Note: Something about the 1.10 update of Fallout 4 seems to have broken this mod. As far as I can tell, the code is still fine, but the changes this mod makes to settlers to make them more amenable to having their outfits replaced aren't carrying over. I'm not sure why there haven't been more reports of it not working, but I'm looking into it and will post a fix as soon as I figure out what's going on.







Central Settlement Armory lets you craft armory containers at your settlements that can be used to automatically distribute armor, weapons and grenades among your settlers. In addition to two styles of basic armory container (metal box and vault locker), it also lets you craft an Armory Telestorage Manager that connects all of your settlement armory containers via teleportation, letting you distribute weapons to all connected settlements at once. This happens more quickly than I would have imagined (right now I've got it distributing to 118 settlers in about a minute).



How To

Warning: Distributing weapons to settlers will cause them to revert to their original outfits. Distribute weapons first, then distribute armor (luckily distributing armor doesn't interfere with their currently equipped weapon.)

Via Settlement Armory Containers 

• Craft an armory container at a settlement (found under Resources/Miscellaneous). There are two styles (metal box and vault locker) and two types (one for armor, one for weapons).
• Fill the armory container with weapons or armor, depending on type.*
• Retrieve obsolete weapons/armor from settlers (optional).
• Check stock to see if you have enough equipment for all of your settlers (optional).
• Distribute to settlers.
  
  

Via Armory Telestorage Manager

• Craft an armory weapon and/or armor container.
• Craft an Armory Telestorage Manager (found under Resources/Miscellaneous, requires Level 1 Science and a Synth Relay Grenade, or Level 3 Science, to craft).
• Fill armory telestorage with weapons or armor via the armory container (all gear will be moved from individual armory containers to armory telestorage upon crafting an Armory Telestorage Manager, so you don't need to hunt them all down.)
• Retrieve obsolete gear from settlers (optional).
• Check stock to see if you have enough gear for all of your settlers (optional).
• Distribute weapons to all settlers via the Armory Telestorage Manager (this may take a minute, but progress can be checked by activating the Armory Telestorage Manager).
  
  

*Note: Correct armor distribution requires that armors components be placed into the appropriate sub-containers. There is a sorting function that uses AWKCR keywords to sort armors (just fill up any equipment subcontainer with armor and choose "Sort Armor"), but armor that lacks the appropriate keywords will be moved to junk upon sorting. Unsupported armors can be placed into the appropriate sub-containers by hand, though armors will automatically be re-sorted when "Retrieve Settler Armor to Equipment" or "Retrieve Armor from Workbench" options are chosen. 



How It Works

Central Settlement Armory steps through all of the settlers in your settlement, or all connected settlements, retrieving weapons and ammo from their inventory and moving them to junk storage. It then selects a weapon from the armory container, more or less at random, and equips it on the settler, also supplying one of the appropriate ammunition (this will give them infinite ammo for that weapon).

Two storage compartments are supplied with each armory container, "Equipment" and "Junk". Obsolete weapons recovered from settlers are moved to "Junk" for you to sort through and reuse if desired. New weapons are selected from "Equipment" and distributed among the settlers. Once an Armory Telestorage Manager is created, all armory containers will share storage, making all items accessible from any settlement.

You can retrieve weapons and grenades from your settlers ahead of time so that you can go through their equipped gear and decide to reuse it or weed out the crummy weapons. Weapons can be retrieved to either "Equipment" or "Junk", depending on whether you think you'll be reusing them or scrapping them.

I've tested this with about 6 connected settlements, for a total of 118 settlers 34 connected settlements with 300+ settlers, and it takes a couple of minutes to distribute the gear. It will take longer the more settlements and settlers you have, but progress can be checked by activating the Armory Telestorage Manager during distribution.


Version 2.0 adds in armor distribution. It works the same as weapon distribution, but has a container for each armor slot (clothing, one piece armor sets, underarmor, helmets, chest pieces, left arm, right arm, left leg, right leg). The mod distributes one piece armor sets first, then underarmor plus its associated armor components, then clothing. You can sort armor into these containers by hand, or use the included armor sorting functionality (it uses AWKCR keywords for the sorting, so if you want to distribute armors that aren't supported by AWKCR you'll need to sort them by hand.)


Version 2.1 adds flags to settlers that indicate that armor or weapons have been distributed to them. This means that you can redistribute periodically to get gear to any new settlers that have shown up since the last time you distributed, without having to redo your whole distribution. The flags are cleared when you retrieve armor and/or weapons from your settlers.

In a future release, this will optionally be done automatically, keeping your settlements equipped as they grow.

Note that this flag is new, so if you're updating from a version prior to 2.1, and have already distributed weapons and armor, you'll need to use the "Flag Settlers as Equipped" option at an Armory Telestorage Manager to set the flags for your equipped settlers. This only needs to be done once (the option disappears after it's been applied.)


Version 3.0 adds settler categorization. There are now two sets of containers each for armor and weapons, combatant and non-combatant. Categorize settlers as either combatants (usually guards, provisioners, and scavengers), non-combatants (e.g. farmers and merchants), or "ignored" (unassigned settlers) at armory containers, and gear will be distributed from their associated containers. This lets you do things like distribute better gear to guards, skip over unassigned settlers until you can give them a role, or narrow down your list of settlers to distribute to if you don't have enough gear for everyone.

It also changes the behavior of Armor Telestorage Managers. Prior to version 3.0, you also needed to construct armory containers in any settlements that you wanted to distribute gear to, but now you can distribute to all settlements simultaneously.

To avoid issues related to settler default outfits, this mod operates on generic unnamed settlers only, switching their outfits to leveled list inventory entries, forcing them to be equipped via a spell that sorts through their inventory re-equipping armor when necessary. Compatibility patches for Better Settlers are provided in the optional files section.

Also new to version 3.0 is the ability to distribute to children (disabled unless you download the Equippable Children optional file, since there normally isn't any clothing available for them unless you've downloaded a mod for it.)

One-piece female-only armor can be placed in the Female armor container, and will be distributed to female settlers first. 



Wish List/To Do

• Get this working for armor as well as weapons (currently there is no easy way to get the biped slot of a piece of armor, making it impractical.)
• Prioritize based on weapon damage (currently the F4SE functions for checking damage and rate of fire are working too sporadically.)
• Prioritize weaponry based on settler role (distribute better weapons to guards and provisioners first).
• Add more styles of basic armory containers (upon request).
• Maybe come up with a fancier model for the basic armory, like this one.
• Automatically poll for new settlers and distribute armor and weapons to them (optionally, since the scripts would need to run continuously and some people don't like that.)
  

Installation

Install F4SE. Requires version 0.4.0 or later.

Version 2.0 requires Armor and Weapon Keyword Community Resource (for armor sorting). Install prior to installing CSA.

Install via NMM, or manually copy Central Settlement Armory.esp and Central Settlement Armory - Main.ba2 to your data directory and tick the .esp in your load order.



Uninstallation

Remove everything from armory storage before uninstalling or your items will be lost. It's more easily done after you've created an Armory Telestorage Manager since everything will be in central storage rather than spread out across a dozen settlements.



Compatibility

This should be compatible with all other weapons, and all grenades that have the appropriate vanilla keyword, although the infinite ammo trick doesn't work for mini nukes.

Armor sorting relies upon Armor and Weapon Keyword Community Resource. Armors that do not have its keywords will be moved to Junk upon sorting. They can still be hand-placed into the appropriate containers prior to distribution.

This is compatible with Sim Settlements.

Patches are available for Better Settlers.



Known Issues

When you install F4SE, it looks like you need to also install the files in the Data/Scripts section of the download. This is not mentioned in F4SE's installation instructions. I thought it was only needed if you want to compile F4SE scripts, but I've been getting reports from my Jetpack Overhaul that they're needed.

Settlers have default outfits that stick around even after you've removed their original armor via this mod. The only way around this that I can see is to edit settler NPCs to replace their outfits with leveled list-generated clothing. This means compatibility patches are needed for any mods that alter settlers. A patch is available for Better Settlers.


v2.0 Only

Distributing armor to power armor equipped settlers causes them to lose their power armor (fixed as of v2.01).


v1.0 Only

"Retrieve Settler Weapons to Junk" and "Retrieve Settler Weapons to Equipment" options are swapped for basic armory containers, meaning you'll retrieve weapons to the wrong storage category.

Your settlers' currently equipped weapons are removed to junk storage as the weapons are distributed. At present, this means that if there aren't enough weapons in your equipment box, some settlers will end up without a weapon (I need to add a check that stops removing weapons when the weapon container is empty).



Recommended Mods

Telestorage - This mod lets you teleport looted items directly to settlements without having to pick them up. It's great for conveniently amassing a ton of weapons for your settlers.

-or-

More Complex Wasteland - This overhaul/all-in-one includes Telestorage if you're also looking for an in-depth hunger/thirst/sleep mod.