Hi everyone,

I was playing the railroad faction because I'm sympathetic to the plight of synths. But at the battle of Bunker Hill I was aghast to see the Railroad troops attacking the caravan folks. I thought it must have been some sort of bug but they were yelling "Bunker Hill is ours!" So I had no choice but to gun them all down to protect the settlers.

I've now started to look more closely at the RR and question their motives.

What do you guys think of this faction? Do you support them morally (or are you just playing them because you want to experience all the game has to offer which is of course perfectly valid)? If you did have you changed your opinion?

A bonus for me is it made it easier to strip them of their armour, which is cool (although bloody heavy) and it will make having to wipe them out in my next playthrough with the Brotherhood a bit easier. I was really looking forward to the Brotherhood campaign but didn't know if I could bring myself to do that. I think this has made it a bit easier.

Speaking of the Brotherood, they are often accused of being ruthless zealots and being the most morally questionable faction but they were also present at the battle but they didn't go running around wiping out the settlers. And now the battle is over they're still there guarding the place.

Welcome to the realization many RR players make: they're a bunch of [censored]-heads.

And if you haven't played their end-game yet, you haven't even seen the worst crap they'll do to "save" Synths.

Yeah, the Railroad aren't heroic secret agent freedom fighters... I still think they're storyline is great. The ending makes you feel like dirt and question everything, but that's exactly what it's meant to do, and it's effective.

I never did understand why the Railroad would attack the caravans at Bunker Hill. My guess is that it's more of an AI oversight rather than any real in-game reason - they use it as a safehouse after all, and X6 does mention how so many trails of escaped synths grow cold at Bunker Hill.

I don't necessarily like the Railroad, but I don't think that their fight with the Bunker Hill residents are reflective of their cause and stand on things.

That's why I only support the Minutemen. I did quite a few missions with them, but it was when Deacon started talking about them not helping humans at all with Desdamona in charge that I started drifting from them. It seems that most of the moderate members of the Railroad are either dead or in hiding, and all that is left are the radicals and the few "normal" people (aka Deacon and possibly Carrington?). They are more of just an ally than someone to complete the campaign with.

I would also that it was probably a bug, with the "Bunker Hill is Ours" dialogue likely being from the Battle of Bunker Hill quest.

I'm very certain it's a bug. It doesn't really make sense for them to attack caravaneers at all as they are supposed to be allies. So I'm going to label that as on oversight on Bethesda. I myself am sympathetic to the plight of synths. The best bet for synths in the commonwealth is the Minutemen.

Or a post-Father Institute with a sympathetic director. Of course, technically, you wouldn't know that until Mass Fusion.

Here's the problem. If you go institute you kind of have to be a hardliner. There's simply no getting around it. If you talk to Liam post institute ending you pretty much shut down any equal rights movement for synths.

During the Plugging a Leak quest you can agree with Liam that Synths are people and help him in framing Dr. Ayo, if someone so chooses.

I've played Institute up to Mass Fusion and haven't really been asked to do anything which I felt was evil - recovering Gabriel was fairly straightforward - regardless of whether he was a synth or not, he was a hostile raider which needed to be neutralised (or at least, his neutralisation wouldn't hurt anyone). Bunker Hill was less straightforward, but I neutralised the Courser and set the synths free, and when I told Father he wasn't happy, but accepted it. Mankind Redefined is basically just attending a meeting and listening to Father declare his imminent passing as well as his appointment of you as his successor. Finally the side quests a House Divided and Building a Better Crop were hardly controversial, and there are good endings you can pursue with them - even Curie (who I regard as a moral compass for my character) was enthusiastically encouraging with Roger Warwick's dilemma. Even Mass Fusion seemed harmless enough, if the game didn't make the BoS hostile (if only there was a way to stealthily retrieve the item). You don't really need to be a hardliner to play up to that point, and you don't even need to be a hardliner to do Mass Fusion. By this point you already know that the Institute is yours (whether you are happy or not), and you will already have in your mind the changes you want to make which, with your knowledge of both sides of the story, you believe will be the best, long-term solution for the Commonwealth. If anything, it is just unfortunate that Father survives long enough to demand you destroy the hapless Railroad (and that the Brotherhood of Steel have declared war on you during Mass Fusion), otherwise given your relationship and trust levels with Desdemona and Maxson there would most likely be an option to work together with them (ok, Maxson will be a stretch unless you turned control of the Institute over to him). The only really possible outcome which does not let you know that you're going to take on the role of Director is if you got banished after your first meeting with Father without even meeting the people and getting the full picture. It's possibly not the wisest and most open-minded option, but it's certainly one which is acceptable because of how upset you were at that point.

It's just a shame the way the BoS goes hostile during Mass Fusion (or how the Institute goes hostile if you let the BoS have the item, but that's far more understandable because without it, they're doomed), and how you're not given a chance to tell Father that you refuse to exterminate the Railroad. Otherwise, I really don't find that working with the Institute makes me any less of the hero I want to be, and so it is with deep regret that time must stand still at Mass Fusion. The ideal ending for synths in general, though, would be the Institute ending. You were forced to exterminate the Railroad, but the spirit of synth rights lives on in you, and as Director of the Institute, you are in that position to not only grant them those rights, but work towards helping and supporting their return to civilisation among normal people by bridging the understanding between the Institute and the Commonwealth.

Huh...?
In my game the Railroad certainly never attacked any settlers, in Bunker Hill or anyplace else!
So that's some weird glitch there, heheh...
The Railroad guys are good people.

Having played all four endings, I found the Railroad to be the most pleasing and satisfying.
The BoS is gone and the Minutemen, Railroad and settlers all get along just fine.
My biggest dilemma is whether to head out in my Minutemen or Railroad power armor rig...
(Though T-51 is definitely my personal favorite of them all.)

Preston Garvey, Desdemona and I were hanging around together in RR HQ just the other day.
Pretty sure I caught him staring at her boney little butt...
Seriously, all you Railroad haters are out of line.
Of the four, my Railroad ending is the game I've chosen to play forward and explore and tie up loose ends with.

Your not alone Gryphon I like the RR as well.... Everyone does seem a bit down on DES hehe, but I dont think there out of line for it just there opinion.

I like them most I suppose being a fan of the real history of the abolitionist movement in the states. (YOU May want to read up on the militant bits of that for both sides, And how the government of the time secretly backed and denied, or fought tooth and claw and passed some very odd property laws (akin to say making it the law to return a runaway synth) depending on the state well till the war.... All of that was real bloody, and underhanded and cruel (both sides sadly).... Then there was A war. heh The RR is childsplay.

Still not a big fan of the Blow it all up but thats what we got sooo......

And that is most likely a horrible bug (bunker hill the whole dang thing is awful touchy ) I think what happens is stray shots might accidentally hit the settlers And if caravaneers are there (like cricket) it just becomes a mess. Any side could get all wiggy Institute, RR or BOS hehehe so the MM are the only ones with sense not to show?

..............

I am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood. I had, as i now think, vainly flattered myself that without very much bloodshed it could be done (or something like that).

Oh Phil... if you only knew the literal Pandora's Box you just opened ha ha.

I feel like them attacking the settlers was probably a glitch. Stockton is their point of contact in Bunker Hill and he runs the caravans, so I'd guess that was some weird stuff happening in the game (stray bullet from a settler causing the RR npc to aggro? I don't know). There isn't an in-game reason for why they would attack the caravaners. I do know that.

For my part, I support the Railroad 100%. The only thing I dislike about the faction is that some of the members seems to portray the organization as caring more about synths than they do human beings. Certain quests showcase how the fight for freedom is more of a joint effort between synths and the RR, but other times you feel like you are baby sitting advlts, which is aggravating at the least. A lot of the synths are very capable though. Plus, Nick Valentine. Need I say more?

I find that any critique someone has for the RR has a good answer, and I'd be willing to give them, but I'm not going to wade in to this particular topic again full bore. However, if you have specific things that bother you about the Railroad, you can ask me. I'm basically their apologist on this forum ha ha. I will say this, before you make a point about the Railroad, look at the other two factions and see if they don't do something identical or worse.

Honestly yea, I've been doing the Railroad questline and Des is actually kinda really cool. I've done Bunker Hill twice and never seen RR attacking caravans meaning it was probably a bug and overall they seem cool but a little misguided with trying to constantly find an enemy to fight or how they don;t monitor re-programmed synths.

Must be a bug they never attacked the caravans for me.

I was referring to the quest to get 13 synths out of the institute. If you talk to him post institute ending you shut that plan down.





Wait I thought you get banished from the institute if you let the synths go. Did I miss something? As for keeping the synths equal rights movement alive I find that highly unlikely. For starters there's already the afore mentioned Liam's plan. Secondly the minute you try to make any sort of meaningful change.


You'll probably be at best ignored. I would also be willing to bet every cap I have that at least one member on that board will try to remove you permanently. Then there's still the matter of trust with the rest of the commonwealth. I highly doubt they would be as forgiving as Nick and apparently Piper are. I say apparently because I don't think Piper should be all that forgiving.


It seems rather OOC of her. But before this gets into probably the 100th debate about factions we should get back to the matter at hand. This whole thing about the Railroad is a clear bug. The only people they should really be attacking are Brotherhood knights and Institute soldiers.

I told Father that I let them go, and when he asked why, I said it was the right thing to do. He then goes ballistic, and I apologise, and he just sighs and asks me to join him in the meeting. Didn't have to lie about being ambushed and whatnot - I didn't feel that I needed to lie to him.

I have no idea what Liam's plan is, but if he's planning to ship synths out there will no longer be any reason to do so, because they will be free to leave if they wanted to with me as director. The Board can try to remove me, but somehow I don't think they will. Ayo (and possibly Li to a certain extent, but simply because she will find such sentimentality redundant rather than disastrous) may object, but at the end the Director's decision seems final. If they had a say I would never have been named successor at all. After the way I dealt with Higgs and Loken I doubt there would be much dissent in the Institute anymore.

Much of the problem with the backlash with Nick and Piper (and indeed with most people regardless of ending choice) is that you never get to say things which you should be able to say. The game simply doesn't give you the option to say the things which you know will provide them the closure and reasons they need to see things from your perspective. In the same way the game doesn't give you the option to tell Father that you will not hunt down the Railroad and will instead come to an understanding with them on synth rights. There's this entire headcanon on how ideal the future would be with an Institute ending but you never get to communicate it with anyone - that's a limitation of the game rather than the principle behind an Institute ending. Piper and Nick never even had friends in the Railroad or BoS, they just don't understand why I did it, and I can't tell them why. Given what I know of their personalities, if we sat down and I briefed them in detail about what I wanted to do they would have supported me all the way.

For Railroad think militant animal rights activists.

Anything the Railroad can do, any other factions can do better. That's the problem with the faction. If you want to help synths, go for the Institute, becoming director, ousting extremists like Dr. Ayo and putting synth sympathizers like Liam in power, the Institute has plenty of people sympathize with the surfaces and synths, some call synths as the next step in human evolution. If you want to minimize casualty, the Railroad resulted in the most deaths, especially among the innocent. Simply by the fact that they're all fully grown advlts who join voluntarily, killing them are nothing more than killing soldiers and their numbers are in a dozen. Killing the other two factions, who have bigger number, meaning that you kill a larger amount of people, including children and civilian, by requiring you to wipe out both factions, you killed more people than any faction, moreover, entering the airship to blow it up is secretive, so you will see children asking you questions while inside the ship. You are knowingly killing off children and innocent people to save robots. You will kill more synths and people than you save. The synths are not better off in their ending. Synths are still living in fear and hiding in the Railroad ending, and you will continue killing off people who threaten them, so you continue to kill humans to save robots. Synths are now extinct, those in hiding will be found out eventually and will either kill or drive out of town, especially the ones with the memory wipe, they can't take precaution to protect themselves, as opposed to in the Institute ending, you will have synths living on the surface alongside humans, allowing synths to exist and live alongside humans. The Railroad also employs the worst underhanded tactics, lying and betraying their allies, do anything necessary to achieve their goal, including knowingly kill children, lying and destroying people who love and trust you like Liam and Father, who did everything in his power to buy your love and earnestly protect you from other Institute people and doesn't hide any secret from you even when the Institute people try to shoo you out of the meeting, driving Liam to suicide because you destroyed everything he knows and loves and his only crime was wanting to help synths. You also leave the world in complete chaos. There is no BoS actively killing feral ghouls, supermutants, and raiders so people are now living in fear of being eaten and killed, the Minutemen doesn't have the reputation of destroying the Institute, they don't have a big recruitment like in the Minutemen ending, destroying all future hopes and technology for the world, there is also an uncertain future where the BoS will come back and retaliate, starting another future war. The Railroad sees synths as better than humans, some of the members will kill humans as the first option, and hesitate to even kill synth-1 and synth-2. Many of them are not even there to save synths but to destroy the Institute, so their goal is not as noble as you think but motivated by revenge. They also refute any effort to help human slavery and only care about helping synths. Basically, they may seem good in what they're selling you, but there is nothing good comes out of what they do. They're conman and as Deacon said, don't believe everything people try to sell you, they may say sweet words to get you on their side, but you should also be careful of who you involve with. It's ironic that it applies to the Railroad more than any other factions.

I'm pretty sure that's a bug. They are yelling those lines because Bunker Hill is a town under their protection and the place where they take Synths before moving them elsewhere (not to mention that it's probably also their main source of income).

Though they don't have such a good grasp on the town because all their caravaners are Institute informants. Stockton should work on his employee selection...

They are my second favorite faction because I like their character and their spy theme. But their ending is my least favorite and I don't support their cause, morally or pragmatically.

Desdemona would agree, yes.

And then you would find out how betrayal feels, just like what Father learns at the end of the Railroad route. Once you returned to the Institute after destroying the BoS, you would find out that Tinker Teleported the Railroad in and they started killing people.

You see, Desdemona does not trust you to be able to control your minutemen, which is why she passionately rejects any idea of allying with the Minutemen and downright forces you to choose Railroad over your own Minutemen in order to continue with the Railroad route. She would trust you with the Institute even less and would use this opportunity to destroy the Institute and save the Synths.

Also, nobody knows as much about evils of the Institute as the Railroad does. They are the least likely to trust them.

You can either lie to Shaun with a Charisma check or admit the truth and not be hostile to Shaun in the conversation that follows. I saved the Synths, admitted it, disagreed with Shaun more often than not n all quests and he still died telling me to make my own place rather than try to imitate him.

Mama Murphy reveals that you save the humanity, however you choose to define it. So if you consider Synths humans, you save them.

The only problem is the "Every sacrifice an acceptable lose" lien which practically tells you that the future of the Director Survivor will be a rocky ride (which is not surprising as there is too much bad blood between Institute and Wastelanders for it to be fixed so easily).

Yellow Director - loyal to you. If by some miracle she disagrees with your policies, she is the member of the least prominent department so little damage is there to be done

Justin Ayo - ambitious and would no doubt like to remove you... thankfully you can frame him and get him kicked out of the Institute, thus also getting rid of the only evil person on the board and the one responsible for 90% of evils the Institute did on the surface and inside the Institute

Alam Binet - believes Synths have souls so he will support many of your pro-Synth policies. Also, he will be replaced by Liam with time

Madison Li - wants the Institute to use its technology to help the people of the Wastelands. She will happily support your pro-wastelander policies

Biotech Director - in a random conversation with his second hand, he reveals to be sympathetic to Wastelanders so he will not oppose your policies. And if you are the Minutemen General, you can make his experiments easier by letting him do his work on some of your farms

She won't. Madison LOVES using science for the good causes. She is a very idealistic woman.

The trick with Desdemona is, I won't trust her either. We will have meetings outside the Institute in a neutral place, possibly the Castle, where we will debate policy and agree on an action plan acceptable to both. If she tries anything funny I'll discredit her with Glory and Deacon, and possibly overthrow her and replace her with Carrington. It may all go pear-shaped eventually, but I would at least give it a go.

I never did get much chance to speak to Alan Binet, although I'm pretty sure Allie Fillmore and the Biotech guy would support me. You are correct about Madison - I forgot about her involvement in Project Purity - the Madison in FO4 is significantly less friendly and gave me the impression she was some cold technological geek. Funnily enough I seem to be the only guy who doesn't dislike Ayo (I can't replace him because I used the Railroad's help earlier on and did their quests, shutting me out from Liam's quest) - as basically Chief of Security, he has every right to be paranoid to the extent he is. I wouldn't actually trust the security of the Institute to anyone else with a more casual outlook (such as those who would let Desdemona figure out how to enter). He has his problems, but they need to be managed through mutual respect, instead of removing him as a scapegoat for all the Institute's ills. He inherited the position from Zimmer, and I'm sure all the SRB heads before them had a similar outlook and viewed everything on the surface as a threat. It is their job, really. He will object vehemently to my pro-synth rights policies, but will just have to toe the line, and we probably have to find some other project for him to concentrate on, which can continue to let him utilise his coursers in strategic engagements in order to further the security of the Institute's operations. We'll think of something, but Ayo is doing a fine job. He's just not there to make friends.

Could it be because pretty much all the caravan traders (Crickett, Lucas, Carla) are informants for the Institute?

For them, it's about buying time and striking when Institute is most vulnerable, which is during Airship Down. They already know about teleportation, they have acquired a lot of Institute tech over decades, someone already built a teleporter once (maybe even with their help) and they have a genius (even if eccentric) scientist amongst them who can fill any blanks that remain. So even without player help, they would probably be able to build a teleporter and teleport into the institute (and probably have already built it somewhere, even if it is not shown by the game). The only difference would be that the Synths are not ready to rebel so Railroad would have to fight by themselves.

Railroad is small, but they are people who have fought against the Institute for over 30 years. They are capable people, and very daring.

To be honest, she was very cold even in FO3 (I replayed it recently). It is mostly cynicism mixed with honesty that can makes her look unlikable.

It's not his paranoia that is the problem, but the fact that he abuses his authority. He often sends his Synths to harass other members of the Institute for no reason other than to show off. The very reason why Liam can so easily frame him is because "Justin releasing Synths to strengthen his own position" fits his image. Heck, Liam isn't even replacing him with a pro-synth person here: Justin's replacement sees Synths as mere machines like Justin did (she is the one who decided that the Mayor is useless due to being fat and should be eliminated rather than reclaimed), but he likes her more because she is not as bad of a person and will use her authority more properly.

The same idea came to me: maybe the traders are marked as friends of the Institute due to this which may result in Railroad attacking them during the Battle for Bunker Hill, which would then spread onto the rest of the town due to a developer oversight.