Best combination of mods to enhance melee, ranged, and magic combat?

[ImWarpedd]

Hello, My name is Warped. I am looking for a combination of mods that will give me a very enhanced, realistic, exciting, and all around more fun experience for combat. Right now, I have ACE (with all of it's plugins active), along with Duel Combat realism. Right now I only have Dawnguard, so if anyone can appoint me to some mods that will give me a very fun, exciting, and realistic experience I'd be more than greatful. Thank you for taking the time to read my topic, and have a nice day.

Edited October 23, 2013 by ImWarpedd

[ImWarpedd]

Bump

[Senviro]

Although a lot of people say it's a little too hard, I'd recommend Requiem for general changes. But again, it can get pretty hard core, and it requires a new saved game to work 100% correctly, in my experience.

 

To make melee a little better, I'd also say TK Dodge (the Script Dragon version) is pretty cool to have, since Skyrim needed a dodge mechanic badly.

[ImWarpedd]

Although a lot of people say it's a little too hard, I'd recommend Requiem for general changes. But again, it can get pretty hard core, and it requires a new saved game to work 100% correctly, in my experience.

 

To make melee a little better, I'd also say TK Dodge (the Script Dragon version) is pretty cool to have, since Skyrim needed a dodge mechanic badly.

In all around terms, would you completely recommend swapping to requiem as a whole? I tried SkyRE the beginning of this week and found it to be too easy/boring, right now I am using ACE but once again, too easy/boring. It feels like both these overhauls only really enhance perks while everything else seems to be the same. I'll look into TK Dodge, but what is your overall recommendation on terms of requiem?

[Senviro]

Well, from what I've gathered from reading and playing, Requiem was sorta designed to be a throw back to older RPGs, where save-whoring was a must. Likewise, stats are far more important. Trying to pick locks without any lock picking perks will take you nowhere. Same goes for weapons. Without a good amount of training, leveling and perks, you will suck with weapons you're not trained in. But to start you off, you get 3 free perk points.

 

Best example for some changes are the bow/crossbow mechanics. If you've got no perks, you don't do as much damage, and you notch and draw the bow slower. For crossbows, you'll take waaaaay longer to reload them without perks.

 

I would recommend Requiem over other overhaul mods, because it changes so many little things as well, making pretty much everything more dangerous. Enemies with heavy armor won't give a crap about arrows as much as people wearing light/no armor, who could die in 1-3 shots. There are also new items, like different alchemical powders (stored under the scrolls menu) that you can to throw small blasts of fire and such.

 

Combat is harder, and at level 1 even wolves can beat the s#*! out of you if you're not careful. And again, depending on your armor/items/stats, there are enemies you wouldn't want to mess with until you learn their weaknesses or strategies. For the most part, walking into a bad situation will get you killed 99% of the time.

 

Bigger animals like bears are actually really, really dangerous with the mod, and (in my experience) draugr can't be killed with arrows, since they're dead and have no vital organs, meaning they need to be cut or burned. Also, trolls either need to be killed with a lot of fast damage, or they'll regenerate much faster than before. Setting them on fire first usually works, but they also hit hard.

 

Wearing heavy armor can make a lot of the combat easier with that mod, but there are minuses, like not moving as fast, having your stamina drain if you don't have the perks, etc.

 

But anyway, yeah, I think it's far better than other overhaul mods. I would say play around with it, but don't use it on an existing save, since that could cause a HUGE amount of problems. If it sounds fun/interesting, test it out on a new character, and see if you like (and can handle) all of the changes.

 

And as a side-note, the dynamic loot mod I recommended can make it both easier and harder, depending on the items spawned. If an enemy happens to have a heavy-hitting enchanted item, they'll probably kill you every time you reload. If you happen to find some super-armor off of somebody you killed though, some enemies will become easier. Humans are supposed to be easy to kill with the mod, though, depending on their stuff; because they're low tier enemies.

 

Also, if you intend to play a melee character, TK Dodge will save your life a lot. If you time it right, you can even dodge arrows. Which is good, since archers as a pain in the ass with Requiem.

 

/Textwall

[ImWarpedd]

Well, from what I've gathered from reading and playing, Requiem was sorta designed to be a throw back to older RPGs, where save-whoring was a must. Likewise, stats are far more important. Trying to pick locks without any lock picking perks will take you nowhere. Same goes for weapons. Without a good amount of training, leveling and perks, you will suck with weapons you're not trained in. But to start you off, you get 3 free perk points.

 

Best example for some changes are the bow/crossbow mechanics. If you've got no perks, you don't do as much damage, and you notch and draw the bow slower. For crossbows, you'll take waaaaay longer to reload them without perks.

 

I would recommend Requiem over other overhaul mods, because it changes so many little things as well, making pretty much everything more dangerous. Enemies with heavy armor won't give a crap about arrows as much as people wearing light/no armor, who could die in 1-3 shots. There are also new items, like different alchemical powders (stored under the scrolls menu) that you can to throw small blasts of fire and such.

 

Combat is harder, and at level 1 even wolves can beat the s*** out of you if you're not careful. And again, depending on your armor/items/stats, there are enemies you wouldn't want to mess with until you learn their weaknesses or strategies. For the most part, walking into a bad situation will get you killed 99% of the time.

 

Bigger animals like bears are actually really, really dangerous with the mod, and (in my experience) draugr can't be killed with arrows, since they're dead and have no vital organs, meaning they need to be cut or burned. Also, trolls either need to be killed with a lot of fast damage, or they'll regenerate much faster than before. Setting them on fire first usually works, but they also hit hard.

 

Wearing heavy armor can make a lot of the combat easier with that mod, but there are minuses, like not moving as fast, having your stamina drain if you don't have the perks, etc.

 

But anyway, yeah, I think it's far better than other overhaul mods. I would say play around with it, but don't use it on an existing save, since that could cause a HUGE amount of problems. If it sounds fun/interesting, test it out on a new character, and see if you like (and can handle) all of the changes.

 

And as a side-note, the dynamic loot mod I recommended can make it both easier and harder, depending on the items spawned. If an enemy happens to have a heavy-hitting enchanted item, they'll probably kill you every time you reload. If you happen to find some super-armor off of somebody you killed though, some enemies will become easier. Humans are supposed to be easy to kill with the mod, though, depending on their stuff; because they're low tier enemies.

 

Also, if you intend to play a melee character, TK Dodge will save your life a lot. If you time it right, you can even dodge arrows. Which is good, since archers as a pain in the ass with Requiem.

 

/Textwall

Can't thank you enough for the all the help you've given me so far, my requiem just finished downloading a minute or two ago. Is there any way to add you to keep in contact? You obviously know 1000x more about mods and modding in general than I. And as for the TK dodge, I tried it a couple of minutes ago and it seems.. Buggy to say the least. It's extremely unresponsive in general and all around uncomfortable to use. Is there maybe a different version? I noticed there is a dragon version or something that required a manual download (I'm not used to downloading things by myself)

[CalibanX]

There are lots of great combat overhaul mods out there. A general problem I find with many of them is that while the greater challenge is initally a breath of fresh air; eventually, I get worn down by the sheer tedium of "hardcore" combat. It's one thing to have to hit a Dragon 100 times with your two-handed battle axe to bring it down, they are, after all, huge behemoths, but 80% of the combat in Skyrim is against human-sized opponents. When it takes 50 hits with a battle axe to fell a bandit or mage it starts to feel ridiculously tedious to me. So, I prefer using mods that change the difficulty in ways that allow me to play at Adept Level. Higher difficulty levels = more hits to kill an opponent. The balance, is trying to mod your game so that you aren't one-hitted by archers but still have challenging opponents.

I'm currently using a very small mod that makes the enemies you encounter be at a higher level with another unleveled loot mod.

The single biggest exploit in skyrim combat is the ability to pause the game and chug healing potions. By removing this one exploit, even on vamilla, you will get a much more satisfying challnege since every enemy in Skyrim can be defeated if you have enough healing potions. Playing without them really makes a big difference. I use food mods that buff my stats for a while rather than heal damage for instance.

Good luck!

[ImWarpedd]

There are lots of great combat overhaul mods out there. A general problem I find with many of them is that while the greater challenge is initally a breath of fresh air; eventually, I get worn down by the sheer tedium of "hardcore" combat. It's one thing to have to hit a Dragon 100 times with your two-handed battle axe to bring it down, they are, after all, huge behemoths, but 80% of the combat in Skyrim is against human-sized opponents. When it takes 50 hits with a battle axe to fell a bandit or mage it starts to feel ridiculously tedious to me. So, I prefer using mods that change the difficulty in ways that allow me to play at Adept Level. Higher difficulty levels = more hits to kill an opponent. The balance, is trying to mod your game so that you aren't one-hitted by archers but still have challenging opponents.

 

I'm currently using a very small mod that makes the enemies you encounter be at a higher level with another unleveled loot mod.

 

The single biggest exploit in skyrim combat is the ability to pause the game and chug healing potions. By removing this one exploit, even on vamilla, you will get a much more satisfying challnege since every enemy in Skyrim can be defeated if you have enough healing potions. Playing without them really makes a big difference. I use food mods that buff my stats for a while rather than heal damage for instance.

 

Good luck!

So, do you think maybe I should just find mods that enhance enemy AI? Then I can take the difficulty from there. I understand what you mean about how tedious hardcore combat can be (Example, you die like 20 times to get past one singular room) that sort of thing. Can you give me any examples of the kind of mods you explained? Thanks for the reply.

[Senviro]

To clear a thing up with TK Dodge, yes, it's faaaaaaaaaaaar better with Script Dragon. Don't use the Skse version, as it's quite unresponsive. Get Script Dragon and just follow the instructions, and it shouldn't cause you any problems. Just make sure to get rid of the Skse version first.

 

And since you asked, contacting me is as simple as clicking on my name and then the "Send message" thingy above the friends tab.

[CalibanX]

Well, first, I'd recommend trying Requiem as suggested above. It's a solid overhaul mod that has a huge following. It's worth checking out.

For combat & magic, I'm using these mods:

Immersive Difficulty Levels
Duel
Immersive Loot

Better Enemy AI
Proper Magic

Minimalist Magic Overhaul
Lore Mongering Beasts
Another Food Mod
Armor Rating-What you see if what you get