Fallout 4 – Cait Companion Guide

In my runs, I keep coming back to Cait after I acquired all the needed Companion Perks. I just find it fun to have her around. The Scottish accent, the snarky comments, the way she reacts to things… I find it all funny and comforting. Also, Cait likes to use close-ranged guns, which favors my playthrough. I like my companions getting close and personal. Lastly, I feel like Katy Townsend had a lot of fun while making the character, which makes her feel very alive and emotional.

Cait’s Overview

Everyone has it rough in the Wasteland, sure. But Cait’s story is specially rough, having been born into an abusive family that would go to the extremes of locking her up in a shed outside their house for trying to escape, or even breaking her leg. Not because they wanted her around, mind you, since her parents ended up selling her as a slave once she turned 18.

After having endured slavery for five years, she bought her freedom with caps she stole from the men she entertained, and went straight to her parents’ to dispense some shotgun justice. Following that event she fell into a spiral of drugs and alcohol, and eventually found a way to fund her lifestyle via gladiatorial entertainment with Tommy Lonegan in the Combat Zone. 

A raging death wish, a psycho addiction, and a nuclear post-apocalyptic world, a happy girl do not make. Cait is rough around all edges, but she can soften up to the Sole Survivor given enough time and affinity. Always reliable in a fight and opinionated, she’s also a popular choice to romance, and she is more openly flirtatious than most or all other options.

Note: Cait’s family is noted to be of Irish Descent, but Katy Townsend, her voice actress is Scottish, which invites some confusion on whether Cait should be considered Irish or Scottish. With the information available, we should consider Cait to be simply a wastelander, since she would have been born post-war, and there’s no reasonable expectation of transatlantic traveling, she can’t really be either one of those.

Cait’s Location

Cait is located in Combat Zone, almost a straight line East from Diamond City. The location and surrounding area is raider territory. Once inside the Combat Zone, you’ll find that this is an old theater that has been repurposed into a small gladiatorial arena, cage and all.

If you don’t feel like walking blindly around in hopes to finding the location by just looking at the image on the map, you can also strike a conversation with one of the Diamond City guards. They’ll eventually mention the place, and warn you not to go there. By the time you reach Diamond City, you should have the experience and skill to make the raiders in and around Combat Zone a small challenge.

Once the raiders have been dealt with, the only people left standing will be Cait and Tommy Lonegan, who is effectively the owner of the zone as well as the holder of Cait’s current employment contract. Now that the Combat Zone is going down without its customers, he’ll offer to hand over her contract to you.

When talking to Cait, she will express her desire to join you, and you can take this opportunity to talk to Tommy about Cait, and make sure to be concerned about her opinion and take her side on every chance to start gaining points with her. After all, you’ll be seeing a lot more of Cait than of Tommy from this point on.

Cait’s Companion Perk

“Trigger Rush” is the name. The Perk increases the regeneration rate of your Action Points when you are below 25% of HP. In my runs I found it to be very effective when mixed with chems, the usage of which Cait adores until you complete her companion quest. However, don’t get addicted when she is around.

“Trigger Rush”, Cait’s companion perk

Keep in mind that you’ll need maximum affinity before Cait grants you her perk. Completing her quest Bening Intervention is required to reach this level, so the soonest you’ll get it is when you’ve cleared Vault 95. On your way to the vault, make sure to lean heavily into her likes and avoid her dislikes and that way you can guarantee you’ll be getting the perk as soon as it becomes available.

Cait’s Likes and Dislikes

Cait’s main likes are going to be lockpicking and chems. Seeing you lockpick any lock will work on your favor. Seeing you use chems will also be in her likes until you cure her addiction in Vault 95, but be mindful not to get addicted, as that is a dislike. She will also use the chems she has in her inventory, and is theorized that she being under the influence also helps on the affinity level with the player, so if you can spare some, keep her stocked up until you’ve completed her final quest. 

Lastly, remember that in every dialogue interaction, you want to be assertive, agressive, and hostile on your responses. Doing all of these actions while having Cait as a companion will steadily increase her affinity to you. Do it enough on the way to completing her quest and her perk will be yours.

Avoid being too generous, and avoid helping ghouls and mutants, as she has a deep dislike for them. If you ask any ghoul characters to move into one of the settlements, don’t ask them into the one you have Cait living, which, while she is your companion, will be whatever you are using as a base.

Below you’ll find a list of general likes and dislikes. I’ve excluded those that are too quest-specific for simplicity’s sake. With these in mind, you should be able to navigate quests involving the Institute, the Brotherhood of Steel, the Railroad, and settlers. Cait likes to play lone wolf, and she’ll gladly bring you along if you follow suit. 

Cait’s Companion Quest

If you are unfamiliar with companions in Fallout 4, the CliffsNotes are as follow: 

1. You find the companion
2. They’ll ask to come with you once they are available (could be locked behind requirements or quests or not)
3. You’ll accept their request and they’ll start following you around, replacing any other companion you have at the moment. 
4. They’ll show their likes and dislikes as you go about your business. Pay attention to the notifications.
5. They’ll build rapport/affinity with you until reaching multiple thresholds. Each time a threshold is reached, they’ll ask to speak with you, giving you a chance to deepen the relationship between the two of you. 
6. On one of these thresholds, you’ll be given a companion quest, which you’ll have to complete to reach maximum affinity. Reaching maximum affinity comes with an additional perk, active while you have the companion with you.

Vault 95 map location

Unlocking Cait’s Companion Quest is as straight-forward as it can be. Keep her as your companion while you lean into her likes and avoid her dislikes and she’ll eventually open up to you about her chem use. She’ll admit to being actively addicted to Psycho, and that she has been dosing behind your back. She’s heard about a way to cure addictions hidden in Vault 95, and so that is the gist of the quest: Bring Cait to Vault 95 and find this addiction cure, if it exists. While in Vault 95, make sure to strip it of all aluminum, as it is a valuable resource.

The Vault is not abandoned. It has Gunners, as well as few Assaultrons both inside and out. Their levels are between 20 and 30. The whole Vault will consume some time to clear out. If you want to skip unnecessary parts of it and get to the point, go to the Facilities Wing. It is located to the left of the main hall. You will reach the main hall as soon as you get in the Vault, by using the elevator inside the vault entrance and going through a small corridor and turning to the left. unlock the door using the computer in the room upstairs in the Overseer’s office. It’s the one with all the mugs.

The only thing left is to proceed in the wing and clear it out. Eventually, you will end up in the room that is built to cure the drug addictions. After hesitating to proceed Cait will sit in the chair and you will cure her addiction. This completes the quest, and you will earn the Perk after reaching maximum affinity with her.

Is Cait the Right Companion for You?

With every companion, there are caveats to consider about having them around. Each of them plays a little differently and have different personalities and fighting preferences. Cait likes things up-close and personal. When given a variety of weapons, she’ll normally default to a Double-barrel Shotgun and a melee weapon, typically a Baseball Bat. She doesn’t pull her punches and she’s more proactive than reactive, meaning she won’t necessarily wait for you to engage first. 

Fighting strategy

Cait is great at clearing buildings with multiple halls. Her shotgun, baseball-bat, and fearless guts makes her a good frontwoman and she will surely watch your back effectively indoors. In contrast, she doesn’t do great on open-field, long distance fights. She tends to hug her shotgun even when dealing with an enemy out in the open. 

Never one to back down

Still, having her around for any fight is well worth it if you have unlocked her companion perk. Increased AP regeneration below 25% HP can be a godsent in a tough fight. If you can hold yourself fine in a long distance fight and would rather someone watching your 6 indoors, Cait is your girl. 

I would not necessarily recommend to put her on a Power Armor, though. It does increase her carrying capacity but her shoot-first-ask-questions-later philosophy means that the Power Armor will get destroyed pretty quickly. Unless you are swimming in Aluminum and Steel to keep patching her up, I’d say it’s hardly worth it.

Playstyle Affinity

A common complaint you can find online about Cait is that she dislikes a lot of things. The reality is that she dislikes a lot of things that most players would consider “the nice thing to do” or “the rightful thing to do”. It’s important to remember that, all things being equal, Cait would be your stereotypical lone wolf character. But since she’s following you around, you’ll need to have an “us vs the world” approach if you intend to keep her happy. 

Is it morally reprehensible to lockpick during the apocalypse?

In general, if your playstyle is righteous and moral, if you like taking the high road, if you like solving disagreements with words instead of lead… then, Cait’s personality is not going to play nice with yours. Of course, you can still have her around, do all these things, and lockpicking everything you find will still probably keep her on your good graces. If you don’t like lockpicking yourself, then is a pretty hard sell. 

If, on the other hand, you are doing a cutthroat approach, like to bully your NPCs, and are a bit of a cleptomaniac, then she’ll fit like a glove. If you also antagonize the Brotherhood, the Institute, and the Railroad, even better. If you are quick to use chems, remember that she switches, and she’ll like your chem use until you resolve her own addiction. After that point (beating “Benign Intervention”) she’ll dislike chem use. She always dislikes you getting addicted. 

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