Which Way To Go

[Adipose]

Stormcloaks, Empire, nonaligned...which way to go?

[Skagens]

If you like the Stormcloaks, join em'. If not, join the Empire. You could avoid the civil war all together if that's what you want. It's your play-through, do what you want.

[Adipose]

If you like the Stormcloaks, join em'. If not, join the Empire. You could avoid the civil war all together if that's what you want. It's your play-through, do what you want.

 

Yep, and I played nonaligned the one and only time I played to the end. After heavy modding, the game I play now bears little resemblance to that pre-dlc game. Still and all, I'm probably most comfortable being nonaligned. Leaves me free to attack who I want, where I want...as long as I don't get caught. In the first go around I supported the Foresworn, however, their alliance with the Hagravens puts me off more and more. I may just mop them up in a mercenary capacity. Being a freelance Merc has quite a bit of appeal. So does marrying Elesif and becoming king. Have no idea if that mod works well though. My guess is that it's probably not thorough enough to feel comfortable. Most mods of that sort don't reprogram the npc responses enough to recognize your new role in Skyrim society and culture. Kind of like the new racial changes don't program the npcs to respond and interact with the new race.

[LeddBate]

I hesitate to mention this, but there is a thread about the pros and cons of joining either side. Be warned, it's over 150 pages long.

 

I prefer the Empire myself. Not because I think they're good, but because they are a better "fit" for the way I think. Also, I can't stand the thought of deposing Jarl Balgruuf.

 

If you decide to go ahead and try the civil war storyline, I recommend a few mods.

 

1) Alternate Start - Live Another Life (by Arthmoor): Why go through the opening scene yet again? You can start IMMEDIATELY as a soldier of either side. Or, pick another start (like the mercenary biz like you mentioned) then pick up the civil war line at your leisure.

 

2) Open Civil War (by simtam): Wouldn't it be nice if the civil war in Skyrim wasn't as linear and on-rails as the single player campaign in an old FPS? Well here's a mod that not only lets you pick and set-up battles at cities across the face of Skyrim, but also lets you fight in "strategic" mode utilizing the maps you find in every command center and command tent throughout the war theatre! Beats the living crap out the vanilla war (and then takes it's lunch money and does a tea-bag on it.) It can be a bit complex to wrap your mind around it when you first try it, but you'll never want the vanilla campaign again after you master it.

 

3) Warzones 2015 - Civil Unrest (by MyGoodEye): And while you're going from one city battle to another, why not fight a few battles en-route? Warzones adds dozens of battlefields (and random encounters) across the face of Skyrim. Best of all, you can control all of the spawns, levels, numbers -everything from the MCM menu included. If your rig can handle it, Warzones will let you participate in battles with over a hundred soldiers fighting onscreen at once. Did I mention it also includes doing wild things like hiring giants to be part of an army? Did I mention it has an expansion that allows ARTILLERY for both sides?

 

4) Civil War Repairs (by MightyMalts): Tired of the debris still being in Solitude, Whiterun and Windhelm months after the war is finally finished? This mod will let you tidy up the cities affected. The only drawback is that you have to manually enter a few console commands to make it work. But they're documented on the mod, so not really a problem.

 

5) Civil War Aftermath (by Korodic): After the war is completed, go after those encampments that either enemy side has scattered around Skyrim. With this mod, you can attack them (with a band of followers if you use a follower mod) and then burn their encampments to the ground after they're dead. Not only will the encampment stay wiped out (if you return later, you'll see the former commander hanging from a gibbet) but you'll also be rewarded by the commanding general of your side for your dedication to wiping out "holdouts".

 

Most of these mods have already been ported to SE as well.

[Adipose]

Many thanks for the information. Actually, it all looks kinda interesting. I might just take that route...assuming my comp can handle them. I really, really need to get the new comp built. All it takes is cash. (wry grin).

[LeddBate]

There's lots of folks here that will wax poetic on that subject with lots of suggestions for you if you ask them. I'll just say that there are two main routes to go to getting a new PC.

 

1) Go to online sellers like NewEgg, Select the parts you want. Have them delivered and then build that sucker. It can be very rewarding to see your creation come to life. However, it can also be very frustrating dealing with all the details of the build and testing (and troubleshooting, and testing, and more troubleshooting, and re-testing) when it fails to boot. There ARE lots (and lots) of on-line guides and videos showing you how to pick parts and even show you step by step how to build a rig, so it won't be guesswork.

 

2) Go to a big-box retailer (Best Buy or what have you) and buy a rig that's close to what you want, then add a GPU upgrade, maybe more RAM and perhaps an all-in-one water cooler for your CPU. The upside to this (especially if you buy their service plan) is that instead of having to send individual parts back to the manufacturer for repair when something goes belly-up, you can simply take the whole rig to the repair center in the store nearest you.

 

I built my last rig myself (because I'd accumulated a lot of experience over the years) but my next rig will definitely be store-bought with the upgrades I want to tweak it with. It used to be that you could save considerable money by building the rig yourself (and you still can save a little -perhaps as much as 20% if you catch enough parts on sale) -but store bought rigs from the retailers are now getting cheap enough that the convenience factor (especially with on-site repair and maintenance) goes a long way to off-setting the discount of purchasing parts yourself.

[Adipose]

Again, thanks for the advice. Unfortunately, I've a soon to be ex that's put the bite on for some money, so, for the next year or so I'll be focusing on putting together the last of her severance package. THEN, we'll see what's what.