DARK CORNERS OF NIRN - STRESS
by GPortner

Version History:
Read Changelog for full details.
ver1.2: Further tweaked and improved.
ver1.1: Added several tweaks and improvements.
ver1.0: Initial public release

CONTENTS
01 : Introduction and Description
02 : Systems and Features
03 : MCM Options and Configuration
04 : Requirements and Installation
05 : Acknowledgements
06 : Contact


01 INTRODUCTION AND DESCRIPTION

"Dark Corners of Nirn - Stress" is a mod inspired by the game
"Darkest Dungeon," bringing certain aspects of the Stress mechanic
from that game to the world of Skyrim. Unlike other "needs" mods,
DCoN focuses on mental well-being, rather than bodily needs.


02 SYSTEMS AND FEATURES

STRESS GAIN: Time spent outside of safety, whether in remote parts of
the wilderness, or deep within the chambers of a barrow, will cause
you to accrue Stress. The amount of Stress gained is random, to an
extent, but is influenced by various conditions:

LIGHT: The less light there is, the more Stress a you will
receive over time. In particularly dark areas, it may be
prudent to bring a torch along, to help keep madness at bay.

DANGER: Certain areas or situations are more dangerous than
others, and danger has a direct influence on Stress. Unless
you are trespassing or in combat, cities, towns, and villages
are not considered dangerous. The wilderness is dangerous,
but not as dangerous as a dungeon.

COMBAT: Not only is combat dangerous (see above), but it is
also inherently more stressful than non-combat situations.
Any action you take in anticipation of combat, such as
sneaking about or readying a weapon, will cause more Stress
to accrue than otherwise. Keep this in mind, and consider
sheating your weapons when not actively engaged in combat.

INJURY: Whenever you take damage, you will gain a comparable
amount of Stress to go along with the injury. Keep this in
mind when picking your approach to any given encounter.

CRIME: Trespassing, theft, murder, and any other crime will
cause you to gain Stress: the weight of a guilty conscience.

STRESS RELIEF: Not all hope is lost. There are a number of ways you
can relieve Stress, if you find yourself approaching the precipitous
threshold of madness:

REST AND RELAXATION: Spending time in safe or relaxing places
will cause Stress to decrease over time. Additionally, when
you sleep anywhere, you will relieve at least a little bit of
Stress: the safer and more relaxing the location, the more
effective Sleep will be at relieving Stress. As a metric, a
full nights rest (8 hours of sleep) in an Inn or your own bed
in a player-owned house will relieve all Stress.
o Additionally, while you have a RESTED buff (i.e.
Rested, Well Rested, or Lover's Comfort) you will
receive reduced Stress for the duration.

FOOD AND POTIONS: Consuming food or potions will reduce your
Stress levels by a little bit. Food is more effective at re-
lieving Stress than potions are.
o Eating Food will usually also grant the SATED buff,
which reduces Stress for 4 hrs Game Time.
o Using Narcotics will also grant the SEDATED buff,
which reduces Stress for 3 hrs Game Time.
o Drinking Alcohol will also grant the TIPSY buff,
which reduces Stress for 2 hrs Game Time.

HEROISM: Landing critical strikes and felling enemies will
reduce Stress by a small amount. Leveling up and clearing
dungeons will reduce Stress more noticeably.

JUSTICE: Paying your due to society, either by paying accrued
fines or serving time in jail, will reduce your Stress.

AFFLICTION AND VIRTUE: Regardless of how careful you may be, it is
inevitable that your Resolve will be tested when you accrue 100
Stress. When this happens, you will either gain an Affliction or a
Virtue.

AFFLICTED: This is the umbrella effect which is applied with
each Affliction. It reduces max Health by 10% and decreases
all Resistances (other than Stress Resistance) by 15%. On top
of all that, Afflicted characters also tend to gain more
Stress more frequently. There are Seven Afflictions that
could be applied when you become afflicted:

ABUSIVE: +20% Damage. -60 Armor. Reduced Accuracy.

FEARFUL: -25% Damage. +40 Armor. 20% Speed increase.

HOPELESS: -20 Armor. 30% Speed reduction. Reduced
Accuracy.

IRRATIONAL: -10% Damage. -20 Armor. 20% Speed
increase. Reduced Accuracy.

MASOCHISTIC: -60 Armor.

PARANOID: -25% Damage. +40 Armor. 20% Speed increase.

SELFISH: -10% Damage. +20 Armor. Reduced Accuracy.

LEGACY AFFLICTIONS: The following Afflictions are considered
Legacy Afflictions because they are taken from grasscid's
Stress Mod, the spiritual predecessor to this mod. They are
Disabled by default.

ANXIOUS (grasscid's Paranoid): Increased Stress.

DELIRIOUS (grasscid's Irrational): Erratic loss of
Player Controls during combat.

DESPONDENT (grasscid's Hopeless): -80% Damage.
-80% Spell Durations.

LETHARGIC: During combat max carry weight is reduced
to 0.

NEGLIGENT (grasscid's Masochistic): Receive quadruple
damage. Spell costs are quadrupled.

VIRTUOUS: This is the umbrella effect which is applied with
each Virtue. It increases all Resistances (other than Stress
Resistance) by 25% and caps Stress at 100. There are Five
Virtues that could be applied when you become Virtuous:

COURAGEOUS: +25% Stress resistance and gain the
Courageous Call greater power: once a day, you and
nearby allies gain 25 bonus Health and Stamina and
double heal rate for 5 minutes.

FOCUSED: +15% Critical Strike chance (even without
a critical strike perk). Attakcs ignore 10% of the
opponent's armor.

POWERFUL: +25% Damage and gain the Powerful Call
greater power: once a day, you and nearby allies gain
+15% Damage for 5 minutes.

STALWART: Immediately relieves 60 Stress. +50% Stress
Resistance.

VIGOROUS: +40 Armor. 50% Speed increase. 5% Increased
Heal Rate.

LEGACY VIRTUES: The following Afflictions are considered
Legacy Virtuess because they are taken from grasscid's Stress
Mod, the spiritual predecessor to this mod. They are Disabled
by default.

ARDENT (grasscid's Vigorous): 100 Bonus Health and
Triple Heal Rate for 1 hr 40 mins Game Time.

FERVENT (grasscid's Powerful): +100% Damage and Double
Spell Magnitudes for 1 hr 40 mins Game Time.

ZEALOUS (grasscid's Focused): 100 Bonus Stamina and
Magicka and Triple Recovery for both for 1 hr 40 mins
Game Time.

Once an Affliction is gained, it will not be lost until you spend
time in a relaxing location (e.g. an Inn) while your Stress is 60 or
lower. On the other hand, a Virtue is lost as soon as you return to
safety, regardless of your current Stress level.

HEART ATTACK: If you push yourself too hard after gaining an
Affliction and manage to accrue 200 Stress, you will suffer a Heart
Attack. This is lethal, if you are also At Death's Door (see below)
but, at any rate, will relieve 30 Stress, drop you to 10% health,and
apply the Heart Attack Recovery effect:
-10% Damage. +15% Stress Resistance. 20% Speed reduction.
Reduced Accuracy.

AT DEATH'S DOOR: Whether you get their by heart attack, or simply
from taking too much damage, when your health falls to ~10% you are
At Death's Door:
-25% Damage. -33% Stress Resistance. 50% Speed reduction.
Reduced Accuracy. Suppressed Heal Rate.

Suppressed Heal Rate means that your health will not automatically
recover as long as the effect is applied. To recover from At Death's
Door, you need to raise your health to ~25% by some other means (e.g.
drinking a potion). In this case, you will still be suffering from
Death's Door Recovery:
-5% Damage. -10% Stress Resistance. 10% Speed reduction.
Reduced Accuracy.

Death's Door Recovery and Heart Attack Recovery both remain in effect
until you return to safety.


03 MCM OPTIONS AND CONFIGURATION

DCoN is provided with an MCM which has three pages: "General
Options," "Advanced Options," and "System."

GENERAL OPTIONS: This page contains the general purpose options which
are to be used for the most basic level of cusomization.

STRESSFULNESS: Select the overall multiplier for Stress which
is gained over time. Theslider ranges from 0.25 to 2.00 and
is adjusted in step increments of 0.05.

MESSAGE THRESHOLD: Periodically, a message notification will
let you know what your current Stress is, so that you do not
need to continually access the menu to monitor your Stress.
Lower numbers on this setting will cause these notifications
to display more frequently, and higher numbers will result in
less frequent notifications.

AT DEATH'S DOOR: This feature can be disabled here. If you
are already At Death's Door, this will not remove the effect,
but it will prevent it from getting reapplied later on.

HEART ATTACKS: There are two customization options for Heart
Attacks: they can be disabled or they can be made to always
result in Sudden Death, regardless of whether you are At
Death's Door.

AFFLICTIONS - IMOD INTENSITY: Effects which cause Reduced
Accuracy achieve this by applying Image Space Modifiers. This
setting is used to adjust the intensity of these Imods.
Setting the Intensity to 0% effectively disables Reduced
Accuracy effects.

AFFLICTIONS - NOISES: Fearful and Paranoid both cause ambient
noises to be played periodically. These noises can be turned
off here.

VIRTUES - VIRTUE CHANCE: The likelihood that you will gain a
Virtue rather than an Affliction when you hit 100 Stress. The
default value is 25%. Adjustments are made in 5% increments,
with a minimum of 5% and a maximum of 40%.

ADVANCED OPTIONS: More detailed customizations can be made on this
page:
o Individual Afflictions or Virtues can be disabled.
o The effect of Speed Changes can be adjusted.
o Stress Gain / Relief for certain actions can be modified.
o Location classification (Safe / Dangerous) can be modified.
o Locations (or even individual Cells) can be added to Custom
Lists for consideration in classification.

SYSTEM: This page allows for disabling the mod, in case you wish to
uninstall it. Disabling the mod will remove all active effects and
stop further Stress Gain / Reflief from occuring. It will also
disable the other pages of the MCM. If you choose to re-enable the
mod afterwards, the system will reapply any effects it removed.


04 REQUIREMENTS AND INSTALLATION

This mod requires SKSE and SkyUI.

To install, simply extract the files into your Data folder.

For uninstall, it's recommended that you first disable the mod using
the MCM, to prevent any lingering effects.


05 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I'd like to thank RedHook Studios for making the excellent game
Darkest Dungeon, which inspired this mod.

A very special thanks goes to grasscid for the original idea to bring
the Stress mechanic to Skyrim; and much gratitude, as well, for
granting me permission to upload my take on the idea.


06 CONTACT

Any questions, comments, concerns, or recommendations, please contact
me via Nexus, either in the comments section for this mod or PM.