You are a stranger to Father. His 'experiment' is also his way of getting to know what you are like at least a little before he decides to let you into his secret base. And even then it's clear he feels some emotional connection to you. Lets not forget at that point the only thing actually tying you together is blood.

As for helping humanity, yes the Institute is concerned with its safety and development. Once all those contaminated creatures up on the surface die out, humanity will finally be able to leave the security of the Institute and implement, with the help of their mechanical workforce, all the solutions they've been preparing, like improved crops and synthetic animal species.

Actually, the Railroad does in fact steal Institute synths, that's exactly what their contact Patriot is doing. And as far as the Institute is concerned, the Gen-3's do not have free will, they just occasionally malfunction. Nothing a short session in the SRB chair can't fix though.

Minus as I said two message before yours: grey is good if you can afford roleplay possibilities in your game, which isn't the case in Fallout 4, it's just:

-Kill

-Ignore

It lacks the "grey" between those two.

The Minutemen are exactly as powerful as you, the player, makes them.

Do you retake the Castle and turn it into an unassailable fortress, or leave it as a dump full of fish patties? Do you organize the 29 (yeah, there really are that many, even I was surprised when I counted) different settlements or do you leave them all as dung farmers? Do those settlements have food, water, defenses -- all of which contribute to ensuring you have artillery coverage (and power projection) over the entire map? Do you have a trade network established guaranteeing that there's an economy in place and the ability to build whatever defenses are necessary to ensure the safety of the citizens within each settlement?

It's a lot of in game work. A ton of it. It is also the most rewarding.

A character who husbands his settlements carefully, keeps them full and happy can call on two different aid items (instead of one) for this faction and either call squads of Minutemen to his aid or artillery support (which might be the most powerful non-explosive grenade type in the game). With trade and resource sharing your Sole Survivor can be swimming in resources by end game, to the point that plopping down Tier 3 vendors (costing 2-3K caps per vendor) doesn't even pull from your own caps inventory, but can pay for itself from workbench funds with ease (and some to spare).

I regularly see squads of Minutemen patrolling around the map at the moment in my current playthrough (level 55, owning about 20 settlements, most of which are 15+ settlers with amenities) and can usually get artillery support just about anywhere I call for it.

Or you can have a few dung farmers here and there, a cabin in Sanctuary, and not much else. The other factions need your help, but they existed without you just fine. The Minutemen die in Concord without you, and you are vital to their success. With that extra effort comes the greater rewards -- more secure position and access to the potential for vast economic returns.

The only way the story could have been improved would have been to punish inaction as a form of action. I would have been really impressed if the SS could say, "I'm not going to do that." or "Let's just talk it out." This would trigger some random spark event (one for each faction so that guilty faction is random globally to avoid a 'Han shot first' debacle and then the NPC factions would just continue on with their plan on a timetable forcing the SS to either step in or just watch as everyone obliterates one another to make the actual worst ending.

This would have really driven home the point the developers seem to have been trying to make about how there are no good choices in this conflict.

Oh, so the Institute is basically the Enclave in Fallout 4. One waits until humanity on the surface dies out, in order to establish a new synthetic one (not that many real humans left in the Institute), while the other tries to speed up the process and tries to kill off the wastelanders. Father and Autumn would have been such great friends! What about the people who are right now trying to survive and have been surviving, since the war? Do they not deserve our help? Not everyone is a filthy raider or supermutant...

Well said. Most of my settlements are well defended. There are maybe 3 that I haven't developed and I'm not planning to. Nobody lives there. However, I should build up some of my outlying farms and get more settlers to live there.

Well, no, the fact that the Institute has no intention to wipe out wastelanders makes for a pretty big difference between them and the Enclave. The Institute mostly just wants to be left alone to continue their work. When you become Director you say that almost word-for-word in your radio speech: 'We have no interest in interfering in your daily lives, so don't mess with our operations or there'll be dire consequences' - the way there were consequences for the Railroad.

Father tells you outright he believes the Commonwealth is essentially dead, there's no point in wasting resources on a dead entity. And the Institute certainly isn't planning on replacing humanity with synths. Synths are just mechanical labor, well suited to doing surface work so that the humans of the Institute don't have to risk contamination.

Also, concerning the number of people - presumably there are a lot more people in the Institute than we see in the game, that is an issue of scale and game engine limitations. Same as the BoS supposedly brought an army to the Commonwealth, but the Prydwen holds maybe two dozen people. If we were to take the number of characters present at face value, than Diamond City couldn't even be called a Rock Hovel.

While a tangent, I'll toss out a couple random thoughts on this:

While the Institute is certainly fooling with technology that could ultimately turn out more dangerous than the Legion, and while they are certainly doing a great many evil things, the Legion slaughtered and enslaved entire populations of free humans and subjugated women entirely. It's hard to imagine a moral code that would make the Institute's activites the greater evil between the two.

Why did you kill the Mojave Brotherhood if you were going independent? Like the Institute, House was also a source of great technology that could benefit humankind yet you disposed of him to go Independent.

The Minutemen are about recivilizing the savage and empowering the Commonwealth to take care of itself, and would be the most 'Independent' option. It's certainly my personal favorite outcome for the Commonwealth.

Thank you.

The Minutemen get harshed on a lot, but they're also the bravest of all the factions.

A citizen with a laser musket stepping up to form ranks, no matter the cost. They have the most to lose and the least to gain, individually. Yet they're doing their duty. Effective or not, that's courage. If the Sole Survivor supports them, this collection of farmers and citizen soldiers are the ones who bring down the big bad Institute... not all the pretty knights in their airship, not the collection of super spies and heavies.

Joe Dirt, his laser musket, and a bucket full of gumption. That's a lot more endearing, IMO.

Also, they're the faction with the real plan on fixing the Commonwealth. The BoS are next in line with providing security, but the Railroad even admits they got nothing and the Institute just waggles its fingers and goes "TECHNOLOGY! OOOOOooooooOOOOooooo!" as if that'll magically fix things (and they're BSing anyways -- their plan is to Enclave it up and wait for everything on the surface to die and then replace it).

The plan that works, that's practical is this -- give people food, shelter, water, and security. You give people those things and the world gets a little bit better every day. Every day that a farmer can feed his kids and not fear a supermutant attack, the world just a bit better. Every day that clean water comes out of a pump or purifier and a farmer can trade his excess crops for things they need like medicine, clothes, etc instead of paying tribute to raiders, the world gets a little better. Fixing the world isn't magic, it's hard work, dirt under the fingernails, about a million gallons of elbow grease, and dedication. It fixes itself in increments and fractions, not magically with a wave of a synth. With peace of mind at home comes extra resources, with extra resources comes trade, with trade comes agreements and organization, with that comes government and democracy.

It may take a hundred years, but it works.

In a perfect world, the Minutemen end standing guard over the Commonwealth, the Railroad stand in the light without fear, knowing their job is done, and the Brotherhood can go home, with no more enemy to fight, and go seek a new enemy that their might is truly needed against.

As for the Institute, to answer your leading question (since this is a spoilers forum) --

While the Sole Survivor, if they take over the Institute, can take a reform oriented approach and even a positive tone with the world above, the prevailing sentiment when you first enter the facility is that the people on the surface are un-people. They are all dead men walking, so there is no point at treating them with any respect, and it's best to get use of them while they can as guinea pigs.

This is not a mentality that you're actually able to change in game -- you can state that you're going to be helpful and redirect the director's personal resources to helping the surface, but you can't force the Division Heads to to do the same (you're not a dictator, just the head of the board of directors). Justin Ayo, acting head of the SRB, and Dr. Zimmer (SRB head on sabbatical) are especially odious. You also have no way, shape, or form to release or free the Gen3 synths currently in service to the Institute, and you have to acknowledge their status as property.

The Institute seems to be a more sterile version of the Enclave. They are not as proactive about wiping out the Wastelanders, but are willing to let decay and inertia work their magic. Part of why they want the nuclear reactor they are working on to be completed so badly is so they can ignore the surface even more than they do now, as they don't want to be pulled into the Commonwealth's death throes. At the same time, these are the same people who used a strain of FEV they had from the War to create the first Commonwealth supermutants and then released them into the wild to 'see what would happen'.

Yeah. That's not morally indefensible at all. (/sarcasm)

Killing people secretly and replacing them with synths boiled my character's blood a lot more than the open "yes, we think women are inferior and should be slaves" mantra from Caesar's Legion.

The Mojave Brotherhood members whispered, as my character was exiting the bunker, that they would steal the Securitrons once they have an opportunity. So she acted upon it.

Why did she kill Mr House? In her story, she casually discussed with him that she helped the Kings with an incident with the NCR. Mr House had the audacity to tell her that "the probability of them surviving after my victory at Hoover Dam is 2.83%". She became angry and killed him, fearing that he may kill more of her friends if he had the chance. She reasoned that if she had to walk on eggshells to stop an autocrat from taking away the people who she loves, it's best to get rid of the autocrat, even if it means removing technical progress.

Well at one point, they did attempt to actually help people above. By putting four years of effort and alot of work into forming the Commonwealth Provisional Government in cooperation with the people above ground. However, the surface-dwellers fell into infighting and The Institute ended up being blamed for something they didn't do. This event caused The Institute to give up on the surface world completely, turn off the lights, and pretend nobody was home in their happy little hole.

At this point now, most people in The Institute don't believe the surface world contains anything more than monsters and savages. They're not so much moustache-twirling evil scientists as they are extremely sheltered bumbling nerds (with the exception of a few people). You constantly hear remarks about how surprised they are you managed to survive up there in that hell-hole and how uninhabitable life must be up there. Undoutedly the SRB is also flooded with reports of raiders maiming and killing people which doesn't exactly paint a pretty picture.

But, the main moral justification with siding with The Institute (assuming of course someone sides with them for moral reasons) is not keeping them as they are. Its basically Father's whole plan. "The Institute has enough scientists." He says, "What it needs now is a leader."

You as Director can make the choice to turn reform The Institute or leave it how it is. You do this when you decide to make your speech to The Wasteland announcing your intent. You can basically do one of three things: 1. Declare you're now the King of The Commonwealth and The Institute are the masters of the surface dwellers, 2. Declare that you wish to be left alone (default) or 3. Declare that from now on, The Institute will help the surface.

As The Director, you can end the Gen-3 program if you so wish. Effectively ending Synth-slavery if that's your prerogative. And you can end Synth Watchers from infiltrating the surface if that is your choice (or perhaps just stick to infiltrating raider groups). The Director is de-facto commander-in-chief of The Institute and has all of its military assets at his disposal, since all command codes for the Synths are located in The Director's office. Including a force-shutdown if needed. Which means you could potentially begin directing Institute military forces to places of greatest need, wiping out raiders and protecting settlements (something a high ranking member of The Institute suggested after the breakdown of the CPG).

Now as for me, my character was charged by his son to keep the people of The Institute safe. The Railroad and The Brotherhood both posed a threat to his people. Truthfully I don't have a problem with either of them, except that they're trying to destroy my new home. If The Brotherhood turned around and left or The Railroad laid down their arms. We wouldn't have a problem, but since they'd refuse that: we do. Its nothing personal really (okay, maybe The Brotherhood is a little personal, but that's another matter ).

Either way, you as Director can stop the part of The Institute that The Railroad's entire purposes revolves around, making joining them IMO less about ending Synth-Slavery and more about punishing The Institute for perceived past crimes. I'm a big believer in the idea of atonement and recompense (one of the reasons I always side with Paarthunaax in Skyrim for instance). I don't believe The Institute has to be wiped out to reform it, or that its beyond saving. Besides, unlike The Railroad or The Brotherhood. You're wiping out an entire society of people when you blow up The Institute. Something which Patriot later comes to deeply regret having helped come about. Because while he wants Synth-Freedom, he realizes that The Railroad went too far. Massacring innocents to free perceived slaves. Two wrongs don't make a right. And honestly, what The Railroad does is pretty downright despicable.

As for The Brotherhood, well they're a lost cause either way.

Seems every positive Institute argument is how you can change things once you become the Director. Yet, Father already said that certain choices were done that he didn't agree with.

Sounds like the Institute is more old time Soviet style. They elected a primer to head the party, but the committee still votes its own policy if they don't approve.

After I left the Institute, father told me as long as I don't interfere they'll leave me alone. Yet, soon as I get back to the Castle, hear they're going to attack.

And what if you do become the Director, as someone said, you have to prove yourself. How, destroy the RR and BoS, now they're gone. You don't agree with the Institute direction, the committee over rules you.

Where can you go? You destroyed your rivals, left the MM, the institute is now the only choice.

Then you send in the Synth Troopers and start cracking heads. The Synths are programmed to serve The Director. And he has command codes in his office. The position is basically a military dictatorship.

Ultimately, the people of The Institute value their safety, security, and standard of living. If you don't change either one of those things, the scientists aren't going to care what you do.

There's nothing stopping you from being both Director of the institute and General of the Minutemen.

Referring back to the Institute...

On my first playthrough (which was choose what felt right, let things fall where they may)...

i made it pretty far before going in, and hadn't had Father's identity revealed to me as a player yet. About 30 minutes irl before stepping into the teleporter that first time I'd cleared the University Point ruins and read through every terminal and letter and found the body of Jacqueline Spencer.

Those poor people never had a chance, and all for a stupid gun that young Jacqie couldn't even get to as she had no way to open the safes in the credit union (it took Cait about 10 minutes of trying). I think that, right there, determined the basis of my decision more than anything else. I'd had that horrific crime placed right in the forefront of my mind.

On learning who Father was, my first thoughts were 'You murdering sack of *bleep*, you're not my son!'

The BoS ended up burning the Institute to the ground in that playthrough, full of knowledge of the Institute's arrogance and their crimes.

Can you please show us how to do that within the framework of the game without using head-canon? I wasn't aware of this being an option.

not yet anyway. give them 100 years where Liam's dumb programming has given then robot too much freedom and they kill their human creators and decide humanity is a relic to be replaced.

So then end the Gen-3 program. Cut its funding, and divert it to something else. Tell robotics to get back to building the less intelligent Gen-2's. There's no stories of any of them rebelling or escaping (nick was dumped and was an advanced prototype). And for the most part the Gen-2's suffice as both a labor and military force.

The Gen-3 program is an arguable security risk. Shouldn't be hard to convince anyone that after bringing down the hatred of a techno-religious group and starting a revolutionary movement, that perhaps the Gen-3's aren't worth keeping around. Too much effort and resources expended.

The Gen-3 program is not part and parcel to The Institute. Its one program among many. Hell, in 50 years when the Dark Matter initiative succeeds in bringing about unlimited untapped energy potential, it'll probably be looked at as a footnote in The Institutes history.

Two things, father said it took years to prove himself for the position. So to me, sounded like he was appointed to the position.

Also, he said his command codes worked only on some synths, not all. There's other department director's that hold power alsoI would guess, those ready to overthrow him if needed.

Then again, this is only guessing, same as guessing the SS can change the Institute.

You can, however, defy this by declaring that the Institute will protect the Commonwealth in the same speech.

Anyway... I agree that there's no satisfying ending possible. But that's why cheating was invented.

The "A House Divided" quest shows that scientists within a division have control over the Gen 2s assigned to that division. They are able to change targeting priorities and orders. Loken and Higgs were able to make it so that the Gen2s they controlled fired on anyone trying to enter the lab in protest to the Sole Survivor being named Director.

It seems likely that scientists (and especially Division Heads) would have similar control over their assigned synths. It would also explain why Father's command codes only override some of the synths.

I do not think the Director is a dictatorial position, but one that rules by consensus of the division heads, even if they may not be the ones that name the successors to the position. If all four decided to oust the Sole Survivor, I speculate that he or she would be out. After all, you can be named successor to Father, then shoot Father in the head (thereby making yourself Director), and then immediately be Banished From The Institute.

In my first playthrough I went with the institute because 1.) why "nuke" a city and leave another huge whole and re-create the whole reason for the state of nuclear fallout again? 2.) as director I could make decisions on the future state of the commonwealth with the minutemen's help.

In my second playthrough I am leaning towards the minutemen if I can spare the railroad.

Of course he was. By the previous Director. Just like the SS.

That's never really stated. None of the other terminals have command codes of any sort for The Synths. Its probably just ones that are not connected to the primary network.

Yet the key point of that is what happens afterwards.

Higgs and Loken are placed on lockdown, Coursers are dispatched to increase patrols in the halls, and, if you so choose, can summarily execute the both of them without a trial. And everyone universally agrees it was a terribly stupid and foolish thing to do. Even Dr. Loken says he only pulled the little stunt because Higgs talked him into it. The Institute is placed under temporary martial law and you can immediately execute the instigators with no input from The Directorate. Not even from Dr. Allie Filmore, the Division Head of Facilities and Higgs' supervisor. That certainly sounds like absolute power.

Honestly the reason the Gen-2 Synths of Higgs and Loken can't be shut down remotely is probably the same reason you can't send in The Coursers and crush them. Gameplay reasons.

Its hardly just naming of succession. Father directly orders Dr. Li to begin the Synth-Child program despite her refusal to do so and even blocks Dr. Li from learning more about the FEV lab incident with his authority.

Hell, all of the Director's don't use pronouns and phrases which suggest equality at all. And Father calls Dr. Ayo "insubordinate" for his tone. Certainly a term NOT used to refer to an equal.

Summary execution of Higgs and Loken is only an option if you can convince the NPC (Oberly) that it's the correct choice. Fail your Charisma check and it doesn't happen. That doesn't sound to be like someone with dictatorial fiat (at least the SS doesn't have it at the time). Oberly disagreeing with you wouldn't be grounds of denying execution if you had such blanket authority (which you obviously don't as he can disagree with you and decide not to kill them and there's nothing you can do to change his mind after that point).

And I've never stated that that the Director was a peer to the Division Heads. He can't govern without them though, as we've already seen the havoc two non-leadership scientists can cause by putting the Institute's food stocks at risk, requiring you into either talking them down, killing them with synthetic apes, or invading Bioscience and handling the issue yourself. It's not difficult to postulate what being locked out of the SRB, the Applied Sciences, Robotics, Biosciences, and (most importantly) Facilities divisions at once would do to the Director's position.

Technically at that point however, you aren't *actually* Director. Father is, since you haven't officially assumed your role. You may be heir-apparent, but not dictator-for-life.

And if you order them on lock-down, all The Institute scientists remark how "lenient" you were with them, as if they expected something much worse than what happened.

Regardless though, Oberly isn't a member of The Directorate. So unless we want to try and argue that Oberly, a doctor but one with no administrative power, has more authority than either The Director or The Directorate. We can probably safety assume that again is gameplay.

Of course, you're right. The Director does need the Directorate, because a leader is nothing without his bureaucracy. The Directorate administer to their individual divisions and help keep The Institute running smoothly.

If you, as Director, decided to declare The Institute had a mandatory nudist policy, opened it up as a soup kitchen to wastelanders, and turned Bioscience into a cabaret. I'm sure the people of the institute could find some how, someway to eliminate you. Just like if you, as Brotherhood Sentinel, decide to marry a ghoul I'm sure Elder Maxson isn't going to keep you around very long.

But change IS possible. And its possible in a way that can't really be achieved with the rest of the factions. If you keep The Institute's standard of living secure, protect them, and act as a good leader should in involving others in your decision and taking advice when needed. You'd be fine. The citizens and scientists of The Institute thrive on the mundane and living orderly lifes. Most express disbelief that Higgs or Loken could even pull something like that. And that (relatively speaking) was a pretty lame rebellion. More of a temper-tantrum really.

Ending the Gen-3 program is possible, ending the Synth infiltration program is possible, and dispatching Synths to protect the surface is also possible. By the end of the game The Institute does that last one anyway. Sending a number of Gen-1's to Diamond City and deploying gobs of Gen-2's all over The Commonwealth.

As in everything, reform to The Institute would need to be done logically and soundly.

Oh, if the Brotherhood would bring the hammer down on you for romancing Hancock, that would be a very clear sign of their dikeishness.

On that note, though, I was planning on marrying a synth (Curie). Would the Institute count that against me?

No. Because Dr. Alan Binet, a primary researcher in robotics, has a Synth wife already.

Dr. Ayo thinks its weird, but he's a stick in the mud anyway.