Best Skyrim Mods Thread

[t0mby]

*edit*


New page ffs. Your mod info is at the bottom of the previous.

[cloud]

Whats the physics one tomby? i can't seem to find it.

[t0mby]

Here ya go Cloud. It's called Realistic Ragdoll Death Force.

[Candy Arse]

tomby you're a legend thanks for the info dump there. I'm using the mod manager from the Nexus site and it's fantastic!!!

When all is said and done I can see this game being top 5 all-time for me.

[t0mby]

Keep an eye out on this one, will be a worthy add on when completed. Only work in progress for now and in early stages of 0.1 but you can already see the improvements.

http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=3147" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[flipswitch]

So I have skyrim already on my Xbox.But looking at all these mods is tempting me to join the master race.My pc should handle it .

I was thinking of outputting the game to my tv, and playing with the controller.
What tipped my over was a mod called Jasmine
You can download it here,
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=9681" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Just a quick question, candy mentioned something of a mod installer, does this work with all mods and is it easy to install.
Do I have to worry about any unofficial patches to get the game running smoother, or is this included in the steam patches?

I will go back a few pages and carefully look at the mods ppl have posted in this thread.

Thanks

[t0mby]

Fucken hell Flip, that looks awesome!

[flipswitch]

I have finished downloading skyrim, now I am doing the high res texture pack off steam.Have you guys bothered with this texture pack?I know there are many others available.

[GameHED]

Teenager spends 2000 hours to makes a skyrim mod instead of going to school to hopefully obtain work as a bethesda employee:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013- ... skyrim-mod" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I like those kinds of stories. This is what makes pc the superior machine to console. Long after a game is released there are still people playing it and using tools to create things and then gaining some skill that could be handy if they want to work in the game industry one day. It's educatioal software. The dad should be proud. I bought the legendary edition recently so I might reinstall the game to check this out.

great soundtrack too..

[GameHED]

update on teen trying to get job at bethesda through mod making:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013- ... -games-job" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

works for bungie now. The dad is probably beating him up for not achieving anything worthwhile in life. He will be forced to work on crap sequels to halo (a dead series) which offer linear levels and cramped environments.

edit:

joking. Bungie kick butt. But bethesda beat them to the "vehicles in fps" idea with terminator on pc. lol (sure enemies had no ai to speak of, but you could ride a vehicle. Don't know why it was so hyped as a groundbreaking feature when halo 1 came out.
As for halo fans who got buttthurt:
Halo isn't a bungie game series anymore so it's shit. Just like sonic. MS should hand the series to Rare imo.

[GreyWizzard]

The only mod you need is Schlongs of Skyrim.

[Deef]

Just got this and even though everyone's over it by now, I'm going to rattle on here a bit. Mainly about beginner gameplay mods, and a bit of blurb about the game itself. Which means time for a fresh wall of text that I know no-one will read in a long-dead thread.

It's currently $9 USD on Steam for the original content, or $17 for Legendary, just in case anyone reading doesn't have it already. Even if traditional and somewhat clunky fantasy questing isn't your thing, I'd say it's worth the buy if only for the modding scene.

I'm still just level 18 on my first run through. It seems pretty clear to me that once I'm done I'll be starting again for the new take on everything with increased understanding, and with new modding aims. Actually I've already spent the last 2 days hopping around Nexus and Youtube like a kid in a candy store, but at the same time trying not to change anything before fully understanding the vanilla version of that thing, for the sake of appreciation of both sides. Actually yesterday I found myself wondering if I had really just gone 18 levels never finding a knapsack, allowing me to carry more, or if that was from a mod. I still don't know (so answers appreciated). Big fail; that's the kind of feeling I want to avoid.

So no improving enemy AI just yet since I'm still a complete derp (and a mage) in combat. But there are a number of things that were simple enough to tire of the vanilla approach almost immediately; like being unable to put a lit torch on the ground, scare wolves with fire, or retrieve most arrows from animal corpses. I really love that I can now hold back a pack of wolves at night by waving a torch around. So I was quite happy to "fix" several parts of it even though I've just started, for the sake of immersion. I try not to make things easier at all, or harder just yet, but increasing immersion trumps small changes in difficulty either way. So here are some of the things I've changed:

* Climates of Tamriel - Darker dungeons so I usually find myself wanting to carry a torch.
* Drop Lit Torches - Works very well with the above. In fact yesterday I ran out of torches; I love that I have to manage them or revert to magelight.
* Primal Fear - Scaring wolves away with torches. The modder has made the effect intelligently diminishing so this operates really well. I brandish a torch and hope. It's great.
* Dynamic Things - Just makes more stuff interactive, but the immersion benefit is that containers can hold your stuff forever, and you can get better at a skill by practising it on training dummies if you want. You can also chop down trees for firewood.
* Wet and Cold - Mostly graphical additions but it has one tweak where you get sporadically blurred/blinded by rain and snow if you look up too much. The effect is perfect.
* Fishing in Skyrim - Closes an obvious gap in realism without altering existing gameplay at all.
* Get Arrows Back - So when you kill a wolf with 3 arrows, there's a good chance you can loot them all back from its corpse.
* Touring Carriages - Carriages can actually travel the entire route between cities instead of just Fast Travel. Sit and watch the scenery pass by.
* Realistic Needs and Diseases - See below.

I've added a heap more, but these are just the mods that are strictly about gameplay-affecting immersion, while not drastically altering how one plays.

Realistic Needs and Diseases is the exception though, so I am already losing touch with vanilla Skyrim but I very much enjoy RND. The first thing I liked about it was simply that eating raw meat immediately disturbed me in vanilla, and now it's something to avoid because it RND it can make you sick. RND obviously goes a lot further than that however, in fact it is a management system for the 5 states of hunger, thirst, tiredness, drunkedness, and disease. All 5 of these work really well. Raw food not only makes you sick, but spoils faster. Food spoils. You can find it already spoilt, typically when you search barrels, or it just goes bad while you carry it around. You can ditch it, or if necessary eat it and risk disease. Getting sick is improved, because it actually matters and gets worse with time. You need a cure potion, or a good sleep on a bed that is actually clean, or whatever else cures diseases that typically isn't at hand in the middle of a dungeon. Excellent. Thirst not only means you have to drink stuff, for fear of death if you like (I like), it also means the game maintains a bottle's state as empty or full, so you can keep empty wine bottles and fill them with water or even wine again (from kegs). It means actually asking innkeepers to refill them for you, which was perhaps the first time I needed gold for anything, or a little bit of joy when you find a well, drinking fountain, keg, or river. It also means wanting to boil river water first to again avoid the chance of getting sick. What's more, you typically want drink water instead of wine unless you have no choice, because wine gets you drunk.

Being able to get drunk is awesome. The main effect is double vision in various levels of blur and bloom. As with Wet and Cold's vision blur, this effect is spot on. Twice I have died because I simply didn't recognise a creature approaching me until it was too late. Better yet, twice I have died due to falling over at a bad time. Oh man I love it. So when you're semi-drunk, fighting a dragon in a blizzard, double vision and occasionally snow blind, it just feels great. It doesn't feel like tacky effects, it legitimately makes things more fun and funny. The final touch is an occasionally stumbling camera, again, done very well. Since this is about immersive gameplay, here's another good example. I was on a carriage between two towns, drunk but not wasted. I decided I wanted to enjoy the view from an even less sober state, so I got the driver to stop, hopped out, looked around a little and was about to drink some more mead. Then a troll hit me. Didn't see the bugger coming. I started to fight back but he was hitting hard, so I decided I would return to the safety of the carriage and booze it up a little later. I sprint to the carriage and fall over right next to it. Troll catches up and resumes the beating he was giving me. I need to heal before trying to get back in the carriage so I start running again, magicka low... magicka still low... and great, my magicka's not recharging at all. Now I'll have to.. nope, fell over again. I was a drunken idiot trying to fight a troll while having trouble just standing up. I died. It was great. There are extra drunken animations too, funny, but worth turning off for the sake of consistency.

Finally sleep. When I installed the mod I noticed that my character had slept 1 hour in 20 days, so this was a change that felt right to me. If you don't sleep you get tired, and if you get tired you can't carry as much, which equates to walking, or dumping gear. As with the other states, it really works well. You can't sleep in beds someone else owns, and sleeping in dirty beds can be bad for your health. Fast Travel affects all your states, so you really do have to think with a bit of realism. You can't just travel miles to a place and expect to not be tired, and if there's nowhere to sleep you have some decisions to make. Yesterday I literally killed for a bed. Twice. I've done everything twice it seems.

So that's Realistic Needs and Diseases, and an example of my internal battle to not mod vanilla Skyrim too much. All that stuff about beds and raw meat? The Hunterborn mod is good for that. But that will be an even bigger change from the original game. Meanwhile Frostfall (Hypothermia Camping Survival) is very tempting to me, and complements RND even more with its prevention of Fast Travel, but this will completely change the game. I might do all of this, while still avoiding more hardcore or heavier balancing mods until later. Not sure. This set of mods appeals to me.

But speaking of balancing, I do need to fix wolves; they die too easily. Plus it would make my torches cooler.
And I need to seriously buff dragons. Bears are a really good threat. Dragons should not be less scary than bears. More like about 100 times more scary. This would be another big change from vanilla, but I've killed a few dragons now and I'd rather buff them before I get too used to them.
SPERG has been recommended to me as well. A big rebalancing mod that seems to lean towards making stuff faster and easier, so it's a huge change so I want to avoid, but I have learnt that vanilla Destruction spells don't get stronger like everything else, and I already see the problem this is causing.


Ok, off that topic now. Any good utility changes to recommend? I have:

* a HUD clock
* SkyUI
* fake fullscreen

... and that's it.

Graphics-wise, I can't go too full on with my machine which is why I haven't talked about them. I have HD textures, better grass, fire, blood... a few other things running well, but I doubt I'll get decent performance with any of the ENB mods.



My thoughts on the game itself?

[Click to see hidden content]

To be honest, the modding game is currently taking up more of my attention than the real game, making it harder to gauge what I think of Skyrim itself. There were a few annoyances in vanilla that I'm glad I could change, but only minor ones so far. The lack of Destruction scaling might be the worst yet. It's easy to find things to complain about, and just as easy to counter those complaints by pointing to the sheer scope and customisability of the game. Things that would be considered to be unacceptably sloppy elsewhere are legitimately forgiven here because there's already so much content and detail. And while I've never been a huge fan of the medieval/fantasy genre (though it's admittedly the best setting for a game like this), adventure games I do like. So I'm not majorly disappointed by anything, but not majorly thrilled either... and then it keeps having nice random moments. It looks like the game's biggest hook really is its scope, as opposed to how you do the things you actually do. Everything you really play is "decent" at best, but it's the random, living happenings that keep you playing. Not a surprising opinion I imagine.

Actually tell a lie, I do have one big disappointment: the quest system, with a big focus on the existence of quest markers. It seems clear that the devs just want to spoon feed the player when it comes to quests, taking all thought and involvement out of the players' hands. You can completely ignore whatever is being said and simply make a bee line for the next marker and press 'E' once. This was especially bad when I found myself seeking the last of 3 potions in a dungeon, not knowing where it could be until I opened the map. Big glaring quest marker right to it. Made me wonder if I was even playing. An even worse and much more frequent example is quest creation from books. Pick up a book and bam, a quest is active even though you haven't read or heard anything. So the design choice was explicit; the player can be given a goal without being given a reason. That's what they planned deliberately, taking that intuitive, fun drive that quests should have completely away from the player. Even worse that this is most apparent with books of all things; the object you can literally open, read, and carry around with you. The written words should drive the question, not the artifical quest title in your journal. Overall it's a terrible, lazy, shallow design approach. Quest journal records should be reminders, not motivators, not tick-boxes, but they cheesed it hard. The quest journal should have nothing more than "Blah blah book says something about blah blah". Compare this to the natural concept of there being absolutely no interest in travelling to town X until you have an intuitive reason in your head; a reason you personally want to follow up on. I think I'm explaining something too obvious in too many words. Basically the gameplay is a tonne better when quests are driven naturally, and Bethesda pretty much went full retard on that. And this is a single player game. Hooray modern gaming.

I keep asking myself why games these days never seem to repeat the open, non-linear, non-spoon-fed, hugely-involving story delivery of Star Control 2, which just didn't identify anything as a "quest" at all. Where it was impossible to travel anywhere in without actual internal drive created by the knowledge of what you were travelling for and what it meant. There was no other reward for going; each game event had to be its own motivator. Starcon 2's side stories weren't nearly as numerous as side quests in Skyrim, which is why I'll admit that having an in-game journal is ok (Starcon 2 didn't). But quest markers in particular are the devil, enabling the demotion of quests into chores that are literally mindless; you don't need to know anything. Sure the markers can be turned off but the game has been designed with them in mind, which means that other quest aids, such as journal info, NPC awareness, a build up of meaning, or game-world clues, are already lacking. Plus managing self-imposed restrictions to counter design issues is just lame in any game. So it's a lazy barrage of quests designed to be completed with glazed eyes, and the reason I've gone all GameHED on this is because for all the technical mastery that has gone into Skyrim, it could have been much, much more intriguing and fun, for absolute pittance in terms of relative technical effort. All that real effort they put into the lore and writing all those stories, wasted.

But yeah apart from that it's pretty good.

[Candy Arse]

Try out an ENB and see how you go, there's nothing to lose because if performance sucks you can turn it off.

[GameHED]

Actually tell a lie, I do have one big disappointment: the quest system, with a big focus on the existence of quest markers. It seems clear that the devs just want to spoon feed the player when it comes to quests, taking all thought and involvement out of the players' hands. You can completely ignore whatever is being said and simply make a bee line for the next marker and press 'E' once. This was especially bad when I found myself seeking the last of 3 potions in a dungeon, not knowing where it could be until I opened the map. Big glaring quest marker right to it. Made me wonder if I was even playing. An even worse and much more frequent example is quest creation from books. Pick up a book and bam, a quest is active even though you haven't read or heard anything. So the design choice was explicit; the player can be given a goal without being given a reason. That's what they planned deliberately, taking that intuitive, fun drive that quests should have completely away from the player. Even worse that this is most apparent with books of all things; the object you can literally open, read, and carry around with you. The written words should drive the question, not the artifical quest title in your journal. Overall it's a terrible, lazy, shallow design approach. Quest journal records should be reminders, not motivators, not tick-boxes, but they cheesed it hard. The quest journal should have nothing more than "Blah blah book says something about blah blah". Compare this to the natural concept of there being absolutely no interest in travelling to town X until you have an intuitive reason in your head; a reason you personally want to follow up on. I think I'm explaining something too obvious in too many words. Basically the gameplay is a tonne better when quests are driven naturally, and Bethesda pretty much went full retard on that. And this is a single player game. Hooray modern gaming.

I keep asking myself why games these days never seem to repeat the open, non-linear, non-spoon-fed, hugely-involving story delivery of Star Control 2, which just didn't identify anything as a "quest" at all. Where it was impossible to travel anywhere in without actual internal drive created by the knowledge of what you were travelling for and what it meant. There was no other reward for going; each game event had to be its own motivator. Starcon 2's side stories weren't nearly as numerous as side quests in Skyrim, which is why I'll admit that having an in-game journal is ok (Starcon 2 didn't). But quest markers in particular are the devil, enabling the demotion of quests into chores that are literally mindless; you don't need to know anything. Sure the markers can be turned off but the game has been designed with them in mind, which means that other quest aids, such as journal info, NPC awareness, a build up of meaning, or game-world clues, are already lacking. Plus managing self-imposed restrictions to counter design issues is just lame in any game. So it's a lazy barrage of quests designed to be completed with glazed eyes, and the reason I've gone all GameHED on this is because for all the technical mastery that has gone into Skyrim, it could have been much, much more intriguing and fun, for absolute pittance in terms of relative technical effort. All that real effort they put into the lore and writing all those stories, wasted.

in short they dumbed it down. hehe

There are many youtubers who claim its not dumbed down (see below) but these are obviously paid to defend weakness of the newer elder scrolls games which wish to appeal to a wider and dumber audience so they don't return the game to ebgames in frustration.

I think bethesda should try to be a trail blazer and do something bold with ES and make console specific editors so they can enhance the replayability of thier rpg games on console platforms to let fans change stuff in vanilla settings even if it something small like the amount of resources, the effect weather has on travel etc now that they aim the ES games on console gamers mostly. But I often wonder if that would threaten the dlc part of the business. But that would be like saying mario maker is going to cause future 2d mario games to suffer in sales. (you had editors in excitebike and far cry has editors)

you can tell when something is dumbed down when choices are inconsequential, and merely walking down the street and talking to someone triggers quest automatically. Bad design...games play themselves now.
What makes an adventure game fun is the mystery of everything there and having to figure things out yourself through exploration and discovery. When you travel to a new location its like going on holiday from your boring homeland and seeing different people and experiencing different cultures and learning as you go. Too many games forget that and want to rush us through things and this ruins the experience. No eureka moment in figuring out puzzles anymore by learning languages or talking to npcs and persuading them to give you hints to use the process of elimination to narrow down location of quest items.

Imagine if you were an indiana jones type explorer looking for hidden treasures and unravelling mystery and you just instinctively knew everything before you got there instead of trying to search and look for things. It's not the same. That's why open world games can be intimidating to noobs. The world is vast so it makes them angry to have to do everything themself. But that's what made older ES game appealing to older fans. Now new games have the GPS marker which doesn't make sense. In the old games you could ask people questions to have them mark it on your map if they knew and they were ok with helping you out, which to me makes more sense than just knowing. It spoils the mystery. When you tell a joke you don't give away the punchline early. Same thing with stories in the game environment. Let every player feel they have to invest effort to seek knowledge instead of just handing it to them. When they finally discover something and are not ready to deal with it, they are kept awake and on their toes for danger because you didn't tell everything at once and they have to react to what happens instead of go in prepared all the time. Going on adventure should be risky because you are going into the unknown. Quest markers give away the info making you feel safe instead of adventurous and brave by absorbing risks. By telling you too much, it feels less like adventure and more of a fetch quest sim. You don't feel scared to delve into the unknown since everyone knows everything already.

[Deef]

Well, your reply was less irritating to read than my post so I'll acknowledge that yes we're on the same page with that. Though I imagine everyone here would have preferred a less patronising quest system. It's sad but true that when it comes to sales, avoiding frustrating trumps intelligent design.

As I play through Skyrim more (and the mod scene about 10 times more), it's becoming apparent that Bethesda really were riding their one good trick all the way to the end. The world is very good, and makes up for downfalls that wouldn't fly in other games, but they have really milked that as an excuse. The game shines at one thing and for that it receives its praise, but to me it appears that they knew they didn't have to aim for excellence anywhere else. Well, I should actually complete it before getting too critical.

But yes. Make it mindless if it removes frustration = profit.

[GameHED]

Beyond Skyrim: Three Kingdoms Announcement Trailer

Beyond Skyrim
Published on Apr 20, 2018
Beyond Skyrim: Iliac Bay is proud to present its first trailer!

Beyond Skyrim: Three Kingdoms is the first planned release from the Iliac Bay: Tower of Dawn project. If you enjoyed this update, please join our team and help us to deliver the release sooner. We particularly need artists (both 3D and 2D), scriptwriters, coders, voice actors and experienced mod-makers who know their way around the Creation Kit. Join us: BS Community Discord server: https://discord.gg/kbKVEsX" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; Iliac Bay Community Discord server: https://discord.gg/ESagg52" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; If you want to help, please use the contact details below:
https://www.youtube.com/redirect?q=http ... JU_pSTbFoI" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Filmed and edited by McFearless

Soundtrack by Joao Guerra: https://soundcloud.com/joao_guin_guerra" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Soundtrack by Alex Catana: https://soundcloud.com/alexcatana" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Voiceover by Trendane Sparks: http://www.trendane.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It's time nintendo allowed mods for their new generation of zelda games which sacrificed story for open world 'roam anywhere you damn want" gameplay. Labo is nice but we want a level/world/dungeon editor like the pc gamers have had for ages. Mario Maker was the first step. Let that expand to include their open world adventure games. These skyrim mods are offering expansion pack sized free content. Now imagine millions of people creating new zelda Breath of the Wild dungeons?