I've been using 4.6, and its nicely balanced, but a few suggestions. One would be to increase weapon spread, probably by reducing the player's small guns and energy weapons skills, when strain is high enough to make them breath heavy. It would feel pretty natural if it made it seem like you were having trouble holding the weapon steady. Also, its a minor thing, but having strain reduce a little faster while crouching but not moving would be a good effect, like hunkering down for a break. I agree with you though about sneaking, its difficult to move like that and should be at least as tiring as walking or running. The final would be to have crippled legs or torso reduce carry weight.

well my character got "whacked", "gunshot" AND crippled both legs. needless to say my agility was reduced to 1 (with real injuries med bracers). limping back to town, taking the most direct route, i was stopped in my tracks by some wood debris maybe 6 inches in height. not wanting to get delayed by moving around it i decided to jump over it. or tried to. my character did a strange motion where instead of gaining elevation, his head remained about the same level while he pulled his feet up a few inches. not enough to clear the obstacle.

with the tweaks, jump height is affected by AGI, an excellent idea. however, with the current settings, while allowing me to appreciate that it's realistic not to be able to jump over stuff when im crippled, i should at least be able to JUMP over obstacles that my character would otherwise be able to STEP over. besides, even when im not crippled, with an agility of 1, i cant "jump" over stuff only a few inches from the ground that any person, no matter how clumsy, should be able to step over. also, i find that my character cant "jump" on ledges (or chairs, tables, others around the same height) that any person would be able to climb over.

Is it possible to make the jump height greater when the character is pressed up against a ledge, chair, table to simulate climbing on it (which any person can do) to differentiate it from jumping over it (which only agile people can do))? for example, while i may not be able to JUMP ON a bed from the floor, when pressed up against it, i would certainly be able to climb and lie down on it.

Thanks for all the great feedback! Obviously I cannot please everyone. . . . which is why you all have to understand that this is first of all my own personal vision of how to improve the gameplay. Secondly, balancing the game play is very difficult, and my goal has focused on making the game much more balanced (since the default game generally give the advantage to the PC, by weakening the NPCs). And third, my tweaks are limited by the game engine/programming. While I've added things that may be beyond the scope of the default game, I'm still generally restrained by the game itself.


The "hurt" system is part of the default game. The only part of this I have altered is that I've increased the player's response to pain . . . to what I feel is a more realistic response.
My mod does NOT make you unconscious when you are shot . . . it makes you fall down when your fatigue is depleted. And enemies will still attack you when you collapse from loss of fatigue.

Loss of fatigue is like being knocked out, but this is not exactly the same as being unconscious. The unconscious flag must be set for an enemy to recognize that their victim is unconscious (which is the only time that they will cease to attack, and there is always still a chance that any NPC/creature will still attack an unconscious victim.

The only one of my weapon effects that triggers the unconscious flag is my Whack effect (attached to melee weapons) . . . and it is only triggered when your health is less than 25%.


I would love to add a PC breathing hard lip-sync, but I don't know how to do that. If someone could show me how to do that, I would try to add it.


An unarmed character is never going to fair very well against a bunch of heavily armed NPCs. And that is, in my opinion, the way it should be. Dodge is built in to the game . . . so is duck. I dodge all the time, by zig-zagging, and by tapping the sneak mode key. And I really do not see the need to a nerf ranged combatants, since ranged combat is not very effective when you are close enough to whack them (or be whacked by them). But I am working on a modification to Whack (and all my weapon effects) that should balance this out even more.


I'm not going to increase gun spread when Strain is high, because I have already increased spread enough in other ways (such as when moving and running while shooting, when not crouching, when your weapon is not in very good condition). In v.4.6, I actually set the way weapon skills effect effect spread back to default since my settings were making ranged combat pretty ineffective at low skill levels for the NPCs as well as the PC).

Personally I feel that Strain decreases too fast . . . so while I tend to agree that a faster decrease when in sneak mode stance, while not moving, makes sense . . . I would only be willing to add this if I set this at my current (v.4.6) non-moving rate . . . which means that I would decrease that rate for non-moving, walking, and menu-mode rest.




I don't see any way to differentiate jump, based on the object your character is trying to get over. There is no climb in the game, or any real step-over animation. All I have to work with is walk/run (which is more like skating than anything else) and jump. So, I would have to pretty much remove my jump-based on AGL penalty/bonus if I was going to permit a PC with a crippled leg to 'step' or 'climb' over obstacles.

maybe just raise minimum jump height a bit? so that no matter how low my agi might get, i can jump over things i should be able to step over anyway.

I'll look into tweaking my script a bit, to increase the minimum VERY slightly. The thing is, I would have to pretty much nerf my jump penalty for low AGL AND for having crippled limbs if I was to increase the minimum jump height to anywhere near the height a person could step over, since that would be somewhat over two feet.

As I tried to explain in my previous reply, the problem is that the game itself does not use realistic animation. Tthere is no step-over animation in the game . . . so, when you cannot slide (walk) over an object you have to jump over it. And I feel that you should NOT be able to jump when you have a crippled leg. To me, that is the more realistic approach. A very talented animator could perhaps improve the game's unrealistic character movement animations, but that is far beyond my current modding ability.

thanks for considering it at least. i totally agree that there should be no jumping when crippled. but like i said, not being able to get over an obstacle that low isnt realistic either. i just think of it as stepping over instead of jumping over even when then the animation is that of jumping. i should edit my previous post to say "step over easily" which would be a foot or less, instead of just "step over", which would be as you said over 2 feet.

btw, whats the verdict on the alternate start mod? i know you took it off you active mods list but i think its been updated recently. i was planning to use it with ART. are there still issues i should be concerned with?

Thanks for letting me know that this was an issue for you. I do read and consider every single complaint/suggestion posted in my mods' threads, both here and at FO3 Nexus. After playing around with different settings, my initial thoughts were correct . . . I cannot increase the minimum jump height without nerfing my jump penalty. But I did increase it slightly, so even with an AGL of 1, you should be able to 'step' over most low objects (8 to 12 inches).

I'll have to take a look at the latest version. But even the older version was compatible with my Tweaks . . . the main reason I wasn't using "Alternate Start - Roleplayers" in my own game was that it was not compatible with Broken Steel. If I remember correctly, the only real issue with my Tweaks was that you had to load it after my Reduced Quest XPR module, and I'm pretty sure that you instantly leveled up when you entered the Wasteland.

looking forward to the next one then!

btw, it seems to me that the encumbrance mod isnt getting the attention it deserves. this is likely because people dont know about it seeing as its only discussed as part of ART, even though its completely stand alone. i think it deserves it's own thread. it should prove popular as its the closest thing to OB's real fatigue and SM's encumbrance mod (title escapes me at the moment), both of which are also popular mods.

I'm currently working on a adding some new effects to my weapon effect scripts, and could use some feedback.

• Whack Effect: when you are knocked unconscious, you drop your equipped weapon
  
• Gunshot Effect: when you are knocked unconscious, you drop your equipped weapon
  
• Blast Effect: when you are in the radius of an explosion, your equipped weapon is Blasted out of your hands.

Your dropped weapons can be picked up by NPCs, so dropping a weapon can be somewhat harsh if you are unable to recover it . . . not only will you be without that weapon, but the NPC will use it against you.
Plus, when weapons get blasted away, they go pretty far . . . so small handguns can be really difficult to find . . . and sometimes they are impossible to recover. But this is realistic.

I'm also making some changes to armor:

• The armor that you are wearing is now damaged much more by the blast of explosions. The amount of damage to the armor is based on its AR value.
  
• As part of my Jump Quest, armor weight is now factored into jump heights

Besides general feedback, I need specific opinions on the following:

• Instead of using armor weight as a jump height penalty, I could perhaps use how encumbered you are.
  
• Whack effect (v.4.6): Are you happy with my current change that prevents you from being knocked unconscious? Currently your health has to be less than 25% to be knocked out. Is 25% enough, or is it too low?
  
• Whack effect (v.4.7 beta): Dropping your equipped weapon is my way to add the ability to loot unconscious victims, so I'm wondering if I should add more dropped items. For instance, I could also make you drop your ammo as well (for your equipped weapon), I could make you drop a percentage of your caps (but NPCs co not seem to pick caps up, so it would be better to just remove them). I love the dropped weapons, which is very realistic, but things get a bit silly if I add too many dropped items.

Oh . . . I forgot to mention that all my weapon effects also affect all the NPCs.

I'm also rebalancing my Luck Quest script a bit . . . as I feel that a high LUCK makes loot amounts a bit too great.

Thanks . . . v.4.7 is nearly ready for release. I just need to finalize the above scripts.

I may release my Encumbrance module as a separate mod, since it is a totally independent part of my Tweaks, If I do that, I'll likely make a new [RELZ] thread for it.

I like the idea of dropped weapons. though perhaps dont let them get knocked too far away if possible. Not fun to lose a favored weapon. Not so much liking the dropping other items though. specially the caps. even after you win the battle, the small items will get havoked around and you'd have to go looking them up. also, why only ammo and caps and not anything else from the inventory? I'm also thinking about at least some helmets (not PA of course) possibly getting knocked off.

I'm all for making SPECIALs more special so instead of making you drop the weapon all the time, perhaps another check against a SPECIAL so its more chance based? chance to drop could also be affected by the amount of damage which caused the weapon effect, so a smaller damage gunshot/whack/explode would be less likely to make you drop your weapon than a greater damage one. and, to give, melee better balance, whack could have a greater chance to knock weapons away than the other weapon effects.

Jump height, im for encumbrance rather than armor weight. Luck, havent tried high luck characters yet but my low luck/low barter character is pretty much compelled to drag EVERY sellable piece of loot back to town just to have caps to heal enough to go back out again so nerfing it will really hurt me more.

On that note, is there anyway to change doctors and repairmen not to heal you or repair the full amount but only in proportion to the caps you have? As i said, most of the time my character is REALLY low on caps and it seems silly that the doctor wont heal me ANY amount because I'm 1 cap short of his asking price for restoring me to FULL health. same goes for repairmen. Coudlnt help but think "OK, i cant afford the full heal/repair service, but what can you do for me for this amount?"

I agree that it would increase realism, but I have some doubts about dropping weapons because of the Fallout engine, I've seen some heavy gear being propelled over ridiculous distances by explosions and even worse I've seen some stuff that I dropped (to be able to move again) just disappear into the ground.

Mind you, it might be interesting to track for example a raider who has stolen the Lincoln repeater (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winchester_%2773 ) But I wonder what will happen if you have to return to base to heal up and get a replacement weapon before setting out to hunt the thief? Or to ask the question another way: what happens to a unique weapon that has been picked up by an NPC when the cell resets?

Concerning whack, I've been knocked down quite a few times, since my current character isn't very strong and doesn't have many hit points, but somehow I now take out the foes wielding blunt weapons and those armed with hunting rifles first. So I think that your whack settings are ok.

I like the idea of having things knocked out of your hands, but only if it can be done in a way that doesn't end up being frustrating. Maybe the weapon could emit some kind of shining effect (a magic shader) when it is knocked out of your hands, so it's easy to see where it ended up? I don't know if that's possible. And there would probably have to be a way to limit how far an explosion can blast your weapon away, because that could lead to some really awkward situations..

And yeah possibly some kind of check to see if the weapon isn't a quest item or something...

Copied this over from your own forum...nothing bad..just a question from me regarding a peroblem I have encountered.

Love the realism tweaks you've done..very immersive and your list of mods to use is also a great guide...

Now to the problem..
Was playing a new game with latest realism tweaks installed..and set up(as best I could) the load order according to your guide....some of the mods you use I don't plus have some other mods I'm trying out.

Noticed after picking special stats..that ..my carry strength was only 120lbs..as a male with a strength of 6(Albeit the latter was increased with console..yep..re-added the 5 stat points in my game that you cut with realism core...reasoning being that..the vault selected would have been some of the best genetic material possixrs in the country..Access to good educational and physical training through their schooling,work ethic and such..and hey..A potential hero/oine should be a cut above.)..This was the only change I made i.e edited 5 stat points back in via console..

Now..as I understand it..tweaks should give,even with less is more installed a base of 50lbs..plus 20 per strength point plus 5lbs extra per pont due to male gender...so..200lbs carry weight!
Checked in F03 Edit..the base values of strength etc and noticed a conflict..with less is more overriding the core moduel...core displays 50lbs as base..Less is More displayes 35lbs as base......with vanilla showing 150lbs.....(These are the only 3 Modules that appear to do anything to strength in game...i.e. Fallout3 Esm..and your core and less is more modules.
Have no clue as to what is going on..as even with base at 35..should still be able to carry 185lbs using your core formula with base changed to 35 instead of 50..


Help please..

Having NPC companions drop weapons more frequently would be annoying, but if you checked them after every combat I guess you could keep track. Plus, dogmeat can find lost weapons, and I'm pretty sure Schlangster's Helmet POV has some vision modes that make finding dropped weapons easier. Seeing 10000 caps scattered all over the ground would be funny, but it seems like anything in your magical mystery backpack of infinite space should probably stay there - I don't see any loose pockets on power amor.

Also, I don't know if you've had a chance to check out my latest release of IMCN, but the single HUD XML file does a check to see if DUI is installed, and formats itself accordingly, making installation a little easier. Let me know if you want to try that out. I'm not 100 percent sure that it would work though for your application, because you're using some of DaRn's custom meter templates, and I don't know if the engine would balk if DUI wasn't installed and those templates were absent, even if the elements that used them weren't being displayed. It's OK with missing globals though. :blink:

In relation to what Norbingel says above about continuing the theme of making SPECIALS more special..well...

There is already at least one mod that touches in this area in regard to experience gain..i.e utilising a formula where perception and intelligence help to calcualte an xp bonus/or deficiency...(http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=9601)

Sure that the same principle could be applied in other fields also.......strength/agility for retaining that weapon and/or items?perception/luck for finding loot?Charisma/Luck as to whether a doctor/repairer would fix up to a lesser degree than full either your body or item?

Not perfect and no idea if it could work but would seem it might in principle....and sure there are others out there who can come up with more ideas and derived bonuses in relation to such.

Thanks so much for all the suggestions!

I set the weapon to be dropped as late as possible, so it does not receive the full force of the explosion, but small weapons are sometimes going to blasted quite a distance, if you are near the center of the explosion. I'll look into making your helmet be blasted off



A weapon will only be dropped in an explosion when it is in your hand. The idea is to make the effects of explosions more realistic (with much greater consequences), so my feeling is that anytime you have a weapon in your hand, it should be blasted out of your hand . . . no matter how high your SPECIALs are. As far as Whack goes, there is already an existing chance that your weapon will be knocked out of your hand, and I feel that my Tweaks have already made melee pretty well balanced. With both my Whack and Gunshot scripts, you will only drop your weapon when your fatigue is reduced to less than 0. And your fatigue is not reduced with fatigue when your opponent is much weaker than you (which I'm planning to make more restrictive in v.4.7).


I'm also leaning toward using encumbrance, rather than armor weight to reduce jump height. LUCK is now definately a much more important stat, and having a low LUCK is going to mean you'll find much less loot. All I'm doing is just tweaking the balance of my LUCK script a bit.


I agree with you, but this is probably best left to the mods that alter injuries. Although I will consider trying to add something like this if I can figure out a simple way to do this, that is also compatible with mods like RI.

Yes, things can sometimes just disappear, which can be a bummer . . . but how realistic is it to be knocked out by an NPC and then not have them take your weapon, if it is better than what they have? That is what I'm attempting to change. So if your weapon does just disappear into the ground, the result is somewhat the same as having an NPC take it from you. I have no idea what might happen with unique weapons, but we'll likely find out soon enough, once v.4.7 is released.

Thanks for the feedback on melee! But I'm probably going to increase the requirements for being able to knock out someone, as melee seems a bit overpowered for the weaker/lower skilled characters. What I'm most interested in are my newest unconscious changes . . . where the NPCs keep attacking you until your health is below 25% (and you are knocked unconscious).



Oh, it can be VERY frustrating to lose a favorite weapon . . . especially when an NPC picks up your dropped weapon and uses it against you (which just blew me away when I was play testing this last night). Personally I feel that most RPGs have been designed to be so non-frustrating for casual gamers that much of the fun of playing a challenging game has been removed from them. Far too many players insist that games be streamlined, so they don't have to work too hard to beat the game in record time. Some frustration is actually a good thing, because it increases the immersion . . . by adding the chance that even frustrating things can sometimes happen to your character, which makes the game a bit less predictable, and it makes better weapons more valuable when you have to worry about losing them (and having to replace them).

Are there any weapons that are actually quest items in the default game?

MQ11AutumnLaserPistol is a quest item that I know of - Not sure why, though. I tried to get rid of it once and couldn't!

There's still some FOSE functions in 1.2 b2 that haven't been documented yet. One of them is IsQuestItem:

int form.IsQuestItem(ref obj = NULL) - returns if form (or obj if present) is a quest item

so from this I would think you use it like this:

if (rWeaponRef.IsQuestItem)    ...don't do things to lose it endif

I see your point. Well, I'm fine with it as long as there isn't a big chance of a physics glitch to occur that unrealistically blasts my weapon across half the capital wasteland!

According to the GECK the only quest item weapons in FO3 that you can walk around with (Didn't check DLC) are the Repellent Stick and Col. Autumn's Laser Pistol. And a rolling pin in the Tranquility Lane level, but there are no explosions there. So I guess it's not really a problem.




Also I was messing with the console a bit and raised my agility to 50... Thanks to ART's agility based jumping this allows me to make super jumps. Nice.

Thanks! Sorry that I missed your post on my forum.

But you should really not use an overhaul like mine that makes the game more difficult, and then make changes to my changes via the console . . . that just messes up my mod's balance (which is the main reason that my mod doesn't have a config menu). Besides, you should give my mod a chance before hacking my settings. Yes, doing so will mean that your character will be less powerful . . . but that is one of the main reasons that I make my Tweaks . . . to balance the game play.

Ok, on to your Carrying Capacity problem [which seems to mostly be caused by your frustration at not being able to easily hack my changes.]

If you are using my Less-Is-More module, it makes many of the changes from my Realism Core module much harsher . . . this includes how much you can carry without being encumbered. From my ReadMe (and from my mod's description): "Greatly reduced carrying capacity, which are now gender-based [for 1 to 10 STR: females: 45 to 135 lbs; males: 50 to 185 lbs]."

This is the formula for carrying capacity: fAVDCarryWeightsBase + (the actor's strength value * fAVDCarryWeightMult) = Carrying Capacity
This is with my changes plugged in: For 6 STR male: 35 + (6*15) = 125 pounds.

So your carrying capacity should be 125 pounds. It if is less than that, you either have a STR penalty being applied, or another mod is messing with it.
If you need to increase your carrying capacity, buy a backpack.
You also have to remember that with my Tweaks, wearing armor actually increases your carrying capacity by 50% of the armor's weight (75% for Power Armor).

Many of my changes will not be apparent when viewing Game Settings in FO3Edit . . . because they are implemented in my scripts.


Well, the SPECIALS have already been Tweaked a bunch (especially if you use my Less-Is-More module) . . . they are ALL now a MUCH greater factor in the way your game plays out. (Which is another reason not to mess with my settings). But I will see if I can co anything to allow partial healing from doctors (although I'm guessing that this may be impossible for me to fix).

It looks like I'm only going to have your character drop their equipped weapon. I tried also dropping ammo (which comes out as a box of ammo), but since the NPCs don't use ammo, this turned out to be totally unnecessary (and way too frustrating, since you never get any amount of ammo off an NPC). I may also add dropped equipped helmets to my Blast script (haven't attempted this yet). If I do anything with caps . . . you won't drop them . . . they will be removed. And only a percentage of them would be removed . . . to simulate being robbed by your attacker.


I have installed your latest update, but only replaced the two files that you suggested. I would like to try your new install, but I'm not sure that I can make it work for my set up.

THANKS!!!!

I've added this to my blast script. I still need to test it to make sure that it works. Once I make sure that it is working, I'll add it to all three of my weapon effect scrips.

Thanks for the reply about the weight problem..

Didn't realise that less is more changed the bases etc. compared to your main realism tweaks file...
Think,having played,with it as is..for past couple of days..it works out fine really...........when one considers that fit,trained soldiers tend to carry around 60-80lbs of gear and a weapon.So..yep..seems more realistic.

With regard to the hacking via console......well..liked the changes of your less is more in the main..i.e the luck based loot chance..gender changes etc.(Though not quite sure women can jump higher or further than men...but that's just a minor glitch.)..
Maybe it would be possible for you to have the choice of normal FO3 stats at start..i.e. 40pts..or your revised 35?Maybe have something much the same for the sp allocation at level up to..i.e 7 or 10...or failing that..bring back some minor intelligence bonus..though..that's not really that essential.
I still rest my case that although some may want to play an average person..well..those coming from the vault are supposed to be genetically superior to the mainstream..and thus..should perhaps have the benefit/choice of choosing from the base line stat pool.

My carrying capacity changes are designed to work with backpacks . . . specifically with Blackwolf's Backpacks, that come bundled with Primary Needs (you have to purchase them from a merchant). You do not need to used a backpack with my Tweaks, but using Blackwolf's will not unbalance my mod, because even with a backpack, your capacity is still well below default.

I didn't just reduce the number of SPECIAL points available to make the game more difficult . . . that was done for balance, as I needed a way to allow for the additional 7 SPECIAL Bobblehead points . . . with I personally wanted to keep in the game, but the default number of initial SPECIAL points, combined with the 7 SPECIAL Bobbleheads, made the player way too powerful, way too soon.

Where did you get the idea that the people living in the Vaults were supposed to be physically and mentally superior? I haven't seen any lore that supports that. Besides, one of the best things about traditional RPGs is how you start out as just a normal person, but you gain skills and abilities as you play the game. Unfortunately most of the newer RPGs are FPS/RPG hybrids, where the player character starts out as a superior character . . . since this makes the game more "fun" to play (if you equate "fun" with less challenging . . . which I don't). So I'm not going to add the superior PC option, as the idea is totally contrary to my reasons behind making my Realism Tweaks.