voidgenesis

I am interested to get into skyrim modding and have a concept that is modest in essence but ambitious in scope. When I replay skyrim the thing that annoys me the most is remembering where the enemies are in every dungeon, so as you explore you know there is going to be someone sitting in a chair around the corner etc. It takes all the fun and suspense out of completing quests for me. The simplest solution seems to be to simply move the enemies into new locations and maybe mess with their numbers and levels a little. Nothing game changing, but just enough to keep you on your toes. My question is- can this be done with the current modding tools? I imagine I will be going into the levelled actor lists and changing the locations and patrolling behaviour of all the NPCs. A huge job I understand, but I enjoy getting into a rhythm with this kind of work. Can these original vanilla enemy spawns lists be modified? Can it be done more efficiently by editing the relevant files themselves rather than slower process of dragging of NPC locations around in the creation kit? Could the process be partially automated/randomised to speed it up (then just play through each dungeon to fix any glaring problems). From my perspective the ideal would be to have multiple sets of this mod, so every time you started a new game you could have a fresher experience and never know exactly what was waiting behind every door and corner.

Thanks for the suggestion but it isn't exactly what I was looking for. My main idea was when you are doing a quest for the 100th time you will run into similar enemies, but their exact location inside the area will change. Would this require recoding the spawn lists manually for all locations? I want to go back to the feeling of anticipating being surprised by an enemy and needing to be aware of the environment as I explore.

I love skyrim but I am finding it impossible to enjoy replaying, almost solely due to the fact that I easily remember where every enemy is lurking in every area. The radiant spawns in the open world are ok, but I would love to pop into a dungeon and be surprised by a different enemy hiding in a different location. Avoiding having the enemies conveniently scattered just out of earshot from each other could be fun also, as would occasionally going through a door to find five angry bandits looking at you on the other side. It could add some great unexpected challenge, and the occasional need to backpeddle and run away in some areas. Would this be a huge job?

I am in the same boat, but I am incorporating a number of extra quest and gameplay mods, including the amazing vilja follower mod (best one I have seen). I am trying to take my time and not grind skills or rush stories this time around, so I am planning take each day at a time. I was going to do the civil war first, but other quests have gotten in the way. That is the best thing about skyrim- it allows you to really get into your characters emerging story and respond to opportunities as they arise. I will get involved in the dawnguard and dragonborn stories when it seems reasonable to want to do so.

I had an idea for an endless random quest that simply chooses a next quest objective at random from all the existing quests in Skyrim (and hopefully a whole lot of absurd and bizarro options as well). Would this be easy to put together?

To mix it up on a skyrim replay I was pondering the viabiility of playing a tank like character (heavy armor/flesh spells/shield) who uses cloak spells (flame/frost/lightning/ebony mail) to do damage while turtling/blocking/healing with restoration. I think there is a mod that allows you to add elemental cloaks to armor as an enchantment as well that could be interesting. Flame cloak can be grabbed early in the game from the unfortunate college student who burnt themselves on the northern coast of skyrim. Has anyone tried this before? Is it fun and/or viable?

One thing I noticed playing fallout 3, I played through once as a certain type of character, finished the main quest, and had many unexplored regions and quests left to go back and do. I tried a new character playthrough in a different style and it just didn't feel right- I kept remembering my original character. That experience felt so real that to replay felt really fake. Maybe the trick with skyrim is that none of the quests are all that emotionally satisfying. They give you a taste but don't really finish the job. Hence it is easy to come back looking for more....

Great to see I am not the only one. Maybe I should give Morrowind a go some time. The mods and the idea of playing is definitely a big part of it compared to the reality of playing. I think I probably spend more time on the forums/nexus than playing some weeks.

So here I am, having just played farcry 3 through and I was amazed at the gameplay and the strength of the story and characters, and I'm halfway through sleeping dogs, and likewise finding so many aspects where I find myself thinking "this is so much better than skyrim". I even did a recent quick playthrough on skyrim where everyone was non-essential (thanks mods) and it was such a relief to stab everyone in the back, and it made me realise how little I liked the characters in the game. And yet.....I still find myself wanting to go back, try out another mod, try out the DLCs (haven't tried any of them yet). So the question is why? What is it about skyrim that makes it so replayable? Am I just lazy and enjoy playing it because I don't have to think very hard or struggle with unfamiliar controls? Curious to see if other people are in the same boat.......

I was actually planning on using the psijic adventurer mod where you need to kill a wandering psijic monk to steal his robes......the "justice" part of it is purely tongue in cheek, more like a delusion on the part of my character from a role playing perspective.

I am looking at restarting a skyrim game with a character who takes on the role of a psijic monk who travels around skyrim dishing out ironic and poetic justice to those who deserve it. A crucial tool will be to make all NPCs killable (several mods to choose from, massacre in skyrim suits best) Another is the mark and recall spell MRN teleport to allow me to move NPCs where I want them to go without them being followers. Are there any good mods to allow me to force anyone to become my follower as well as an alternative? This should allow me to get NPCs to face off against each other due to my manipulation. Before I get into this does anyone have any other thoughts? Nasty NPCs I should avoid killing too quickly so I don't miss out on a shot at someone else horrid? Other mods I should consider including. Pairings of NPCs or ironic methods for NPCs to die? Plain old beheading/incineration are too easy. I want to take them to a place and use a creative method befitting their crimes. Thanks for reading

The time scale of the game is at best *cough* unrealistic. I would add this mostly for game play because even mods designed to make the game harder at high level don't seem to be enough for me to keep the game challenging.

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An idea to make the late game more challenging (I find it a bit lame even with ASIS and unlevelled skyrim on master). After level 40 every time you level up you have to choose to ***REDUCE**** either your magicka, health or stamina by 10 points. This simulates the dovahkiin growing old and eventually dying (sometime around level 81 you would become very fragile). This way you have a limited amount of time available to complete your quests. Late game enchanting/smithing/alchemy loops actually become essential to stay strong. 100% magic school reduction would be necessary to be able to cast any advanced spells. It also means the player would be punished for power levelling eventually. Would this be codeable with the tools available? Would it be fun to play?

I often find the vein will respawn visually but not be mine-able. To fix this exit the mine then re-enter-bingo: the vein can now be mined.

Beitild in Dawnstar is another who could be taken out before starting the DB questlines. Hern the vampire I think spawns before the kill contract goes out. Lurbuk in Morthal is present before the DB quest. Deekus near Dawnstar is also there and killable before the quest. Marandru jo of the Khajiit caravans is also about beforehand. Anoriath in Whiterun is also selling meat at the beginning of the game. I think Helvard in Falkreath is als available. Safia in Windhelm too. I am curious to see what happens if all these people are dead before I even kill Grelod the Kind.....but it could be a lot of work only to crash my game.....

I am about to start my dark brotherhood questline on my current play through and wonder what happens if you kill off all the accessible targets before being given the DB quests to knock them off. I would just do it and find out myself but it will take a fair bit of time to figure out the consequences......

I had a group of thalmor (two shiny guards and a mage in robes) turn up in my dovakhin hideout recently. They just hung around for a few days near Merch, until I got bored and killed them for their shiny armor. Weird.....

....I found the apocalypse spell pack. Have other people found it has totally revived their games? Live another life has been a big help as well.....playing as a mace and restoration wielding vigilant of stendarr has been enormous fun. And despite my reservations the dovahkin hideout has been great.....collecting every set of armor without using my own smithing makes loot hunting fun. Has anyone else found things that have revived their interest in skyrim?

I am one of the many Skyrim players who have enjoyed spending hundreds of hours but have now grown bored. While I have been giving it a rest I have been wondering if the current modding tools would ever allow the game to produce randomised emergent quests and storylines? So.....random maps/towns/landscapes would be generated on each game start. A fog of unknown territory would be on each map to begin so you had to explore. (Ideally alchemy ingredient effects would also be randomised) Random NPCs would be generated to populate the landscape. NPCs would have a limited number of interactions with each other to build up status levels. These random NPCs interact in the background to generate interactions between themselves to generate mini-factions. Each NPC has a range of dialogue options (spoken dialogue may have to be abandoned) Each NPC has a possible range of random quest types (help me do this, fetch this for me, kill this person/faction, etc) that are assigned semi-randomly (weighted by their factions/past random interactions). Daedra could perhaps become more like dragons in randomly turning up to be a megaboss that harrasses your faction in their own special way. This could turn the game into a process of incorporating yourself into a random faction at a random location and helping to further their goals/interests. So no main-quest type big theatric pre-scripted drama, but the randomness would give you a lot of replay potential. Is this doable or does everything have to be pre-scripted by modders?

I've played skyrim madly for the last few months, but even with a lot of pre-CS mods from the nexus (which made the game much more playable) I seem to have run out of fun things to do after making a variety of mage/thief/warrior builds with different variations. I tried to do a restoration only build that simply dashes through dungeons past enemies, avoiding damage, which was kind of funny but didn't keep my interest long. So....to get to my question....based on previous experience of other TES games, how long should I go off and do other things before coming back to see what improvements have been added from CS based mods. Is six months about right?

How about a mod that puts the player in a framework that ages their character over time. You could start off as a skinny teenager, with low health/magicka/stamina but fast regeneration to all of them. Being weak would favor an archery/sneak/thief/assasin style of play. Every time you level up your player ages one year. So start at 16 and end the game ideally around 50 levels/years later (tweak the character appearance by incrementing build and age over time). Your stamina level would increase up to your mid thirties and decrease from there- this would encourage a warrior type style to begin. Your health level would increase up to your mid forties and then decrease from there. Your magicka level would increase up to your mid fifties then decrease from there- this would favor a mage build toward the end. This means as you complete the main quest and side quests you are always fighting the clock and may die of old age before you finish everything. It removes the problem of the game being too easy when you get to a high level- your character will become quite weak as it becomes old and eventually dies. Specialising in just one build type means the game is easier or harder at the beginning or end. It also encourages you to dabble with changing specialisation and playstyle over time.

How about guild quest line extensions so you don't unexpectedly find yourself in charge of a guild with possibly zero relevant skills? For each guild when the leader is lost there is a fierce competition to find a new leader. So for the mage line there would be a need to defeat each magic school specialist using only the magic school they specialize in. For some of the defensive schools this could involve having to protect yourself from wave after wave of damage from summoned creatures. For enchantment you could need to defeat the opponent using only enchanted weapons/armor (maybe even just equip an NPC to fight on your behalf). For the thieves guild you would have to beat the expert trainers at their own skills in sneak, pickpocket, lock-picking, archery, alchemy. For the companions you would have to prove yourself against experts in one handed, two handed, at least one armor skill, block, (archery?) and smithing. The bards college is a bit of a dead end....not sure there. And the dark brotherhood quest line is probably interesting enough already.....I felt like I had earned my place as leader by the time it came around for that one.

How about a semi-hard core mode where you can only save your game in the capital cities? That would mean you would have to be able to get to a dungeon/etc and clear it in one go without dropping dead along the way. Could add a nice amount of tension instead of the current state of "oh well...I'll just quicksave, dash into the next room and see whats around, and if I die I just reload" kind of mentality.

I want to see new minigames for skills other than lock picking. Alchemy, smithing, enchanting and pick pocketing should all involve a kind of simple physical skill that can be adjusted to be easy or hard depending on the exact situation/perks taken.