9 Years Later Modding

[Puppettron]

So, Senterpat came up with a modding concept called 9YL (9 years later) which is basically the idea that content mods set in the CW should have significant changes made to them after your first trip to the mojave, that show up on a return trip to the CW.  this is something that interests me, but i don't make mods that would be effected by it.   however, that doesn't mean i can't do things to aid the idea.  so for starters, i'm making a thread here to talk about it and where you modders can look for help/answers/dick jokes about it.  ok, maybe not the dick jokes.

now, here's what this is and why it's awesome:

9YL is a modding philosophy, which basically means it's a way of creating mods that is in line with an idea or ideal but isn't exactly a cookie-cutter thing.  there's plenty of other philosophies out there, like the Low Impact philosophy where your goal is to make as few changes to the vanilla assets as possible while making a mod that does whatever your crazy heart can come up with.  Unlike most modding philosophies though, 9YL is one that's unique to TTW, since it's entirely based on the concept of 9 years passing between leaving the CW and waking up in Doc Mitchel's.  which means that our mods have the ability to go beyond the "I brought Dogmeat to the Dam Fight" level and become something new and dynamic and encourage back and forth travel.  it gives incentive to make a TTW specific overhaul of megaton or paradise falls or whatever, rather than just converting something someone made nearly a decade ago.

so, what does 9YL entail?  idunno, it really depends on the mod.  it could be buildup of areas you've put in the game, it could be aging characters, it could just be wiping out andale or rotting out minefield.  hell, that's the beauty of this, you're figuring out what the hell would happen during the 9 years gone.  and that's why this thread exists in Mod Talk, so that you and other modders like you can hash out ideas and get some consistant best practices together for doing this.  i'm sure if there's enough interest in this that it becomes a thing, we could put up a sticky post collecting these mods in releases.

[TJ]

Dogmeat dies of old age sometime before 9YL. That'd work as a concept, right?

[Puppettron]

yeah, but it'd be really simple and you'd be best off bringing all the feels to that one.

[TrickyVein]

Dogmeat gets turned into a robodog only without a memory or emotions.

[JaxFirehart]

Interesting thought: put dogmeat's brain in Rex

Ending slides would be hard to pull off, but we could call the result a "Dogmeatus Rex"

[paragonskeep]

This sounds like a great idea. IF I actually had any modding skills I'd be working on things for this. A few aspects or areas this would affect:

The Mall: Has the Lyon's Pride wiped out the Super Mutants as were the mission at the end of Broken Steel

Outcasts vs Lyons BOS: Resolution, full out war?

Reilly's Rangers: It's been 9 years who's still alive?

Rivet City: No Dr Li, No Harkness, Who's in charge now? Pinkerton still alive or Washington?

I could see lamplight and by default Big town being destroyed. Collateral damage eradicating Vault 87.

Any Enclave rebuild?

How far has Oasis spread by now, same with the clean water from the Purifier. How many Mirelurks still exist?

Has Talon finally claimed the Capital building and setup a new stronghold?

How fortified is the Lincoln Memorial, have slavers came to reclaim? (If Talon is at the other end of the Mall this could be interesting with the BOS in the middle)

Has Liberty Prime been rebuilt by now?

Is Sarah the new Elder? 

Age aspects are any of these still living? Elder Lyons, Rothchild, Abraham Washington, Nathan and Mayan, Cromwell, Moriarty, Andale old man, Clifford, etc

What has Moria invented, or has she destroyed Megaton with a bad idea?

Tons of possibilities which will require tons of scripts and checks as to what has or hasn't been done. 

 

[sesom]

Warning this is a crazy idea:

I still have a esp which has the whole worldspace of FO3s CW, including statics, but !!no!! navmesh, NPCs, dynamics (tincans...) that was made in FO3Edit for a mod that never was done. Its a 1:1 copy of the original one (geck crashes if you try it with the original CW). The original FO3 LOD works with it. Sure there has to be made a conversion to TTW (its still a FO3 esp).

The big advantage of it would be that 9YL content wouldn't have to change original content which can be a big hazzle. The downside its only the worldspace, with statics, ...

So what this mean? I could provide a empty Capital Wasteland which is completely independent from the original one to fill with 9YL NPCs, Quests, ... whatever we want.

As I said a crazy idea because a ton of work but complete freedom. You where warned.

[Ein]

Depending on when you leave? Everyone is dead, Enclave rules the wasteland which has become a graveyard, inhabited only by hostile militants in Power Armor ruling from rebuilt military bases.

After doing everything? Probably only half the people are dead. All the kids are grown up.

A decade is a REALLY long time. And considering there's only 3 towns in Fo3 that aren't Dead on your Arrival, it doesn't really bode well for anything.

[TrickyVein]

[quote=Ein]

Depending on when you leave? 

[/quote]

It really should depend on this. You can leave CW without even finding your dad, or once you do, never visiting the memorial again. It makes for weird continuity problems.

If TTW were its own game, my own personal imagining of how it would progress is that you wouldn't be able to travel to NV until blowing up Raven Rock or killing Augustus. Union Station would be under the Enclave's control, always was, even before the Great War. The key to the tunnels would have been entrusted to Colonel Augustus Adam by his father, who first brought Enclave refugees to DC from the west coast some 30 years prior, using the rails as transport.

[Puppettron]

you know, the only 9YL mod i'm aware of currently is pat's Fortified Raider Bases mod, so it's not like 9YL is only for aging the CW into fnv, even though that's what apprently everyone is thinking.