Fallout 4

[mandru]

Nice find but still very odd. 

Garden gnomes and teddy bear displays.  Sheesh.

[fragger]

Yeah, isn't it though? Some of these Fallout Land denizens are oddballs. For such wretched souls scratching out a measly living in a blasted post-Apocalyptic wasteland, they seem to have a surprising amount of time on their hands to play with things like teddy bears and mannikins - and in Far Harbor, garden gnomes

Almost two years I've been playing this game, and I ran into yet another character I haven't encountered before - some Scavenger/Raider-type dude named "Gruel". He wore some Raider Armor over Road Leathers and had a Chef's Hat on, and he was marked as a hostile and indeed he opened up on me when I got too close (as Scavs are often wont to do) but then he ran away after taking a few hits. I caught up with him and bashed him up, whereupon looting his body yielded a shopping list with a bunch of foodstuffs on it. There doesn't appear to be any kind of side quest associated with him or his list (he had some of the stuff in his list on him already), so I guess he's one of those rare random encounters who just appears for novelty's sake.

[PZ]

Still kind of cool 

[mandru]

Sometimes I shoot before I get a good grasp on unique opportunities.  Gruel was one such encounter that unfortunately happened when I was about 45 minutes into a long run of having not made any save points. 

I spotted him at long range, identified him as a raider, and killed him before I could squeeze any dialog out of him. 

It was only when I was scavenging him that I spotted that he had an actual name to go with the Chef's Toque and it occurred to me "Gee there might have been more to this guy if I wasn't so trigger happy." 


With the conclusion of Cappy in a Haystack (mission arc) I'm convinced the game developers missed a huge possible alternative ending for that story line.

We are given the two options to conclude that mission relating to John-Caleb Bradberton's last wish.  But something was nagging at me as being yet another possibility that could have led to an even better outcome for Bradberton and after all this time I finally hit on it.

To quote from the old TV show The Six Million Dollar Man's preamble "...Gentlemen, we can rebuild him.  We have the technology ...".

I think what might be more fun rather than my spelling out what could have been a possible mission path, I'll introduce an existing component of FO4 that I feel was overlooked and allow you to build your own conclusion.

Let me point out The Memory Den's Dr. Amari.  She has a very specific skill set that relates to both Nick Valentine's initial personality imprint and Curie's upgrade to Synth form.

I think that connecting the Dr. to the patient may have been an intriguing and as challenging as you care to make it addition to the story line. 

And think how happy Sierra Petrovita would have been if that path had been accommodated. 

[T.V.]

I was thinking in the same manner, and was thinking of a robobrain as the solution, but that would probably require both the Nuka-World and Automatron DLC's, so I concluded it could not be an option...

And think how happy Sierra Petrovita would have been if that path had been accommodated. 

She certainly would have been more happy than when I first accepted her jumpsuit, and then flipped the switch on Bradberton.... 
(Now her outfit decorates a mannequin in Sanctuary...)

[Art Blade]

 

[fragger]

mandru, I don't think you would have gotten anything out of Gruel anyway. When I first saw him from a distance and used V.A.T.S. to identify if he was friend or foe, his ID was in red for foe. And as soon as he saw me, he started to fight, so I don't think you can interact with him in any way.

Interesting speculation about Bradberton


I've been having some fun with the Animal Friend and Wasteland Whisperer perks. I never bothered with these perks in any earlier playthroughs, maybe because I never played up to this level before (155 now) and so I always focussed on other perks that I wanted more. I've now ranked both perks up to 3 (max), so if I pacify a critter, I can then order it around. It's fun to get command of a Mirelurk and turn it against others of its kind, or run around the countryside accompanied by a big Radscorpion instead of a dog I've yet to be able to endear a Deathclaw to myself, but apparently it is possible (the base chance of pacifying an animal is 40%).

I found out the hard way though that if you have command of a creature and you put your weapon away, the creature immediately turns hostile again. So it's gun out at all times when commanding a creature (I thought the game was glitching out or something until the penny dropped). According to the Wiki, it's also possible to pacify more than one creature at a time, but if you try to command more than one at a time, only whichever creature you commanded last will remain obedient. The others will revert to hostility.

[Art Blade]

funny story and good info. Cheers, fragger

[fragger]

Have any of you Faller-Outerers ever tried doing an "Amoral Combat" mission after completing Open Season in Nuka-World? These are the repeatable side quests from Fritsch, the raider who remains friendly even after Open Season and who runs Nuka-Cade.

I hadn't been inside Nuka-Cade since doing Open Season ages ago, and when I did finally go in, Fritsch told me there was someone coming through the Gauntlet and did I want to fight them in the Cola-Cars arena. I didn't realize these quests continued to be offered after Open Season, so I said yes, then made my way over to Cola-Cars.

Once inside the building, I immediately noticed something out of the ordinary. As I watched, more and more Raiders from the three original gangs began to appear, filing in and taking seats. They all had red tags indicating they were enemies, yet they didn't attack me even if I got right up in their faces. I couldn't interact with them either.

Turned out they'd come to watch the fight, from - somewhere.

So I went into the arena proper and the Gaunlet-runner appeared, some dude named "Wretch" in a suit of Raider Power Armor, and I dealt with him in pretty short order with a good hit of PsychoJet and the Spray-And-Pray.

BUT THEN - as soon as the fight was over, every raider in the place turned against me, and there was a heap of them - I lost count after THIRTY. THere were so many that their little red squares on my heading indicator made an almost solid red line. It was like Open Season all over again, except we were all inside the Cola-Cars building. Since they were all between me and the exits, I had to make a fighting retreat back through the arena and into the backstage area, where I could use the narrow hallways as choke points.

A hell of a fight ensued with much gunplay and chucking of grenades and Molotovs in both directions, but I made it out - with almost no ammo left and a collection of 28 assorted "handmade" weapons that I took off dead guys. There were bodies and bits thereof all over the place, and since it was often hard to tell who had formerly owned which body parts, I was unable to get an accurate count of the baddies. Best estimate was around 35.

Blimey... Well, I know where to go now if I feel like getting into a good argument. Next time though, I'll wep up better before I go in. I wasn't expecting that turn of events.

[Art Blade]

reading that made me chuckle all the way down the post

I had no idea. I'll have to try that next time I'm firing the game. I'm not sure Fritsch survived my version of Open Season so I'll have to check that out first (apart from the fact that there's no way around if I want to get one of his random quests) when I'm back in Nuka-World.

Coolio mate, and +1

[Dweller_Benthos]

Yeah that's interesting. I'm not sure if I did open season or not, I forget what state I left Nuka-World in when I left. I know I haven't been back there in a long time. I'm pretty sure I did do open season at one point but not sure if that's the save I continued to use after that. I'd have to go back and check and see what's going on there. But even if something like that did occur, I carry the explosive minigun with me, and it makes short w0#k of just about anything.

[fragger]

Thanks for the one-up, Art

D_B, I'm assuming that minigun is a Legendary variant? One which shoots explosive rounds would be okay. The standard ones are awfully weak for miniguns, I always thought.

I found a Legendary 10mm Pistol which fires explosive rounds and I modded it to be full-auto and beefed it up. Now it'll even bring down Deathclaws with relative ease.

I just reminded myself, I still haven't tried out that "Freezing Flamer" yet Can't remember if I sold it or not, it might still be in my "Ridiculous Weapons" cabinet, along with things like the Cryolator and the Junk Jet.

[Art Blade]

 

If I'm not mistaken, I too got that mini gun and I do believe it's a legendary one or perhaps even unique. I don't recall much of it because it takes up too much of my inventory, it's bloody heavy, and I got better weapons that weigh less

[Dweller_Benthos]

Yeah it's a legendary that is very over the top in damage. A deathclaw is dead before you can let go of the fire button, a mirelurk queen takes maybe a 2 second burst, hard to tell. Pretty much anything dies faster than you can react and stop firing. Someplace like Libertalia, the sunken ship raider base, you can pretty much clear out by spraying the whole thing from the water level and anyone on it is dead unless they are lucky enough to be in a closet where the explosions can't get to them.

[mandru]

Interesting, I never had the raiders show back up to view the arena events after I ran the purge on them.  It was sometime after that house cleaning before I happened upon Fritsch and he let me know there was still something going on that could be played through in NukaWorld.

There were three or four rounds of Amoral Combat before I faced the (I believe) BoS Paladin who awarded the legendary weapon.

Also wait until your opponent in Amoral Combat steps well out onto the Arena floor.  If you kill them too soon or possibly knock them back into the staging vestibule it locks up the event and you are not awarded the kill and any future rounds of opponents.