FULLY COMPATIBLE WITH 4.04


Overview

This mod restores five cut perks(yellow branch skills). Like all of the other perks in game these skills only have 1 level that can be obtained and don't require spending a certain number of ability points to unlock. If you have my Restored Content - Yellow Mutagens mod then these skills will synergize with yellow mutagens just like the vanilla yellow skills. The fifth row of yellow skill tree was left empty so these skills can slot in without any compatibility problem inducing redswf file edits!


Background

Four of these skills were originally intended to be included in the Hearts of Stone expansion and one skill was cut from the base game. The skill cut from the base game, Predatory Instinct, is actually still fully implemented in the game. It just needed to be uncommented from xml definition file and switched to a more appropriate icon and it was good to go. The four skills cut from Hearts of Stone have a stranger story that was shared with me by user Flipper444. Apparently, HoS was supposed to come with 10 additional perks but this was cut down to five. One of these made it back in as part of Blood and Wine but the rest were lost. The strings which revealed their existence and functionality could be found in Patch 1.10 but were shortly removed. Two of these cut perks had all of their code removed from the game's scripts while the other two only had vague references left. The latter two also had their icons leftover in the Blood and Wine files indicating that CDPR might have tried to bring them back there but didn't. In either case I had to re-implement them with my own code which fortunately worked well.


Mechanics

The five included skills and their functionality are as follows

Predatory Instinct("Hot Hacker") - Increases the chance of dismemberment by 10% and increases the chance of Incineration when using Igni by 10%.

Does exactly what it says when equipped. This skill was still fully implement in the code and just needed its xml entry uncommented to work. I have no clue why they just left this one there while the tried so hard to scrub the other four from existence. It's back now though. Icon was chosen from the many leftover perk icons in the game.


Huntsman - Doubles the effect of the currently equipped trophy.

Does exactly what it says when equipped. I think this skill was quite interesting and was disappointed that they cut it and didn't bring it back. The only remnants of this one were two declarations of the horseManager and a trophy variable in the PlayerAbilityManager. No comments on it were made by the devs in the old commented version of thegame scripts. Restoring this one required understanding the mess that is/was the horse inventory. They had originally intended for Roach to have her own inventory instead of Geralt having access to the Stash. Then they decided to bring the Stash back and just repurposed the horse inventory system they already made for it without changing its name. Whenever you equip a horse item it actually gets transferred to the stash and then put in an "Equipped" state where it gets hidden from the stash view. Fortunately, I was able to finally get the horse manager to report the currently equipped trophy so its effect could be doubled. Icon was leftover in Blood and Wine files for some reason.


Devastating Blows - Strong attacks consume 1 Adrenaline Point. Each blow struck reduces the target's Stamina to 0.

This one requires some explanation. The enemy stamina system in the vanilla game broken and unfinished. Some enemies use and regenerate stamina while others do not. Further discussion of the vanilla enemy stamina system is included in a section below. As of version 1.1 of this mod, a solution developed by user LtJoker allows this perk to be useful on enemies with non-functional stamina system. Using this skill on one of these enemies will drain its stamina to zero for one second after which its stamina will be restored back to maximum. During this period of zero stamina, the enemy will not attack giving Geralt a window to get an extra hit in. Restoring this one seemed overwhelming at first as the combat system scripts are huge mess. Fortunately, this one was actually partially left implemented in the npc.ws script and had a bool declared in attackAction.ws. Dev comments in the commented version of the scripts made this possible to find. Finishing the implementation in the damage processor made this one good to go. Icon was leftover in Blood and Wine files for some reason.


Balanced Diet - Vitality Regeneration after eating is increased by +100%.

This skill was probably an early version of the Dumplings runeword. The runeword increases the amount of vitality regenerated via eating by 100% by doubling the duration of that the effect stays and not increasing the rate of vitality regeneration itself. This skill achieves the same but instead increases the rate of regeneration by 100% giving you the same overall health regeneration in half the time. Changes were made in wellFed.ws to achieve this. The icon was chosen from the many leftover perk icons in the game.

NOTE: The following section is no longer relevant as of the next-gen update since CDPR fixed the healing bug. I have left it here for reference.
When trying to add this perk I realized what a lot of other user have know for a while, the vitality regen system in Witcher 3 messed up. To put it short, Geralt has a permanent 1 point/second vitality regen that's almost always running. The idea of the food and other healing items is to add on to this base regen rate for a certain duration. The problem is the system is bugged and food items will also buff this auto regen on top adding their own regen effect which effectively doubles their effect. Having this skill on top of that would give you x3 the foods intended effect! I went ahead and decided to fix this bug for food items only so anyone having this mod installed will notice a reduced a effect from food items as they will only buff the auto vitality regen now. If you are a user of Ghost Mode or another overhaul mode then you don't have to worry about this as those mods have this problem fixed universally for all regen items.


Meticulous Maintenance - Enhanced Armor and Enhanced Weapons buffs now last +100% longer.

Does exactly what it says when equipped. This skill had no remnant in the current scripts and required a new function in repairObjectEnhancement.ws to be implemented. Icon was chosen from the many leftover perk icons in the game.


Enemy Stamina

Note: As of version 1.1 of this mod, a workaround for the broken stamina regen on vanilla enemies has be developed by user LtJoker and is included. I am however leaving my write-up below on enemy stamina regen up for reference.

In the vanilla game not all enemies have a fully working stamina system implemented. Based on my experience testing this mod, some enemies such as large flying ones(like the Griffen or Basilisk) do use their stamina to perform special attack on Geralt. Using the Devastating Blows skill against them will take their stamina down to zero preventing them from using their special attacks but it will soon regen back. On the other hand some enemies(such as the Beserker among many others) do not have a working stamina system at all(despite still having the bar over their head). Devastating Blows skill will take their stamina down to zero but it won't regen back since they don't have stamina regen implemented. It ultimately won't mean anything for these enemies since they don't use stamina to perform any of their attacks. Lastly, there are the enemies which have a stamina system partially implemented(mainly humanoid enemies). These enemies don't use stamina for their attacks but upon reaching zero stamina when the Devastating Blows ability is used against them they will stop attacking the player(stamina controls enemy aggressiveness for these enemy types). Their stamina doesn't regenerate until they are hit so they will be stuck in a non aggressive state until Geralt hits them again. These quirks make the usefulness of the Devastating Blows skills questionable for vanilla players however it might still be useful against large enemies with a work stamina system. Some overhaul mod players may find this skill much more useful if their particular overhaul fixes the enemy stamina system for all enemies.


Compatibility

As of Version 2.0 I have finally figured out how to make this mod a DLC mod! That means that all xmls should now be conflict free leaving only scripts that have to merged with script merger. Merging this mod with Immersive Cam may be tricky but it is fully compatible. If you are using Perks Always Active - Next-Gen then be sure to install the version of that mod that is supposed to be compatible with this one. This mod is currently not compatible with any mod that changes buffs from time based to charge based.


Installation

Unpack 'dlcabilitiesrestore' to your 'dlc' folder. Unpack 'modAbilitiesRestore' into your 'Mods' folder. If there isn't one, create it. Resolve any conflicts using guidance in the above section.

IMPORTANT: If you are updating to version 2.0 from an older version make sure to DELETE the old version before installing the new one!


Uninstallation

Doing a clean uninstall of this mod is unfortunately a little tricky due to how CDPR attaches skill definitions to your save file. First, go ahead and delete 'modAbilitiesRestore' from your Mods folder and delete all merges that involve this mod using your Script Merger. If you just do this step then skill will continue to remain in your perk tree but will be unusable and indicate point investment of 0/-1. To fix this issue you will have to use a special version of the cleardevelop console command created by wghost81. You can find this special version called 'modCleardevelop on its Nexus page.

https://www.nexusmods.com/witcher3/mods/3633

Go ahead and install modCleardevelop and merge using script merger. Then, start the game with AbilitiesRestored, both mod and dlc, uninstalled and open the developer console(you can find out how to enable it without any mods by searching on google). Type in cleardevelop and your Geralt will be reset. All your progress and inventory items will remain but your skills points will be reset and returned to you. You should no longer see any remnants of the new perks added by this mod in your yellow perk tree. You can go ahead and uninstall modCleardevelop now if you would like.


Translations

User Arkwulf was kinda enough to dig through the strings from Patch 1.10 and extract all the CDPR localized strings belonging to these cut skills. This mod should now feature it's full original localization made by CDPR's localization team. Previously this mod was human translated and I will continue to include the section below to thank those who contributed to that.

   English (en)    --  written by CDPR(taken from 1.10 strings)
   Arabic (ar)    -- Google Translate
   Portuguese (br)    -- Google Translate
   Simplified Chinese (cn)    -- CatalystJ and ffff1014
   Czech (cz)    -- Google Translate
   German (de)    --SorceressJ or see WileCoyote's translation
   Spanish (es and esMX)    -- Google Translate
   French (fr)    -- Google Translate
   Hungarian (hu)    -- Google Translate
   Italian (it)    -- Google Translate
   Japanese (jp)    -- Google Translate
   Korean (kr)    -- Google Translate
   Polish (pl)    -- See Macrophobic's translation
   Russian (ru)    -- Arkwulf
   Turkish (tr)    -- Google Translate
   Traditional Chinese (zh)    -- Google Translate

Future

There are actually about a dozen or so left over perk icons in base game files however there is no indication in the strings or dev comments on what they were for. If I can find out what they were for I can try restoring them by writing their code from scratch. A redswf mod will however probably be required to accommodate them on the user interface as with this mod there or no additional room left in the yellow tree.

Special Thanks

Special thanks for Aeltoth for all of his advice in editing the games scripts. Thank you to MerseyRockoff for all his helping testing this with Ghost
Mode. I would also like to thank Flipper444 for bringing these skills to my attention. They would have almost certainly been lost to time if hadn't brought them up as their strings only every appeared in Patch 1.10 and were the removed. I would also like to thank LtJoker for providing a fix for the broken stamina regen on some vanilla enemies andallow me to include that here with this mod. Thank you to ElementaryLewis for creating an providing a patch script for FCR3 for the original version of this mod. This patch was used to help develop this port for next-gen as FCR3 is now standard. Thank you to Arkwulf for digging up the original localization for these skills in the 1.10 patch files. Additional thanks to the BiA collaborators for testing this mod.

My Other Mods

Old Witcher 3 (1.32):
Novigrad Crest in Journal Restored
Restored Content - Shrines of Verna
Restored Content - Ciri's Fate
Restored Content - Old Mutagen Icons
Restored Content - Additional Perks
Experimental Restored Content - Ice Skating
Smooth Camera Zoom for Base Game Signs and Posters
Restored Content - Yellow Mutagens

Next-Gen Witcher 3(4.0):
Smooth Camera Zoom for Base Game Signs and Posters
Restored Content - Old Mutagen Icons
Restored Content - Yellow Mutagens - Next-Gen
Restored Content - Additional Perks - Next-Gen
Experimental Restored Content - Ice Skating - Next-Gen
Restored Content - Ciri's Fate - Next-Gen
Restored Content - Woodland Spirit Aftermath
Restored Content - Shrines of Verna - Next-Gen
Restored Content - Usable Whetstones


Other mods I have contributed to or collaborated on:

Restored Content - Buffed Monster
Restored Content - Buffed Monster - Next-Gen
Restored Content - Food
Healthy Food
Brothers In Arms-TW3 Bug Fix and Restored Content Collection(includes all my location fixes mods as well as some other things I've contributed)
Brothers In Arms- TW3 Bug Fix and Restored Content Collection - Next-Gen
DLC - Events
DLC - Events - Next-Gen