Carl's Fallout 4 Guide
for PC, Xbox One, and PS4

I'm writing a Guide to Nuka World, piece by piece. Here are the newest/most popular pages:
See a full list of guides on the Nuka World page. I've written over a dozen in just a week and plan to continue. There is much more to this DLC, it will just take time to write it all. Check back for more. Comment on the appropriate page if you have a tip to share with other readers.

Carl's Fallout 4 Guide

A Spoiler-free Gameplay Strategy Site

Carl's Fallout 4 Strategy Guide logo

Guides to PerksAbout the Guide & Navigating It
See My Plans for the Site if you're interested in the direction this is heading. Cheats are just below, as they belong in no category and are only for PC players. For now, I've got to have readers lean on this main page to get a feel for where to find things in the guide, though some things like Perks are found deeper (on their SPECIAL pages). We also have search but I cannot guarantee you'll find what you're looking for - I'm one man on a mission to make a huge Fallout 4 Strategy Guide and that takes time. The Guide is currently broken into four categories, as you can see below. Click to jump to the section you need help with:

Cheats
Probably the only page on this site that just won't work for consoles. These are very handy for me as a guide writer, but generally just fun for messing around and testing perks. Always make a backup save before you cheat in case you regret it and want to return to your unmodified game. On this page, you'll find infinite money, crafting materials, weapons and armor cheats, as well as general commands to help struggling players - you can look up item and Perk ids, boost your carry capacity, reveal the entire map, or walk through walls. I've listed only the most useful cheats, because I personally hate looking through huge lists of console commands in order to find the ones I really want.


Customize your Character

Character Customization Guides

Bobblehead Locations Guide - Maps to Help Find All 20
All 20 of Fallout 4's SPECIAL and Skill Bobbleheads listed, with maps to help you find the building in which they are located. Descriptions will help you to avoid wandering buildings trying to get them. I've also provided quick navigation so you can jump to the Bobblehead you need.

SPECIAL & Perk Guides
Coverage of the seven main stats in Fallout 4, which determine the Perks your character can unlock. Their additional effects are minor compared to the power of most perks, but it's far from nothing - they all grant minor bonuses to multiple things and help define your build. The Bobbleheads will give you a free point in each of them, should you find them all.

Full List of Perks
This is a list of every Perk in Fallout 4, extracted from my individual pages in the SPECIAL Stats guide, so that you can have all Perks handy on one page. I've included the mechanics info from each page (along with my opinions), but left the images out to keep it tight.

Main Character Guide - Stats, Inventory, Menus, and More
Understanding the various stats of your character in Fallout 4, as well as the numerous Pip-boy screens. This guide is great for newcomers to help them manage their inventory, quests, and gives some tips to finding components and favoriting weapons, armor, healing items, and drugs.

Leveling System and HP Gains
This guide goes into detail on Fallout 4's level up system. Each level you gain a perk point and an amount of HP based upon your character's endurance stat. Though Perks entirely replace Skills in this game, it's a great system and there are many other ways to improve your character as you explore the huge Commonwealth. Magazines you find will give you hidden perks, as will bobbleheads that grant bonuses or raise your S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stats.

Making a Build: Perk Choice Tips
This guide is an overview of how to make a strong build in Fallout 4 for high-difficulty play. It doesn't tell you WHEN to take Perks, but gives you some guidelines to help you choose the best ones to make your character strong.


Major DLC

Fallout 4 Automatron DLCAutomatron DLC Guide
The Fallout 4 Automatron DLC will pit us against an evil mechanist who is creating robots that are marauding the commonwealth. The motives behind this are shrouded in mystery, but we are able to make our own robot companions out of the scrap we gain from destroying his creations! See here for a guide to getting started, along with a walkthrough to the third quest: Headhunting, and final quest Restoring Order (to deal with Mechanist). Rewards after Mechanist (Spoilers): The Lair, Eyebots, and Rogue Robots. Learn more about Building good robot companions.

Fallout 4 Far Harbor DLCFar Harbor
The Far Harbor DLC released May 19, 2016. This is the largest addon to date and features a massive area that is said to be the largest DLC area Bethesda have created. Featuring a story revolving around the Children of Atom, Synths, and a lone settlement's conflict with them, it offers a deep main quest and story. Players will find new weapons, armor, and enemies lurking in the area of Far Harbor. Here are walkthroughs to Quest 1: Far from Home, Walk in the Park, Quest 2, and Quest 3: Acadia, DiMA and Where you Belong with more to come!

Nuka World
Fallout 4 Nuka World released August 29. This DLC allows players to conquer settlements by leading raiders. Its central location is a run-down theme park. First, you must pass a significant challenge only available at level 30. Here is a list of the current guides to Nuka World:


Gameplay Mechanics in Fallout 4

Gameplay Mechanic Guides

Companion Perks & Affinity Guide - List of Likes & Hates
A guide to getting Companion Perks, which are permanent hidden perks gained by reaching maximum affinity with each companion. Lists the major things that each companion likes and dislikes for your character to do, so that you can get the Perks faster.

Difficulty Settings and What Changes in Each Mode
Fallout 4's difficulties explained. The main changes are damage dealt, damage taken, and the rate that Legendary Enemies spawn, but these have some major implications on your gameplay. Survival Difficulty is particularly nasty, with healing items greatly reducing the rate of regeneration. This effectively makes them less useful during combat, should you find yourself in a dangerous situation.

Gameplay Tips and Things that Aren't Obvious for New Players
Helpful tips for new players. This list is ever-expanding as I myself go through the game and think of things. Have a tip? See my contact info above.

Fallout 4's Vault Assisted Targeting System (VATS) and AP Cost from Weapon Mods
Use this guide to learn the basics on V.A.T.S. and get tips to modify your weapons to minimize AP cost while maximizing utility. Weapon type and mods greatly impact the amount of AP it costs to fire a weapon in VATS. I've analyzed scopes, sights, barrels, and receivers to help you figure out what type of mods would be best for your guns.

Action Points, Boosting AP, and Regeneration
A guide to Action Points and how its regeneration works. Also looks at the various things you can do to raise your character's AP or increase its regeneration in some way.

Radiation
Radiation works a bit differently in Fallout 4. This Guide explains its effects on your character, rad resistance from various sources, and how you can remove radiation damage done.

Fighting Legendary Enemies & Their Spawn Rates
This guide looks briefly at Legendary enemies' spawn rates, but its priamry purpose is to give you some pointers in fighting Legendaries in order to get their loot!

Chems in Fallout 4: Drug Effects and Crafting
All you need to know about chems, addiction, and stacking the buffs provided by these. Lists all craftable chems, and a few of the rare ones that you may find.

Does Loot Respawn, or Do Enemies Come Back to Cleared Areas?
This page goes over the types of items you can expect to reset - and how long - after you've cleared an area. It's mainly to address a common FAQ from newcomers to the series or Bethesda games in general.

Dogmeat
Dogmeat is the first follower many players get in Fallout 4. Learn all about this faithful companion, her level, carry capacity, combat capabilities, commanding her, and where to find her some dog armor to look a bit more vicious.

Stealth in Fallout 4
All about the stealth meter and how that works, while providing you some tips to help you avoid detection, pull off more sneak attacks, and improve as a sniper or melee blitz machine.

Hacking Tutorial
A step-by-step example showing how to guess the correct password on a terminal in Fallout 4.

How to Join the Railroad: Road to Freedom
A simple step-by-step for joining the Railroad Faction in Fallout 4. Joining them and at least working with them for a bit can get you the Ballistic Weave Clothing Mods to give Energy and Damage Resistance to certain item types.

How to Wait in Fallout 4
For many, advancing time isn't obvious. Use a chair or bed to sit or sleep until the time of day suits you. Using a bed grants a well-rested XP bonus, so long as you're the owner! I guess I too would be a light sleeper if I were snoozing in someone else's bed without permission.


Settlements

Settlement & Crafting Guides

Settlements Tutorial
A guide to settlements and how to manage them, attract more people, and bringing in food, water, resources. Also goes over how to power things, supply lighting and defense. You can also learn to get the Benevolent Leader Achievement.

Supply Lines in Fallout 4
Supply lines transfer food and water between Settlements. They also let you craft things without the materials in your inventory so long as a connected Settlement has the necessary materials. The Local Leader Perk is necessary to establish Supply Lines.

Water and Food
Water and Food in Settlements and how it is deposited into the Workshop Inventory. This guide shows you a good place to get food early in the game, and describes how you can get ample amounts of purified water to use for healing or selling for caps.

Scavenging Stations and What They Do
A guide to Scavenging Stations and the scavengers you can assign to them. Includes information on how often supplies are deposited and how to make best use of Settlers once you have enough food and water.

Where to find Things: Crafting List to Help you Get Items You Need.
Advice on using Tag for Search to find components, as well as a list of various crafting materials that are useful to you. Listed by component, so that you might find an item that has what you're missing.

Adhesive: Finding it and Making it for Crafting
This guide details how to make Vegetable Starch from Mutfruit, Tatos, Corn, and Purified Water in order to get 5 Adhesive each. A good location (graygarden) is mapped, so that you can travel there and get the required vegetables. You then only need an excess of water to get the Purified Water you need to get the Adhesive.


Weapons

Weapon Guides

Pistols in Fallout 4
A list of all Pistol-class weapons in the game, along with their base stats (including AP Cost). This is a section I intend to expand over time, covering every weapon type and giving individual weapons a page that describes select modifications and how they affect weapons. You can see examples of this project below:


Walkthroughs

Main & Side Quest Walkthroughs

While my primary focus is to make guides for Fallout 4, quest walkthroughs will come over time as I will inevitably enjoy sharing some of the quests you can find off the beaten path, as well as detailing how main quests work when possible. Expect spoilers in this area, because it's impossible to have pages on these things and NOT spoil something. However, I will not write anything too revealing about the story in the walkthroughs or the descriptions on this page.

When Freedom Calls and the Museum of Freedom
While such an early quest hardly deserves a walkthrough, I wanted to point some things out to newcomers while trying to minimize spoilers. This walkthrough offers some tips to players who are new to Fallout 4 and emphasizes that the Minutemen Quests are optional.

Mystery Meat - Cheaper Prices from one Quest
Do the Mystery Meat quest and you can get one copy of Tales of a Junktown Jerky Vendor along with a Barter Bobblehead, both in one location and with an easy-to-complete quest that offers lots of free meat, bones, a fusion core and some ammo.

Secret of Cabot House: Charisma Bobblehead and Lorenzo's Artifact
This Quest is the only way to enter Parsons State Insane Asylum and get to Jack Cabot's office where the Charisma Bobblehead is located.

Vault 81
The benefits of traveling here are plenty - a medicine bobblehead, Curie (companion), the ability to buy the powerful Overseer's Guardian combat rifle, and the below quest.

Hole in the Wall (Vault 81)
Allows Curie as a companion. You'll get a Syringer for your trouble, and along the way may contract a disease that permanently lowers HP. Thankfully, there is also a Medicine Bobblehead as a reward.

Finding the Agility Bobblehead on the FMS Northern Star
There's no quest for this, but you can journey to the Wreck of the FMS Northern Star to get the Agility Bobblhead, perhaps one of the most desired in Fallout 4, and kind of hard to spot.

Where to Find Serum for Virgil
This side quest confuses many players, so I wrote this small guide to direct you to the serum within the Institute

The Battle of Bunker Hill
Who do you inform about this battle, should you? This quest describes the few outcomes and how to come out of it with everyone still liking you.

Mass Fusion
This Institue Quest gives you the opportunity to side with the Brotherhood. This walkthrough details the quest, outcomes of your choices, and things you can find along the way.

Beginning Guide: Skipping Quests, the Minutemen, and Rescuing Nick Valentine
This Guide lists some of the options you have on a second playthrough of Fallout 4. You do not require the Minutemen to use Settlements, you don't have to go to Diamond City to eventually track down Nick Valentine, and can quickly get to the Getting a Clue and Reunions Quests.

Endings Guide: Which Quests Trigger Faction Hate and How Far You Can Go
This page summarizes the consequences of endings of Fallout 4 without giving story details. It is a guide to which quests you can do without upsetting each faction, so that you feel more comfortable to press on with them. It is not a true summary of endings - but who would want to be told how the game ends in every way? Experience it yourself!

Finishing Fallout 4 with the Minutemen Ending (SPOILERS)
This guide will help you if you're not friends with X and can't work with Y. Only use this if you want to finish the game with the Minutemen, and it'll tell you how to proceed.


Useful Fallout 4 Sites

The Fallout 4 Wiki
This is a great site to lookup quests, for when you want to know everything about a topic and don't mind to experience spoilers. I don't see our sites as competition, mine is an entirely different style of writing and this community-driven wiki is useful for many things.

Build Planner
This is great for planning a build ahead of time, because it does the math for you - wanting multiple level 50 skills, and certain stats set to 10 can require your build to go well into the 60s. This may help you prioritize certain perks, and let you determine which are more important for you.

Fallout 4 Map
Want to track down every nuka cherry, nuka quantum, or just see what a certain location might have to offer you? This excellent Fallout 4 map site will help immensely with that.


More Guides to Come

Future Plans for the Guide

I've got much more to come. I can only do one or two pages of this size daily. Next I plan to make a guide to SPECIAL stats, one for each category of Perk, list all Bobblehead locations with detailed instructions on finding them, and write more gameplay guides to help players navigate the Wasteland of the Commonwealth as the Lone Survivor.

Suggestions

If you like my style of guide-writing and have any article suggestions, send them along to [email protected]! You may have an idea I did not think of - yet - I'm still playing this awesome game. It's all I wanted it to be, and millions of people seem to agree.

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Share Tips and FAQs (23)

KiM
Hello Carl. I have been following your guides, especially Civ 5, and now I am happy that you have made a guide for fallout 4. I have been playing fallout4 a week now. The game is fun to play, and its huge in every aspect. My intention in joining this page is for me to thoroughly enjoy the fallout4 game. Thanks :)
24th February 2016 9:29pm
Carl
Hey I remember you, KiM! You've given me great feedback in the past, which I really appreciated so I'm glad you're around. Hope this one is useful and do let me know if you spot any errors!
24th February 2016 9:30pm
KiM
I'm glad to help.
24th February 2016 9:35pm
Michael
Many thanks for your F4 guide, Carl! I just searched google for the "penetrator perk" and found all I needed to know about it here on your site :) Great work! Will come back soon.
20th March 2016 1:42pm
Carl
Thanks for writing me. Not too many are aware it exists, so always happy to hear it could help someone :)
20th March 2016 5:30pm
Dawn
I love your guide! It's better than the official one. Keep up the great work! :)
2nd April 2016 9:14am
Carl
Thanks, I'd taken a break but plan to get back to it when the Far Harbor DLC is available. Then I'll try to wrap up all the Perks and get more in-depth on them!
29th April 2016 3:45pm
Sylvia
Carl, I have been following your guides through Sims 3, Skyrim and now Fallout 4. You are my go-to place for info on any game you cover. Just wanted to thank you for what you do, because I know it must be an incredible amount of work to make this happen!

/salute
11th May 2016 12:11pm
Carl
Hi Sylvia, thanks so much for your kindness. I don't think any guide I've made has ever quite been perfect, but it's great to know that people still find them useful.

I'm looking forward to writing on Far Harbor when it releases the 19th! Hopefully the new creatures will be interesting enough that I do what I've wanted to for a while: a list of all creatures with weak points, their resistances, etc. so that people can avoid, say, shooting deathclaws in the body where they take less damage. I think one of the Brahmin heads also takes more damage than the other!
12th May 2016 2:19am
Sil
Dear "Carl",
I found this guide last week when i started playing Fallout 4 and I bookmarked it right away. It seems to have everything I could ever need to know about the game. Love the structure which makes finding stuff just so convinient compared to other guides/wikis.
Thank you very much for the effort!
10th August 2016 5:07pm
Carl
Thanks, I feel if I did get one thing right it's navigation. There's a lot more writing to be done if I want to cover everything, so it'll grow very gradually over time.

I appreciate you letting me know it helped you in any way :)
11th August 2016 3:20pm
Emma
I just wanted to give you a huge shout-out for creating such a solid guide! I stumbled upon it via search and I gotta say, you've really done an awesome job. Being new to Fallout, your tips helped me understand the different features of the game much quicker, which made the game more enjoyable right from the start. I like to discover things myself (i.e. I don't go for walkthroughs), but your guides to Character Builds and general Gameplay were just what needed to wrap my head around everything. Cheers dude — appreciate the time you've put in here!
18th September 2016 1:11am
Carl
Hey, thanks so much for saying so. You've made my day. That's exactly why I don't do many walkthroughs and left story details out of the few that I did do. I know people want to enjoy the game, and story details are irrelevant to gameplay mechanics. I'm more interested in how things work. I'm planning a total beginner's guide soon that will touch on all these various things and help to tie things together. Sounds like you're past that, but I'm glad i could help you to enjoy the game a bit more. :)
18th September 2016 3:13am
Sethvir
You do gain hp after level 100.
13th November 2016 4:21am
WW
Great guide! Ive bookmarked it and must say of all the guides and sites out there this one is the one i would refer people to. Thank you!!
16th November 2016 4:56am
Grumpy Neill
My fallout 4 won't let me log in and start the game. A voice says that I'm at the home
page with text that indicates "Press any key to start" Pressing any key does nothing. How can I get passed this. It won't even let me change players by pressing the "Y" key. (I'm at level 100)
10th December 2016 9:47pm
UniversityOfPi
Just want to let you know, the build planner link has rotted.

I'm personally a fan of levelbased's though there's also Blavek's on github and a bunch of others that are pretty easy to find.
2nd March 2017 6:19pm
Benjamin hamm
fun ever
in my life
10th April 2017 8:14am
Sadishist
Hi Carl, I just found out this guide and it is awesome. I don't know if you're a fan of Creation Club or not, but wanted to suggest it would be neat if you can briefly cover some of the bigger-impact CC contents in your guide. That is if you have played with any.
14th March 2018 8:14am
Amber
Really love your guides, its easy to find and easy to follow! Maby you can make a pdf guide of this for the people who dont always have internet?
20th June 2018 4:52am
Carl
You got some nice web scam pop-ups on your site guys. Might wanna check in to it
31st January 2019 9:52am
RasaeCul
Hi Carl, just adding a quick comment saying that your guides have been a great help going through the game again after a while away. Better knowing settlement calculations, what quests lock away other quests and so much more.
23rd March 2019 3:45am
Alice
Hello,

I would like to discuss with you an opportunity to place branded campaigns on your website.

Campaigns' CPM rates range up to $5 CPM for Display Banners and up to $18 CPM for Native Video format. All campaigns are delivered by premium brands, such as Starbucks, BMW, Uber, Loreal, McDonald's, and etc.. 

After taking a close look at your website I can say that you’re a perfect match for our advertising strategy. I'd be happy to discuss the next steps.

Best Regards,
PixFuture Alice Smith
21st August 2019 10:47pm
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Far Harbor DLC

See my Far Harbor Guide for new features in the DLC. There, you can also watch the trailer and view new weapons that can be found. The area is massive, so we can expect plenty of quests and exploration in a foggy, rugged area with new and challenging creatures to battle.

Pleae note there are different endings for this DLC, something we all wanted! It's like the actual end-game of FO4 in that you can choose the outcome.

Walkthroughs
Islander's Almanac Magazine Locations
Far From Home: Quest 1
Walk in the Park: Quest 2
Where you Belong: Quest 3
Best Left Forgotten: Quest 4
Best Left Forgotten Pt. 2
Endings Guide New
Old Longfellow Likes New
Inform BoS/Institute/RR? (Spoilers)
Joining Children of Atom New
How to do DiMA Puzzle
Side Q: Living on the Edge

Hidden Area (Eliza Map) New
Attacking the Children of Atom for DiMA's Memories
Ware's Brew Quest New
The Striker New

Automatron Guides & Walkthrough

The final quest Restoring Order (Mechanist Fight/Options) is now available. I've also released a page that describes Getting Started in Automatron to accompany the main page about the DLC. This covers how to make the Robot Workbench to begin making your own Automatrons, and walks you through the first two quests while providing some tips for fighting the Mechanist's creations. Quest 3 Walkthrough: Headhunting is also live on the site.

Robots in Automatron New
Mechanist's Lair, Eyebots, and Rogue Robots covers what happens after the Mechanist story is complete.

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