#fallout 4 modding

[twosides--samecoin]

Excited to announce I'm writing companion dialogue for the upcoming full release of Mind Games! Please check out the demo if you haven't already!

I enjoyed Mind Games so much that I went around taking screenshots of all the characters to help spread word about the project/as a gift for the crew. I feel so honoured to be involved with one of the best story mods I've ever played :)

[commonwealth-operator]

Open for business.

[conkreetmonkey]

In the process of attempting to create an incredibly basic Fallout 4 mod, I've realized that Bethesda games are needlessly hard to mod. Like, let me tell you about my journey so far:

(long one... yet another ConkreetMonkey wall of text, this one bemoaning Bethesda's spaghetti code and lack of decent modding resources)

First off, I should probably explain what the mod is intended to be. The Sanctuary bridge (known as the Old North Bridge, which is a real and historically significant bridge irl, mentioned by Preston Garvey upon seeing it for the first time) has always bugged me. It's half-collapsed, and cannot be repaired in the base game, despite seeing a lot of use as the main entry point to an important settlement. There is no mod fixing this that I like, as none remove the collapsed part without replacing the entire model. I've always wanted to see the thing repaired in an immersive way, but no matter how many workshop mods I download or in-editor changes I attempt, the collapsed part is baked into the model. The mesh itself needs editing.

The plan was simple: extract the model, make my 10-minute edit removing the broken planks and supports in Blender, and replace the original version with my slightly different new one. Since all I was to do was delete chunks of the model without leaving any open holes in the mesh, theoretically, the same texture should still work. The UV map would not need edited, as nothing I didn't remove changed in size or position. After replacing the model with this modified one, I would then either "repair" it in-game with Place Everywhere and some mods that add planks and support beams, or "repair" it in the official editor. It would finally look like the broken parts were removed and replaced with salvaged, mismatching wood, which is what would realistically happen. The "cleanest" way to do this would be to save a version of the plugin with just the edited model, and then one with my immersive repairs made in the editor, both uploaded to Nexus so others can benefit. They say to make the mods you want to see, and this one was both at the top of my list and felt very doable. I shouldn't even need to edit the navmesh or pathfinding because I'm not replacing any parts of the bridge NPCs actually walk over.

Roadblock no. 1: extracting the model. You can't just download it from the editor (to my knowledge), you have to extract it with a third-party tool called Bethesda Asset Extractor (BAE). So I download BAE and start sifting through the filenames of all the models in the game.

Roadblock no. 2: the filenames and organization are hot garbage, probably making sense to the devs but not to me, and there's no way to know what the model is of aside from the vague hint the name gives you. It's already become abundantly clear that this game was not initially programmed with modability in mind. I go on Reddit, and am informed by a helpful soul named u/ChaoTikPranXter that I can just open the editor, select the bridge, and see what its filename is that way. Of course! I do so, get the name, go into BAE, and extract the asset.

Roadblock no. 2.5: Bethesda's in-house engine apparently uses a weird-ass file format for 3D models called a .nif. Blender was unable to open these files. Thankfully, there exists a plugin that allows it to, which I downloaded and installed. When I tried to open my new .nif that way, however, only chunks of it displayed. The walking surface, the planes representing the alpha-channel bolt decals on the supports, and some bits of railing. This could not be right. The model was complete when opened in Nifskope, a 3D software that could open .nifs I downloaded when manually sifting through assets in BAE to check what they were (Nifscope, unfortunately, does not actually allow you to edit the models aside from rotating or resizing them along the XYZ axes, so it was useless to actually carry out the edit I wanted, which required the deletion of polygons). Apparently Blender was still struggling with the file format? With no other options, I used Nifskope to convert the .nif to an .obj (which took a few attempts, as the selection system in that program was hard for me to figure out).

Finally, after much trial and error, I had a full, unbroken version of the bridge that I could open in Blender. A compromise, since I'd have to convert it back to a .nif to get it back in the game (just adding more possible points of failure), but it was done. I had successfully opened the model in Blender after hours of trial and error, and downloading 3 third-party pieces of software.

Roadblock no. 3: Apparently converting a .nif to a .obj causes some eccentricities. The model is so massive it is not all visible at once as it far exceeds the render distance, and is also rotated 90° on its side for some reason, and is also positioned just below the "ground." Really hard to work with. I had to reposition it, which will definitely fuck things up down the line.

Roadblock no. 4: Also, BAE can't rip textures, just meshes. It's a known issue and I couldn't find any fixes or workarounds online, just forum posts reiterating that it's how things are. It's not terrible, I can work with a pure white model for my purposes because it's an inanimate object made of wood so it's pretty clear what's what, but now I'm going to have to figure out how to reapply the texture in-engine, which I assume will be a nightmare. Every time I want to move a file from one program to another it feels like I'm at the DMV.

Roadblock no. 4.1: Not really progress-stalling, just another example of Bethesda-ness: the groups on this model makes no sense. The walking surface is grouped with a random few bits of railing for some reason. Not all the railings, just some. All parts of the model are like this, mixed in with a little bit of everything else like the steam trays at a crappy buffet. Like, no shade towards whoever modelled that thing, but... why? Why did you organize it like this? Do 3D artists have the same esoteric approaches to object grouping as 2D ones have to layers? Am I even using the right terminology here? The only thing I know how to do decently in Blender is remove the hair from game characters downloaded from The Models Resource to see them bald (which, coincidentally, is all I should need to know for the edit I want to make).

So I, finally, after HOURS of toil, an entire afternoon, finally get to start making the actual edit.

It takes like 10, maybe 15 minutes.

This could have been so much easier.

I'm hesitant to even attempt adding my new model into the game. Is it really worth the time and effort? This was the easy part. Who's to say the model doesn't flip out again once I convert it to a .nif? I'm assuming the editor will let me copy/paste the size, coordinates and rotation from the vanilla bridge, but is that too optimistic? Will the textures want to cooperate, if there even is a way to reapply them within the Creation Kit? I had to download 3 third-party programs already just to open a mesh file in Blender. Now I'm seeing forum posts about how Outfit Studio is the best way to get .nifs into the game, so I guess make it 4. I think my best bet is likely to get a more experienced modder to help me out with this. I just hope I can find one who also wants to see this mod be created, because none I've found really do commissions, just requests they find compelling (understandable tbh, not shitting on them for that).

In conclusion, Godd Howard has abandoned us. If you're pro-mod, make your games easy and intuitive to mod. Modding is never simple, I know, but this is ridiculous.

[zombiehearts2007]

Testing out mods that let you be gay pre war and-

Sadly, I can't recommend this mod cause it uses AI voice acting, and besides all of the moral implications about AI, it makes him sound like he's dead inside.

[ryngwraith]

In your response about military service, you mentioned wasteland comp-het. Do you mind expanding your thoughts on that? Like, what are the differences between pre-war and post-war attitudes, what do you think are he reasons the wasteland is like that? Is it just Boston/the commonwealth? Do you think those attitudes are still around quite universally? How does that impact queer people in the wasteland?

In my mind, nothing cultural necessarily changed in America immediately following the bombs. I would imagine that the atomic-age veneer of 2070's America and the subsequent focus on the nuclear (ha-ha) family meant queer people weren't openly hated or persecuted in prewar America, but socially ostracized and shooed into the closet. There's nothing WRONG with being gay, per se, but are you sure you're not just confused? Rebelling? Propagandized by communist spies? There's two billion Chinese people and only half a million Americans, still shy of a billion counting Canada. It's YOUR DUTY to replenish the generation of kids WE just threw into the meat grinder in Alaska/Gobi/Canada.

After the war the justifications changed but the underlying message stayed the same, especially for women and vault dwellers: stay home, get married, get pregnant, raise the new generation of Americans, be they panicky vault dwellers or resourceful legacy muties.

That being said I don't think that open homophobia is either rampant or ubiquitous. I imagine that (like in our world) proximity to larger population centers makes people less inclined to care, because of greater social progress there, proximity creating familiarity, or simply having other things to worry about. A waster in Vegas, for example, isn't going to give a damn if Old Ben tries to book him for a night, because he's running to pay the Omertas who threatened to break his legs, and it's probably not the first time he's been propositioned that day.

Boston, meanwhile, is a slum to end all slums. It's been over two hundred years and the place is basically a giant hole in the ground full of garbage. There are still skeletons and trash everywhere. It's economically depressed and has no real government, only small bands of survivors - typically nuclear families - eking out a living, eating trash and huddling in shacks. So I always imagined that places like that are sort of the backwoods of postwar America. In contrast to the cosmopolitan jewels like Vegas and the Boneyard, survivors here have very little to do, limited exposure to strangers, and a constant everyday threat of cannibalism, robbery, or just plain murder that makes them highly distrustful of strangers and new ideas.

Ultimately it makes life in these spaces very lonely for many queer wastelanders, who grow up knowing something is different about them but often go their whole lives without learning the tools and language to live their lives authentically. Not all of them though! Opinion on LGBTQ folks in the wasteland tends to improve the closer to NCR one gets, and one trip to Vegas can be enough to get people informed and living their truths.

Cheyenne has never been to California and I haven't played Fallout 2 in about 8 years, so I can't speak on attitudes there, although I know Knight in FNV mentions "friendships" are frowned upon there. And I won't be commenting whatsoever on the Legion; it should go without saying that abusing child slaves and men loving men are not the same thing or really even close, and it's kind of weird to hypersexualize legion men because of their perceived homosexuality when they're about as queer as a bunch of frat boys.

[agave]

I added a mod that improves supermutants including giving them wearables and stuff and apparently it also laxes the reins on their ability to be in certain factions because oh boy did this surprise me

[synthoverboss]

I made knives out of broken ribs, I would be the one to eliminate you...

Outfit: Dark Disciple - BLOODLUST Edition

[gerbits]

my reaction to seeing fallout london

[twosides--samecoin]

Nora was a huge music fan and attended a lot of hardcore shows. After Shaun was born, she and Jack wanted to adopt a girl which unfortunately didn't happen during her lifetime. When Jack left Vault 111, he saved as much of her clothing as he could - some of the extant garments were band shirts. I think she would have loved to see her kid running around in her old Black Flag shirt :)

[commonwealth-operator]

Good effect on target.

[3drotation]

New update to these mods:

Underarmor Weave Expanded now has a patch for UFO4P. Wild Harvest now includes all harvestables in the base game & DLC and a patch for Northland Diggers 1.4 in a nice shiny new FOMOD. Haven't experienced any issues with the next gen update.

New simple mods

Just a couple of easy ones while I work on some other stuff:

Underarmor Weave Expanded adds the ballistic weave upgrade to every piece of underarmor (armor that occupies no slots) in the game

Wild Harvest adds wild plants that were previously unplantable to the workshop, allowing you to grow them in your settlement.

consider them vanilla+ type mods :)

[conkreetmonkey]

On my hands and knees begging, pleading with Fallout 4 creature mod creators to understand that more contrast and "detail" doesn't always make for a better texture. Every neon green scale on that beast has a hard black shadow and it's really hard to look at. It sticks out like a sore thumb against the greys, browns and faded primaries of the world it's in. Turn down the contrast, I beg of you.

Also, while we're at it, please turn on the alpha mask on the fur texture of that "improved" mutant dog model so it doesn't look like it has rectangular confetti glued to it. The rest of your texture is great, but that's an instant dealbreaker. I don't understand how you're simultaneously good enough at 3D software to retexture this model so well and don't understand how to do transparency.

[newvegays]

Got fo4 working again, so here's my new girly, Assistron! A heavily modified Assaultron re-programmed to provide emotional and medical support to the wasteland.

[fazthegoatclown]

the autism won't stop me, now we will go everywhere,,,

[galoogamelady]

So. Multiple companions bugs out Automatron. Heres uh. Buttons somehow having the M-Sat? No idea what happened.