1. How do I start the first quest?
Enter orbit of a planet or moon in a level 15 or higher system. Ships should jump in and hail you.
If this does not occur, it could be that another encounter has superseded the Watchtower encounter in priority. Continue jumping to different planets/systems that are level 15 or higher to trigger the initial event.
2. How do I trigger the quests towards the end of the mod?
Without spoilers, there is a point in the main quest, where it will feel like you are sort of set free to feel out the mechanics and upgrade what you like, with no specific Faction quest to guide you.
Once you get here, there are two things you need to do to advance things.
- Engage in the various mechanics introduced to you for a bit, its up to you which. You can hunt down minor arrays, try and fight the major hubs, pursue leads from Harper, or hunt down listening posts on your own through the POI system. This section was designed to let players do it however they like while they play the rest of the game.
- Move the base game's main quest forward until your character knows enough about Starborn (if you are on a Unity playthrough, your character knows everything they need to already!). Specifically, you must play up through the quest In Their Footsteps. This quest will ensure your character has the understanding of the rest of the things Watchtower is dealing with.
3. Will you expand on Watchtower in the future?
In the short term, our focus will be on bug fixes and quality of life improvements. We're also pursuing text translation for additional languages, starting with Spanish.
We have a large number of wishlist items we'd like to add to Watchtower in the future, including expansion of features and story. Several of our wishlist items will require updates from Bethesda to Starfield before we can add them. For example, we'd like to add more dialog for post-unity, but we are at the new file size limit of 2 GB on PC and will need that expanded before we can pursue it.
4. Is this compatible with Fleet Commander?
Sort of. Since both systems are doing similar things, and operating on the same stock of ships, you'll need to be careful to not engage the same ships with both mods systems. For example, if you assign Sarah Morgan to a ship with Watchtower, be sure not to use the Fleet Commander system with her ship.
Watchtower really only requires that you use one fleet ship from its mechanics for story purposes, and can eventually unlock slots for another 8 - which would be all the ships you can have in the base game.
If you are using mods to extend beyond 10 ships, it might be possible to use Fleet Commander for additional ships - though likely you'd run into performance issues.
All that said, here's what I'd recommend. If you already have Fleet Commander installed on your save, don't uninstall it. Instead, leave the ships it is managing how they are, and buy or capture new ships to interface with Watchtower's system. If you are starting a new character, and are planning on engaging with Watchtower, you likely won't need Fleet Commander and could uninstall it.
I have been in touch with the mod author of Fleet Commander to find out if there's anything we can do to help with compatibility, and if something comes up, we'll do our best to accommodate!
5. How do I get more computer cores to unlock things?
The easiest way to get Computer Cores is to destroy Watchtower Arrays which guarantee a core. You can find these by pursuing leads from Harper to find their listening posts. Once you find a listening post, reach its central terminal to reveal the array's location in orbit.
You can also occasionally find them in the wreckage of Watchtower Ships or containers in Watchtower bases.
Finally, if you destroy several of the Major Hub Arrays, and speak to Gren, you'll unlock the ability to capture and mark their ships for Salvage. After marking ships for salvage, the next time you speak to Gren he'll give you the results of the salvage which can sometimes include Computer Cores.
Enter orbit of a planet or moon in a level 15 or higher system. Ships should jump in and hail you.
If this does not occur, it could be that another encounter has superseded the Watchtower encounter in priority. Continue jumping to different planets/systems that are level 15 or higher to trigger the initial event.
2. How do I trigger the quests towards the end of the mod?
Without spoilers, there is a point in the main quest, where it will feel like you are sort of set free to feel out the mechanics and upgrade what you like, with no specific Faction quest to guide you.
Once you get here, there are two things you need to do to advance things.
- Engage in the various mechanics introduced to you for a bit, its up to you which. You can hunt down minor arrays, try and fight the major hubs, pursue leads from Harper, or hunt down listening posts on your own through the POI system. This section was designed to let players do it however they like while they play the rest of the game.
- Move the base game's main quest forward until your character knows enough about Starborn (if you are on a Unity playthrough, your character knows everything they need to already!). Specifically, you must play up through the quest In Their Footsteps. This quest will ensure your character has the understanding of the rest of the things Watchtower is dealing with.
3. Will you expand on Watchtower in the future?
In the short term, our focus will be on bug fixes and quality of life improvements. We're also pursuing text translation for additional languages, starting with Spanish.
We have a large number of wishlist items we'd like to add to Watchtower in the future, including expansion of features and story. Several of our wishlist items will require updates from Bethesda to Starfield before we can add them. For example, we'd like to add more dialog for post-unity, but we are at the new file size limit of 2 GB on PC and will need that expanded before we can pursue it.
4. Is this compatible with Fleet Commander?
Sort of. Since both systems are doing similar things, and operating on the same stock of ships, you'll need to be careful to not engage the same ships with both mods systems. For example, if you assign Sarah Morgan to a ship with Watchtower, be sure not to use the Fleet Commander system with her ship.
Watchtower really only requires that you use one fleet ship from its mechanics for story purposes, and can eventually unlock slots for another 8 - which would be all the ships you can have in the base game.
If you are using mods to extend beyond 10 ships, it might be possible to use Fleet Commander for additional ships - though likely you'd run into performance issues.
All that said, here's what I'd recommend. If you already have Fleet Commander installed on your save, don't uninstall it. Instead, leave the ships it is managing how they are, and buy or capture new ships to interface with Watchtower's system. If you are starting a new character, and are planning on engaging with Watchtower, you likely won't need Fleet Commander and could uninstall it.
I have been in touch with the mod author of Fleet Commander to find out if there's anything we can do to help with compatibility, and if something comes up, we'll do our best to accommodate!
5. How do I get more computer cores to unlock things?
The easiest way to get Computer Cores is to destroy Watchtower Arrays which guarantee a core. You can find these by pursuing leads from Harper to find their listening posts. Once you find a listening post, reach its central terminal to reveal the array's location in orbit.
You can also occasionally find them in the wreckage of Watchtower Ships or containers in Watchtower bases.
Finally, if you destroy several of the Major Hub Arrays, and speak to Gren, you'll unlock the ability to capture and mark their ships for Salvage. After marking ships for salvage, the next time you speak to Gren he'll give you the results of the salvage which can sometimes include Computer Cores.
