The unofficial patch has fixed several minor issues related to Dreth in the past, including some subtitles on the dialogue. They have not fixed the issue this mod addresses, as demonstrated by the open ticket from 2019 that I linked to in the pinned comment above. This is what the unofficial patch has done to this encounter thus far:
I always thought dreth was a victim of cut content from the gunners before the game released. Why name all those gunner npcs and dreth then never use them in a quest? Hey does she have any changes by SS2? they seem to use gunners a lot in ch2 and 3.
There's a surprising number of random encounters you can run into that are considered cut content for various reasons. Part of that may be that many encounters have issues like this one does. It may also involve the fact that the random encounter system slowly breaks down and stops functioning as you continue to play the same save. That, at least, gets fixed by the unofficial patch.
As for SS2, this encounter is completely untouched. All NPCs in the encounter are custom, too. I'll add that to my compatibility post in a moment.
Dreth (and a lot of the Random encounter NPCs) being cut content, that was hastily made into a random encounter makes a lot of sense to me. I always thought it was kinda weird how you walk up and talk to her... Then she tells her guards to let you through. Like what????
Thinking about it, she was probably supposed to be one of those weird trader NPCs you find in weird alleyways that you can ask if you can use their workbenches.
It's less that they're presumably cut from other parts of the game and more that some encounters are so broken or so unlikely to happen that people find them in the game data and assume they're cut content. For example, Ben Gibson and his random encounter are marked as cut content on the fallout wiki despite the encounter still being fully hooked up. You absolutely can run into him in game under the right conditions.
Yup. The conditions on the encounter are super strict. First off, it's an assault encounter, which means it only happens at one of thirteen or so locations in the entire commonwealth. Even beyond that, it has the following conditions:
Preston is currently loaded
Preston is currently near the player (less than 1500 units, specifically)
Preston is currently the player's follower
The player has progressed the minutemen quest line beyond "The First Step" (This condition is normally redundant due to the requirement that Preston be a follower)
The player must have at least four settlements under their control
The player must currently be in the commonwealth.
And even if those conditions are met, the game still picks randomly between it and twenty or so other encounters.
It is specifically the result of asking Dreth who she is. Her response to that question sets a variable that breaks the encounter in the future. If you never ask, she just does business as normal.
These sorts of fixes are very welcome for this game. A lot of the random encounters just seem very incomplete and messy.
Would you perhaps also be interested in looking into the Ness/Skylanes quest? My understanding of that quest is that if you ever go to the Skylanes crash site before meeting her, or if you don't beeline it there after speaking to her, it can never be completed or something weird. Ness will appear at her quest marker, but you won't be able to interact with her, and stealing the key from her will be the only way to complete the quest.
Definitely worth looking into. From the initial description that sounds like one of the treasure quests, and those are always super finicky.
Edit: Not a treasure quest. Looks like faulty interaction between four different quests to manage this single event. Definitely something to look into, but the whole thing looks prone to falling to pieces as a result of some assumptions about how the player would find and interact with this encounter.
Edit 2: This is a big, complex interaction that will take me a while to sort out. I'll probably need a free day just to properly sit down and tear these quests' logic apart so I can map it properly and find the edge cases. Don't expect a fix for it anytime in the near future, I'm marking it down for a rainy day project.
A fix would most definitely be appreciated. Ness is a thorn in my side every playthrough. XD
As well as that, the merchant Stash appears to have some story regarding her two bodyguards, but it never seems to work for me, and any subsequent time I meet her she won't trade with me.
Yeah, I'm looking into Stash right now. So the funny part is that you can repeat the first (and second) encounter indefinitely until the third encounter has been seen, and it's the first encounter that is broken. Everyone assumes it's the second, but the second is a travel-type encounter, which is much more difficult to trigger. Without running through the second encounter, it's impossible to trigger the third.
So choosing the upper dialogue is what causes her to glitch? I guess that explains why I've encountered several times already and he's not broken, since I haven't asked her anything other than trading. Stash bugged out as usual, though, she's now all like "Huh?" or "Yes?" whenever I talk to her.
I can look into it, but Stash is a three part encounter so that's also up there on the complexity list.
Edit: Well that's fun. The problem is with the "first" encounter, which explains why the unofficial patch team still hasn't fixed this despite looking into it. The first encounter is repeatable until stash or the guards die, but has some assumptions regarding quest stage conditions that break it after the first run.
It will be, though the AIO will be updated with batches of mods rather than every time I post a new fix. There's another fix I want to include in the first update, so it'll be sometime next week at the earliest.
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I'll list mods that people ask about here, along with their compatibility and resolution status. This fix has an issue filed for the unofficial fallout 4 patch, and may be rejected or included in a future version.
Compatible Mods:
- Sim Settlements 2: No special load order necessary.
- Sim Settlements 2 - Chapter 2: No special load order necessary.
- Sim Settlements 2 - Chapter 3: No special load order necessary.
None of these fix the inability to buy from Dreth on some repeat encounters, which was left open pending a rework on the dialogue's conditions and wound up never being addressed.
As for SS2, this encounter is completely untouched. All NPCs in the encounter are custom, too. I'll add that to my compatibility post in a moment.
Thinking about it, she was probably supposed to be one of those weird trader NPCs you find in weird alleyways that you can ask if you can use their workbenches.
And even if those conditions are met, the game still picks randomly between it and twenty or so other encounters.
Would you perhaps also be interested in looking into the Ness/Skylanes quest? My understanding of that quest is that if you ever go to the Skylanes crash site before meeting her, or if you don't beeline it there after speaking to her, it can never be completed or something weird. Ness will appear at her quest marker, but you won't be able to interact with her, and stealing the key from her will be the only way to complete the quest.
Edit: Not a treasure quest. Looks like faulty interaction between four different quests to manage this single event. Definitely something to look into, but the whole thing looks prone to falling to pieces as a result of some assumptions about how the player would find and interact with this encounter.
Edit 2: This is a big, complex interaction that will take me a while to sort out. I'll probably need a free day just to properly sit down and tear these quests' logic apart so I can map it properly and find the edge cases. Don't expect a fix for it anytime in the near future, I'm marking it down for a rainy day project.
As well as that, the merchant Stash appears to have some story regarding her two bodyguards, but it never seems to work for me, and any subsequent time I meet her she won't trade with me.
Stash bugged out as usual, though, she's now all like "Huh?" or "Yes?" whenever I talk to her.
Edit: Well that's fun. The problem is with the "first" encounter, which explains why the unofficial patch team still hasn't fixed this despite looking into it. The first encounter is repeatable until stash or the guards die, but has some assumptions regarding quest stage conditions that break it after the first run.
Thanks for the mods.