Manual scrapping and construction system...

[dainsgames]

By "manual" I mean either you or your assigned NPCs walk on over and work on it for x time until it's done. Here's the concepts:

 

Scrapping

Instead of auto-scrapping something, you are only marking it for scrapping in the settlement building UI. If you are scrapping it, you should be seeing your character perform a scrapping animation which takes time. You should only be able to solo-scrap small things unless you got the Scavenger perk, which would let you scrap larger things like beds/dressers by yourself.

But as a solo person, you would NEVER be able to scrap a whole house or car alone. Nor a whole tree unless you want to see your char knocking away at it for a full day. Instead, when you have the LL1 perk, *you can have the settlers assigned to scavenging stations actually scrap the stuff you indicate*. You mark it for scrapping, they head on over and start banging it with hammers. You go away for awhile and come back, the thing is gone and the parts are in storage.

Time-to-scrap would need to be worked out based on size, and settlers should auto-assign the numbers based on the size of the job - a small thing would take 1 settler, a house like three minimum, maybe more. You should absolutely NOT have the ability to scrap something unless you have the appropriate number of settlers assigned to the scavenging station.

Building:

Re building, the same in reverse. Instead of magic structure placement, the same wireframes are placed and the resources allocated, but the structure is not actually built immediately. (The placed wireframe would show when you opened the crafting UI the next time.) When you exit the building UI, the settlers assigned to scavenging stations head over and actually build the stuff you placed.

This forces you to up your population if you want to build up your settlement, which is how RL settlements work and to me, would add a lot of immersion to the game.

 

*An extended feature would be to work with a 'build/scrap anywhere" mod so you can take settler parties out on a scrapping mission. You'd hit ruined buildings and put them to work on tearing it down while you guarded them, then moved back to your settlement with your haul of scrap. That'd be fun, interesting and a way to save you a lot of personal / companion hauling of materials as well.