Improving Skyrim / Recommended Mods thread (Mostly about Requiem)

[Delterius]

Horses poop less while being ridden? Decreases when running?! Won't poop if sleeping, sitting, dead or unconscious?!!

What the fuck. It's like this asshole's never taken a dump.

He obviously needs your expert advice on the needs and reality of the equine sort.

 

[Andyman Messiah]

"I considered adding in a side quest of some sort, though a talking poop might be to much for most people to handle."

Depends on how large the poop is.

Horses poop less while being ridden? Decreases when running?! Won't poop if sleeping, sitting, dead or unconscious?!!

What the fuck. It's like this asshole's never taken a dump.

He obviously needs your expert advice on the needs and reality of the equine sort.

Just fucking drop your trousers and squeeze real hard. That's all the 'expert advice' you need.

As far as this guy goes, he might need a little bit more. Look, pooping shouldn't decrease when you move. It should increase. Make it come out even faster cuz you're moving and your stomach is bubbling and stuff. Also it'd look like a tail. Y'know, you're running around and pooping and shit comes out of your butt like a tail! Man, a poop tail! Shit, dude.

 

[DraQ]

Horses poop less while being ridden? Decreases when running?! Won't poop if sleeping, sitting, dead or unconscious?!!

What the fuck. It's like this asshole's never taken a dump.

True dat. Stuff often poops when dying.

 

[Ovg]

Will this work with the horse vagina mod? For that 110% immersive expirience?

 

[Orma]

Any other good immershun mods, like this manure one?

 

[Broseph]

Why would anyone waste their time modding this crap? Nevermind, someone from Loverslab with a poop fetish is very excited about this.

 

[someone else]

New to Skyrim.
I use the unofficial patches and improved UI.
Next I recommend skytweak for easy tweaking of game balance.
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/33395/

Others that I'm using which are easily found:
ASIS manual patcher, for increased spawns
Alchemy Balanced Overhaul
Apocalypse spells, lots of nice spells
AmazingFollowerTweaks for follower tweaks
D13 Faster Get up Stand up animation
Acquisitive Soul Gems & Enhanced soul trap
A Quality World Map
Categorized Favorites Menu
Craftable Crossbows and Bolts for all
Dual Wield Parrying
Weapons and Armor Fixed
Enhanced Crafting Version
Upgrade Leveled Items Spell
Enhanced mighty dragons.
ERSO, parts of it
Fcte Resurrect
HeavyArmorTree
LightArmorTree
Run For Your Lives & When Vampires Attack
Soul Eater the Enchantment Removing Chest

Notice I don't use any graphic mods.
With the creation kit you can tweak/fix the game as you wish. For level scaling I find mods that do static leveling aren't that good and resort to skytweak and ASIS for adjusting game difficulty.

 

[IDtenT]

Whilst insanely detailed, I'd prefer not to balance somebody else's game.

 

[DraQ]

Requiem on top of duel - oh god its heavan.

 

[JrK]

Duel (Combat Realism) is great anyway, it made parry worth something and even important.

 

[Zewp]

As much as I love the Requiem mod, unfortunately the game is still Skyrim. There's just too much wrong with the RPG side of the game for it to be worth playing through with gameplay enhancement mods.

 

[Turisas]

As much as I love the Requiem mod, unfortunately the game is still Skyrim. There's just too much wrong with the RPG side of the game for it to be worth playing through with gameplay enhancement mods.

[Intelligence] But at least you would be fighting the good fight, right?

 

[DraQ]

As much as I love the Requiem mod, unfortunately the game is still Skyrim. There's just too much wrong with the RPG side of the game for it to be worth playing through with gameplay enhancement mods.

Such as?

Requiem is a pretty comprehensive mechanical overhaul, and you can always throw in Morrowloot as well if it's the lack of handplaced lewt that bothers you.

 

[Zewp]

The actual RPG side of Skyrim is incredibly shallow. Lame quests, lame NPC interactions, lame storyline, lack of choice and consequence, shallow game world. The game just gives you absolutely no reason to care.

 

[Manjuice Nutella]

It's just that the action and gameplay side (with mods) can really make up for it.

 

[Zewp]

That's the thing, it can't. I really love the Requiem mod, but after playing with it on for about 10 hours I got bored of Skyrim for the same reasons I got bored when I played it two years back.

 

[Manjuice Nutella]

Requiem on top of duel - oh god its heavan.

I have a few questions. Again :D .


* How is it working on higher levels and difficulty settings?

A common theme of "Gamebryo" games, modded or not, is almost uniformly the late game that, past the difficulty of Level 1 char with no supplies, eventually becoming a steamroll, with hundreds of potions you will never drink or other supplies you will never use cluttering everything. Or at least the player has enough gold and opportunities to buy himself hundreds of Potions of Ultimate Healing/Magicka to ensure being a demigod. Is it like Dark Souls Would you say Requiem makes the game consistently challenging even on higher levels and balances the base elements and mechanics of the game better to this end?

Because I would love a game where I must think about & carefully plan every fight and encounter, or at least do it in appropriately "higher level" ones that would be abundant in game and not an anomalies, regardless of level or items.

* How do you imagine it would work with custom spells like Apocalypse or DLCs like Dragonborn (in terms of custom enemies, weapons, abilities etc.)?

 

[DraQ]

The actual RPG side of Skyrim is incredibly shallow. Lame quests, lame NPC interactions, lame storyline, lack of choice and consequence, shallow game world. The game just gives you absolutely no reason to care.

Actually, "the actual RPG side" is more along the lines of stat system and builds/strategies it allows, and while it's simplified compared ot Morrowind and Daggerfall, it's more in-line with the idea of divergent builds and can be modded into quite a decent system.

Quests are indeed pretty lame, but the world isn't nearly as shallow as it was in Oblivion and is more than sufficient as backdrop for modded gameplay.

 

[sea]

Morrowind really isn't that much better in terms of quest design. The rules are slightly more open and there is no quest compass but the vast majority of quests in the game are still just basic fetch/kill types. Elder Scrolls has always been about giving you a set of RPG mechanics to play with in a big world, not about deep quests with tons of options and C&C or anything like that. The real problem with Skyrim isn't writing or world design or depth of quests, it's that the ones that are there generally don't make a lot of sense plot-wise and/or have really weird disproportionate rewards to what you're doing (thanks to level scaling) - and then that the RPG mechanics they do give you are dumbed down and simplified compared to past games.

 

[Zewp]

Quests are indeed pretty lame, but the world isn't nearly as shallow as it was in Oblivion and is more than sufficient as backdrop for modded gameplay.

Well, then I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. I think the world in Skyrim is as wide as an ocean and as deep as a puddle. Requiem is a wonderful mod, but it's not enough to make me look past how crap the rest of the game is.

 

[Necroscope]

The real problem with Skyrim isn't writing or world design or depth of quests, it's that the ones that are there generally don't make a lot of sense plot-wise and/or have really weird disproportionate rewards to what you're doing (thanks to level scaling) - and then that the RPG mechanics they do give you are dumbed down and simplified compared to past games.

Pretty much this. For me the deal breaker is lack of hand-placed/unique loot and lack of proper reward system. The biggest problem of this game is still disheartening level scalling that kills any reason to do/go anything/anywhere.

 

[Akratus]

Yep. Felt great to delete my 25 gb skyrim folder. Should have realized far earlier you can't turn a zombie back by giving it cpr.

 

[DraQ]

Requiem on top of duel - oh god its heavan.

I have a few questions. Again :D .


* How is it working on higher levels and difficulty settings?

Difficulty settings are nuked by Requiem - they no longer have effect (there are optional .esps to change that).
Higher levels are generally easier, but you can still die very easily and there are hi-level challenges. Even some seemingly low level places got a nasty boost (Valtheim Towers, just Valtheim Towers).
Requiem is the kind of mod where you don't tank. Heavy armour, shield, high skills and lots of HP are very valuable but they still don't allow you to just tank.

Potions are both made more important and gimped. You don't regenerate health naturally (even when resting), so you must rely on potions and spells, but potions arent instantaneous any more, so you can't just go into inventory and reset the health bar.
You also can't change worn items when in combat.

Lastly, game becomes far more build dependent. Many skills only really work if you invest perks into them. Security? Without perks you just can't open locks no matter how good you're at minigame - the actual sweet spot just doesn't exist when fiddling with the lock although it may appear that you're getting close - and opening more difficult locks requires more points put into right perks. Heavy armour? It's protective but without at least the first perk it will drain your stamina just by being worn, and then you have to sink perks in it to remove movement, stamina and casting penalties - without right perks you just can't cast in HA because cost will be in high thousands. Casting skills? All but simplest spells can't be cast without cost reduction from perks, unless you manage to get your magicka ridiculously high. Sneak got both powered up and made insanely hard. Enemies will be on their guard, they will search for you long and effectively and will be tipped of you presence by even slightest noise. Sneak attacks with bows usually just don't occur, you must have high skills and clear shot. OTOH sneak attacks against sleeping targets just kill them (200x damage multiplier) and you can get perks to make all sneak attacks lethal against humanoids and later not only that.

Because I would love a game where I must think about & carefully plan every fight and encounter, or at least do it in appropriately "higher level" ones that would be abundant in game and not an anomalies, regardless of level or items.

Well, if you won't plan and aren't good at running away (while zigzagging), you will reload a lot. When one or two arrows can off you (assuming you don't have heavy/good armour) attacking bandit camp in a way that doesn't subject you to a rain of arrows suddenly becomes important.
And then casters.
Casters murder you in Requiem.

A tutorial video for dealing with casters in requiem:

* How do you imagine it would work with custom spells like Apocalypse or DLCs like Dragonborn (in terms of custom enemies, weapons, abilities etc.)?

I wouldn't expect problems from DB, but would stay away from custom spell mods. Requiem alone adds tons of custom spells and makes exisiting spellcasting just ground shattering at high levels.
Master level spells include stuff like teleportation (mark & recall as well as line of sight teleport), disintegrating enemies into pile of goo, making enemies commit suicide via mind control, teleporting someone's heart out of them, TK grabbging pretty much anything, and ordinary nuke grade fiery explosions.
OTOH without putting several perks into magic schools and religiously pumping magicka each level you won't even cast spells gatekeeper girl wants you to at CoW.

Morrowind really isn't that much better in terms of quest design. The rules are slightly more open and there is no quest compass but the vast majority of quests in the game are still just basic fetch/kill types. Elder Scrolls has always been about giving you a set of RPG mechanics to play with in a big world, not about deep quests with tons of options and C&C or anything like that. The real problem with Skyrim isn't writing or world design or depth of quests, it's that the ones that are there generally don't make a lot of sense plot-wise and/or have really weird disproportionate rewards to what you're doing (thanks to level scaling) - and then that the RPG mechanics they do give you are dumbed down and simplified compared to past games.

Morrowind might not be too different in terms of individual quests, however:

1. Less hoops to jump through. Morrowind quests aren't as scripted so whatever let's you achieve quest goal goes, allowing for much lateral thinking and creativity.

2. High level structure of quests is different. Quests often havem ultiple entry points, tie into one another and are interconnected with wide network of hints and relations. You may get sent by Legion to retrieve a legendary artifact and kill traitor who stole it, but you might just as well stumble onto it when going on a quest to steal an unrelated item from an unrelated legion-affiliated person which will make you got through the same location but from opposite direction. Or you may just find it when sent by corrupt branch of Fighter Guild to kill a legion official who messed with Cammonna Tong.

 

[Gord]

The real problem with Skyrim isn't writing or world design or depth of quests, it's that the ones that are there generally don't make a lot of sense plot-wise and/or have really weird disproportionate rewards to what you're doing (thanks to level scaling) - and then that the RPG mechanics they do give you are dumbed down and simplified compared to past games.

Simplicity aside, most of the quests don't make more or less sense than in many other games, although the game is definitely lacking in decent larger quest lines.
I think it has a lot to do with missing links between quests and main story/other quest lines, making quests feel strangely disconnected.
And disproportionate rewards are nothing new, but rather an old problem to TES games - Morrowind had generally quite terrible rewards.

As for the RPG mechanics, the simplification of the character system is unfortunate, although the Perks are a good addition and actually help to offset some of it.
Potentially at least the system is not that bad.
Of course this only helps so much when there are very few occassions in the game where your characters abilities matter much (outside of combat that is).

 

[Bahamut]

Skyrim mods fix everything, even your character's dick!
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/35463/?tab=1&navtag=/ajax/moddescription/?id=35463&preview=&pUp=1

SOS - Schlongs of Skyrim is a mod intended to work as a framework for customized, animated and dynamic assignment and management of male genitalia. Although the mod started by only aiming to provide it only for male characters, due to demand, it soon shifted to a full framework, capable of managing it to any possible race/gender. Currently it features a base male body to work with, and 3 distinct shape Addons. We expect with further development, to extend the shape "database".

Spoiler