Setting up FUSION with Wabbajack

While Wabbajack takes care of 99% of the work, there are still some steps that need to be completed by the user. The Installation section will take you through the process from start to finish and you are expected to follow it to the letter. FUSION requires:

• A copy of Fallout 4 with all official DLC (Game of the Year Edition) on Steam.
• A Nexus Mods account, preferably with a Premium subscription.
• Around 17GB for FUSION, 14GB for the downloaded mods, and 34.5GB for the base game.
  

Setting up MO2

Mod Organizer 2 requires the Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable and .NET Framework 4.8, two basic packages. Chances are you already have them installed, but please grab the two installers linked below and run them. If the packages are already present on your system, the installers should notify you.

• Download and install Visual C++ 2019.
• Download and install .NET Framework 4.8.
  

If either of them were missing on your system, they will be installed now. Afterwards, you may be required to restart your PC.

Uninstallation

In order to ensure that your Fallout 4 installation is pristine and vanilla, we are going to completely re-install the game. This is especially important if you have modded the game previously as left-over files might interfere with your FUSION installation.If you never modded Fallout 4 and/or never installed other Wabbajack lists, you may skip this step. However, I still recommend you verify the game files through Steam in that case.

• Uninstall Fallout 4 through Steam
• Navigate to your Steam directory.
• If there is still a Fallout 4 folder, delete it.
  

When uninstalling a game through Steam, only vanilla files are removed. Mod-added files must be deleted manually.

INI Folder

More Fallout-related files are located inside the so-called INI Folder which needs to be cleaned out as well. It contains your savegames as well as the game’s INI files and, if you modded Fallout 4 before, F4SE plugin logs.

• Navigate to the INI Folder
• If you have an ongoing vanilla playthrough, back up the Saves folder.
• Delete everything inside the Fallout4 folder.
  

Reinstallation

The reinstallation also serves the purpose of relocating the game files to a better directory. Using UAC protected folders for the game or any modding tools has a risk of causing issues down the line. It is best to avoid those folders to begin with. Most Wabbajack list authors, myself included, will not provide support for people that disregard this warning and use UAC protected folders anyway. Note that this does not include the Steam client. Additionally, Fallout 4 and Mod Organizer 2 should be installed on the same hard drive. Ideally that hard drive would be an SSD to reduce loading times and eliminate stuttering. 

Steam Library

In order to prevent some confusion, I will refer to the Library in Steam as the Game Library. It is the second of four items in the top menu in the Steam client and contains a list of all your games. A Steam Library on the other hand is a folder on your hard drive into which Steam games are installed. Since we do not want to have files inside a UAC protected folder we should not install Fallout 4 in the default directory. A new Steam Library is required.

Unfortunately Steam allows only one Steam Library per hard drive. You can find a workaround here.

If you already have a separate Steam Library outside the UAC protected folders on the drive you want to install Fallout 4 and Mod Organizer 2 on, skip ahead to the next step. Otherwise follow the instructions below to create a new Steam Library:

• Open Steam and go into the Settings.
• In the Downloads tab, select Steam Library Folders.
• Click Add Library Folder.
• Point it to a location somewhere outside the UAC protected folders
• Close all windows when you’re done.
  

Setting the language to English

Non-English installations of Fallout 4 are not supported.

• Right-click Fallout 4 in your Steam games library.
• Select Properties and switch to the Langauge tab.
• Ensure that the language is set to English.
  

Reinstalling the game

• Open Steam and go into your Game Library.
• Find Fallout 4 in the list and click Install.
• As location, select a Steam Library in a non-UAC protected folder and click Next.
• Wait for Fallout 4 to be downloaded before you proceed.
  

Regenerating INI Files

After re-installing the game, it is important to launch it at least once through Steam so that the registry keys are set up. Otherwise, certain modding tools may not recognise the game. Upon launching the game, the default set of INI files will also be regenerated.

• Find Fallout 4 in your Games Library and hit Play.
• You will be prompted with a notification that Fallout 4 is configuring your video options, click OK.
• Click OK again to the next window and hit Exit to close the launcher.
  

The preset that is selected now will be irrelevant. FUSION uses its own set of INI files.

Future Updates

The most important mod for most Bethesda games is the Script Extender, a resource that is in turn required for many key mods. The Fallout 4 Script Extender (F4SE) is version dependent. It requires a specific version of Fallout 4. Unfortunately any update for the Creation Club requires the game executables to be updated which breaks F4SE every time. When that happens, the Script Extender team usually updates F4SE within a few days. Any F4SE plugins will have to be updated by their respective authors as well which can take several weeks. In order to prevent Creation Club updates from interrupting your playthrough and breaking your game, we are going to disable automatic updates in Steam. We are also going to backup the current version’s executables so you can restore them at any time.

Disable Auto Updates

• Open Steam and find Fallout 4 in your Game Library.
• Right-click it and select Properties
• In the Updates tab, change Automatic updates to Only update this game when I launch it.
• Close the Properties window.
  

Official High Resolution Texture Pack

Bethesda published a free 55GB texture pack with upscaled 4K textures that are nowhere near worth the hard drive space, while some textures are an improvement they are not worth the extra hard drive space. FUSION comes with its own set of small texture replacers that correct the base games more glaring issues! If you had the HD DLC installed previously, you need to disable it in Steam.

• Open Steam and go into your Game Library.
• Go to the Fallout 4 page and click Manage my 8 DLC.
• Uncheck Fallout 4 - High Resolution Texture Pack in the list and click Save.
  

Creation Club Content

Is not currently supported at this time. I have disabled it entirely and support will not be offered if you decide to add any of these mods yourself

Wabbajack Installation

• Download the Wabbajack executable from the official website.
• Move the downloaded file to a location of your choice.
• Double-click Wabbajack.exe. It will automatically download and install the latest version.
  

Downloading FUSION

• Once you Wabbajack running, click "browse modlists" on the left.
• FUSION Can be found under the "fallout 4" dropdown in the Wabbajack UI
• Make sure you have "Show unofficial lists" checked at the top of the page
• Press the little "Download modlist" button to take you through installation.
  

The FUSION folder:

• SHOULD be on your SSD or otherwise fastest hard drive.
• CANNOT be inside the Wabbajack installation folder.
• CANNOT be inside the Fallout 4 installation folder.
  

Download Location

The MO2 downloads folder within your FUSION folder will automatically be chosen as the download location. However, this is mostly a waste of space as the downloaded mod archives are only required for the initial installation and subsequent updates but not for gameplay. I strongly recommend changing the Download Location to a folder on a hard drive with plenty of free storage.

You can reuse the download folders from different Wabbajack lists for the same game.

FUSION Installation

After filling in the installation and download directories, click the Start button on the left. If you have Nexus Premium, you can lean back while Wabbajack downloads the required mod files and installs the setup. Otherwise, you will have to click through the mod pages and download manually (Wabbajack will guide you).

Mod Organizer 2

All mods are installed in Mod Organizer 2 which is required to play the setup. You must always launch F4SE through MO2.

• Navigate to your FUSION installation directory.
• Double-click ModOrganizer.exe.
  

Frame Rate and VSYNC

One of the Creation Engine’s drawbacks is the physics engine which is tied to the frame rate. Simply put, the game breaks if it runs at more than 60FPS. However, there is a mod that allows you to unlock the frame rate by dynamically adjusting havok settings at runtime, aptly called High FPS Physics Fix.

• FPS or frames per second are how the amount of still images shown every second are measured. The higher your FPS, the more fluid the game appears. The amount of frames per second that can be rendered depends on your hardware, primarily your CPU and GPU.
• VSYNC is a technique that syncs a game’s framerate to your monitor’s refresh rate (hence the name). It prevents screentearing at the cost of latency and is always recommended.
  

FUSION caps the framerate at 60 and forces VSYNC through High FPS Physics Fix.

That's it! If you have installed everything correctly you should now be able to launch the game through MO2.