Made by Monkeys

Now that I’m level 114 in Fallout 4, I’m pretty sure I’ve killed almost everything and visited almost every place. I do still find weird locations, like the Electrician’s Hobby Club, and I have yet to come across muppet’s sentry bot eternally awaiting guests at its tea party. I also have yet to start Nuka-World because I have to make absolutely sure I’m at the very end-end game before committing to it (the changes it makes are catastrophic). So mostly what I do these days is provoke gunfights in the Quincy Ruins and embellish my settlements.

I’m still having a good time with all the DLC stuff, and I have discovered some interesting things about making my settlers happy.

1. Settlers love stores. If you have enough Charisma and the right perks, you can build all kinds of shops that will increase settlement happiness. For some reason, settlers really like food shops and restaurants. They get excited about noodles. (Also, stores make money. I carry around about 50,000 caps, but I actually have over 90k. I just haven’t gone around collecting the caps from my workshops.)
2. Settlers get sad and nervous if anyone dies during an attack, especially a named NPC like Daniel Finch or Wiseman.
3. Settlers become grumpy if their crops or power generators get damaged. They also dislike being wounded.  They particularly object if any of this happens because of friendly fire. So I have learned to be more strategic when placing defenses, and I always pick targets carefully.
4. Settlers like having a roof over their heads. Therefore, I no longer put beds outside. Also, roofs need to be real roofs, not some cloth thing with gaping holes in it.
5. Settlers like being assigned to their own beds. This, along with the roof thing, substantially raises the happiness of a settlement. I don’t know why.

So be sure to coddle your settlers. Really high happiness in Vault 88 results in a population wishing they could give you birthday presents and write songs about you. No joke.

Also, be sure to arm your settlers with all the high-level weapons you collect from enemies. An assault rifle will keep your people alive longer than a pipe pistol.