What Is This Voodoo?

Adds State of Decay 2 style infestations to Fallout 4 that grow over time if left unchecked, where each incremental growth is slightly stronger than the previous level. There are three levels of infestation, just as there are in State of Decay 2. Due to constraints however, this mod will only track up to six active infestations at a time.


Is This Mod For You, You Might Wonder?

I think so. But don't take my word for it, take CthulhuRolledaNat20's word for it:

"This mod is amazing, its definitely one of my favorites and a 'keep in my load order' mod, I personally used this with both More Feral Ghouls and FGEP-Feral Ghoul Expansion Pack there's a patch for both FGEP and MFG to work together here. Which made the infestations feel more like State of Decay meets Left 4 Dead in a good way. I also had Feral Nights installed which led to some moments where I'd encounter the random horde of ferals from this mod and the random feral hunters and horde from FN which definitely was quite a fun challenge. My current playthrough (in the spirit of Halloween) is a full on undead apocalypse playthrough and Feral Infestations is a fantastic addition to the other mods I have to make venturing out of the safety of my settlements for supplies a much more unique and fun experience. Great job with this mod joerqc and keep up the amazing work.

This mod does put my settlements' defenses to work and together with the other mods mentioned in my post definitely gives them a run for their money. I have had to craft good armor and even better weapons to arm my settlers with just to ensure they can survive. It's a real BLAST! I love it! I am very excited for the updates to come and the Bloaters :). Keep up the amazing work, and to anyone else reading through the comments and thinking, "Hmm should I get this mod?" The answer is "YES! just do it! You won't regret it, it has turned the Commonwealth from a oddly mostly barren place where not much used to happen to a full on exciting chaotic wasteland."
10 Stars from me."

Thanks for making Feral Infestations the top Hot Mod for it's first week of release!

How Does It All Work?

To get started, simply go to the UTILITY menu of the CHEMLAB and craft the free settings holotape. The mod starts in a disabled state, so you will need to use the holotape to turn it on and to set up the basic settings for the mod. For those who use MCM, the mod does ship with an MCM menu for you to use instead of the holotape, though you aren't required to use it (and you aren't required to use MCM for those that don't).

The difficulty setting in the holotape tells the infestations how big they are and what relative strength the ferals are. The higher the difficulty, the more ferals there will be and they will be of stronger stock.

To clear an infestation, all ferals at the target site must be eliminated, lest the infestation continue to grow. Missions for infestations show as MISC quests and will not clutter your main quest log.

After each infestation is cleared, it allows for further infestations to occur, allowing the mod to last for as long as you play your character.

Failure to clear infestations will result in the fully formed, level 3 infestation leaving their current lair and making their way to the nearest owned player settlement in search of food, which of course is what makes the mod's infestations have an actual gameplay hook. Works best when you have mortal settler mods enabled, so there is an actual cost to NOT clearing infestations.

Infestations randomly occur as you travel around the Commonwealth worldspace; they will never trigger in Far Harbor or Nuka World.


Will this work with 'x' zombe/feral overhaul mod?

Be it Zombie Walkers or the Feral Ghoul Expansion Project or others like them, this mod doesn't alter the base game feral ghoul actor records. So whatever those other mods do to ferals, it translates into this mod seamlessly. All this mod does is place those actor records in various locations in the game.

Can You Explain "Feral Plague" In This Mod?

When Feral Plague is activated, the player, companions, followers and settlers can become infected with Feral Plague from being hit by ferals or standing too near to an exploding Bloater. You can cure yourself with antibiotics or by visiting a doctor. Once infected, the player will have 15 real world minutes to find a cure, or the game will kill the player, forcing a restart. The mod will remind you every minute, counting down how much time you have left, until cured or you die.

For companions, followers and settlers, they also get a 15 minute grace period. Once their time runs out, they will die (if you have mortal friendlies enabled in the config for this mod). When a companion or follower or settler is infected, you can approach them to see a secondary action prompt (shows beside TALK) where you can administer some of your antibiotics to them, in order to reset their infection level to 0.  As a note, Feral Plague only affects humans. Infected friendlies that will eventually die, will glow red to indicate the severity of their infection.

Obviously, this mode is kind of hardcore. It doesnt allow for differentiation between settlers and followers, so you probably don't want to use this mode if you are one of those people who would cry if your companion dies from the plague.

To use the Feral Plague mode, you need to have F4SE installed (hard must) and you need to be either running in Survival Mode OR be using Advanced Needs 76. These are the only two ways of obtaining antibiotics, needed to cure the plague.

There is an option in the MCM and in the holotape for the player to check their own infection level - remember, anything less than 100%, you don't have the plague yet, so you have lots of time to go see a doctor or take antibiotics to reset your infection level to 0.

For each hit you take from a Feral, you accumulate 1.5% infection. A bloater exploding at you, you are going to get between 10% and 20%, depending on your proximity and how long you stand in the poison cloud. Gasmasks and Hazmat suits will negate accumulation from bloater clouds.

Is This Compatible with Fallout 4 VR?

Out of the box? No. However, if you take the mod's ESP file into xEdit and change it's header from v1.000 to v0.95, it will then work. For best compatibility once you have got the mod ingame, use the holotape for your control setup. While its not as granular as the MCM is, in terms of percentage sliders, xbox users by the thousands have been using the holotape without complaint.

Can I use 'x' mod's gasmask to protect from Bloater gas attacks?

You can use any gasmask or hazmat suit that contains the keyword "AnimHelmetCoversMouth" on it's ARMOR form. If it does not have this keyword, simply use xEdit to add it to the Armor form and it will then register as protection from Bloater gas clouds. If your gasmask works with Advanced Needs 76 already, it will work here perfectly.

Technical Notes:

This mod does not require any external mods or DLC. It is HIGHLY lightweight, relying on small instanced "listener" scripts to know when infestations are cleared but mostly relies on Story Manager nodes to drive the initial infestation and subsequent growth of each one. There are NO persistently running scripts in this mod and most importantly, this mod mostly runs without any timers, save for when watching you eliminate the infestations in your game or when waiting for you to defend a settlement (and failing to do so, the timer will end the infestation and damage your settlement).

This mod alters some interior cell locations to add more areas for infestations to occur. This will not cause issues with precombines or previs as there are no movements of existing assets, nor deletions. That said, it is worth knowing ahead of time that there may be cell location conflicts with other mods that you will need to resolve via patching on your own, should you find one. Affected are:

• Cambridge Diner
• Lexington Laundromat
• Goreski's Cabin
• Union's Hope Cathedral
• Charleston Abandoned House
• North End Boxing Gym
• North End Valenti Metro Station
• Medtek Research
• Old Corner Bookstore
• Commonwealth Bank
  

If there are locations that you do not wish to be a part of the Infestation system, you can modify a formlist in the mod via xEdit, to remove specific location entries. That formlist is named: Flashy_List_InfestationList. Note that you cannot add new locations to this list - locations need to be set up properly via the cell editor in the CK in order to work with the mod's infestation propagation system.

Recommendation:

If you love State of Decay 2 and are looking to make FO4 a little more like it, consider pairing this mod with SKK50's Commonwealth of Decay!

For those who translate mods into other languages:

You don't need to ask my permission to translate my mods to your localization. Have at it! :)