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Here for a laugh, or did you want a cold beverage?

Buddy, officially called Drinkin' Buddy, is a robot residing in the Commonwealth in Fallout 4.

Background[]

Pre-War[]

Prior to the Great War, Patrick Merryweather, owner of the Shamrock Taphouse near Boston Harbor, used a procured Protectron chassis to create a mobile brewery with the intent to contract the working prototype to the Hotel Rexford as a means to serve ice cold beer to the hotel's patrons. The project was fronted by Jack West, the Taphouse's manager.[1]

Dubbed "Drinkin' Buddy", it was created by acquiring a consumer-model RobCo Protectron, stripping out the robot's main assembly and replacing it with a custom miniaturized micro brewing unit fabricated with unlicensed parts (thus voiding its warranty) that was capable of flash-fermenting mash, producing alcohol at a faster rate and ice cold. Patrick designed the robot to accept recipe holotapes, giving it a wide range of types of beer to serve as well as programming in a wide variety of jokes to be told for the customer's amusement.[2]

However, Patrick's plan hit a snag as the Hotel Rexford was under contractual obligations to only serve Gwinnett beer, preventing him from selling his own recipes. However, he managed to get in contact with a person who was able to illegally crack the encryption on one of the brewery's proprietary brewing holotapes, allowing Buddy to brew Gwinnett pale ale by default.[3]

After days of tinkering and perfecting, Patrick managed to finish the robot. Knowing that Gwinnett had legal copyright to their alcohol, he hoped to be in full production, or even to work something out with Gwinnett before their lawyers caught up with him. Patrick had the original prototype unit scheduled for delivery to the Hotel Rexford, though he decided he would need to rent a truck to transport it due to the Protectron's notorious slow walking speed.[4] However, Patrick's business plan, along with nearly everything else, was cut short by the breakout of the Great War.

Following the nuclear apocalypse, the basement of the Taphouse was left mostly intact and Buddy itself still inactive in its charging pod, with a delivery that's decades behind schedule.[5]

Post-War[]

By 2287, the upper floors of the Taphouse have been taken over by raiders led by Gaff, sent by Bosco from the D.B. Technical High School to maintain control over the surrounding area while the basement itself where Buddy initially remains is infested by mole rats.

Character overview[]

Brewing[]

Giving Buddy any variant of Gwinett, Nuka-Cola (both base game and Nuka-World variants Nuka-World (add-on) ), or Vim Far Harbor (add-on) will cause it to become the ice-cold variant after about 12 hours in-game time. This increases the benefits of most items upon consumption by a variable amount but does not remove the rads present in the beverage.

The one exception is that Buddy will not generate ice-cold beer.

List of Gwinnett recipes[]

To give Buddy recipes, one must play the recipe holotape on their Pip-Boy. Once this is done, the Sole Survivor automatically initiates dialogue by stating "Buddy, I have some recipes for ya...," after which they are removed from the inventory and Buddy will be able to produce them in the future. If this dialogue doesn't trigger when speaking to him with a recipe in one's inventory, try dropping the recipe from the inventory and picking it up again. This especially helps with recipes obtained prior to meeting Buddy.

Combat[]

Though his main purpose is brewing alcohol, Buddy still retains the Protectron's basic weaponry including a flamer and a laser gun. He alternates between them when in combat.

Instead of having physical weapons equipped in his inventory, Buddy has amounts of fusion cells and flamer fuel instead. If these are looted from his inventory at any point, Buddy will only be able to use melee attacks. If any amount of one or both is put into his inventory manually, he will regain the use of his weapons.

Settlements[]

If sent to a settlement instead of the Hotel Rexford, Buddy will gravitate toward the left side of a drink stand, provided one is present. If a trade caravan post is also present, Buddy will patrol between the two.

Buddy cannot be changed in a robot workbench Automatron (add-on).

Interactions with the player character[]

Interactions overview[]

Interactions
Icon quest starter
This character starts quests.
40 Weaponsmith
This character can modify weapons.

Beer, soft drinks

Quests[]

Effects of player's actions[]

Once found and reactivated in the basement of the Shamrock Taphouse, one can choose to either keep him for themselves or to send him to the Hotel Rexford at the request of Rufus.

  • If selecting to keep him, he will ask for his default "HOME" which will be any allied settlement the player character selects.
  • If selecting to send Buddy to Hotel Rexford, he will be found in the hotel near the bar in the lobby.

Inventory[]

Apparel Weapon Other items
Built-in flamer
Built-in off-hand laser gun
Flamer fuel
Fusion cells
Ice cold Gwinnett pale
Shamrock Taphouse key

Notes[]

  • Unlike other Protectrons and robots in the game, Buddy cannot be hacked into with the Robotics perk.
  • Strong likes destroying Buddy, whereas Cait will hate it.

Notable quotes[]

Jokes[]

Appearances[]

Buddy appears only in Fallout 4.

Bugs[]

  • PCPC Playstation 4Playstation 4 Xbox OneXbox One If Buddy still provides the dialogue choice to be sold to Rufus after choosing to keep him, one can fix this with the command setstage 1761c7 120. The player character will respond "No thanks" from then on.[verified]
  • Playstation 4Playstation 4 Xbox OneXbox One If deciding to keep him, the quest remains active. The Sole Survivor cannot finish the quest and keep Drinkin' Buddy. Since the quest continues, when sending Buddy somewhere, the player character will be able to track his movements using the quest marker on the map.[verified]
  • PCPC Playstation 4Playstation 4 If the player attempts to remedy the quest remaining active after keeping Buddy by killing Rufus, the "No thanks" dialogue option will work the same as the "I've sold you" option, causing Buddy to leave the player's settlement and go to the Hotel Rexford.[verified]
  • PCPC Xbox OneXbox One If Buddy is sent to Sanctuary Hills he may try to reach the settlement by crossing the river and will stop halfway across the river. If this happens, send him to a different settlement (preferably the Red Rocket truck stop due to its proximity) and then send him back to Sanctuary.[verified]
  • PCPC Xbox OneXbox One After sending Buddy to Hotel Rexford, he may not leave the Shamrock Taphouse and instead continuously greet the player character.[verified]
    • This can be fixed on PC by using the console. First, reset the Trouble Brewin' quest using ResetQuest 0017d18c, then meet up with Rufus and accept the quest again. After doing so, head back to the Taphouse and in the console, enter setStage 1761c7 10. This should reset the dialogue and allow to re-do the quest from that point onward.
  • Playstation 4Playstation 4 Attempting to send Buddy to Hotel Rexford results in Buddy accepting request but not going. Talk to Buddy again and tell him you're keeping him for yourself, give settlement destination, then do Hotel Rexford dialogue again will get him to go.[verified]
  • Playstation 4Playstation 4 Overfilling Buddy's inventory with various drinks can cause some of them to double in quantity when being made ice cold (16 brew, 23 pilsner, etc. came back as 32 brew, 46 pilsner, etc.).[verified]
  • PCPC Sometimes after having sent Buddy to a settlement and having him there for a while, without further instructions he will start walking towards the Hotel Rexford and will remain there.[verified]

References[]

  1. The Shamrock Taphouse terminal entries; Patrick's terminal, Investor
  2. The Sole Survivor: "What are you?"
    Drinkin' Buddy: "I am a modified RobCo Protectron, designation Drinkin' Buddy. My internal microbrewers allows for the internal brewing, bottling and dispensing of beer at an accelerated rate. I am also programmed to tell a wide variety of jokes for the customer's amusement. How would you describe the testing sample provided?"
    (DrinkingBuddyProtectron.txt)
  3. The Shamrock Taphouse terminal entries; Patrick's terminal, Recipes
  4. The Shamrock Taphouse terminal entries; Patrick's terminal, Delivery
  5. The Sole Survivor: "Where is the Hotel Rexford?"
    Drinkin' Buddy: "The Hotel Rexford is located on State Street near the Old State House. Delivery is currently 210 years behind schedule. Shall we commence delivery to the Hotel Rexford?"
    (DrinkingBuddyProtectron.txt)
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