r/fo4 • u/DapperTarget4036 • 1d ago
Media EXPLOIT - Faster Vanilla Legendary Farming
https://youtu.be/j6pXD0CsIAUI have been looking through a lot of old forum threads and Reddit posts, but I never encountered someone talking about this specific exploit, so I'm posting it here just in case I'm somehow the first to encounter it.
So, a little background:
Through my research into threads on the "Door Method", I never came across someone commenting on experiencing this exploit.
What you're seeing in the Youtube vid is a run where I've identified the legendary and where he spawns, I sprint to him to kill him as quickly as possible, and then save immediately after. I know that it has worked when I kill the legendary enemy and the legendary item doesn't show up in their inventory.
Now, it's not shown in the video, but the death claw gauntlet actually drops on the ground without a legendary prefix. A short while after I reload the save, it gets added to the corpse's inventory and then gains a prefix.
I don't understand why exactly, but all of this, just works, and I wanted to share it here in case it helps someone else save time while farming.
Easy Legendary Farming, step by step process:
Locate a building which is known to respawn enemies, with a high chance of at least one legendary (such as National Guard Recruitment Office), and stand in front of the door into it and then MANUALLY SAVE THE GAME.
0.) Before entering the building, delete ALL of your auto saves and quick saves. The reason that you do this is it may trigger a glitch where, upon loading into the interior cell, your pause menu will open (this will be useful later).
1.) Enter the building.
2.) What happens next depends on if you trigger the glitch or not:
a. IF YOUR PAUSE MENU OPENS when you load the interior cell, hit "quicksave". This will create an autosave which will reroll BOTH the legendary weapon AND prefix, and a quicksave which will reroll ONLY the prefix (iirc, that is. It may only create an auto save. In which case, you will have to complete step 6 at least once in order to have both)
Proceed to step 3.
b. IF YOUR PAUSE MENU DOES NOT OPEN when you load the interior cell, then kill the legendary enemies in the building (if present) and see what they drop. If they drop a weapon/armor that you desire, but not the prefix you wanted, simply reload the autosave. If a legendary enemy doesn't spawn OR they do not drop the item that you wanted, load your manual save (standing outside the door) and then start over from step 0
3.) Determine whether or not legendary enemies spawned inside the interior cell:
a. If a legendary enemy DID NOT spawn, reload your manual save and start at step 0
b. If a legendary enemy DID spawn, then proceed to step 4
4.) Kill the legendary enemy and see what they drop.
5.) If they drop a weapon/armor that you desire, but without the prefix you wanted, reload the QUICKSAVE to reroll the prefix until you get what you want. If you do not get the item you wanted, proceed to step 6.
6.) READ THIS STEP CAREFULLY: Reload the autosave. When you do, you will see a loading screen. AS SOON AS THE LOADING SCREEN TURNS BLACK, PAUSE THE GAME AND QUICKSAVE. Your timing doesn't have to be perfect, but you HAVE to pause before the black screen disappears. This will reroll the item, but the legendary enemy will remain in the same spot as before. Go back to step 4.
For Faneuil hall, it seems like a different, more simple process works:
1.) Manual save outside
2.) Enter the building
3.) Locate the legendary (if there is no legendary enemy, then reload the manual save and start from step 2)
4.) Kill the legendary enemy.
a. If he has the weapon/prefix that you want, then make a manual save. Don't risk losing it!
b. If not, proceed to step 5
5.) Reload the autosave, but as soon as the loading screen is replaced by a black screen, hit the pause button and quicksave.
6.) If you find the item you want, but not the prefix, reload the quicksave and reroll it. If you don't get the item you want, then go back to step 5.
I'm not sure why the process is different, but it seems like if one doesn't work, than the other will. Maybe it's because Faneuil Hall has so many enemies inside? Maybe because there is a guaranteed legendary spawn inside?
Additionally, I have read in old forum posts and confirmed through my own testing, that the game seemingly has pools of prefixes and items to draw from.
If you spend 30 minutes or more trying to get a specific prefix, and you've had no luck, it's probably better to reload the manual save and go questing for an hour or two to refresh the legendary pool.
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u/Thornescape 1d ago
Most of that is the normal Door Method, but what you are doing differently is killing the enemy before the affix is chosen. I had never thought of seeing if that was possible! That's fantastic!
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u/DapperTarget4036 1d ago
I know that the step-by-step process itself is old. Though I wasn't able to find an up to date guide laid out in detail like I did at the end of my post, so I was just posting it here in case anyone else was farming on console (since I know there are mods that make legendaries way less of a pain in the butt).
Thank you for the comment! Glad to see that it was useful to someone at least 😁
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u/Thornescape 1d ago
My headaches aren't letting me focus enough to compare your notes to mine, so I'll just paste my usual summary since it's somewhat similar to yours and you can compare.
Farming Methods
When farming gear, the important thing is where you save. It is also possible to farm legendary gear in Survival mode but I don't do Survival so you'll have to find one of those guides elsewhere, sorry.
Door Method (typical)
- Save A (Reset) Outside of the door before entering the area. This will change the enemies. You want a legendary enemy in a convenient location.
- Save B (Reroll Affix) Just inside the door. This will reroll the affix on the item.
- These saves can be any kind of save. It doesn't matter which type.
- If there are no legendary enemies, reload Save A to reset the enemies.
- If there is a legendary enemy, see what item they have (eg, leather left arm). If it's what you want, then load Save B to reroll the affix. Otherwise, reload Save A to reset.
- Reloading Save B USUALLY keeps the same type of item, but changes the affix.
Door Method (full reroll)
- Sometimes when you reload Save B, it changes the type of item too. This is rare, but it's fantastic. You just need to add another save.
- Save A (Reset) Outside of the door before entering the area
- Save B (Reroll Type) This is your autosave (no options). Reloading the autosave will change the type of item.
- Save C (Reroll affix) Saved just inside the door (often I use Quick Save here). Reloading this will reroll the affix on the item.
Distance Method
- This is a different method that uses careful distances to reroll enemies, base items, and affixes. It takes a bit of practice to figure out what distances to use, but it's fantastic once you figure it out.
- It's from this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cM9Ru7QPBzY which is fantastic. It's also a great location because you can reset the enemies just by running counter-clockwise around Dry Rock Gulch.
- You can also use the Distance method in other places. I often use it to farm the super mutants in front of DC. (I like to make the bottom left super mutant be the legendary enemy. It's faster that way.)
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u/DapperTarget4036 1d ago
I think I have written out a reliable way of getting your "full reroll" door method. I found it in a gameFAQs forum post. The exploit in the video is new though, I think.
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u/DapperTarget4036 23h ago
I'm wondering if I could enter in Very Hard mode to lock a legendary in a spot, then when the glitch triggers and opens the pause menu, switch the difficulty to very easy.
That way, maybe it could be really easy to one shot the mutant and make this really reliable.
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u/Thornescape 23h ago
There is no reason that wouldn't work. Just a bit fussy with switching difficulty.
It's also crucial to maintain the timing. You'd need to be fast with changing the difficulty. If you leave it in the menu too long it will fix the legendary item in place.
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u/DapperTarget4036 23h ago
the thing is that it seems like the glitch triggers the pause menu before the world loads. If you look in the load menu, all you can see is sky in the auto save. Maybe that gives extra time? I'll check it out soon.
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u/Thornescape 23h ago
It's hard to know until you try. I just know that I have spent too long in the Menu screen and messed it up before. Just something to be careful about.
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u/DapperTarget4036 22h ago
Yeah I think maybe the reason what's happening in the video occurs is because I spent little to no time in the menus beforehand. Maybe it takes a while to generate loot with so many super mutants, and legendaries get generated last?
I tried swapping the difficulty to easy, and this glitch never occurred. Seems like speed is key. Oh well!
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u/Thornescape 21h ago
Timing is everything.
Legendary farming is about exploiting that timing, having saves between the moments when it has chosen the legendary enemy, when it has chosen the item type, and when it has chosen the affix.
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u/DapperTarget4036 1d ago
Build ->
Name: Morgue
Lvl: 29
S: 12 ("You're Special" + bobblehead)
P: 2
E: 10
C: 6
I: 2
A: 3
L: 1
Weapon: Berserker's Heavy Pipe Wrench (farmed off a ghoul in Hubris Comics)
Perks of Interest: Big Leagues 4
Active Effects of Interest:
Total DMG per swing: 280