Finally starting to get other end of random luck and have attacks happen while I am in settlement - one at Abernathy Farms and one at Sanctuary

I can confirm that some attacks do annoyingly 'pop' right out of thin air it seems and inside perimeter of settlement. Could be totally RNG so no value, or could be certain fixed positions. Would help if people reported known spawn points, to see if it is random or semi random based on favored spawn locations inside various settlement maps.

For me:

Abernathy Farms - ghouls spawned just to left (when facing West) of the melon patch - already inside the settlement borders and into melon patch.

Sanctuary - super mutants main group of 4 spawned NW of bridge, right in between the first blue pre-existing home and the abandoned home next to it.

*fortunately for me, I had torn down and left unbuilt the razed home, and used foundation to plant corner ring of turrets. Bridge turrets were useless, answering my own prior question of turrets do not traverse 360, only the angle shown when laying down turret. So these backup turrets were what saved settler deaths.

clever smaller group of 2 mutants spawned way, way north -almost at far north border of sanctuary, just past the circular courtyard street. Had zero defenses here, no turrets because had thought this was rear zone and mobs would have to get past my bridge chokepoint and backup turrets at razed foundation I setup.

So this is kinda annoying but manageable now that I know for fact that spawns happen random or semi random inside the perimeter. Because I was there, I saw HMG turrets have INCREDIBLE range.

At Abernathy it was a brutal short range fight so thought nothing of it. At Sanctuary one backup turret was way, way far back and that svcker still fired and hit the main pod of super mutants. It fired through an entire orchard of mut fruit. I don't know what the range limit is, if any, because from where that turret was, it almost seemed like LOS attack.

Exact position of that turret was due-south corner of razed foundation just east of the main craft house - from there, it fired on and hit the mutants way down SW of it at the just past bridge and side of first blue house.

So on one hand, if attacks do come from across the river, turrets placed on far side of river along the seawall will annihilate them. The range is super long on these HMGs apparently. Knowing this, I've moved bunch of seawall turrets because 2-3 can cover that entire side with the range it has and mobs would need to swim, making them easy meat.

My new RNG spawn defense is I built temporary ladders up to homes around the circular driveway and the homes along the main street going down to bridge. Using those ladders I reposition turrets so I have angle of fire 360 degrees from any section of Sanctuary with at least 2 turrets.

If a random spawn pops actually inside a house.....then I will cry lol.

Good to know.