Advice on mods/combat diffifulty

[jdk099]

 

Hi everyone, I’m looking to get back into Starfield after a break of close to a year.  I play on PC, and while I enjoyed the game at release, as I got to 200 hours of gameplay, I realized I kept waiting for it to get “better” with official updates.  Most of the early updates were bug fixes and didn’t get at what I felt was really lacking in the game.  Specifically:

- The game just didn’t look as pretty as I’d hoped it would.  My setup is strong, with a 3080ti, high end monitor etc etc, so I was disappointed that to me at least Witcher 3 with the updated textures looked prettier than Starfield. 

- I was getting bored of the repetitive dungeons, and lack of challenge

- I was frustrated by the shipbuilder (ladder and door placement, lack of stairs were my main complaints)

- I was skipping locked containers because picking them took too much of my time

 

So I decided to put it aside, play some other stuff and wait.  Now, I’m feeling the itch to get back into it.  I’ve been scouring nexus for mods.  I did a little modding in Morrowind and Oblivion (on the old nexus site, sadly I couldn’t find my old mods!), had a busier life and didn’t ever mod in Skyrim, so I’m very out of date with modding in general.  I downloaded vortex and it sure is easier to use than the old managers I remember.

 

I found some really good looking mods that address my main complaints, and a few things I didn’t even know I wanted until I saw the mod (list below). 

 

However, I’m struggling to decide on what mods to use to increase the difficulty.  I looked at PEAK and “improved combat ai” which sound cool, but I see people complain about enemies behaving oddly, or getting crammed into one small space for no reason etc etc, stuff that sounds kind of immersion breaking.  I also read through the mods in the “royal collection” like early game weapons empowered, doubled enemies, the “royal” difficulty mods like levelled NPCs, aliens, terror and starborn, but I am not sure which/how many of these are ideal.  I’m not looking for an “ultimate difficulty” type thing – I want some challenge/possibility of dying if I make mistakes, don’t prepare etc, but I don’t want to regularly have to try an area multiple times.  Obviously this is subjective/based on skill, but I’m hoping to get some advice on which mods work well (both in doing what they say and NOT causing crashes/other errors), avoid immersion breaking situations as much as possible and make the game a bit more challenging?  Any help appreciated!

 

Any other input on these mods would also be appreciated.  It’s been close to 15 years since I was modding a game so I am relearning how to do it.

 

Mods I plan to use (not in load order):

Visuals: Luma, ELFX, All the Rabbit mods for outdoors spaces, Starfield HD overhaul, EXE  -effect textures enhanced, Starfield billboards and posters, UC military overhaul

-          Question: does Starfield HD overhaul cover all the textures/effects in EXE?  I read somewhere that the newest HD overhaul made EXE unnecessary, but I swear I saw a difference in how a grenade explosion looked even with HD overhaul loaded AFTER EXE.  I could just be wrong though, my testing was brief.

Gameplay/world: Royal weathers, Gravity is real, Improved follower behavior, Auto unlock SFSE, ship command redux lite, Rosie Tannehill: A real doctor, medpack weight fix

Combat/dungeon: POI variations – no more duplicates, player level scaling, simple offense suppression.

Misc: Starfield community patch, Star UI, smarter spacesuit autohide

Ship building: Place doors yourself, Stroud premium edition (for the stairs), ship builder configurator.

 

 

[Keelo6969]

Those are all prerty good mods.  I use many of them.  In my opinion, Royal Galaxy is a great starting point as a base for serting a basic modding of the game.  The changes and subtle and not immersive breakimg. It also has a few optional mods that tweak certain features. You can adjust setting in the gamepIay options to higher. I have mine set on normal and its pretty balanced enemy wise. I use Royal and EXE textures, with EXE after Royal and find the visuals great.  I also use 'Better Explosions'. Concept Art Akila is also grsat visuals for Akila, as it changes the landscape and looks amazing. Also, I'd definitley download 'Starfield Engine Fixes -SFSE'  as it has many setting that improve game performance, some visuals, and fixes for stuttering and other nice options. 

And if you are looking for a ship HUD mod, lI hear.....

'Keelo's Sleek Ship HUD ' is a good one to use...LOL (Little bit of promo..)

Cheers!

 

[jdk099]

Thanks for the advice.  I got the engine fix you recommended and will look at the others.

 

I decided to try out the royal combat overhaul, levelled enemies, bedlam and doubled enemies.  Difficulty was on max.  I walked into a crimson fleet base and died within 15 seconds after managing to take down just one guy charging me with a machete.  I disabled doubled enemies (for now) and am adjusting difficulty to find the sweet spot, but it seems to work well and makes combat more fun/challenging.  

 

One odd thing, not game breaking or anything, but after grabbing the starfield engine fix and above mentioned mods, the setting for "Ui paper white" in display settings (a luma setting) is grayed out.  My UI menus and galaxy map look kind of washed out, but not that bad, rest of game looks great and is running smooth.  

 

Thanks again!

 

[Keelo6969]

Glad to hear. Ya Royal with bedlam AND 2X enemies is a little tough.  ..the doubled enemies is not really needed when using the other two. Bedlam is great because they sometimes appear behind you in areas youve already been.  As for the Kuma setting isssue, you'd have to check out the mod page to see. I use a NASA mod and Cine mix from the Starfield HD mod page for my colors.

 

Cheers!

[Khuzait233666]

I'm currently developing a mod to adapt combat mechanics similar to Helldivers into Starfield.

-I've streamlined ammunition types: all weapons now share 6 universal ammo types (excluding throwables).

-Added armor tiers where weapon damage scales against target armor. Specific countermeasures are implemented—e.g., "anti-personnel" weapons deal massive damage to unarmored targets but are ineffective against light armor or higher.

-Imposed realistic weapon ranges: pistols limited to 20m, shotguns to 10m (I find Starfield's distance scaling exaggerated; aiming beyond 50m without scopes is nearly impossible). Notably, this forces closer engagements and enhances tactical positioning.

I have now completed nearly 150 weapon attachments compatible with 30 vanilla weapons. However, I currently only specialize in modifying items and characters. I hope to make my custom characters spawn in special locations or during radiant quests (I can currently edit existing enemies or place them in fixed locations, but my goal is to diversify radiant quests and planetary exploration). I’d greatly appreciate guidance from anyone with relevant expertise. Thank you very much!

[aurreth]

23 hours ago, Khuzait233666 said:

-Imposed realistic weapon ranges: pistols limited to 20m, shotguns to 10m (I find Starfield's distance scaling exaggerated; aiming beyond 50m without scopes is nearly impossible). Notably, this forces closer engagements and enhances tactical positioning.

Maximum Effective Range is the distance at which a weapon has a 50/50 chance of hitting a target.  Note this is not he maximum range, which is much farther.

Pistols typically have a maximum effective range of 50m.  That's the distance to the farthest target on a military qualification range, and yes, soldiers hit it most of the time.

The maximum effective range of an M16A2 is 800m.  With iron sights.  The Army doesn't train to hit targets at that distance, but the Marines do.  The old M1 Garand from WWII/Korea had a max effective range of around 1000m, again with iron sights.

I don't have much background with shotguns, but 10m seems ridiculously short.  I mean it's about 15 meters from my bedroom to my front door, straight down the hallway, and I'm pretty sure my 12 gauge would stop someone breaking in.  I mean it depends on what you load it with, but a slug would definitely punch a hole in the door at that distance.

Edited July 23 by aurreth

[Khuzait233666]

I'm confident that the effective ranges of real firearms are reliable, but it appears that Starfield scales 1 meter differently. Currently, I'm standing 10 meters from a door, but in-game this distance only displays as 3 meters. Perhaps we should multiply in-game distances by three to get real-world equivalents?

[aurreth]

19 hours ago, Khuzait233666 said:

I'm confident that the effective ranges of real firearms are reliable, but it appears that Starfield scales 1 meter differently. Currently, I'm standing 10 meters from a door, but in-game this distance only displays as 3 meters. Perhaps we should multiply in-game distances by three to get real-world equivalents?

Meh, could be.  Wouldn't be the first game that did something like that. 

Anyway, the military trains with iron sights, not scopes.  In game terms scopes increase accuracy, not range.  Range is a function of the weapon, scoped or not.