Balakirev

This is clearly a matter where different aspects of a mod determine whether one will find it very good, or illusion-breaking. The review in question does mention specific instances where the critic found it impossible to accept his options; but again, it's not the kind of thing where one person is obviously right, or wrong. Hundreds of those. :rolleyes: There are many great things about Oblivion, but the dumbing down of its quests to get a younger audience of buyers wasn't among them. I've found no mages with quest systems, but then, the combat AI really isn't up to handling spells very intelligently. It doesn't need to when it's targeting you, but when it's working on your side, getting hit by reduced to a charcoal briquet from friendly fire isn't my idea of fun. ;) So I educate my companions in summoning spells and buffs, and leave most of the destruction school to myself. There are several CM Companion mages, though, if you want to go that route. Or you could enter the construction set and reset a companion you've got to a mage.

Hmmm...The Hall of Blissful Dreams isn't going to do all that, but it is kind of surrealistic in a sneaky way. You may want to take a look.

Welcome to The Configuration Game. ;) I've got 270+ mods running (thanks to a little merging). There are a few people in Bethsoft's forums that have as many as 500 going at once, though I think if any of them put that kind of effort into dealing with world hunger, they'd probably win a Nobel Prize for Peace. Really good companions with individual touches really interest me, and I've got a few. Viconia deVir not only gives you a Dummer companion, but lets you travel through a huge mod called The Underdark. You'll have plenty of battles to face, lots of dialog and decisions to make, plus numerous rewards along the way. Also has an optional romance quest, if that floats your boat. Viconia can learn spells from you, has cloaking spells of her own, and good vocal comments. Companion Vilja is the most full-featured character-as-mod. Tons of comments about everything you encounter throughout the world, as well as her own views, plus an ability to get involved in conversation (such as it is) with select other companions. She also has a few intriguing quests, and you can send her off to gather herbs, do shopping, even make potions for you if she's gotten the ingredients. Arren has strong abilities, but well-defined preferences. You don't want to kill innocent NPCs, or he'll eventually leave you. Wants a share of your loot if you have 10,000 coins or more. Includes leveled monster summons. Saphira's Romance and the Djinni's Chamber introduces Saphira, as you might guess. Relatively tough quest battles at times, but you get a really attractive Ayleid home (and I don't like Ayleid architecture, but the images you can see of it will give an idea of what's been done), plenty of armor, weapons, and a djinni companion who will return to her summoning flask any time you request it. Doesn't like crime, comes with her own horse, turns into a mermaid if you go for a swim, fills soul gems, can mix potions and recharge weapons (with limitations), etc. Also with a romance quest, if that, etc. Note, the original is in German, but the translation is always comprehensible. Stoker Wolff is by the same guy who did Viconia. He also journeys with you on a lengthy Underdark quest that yields weapons and armor, among other things, but the battles are less intense. Given the fact that you meet Viconia down there in his company, it's best to do this mod first. Also optional romance quest. I've heard mixed things about Heart of the Dead. On the one had, it offers a choice of companions, a lengthy quest system, and plenty of loot. On the other hand, I've read an intelligent review that criticizes its inflexibility: things are forced on the character because the plot requires it, not because they're logical results, etc. Haven't played through it yet; up to you. This is also a list of companion mods, somewhat out of date as the list keeper had a child about a year ago, and is spending all his time understandably with his new family. Still, it's a great list, and also includes a lot of other quest mod systems, with plenty of description. Hope that helps. :)

Yes, it is. It's also a very solid release. 291 is due out within a short while, but I'd suggest reading about it as stated before, to find if there are any issues before installation.

OBSE 19b is causing problems for some mods. That's been repeatedly reported the thread on Bethsoft's boards, so while it's unrelated to this, it's something to keep in mind. I'm personally sticking with versions of mods that still use OBSE 18 until everything is ironed out. Second, where does your Bashed Patch load relative to everything else in your loading order? That's not clear from your list. Is it right before Deadly Reflex 6? Third, if you run okay without the Bashed Patch, then it's not the BP that's the problem, but likely one or some combination of other files running within it (since BP is a compendium). You could try disabling, say, half the files running through your BP, and see if that works; if it doesn't, try disabling the other half. It takes time, but this should narrow matters down.

Haven't seen this, either. Probably a case of "X said that Y heard it from Z." Techgeek, Wrye Bash is in constant development. If you want to follow this, heck out the relevant threads in Bethsoft's own Oblivion mod forums. That'll keep you informed about what's being worked on, and how soon another version of the mod will (probably) show up. By the way, Pacific Morrowind is the person who would know best about its development. ;)

For one, the obvious: the heavier the armor, the better the protection, but the greater the encumbrance, and the louder the noise while moving. It's difficult to employ stealth without magic if you're in heavy armor. Conversely, it's difficult to get adequate physical protection without magic if you wear no armor. Second, the heavy armor skill builds endurance, while light armor builds speed. What you use, when you level up, matters, though you can always compensate with trainers. As a rule, I favor heavy armor, even though my characters typically mix magic and melee. I don't really see the need for my people to be fast, at least, not how I play the game. On the other hand, they can always use the extra protection. Bear in mind, creating strong enchantments for your armor pieces not only improves them in different magical resistances (frost, fire, etc), but also adds to their physical resistance. So if you get some armor enchanted with fire resistance, it improves it's physical resistance, too. A good wiki page on Oblivion armors.

Yes, there is. What you want is Divine Elegance Showroom, by QQix. Per the description: This mod creates a showroom in Divine Elegance's basement where live models will wear whatever Palonirya has for sale. And Palonirya is so proud of her showroom that she decided to share it with all clothes and armor merchants in Cyrodill. ANY store. YES! Armor too. Once you enter Divine Elegance, you go downstairs. There you'll find 3 letters. Give one of them to each of three clothing/armor merchants whose wares you want to see modeled, and when you return to Divine Elegance, you have options to see the works from each of these shops shown to you. You can also buy them. At any time you can grab the letters and go to other merchants, substituting their stock for whatever you've seen. The models occasionally get stuck behind the scenes, but not usually, and the whole thing is frankly brilliant.

Does this happen to all companions when you use them, or just one companion in particular? Also, checking under Wrye, is your CM Partners.esm still checked? Since companions are reliant on this, if it's accidentally unchecked then a companion will flop over on the ground and just lie there. (Tested this.) As happened to you. Finally, try the 50% Rule: disable 50% of your mods (alphabetically, or in modified date, or whatever order you prefer), and try running just to see if the companion stays active. If it does, the issue lies somewhere between one (or more) of the mods you deactivated, and that companion's mod. Try re-enabling half of the mods you deactivated. Enter the game, and see if the companion's still moving, etc. Keep it up until you've found the issue. Typically, companion mods should run towards the end of your lineup, close to your Bashed Patch. Make sure each shows up in Wrye in black, with no master files missing. I typically have 8-10 companions, of whom I usually go out with one, at most, two.

Oblivion XP is probably the best known, but there are others, such as Advanced Selective Leveling. Try searching the TES Nexus mod database on "leveling." I have no opinions to offer on any of these, as everybody has their own preferences for their own perfectly valid reasons. Deadly Reflext is a favorite for try this. Absolutely. I use it all the time for mod sorting, fixing occasional problems, combining patches, and changing settings that allow me to edit and create mods. Depends on what you prefer. You might want to be more specific. Mage or warrior? Lots of storage space? Plenty of decor, or none? No companions, one, or many? COBL in use? You wouldn't go into a realty agency and say, "I want you to show me homes," now, would you? :D I'll recommend my one finished mod, if you don't mind a little self-promotion: Skin-Toned Mannequins. I like realism, and it seems to me that if you can cast spells moving yourself around a world, turning invisible, etc, you should be able to buy mannequins that looks like various races. These do. Regardless, good luck!

The Oblivion Wiki, on Luck.

Showracemenu, as I recall, often caused issues in Morrowind. Just be sure that before you make a major change, you do a save. It never hurts to cover your butt in this way.

It does seem, though, that guys don't really get more than about 10% the new effort in good armors, doesn't it? Can't say I blame modders for this; I enjoy female eyecandy as much as the next male who isn't dead. ;) For male armor, I recommend the Apachii Heroes Store. There are also some very nice, distinctive but sex-neutral armor sets in the quest mod, Adash, as well as some wonderful weapon models with special effects.

All races receive different bonuses. Some get spells (usually castable once a day), or infravision, or some other ability. Some races also receive bonuses to skills, as well as attributes. Note also that there's a slight positive NPC attitude adjustment to player characters of the same race, and at least a few of the races have both positive and negative attitude adjustments. Dark Elves, for example, don't like Wood Elves. It's a -10 on all NPC reaction checks. This is a useful page about 'em all.

The good news is that copying faces between some of the standard races--for example, Imperial to Breton--is easy. The bad news is that copying faces between other standard races--say, Imperial to Wood Elves--is much more difficult, because of major differences between them. Much of the latter applies to custom races, as well. It takes a fair amount of work in my experience in the editor to get anything halfway decent in the result, and there have been several times when the thing simply gave me an error and closed after trying to save.

First: define what you're looking for by category: house mods, companions, rule tweaks, spell tweaks, etc. Then use TES Nexus' filtering function to look at all the mods in that category, perhaps over the last year or two (just to be current on functionality). Reading the descriptions should help focus on what qualities you really want out of that kind of mod. After you've narrowed it down this far, you can probably either find what you want without help, or ask specifically for X mod that does A, B, and C. That'll make it a lot easier for everybody. ;) Good luck!

Sure does. Just released Windows Glow Expansion for Morrowind, which you can find here.

There have been some mod packages compiled and released here on TES Nexus, but in general they're not used. For one thing, no two people have the same taste. For another, re-releasing somebody else's mod without having their permission (which is usually the case with compilations) is frowned upon. FCOM, mentioned above, is actually four separate mods that reconfigure much of the way Oblivion responds. It's difficult to get all four working together properly, and takes a lot of CPU and RAM to run at a distant speed. If you're interested, search out threads in the Bethsoft forums about FCOM to read what people say about them. I myself use only two of the components: Francesco's leveled creatures/items mod, and Mart's Monster mod (often abbreviated Fran's and MMM). Francesco's isn't that great a drain on your computer's resources, but MMM is. Cavaet emptor. For quest mods, I strongly recommend checking out TOQL, The Oblivion Quest List. It lists a ton of Oblivion quest mods, divided by size, including descriptions, and links. It's not completely up-to-date; the author became a first time father about a year ago, and has taken a break from Oblivion. Understandably so, but it remains an excellent resource.

No description to speak of, and the mod's been posted in the wrong section, under Oblivion. I'm not trying to cast aspersions on Dungeons, mind you. I just think that providing some useful background, and placing it where others who play the game might seek it out, would be helpful to the modder.

I've been using OBSE 18 for some time, and both SM and LAME. I've not noticed any problems with the magic system in either. What's your source for a conflict between SM and OBSE v18?

Are you looking for armor to find on bodies, or placed in chests with no fees or quests, or to be found in stores? If the last, you might take a look at the Apachii Goddess Store, and the Apachii Heroes Store. Both use HGEC, but offer so much stuff that you're bound to find a number of things to fit your character. Plus, much of it is clearly labeled as to HGEC type. Worth a glance, in any case. Nearly all their contents are displayed online, in the images section of each mod.

Try here.

One major problem is the ever-increasing desire on the part of players for more game features. The more you put in, the more difficult for the rules-based AI, and the more difficult it is to adequately beta test in-house. Which is no excuse either for releasing a brain-dead AI or a game that's beta-tested by your players, of course. It's simply a fact of life. By contrast, check out something like Solium Infernum. Tiny company, simple, menu-based graphics, had fantastic AI almost from the first, despite having a relatively complex set of interactions with computer-driven AIs, because there are physical spaces to consider (saving lots of time and money) and because aside from those interactions there's very little else. I'm not recommending the game (though it is fun), but just trying to show that a game concentrating on a few design elements takes less resources and works well from the start. It's just not the kind that sells a lot, though.

Consider Windows Glow and Windows Glow: Tribunal. I've used both of them without any problems--which is of course no guarantee you'll find them suitable, but still.

This is dated in some respects, but remains an excellent list of some of the finest Morrowind mods from a variety of perspectives, including very brief reviews. Note that if the links are no longer completely accurate, each of the mods should be available either through PlanetElderScrolls, or here on TES Nexus. If you have questions about any specific mod, feel free to ask. I've been playing the thing ever since it came out. In general, Morrowind is a slower, more challenging game. Because many conflicts aren't leveled, you will find it much easier to die, until you get your combat skills raised at the beginning. Word of advice: don't neglect dexterity. In Oblivion it was largely of use to ranged fighters, but it affects the chance to hit on all non-magical combat in Morrowind. Alchemy is a boon, as someone else noted, but it's difficult to get it going if it's anything less than a minor skill, since it will fail regularly. (It never fails in Oblivion.) Best place it in as a minor or major in Morrowind. I strongly recommend a mod, any mod, that allows for magickal regeneration over time while awake. This means you don't need to sleep to get back your magicka, and can wait on raising your levels until you do.