So we are all gearing up for the big day today, the extended BETA day (2pm-11pm ET for those interested, dont miss it!), and I've been talking with my group in discord about our plans when it goes live. But while discussing it, some ideas started popping up, and I genuinely think some of them would be pretty great. I figured I would drop them here in hopes that maybe they can get some attention as I'm sure we aren't the only ones who would find some of them useful. (NOTE: I played the first BETA and the most recent one, missed the two in between, so I don't claim to know everything about the game yet. If any of these ideas are already in-game and functional, I apologize)

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-CAMP Towns -

Our CAMPs are fun, but they arent super huge. Compared to some of the Fallout 4 settlements (looking at you Starlight and Sanctuary), they can be a bit cramped. Obviously they aren't SUPPOSED to be big as we are building it for ourselves, not a huge community of minutemen, but what if we wanted to support a growing community?

The proposal here are CAMP Towns. You running with a group or player faction? Everyone setting up camps wherever, but you guys want to take it to the next level and move in with each other? With this feature, players can build their camp touching the camp of someone they are grouped with to connect the build areas of said camps, creating a larger, single camp fit for two or more people. With this idea, group members can build a small shanty town for their group using connected build spaces. Talk about rebuilding the wasteland!

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-Factions and Faction Branding-

So, Ive made a similar post about this in the past, but its something that really is on my mind heavily while playing this game. The idea of gangs/clans/guilds has come up before, but its a system that I really feel would benefit the game as a whole. As players are now the NPCs, we ARE the raiders, we are the gunners, the institute, the outcasts, the Kings, we are the ones who will populate the wastelands. And lore wise, it makes sense to have lots of factions, early days after the war would have been chaos, tons of gangs/tribes popping up left and right before they all had time to consolidate into major factions. I run a small community, and we are building a Gunners type faction for our play, but nothing makes us official without Beth giving us the option. But what does this have to do with CAMPs? Good for you to ask...

I propose that factions/gangs work similar to ESO, because honestly the guild system in that game is pretty decent. You have the name, a menu for the guild itself with guild info like roster, ranks, history, etc. You can rank your members, and you can even pick a symbol to represent your guild. Id love for us to be able to make our own guild emblems and upload them similar to Warframe or GTA V, but I understand that is a lot of server space and moderation time, so I'd be happy with just a large list of emblems to choose from, as long as we can also pick faction colors. But on to CAMPS.... Now that we have a gang/faction name, emblem, and colors, you should be able to apply those to different things. For clothing, maybe the option to trim your armor in the color of your faction, or pop your emblem on your shoulder like a military rank. Toss some faction color T-shirts and hats with the faction emblem on it in the Atom store to make some extra money if wanted. Allow us to build a flag with our emblem on it for our CAMP, maybe even some kind of banner. The main point is allow us to set customization for our factions, then give us options to brand ourselves, but tastefully. I dont need a neon rainbow settlement to advertise, but a couple small banners/signs would work wonders.

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-Displays and Messages-

Part of what my group is doing is setting up our camps in high traffic zones as shops for equipment we find/build, and rest stops with workbenches and beds for traveling players. During the last BETA, it was working well enough, I had a couple groups of players hanging around for workbenches and beds, even sold off some guns and made a few caps. But what would be nice is some display options.

Im not the first to think of making shops, and I wont be the last. What would be handy are gun/armor racks for us to show off some stuff. Make them lockable like our containers, allow us to pop some inventory up on the wall for others to see. But beyond racks, messaging of various kinds would also help. For starters, I would kill for sign lettering to go on our walls; like light up letters, maybe a foot tall per letter, let us spell out our own signs similar to the neon letters on FO4. Another idea would be the custom wall terminal; essentially a terminal we can place on a wall where we can add our own entries and entry titles. Do you want to list prices, rules, discord info, or just leave a zodiak killer type puzzle to trick people into thinking you may be Ted Cruz? Type it up, give it a title, let people access your terminal and read your messages.

And finally, the shop itself. Let us build a shopkeeper of some sort to sell inventory while we are off exploring. Whether its a robot or just a vendor machine like the ammo vending, it would be nice to not have to man the shop to keep profits rolling and players loaded with guns and ammo. Let us place the shopkeeper, set prices, then pick up profits when we get back.

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Well, that's going to be it for now. There are other ideas, but Ill post others if this gets any attention. If you like any of these, make sure to keep the discussion going, lets get it noticed. Thank you all for your time, you have a wonderful night! See you all in Appalachia soon!