sensible mod suggestions for a better play experience?

[crudius]

Hi,

 

Im about to playthrough Oblivion on the p.c, and im looking for a set of mods that will enhance the experience rather than kill it (which i did with FO3,sadly)

I have been playing a pre-owned copy on the xbox, and decided this game needs doing justice on a good p.c......ready for Skyrim.

 

I have been trawling through the lists and suggestions, but there seems to be a lot of godmod and non-lore funny stuff,and a lot of dead links.So im looking for current suggestions from the community as it stands now.

 

What i want is some suggestions that will cover the following....

 

Better graphics (running on high end rig)

Better interface

better looking and acting NPC models

More Creatures and NPC's in and out of towns.

Better dungeons

Maybe tweaked loot....but not OTT uber kit on every early level bandit.

Any nice lore related touches and extra's you think will enhance the game.

 

I will be using official install (OB,NON,SI) and all extra plug-ins.

official and community patches

 

So, thanks for reading and hopefully you might have some suggestions.Thanks.

[TheReverendTholomewPlague]

Edit: Oh heck, I didn't realize you were talking about Oblivion Edited May 2, 2011 by TheReverendTholomewPlague

[RebelOConner]

for better gameplay, i recommand you Oblivion XP, to gain level by playing, not by using skills.

[crudius]

no probs REV...

 

Thnx Rebel, looks interesting.

 

Anyone know FCOM? got sent a link for it.....pretty big, 2 gig......anyone played it before?

[HeyYou]

FCOM dramatically alters the game world. life is a lot more dangerous. I won't play without it.

[RebelOConner]

for better gameplay, i use Less annoying oblivion to avoid annoying things, as it says.

for better graphics, there's a lot. Realistic Water , Oblivion Graphics Extender v2, Landscape LOD Texture Replacement

and so on. there's so many it's difficult to choose.

for interface, you can use Color Map Mod

 

for more monsters, there's OOO (external link ) and MMM, but i don't use them, so i can't really help you for that.

 

Edit: oh, and Unique lanscapes too.

you need also Oblivion mod manager to instal all

[SilvasRuin]

Anyone know FCOM? got sent a link for it.....pretty big, 2 gig......anyone played it before?

Played it.

Hate it.

 

 

Overhauls

People might want to strangle me for saying so, but I think OOO sucks, and the only thing you'll really get out of it is the content it adds. The content it adds, btw, are well beyond the power of anything else in random gameplay, both the enemies and the items you can get. It's absurd, IMO. And FCOM is centered around it.

 

TIE is an overhaul like OOO but is much smaller and is a much more drastic change. Nothing you encounter is scaled in TIE except maybe quests and probably the quest rewards. The content TIE adds are hit and miss. If you don't like fences outside of the Thieves Guild, even if there is a bit of risk in seeking them out, then TIE is not for you. If you don't like keys scattered around seemingly random places to steal them from across the country that unlock various display stands around the country containing items ranging from junk to fantastic, then TIE is not for you. If you don't like hidden and/or tricky ways in and out of castles and towns, then TIE is not for you. If you dislike harsh encumbrance limits, crippling diseases, and very lethal melee combat, TIE is not for you. Personally it's the second that really kills it for me.

 

Francesco's balances equipment, tiers the scaling of everything but quest rewards (so that they have lower limits and upper limits for how far they can mimic your level), and optionally adds more items and creatures. Since it is extremely modular, you can very easily just not include the things you want to leave out, so if you want a minimalist overhaul as far as changes go, just get Francesco's. But don't have it balance the default equipment.

 

Revised Oblivion Mod is another alternative, but it does have some annoying bugs in it that the mod maker isn't going to be able to fix for some time due to his job taking him overseas. It is built upon the back of OOO, but it rebalances the OOO added content to fit in with it's design. This overhaul is very, very thorough in its changes in order to achieve consistent balance throughout and so it is not recommended to use any other leveling, magic, combat, or balance altering mods with it. Fizzle should be compatible with it if you want to do that though. It has its own version of Drop Lit Torches, and has things like Realistic Leveling and Realistic Fatigue built in. I would use it and maybe Duke Patrick's SCA Combat Archery mod if the mod maker was still working on it, but the remaining issues have persuaded me from it. They're not major ones, they're just really annoying if you ever do run into them.

 

If you want the core game and SI weapons balanced (might balance armor too. I'm not 100% on that.), then just get the standalone Medieval Oblivion Balance System. It's been updated long since Fran's stopped updating, so use it instead. There is also another mod out there that balances the DLC to MOBS too, but I haven't yet checked to see if it's up to date. It shouldn't be too far off, but if you're stubborn about consistency, MOBS provides a spreadsheet for their standards, making balancing content adding mods a lot easier than it would have been otherwise.

 

If you want added creatures, yes, use MMM. Or use Waalx's creature mod, but that one is trickier to track down (I don't have the link handy or I'd give it), and it makes the life of Cyrodiil... extremely Lore UNfriendly. Last I looked, he also refuses to make any compatibility patches, leaving that task to the makers of the mods that are incompatible with it. MMM is more modular, I think, and more Lore-friendly (though it does have its issues on that front).

 

Magic

If you want a magic balance mod that does not add any spells, Valdacils Spell Tweaks is wonderfully minimalistic... except that for some bizarre reason it buffs sneak attack bonuses, which have nothing to do with magic. Just make sure a stealth overhaul mod overrides it rather than the other way around.

 

If you want a magic balance mod that is more robust, is mostly customizable, and adds spells that for the most part aren't inherently overpowered, get Supreme Magicka Update. Jump and Levitation spells are much less abusive than you would think compared to the Fortify Acrobatics spells you could make in vanilla Oblivion. If anything is unbalanced about Supreme Magicka Update, it's that it adds Poison Destruction spells to the game, upping the possible means to damage health directly from a single spell to 5. That said, a lot of mods out there make melee and ranged combat much quicker/more deadly, so attack magic will probably need a boost to keep up anyways. Alteration might be a little too useful, but it falls a little short of the skills it managed to mimic in use.

 

Fizzle is another great magic balance mod that is compatible with and supplements many other magic balance mods. It adds a spell failure chance based on armor weight (which is considered accordingly to what part of the body it restricts), current Fatigue percentage, and Magicka cost relative to your skill level. It works great with mods like Supreme Magicka that can turn off the normal spell efficiency penalty from armor.

 

If you want incredible spells in both flashiness and utility, and you con't care that the utility in said spells goes too far, then get Midas Magic Spells of Aurum. It's a great mod, really. But its utility spells do have an adverse effect on game balance and difficulty.

 

Specialized Combat Overhauls

Marksmanship balance has Duke Patrick's SCA Combat Archery. Well before Skyrim was announced, he had already managed to mimic it in Oblivion with this. Archery is more lethal, hitting certain areas on a human body (or anything's head) cause significantly more damage, bows take time to fully draw depending on the bow's material and the player's strength, running backwards can cause the player to trip over objects (including dead bodies) or significant elevation changes, and getting hit when trying to aim makes you lose your shot. Improves enemy AI for archers and for countering you when you're using a bow. It makes marksmanship in general much more tactical.

 

Deadly Reflex overhauls the way melee combat and sneak attacks are performed. (You can still do normal sneak attacks, but it adds ambush and assassination sneak attacks as well.) Blocking is more tactical, the ability to dodge a swing is added, you can shield bash, kick, or head-but, it adds critical attacks, and the more you vary your moves, the more you will overwhelm your enemies. If you're using magic and archery balance mods, I recommend turning the critical hits for those off, especially if using Duke Patrick's SCA Combat Archery.

 

Minigame Removal

Lockpicking has Zumbs Lockpicking mod. It takes away the minigame (or at least is supposed to... I can't seem to get it to remove it for me) and replaces it with real time skill based lockpicking, which also means the player has to be far more aware of their surroundings to not get caught.

 

Persuasion/Speechcraft has the Persuasion Overhaul. It removes the silly and partially luck-based minigame, and instead has you try to persuade people based on their individual personalities. The Speechcraft skill becomes much more valuable with this mod.

 

Environments

All Natural enhances weather, can incorporate weather other mods add, and is very customizable. You can even mimic the effects of Darker Nights with this if you want. It also has Real Lights incorporated into it so that you won't encounter anymore illogical light sources where there should not be. This will make dungeons somewhat darker, but not nearly dark enough to satisfy Darker Dungeon fans.

 

Liquid Water has some glitchiness going on with shaders, but it's worth it. It handles everything visual about water, overhauling it entirely, and it is possibly the most customizable mod I've ever seen. You can even make water in different areas have different appearances, and has a way for players to add more areas that it uses separate settings for.

 

Darker Dungeons removes ambient light from dungeons, caves, ruins, etc.

Let There Be Darkness does that and lowers the fog brightness.

Cava Obscura is unique in that it reduces the light to nearly non-existent rather than removing it entirely. Oblivion handles extremely low light better than it handles no light, which is why this mod was created and why I recommend it over the other two.

 

City "cosmetic" improvements include Better Cities, Open Cities Classic, Open Better Cities, and Open Cities Reborn. The Open Cities variants place the cities into the Cyrodiil world space so that there are no more loading screens when going through city gates, and if you ever manage to get over the walls, you won't encounter empty landscape. Better Cities adds a lot of content it isn't up front with players about, however, and I've found at least one set of god-item level armor that is astoundingly easy to get to if you know where it is.

Open Cities Reborn, on the other hand, simply rearranges the cities and changes the walls to mimic concept art a bit better and to mimic medieval style town layouts. I don't think they've done Skingrad yet, but they will improve all the towns eventually. It can be mixed and matched with Open Cities Classic if you like some of the changed towns and dislike others.

ImpeREAL City Unique Districts is now incorporated into Better Cities, but it's minimalistic design philosophy means it does not add new content. I recommend getting the standalone version.

 

Misc.

If you want quest rewards to scale with you always rather than only when you get them (and as a result sucking forever after), then get the Quest Reward Leveler.

 

The DarNified UI is an absolute must for me to play Oblivion. It has another inventory mod built into it that allows you to switch the main inventory page to a grid layout. There are also different color variations you can get for it.

 

If you want a companion, Vilja is the most robust. You can make her obey encumbrance for her inventory or ignore it, her stats and level mimic yours, she starts with only basic equipment, she's fully voiced, you can keep her mortal or have her marked Essential so she only gets knocked out, she can be introduced to and recognize several other player-added companions and converse with them accordingly, has tons of things she can say, and is used by and has lines written by Terry Pratchett. I just don't see any other companion mod even coming close to the balance, customization, and overall thoroughness this companion mod has.

 

Enhanced Economy is the most robust economy mod available now, is capable of all sorts of bartering related things, can add random quests merchants can send you on in dungeons that were only rarely used in the original game if at all, and I believe it even works with many mod added stores and merchants.

 

For leveling, Oblivion XP and Realistic Leveling are the best I've found. One uses an XP system and the other automatically adjusts your stats according to your skill improvements. Realistic Leveling is the most immersive and generally compatible leveling mod I've found. Oblivion XP, however, is the only leveling mod I've found that eliminates the need/urge to eventually run around grinding your weapon skills up on mudcrabs. If you get XP, make sure you get the more recent version rather than the original.

Wrye Leveling or whatever it is called is supposedly very much like Oblivion XP, but it uses gold as your exp rather than giving exp for kills, quests, and other significant actions. I've never used it, but I suppose it offers the same benefits as Oblivion XP.

 

Magick Overlap is an old mod that simply prevents many magical effects from stacking. Constant effects still stack, but casting two Reflect Damage spells, for example, will only apply the higher magnitude spell and ignore the lower one. It can also place a hard cap on many effects, for example setting Chameleon to go no higher than say 75. If nothing else, it can remove the temptation to abuse one of the major exploits in Oblivion's magic system.

Edited May 3, 2011 by SilvasRuin