Shadowed Synth Armor
WHAT IT DOES
Adds the existing Bethesda black synth armour texture (see the endgame legendary synths) as a synth armor material you can craft at any armour crafting station, as long as you have the Armorer perk at level 2 or above. The material is called “Carbon Nanotube Material”.
The armour actually acts as shadowed armour, meaning it will actually make it harder to see you in the dark. Just like shadowed leather or metal or combat armour, really.
I chose that name because carbon nanotubes are:
A) very black
B) very, very strong for its weight
C) hi-tech enough to be an Institute material
D) sounding like one of the other materials Bethesda included, so it shouldn’t trip lore or anything.
Made entirely with FO4Edit, if you care about that kinda thing.
HOW TO INSTALL
Preferably use NMM. Otherwise, unpack the .esp in your game’s data directory, AND you will have to edit the plugin.ini file in your AppData\Local\Fallout4 folder by hand to add the mod. And set it as read-only so the game doesn’t overwrite it.
HOW TO UNINSTALL
Just delete the .esp from your Data directory.
HOW TO GET IT
Ideally, you should get Armorer level 2 and craft it yourself.
Alternately, t’s likely that at very high levels, some pieces with this material might spawn on random synths, but it’s going to be more rare than the nanofiber material.
Or, if you just want it RIGHT NAO, you can try “help nanotube 0 omod” and then adding it to the armour pieces with amod.
COMPATIBILITY
It will probably conflict with anything else that changes the lists of synth armor materials, but not with simple recolours (e.g., the mods that just repaint synth armour) or stat changes. So if another mod actually ADDS new synth armor materials, well, either:
A) make sure this one loads last, or
B) if you can’t find it in the list of mods to build, you can always just add it to your armour pieces with amod instead. It IS just an armor mod.
It’s not the end of the world, basically. Worst case scenario, you might have to use the console. It won’t make your game go corrupt or anything bad.
It is compatible with mods that affect other things, such as the armor size, legendary enchants, the linings or the weave. So you can for example have this material on the helmet AND the shielded lining from another mod AND the ballistic weave from yet another mod. They’re not competing for the same lists or anything, since they’re different slots, with different lists.
It’s also compatible with the crafting benches. As far as the game is concerned, synth armour is synth armour is synth armour, regardless of whether you looted it, or bought it, or crafted it at a modded workbench. The armour my character wear is crafted for example. Once you craft it, just go and mod it.
LORE CONSIDERATIONS
I’m not a lore purist myself, but in this case, it’s what at least two legendary synths are already wearing in the vanilla game. I’d say things don’t get much more lore-conform than being identical to what’s already in the game.
BALANCE CONSIDERATIONS
It adds exactly as much stealth capability, damage resistance and energy resistance as the vanilla shadowed leather torso material. So as far as I’m concerned, it should count as fair and balanced, since it has identical stats to a vanilla material for a weaker armour. It’s not going to end up being a substitute for power armour or anything.
But… one constant of the universe is that everyone has their own ideas about game balance. Personal tastes and play style are a personal thing. What works for me might not be what works for you, and viceversa. If you disagree with my values in either direction, just use FO4Edit (or the GECK when it finally gets released) to change the values to whatever fits YOUR views.
LICENSE
I release this in the public domain. Do with it whatever you wish. I’m not going to hound anyone just because they used the same Bethesda texture and enchantment.
Note however that it DOES use Bethesda’s files, so it’s not ok to port to other games.
