Fallout 4 Mods & Angel's Pip-Boy Diary #20 · 10:30am Jan 24th, 2016
art by LateCustomer
As there has been some interest, here is the current collection of mods that I am using while enjoying Fallout 4. As you can see, most of my modding has been focused on settlement building, which I feel is both the most amazing new feature that Fallout 4 incorporates into Fallout gameplay and where the most improvement can be achieved.
General Improvement Mods:
Full Dialogue Interface by Cirosan
The first mod I chose, this changes your dialogue options from the generic descriptors of what you will way that the game currently gives you to what you will actually say. Great for roleplaying and immersion.Shaikujin's Better warning for settlements being attacked by shaikujin
Sick of missing those tiny, quickly-disappearing notices that your settlements are under attack? So was I. And clearly, so was Shaikujin, who did something about it. Now, those messages come in the form of proper, click-to-close alerts.Valdacil's Item Sorting by (you guessed it) valdacil
Valdacil adds tags to the beginning of a lot of items so that they sort better in your inventory. For example, holotapes will have "[Holotape]" in front of their name, causing all holotapes to be sorted together in your MISC inventory section. Having all your grenades or syringer ammo, or miscellaneous quest items sorted together is extremely helpful. I currently use an older version of this and may upgrade to the latest update soon.Settlement Building Improvement Mods:
Homemaker - Expanded Settlements by NovaCoru
This is one of the top mods available for expanding your settlement building, adding a glorious number of new items and options (without giving you so many that you can never find anything). The mod is constantly being updated and improved.Robot Home Defence by TheTalkieToaster
Now, with the appropriate ranks in the Robotics Expert perk, Angel can build a variety of robots to improve life at her settlements and aid in their defense.
Craftable Glass Stuffs by DDProductions83
This mod adds some options for transparent glass floors, walls and ceilings.Standalone Atom Bomb Pinups Paintings by Zoran
Tired of the same kittens and lighthouses in all your settlement's painting? This mod adds in a bunch of new painting and poster options. One set is comprised of lore-friendly pin-up paintings by the famous 40's-50's artist Gil Elvgren. The second set is black & white images from the movies "Metropolis" and "Forbidden Planet". (Currently, I just use the first set. But I might be editing the second set with lore-unfriendly pictures such as wastleland ponies.)
Convenient Stores by Amstrad
This mod adds in the ability to establish stores in your settlements without having to build the large trade stands (which can be difficult to place indoors and are thematically unnecessary in places such as Covenant or Starlight where trade areas are already present). Now, for the same resource costs, you can just place a cash register on a counter or table to create a store.Higher Settlement Budget by GrimTech
This mod gives you the bat files to remove the artificial limit on how many items you can build in your settlements.Brighter Settlement Lights by Elvani
This does exactly what the name suggests.
Simple Intersection by Draco856
This simple mod makes building settlements a lot easier by allowing you to place objects (like junk walls) just slightly into other objects.Personal Preference Mods:
Settler Renaming - Rename Settlers and NPCs by drdanzel
The recent Fallout 4 beta update did a lot to fix the problem of how hard it was to tell which settlers were assigned to what. However, I still like using Settler Renaming, which allows me to change the names of generic settlers to job-specific names like "farmer", "guard" and "artilleryman". Not only does this let me tell who is assigned to what without going into workshop mode, but it makes the settlement populations feel more interesting.Caliente's Beautiful Bodies Enhancer -CBBE- by Caliente
This is my choice of obligatorynude mod. I use it with the associated BodySlide and Outfit Studio by Ousnius.
Black and White Pipboy by mm137
This is just a little re-texture that I chose for personal preference.Finally, the mod below is still in my load order, but not for much longer. It was good at first, but has been surpassed. I'm phasing it out, but that requires finding everything I built using its models, scrapping them, and rebuilding with Homemaker.
Settlement Supplies Expanded 2.5 - Safe SSEx by TroyIrving
(I figure I'll be completely done with SSEx by the end of next week.)
Below the break you will find the next installment of Angel's Pip-Boy Diary. I hope you enjoy. 
(And, as always, if interest in these diaries starts to wane, please let me know. I don't want them to outstay their welcome.)
Angel's Pip-Boy Diary
Day 39
Day 39 – Afternoon
December 1, 2287Winter is here.
It certainly doesn’t feel like it. We still haven’t had that Boston cold that we had in my Commonwealth. I am beginning to fear what summer will be like.
I am using the same recording on all of the settlement beacons. We have a smaller music selection than Travis… and that’s saying something. Maybe the Minutemen can help improve our broadcasts?
I set out at dawn, headed to Sanctuary. I had barely reached the dam when I ran into triggermen. Mr. Marowski knows I’m involved in the missing chems (I shouldn’t have trusted that ghoul.) and has sent his boys to deliver a message: he wants a talk with me at his hotel in Goodneighbor, the Hotel Rexford. Because with everything else going on, I need that mess coming back to haunt me. When it rains…
A wandering deathclaw attacks the Abernathy Farm. I arrived at the farm just in time to intervene. We dodged a real massacre. I’m glad I was still in my power armor.
By the time I returned to homestead, my new, fancy power armor was just about toast. I spent through lunch repairing it. I also swapped out my leathers for some pieces of combat armor, modifying them with muffling, shadowing and the best pockets I could craft. And finally, I rebuilt that pipe pistol into the .45 revolver sniper rifle that I knew it could be. I’ve named it “Sweetness”.
Then I took a nap. This has been an exhausting few days.
New Perk: Sneak Rank 4
Day 39 – Late Afternoon
December 1, 2287The first assignment to check off my Brotherhood panic list was retrieving a piece of rare technology from Bedford Station for Scribe Hayden. After the easy of Sunshine Tidings Co-op, I expected the job to be a breeze. Apparently, the Commonwealth decided it was time to remind Angel that ghouls are scary as hell.
I shot the head off of one of them and it still came at me. A headless ghoul!
Fortunately, I quickly learned that ghouls can’t climb trees.
Thankfully, they can’t climb quarry rocks either. Once I was able to get into a safe position, Bedford Station became a lot less harrowing. My heart is still thudding between my breasts. Lesson for the day: don’t get complacent or cocky.
My reward was the tech that Scribe Hayden wanted and some unfortunate soul’s homemade rifle. The rifle is a terrifying piece of work. It looks like it was built from scrap to shoot railroad spikes. If it really works like it should, I’m surprised the person who made it didn’t survive. I wish I had this thing back at the Abernathy Farm this morning. On second thought, considering the previous owner’s state of health, I should probably resist the urge to experiment with it until I can get it back to my workshop and tear the thing apart.
Day 39 – Early Evening
December 1, 2287Shortly after Bedford Station, I ran across Preston Garvey. Not the real Preston Garvey, my friend who I enjoyed a late lunch with this afternoon. A Preston Garvey impersonator.
I seriously needed that. After everything, that little big of levity couldn’t have been better timed.
I’m actually feeling surprisingly good right now. I’m rested, and the heart-pounding terror of Bedford Station has given way to a good mood. I still feel that edge of panic, and I’m going to be taking care of my Brotherhood duties as swiftly as possible… but I feel better than I have for a while.
Maybe it is because Kellogg is dead and I have finally been able to put Nate’s murder to rest. Maybe it is just the good meal and pleasant company I am now enjoying. Maybe it is because Bedford Station reminded me how much good the Brotherhood of Steel can do for the Commonwealth, so maybe it is a good thing they are here in force now. This could be when everything turns around for the better.
My dinner company is a man names Lucas. He sells armor for “Old Man Stockton’s” outfit in Bunker Hill. (The same place that runaway synth Jules was headed, I couldn’t help but note.) Lucas is a pragmatic, down-to-earth merchant with decent wares and good prices. His “Mantis Left Greave” is want.
Sadly, I cannot afford it. Hopefully, he will still have it in stock when I can.
For now, I have a long trek ahead of me. It is time to find out what happened to the lost Brotherhood of Steel squad. The last known location is quite a long distance from here, with a lot of unknown territory between us.
Angel: lawyer, civil general, military soldier… explorer. Post-apocalyptic Commonwealth, here I come.
Day 39 – Evening
December 1, 2287Clearly, the Commonwealth has decided I haven’t learned my lesson hard enough yet.
Legendary festering bloatfly!
I want to go home to 2077 now please.
Day 39 – Night
December 1, 2287
I’ve stumbled upon a crash site just past an elevated highway. However, this doesn’t look like what fell from the sky several days ago. This is the wreckage of an airliner. From the crash path, I wonder if it collided with the highway as it fell out of the sky.
As I approached, I could hear the battle cries of ogres, and the sounds of a firefight. One with energy weapons, which are not something I associate with the big green brutes. My immediate expectation was that the ogres were attacking Minutemen, and I rushed to help.
My help may not have been needed. These supermutants weren’t facing Minutemen. They were engaged with a squad of the Brotherhood of Steel. And the Brotherhood was mopping the floor with them. I am impressed. In just over twenty-four hours, the Brotherhood has deployed troops to far corners of the Commonwealth and are actively wiping out threats.
After the battle, I swept back through the crash site, scavenging from the plethora of scattered luggage. (I also found an Awesome Tales comic: “Attack of the Fishmen”. It was an issue with one with one of those covers Nate and I really liked. I remember Nate buying that issue. We had fun that night.)
My sweep brought me back to the elevated highway. I decided to top off the day by investigating a light up on part of the highway.
The light was a spotlight, part of a Gunner outpost. The outpost was small and severely undermanned. They had taken to using mannequins to create an illusion of greater numbers. It was almost like the Commonwealth decided to give me an easy fight… just so long as I played it cautious and took nothing for granted.
This is a great location. Remote, secure, easily defended. I’m tempted to sleep here tonight. Practically, I should backtrack to Tenpines Bluff; it isn’t far and the need for sleep isn’t pressing. I slept a few hours this afternoon, and I’m pumped on enough adrenaline that I doubt I could again before morning.
On the other hand, maybe the soldiers securing the crash site could make use of this place. Either way, I want to talk with my fellow Brotherhood and try to get a better grasp of what is going on. Given this opportunity, it makes no sense to wait and risk them moving on.
art by RubleGun
Personally, I have no feeling of waning interest. These log entries are a bright spot in my day every time you post one.
By all means, as long as you're still having fun making them, never stop.
I knew I was gonna regret not just getting Fallout for my computer. I ended up getting it for my Ps4, and the lack of mods is causing dental wear as I grind my teeth in frustration. I feel like I'm gonna be shelling out another 60$ soon...
3709021 I have no idea. I have just been scrapping things manually. I should look into that.
hey Kkat. Have you back-tracked to previously-explored locations that weren't major settlements or cities yet? cause if you do and find that that wall-safe upstairs, along with that fridge with a bottle of Nuka Cola Quantum, a pair of welding goggles and a red bandana, a couple of Bobby Pins, a chem cooler with Nuka Cola regular, a 10MM Pistol with ammo -first house on the right into Concord from the Red Rocket-, and you'll find to your abject HORROR that all of those items have re-spawned inside of them. And it's not just in that Concord house: but EVERYWHERE: that crashed airliner you just visited: return after a few in-game days of looting the place, and you will find that all of the suitcases are filled back up, the service tray cart will have Fancy Lads Snack Cakes, the Cargo Holds "Chem case" will be brimming again: (even ammo and weapons will be there still: at higher levels you'll even have better weapons than you normally found: in one rundown of the area I got a shotgun next to the box, on another run it was a combat rifle, later I got a Plasma Caster with the ammo for it!) This is one kickass glitch in the game, now I can get whatever necessary items I need for crafting or killing.
That one Aisan Hotel Investor Guy from the Click Movie restaraunt scene: "FUCK YEAH!"
In the movie version, Angel will be played by Felicia Day.
38.media.tumblr.com/a755bacc79d6c7a4751a3beeaa6f4db5/tumblr_n37a0jp07S1qbvwm8o2_250.gif
I don't usually comment on them but I still enjoy reading these journals.
Thanks for the diary entries - I'm still fascinated by your playthrough, which is very different to mine - I'm far less complimentary towards the brotherhood than Angel is. Keep it up.
These diary entries are great fun.
I use a lot of the mods you do except for the expanded build list. I had a ummm "burp" with my computer and found out that if you reload your OS and don't have your mods in the right order afterwards well your saves are kinda messed up.
Bedford Station.. that place was scary the first time I visited it. Just wait till you get high enough level to see Legendary Charred Ghouls. Those suckers take missiles to take down.
3708985
Bethesda is releasing a thing called BethesdaNet in a few months that will let console players download mods
Link to an article about it
I'm really looking forward to a couple of armor mods, but something that makes playing as Minutemen bearable would be great.
Another interesting addition to the story.
Hmm... I wonder if Angel will ever notice these cool Perks she gets from reading books and attaining certain items?
Well after Kellogg I'm sure Angel is finding Deathclaws not as bad as they use to be for her. That guy is a beast.
<See's first pic>
Ponies are into some freaky stuff.
What...
Perv
I kid of course
Sweet buttery Jesus on kosher bread Kkat! What sort of computer rig are you running? You must be pushing out of Skynet territory in Matrix Master System with all these bells and whistles! How do you not burn out your system?
3708985
I think they're coming with a means to get pc mods on console
Fading interest? No. Mostly, it makes me feel if I should get back in and finish all the various diddle-daddle, or just not worry about spoilers. There's a million little stories in the game, after all.
If you want, I can recommend a couple of mods: Better Weapon Mod Descriptions and Better Armor Mod Descriptions. They replace vague "Better X, poor Y" descriptions with actual stats, including some hidden info like AP cost.
I'm loving every one of these myself. Please, by all means, continue!
For one thing, to me you're doing a fantastic job of rendering a "game" as a "story", while keeping the required elements and influences found in each, but not overloading either one.
Really takes me back to when I found Fallout: Equestria. ...about a week and a half after you posted the final chapter. Plus side - no agonizing wait for the next chapter of awesome. Down side - ... none!
3708985 Mods are coming for ps4 too in a few months and unless you're very confident in the specs of your computer I wouldn't recommend getting the PC version.
3711380 Well, I've got this, between the better and best configuration, so I'm pretty sure my rig can handle it.
Good to know mods'll be coming to console, though! Hopefully they're pretty stable.
3711680
Unfortunately, in past games most of the best mods required the Script Extender, which won't be available on consoles.
When the GECK comes out, we'll see if Bethesda were smart enough to implement the most important *SE enhancements that modders use all the time in the actual scripting language. If they did not, then consoles can only get the simple, "vanilla" mods – a lot of great stuff can be done with those, but nothing really exciting or groundbreaking.
3711680 That's reassuring, I had a friend who got it through steam only to find out her computer couldn't handle it. I'm really looking forward to console mods and since they promised mods ported to consoles I'm pretty sure they've at least tested for compatibility beforehand so I'm not too worried.
I'm curious; how did you get Homemaker to work? I've been using Nexus, and my game crashes ever time I try to load up Homemaker.
3882868 The crash may be due to a conflict with other mods you have. I am running the version of Homemaker that does not use SK, as I have found a lot of problems can be traced back to Settlement Keywords.
3883717
Yup, Keywords was the problem. Got it working now. Thanks!