Suggestions for good mods for 1st time player?

[Rooker75]

I spotted a copy of Oblivion on sale practically for pennies, so I picked it up. I've never played it before, so I was wondering what are some good mods? I'll play it vanilla first, but after that I'll mod the crap out of it.

 

I just read somewhere that the game ends after the final quest, like Fallout New Vegas did? I assume there's a good mod to fix that? I assume there's also probably an unofficial bug fix patch?

 

Mods I'm usually not interested in are things like "realism" (adding food/water needs, etc), things that make the lighting pitch dark or adding naked pixel women. Other than that, I'll usually try anything once.

[Striker879]

The game is very open ended. By that I mean you decide whether or not to finish the main quest. Even after you finish the main quest you can still play using that character for as long as you like (my original character, aka MyOldGuy, has well over 1300 hours, has done everything except the Dark Brotherhood and final Arena quest, and I still play him because of the companion mod I use on that guy). There are plenty of vanilla game quests you can do after, before or during the main quest.

 

To give you a leg up on what comes with the vanilla game have a glance through the UESP Wiki page for Quests. If you prefer to not see possible spoilers just click the top level links (e.g. click Anvil and then you'll see a list of all the quests that start in the city of Anvil, with a very brief description of each quest). If you do download and install the Unofficial Oblivion Patch it will fix many (if not all) of the game breaking problems with the original game's quests. Alternately you can just read the 'Bugs' section on each quest (scroll to the bottom of the quest page ... that section is always at or very near the bottom of the page).

[Lanceor]

The game doesn't end when you finish the main quest - it just continues, though townsfolk will acknowledge your efforts in saving the world. AS for what mods to start with:

 

Everyone has their individual preferences so it's hard to recommend particular mods without knowing what you like.

 

I'd start with the Unofficial Patches as they fix a lot of bugs and annoyances that Bethesda had missed.

 

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• The Unofficial Oblivion Patch
  
• The Unofficial Oblivion Patch Supplemental
  
• The Unofficial Official Mods Patch
  
• The Unofficial Shivering Isles Patch
  

You'll need to have some way of sorting your load order:

 

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• Better Oblivion Sorting Software - BOSS will auto-order most of the mods based on the collective experience of experienced mod users.
  

And to manually adjust the load order (pick one or more)...

 

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• Nexus Mod Manager is the newest and allows automatic installation straight from Nexus. While this feature is handy, it is less reliable than manual installation.
  
• Oblivion mod manager is not as powerful as Wrye Bash (below), but is easier to use. It supports OMODs, a packaging method used by some mod authors.
  
• Wrye Bash is probably the most powerful load order manager and seems to be recommended by the most mod Authors.
  

Keep in mind that almost all complex mods require The Oblivion Script Extender (OBSE) to function properly so make sure you have that installed if you download any mods that require it.

 

After that, browse around and pick whatever mods appeal to you. I'd suggest trying one or two simple mods first before attempting to install the mega-overhaul mods like OOO, UV or MMM (those acronyms will become familiar to you soon ;)) Most mods have installation instructions that you should follow. You can check the Nexus Top 100 for the most popular mods, and filter it by category if you're after a particular type of mod.

 

If you haven't played through Oblivion though, many would suggest not adding mods until you've played Oblivion for a while and have an idea what would improve your gameplay the most.

 

Personal opinion: The only part of Oblivion that I think is "unplayably broken" is the default leveling system which forces you to play in odd ways if you want to maximise your character. So IMHO, a mod that alters the levelling system is something that I would recommend right from the beginning.

• All +5 Attribute Modifier or Attribute Plus X lets you use the default system without worrying about how many attribute points you'll get on level-up.
  
• Realistic Leveling lets you simply play and your attributes increase automatically based on skills leveled.
  
• Oblivion XP gives a classic CRPG style leveling system: earn enough experience points to level up and spend your attributes as you see fit.
   
  

Have fun with the mods!

[Rooker75]

Cool, thanks guys. Four different unofficial patches?? Jeez, Bethesda.