fast travel. Would make the game world MUCH bigger!

10 not 12. Cogs and dogmeat both come from the same area and dogmeat is, well a dog on top of that.

And I kind of doubt Fenway is one of the settlements given that it is aparently her home.

It would, but I'd expect there would be the normal fast travel since you may never get the ability to call in the Vertibird (if you don't join any faction with Vertibirds) and your unlikely to get it early in the game. At least I'd hope so, I'd rather there was an in-game reason that the Protagonist is important enough to get his/her own Vertibird rather than it being the standard mode of fast travel for the Commonwealth.

I have actually amended this suggestion to eleven in one of my further posts in this thread, because I think it would make more sense. That way, if we have dogmeat with us, each of the other eleven could be left in charge of their own settlement. And if we build a kennel on each site, we can leave dogmeat wherever we like.

Also, the restriction of one companion may only be at the start of the game. Either at a certain point in the main quest (I'm thinking HUGE battle), or possibly even when we've unlocked certain perks, this number may increase.

I also suggested that each of the twelve (eleven) would have a default location, as well as a possible settlement (which could be swapped around at any time).

In the case of Piper, her default location would be Diamond City. This is most likely where we would find her if we left her anywhere, or lost track for any reason. As another example, dogmeat's default location would be the garage.

I was just thinking about the Fallout 3 companions, how many of them would you trust to run a settlement?

I'm also thinking that they might have expanded on the Steward position from Skyrim, so you could have the option of appointing companions as Mayors and maybe other NPCs that impress you in game if your Charisma is high enough to convince them to join your communities.

Actually you may need to recruit a Mayor to allow you to add extra NPCs to your settlements since it maybe like Skyrim in that the Steward type of character may recruit based on your decisions unless the NPCs are directly linked to the things you build like the trading posts, guard posts, mato plants etc.

raoul for mayor!

(...yeahyeahokoknviknowiknow...

This suggestion right here has just blown my mind, and I think I saw a few new ideas fly out the top! If I can catch them, I will post them in due course...

EDIT: for the record, this suggestion actually made me think of Riverwood, if it had been included as part of Hearthfire!

Given that your aparently able to call in powerarmor strikes by the time you get to Lexington.....

Pretty sure it was a set piece for the demo.

Wasn't that a case of you using an abandoned set of Power Armor (and taking the weapon from the Vertibird), rather than you calling it in.....that maybe how you get your first Power Armor in the game.

Actualy i suspect it was supposed to be a " introducing the BOS "moment

that was Concord, I'm talking about the bullet festival in Lexington.

LS: "https://assets.rbl.ms/194061/980x.jpg"

Okay, I was thinking of the other power armor demonstration.....so the other one where you are shooting up a bunch of Raiders, no idea if you have access to a Vertibird at that point. Is it the same Power Armor you find in Concord or a different set?

I'm looking at this part that may be Piper, in the distance, and I see "Generic lady in a pink dress".

Looks like he's already a bit over-encumbered!

EDIT: this of course depends on which type of booty you meant lol

from the sound of thing they were air droped from a flying Vertibird that gets shot down

Oh, you mean like carriages in Skyrim? So vertibirds would work the way dragon riding was supposed to (well hopefully better).

Needing high charisma makes sense.

Dragon Riding was never made to work differently actually.

But yes, vertibirds seem to work like how people thought dragon riding would work.

LMAO.

That's what I think. Although as HellJumper pointed out, this would most likely be something of an earned privilege, so we might not get to access them until a little later into main quest.

I don't know if this would actually replace fast travel completely, but the whole idea of having it take place in real time with the possibility of being attacked en route just seems so cool!