Going to mod the crap out of my game. Suggestions?

[Draconzis]

I have found a solution to my last dilemma and back to looking for mods. I am modding the crap out of my game to the point of making Skyrim look unrecognizable. Any suggestions to mods, big or small, are appreciated. But please, no sex, nude, skimpy, or slooty mods. Also, please no regular follower or house mods unless they are quite exceptional.

 

NOTE: I have now indeed installed a metric crap ton of mods and the following list is very incomplete. I will update relatively soon.

 

List of the bigger mods I am getting

Big Quest Mods:

Expanded Towns and Cities

Civil War Overhaul

Wymstooth (Not from Nexus)

Legacy of the Dragonborn

The Gray Cowl of Nocturnal

Falskaar

Helgen Reborn

Moon and Star

Summerset Isles

Artifacts of Boethiah

Wrath of Nature

Undeath

Agent of Righteous Might

Adal Matar the Last Stronghold

Moonpath to Elsweyr

 

Medium Mods:

Ultimate Follower Overhaul

Convenient Horses

Automatic Variants

Jaxonz Positioner

Edited June 6, 2016 by Draconzis

[gatorjet70]

cassandra frost witch , skyhammer hold, silverstead, levelers tower, shiamar, black dragonbone weapons

[jeedge]

Make your new world alive with lots of new NPCs and monsters, never a dull moment - my last build had all these together and it added up to a crap ton of NPCs in the world, taverns were so lively - roads were more interesting , towns were so much more alive that I hardly ever fast travelled because there was so much more to see and interact with. Random encounters of little to huge NPC vs NPC battles going on - lot's of ninja lotting, LOL.

 

ALL the Populated Legendary mods, People of Skyrim (then the patch to let you use both of those), Immersive Wenches, Anna NPCs 2.0 or >, Immersive Patrols, OBIS, inconsequential NPCs, interesting NPCs (inconsequential and interesting mods work well together), Warzones 2015, Real Traders adds many tavelling NPC merchants you can trade with.

 

Followers - Best stand-alone follower >> Hoth and Inigo for sure, Vilja and Arissa - a lot of people like Cerwiden, but I noticed she was buggy last time I used her. Instead of UFO, use EFF - that's what most people are using nowadays, once you see and use EFF's radial GUI dialogue wheel, you'll never go back. Get MHIYH (My Home is Your Home)

Other followers or followers packs - Celestine (dedicated healer follower, useful!), Bards and Guards (old but worth trying, hire bards and guards for your home). Get NPC Smarter Water AI - Full Compatibility (helpful)

 

ETAC (get complete version, new one is stable) - also get Legendary Cities, don't forget about Cutting Room Floor.

 

Awesome player home outside Whiterun - Elysium Estate, doesn't clash with ETAC complete's latest version.

 

Creatures - get Skyrim Immersive Creatures and Deadly Dragons

 

Magic >> Apocalypse Magic, Forgotten Magic Redone ( both of those work well together), Staves of Skyrim, Passive Weapon Enchantment Recharging, Black Mage Armor

 

Misc >> Notice Board, Glowing Ore Veins, Smelting - A way to recycle, Jaxonz Protect Favorites, Celtic Music In Skyrim (This is awesome!), Ishs Souls to Perks, Master Alchemy Recipes Book (Still gotta find it), Trade And Barter - Hearthfire, Training - No Limits, Auto Unequip Ammo, Skyrim -Community- Uncapper, RaceMenu

 

Be careful not to get a major 'gameplay' overhaul like Sands of Time or Requiem - those require you to build around them and many other mods conflict with those. Requiem also patches differently using their own leveling patch program. Also be careful of Alternate Start Live Another Life in that it really does need to be at the end or near the end of your mod load if you choose to use it.

 

Environment - Try 'Purity', it's newer than Climates of Tamriel and includes everything in one package. I like it a lot so far. And Enhanced Lights and FX

 

USLEEP instead of the Unofficial Patches - nowadays, people are using USLEEP instead of the 4 unofficial patches. The first POST in USLEEP's page will show you how to edit the master header of any old mod to look for it, most newer mods already look for USLEEP instead of the old patches.

 

Performance and visual enhancing mods >> Grass on Steroids, Skyrim Performance Plus, Skyrim Bigger Trees (use the largest trees choice)., Skyrim complete 2K textures (not 4K based on what you said about your computer).

I use Realvision ENB, it has options depending on your machine performance which is great.

 

I could go on but I think I'm getting carried away, anyway those are some ideas.

 

 

Jeedge

[Draconzis]

-snip-

Thanks for the suggestions! Looks like there are a lot of good mods in there. But the reason why I use UFO and not EFF is that I actually can't stand the dialogue wheel, I prefer initiating dialogue.

[jones177]

Since you use UFO I will assume that you like to use followers.

 

I recommend that you download a follower mod manually first, Look at the textures sizes & if they are over 25mbs don't use the mod or replace textures with better optimized ones.

 

For example I downloaded a follower last night & I broke my own rule & did not check the file sizes. After "meeting" the follower I noticed a slight stutter. I was running Skyrim Performance Monitor at the time so I got out of the game to see what was up. I found that the one follower was using 500mbs vram & 300mbs ram. A literal walking talking resource hog. For fun I replaced the textures with the popular Mature Skin body textures & normal UPN body & after testing again the follower had no impact on my game at all. It also looked a lot better. I will be uninstalling the mod because I can't indorse it.

 

Also some mods don't play well with other mods so install only one or two at a time.

 

I have been installing mods weekly to my game since there has been mods for this game & 70% of the mods have had issues. So be carful.

 

The big mods that have there own world space are safe. Hegen Reborn is very safe. Anything to do with the civil war changes the game in a bad way.

 

Some of the best work here is a bit on the sexy side. I view it as art & the quality of it is what it most important to me.

 

For the games "look" I use Vivid Weathers & their ENB. My game has never looked better.

 

I use UFO as well. I like it better than the others. I use MHIYH along with it. It helps fill out my game with NPCs that I can control. I also use a mod called "Followers Go On Trip". I is useful for giving them something to do if you don't want to use MHIYH on them.

 

Like jeedge I have a game full of NPCs & monsters. One arrow from a skilled archer can take my character down so I use a Mod called "Death Alternative". Instead of dying, my character goes into bleed-out. That gives the possibility of being saved by a follower or other NPCs in the area. It is not perfect but it adds hope(hope I get saved by someone) to the game.

 

Later

[Draconzis]

I've updated my original post as I now hit a dilemma between two large mods. I didn't want to create a new thread for it, so I am settling with bumping it with this post.

[mdfeelgood]

According to the ETAC mod page, Cutting Room Floor is compatible with a patch (comes with the ETAC patch installer) and Civil War Overhaul is compatible, no patch necessary, so you should be good :)

[Draconzis]

According to the ETAC mod page, Cutting Room Floor is compatible with a patch (comes with the ETAC patch installer) and Civil War Overhaul is compatible, no patch necessary, so you should be good :smile:

Just to make it clear, you are saying ETAC is compatable with Civil War Overhaul?

[mdfeelgood]

I have not tried Civil War Overhaul so I can't personally verify, but yes, according to the mod page ETAC and CWO are compatible.

[Draconzis]

This just in: I'm an idiot. I have been working for the past couple days thinking Expanded Towns and Cities was Holds-The City Overhaul. Now I have to decide whether to start all over again with Holds as my base, which is 100% incompatible with the Civil War Overhaul (along with a few smaller mods I had added), or just forget the City Overhaul and continue with .

 

Edit: I am definitely continuing with ETAC. The City Overhaul conflicts with too many mods that I intended on installing.