Preparing to get Dawnguard - have some questions

[enderes]

I'm relatively new to Skyrim, in that I only started playing in July (on PC). I'm still in the (very long & complex) period of learning the game & trying out mods. I have 2 active characters, both of which are for "testing" the game, so I can figure things out like:

-what race I'll want to play when I finally make a primary character

-what factions I'll want to join (e.g. Stormcloaks vs Imperial Legion)

-what mods I like (and which can function with the game & with each other) that I will want to use long-term

-what basic gameplay elements I don't like & will want to find mods to fix

 

Really this game is more like a huge research project for me right now and not yet an actual GAME, and so soon after I started, I learn that the Dawnguard mini-expansion is released for the PC. So now that's added to the list of things I need to figure out before I make my real main character. I try searching online for answers to most of my questions but my google-fu is weak, and I usually get clearer answers when I just ask people who actually know.

 

Also, please NO SPOILERS for storyline or quest stuff or anything that I might like to be surprised by when I get to it in mid-game or late-game.

 

These are my questions:

When I download DG, what effect will it have on my saved games?

Although I've not gotten very far into the game yet, I don't want to have to start over from a clean save. I haven't even killed the first quest-dragon outside Whiterun & unlocked random dragon encounters yet. But I have put a lot of time in one of my tester-characters, and there are still some "big" mods (ones that add large amounts of content or overhaul basic aspects of the game) I haven't yet tested, and some mods I need to test out that affect content I haven't unlocked yet.

 

What effect, in general, will Dawnguard have of my already-installed mods?

I'm sure this varies from one mod to another, and I plan to research each one that I use to see if they say if they're DG-compatible or have a newer version or addon out that makes them DG-compatible. But what about ones that don't tell in their descriptions, or whose pages haven't been updated since before DG's release? Will the game continue to work with mods as long as they individually don't change stuff that conflicts with DG, or should I just assume that ALL mods will be incompatible with DG unless their makers have stated otherwise? I know that DG adds a sh*t-ton of bugs/glitches, so the less guesswork I have to do in troubleshooting (like loading the game with different mods active to narrow down what's causing a problem), the better.

Also what about mods that only change things like textures & meshes (for example, the Sexy Skyrim set) and don't have any .esp/.esm files to be toggled on/off for troubleshooting?

What basic gameplay changes does it add?

I know that the biggest deal with DG is vampires (& werewolves), and I haven't yet played as either yet so the changes to them won't mean anything to me right now. But what things are changed from the vanilla game that a low-level character might already have experienced? I'm especially interested in things like UI, the controls, and the basics of things work such as magic, combat, leveling, crafting (smithing/enchanting/alchemy), sneaking/etc, travel, NPC functionality, stuff like that.

 

Is there going to be a patch for DG to fix some bugs/glitches, and should I wait for it to come out before I purchase the add-on?

Keep in mind that I'm playing on PC, got the game through Steam, and currently I launch the game itself exclusively using thy SKSE launcher (since some of the most vital & fundamental mods I have rely completely on SKSE).

 

Anything else that I should know while I'm still learning the game, to help me prepare for making a new long-term main character, or that will help prevent my tester-characters from getting messed up while I'm still using them?

Edited September 4, 2012 by enderes

[sinnerman69]

This isn't in the spoiler section so I can talk about story plot lines or bugged quests, I was going to point to the wiki's but they don't tell you much about the DLC

 

There is blotted games saves with dawnguard and it doesn't work while with custom races or vanity mods, there's a custom race mod fix you could try, 150 saved games can get up to 1.5 gb

 

about werewolf perks read the spoiler tag

 

 

Not all the werewolf perks are working, like call ice wolf or call other wolfs

 

 

Dawnguard may make other quests buggy and console command completion codes may be needed to complete bugged quests

 

There hasn't been a official dawnguard patch released yet by Bethesda , 1.7 patch was released before dawnguard

 

watch this video in spoiler tags it well give you a ideal of what to expect, owe its a machinima video so it's heavily modded , watch at own risk it's epic

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7dGsF_Og9E

 

Edited September 4, 2012 by sinnerman69

[blitzen]

"Really this game is more like a huge research project for me right now and not yet an actual GAME"

 

A modded Bethesda Elder Scrolls or Fallout game on the PC never becomes an actual game. It remains a research project until it begins to collect dust.

[David Brasher]

There is going to be random vampire attacks in the towns. Some people don't like this because the attacks can work toward depopulating towns.

 

The vampires now have a really lame dress code. I always figured that vampires would be more individualistic.

 

Crossbows! The best part of Dawnguard.

[enderes]

There is blotted games saves with dawnguard and it doesn't work while with custom races or vanity mods, there's a custom race mod fix you could try, 150 saved games can get up to 1.5 gb

 

Well I don't use any custom race mods & don't plan to, but what exactly do you mean by "vanity mods?" I have mods that chance character & NPC appearance (e.g. Prometheus Better Female Boddies, CBBE, Alternative Textures for CBBE, XCE) and one of the next things on my list to try is mods that add more hair options & maybe more face options during character creation. Is that what you mean?

 

Also before I made this thread I google-researched the subject of what effect installing Dawnguard has on savegames, and I saw a lot about this problem of bloating.

I'm curious... right now my Saves folder has 74 files in it that have a total combined size 297 MB. Hypothetically, if I installed Dawnguard now, and my # of save files didn't grow very much/fast, how bad would they likely get bloated? Is this enough to be likely to really bog down my system if they bloat up? Or is it usually just a problem for people with far more files than me? Or do bloated save files get to be a hindrance regardless of how many total files there are?

 

 

A modded Bethesda Elder Scrolls or Fallout game on the PC never becomes an actual game. It remains a research project until it begins to collect dust.

 

Well when I played Morrowind (my first Elder Scrolls experience) I started by making 1 character... and then I played that character for 3 years during which I beat all the quests of the main game + Bloodmoon & Tribunal, and proceeded to do THIS PROJECT of killing EVERY CHARACTER and collecting EVERY SINGLE ITEM IN THE WHOLE GAME. So I started "playing" right from the start and also "studied & learned" along the way. Made another character a while afterwards but didn't go far. Basically the same story with Oblivion (although I never finished the game; I got just a little way into the Shivering Isles content when I had to reinstall windows and I failed to backup one of the folders of data files, making my character & her saves irretrievable).

 

It's only with Skyrim that I decided beforehand to do the bulk of the "research" at the beginning before making a main character, then switch to primariy "playing" and only add small mods over time from then on (stuff that doesn't make major changes/overhauls, that would work okay with a character already far-played).

Edited September 8, 2012 by enderes

[achen94]

I love playing as a nord, I joined the imperials. I have played and beaten dawnguard and highly recommend it! It was an AWESOME questline, although a bit short. It should not have an impact on your saves.

[sinnerman69]

What I meant by vanity mods, was mods that change the body type [nude skins],muscular body's, skin tone, eyes, hair and or eye lashes and finger nails

 

As for the blotted saves, I tried to search the forum for other threads and nothing came up and there where a bunch of threads about this issue, I most be spelling blot wrong, maybe it's bloat or blut in those help threads, the blot means big saved files or bigger

 

I have a re-textured dawnguard mod in my game called Dawnguard Paladin Armor and it's had no ill effect so far, I installed it last weekend, but haven't played dawnguard since installing this new mod, well be starting dawnguard today and well see!..

Edited September 8, 2012 by sinnerman69

[Pentigan]

The only problem that I found when actually getting and installing Dawnguard was that one of my mods had already altered the area that the expansion uses for the entrance to it's Fort Dawnguard area. Luckily the mod was a quest I had already completed and there wasn't any unique rewards.

 

Besides that, there hasn't really been much that is a problem caused by mods that couldn't be solved by a swift application of the console or choosing a different path than intended. And thus my first playthrough was Vampire Lord when I intended it to be Dawnguard.

 

Above all else, you should get Dawnguard not just because of it's own locations and storyline, but also for the growing amount of awesome mods that use the resources added by the expansion. Like a player-owned castle in the Fort Dawnguard style or cool crossbows.

[Moraevik]

I most be spelling blot wrong, maybe it's bloat or blut in those help threads, the blot means big saved files or bigger

 

Sinnerman, it's "bloat". A "blot" (noun) is a smudge on something or (verb) is something you do to spilled liquid with a paper towel. "Blut" is German for "blood". This is why you couldn't find anything for save game bloat. :wink:

[NEMISIES1]

Want Dawngard ?

 

Dont want to Pay for It ?

 

Works with Steam Complete.

 

Gimme a Buzz...... :thumbsup:

 

How about I just "buzz" you off this site now, we don't cater for thieves and pirates - TVD.