Mods: your experiences

[PZ]

Use this thread to post your experiences (good and bad) so that others may benefit from your knowledge.

Mods can be extremely fun, or quite exasperating depending on your experience.  There are several categories of mods:

   
• Mods that change parameters - these are usually the safest to use, easiest to remove, and are easy to identify - they are typically only a few k in file size, and typically contain only a single .esp file.  Simply drop the .esp into your Fallout folder and activate it.
• Mods that contain textures and meshes - these always have an .esm or .esp (or both) and also a Data folder.  Sometimes these will over-write game files and at other times not.  Read the uninstall instructions carefully - they will allow you to relatively easily back out of a mod that you might not be happy with.
• Mods that over-write original game files - these are ones difficult to recover from if you've not made backups.  If it is a simple texture replacer (like the one that removes scan lines from your Pipboy) then it might be worth trying.
• Utilities - FOMM (Fallout Mod Manager) is an essential tool if you want to precisely (and safely) use complex mods.  Although it has not been developed for FNV yet, I imagine that it will come out soon, and might be called something like FNVMM.  FNVEdit is already out is alpha form, and allows you to seamlessly integrate mods that were not designed to w@&k with one another.  In fact, you can choose the best features out of two different mods that modify the same parts of the game.

[PZ]

I just tried the d3d9.dll mod to see how performance would be changed and I was able to switch to ultra high setting with a performance better than what comes with Vista set at high.  What a difference this small change has made.

PS: I sent the file through Art's online virus scanner and it came up clean.

[PZ]

I've installed all the mods in which I've entered a green comment in the mods thread with no ill effects so far.  :-X

[PZ]

The Colt assault rifle mod is outstanding.  I've used it for a couple of hours now, and have found it to be an excellent all-around weapon.  It looks great on the screen, and the scope works as well as any other weapon.  Because it works in single shot, or automatic mode, it is a devastating weapon.  If you like assault weapons and sniper rifles, I don't think you'll be disappointed with this weapon.

[PZ]

CONELRAD 640-1240 - Civil Defense Radio

This is a great mod if you like vintage music and radio advertisements.  It adds another layer of immersion into the game - I recall something similar in FO3 - a set of authentic advertisements that takes old timers back to the good 'ol days.  :-X



edit: to avoid confusion with the actual mod topic, I changed the yellow colour and bold to normal. I had already split and was about  to move the following post into this (lol) topic when I realised what caused the confusion, both the yellow colour and the fact that this isn't a description of an "experience" with that mod. :) /Art

[Ricamundo]

I installed the "VATS Disabled "mod hoping that the irritating almost constant "Press V to Enter VATS" message that is on my top left corner of the screen would finally be gone, but its still there. ::) I installed it in my main NV folder. Is that where it goes? There's no instructions. I guess they just expect you to know. :-\

Ok, i had to put it in the data folder, duh! But even tho VATS no loonger works, im still getting tose stupid on screen messages telling me to "Press V to ennter VATS". Argh.

On pther minor peeve...where is all the ammo? I have hundreds of rounds of 5.56 ammo, but no gun that uses it. No sign of assault or chines assault rifles, at least yet. The AK47 addon that i downloaded gave me 15-20 copies of the gun but a measly 150 rounds of ammo, and it uses 5mm, which i havent seen anywhere yet.

now im running a bit low on 9mm and 10mm ammo as single shot guns just arent anough out in the desert with multiple packs of coyotes, radscorpions, and other critters.

Oddly, even after i wiped out the Legion podst in that town whatever its called, im stealing if i clear out their stuff from lockers etc. weird.

[PZ]

Interesting VATS problem Ric, I never see that message, and I even use VATS on occasion.

There is an ammo mod that is available, I'll see if I can remember the details and post.

EDIT: You might check the latest mods I posted information about - a couple of them sound like they might do the truck regarding ammo.

[PZ]

The Adventurers New Vegas mod that changes the game parameters is very good.  Now a weapon can actually take down a target without having to expend 100 bullets to do so.  However, you too have less resistance to being struck and damaged.

[Art Blade]

(Show me what you have)

Lets you access the inventory of everybody.
If you can talk to them it will show an option to access their inventory. You can take what you want from them and they wont care.

I don't know if it will break your game if you take a quest item.

^+-+ ^+-+ ^+-+ ^+-+ :-X

Now that is ridiculous and funny as hell.. anyone tested this yet?  ^+-+

[PZ]

I did - it was funny - after talking with some punk, I looked into his inventory - all he had was 21 caps and his dirty outfit - I took both leaving him standing there in his underwear.

^+-+

[Art Blade]

Are you talking about real life or that mod?


^+-+

[fragger]

 ^+-+

Let's hope it's the mod - although a dirty punk outfit would ensure that you'd always have plenty of elbow room at the movies ;D

[Ricamundo]

I installed the Weapon House, which is up on a hill near Nipton. I assumed this was a trader/gunsmith type deal, but its actually unoccupied. Just walk in and every weapon available in the game is in there waiting to be taken for free, no caps required. There's also several boxes with 1000's of rounds of every kind of ammo, for which i was grateful. Nothing like having a gun and no ammo to use it! :-[

The only minor glitch is that when inside the framerate is poor, and i get a rather nasty case of frame judder. >:((

I have the No VATS mod installed, but i still get constant messages in the top left of my screen saying "Press V to use VATS" argh. When displayed it blocks other messages, like the one that tells you that you dont have enough experience points to unlock this safe, or whatever. I didnt have this issue in FO3. ::)

[PZ]

You're a funny guy, Art!  ^+-+

You might try looking at both of the game menus, Ric - the one before the game starts, and the in-game menu.  There must be some kind of setting that will disable that prompt - however, I can't remember ever seeing the VATS thing you're experiencing.  I'll check more closely to see if I can get my game to pop up the VATS message

[Ricamundo]

You're a funny guy, Art!  ^+-+

You might try looking at both of the game menus, Ric - the one before the game starts, and the in-game menu.  There must be some kind of setting that will disable that prompt - however, I can't remember ever seeing the VATS thing you're experiencing.  I'll check more closely to see if I can get my game to pop up the VATS message

I wonder if its because of XP. perhaps they didnt beta test using XP as much as with Vista/7. :-\\

Has anyone else noted the changing atmosphere in the game? I mean literally. Some areas all the colours are dull and lifless, almost blanched out into a sort of reddish hue. then inside a building or if i fast travel to another area, it returns to normal.

Ive just installed the clean up mod. the one that supposedly cleans up the trash so fps should improve, although i havent been in Vegas much so i dont know what effect, if any it has, as yet.

[PZ]

I hadn't thought about the XP angle, but if the VATS prompt is specific to that OS, then it must be some kind of bug.

I've not noticed any strange color changes, but I already have quite a few mods installed that change the environment.  I just saw another DirectX mod specific to the nVidia cards, so I'm going to try that one as well as an early release of FVMM (a mod manager)

[PZ]

I'm using the latest release of FOMM, which includes support for FNV.  When you start the mod manager, you are prompted with a question asking which game you want to mod - FO3, or FNV - cool, you can use the same manager on both.

FOMM now installs like any other application, into your All Programs area.  So far, it has worked flawlessly; I experimented with adding a few mods, then deactivating them, and FOMM removed all traces of their installation.  The good part is that it is really easy now to trace problem mods by deactivating them to remove their affect on the game.  Sure, you can uncheck the mod, but I recall reading somewhere that .esm files are loaded even if they are not checked, which appears to be correct because I can uncheck the vanilla Fallout New Vegas master and the game still runs.  This fact explains why I had some mod problems months ago in FO3 that would not go away - now I know why.

[Art Blade]

interesting.. good to know, cheers  :-X

[PZ]

 ;)

One thing that works really well is the ability to change the meshes and textures, yet be able to get right back to vanilla at the click of a button.  For instance, there is a money replacer that normally would have written over the vanilla files, but because everything in FNV is in the .BSA files, you can replace to your heart's content secure in the knowledge that it is now impossible to do any damage to the vanilla files.  FNV is the modder's paradise when used with FOMM (which now does archiveinvalidated from within the application - no more modifying the .ini files)

[Ricamundo]

After yet another CTD, i installed FOMM, but when i tried starting NV from there, it didnt w@&k. ::) it says Steam load error, then a bunch of numbers, so there's a conflict with Steam, i guess. :-(

[Art Blade]

 :-\\

[PZ]

After yet another CTD, i installed FOMM, but when i tried starting NV from there, it didnt w@&k. ::) it says Steam load error, then a bunch of numbers, so there's a conflict with Steam, i guess. :-(

Sorry to hear that, Ric.  I've noticed on the Steam boards that people are having different experiences, all the way from no problems at all, to completely un-playable (the game won't even start).  The only common thread seems to be power of the PC and/or graphics unit.  High power units don't seem to have nearly the problems as the ones that meet minimum specifications.

As to FOMM, it is simply passing the parameters to Steam, so there should not be a conflict.  A couple of things I'd check - be sure that your Steam client us updated to the latest version, and that FOMM is the latest - I'm using 10.13, and it works great.

As to starting the game, I've done two ways (each with FOMM).  You should be able to start it without the Steam client first being loaded - FOMM will start Steam, then log you in, then start the game, and then close itself so that only the game is running.

The second way is with Steam already started.  In that case, FOMM immediately loads the FNV start screen and the game begins.

You might try both ways to see if that changes the error you are receiving.

[Ricamundo]

Ok, today, i went online with Steam( I normally start in offline mode) and Steam updated NV to v1.2.285 or something like that. Afterwards, with Steam still running, i tried the FOMM and NV started right to the load screen as usual. I'll have to try starting NV without Steam running and see how that goes. I hope the slightly altered mod load order makes NV a little more stable. :-X

[PZ]

Ok, today, i went online with Steam( I normally start in offline mode) and Steam updated NV to v1.2.285 or something like that. Afterwards, with Steam still running, i tried the FOMM and NV started right to the load screen as usual. I'll have to try starting NV without Steam running and see how that goes. I hope the slightly altered mod load order makes NV a little more stable. :-X

Keep fingers crossed  :-X

The game should start with or without Steam first being opened.  One thing to keep in mind with CTD is that the game will load any .esm files you have in the data folder regardless of whether or not it is checked, so if you are trying to track down a problem mod, don't forget to physically delete any suspicious .esm file.

Also equally important, click each .esp file in FOMM, and it will tell you if it has a master (.esm) that it relies on - if the master is missing or if it is lower in the mod order than the .esp file, you are guaranteed to have a CTD.

PS: FOMM is now at version 13.19

[Ricamundo]

Just an update to keep the FO threads sort of active. :-D A couple of weeks ago, i discovered that i could play FONV without the DVD in the tray, so just like FC2, i can fire it up straight away now. 8) A side benefit in my case is that for whatever reason, NV has been running crash free for pretty much the same length of time. My crashes were 2 fold, the standard CTD, and the more problematic PC reboot, which was always immediately after i heard the DVD Rom starting to spin up during the game.

Now that the DVD tray is empty, NV has been great, even after adding a couple of new mods, its been really well behaved. Im impressed. ;D

Speaking of new mods, i want to recommend 1 in particular, which has been great fun. Its called "A World Of Pain" or AWOP for short. The modder has added something like 35 new locations to the world, mostly of the underground bunker, subway, fortress, or sewer variety. I hear there's even a dungeon somewhere. Its not finished yet, according to the modder, he wants to add even more locations and also quests, but right now, as a shoot and loot mod, its really fun. :-X Plenty o baddies, and some special weapons and loot.

As ive entered some of these underground locations, ive stumbled upon a firefight in progress between several different factions, including FO3 mutes and others. You can join in on the action, or loot the place, then loot the dead bodies later, its up to you.