Which Oblivion mods are you using?

[suibhne]

I figured I'd post a list sans tubgirl, at least for VD's benefit.

I applied a long list of mods yesterday, and the game was immediately more fun. Check out this thread as the ES forums for a good list of available mods. They don't solve all the problems - the speechcraft stuff just can't be fixed, e.g. - but at least they make the game a lot less blatantly stupid.

Here's what I'm currently using, in order from that post:

Bug Fixes
Birthsigns NoMax v1.1 - excludes birthsigns bonuses from stat cap
Dark Brotherhood Continues Selling Poison Apples v1.0 - vendors in DB sanctuary continue selling poison apples after plot
Fathis Fix v1.0 - fixes bugged fence from thieves guild
Kobu's Stamina Mod v1.01 - corrects some wording in game
Sneak Master Perk Replacement v1.0 - adds damage multiplier to master sneak as current perk is broken

AI Tweaks
Combat Behavior Modification v2.0 - customizes behavior of enemies during combat

Item Tweaks
More Arrows Recovered v1.0 - increases chance of arrow recovery and raises max amount shown
Potion Sorter v1.0 - renames potions to sort by type then potency - Download

Leveling Tweaks (Summary; Discussion/Comparison threads here, here, and here)
Rare Items Mod v1.18

UI Tweaks
BTmod v2.20 - customized user interface
Compass Marker Reducer v1.0 - reduces range in which compass shows POI icons
No More Annoying Messages v1.2 - removes loading messages and others like it

Visual Tweaks
Darker Dungeons Mod v1.1 - makes dungeons darker
Darker Nights Mod v1.0 - makes nights darker outdoors
Landscape LOD Texture Replacement v1.0 - higher quality distant landscape textures
Natural Faces v0.6 - higher quality face textures
Oblivion Color Map Mod v1.1b - colorizes world map

My commentary:

The Bug Fixes are all necessary.

The Combat Behavior Mod makes things more interesting for me. Enemies are more aggressive and also dodge and strafe much more often. I've seen no problems with it.

Under Item Tweaks - Potion Sorter is an absolute necessity in my view. More Arrows Recovered might seem like a cheat at first - except that a 75% recovery rate still seems reasonable for metal or even higher-quality arrows (all that's available in Tamriel), and the other improvement is simply that it leaves more arrows in the world for a much longer period of time. (The game defaults to a limit of 15 arrows out at any given time, and despawns all arrows after a ridiculously short period, presumably for performance reasons, so stray arrows sometimes disappear before your fight has even ended. This is especially stupid with enemies like Skeletons and Atronachs, against whom your arrows do damage but then bounce off and are 100% recoverable.)

Tom Servo's item rarity mod fixed my complaints with loot levelling, making it much more rational (yet still rewarding enough for Monty Hauls - I typically get 500-1500 septims from clearing out a dungeon, rather than 5000-10000 septims...and that's more than enough to make a small profit on top of repairing armor, buying kickass arrows, etc.). It obviously weakens some monsters (like Bandits), but it doesn't change the strength of less gear-dependent monsters like Minotaurs, Brown Bears, and especially undead. I settled on a difficulty setting of maybe 60% to make up for the weaker gear; anything more seems to make undead far too strong. My only complaint with the mod is that it seems to weaken Vampires as much as it weakens Bandits, and I think Vampires should generally have access to a higher-level loot pool (more Mithril/Dwarven/Orcish than your average Bandit, maybe even a little Ebony or the rare Glass piece).

BTMod and NoMoreAnnoyingMessages are both essentials. The other UI tweak I use is just my preference. Honestly, I never even look at the goddamn compass, so I'm not sure why I don't disable all markers (which BTMod offers); I just haven't tried that.

Darker Dungeons makes dungeon-crawling much more enjoyable for me. Caves are downright creepy when you have to pull out a torch to see anything, especially when Spriggans are giggling around you in the darkness. The only drawback is that torches don't seem to count against your stealth; even tho my stealth ranking is now 107, that's just plain dumb.

On to the other visual tweaks... Some faces, especially Nords, are still pretty ugly even with Natural Faces. All of the other tweaks make a significant difference, tho. And the Landscape LOD Texture Replacement should be combined with LOD Normal Map Replacment for the best visual improvement with virtually no performance hit.



As for the $2.73 question - I totally disagree with Rendelius' suggestion that Beth should get a total pass for not implementing some of this stuff. Their stock UI is total crap, and even BTMod can't come close to fixing the basic design stupidities. Their levelling scheme is objectively bad design, not a matter of personal preference as Rendelius claims. Some of the stuff I've started using is merely cosmetic, like the colored world map, but a few of those mods are prime examples of volunteers doing Beth's work for them.

 

[HardCode]

Wow, this thread is the best reason to not buy Oblivion that I've seen so far!

 

[kohla]

I was browsing the ESF boards today and came across this. Of course, seems not all are too happy about it.

funny, pete said one time he wouldn't pay 5$ for only a "horse" armor mod.
apparently he changed his mind...

Yay! I am happy for the 360 users! By the way, why do you need 200 points and what is he talking about ?

 

[Thrawn05]

$2.50 for a freakin' horse armor mod. From reading that thread, looks like some are none too happy about that.

 

[RK47]

i tried out the mercenary mods for fun n laughs and it worked well, except the AI seems to be anti-crime. So I can't steal/murder within their sights.

It made oblivion gate clearing fights go much quicker IMO and more fun.

 

[Goliath]

I use the "Did not buy it" mod; I am very happy with it! :D

 

[Oarfish]

200 points

XBox live currency, it's about 80 points to the dollar I think.

 

[vazquez595654]

I use the "Did not buy it" mod; I am very happy with it!

Hey that mod doesn't work for me for some reason.

 

[Zomg]

Wow, converting cash into points, to create lock-in and break down psychological barriers about spending money. That's right out of the playbook on how to soak children.

 

[suibhne]

Wow, this thread is the best reason to not buy Oblivion that I've seen so far!

Most of the game is genuinely fun once some of those mods are applied, at least for combat-heavy or exploration-heavy types. You can mostly ignore the Persuasion bullshit (other than a few times when a quest-essential NPC says "I don't trust you enough to tell you that", you run the ludicrous Persuasion minigame and ask them again, and they say "I guess I trust you enough to tell you that..." ). With high levels of Stealth you can even ignore a lot of the combat, if it's not your cuppa.

Almost all of my previous complaints still stand, and mods can't get rid of serious design problems like NPC interaction. But the world design is mostly really good, some of the dungeons are mighty fine (even tho I still haven't seen anything as good as Morrowind's best dungeons), and the levelling loot can be fixed. The mods I mentioned all make the game more enjoyable for me, in both small and large ways.

Also, I don't blame Beth for the bugs, just because every single RPG maker ships a healthy portion of those. Which is to say, sure, I blame Beth for the bugs - but that's just the baseline for modern RPGs. Oblivion is purely average in that sense.

I'm not ready to give it GOTY or anything like that. It's not a great RPG, and it's especially poor in terms of really letting you roleplay different character types; on that front it's no more sophisticated than, say, Deus Ex (where you can "roleplay" a few different types of character as long as you recognize it's an action game and accomplish the goals you're given). The biggest letdown is the feeling of creeping malaise that seeps into every pore of my being whenever I get even the littlest bit self-reflective, because I have to acknowledge that nothing I do in the game is actually meaningful (in real life or in the game :wink: ). But I'm finally getting to the point where Oblivion is meeting some of my (very modest) expectations, which is basically a cool Sim Hiker with some neato lore behind it.

 

[Rat Keeng]

I changed some settings myself, setting arrow recovery to 80%, changing respawn times to 30 days instead of 3, and completely removing POI on the compass, but still have the marker for the main quest. Although, to be honest, I find myself forgetting about it most of the time, particularly because the main quest is so hand-holdingly linear.

The BTmod 2.20 is excellent, not only does it redo and enlarge the interface, it hotkeys all the yes and no responses you face when selling equipment, buying equipment etc. Pretty crappy on Beth's part, that all it required was some changes in a few .xml files.

Tom Servo's Rare Items mod sounds great, and I'm using it even though I haven't gotten far enough to see the "bandits in full ebony" hilarity, so I hope I never will. You can only blame Bethesda for giving vampires the same levelled item lists as common bandits and robbers.

Other mods I've deemed worthy:
Better Water - Reduces the murkyness, lets you see through the water's surface somewhat, improves reflection etc.
Jump Adjustment - No more crouching tiger jumps, imposes earth-like gravity on the player. Avoid if you like the current moon-jumping settings.
Short Grass - Improves performance, and looks much better if you ask me. It halves the height of all grass in the game.

Only bad news is you have to register at tessource to download any files, though the process is much less painful than most registry-requiring sites.

 

[FrancoTAU]

Holy fuck, they're charging for a horse armor mod? For a game that was just released last week? I was pretty annoyed when they first announced the pay for mod thing, but that's exceptionally shitty. I thought they were going be like mini expansion packs.

I'm definately waiting for Oblivion to hit the bargain bins.

 

[bryce777]

"(other than a few times when a quest-essential NPC says "I don't trust you enough to tell you that", you run the ludicrous Persuasion minigame and ask them again, and they say "I guess I trust you enough to tell you that..." Rolling Eyes )."

You have pretty eyes.

What's brown and sounds like a bell? Dunngggg!

I'LL KILL YOU, BITCH.

'Ok, here is the sekrit password."

 

[Micmu]

I used the Uninstall Wizard mod. It's just awesome - it fixed all the bugs and cured my headache.

 

[thomase]

Leveling Tweaks (Summary; Discussion/Comparison threads here, here, and here).

Are there supposed to be links here?

 

[suibhne]

Leveling Tweaks (Summary; Discussion/Comparison threads here, here, and here).

Are there supposed to be links here?

No, I just didn't adequately edit the stuff from the original post. Check out the original if you want more. IIRC, that bit was pointing to a compare-'n'-contrast between several loot levelling mods.

 

[Blahblah Talks]

Holy fuck, they're charging for a horse armor mod?

Does anybody remember a little game called Total Annihilation whose developer released a new unit about every week for a long time after the game was released? For free.

 

[Bossman]

Yeap, but then again, Cavedog didn't have to release Total Annihilation for the Xbox 360. Plus they really wanted to improve the game experience for the players long after the release of the game. : sigh : Those were the good old days.

 

[suibhne]

Does anybody remember a little game called Total Annihilation whose developer released a new unit about every week for a long time after the game was released? For free.

Does anyone remember a little game called Morrowind whose developer released a few new mods a long time after the game was released? For free.

I'm not saying those mods were anything to write home about, and I'm definitely not suggesting Morrowind was a classic in the same sense as TA. But it's pretty striking that Beth released Morrowind mods for free - they celebrated those releases on their homepage and patted themselves on the back for post-release support - and now they charge for crappy dress-up options for your Oblivion horsey.

 

[kingcomrade]

Holy fuck, they're charging for a horse armor mod?

Does anybody remember a little game called Total Annihilation whose developer released a new unit about every week for a long time after the game was released? For free.

Yeah that's exactly what I was thinking. I was actually playing it earlier today.

Why, exactly, would someone spend money on a mod that adds horse armor? Secondly, are normal modders restricted from making horse armor mods of their own? konsole kidz are getting screwed, but I'm not quite sure if I feel bad for them.

 

[Drakron]

The Firemouth plugin was a disaster ... even down to a technical standpoint.

The fact we have rebalance mods within a week of release says a lot, nobody likes a "the world levels with you" because ITS STUPID, what the fuck is the point of levels when in essence they are made IRRELEVENT.

 

[thomase]

The Firemouth plugin was a disaster ... even down to a technical standpoint.

The fact we have rebalance mods within a week of release says a lot, nobody likes a "the world levels with you" because ITS STUPID, what the fuck is the point of levels when in essence they are made IRRELEVENT.

You have to increase your level to get better armor/weapons... :wink:

But seriously, are there not at least SOME challenges that are NOT scaled to level, such as:
1.) Quest-specific fights with NPCs.
2.) Quest-specific locks with fixed difficulty.
3.) Non-random loot.

Is it POSSIBLE to find high-quality weapons/armor in specific locations (or on specific NPCs) before reaching the level required for such an item to appear with a random encounter?

 

[Drakron]

You have to increase your level to get better armor/weapons... :wink:

And they get better gear too ... so what is the point of level to get better gear when your enemies get upgraded too?

None.

Is it POSSIBLE to find high-quality weapons/armor in specific locations (or on specific NPCs) before reaching the level required for such an item to appear with a random encounter?

Of course it is, the unique artifacts are ... well unique and so you can get Umbra right at lv. 1 since Umbra will be lv1.

You want another example of idiocy?

Guild level advancement requirements are removed ... that is right, no longer you need to get at least 50 in destruction to became the archmage of the Mage Guild.

Morrowind was scaled, Daggerfall was also scaled but the scaling of Oblivion is absurd ... at one point you start to see bandits decked in ebody and glass with guards ALWAYS being slightly better that you are.

And the "its raining ebony and glass" screws up the economy, after all after lv 20 its easy to get over 10.000 gp with loot only.

You see ... Morrowind and Daggerfall forced you to level , if you wanted to climb ranks you simply had to level so there was a iniciative for the player to level.

They sould have cap leveling so a bandit stops leveling around 10-15 with bandit bosses going perhaps at lv 20 and stopping there and guards leveling at a slower pace and also stopping at lv 10-15 with the exception of some guards (such as the ones guarding the palace) that would go until lv 20.

Also it a issue that I call "the world run out of orcs" (I call it that in reference to AD&D 2nd ed) were creatues simply vanish because they are "too low level" and so no longer spawn ... what is wrong I still having to deal with lv 4 wolves at lv 20? did they became extint or they mutated all into bears?

 

[Blahblah Talks]

All ur mod are belong to Bethesda.

From the CS EULA:

If You distribute or otherwise make available New Materials, You automatically grant to Bethesda Softworks the irrevocable, perpetual, royalty free, sublicensable right and license under all applicable copyrights and intellectual property rights laws to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, perform, display, distribute and otherwise exploit and/or dispose of the New Materials (or any part of the New Materials) in any way Bethesda Softworks, or its respective designee(s), sees fit. You also waive and agree never to assert against Bethesda Softworks or its affiliates, distributors or licensors any moral rights or similar rights, however designated, that You may have in or to any of the New Materials. If You commit any breach of this Agreement, Your right to use the Editor under this Agreement shall automatically terminate, without notice.

Also from the EULA:

Use of the Internet is at Your sole risk.

Don't say they didn't warn you.

Edit: Of course, the real question with this is when are they going to start porting user created mods to the XBox and selling them at $2.50 a pop?

 

[Rat Keeng]

New mod just in, Spell Removal Potions. Now that's a good idea if I ever saw one