How to set-up funding in settlements.

[ManOWar2]

Ok so I'm returning to my game after a long time. I'm still only level 20.

I'd like some help to know how to set up settlements that will give you money. How does it work, do you need to just plant crops and go sell them or is there a way to automate that ?

How does the whole things work out. Looking for advices from experienced players.

I've looked some guides on the net, but I'm still clueless somehow.

Thanks.

[Empire]

Collect a bunch of gears and put down a bunch of water pumps. They don't need to be worked and they added purified water to your settlement inventory, which you can then take to sell. You can also use the enemy spawning cages from one of the DLCs to spawn gunners who have valuable equipment which can be sold. You will either need to sell stuff to other traders such as those at diamond city, or if your charisma is high enough you can get a perk which allows you to create your own traders to sell to.

[Chaosium]

If you build stores and assign settlers to them, they generate caps over time in your workshop, you can build some in every settlement and collect the money once in a while.

Else, you have to sell what is produced in your settlement. A good way to get rich is the infamous water farm trick, which consists in selling purified water en masse

[ManOWar2]

How does the purified water is added to the inventory ? It simply appear in my items list or do I need to collect it from some place inside the settlement ? Is it the same for others goods produced in the settlements ?

Thanks guys.

[Thward]

You collect the water from the workbench inside the settlement. A problem you may run into is that the settlement stops adding additional water, food, junk etc. to the workbench once certain limits are reached. There is a mod on Nexus, "Uncapped Settlement Surplus" (chickens**t Steam filters block me from giving you the actual link), which allows you to raise these levels very high or remove them completely. Using it, though, can break the game if you have a significant settlement empire. I installed it a couple of days ago, and with 6-8 settlements I am basically just printing (stamping?) my own caps.

[ManOWar2]

Again, thanks for all the help and replies.

Is there any particular vendors that will have enough money to buy all my goods ?

[N1SB]

Hi ManOWar2, I'm doing basically the Water Baron thing (I see her as a wealthy politician that builds up Settlements, visits them regularly like a caring governor...but also enriches herself along the way.)


+++ Most Vendors "reset" after about 2 days, so I have a route +++


Almost all merchants seem to "reset" their stores, both in how many Caps they carry and the items they sell, about every 2 days. I'm not sure if it's exactly 48 hours, but it means I deliberately had set routes that allow me to drop by with my inventory of Purified Water around every 2 days.

Settlements produce Purified Water daily then just store a certain amount at your Workbench(es) to a maximum amount based on how many Pumps, Industrial Water Purifiers, etc. they have. They'll sit there until you empty them all out (and for some reason they'll count Dirty Water as well).

So what I do is I've got a few Settlements that produce Purified Water, I take it all when I visit, then go around the Commonwealth selling it. By the time I return the Settlements have a bunch of Purified Water waiting for me to pick up again. I actually have a round-robin route I follow.


+++ Vendor Gatherings +++


Because of travel times, I think of Vendors in clusters, like places where I can hit multiple Vendors in a single spot to be more efficient.

Diamond City - most Vendors on 1 map

Bunker Hill - fewer Vendors but each carries more Caps

Drumlin Diner - the shopkeeper and the drug dealer near Sanctuary

Covenant - tiny village with a shopkeeper and a medic

Vault 81 - a shopkeeper, a restaurant and a medic

(And many, many others as well, but those are ones you'll frequently come across. For example, I happen to visit the Brotherhood blimp Prydwyn and The Castle, but that might be too out of the way for most players. The ones above are very accessible IMHO so I mention them 1st, you'll find more on your way.)

To show I go about doing this, I actually have routes that hit all those areas EXCEPT Vault 81 now (that's just not as convenient for me anymore), so my character has become like the regular Purified Water dealer to those places.


+++ Merchant Caravans +++


As you travel to those places, and others, you'll come across traveling Merchant Caravans, like Trashcan Carla, Lucas the Armor dealer, Cricket the Arms dealer, and the sleazy Doctor. They carry a lot of Caps and they carry more as you level.

They have regular routes, but instead of searching them out, I actually run into them regularly enough trying to visit the places where Vendors gather above that I just go to those spots. Of course, you can also eventually build stops for them at your Settlements and they actually stay at ones near their routes. Example - County Crossing, near Bunker Hill, is a favourite stop for a few of them once I set up their little stop.


+++ Your Own Settlement Merchants +++


You can of course set up your own actual Vendors in your own Towns (and invest in them if you want to increase their Cap maximum) run by Settlers, AND you can hire special top tier merchants that have more items and, more importantly, more Caps. Example - there's a wandering ex-Vault 81 Merchant called Rylee that you could recruit and she'll become a Settler. When you build a Level 3 Sales Stall for her...she'll actually upgrade it to Level 4 when she's manning it.


+++ Just my thoughts, but 1 big piece of advice +++


Build Defenses like lots of Turrets at your Industrial Water Purifier sites immediately.

You know how your settlements get randomly attacked? As far as we all can tell, that's based on some factor of Food + Water vs. Defense. So when you set up your Industrial Water Purifiers, which is a good idea, just be sure to set up Defenses as well.

It's a sloppy formula, but I think you want a Defense rating about 50% higher than your Food + Water amount to avoid attacks. So let's say I got a Settlement with 30 Food and 100 Water, I'd have 200 Defense with Missile Turrets and stuff. I'm not sure of the exact amount, but that seems to work for me.

The craziest thing is I've noticed that when you increase Purified Water production at a location...Raiders/Mutants/etc. might not attack THAT Settlement, it'll just randomly attack one of your Settlements.

Disclaimer - I have a Driveable Motorcycle mod that just makes this really fun. I play Fallout 4 more like this other game called Mount & Blade, building up cities, selling items (which all happen to be Purified Water). I also have a Working Shower mod and I build those for towns that have Water Purifiers and it's like I'm re-introducing hygiene to the Commonwealth.

[EolSunder]

Ok here is how you make money with settlements, other than the various ways people above have said. The easiest way is growing adhesive crops.

You get a settlement, you build it up to max settlers, you assign them to what ever various tasks you want. You want food and water in your settlements. This is how you make money. Settlements will naturally gather limited quantities of food and water and put them into the settlement workbench. Also if junk items by scavenging, you can use scavenging benches on settlers not assigned to food, defense, etc.

You grow 3 crops that are required for making vegetable matter, which you can turn into adhesive to use and sell. Plus you have your water in the settlement gathering purified water also over time. You have the settlements linked to each other of course to share resources.

Now, as you adventure about, visit settlements, items are gathered up over time. You can't gather tons of stuff, since there is a limit on items you can gather in each settlements, but as you gain more settlements you can get more items. In each settlement you make a cooking station. As you visit settlements, play, etc you use the stove to make vegetable matter from the food and water you gather in all the settlements. You can also "farm" the food if you visit the settlement for a little extra if you want.

This guarantees later a endless supply of money as your settlements automatically gather resources for you into the workbench that you can access at ANY settlement your in. Drop by a settlement, use the stove, make adhesive until you run out, and continue playing. Suddenly you have 1000 adhesive in your workbenches, usually a lot of excess purified water also, both of which you can sell off at a great price.

There are dozens of other ways to make easy money with your gathered items.. making drugs, bear traps, robot repair items, selling off excess armor and weapons, scavenging energy weapons with the scavenger perks, and tons of other ways. But using food and water to make vegetable matter is the easiest way, all it takes is jumping on the nearest stove to use up built up material.

My current playthrough im only about 1/2 to 1/3 through the vanilla areas of the game, not even started any dlcs, and there isn't anything i need to buy, i have way to much ammo and such already, 200k money, and 10k adhesive, drugs, etc just piling up with really nothing to spend it on. Money isn't hard to make in the game don't worry you'll have more than you'll ever need soon.

[Isti]

I also recommend using Uncapped Settlement Surplus, if you're using mods, as it'll allow things like water, food, caps etc to continue to build up in your workshop without stopping once it hits the default game limit. It's been really handy for me.

[Zotliatlicor]

In Greygarden they will buy Nutfruit, so have that settlement produces Tons of it, this will boost your Caps each time you visit there.

After Quest Completion you can sell Tools in Vault 81 for 15 caps each, and Fertilizer for 3-5 caps each. Selling Fertilizers is a bad deal, but the tools are a great one. As you travel, have your Copmanion carry all the tools you find of theese 5: Adjustable Wrenc - Ball Hammer - Comination
Wrench - Screwdriver - Wrench.

Comanions (-Dogmeat) can carry unlimited by forcing them to pick up or loot container. I usually get close to 1000 caps on selling tools after adventuring for a while.

Have Charisma 6 with Local Leader and Cap Collector. Have Luck 2 with maxed Fortune Finder. Fortune Finder increses the value content of ALL containers in the game. Invest in your Shops so they carry more caps, then you can sell everything you find that you dont need.

Bar's produce most caps and most Happiness, so have several bars in your settlement.

[oldrotorhead1]

Sell the water and buy fertilizer, plastic, and flamer fuel. Use those to make Jet and then convert it to Jet Fuel, which you can then sell for a tidy profit. You also get XP for creating the Jet, and again for creating Jet Fuel.

[oldrotorhead1]

Anything you can eat or drink that is placed in your workshops increases your chance of being attacked.
https://www.reddit.com/r/fo4/comments/cju72y/psa_settlement_defenses_and_attacks/

I use the Object Extractor from the Manufacturing Extended mod to pull all water and crops from all linked settlements. It has reduced the number of attacks I get pretty dramatically.

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by Isti:

I also recommend using Uncapped Settlement Surplus, if you're using mods, as it'll allow things like water, food, caps etc to continue to build up in your workshop without stopping once it hits the default game limit. It's been really handy for me.

That leads to this:

Originally posted by oldrotorhead1:

Anything you can eat or drink that is placed in your workshops increases your chance of being attacked.
https://www.reddit.com/r/fo4/comments/cju72y/psa_settlement_defenses_and_attacks/

I use the Object Extractor from the Manufacturing Extended mod to pull all water and crops from all linked settlements. It has reduced the number of attacks I get pretty dramatically.

Yeah I never got the whole water farm thing especially when there is so many ways to earn money.

1. The extra meat book in Sunshine Tidings, farm animals and cook the meats to sell.
2. Make jet with fertilizer and plastic, put a brahmin in the settlement.
3. Sell excess ammo, ammo that you wont ever need or use is worth a lot.
4. Build stores and barbers in your settlement and have a large population since caps income is population based.

Then if you are into mods, Sim Settlements pushes caps income even further in settlements.

[no1schmo]

While I'm not going to tell you how to play your game, I feel it's worth noting that there isn't a whole lot of reason to do all of this just for caps. If you just want to do it for fun, have at it, but if money is the actual goal, it's not the most enjoyable path. It's a lot of work and all you get are caps to buy...very little, actually. Money is almost totally worthless, besides buying replenishment stims and ammo after every scavving trip.

[oldrotorhead1]

Originally posted by no1schmo:

While I'm not going to tell you how to play your game, I feel it's worth noting that there isn't a whole lot of reason to do all of this just for caps. If you just want to do it for fun, have at it, but if money is the actual goal, it's not the most enjoyable path. It's a lot of work and all you get are caps to buy...very little, actually. Money is almost totally worthless, besides buying replenishment stims and ammo after every scavving trip.

Overseer's Guardian, Spray & Pray, Throatslicer....

[ManOWar2]

Thanks for all the replies and feedback. I do not have the desire to simply make caps for the sake of it, I just want to cummulate a bit so that I can expands settlements and buyings materials.

I guess all the advices I got here give me a pretty good idea how the whole things works. I'll keep it simple and fun, but this will help a lot.

Thanks again.