TL;DR: An option (possibly on startup, prior to all the scriptwork initializing?) to deactivate all "main quest" (i.e. Jake's) progression in favor of SS1-esque building without gated content. I recognize there are some ways to do this currently, but they feel more like workarounds ("cheats" which leave loopholes and console commands to advance quests, rather than disable them). I recognize the hard work and talent that has gone into these, but they simply aren't appealing to me for a variety of reasons and detract from what I thought was the point of the mod.
While I recognize the immense undertaking it must have been to create all of the quests and non-settlement elements, it feels like a drastic shift in focus and, to me, more of a barrier to the cool stuff. This has been mentioned before, but I'd rather not necropost on something from close to a year ago. There are a number of reasons I'd prefer to just not have to deal with any of it and build up my settlements as previously in SS1. SS2 feels much more like a quest mod than a settlement mod, particularly with how the quests and content are paced/gated. Additionally, while in a vacuum, the quests seem well designed, I've had multiple points where they simply don't work logically. Spoilers ahead for those that care: during Casting a Line, I stepped down from Sanctuary to Concord (which took less than 5 minutes). In that time, Raiders have captured half my settlers, AND managed to get twice as far as me going at running speed down the hills. On top of that, due to misunderstanding how the systems worked, I had approximately 12 heavy turrets lining Sanctuary for a full defense meter (which wouldn't have been necessary had the martial plots not been gated). Immediately after in Scavver's Delight, I was told to travel to Olivia to grab the Comm Hub. I had cleared Olivia relatively recently, so it was a surprise all Raiders respawned. Even more surprising was the fact that despite having the key to the locked door already, I had to clear it again while Jake "hacked" the computer. The initial quest in Concord had a contingent for the player killing the Raiders ahead of time, so it's surprising this one didn't. There are other reasons I would rather not deal with the quests in order to build cool and immersive stuff in my settlements (pacing issues, lore/logic issues, and the above inconsistencies), but I don't want this to come off as bashing the mod. It's good, and the scope is impressive. I just wish there was a proper option to make it a purely settlement-focused mod again, rather than a quest mod with some settlement elements sprinkled in.
While I recognize the immense undertaking it must have been to create all of the quests and non-settlement elements, it feels like a drastic shift in focus and, to me, more of a barrier to the cool stuff. This has been mentioned before, but I'd rather not necropost on something from close to a year ago. There are a number of reasons I'd prefer to just not have to deal with any of it and build up my settlements as previously in SS1. SS2 feels much more like a quest mod than a settlement mod, particularly with how the quests and content are paced/gated. Additionally, while in a vacuum, the quests seem well designed, I've had multiple points where they simply don't work logically. Spoilers ahead for those that care: during Casting a Line, I stepped down from Sanctuary to Concord (which took less than 5 minutes). In that time, Raiders have captured half my settlers, AND managed to get twice as far as me going at running speed down the hills. On top of that, due to misunderstanding how the systems worked, I had approximately 12 heavy turrets lining Sanctuary for a full defense meter (which wouldn't have been necessary had the martial plots not been gated). Immediately after in Scavver's Delight, I was told to travel to Olivia to grab the Comm Hub. I had cleared Olivia relatively recently, so it was a surprise all Raiders respawned. Even more surprising was the fact that despite having the key to the locked door already, I had to clear it again while Jake "hacked" the computer. The initial quest in Concord had a contingent for the player killing the Raiders ahead of time, so it's surprising this one didn't. There are other reasons I would rather not deal with the quests in order to build cool and immersive stuff in my settlements (pacing issues, lore/logic issues, and the above inconsistencies), but I don't want this to come off as bashing the mod. It's good, and the scope is impressive. I just wish there was a proper option to make it a purely settlement-focused mod again, rather than a quest mod with some settlement elements sprinkled in.