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About this mod
Multiple Followers Framework is a standalone follower framework, the default follower system was not edited. Supports up to 512 active followers. Includes a mount system. Capable of temporarily converting NPCs into followers, including enemies. Many configurations: settings, dialogue, control shouts, and more!
- Requirements
- Permissions and credits
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Translations
- Donations
Multiple Followers Framework
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4 x 128 bit arrays
Many configurations
Compatible with all mods
If you are having issues, please post a bug report, the comment section is for commenting on the mod.
Welcome, I am Dromundas, the creator of Multiple Followers Framework. I built this mod for myself and wanted to share it with the Skyrim community. The framework is highly configurable to support both the player as well as mod developers. Feel free to leave a comment or ask any questions about the framework.
- Description -
Multiple Followers Framework is a standalone framework built for mod development. It was designed to be used with basic followers and for the conversion of NPCs for use as a follower. This mod was carefully designed to join a legacy of long load orders and build toward something new at the same time. You can use it side by side with any mods, including follower frameworks such as the default follower system or any mods for it.
The framework includes a complimentary party system so players can use the framework right away. Followers managed by MFF are referred to as party members. The complimentary party system for MFF is highly configurable. Check out the default settings section for a full list of configurable features. Configuration is performed in 2 ways, one of which can be accessed with the Manual of Configuration which contains all of the configuration options, many of which are applied upon recruitment. And then there's the Power of Configuration which can configure follower's recruitment settings after recruitment as needed. Even the dialogue itself can be enabled and disabled with the manual.
The framework also supports mount ownership and includes a complimentary mount system as well. Once enabling the mount-related dialogue on a party member type, you can give any mounts to your party members. You can order party members to mount and dismount or this can be performed automatically by riding your own mount.
Although there are many configurations, the framework aims to be simple to use. With default settings, the party system functions more or less the same as the default follower system. Now that you have a better understanding of MFF, you are ready to get started with installing MFF.
Read on for more useful info.
- Full Mod Page (No Spoiler Sections) -
Spoiler:
- Compatibility -
MFF was designed to be compatible with any other follower framework: the default system, AFT, EFF, UFO, FLP, NFF, UMF, and so on. I'm told it's also compatible with MHiYH I & II. MFF's compatibility means you can use these types of mods together without issue. MFF doesn't modify follower mods and instead exists outside of them. When a compatibility patch exists, any follower system mods can be made to use MFF. I don't create such patches, it is left up to other authors.
This is because the original follower system was not edited, it is untouched by MFF. This mod is 100% standalone other than a couple of exceptions...
There are three edits made to the game...
1. Bug Fixing: edited conditions on "dialogue-blocking caused by trespassing" to fail on current followers and current MFF followers. (Overrides a similar fix in USSEP)
2. Distance between followers is lowered to 50 to allow groups of followers to clump up instead of marching single file which the default value caused.
3. Teammate weapon draw distance was lowered to produce a more localized affect when the player draws their weapons.
4. Non-speaking races, except the horse race, have been edited to allow for dialogue with the player for use as a follower.
All of the changes listed above override or are overridden by similar changes in other mods, depending on the load order. Load MFF before anything you don't want to mess or after if you want MFF to work entirely as intended.
Lastly, followers that are managed by MFF still join the same PlayerFollowerFaction as the original, this is good or bad for compatibility, depending on the author.
- Supported Voices -
Supported voice-types allow for voiced follower dialogue. This is still a work-in-progress. So far there are 48 supported voice-types, these are the most common found in-game and across mods. Unsupported voice-types are known as "incompatible voice-types" and so they will respond with silent dialogue responses as needed. So even if a character has an incompatible voice-type, they can still be recruited and commanded through dialogue.
Below is a comprehensive list of supported voice types to compare with follower mods that share such details:
Common voice-types:
femaleargonian
femalechild
femalecommander
femalecommoner
femalecondescending
femalecoward
femaledarkelf
femaleelfhaughty
femaleeventoned
femalekhajiit
femalenord
femaleoldgrumpy
femaleoldkindly
femaleorc
femaleshrill
femalesultry
femaleyoungeager
maleargonian
malebandit
malebrute
malechild
malecommander
malecommoner
malecommoneraccented
malecondescending
malecoward
maledarkelf
maledrunk
maleelfhaughty
maleeventoned
maleeventonedaccented
maleforsworn
maleguard
malekhajiit
malenord
malenordcommander
maleoldgrumpy
maleoldkindly
maleorc
maleslycynical
malesoldier
malewarlock
maleyoungeager
dlc1femalevampire
dlc1malevampire
dlc2femaledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcynical
- Relevant & Useful Mods that go with MFF -
Simple Outfit Manger: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/15211
The Placidus Curatorius Unit: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/34485
- Starting the mod -
You must manually start this mod for the first time, there is no .SEQ file for dialogue. Multiple Followers Framework automatically adds the Manual of Configuration to your inventory when you install and enable the mod. Reading the manual will open a custom mod menu built to house MFF and mods for MFF. The Manual of Configuration was created to support both PC and Xbox players with one menu.
When choosing an option in the book, it's important to give time for the menu system to cycle back to being visible to allow scripts to finish execution. Failure to do so could cause errors. Once the framework is started, it will remain active until shut down manually from within the Help menu. Shutting down the framework is recommended before uninstalling the mod because it's designed to reverse as many changes as possible to prep for this event.
- Full Default Settings List -
Manual of Configuration settings:
MoC Power: Disabled
MoC Title: Manual of Configuration
MoC Weight: 512
PoC Title: Power of Configuration
Framework settings:
Party Limit: 512
Recruit Cost: 100
Wait Limit: Enabled
Wait Time: 72 hours
Friendly-fire Perk: Disabled
Give-Mount Safety: Enabled
Auto-Mount: Enabled (On)
Auto-Rest: Disabled
Auto-Rest proximity: 2048
Recruitment-only settings:
Follower type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: Default Hidden Bow
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Animal type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weapony: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
NPC type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Dialogue settings:
Follower type:
Recruit: Enabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Enabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Animal type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
NPC type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Child type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follower: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Control Shout settings:
Recruitment:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Disabled
NPC: Disabled
Child: Disabled
Party type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Target Mount-up: Disabled
Target Dismount: Disabled
Target Calm: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Group Mount-up: Disabled
Group Dismount: Disabled
Group Calm: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Mount type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Thrall Spell:
Active: Disabled
Dominate Mind mana cost: 10
Relinquish mana cost: 10
Safety: Enabled
Targeting:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Enabled
NPC: Enabled
Child: Disabled
- Manual and Power of Configuration -
Manual of Configuration:
The Manual of Configuration is a mod menu compatible with both PC and Xbox. The Manual of Configuration is contained within a book in found in your inventory to configure MFF and mods for MFF. It also comes with a settings menu to configure the book itself. The book can even be converted into a power if preferred. The MFF menu option stores all of the settings, dialogue switches, control shouts, thrall spell, and help menus used to configure MFF. A lot of the options found within the menus are only applied on recruitment of a party member and will say so if true.
Power of Configuration:
The Power of Configuration is to be used in tandem with the Manual of Configuration. This power allows you to configure the settings on party members that are applied during recruitment. This allows you to correct mistakes or change things dynamically as required. The only difference with the manual is that any changes must be finalized from the main menu of the power by hitting accept. Choosing cancel will stop the power from going through with the configuration if you change your mind half-way through the configuration process.
- Party System -
Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary party management system.
This is a distinct system built-in to the core of MFF. There is no connections to the original follower system. The entire frontend of the party system can be disabled at runtime and the backend remains accessible via Papyrus for mod development. The party system also makes use of hooks to facilitate mod development.
The system can be configured to allow for the recruitment of any NPC in the game, including enemies in the midst of combat, either through dialogue, control shouts, or the Thrall Spell. Upon recruitment of any character, the party system stores information about that character's original mental state and will return them to this original mental state upon dismissal. Exercise caution when recruiting, because changes to their mental state from quests and the like during their membership will be undone upon dismissal and they might not behave as expected as a result. Enemies recruited into the party system revert to enemies once dismissed.
All party members use a new AI package for following mechanics and can be told to hold position or to relax here on or off their mount. Relaxing allows a party member to sandbox in the location, meaning they interact with the area around them. You can leave them in this state "sandboxing" forever by configuring the follower-wait-time limits beforehand. You can also manually correct their waiting state afterwards using the Power of Configuration.
The AI package is base on a custom template that can be modified to change the AI package used by followers to better facilitate mod development.
* Party members on foot will stop closer to you than mounts and mounted party members.
- Mount System -
Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary mount system.
DISCLAIMER: All dialogues for the mount system start disabled. This is because giving mounts to followers is permanent!
There are 512 new factions (1 for each follower) that were added for member ownership purposes to facilitate mod development. In this case it's used for mounts.
Acquiring Mounts:
Any mount, even mounts previously owned, can be given to a party member. To give your follower a mount, first you must enable the dialogue with the Manual of Configuration. After enabling the dialogue for mounts, you can talk to a follower about their mount where you will find the option to give them a mount. Selecting this option automatically equips a mount-gifting power that target mounts with. The first mount hit with the power (unrelenting force projectile) will be given to the party member you were speaking with. Party members can own an unlimited number of mounts and will usually ride the closest one.
Due to limitations, when giving a mount to a party member, the mount actually belongs to that party member identification within the framework. This means that dismissing that party member will free their identification and any party member who takes it over through recruitment will also take over the mounts. As explained previously, you can re-gift anyone's mount to a different party member as needed.
Riding Support:
Within Multiple Followers Framework AI package is support for two different modes of travel. When a party member owns a horse (either by default or with the horse gifting power), they can be told to mount/dismount from it manually or automatically along with the player.
* Mounts and mounted party members will stop further from you than party members who are on foot.
- Control Shouts -
There are two categories of control shouts: shouts to control party members, and shouts to control mounts (including the player's mount).
There are also three styles: target, group, and global.
Control shouts are to be used in place of dialogue to recruit & dismiss groups of followers & mounts or order them to wait & follow.
Targeted control shouts are based upon the Unrelenting Shout projectile collision model, any eligible characters that are hit by the shout are affected.
Group control shouts look similar to targeted control shouts but instead they hit eligible characters around the player in a wide radius.
Global control shouts work by accessing the arrays within MFF and will apply to all currently recruited party members around Skyrim.
- Thrall Spell -
The Thrall Spell is back! And with it comes a few changes. Most importantly, resurrection.
Thrall Spell can be configured in multiple ways. By default the Thrall Spell works on Followers, Animals, NPCs and is resisted by children. You can also configure the cost of the spells from a range of free or very costly. You can also use the Thrall Spell to resurrect the dead (except for NPCs that start as dead which is a game mechanic). Resurrection comes with a warning because doing so will permanently delete equipped weapons from the deceased character. You can simply take their weapons before resurrection to stop this from happening. Their clothing and inventory otherwise remains as it was.
- Guide-book -
Found within the Help menu is an in-game guide-book with 80 pages which can even be stored within a bookshelf in the game. This guide-book is mostly meant for Xbox players who lack the depth of a Nexus mod page, but also for fun. It does contain a lot of information about each setting within the manual as well as some notation and even examples of how the mod can be used in a roleplay sense with the use of lore-friendly short stories. As an added bonus, the guide-book also contains handmade images that are relevant to each chapter.
The help menu can add as many guide-books as needed to your inventory.
- Q&A -
Follower, Animal, NPC, Child?
The original follower system identifies two types of characters: the follower, and the animal follower.
Every basic follower in the game and most follower mods were created based on these two categories. Other characters in the game and within other mods aren't added to the appropriate factions and are also not given a mental state appropriate for use as a follower, so they are not detected by the original follower system. Such as an enemy who is able to be or already is aggressive toward the player and is not suitable as a follower.
MFF can detect four different categories: the follower, the animal follower, the NPC (non-followers), and children.
The biggest difference is with how recruitment is handled. The mental state of characters is stored upon recruitment and retrieved upon dismissal. This allows for the use of any character in the game or found in mods to be used to as a follower.
* You shouldn't recruit an important NPC during a quest or you might get stuck in the quest.
Why can I give Animal Followers hidden weapons and mounts? They won't use it.
This is not recommended, the option was only included for experimenting/mod developers.
What's this about infighting?
With the original follower system, followers getting in a fight with followers isn't usually possible but it's quite possible when using multi-follower mods. As the player, you can accidentally hit a follower a few times before they turn hostile and dismiss themselves while fighting you. Infighting controls allow you to determine how each follower reacts in these situations, you can make them very passive or have them remain your follower and still fight with you. If you do opt to have infighting occur, you can also use an MFF-specific calming power to tell followers to stand down.
What is a hidden bow?
The original follower system provides followers with a hidden bow because the game is usually full of dragon fights. The bow is hidden from the follower's inventory screen and is removed upon dismissal.
MFF adds 3 different types of hidden bows and hidden bows can also be removed. The hidden bow can be added automatically on recruitment or manually with dialogue and is removed automatically with dismissal or manually with dialogue.
What is a scripted cloak spell? Is the mod script heavy?
I would classify MFF as "not script heavy" based on my research but keep reading to learn more.
When people say a mod is script heavy, it's a quick way of saying that the mod greatly impacts the performance of the script engine for some reason specific to the mod's design. The mod can still be useful and work well enough for your needs, it's simply an important consideration when downloading multiple script heavy mods. There are limits to what the system can handle.
There are 2 major culprits in the script heavy scenario that are best avoided by mod developers where possible: Polling/update loops, and cloak spells.
For a deeper dive into this topic, check this out: https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/4fgf3n/looking_for_deep_explanation_of_the_cloaking/
There is only one script in MFF that can be considered script heavy by these standards and you can disable the script, it's found on the recruitment cloak.
The invisible recruitment cloak for MFF is an auto re-casted spell. The range is pretty small, about 8 feet in front of you. The cloak is re-casted every 0.76 seconds and lasts for about 1 second on any targets in range. The cloak checks for pre-follower factions on nearby characters: PotentialFollowerFaction and PlayerAnimalFaction, and can be configured to detect any other character after the first two. Detected characters are removed from previous factions (to avoid dialogue conditions) and/or added to the MFF_PotentialFollowerFaction so they can pick-up the recruitment dialogue from MFF. Upon exiting the scripted recruit-dialogue cloak, these temporary changes are reverted to their original state.
The recruitment cloak is enabled by default because it's quite light for something that can be considered a script heavy feature.
- Known Issues -
+ When restarting the framework, followers freeze until restarting has completed. This is intentional and disables AI related issues caused by restarting.
+ Follower dialogue on animals, who are technically NPCs IE. Chickens, suddenly stops working. I'm still looking into the fix for this, reload or use the control powers.
+ Followers stand around for a while or get stuck performing an in-game cinematic. Generally caused by the scene overriding AI. Exit the scene and Summon if needed.
+ Followers are really slow at mounting their horse/mount at times. The mounting action just works this way by default and seems to be related to navigation pathing.
+ Paying off bounty alters friendly-fire reaction (not caused by MFF)
+ femalecoward voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ maleslycynical voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ NPC type (non-followers) inconsistently auto-vanish after waiting for 2 in-game weeks
- Extensive Mod Support -
Multiple Followers framework is a mod developer's resource framework that contains an entire quest with scripts for the purpose of programming hooks.
All of these hooks assist with synchronization and can streamline feature development. Mods can easily hook onto actions taken by the framework and capture any associated data in the process. Mod authors can easily discover what character is being recruited or dismissed and do something in response, or they can restart their mod automatically when MFF is restarted, before or after MFF.
The front-end of all complimentary in-game systems can be disabled, resulting in a multi-follower framework base to use with your own fully-featured follower system. The framework also includes ownership factions for 512 characters and an AI package template used by each character stored within the framework. The source code is included within the .bsa file so you can easily unpack the whole system and learn how it works with the Creation Kit.
Show
- Compatibility -
MFF was designed to be compatible with any other follower framework: the default system, AFT, EFF, UFO, FLP, NFF, UMF, and so on. I'm told it's also compatible with MHiYH I & II. MFF's compatibility means you can use these types of mods together without issue. MFF doesn't modify follower mods and instead exists outside of them. When a compatibility patch exists, any follower system mods can be made to use MFF. I don't create such patches, it is left up to other authors.
This is because the original follower system was not edited, it is untouched by MFF. This mod is 100% standalone other than a couple of exceptions...
There are three edits made to the game...
1. Bug Fixing: edited conditions on "dialogue-blocking caused by trespassing" to fail on current followers and current MFF followers. (Overrides a similar fix in USSEP)
2. Distance between followers is lowered to 50 to allow groups of followers to clump up instead of marching single file which the default value caused.
3. Teammate weapon draw distance was lowered to produce a more localized affect when the player draws their weapons.
4. Non-speaking races, except the horse race, have been edited to allow for dialogue with the player for use as a follower.
All of the changes listed above override or are overridden by similar changes in other mods, depending on the load order. Load MFF before anything you don't want to mess or after if you want MFF to work entirely as intended.
Lastly, followers that are managed by MFF still join the same PlayerFollowerFaction as the original, this is good or bad for compatibility, depending on the author.
- Supported Voices -
Supported voice-types allow for voiced follower dialogue. This is still a work-in-progress. So far there are 48 supported voice-types, these are the most common found in-game and across mods. Unsupported voice-types are known as "incompatible voice-types" and so they will respond with silent dialogue responses as needed. So even if a character has an incompatible voice-type, they can still be recruited and commanded through dialogue.
Below is a comprehensive list of supported voice types to compare with follower mods that share such details:
Common voice-types:
femaleargonian
femalechild
femalecommander
femalecommoner
femalecondescending
femalecoward
femaledarkelf
femaleelfhaughty
femaleeventoned
femalekhajiit
femalenord
femaleoldgrumpy
femaleoldkindly
femaleorc
femaleshrill
femalesultry
femaleyoungeager
maleargonian
malebandit
malebrute
malechild
malecommander
malecommoner
malecommoneraccented
malecondescending
malecoward
maledarkelf
maledrunk
maleelfhaughty
maleeventoned
maleeventonedaccented
maleforsworn
maleguard
malekhajiit
malenord
malenordcommander
maleoldgrumpy
maleoldkindly
maleorc
maleslycynical
malesoldier
malewarlock
maleyoungeager
dlc1femalevampire
dlc1malevampire
dlc2femaledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcynical
- Relevant & Useful Mods that go with MFF -
Simple Outfit Manger: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/15211
The Placidus Curatorius Unit: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/34485
- Starting the mod -
You must manually start this mod for the first time, there is no .SEQ file for dialogue. Multiple Followers Framework automatically adds the Manual of Configuration to your inventory when you install and enable the mod. Reading the manual will open a custom mod menu built to house MFF and mods for MFF. The Manual of Configuration was created to support both PC and Xbox players with one menu.
When choosing an option in the book, it's important to give time for the menu system to cycle back to being visible to allow scripts to finish execution. Failure to do so could cause errors. Once the framework is started, it will remain active until shut down manually from within the Help menu. Shutting down the framework is recommended before uninstalling the mod because it's designed to reverse as many changes as possible to prep for this event.
- Full Default Settings List -
Manual of Configuration settings:
MoC Power: Disabled
MoC Title: Manual of Configuration
MoC Weight: 512
PoC Title: Power of Configuration
Framework settings:
Party Limit: 512
Recruit Cost: 100
Wait Limit: Enabled
Wait Time: 72 hours
Friendly-fire Perk: Disabled
Give-Mount Safety: Enabled
Auto-Mount: Enabled (On)
Auto-Rest: Disabled
Auto-Rest proximity: 2048
Recruitment-only settings:
Follower type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: Default Hidden Bow
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Animal type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weapony: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
NPC type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Dialogue settings:
Follower type:
Recruit: Enabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Enabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Animal type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
NPC type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Child type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follower: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Control Shout settings:
Recruitment:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Disabled
NPC: Disabled
Child: Disabled
Party type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Target Mount-up: Disabled
Target Dismount: Disabled
Target Calm: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Group Mount-up: Disabled
Group Dismount: Disabled
Group Calm: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Mount type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Thrall Spell:
Active: Disabled
Dominate Mind mana cost: 10
Relinquish mana cost: 10
Safety: Enabled
Targeting:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Enabled
NPC: Enabled
Child: Disabled
- Manual and Power of Configuration -
Manual of Configuration:
The Manual of Configuration is a mod menu compatible with both PC and Xbox. The Manual of Configuration is contained within a book in found in your inventory to configure MFF and mods for MFF. It also comes with a settings menu to configure the book itself. The book can even be converted into a power if preferred. The MFF menu option stores all of the settings, dialogue switches, control shouts, thrall spell, and help menus used to configure MFF. A lot of the options found within the menus are only applied on recruitment of a party member and will say so if true.
Power of Configuration:
The Power of Configuration is to be used in tandem with the Manual of Configuration. This power allows you to configure the settings on party members that are applied during recruitment. This allows you to correct mistakes or change things dynamically as required. The only difference with the manual is that any changes must be finalized from the main menu of the power by hitting accept. Choosing cancel will stop the power from going through with the configuration if you change your mind half-way through the configuration process.
- Party System -
Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary party management system.
This is a distinct system built-in to the core of MFF. There is no connections to the original follower system. The entire frontend of the party system can be disabled at runtime and the backend remains accessible via Papyrus for mod development. The party system also makes use of hooks to facilitate mod development.
The system can be configured to allow for the recruitment of any NPC in the game, including enemies in the midst of combat, either through dialogue, control shouts, or the Thrall Spell. Upon recruitment of any character, the party system stores information about that character's original mental state and will return them to this original mental state upon dismissal. Exercise caution when recruiting, because changes to their mental state from quests and the like during their membership will be undone upon dismissal and they might not behave as expected as a result. Enemies recruited into the party system revert to enemies once dismissed.
All party members use a new AI package for following mechanics and can be told to hold position or to relax here on or off their mount. Relaxing allows a party member to sandbox in the location, meaning they interact with the area around them. You can leave them in this state "sandboxing" forever by configuring the follower-wait-time limits beforehand. You can also manually correct their waiting state afterwards using the Power of Configuration.
The AI package is base on a custom template that can be modified to change the AI package used by followers to better facilitate mod development.
* Party members on foot will stop closer to you than mounts and mounted party members.
- Mount System -
Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary mount system.
DISCLAIMER: All dialogues for the mount system start disabled. This is because giving mounts to followers is permanent!
There are 512 new factions (1 for each follower) that were added for member ownership purposes to facilitate mod development. In this case it's used for mounts.
Acquiring Mounts:
Any mount, even mounts previously owned, can be given to a party member. To give your follower a mount, first you must enable the dialogue with the Manual of Configuration. After enabling the dialogue for mounts, you can talk to a follower about their mount where you will find the option to give them a mount. Selecting this option automatically equips a mount-gifting power that target mounts with. The first mount hit with the power (unrelenting force projectile) will be given to the party member you were speaking with. Party members can own an unlimited number of mounts and will usually ride the closest one.
Due to limitations, when giving a mount to a party member, the mount actually belongs to that party member identification within the framework. This means that dismissing that party member will free their identification and any party member who takes it over through recruitment will also take over the mounts. As explained previously, you can re-gift anyone's mount to a different party member as needed.
Riding Support:
Within Multiple Followers Framework AI package is support for two different modes of travel. When a party member owns a horse (either by default or with the horse gifting power), they can be told to mount/dismount from it manually or automatically along with the player.
* Mounts and mounted party members will stop further from you than party members who are on foot.
- Control Shouts -
There are two categories of control shouts: shouts to control party members, and shouts to control mounts (including the player's mount).
There are also three styles: target, group, and global.
Control shouts are to be used in place of dialogue to recruit & dismiss groups of followers & mounts or order them to wait & follow.
Targeted control shouts are based upon the Unrelenting Shout projectile collision model, any eligible characters that are hit by the shout are affected.
Group control shouts look similar to targeted control shouts but instead they hit eligible characters around the player in a wide radius.
Global control shouts work by accessing the arrays within MFF and will apply to all currently recruited party members around Skyrim.
- Thrall Spell -
The Thrall Spell is back! And with it comes a few changes. Most importantly, resurrection.
Thrall Spell can be configured in multiple ways. By default the Thrall Spell works on Followers, Animals, NPCs and is resisted by children. You can also configure the cost of the spells from a range of free or very costly. You can also use the Thrall Spell to resurrect the dead (except for NPCs that start as dead which is a game mechanic). Resurrection comes with a warning because doing so will permanently delete equipped weapons from the deceased character. You can simply take their weapons before resurrection to stop this from happening. Their clothing and inventory otherwise remains as it was.
- Guide-book -
Found within the Help menu is an in-game guide-book with 80 pages which can even be stored within a bookshelf in the game. This guide-book is mostly meant for Xbox players who lack the depth of a Nexus mod page, but also for fun. It does contain a lot of information about each setting within the manual as well as some notation and even examples of how the mod can be used in a roleplay sense with the use of lore-friendly short stories. As an added bonus, the guide-book also contains handmade images that are relevant to each chapter.
The help menu can add as many guide-books as needed to your inventory.
- Q&A -
Follower, Animal, NPC, Child?
The original follower system identifies two types of characters: the follower, and the animal follower.
Every basic follower in the game and most follower mods were created based on these two categories. Other characters in the game and within other mods aren't added to the appropriate factions and are also not given a mental state appropriate for use as a follower, so they are not detected by the original follower system. Such as an enemy who is able to be or already is aggressive toward the player and is not suitable as a follower.
MFF can detect four different categories: the follower, the animal follower, the NPC (non-followers), and children.
The biggest difference is with how recruitment is handled. The mental state of characters is stored upon recruitment and retrieved upon dismissal. This allows for the use of any character in the game or found in mods to be used to as a follower.
* You shouldn't recruit an important NPC during a quest or you might get stuck in the quest.
Why can I give Animal Followers hidden weapons and mounts? They won't use it.
This is not recommended, the option was only included for experimenting/mod developers.
What's this about infighting?
With the original follower system, followers getting in a fight with followers isn't usually possible but it's quite possible when using multi-follower mods. As the player, you can accidentally hit a follower a few times before they turn hostile and dismiss themselves while fighting you. Infighting controls allow you to determine how each follower reacts in these situations, you can make them very passive or have them remain your follower and still fight with you. If you do opt to have infighting occur, you can also use an MFF-specific calming power to tell followers to stand down.
What is a hidden bow?
The original follower system provides followers with a hidden bow because the game is usually full of dragon fights. The bow is hidden from the follower's inventory screen and is removed upon dismissal.
MFF adds 3 different types of hidden bows and hidden bows can also be removed. The hidden bow can be added automatically on recruitment or manually with dialogue and is removed automatically with dismissal or manually with dialogue.
What is a scripted cloak spell? Is the mod script heavy?
I would classify MFF as "not script heavy" based on my research but keep reading to learn more.
When people say a mod is script heavy, it's a quick way of saying that the mod greatly impacts the performance of the script engine for some reason specific to the mod's design. The mod can still be useful and work well enough for your needs, it's simply an important consideration when downloading multiple script heavy mods. There are limits to what the system can handle.
There are 2 major culprits in the script heavy scenario that are best avoided by mod developers where possible: Polling/update loops, and cloak spells.
For a deeper dive into this topic, check this out: https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/4fgf3n/looking_for_deep_explanation_of_the_cloaking/
There is only one script in MFF that can be considered script heavy by these standards and you can disable the script, it's found on the recruitment cloak.
The invisible recruitment cloak for MFF is an auto re-casted spell. The range is pretty small, about 8 feet in front of you. The cloak is re-casted every 0.76 seconds and lasts for about 1 second on any targets in range. The cloak checks for pre-follower factions on nearby characters: PotentialFollowerFaction and PlayerAnimalFaction, and can be configured to detect any other character after the first two. Detected characters are removed from previous factions (to avoid dialogue conditions) and/or added to the MFF_PotentialFollowerFaction so they can pick-up the recruitment dialogue from MFF. Upon exiting the scripted recruit-dialogue cloak, these temporary changes are reverted to their original state.
The recruitment cloak is enabled by default because it's quite light for something that can be considered a script heavy feature.
- Known Issues -
+ When restarting the framework, followers freeze until restarting has completed. This is intentional and disables AI related issues caused by restarting.
+ Follower dialogue on animals, who are technically NPCs IE. Chickens, suddenly stops working. I'm still looking into the fix for this, reload or use the control powers.
+ Followers stand around for a while or get stuck performing an in-game cinematic. Generally caused by the scene overriding AI. Exit the scene and Summon if needed.
+ Followers are really slow at mounting their horse/mount at times. The mounting action just works this way by default and seems to be related to navigation pathing.
+ Paying off bounty alters friendly-fire reaction (not caused by MFF)
+ femalecoward voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ maleslycynical voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ NPC type (non-followers) inconsistently auto-vanish after waiting for 2 in-game weeks
- Extensive Mod Support -
Multiple Followers framework is a mod developer's resource framework that contains an entire quest with scripts for the purpose of programming hooks.
All of these hooks assist with synchronization and can streamline feature development. Mods can easily hook onto actions taken by the framework and capture any associated data in the process. Mod authors can easily discover what character is being recruited or dismissed and do something in response, or they can restart their mod automatically when MFF is restarted, before or after MFF.
The front-end of all complimentary in-game systems can be disabled, resulting in a multi-follower framework base to use with your own fully-featured follower system. The framework also includes ownership factions for 512 characters and an AI package template used by each character stored within the framework. The source code is included within the .bsa file so you can easily unpack the whole system and learn how it works with the Creation Kit.
- Compatibility -
Spoiler:
MFF was designed to be compatible with any other follower framework: the default system, AFT, EFF, UFO, FLP, NFF, UMF, and so on. I'm told it's also compatible with MHiYH I & II. MFF's compatibility means you can use these types of mods together without issue. MFF doesn't modify follower mods and instead exists outside of them. When a compatibility patch exists, any follower system mods can be made to use MFF. I don't create such patches, it is left up to other authors.
This is because the original follower system was not edited, it is untouched by MFF. This mod is 100% standalone other than a couple of exceptions...
There are three edits made to the game...
1. Bug Fixing: edited conditions on "dialogue-blocking caused by trespassing" to fail on current followers and current MFF followers. (Overrides a similar fix in USSEP)
2. Distance between followers is lowered to 50 to allow groups of followers to clump up instead of marching single file which the default value caused.
3. Teammate weapon draw distance was lowered to produce a more localized affect when the player draws their weapons.
4. Non-speaking races, except the horse race, have been edited to allow for dialogue with the player for use as a follower.
All of the changes listed above override or are overridden by similar changes in other mods, depending on the load order. Load MFF before anything you don't want to mess or after if you want MFF to work entirely as intended.
Lastly, followers that are managed by MFF still join the same PlayerFollowerFaction as the original, this is good or bad for compatibility, depending on the author.
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MFF was designed to be compatible with any other follower framework: the default system, AFT, EFF, UFO, FLP, NFF, UMF, and so on. I'm told it's also compatible with MHiYH I & II. MFF's compatibility means you can use these types of mods together without issue. MFF doesn't modify follower mods and instead exists outside of them. When a compatibility patch exists, any follower system mods can be made to use MFF. I don't create such patches, it is left up to other authors.
This is because the original follower system was not edited, it is untouched by MFF. This mod is 100% standalone other than a couple of exceptions...
There are three edits made to the game...
1. Bug Fixing: edited conditions on "dialogue-blocking caused by trespassing" to fail on current followers and current MFF followers. (Overrides a similar fix in USSEP)
2. Distance between followers is lowered to 50 to allow groups of followers to clump up instead of marching single file which the default value caused.
3. Teammate weapon draw distance was lowered to produce a more localized affect when the player draws their weapons.
4. Non-speaking races, except the horse race, have been edited to allow for dialogue with the player for use as a follower.
All of the changes listed above override or are overridden by similar changes in other mods, depending on the load order. Load MFF before anything you don't want to mess or after if you want MFF to work entirely as intended.
Lastly, followers that are managed by MFF still join the same PlayerFollowerFaction as the original, this is good or bad for compatibility, depending on the author.
- Supported Voices -
Spoiler:
Supported voice-types allow for voiced follower dialogue. This is still a work-in-progress. So far there are 48 supported voice-types, these are the most common found in-game and across mods. Unsupported voice-types are known as "incompatible voice-types" and so they will respond with silent dialogue responses as needed. So even if a character has an incompatible voice-type, they can still be recruited and commanded through dialogue.
Below is a comprehensive list of supported voice types to compare with follower mods that share such details:
Common voice-types:
femaleargonian
femalechild
femalecommander
femalecommoner
femalecondescending
femalecoward
femaledarkelf
femaleelfhaughty
femaleeventoned
femalekhajiit
femalenord
femaleoldgrumpy
femaleoldkindly
femaleorc
femaleshrill
femalesultry
femaleyoungeager
maleargonian
malebandit
malebrute
malechild
malecommander
malecommoner
malecommoneraccented
malecondescending
malecoward
maledarkelf
maledrunk
maleelfhaughty
maleeventoned
maleeventonedaccented
maleforsworn
maleguard
malekhajiit
malenord
malenordcommander
maleoldgrumpy
maleoldkindly
maleorc
maleslycynical
malesoldier
malewarlock
maleyoungeager
dlc1femalevampire
dlc1malevampire
dlc2femaledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcynical
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Supported voice-types allow for voiced follower dialogue. This is still a work-in-progress. So far there are 48 supported voice-types, these are the most common found in-game and across mods. Unsupported voice-types are known as "incompatible voice-types" and so they will respond with silent dialogue responses as needed. So even if a character has an incompatible voice-type, they can still be recruited and commanded through dialogue.
Below is a comprehensive list of supported voice types to compare with follower mods that share such details:
Common voice-types:
femaleargonian
femalechild
femalecommander
femalecommoner
femalecondescending
femalecoward
femaledarkelf
femaleelfhaughty
femaleeventoned
femalekhajiit
femalenord
femaleoldgrumpy
femaleoldkindly
femaleorc
femaleshrill
femalesultry
femaleyoungeager
maleargonian
malebandit
malebrute
malechild
malecommander
malecommoner
malecommoneraccented
malecondescending
malecoward
maledarkelf
maledrunk
maleelfhaughty
maleeventoned
maleeventonedaccented
maleforsworn
maleguard
malekhajiit
malenord
malenordcommander
maleoldgrumpy
maleoldkindly
maleorc
maleslycynical
malesoldier
malewarlock
maleyoungeager
dlc1femalevampire
dlc1malevampire
dlc2femaledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcommoner
dlc2maledarkelfcynical
- Relevant & Useful Mods that go with MFF -
Spoiler:
Simple Outfit Manger: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/15211
The Placidus Curatorius Unit: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/34485
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Simple Outfit Manger: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/15211
The Placidus Curatorius Unit: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/34485
- Starting the mod -
Spoiler:
You must manually start this mod for the first time, there is no .SEQ file for dialogue. Multiple Followers Framework automatically adds the Manual of Configuration to your inventory when you install and enable the mod. Reading the manual will open a custom mod menu built to house MFF and mods for MFF. The Manual of Configuration was created to support both PC and Xbox players with one menu.
When choosing an option in the book, it's important to give time for the menu system to cycle back to being visible to allow scripts to finish execution. Failure to do so could cause errors. Once the framework is started, it will remain active until shut down manually from within the Help menu. Shutting down the framework is recommended before uninstalling the mod because it's designed to reverse as many changes as possible to prep for this event.
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You must manually start this mod for the first time, there is no .SEQ file for dialogue. Multiple Followers Framework automatically adds the Manual of Configuration to your inventory when you install and enable the mod. Reading the manual will open a custom mod menu built to house MFF and mods for MFF. The Manual of Configuration was created to support both PC and Xbox players with one menu.
When choosing an option in the book, it's important to give time for the menu system to cycle back to being visible to allow scripts to finish execution. Failure to do so could cause errors. Once the framework is started, it will remain active until shut down manually from within the Help menu. Shutting down the framework is recommended before uninstalling the mod because it's designed to reverse as many changes as possible to prep for this event.
- Full Default Settings List -
Spoiler:
Manual of Configuration settings:
MoC Power: Disabled
MoC Title: Manual of Configuration
MoC Weight: 512
PoC Title: Power of Configuration
Framework settings:
Party Limit: 512
Recruit Cost: 100
Wait Limit: Enabled
Wait Time: 72 hours
Friendly-fire Perk: Disabled
Give-Mount Safety: Enabled
Auto-Mount: Enabled (On)
Auto-Rest: Disabled
Auto-Rest proximity: 2048
Recruitment-only settings:
Follower type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: Default Hidden Bow
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Animal type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weapony: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
NPC type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Dialogue settings:
Follower type:
Recruit: Enabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Enabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Animal type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
NPC type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Child type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follower: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Control Shout settings:
Recruitment:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Disabled
NPC: Disabled
Child: Disabled
Party type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Target Mount-up: Disabled
Target Dismount: Disabled
Target Calm: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Group Mount-up: Disabled
Group Dismount: Disabled
Group Calm: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Mount type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Thrall Spell:
Active: Disabled
Dominate Mind mana cost: 10
Relinquish mana cost: 10
Safety: Enabled
Targeting:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Enabled
NPC: Enabled
Child: Disabled
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Manual of Configuration settings:
MoC Power: Disabled
MoC Title: Manual of Configuration
MoC Weight: 512
PoC Title: Power of Configuration
Framework settings:
Party Limit: 512
Recruit Cost: 100
Wait Limit: Enabled
Wait Time: 72 hours
Friendly-fire Perk: Disabled
Give-Mount Safety: Enabled
Auto-Mount: Enabled (On)
Auto-Rest: Disabled
Auto-Rest proximity: 2048
Recruitment-only settings:
Follower type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: Default Hidden Bow
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Animal type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weapony: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
NPC type:
Aggression: Default
Assistance: Default
Confidence: Default
Hostility to Player: Disabled
Hostility to Party: Disabled
Damage: Default
Melee Weaponry: None
Ranged Weaponry: None
Protection: Default
Light Foot Perk: Disabled
Muffled Movement Perk: Disabled
Silence Perk: Disabled
Stealth Perk: Disabled
Dialogue settings:
Follower type:
Recruit: Enabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Enabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Animal type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
NPC type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follow: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Child type:
Recruit: Disabled
Dismiss: Enabled
Trade: Disabled
Favor: Enabled
Follower: Enabled
Hold Position: Enabled
Relax Here: Enabled
Mount: Disabled
Control Shout settings:
Recruitment:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Disabled
NPC: Disabled
Child: Disabled
Party type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Target Mount-up: Disabled
Target Dismount: Disabled
Target Calm: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Group Mount-up: Disabled
Group Dismount: Disabled
Group Calm: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Mount type:
Target Recruit: Disabled
Target Dismiss: Disabled
Target Follow: Disabled
Target Hold Position: Disabled
Target Relax Here: Disabled
Group Recruit: Disabled
Group Dismiss: Disabled
Group Follow: Disabled
Group Hold Position: Disabled
Group Relax Here: Disabled
Global Rally: Disabled
Thrall Spell:
Active: Disabled
Dominate Mind mana cost: 10
Relinquish mana cost: 10
Safety: Enabled
Targeting:
Follower: Enabled
Animal: Enabled
NPC: Enabled
Child: Disabled
- Manual and Power of Configuration -
Spoiler:
Manual of Configuration:
The Manual of Configuration is a mod menu compatible with both PC and Xbox. The Manual of Configuration is contained within a book in found in your inventory to configure MFF and mods for MFF. It also comes with a settings menu to configure the book itself. The book can even be converted into a power if preferred. The MFF menu option stores all of the settings, dialogue switches, control shouts, thrall spell, and help menus used to configure MFF. A lot of the options found within the menus are only applied on recruitment of a party member and will say so if true.
Power of Configuration:
The Power of Configuration is to be used in tandem with the Manual of Configuration. This power allows you to configure the settings on party members that are applied during recruitment. This allows you to correct mistakes or change things dynamically as required. The only difference with the manual is that any changes must be finalized from the main menu of the power by hitting accept. Choosing cancel will stop the power from going through with the configuration if you change your mind half-way through the configuration process.
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Manual of Configuration:
The Manual of Configuration is a mod menu compatible with both PC and Xbox. The Manual of Configuration is contained within a book in found in your inventory to configure MFF and mods for MFF. It also comes with a settings menu to configure the book itself. The book can even be converted into a power if preferred. The MFF menu option stores all of the settings, dialogue switches, control shouts, thrall spell, and help menus used to configure MFF. A lot of the options found within the menus are only applied on recruitment of a party member and will say so if true.
Power of Configuration:
The Power of Configuration is to be used in tandem with the Manual of Configuration. This power allows you to configure the settings on party members that are applied during recruitment. This allows you to correct mistakes or change things dynamically as required. The only difference with the manual is that any changes must be finalized from the main menu of the power by hitting accept. Choosing cancel will stop the power from going through with the configuration if you change your mind half-way through the configuration process.
- Party System -
Spoiler:
Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary party management system.
This is a distinct system built-in to the core of MFF. There is no connections to the original follower system. The entire frontend of the party system can be disabled at runtime and the backend remains accessible via Papyrus for mod development. The party system also makes use of hooks to facilitate mod development.
The system can be configured to allow for the recruitment of any NPC in the game, including enemies in the midst of combat, either through dialogue, control shouts, or the Thrall Spell. Upon recruitment of any character, the party system stores information about that character's original mental state and will return them to this original mental state upon dismissal. Exercise caution when recruiting, because changes to their mental state from quests and the like during their membership will be undone upon dismissal and they might not behave as expected as a result. Enemies recruited into the party system revert to enemies once dismissed.
All party members use a new AI package for following mechanics and can be told to hold position or to relax here on or off their mount. Relaxing allows a party member to sandbox in the location, meaning they interact with the area around them. You can leave them in this state "sandboxing" forever by configuring the follower-wait-time limits beforehand. You can also manually correct their waiting state afterwards using the Power of Configuration.
The AI package is base on a custom template that can be modified to change the AI package used by followers to better facilitate mod development.
* Party members on foot will stop closer to you than mounts and mounted party members.
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Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary party management system.
This is a distinct system built-in to the core of MFF. There is no connections to the original follower system. The entire frontend of the party system can be disabled at runtime and the backend remains accessible via Papyrus for mod development. The party system also makes use of hooks to facilitate mod development.
The system can be configured to allow for the recruitment of any NPC in the game, including enemies in the midst of combat, either through dialogue, control shouts, or the Thrall Spell. Upon recruitment of any character, the party system stores information about that character's original mental state and will return them to this original mental state upon dismissal. Exercise caution when recruiting, because changes to their mental state from quests and the like during their membership will be undone upon dismissal and they might not behave as expected as a result. Enemies recruited into the party system revert to enemies once dismissed.
All party members use a new AI package for following mechanics and can be told to hold position or to relax here on or off their mount. Relaxing allows a party member to sandbox in the location, meaning they interact with the area around them. You can leave them in this state "sandboxing" forever by configuring the follower-wait-time limits beforehand. You can also manually correct their waiting state afterwards using the Power of Configuration.
The AI package is base on a custom template that can be modified to change the AI package used by followers to better facilitate mod development.
* Party members on foot will stop closer to you than mounts and mounted party members.
- Mount System -
Spoiler:
Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary mount system.
DISCLAIMER: All dialogues for the mount system start disabled. This is because giving mounts to followers is permanent!
There are 512 new factions (1 for each follower) that were added for member ownership purposes to facilitate mod development. In this case it's used for mounts.
Acquiring Mounts:
Any mount, even mounts previously owned, can be given to a party member. To give your follower a mount, first you must enable the dialogue with the Manual of Configuration. After enabling the dialogue for mounts, you can talk to a follower about their mount where you will find the option to give them a mount. Selecting this option automatically equips a mount-gifting power that target mounts with. The first mount hit with the power (unrelenting force projectile) will be given to the party member you were speaking with. Party members can own an unlimited number of mounts and will usually ride the closest one.
Due to limitations, when giving a mount to a party member, the mount actually belongs to that party member identification within the framework. This means that dismissing that party member will free their identification and any party member who takes it over through recruitment will also take over the mounts. As explained previously, you can re-gift anyone's mount to a different party member as needed.
Riding Support:
Within Multiple Followers Framework AI package is support for two different modes of travel. When a party member owns a horse (either by default or with the horse gifting power), they can be told to mount/dismount from it manually or automatically along with the player.
* Mounts and mounted party members will stop further from you than party members who are on foot.
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Multiple Followers Framework includes a complimentary mount system.
DISCLAIMER: All dialogues for the mount system start disabled. This is because giving mounts to followers is permanent!
There are 512 new factions (1 for each follower) that were added for member ownership purposes to facilitate mod development. In this case it's used for mounts.
Acquiring Mounts:
Any mount, even mounts previously owned, can be given to a party member. To give your follower a mount, first you must enable the dialogue with the Manual of Configuration. After enabling the dialogue for mounts, you can talk to a follower about their mount where you will find the option to give them a mount. Selecting this option automatically equips a mount-gifting power that target mounts with. The first mount hit with the power (unrelenting force projectile) will be given to the party member you were speaking with. Party members can own an unlimited number of mounts and will usually ride the closest one.
Due to limitations, when giving a mount to a party member, the mount actually belongs to that party member identification within the framework. This means that dismissing that party member will free their identification and any party member who takes it over through recruitment will also take over the mounts. As explained previously, you can re-gift anyone's mount to a different party member as needed.
Riding Support:
Within Multiple Followers Framework AI package is support for two different modes of travel. When a party member owns a horse (either by default or with the horse gifting power), they can be told to mount/dismount from it manually or automatically along with the player.
* Mounts and mounted party members will stop further from you than party members who are on foot.
- Control Shouts -
Spoiler:
There are two categories of control shouts: shouts to control party members, and shouts to control mounts (including the player's mount).
There are also three styles: target, group, and global.
Control shouts are to be used in place of dialogue to recruit & dismiss groups of followers & mounts or order them to wait & follow.
Targeted control shouts are based upon the Unrelenting Shout projectile collision model, any eligible characters that are hit by the shout are affected.
Group control shouts look similar to targeted control shouts but instead they hit eligible characters around the player in a wide radius.
Global control shouts work by accessing the arrays within MFF and will apply to all currently recruited party members around Skyrim.
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There are two categories of control shouts: shouts to control party members, and shouts to control mounts (including the player's mount).
There are also three styles: target, group, and global.
Control shouts are to be used in place of dialogue to recruit & dismiss groups of followers & mounts or order them to wait & follow.
Targeted control shouts are based upon the Unrelenting Shout projectile collision model, any eligible characters that are hit by the shout are affected.
Group control shouts look similar to targeted control shouts but instead they hit eligible characters around the player in a wide radius.
Global control shouts work by accessing the arrays within MFF and will apply to all currently recruited party members around Skyrim.
- Thrall Spell -
Spoiler:
The Thrall Spell is back! And with it comes a few changes. Most importantly, resurrection.
Thrall Spell can be configured in multiple ways. By default the Thrall Spell works on Followers, Animals, NPCs and is resisted by children. You can also configure the cost of the spells from a range of free or very costly. You can also use the Thrall Spell to resurrect the dead (except for NPCs that start as dead which is a game mechanic). Resurrection comes with a warning because doing so will permanently delete equipped weapons from the deceased character. You can simply take their weapons before resurrection to stop this from happening. Their clothing and inventory otherwise remains as it was.
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The Thrall Spell is back! And with it comes a few changes. Most importantly, resurrection.
Thrall Spell can be configured in multiple ways. By default the Thrall Spell works on Followers, Animals, NPCs and is resisted by children. You can also configure the cost of the spells from a range of free or very costly. You can also use the Thrall Spell to resurrect the dead (except for NPCs that start as dead which is a game mechanic). Resurrection comes with a warning because doing so will permanently delete equipped weapons from the deceased character. You can simply take their weapons before resurrection to stop this from happening. Their clothing and inventory otherwise remains as it was.
- Guide-book -
Spoiler:
Found within the Help menu is an in-game guide-book with 80 pages which can even be stored within a bookshelf in the game. This guide-book is mostly meant for Xbox players who lack the depth of a Nexus mod page, but also for fun. It does contain a lot of information about each setting within the manual as well as some notation and even examples of how the mod can be used in a roleplay sense with the use of lore-friendly short stories. As an added bonus, the guide-book also contains handmade images that are relevant to each chapter.
The help menu can add as many guide-books as needed to your inventory.
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Found within the Help menu is an in-game guide-book with 80 pages which can even be stored within a bookshelf in the game. This guide-book is mostly meant for Xbox players who lack the depth of a Nexus mod page, but also for fun. It does contain a lot of information about each setting within the manual as well as some notation and even examples of how the mod can be used in a roleplay sense with the use of lore-friendly short stories. As an added bonus, the guide-book also contains handmade images that are relevant to each chapter.
The help menu can add as many guide-books as needed to your inventory.
- Q&A -
Spoiler:
Follower, Animal, NPC, Child?
The original follower system identifies two types of characters: the follower, and the animal follower.
Every basic follower in the game and most follower mods were created based on these two categories. Other characters in the game and within other mods aren't added to the appropriate factions and are also not given a mental state appropriate for use as a follower, so they are not detected by the original follower system. Such as an enemy who is able to be or already is aggressive toward the player and is not suitable as a follower.
MFF can detect four different categories: the follower, the animal follower, the NPC (non-followers), and children.
The biggest difference is with how recruitment is handled. The mental state of characters is stored upon recruitment and retrieved upon dismissal. This allows for the use of any character in the game or found in mods to be used to as a follower.
* You shouldn't recruit an important NPC during a quest or you might get stuck in the quest.
Why can I give Animal Followers hidden weapons and mounts? They won't use it.
This is not recommended, the option was only included for experimenting/mod developers.
What's this about infighting?
With the original follower system, followers getting in a fight with followers isn't usually possible but it's quite possible when using multi-follower mods. As the player, you can accidentally hit a follower a few times before they turn hostile and dismiss themselves while fighting you. Infighting controls allow you to determine how each follower reacts in these situations, you can make them very passive or have them remain your follower and still fight with you. If you do opt to have infighting occur, you can also use an MFF-specific calming power to tell followers to stand down.
What is a hidden bow?
The original follower system provides followers with a hidden bow because the game is usually full of dragon fights. The bow is hidden from the follower's inventory screen and is removed upon dismissal.
MFF adds 3 different types of hidden bows and hidden bows can also be removed. The hidden bow can be added automatically on recruitment or manually with dialogue and is removed automatically with dismissal or manually with dialogue.
What is a scripted cloak spell? Is the mod script heavy?
I would classify MFF as "not script heavy" based on my research but keep reading to learn more.
When people say a mod is script heavy, it's a quick way of saying that the mod greatly impacts the performance of the script engine for some reason specific to the mod's design. The mod can still be useful and work well enough for your needs, it's simply an important consideration when downloading multiple script heavy mods. There are limits to what the system can handle.
There are 2 major culprits in the script heavy scenario that are best avoided by mod developers where possible: Polling/update loops, and cloak spells.
For a deeper dive into this topic, check this out: https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/4fgf3n/looking_for_deep_explanation_of_the_cloaking/
There is only one script in MFF that can be considered script heavy by these standards and you can disable the script, it's found on the recruitment cloak.
The invisible recruitment cloak for MFF is an auto re-casted spell. The range is pretty small, about 8 feet in front of you. The cloak is re-casted every 0.76 seconds and lasts for about 1 second on any targets in range. The cloak checks for pre-follower factions on nearby characters: PotentialFollowerFaction and PlayerAnimalFaction, and can be configured to detect any other character after the first two. Detected characters are removed from previous factions (to avoid dialogue conditions) and/or added to the MFF_PotentialFollowerFaction so they can pick-up the recruitment dialogue from MFF. Upon exiting the scripted recruit-dialogue cloak, these temporary changes are reverted to their original state.
The recruitment cloak is enabled by default because it's quite light for something that can be considered a script heavy feature.
Show
Follower, Animal, NPC, Child?
The original follower system identifies two types of characters: the follower, and the animal follower.
Every basic follower in the game and most follower mods were created based on these two categories. Other characters in the game and within other mods aren't added to the appropriate factions and are also not given a mental state appropriate for use as a follower, so they are not detected by the original follower system. Such as an enemy who is able to be or already is aggressive toward the player and is not suitable as a follower.
MFF can detect four different categories: the follower, the animal follower, the NPC (non-followers), and children.
The biggest difference is with how recruitment is handled. The mental state of characters is stored upon recruitment and retrieved upon dismissal. This allows for the use of any character in the game or found in mods to be used to as a follower.
* You shouldn't recruit an important NPC during a quest or you might get stuck in the quest.
Why can I give Animal Followers hidden weapons and mounts? They won't use it.
This is not recommended, the option was only included for experimenting/mod developers.
What's this about infighting?
With the original follower system, followers getting in a fight with followers isn't usually possible but it's quite possible when using multi-follower mods. As the player, you can accidentally hit a follower a few times before they turn hostile and dismiss themselves while fighting you. Infighting controls allow you to determine how each follower reacts in these situations, you can make them very passive or have them remain your follower and still fight with you. If you do opt to have infighting occur, you can also use an MFF-specific calming power to tell followers to stand down.
What is a hidden bow?
The original follower system provides followers with a hidden bow because the game is usually full of dragon fights. The bow is hidden from the follower's inventory screen and is removed upon dismissal.
MFF adds 3 different types of hidden bows and hidden bows can also be removed. The hidden bow can be added automatically on recruitment or manually with dialogue and is removed automatically with dismissal or manually with dialogue.
What is a scripted cloak spell? Is the mod script heavy?
I would classify MFF as "not script heavy" based on my research but keep reading to learn more.
When people say a mod is script heavy, it's a quick way of saying that the mod greatly impacts the performance of the script engine for some reason specific to the mod's design. The mod can still be useful and work well enough for your needs, it's simply an important consideration when downloading multiple script heavy mods. There are limits to what the system can handle.
There are 2 major culprits in the script heavy scenario that are best avoided by mod developers where possible: Polling/update loops, and cloak spells.
For a deeper dive into this topic, check this out: https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comments/4fgf3n/looking_for_deep_explanation_of_the_cloaking/
There is only one script in MFF that can be considered script heavy by these standards and you can disable the script, it's found on the recruitment cloak.
The invisible recruitment cloak for MFF is an auto re-casted spell. The range is pretty small, about 8 feet in front of you. The cloak is re-casted every 0.76 seconds and lasts for about 1 second on any targets in range. The cloak checks for pre-follower factions on nearby characters: PotentialFollowerFaction and PlayerAnimalFaction, and can be configured to detect any other character after the first two. Detected characters are removed from previous factions (to avoid dialogue conditions) and/or added to the MFF_PotentialFollowerFaction so they can pick-up the recruitment dialogue from MFF. Upon exiting the scripted recruit-dialogue cloak, these temporary changes are reverted to their original state.
The recruitment cloak is enabled by default because it's quite light for something that can be considered a script heavy feature.
- Known Issues -
Spoiler:
+ When restarting the framework, followers freeze until restarting has completed. This is intentional and disables AI related issues caused by restarting.
+ Follower dialogue on animals, who are technically NPCs IE. Chickens, suddenly stops working. I'm still looking into the fix for this, reload or use the control powers.
+ Followers stand around for a while or get stuck performing an in-game cinematic. Generally caused by the scene overriding AI. Exit the scene and Summon if needed.
+ Followers are really slow at mounting their horse/mount at times. The mounting action just works this way by default and seems to be related to navigation pathing.
+ Paying off bounty alters friendly-fire reaction (not caused by MFF)
+ femalecoward voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ maleslycynical voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ NPC type (non-followers) inconsistently auto-vanish after waiting for 2 in-game weeks
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+ When restarting the framework, followers freeze until restarting has completed. This is intentional and disables AI related issues caused by restarting.
+ Follower dialogue on animals, who are technically NPCs IE. Chickens, suddenly stops working. I'm still looking into the fix for this, reload or use the control powers.
+ Followers stand around for a while or get stuck performing an in-game cinematic. Generally caused by the scene overriding AI. Exit the scene and Summon if needed.
+ Followers are really slow at mounting their horse/mount at times. The mounting action just works this way by default and seems to be related to navigation pathing.
+ Paying off bounty alters friendly-fire reaction (not caused by MFF)
+ femalecoward voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ maleslycynical voice is inconsistent (Bethesda made this voice with 2 different VA)
+ NPC type (non-followers) inconsistently auto-vanish after waiting for 2 in-game weeks
- Extensive Mod Support -
Spoiler:
Multiple Followers framework is a mod developer's resource framework that contains an entire quest with scripts for the purpose of programming hooks.
All of these hooks assist with synchronization and can streamline feature development. Mods can easily hook onto actions taken by the framework and capture any associated data in the process. Mod authors can easily discover what character is being recruited or dismissed and do something in response, or they can restart their mod automatically when MFF is restarted, before or after MFF.
The front-end of all complimentary in-game systems can be disabled, resulting in a multi-follower framework base to use with your own fully-featured follower system. The framework also includes ownership factions for 512 characters and an AI package template used by each character stored within the framework. The source code is included within the .bsa file so you can easily unpack the whole system and learn how it works with the Creation Kit.
Show
Multiple Followers framework is a mod developer's resource framework that contains an entire quest with scripts for the purpose of programming hooks.
All of these hooks assist with synchronization and can streamline feature development. Mods can easily hook onto actions taken by the framework and capture any associated data in the process. Mod authors can easily discover what character is being recruited or dismissed and do something in response, or they can restart their mod automatically when MFF is restarted, before or after MFF.
The front-end of all complimentary in-game systems can be disabled, resulting in a multi-follower framework base to use with your own fully-featured follower system. The framework also includes ownership factions for 512 characters and an AI package template used by each character stored within the framework. The source code is included within the .bsa file so you can easily unpack the whole system and learn how it works with the Creation Kit.
- Donation -
Do you like where this project is going? You can offer support through the Patreon tipping jar.
https://www.patreon.com/indiecision