Did the Zodiac mod go missing?

[praecave mori]

Does anyone know what happened to it? Great mod.

[migueltorga]

I was also wondering, seems like it was nuked out of the internet.

[terajunkie]

I only just recently installed the mod. and came back to the forums to look for support on how to get it to work in game.  and all the links i had saved for it, and the support forum are error'd out.  not even showing up in the topic lists. so yeah, think it was flat out removed for whatever reason.

[Nickolos1818]

20 hours ago, terajunkie said:

I only just recently installed the mod. and came back to the forums to look for support on how to get it to work in game.  and all the links i had saved for it, and the support forum are error'd out.  not even showing up in the topic lists. so yeah, think it was flat out removed for whatever reason.

This happens by the author sometimes, usually a bit later their mods are back up but updated.

 

Anyway, what issues where you having with the mod?

[Renbu_Revolution]

If possible does anyone have a copy of the last version? I just reinstalled FO4 and came to grab it but sadly its gone.

[Stormer]

I dont know man... "sharing" or re-posting mod wouldnt be right. Ask mod author about what happened and why first.

[terajunkie]

On 4/29/2020 at 7:46 PM, Nickolos1818 said:

This happens by the author sometimes, usually a bit later their mods are back up but updated.

 

Anyway, what issues where you having with the mod?

so, when i use the "locator" to find a Zodiac Portal.  IE. the one in boston library, when i get to the "portal" its an overused book return terminal instead.  I've tried this with most of the portals in the game, and they are all book terminals, that give no Zodiac Options when accessed.   I cheated in the MCM to instantly become an employee, and I can build a personal Zodiac Portal in my Settlements.  the Mail works.  but I cant figure out how to get Zodiac Tokens, or how to "service" clients.  I tried waiting at various "located" bus stops throughout the commonwealth and got nothing.

 

I use MO2 and it shows that Zodiac is not conflicting with any of my other mods.  I'm not sure if the mod is broken on my end, Or if im just not understanding how it works (User Error).

 

[Nickolos1818]

Target the terminals, dont actually use the book return terminal, usually focus on just to the right of the screen.  When you hover over it it should be by default  E  to interact with terminal and R for Zodiac, hit R and it will take you to Zodiacs portal interface.

 

The settlement portal you can build isn't set up fully yet.   Don't bother building one until after you first visited a portal to enroll.   If you have ZAP Undeployed in your inventory, should be under Misc section in pipboy, you can either hit R to drop and it will pop up or in the MCM you can set a hotkey to auto deploy it.

 

All Zodiac Portals are the Book Return Terminals.  Hopefully the  R option shows up for you.  Should try to find all of them.  The Tokens are given while interacting with the clients.  As far as the bus stops go, you need to deploy the ZAP near it, once it loads up you can hit R and select presets, if your close enough you should get an option of the Bus Stop Preset.  There are other ones you can use, like if you deploy ZAP near a dumpster that has loot, as in the lids are shut, you get a preset for Dumpster.   Dancing preset is available in almost all locations as long as your not near a bus stop or dumpster.  If you have dogmeat or a male companion you can choose the Live Show preset.

 

There were in older versions the Permit system for modded player homes where clients could meet you there and they had certain encounter mechanics that were different then normal stuff out in the world.   Author said that was going to come back in future updates but was going to be revamped.

 

Hope this info helps, if you got any issues still let me know, will try to help.

[Carabosse]

Player made portals have a custom mesh and only require normal activation (this also means they can only be used for accessing the Zodiac network).

 

The book vendors require a perk for access (every time the game is loaded and Zodiac is active, i.e. you have enrolled via the holotape or used the instant enrolment MCM option, it checks to see if the player has the perk). Note that the book terminals are actually two objects. The terminal and an activator which is the vendor 'chassis'. The activator only passes through activation calls to a linked reference, the terminal. But the Zodiac activation perk only applies to the terminal. I probably should have applied it to both to avoid confusion. The Zodiac perk provides an alternate activation mode for the book vendors. Which when chosen will put the player into a Zodiac terminal instead of the book vendor terminal.

 

I know it sounds more complicated than it needs to be but that's because one of the design challenges I have for Zodiac is that it will never edit any forms external to the mod, including base game forms. Therefore I often have to jump through additional hoops to do things that would otherwise be very straightforward. But the upside is that it won't conflict with other mods.

 

Just a note on player made portals like the ones at settlement workshops. If you've placed one prior to enrolling with the Zodiac. You'll want to store and replace it after enrolling. This is because Zodiac has to do some housekeeping on network terminals when they are first initialized so that they can use the word and number replacement system. This is not a problem for book vendors as the Zodiac terminals you use there are always newly placed and initialized. Future versions will track all player placed portals and handle re-initializing them itself.

[terajunkie]

Thank you guys so much @Nickolos1818 and @Carabosse .  gonna hop on in a bit and try all of that out.  Will edit this post if i get it working.

 

EDIT:

So yes, i did finally get it working. Thank you both for the guidance.  @CarabosseI have some modding experience with the Creation Engine and Skyrim from Several years ago, so the work arounds you mentioned to keep the mod clean and "unobtrusive" made sense to me, and I would like to say, after looking at the items that this mod contains, and 'spawns'.... Very clever work, sir.  Very impressive.  thank you for sharing this work, and I hope you are able to continue development and add as much as you originally intended for it.   ?. 

 

The only issues I've had, so far,  is Deploying the ZAP at a bus stop in concord, and even tho the scan results said High Potential Client, Medium threat, No clients would show up.  PC just remained in the 'typing on the ZAP console' animation, and I was unable to cancel the animation, so I would have to reload previous save.  Also, when deploying the ZAP in Diamond City, the only deployment option that shows up is 'Merchant' and when choosing that option I get an Exclamation symbol on the ZAP display, I'm assuming the script is timing out, it then successfully resets, and allows you to 'pack up' the zap.  I dont know if that is a feature you have planned for later or not.  I am able to deploy the Zap in Sanctuary and Deploy Dance mode, which was nice.  I havent been able to use all the content yet, but Your mod has a ton of features and I plan to test them all, thanks again  

 

EDIT2:

Oh and i keep getting notifications sometimes that i have ZAP messages, and I havent found where you check those yet.  I know where the Zodiac mail is, but not ZAP mail/msgs.  Still periodically reading through the documentation when I come across it.

[Carabosse]

I'm not sure why the player would stay locked into the terminal. I've never had that happen. It's kind of irrelevant now any way as in my current version I have removed all of those moveto commands that snap the player into a piece of furniture. MoveTos = load screens so they're all gone, including the one left in the dancing preset.

The exclamation animation on Zap is just to signify that a feature is under construction.

Zap messages are separate from mail. You access them via the ZAP terminal. Which has an option unlike other Zodiac portals called 'Z.A.P.'. It'll be stuff like welcoming you back when you load the game, warning you that its low on power, thanking you for recharging it etc.

One last thing. As I'm no longer hosting my mods on this site, I don't really want to discuss them openly here any more or provide support. When the alternative is ready I will put the link in my profile and signature. I'll still be around on this site to ask and answer general questions in the tech support forums. And in the meantime if you have any specific questions about my mods feel free to PM me.

[Alexcs2]

So is the mod gone ? Or is it just removed to get updates/fixes ?

[Carabosse]

22 hours ago, Alexcs2 said:

So is the mod gone ? Or is it just removed to get updates/fixes ?

 

Gone from here. I'm hoping to have the alternate available this week.

 

I've got it mostly set up, Discord, file hosting etc. It's all free, you'll only need a discord account. I'll never ask for or accept any kind of gift or payment for my mods.

 

It's mostly just a place to get links to download the mods and read information about how they work. I'm not expecting people to go there to chat (I'll probably actively discourage this). But there will be a channel for support questions and maybe suggestions also. I'm trying to put in a lot more information about how parts of Zodiac and Essential Relief work. Bestial Essence LE not so much, as that's no longer worked on. But you will be able to download versions of that there too. In fact, I found a later version (a few actually) unreleased of Bestial Essence LE. If I get time to check what's actually in them, as I don't remember. And they're not horridly broken, I'll also put them up for download. With no support though, obviously.

 

[edit]

 

Btw you can still download Bestial Essence SE from Loverslab. Nomkaz? Nomkatz? Something like that, put the effort into porting that to SE so they're entitled to do with that port as they wish.

[KillinCuzICan]

I'm guessing you fell out of love with the lab here, so discord, then? I await the invite!

[Algene]

ah well, at least it didn't dissapear like so many good mods in the past years, where will you post your discord Carabosse? or will it be private?

On 5/11/2020 at 11:14 AM, Carabosse said:

 

Gone from here. I'm hoping to have the alternate available this week.

 

I've got it mostly set up, Discord, file hosting etc. It's all free, you'll only need a discord account. I'll never ask for or accept any kind of gift or payment for my mods.

 

[Carabosse]

5 hours ago, Algen said:

ah well, at least it didn't dissapear like so many good mods in the past years, where will you post your discord Carabosse? or will it be private?

 

 

I'll have a link to it in my signature.

[Algene]

17 hours ago, Carabosse said:

 

I'll have a link to it in my signature.

thanks!, and thanks for your hard work!

[Rambean]

On 5/16/2020 at 12:09 AM, Carabosse said:

 

I'll have a link to it in my signature.

Can't wait. Almost literally. I just started a new character with a primary intent to finally play Zodiac more comprehensively. Version I'm sitting on is .9915. I know you said you don't really want to talk about it here anymore; I'm just curious to know if it'll be a safe update on an existing save or should I just wait?

[Carabosse]

1 hour ago, Rambean said:

Can't wait. Almost literally. I just started a new character with a primary intent to finally play Zodiac more comprehensively. Version I'm sitting on is .9915. I know you said you don't really want to talk about it here anymore; I'm just curious to know if it'll be a safe update on an existing save or should I just wait?

 

All versions of Zodiac are safe to update to later versions. Stats/Progress are carried over. Same is true for Essential Relief.

 

One of the things I really regret about Bestial Essence is that it was structured so that it assumed the player would start fresh for every update (that's not fair). In my defence, it was my first mod. 

[ganga]

On 4/30/2020 at 3:46 AM, Nickolos1818 said:

Anyway, what issues where you having with the mod?

I have problems in the scenes, only pole dancing works, when choosing other options, clients appear and sit on chairs and nothing can be done further, they just sit ...
Why do I need a box, I also did not understand. When activated, it says you activated the box and nothing happens...

[Toddi]

22 hours ago, ganga said:

I have problems in the scenes, only pole dancing works, when choosing other options, clients appear and sit on chairs and nothing can be done further, they just sit ...
Why do I need a box, I also did not understand. When activated, it says you activated the box and nothing happens...

same for me

[elymas2019]

ETA on that discord link etc?  Not being a jerk, just wondering.

[Carabosse]

1 hour ago, elymas2019 said:

ETA on that discord link etc?  Not being a jerk, just wondering.

Damn, I knew I'd forgotten something.

 

No, I haven't forgot. I've been a bit obsessed with Essential Relief lately. And I'd decided to do the removal and replacement of all the XDI requiring encounters in Zodiac in the current update not the following one. So not having something new to release imminently took the urgency of the discord channel away. I thought, any way.

 

I still regularly post on my profile so that's your best way to keep track of what I'm doing for now.

[Alexcs2]

Was wondering if there is going to be any compatibility with mods like Diamond City Expansion and its Red Seat in terms of poledancing and maybe it's brothel too. Was looking for something like that but no luck. Maybe anyone can help me find something ? 

[Carabosse]

8 hours ago, Alexcs2 said:

Was wondering if there is going to be any compatibility with mods like Diamond City Expansion and its Red Seat in terms of poledancing and maybe it's brothel too.

 

Yep.