Weapon Damage Improvements (WDI) modifies the damage and usefulness of many of the weapons from the vanilla game that were a bit underwhelming. WDI also makes some changes to turret durability as well as the Demolition Expert perk.


Description

Most changes made by this mod will be useful both to you, your allies, and your enemies.


Weapons

When changing the receiver of a ballistic firearm, it will no longer affect its damage output. Instead, the damage is based on the ammunition that's used. The only way to change the damage output of a ballistic weapon is to convert it to use another type of ammunition – if such a feature is available for the weapon in question. The various types of ammunition do the following amounts of damage:

• 10mm Round
  Damage: 25

• .38 Round
  Damage: 21

• .45 Round
  Damage: 44

• .308 Round
  Damage: 74

• .50 Caliber
  Damage: 140

• .44 Round
  Damage: 60

• 5.56 Round
  Damage: 44

• Shotgun Shell
  Damage: 100

• 5mm Round
  Damage: 16

• .45-70 Caliber
  Damage: 88

• 7.62 Round
  Damage: 70

This system does not apply to any of the other weapon types, for example energy or melee weapons. Instead, just like in the vanilla game, they can be upgraded normally, although there are many instances of them being more powerful with WDI than they were in the vanilla game.

The base damage of the following weapons has approximately been doubled compared to the vanilla game:

• Gatling Laser
• Flamer
• Gamma Gun (Radiation Exposure)
• Alien Blaster
• Grognak's Axe
  

The base damage of the following weapons has been increased by about 60% compared to the vanilla game:

• Institute Laser Gun
• Machete
• Chinese Officer Sword
• Shishkebab
• Assaultron Blade
  

The base damage of the following weapons has been increased by about 35% compared to the vanilla game:

• Laser Gun
• Laser Musket
• Plasma Gun
• Cryolator
• Deathclaw Gauntlet
  

In addition to the weapons listed above having received increased damage, some have also received bonus effects and other little changes, making them more fun, useful and unique than before. That includes the following:

• The Walking Cane can be used to disarm opponents. This will be difficult at first, but becomes significantly more effective with the Local Leader perk.
  

• The Pole Hook can be used to disarm opponents. This effect is set to 35% and does not depend on any perks.
  

• The Boxing Glove can be used to knock out (paralyze) people in combat, and they will stay down for a long time. Your ability to perform this is highly dependant on the Iron First perk.
  

• The Rolling Pin can be used to knock out (paralyze) various people and creatures, but only for a little while. This effect is set to 45% and does not depend on any perks.
  

• The Flamer, Molotov Cocktail and Plasma Thrower can be used to demoralize opponents in combat, which will cause them to flee. This is very effective against most people, animals and creatures, but things like robots and people in Power Armor will not budge that easily.
  

• The Alien Blaster is a very powerful weapon when used with the Alien Blaster Rounds. It can still be converted to use Fusion Cells, but doing so will have a severe impact on both its damage output and ammo capacity, making the weapon far less viable once the original ammunition runs out.
  

• The Deathclaw Gauntlet can be used to disarm opponents. This will be difficult at first, but becomes significantly more effective with the Wasteland Whisperer perk. The weapon can still be modified to add an extra claw, but the crafting now requires a Deathclaw Hand instead of just normal bones. When attaching this, the weapon's weight now increases by 50%, rather than 20% like in the vanilla game. This is very logical, since the third (and slightly larger) claw would make up approximately one third of the weapon's total weight. Furthermore, the bonus damage has been reduced from 25% down to 10%, but since the disarm effect has been made a core part of this weapon, the third claw will instead enable the weapon to inflict bleeding.
  

• The Commie Whacker can have some peculiar effects on people when used by someone who filled their pockets with a ton of old money.
  

Turrets

A defensive turret made out of metal should be able to take a beating without immediately getting destroyed. Having it explode after just a single bullet or two is definitely not a viable option. It doesn't make sense that people wearing cloth armour should survive getting hit by more bullets than metal-shielded defensive turrets do. With WDI, the "tripod" type turrets will typically have higher durability than the smaller "bubble" type turrets, but both will be better than they were in the vanilla game.

In addition to having increased durability, turrets also do much more damage. For low-end turrets, the damage is now a little more than double their damage in the vanilla game, and for high-end turrets, the damage is slightly below double their damage in the vanilla game. Unlike handheld weapons, the turrets don't follow the aforementioned ammunition damage system, due to technical and balance-related reasons, but shotgun turrets should do damage comparable to the handheld shotguns.

Notice: If you are playing on an older save or at least being in a location where turrets have already been discovered, the new durability improvements may or may not take effect immediately. Their increased damage however, should work without any form of issues.


Other

With the Demolition Expert rank 2, you no longer gain a throwing arc when throwing a grenade. Having a green arrow pop up and show the trajectory is not only extremely immersion breaking, but it can become an overly convenient feature that can harm actual player skill.


Balancing

Due to the steep increase in difficulty this mod introduces to the game, it is for the most part not directed towards average players, but rather to those who want the most hardcore survival experience possible in Fallout. All in all, DO NOT download this mod unless you want the game to become significantly harder.

For users who want additional damage in Survival Mode, FallExD provides an increased amount of damage inflicted to and by the player.

This mod is very much open to feedback and ideas for additional modifications to be made – as long as they make sense and are focused around Survival Mode.

As of version 1.1, the mod includes more weapon types. Shotguns have received additional increases to base damage, in order to make up for their extremely poor range.

As of version 1.2, shotgun damage has been nerfed from 400% back to 200%, similar to how it worked in version 1.0. Other than that, this version is identical to version 1.1, and as such, users who prefer more shotgun damage can stick to the previous version.

As of version 1.3, the Radiation Exposure damage from the Gamma Gun has been doubled.

As of version 1.4, Grognak's Axe does double damage, in order to compensate for its otherwise complete lack of upgradability.

As of version 1.5, the mod now includes the Machete, Chinese Officer Sword and Shishkebab.

As of version 1.6, the mod now includes the Pipe Gun and Deathclaw Gauntlet. Slight changes were also made to how the Deathclaw Gauntlet can be modified.

As of version 1.7, the mod now includes the 10mm Pistol. In addition, the Pipe Gun and Deathclaw Gauntlet also received higher damage. The Submachine Gun was fixed to have its base damage exactly doubled compared to the vanilla game (at 26) rather the the modded value in previous versions, of 25.

As of version 1.8, the mod now includes the Alien Blaster, Lever Action Rifle, Assault Rifle, Combat Rifle, Radium Rifle, Handmade Rifle, Laser Gun, Laser Musket, Plasma Gun, Cryolator, Assaultron Blade, Walking Cane, Boxing Glove, Rolling Pin, Pole Hook and Molotov Cocktail. The Institute Laser Gun also had its base damage increased again, and was thus changed from the ambiguous "slightly more" and put into the proper category of weapons where the base damage was increased by about 60%. This means that it should remain slightly more powerful than the Laser Gun under most circumstances. Finally, this version introduces a bunch of bonus effects for weapons, aside from their increased damage, making them more fun and viable. This includes more changes to the Deathclaw Gauntlet, which received further modifications and mechanics in this version.

As of version 2.0, the Bull Barrel for the .44 Pistol is slightly heavier than the other barrels.

As of version 2.1, the mod now includes the Commie Whacker. In addition, a new system for consistent ballistic damage with different receivers has been implemented, along with other small fixes and adjustments.


Installation

Using Vortex is the recommended method.

Due to user requests, any new update for any mod in this series, uploaded to the Nexus from August 14, 2021 and onward, should no longer follow the system where the same ESP file would be given a new name for each new version. Instead, new version names should be given to the ZIP file in which the other files are contained. For mods in the collection where one or more ESP files have a name that ends with a version number, they will be renamed back to their original names in their next update, and the plan is to not rename published ESP files after that point.


Requirements

For the main part of the mod, all you need is Fallout 4.

For the optional DLC files, you need their respective DLCs.


Compatibility

WDI should be compatible with most mods, unless they make edits to any of the same assets.


Mod Collection

This mod is part of a larger collection of mods aiming to make Survival Mode more difficult and immersive. They come packaged as separate mods in order to allow the player to choose which they want or not, but using them all together should hopefully bring out the best and the most immersive survival experience possible. The mods come in three main categories:

Survival

The mods in this category are aiming to make the game significantly more difficult and immersive in every way they can.

• HSC
  The primary mod of the entire series, HSC is the foundation for an extremely challenging survival experience. This mod focuses on making food, water and sleep management much more essential, as well as making sure things such as carry weight, healing, medical services and damage scaling are far more realistic and challenging than ever before. All the other mods in this series are designed or updated according to the standards set by HSC. For anyone looking to make their survival experience harder and only were to download a single mod in this collection, this should be it.

• HSC-SB
  Where the main HSC mod made sure to make food, water and sleep more important, HSC-SB makes these things more difficult to obtain. Introducing massive challenges in what you are able to build, along with a system for using tools in the construction of more or less everything, settlement building should be far less of a convenient safe zone than it was before.

• Falltoxin
  This mod significantly increases the danger and potency of most types of poison in the game, both from wild creatures as well as the syringes you are able to use. Falltoxin also comes with an optional secondary set of mods known as the Food Add-on, which increases radiation in food, and introduces simple mechanics related to food poisoning and nutrition. These mechanics add a third layer to the food aspect, and are of course designed with HSC and HSC-SB in mind.

• FallMisc
  Enabling the player to craft a bunch of tools and other useful items, this mod adds a lot of convenience. Aside from essential items, many other mods in the series will be referencing FallMisc, rather than having each mod introducing its own set of craftable tools. Both HSC-SB and Falltoxin rely a lot on FallMisc for this purpose.

• WDI
  This mod increases the damage for a variety of weapons from the vanilla game. It also introduces a few new special mechanics for a few weapons, making them more unique than before. Additionally, WDI increases the durability of most turrets. All in all, most of the changes made by this mod will be useful both to you, your allies, and your enemies.

• PADI
  This mod increases the defensive capabilities of Power Armor, a few other types of armor, and gas masks. It also introduces a variety of new features related to Power Armor, making it more detailed and functional. All in all, most of the changes made by this mod will be useful both to you, your allies, and your enemies.

Environmental

The mods in this category are focusing on making various obstacles in the world more difficult to overcome.

• Fallfall
  This mod increases falling damage to a much more realistic level. This should encourage the player to navigate the world in a more careful manner. Not only does it make the world feel bigger, but it also adds a lot to the immersion when you actually have a reason to properly navigate the environments, rather than carelessly performing super dangerous jumps and stunts without as much as a scratch.

• Swimout
  This mod significantly increases the amount of radiation in the various bodies of water across the game. This should encourage the player to actually stay on land, use bridges to cross rivers, and avoid falling into the water.

• FallExD
  This mod increases incoming and outgoing damage for the player in Survival Mode. This makes the game's combat far more dangerous.

• Fallock
  This mod makes lockpicking significantly more difficult, and gives lockpicks some weight. All in all, this should encourage the player to be more careful when picking locks.

Perks

The mods in this category are focusing on improving the variety of features some perks can have, but they also exist as a way to prevent certain perks from completely undermining gameplay mechanics intended to make the game more challenging.

• SPI
  A mod that improves a bunch of perks that had too little or too weak usage throughout the game. This mod comes in three editions, where the two others could be considered for everyone, but the HSC Edition is particularly designed for being used alongside HSC.

• Night Stalker
  A mod that adds new functionality to the Night Person and Cannibal perks. Aside from being fun and allowing for a new playstyle, this mod introduces a small new penalty to cannibalism.

• TWG
  A mod that adds new functionality to the Ghoulish perk. Aside from being fun and allowing for a new playstyle, this mod introduces small penalties depending on where you are.

• RTT
  A mod that adds a few small mechanics to the Solar Powered and Rooted perks. Aside from adding a few new fun and convenient mechanics, the main point of this mod is to reduce the ability to heal radiation damage when in the sun. Being able to get rid of radiation that easily undermined a huge part of the mods with features related to radiation, such as HSC and Falltoxin.