I love that the factions take control of the checkpoints, gives the feeling of progress to freedom in the wasteland. Seeing factions go out to keep the checkpoints safe is a fun side quest

It makes sense to want to control them. The Prewar military had a reason for putting them there, and we can assume they already did their research and deemed that these points were of strategical value. If the roads are still used by people 210 years later, then they should still hold that same strategic value.

The downed Vertibird near Murkwater is considered a military check point. I've gotten calls for it while in Murkwater.

It makes sense that your faction doesn't man the south boston checkpoint, that speaker is super annoying.

I've got a weird glitch. I used the Minuteman flare during the Defend the Castle quest. And now I've got a group of Minutemen following me around the Commonwealth. Lol It's actually kind of fun and it definitely makes me feel like I'm the General of the Minutemen. It does mean I'm not really using stealth much anymore tho. It'll be interesting to see if they actually follow me to Far Harbor or Nuka World. Although I plan to finish up a bunch of stuff in the Commonwealth first.

I love the checkpoint thing at the end game. As someone who did a "good institute" play through, the teams of synths dotting the commonwealth keeping people safe makes the institute have a more tangible effect on the surface. I also feel less bad for gen 1&2 synths dying then I do my Minutemen. Let's face it, they are basically smart toasters with guns.

Fusion cells aren't that expensive once you find out the secret money of the game, .38 rounds, once you're a high enough level to use those pipe rifle bullets as money, nothing is truly expensive.

There is more on the Wu family. There is a terminal (Kim's Terminal I think) in a settlement a bit north of the glowing sea.

I would like to see a fallout game that takes place months after the bombs fell. Who agrees?

I love these end game things where you can actually see how your choices have impacted the world around you. We need more of this in The Elder Scrolls and Fallout.

>First encounter with Queen Mirelurk >Sees massive Mirelurk in the distance accompanied by a plethora of other Mirelurks >Tries to snip massive Mirelurk >Mirelurks finds my hiding spot and simultaneously charges my position >Retreats to nearby Minuteman checkpoint >We all empty *EVERYTHING* on the Mirelurks >All died in the end

Synth: "your destruction is inevitable" X6 in direct response: *"good, I was starting to get bored"*

I am a us veteran and I can say for sure is what you just said for most part Is accurate. of what we would do if martial law was declared.

I hate not being able to turn off the PA system, but 884 hours in I have yet to pick a faction... building & looting is to fun.

These checkpoints are the reason why i believe the minutemen can potentially become stronger and stabilize the commonwealth. They will control the roads, get better equipment and potentially power armor, which will naturally extend their appeal to nearby regions (and that will in turn make the minutemen even better funded and more powerful). Think of the minutemen like an insurance company, they would get paid by settlements so they could protect them when they need them. This is one of the theories on how an Anarchic society would work, the only problem i see is if the minutemen grow into an NCR-like govt.

hey I know we butted heads on the psychopath video, but I just wanted to let you know how much your work is appreciated.

why are none of the vehicles in use Bethesda should fix that because there's no way for 200 yrs near pristine apcs and tanks sitting around would not have been restored to working order.

If I remember correctly, there is more to the Woo family story found in a house on the NW side of Natick Banks.

I think you’re on point with your reasoning as of why the factions take over the check-points, especially the brotherhood of steel and the minutemen who are attempting to protect the commonwealth. As for the railroad I think they’d use them as waypoints for synths.

I can honestly say, at this point, I can pretty much consider myself a Fallout & Elder Scrolls lore scholar. That's basically a fancy way of saying I've watched way too many lore videos for Fallout & the Elder Scrolls.

700 hours in FO4, and I didnt know they spawn at the check points.

ox you should turn one of the checkpoints into a settlement with mods

Miscellaneous quests are in no way a bother unless I have to walk across the entire commonwealth to do them.

There is also one out in the swamp by the crashed vertibird east of Mirkwood and one near Jamaica Plains over under the bridge near the fridge with the ghoul kid in it. I'm also not sure if you mentioned the one on the road between Finch Farm and the National Guard Armory or the one near the Sand and Gravel place north of Lexington. There really are a lot of them and if you use the roads you will cross them regularly. They do help control the map - not as well as well armed Suppliers, but they do give you lots of places to see "friendlies" and remind you of the faction you backed in that play though. If you were new to Fallout and foolishly followed the main quest to an early completion, the misc quests do drive you to those points and those points are where you find many of the Power Armor sets in the game if you want to collect them all, give each companion a set, etc.

I always love more Fallout lore!

So you're saying we KNOW the Chinese fired missiles first? Would like to know more about that.

There are a few relevant lore tid bits over at Cambridge polymer labs too, mentions of a Colonel Kemp and the military having extraction teams for non military personal vital to the war effort. Some indications that even so far as a few weeks post detonation there was still some level of structured military presence enough to mount rescue attempts of some kind.

I love the fact that the Institute can create a teleport and synthetic life but can't repair a intact APC

It's fallout 4, you can only have a good guy playthrough.

"destroyed the institute in your 20's or early 30's" we're not hippies..maan

About the whole settler death at your hands thing, does that include the player's settlement defense armament? Showed up at the tail end of a settlement defense deal where Rust Devils showed up in mass. Right beside the last body I checked (not far from a heavy laser turret) was a very dead named settler. Nooooo!

I love the checkpoints, I am a very commited General so I love to see my minutemen defending the commonwealth and making it a safer place. What makes it even better is that I have the mod 'We are the Minutemen' installed. It is amazing to at higher level see my minutemen in T-45 PA and Gauss Rifles. Just fucking up every enemy that comes near.

I dont think its possible for oxhorn to make a bad video!

Can you do a far harbour lore video on the randome fire in the water please. Also love the vids

Institute: fighting deathclaws BOS: fighting the railroad Minutemen: *s o m e m u t a t e d d i r t r a t s*

Your videos are great! I usually watch them during slow days at work and you have gotten me back into fallout 4, which I never thought any one could do! Keep it up man! Love your stuff.

Keep up the Good work OxHorn! Would love to see more Console mod review's and a video explaining The Load Order.

I like it and I think this (sort of) explains why there are so many weapons in the commonwealth

Firstly, yes, I enjoy coming across the checkpoints (mine are all BoS manned). They always provide a spontaneous action interlude that is fun (and usually challenging). Also, I particularly like it when one or more vertibirds show up and zero in on a target area and I do my best to chase them and get myself involved (I have a mod installed that makes the vertibirds nearly impossible to shoot down, so the fights can go on for a long time). There are a couple of odd things that happen at checkpoint fights, though. The first one is that now and then everyone not in the BoS turns on one of the Brotherhood of Steel characters and attacks him until he is dead (I never participate; I just stand and watch). After the BoS character has been killed (by either my settlers, or their dogs) nothing happens; the other soldiers are not hostile toward me or my settlers, they converse with me normally, and everyone just ignores the incident. Very odd. I think it must be a reaction to his accidentally shooting a settler during a big firefight (they can get quite large and hectic involving multiple types of enemies) and so he gets marked as an enemy and is killed. Never by me, however. The other thing that happens is that sometimes one of them will step out of his power armor and just leave it abandoned (and on a couple of occasions I've just happened upon a suit of BoS PA standing abandoned in the wilderness, or on a road). If I leave it then it is still there the next time I pass by the location. If I make a move to wear it it is marked as stealing, but stealing it elicits no response from the other soldiers (which makes sense, since I am a Sentinel of the BoS, but then why would taking it be considered theft?). Anyway, I don't need the armor as I have a huge collection on display back at my home base and I'm always finding more (just in Nuka World alone I found three full sets of armor as well as three additional frames with partial armor). So what I do now is I get into the "stolen" armor and make my way back to the Prydwen and leave the suit of armor in the repair bay with the fusion core left in. Can't leave PA standing around for Gunners to find and use, it's already bad enough when they hijack a vertibird and go on a shooting spree (which has happened to me twice so far -- my companion started attacking a vertibird and I was totally confused, until the vehicle crashed and i discovered it was being piloted by a Gunner).

I think these checkpoints are so no faction can establish a foot hold in the common wealth because eventually I think Boston in Fallout 4 has the potential to become it's own country like the new California Republic the only faction that would not form a faction would probably be the institute since they just want to live under ground and build Gen 3 synths who cant reproduce

Who mans the checkpoints if you did the faction "friendly" ending??

Hey Oxhorn, What is your favorite faction from the base game? Mine is the Brotherhood of steel but I'm going to reset my character and work with the institute as I have already done all factions but them. Also keep up the amazing work!

One of the mods I have installed marks all the military checkpoints along with other minor locations that weren't marked on the vanilla map. I can't remember it's name off hand though.

"destroyed the Institute in your 20s" LOL I was level 70 before I even sided with a faction.

checkpoints do make since and glad it was thrown in as a nice touch.

I would love to see more from the factions, such as larger random battles that occure, or the faction it's self can invade or expand and destroy other factions or settlements. As an example you might start the game and travel to diamond city trade a few things then return back to the city to find it has been taken over by gunners or overrun by ghouls. I think it would create a much more realistic feel to the game, of course I think this should only be setting that you can choose to allow it to happen, or it could be triggered after the main story is complete so all hell breaks after you finish the main campaign. I also think that you should be able to call in or recruit squads of people from the faction you sided with to help in large scale battles I know there are mods on console and pc but still it's nicer to have it properly in the game what do you think?😀

Although there isn't a map for the military checkpoints, many of the power armor that spawns randomly in the world spawn in or very close to the military checkpoints, so any of the numerous maps that show where the power armors out on the world are will also give s good hint to where the checkpoints are.

I really like the checkpoints in the endgame, just because they add to the lived-in feeling, along with meeting supply-line convoys, the roads actually feel like people are using them.

I noticed you're using an automatic rifle - do you find them more effective than a semi-auto one? The only advantage to going full auto, that I can tell, is that the commando skill encompasses full auto pistols AND rifles, whereas the other weapon skills do not...

I found a fill suit of X-01 suit of power armor at a gunner checkpoint 5 minutes after I turned level 27 EDIT: fill=full

Only now realized. The Great War scenario mirrors what happened in 1983. When Stanislav Petrov saw on his screens that USA had launched five missiles towards USSR, he decided that there must be an error because he had been taught that when Americans attack they'll hit USSR with all they have. He didn't report to his superiors and decided to wait for confirmation, which didn't come because the attack warning was a computer error, thereby arguably saving the world. Cold war was at a tense phase with the Korean airliner being shot down and new missile deployments along with "Star Wars" announcement by Reagan, it has been argued that had Petrov reported onwards the politburo would have retaliated. It's an interesting chain of events and I'd never realised that the Great War might've been averted if USA had a wonky computer too.

I choose the minutemen everytime. Brotherhood doesn't like most of my companions and they call dogmeat names so I destroy the BOS everytime. I do lost patrol and kill Brandis and then I go to Cambridge, help kill the ghouls then kill Dans and his 2 halfwitts. Then after wiping out the Institute, I wipeout the rest of the brotherhood.

Great video but I swear to god this bothers me so much, loot the legendary enemies. It feels so wrong to not at least took at it. It could be an instigating gauss rifle or something....

Love the vids Oxhorn. Keep it up

there is alot of check point and i cant recall all but below is what i can remember just in case you need to do a map on checkpoint 1. Tenpines Bluff - South on railroad 2. Starlight Drive In - East on the road below highway 3. Drumlin Diner - South on railroad 4. Mass Gravel and Sand - East on the crossroad 5. Poseidon Energy Turbine - North on a hill 6. Finch Farm - West on the road 7. Nahant Sheriff Department - North East near Sea 8. Jamaica Plain - East in a pond 9. Jamaica Plain - West on road to Big John Salvage 10. Mass Pike Interchange - North West on a small road towards Fort Hagen 11. Boston Common - Unsure whether consider a checkpoint but the same vehicle is there 12. Pickman Gallery - North East near Sea 13. Murkwater - West of it in a pond 14. Wilson Atomatoys - Unsure whether consider a checkpoint but the same vehicle is there Thats all i can remember for now will have to look into my game map to get more accurate information

7:42 That poor gunner had no chance, he didn't even get up

This might be an obvious answer, but if you help defend a certain military checkpoint, will that same checkpoint need to be defended again later on?

if you are using the overseers gun idk what it is how did you get it to rapid fire

I love this little lore videos! They remind me of the Shoddycast videos back in the day and I loved them as I love this ones! Keep it up Oxhorn!

Some of the checkpoints are quite a bother as they are close to settlements, so each time you wander around those settlements you always get the "help defend the checkpoint". Murkwater and Jamaica Plain are good examples as both have a checkpoint near them.

Once with my explosive shotgun i may have killed my own men at one checkpoint

3:20 is that a mod? the brotherhood guy is weraing Some clothes that are uknown for me (sorry for Bad englisch i'm german)

I found one while getting a radio signal for supplies and ammo, due to the threat of Nuclear war, and when I went there, it was taken by Gunners, with a full set of leveled armor, (I was level 29, so it was T-51), and there was a super mutant Camp nearby too Update: It was the South Boston checkpoint

I one time brought a legendary glowing deathclaw to one of the military checkpoints My allies died

I feel like if the Railroad were for equal rights of all sentient races, they could ally with the Institute and be a successful Communist union in America. the bad part is, you know how those things work.

Holy crap, are you good at this. Did you discuss the pregnant girl in the abandoned cabin? I feel like you did... Or, talk about the Raider gang in the High School, where the leader's wearing that freaky-ass bear mascot head? Thank you for doing this. Bethesda did a wonderful job of world-building, adding so much depth to the dead, and you've managed to capture the nuance that I often missed.

I'd never notice that checkpoints did that. Thanks for pointing it out.

One of the funniest moments in my game was where I had Danse (hostile to the BOS ) at Murkwater Construction and I got a call to "defend the checkpoint". Without thinking I took him along and , since I had done the BOS ending it was manned by BOS Knights. He sees them and yells "For the Brotherhood !!" before opening fire on them and killing them 8-)

Securing trade route was my first idea of why checkpoints are important. Set up on key transportation lines

I like the military cheek points they made sense to me to be in game . Through my first play through stumbleing across one was a highlight .

I have never seen these "military checkpoints" you refer to, nor have I ever had a quest added that says to defend it. Are they something you trigger by going through a questline for one side? I have been trying to stay in everyone's good graces though I know eventually I'll have to choose a side. Once I've chosen, is that when these Military Checkpoints start to occur? Thanks to anyone for help here.

That marshal law, at least in my mind, explains why there are pipe rifles and other improvised weapons in containers that supposedly have not been opened since before the war.

Oxhorn has to be one of, if not the best lore channel on youtube!

Nice lore video as always. I'd love to see a video on the various diners/ restaurants found in Fallout 4

I love your lore videos Oxhorn, im a severe fallout fan and this is very pleasing to watch keep up the good work :)

That could only possibly be brazing or oxy-fuel welding. Spot welding is done with electricity and not flame. Spot welding also requires the welder to make contact with both sides of the metal being welded. Seeing as there was no fill wire added to the animation this is just some guys heating metal with a torch.

I love looting those checkpoints even when I have to defend them the loot afterwards makes it worth while.

I used the build anywhere mod or the camp mod, to build settlements surrounding each checkpoint in order to better support them with turrets and other defenses turning each check point into a veritable gauntlet for the enemy

Oh ok so this is why I randomly get calls to help defend checkpoints for the BoS.

Also there's a military checkpoint west of murkwater construction site. It also has power armor and a pre-war vertibird+steamer trunk

why does that institute rifle look like it was designed by Telltale Games?

i honesty wish there was a mod that brought these to their full potential.

Keep these videos coming. I love fallout 4 and these videos are great.

I like the checkpoints, but the problem I have is that the defend the checkpoints quest happens way too often. Since I play on survival and have to get around the old fashioned way, I end up defending like 3 checkpoints every time I'm on the road, and at high levels, it's difficult because the enemies absolutely steamroll the Minutemen at the checkpoint.

I encountered a Mr. Gutsy in my travels across the waste land that had dialogue telling me that I needed to go home because the US was under marshal Law. There was a Charisma check where you the player tricked him stating that you where military and had clearance to be out and about.

Don't forget haywire capital wasteland checkpoint mr gutsies in FO3 as well. I think one in this very video has an assaultron and gutsy camping it and near the slog is another that a lone gutsy guards. The one with two bots I remember as the only land access to a settlement manor and a church with a mirelurk queen rising out of a puddle. Thought it might be useful.

The first time I came across these I thought I had missed it before. then I put two and two together after I saw it was a bunch of the people who belong to the faction I sided with fighting with me. I was surprised but it was a welcome addition to the aftermath of my post story game play.

0:59 - Gun reminds me of a BAR for some reason?

There’s a mod to make you seem like du are part of a faction called F.C.O.M where it gives du a radio to call in troops from all four joinable factions even the enclave. It even works if du use mods to change or upgrade certain factions which is pretty neat

For me, the military checkpoint missions are more of a bother. It always feels like I am having to babysit my fellow railroad operatives.

Dude you should totally do the vault 81 lore video that would be great

4:56 You should probably find out why that mole rat propelled itself into the air at light speed.

Probably everyone in the Commonwealth is so interested in the checkpoints for the same reason the Gunners set up on overpasses. While the means of travel has changed, a lot of the routes are still following the old times roads. Or are at least within striking distance. The checkpoints (if they were done right) were set up at choke points where traffic was constricted. So, if you're trying to prevent other factions from having easy overland movement, it makes sense to occupy them. Plus the loot. I think the reason F3's military check points were less desirable (and probably more picked over for 200 years) was the terrain. Most of them in DC were on roads in and out of the city. So they were more to check traffic coming in or out. Or restrict access near power stations which would be targets of sabotage. (if memory serves correct there are at least 2 checkpoints in F3 near power substations) Being in more open terrain, travel routes aren't as constricted as in the Commonwealth. I'm also guessing the food riots and civil unrest leading up to the war had something to do with it. We know from the newspaper office in F3 that there were food riots in various places. Boston might have been one of them, which would explain the greater number of checkpoints in the urban areas. Probably with the number of government targets in DC the place was swarming with soldiers similar to WWII. Just that would suppress disorder to some extent. Especially if they were under arms.

I think there is also a military point near greentop nursery, it has a helipad as well. It is similar to the S. Boston checkpoint. But iam not sure if it had the exact same function.

During the defend the castle quest against the gunners i found that after the battle that cricket got killed in the crossfire

I really like this addition in the game, I always felt like I wasn’t really part of a faction or the general of the minutemen, my troops would kinda just show up randomly but with this I feel like I control land, sucks you can’t set up a command center and control land like risk or something lol

You might want to warn that if you go to the checkpoints before completion, MUPTIPLE HIGH LEVEL MILITARY ROBOTS will be guarding it. anything from Protectrons and Mr. Gutsies to Assaultron's and Sentry-Bots.

dude i could listen to your voice for days

Reminds me how I get my Riper and Power Armor in Fallout 3. I let a Brotherhood Knight get killed by hord of Super Mutants. x)

I reckon it's the same reason the military started the checkpoints. You often tend to travel by the roads when moving around the commonwealth. Provisioners seem to travel by road. Caravans travel by road. You see the pattern? People will naturally take these paths to get around the commonwealth. Each faction can seize this point, and ask anyone about their business, prevent harm to the places they ally with, etc. The only thing is, there's no reason for the Railroad or Institute to take them. The Institute can clearly keep eyes on anything they want above ground, either through hidden cameras or stealthy synths. The railroad also has a capability to monitor certain areas (that tinker tom thingy). The BoS lacks this stealthy capability (they can do aerial surveillance with a vertibird, but vertibirds aren't stealthy), and neither does the Minutemen. So they need to keep these spots under control, because they are key to holding the commonwealth.