*SPOILERS* Certain Impersonator

[Erke]

I've been playing Fallout 4 since the day it came out. I had multiple playthrougs and I had NEVER encountered this character until this day!

A little background first; Yesterday I was at the Sanctuary before I decided to do the County crossing settlement quest, so I ordered Preston to move to Boston Airport. That way I could talk to him easily without returning to Sanctuary after I finished the quest.

Today, I completed it and was on my way to Boston Airport to speak to Preston, then out of nowhere, this guy came up to me saying he’s Preston Garvey!!!

I immediately paused the game and started panicking, thinking my game has glitched and reset Preston or one of my mods was messing up the game and so on... Browsing my savegames for a rollback... But first I resumed to see what's going on and started listening to his slightly higher pitched voice and using phrases like "Hey man". At that moment I knew something fishy was going on and started laughing my arse off...

This bloke had the balls for asking 100 caps to help the cause of the Minuteman!!!

Being the General, I told him that, first he didn’t believe it. So I seized everything he owned, except his caps (28) before he started fleeing.

He had 10 Micro Fusion Cells, 17 Watz Plasma Cartridges, 1 Laser Musket Mk. 1 {Focused}, 1 Militia hat and a Minuteman outfit.

Oh, I also made him wear a grey sequin dress with a studded leather PK Collar and gave him a Canned Dog Food for the road.

He started running towards Rever Beach Station, which is infested with raiders... Unfortunately his new outfit didn't help to make friends... Thinking that was a quick end for my roleplay endavours for merely shaming him, I reloaded to a point where started running again. This time he ran the other way and eventually stopped.

I will leave him there now. I also grabbed is refID (ff0561ce for my game), will check on him from time to time by using player.moveto command, he will probably either be disabled or moved into the Quick Test Cell, but we'll see...
=D

Check these screenshots for entertainment...

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669502955
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669502530
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669503452
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669504146
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669514655
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669514914
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669517022
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2669517225

[Bored Peon]

I had 5000+ hours played before I saw him. I saw him once more since in the next 1000 hours.

[Shadowrun]

lol i have encountered this one before and it's funny it was also near boston airport. the random encounters are fun that's what makes it worth running around between points of interest to see what else is out there.

EDIT:

this is so funny, thanks for documenting it. i don't have any screenshots of my encounter

[neds_not_here]

I've also him seen a few times , The first few playthru's I used to see him south of Oberland station 'cause I had have Garvey as a follower . Now ! clocked over 7000 hour over two accounts and don't ''use '' Garvey any more , I've only seen him once in the last three years .

[Erke]

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

I had 5000+ hours played before I saw him. I saw him once more since in the next 1000 hours.

I am at 1806 hours myself. =D Kudos for +6000 hours.

Originally posted by aaron.mann:

lol i have encountered this one before and it's funny it was also near boston airport. the random encounters are fun that's what makes it worth running around between points of interest to see what else is out there.

EDIT:

this is so funny, thanks for documenting it. i don't have any screenshots of my encounter

Glad you find it funny as well mate. =D
Yes finding him at the Revere Satellite Array, between County crossing and Boston Airport was such a lucky encounter, but it's also the reason I panicked at first, thinking my Preston AI (and face+body) is messed up... =D
Random encounters are golden in this game. I love them...

Originally posted by neds_not_here:

I've also him seen a few times , The first few playthru's I used to see him south of Oberland station 'cause I had have Garvey as a follower . Now ! clocked over 7000 hour over two accounts and don't ''use '' Garvey any more , I've only seen him once in the last three years .

Kudos for +7000 hours... Now I feel like I gotta pump up my hours! =D
After posting this here, I researched the net about this encounter and seen people on youtube, encountering him WITH real Preston as companion.... It's such a shame, such a disappointment that they don't have unique dialogue for that...

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by neds_not_here:

I've also him seen a few times , The first few playthru's I used to see him south of Oberland station 'cause I had have Garvey as a follower . Now ! clocked over 7000 hour over two accounts and don't ''use '' Garvey any more , I've only seen him once in the last three years .

Well I think you have to let Preston out of the museum in order for it to be added to the event list. It would definitely explain such a low encounter rate for me. I have seen every rare NPC encounter way more frequently.

In fact....
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1291903339
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1286169386
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1278576722
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1295538364
You aint the only one taking rare photos

Speaking of the Preston Impersonator, the first time I thought I saw him was a bug.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1307877193
This was after talking to the class in Vault 81 about the museum fight. Apparently Preston gets moved to Vault 81 for some odd reason. When you exit the vault after you can see him running away, The fact I can target him in VATS shows he is not a companion. (I have replicated this.)

[Erke]

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

In fact....
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1291903339

I've never seen them both searching for Emogene, did they in fact confirm what they were up to via dialogue?
After completing the whole Cabot questline, while waiting for a week for Jack to give me Lorenzo's gun, I once saw him alone, wandering aimlessly, walking towards the Asylum. Had no dialogue option only said "Oh it's you!"

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1278576722

Can't remember this guy... Is that Skinny Malone?

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

You aint the only one taking rare photos

Speaking of the Preston Impersonator, the first time I thought I saw him was a bug.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1307877193
This was after talking to the class in Vault 81 about the museum fight. Apparently Preston gets moved to Vault 81 for some odd reason. When you exit the vault after you can see him running away, The fact I can target him in VATS shows he is not a companion. (I have replicated this.)

This is interesting. I always go to Concord at very early stages in my game. Never visited Visited V81 before Concord.

In my game I can target allies and companions in VATS as well, but they show up as blue, so I can't remember the vanilla behavour.

So this is real Preston before ever speaking to him, did I understand correctly?

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by Erke:

Originally posted by Bored Peon:

In fact....
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1291903339

I've never seen them both searching for Emogene, did they in fact confirm what they were up to via dialogue?
After completing the whole Cabot questline, while waiting for a week for Jack to give me Lorenzo's gun, I once saw him alone, wandering aimlessly, walking towards the Asylum. Had no dialogue option only said "Oh it's you!"

LOL, no the title was more of a joke for the Emogene bug. After you complete the quest line and get the artifact gun you can find then. The dialogue is well...
Cabot is stating a new project and he offers to buy fiber optics from you

[DouglasGrave]

Originally posted by Erke:

This is interesting. I always go to Concord at very early stages in my game. Never visited Visited V81 before Concord.

The main difference to watch out for there is that if you haven't reached the doors of the museum to trigger Preston calling out from the balcony for help, you won't be able to get the Short Stories quest to tell the children of Vault 81 about your fight with a deathclaw.

The funny part is that Short Stories only needs you to pass near the museum to let you recount the full story, so you can tell the children all about how you helped your friend Preston before you've actually done so, by fighting a deathclaw you don't even realize is present. You may not have even seen a deathclaw since getting out of deep freeze.

[Bored Peon]

Originally posted by DouglasGrave:

Originally posted by Erke:

This is interesting. I always go to Concord at very early stages in my game. Never visited Visited V81 before Concord.

The main difference to watch out for there is that if you haven't reached the doors of the museum to trigger Preston calling out from the balcony for help, you won't be able to get the Short Stories quest to tell the children of Vault 81 about your fight with a deathclaw.

The funny part is that Short Stories only needs you to pass near the museum to let you recount the full story, so you can tell the children all about how you helped your friend Preston before you've actually done so, by fighting a deathclaw you don't even realize is present. You may not have even seen a deathclaw since getting out of deep freeze.

Oh, did not know that. I usually go into the museum, grab the bobblehead and magazine then do the fight after and never go back.

My game are like this:
30% do the Minutemen
60% ignore the Minutemen
10% kill the Minutemen (Sim Settlements Conqueror)

[EolSunder]

yea i think the vault 81 preston is the real one that for some reason gets teleported over to vault 81 when you leave it. I've had times leaving it and seeing him and going "mm is that the fake one?" then looking at quest markers and going .. nope thats the real Preston who suppose to be at Sanctuary, what is he doing way over here the dumb noobie.