How do the turrets work?

[Ramar]

I placed turrets around my property for first line of defense. However, most of them never even go off. Even though zombies will walk right in front of them. is there a limit on how far away from my base I can place them?

I place them far apart so they don't interfere with each other, but I'm missing something.

I have turrets on the roof of the base for shooting the birds, but they never go off. I have turrents under where where we stand for shooting outward towards the incoming zombies, and they go off just fine.

I placed a turret in from of my base door. (a vault door) The idea was so if they made it to the door, they would be taken out by the turret, however, sometimes it goes off, and other times it doesn't. even though it's only 10 feet (or less) from the door.

what am I missing?

[Amanoob105]

Are we talking the turrets with shotguns or SMGs on them or the robotic turrets?

If the former than the most likely problem is a lack of power (assuming you have wired them up) it's likely that you simply don't have enough power coming from what is supplying it to activate them all.
Get/build more power sources and link fewer turrets to each of them. Going into their menus you can see how much power they can give to how much is being taken.

If the latter, then it's far simpler. By default you can only ever have one active at a time. Two if you have maxed out the Robotics Inventor perk. And even then if you have more than you can have active placed at once it will only activate the ones that are closest to you.

[Ramar]

I'm so sorry, noob here. :) Was referring to the robotic turrets. :)

[Ramar]

So, your saying if I'm standing next to a turret, then the turret on the other side of my compound will not go off?

I.E. I have robotic turrets out in the field surrounding my compound tend to not go off. Especially the ones out in the field. Even though I KNOW the zombies are walking in front of them.

[Ramar]

What about a robotic turret outside of my range?

[Crater Creator]

Originally posted by Ramar:

So, your saying if I'm standing next to a turret, then the turret on the other side of my compound will not go off?

I.E. I have robotic turrets out in the field surrounding my compound tend to not go off. Especially the ones out in the field. Even though I KNOW the zombies are walking in front of them.

Robotic turrets don't function while you're far away from them, full stop. The bit about which one's closest to you only matters if you're close to multiple robotic turrets. For most base sizes/designs, it's really not practical to use them as a first line of defense.

[Teresa]

You need to replace your robotic turrets with smg turrets, that you have to have wired to a power source and stocked with ammo.

Robotic turrets are basically more like your body guards, not so much base defense. They need to be close to you in order to work at all and only the closest one (or 2 if you max the perk) will work. They have very limited use in base defense.

The auto turrets (smg and shotgun) will work as long as they have power and ammo. It doesn't matter how close you are to them. They are the ones you use to protect your base.

[Amanoob105]

Originally posted by Ramar:

So, your saying if I'm standing next to a turret, then the turret on the other side of my compound will not go off?

I.E. I have robotic turrets out in the field surrounding my compound tend to not go off. Especially the ones out in the field. Even though I KNOW the zombies are walking in front of them.

No matter how many of them you place down, only one can be active at any one time. I mention the distance thing because of the shear number of them you said you put down.

Of all of them you put down only one (or two if you maxed the right perk) will be active at a time. And if you have more than one (or two) down only the closest one(s) will be active.

[Ramar]

So your saying that having robotic turrets around the 4 corners of my compound is useless? That only the one closest to me will go off?

[Teresa]

yes. robotic turrets are personal protection. smg and shotgun turrets are base protection.

[Amanoob105]

Originally posted by Ramar:

So your saying that having robotic turrets around the 4 corners of my compound is useless? That only the one closest to me will go off?

Also yes. While having them there is useful if you are finding yourself moving all over the base as the closest one, so long as it is within a distance shown in the the Robotics Inventor perk, will give some extra protection the rest will remain inactive.

If you want automated turrets that work even when you are away from them then invest into the Advanced Engineering perk (shotgun and SMG turrets at levels 4 and 5 respectively) or hope you get lucky with Schematics in loot drops.