Preston Garvey as a companion?

[TheGadget1945]

I used Preston only once for a couple of hours. Nowadays I just recruit him to be able to ship him off to a remote settlement where he's safely out of shouting distance and the only inhabitant.

 

I did that with Deacon. Murkwater Construction has two residents, Deacon and Spike the Deathclaw from Fusion City Rising.

[crawe1x]

I have no major problems with Preston, though he can be a bit self-righteous. I normally recruit him for his perk, and once I have that, I dump him at the Castle.

 

Where I do have a problem is with the story-line, which doesn't really make sense. The problem is that in FO4, Beth has given us a very specific plot, which doesn't sit well with the open-world sandbox element of the game. When you come out of Vault 111, you're a grieving spouse and parent, hellbent on revenge and the need to save your child. Nothing should get in the way of that. You even tell Preston some of this after rescuing him. He offers you his sympathy - and then casually asks you to break off your personal quest to go kill the raiders at Corvega. If you do this, he then makes you the general and sends you off on other errands. None of this makes sense in regards to the main quest - your character just wouldn't go along with this. Skyrim was different in its set-up. It was less specific. You were just some random guy crossing a border, who gets mistaken by the Imperials as a rebel. As such, you have no personal stake in the main quest. Even when you discover you're the Dragonborn, it's vague enough that you can stall on the main quest without breaking immersion. To be fair, I actually prefer the FO4 main quest. I always found the Skyrim one tedious and dull. But the Skyrim one DOES fit better with Beth's sandbox approach.

 

I think the only way for FO4's main quest to make sense is after you've rescued Preston from Concord, you need to head off to DC and focus on the main quest. You can then return to Preston when you learn that you will need help with the teleporter (assuming you want to do it with the Minutemen). In the interim, he has no doubt heard about your exploits. As a result, him making you the general makes more sense (it always feels so random when you save him, clear out Corvega, and then become general - it's too much too quick). At this point, it WOULD make sense to build settlements and recruit settlers - in theory (though not really in game-play). The teleporter is meant to be a big deal and should thus (again in theory only) benefit from having a community of allies to support you. This is how I always play the game and for me it's the only way to do so while maintaining some immersion.

Edited December 9, 2016 by crawe1x

[Moraelin]

Speak for yoursef. It made sense for me.

 

Now be fore I start, as I keep saying, I'm not bigotted against NPCs, some of my best friends are NPCs, but... they ain't human. They should stick to procreating with their own. Is all I'm saying.

 

So finding out I started the game married to an NPC and a mongrel child was less emotional attachment, and more like "WTH drugs have I been doing?!" I mean, it's harsh when you wake up from a trip with a chinese tattoo that says "half chicken 3$, whole chicken 5$". Waking up married to someone who ain't even human? Man, that tops the scale of harsh.

 

I mean, geesh, I thought it was a bit of an escalation to wake up about to be beaheaded in Skyrim, as opposed to just in jail in Oblivion, which in turn was upping the ante from being deported in Morrowind. I was wondering since Skyrim how can they go up from that in their next game? Yeah. By starting me married to an NPC. Geesh. Talk about over-the-top. I can haz beheading by Imperials instead, please?

 

It didn't help that the game combined me and Nora to make the ugliest kid ever -- and growing up only made it worse -- but let's not get into THAT Lovecraftian horror again. Let's just say, I still suspect Nora's been cheating on me with Donald Duck.

 

So, forget grieving parent. I was thankful to Kellog. WOOHOO! Single again.

 

I really didn't want to go find him or Shaun. I AVOIDED that main quest. People would try telling me stuff like, "You need to go to Diamond City," and I'd be like, "SPOILERS!!!" Geesh. Can't people just mind their own business?

 

I only grudgingly went after Kellogg after everyone else stopped giving me quests to save their kitten from a tree and whatnot. And some were starting to suspect that I'm the one who keeps putting their kitten in the tree, by now. Hey, a guy needs a hobby, right? Don't judge me.

 

And then there was the disappointment of the conversation with Kellogg. Uh, hello, Bethesda? If I get 4 dialogue choices, how about ONE that says, "Dude, do you want a beer?" or "You're keeping the kid, right? You're not bringing him back, right? He's way past warranty." Is it that much to ask? :wink:

[llamaRCA]

Preston would be a fine character if he wasn't also the quest giver for the Minutemen. I mostly hate him because every time I go near him he forces a quest on me or when I do actually try to talk to him he's fixated on a quest I don't care about at that moment. It's so frustrating. It would have been nice if there'd been two Minutement in Corcord. Maybe have Ronnie there from that point on rather than waiting until later to introduce her. One would give quests and the other one would be the faction companion. I dunno, though, I don't like any of the companions enough to travel with them so even if he was just a companion I wouldn't take him with me.

 

 

Also, since we're talking about it, I don't get all the hate for the main quest. You get to choose a faction (or the Minutemen plus everyone else) ending and the world changes accordingly. That's great. I'd argue the NV main quest has lots of holes and is no less boring to run through, but you get different endings making it worthwhile. FO3 offers basically zero options which is so annoying. FO4 is a huge improvement over that, and is as fun to play through as any other Fallout main quest, imo. They all have strengths and weaknesses, plot holes, periods of boring gameplay, etc.

[genolune]

Skyrim was different in its set-up. It was less specific. You were just some random guy crossing a border, who gets mistaken by the Imperials as a rebel. As such, you have no personal stake in the main quest. Even when you discover you're the Dragonborn, it's vague enough that you can stall on the main quest without breaking immersion. To be fair, I actually prefer the FO4 main quest. I always found the Skyrim one tedious and dull. But the Skyrim one DOES fit better with Beth's sandbox approach.

 

I hear you. You could even avoid Whiterun like the plague and never kick off reanimating the dragons and becoming the Dragonborn which I've done on a few playthroughs. With over 200 hrs in Skyrim, I've never gotten much further beyond than the Kynesgrove mission. Sidequests take priority over main quest to me and I don't know if I'll ever beat the game. I can see where in some ways, it's the opposite here, especially if you want things like settlements, artillery or the Deliverer you have to play the faction main quests.

[cossayos]

Preston would be a fine character if he wasn't also the quest giver for the Minutemen. I mostly hate him because every time I go near him he forces a quest on me or when I do actually try to talk to him he's fixated on a quest I don't care about at that moment.

 

There's a mod taking care of his quest giving spree. It doesn't switch him off completely, but the frequency is considerably lower.

 

But that aside. Preston's one of the stick up the ass NPCs who aren't the least bit fun to have at one's side. Danse is another one. I also steer clear of Ada or Deacon, but for different reasons. They just can't shut their traps for a few seconds in a row.

[TheGadget1945]

 

Preston would be a fine character if he wasn't also the quest giver for the Minutemen. I mostly hate him because every time I go near him he forces a quest on me or when I do actually try to talk to him he's fixated on a quest I don't care about at that moment.

 

There's a mod taking care of his quest giving spree. It doesn't switch him off completely, but the frequency is considerably lower.

 

But that aside. Preston's one of the stick up the ass NPCs who aren't the least bit fun to have at one's side. Danse is another one. I also steer clear of Ada or Deacon, but for different reasons. They just can't shut their traps for a few seconds in a row.

 

 

I couldn't dismiss Ada possibly due to having the UCF mod. Eventually I right clicked on her and typed "disable" and she disappeared forever. I felt really bad about it.

[cossayos]

 

 

I couldn't dismiss Ada possibly due to having the UCF mod. Eventually I right clicked on her and typed "disable" and she disappeared forever. I felt really bad about it.

 

 

I parked her together with Preston. Usually at Red Rocket. She can chat him up for all I care. Danse is safely contained at the Prydwen and Deacon just doesn't get recruited.

[Moraelin]

Also, since we're talking about it, I don't get all the hate for the main quest. You get to choose a faction (or the Minutemen plus everyone else) ending and the world changes accordingly. That's great. I'd argue the NV main quest has lots of holes and is no less boring to run through, but you get different endings making it worthwhile. FO3 offers basically zero options which is so annoying. FO4 is a huge improvement over that, and is as fun to play through as any other Fallout main quest, imo. They all have strengths and weaknesses, plot holes, periods of boring gameplay, etc.

I dunno, personally I wouldn't say I hate the main quest. It's just -- leaving the taking the piss aside for a moment -- that, while I usually just trust the storyteller and don't try to see things coming, this time it was SO obvious that any amount of time may have passed, and probably DID pass, that there was no real reason for me to be in a big hurry. In fact, the way my character AND Nick were convinced that Shaun must be still a baby was mildly amusing.

 

Plus, as I might have been hinting in my taking the piss, 10 minutes together with Nora, out of which only about 1 minute with the ugliest animatronic baby, weren't anywhere near enough to form any kind of real emotional attachment. It's not like I spent 20 hours collecting pencils for Nora or anything :wink:

 

That said, about NV, while I like FO4 a lot, I must say that at least NV was less disappointing. I wouldn't necessarily say that any faction there were saintly, but you could at least find SOME way to feel like you're doing the right thing. Having to choose among a bunch of flaming asshats in FO4 isn't nearly as satisfying.

 

Plus, I don't know what Beth was smoking when they made the end movie of FO4, but I want the number of their dealer. It was the most nonsensical thing I've EVER witnessed in a game. I'm still trying to figure out WTH were they even trying to tell me there. I nuked my son because... I know war never changes? WTH? It was a huge anti-climactic moment for me.

[Vormina]

My problem with companions is the constant whining about me picking up scrap, that's when I wish I had the dialogue option, "Oh yeah? Do you run 30+ settlements full of whiners wanting beds, food, roofs, water, and a bartender? You can't provide all that with just raider scalps and mirelurk meat now can you?"

 

That's why my favorite companion is my weapon... ;)