Here's my story of why I had to seek out mods for Fallout 4: loved Fallout 3. Thought New Vegas' hardcore system was very interesting and fun (having to eat, drink, sleep). I was expecting Fallout 4 to turn it up a notch. Not only did it not do that, it turned it down a notch. Key features were completely missing. I was disappointed right as I exited the Vault because there was no 'Do you want to enable Hardcore Mode?' checkbox.

I started having some fun despite that though. Only to be disappointed to read I don't gain more XP from playing on Survival. Okay, Normal it is then. Started getting into the settlement building stuff, and just as I did, I wasn't allowed to build anymore. After roughly 20+ hours of play, I realized I was still wearing the exact same clothes as I did in hour 3. I went looking for new stuff and there is just barely anything. Come to think of it, why has it never been night? Where is the day-night cycle? What? It is nighttime right now? Why is everything so bright as daytime at night? Just what the...

Disappointment after disappointment arose. Finally, I just quit playing Fallout 4. There is a fantastic game in there somewhere, but they just didn't do the work to make it such. After about 1,5 months, I wanted to get back into it, but knew I would just turn away again. I looked up some mods and found out there is already great stuff out there. Started installing them as they sounded appealing and what do you know? I am having a blast with the game now.

Were you disappointed with Fallout 4 like me? Maybe check out these mods as they did well for me, maybe they do for you too.

Crucial Mods

Simple: these features should have been in the game and they have no reason to not be here (often they were even present in previous installments). This is basic functionality the game should have shipped with.

Primary Needs

Type: Gameplay

This mod enables two parts that were key to Hardcore Difficulty: food and drink. Sleep is not included. How does it go about it? It adds food and drink as addictions in the game. Brilliant! When eating any food item you will now become 'addicted' to food and need to eat once a day to avoid harsh stat penalties and slow health decay. The same works for drink. The modder went as far as to revamp how food and drink provides buffs and bonuses to be more realistic to expectation. For example, eating raw meat will not give you HP, rather it gives you food poisoning. It will, however, still satisfy your 'addiction', thus sometimes a hard choice must be made if you did not prepare enough. It sounds very harsh, but it is not very much so. You just need to keep in mind that you need food and water to survive, as Hardcore Mode should do.

Link to Primary Needs

Darker Nights

Type: Visual

You know when you wander the wasteland, enter a loading area and the tooltip says something about using your PipBoy light? And then you're like: '... why would I ever need to use it'? Yeah, me too. It is insane how bright nights are in Fallout 4. I can see everything just as perfectly as if it's day. Not only does it not make sense, but it takes away atmosphere and gameplay possibilities. Stealth is not a viable option because it isn't dark. Ever. NPC's can spot you from miles away even at night. It also just looks dumb if you ask me. This mod gave me back the atmosphere I wanted and stealth actually became viable. It allows you to set different tones of darkness and how much it affects NPC vision too (for example, if you want a dark night atmospherically but still want NPC's to spot you as easily as daytime, you can do that).

Link to Darker Nights

Higher Settlement Budget

Type: Customization

So, let me get this straight: I'm encouraged by tooltips to build out my settlement because that is better somehow. I get on it and start to enjoy placing defenses and structures and even a personal area for me with a bobblehead stand, lockers for my gear, stimpacks and so on. I want to go slightly further than this though, like build a doghouse for Dogmeat and an area for my settlers. But oh wait, I can't. Because the building limit is ridiculously low. I've searched long and hard what could possibly have the cap be this low and even if you expand and maintain 30 settlements, it seems highly unlikely to cause memory issues moreso than normal. I used this mod which increases building space by 3x and have had no issues whatsoever. Except I'm finally able to build what I want.

Link to Higher Settlement Budget

Difficulty XP Scaling

Type: Leveling

In Fallout 3 and NV, you received more XP for killing enemies on higher difficulties. It was a nice reward based system. You up the difficulty, you increase faster in level. Arguably, those games needed it the least because the level cap was lower. Fallout 4 has much increased leveling possibilities, and the XP you earn on Very Easy is the exact same as on Survival. Ha-ha. That's a good joke. Entirely unbalanced, but a pretty good joke. This mod has various files that all alter the amount of XP you gain on the difficulty you choose. I went for 150% more XP on Survival as a sweet spot. You can also go for 140 or 160%. Alternatively, you can even go for 30% if you really like Bethesda's train of thought and want to be punished even more for playing on Survival. It's your funeral.

Link to Difficulty XP Scaling

OCDecorator

Type: Customization

Part of a sequel's expectation is to improve on an existing formula. At the very least, if it worked adequately, make sure you don't make it worse. Boo, Fallout 4, you made placing items worse. Hurray, OCDecorator, you made it better than before. Let's accept the argument that I am insane for the following scenario: I want to place plates and forks and knives on the table where my settlers eat. I want to place mugs there too. I want to make a shelf and put food on it that I found in the wasteland. I want to decorate my place by lining up Nuka-Cola bottles in order of variation and so forth, because I'm insane. Nevertheless, the reason Bethesda games get a pass on glitches and bugs is because they allow you to do this type of stuff.

Except they don't. When it gets too much to handle, all the stuff I lined up just starts falling through the table and eventually the floor. I place all this stuff, go out adventuring and when I return it is all stuck clipping through the table or shelf. I have to spend a lot of time reorganizing, because if I don't, it just falls through never to return. OCDecorator allows you to build an object that 'solidifies' any object you place in it. Thus, I take my Nuka-Cola, put it in there, take it out and place it. It will be there. I go out, return, it's where I left it. It can't even be knocked over. Yes. I can finally do what this game told me I could.

Recommended Mods

These mods don't cover crucial features like the ones described above, but I still expected these to be in the base game and they weren't. You'll probably get more enjoyment out of the game if you use these too.

True Storms: Wasteland Edition

Type: Visual

I was almost about to pair this with Darker Nights (see above), but ultimately I just felt the weather effects in Fallout 4 were 'just' lackluster, instead of destroying my fun with the game. That said, I wouldn't want to uninstall this mod. It adds a lot more atmosphere to weather effects such as rain, making it more noticeable than in vanilla. It also adds new weather effects like radiation rain, dust storm and more. It also has some neat options for increasing the duration a weather type holds and decreasing how often it is 'good' weather (thus increasing rain, dust storm etc). You can also just keep it to regular values if you wish (which I did).

Link to True Storms

Create Your Own Survival Rebalance

Type: Gameplay

I thought we agreed that 'increase enemy damage by ridiculous amount' and 'decrease player damage by ridiculous amount' are not to be combined to create a harder difficulty setting? Playing on Survival feels wrong. It's not about it being hard or easy, it is literally about dying in 2 seconds, while every enemy (that wears shittier armor than you!) is a bullet sponge that just won't quit. I'm not saying you can't mess with damage multipliers, but the combo of these are just killing for any game I've played. Take XCOM. Imagaine if, on top of the HP buff enemies get on higher difficulties, their guns also do 2x damage as usual. That sounds fucked in a way that isn't fun. It is exactly what Fallout 4 is. And it is boring.

The solution for me is to take more damage than usual, but also deal more damage than usual. It is harder, as groups of enemies still take you out in seconds, but are also capable of killing an enemy or two without having to backtrack-run > regain AP > VATS > backtrack-run and so forth. It makes for more interesting encounters, while still being harder than the Normal setting. This mod allows you to completely change the damage multiplier values. You can make them do even more damage than on Survival, and you do even less damage than on Survival if you want. Note that you can also set the damage multipliers to normal, effectively having combat on Normal difficulty, while still having all the added challenge in other area's that Survival offers.

Link to Create Your Own Survival Rebalance

Wearable Backpacks and Pouches

Type: Gameplay, customization

For generations people have been complaining about encumbrance and weight. Not being able to carry enough. While there are mods out there every time that just increase carry weight to 10.000, people still want a more elegant system that deals with encumbrance. The system being there for gameplay reasons is clear and valid, but nothing is done to mitigate it later in the game apart from some perks. I don't want encumbrance removed or have it be a non-issue, but I don't want it to hamper my experience either. Welcome to backpacks. What we've been asking for, since... like... I can't even remember. It does what it should do. Adds backpacks and pouches to be crafted and they increase carry weight dependent on the type you made. Perfect. In-universe reason to carry more stuff and making it more fun and manageable from the gameplay perspective.

Link to Wearable Backpacks and Pouches

Functional Weapon Racks

Type: Customization

It doesn't destroy the game that it isn't in here, but it was in Skyrim? Why not here? I was kind of expecting it to be. I like displaying my stuff and this mod made it possible. It is also cool that the modder in question is also working on armor stands as we speak. A simple mod, but a cool one.

Link to Functional Weapon Racks

Nice Addition Mods

Lastly, these mods aren't crucial and I didn't even necessarily expect them, but they are good/fun additions to the game still.

Radiant Clouds and Fogs

Type: Visual

It makes clouds thicker. Makes fog more of an actual fog. It's good and works nicely with True Storms.

Link to Radiant Clouds and Fogs

Eli's Armor Collection Remade

Type: Customization

If only this had a significant number of new outfits. It does have some new outfits, but also touches up a lot of the older ones. It's good and I like it, but if there was more to is, this would be up to the Recommended Mods. Because the base game of Fallout 4 is heavily lacking is customization options in terms of clothing and outfits.

Link to Armor Collection Remade

Eli's Sleeveless Outfits

Type: Customization

More outfits. Got to have more outfits. Again, it isn't much, but it is at least something and at least it looks different.

Link to Sleeveless Outfits

Craftable Floor Supports

Type: Customization

You like how all your structures are floating in the air? Me neither. Here is a support structure that can be built so that it at least looks plausible.

Link to Craftable Floor Supports

Improved Map With Visible Roads

Type: Interface

Is this cheating? I don't know. Fallout 4's base map gives you an idea in which direction something is, but it doesn't tell you where or how to get there. Maybe that is the point? So a better map is actually cheating? I don't enjoy it myself however. I like exploration, but having to figure out how the map works in relation to the world does not equal fun for me. This mod makes the map better.

Link to Improved Map With Visible Roads

Unlock All Hairstyles At Game Start

Type: Customization

'You can unlock this hairstyle by completing the game'. Haha, buddy, we are so not on the same page. Yes, I get it. You want unlockables in your game so that even after completion people keep playing. But taking hairstyles away from my entire game experience because I might continue playing after beating the game and getting new hairstyles is not the way. When the game is done, it's done. Give me full customization of my character from the start please. Thanks mod.

Link to Unlock All Hairstyles At Game Start

Nanosuit

Type: Customization

Doesn't this look cool? Yes it does. And it looks different from all the monotone outfits in Fallout 4. All seven of them. Need more stuff.

Link to Nanosuit

As someone who disliked Fallout I'm not sure making it harder is what I'm looking for. Or engaging with settlements. Man settlements suck. But definitely a good list for those who like playing Bethesda games with a more hardcore/survival aspect.

Funny how much can be changed and most of it you listed would be for the better for sure!

I'll wait to continue playing Fallout 4 until there's a mod available that makes the combat actually somewhat good.. (and then be available for consoles as well, did this ever happen by the way?)

I would advice you to get a mod to remove the encumbrance (yes, I know the same can be done with console commands). It is a staple of these games, and probably counter intuitive with your list of mods to increase the difficulty, but the mechanism gets ridiculous in Fallout 4, specially when considering settlements and the need to pick random trash.

Unless your specs are heavily bias toward strength, you will get encumbered twice or thrice for every single quest mission. It really hampered my enjoyment of exploring the wasteland when I had to juggle inventory items or fast travel to a settlement every 10 minutes.

I installed a bunch of these mods on my first run through darker nights, true storms, improved map and difficulty tweaking made the biggest difference. But I definitely think I will give the mod scene a good year or so to mature and filter all the crap re-texture mods from the first week out of the top spots. I need major overhauls for Fallout 4 for me to want to play it again. The entire perk system needs to be reworked and there needs to be a boatload more unique weapons. I felt like I was using the same gun for 80% of the game and I didn't even finish it.

@hermes: That's a good point. I might install a mod that removes weight from settlement upgrade scrap specifically; still keeping the weight on stuff that only helps me out.

Nice post man. I went dark looking at this game for a bit but in a few months I'm going to go back to it. I put 80 hours into the base game but it is just BEGGING for mods to improve all its systems and make them deeper.

I want one badly that makes the Settlement into more of a legit sim/builder game.

I also want a version of that great Skyrim stealth mod that actually made the game feel like a capable stealth game. Forgot how bad base Bethesda stealth was by comparison when I started playing this.

Someone brought up a good point on this to me. The encumbrance seems very similar to how TES works but the problem is in those games you might only keep one or two weapons on you for the most part where in Fallout you are encouraged to carry a whole bunch which of course have weight. Unless you are a melee build that really limits you. That could be like half and more of your encumbrance immediately taken up by weapons and armor. Then all that key junk in this game. I love that they made the junk important but it only makes it more important to grab and then the whole system even more frustrating.

I like encumbrance as a mechanic just fine but it seems out of whack with the actual game here so I see why people mod it.

@artisanbreads: @hermes I found just the mod to help with this. This mod allows you to make certain item categories weightless, or significantly lower in weight but still weighing some if you prefer. I installed it just now. You can check junk (for settlement building and upgrading), weapons, armor, food, stimpacks and some other things all individually if you want them weightless, reduced weight or no change.

I made all junk weightless as I plan on doing no fast travel. I kept all the others at base weight, because I personally don't want encumbrance to go entirely and I am using those backpacks anyway to mitigate it some.

Awesome thanks for this! I've only installed a few mods and decided to take a long break from the game until a lot more were available - I'll keep these ones in mind.

As a structural engineer, those craftable supports make me feel just a tiny bit better (though in no way would those hold a floor...) :P

@zevvion: cool that is a good way to handle it and give players the choice. I'll keep an eye on that one too.

@hermes: @zevvion: I had a similar problem with encumbrance. I like having limited carrying capacity as it force me to make decisions about what I want to carry and give the power armour more of a purpose other than damage limitation. For a finish I just used console commands and gave myself loads of crafting materials for town upgrades. I found the actual act of collecting them to boring and hampered my enjoyment of the exploration. I search everywhere as I want to find bobble heads and comics but I find it liberating not having to pickup every blood clock and microscope I see.

A harder Fallout 4 is definitely not what I was missing but I'll definitely install the roads on map and storms mod

Ooh, there is a few here I did not know about. Thanks!

The Darker Nights one makes everything a lot better by the way. The amount of atmosphere it adds is brilliant. I can also recommend Fr4nsson's Light Tweaks, which tweaks the weird ambient light inside.

This is why I stopped playing Fallout.
I went down the dark road of modding Skyrim, and I spent more time doing that than actually playing it.

never again.

*buys the game on Christmas day*

I'm not going to install any mods on the first playthrough. I'm not going to install any mods on the first playthrough. I'm not going to install any mods on the first playthrough...

*looks through NexusMods*

*installs about 40 mods and an EMB preset*

Goddammit...!

Nice post, thanks!

Thank you for the excellent breakdown on some mods for Fallout 4. I'm going to get this on PC eventually, so this helps a ton.

I've played Fallout for 100 hours now and I'm loving it raw, without any mods. Looking at your screens I can't decide, either I am a fool, or a man who has a reason to play fallout for another plenty of hours using these sweet mods. Thank you!

@zevvion this one helps a lot in settlements http://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/1267/

Not sure if I should post a new thread for this or not but can you guys recommend me some new Vegas mods. I'm playing through it for the first time(might buy fallout 4 later on).

Where's the mod that fixes the boring story?