What is True Scopes?

True Scopes is a modern (As of 2023) mod utilizing the latest and greatest tools the NV modding community has to offer in order to create a non-simple solution to a simple problem: Looking through a scope directly, without the big screen-blocking border.
Now, some people aren't interested in that, think it distracts from the scope or whatever, and that's fine. That's why this is a mod, and not a forced base game change.

With this mod, you can see a magnified view of what you're looking at. Truly magnified, no distortion trickery or zooming of the camera, just a scope working how a scope generally should work.

Before anyone asks about compatibility, this modifies no meshes, no textures, and comes with a full easy-to-use editor mode allowing new compatibility to be added super easily by anyone with a keyboard, mouse, and a couple of minutes.


The same thing I used to complete and fine-tune the scopes, after I implemented it.
To access, enable Debug Mode in the INI, then type into the console: set NVTSEditorMode to 1
Then, when you have a weapon equipped and unholstered, are in first-person, and aren't actively aiming it, press the set key (By default, ;). The interface will pop up, and should be rather self-explanatory. The buttons along the top not only have snazzy icons (For the most part), but will give a description of their use when hovering over them.
You can still aim down the weapon in this mode, to get a better look at how the sights are aligned.

Click the arrows next to every value, and experiment to see how it works.
The rotation settings currently do nothing, as they were found to be unnecessary in every case I tested. If it becomes necessary for some reason, let me know and I'll see about making them do something.

Hold CTRL, Shift, Alt, or some combination of the three to add modifiers to the increments, allowing much quicker control vs having to type in your new value every time.

When you're done, make sure to press 'Save', otherwise your changes will be erased. At least it's easy to recreate, especially once you know roughly what you want.
Under 'config/True Scopes/CustomConfigs', you'll find your 'CustomConfig' file, with the addition of whatever the source mod is on the end. This is what gets written to whenever you 'save' in Editor Mode. You can safely rename these files to whatever you want, and I recommend you name them something unique if you intend to share them on Nexus or something.
The files are also intentionally missing from the download, so that they doesn't get overwritten from any updates to the mod.

Config files take priority from z-a, similar to the base game's load order system. Whatever loads at the bottom (z) is what has its values used. Note that you can have values for many different weapons in a single config file, and they will be used even if other configs take.
Sort of like an .esp, if that helps. Rule of One and all. Any changes to a scope in these files will have complete priority, no taking bits and pieces, like adding a night vision scope to the weapon in one file and changing its position in another. That doesn't work.

Note that there is currently a strange bug I haven't tracked down, seemingly introduced in the midst of massive reworks prior to release, that causes values to be reverted sometimes when entering edit mode.
Saving a couple times seems to generally avoid this, but just be aware of it if you go back to edit a weapon again. It only happens on a few rare exceptions, it's perfectly fine for the vast majority of cases.
Also, some weapons just don't work well with this, and the mod can't properly attach anything. I don't know why, but it's probably because of a very messed-up .nif file.

If you need something more extensive than the in-built editing system, you can edit the scope definition files directly. While most basic settings can be controlled via the editing system, it doesn't yet offer support for changing which scope a weapon uses, or the XML file.
config/True Scopes/CustomConfigs


The config files are structured as a multidimensional array, with each line being a single weapon entry and every 'tab' on that line being a separate value.
There's a legend file located in the 'config' folder, which should be able to answer any questions. If you have more, please leave a comment and I'll update it for the next release, and include more information here.

Mod Issues
Vignette doesn't work properly yet. Disabled by default, but you could turn it on if you wanted.
Spamming aim might cause the scope to 'stick' a bit. Haven't found the cause of this one, yet.
Haven't really investigated, either.
Water looks quite wrong, and the sky does sometimes, too. This isn't something I can really fix, it's the camera-rendering function itself.

Incompatibilities
New Vegas Reloaded:

• Shadows on first-person weapons incorrectly cover the scope, due to lack of emissive support. Also you can't see shadows through the scope, and possibly any NVR effect.
  

Transparency Multisampling setting in the game's launcher

• Soft incompatibility. It makes some things, namely grass, look pretty icky through scopes.
  

ISControl

• Not entirely confirmed, and I don't know what exactly the issue is. Hit hasn't mentioned anything, so hopefully it'll be fine for everyone else, too?