Mods for Skyrim

[Chilloutman]

Hi guys,

 

Looking for replaying Skyrim now that I bought complete edition for cheap. I am looking into mod similiar to OOO for Oblivion - manually placed items, removed level scaling etc. Also if you can point out any 'must have' mods it would be nice as well. Just please state if they are compatible with any already mentioned ones. I dont want ton of mods but clean Skyrim is pretty boring. Any imersion improving ones are welcomed. I will dig through nexus but its so much stuff there so picking only good ones is really hard. I will welcome any suggestions (hey, even busty females are welcome xD)

 

Thanks guys

[Rosbjerg]

Skyrim ReDone

 

And generally the Skyrim GEMS are pretty good. http://skyrimgems.com/ (they link to nexus)

For instance:

Alternate start let's you start as a vampire for instance or even lowly peasant.

Immersive loot and/or Scarcity - makes rare items extremely rare, you'll only really find steel weapons. Daedric, Glass and Dwarven basically have to be forged or fought for as they are not really present in the game world containers.

Deadly Combat for less arcadey fights.

 

and so on..

 

 

Edit: Although it's a little complicated, making a merged patch when you're done is very recommendable, using the TES5Edit. It'll make mod conflicts, crashes etc a lot less likely. The GEMS however usually play well together, if you stick with them.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

Skyrim ReDone

 

And generally the Skyrim GEMS are pretty good. http://skyrimgems.com/

Actually I think PerkusMaximus (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/59849/?) replaced that one.

 

Anyways chilloutman, I'd use either PerMa/SkyRe or SPERG. The former completely revamps the perks and combat system while the latter tweaks skills and revamps perk trees.

 

The Unofficial patches are absolutely a must.

 

Immersive Weapons and Armor adds a lot of new stuff to use. None of it is really OP, but it looks pretty good. Immersive creatures adds more variety to encounters and I highly recommend it.

 

Imperious Races balances the races by giving all of them two passive abilities, one power, and a quest to unlock another power.

 

If you're not using PerMa, Wintermyst is a great mod that adds a lot of new enchantments to the game.

 

Classic Classes and Birthsigns is good if you want to start a little more specialized. Take note that you will start off with 40 or 60 less total skill points though.

 

Apocalypse Spells adds a lot of new spells that are more interesting than the vanilla spells. Forgotten Magic can be cool, but the spell abilities can be op. Thunderchild(?) adds new shouts so I'd give that at least a glance.

 

Better Vampires is good if you're interested in playing a vampire. Not only does it add optional buffs, but it has several options that allow you to change how it plays such as vampire hunters spawning to attack you.

[HoonDing]

Kill the Blades.

[Fenixp]

I wrote this up some time ago, with a goal of making Skyrim into a game I always wanted it to be, might help you. Unofficial patch would definitely be a worthwhile addition tho, and keep in mind I wrote it over a year ago so new and better mods doing the same might have emerged:

 

So anyway, I love Elder Scrolls games. One of the most powerful moment of my gaming history was starting to play Morrowind, looking around and thinking "Holy ****, I can go absolutely everywhere!" - Then I have proceeded to play Morrowind for the entire following year, played it every single day when I was able to, at least for a while. 

When it comes to Skyrim, on the other hand... I didn't like it very much at the beginning. I wanted to properly mod it and get more out of the game, but as expansions were getting released, more and more mods required them and I gave up until I get my hands on them. So, this wednesday (or so) I actually got Legendary edition and finally started the modding spree (not really, I'm using 14 mods currently which is not that much by my TES standards) - it's now pretty much the most impressive RPG I have played in a long, long time. Aside from Skyrim and what it got right (rich and detailed world and loads of content would be strongest parts here), there was a fair bit of stuff I flatout wasn't satisfied with and a fair bit of stuff I liked, but felt could have been done better. Below follows a list of my complaints and how to fix them, for those who might be interested. All of these mods actually feel like they're part of Skyrim, not just some tacked-on content: 

I'm gonna be mentioning Skyrim Redone a lot. What can I say, it gets a lot of things right. It consists of modules, so I'll try to mention the relevant ones. Still, it's best to install all of them - they're very well thought-trough and interconnected. 

- Feeling of empowerment - one of my biggest complaints about Skyrim was the fact that it went out of its way to make you feel like a powerful warrior capable of overcoming the greatest obstacles right from the beginning. Not a thing of level-scaling, not really as you could still hit crazy difficult spots at time - but the design decision to give you this 'power' is still around, and... Well let's just say I prefer to start my RPGs as a whimp. So, my fix for that? 

Skyrim Redone - Combat Module + Enemy Scaling Module 
Basically, what the two of these do is turning you into a whimp from the getgo. No loger will you be able to run into a bandit camp and murder everyone within and you'll get a much greater feeling of progression as you'll be able to take on more and more powerful enemies as you level up. It's not one of the 'hardcore you'll break your teeth on everything' mods - the progression is actually reasonably fast and incredibly rewarding. Now add the combat module to the mix - it overhauls the combat and a lot of equipment in a way that makes fighting a lot faster and more deadly. It forces you to actually use tactics and environment to your advantage, and when you get jumped on by a character of roughly the same level as you are, you will most likely die, so caution is a good idea - it works the other way around as well tho. It's also important to learn to properly manage groups of enemies and similar. Combat suddenly feels a lot more involved because of that. 

- Boring perks - now, the addition of perks into Skyrim was a genious idea, allowing your character to profile more in what you want him/her to be. Thing is, the tree was a) unbalanced and b) rather boring, with a lot of passive increases that didn't really influence the gameplay. So, the fix? 

Skyrim Redone 
It was a plugin that was started to overhaul the skill tree, so that's what it does. It changes all the trees substantially, puts a lot more balance into them, and makes them a lot more fun. For instance, it merges pickpocket and lockpicking skills together (as lockpicking was rather boring) and adds a new Wayfarer skill, that allows you to learn lore of Skyrim's fauna and other inhabitants, survival skills if you have certain another mod installed (will mention it below) and, in the end, masquerade as a member of numerous Skyrim's factions, even usually hostile ones, to move freely amongst them (I imagine this should work wonders for asassins). That was the most drastic change, but there are heps more, equally as interesting and fun. You can build dwemer constructs! 

- No real feeling of harsh conditions - Basically, what bothered me a lot about the game was that everybody kept claiming how harsh and inhospitable Skyrim is, but you could swim in freezing water and then go jog butt-naked over its mountains, in a blizzard. And absolutely nothing would happen. Well, the fix? 

Frostfall - Hypothermia Camping Survival 
Yeah. Basically, the mod tracks your body temperature + wetness and you can freeze to death if you're not careful. It offers three variants - basically casual, normal and hardcore - and you can actually tweak individual options of the mod via an in-game menu, so if you don't like something, turn it off. The way I'm playing now is without fast-travel, with different types of clothing offering different amounts of protection from cold and rain (both can be turned on or off at will). What you're always going to get with the mod are ways to craft camping equipment (so you can make fire or shelter when you don't currently have access to some) and heat, wetness and weather tracking, all seamlessly included into the game's UI. Basically, it forces you to put a lot more consideration into conducting long journeys into mountains, ideally packing a tent, some firewood and good, protective equipment. This mod is also interjoined with Skyrim Redone, where SkyRe adds a new branch to its wayfarer tree, concerning survival and even adds spells that help raise your exposure protection. It just all feels like it was in Skyrim all along, and is brilliant. 

Right, those were my biggest bugbears with Skyrim. Now, for any in-game mod menu to work, you need to have SkyUI installed - but you should have that anyway as it improves the UI in every possible way. So, anyway, to my general mod recommendations: 
Realistic Needs and Diseases - you need to eat, drink and sleep. That's it. 
Skyrim community uncapper - is needed by SkyRE. 
Skyrim Script Extender - is needed by all the mods ever. 
Run for your lives and When vampires attack - makes NPCs less suicidal. Peasants won't try to fisticuff the dragons and will rather hide away, those who should fight according to lore stay and fight tho. 
Improved NPC clothing - hi-res - Well, that. 
Sounds of Skyrim - adds a lot of ambient sounds to the game, which in turn adds to immersion. Just... Wonderful and atmospheric. 
Realistic Lightening Overhaul - That. Makes only sources of light in dungeons actually emit light, so there's no 'fog' allowing you to see in pitch black, so ... be wary of that. You can actually turn that feature off tho. Warning - you're gonna need compatibility patches provided with Sounds of Skyrim for it to run properly. 
A Quality World Map - It makes the world map hi-res and adds roads to it, so you can actually plan properly. 

I have also turned off compass markers of undiscovered locations as I feel it make me look around much more, and I find more cool stuff. Otherwise I just follow the black icons on my compass and it's terrible. 

So anyway, there you go. My Skyrim is now ****ing awesome. I wrote all that on the offchance that someone had similar problems with Skyrim as I did - because this just about makes it a perfect game. 

I recommend installing as much as you want from that list via Nexus Mod Manager - does just about everything for you, and offers installation wizard for mods with more that a single flavour.

Edited October 21, 2015 by Fenixp

[Gorgon]

I don't even know where to start, there is soo much. 

 

Get all your ducks in a row first though. Install SKSE, FNIS, Mod menu,  Custom skeletons and custum animation packs, There is a stability and memory patch as well, you need that to take advantage of more ram. and carefully read the description for possible conflicts every time you add something new. 

 

 

Then abandon your idea to 'only add a few things' and go wild with it.