Quote:
RFB_2.0
RFB_2.0_Patch_23April2010
RSRDC_RFB_V575
RSRDC_V5xx_Patch1
3000 Yard Bearing Tool (1440x)
#1 Real Environment mod install
Lite Fog v2 + 300' Underwater Visability
MaxOptics IV for RFB 2.0
MaxOptics Binocular for RFB
Merchant Skinpack v2 RFB
SAP v0.5 Stock-RFB-RSRDC
different_smoke_merchants_warships
Keldunks_RFB.1.52_tweaksV3
Nav Map Make-Over v2.1
NMMO Airbase Add-on
Less Plankton 1.2
Bigger Better Protractors
TheDarkWraith_DC_Water_Disturbance_v2_0_SH4
RSRDC_RFB_Pre Pearl Harbor Career Start
Sub Class Info - RFB
Sub Class Info - RSRDC - RFB
Sub Class Info - S-42 Class
SMALLER SEABED ROCKS
Webster's Better Air Patrols
TDW_Ship_Plane_Fire_Damage_v1_3_SH4
Living breathing Ocean VS_3 with new lighting and reflection work
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Okay, looking through the list here, I'd delete anything that wasn't specifically meant to run with RFB. So,
#1 Real Environment mod install,
Lite Fog v2 + 300' Underwater Visability would be gone. Bearing tool is fine. Different smoke would go away. Keldunk's tweaks, to the best of my knowledge, are not RFB approved and I'd suspect them of unknowing mod breaking. Use at your own risk there.
Nav Map makeover and Airbases should not have any bearing on AI. I say should because modders love to cross the line and tweak something completely away from the subject matter of their mod. Chances are they are fine.
Less Plankton can change underwater visibility which could nerf the AI or make it unreasonably good. I'd leave that alone.
Bigger protractors should be fine: nothing to mess up the AI there.
The Dark Wraith depth charge water disturbance I'm not familiar with. I'd play with and without to try to notice AI differences. Chances are it just shakes the sub and won't hurt anything.
The next group of stuff specifically mentions RFB and is nothing but info. That won't hurt the AI.
Webster's better air patrols should be just a campaign change and not affect AI. You can ask Webster on that one.
But the last two are real deal killers. TDW ship plane fire damage will play all heck with AI and damage behavior, and Living Breathing Ocean will mess up detection distances, ability to lock on targets and enemy AI. TMO has it's own environmental mod simply because NONE of them would allow TMO to work properly. Every one of them caused Ducimus' minutely tweaked balance of enemy AI to sub capabilities to skew too far one way or another.
He ended up working with one of the environmental mod people to get a subset that although it didn't look as impressive, the game played much better.
I say gameplay is about 90 on the importance scale and eyecandy is 10. If you can have the eyecandy and still have a great playing game, fine. But when you get a game that takes 10 minutes to load, you can't lock a target more than 1000 yards away and DDs are shooting you from over the horizon and hitting the first shot, it doesn't matter how pretty the game is, you can't have any fun!
I run TMO, RSRD, a 3000 yard bearing plotter (Capn Scurvy), TMOKeys (gives me shift-i auto identification), a couple of sub skins, some custom missions and that's about it. I keep it as simple as I can so the game plays the way Ducimus wanted it to play. To me, it's an insult to take a mod he bled over for months and drop doggie doo all over it. Then if I'm true to form I'd complain to him that planes are bombing me at 400' in rough weather. If I'm gonna run TMO I want to run TMO the way the modder intended it to run. The few things I don't like are vastly outweighed by the sheer genius of the rest of it.
It's the same with RFB. I tested their mod for them I KNOW how much they put into that thing and all the tough questions they answered the best they could and went with it. When I play RFB I want to experience it the way that whole team of modders intended RFB to play.
Oh! If you really want the eyecandy, the GWX of SH4 is Fall of the Rising Sun. They have more targets and fancy eye candy than anybody. It does have some defects, but it is definitely an underrated mod that is a ton of fun to play. Give it a try!