Looking To Mod Hard Difficulty, Where To Start?

[Aeradom]

I put up this idea on the mod ideas but it got no response so I thought I'd finally dive in and do it myself. As the title implies, I'm looking to mod Hard Mode to mimmick the way Survival Mode was as I hate the fact they included the Hardcore stuff with the difficulty increase. I would like to make the enemies more dangerous (boosting their damage) and perhaps down the road adjust the stims and such to how they worked in Survival mode, but right now, just would like NPC's to be a threat. Only problem is, I don't know where to start. The modding tutorial that's stickied at the top didn't help with my specific question however, and that is where the setting for hard is. I looked at the "Create Your Own Difficulty" mod, to get at least an idea where the Survival difficulty was but couldn't back track it that way (possibly due to my inexperience I grant you). I was wondering if there was a resource out there that I missed where I could use to look up where particular things are, or at least what it's labeled.

 

So yeah, any help would be appreciated.

Edited April 21, 2016 by Aeradom

[PoliteRaider]

The Hardcore mode features in Survival are run from a script, Hardcore:HC_ManagerScript.pex which is triggered through the Quest 80E or Hardcore Manager.

 

Manipulating these features will require learning Papyrus Scripting. This Tutorial and the Creation Kit Wiki Page which are both for Skyrim are a good starting point. Fallout 4 has some differences but there's more material for Skyrim and you just want to start with the basics.

 

You can duplicate some of them, very roughly, through FO4Edit but you won't be able to get the full features without some level of scripting.

[Aeradom]

The Hardcore mode features in Survival are run from a script, Hardcore:HC_ManagerScript.pex which is triggered through the Quest 80E or Hardcore Manager.

 

Manipulating these features will require learning Papyrus Scripting. This Tutorial and the Creation Kit Wiki Page which are both for Skyrim are a good starting point. Fallout 4 has some differences but there's more material for Skyrim and you just want to start with the basics.

 

You can duplicate some of them, very roughly, through FO4Edit but you won't be able to get the full features without some level of scripting.

 

Ah okay, that makes sense then. I'll have a look it in a bit, I suppose the Very Hard difficulty would be adjusted the same. I think that's what I'm more focused on, that and figuring out a way to allow saves in this survival mode.

[PoliteRaider]

 

Ah okay, that makes sense then. I'll have a look it in a bit, I suppose the Very Hard difficulty would be adjusted the same. I think that's what I'm more focused on, that and figuring out a way to allow saves in this survival mode.

 

It should (in theory) be very easy to do actually. Although these things usually turn out to be more complicated then you expect once you start working on it. I've got the rough shape of how to do it in my head, but let me just open up the script and find the right names for variables and things so I can point you in the right direction.

 

Saves are actually blocked by the Main Menu interface. I'm sorry I don't know the exact method used personally (haven't looked into it much myself) but it's something to do with the .swf in the interfaces folder. There's a mod out there already that fixes this, you could maybe check with the author of that one.

[PoliteRaider]

You want to edit this function in the HC Manager script.

Function ::remote_Actor_OnDifficultyChanged(Actor aSender, int aOldDifficulty, int aNewDifficulty)
	If (aOldDifficulty != 6 && aNewDifficulty == 6)
		Self.StartupHardcore()
	ElseIf (aOldDifficulty == 6 && aNewDifficulty != 6)
		Self.ShutdownHardcore()
	EndIf
EndFunction

This determines which difficulty levels have hardcore mode active. Change the logic structure of that if and you should be able to put the features into any difficulty setting.

 

Sorry, I'm not sure how this will affect the game saving or the console command window. It may also have other elements that I haven't noticed or considered involved. However hopefully this is a good starting point for you to begin working on your mod and any problems should come up in testing.

 

Good luck.