Oh yeah, that perk has added so much stuff to my stash! A lot of materials I couldn't find are coming from all the guns I'd been breaking down for just wood and steel before. Huge boost. Worth getting both ranks, definitely.
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It's not so bad when it's different settlements and all, but in under a week's time Mr. Abernathy has managed to have his wife *and* his daughter kidnapped, and I'm pretty sure there was an earlier kidnapping there. Since there's an offer to give him the caps to pay the ransom (since he's "too poor"), I've become convinced it's a scam he's running where one of the women in his family is "kidnapped" and he tries to convince someone (i.e. me) to pay the ransom, and he gets a nice cut of that.
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Check your workbench if you get low. In Sanctuary Hills (where I did set up one or two pieces, so that might have something to do with it), I can get another 10-12 artillery markers every time I go back to town and check that (plus 10 flares). I think I have a hefty collection of them by now.