Power in the Red

[Goldenkitten]

Does anyone know what it means when the power for a settlement is in the red?

I know with other things like food and water its red if there's not enough for the settlers, and if defense is in the red you aren't defended enough for how much you output. But what does it mean when power is? Because I triple checked every device that requires power and all of them are hooked up to a generator and working.

Do certain areas actually require you to have a certain amount of power to make people happy (this is Minutemen HQ/The Castle for the record), or is it alerting me that something isn't connected even though I've looked through everything?

[Akatosh]

Maybe you have too many devices on the same generator ?

For exemple, 4 devices connected to a generetor who only makes 3 power unit.

[Goldenkitten]

Hmmm I'll check. I do have a number of shotgun and laser turrets watching the main entry but I thought I'd divied them up appropriately. But I probably made a mistake as that seems the most likely since I can't see anything else that could be causing it. Will check when I go back in, in a bit.

Thanks for pointing that out.

[Neerovra]

I just had this same exact issue. The base has lighting preinstalled with conduits and wire in two areas. When wired to power, the power indicator went from green to red for me.

[velvet236]

What you may want to try, is establishing a power grid. Build 4 big generators, or 6, or 8, depending on your power requirements, wire them all together, then build power pylons across to the things that require power. This way, your using the total output of the group, rather than making sure 1 is allocated properly.

[Mio Rin]

To clarify for those who may not have made the connection yet (har har):

When the power indicator in a settlement is red, some of your powered devices do not have the power they need to run properly.
Check your power supply grid.

^_^

[Kameraden]

I suggest building a power station, a location specific to generating power then string power lines across the settlement. Build a gride in short, well at least for general power for a community. Having generators in multiple locations is too hard to manage. This is best, unless you plan on doing some really complicated stuff that likely would require it's own power needs that are off the gride, like some of the new workshop like stuff for example.

Sanctuary for example that north west corner "Lot" I turn into a power station, then string power lines from roof top to roof top to power the community, then string more lines tot he guard towers (Laser turrets) etc. It's out of the way, and keeps the noise out of the heart of the settlement.

[death1996]

If it in the red then if you turn ever thing on something will lose power
I use switches to make up for lack of power or you can you use gates

[Xyzzy]

power = food/water, if food = 20 and water =30, put power at around 25.

[bansheeonfife]

Originally posted by Neerovra:

I just had this same exact issue. The base has lighting preinstalled with conduits and wire in two areas. When wired to power, the power indicator went from green to red for me.

this solved it for me as well. build a bunch of generators before that, making wel over 60 power units. where 10 was more then enough for settlements with an equal amount of settlers.

[Rellik]

Thanks for this! I know this post is old, but I'm on my first playthrough for F4, and this is really helpful! I just redid my power setup in Sanctuary, and it's so much better now.

Originally posted by Kameraden:

I suggest building a power station, a location specific to generating power then string power lines across the settlement. Build a gride in short, well at least for general power for a community. Having generators in multiple locations is too hard to manage. This is best, unless you plan on doing some really complicated stuff that likely would require it's own power needs that are off the gride, like some of the new workshop like stuff for example.

Sanctuary for example that north west corner "Lot" I turn into a power station, then string power lines from roof top to roof top to power the community, then string more lines tot he guard towers (Laser turrets) etc. It's out of the way, and keeps the noise out of the heart of the settlement.

[Zekiran]

Originally posted by Rellik:

Thanks for this! I know this post is old, but I'm on my first playthrough for F4, and this is really helpful! I just redid my power setup in Sanctuary, and it's so much better now.

There are lots and lots of *VERY* good videos on youtube for both broad suggestions and tips, as well as super-detailed settlement building!

This issue is easily one of the first things that people miss in the game's early tutorial stage. I know I missed it that first time too.

[Death Approaches]

you will regret it if you follow such advice without a power distribution mod; the best vanilla way to make defense stations is to multi-connect them to sources; put a genny below your turret towers, but also connect them to the main grid as well... otherwise one damaged generator stops the defense there, and if you went with a pile of central gennies, you can lose all defense at once, and that is a lot of repairing.

just as making turrets to guard entryways is hella dumb, that's not how under attack spawning works, you need a mod that shows you where the spawn points are, because just like in horror movies, sometimes that call is coming from inside the house! turrets at the bridge of sanctuary for example defend against practically nothing, nor can their range reach the ~6 attack spawn points.

some newbies spend 10s of hours putting perfect walls around settlements, only to come back to say, but they're spawning inside the walls.... why yes, yes they are. and your own turrets do more damage to your crops than the attackers do. both of these things are true.

and that's only when you're there... when you're not, it's just math. your beautiful lethal overlapping fields of fire are not actually shooting anything, just rolling dice, this + that - this other = outcome.

so don't go too crazy on any particular thing unless it's fun for you, because it probably doesn't work the way you expect it to, it works Bethesda-style, meaning you have to look it up and it still might be confusing. :-)

[Lucus]

Originally posted by Death Approaches:

you will regret it if you follow such advice without a power distribution mod; the best vanilla way to make defense stations is to multi-connect them to sources; put a genny below your turret towers, but also connect them to the main grid as well... otherwise one damaged generator stops the defense there, and if you went with a pile of central gennies, you can lose all defense at once, and that is a lot of repairing.

or you can not have to worry about most of your turrets power needs because most of them are Heavy machinegun turrets and thus don't need generators making it much simpler to setup your power grid. also one thing i don't see mentioned is the wall mounted spotlights they make excellent decoys for attackers to shoot at while the turrets situated a bit back from them shred attackers.

[Bored Peon]

People are overlooking the obvious....

Red means you have an unpowered object.

You can have 300 power in your settlement and one water purifier. If the water purifier aint connected then the power is red.

All this and that about power grids and such and people just skipped right over the obvious thing, PLUG IT IN.

[major tom]

it happens often if you have two or more available power generators and the power distribution works not as intended. just reconnect.