Striker879

When I first arrived here at Nexus I was unsure of many of the rules. A great source I have found is a daily perusal of Forum Rules and Warnings. It doesn't exactly have the immediacy of question/answer learning ... it's more akin to the learning from other's mistakes variety (always high up on my ToDo list).

Seams between body parts are an artifact of a combination of mesh vertices not perfectly aligning at the juncture of two body parts and the ability of the EGT files to transfer head colour/tone qualities to the adjacent body parts. There used to be a good explanation (including pictures) in one of the Seamless series mod page's mod description but that particular member of the Seamless series has since had a mod description redesign and the info is no longer there. - Edit - The original mod description referenced OFF-Optimized Facegen Files for further info on the subject.

The size of a mod isn't my biggest criteria when picking mods, it is what it adds to my gameplay and playstyle that form the bottom line. Actually MOO was intended for my current guy's load order, but after I saw how much RF + BPN changed how I play the game during install testing and tweaking I decided to leave it for the next iteration of load order. At the time I didn't even dream it would be more than 6 years before that LO change would happen. I suspect that my next guy's chance may be getting closer to the horizon as I've started following the MOO mod comments closely again in the past year (I started watching MOO as soon as it was first released, but stepped back somewhat after it didn't make into the current LO). This guy is the first one I've taken to max level, and all he hasn't done so far is Thieves Guild (been there, done that with previous characters) and Mehrunes Razor (the only DLC I've not explored after my current guy went to the Isles). Originally after I decided against MOO for this guy I thought I'd leave it until I got around to finishing my next computer, but things have sort of stagnated on that front. I go a bit different heading than your Safe Roads direction (I do agree that vanilla just adds tedium after a while ... stopping to fight as you round each corner, made even worse once you get a horse to move around as then you wind up spending so much time protecting your horse, so the fights aren't even truly fights as much as slaughtering the bandit/critter wanting to kill your horse). The way I go is SPAWN with the sExteriorMax setting tweaked to a fairly large value in SPAWN.ini (along with quite a few other INI tweaks in it of course). Sometimes you'll get a respawn at one of the roadway spawn points without much time passing (I have sExteriorMin tweaked up to 36 hours from the default 24, but still that means it's half the vanilla repawn time) but most of the time it's somewhat or quite a bit longer for respawn, meaning you never can tell when a cleared spawn point will respawn. SPAWN also comes in handy for my main use for it ... controlling the resetting of player owned cells. This plays into one of my favourite "Striker's Mini-games", populating my houses with my favourite bandits/marauders/conjurers and necromancers. Without SPAWN they're gone in three days, with SPAWN and my INI tweaks I have some who have been at some houses almost as long as I've owned the house. SPAWN gives me something elese I really enjoy gameplay wise ... some unpredictability Here's my current guy's load order, should give a bit of fuel for picking one anothers brains:

What's even more amusing is the fact that this discussion was necro'd from a thread that died in 2017, only to be almost immediately hijacked and sent down a very spurious path. E'gad I love GMAD and her children. :happy: I can't speak to your track record Perraine, as I must confess that I haven't taken note (yet ... you are on notice now) but Hey and I enjoy something that I consider more akin to an ability than a skill (as you might find in Oblivion). The advantage conferred by an ability is no effort is expended to achieve it's result, it just flows as naturally as water down a course.

We still have baby bonus here in the Great Frozen North and at one time I think the idea existed south of the border too ... has it been done away with in the US or was it always more of a state by state thing? You still get tax deductions for each child you have, and if you have 12 (or more) you don't pay income taxes at all. The republican party is against abortion, and a fair few of them are against federal dollars paying for contraceptives as well. The republican party gave a really good shot at defunding planned parenthood. And I think some of that is still about. To the point of NUMEROUS clinecs closing. Yes, the birthrate is declining, but, that isn't relevant to the discussion. The republican party is all about 'pro-life', right up until you are born, then, you are on your own. So, while they may not be actively encouraging a high birth rate, they ARE taking active steps to see that it happens. Fortunately, they aren't as successful as they would like. Interesting ... so here in Canada the family receives money for each child and tax deductions per child as well. The baby bonus income is generally attributed to the woman as that is more often than not the lower income earner of the family and the tax deduction to the man (providing he is the higher income earner, and thus offers the most "bang for the buck" from the tax break). I've not been involved in all that for decades of course. I've also not seen much reported regarding how effective it is in sustaining organic population growth. I would think it would be a difficult thing to measure accurately. There we go Hey ... yet another successful thread hijack! :laugh:

We still have baby bonus here in the Great Frozen North and at one time I think the idea existed south of the border too ... has it been done away with in the US or was it always more of a state by state thing?

Very valid points raised in that video Gnarly ... another well deserved thank you. About the only one I didn't have complete concurrence with was the quest marker issue, but that does come down to a personal choice issue and has nothing at all to do with the "dumbing down" assertion (and thus was never a valid point for me in illustrating Bethesda's "transgressions"). Getting rid of the quest marker is as simple as selecting a quest that didn't offer a marker to it's current stage for me (I tend to lean towards cobbled together solutions ... Enhanced Economy's merchant quests are my usual go to for the job). Like the fast travel thing I mentioned earlier in the thread, it leaves me with a simple workaround that is just as simply undone when I want. As is often the case, the "truth" (whatever that is) probably lies somewhere in between the extremes, but knowing it doesn't change a thing. Overcoming a slant or prejudice is a personal journey, with neither a "correct" starting point or end. I'm one of those who leans toward enjoying the trip more than preparing for departure or arriving at journey's end, so the thanks for the video was really a thanks for giving me a push to get me started down that particular hill.

"It's not a perfect game ... but it's perfect for me" sums it up for me too. I don't think I'm really a "role player" at heart though, as I always wind up being me no matter what my character looks like or does. I guess my challenge has been to find the mods that let me be me the best. That it is easy to view your own position as the pinnacle is just human nature expressing itself. Nothing wrong with it, but I don't find it stimulating. Finding a perspective that isn't your own is a beginning, but learning how to see from that perspective with eyes other than your own is the trick that is harder to come by. We are all limited by our field of view.

Considering what he did for a living, that really doesn't come as a surprise. :D As they say ... to the victor the spoils. On the reverse side the most common last name on the planet is Khan. Why ... because those very "spoils" wanted to give every possible chance to the offspring of the losing side. It's in our nature to strive to survive, and what better place to do that than from as close to the top of the heap we can manage. Any way we find to do that "managing" is justified (at least from the managing individual's perspective ... hence the still current need to keep a supply of sharp sticks handy to do a little eye poking when called for).

What we need to keep in mind is while it is true we a running human OS 2.0.21 all of that is stuck trying to run on human hardware version 1.0 ... and to make matters worse that hardware will only support human BIOS version 1.01 (or maybe ver 1.02). Many of the commands that OS 2.0.21 wants to run get their result truncated by the BIOS to actually fit the hardware. At our core we have more in common with our hunter gather ancestors than some idealized 21st century man. We come from a world where if we didn't spawn at every opportunity the race could go extinct (of course at the individual level we've never thought in those specific terms ... more like we want our DNA to be the dominant strain). Fun fact ... the one man with the greatest number of descendants in the world is Ghengis Khan as shown by Y chromosome analysis.

LOL ... OA be very very careful when getting close to the Blockhead rabbit hole. If you slip over it's edge there is no way out!

So one of my typical Striker questions Jathom ... did the market expectations actually change from Morrowind through Oblivion to Skyrim, or does it appear to shift as each game was targeted to an ever expanding market? I completely understand Bethesda's part in the progression, as the main focus of all companies is to produce larger profits. In the gaming industry there really is only one way to do that ... sell more games. If a portion of their old customer base isn't happy with what Bethesda needed to do to gain that larger audience, well isn't that what marketing departments are all about ... convincing the masses that less is actually more? Akin to Flat Earthers to some eyes, I'm one of the few who thinks that bigger isn't always better (notice I didn't assert never). Weighing what is lost vs the gains is a personal accounting. Once again we have no right answer, just different ones. When you play Morrowind do you mod it to become more Oblivion-like (I'm specifically thinking of game combat mechanics, but don't let that limit the scope of your answer)? It wasn't until I'd played Oblivion for some before I came to realise that it wasn't my first RPG game (I came from primarily a Doom/Quake/Half Life 1/racing and flying sim background). The very first game I played was the Privateer series, and especially with the first one I remember how I couldn't wait to get home from work so I could disappear into the game universe. It wasn't just the main story that pulled me in, but the ability to go anywhere, do anything whenever I wanted that sucked me in and wouldn't let go. Perhaps that's why I never actually played any of those FPS titles through to game end (or perhaps very rarely would be more accurate) ... they only offered the choice of wander around in an empty level after you'd killed the enemies or go to the next level and another grind. When I first played Oblivion I regained that freedom of choice. Frenetic activity or peaceful repose, all within my grasp whenever I wanted it. I study things I like, so the vagarities of the leveling system was just another element to be mastered, not something to fight or rail against. The more I understood the more I appreciated how Bethesda had given me the tools to go my own way, even if all of those tools weren't handed me via a tutorial dialogue on a silver platter. I have notes to myself for tweaks to my custom class for my next character, and no doubt that playing that character will open up new insights and possibilities for the next guy after him. A couple of years back I ran across a page here at Nexus for Privateer (actually a remake using the Gemini engine) and decided to give it a go. I won't say I didn't enjoy the revisit, but it's true value was in helping me see how rich the game experience in Oblivion was in comparison. In the end Privateer had lost it's grasp on me, not because of what it had to offer but due to what it couldn't offer because of limitations from it's era (Intel 286/386/486). Playing Privateer allowed me insights into my Oblivion experience I lacked before it gave me the frame of reference the FPS/sim transition could never give. This gives me an appreciation for how the Morrowind/Oblivion/Skyrim experience must play for some folks, as that progression devolves in the face of ever increasing computer power, as opposed to evolving to take advantage of what tomorrow offers. Gnarly posted a video link in the Mod Authors forum yesterday that I enjoyed. I'll post the link here with a thank you to Gnarly ...

Fortunately for me Jathom I don't mind being "an army of one" ... it may be a bit over the line to say I revel in it, but that does indicate the direction I'm facing. That won't stop me from sharing my spin on what tweaks to the game make it more enjoyable for me, nor dampen my interest in finding out what your ideas for the same are. The one thing I can't do for myself is have an idea that doesn't have it's start in my own gray matter. Ideas I don't necessarily agree with have just as much (if not more) value to me as ideas that align well with my own. The ones that align well just take closer scrutiny to see where they differ and thus may outline new pathways forward. I don't have a problem with the idea of encumbrance HadTo, in fact for me the notion of no encumbrance has less allure than that used by the vanilla game. What irks me is that if my character's max encumbrance was for example 500, in the vanilla system at 499.9 I can move without any penalty but at 500.0 I'm frozen in place. With RF + BPN as I start to carry more my speed and fatigue are affected and if I'm foolish enough to exceed my maximum I'll find my guy laying on the ground incapacitated. Makes walking around with your pockets filled to the brim a bit of an "adventure" at times, especially when near an enemy with burden poisons/enchantments at hand. Though I haven't played either Morrowind or Skyrim I'm always interested in other's views on the differences between the games. If I were to summarize what I've read so far I think I'd go for dumbing down in the interest of more mass appeal as you go from Morrowind to Skyrim. A larger fan base does not necessarily equate to better gameplay, or even a more fullfilling gaming experience for the player. It does achieve the business model goal of more money in the "right" hands though, which is the primary reason the games exist. In some distant future perhaps I'll take Morroblivion for a spin (I'm not sure I could come to grips with the chance based combat aspect of vanilla Morrowind). That would need to come after my next character gets off the ground in Oblivion however, as I have a good sized handful of new additions to my Oblivion mod loadout I'd like to try, one of which (Maskars Oblivion Overhaul) will certainly take me well beyond the "vanilla" game. My current guy (who is only 6 years gameplay old) is beginning to show his age. One of these days he'll find himself relegated to the role of mod test dummy for my next guy.

I haven't disabled fast travel myself, but that is as much a consequence of the fact that I just never do it during gameplay as anything (i.e. just because something is possible has no bearing on whether or not I will utilize it ... fast travel has on rare ocassions been handy when I didn't have a testing save close by to somewhere I was modding). Now autosaves are a whole 'nother story ... scripted are the only ones not disabled for me (and I don't use any of those fancy "better saving" mods). My original motivation/goal for using RF + BPA was to overcome a limitation with Universal Skeleton NIF based skeletons (the one I use is BBB Ragdoll Breast Physics - Growlfs Skeleton but any skeleton.nif derived from the later versions of Growlf's skeleton.nif suffer from the same problem). It was exploring the INIs for settings to solve that problem that brought me to where RF and BPA are integrated into my gameplay style now beyond fixing that Growlf problem. BPN also ties into the mix nicely, and adds it's own sprinkling of texture to the rising dough. Often while working through a long dungeon crawl I'll find myself thinking strategically ... planning where to get some rest and have some food/drink to regain strength and stave off the "pillow guy". The worst was trying to save Farwil and company from the Cheydinhal Oblivion gate (that gives you no recourse to going back to Tamriel) as I entered without nearly enough coffee in my inventory. I wound up getting through it by carefully selecting my locations before the collapse from lack of sleep hit. Harder/more complicated always wins my heart and mind.

You could do that, but, if you had read the ToS, you would know that you are not allowed to do that. The staff is rather good at tracking down people who go that route, and usually ban all the related accounts. The Forums Rules and Warnings section is littered with just that sort of thing. : / An alternative way that does fall within the ToS is to close your current account and then open a new one ... the tools to do that are provided by the site.

I read somewhere (probably on the UESP Wiki, but it could very well have been somewhere else) that the weight system is metric. If that is the case then divide by 2.2 to get weight in pounds. An 18 pound warhammer sounds reasonable to me ... you do want to do some damage with it, right? That said I still do enchant up some gear for myself to help sidestep some of the vanilla game limitations. As my magic skills get better with a character I think it is quite reasonable that my guy should also get skilled at enchanting. My current character uses Magicka-based enchantment limits and it's not that I dislike using it but for my next character I'm going to look into using Enchantment Mastery in conjunction with Sorcerys Toll. I already have the option turned on in Unequip Broken Armor for there to be a chance of destroying broken equipment (I do enjoy living dangerously ... and yes when one of my custom enchanted pieces gets destroyed I do say bad words, in fact at times a rather long string of them). Don't fight minotaurs toe to toe ... that is what fireballs where invented for. Another of my must have mods is Packdonkeys ver 2. It helps sidestep that encumbrance situation in a believeable way and getting enough gold for my first one is always job #1 for my character after starting the game (alt starts are the only way to go for me anymore). So have you tweaked your RF and BPA INIs Jathom?

I'm onboard with most of what you're saying Jathom. About the only things I couldn't go back to vanilla are the faces and bodies (sorry, you will never have any luck prying OCO v2, HGEC and Robert Male from my cold dead fingers, so your chances of doing so before that last day I spend here will be less than nil) and the vanilla encumbrance system (come on really ... one single flax seed weighing in at 0.1 is all it took for me being able to move at full speed to being rooted to one point ... Realistic Fatigue/Basic Physical Activities forever for me). The interface is not bad in my opinion, but then again I am known for making my own determination of what bugs me and what doesn't so all those "Better" mods have an uphill battle on their hands before I even give them a glance. When something bugs me I go looking for alternatives. The last place I'll look for alternatives is somebody's "must have" mod list. Even looking at other's forum/mod comments posts I seldom see a proper explanation of why mod A is superior to vanilla ... just a flat statement that "it is" (and that never piques any interest on my part to investigate further).

"I get what you're saying, however "Someone else" would've been clarified/qualified with "I've given", or "I've already given" preceding it then, if that was the case that it was specifically meant that only one specific person has the right to port it." If the misunderstanding stemmed from a forum/mod comment post I totally agree, but in the case of Link and Rex I think it all got started from Link misunderstanding the Permissions and Credits tab of the mod (so boilerplate wording) and then sought further information via the mod comments. My interpretation of Rex's request was to change the wording of that Permissions/Credits tab item. In any case HadTo I'm not right (or wrong) ... just different (in this case standing in a different spot, and offering what the view looks like from where I'm standing). Last time I looked out the window the sun seemed to be still making it's slow march across the sky, so all is still well in our little corner of the universe.

Took me a few read throughs to notice, but the change of "someone" to "anyone" is the change that the OP is promoting I believe (and though it's a subtle change does make the intent of the Console Modding Permission statement clearer in my opinion). Someone is basically the same as Anyone. Both ways are grammatically correct, and no changes are needed Also, OP made this unnecessary change True, though I do also see how in the context of the mod comment discussion that Rex linked the misunderstanding originated. If I say to you "Someone else has permission to port this mod to console" it is easy to interpret "someone" as referring to a particular individual you have chosen to not name. In contrast if I said "Anyone has permission to port this mod to console" it is clear that no particular person is being referred to. Ambiguity is one of the outstanding qualities of the English language, and if you weren't born and raised on it that very quality can lead you to different conclusions than intended (as Link discovered). So does the fate of the free world rest on resolving the amiguity ... I think not.

One of the most difficult (or perhaps uncommon may be more accurate) things to do is to consider views/information that don't conform/support your previously held views/beliefs without predjudice. It is far easier to discount something that doesn't support your views/beliefs than it is to ask yourself the question "Could this be true" and then look into the matter more deeply. Perhaps a lot depends on which end of the telescope you use to see your place in the universe ... the end that makes what you point it towards look larger or the end that makes those same things look smaller.

Took me a few read throughs to notice, but the change of "someone" to "anyone" is the change that the OP is promoting I believe (and though it's a subtle change does make the intent of the Console Modding Permission statement clearer in my opinion).

Is your Oblivion.ini set as read only (Oblivion Reloaded will set it that way ... which will remain even after OR is uninstalled)?

Something else that occurs to me has to do with stride length. Two NPCs with greatly different heights will have a different apparent speed in game even though they have the same speed setting (as shown by GetAV speed) because of their length of stride (e.g. a Woodelf male vs a High Elf male will not be the same speed in game at the same speed setting). Now your cows will probably have a very similar "stride length" as a horse. The fastest horse in the vanilla game is the black horse, which has a speed of 33. I have the couriers Blockheaded and they find wearing shirts "a bother" (and NoMaaM's riding animation is BBBed) but at speed 33 they just fly by, giving little time to admire "the scenery". I console their black horse down to 28 for that reason, and it does make a noticeable difference. Now if I ModAv speed -5 an NPC you won't really notice the difference in their speed (but their stride length is considerably shorter than a horse). Where I'm going with this is your speed of 50 for a cow may very well give them what they need for their moon jump attempts. Dialing their speed back in increments of 5 until they lose their aspirations at space travel may be all that is needed.

As a matter of full disclosure ... I very very seldom have any custom/player filled soul gems in inventory beyond filled black soul gems (which will be deposited directly into one of my home's containers and/or one of my Packdonky's containers as soon as possible ... my guy doesn't walk around with his pockets bulging to the bursting point for longer than absolutely necessary).