Please help me! I'm new at this!

[Deleted79169328User]

Hi everyone! I could really use some help. After hours and hours of trying to understand how to mod the game, I think I finally got the gist of it. However, I see all these screenshots and videos from other players and I'm still not sure what I'm missing!

 

I'm trying to get my game and NPCs looking beautiful and photorealistic, but I'm not sure what else to do. I've already added plenty of mods but apparently I'm missing something or didn't do something right.

 

I'm listing my mod list off the top of my head since I'm not at home right now, I will update when I do:

 

Racemenu

Unofficial Skyrim patch

Cbbe+bodyslide

Bijin collection

The ordinary women(though I noticed it conflicts with bijin, hilariously giving some NPCs blackface, so I disabled it)

Eyes of beauty

Skylight textures for males

Several texture options for females: bijin, thepure, and can't remember the other one (trying to figure out what looks best but each one gives weird shadows, why?)

Several racemenu/bodyslide presets

Enhanced blood

2k textures

Tried to install the fxaa sliders but incorrectly, cant access it ingame

Enhanced clouds

Enhanced Flora

Total character makeover

Cnb physics

 

I just want my game to look like everyone else's, lol. I'm not looking for unrealistic proportions of NPCs, but I want to at least improve their look. Several examples like the racemenu and bodyslide screenshots, or if you watch any best-of on youtube. Im looking for a mod like realvision. I read it's outdated, but anything that will help add or help the look of my game.

 

Thanks!

[anjenthedog]

FWIW... In terms of characters...

 

I discovered the same thing about Bijin and ordinary women. I disabled Bijin instead of ordinary women

 

Also, I use Shiva's Beautiful Presets

 

I use Botox as well.

 

3BBB not CBBE anymore (well technically 3bbb is a cbbe variant but whatever)

 

I use the BHUNP for my xUNP followers that have no cbbe foundation

 

And SG texture Renewal (rule not with demonaic)

 

And Demonaic HQ Glossy Female Body texture (rule not with SG)

 

And Expressive Facial Animation -Female Edition-

 

lots of manual tweaking to my female characters faces (and my male player's face too, although far less effort than the females), and my female's body, long before I delved into applying another level of complication by adding any racemenu overlay faces or bodies. (apparently they morph what you apply them to, they don't just replace them one for one with what you see on the webpage prior to downloading) and lots more tweaking with racemenu to refine the new morphed amalgam.

 

The ENBs you choose can make a big difference too, and they change the tonality of the characters. Also, not sue if I'm right or not, but I believe when you work in racemenu, the embedded facelight style light can be turned off or on. I generally prefer to turn it off and use either facelight directly, or my trusty magic lamp (quick light) for local lighting when playing

 

Yundao hair is pretty nice, way better than vanilla (also is HDT)...

 

I'm sure something gets overwritten along the way, since most were installed pretty early on without any real insight into the way things work, but all of them are in evidence either on my player character or one one or more follower, so all's well as far as I'm concerned.

 

 

Something *is glitched with a very small number of NPCs in my build, (Senna, Camilla, the veggie stand lady from whiterun, etc. a couple dozen in all), as they seem to have screwed up textures that don't match their body topographies, but all the other characters and the uniques (sha, hikari, elwyn, etc etc) are fine.

[Deleted79169328User]

So is 3bbb a different mod altogether that I disable cbbe or do I add that in with cbbe? Does 3bbb have their own presets or will it work with cbbe presets?

[JimmyRJump]

I think 'BBB' stands for Bouncing Boobs & Butt. It's a body setting that can be applied to body presets in BodySlide. At least that's how it works with other animation jiggle mods.

 

As far as wanting your game to "look like everyone else's" goes, then you're on a wrong path. Mainly because you don't know how everyone's game looks, only how that of a hadnful of gamers looks and secondly, you need to focus on what YOU like, not on what someone else likes. As such, you have a whole world of mods to discover and to test to see what you like and which mods work together well and which don't.

[Deleted79169328User]

Yeah you're right. I just in general am a big admirer of artwork and design, thus why I can't really decide on my own ideas. Lol.Thank you for the help and your suggestions.

 

It looks okay with the mods I have but I think for the first time, I've done well so far.

 

Besides the character mods, any suggestions for overall graphics/world mods, like the real vision enb which I guess doesn't work with se? I can't get fxaa mod to work. I have a few mods but again, I'll post a complete list once i get home.

[anjenthedog]

What ***I*** use for environmentals right now... (probably won't match what anyone else uses)

 

Visuals and graphics (mod category)

1) Immersive Saturation Boost

2) Imaginator - SSE - Visual Control device (provides "realtime" control over brightness, contract, saturation, etc)

 

Cities, Towns, Villages, and Hamlets

1) Blubbos Riverwood

2) Fish in the Fountain

 

Creatures

1) Improved fish

 

Environmental

1) Verdant 1.6. SSE Edition

2) Realistic Water Two v2.12

3) Bruma lanterns (I have the Bruma addon in stalled which is why this is here)

4) Whiterun River Trees

5) Dolomite Weathers (currently disabled because I'm currently using a "Spring/Summertime" motif

6) as noted earlier, Trees of the Rift Reborn Pink Cherry Blossom 2, although it's no longer available from nexus (or anywhere far as I can tell)

 

Models and Textures

1) Static Mesh Improvement Modd -SMIM

2) Skyrim Flora Overhaul SE v2.72a

2) Unique Flowers and Plants for Skyrim SE DLC compatible (2.08)

 

Landscape changes

1) Landscape Fixes for Grass Mods

2) Simply Bigger Trees SE

3) Seasons of Skyrim - Springtime Overhaul SSE

4) Vivid Landscapes - Special Edition

 

Immersion

1) Lanterns of Skyriim II - FOMOD

 

 

Thing is, you might like these, you might not. I have no idea in the long run. So it's up to you to experiment and see what your eyes say is "right"

 

FWIW, I spent quite a bit of time up front watching showcase videos, and then once I got here, checking out almost every mod dating back to ~2016 or so. I got a bit of a boost on that by scanning the "most endorsed" mods category.

 

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RE: 3BBB, it's just the latest revision to the CBBE base model. You don't "need" it.

 

I noted it, like I noted several other mods I use, because they're part of what I use to produce what I think appears similar to much of the higher quality content I see on You tube and elsewhere.

 

The bulk of what's really important in my response on character tweaking was the paragraphs that noted (albeit admittedly somewhat "in passing") that I spent quite a bit of time tweaking my characters. (and still am closing in on a year later... it's a continuous improvement thing)

-----------

 

Last thing I'll note here: I'm running a 9700K system with 64G of primary memory, a 500G SSD, and a 6G video card (1060), so if you're expecting "MXR grade" graphics, you'd better be ready with a better card than mine and probably as much or a bit more basic horsepower than I have at my disposal from the computer itself.

 

edited for content

[Deleted79169328User]

I forgot to post my specs:

 

Ryzen 2700X, GeForce 1660ti, b450 tomahawk motherboard, 16gb Corsair ddr4

 

I'm using vortex. I tested things again but stability is the problem. I tried to follow Sinitar's guide but he doesn't use vortex. He lists alot of fixes to various mods that no one else mentions.

 

I know vortex already has loot but is SSEEdit important as well?

[anjenthedog]

I've used SSEEdit a couple times so far, to "clean the masters" (skyrim.esm, dawnguard.esm, hearthfires.esm, and dragonborn.esm... see the cleaning thread in the Skyrim Special Edition Mod Talk forum), as well as to alter the height of a couple of followers

 

https://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/5381485-guide-manual-cleaning-skyrim-and-skyrim-special-edition-master-files/

 

I'd probably use it more but I'm still not familiar with all the underpinnings or how they're put together. I'd say install it for those times you find you need it, even if few and far between.

 

Afaik, SSEEDit is one of those tools you might not use often but which is good to have on hand when you do. (from the perspective of a relative newb)

 

I also have NifSkope installed (although I don't think I've used it yet), Skyrim Performance Monitor, Creation Kit (haven't used it yet), and of course, Fallrim tools, which I use routinely.

 

For stability... Are you running the Unofficial Skyrim Special edition Patch? Afaik, it's a very popular download. Surprisingly, I haven't had much need, or at least I'm running pretty well without it, but in any case, many swear by it...

[Deleted79169328User]

Hi there. So just a quick update, I followed Ultimate Immersion's guide and it worked out perfectly until I installed the enb. Once I did that, my frame rate dropped and became very laggy. My loading screen took forever and my game itself just appeared very bland rather than looking nice, although I understand I probably have to mess with the settings. Also, I kept having to mess around with the load order. I don't know how accurate Vortex's loot system is but can anyone explain how I should order my plug-in/mods?

 

Anyone else have had trouble installing the enb? I followed all the directions regarding the root files and installing my chosen enb but is there another mod I need to get it working correctly? Also, why does it look like crap? Lol. Is it because of mod order? Thanks again for the help ð