Can't Complete Sanctuary/begin The First Step

[radbeetle]

ETA: incorrect title, should read can't start sanctuary since sturges won't talk to me about that stuff

 

I've seen reports that this is a vanilla bug but the bat file fix on the Workshop Framework mod isn't fixing it, so presumably the cause must lie elsewhere?

 

It's an issue where once Preston returns to sanctuary, you speak to him and when he gets to "anyway, i'm glad you're here" (or whatever the line is) he just sort of... hangs up, and stares at you without the dialogue progressing. No dialogue menu, clicking and pressing 1-4 just makes my character go 'mhm, huh, yeah' but nothing happens. I can walk away, but when i get back near Preston he still just stares at me. 'When Freedom Calls' also won't complete for me; I can't recall if that's supposed to complete by simply re-entering sanctuary with the survivors present, or upon talking to someone.

 

Looking in xedit, none of my mods seem to affect the Min01 quest aside from start me up (and that doesn't seem to affect the parts of the quest that would cause this?) so I'm not sure where to begin troubleshooting, or what to look for that might be affecting this.

 

The primary culprit, i thought, could have been WATM or maybe workshop framework, but disabling both of those didn't help.

 

(the problem now, of course, becomes 'my load order is embarrassingly large', so I'd appreciate any thoughts to help narrow this down!)

[leisuresuitberry]

1. Load back to a previous save.

2. When you talk to Preston Garvey, be patient.

3. There will be a time he will stare at you for 20 seconds, dun do anything or walk away.

4. Eventually he will give you the quest "The First Step" and ask you to talk to Sturges (where he will give you the "Sanctuary" quest).

5. If you forgot to save at the exact moment, talk to Garvey again, make sure you follow step 2 to 4.

Edited September 27, 2019 by leisuresuitberry

[radbeetle]

1. Load back to a previous save.

2. When you tals to Preston Garvey, be patient.

3. There will be a time he will stare at you for 20 seconds, dun do anything or walk away.

4. Eventually he will give you the quest "The First Step" and ask you to talk to Sturges (where he will give you the "Sanctuary" quest).

5. If you forgot to save at the exact moment, talk to Garvey again, make sure you follow step 2 to 4.

 

This was the first thing I tried yesterday and after sitting in front of Preston for ten literal minutes, i concluded the conversation would not continue and there was something wrong.

 

ETA: you know what, I'm going to stop question why this game be like this, because I just fixed this in the most ridiculous way, which was using the commands in kinggath's preston fix bat file but entering them manually instead of using the bat.

[leisuresuitberry]

It is very nice you manage to solve this problem.

 

If you are replaying this game again, remember this is a "minefield", save first, talk to Preston Garvey, let him stare at you for 20 seconds and he will give you the quest.

 

Btw, upon completion of "The First Step" quest, the same issue will come out again, save first, let him stare for 20 seconds and he will give you more quests (which I ignore because my settlements are too weak and I need to do the DLCs first).

[LuciusEmilius]

 

1. Load back to a previous save.

2. When you tals to Preston Garvey, be patient.

3. There will be a time he will stare at you for 20 seconds, dun do anything or walk away.

4. Eventually he will give you the quest "The First Step" and ask you to talk to Sturges (where he will give you the "Sanctuary" quest).

5. If you forgot to save at the exact moment, talk to Garvey again, make sure you follow step 2 to 4.

 

This was the first thing I tried yesterday and after sitting in front of Preston for ten literal minutes, i concluded the conversation would not continue and there was something wrong.

 

ETA: you know what, I'm going to stop question why this game be like this, because I just fixed this in the most ridiculous way, which was using the commands in kinggath's preston fix bat file but entering them manually instead of using the bat.

 

I have your same problem, do you have a link to this fix?

[WsElite]

 

 

1. Load back to a previous save.

2. When you tals to Preston Garvey, be patient.

3. There will be a time he will stare at you for 20 seconds, dun do anything or walk away.

4. Eventually he will give you the quest "The First Step" and ask you to talk to Sturges (where he will give you the "Sanctuary" quest).

5. If you forgot to save at the exact moment, talk to Garvey again, make sure you follow step 2 to 4.

 

This was the first thing I tried yesterday and after sitting in front of Preston for ten literal minutes, i concluded the conversation would not continue and there was something wrong.

 

ETA: you know what, I'm going to stop question why this game be like this, because I just fixed this in the most ridiculous way, which was using the commands in kinggath's preston fix bat file but entering them manually instead of using the bat.

 

I have your same problem, do you have a link to this fix?

here is the link (https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/35004?tab=files)

*In misc files

Edited September 11, 2020 by WsElite

[curlytom4637]

 

1. Load back to a previous save.

2. When you tals to Preston Garvey, be patient.

3. There will be a time he will stare at you for 20 seconds, dun do anything or walk away.

4. Eventually he will give you the quest "The First Step" and ask you to talk to Sturges (where he will give you the "Sanctuary" quest).

5. If you forgot to save at the exact moment, talk to Garvey again, make sure you follow step 2 to 4.

 

This was the first thing I tried yesterday and after sitting in front of Preston for ten literal minutes, i concluded the conversation would not continue and there was something wrong.

 

ETA: you know what, I'm going to stop question why this game be like this, because I just fixed this in the most ridiculous way, which was using the commands in kinggath's preston fix bat file but entering them manually instead of using the bat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I tried to use the bat file you linked and it didn't work when I had the problem as I am having the same issue. What were the commands that you used to manually fix it? I have tried all of the basic "complete quest" and "setstage" commands only for them not to work.

Edited September 12, 2020 by curlytom4637

[Wererommel]

The quest order sometimes gets complicated, and one quest won't start until another is completed. Check your open quests.

[BradLaSalle]

Extremely late, but having just had this issue come up, I found a strong potential cause of the bug. After messing around on my own game, getting nothing but idle dialogue from each of the Sanctuary settlers and the quest not progressing, I noticed one was nowhere to be found; Marcy Long.

 

Re-traced the route all the way back to the Museum of Freedom and, lo' and behold, Marcy is just sitting there where she is after you beat the raiders and speak with Preston before heading to Sanctuary. She doesn't even reply when I try to talk to her, I greet and all she does is blankly stare at me. Knock her down, and she gets up and sits right back where she was. Make her hostile and put your gun up, she'll sit back down.

 

My only theory on the actual cause is that I always leave the Museum as soon as I'm done talking to Mama Murphy, when they're in the middle of their little chit-chat before getting up and leaving. I guess not sticking around long enough to ensure they all get up and start going to Sanctuary breaks at least Marcy Long, in my experience. Which means the rest are stuck in the idle dialogue you get if you try to talk to them on the way to Sanctuary, they're all just waiting on Marcy. I play survival so no console command fixes for me, but I'm sure that's at least one main cause that I haven't seen anyone find when I looked this issue up.

[Trentckx]

FIXED

I know this is late but for anyone in the future encountering this bug. At the end when Preston and group reaches sanctuary Preston says "i'm glad you joined up" or when talked to later "are you ready to help out?"

I don't know the exact solution but here's what I did. Mind you, mine's a modded gameplay, but vanilla users, you can try the similar steps, minus the modded bits.

Load a save prior to meeting Preston in concord. I have done nuka world so MAKE SURE TO DO OPEN SEASON AND THEN CLEAR ALL RAIDER SETTLEMENTS OF THE RAIDERS, THEY DO NOT RESPAWN. Remove flags (I had a bug so mine had no flags but some other threads suggest this). Also make sure to remove turrets before starting this as they can cause glitch problems. Build a radio beacon at all settlements and have at least 1 settler. I use Tales of Commonwealth mod so some are named settlers and that's fine. Not confirmed, but it seems the key settlements are Oberland, Tenpines and Abernathy. ALSO DO ALL SETTLEMENT-related quests before meeting Preston. I activated Abernathy's quest prior to that so I completed that.

Then I rescued the group and played as normal up until the point where Preston stops in front of the minuteman statue and that (for me) is the infamous glitch. Ah also to note, before reaching said point, I had some mods that enabled multiple companions (everyone's best friend and Wastelander Barb), I just dismissed said companions and kept ONE vanilla one (piper in my case). Then talk to Preston at said location. At first the same situation unfolds, give it half a minute or so. Wait for up to 2 minutes if you must, I thought I failed again until he finally broke silence and spoke about being the last minuteman.

I literally went a sleepless night trying various things and FINALLY I got it to work. I was on the verge of reinstalling/restarting. Thank god my last attempt worked. This SHOULD work and if it doesn't then yeah best of luck to you, this is the best I can do and my job is done. Adios.