Fallout 4 Guide: How to Build and Use Artillery

Fallout 4 is full of different ways to kill your enemies. One of these is the ability to call on your allies to swing in and help out if you’re in a bind. While getting a Vertibird full of Brotherhood Knights to come to your aid is cool, sometimes you just want to blow some stuff up. For that Fallout 4 provides you with artillery, but it’s tricky to unlock, build, and use. Here’s a quick guide to get you started with them, and check out our other guide to see how to get more artillery smoke grenades, so you can keep raining terror down on the wasteland.

To first gain the ability to use artillery you’ll have to get very far into the Minutemen’s quest line. Keep chatting with Preston Garvey and eventually he’ll have you take back the Castle, a former Minutemen fortress on the east coast of the Boston wasteland. Once you gain this spot just do what the missions say, which should have you establishing a new base here complete with a recruitment beacon.

After a while you’ll be told to head back here, check in with Preston Garvey often if you’re getting anxious. Once there you’ll run into a former Minutemen soldier who walks you through the base looking for a way into the armory. Use the Workshop to scrap the debris blocking the hallway and head into the basement. Be ready for a fight here, as you’ll encounter a ton of land mines and a particularly difficult robot.

Once you’ve taken them out head into the armory to grab the artillery plans and some supplies. Now you can build the artillery guns by using the Special option in the Workshop menu. Build one and grab a nearby settler to assign to it (check here to see how to do that). Once that’s complete the game will walk you through exactly how to use the artillery.

The short version is to equip the artillery smoke grenade, head toward your target, toss the grenade and get back…far back. You can tune the radio on your Pip-Boy to Radio Freedom to get updates on the status of the artillery. If you’re within range of an artillery station they’ll fire on the target and bombs will rain down on whatever is there. That range is a bit tricky though, as there’s no definite measurement. Check out our guide to see what the best estimates are at this time.

To gain the ability to use it in more places across the Fallout 4 wasteland just build an artillery station at each of your settlements. You’ll need the supplies and enough settlers to assign one to it, so check here to see how to get more at your settlements. Once you have them built all across the wasteland you should have one nearby whenever necessary. If not you’ll probably want to look around for more settlements to recruit to the cause.