Old player starting from scratch

[spiro7]

I have been playing Skyrim with mods ever since I got my PC 2 years ago. I'm gonna be honest and say I've been using a pirated copy to play. I've stopped playing and following the modding scene for a while but I decided to get back to playing again. I bought the GOTY edition a while back during a sale but have never got around to installing it. Basically I'm now starting from scratch since I uninstalled everything.

 

So what I want to know now is what should I do before installing? Like what should I prepare before playing the game? I've been using NMM but I've read others saying that other mod managers are better. Are there any settings I have to mess around with as well?

 

My list right now consists of

- NMM (or whichever mod manager you guys can suggest me)

 

- Unofficial skyrim patches (apparently there's a compiled version?)

 

- SKSE

 

- either Racemenu or ECE, alongside ShowRaceMenu Precache Killer (which character editor should i get?)

 

- FNIS

 

- ENB or SweetFX (not sure which to get and if I'm not wrong both will clash with one another. Any suggestions? I have an i7-3770, 8gb ram and a GTX 770 with 4gb vram. I prefer something that looks amazing graphics wise but is not a performance hog. My previous enb looks good but I get constant fps drops)

 

- Which body type should I use? I've mainly used UNPB so not sure if you guys have suggestions for other types? If there's a noob friendly type that's also compatible with the character editor, I'd be happy with it

 

So.. yeah. I may be missing something but that's all I have for now. Don't worry about suggesting mods for gameplay and the like. My main concern right now is just starting the game on the right foot so any tips/advice will be really helpful. Thanks in advance. :D

Edited July 25, 2015 by spiro7

[BlackRoseOfThorns]

NMM is easier to use for bigginers. I personally use Mod Organizer (MO), it allows you to store all installed mods in separate folders, so duplicates won't get deleted. I like to try different mod combinations for different characters and with MO I don't have to reinstall anything. You can save any mod list as a profile with separated game saves. The NMM beta was suppose to have similiar features, but I haven't got around testing it.

 

Get LOOT for sorting mod order.

 

RaceMenu got upgraded some time ago and has many ECE features. Use it together with ShowRaceMenu Alternative, it will prevent your character stats from bugging when changing appearance in the middle of playthrough. To be honest I've never used ShowRaceMenu Precache Killer and I have installed over 800 hair styles and didn't crash so far. Not counting buggy bethesda Helgen intro, which I won't have to suffer through again thanks to "Live Another Life - Alternative Start". I highly recommend it.

 

SweetFx can work together with ENB, if the preset is tweaked for it. SweetFx will never recreate all effect avaible in advanced Enb preset. I recommend using light ENB preset with integrated Enboost. Check s.t.e.p. guide on how to properly set it up. For starters try Clarity ENB, Tranquility Extended Fx - Performance, Straylight ENB or Skyrim Enchanced Shaders - NLA. If you have performance issues you can open ENB configurator ingame (shift+enter) and turn down some options like ssao, shadows, skylightning, reflections, dof, adaptation time.

Install Verdant grass pluging (v1.6 + 512 res textures for performance, set MinGrassSize=45 or higher in Skyrim.ini) and ground textures (Tamu75 Terrain Parallax Textures, Tamriel Reloaded HD, Skyrim HD - Terrain Parralax Tributte, Vivid Lansdcapes - Tundra >> terrain parallax turned on in enblocal.ini for v0.265+ enb binary) before rating an enb.

In case you are dead set on pure SweetFx preset check ICBINE 3.

 

UNPB is pretty good. I like SevenBase / UNPB mashups, but pure UNPB will be more noob friendly :tongue: All UNP skin retextures will work with it. Same for custom armor mods, just the UNP version will have smaler breasts. Get "Armours by FastestDog - for SEVENBASE 7B and UNPB" vanilla armor mesh conversion - super lore friendly!

Iron Armor

Steel Armor

 

I would install UNPB and Better Males on top of XCE pack to get high res dirt, warpaints, eyes, etc.

 

 

Don't forget "Skyrim ini for lazy users".

Edited July 25, 2015 by BlackRoseOfThorns

[ElioraArin]

I highly recommend using Mod Organiser rather than NMM as it sounds like you will probably be doing a bit of experimenting with different mods until you get your game where you want it. As BlackRoseOfThorns stated this is a more difficult manager to use but there are excellent tutorials in how to install & use it (USE THEM - you will need to :D). MO keeps your mod data in a separate file to your vanilla Skyrim data, so you are much less likely to end up having to do a clean install after messing around trying this, that & everything else in the way of mods that you can find!

The list of mods you prefer will probably be very different to someone elses - people may give more suggestions if they know what you are most interested in, ie graphic enhancements, immersion, new armors & weapons etc. Ultimately be prepared to spend hours, days, maybe even weeks of your spare time scouring the files on this site - I recommend browsing through each Skyrim Category using "Most Endorsed" as your Sort By option, this helped me in finding what in most cases turned out to be the most high quality & game improving mods.

Good luck :smile:

Edited July 25, 2015 by ElioraArin

[spiro7]

Ahaha believe me I've experimented a lot with mods before I uninstalled the game. I had the load order just where I wanted it and all but since I've uninstalled, I've forgotten what mods I had. Thanks for the tips guys. I'm gonna research more before I dive in once again :D