Dynamic Universe

Dynamic Universe, a so small collection mod (see collection details at the end)

-- The universe in a nut shell -- Star systems dynamically level with you every 10 character levels, starting with character level 5, ranging up to the new mighty star system level 99. This only upscales star system levels, never downscales. Additionally, the default level 65+ systems will do their very best to keep their level distance from you until you near player level 99.

Furthermore, no ground enemy is ever spawned lower than 70% of your actual character level, adhering to the following structure (refined in version 2.2 of Dynamic Universe):

70% for fauna classified as prey 75% for Spacers 78% for standard UC Marines 79% for Freestar Rangers 80% for Crimson Fleet 81% for UC System Defense 81% for various elite security guards 82% for fauna classified as predator 83% for the Syndicate 84% for class A and S robots 85% for Ecliptic Mercenaries 87% for The First 90% for Varuun 100% for Starborn, regular Terrormorphs and Aceles 110% for Elder Terrormorphs

All NPC and creatures not listed have a minimum level of 75% of player level (standard fallback). This mechanism is only for upscaling - enemies spawned by the game at higher levels than these minimum levels keep their higher level.

In late game this creates enemies outside the normal bounds of the unmodded game, like eg the lvl 153 Ecliptic in the screenshot gallery. XP kill rewards are always appropriate for the level of the enemy, even for enemies that had to be upscaled heftily.

This keeps the game interesting all the time, from start to endgame. Not only by raising enemy levels, but also by improving the quality of the loot found at the same time.

-- Important: On first start -- After installing the mod, please make a save and reload that save. Then change your location ingame (best step out onto a different planet than you are currently on). Now you are good to go and the mod will do the rest.

-- How is this different from my Minimum Enemy Levels (MEL) and Dynamic Systems Levels (DSL) mods? --

• The star systems go to level 99 instead of level 75 of now (including a mechanism that makes the level 65+ systems of the default game always stay quite ahead of you untill very late in the game).
• All scaled enemies provide appropriate XP amounts now (via a new function in the main script). I had to remove all old xp rewards from the hundreds of enemy actors affected by the mod and script their xp back in afterwards. Quite the hassle, but really worth it imho.
• I manually redid the whole Mimimum Enemy Level entries and cleaned them up big time. This includes getting rid of a faulty dependency on ShipBlueprints.esm which would have caused potential trouble down the road (still stemming from working with xEdit as tool, prior to release of the Creation Kit)
• The Acceles have joined the Starborn and Terrormorphs in upscaling to 100%.
• NEW in version 1.5: Fixed a bug related to a few mission boards and radiant quests that required too low maximum levels for possible target systems/planets to be compatible with Dynamic Universe (eg Free Star Rangers Mission board, Barret's Temple quest, Commander Tuala's quests after completion of UC Vanguard campaign) NEW in version 1.9: further fixes for radiant quests of Vae Victis and Percival (Apex Predators)
• Finally, with 300 credits I have decided to keep the price point rather low for the effort of making this mod (and the effect it has on gameplay for those who like it).
• I will let Minimum Enemy Levels and Dynamic Systems Levels stay free on Creations. So you always have a choice. Nothing lost.
• And hey, maybe you liked my old work and looked for a way to give a little something in return. Here it is. If not, no worries at all - you already warmed my heart big time by just playing my mods, thank you.

-- But how does all this enemy level stuff really, really, really work? -- So, you got time and are in the mood for a long read. Here we go :-):

There are (mainly) two ways by which Starfield places enemies: direcly as actor or via a leveled list. The leveled list method is more common.

A directly placed actor usually comes with a fixed level, like (Im making the details up here) a lvl 7 Crimson Thug. That's it. It will always be a level 7 Crimson Thug, regardless of your current player level or whether you are in NG+6. Dynamic Universe changes all actors in a way that their intended level (7 here) becomes their minimum level (this is already build into the game code, it just has to be setup differently). At the same time it makes them scale to 75% of the current player level. So, if you encounter this former lvl 7 Crimson Thug at level 40 you will meet a level 30 Crimson Thug. Hooray. It will have better equipment (when it comes to the tiers , like Advanced weaponry or armor) and it will give you appropriate XP for a level 30 opponent. It will also, of course, have more hitpoints and generally be much more dangerous.

An actor placed via a leveled list is a bit more tricky to understand. Such a leveled list contains eg entries for 10 different enemies, of whom you will only encounter one. This could be a list that begins with our lvl 7 Crimson Thug and ends with a vl 98 Crimson Mythic. The game will pick that enemy that is lower, but as close as possible to the "Encounter Level" (it can also be set up to randomly pick any enemy below Encounter level). But what in the Blackest Sea is the "Encounter Level"?

Usually the "Encounter Level" is the player level. Easy? Well, yeah... it is not the player level if the player level is below the Star Systems Minimum Level or above the Star System Maximum Level. In that case it's either min or max Star System Level. So "Encounter Level" for a lvl 10 player in a lvl 75 star system is 75. And "Encounter Level" for a lvl 75 player in a lvl 10 star system is... you knew it, right... 20. Wait, not 10? Level 10 star systems (as you see them on the star map) have a minimum level of 10 and a maximum level of 20 (the later is not visible to the player; it's usually 10 or 20 higher than min level, until level 50+ systems where it switches to a whopping 255 or even unlimited).

Puh, that's the whole monty? No. Then comes the individual encounter difficultý ranging from Easy to Very Hard, which is set up by a game dev for each individual encounter with a leveled list. Eg an easy encounter will only use 40% of the Encounter Level, while a Very Hard encounter will use 125%. So our lvl 75 encounter on easy encounter difficulty will turn into an Encounter Level of 30, which - depending on the leveled list composition, see above - might eg result in a lvl 22 Crimson Pirate.

As you can see now, raising the Star System level (min and max) has a big effect for encounters based on Leveled Lists. Furthermore, you can see that upscaling is useful on top: A lvl 75 player might - even on Ecounter Level 75 - easily step into a lvl 22 Crimson Pirate as shown above which is not a very satisfying battle (and with not very satifsfying rewards). With Dynamic Universe this enemy would turn into a level 60 Crimson Pirate (80% min level) - much better and still dangerous, especially when encountered in groups.

-- Contact -- Feel free to ama on the "NoSodiumStarfield" reddit. Have a look for the "Dynamic Universe" thread there for feedback, bug hunting, updates and general chat with a good Terrabrew in hand.

-- so small collection -- This mod is part of the "so small collection" of mods. These mods dont require each other and can be played stand alone, even balancewise. They form a greater whole though - the more of them you combine, the more you see this final shape. The overarching idea is to create a gameworld that feels immensely vast, begs for thorough exploration, is full of mysteries, plays truely challenging and lasts very, very long. In other words the goal of the mods is to make the player feel: so small.

Here's the so small collection's homepage for further info: https://youngneil1.github.io/so-small-collection/

And an overview video on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKrZ3oP20aA

Finally a list of some Creations in the so small collection in case this idea resonates with you (only highlights):

High Level Weapons: Continue to find better weapons, all the way up to level 300. 7+ new revisions/tiers for each of 50 weapon types. Uniquely named, legendary, each hidden in a specific star system.

High Level Armors: Continue to find better armors up to lvl 255. All HLA share about the same power level - mix and match for the looks you like. Starborn armors improve in quality and variety, too.

Level Scaled Quest XP: LSQXP makes XP rewards for almost all quests (campaign, faction, mission boards, other radiants...) scale with the player level. Questing stays relevant mid and endgame this way.

POI Rotation: A new realtime timer and a new list of discovered POI (Points of Interest) effectively prevent repetition. It will now take many hours before you can discover the same POI twice.

Waylayer: Open field random encounter system. For adventures inbetween the Points of Interest (POI). You never know what lurks out there.

Gear Progression: Gear Progression adds levels to all weapons, suits, helmets and backpacks. Your character level must match these in order to equip the gear. Each NG+ these levels raise further.

Economy: Economy shifts income generation away from tiresome loot hauling. Ship building becomes the long term goal it's meant to be. As credits get more scarce, rewards remain meaningful.

Explorer: An immersive overhaul of the resources - crafting - exploration loop. Get out there into the Starfield and explore - the rewards are much bigger now, but so is the need to do it.