Fallout 4 Automatron: Level 15 Gate and the Five Perks

Short answer: three things matter before you start Automatron. The DLC will not begin until you reach level 15. Finishing the first quest, Mechanical Menace, gives you the robot workbench schematics, after which you can build an unlimited number of robots as long as you have materials. And unlocking every available mod requires five perks at specific ranks: Science! 4, Robotics Expert 2, Armorer 4, Blacksmith 3 and Gun Nut 1.

This guide covers building and customising robots: the entry requirements, the workbench materials, the seven categories, and the changes you cannot undo.

On sources. Automatron was Fallout 4's first add-on. The release date is recorded inconsistently. Nukapedia gives 22 March 2016, while Steam’s appdetails endpoint for appid 435870 in the English locale, retrieved 28 September 2026, returns "23 Mar, 2016". Steam’s displayed date varies by locale, so this article treats 22 March as the release date and cites the Steam value as retrieved metadata. Asian territories got it on 6 April 2016. The mechanics below follow Nukapedia, which serves as the reference wiki. Platform build numbers are not stated in the official announcements, so this article does not assert a version number.

The only entry requirement is level 15

Owning the DLC is not enough: the quest will not start until you hit level 15. When you do, a caravan distress call appears on the radio, and listening to it points you to an area near Wattz Consumer Electronics.

There you find a crowd of robots fighting under a highway. Destroy the hostile robots, speak to Ada, and the quest ends.

Friendly robots die anyway

Hurtz, Turing and Porter fight on your side. If one of them survives, it dies automatically a few seconds later, and the quest counts it as one of the "hostile" robots you were meant to destroy. There is nothing to protect here.

Completing it turns on Rust Devil attacks

Know this before you start. Once Mechanical Menace is complete, settlements begin to be attacked by Rust Devils, and random encounters start including hostile Mechanist robots and Rust Devils.

Nukapedia adds that this can make other random encounters much harder to trigger. Starting the chain before your settlement defences are in place means spending time on defence requests.

Building the robot workbench

Two things about placing it:

• It sits in the Special category of the workshop menu, and unlike other workbenches it does not require Local Leader rank 2
• It is the largest crafting station in the game in both width and height, so it can end up unusable indoors. Building it outside avoids the problem

As with any workbench, you cannot use it while wearing power armor.

Five chassis, seven categories

A new build produces a basic protectron with no armor, named "Automatron-XXX" with a random number, renameable like any weapon or armor piece.

• Protectron (Nukatron, Galactron, N.I.R.A.)
• Mister Handy
• Assaultron (Novatron)
• Robobrain
• Sentry bot (Space sentry bot)

Parenthesised entries are Nuka-World variants. Nukapedia describes assembly as spanning seven categories, yet lists the eight category names below. Head and Thruster arm both carry a footnote reading "With Mr. Handy torso and thruster only", and the wiki does not make clear how that footnote applies to each of them. Either way no single configuration offers all eight, so check the workbench screen for what is actually selectable.

A further category, "special mods", only matters for the Automatron questline and plays no part in building generic robots.

The head and both arms are optional

A robot can be finished without a head or either arm. In that state it usually has no way to deal damage or interact with its surroundings, which is fine for a settlement worker but not for a companion.

The five perks that unlock every mod

These are the highest ranks any robot mod asks for, not each perk’s own maximum (Robotics Expert has three ranks, but robot crafting needs only 2), and no single mod requires all five. Which rank applies depends on the mod. And perks alone are not enough: Nukapedia states that not all modifications are available initially and that you must either find the component or complete the DLC quests to unlock new components. When a mod is missing, separate "perk too low" from "not unlocked yet".

Only two existing robots can be modded

From the base game, only Codsworth and Curie before she becomes a synth can be modified. The side effects do not reverse.

• Once modified they can no longer equip apparel such as the bowler hat. The only way back is loading an earlier save
• Curie loses her robot-body modifications and reverts to her original appearance during her side quest Emergent Behavior, so remove them before starting it
• Robots that already live in a settlement cannot be modified, but robots you build can be assigned to any settlement you like

Unstable weapons alone cause self-destruction

If a robot carries only unstable miniguns or Gatling lasers and those weapons break mid-combat, it will attempt to detonate itself against an enemy.

After combat the robot repairs broken weapons on its own, and robot repair kits also work. If you do not want the detonation behaviour, do not fit unstable weapons as the only armament.

Settlements: usable on supply lines, but the robot is what loses gear

Robots you build can be companions, assigned to settlement jobs, or put on supply lines. Nukapedia describes workbench robots as useful for establishing supply lines in dangerous areas.

The reasoning that a robot spares a human who would otherwise die does not hold. Nukapedia’s provisioner entry says the opposite.

• Humanoid provisioners keep all their equipment after being restored when defeated
• An automatron provisioner may lose all its upgrades and revert to an unarmored basic model when defeated, leaving you to rebuild and repair it with settlement resources

So the robot is the side with more to lose. Sending a heavily upgraded unit down the dangerous route is exactly how it gets stripped back to basic. Because the workbench builds robots indefinitely given materials, sending a plain unit you intend to rebuild works; treating an upgraded unit as a consumable does not.

Quest order

1. Mechanical Menace (schematics and Ada)
2. A New Threat
3. Headhunting
4. Restoring Order

Rogue Robot sits alongside these. The main locations are Fort Hagen hangar, the RobCo Sales & Service Center and the Mechanist's lair.

Summary

• Nothing starts before level 15; the trigger is a caravan distress call on the radio
• Mechanical Menace gives schematics and Ada, but switches on Rust Devil attacks on your settlements
• The workbench is in the Special category, needs no Local Leader rank 2, and is the game's largest station — build it outside
• Crafting all possible mods needs Science! 4, Armorer 4, Blacksmith 3, Robotics Expert 2 and Gun Nut 1 — the highest ranks any robot mod asks for, not each perk’s own maximum — and no single mod requires all five
• Mods also unlock by finding components or progressing the DLC quests, not perks alone
• Only Codsworth and pre-synth Curie can be modded, and modding blocks apparel with no way back except an old save
• Unstable miniguns or Gatling lasers as the sole armament lead to self-destruction when they break

Sources (Nukapedia is a community wiki): Nukapedia — Automatron (add-on), Nukapedia — Robot workbench, Nukapedia — Mechanical Menace, Nukapedia — Automatron robot mods Nukapedia — Provisioner for how humanoid and robot provisioners differ after being defeated, and Steam — Fallout 4 - Automatron with its appdetails endpoint (English locale) for the release-date cross-check.