5 Easy Ways to Fix The Railroad In Fallout 4
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- čas přidán 5. 05. 2023
- Are you among the majority of fallout 4 players who have a very slight intense hatred for the Railroad? well you're not alone. we thought it would be good fun to continue our series on improving the factions in Fallout 4 by addressing the worst faction in all of fallout.
- Hry
There should have been a way to convince Desdemona that she could actually trust the Minute Men.
I agree, a Railroad-Minutemen alliance might as well be the Institute's worst nightmare
Yeah, Railroad essentially becomes the Minutemen's intelligence agency.
@@windwalker5765 vs sturges and virgil intelligence.
I play Minutemen in every playthrough since you get to build them up. Yet I still disagree. The Minutemen let too many Wastelanders in their ranks and they have their own internal problems. They don't screen enough people and Institute synths sometimes infiltrate and replace settlers. Too many problems. The only thing I can see is giving Minutemen fire support to Railroad agents that request it when compromised.
@@ayythatsmikey The Minutemen give the Railroad their support while they give them intel, that sounds like a deal we could make as General
Railroad is a pretty cool concept but execution wasn’t what it should’ve been
Fallout 4 in a nutshell
I like it conceptually more as a minor faction than a major. I like the idea of an anti-institute major faction. But a major faction that seeks to free runaway androids? Where do they get the support and funds? Why would any but a small minority of people in the wasteland even care? How can they possibly compete with the Brotherhood’s military might, Institute technology, or Minutemen manpower for control? Idk. They just don’t make sense to me a major power contender.
@@harambe855They should’ve been like the BOS in FONV, a minor faction that you have to encounter/talk to for most of the factions, and you can decide from there.
@@codeinecowboy8607 yeah, that is why it receives so much hate - if it was just bad, people simply wouldn't care, but Fallout 4 has a lot of potentially cool things, which inevitably disappoint you as you progress
@@harambe855 The Railroad always strikes me as a minor faction with a major plot impact. Good writing could find the potential in that discrepancy, but, well...
My biggest annoyance with the Railroad is that they don't seem to have their own story. The vast majority of the Railroad questline is infiltrating the Institute. They're not spying on the Brotherhood of Steel or the Minutemen, which is another missed opportunity. There also isn't an option to create an alliance between them and the Minutement and/or the Brotherhood of Steel. Yes, I get it, they are diametrically opposed to the Brotherhood in terms of how they think about synths, but that would be part of the challenge.
Yeah I feel like it's weird the Railroad doesn't have the option to ally with Minutemen and/or form a truce with the Brotherhood.
I also always found the brotherhood attacking the Railroad... odd. Like it just feels forced because realistically there's minimal reason to waste resources attacking the Railroad.
Being able to make a truce with the Brotherhood to allow them to work together to stop the institute would have been far more interesting.
@@HowlingDoomYeah, the BoS attacking the Railroad always stood out to me. Like, they're not allied with the Institute, if anything they stand against them for similar reasons to the BoS. So Elder Maxon asking the SS to turn on them and eliminate them just felt so out of place that it felt like a fever dream.
Those would be great options for sure. Especially an alliance with the minutemen. I guess they just have a hard time trusting people. As for thr brotherhood of steel, the only reason I could see for having the brotherhood take out the railroad was just Maxon and his fanaticism
Because BOS didn't mobilize their ship to commonwealth yet and Minutemen was broken statue
@@BrightWulphi disagree. Maxon know they are smuggling synths out of the commonwealth. No railroad=no smuggling= easier to find and kill synths.
I feel like there should have been better ways to join the Railroad instead of the Freedom Trail. My suggestion is modifying the Covenant quest. First off, Nick Valentine contacts you and says he has a missing persons case in a place he can't go. Covenant doesn't allow synths in, so the player has to be Nick's eyes and ears. You go through the quest and rescue the woman (who you suspect is a synth). Then, Honest Dan reveals himself to be Deacon, in disguise. The mission was a test, to see how you'd respond to synths.
That would have been a neat idea! Definitely better than what we got. Their password was "railroad" ffs. No wonder their last headquarters got overrun.
If Boston didn't lag so much I wouldn't mind the Freedom Trail.
I'd leave the freedom trail, but as a procedure of showing your intentions to join them; like, you walk it, solve a some sort of puzzle at the end in the north old church - and discover nothing but an empty basement. However, this initiates their quest, with Nick Valentine receiving the case you mentioned in three game days after you walked the freedom trail
While I do agree with your verdion, I do like the freedom trail also. However, instead of making the Church the main hub, its just a meeting point for recruiters to meet you. Deacon beinf the one that waits for you there (since he has been keeping an eye on you after all). So when you get there, you are met with him, and after he tests you with some basic questions, he takes you to Desdemoa, qhere deoending on your accomplishments, she accepts you outright (killing a Courser is the top like in the game), or doesnt acceot you yet until you've proven yourself to her. And for God sake, make killing Kellog a BIG DEAL!
Fuck that's good
Nice suggestions- I like the MILA questline alteration since it just makes sense and you would get to spend more time with Glory, maybe getting more of her back story.
It would also make her death much more impactful
A negotiated settlement ending would make them FAR more interesting.
Loved the railroad's concept. I really wanted to feel all sneaky and be a James Bond character in Fallout. Turns out after the first like 3 main quests for them nothing feels like you're changing things around you. The minutemen cement this the most in having you make bases.
The Railroad should have had more psy-op stuff in it.
Funny you mention WRVR. If you bring X6-88 there, he mentions the Institute monitors the station to make sure the Railroad isn't using it for the exact purpose you proposed.
Yeah that was one of the few things I didn't agree with. The Institute are smart, but also arrogant. Every solution has to be a high tech and convoluted, the Railroad using and organising themselves via comparatively primitive methods allows them to operate under the Institute's nose.
@@RJALEXANDER777 That just sounds like an excuse, not even a good one. That holds ZERO value when you HAVE to consider that Kellog was always in the picture (before we blew his brains out). He was far more adaptable and logical. What he said and did was uncontested. No one in the institute stood in his way during a mission, so he had the authority to force the Institute how and where to look.
@@midgetman4206 Well the institute was on it's last legs before we show up, so clearly he was doing something right.
I've been working on a RR overhaul for the past two years. Your RR sign idea is good, and some people pointed out that if the weather went south that you wouldnt be able to notice them. In my idea, they're still symbols, but painted with an invisible ink that becomes florescant while wearing certain lenses. The making of these lenses is mostly just Fallout super chemistry style BS but doing it this way allowed me to give the RR a low tech style upper hand on the institute since they wouldnt have access to this concoction used for these special glasses. Kinda like how NW bottle cap glasses work i spose.
My only regret on it is the fact that, for the story bit of it, I couldnt use really anyone in the RR without messing with vanilla quests and voices. I have quest ideas to get the RR their own Vertibird meant specifically for transport with no weapons platforms, cloaking technology, night vision, and even ideas for more ranks in general. It may never see the light of day, but it's fun to think of ways to improve on the underdog of the factions. I love the RR because no one else will. :)
I liked them because they weren't evil. Also, yeah, the spy goggles were also in Point Lookout as the Cryptochromatic Spectacles, so it's an established piece of worldbuilding.
When you say “working on” do you mean making the mod or just thinking about possible overhaul ideas, because if you are making a mod I just want to pitch in they need more bases, having just the one and the quests to make safe houses is silly, and more caches, I feel that rail sign is never used
It's funny, but a throw away line about 'inspired by this old theme park' on this idea would have ended up as great foreshadowing of Nuka World.
the railroad really should've been a minor faction instead of a major one. it has literally zero purpose after liberating the synths. thats like making the boomers from FNV a faction you can go storm the hoover dam with: it makes zero sense
That was my thought exactly: The Railroad should have been more along the lines of the Boomers in New Vegas. A minor faction with some really cool toys & definitely worth recruiting if you are going for certain endings, but a minor one nonetheless.
Being able to create alliances between certain groups would've been good. Particularly since the Minutemen going after the brotherhood & the brotherhood wiping out the RR are both kind of out of the blue. Until that point it's almost like each exists in a vacuum.
Show us the friction growing between the brotherhood & other groups.
Railroad as a minor faction that if you’re allied with them alters your main faction questline would be nice. Railroad institute being reform the institute style, railroad minutemen trying to make the commonwealth safe for synths, railroad brotherhood needing the Herculean task of convincing Maxson of his hypocrisy as a cyborg or the brotherhood will simply eat the railroad and steal their tech
What to fill in the main faction gap? … the gunners? That would make the main factions two pairs of staunchly opposed factions, while in theory factions can ally with either of the main factions not in their pair. Gunners questline could be something like the Survivor essentially hiring them; taking the role not as a member of the faction, but as a client. If you can’t pay in caps you can pay in favors like wiping out the last of the minutemen.
I kinda wish they started off in their first base and then in their quest line much like the Bos did attack the safe house forcing them to locate(maybe to a settlement you have taken) and then make you go back with deacon to retrieve data and carringtons prototype. Would be a fun way to make the railroad a more interesting faction and if we got to know some of these other characters and even have them die in the institutes attack would be better for us to empathize with them
The Switchboard wasn't their first base. Most of the Railroad's backstory is obscure in the game but in canon the Railroad has been active since at least the early 2260's (over 25 years before Fallout 4). The Gen 3 synths have been known about since the Broken Mask incident in 2229 (only 2 years after Shaun was taken). It's a good idea but the problem is the story has the Railroad be on the backfoot after recently losing the Switchboard and 4 of their current 8 Safehouses (they lose 2 more over the course of the game). There are a lot of good ideas in the Railroad or what they could have done with the faction but like with the Minutemen they feel halfbaked.
I think the fact that you don't know of any other Heavies can be explained by cell organization. They aren't in your cell, you didn't need to know.
One thing that put me off railroad is that it is their standard procedure to erase and replace the memories and personalities of the synths that they breakout, at least some of rich need up being particularly tough raiders. So their not helping those synths because they are gone, other synths have to deal with increased suspicion and everyone else gets even more problems.
Honestly my number 1 issue with railroad is thematic dissonance.
The game markets the Railroad as this stealth secret society that at least in central boston has information network as good as the institute and how they hide in plain sight.
But you find their base in 5 minutes, and all of their quests can be described as "stealth is optional"
There should have been massive stealth bonuses for their quests, or at the very least make the combat encounters push the player to avoid open conflict by having lots of high tier enemies in them.
My biggest desire is a Railroad/Minutemen alliance, since the Railroad has the same goals as the minutemen, they just focus on synths.
9:37 I believe that it is explained in a line that the Railroad doesn't have enough numbers to *hold* the Institute. They can assault it, and reach the reactor to blow it up, but not hold onto the location indefinitely. Reinforcements (synths still in the surface like University Point or Coursers on missions) can return, and that's not even including the resisting Institute scientists
One thing that bugs me with the railroad is their HQ. Minute men have a castle. Brotherhood has a armored blimp, institute is an awesome sci-fi compound. Railroad has a mourge underneath a dusty church filled with ghouls. The secret FBI Base under the doughnut shop should have been their actual HQ, waaay cooler.
Also, the crypt only has two entrances. I feel like it would've made more sense to be connected to... hear me out... the actual subway tunnels (Because they're the underground railroad)... without complete control over the system, but with enough ability to navigate it that they could basically enter anywhere in the commonwealth and find their way to their base. Or the sewers, but the smell might give them away.
Problem with the railroad is that they're ultimately useless, I cant think of a single goal for them to have after wiping out the institute (or joining them) , the other factions atleast have something
Institute keeps doing Institute things
BoS continues their search for technology
Minutemen keep trying to protect settlements.
Whats the point of the railroad's existence after the institute is wiped out?
Their point is to help escaped synths. If they don't need to exist anymore, _then they've won._
They're the only Faction that actually accomplishes its goal - destroy institute, free synths.
@@auguste418 I wouldn't say they freed the synths....more just dammed them to extinction
@@bossy1496 Well it's not like they want to reproduce. They want to fit in with the wasteland, not be a subcategory of humans.
I think the best ending for the railroad is one where the minutemen general is also a railroad agent. Then they can work as like a separate Bureau in a potential new CPG dedicated to protecting the rights of synths in the commonwealth
In all my years, I didn't know mercer safe house was randomized.
For me it was always taffington boathouse
If I'm not mistaken, Dima will say that there will be no more synths now, if you tell him that the Institute is destroyed. That would mean that synths are indeed infertile. Which I always assumed from the start anyway.
Dima is also known for being an unreliable/untrustworthy narrator, so it's possible he's just wrong
Nice video. You definitely earned a sub. In terms of ending, I think there is a mod called "Subversion" on Nexus, where the sole survivor could lie to father about destroying the railroad, take control of the Institute and grant all synth human rights in a board of director meeting. The player could even spare the brotherhood and replacing Maxson with a synth to guarantee peace, or do it the old way. The idea of the mod is very nice and they even remade the NV slide-show style ending.
I would like to see more railroad missions that actually do secret agents stuff. There are just so many wasted opportunity. How about a quest line where Tinker Tom further researches into Courser chips and ends up finding some ring 0/bootloader level bugs that would allow railroad agents to reprogram lesser synth and shut down Coursers during battle, and the player given a perk that would allow them to do this. Or using MILA as triangulation devices to pinpoint where the Classic Radio is from, what it is used for and provide an entire alternative quest line to get inside the Institute.
It feels like every time someone on the quest team suggested something more ambiguous than pure black and white or more complex than "now go blow up that place" they got shot down by Todd, because everything in the game should be understandable and fun for an 8-year-old.
it’s callled a spy ring, you don’t ever see the whole thing even if you’re in charge of it. Those railroaders manning checkpoints were hidden before because it wasn’t safe to publicly be a Railroad member, but when it is they come crawling out of the woodwork.
Shockingly good ideas each one; rich and diverse. Just goes to show that we should get into the weeds -- there are precious things to be found in them.
I wish when you met the railroad for the first time and give all the pro-institute and anti-synth answers, then they'll try and kill you and then the faction will permanently be hostile to you. Imo it'd pair nice with a mod that adds back the "hit squads" that the NCR and Legion sent out on you in FNV, if a mod like that even exists
I liked the rail road until I tried to work for them while playing survival mode. "Okay we want you to go to a dead drop far in the North, so you can complete a mission just outside the glowing sea." After that experience I began to see their flaws a lot more than ever before.
I think the railroad should've also been able to move back the old hq, switch wire I think? Idk, after you take out the institute so it feels like they at least have their own proper hq and you see them improve from your actions. Hell even the minutemen get this
I played Railroad in my first and only full playthrough so I’m more of a fan than most (and it might be because I love Deacon)
If I were to fix the railroad it would be through, honestly, a complete rewrite. The railroad would still be at the switchboard, and the switchboard falling would be a very end game plot point just before you move to destroy the institute. Bethesda loves to tell but never show, all the interesting plot points and character development happens well off screen.
If they're based on the underground Railroad, why not just hang out in the subway? Lot of entrances and exits to sneak in and out of (more if you're willing to leave via the sewers).
@@RorikH RIGHT
@@RorikH The church is such a stupid base. Why are there still skeletons in it just lying around when they're sleeping there. Bethesda refuses to acknowledge the existence of brooms.
@Katherine Novella Are their skeletons in the base part or just the entrance, and either way, If I were them I'd be more concerned about the feral ghouls.
@@RorikH In the base. Like 4 feet away from their beds
A massive advantage they have at least is that their radiant quests don't have a %90 chance of forcing another settlement down your throat that you have to drop everything you're doing to feed and bed another set of grown adults only to have them somehow get kidnapped out from under 9 sentry guns.
How to make everyone choo-choo-choose Railroad, every time:
+Minutemen and Institute are the only main routes
+To beat Institute Minutemen recruit allies
+one and only one of Railroad or (small strike force of) BoS is mandatory
+BoS are also mutually exclusive with THE ATOM CATS
I SERIOUSLY doubt the Atom Cats would be cool with the the techno-fascists.
MILA is not a radiant quest, it ends when you place all of them. Not knowing this is too common in the fandom.
by that logic all the minutemen quests to take new settlements aren't radiants either because there's only 37 of them. they are still procedurally generated quests, set in random locations, in no particular order... that's pretty much the definition of a radiant quest.
Maybe it's my knee-jerk reaction as a Mass Effect fan, but Cerberus's ramp-up in two years after producing 'a single frigate' is pretty well justified. It is well established in the games, time in and time out that the Normansy S-R1 was a ,arvel of stealth technology, but that the S-R2 is literally the single most technologically advanced ship in the Alliance navy. In ME3 when you start to collect war assets, just the Normandy and it's crew are worth more than any of the other single-ticket items on the list. It is a single ship that punches in the same weight class as remnant fleets, Krogan battalions and entire Divisions of Alliance Marines or Turian soldiers. So, the fact that Cerberus took so long to build a single ship makes more sense. It wasn't 'a single ship'. It was *the* ship. Also, we have only hearsay that Cerberus had to pour all it's resources into the Normandy, plus, keep in mind that this is an organization built entirely on the back of secrecy. They may well have wanted everyone to believe they were not as strong as they truly were by having Miranda and Jacob say such things, or they may have been telling the truth, but they had been building their fleets in secret for years prior, a concept which makes perfect sense when we think of the fact that Cerberus is a huge prescence even before the events of ME2, with bases in the fringes of the galaxy and the power to assasinate Alliance admirals. They may well have had all their warships and most of their ground troops availible in advance, ready for any eventuality, but because they are a group who base themdelves entirely off of being secretive, they were just hiding their true strength. There are a million ways to explain, without plotholes, in-lore how Cerberus could be as strong as it became in ME3, so, I don't think your criticisim of the way Cerberus was handled is at all warranted.
Good video. But in "using things that trigger geiger counter to hide message" part, isn't it will be useless when the Commonwealth got struck by a radioactive storms? What if time presses and the weather decided to turn "haha rads goes brrrrrt"
that is a good point.
Or, it could be "based on" how a Geiger counter functions and would display on the HUD as a separate color or make a different sound.
Your analysis is great and the ideas presented all have merit and would've been great additions to the Railroad.
The issue is... it's Bethesda. Since Oblivion, their focus has been on pumping out trash for profit instead of actually having devs with the ability to think analytically.
The whole encryption over the radio thing reminds me so much of a video, "turning the titan missile key" where a guy explains the launching process of a ICBM. Calling back to that using radio encryption would have been amazing
Yeah the thing with radio transmissions.... the fact the Railroad did not use this for themself is baffling. Especially when they tell you that the classical radio station signal has harmonics that carry informations to trace coursers. Imagine if they had used that like for example RDS (Radio Data Service) for an FM Radio Station is transmitting Text infos for Song names or Station names and radio Clock time-sync signals. I mean this tech exists and it could have easily existed in the Fallout universe as well, to transmit simple digital informations to all Railroad agents.
Id say the biggest oddity is how long the "Continue to work with Father" part lasts, it takes until "End of the Tracks" coming up for an event to trigger that wraps that up. (Also ever wonder how a pro Railroad synth in the Institute finds out the BoS found the Railroad?)
Maybe an alternative could of beem "Continue to work with Father or talk to (Synth name) to start the battle now" the earlier you do it the harder the battle is and less well armed the rebel synths are.
But you wouldnt have to do the awkward thing of delivering a speech or attend meetings if you dont want to, adding to player choice.
I also like your alternative to the Nuclear Option.
Yeah it's a bit of a letdown on how much of the Institute quest-line has to be done before the player stops "continuing to work with Father" though it does make it a bit amusing that you can decide to destroy the BoS as the Railroad and only afterwards decide whether to quickly destroy the Railroad to get the Nuclear Family ending or start the Nuclear Option (Railroad) mission. It's probably the easiest way to get both achievements without replaying the game if you don't mind the Railroad endgame but I was disappointed that I could do that.
As for how a pro Railroad synth discovers how the BoS found the Railroad the Institute is monitoring the BoS's coms, and as the Sole Survivor has become a rather known name in the Commonwealth and is a known enemy of the BoS by this time the BoS are likely monitoring the Sole Survivor (regardless of whether they were once a Knight). I think it's a shame no faction calls you out that you can be working for the Institute, Railroad, and BoS while also the defacto leader of the Minutemen, and the player can almost never use their membership as a bargaining chip with a different faction.
You definitely hit the nail on the head with the radiant quests; I'm sick of Drummer Boy running up to me to tell me that someone wants a word.
Implementing even some of your suggestions would go a good way to improving the storytelling and gaming experience. I downloaded a mod on my third playthrough which used diplomacy, and some aggressive negotiations for those who wouldn't get with the program...
Although some people might find it boring, I would’ve loved to help negotiate a treaty. Hold up the Institute and through speech options and checks you negotiate a favorable outcome for the Railroad. Faction relations and compromise is so interesting to me. I think it also is a fascinating ending to have the Institute still exist but have them treat Synths better and no longer force them to spy on the Commonwealth.
I thought it was really interesting how you said people don't see the Railroad as a "real" faction. I agreed, but it took me a minute to figure out why.
I think I take issue with the fact that, the first time you roll up to the Railroad's headquarters, literally half the named characters roll out to greet you, including the faction leader. Desdemona, Glory, Deacon, Drummer Boy. There are like maybe two or three other named Railroad characters you meet over the course of the game, and that's about it.
The Minutemen, you meet Preston right away, but that's basically because he's the only one left. The Institute, the faction leader is literally your child, so it's understandable that he'd show up in person. The Brotherhood, your first interaction with them is with a smaller squad, and you don't even meet Maxon until after you've already dealt with Danse (probably) and seen the giant airship.
I know they wanted to give the impression that the Railroad is down on their luck at the moment, but honestly they didn't feel like an organization that could hold their own against Brotherhood and the Institute. They felt like a group of 20 people camping in a basement.
This would be worth a RR play through. I get a mod to unlock ballistic weave just to avoid them. The running joke is just slaughtering them when you have the courser chip and doing it yourself
Great point about the Railroad blowing up The Institute instead taking it over or negotiating for the synths. I always thought it was weird that they're so protective of synths, but also doom their future, although we don't really know if Gen 3 synths live a long time of just a normal human lifespan. I always wondered if the child Shaun synth would ever grow up or remain a child forever. It's also a rather sick joke by Father to program Shaun to think it's Nate or Nora's son, as it's really just a reminder of the life and family that they lost.
Negotiating for the synths wouldnt really make sense. I mean, the goal should be to stop the production of synths entirely, which would be accomplished by destroying the lab or forcing the institute to a hault.
Since synths cant reproduce, stopping their production should be the ultimate goal, because then no more new synths would be created.
Exactly, the creator treats synth production ending as a bad thing from the view of the railroad, but the railroad doesn't want synths to be like separate people that reproduce, they want to stop the inhumane practice of subjecting sentient beings to slavery then once that is stopped they want to stop production of those sentient beings.
personally I think Bethesda could have made it so the player has to join the Minutemen then Gravy tells the player that most of the Minutemen broke off and formed the Gunner faction so that would be the first half of the game then the player has to choose which faction the Minutemen should ally with either the Institute, the Brotherhood, or the Railroad but all of the options would be blocked until the player deals with the main quest that I would call "Minutemen Divided" then once the player reunites the Minutemen then that when you would hear about the Cambridge Police Station and Brotherhood units needing help as well as the follow the freedom trail and the institute
There's an interesting bit when you first meet the Railroad I feel could have been better utilized. When Desdemona asks if you are willing to put your life on the line for a synth, if you answer 'No' then she says it's probably best if you don't work together going forward. However, Deacon will explain that Des is a bit of a "hard-liner" and he gets that you don't want to risk your life for a synth, but offers the alternative of just wanting to hurt the institute and says some of their members operate in this capacity, which Des is okay with.
I always felt that this narrative fit the main character better since you have recently learned that the Institute is responsible for the death of your spouse and kidnapping your son. You wouldn't necessarily care about synths at this point, you just want to get Shaun back and make the Institute pay. So I took this option hoping it would make a difference, but no. Everything else proceeds as normal, which as outlined in this video, isn't great.
The only other option I've found for going against this forced narrative is when Des tells you to seek out the Patriot upon entering the Institute. You can tell her 'No' because you don't want to compromise your true goal of finding your son, but you're still forced to go along with it because this game is rife with the illusion of choice. At this point I just ended up killing Father because I don't believe he's your son anyway and forcing the mission to rescue synths to fail. Des will mention getting help from the minutemen, then stop working with you. I'm more satisfied with this ending than any of the actual endings. Now the main character is free to do w/e the F they want in this new world and leave the factions to deal with themselves.
"get help from the Minutemen"? After telling their General to fuck off? Another fine example of Bugthesda writing everyone!
I didn't have those problems with the radiants. Every time I came back to Tom to turn in, he'd hand me another MILA. Same with PAM, though Carrington left me alone.
Mercer safehouse spawned at Jamaca Plain, a location I was yet to even unlock. I was able to make it almost invisible. If you were a raider strolling by, you'd never know it was there. Though I was expecting to be given some synths to look after. I feel bad for the Caretaker, completely by himself, out in the middle of nowhere.
Everything else I more or less agree with. You can tell the Railroad was Bethesda's less loved middle child.
With the radiants I really just wish they'd made the Mila's smaller and given you all of them at once. It's always really annoying to come upon a MILA spot while not having the quest active and just having to walk away even though you climbed all of the way up there.
Imagine taking over Gunner Plaza and then populating it with "friendly gunners" to serve as cover for the station working double duty as gunner comms and the railroad's when necessary.
This series of videos needs to be tweeted at the Fallout 4 devs.
They really needed way more actual stealth stuff. I get that they already had stealthy guys and didn't need you to be one, but that's like the brotherhood offering you a job as a conflict mediator because they already had enough power armored soldiers. These games in general do have a problem making stealth anything other than "shoot everything that moves while crouching", I think one thing that might help in the future is doing more with the in-game cameras, like FNV's Codac R9000 and the Pro-Snap Deluxe from 76. Having a mission to photograph important parts of an enemy base for recon/intel gathering purposes, and having to do so while remaining concealed and without killing anyone so that they don't realize you're onto them, would be a fun take on stealth. Would've worked well in the Institute too, getting them a better understanding of the layout, and been fun if you had to use the camera without being noticed.
Oh, also, I find it hilarious that the best Railroad ending is just skipping most of their content and doing the Minutemen ending so glory lives and maybe Ticonderoga doesn't get wiped out.
The only reason i ever sided with the railraod was the trophies, after that killed em all and went to nuka world to be a full blown raider
Bathesda PLEASE hire more writers and better the communication inside your teams PLEASE y'all won such amazing universes, do them justice!!!!
Bethesda needs to fire Emil Pagliarulo or sideline him to dlc's where he's good at.
The railroad heavies fighting the Bunker Hill residents after the battle of Bunker Hill meant I had to wipe them out. That sucked.
Preston once gave me three radiant quests all at once. When I completed one and reported back, he immediately gave me two more, giving me FIVE settlements to build or protect... The worst of it was, that one of them was a "Clearing the Way" quest so I had 6 settlements to deal with at the same time!
that is not normal behavior, from what I have been able to observe, Preston isn't supposed to give you more than 2 active radiants at a time. if you have two active minutemen radiants in your quest log you should be able to safely talk to him without getting any more. since taking independence and old guns aren't radiants, you could expect to get either of those assigned in addition. I think your game was bugged.
I’ve been doing this joint minutemen/RR play through and only at the beginning of the RR quest line and I already see a major flaw with Glory’s character. She’s a synth that believes that all synth should be free’d from the institute not just the gen 3’s which could lead to interesting story/character development about the morality of using robots as basically slave labor. Then it gets completely ignored besides a short mention by Deacon and Glory forgetting her morals by shredding gen 1 and 2 synth’s in Medford with a mini gun.
Another thing I wish we could do, is on one of the Glory missions, she states that when a Synth dies, their subconscious remains inside their brain chip for a limited time. Curie, when she's in a synth body, is still taking over a dead body. But, we could have the option of instead giving that body to Glory, who feels both terrible for taking over her old friends body, and struggles to adapt. Or, if we hold off on both until we get to the institute, we can make them both new bodies. Just something. Glory would be changed by this experience, maybe more aggressive or something, an idea to symbolise her change, and Curie could be customisable?
Just an idea.
I think that there was a space for the Railroad to be a secondary faction. The problem is that the Railroad have no vision for the _Commonwealth_ .
In Skyrim, there are two parallel narratives which touch, but are not contingent on each other - the Dragons (World ending stuff) and the Civil War (arguably more impactful on Skyrim as a place). The same would have been gangbusters in Fallout 4: there is the big ethical question of how to treat the synths, which is to dehumanize the gen 3 synths or not. And then there is the question of how to govern and be involved in the commonwealth the Commonwealth.
Each faction exists in these contexts:
The Institute is Isolationist/Anarchic (govern), Supremacist (relation), and Anti-personhood (synth question).
The Minutemen are Democratic/Confederated, Engaged, Neutral/lean personhood.
The Brotherhood are Authoritarian, Supremacist, and Anti-synth.
The Railroad don't have explicit policy on the first two. But, engaging with the Railroad can allow the player to inform change in other factions through internal usurpation, or by elimination of the Railroad, etc.
Calling them a faction is a struggle because the Railroad has no structural opinion about the Commonwealth.
It would require a bit more reworking, but I wish the Railroad was a coalition of synths, supermutants, and ghouls. It would make sense to have a faction made up of all the pariahs of the Commonwealth. They could live in the subway tunnels and operate the trains as a trade network.
Imagine setting up Mercer Safehouse AT Outpost Zimonja, then using it as the final stop for synthetic on their way out of the commonwealth AND being used as their broadcasting station for orders and such via pre-war tapes provided by Kent, who's just excited they're going to be on the air outside of the immediate goodneighbor vicinity
Honestly one of the worst parts of Mercer Safehouse is when the random location is in a place that is just flat out impractical, like Spectacle Island. I'm sorry but HOW are people supposed to get there? Most people aren't going to swim that far. Heck, the player shouldn't be able to swim that far. And by forcing the safehouse to be at Outpost Zimonja, that ties in to the operational security side suggested.
TBH I think that secure comms would be really difficult due to the institute's level of technical advancement. Stenography would be cool or they could use a combination of tech and tradecraft. Near field communication is an amazing way of communicating when someone dominates the technical realm, combine that with dead drops, brush passes or another form of tradecraft and the institute would have a hard time cracking it. Then again when all the traders work for the SRB you're kind of in a shit sandwich 😂.
I would really love to see a quest where you can contact some kind of Railroad like faction and try to unite with them
I think the Railroad would've been more interesting if they *did not* have a Heavy corps at all (aside from Glory) - the whole concept of the Railroad is, after all, that they are hopelessly outmatched by superior forces, they don't have the manpower or resources for a full-scale military assault, they rely on secrecy, code words, stealth, and sabotage. At least, they're supposed to.
So having Railroad quests that essentially just come down to a slugging match between Railroad and BOS or Institute is absolutely absurd. The Railroad should've been the faction choice for stealth/charisma characters primarily, and the quests involved should reflect this, encouraging the player to sneak, backstab, lie, etc. to complete objectives - while the BOS and Minutemen would satisfy more combat-oriented players, and the Institute could've been a kind of hybrid of both subterfuge and combat.
What's the point of different factions, if there's no functional difference in how you play them?
I need to see a collab between the epic nate and this guy
I would have liked fallout 4 to do something slightly different from other Bethesda games, present the institute as so terribly powerful only by uniting the Railroad, BOS, Diamond City, and Minutemen could you have any chance of defeating them. The final quest would be a death star trench race against the clock where if you fail, humanity would really be redefined, forever.
Given how obvious railsign is the fact that the institute hasn't wiped them out several times over indicates a shocking incompetence on the SRBs fault.
Acadia in Far Harbour is what the railroad should've been
The railroad just felt like the BOS in FNV. A small faction that’s a shell of their former self hiding in a hole
Another suggestion.
In a recent playthrough I put the main quest on hold after rescuing Valentine and retaking the Castle. I went and found the Railroad and Deacon identified me as the leader of the Minutemen during the meeting. I feel like the dialogue should have changed with two faction leaders meeting into one that leads into an alliance. The Sole Survivor would still do the RR quests as a show of good faith but after that a coordinated alliance while both organizations establish a trust between one another. Instead of just being an agent forced to do more radiant quests.
I still remember in my most recent playthrough the RR sent me all the to the Vim pop! factory to clear it out so a synth could be transported and im sitting on the boat thinking "why TF are we going through Maine to do this one particular synth why i dont i just drop them off at Acadia?" and given that play through is no fast traveling except to the institute for obvious reasons and walking that whole distance from RR HQ to the boat then to the factory and back really made me consider going both raider and institute got tired of being the solution i wanted to be the problem for once
Unfortunately, a lot of the radiant quests pick random or semi-random locations and so the player can get Railroad and BoS locations in the Far Harbor or Nuka-World DLCs. It's a pain to have to go back and forth between them and the Commonwealth (especially to protect against Settlement raids). It's kind of underwhelming that Acadia has almost no effect with the Railroad (though it's amusing that telling the BoS or Institute is a quick way to end the Far Harbor main quest).
what's funny is that the Children Of Atom in far harbor are basically a better version of the Railroad
So... you mean if Bethesda had actually made the spy faction a spy faction instead of a reskin of all the others? I agree completely lol
The railroad like many of the factions in Fallout 4 was created just to serve the story rather than being a faction that exist in the world. When the story of Fallout 4 is over and you have either saved or doomed the synths. What left is there for the railroad to do?
Just just exist now
I think part of the problem is Bethesda only put the new factions in solely to give you technical support for the goal of getting to the Institute. That, to me, has always been the sole faction Bethesda put any effort into solely because it was the only part of the story to begin with - Get frozen, get thawed, lose spouse, lose kid, get frozen, get thawed again, and the rest of the game is just a means to an end of going Inigo Montoya on Kellogg and the rest. Everything else was bolted on to the story to make it move forwards to that sole ending.
I also suspect that seeing the modding community surrounding Fallout 3, Bethesda (in its own way) expected modders to fill in the huge gaps they left with Fallout 4. In a way, I think they looked at it as "We're giving them this linear story line, with one big bad monster, and a supporting cast for that end. If they want worldbuilding, they've got the talent to make it happen."
And they don't even have to pay the creators for doing it :P
I really like the Railroad, but they definitely don’t seem like main faction material. It would be cool if they were more of a side faction (kinda like the BoS in New Vegas). I think it would’ve made sense you could convince Des to ally with the Minutemen and you rush the Institute together in the end. Two small factions coming together for a common goal would’ve been cool.
Honestly, I was kinda hoping for suggestions for things that WE could do while playing to make the Railroad better. Is there a mod for that maybe?
Every single faction in Fallout 4 has flaws.
None of them is fully good, none of them is fully evil.
All of them are on a grayscale basis, somewhere between Black and White.
The Minutemen are relatively white. A kind of dirty white. Considerably dirty.
The Institute is relatively dark grey and so is the BOS, albeit a tad darker.
On first glance you'd see that the Railroad is relatively white as well until you notice that it was just the printer running out of ink.
As it is in vanilla Fallout 4 the Railroad is nothing what it should have been.
For example in the Far Harbor DLC all factions besides the Minutemen (they neither are responsible for nor have control over the island, plus they are not wanted there either) are getting involved in Arcadia.
The Institute goes in reclaiming escaped synth, BOS goes in killing everyone on sight and the Railroad on encountering a nearly completely safe haven for the synth they rescue sent a representative to "see for herself". In other words nothing at all.
DiMA - the leader of Arcadia - has not a single good thing to say about the Railroad. And it is easy to see why.
When it comes to Nuka World it is a somewhat similar situation.
Mods have restored the planned assaults from the BOS, the Institute and the Minutemen.
But the Railroad despite having reasons to do so are not getting involved. Not even concealed spy missions are undertaken. Hell you can't even tell Des about the Park.
BOS, Institute and Minutemen need some improvements to really feel immersive.
Quite a few for the Institute, though.
The Railroad needs serious improvements to at least feel somewhat believable.
As it stands right now they are an underground spy organisation that can't spy for dear life and are only hiding below a church in a mausoleum.
The *very* first time you walk into the church Desdemona without any knowledge of who you are tells you her name, that she's in charge of the railroad, and you found their secret base. She has no idea and give you every single piece of information you need to destroy them.
Seriously, the next time you start a new game and contact the railroad the first time exhaust her dialogue to see how much personal information she gives you without any idea of who you are, it's freaking astonishing.
They never state how the switchboard got discovered but i could easily imagine Desdemona being a little fast and lose with secrets playing no small part.
I feel that instead of the password to their Headquarters being Railroad, you would instead have to find all of the Railsigns across the map. These Railsigns could have a letter nearby them, and after lining up the letters in a certain pattern, like in a star or circle formation, the Old North Church would be in the middle. And then, using these lined-up letters, you would figure out the password to the HQ. And also, get rid of the Freedom Trail altogether. You're telling me the Institute never heard the "follow the Freedom Trail" while an operative was in a city or something?
Okay, so the game should have had actual faction alliances between two different groups instead of having to choose one to do the dirty deeds. A Minutemen/Railroad is already such a no brainer, as both have a shared interest in helping people and a disdain for current Institute policies, and since the Sole Survivor is the literal General, he/she could have easily broker this alliance as the basic bare-bones ending.
As this video said, a Railroad/Institute alliance would require some bloodshed and player consequence to get them to play along, but this way they could guarantee Synth rights by taking on the Brotherhood of Steel who would be one hell of an army to try beating even with the Institute's advanced technology, let alone whatever the Railroad could possibly muster.
A Brotherhood/Minutemen alliance would ensure the BoS to not instill total martial law under their control and would give the MM a MUCH needed boost to arms and firepower. It would mean making the Institute their main enemy in the late game, and possibly pissing off the Railroad however.
Minutemen/Institute alliance would be almost identical to the RR/INS ending, but instead of what you said in terms of Synth rights and reducing the production to sustainable levels, it would be to make the Institute work for the Commonwealth rather than themselves. While the Minutemen would necessarily get stronger combat-wise, they could work a way to get much better food, clean water, and medicines to the people of the Commonwealth as well as open up the Institute to a path of redemption in the eyes of the people.
A Brotherhood/Institute alliance would almost certainly never work, lore-wise it would be against the very nature of the Brotherhood to side with someone like the Institute normally. However, it may work if the player first sided with the Institute and force the BoS to their knees, in which the Institute offers them a technological alliance in which INS and BoS scientists work together to preserve and improve technology, at the cost of shutting down all Synth production and making all Synth marked for extermination. Easily the most difficult path to choose and the most evil but player choice should always be prioritized over sloppy "railroaded" story telling like base FO4 has.
Railroad always felt like the neglected faction, which never made sense as its suppose to be the main faction against the institute. Really big missed opportunity and these would've been amazing quest to further flesh out this faction.
The worst thing about the Railroad is that they do have a questline. The story of H2-22, the mystery behind Randolph Safehouse, Tycon being sakes and High Rise's death, all of this is a solid story.
The issue is that all these quests can be easily missed, as nobody tells you they're there. Instead they just tell you to do what the Institute tells you to until the last 5 minutes, then repeat the same finale as the other factions.😢
Modders gonna be like hold my Drink.
Lets just hope we get some moddets to see this and make this a mod.
The Railroad has always been my favourite faction, and not just from a moral standpoint. I really like their spy aesthetic.
Some Diamond City quests for the Railroad would have been interesting. If they had added a city council that governs with the mayor, there could have been missions to get certain railroad friendly city council members on the council. Or to bribe and blackmail others into getting certain legislation passed or rejected. It could have also been another way the mayor got revealed as a synth. It would definitely add more to the espionage side of the railroad.
Also, a few faction crossover quests would have been interesting. Like having the suggested railroad heavies be recruited from minutemen and have them train and operate under a cover as a specialized minutemen squad or something along those lines. I don't think there's a way for the minutemen to come into direct conflict with the railroad, so that would have been an interesting pairing.
It's always great when I new upload
A Minutemen - Railroad alliance would’ve been amazing. It fits perfectly, Railroad frees slaves and has the most information on the institute. They’ve been taking on the institute for decades.
The Minutemen want to rebuild and protect the commonwealth, they take the fight to anyone who wants to harm the commonwealth, which the Railroad also does.
It’s utterly bizarre that Bethesda didn’t even think of letting us make a Railroad - Minutemen alliance. Oh well, I guess that’s what fanfiction and mods are for.
You didn't mention that the railroad "saves" synths by essentially murdering them by eliminating everything which might make them an individual. Why not just shoot them in the head? This is what made me want nothing to do with them...
But on the other hand it makes the robobrains in the automatrons dlc far more relatable, seeing as they have the same great idea.
Every synth that chooses the brain wipe chooses to do so because they can't stand the knowledge that they're not bio human, so it's more akin to assisted suicide of the former self than murder. It would be interesting to have a different perspective like using therapy to habilitate synths in their bodies, or antidepressants or something.
@spok_real The railroaders themselves seem fine with that knowledge. And with the wipes, they are not saving an oppressed people. They are saving a bunch of circuit boards. The whole thing about the organic synths is whacky from every perspective tho. Why make a perfect human if you are just going to enslave them anyway?
Edit: Slaves are already a thing why reinvent the wheel?
Alright, the Cerberus thing. It's impressive they secretly built possibly the most advanced ship in the galaxy in two years undetected specifically. There is never any statement that they did not have a decent number of warships already active by this point considering they seem to have near infinite money.
I think ballistic weave should have been rolled out in stages as player progresses through RR quest lines instead of giving access to mk5 straight from the Jackpot missions. Mk1 initially, Mk2 after Mass Fusion, Mk3 after finishing Underground undercover, Mk4 and 5 after RR blows up the Institute.
I like the idea proposed by others of combining the RR with other factions MM BOS etc. Or cutting them out entirely. Something to think on. Working them into an alternative story line such as simsettlments would also be good. Sadly I don't code
They were established as the Institute's sworn enemy all the way back in 3, so just not having them show up at all would be weird.
Tbh, i remember I wrote basically a huge essay on your YT short before on how I would change the Railroad to act more as some sort of secretive assassin intel gathering mercenary faction were their goal isn't something moral but selfish and somehow beneficial for the Commonwealth. Make the Railroad have their own unique gear and weapons that fit their Railroad & secret agent theme with quests that also fit as well. Cause in Fallout 3 they kinda showed small as some sort of secret society. So I was expecting them to be this badass group of spy intel gathering faction but instead they were the lamest dumb faction I have ever seen. So bad they make Outer world radical factions look cool.
In the end is Bethesda fearing on being creative and instead create sandbox were the player can do whatever they want and change whatever they want.
That's stupid
My biggest missing feature of the Railroad is SLAVES! Slavery has been a consistent feature of the prior Fallout titles and its lack in F4 probably a marketing/rating decision by Bethesda, but would have been a great feature of F4's universe given the enhanced characterization it could have given. Raiders/Gunners => Slavers (extra settlers as a reward for clearing POIs); Railroad => actual reason to be known to the general population; Minutemen => moral grey zone given as they only care about "landed" settlers (property is liberty, duh); Brotherhood => An actual human evil in the world ignored due to (re)focus on isolationist policies; Institute => a way to insert Synths into the population; the Sole Survivor => a real challenge to modern sensibilities there. Obviously this an idea with a massive scope in terms of modifying F4, one of the most glaring "plot holes" the game has.
the only mention of slavery is kid in a fridge where a gunner offers to buy a kid from you that's the only thing 😭😭
Perhaps you are told by Doctor Amari to go to Bunker Hill, giving the call and counter sign and told to wait for someone to talk to you. You talk to Old Man Stockton and are tasked with helping out Honest Dan in the Covenant quest to earn the Railroads trust. After doing this you are pointed in the direction of Old North Church (without any red lines) and you are introduced to Drummer Boy, a random agent and Deacon. This is the recruitment hub for the Railroad. People usually have to serve for a long time before being introduced to the real HQ but with Deacon having been tracking you for sometime he vouches for you. If you mention the Courser Chip you are taken to the HQ, the Switchboard immediately but if you don't or havent gotten to that point in the story you have to help out Highrise with H2 before being let in to HQ.
You meet Desdemona and the others (with Tinker Tom not being crazy), have the chip decoded and get Deacon as a companion.
There are some very talented modders that have been making new quests with new characters, etc. Many of those mods use a BA2 file to anchor their mods. I'm wondering why the main BA files haven't been opened up and these kinds of changes made. Sure, it would take a lot of people working together, but I'm positive it could be done, and done as a mod overhaul to the game. Overwriting the main quests of the different factions to make the game more sensible in that respect. Give the play other options as well. I play with no radiation with mods based off of the Hiroshima/Nagasaki areas already being occupied and the game is 210 years later (rain and wind do a good job of washing things away). A whole lot of things could be changed and one in particular is the game engine itself. It's wonky to say the least. Depends too much on precombines, etc. I don't need super high resolutions and I'll bet many others don't as well. How many of you have played the Borderlands series? I'm not suggesting cartoon black outlined characters, but the difference is my point, and those games run circles around the Fallout 4 engine on my computer which is not on the low end, BTW. If someone or group can make a Fallout London addon, this can and should be done. Heck, if need be, make a new game and call it anything but Fallout and you'd have customers.
i hope you know i loooove these videos! :)
I would have liked to see a mission where one of your companions turns on you out of the blue. Make it a random one so you don't know which one it's going to be.
Turns out they are a synth that replaced your companion. They don't die but instead escape and that starts a quest to liberate your companion form the institute. From there you get them out explore what happens to the humans that are replaced and must contend with the fact there is another version of your companion out there that can kill you. It actually adds complexity to the whole thing in a deeper way than paladin danse.
You make really pertinent points, especially the one about blowing up the Institute but like many people said before, the RR should be just a side quest and nothing more. They can be replaced by the Children Of Atom as the 4th main faction or even the Gunners (even tho that might make joining the Minutemen useless)
That would give the minutemen more purpose. It would basically turn into the bos vs railroad except it would be the minutemen vs the gunners. Protecting the people at a minutes notice vs taking on any job no matter how bloody for the right price.
Why is that?
My issue with the railroad and the synths in general is there is only one real option maybe two for truly protecting the synth. As everyone destroys the synth production facilities. For the railroad we should be able to use our power as leader of the institute to change the institutes treatment of synths to be less amoral. Or at least convince them to continue running the synth program.
(The brotherhood should have taken over the institute and used it as a storage facility for the local tech and keep the synth safe. They are the scp foundation. They are supposed to horde tech not destroy it.)
The synth program is amoral though, that's like the point of the railroad. Manufacturing people to turn into slaves is amoral so the railroad seeks to 1. free the slaves already made and 2. stop the production.
@@spok_real yes, to turn into slaves is amoral, to stop production is genocide.
the radiant quest feel like a worst version of the Skyrim Thieves Guild radiant quest...
By far the biggest problem with the Railroad imo is how it's the only faction of the four whose Faction itself isn't it's own collective character. The other 3 Factions you can join have their own memorable characters here and there, but they all also act as a facet of their Faction's own characterization, a personality. Looking at Brotherhood of Steel, you have Haylen who acts as the heart and emotional aspect of the faction, Maxson as the head, Brandis/Kells/Danse as dogmatic believers to a fault, Neriah/Quinlan as the amoral brain, etc. All of whom are characters in and of themselves, but collectively they give their faction character and the BoS in turn sort of becomes it's own character. Same can be said for the Institute where you have Liam and Justin Ayo with their polar opposite personalities and views on Synths, Eve who is a surrogate wife, and Madison who is smack dab in the middle, etc. In all these examples they're all individuals, but you can clearly see they're part of the same organization, and they collectively contribute to their Faction's character. And maybe having a consistent dress code helped them all too, from the Insitute's different division uniforms, to the Brotherhood's soldier/scribe uniforms and Power Armours. And the characters all have relationships with one another too, like Haylen/Rhys/Danse.
But the Railroad? You have nothing but a collection of "quirky" characters like a jerkass doctor, Deacon who changes his identity, the tough Glory who is a former Courser, Tinker Tom who is just annoying, and Drummer Boy...all of whom are individual characters, but they have nothing unifying them. No uniforms, no consistent design or appearance, nor are there much in way of chemistry with each other either except for the vague "everyone thinks Tinker Tom is nuts, but he's a genius with a heart" or "everyone hates the doctor, but he's good deep down".