Yes -- you're right and I'm wrong. Put my foot in my mouth there. I had no idea the Workbench at Home Plate was nerfed!

Why would Beth not allow you to build crafting stations in the private houses. You're even told (in so many words) that the tools of the former owner were left in Home Plate so you could build "whatever you want". You get there, and all you can do is decorate. There's no tab for Crafting, Defenses, Structures -- only containers, decorations, furniture, and lighting.

This is stupid -- they developed a totally separate Workbench for these private residences that simply removes all "functionality". Granted, all the crafting stations you need exist in the market square above, but how inconvenient is that? Having to manually pick up all of the junk you need from the Workbench, manually scrap them, carry them to the crafting station and build something, then manually drop them off again afterwards -- ?? Rather than simply leaving the functionality of the Workbench intact -- like every other workbench in the game???

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Realism is perhaps the wrong word, though I find myself using it a lot when talking about this game. The fact is that it is a sort of fantasy logic that comes into play simply because it has to. Each of us have a preconceived idea of what things would be like if we happened to survive a nuclear holocaust. The 50s world saw nuclear holocaust in an entirely different light than we of today do. I remember when people were digging backyard bunkers and making plans for surviving based on a post-apocalyptic world that was very much like FO.

I even remember when students at one of the big campuses (Harvard perhaps?) were demonstrating, pushing to have "suicide stations" set up where they could go get lethal doses of poison so they wouldn't have to endure the nastiness of surviving a nuclear war. What we have in Fallout is almost identical to that imaginary world that people inhabited in that time period. It was a time of great innocence in many ways, and the logic they used has has long fallen by the wayside, Except in the Fallout universe.

Sorry, but I disagree. The main charact's sole motivation is to heal the world? Really? What happened to finding his/her son? When my character woke up, nobody told him/her to go out and heal the world, nor was there any indication that I saw that this was the mission. That mission exists if you want to take it on, but it's not really necessary to play the game in an immersive manner.

Thirty areas to make his/her mark in the world if he/she wants to. Personally, I take it that I set up the Sanctuary Hills settlement for a few reasons, none of which really have anything to do with healing the world.

First, Preston and Co need a safe place to go. I provide them with that, though I don't live there, or accompany them.They need food, water, beds, and defenses, I provide them with that. I found myself a bit upset when I realized they really weren't going to be much help with that. So, I take the time to dig a well by hand, set up a pump, clean out or build shelter and put beds in it, plant crops, and set up machine gun turrets. In the meantime, what about my kid?

I take my payment (yes, I expect to be compensated) in the form of tatos, corn, and mutfruit so I can make adhesive to improve my own weapons and armor. If I happen to give a settler weapons or armor, it comes straight and unimproved from the body of a raider, I don't make it.

Now we come to the part about using 200 year old materials and using what's available. Personally, I don't make any dressers. I use the ones that are sitting there in the houses. If I did make a dresser, it would likely be made using the pieces of existing dressers. I build one communal structure, and in it I put couches, tables, and so forth that I drag into it from the houses nearby. Again, I use what's available. Then I wish them well, and leave. I don't do any Minuteman quests, at least not early on. When I visit a settlement, I usually do whatever quest they ask of me, but I don't make any furniture, I don't plant crops, I don't dig wells, I don't make beds, and I don't set up any radio towers. I do none of that, at least not early on. Sometimes I set up defenses, but in the end, it's up to them to defend themselves in the large part, as it should be. I don't get notifications to go defend the settlements.

I spend my time exploring, and talking to people in the search for my child. that is my mission, not healing the world. The world has been around for thousands of years before my character got there, and it will be around long after my character is gone. Nobody can heal the world, that's up to the people who live in as a whole to do.

I've had I believe nine or ten characters, and I've bought one shipment of wood and one shipment of concrete from Abernathy's. That's the total.It's kinda like I go around to the settlers and say "Hey, if you want this or that, you need to chip in here and help buy it." They silently tell me to buzz off, or respond with something like "If you work, you eat."

The SS doesn't change the world and there's no story? No offense, but that's bull IMO. Of course there's a story. A story of a parent searching for a child who does some good and perhaps a little harm along the way. The SS is part hero and part villain, as he or she should be in my estimation. the problem here is that you seem to think that I have to play with the same motivations and logic that you do, and nothing apparently could be farther from the truth.

By the way, I've NEVER heard my character give those statements about changing the world. I have to say that I'm both astounded and repelled by the skeletons laying everywhere. First, If I were running a settlement, those settlers had better get off their butts and burn those remains or make cutting fluid out of them if possible. I'm not setting up housekeeping in the midst of a bunch of skeletal remains and just stepping on or over them.

Second, I really doubt there is much smell coming off of the ones that have been laying there for 200 years. Have you ever stumbled on a carcass that has been dead for a year or two? Not much smell... and no weight to them, they are like... paper or cardboard caricatures of what they were in life. A friend of mine committed suicide up in a local mountain area. They found his skull three years later, but that was all that was left. Small animals had dragged off the rest, you see.

I know, no realism but the fact is that these things aren't really covered one way or the other in the game, so we have to use the knowledge we have. From a realism point of view, as well as a logical point of view, I think the dude and the dog by the bridge upset me the most. I strip them and drag the guy over and drop him in the river, but it says I can't move the dog because he's too heavy. Like he weighs more than the dude, when the dog obviously is about 80 to 100 pounds. Then a few days later, the guy is back, dressed and equipped again laying right where he was to start with. What's up with that, eh? Ghosts?

Anyway, I don't mean to be offensive, but we obviously look at these things in a very different manner, it's only that I object to being forced into a "savior" or "world healer" role when I just don't see it that way. I didn't see it that way in FO3, or FONV either, as a matter of fact.

Changing horses here...

Yeah, I couldn't believe they did that. I could perhaps see it if the had just removed the defenses portion or the water/crops part cuz there is no dirt. I can't build a wall in there according to Beth? why the hell not? Thanks to webhobbit though, I can now build anything I want in there, long as I have the perks of course.

For those of us on console without access to the mod, the large wooden bookshelves make pretty good wall dividers. I've used them to wall off a small room to use as a bathroom. The open area house plan idea can be fine, but even the designs on HGTV don't have bathtubs and toilets sitting in clear view of the living room.

Currently, my characters have primarily used the existing dressers, broken drawers and all, but given time, I'd like them (and the settlers in their respective commnities) to be able to build furniture that looks nicer and newer. I wouldn't want to see the broken, run-down options go away since that would probably fit better with characters who are basically leaving the settlers to fend for themselves, but for those of us who are primarily into making the Commonwealth into a more pleasant place to live, it would be great to have more options.

I always have to have toilets and tubs installed in houses I build. In Skyrim and FONV, I made mods that added them to my houses. Not only that, I have to have them walled in so there is a modicum of privacy. No matter how I feel about people I live with both in-game and in RL, I require privacy in the bathroom...

While I think building too much really nice looking stuff would be, for me, immersion breaking... I also think more options is usually a good thing as long as one is not forced to use a particular option.

Ah, yes! This will do nicely and is far better that what I was planning. Thank you!

Neildarkstar, your idea of what is and isn't the player motivation is yours and I'm sure many people agree with you. Actually "Angry Joe" made an amusing comment about how the initial motivation is to find your son but very quickly the game inserts other motivations and the son-finding element gradually disappears and is virtually forgotten. However, what I didn't say earlier because I didn't really believe that it needed to be said is that this is not a novel or a film; it's a game. The main difference with this art form is that the audience participates, chooses different motivations and gets different outcomes. So, what you or anyone else accepted or rejected is completely irrelevant just as is any single choice or preferred role. The only thing that matters is if a motivation exists in the game then it and the role it produces must be catered for and painting my power armor with a fresh coat of "hot rodder" paint and not getting new paint is nuts, unacceptable, and immersion breaking.

As for your comments on smell, I am wondering if you are arguing merely for the sake of argument. The world of FO4 would be "assault and battery" on your nostrils. Sure the skeletons wouldn't smell but everything else would from the garbage piles to the gore and super mutant 'bags'. And, let's not forget the lack of clean washing water or unbroken toilets or the fact that these morons haven't even mastered a broom never mind basic crafting and hygiene.

Heh, okay, if you say so, but it was just a couple of posts ago that you were adamant that I must accept the role of world changer as the SS... The thing is that your notion of what the motivation is, is neither more nor less correct than my own, and is completely irrelevant in MY game, yes? So I have no need to be a world healing arbiter of the destiny of the human race unless I see a need to do so.

You know, garbage piles are much like corpses in that they smell like hell for a while, then cease to smell at all. I kinda think most of the garbage piles are over a hundred years old, and perhaps two hundred. A quick query... Have you ever lived in a place that was completely filthy by our USA "civilized" standards? Have you ever spent any time in Hong Kong, Thailand, some Mexican border towns, or even some Native American reservations in the US? Have you ever seen and smelled raw sewage and garbage as it drifted slowly by on the murky currents of a major river?

Let me tell you about dining out in some parts of the world. You go out to a good restaurant, and at some time during your visit you feel the call of mother nature. You ask your waiter where the restroom is, and he doesn't know what you are talking about. When you finally make him understand, he points you to a slightly raised, open area without walls over in a corner. Back in that corner is a hole in the floor. You are expected to squat down over the hole and do your business. If you look down, you can see a river flowing beneath the hole, and that's where your business goes. On the birhgt side, think of the water you save by not having to flush, eh?

Imagine living in a country where restaurants can sell bottled air... (illegally) because the air is so bad. In short, some of these places (in varying parts or districts) smell no better than the world of FO4 would if it was a real vacation destination and their air is often no better for your health either.

What happens is that your sense of smell becomes acclimated to it, and soon, you don't smell it at all. The first three days are like some kind of hell, but the second week or so you've forgotten it ever bothered you. The same would be true in the world of Fallout 4. I can name a place where the gutters are three feet wide, and four feet deep, and double as public restrooms for a very large population. Believe me, I know a thing or two about smell.

The people who live in these places would be highly offended and insulted if you told them their home town stinks, because they don't even smell it. If you were to try to change things, you would be faced with a huge resistance because they don't see the problem.

Just to address the concrete issue. They have access to considerable tech. Something like concrete is not really modern tech, so it should in no way be a "tremendous obstacle." Look at the Roman Pantheon. Built in 128 AD, an unreinforced concrete dome that is still standing. It makes sense we can make concrete slabs, what doesn't make sense is that we can't make any other concrete structures. Actually, now that I think about it, humanity went thousands of years building ever more impressive structures with far less than the wastelanders have access to....wtf..

I think you're underestimating the difficulty of making the cement (as opposed to the concrete made using the cement). It's quite true that ancient cultures used concrete in one form or another, it would be difficult to do when you are struggling to grow enough food to feed yourself, fighting off predators that range from feral dogs to radscorpions, and deathclaws.

You know, most people don't even know what is in cement, or how it is processed.

Here's an abbreviated rundown.

4 components are needed.. calcium, silicon, aluminum and iron which can be found in limestone, sand and clay.

Limestone needs to be quarried and crushed into powder (finally a use for that super sledge? )

The limestone has to blended with the sand and clay in the right proportion

The blended result is again ground to powder.

the mixture then has to be subjected to a process called "sintering" where the mixture is heated to the point of becoming partially molten, without actually melting. About 2700 degrees... Which means before you can make cement, you're going to have to make some kind of large kiln or furnace capable of generating and containing such heat. I dunno, maybe if you asked nicely, the Forged would let you use their smelter...

That causes changes to the ingredients, and results in them coming out of the kiln or furnace as "clinkers" which are actually large cinders.

Then let it cool and grind the clinkers into a fine powder. That's a lot of grinding and powdering to do by hand, wouldn't you think? In our modern setting, most of that is done by various rock crushers, and machinery designed specifically for the purpose of converting rock to powder.

Now for the comforting part... If you screwed up anywhere along the way, (maybe too much sand, or the wrong amount of clay, or maybe your sand didn't contain enough aluminum or whatever) you will mix it with your other materials to make concrete, create your forms, mix with water and pour and... it never hardens. Or maybe, you finish your concrete foundations and the build your building atop it and... the first time it rains, the foundation turns to mud.

Actually, adobe might be the better choice, if only it didn't rain so much.

Anyway, the point is to imagine trying all of that process under primitive conditions with primitive tools and limited numbers of people and under conditions in which nobody can remember how to make a roof that doesn't leak... while trying to grow your food, and fight off the critters, and with minimal shelter. It kinda boggles the mind when you think about it, eh?

I wish we can upgrade the house. Add a 2nd floor or basemant.

If you're on PC. and you use the console code webrabbit provided earlier, you probably could add a small loft area in that one large room.

EDIT: After checking, yes you can put in aloft, but you can't git into it with your character. You could use a loft there for storage though.

Neildarkstar, I don't have a problem with much of what you are saying although your statement that all the garbage piles are old and not an on-going issue is illogical. Have a good roam around the Prydwen - a ship supposedly manned by a highly disciplined force. There are rooms on that ship full of garbage with crates and barrels cluttering the decks. In one of these rooms there is even a broom in the garbage. The point is that the SS tells Piper the world smells so we don't need to beat that horse any further. Then there is the debate over concrete and glass. Who cares? The SS makes a teleportation device - realism and historical or cultural reality are no longer in the room. And, while there may be an argument for simplistic designs, or even inexpert craftsmanship, there is no argument that explains how you can make a sheet of iron with rusty holes in it, or make a new power armor paint job instantly fade and disappear.

Well, it really doesn't matter anyway. like I said, I've never heard the SS tell Piper that. Of course I only used her as a companion very briefly with one character...

You're kinda giving me a chuckle though. I mean, in one sentence you're telling me that realism and historical or cultural reality are no longer in the room, and then in the next complaining because you can't find a reason for your paint job to fade...

I was of the opinion actually that those green walls with all the holes were tin, like what was popular in shanty towns way back when. I have a shed in my back yard that's made of some similar material. Anyway, I hadn't really thought those were recently made by anyone, but rather salvaged from old sheds like the one in my back yard. those were really popular in the fifties, and following the story line, there would have been a lot of them around.

I remember when I was in Cuidad Juarez, the workers there who worked for American manufacturing companies like Farah lived in similar shacks to the small wood shack in FO4. The ones who could manage to find, steal, or afford something better than a cardboard refrigerator box as a house for a family of five, anyway... That was a long time ago, maybe things have changed. Anyway, I didn't think the walls were actually made, but rather were scavenged.

As to your paint job, well, it could perhaps be explained to some extent. It would depend on what the composition of the armor was, and if it had ever been chemically treated. Sometimes chemical treatments (or waxes designed to coat metal surfaces to prevent rust) are nearly impossible to remove, and can literally destroy paint jobs. That's only if you're looking for a reason why it might fade rapidly, though...

There is a huge difference between adhering to the realism of our cultural and scientific understandings and unrealistic actions or intentions outside of the narrative. For example, we accept that the SS can build a teleportation device because the story says he can but we cannot accept that paintwork instantly fades because it doesn't. Had the SS said in surprise, "My god, the paint is fading as I apply it. The ionized air must be causing it" then fine, the story says that it happens so we accept it. (and I wouldn't be painting any more armor). Instead, the paint fades more as if it were a game bug or a graphics glitch. "Hey Devs! I applied paint but it's not showing up!" They are two totally different things.

As for you not hearing it from Piper... That's fine. Everyone's paths in this game are going to be different. The point is that just because you don't do some quest doesn't make it okay for that quest to be bugged, true? I didn't do the Danse quest lines so I didn't discover his secret but he still has that secret just as the motivation for the SS to heal the world is well established. You didn't follow it. That's okay but it still has to work and make sense for those who do. Fair enough?

If we were actually scavenging materials like you suggest then let a whole host of rubbish around the game world be interactive. You'd find an old couch on a garbage heap, click on it and get a menu of current settlements that you could transfer it to. Then fine but forget about crafting anything because we have just established that our main character is a total scavenger loser who would pick up a couch that the target audience thinks should be burned. As for the waxed metal, okay.... So, why am I wasting my time painting it?

I really doubt the fading paint is a bug or a glitch, I think they did that intentionally because your armor is two hundred years old and they think it should look it. Like everything else you do or build in the Fallout universe.

I really don't know what you're saying int hat second paragraph... Not having played the quest line, I don't have any idea if it's bugged or not. Nor have I done the Danse quest lines, so I only have a sniggling of what that's about from comments that I've inadvertently run into here in the forum.

Should it work for the quest line for those who do follow it? Yes, but to say that by following a certain quest line you gain an insight into character motivation only really applies to that quest line. Had you not gone that route, or had you arrived there differently,he might have said something entirely different. I don't know.

Now wait a minute. You mean to say that you think all that stuff is remade by the SS? Hell, When I build a settlement say in SAnctuary Hills, and I want a couch, I just go into one of the houses, grab one, and take it where I want it to be. I do the same with tables, cahirs, the cook station, radios, TVs if I want to use them, toasters and many other items that I don't bother to scrap and rebuild. Guess what? You can't tell the difference between a couch I scrapped and rebuilt and one I dragged across the street...

Why must that couch be on a garbage heap in a world where most owners of property are dead and the rest are gone to who knows where? ...and why should you have the ability to just send such items off to whatever workstation you want? You're not allowed to just send items from anywhere to anywhere simply to reduce the amounts of materials available and make you work for them. that part is game balance.

Besides, I presume you scrap the collapsed houses right? so have you ever looked at those scrap piles of metal that are laying beside the houses? If you take that scrap metal, and make a wall out of it, aren't you just really reusing an existing material? It's not like that wall you just crafted was smelted and rolled off a line all brand new, eh?

...and scavenger loser? Just what do you think you're doing when you stop off in some town and grab up scrappable items from houses and stores? How about when you scavenge armor and weapons from fallen foes? You don't take desk fans, toasters, typewrites, cigarettes, and anything that's not nailed down for scrapping at the workstation when you get back to it?

C'mon now, I mean really. Why are you painting that armor? Well probably for the other effect you get from having all pieces painted (I don't remember what it is for the flame job), and the knowledge that, if it hadn't faded it would have been cool as hell... Now it's just sort of faded cool as hell...

garbage piles are through their trial period after 100 years and afterwards qualify as landscape.

it's an undisputable garbage right.

Didja ever wonder about some of those garbage piles? I mean, think about it for a moment. After 200 years of recovery, 0 survivors in Sanctuary Hills, right? 0 survivors in Concord, 0 survivors at the Starlight, two survivors at the diner, two survivors at Abernathys, two at Tenpines Bluff. Other than Raiders and mutant animals, that's it for the entire Northern area. Prior to the war in which everybody died, one would think there was garbage service, though I haven't seen a truck or a landfill, so who left the piles of garbage?

On a different note, I said earleir that I would post some screenies of my version of Home Plate. Here goes.

I'll start with https://i.imgur.com/1AOjrar.jpg (oops, forgot to make the bed.

I put the https://i.imgur.com/4585T3e.jpg above the bedroom, I figured it's be good to have some nearby ventilation. Embarrassing when the chem lab blows up the bedroom, eh?

Downstairs below the bedroom is the https://i.imgur.com/OPdB52A.jpg, this is the entrance.

A little better peek at the https://i.imgur.com/KgdqRfP.jpg.

Here is the https://i.imgur.com/mbRBR3W.jpg.

A look at the https://i.imgur.com/tIaXbl0.jpg from the main living area. For some reason, this was the only position where the power armor station would fit without sitting in the middle of the room.

This is from the https://i.imgur.com/T00PtaK.jpg looking back toward the workstation. Personally, I like the wall there, on the other side of that wall is a storage area with chests and such that I didn't get a screenie of.

Here we have a look at the https://i.imgur.com/MMbutzv.jpg, rec area and kitchen from the dry wet bar. Still can't put water inside.

Finally, a view of the https://i.imgur.com/XkJmHzB.jpg and kitchen from the Workshop doorway. Why do I keep thinking of it as the garage?

It's an aesthetic. While details such as you're suggesting are good ones, eventually, devs need to stop coming up with more and more details and publish the game. If they took the time to add garbage trucks, then what? Why are there postman outfits, but no mail trucks? Shouldn't we see logos on train cars and such for the various businesses? If there are civilian jets, how come we can't dress up as a stewardess -- what...jeans and T-shirts survived by not a stewardess' uniform? Okay, dogs eat and drink from their bowls now, but they drink first then eat -- shouldn't that be the other way around? When I see the animation add Mr. Handy Fuel, my character holds the bottle as if they're right-handed -- shouldn't there be a left-handed animation for that...?

It's a game, in the end. It will be awesome when game engines get so powerful that stuff like the above is simply the norm. Just not this week.

Very well done, sir! Looks great. (Why...why...would Bethesda take the time to purposefully remove these construction options? [Here, we've created these totally awesome, in-game construction tools! Build whatever you can imagine! Go crazy! Ah, I see you've purchased Home Plate! Hang on while we gut 75% of the options from the Workbench. There ya go!])

Neildarkstar, I give up. You aren't opposing my views but rather side-stepping everything I say. You just don't seem to understand my arguments and I don't know how much simpler I can make them. Just because you, I, or the guy over the road doesn't do a particular quest doesn't mean that it is okay if that quest doesn't work. True or false? In exactly the same way, just because you, I or someone else doesn't follow a particular path in the game OR role play a particular motivation present in the game doesn't mean that the motivation isn't there. The motivation might not be there for us because we didn't uncover it but it is in the game all the same. Fair or not fair? Now, YOU DID NOT uncover this motivation to save the world and so you couldn't be motivated by it - following me so far? I did uncover it and was motivated to save the world but the means to do it conflicted with what was required. Okay?

errrr... yeah. You are messing with me, right? I stand at a crafting station, and use up timber shipments and the wood I've gained from chopping down trees and I craft it. How I manage to craft stuff that's 200 years old is a flaming miracle.

Now we are making headway. You cannot tell the difference. Am I in the Twilight Zone? You should be able to tell the difference because there would be a difference. No matter what the medium, novel, film, play or game: you can set the stage any way you like but if you start making the main character act out of character it's a fail.

No the fading paint is not a glitch but it may as well be because it's not a graphics glitch it's a story glitch. The armor is 200 years old but the paint job isn't. And, while you seem to want to hand out a pass to Bethesda for this it's a rookie mistake. Every time you tell a story there are two storytellers - you and the story so far. You may want the hero to be on the train to overhear the assassination plot but if you've already established that the hero has an overwhelming phobia about trains you've got a problem. In this story, management (probably) along with the graphics department wanted everything to look post-apocalyptic and the story people may have gone along with this not realizing that graphics of new things would appear old as well. Why? Because it is a mistake. It breaks immersion by removing the impact the main character has on the world. I don't paint 200 year-old paint jobs and if I had those kind of powers I'd be calling the seas to rise up and wash away humanity so that we may start again.

I just want to agree with you on this, to a point. Been following the whole paint thing for days now. I agree new paint should appear NEW. It should also require actual paint, even if you have to craft it first. Second the paint should appear faded and scratched, but only AFTER you have been in a battle, and the amount of fading and scratching should reflect the percentage of damage taken.

Again, if Neolithic mankind could devise it from around 6500BC and onwards, then I see no reason why post-apocalyptic FO4 mankind can't.

You're confusing the difficulty that lies in the production of modern day industrial concrete, in it's various forms for specific applications, with the surprising simplicity of basic concrete and concrete-like materials. The required cementation doesn't have come from relatively complicated cements like Portland cement or Roman cement.

Fairly certain I'm learning more following certain threads in this forum than in all my years in college....

Sadly, that is normally how things go. Now, your loan payments are due.

Bumping this thread for DLC wish/request. It's in the DC market...you should at least be able to use it as a shop and be able to send some followers there.

It would be neat if you could set up a shop in Diamond City, they don't have an "Armor dealer" so that would not conflict. The other possibility would be, if you set up a shop type that overrides one of the others, it causes a bunch of quests along the lines of the "crooked merchant" quests in Imperial City in Oblviion. Could be good for a DLC.

I think it would be neat to have the option (without console) to put all the workbenches inside Home Plate and to have at least one merchant there and to link it into the rest of the settlement network. Obviously the provisioner and brahmin should just make it to the front gate and despawn out until time elapsed and then they leave . . . else just stay in the area in front like the other traders do.