Yep. They are living on borrowed time!

Yay, Victoria's got a water pump in her rocket house! That is funny/clever how she set up those defenses with an eye toward taking them all out sometime.

Victoria is smarter than the average Raider!

Plus the do-gooders are far too trusting. Khajiit suspects their "essential" status is mostly to blame for that, but we shall deal with that soon enough!

October 29th, 2287

Got a lot crap done today.

Headed northeast early this morning in the direction of Tenpines Bluff, which Garvey so graciously gave me the coordinates to yesterday. Heh heh, foolish man. Went past the little Raider camp I cleaned out on the 23rd, up the hill, and came to a road. Just beyond the road looms the satellite station, Olivia.

When I arrived on the scene, a Raider and his mutt were fighting two bloatflies. I let the Raider and mutt kill the flies, then I popped the dog and Raider, who were up on a catwalk and balcony that leads to a utility shed near the dish. A second Raider was in the bunker containing the entrance to the underground part of the facility, with his friggin' back turned to window! Can you believe that?! He took a sword to the side of the neck and that was that for the surface defenders of Olivia. Later I'll return and clear out the jerks in the facility proper. See what Abernathy will give me for recovering that stupid locket.

I looted the utility shed up on the catwalk and noticed some molerats scurrying about not too far from the facility's ruined chainlink fence. Through my bolt action's scope I noticed flashing lights on one. The flashing lights of a land mine. Some sick jerk strapped a mine to a molerat! I shot the one with the mine on it when the others were near it, and the resulting explosion took all but one out in one shot. The other went running up the catwalk and I gunned it down with my 10mm.

Just east and a bit south of Olivia I came to a little junkyard with about 4 feral mutts sniffing around. Once they were dead, I searched the junkyard, found some caps and little else of note, then headed straight east towards Tenpines. The PipBoy map showed it being not far over the next hill, so I sunk down into my stalking stance. Stepping carefully so as to avoid making noise, I crested the hill and looked upon Tenpines Bluff.

The settlement at Tenpines Bluff was a pitiful sight. It consisted mostly of farmland for the growing of tato plants, with a small, dilapidated shack for the settlers' home and an old ruined house on the fringe of the settlement. There was a workbench right behind the shack, a cook fire out in front of it and a water pump not far from there, so I could see the site had potential. While I was still some distance away, I watched the settlement through my bolt action's scope. Saw just two settlers and when I was confident there were not any more, I carefully moved into position.

There are moments just before a settlement falls when the thrill almost becomes overwhelming. Your pulse quickens, your vision becomes more focused, and you get this feeling like nothing can stop you! The two settlers at Tenpines died without a fight. The first guy was tending to the tato plants and he took a shot to the head. The woman, who was in the shack, had gotten up to investigate the gunshot and was shot through the abdomen, the bullet destroying her spine. With just two well placed shots, Tenpines was mine! Having dispatched the former residents, I moved in to see what I was working with.

I had a lot of daylight left so after I spent some time looking around Tenpines, I headed southeast and crossed a small chasm made by a railroad cut through via a shaky rope bridge. Once across, I killed a feral mutt and continued southeast to a ruined elevated highway. Straight ahead was a huge crashed aircraft. Just before, and to the right of the aircraft wreckage was an outpost of some sort accessed by a fallen segment of elevated highway. The top of the ramp was guarded by a turret so I popped it and the spotlight to its left with my rifle. With that threat eliminated, I sneaked my way up the ramp.

The interior of the outpost is the lower deck of the elevated highway and was guarded by two mercenary types armed with laser weapons. I took them out with my rifle and then found a lift that went to the upper deck. As soon as it cleared the top, I was confronted with a sniper who was patrolling the top level. Luckily he had his back to me so I was able to pop him before he could turn around and shoot me. After clearing the outpost, I looted it and hauled the stuff back to Tenpines, and called it a day.

Well log, it's been a busy day and I'm exhausted. Tomorrow I'll demolish the shack and ruined house here at Tenpines and start building a structure of my own. This is going to make an excellent outpost!

Victoria out.

Vicky had a long day of murdering people!

Well to be fair, the Gunners and Raiders would have attacked her on sight so we'll consider those cases as "preemptive strikes",
The Tenpines killings? Definitely murder, lol

Victoria's pretty darn good at using range to her advantage. A fine sniper, she be!

True to her style, she secured the Tenpines shack for herself only. She seemed to enjoy killing those farmers.

Is the guy's shirt vanilla? It looks AWESOME.

Nope, it's part of a mod called Eli's Armor Compendium. Adds a bunch of awesome clothes that fit in quite well with the post apocalyptic setting. A lot of the random settlers and scavers will spawn with these clothes.

Yep! That said, she just went through an interior space using mostly her "sword". It was pretty fun!

Dang. Sorry. Missed this one earlier.

Wow, so they really have walking frag mines? In the sense that you saw one strapped to some dog? Damn.

Yes, that Tenpines Bluff settlement is really sad! Lol.

Yeah, it's legit crazy! Someone put a mine on a molerat!

Under Victoria's supervision, Tenpines shall be transformed into a fortress of dread!

There are at least two places with mine-garbed molerats. Olivia is one. There is another in a ruined parking garage in downtown Boston, where a scavenger has semi-tamed them and uses them as guards.

October 30th, 2287

Spent today working on Tenpines. Demolished the shack and ruined house and started constructing a tower near the site of the ruined house. I also tossed the settler bodies into a nearby ditch. Food for crows, haha! Maybe they'll eat that and leave the friggin' tatos alone. Tomorrow I'll finish building.

Had an unwanted visit from a trader today. Guy named Lucas Miller and his two caravan guards and pack brahmin surprised me while I was working on my tower. Luckily I had changed into something with pockets for work so I wasn't in my Raider gear. I put on my "friendly face" and greeted them cheerfully and browsed his wares. Nothing worth spending the caps on. After chatting a bit I went back to working on my settlement, all the while hoping they didn't notice the two dead folks in the ditch nearby. When they were rested up, they went back the way they came. Jerks didn't even offer to help me, can you believe that crap?! If they come back, they're dead.

Victoria out.

Victoria's getting very domestic, building her house, feeding mirocu the crows and even entertaining houseguests and not killing them (this visit).

Victoria is following the old Celtic tradition of leaving the dead unburied after a battle, as a sacrifice to The Morrigan.

Vicky did not buy any ballistic fiber from Lucas? I think he is the only merchant who sells shipments of it.

Nope. No Ballistic Fiber. Didn't have the funds. Also, Nukapedia says KL-E-0 in Goodneighbor sells the fiber shipment.

This was going to be a two date post, but she ended up providing a lot more food for the crows on Halloween so Khajiit thought that entry should be by itself.

"Spent today working on Tenpines."

By this Victoria mostly means ditching the former settlers, right?

Lucas Miller looks like hails from Skyrim. He and his crew better not return to Tenpines Bluff...

Lol, no she did that the day before! She literally spent a few minutes setting stuff up then had to do a lot of waiting to simulate build time, because building is an instantaneous thing in Fallout4. She took 2 days setting up Tenpines.

What happened to Victoria?

Sorry, been busy with other things. Khajiit actually does have another entry ready to go. Will post it later.

*update*
Welp, the entry somehow got deleted so it's going to be quite a while before it gets up. Sorry.

Victoria out. For awhile.

Khajiit doesn't know what happened to it. He opened up the note on his phone and only the last paragraph was left.

October 31st, 2287

The old folks used to say that October 31st is something called Halloween. Before the war that ended society as people knew it, kids used to dress up in costumes and go from house to house extorting candy from the owners in exchange for not playing pranks on them. The old folks also said that even older folks thought that Halloween was a time when the border between our world and the realm of the dead thinned, allowing for spirits to visit the living. I hope that bunch over in the mass grave over there don't come calling, haha... ha...

.... Errr, yeah, so I got my tower built here at Tenpines, which is a wonder given how many distractions I've had today. It started this morning when I was interrupted from my work by a few Raiders who decided to attack. The dog took the brunt of their attention while I was working on the porch of the tower but wasn't seriously hurt. I quickly dealt with them and added their bodies to the corpse pile in that ditch. Then I got back to work.

A little bit later I took a break to hunt a radstag that wandered into the area. Hey what can I say, food can become scarce out here so you should take some game when an opportunity arises. After killing the deer, I returned to Tenpines, and guess who I found sitting with his back to me. Yep, that's right, Lucas Miller returned while I was off hunting. Strange thing was, his guards were no where around. Seizing the opportunity, I crept up behind him, and buried my sword in his neck. Another corpse for the pile.

With that bit of business concluded, I got back to work on my tower. I was working on the interior when I heard voices outside so I peeped around the door and saw that Miller's frickin' guards and the brahmin came back looking for their boss. So many distractions! I tossed a molotov at the closest guard but it landed a bit too far behind them only doing minimal damage. The dog then attacked them and I opened up with my bolt action, while the brahmin hauled ass over the hill to the west. After the guards fell, I chased down the brahmin and put it down in a large washout on the other side of the hill. The washout was so large that I decided to move the bodies that were stacking up in that ditch by the tower to there, and so I did after I finished work on the tower.

Well, it's been a long couple of days but I finally have a nice outpost to camp out at in this part of the Commonwealth. Thanks again Garvey! Ha! Anyway, I guess tomorrow I'll go check out that plane wreck over by that ruined overpass and see what's over there, but for now it's time for sleep. The tower is going to be a big improvement to sleeping in the open.

Victoria out.

Yeah totally. I like how Vic included her thoughts on special days of the past, such as Halloween. Makes total sense.

She's got herself a decent little hideaway there, at least for a night or two. Looks as if it were built for a flood plain though, since it's on stilts.

It's easy to forget that Victoria came from a civilized yet backwater settlement. The old folks there would have told stories of the good ol' days.

Lol, Khajiit should have included a pic of the view from the tower. Tenpines is on a high bluff (its original settlement name is Tenpines Bluff) that looks over the area. This one built the shack on stilts to give a commanding view of the area, like a watch tower.

I really like her makeshift shack.

Woe to anyone that approaches the Tenpines Bluff.

The corpse pile is getting full! Loviatar says it is a shame to let such good meat go to waste...

Vicky killed Lucas? But he is a convenient way to sell loot and get caps. Even Loviatar left the traveling merchants alive after blowing up Megaton. They made life easier.

Something tells me that Victoria is still going to need a bigger ditch...

That looks like one of those swamp houses built on stilts.

Yes, Victoria killed Lucas and his people. Raiders raid and take what others have by intimidation, or failing that, violence. Only what Lucas and Co. had wasn't what he normally sells, just what they were wearing and fighting with and little else. Even the brahmin only had some meat, hide, and a couple of items of random junk.

Also, the original entry for Oct. 31st. had a cannibalizm comment in it. A shame it got erased.

Has the alternate start mod been causing any issues? I want to give it a shot, but am worried it will wonk out my game.

I have used it in several games, and it has worked fine. I never did the main quest beyond freeing the detective though.

Is it this one? I'd like to do an RP in the wasteland, so the alternate start is a must. I'd love to be free of the main story, and struggling to live in the wastes.

That is the same one.

Sweet. I'm going to roll it and Grasslands for my next playthrough.

Time to dream up a new character! Thanks, Sub!

Sure, it's a bit wonky. To do the main quest, you basically visit 111 and find a holotape with an audio recording of the kidnapping scene and then you get a quest telling you to go "report the kidnapping" (this one assumes it sends you to Diamond City). Khajiit hasn't run into anything game breaking yet (just some weirdness with Codsworth thinking you are his previous owner; you can tell him he's crazy though), though honestly Victoria is going to avoid the MQ like the plague. She simply doesn't care about some kidnapped brat.

Samesies on the ignoring part.

Lopov’s excellent Card Killer finale has encouraged Khajiit to continue Victoria’s story. There are some new entries heading your way in the near future!

November 1st 2287

Did a lot of exploring today. Investigated that crashed airplane first. A Raider crew and some Scavers had a shoot out over the potential loot so I popped the survivors and took what loot was there for myself. Not a bad haul. There was a bunch of guns and ammo around the plane and the various suitcases held goodies like clothing and armor. Too bad I killed that jerk Miller. Could’ve made a bunch of caps selling him this junk. Ah well, you live and learn right? May have to institute a policy of letting merchants live, going forward.

After I hauled all that loot back to Tenpines, I proceeded to explore the area south and a bit west of the plane crash and discovered a vast graveyard. In the old days before the nuclear war, people would bury their loved ones in places like this when they died. Most people nowadays are lucky if they get such treatment. The graveyard has a couple of open tombs and one has been outfitted with armor and weapons workbenches. Someone has been here but have long since abandoned it. They even left a strange looking hat on the foot of a coffin that is leaning against the wall of the tomb shelter. May have been the person whose skeleton I found draped over a tombstone, beer bottle still clutched in its bony fingers.

Behind that tomb with the workbenches is a wrought iron fence that actually encircles the graveyard, and through an opening in the fence you can access a ruined house that contains a few containers and a working stove, as well as a workshop. Might set this place up as a base and dig up some these graves to see if any of the dead were buried with valuables. They won’t be needing it anymore, and if it can help me, why not?

I took the road west of the graveyard and followed it north under the elevated highway, found a little Scaver camp, the Scaver dead, and a little loot. I continued north and eventually came back to Tenpines where I dropped off what I got from the graveyard and Scaver camp. I then proceeded northwest past the satellite station and found a crashed vertibird and a power armor frame with a few rusty pieces of T-45 armor on it. I left it alone for the moment and continued northwest. Then I came upon an old robot junkyard.

The robot junkyard was devoid of any sign of life at first. I found a mininuke outside the fence behind some tires and then walked through the opening in the fence surrounding the place. There is only one building, a small workshop to the left as you enter the yard so I went in there first and found some useful odds and ends and a computer. I read some of the logs and learned a sentry bot of some sort was brought here before the war. There was even a holotape with the programming commander ds for the bot in the computer. I took it and went outside.

A quick search of the junkyard turned up a napalm tank for a flamethrower weapon, a fusion core, and the real prize, a Fatman launcher! The sentry bot also stood in the yard like a metal statue. Silent. Waiting. I popped the bot’s control tape into my pipboy and activated its startup command. It hummed to life and I next turned on its patrol functions. The sentry bot then proceeded to roll around the junkyard, its reactor humming with power. Some mole rats suddenly sprang from the ground, perhaps stirred up by the vibrations of the big machine rolling around. They should’ve stayed in the ground. Between myself, the bot, and the dog, we made short work of the molerats.

With the goods from the junkyard secured, I headed back to Tenpines. Along the way I popped the fusion core into the power armor I passed by earlier and hopped in. I stomped back home, and as I passed by the satellite station, I was reminded of the raider threat brooding in its depths, and of the promise of reward from Abernathy if I can find the locket there.

Well, I’m back home now, about to lay down for the night. I’ve made up my mind that now is the time to end the Raider threat at Satellite Station Olivia. I strike in the morning.

Victoria out.

Too bad she killed that jerk Miller... That is why even Loviatar does not kill merchants. They have uses other than food...

Wonder if Vickie will find Persephone in the graveyard?

I like her facepaint on her forehead. It reminds me of both Senua and Imperator Furiosa.

He died drinking!

That crashed vertibird by Station Olivia is where I usually get my first power armor.

Yeah, she could’ve used Miller to unload some stuff on, but at the time, she was worried about him discovering her recent... indiscretion with the Tenpines settlers and causing trouble.

Victoria did not see Persephone, but she swears she could feel a presence watching her in the graveyard...

Her facepaint was actually inspired by some images of Native Americans in warpaint. Khajiit just did it in woad blue to go along with her Celtic Warrior theme.

Yep, he was walking in the graveyard and tripped over a root and fell onto the tombstone. Poor guy thought a corpse had reached up out of the ground and tried to grab his leg and he died of fright as soon as he started to fall.

Strangely, Khajiit usually gets the one from Concord first.

SubRosa are you looking at these pics, wanting to return to Fallout 4 again? Some of these are stunning. As I've said many times before they look almost like photos out of some magazine.

Victoria did a lot of exploring in this segment! I love the downed jet plane.

Seems Victoria had an excellent day of adventure and scored some nice loot!

I like it how she took her time and explained what purpose graveyards served before the war.

I can totally see Victoria living there, and the ruined building seems more or less ready to be moved in.

Is that piece of power junk "standing" there by itself?

You mean the Power Armor in the Vertibird pic? If so then yes it is. Power Armor in Fallout4 is not a set of armor you wear like it is in Fallout3/New Vegas. It’s more like a very small mech that you climb into. During the prerelease period over at the old Bethesda Softworks forum, many of the fans of Fallout1 and 2 claimed that this was more like how those games portrayed Power Armor. You have a basic, stand alone frame which is like a skeleton, then you attach various armor pieces to it (examples: T-45, T-51, even a junky Raider version). The system is highly modifiable and allows you to mix and match armor styles, if you want. And of course every armor piece is upgradable with different components that serve different functions.

Thanks for explaining.

Power armor is my least favorite kind of armor I've ever seen in any video game, that's why you'll never see my characters using it, but I couldn't refrain from asking why it's "standing".

Yeah, Khajiit wasn’t fond of it in Fallout3/New Vegas either. This one thinks it’s much more appealing in this tiny mech form.

November 2nd, 2287

Some days have a way of just making you think “Hey, maybe there’s a better way of doing things. A better way to just... be.”. Today was one of those days.

I set out early this morning just after dawn and stomped my way to Satellite Station Olivia in the power armor frame I found nearby. The surface there was quiet so I parked the armor outside the door to the facility’s interior. The armor frame’s enhanced strength would help with hauling all the loot that awaited me inside the station back to Tenpines. Climbing out of the armor, I paused just beside the door to the bowels of the facility and had a smoke. After that, I opened the door and plunged into the Raider den.

There was no guard at the door, just a stairway that led down into the ground. At the bottom of the stairway was a laser beam that, when broken, would set off a trap set on the ceiling, no doubt part of the original defenses the prewar folks installed. Lucky I didn’t go rushing into the damn room. I disabled the trap and entered into the office area.

What the hell were these Raiders thinking?! The entrance was completely unguarded. I waltzed right into the middle of the big room and it wasn’t until I reached an exit into a hallway that I heard footsteps of a patrolling Raider approaching. Crouching behind a corner, I waited until the footsteps were right up on me and then I struck. Using the Raider’s momentum, I thrust my sword all the way through the jerk. She was so shocked she couldn’t scream out and just, died. One down.

I stepped into the hallway and followed it to a corner. Peaking around it, I saw a Raider in a doorway that exits the hallway to the left. When he turned his back I crept up behind him cut him down, dragging his corpse into the bathroom the door opens into. Next I heard a dog growling and waited for it to draw closer before rushing it. I slashed it a few times before hitting something that finally killed the mutt. Three down.

The hallway opened up into a massive control room, originally for controlling and monitoring the operations of the satellite station. Not wanting to expose myself on the catwalks above the room I back tracked to the office area and found another stairway to the bottom level. At the bottom of those stairs is a room with an exit into the control room to the left, and a doorway to a locker room straight ahead, where a Raider was patrolling. I crept forward and surprised the Raider as he was walking back in front of the doorway. He got a sword in the gut just like his friend upstairs. Four.

The locker room has an entrance to a maintenance area to the left as you walk into it from the room after the stairs. I sneaked to the corner and peaked around it spotting 4 more Raiders including the boss, a big gal carrying a frickin’ minigun. Stepping back, I placed a mine right inside the doorway and then readied a molotov. Next, I edged to the right around the corner, aimed for a doorway to the left down the maintenance area, and threw the molotov so that two of the Raiders were caught in the resulting flames when the bottle broke. Six.

Having thrown the molotov, I then retreated back through the locker room and hid behind the corner that adjoins the room after the stairs and the locker room. As expected, the boss came charging into the locker room, minigun blazing, and set off the mine. She died in the explosion and upon further inspection of her corpse after I secured the area, her right arm was gone. That left one Raider remaining alive in the maintenance area and he came charging in after the explosion. I had switched to my 10mm M9 and dropped him as he foolishly stooped down to pick up the boss’s minigun. Eight.

With that jerk’s death, the Raider threat at Olivia was eliminated. I found no other Raiders there, just a storage room with some radroaches. Just in front of the door to the storage area with the roaches, I found a tool box containing some tools (big frickin’ surprise), as well as Abernathy’s locket. I gathered up all the loot from the facility and hauled it all back to Tenpines. After that I headed off to Abernathy’s to return the locket.

The trip back to Abernathy’s was uneventful, which was good because I had already gone to a lot of trouble to get the stupid locket. Abernathy was overjoyed when I told him I had the locket. I think he almost cried, the baby. Then the man did something that both shocked and disturbed me a bit. As a reward for getting back the locket, Abernathy basically made me a member of his family, giving me free reign to take whatever I wanted at anytime and to make the place a home(?) if I wanted. His wife is also giving me discounts and better rates when I sell her something. This was the first time since my crew was killed that people offered to take me in. And it was good people, not a group of killers and thieves.

Confused and a bit shaken, I scouted out an old truck shipping company headquarters, killing the three zombies that skulked there hoping it would help clear my head. It didn’t. Afterwards, I walked back to Red Rocket to think about the odd turn of events of the day. What am i going to do? Should I quit this Raider life and settle down? Or should I go down there tomorrow and just slaughter the lot of them? More for myself if I do that. I’m going to sleep on it and decide in the morning.

Victoria out.

Stomping along in her power armor!

Wow, Victoria very efficiently left a raider-free Station Olivia in her wake!

Yes, she’s very sneaky!

She's smoking! Is it finally possible in the vanilla game or do you need a mod?

Great story, my favorite so far! Not only is she skilled with swords, guns and mines, we see that Victoria also has at least some good side to her as she ponders what to do next. I'm looking forward to the next update.