What is the key to happiness?

[DAActon]

If you just want to keep settlements 'happy' and productive, here's some guidelines. This is based on my own 1200+ hours of play.

 

All settlers need to be assigned to a task and a bed or they will not contribute to the % rate. Check the settlement at 2:00am to see if anyone is standing around. If so assign them to a bed. Keep in mind that provisioners and guards require a bed, but never use it. Beds also have to be under roof.

 

Between 8:00am and 6:00pm check to make sure they are all 'busy'. You can check their assignment in workshop mode. There are also some mods that can help with this.

 

Put the bar (restaurant) in an area large enough to accommodate all the settlers between 6:00 and 9:00pm. Everyone needs to have some happy time. If they won't fit in one area, setup another one and they will split.

 

There should be at least one level III restaurant, doctor, and trader. They all contribute to the happiness total gain. Armor, weapon and clothing vendors do not contribute.

 

Make sure all public areas and living areas are well lit with plenty of lights, but not sleeping areas. Generators and turrets need to be away from living quarters. Don't put turrets on top on the building.

 

Paintings in living areas helps.

 

Music radio in work areas, jukebox in food/bar area helps.

 

Attacks will kill happiness fast. Make sure the defense is at least twice the total of food + water. Because of this, don't overdue water. If you still get attacks, move the defenses closer to the attack spawn points so most of the attackers are killed before you get back to the settlement. Also make sure the settlers are all armed, doesn't take much, but should be decent. They only need 1 round for the weapon they are using. So if they have a mini gun or missle launcher, they won't use up any ammo.

 

Not sure if the 'Bed Bug' has been fixed in 1.5. If it occurs, you need to get back to the settlement asap. It will cut happiness as much as 50% if you don't get back within 24hours. Look for the warning sign in your pipboy under the data / settlements tab.

 

Make sure to complete any settlement quests.

 

This should keep the settlement at 80-85 % when you aren't there.

[minngarm]

Now that the CK is released, did someone check already how settlement happiness gets calculated? Or did someone even release a fix for the wonkiness of the happiness?

 

Currently the happiness of my settlement The Slog is dropping, eventhough I have enough water, enough to eat, a supplyline to all other settlements, twice as many beds as needed, 250+ defense, a bar, a doctor, a trader and a clothing store. I even made sure that there are no enemies close by, eventhough I walled off the entire settlement. It kinda kills the fun for me if I have to hunt down buggy reasons for happiness loss and generally being forced to babysit all my settlements.

Happiness is a warm gun.

[wuwuwuwuwu]

I have another story to share:

A new settler arrived at County Crossing, which caused the happiness at that settlement to drop from 85 to 73. As I tried to get rid of that bug my settlers unassigned themselves from all work and weren't reassignable.

After working around that bug the happiness would continue to stay at 73.

I then ran around killing stuff near the settlement and by killing two lonely supermutants at the radio telescopes I caused the happiness to rise again, currently sitting at 77. But by killing the supermutants I ventured too close to The Slog, which caused the happiness there to drop by 5% to 77. Since killing all the Forged and the Gunners nearby seemed to have no effect on the happiness, I moved on to Outpost Zimonja, only to have its happiness crash aswell from 86 to 73 and falling. At this point I don't even care anymore about the happiness.

 

Could someone simplify the calculation of happiness, with the basic requirements satisfied rasing the happiness to 80 and having a bar, a doctor, a clothing store and a junkyard dog rasing the happiness by 5 points each?

[KethusNadroev]

If all their needs are met (a bed with a roof, food, water, defense) their happiness will be 80. So the answer is a free pet gorilla for every settler. I'm not joking, they increase happiness by 20.

[wuwuwuwuwu]

All the requirements are met a hundred times in my settlements. Stupid bugs are the only thing that prevent my settlers being truly happy.

[TheGadget1945]

On my first (very long) playthrough I simply let the number of settlers build up to the max and provided enough beds and facilities for them. Happiness was up and down all the time and sometimes dropped as low as 10%.

On my second playthrough I have limited the number of settlers to about 12 and happiness is 80%+ everywhere. I never get complaints about not enough beds either. This time round I have provided showers and toilets at each settlement but I don't know if that is a factor.