Settlements & Attacks Question (What determines the % Chance of attacks)

[Enclave777]

So here is my question: What determines the frequency of attacks upon any given settlement?

 

Is it based on how high your defense is, plus how much water and food is being produced?

 

If your defense rating is too high, will your settlement ever fall under attack?

 

My main settlement (Sanctuary) has a defense rating of 239, with 50 water and 36 food: Does this mean that my settlement's defense rating is way too high, rendering the chance of an attack upon it to 0%?

 

I have browsed around the internet and searched for answers but cannot find concrete answers.

Therefore I figured I'd post my question here.

 

If someone has a decent understanding of how this system works, please do share.

 

It would be nice if I actually had my main settlement being attacked once, because so far it has not been attacked, and I have been playing the game since the day it came out (almost daily).

 

Thank you

 

PS: I play on Xbox One.

 

 

[Vagrant0]

Until we have a GECK, there isn't any real way to look at the logic behind it.

 

I have had settlements well above 300 defense still get attacked, so defense alone doesn't mean anything.

 

Most of my settlements are either at 30 or 18 water and ~18-24 food depending on when I last moved people around. so it is not related to any sort of abundance.

 

I have had a 6 person settlement with 8 food, 12 water, and ~180 defense get attacked. I have also had a 19 person settlement with 24 food, 30 water, and 400+ defense get attacked (with 3 guards). So it is not related to population or how able that population is able to defend themselves.

 

I would be tempted to think that it is just a random check based on how long it has been since a settlement has last been attacked... But have had the same settlement attacked twice in a row, within 7 days of eachother, as well as 2 attacks on different settlements happening almost one after another.

 

At the moment, my only guess is that it is more strongly related to how many of the locations near a settlement have recently been cleared, then offset slightly by above factors. In my experience, most those settlements which exist in areas I frequently visit and clear out are also those settlements I don't see attacks happening.

[Enclave777]

Based on what you have shared with me, it looks like it may be a matter of areas in that Encounter Zone that have been cleared.

Sanctuary lies in the same Zone as the USAF Satellite Station Olivia (looking at my detailed map I have), which has raiders.

I have cleared that area twice now, but I have to go back and check if it has re-spawned at all

I cleared the Corvega Assembly Plant twice as well, but it has not re-spawned a third time and it's been a long time since last I cleared it a second time.

Kinda odd, because if a cell is set to an Encounter Zone that is set to re-spawn, it should re-spawn every 72 hours (or whatever the re-spawn timer may be in Fallout 4 as opposed to F3 and FNV).

So I have no idea how Corvega re-spawned once and then never again, unless it is scripted to spawn two times?

In any case, the entire Zone around Sanctuary is cleared, maybe that is why nothing has come to attack my settlement.

I wonder how many areas in the game are actually set to re-spawn...

 

 

 

[Vagrant0]

Based on what you have shared with me, it looks like it may be a matter of areas in that Encounter Zone that have been cleared.

Sanctuary lies in the same Zone as the USAF Satellite Station Olivia (looking at my detailed map I have), which has raiders.

I have cleared that area twice now, but I have to go back and check if it has re-spawned at all

I cleared the Corvega Assembly Plant twice as well, but it has not re-spawned a third time and it's been a long time since last I cleared it a second time.

Kinda odd, because if a cell is set to an Encounter Zone that is set to re-spawn, it should re-spawn every 72 hours (or whatever the re-spawn timer may be in Fallout 4 as opposed to F3 and FNV).

So I have no idea how Corvega re-spawned once and then never again, unless it is scripted to spawn two times?

In any case, the entire Zone around Sanctuary is cleared, maybe that is why nothing has come to attack my settlement.

I wonder how many areas in the game are actually set to re-spawn...

From my own poking around the game uses 2 different variables to determine respawn time.

 

The first one which is around 168 hours (or 7 days) happens in cases of cells which are not flagged as cleared. These are usually exterior cells or minor encampments that are not marked on the map.

 

The second one is around 480 hours (or 20 days) and relates to locations that are marked as "cleared".

 

 

I think it is those locations which can get marked as "cleared" which contribute to some sort of internal "threat" value for a settlement that is used to determine frequency of attacks. This also seems to explain why settlements aren't often attacked you keep doing minutemen quests (since it sends you out to these locations). But without being able to look at the actual scripting, this is all just a guess.

[Enclave777]

 

Based on what you have shared with me, it looks like it may be a matter of areas in that Encounter Zone that have been cleared.

Sanctuary lies in the same Zone as the USAF Satellite Station Olivia (looking at my detailed map I have), which has raiders.

I have cleared that area twice now, but I have to go back and check if it has re-spawned at all

I cleared the Corvega Assembly Plant twice as well, but it has not re-spawned a third time and it's been a long time since last I cleared it a second time.

Kinda odd, because if a cell is set to an Encounter Zone that is set to re-spawn, it should re-spawn every 72 hours (or whatever the re-spawn timer may be in Fallout 4 as opposed to F3 and FNV).

So I have no idea how Corvega re-spawned once and then never again, unless it is scripted to spawn two times?

In any case, the entire Zone around Sanctuary is cleared, maybe that is why nothing has come to attack my settlement.

I wonder how many areas in the game are actually set to re-spawn...

From my own poking around the game uses 2 different variables to determine respawn time.

 

The first one which is around 168 hours (or 7 days) happens in cases of cells which are not flagged as cleared. These are usually exterior cells or minor encampments that are not marked on the map.

 

The second one is around 480 hours (or 20 days) and relates to locations that are marked as "cleared".

 

 

I think it is those locations which can get marked as "cleared" which contribute to some sort of internal "threat" value for a settlement that is used to determine frequency of attacks. This also seems to explain why settlements aren't often attacked you keep doing minutemen quests (since it sends you out to these locations). But without being able to look at the actual scripting, this is all just a guess.

 

 

 

That seems to be right, because the Corvega Assembly Plant has just reset in my game and no longer has the "cleared" tag.

I checked it out and everything has re-spawned.

It's a shame I can't get Fallout 4 for my PC at the moment, I need to slightly upgrade my processor lol.

But that's okay, my personal FNV modding projects keep me still busy and it'll be at least another 6 months to get my game to where it's perfect.

Hopefully mods for consoles will offer something similar to IWS (although I would love to have Zombie Apocalypse in my Fallout 4 game, Boston alone is a perfect zone for such mod).

That is of course if they are still planning to make mods available for consoles down the road (at least the manageable and popular ones I would assume, those that will work on consoles I mean).

I am not sure if mods that require something like NVSE would be available for consoles, but mods like IWS (the outdated version without MCM that is) should not be an issue I think.

Zulufoxtrot's Zombie Apocalypse mod that I ported from F3 to FNV does not require it, so I could see a similar mod being available for consoles, if someone decided to make such mod.

And you don't even need Zombie models, since the Feral Ghouls in F4 look more then good enough for such mod.

Anyways, Cheers!

Edited December 1, 2015 by Enclave777