Improving Skyrim / Recommended Mods thread (Mostly about Requiem)

[Commissar Draco]

Let me guess real property prices reached Kwan Potato modern level too? Makes sense for Whiterun home to cost more than 5000 Septims... Seriously would kill for Drakensang monetary system for Skyrim; and btw noticed Gold being back as Septims

 

[Gord]

About the damage, heavy armor protect you more than enough from arrows as it should and on light armor, arrows hit like a truck as it should. About the precision of the archers, again, something to balance the gameplay, if there was a reallistic accuracy, archers would only really be able to shoot you at close range, where you can just murder them anyway, that is what happens in vanilla Skyrim.

You guys seem to think that there's either being one-shotted by archers or just laughing at them while being transformed into a pin-cushion.
That's nonsense, however. I'm only saying that the damage of archers is too high insofar as they will outright and inevitably kill any player that is not a) wearing heavy armor and maybe a shield and b) not hundreds of meters away, where the damage does drop off.
I'm not against increasing the damage output of bows and making archers dangerous, I just say that increasing it to the point where you are routinely one-shotted is exaggerated, more so since it makes them do more damage than most guys with a sword, axe or hammer.
Rather I'd make archers hit hard, but give you the reasonable possibility to survive being hit by them once, even if barely.

As for the range at which they would realistically hit you, I think being able to take a couple of shots at you with reasonable accuracy starting at ~ 150m isn't that unrealistic.

I use a single barrel in Whiterun for storing everything so i don't have a problem with gold weight. You don't need those 5k in your pocket if you are just going to a next bandit cave.

Yeah, sure. But if Requiem's goal is to increase immersion and add some amount of "semi-realistic roleplaying experience" then having to leave your shit in some rain-barrel in the next town sure sounds a bit counter-productive. Not to get larpy here, but somehow that seems stupid...

 

[Lancehead]

Let me guess real property prices reached Kwan Potato modern level too? Makes sense for Whiterun home to cost more than 5000 Septims... Seriously would kill for Drakensang monetary system for Skyrim; and btw noticed Gold being back as Septims

The player home in Whiterun costs 3000.

Also, there's this mod for banking; looks ok but old.

I use a single barrel in Whiterun for storing everything so i don't have a problem with gold weight. You don't need those 5k in your pocket if you are just going to a next bandit cave.

Yeah, sure. But if Requiem's goal is to increase immersion and add some amount of "semi-realistic roleplaying experience" then having to leave your shit in some rain-barrel in the next town sure sounds a bit counter-productive. Not to get larpy here, but somehow that seems stupid...

If you go away for too long (30 days to be accurate) the barrel will reset its contents.

 

[Commissar Draco]

Looks interesting Shame that Collecting agency and being send to prison for debt was never implement though.

 

[Lhynn]

DraQ
Dont be a smart ass, we are talking bout bows. Plus ranged weapon evolution and proliferation stems from the fact that you get to not-be-where-the-psycho-with-the-knife-is...

You are not holding a sniper in your hands, you are holding a curved stick that shoots straight sticks with a pointy end, it should reflect on gameplay, it should not, under any circumstance, be deadlier than a 300 pound hammer just "because of balance". That is weak, that is ugly. If you want to make the bow better, then you give it precision attacks, feet, legs, hands, arms, heart, throat, head, eyes, you give it different effects depending on location, and then the best archers will actually use that to their advantage and it will be good.

Is it possible to add locational damage to Skyrim? The original surely doesn't have it. People here in the Codex have this discussion about realism/abstracted gameplay all the time in the end what really matters is if make sense on the context of the game with it's limitations. Making the arrows deadly is a way to balance the game. Things like location damage and hit and run tactics and more complex stuff sound cool but the AI of Skyrim can't do it, you have an advantage and they don't when the general objective of Requiem is to up the difficulty and remove popamole. Let's say bows are, at best, situational weapons and you are supposedly only able to hit 1 or 2 times before an enemy closing in, in that example you gave, then those hits must hit really hard or bows are useless, if your window of opportunity to use ranged weapons is tiny, the damage they do must be big to compensate, not lower.

About the damage, heavy armor protect you more than enough from arrows as it should and on light armor, arrows hit like a truck as it should. About the precision of the archers, again, something to balance the gameplay, if there was a reallistic accuracy, archers would only really be able to shoot you at close range, where you can just murder them anyway, that is what happens in vanilla Skyrim. Bows were made to hit someone in huge masses of men/shoot individuals at close range while on a horse/ambushes, things that don't happen in the game or are very limited, to argue for a realistic use for them is the same to make them almost useless on the context of Skyrim. If you were talking about a game where ambushes, decent horseback fighting, complex AI, bigger scale fights were implemented... okay... on the context of Skyrim, you are talking about a lone man that slaugther whole camps of enemies that only know to charge at him or stay in one place shooting. If it makes sense or not that bows are sniper weapons, that is not applicable.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/12615/?
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/18436/?

Am sure there are better than this, skyre already comes with its own version of locational damage and enemy IA.
And you are actually telling me that because the IA isnt smart enough, then you need to keep the game dumb?

Another thing, Light or heavy armor shouldnt make a difference, its just an arbitrary qualification weve given it, it just matter how much it protects and how it protects you. A set of magical legendary elven armor with an upgraded armor rating should protect you better against proyectiles than a weaker in comparison set of iron armor, but it doesnt, because it doesnt have the arbitrary script that says it should . We just go with it because of "RPG", but the more you bring it up the stupider it sounds. SkyRe is also guilty of this sin, it just matters there more because theres a light level scaling.

Im not all for ultra realism, getting shot in the gut and either dying or spending 6 month downtime on a town recovering doesnt strike me as fun if it happens more than once, but stop being so apologetic about the games nature, this thread is to improve the experience, not to white knight an overhaul mod that did most things well enough, there is, after all, a whole community working on improving it because they dont think the game is ok as it is, because they think it can be better, and because they are willing to point out those flaws and give them a solution.

PS: havent played skyrim in a month, should really get on it this weekend. Drox operative was a disapointment, cant get into avadon 2 and looks like how to survive is dumb as shit.

 

[Akratus]

I don't even get how heavy armor and light armor are even skills. That's almost like if you got better at wearing t-shirts in the real world. Classic bethesda dumbfuckery I suppose.

The skill trees really should be renamed to physical prowesses. Acrobatics and Physique for instance.

Acrobatics:
-Running speed
-Jumping
-Evading
-Climbing
-Throwing weapons
-Less falling damage
-Unarmed skill
-Combat staff skill?


Sneaking is silly to have it's own skill tree anyway. That's not as much a skill as pickpocketing for example. And acrobatics could include things that benefit sneaking. And the sneaking assassination stuff could fold into this.

Physique:
-Poison Resistance
-Disease resistance
-Stamina
-Stamina regen
-Counteracting speed/stamina losses of heavy armor and inventory weight
-Reduced knockback on self
-Knockback on enemies
-Mining
-Sprinting Stamina cost reduction
-Food bonuses

So perhaps the protection of a piece of armor should come from, you know, the armor, not the person wearing it.

 

[Lhynn]

Actually there is such a thing as training in armor, being able to handle yourself better in it does have a huge impact on how well it will defend you: how much it will tire you to wear it, how much it will get damaged, how well you move while wearing it, how fast you can put it on or take it off. Its just the stupid perks based on it that are... uh, stupid.

Also, there is such a thing as getting better with t-shirts, there are techniques that allow you to take advantage of what you or your enemies are wearing. Jackie chan shows us this often.

 

[Gord]

A perk for the T-Shirts skill-tree more people should take is the one that allows you to cover your asscrack.

 

[Lhynn]

it exist, but it requires both high int and low weight, so its not gonna happen any time soon in kwazania.

 

[Akratus]

Actually there is such a thing as training in armor, being able to handle yourself better in it does have a huge impact on how well it will defend you: how much it will tire you to wear it, how much it will get damaged, how well you move while wearing it, how fast you can put it on or take it off. Its just the stupid perks based on it that are... uh, stupid.

Also, there is such a thing as getting better with t-shirts, there are techniques that allow you to take advantage of what you or your enemies are wearing. Jackie chan shows us this often.

So that is:
1. Improving your physique with the weight of the armor
2. Identifying the weakness/uses in combat of clothing or what, using it as a weapon? Like a whip maybe?

This is nothing like the armor skills in skyrim. I simply see no logic in them either way.

 

[Lhynn]

Actually there is such a thing as training in armor, being able to handle yourself better in it does have a huge impact on how well it will defend you: how much it will tire you to wear it, how much it will get damaged, how well you move while wearing it, how fast you can put it on or take it off. Its just the stupid perks based on it that are... uh, stupid.

Also, there is such a thing as getting better with t-shirts, there are techniques that allow you to take advantage of what you or your enemies are wearing. Jackie chan shows us this often.

So that is:
1. Improving your physique with the weight of the armor
2. Identifying the weakness/uses in combat of clothing or what, using it as a weapon? Like a whip maybe?

This is nothing like the armor skills in skyrim. I simply see no logic in them either way.

No, actually learning how to use it, what parts of the armor are the strongest and thickest and trying to get blows you cant avoid to land there. Growing acostumed to use it does not mean you become stronger (that could also be the case tho, thats why they tied it to str or endurance in the past i think), it just means your body adapts to the armor, it knows what it can and what it cant do before even trying, this is because the armor itself restricts your movement.

 

[Akratus]

But you can't make the armor itself stronger, which is the whole point of the skill trees. Really, if what you're saying is really such a big deal in a fight there should just be one armor skill tree.

 

[Lhynn]

There should be a lot more depth to it. But we are talking about a game were your skill to wear an armor is the same as your skill to punch a motherfucker, so depth is kinda out i guess...

 

[Akratus]

That's why I favor restructuring the skill trees. It's one of the few elements of Requiem that still has a lot that can be improved.

 

[Lhynn]

SkyRe did it better, if it only fixed that level scaling poop. It is limited tho, and at least it gives you freedom to explore.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

There are mods that change just the level scaling, that are likely compatible with skyRe. Actually, SkyRe's author made one of those.

WTF - Random Encounter Zones - (by T3nd0, author of SkyRe) Lets player assign the range of encounter levels (min and max) for each encounter zone. Highly configurable/customizable.

edit: Skyrim Unleashed sounds promising as well.

Enemies are still leveled but much more difficult. To compensate, enemies don't attack on sight. Loot is unleveled but rare items are VERY rare and VERY expensive. Eating meat gives bonus to weapon dmg, Sweets give bonus to Magicka regen rate. Much more. Designed to work with several other popular mods.

I'll have to try it sometime.

 

[Gord]

Just took the 2nd alchemy perk (or rather level 2/2 of the first perk).
Apparently Requiem transforms you into a kind of tricorder/chemical analyzer with it - eat an ingredient, immediately learn all the effects.
Considering that usually you have to wrestle every bit of comfort from Requiem, this was a small wtf moment...

 

[Utgard-Loki]

needing to blow 4 perks on something that useless in vanilla was a bigger wtf moment. for most ingredients you can just grind potions until you know all the effects (if you didn't memorize them already), so he might as well just take away the tedium.

also some stuff will kill the shit out of you if you eat them without the right perks or with enough health.

 

[Gord]

Sure, still funny that he put in an early-game perk to remove some tedium, when he otherwise is perfectly fine with additional tedium.

 

[Lhynn]

In skyRe they did the same thing, and actually the seems to like separating convenience threes from bonus threes.

For example, learning what the ingredients do leads to being able to craft and use portable alchemy labs. But they are outside the main three.

 

[DraQ]

You are not holding a sniper in your hands, you are holding a curved stick that shoots straight sticks with a pointy end, it should reflect on gameplay

An arrow is more than a stick with pointy end.
Arrowhead is usually constructed to cut flesh on both sides of the wound channel, and, being short relative to depth of penetration, most of the wound channel is not plugged by the arrowhead allowing unrestricted bleeding.

it should reflect on gameplay, it should not, under any circumstance, be deadlier than a 300 pound hammer just "because of balance".

Unblocked power attack with huge ass hammer will usually end you in Requiem even if you're a tincan. I once was steamrolling a bandit camp with a tincan, then some noob in barely a fur skirt to cover his ass managed to get a good swing with a shitty 2h iron axe at me and game over man.
Your point?

Is it possible to add locational damage to Skyrim? The original surely doesn't have it.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/12615/?
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/18436/?

The problem with Locational damage in Skyrim is that the vanilla mechanics doesn't account for it at all.
You need to use scripting extended via SKSE. Even then, AFAIK locational damage mod can't actually check for hit location but has to use aim location for projectiles, which means it doesn't work at all for long range combat (as there is 'arc' in 'archery').
That's not the big problem, though. The *big* problem is that Skyrim's script engine works about well enough for rare, not time-critical events. It's slow, has limited throughput and can choke or hang in the least opportune moments.
And to allow for locational damage you have to feed every single attack through it.

Coincidentally, that's why I'm not using locational damage despite it being a mighty fine mod.

You could probably script the arrows to deal less damage, but cause nasty bleeding, but then again scripting.

the ai arrows are easy to dodge/take cover from.

Requiem fixes this as well by making most projectiles (except those whirly icestorms - they get fucking deadly instead) 2x as fast as in vanilla.

They are still dodgeable, so you won't die cheesily if you know what you're doing, but they are too fast to just stand in the open and weave between them so cover and line-of-sight management becomes vital to survival.
This applies even more to dealing with AoE attacking mages, because they don't need to score direct hits, so choice of cover becomes even more important.

In skyRe they did the same thing, and actually the seems to like separating convenience threes from bonus threes.

Actually that's horribly shitty because it forces player to choose between tedium and nerfing their character.

Convenience perks should be merged into actually useful ones you'll take anyway if you want to use the skill.

That removes the shitty dilemma between gameplay and fun and increases perceived impact of building up your skill.

 

[Lhynn]

In skyRe they did the same thing, and actually the seems to like separating convenience threes from bonus threes.

Actually that's horribly shitty because it forces player to choose between tedium and nerfing their character.

Convenience perks should be merged into actually useful ones you'll take anyway if you want to use the skill.

That removes the shitty dilemma between gameplay and fun and increases perceived impact of building up your skill.

True.

 

[Gord]

it should reflect on gameplay, it should not, under any circumstance, be deadlier than a 300 pound hammer just "because of balance".

Unblocked power attack with huge ass hammer will usually end you in Requiem even if you're a tincan. I once was steamrolling a bandit camp with a tincan, then some noob in barely a fur skirt to cover his ass managed to get a good swing with a shitty 2h iron axe at me and game over man.
Your point?

The point is: An arrow will inevitably kill your unarmored character every fucking time.
Being hit by a non-power sword/axe/hammer attack otoh might just take away 1/2-2/3 of my health.

As I said - make them archers more deadly, that's fine, but for fucks sake, implement some chance not to die instantly whenever you didn't move fast enough/got stuck in some stupid level geometry/missed archer #4 while trying to dispose of melee enemy #2.

Let's not get into a realism argument - it's not realistic that an arrow will kill you 100% of the time - but that isn't the point.
My point is that it's detrimental to gameplay to make archers that dangerous, as it doesn't allow for any error margin - I feel players should be allowed to make some error as long as they have to pay the consequences (no, reload is not a valid consequence everytime).

 

[Akratus]

Perhaps in the future we can have this:

 

[Ivar the Boner]

I decided to give Skyrim a try and with Requiem mod it's pretty fucking enjoyable. Sure, story and dialogues (oh god, teh dialogues!) are shieet but combat is nice, thanks to Requiem I'm sure. I have two major issues though:

Is there a way to turn off those goddamn finishing moves? My character is jack of all trades (which means he sucks at everything) who wears no armor other than fur shoes because I'm larper and I like how he looks in white shirt so every melee engagement is pretty big deal and there is nothing fucking more frustrating than enemy insta-killing you because some retarded finishng move kicked in and denied you control of your character. Those moves look extremely embarassing anyway, I mean, ninja spinning with a fucking mace? STABBING someone in a THROAT with an AXE? What the fuck man.

Also, I know my one-handed skill is pretty low but I can't stagger anyone with my hits. Every unblocked shitty hit by lowly bandit is putting my useless faggot off balance but I can't do that for the life of me. Well, unless I "fus ro duh" somone, then he fucking flies through the time and space, but power strike with deadric mace? nope, not gonna stop chick in leather bikini.

At the beggining I was raging about OP archery but it's actually kinda cool, no armor means every arror is certain death so I never can just charge the enemy and dragon talk and mace bash them to death because there is always some Jenny or Jack with a goddamn bow to ruin my motherfucking day.

And Skyrim is full of monty python moments. My favorite is this cheesy (but catchy) "DOVAKHIIN DOVAKHIIN!" tune kicking in when you fucking FLEE from a dragon like a little bitch (leaving your housecarl behind). It's like game expect you to fuck this lizard up but it just didn't noticed you have Requiem installed and it simply ain't gonna happen.