That's what vice presidents, ministers and viziers are for

To expand your idea, I think it will also be a good idea to appoint someone else as the administrator while you go adventuring/too lazy/unwilling too administrate your settlement...

Or to simply abandon the idea of building the settlement at all. The settlement feature is optional, right? ^^

From the demo and comments here, it seems like building and running the settlement(s) will be as much fun as playing the quests in the game.

I'm wondering if there will be any chance of building an underground settlement like the Museum or Little Lamplight in FO3.

OH MY! Please do! I'd love building a pseudo-vault community! Or truly an underground community with similarly underground beliefs... (Hipster much? hahahah)

I really like the Settlement idea. First playthrough I plan on making an altruistic chick who wants to make some semblance of old-world order in this crazy wasteland. I plan on making a city with as many people and houses in it as possible. Like Megaton maybe with it's multiple levels and what not. High walls. I will call it Eden and all those that come will be kind of disappointed but they won't want to tell my character about it.

My second character will go nuts and full raider. That one might be more fun.

But I kind of like the idea of sending your unused companions to one of your cities. You could make them their own home instead of them just standing next to your bed waiting for you to come pick them up for your wasteland adventures. Always creeped me out.

Hey that last idea is really great. It always bugs me too, seeing companions wait in the Lucky 38 staring at walls, or waiting in the nuked, irradiated ruins of his home... Doesn't he get radiation poisoning or something? XD

I know its unlikely that Bethesda would include issues such as murders living in your settlement and stuff but I might roleplay law and order a bit for example I might execute a random NPC who I've deemed to be a murder and dump their body in the town centre or just out of sight. I wouldn't think we'd be able to make settlements that big that Bethesda would include issues excluding water, food, safety and sleep arrangements.

Yup if I'm not wrong there's that size meter in the "town building" mode, am I right?

That means the size of the settlement would be most likely limited, which is not too bad because you could simply build more than one...

It actually feels, to me, that they drew much more from mods like http://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/38049/? from New Vegas, only more polished and extensive.

Vault Town

Built around Vault 111, if we can I'll try to make the vault interior inhabitable or into a storage area/bunker.

Build a wall around the area, rebuild the neighborhood near the south, if we can destroy some buildings then I'll clear a land around the vault for farmland.

There will be guard stations all around the wall with the main barracks being on the hill by Vault 111's entrance.

Main entrance will consist of a market place with a brahmin pit on the side, patrols are strongest near that entrance. All along the walls of the settlement are turrets and watchposts if we can make air sirens and tell how people will act during them then I will tell my non-combatants to head straight to the vault.

Most housing will be around the hill of the vault with my character's estate surrounding the vault.

Try to get as much medicine to be made, keep food steady, try to bring as much trade and protection to my settlement as possible. Maybe once my character is BoS set up a landing zone for vertibirds and get my guards to wear custom power armor.

Man, it'd be also cool if we could get a G.E.C.K. and get grass and stuff building along certain patches of ground. I really want to re-create Vault City except less xenophobic

im hoping for a vault the towns are cool but still would like a vault. or a town with a vault door for the gate

With the latter, the only thing that is missing is a site that allows you to build underground... Oh, the possibilities...

Nevertheless, I am really, really looking forward for the extent which we could build our own settlement, and what sites are available...

Well, in the trailer, that site near the river... It really catches my eye TwT

I'm not sure I wanna build a settlement. But if I do my character will build it away from the husk of their old town. Cuz that'll be their ghost town. A very well defended ghost town with turrets placed at regular but unobtrusive intervals. And all you'll hear most of the time is an old radio playing the sad songs of a dead world. And a Mr Handy tripping over it's aging circuitry. And maybe a dog barking.

Oh it would also be cool if there are peaceful super mutants, so want to re-make Broken Hills too.

Maybe a Broken Hills meets Vault City settlement.

Yep your correct it was only half full so that was interesting so it either indicates the the settlement can be 50% bigger or it can only handle 50% more population, its possible that the other settlement sites are bigger and since Fallout 4 is roughly the size of Skyrim I'd hazard to guess there'd be three potential settlement sites.

Its completely option and you can progress with the main quest regardless of if you build a settlement(s) or not.

I wonder what kind of building we can actually create, and out of what materials. Im hoping for something atleast more solid than scrap metal shacks, since I want my town to be as fortified as possible. As for indvidual buildings, not enough information to figure out the plans, but I do know that my estate will be completely independent from the rest of the town, having its own power and self-contained systems. It's what ill build first, before even worrying about getting the whole "Nexus of Trade!" thing going on.

Is anyone going to have a single entrance into their town? Im thinking I need a fortified checkpoint as the only entrance, and maybe ill go with the plans for my estate for the other buildings having their own internal walls. Man, I can't wait until we get more information.

Well considering the trailer where there is that little bridge where the raiders are burnt into crips flambe steaks... Yes, I think chokepoints and checkpoints are pretty much possible...

As for the material, in the trailer, when Todd place the house with the door in the start of the demo, the category states "Structures> Wood - Prefabs"...

And in the material scrapping in the start of the video, in the confirmation dialogue box there's "Concrete (15)" in addition to wood, steel, rubber...

So, it may hint that there are other building materials, such as sheet metal, or even concrete...

I'm wishing concrete would really do exist ^^

Hah, didn't notice the concrete. That'd be the perfect material for my home town. Also I did see the bridge, and that entire area looks like the suburb that we start off in pre-war. I can't wait to build my new home and town ontop of the ruins of the old world, although I might have to take alook at the other locations before I decide 100% on the location. The one we saw looks good for a not so fancy walled town, which is exactly what I am going for. I don't really want that stuff shown in the montage with multiple levels and increasing amounts of fancy.

I imagine wood is easy mode with concrete being hard to get and hard to repair but more durable. Still would be awesome to make a concrete settlement.

I'd like to have Sentry Bots and Protectrons patrol my settlement.

There's that terminal system...

We all know that Sentry Bots and Protectrons have their own stations where they wait until they are deployed, and it usually requires terminals to activate them...

Just imagine that you can put one of those stations in your settlement...

I think it's possible!

Would be awesome if you could, would be a very significant boast to settlement protection.

Just something from one of the latest articles in my thread.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: Another new feature is the ability to build in the game world small fortresses, of things that have been found. Has this feature limits?

Howard: The building is only in specific areas on the map possible. Within these areas, there are no restrictions.

That's kinda boring but oh well.

I will probably build myself a condo and have all the other houses be filthy hovels.

No limits? That is quite vague, and honestly, makes my imagination go wild... ^^

I'm assuming that he said that you could build things like high-rise buildings...