I decided that, rather than sit around and hope for someone to implement some of the ideas I brought up in this thread, I would do the ones that were easiest (using only lua/jsons) to implement myself. The mod is intended to be used with version 2f90bc1 (current as of May 9, 2014, though may work in later experimentals and releases) and can be downloaded here. To install, just unzip and place the folder next to the other mods.
Shakelight : A very rare (spawn weight 1) item found in museum security rooms and on survivor zeds. It at first seems to be an overpowered and infinitely rechargeable flashlight, not using batteries but only internal null charge. After attempting to adventure with it, however, the problems begin to crop up.
First, the light it gives off is weak, with a radius of 8 at maximum charge. Second, that radius shrinks very quickly as the charge time is obnoxiously short (about 5 minutes). That means the survivor must stop and shake (either through the assembly menu or by repeating last craft) the thing for 30 seconds every 5 minutes. Because shaking counts as a crafting action, that also means the shakelight can’t be recharged in darkness. If it loses all of its charge, the survivor is SOL until they have enough light to see the latch they must throw to shake the light again. Third, and perhaps most damning, is that the shakelight is not only extremely rare to find, but also built so sturdy that it can’t be disassembled or crafted.
One might ask "If it is so annoying and rare and hard to use, why even bother with it at all? Wouldn’t the player have found enough flashlights and batteries (and other means of creating light) to make the shakelight obsolete long before it is procured? What is it even good for, then?"
Well, the shakelight might be of use for those who adventure into the dark, quickly turning on and off a light only to gain their bearings, and who do not want to waste any batteries. Besides that, those who have a lot of time to burn (both in the real world, constantly repeating a craft, and in game, spending 10% of their time shaking the light), have an extreme patience, and are obsessive compulsive when it comes to hoarding batteries may find it a better alternative to the regular flashlight or other lighting apparati such as NVGs.
Additional reloaded 40mm possibilities : Found in the launcher manual, the reloaded 40mm frag, reloaded 40mm incendiary, reloaded 40mm teargas, and reloaded 40mm smoke add to the currently very short list of craftable 40mm rounds (40mm acid, reloaded 40mm buckshot, and reloaded 40mm flechette). “Hey! That’s overpowered!” you say? Not exactly. First, all rounds are more complex, more time consuming, and more expensive to make than the current rounds. Second, because each of these rounds had a minimal damage on their commercial counterparts (all had a damage of 5), the reloaded versions would, according to the current math of reloaded rounds, have a damage of 0. Since it doesn’t make sense that any round fired at an enemy would do absolutely zero damage, instead all other reloaded penalties are doubled. At the higher levels of throwing, one could feasibly toss the non-40mm versions of each of these grenades further, and with more accuracy, than these fly.
“Why bother with them, then?” They are additional recraftable, launched explosives. If the player’s throwing skill isn’t very high, settling on a grenade that is a bit inaccurate but able to launch 30 might be a better item to take into a fight than just the standard grenade. Also, if the player simply loves destruction and mayhem, they are more compact and take up less volume than most of their original counterparts (grenade, teargas, smoke).
Electrolytic Cell : “Whoa, isn’t that really overpowered? Couldn’t you just make hydrogen at-will using clean water?” Why yes, yes you could. Assuming you find the book A, B, C, Hydrogen & Me, which can only be located in a very few select primary schools (the book only spawns there, again with only a weight of 1). Oh, you also need to have a cooking skill of 11 to even begin to understand the schematic printed in this “children’s book.” Even if you do, a homemade electrolytic cell using lye as an electrolyte would only be about 40% efficient. That means you’ll probably use less batteries shooting your way into a place that stocks hydrogen with a laser rifle than if you were to try to make it yourself. And there is no possible way to get more energy out of the craft than you put in. So why even do it? Because you really, really like hydrogen, of course!
Pressure bomb : “Come on now, that has to be overpowered.” Okay, I will argue that it is less nerfed than everything else in this mod seeing as it is the only item that satisfies more than just a niche use. Its recipe can also be found quite easily in the anarchist’s cookbook.
A pressure bomb is no more than a container designed to withstand high pressures when it is asked to withstand extreme pressures. Though not as explosive as dynamite and therefore not as suited toward breaching, it still packs a hefty punch with shrapnel that is far larger and more deadly than any conventional fragmentation round could propel. The one major drawback of the pressure bomb, though, is that it is extremely large and extremely heavy. Do not expect to be able to carry more than one or two, and do not expect to be able to toss them very far if at all.