The thing is, you need to get involved with the different factions to progress through the game but there's no compulsion to remain loyal to them.

Right from the start I didn't like the look of Buzz Lightyear and his mates but they're useful to you.

If you really want to delve into the psychology of the game, the idea is that you should, ideally, take the "correct" follower with you depending on what sort of stuff you're doing.
If you're helping people then Piper or Curie will appreciate your actions.
If you're doing anything shady or underhanded then Cait or Deacon will approve.
If you're just killing things then it'll make Buzz Lightyear or Strong happy.

Of course, if you don't have ANY follower then that doesn't really matter but it's part of the reason for the way the various missions were designed.

The trick, with factions, is not to neglect any of them too much.
Do a mission for the Brotherhood and then do a mission for the Railroad and then one for the Institute.
To see as much as possible of what the game has to offer the trick is to avoid committing to one faction or another too quickly.
Importantly, the game WILL tell you if something you're about to do for one faction will make you a permanent enemy of another one so you can't just "accidentally" make a faction hostile and, without giving too much away, it's only right at the end that you are forced to make any irreversible decisions.

Eventually you'll get to the point when every faction will have a never-ending supply of radiant-quests you can do and you can use those missions to farm weapons, armor, ammunition and perks.
With the Minutemen it's the "help a settlement" quests, with the Railroad it's "Kill a synth" or "secure a cache" missions. It's "recon" or "search & destroy" missions for the Brotherhood and a similar thing for the Institute.

Even if you aren't particularly focused on finishing the game you can just avoid the main story missions and just do the radiant-quests forever or, at least, use them to farm stuff and improve your character.

I've run into a couple of glitches that aren't allowing me to progress certain missions (very minor side quest spoilers below):

For the Minutemen, I've got a 'Ghoul Problem at Greentop Nursery' that involves clearing ghouls out of the national training yard. Problem is I have been in that area already which I think has messed it up as it is asking me to clear the ghouls in the yard area itself, which is protected by a master level terminal. This is a low level minutemen quest so something is clearly wrong here.

Secondly for the US Constitution quest I need to repair the Poseidon radar transmitter but selected a dialogue option that meant it's location was never marked on my map. I googled where it was meant to be found, went there, cleared it and checked the box it's supposed to be in, but it hasn't appeared.

Oh yes, I also can't complete the Silver Shroud because the dude who runs Good neighbour can be my follower now, so the quest dialogue I need doesn't appear

I'm playing on ps4. Any quick fixes or will I simply have to wait until I get enough intelligence to fix the transmitter and hack the terminal?

POSSIBLE SPOILERS

I seem to be stuck on the From Within mission for the brotherhood, I need to find evidence for doctor li but I can't use the master terminal so tried the FEV labs route and came to a door that has no way to open it. I've been to virgil's lab before to get the serum and had no problem but now I have no idea how to get there without opening this door.

If it's key to completing the quest search all of area including the people you have killed as one of them have the password/key to allow you to open the door.

That's the problem I haven't killed anyone and when I watch videos of the mission on youtube the door is already open. I'll probably have to get Piper to hack the terminal and use the other entrance.

So it's Cait who does the hacking but only up to expert. FFS.

I had that problem. You need to make him a follower then the dialogue should appear.

I have the Road to Freedom quest listed, but it doesn't show as a marker on my map so I'm not sure what to do about it.


Yes. That's why I didn't want to put myself under Paladin Danse's orders. The game made it sound like a commitment that I don't want to make yet.


Hmm. Ok, thanks. I won't worry about it so much then.

I can't remember the starting point for this quest but you need to follow a red brick path around boston until you eventually reach a church and they hidden underneath there.

its by the lake where that Swan boss is

I was well into the game before I started on any of the faction quests. Up at level 70 and over 200 hours before I met the leader of the Brotherhood. Only just started with the Railroad last night (lvl 78, 230 hours) and on my way to the Institute for the first time.
Like you I didn't want to commit to anyone too early in my playthrough. So I did pretty much everything else first. But just becoming an Initiate with Danse's crew opens up the radiant quests.

Don't use companions at all. Other than the forced use of Danse a couple of times and Dogmeat.
Don't use Power Armour that much either. Just when I'm stomping around the Glowing Sea.


I think you just need to wait until you get the master rank of Hacker for the Minuteman quest.
Have you tried going back to the Constitution to rerun the conversation?
Just have Hancock follow you and then speak to him and the option will come up to speak about the quest. He will return to Goodneighbour at the end of that part of the quest (at least he did for me and I had to track him back there instead of where I parked him in Sanctuary).

It sounds like you're trying to get into the training yard at the door where you're supposed to leave.

If I recall rightly, wiping out ghouls in the National Guard depot involved going in through the double front doors of the admin (?) building, passing through a locked gate (which has a key available in the area) and an "outdoor corridor" and then into the barracks and finally out through a small side-door which IS controlled by a terminal inside a fenced porch.

I had a similar problem with Hancock at one point - I was on a mission with him which required me to contact him as part of the mission.
It SHOULD be possible to access the correct dialogue when talking to him.
Click "talk" and then select the "talk" sub-option and the quest related dialogue SHOULD be there along with "thoughts?" and "relationship".
Failing that, you can also dismiss him (don't do this right next to an exit from the area) and then walk after him, talk to him to get the quest-related dialogue and then talk to him again to get him to follow you again.

I'm not entirely sure what's going on in the USS Constitution missions but I think the options for cheaping-out on the fixes are intended for people who plan on betraying the robots and then looting the ship.
It might be worth just loading a savegame from before you went through the dialogue with the Captain and doing that bit again.
Alternatively, you can just ignore that quest for a while and then farm your science (?) perks until you are capable fixing the navigation array without having to find any spare parts for it.


Also, Cait is NOT the follower who can hack terminals, or Piper for that matter.
It's Nick Valentine you need to hack terminals.
Cait's special ability is lock-picking and Piper's is being annoyingly good-natured.

Incidentally, it's pretty easy to gain sufficient perks to allow you to hack terminals but then, if you're finding actually hacking them to be difficult, there are app's available for your smartphone which allow you to type in the words and it'll figure out the solution.

Just type "fallout 4 terminal hack" into the android or iphone store and you'll find a heap of suitable apps.

Are you my twin?
I am literally just where you are but level 61. Just got quest from Virgil for his serum in the institute and last night met Deacon for the first Railroad quest.

Question for you and other high levels. I am playing on hard and it is starting to get easy so thinking of switching to very hard but wary that the enemies will be harder the more I get into the main quest. There were new types of ghoul in one of my missions last night that were tough. I don't use power armour so can be blown up/one-shotted at times. Any tips?

Also, does anyone play on survival mode? Is it a pain to play or worth trying? Is it much harder?

It's just the way I always play Bethesda games. I ignore the main quest as long as possible. I still haven't finished the main story on Skyrim (had it on 360 since launch day, PS3 for 3 years & PC for 2 years).

I started on hard too. I did up it to v.hard before I went to the Glowing Sea. Wasn't too bothersome. A few Legendary Albino Deathclaws/Radscorpions. Nothing I couldn't handle. By the time I left I had one damaged piece of PA (a red left leg) from an attack by a pack of 3 Deathclaws.
Taken out a couple more Coursers without too much fuss as well.

Will do survival mode next playthrough. Apparently it's just the same but with bullet-sponge enemies.

Hmmm, might up it to v. hard then as the glowing sea was not challenging enough

I'm the same with Bethesda games, though I do get round to the main quest eventually.
The only one I did not finish I think was Daggerfall cause it was so huge, or maybe Tribunal.

In regards to the National Guard Training Yard, there's definitely no key available, nor anywhere else to go. There is the building itself, which has an upstairs and a downstairs, and then there is a locked door (terminal master locked) which presumably leads out to the training yard.

In terms of the USS Constitution, yep, it seems as though I'm just going to have to boost my intelligence stats - I believe a rank of 8+ is needed. I'm currently at a 5, mentats will boost me to 7 (I think?) and then I think I have a hat that boosts it by a further one, so I can probably do that now. I have heard though that apparently once that quest glitches in that way, it fully glitches - I'll be sent for something else next and the same thing will happen. We'll see.

Got Silver Shroud working through your fix though, thanks. Just made Hancock my follower and the dialogue options appeared.

I have been playing this game for about a week and am very addicted. 😆

First of this type of game I have played and absolutely love it. I have been doing the main quest line here and there but all the side quests are so fun I can sense this game taking me ages to complete, which is good.

I am a fan of the Tomb Raider games but they are always so quick to finish. This just seems like you have hours and hours of gameplay and can almost stretch it out as long as you like.

I am on Xbox One, if anyone can recommend other similar games, please do.

Went on to play this evening and my save has been corrupted 😡😡😡 Need to start way back at the beginning again (I had just got to the mission where I had to find the detective)

I've not had a chance to play it for a few hours at a time solid so hadn't got too into it but I had time tonight to give it a good go but can't be bothered now 😭

I'm very much like you. I really enjoyed F3 and I'm finding F4 very similar but with factions added on and of course the settlement building is new. I could well do without the factions and I find the power armour a bit of a drag, but after building one settlement I became a bit hooked on it! Arranging food, beds and defence can be quite satisfying, and getting settlers to turn up by erecting a beacon is good. I usually turn it off and dismantle it once I've got enough folks to tend the crops and man the defences.
I've spent so long rsing about like this that after 50 hours I've only just started on the main quest.....

Okay, if you've got into the admin building you should see there's a door behind a cage that's locked with a terminal on the right somewhere?
That door leads to the corridor that leads into the barracks where the mission-critical baddie is always waiting in the toilets.

The password for that terminal is definitely supposed to be somewhere in that building.
I think it is found in the upstairs office where you'll also find a dead BOS knight who's part of the "Lost Patrol" quest.

It's one of those items which, once you've found it, it remains in your inventory forever (I've been through that location several times and I've never needed to re-find it) but it might be either found by looking at the terminal in the office or, perhaps, by playing a holotape.
Is it possible that you picked up a holotape from that office and then dumped it without playing it?
If you've got a box to store all the junk you can't carry, perhaps there's a holotape in it that'll get you through that door?

Honestly though, I'm pretty sure that all you're supposed to have to do is look at a terminal (the one in the office) to get the password.


The settlements in F4 are a really interesting idea.

It's quite impressive the way they've managed to balance the game so that you don't actually NEED them and you can get through the game purely by scavenging but how, if you DO bother to indulge in managing settlements, they can form a big part of the way you do things.

Not only do they provide direct benefits, such as providing food, water and junk which can all be refined into useful things but the more settlements you have the more radiant quests they'll provide and, thus, there'll be more loot, more caps, more baddies to shoot and more perks to be gained.
And, of course, every settlement (especially once you set up supply lines) provides a safe-haven where you can upgrade your kit, fix your power-armor and sell all your loot if you've built all the right resources.

It can also be compulsive to try and turn each bomb-site into a "perfect" settlement.
Some sites are easy to manage but some (such as Hangman's Alley or Jamaica Plain) can be a real challenge to turn into something decent.

I'm not especially keen on the way the fast-travel allows you to "teleport" around the map, shoot all the baddies and then "teleport" straight back to your home-base so I like the idea of using the settlements as staging-posts for my missions.

The one thing I keep seeing in most comments about F4 is that it's simply PLAYING the game that people are finding enjoyable, rather than actually moving through it and attempting to beat it.
It's got to be satisfying for a game dev' to see that kind of feedback.
They haven't just created a game that people are trying to complete. They've created a world that people want to explore.

It's a good idea to quicksave often in these type of games.
Also, you can get it to autosave on various actions as well.

Fallout 3, Oblivion, Morrowind, Skyrim - all Bethesda

On the Xbox one, Has to be The Witcher 3.

If you got the physical copy (not sure if the downloadable version had it) you should have got a copy of Fallout 3 too. Highly recommended.
If you've got a last gen machine or PC, Zofo's list is all quality. To add to that list there's also Fallout: New Vegas as well.


Haven't had a problem with save corruption until the last week or so. Seems that every time I save it corrupts. Although it always has a duplicate save at the exact same time???
I have now taken to double saving just to be sure.


Of my 230+ hours, I'd say at least 60-70 hours have been spent on settlement projects. And they're not even perfect.
My next playthrough will have less settlements though. Sanctuary, Castle, Prydwen/Airport (as these are forced on you anyway) Egret, Hangman and either Croup Manor or the Lighthouse. Maybe one other.

Power Armour isn't that bad. I'm glad they changed it. I stopped using it in New Vegas. Especially after Fallout 3 and the Winterised T-51b that was unbreakable.
It is useful though. I upped the difficulty and went down to the Glowing Sea and got attacked by a pack of Deathclaws. Without PA I would have died for sure.


Count me in that group.
All the negative comments about ropey graphics and such just wash over me. The world is fantastic. I love exploring and reading all the notes (Super Mutant Orders being my favourite, lol) and terminals. I am the same in the Elder Scrolls series. I like to read the books and various scrolls you find. And keep pretty much everything I find.

I'm at the point now where I need to decide on which faction to go with now.

Question wrt factions:


PS: I found Dogmeat now. He was hiding in a kennel in Sanctuary Hills.