New to SKYRIM

[Fire&Blood]

Everyone always points to mods as a plus point for PC gaming, and they might be, if you can be bothered to spend hours fiddling about to get little difference for fat FPS dips.

Not only is that "little difference" subjective, mods go beyond tweaking visuals.
It's not all Crysis and Skyrim, SOaSE:R has mods that let me scratch that Star Trek itch, Faces of War mods made for some truly epic moments. Mods are a blessing, sometimes it's an embarrassment that we need the community to jump in but overall mods to me helped improve the look and add content to games I thoroughly enjoyed.

 

[Cerb]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned Gopher. He's going to teach you how to install everything Skyrim related.

Beginner guide to modding Skyrim 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QinA4qD6hXM

Beginner guide to modding Skyrim 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE0zXs34xSc

When I first played Skyrim two years ago I looked at Gopher videos.

Never heard of him. Probably the same for others. I looked a t a few random ones, though, and yes, they are very good.

It's an interesting way of doing it, though these days with my houses in various places, I have all of my unneeded weapons in certain places, so I'm normally loaded with a warhammer, a bow, a sword and shield weapon-wise.

That mod just handles what's equipped, not what you carry. I started using it for spell/shield and spell/spell equip combos, for changing them around quickly during combat.

I was having some problems (not the least of which being NMM deleting most files from my HDD :thumbsdown, and basically had forgotten about two very important things for handling many mods:
1. Use ENB w/o ENB visuals. Just configure it for ENBoost (though I'd still like to know why trying most ENBs results in no dynamic lights, and no shadows at all).
2. Heap adjustment now comes with SKSE, and just needs an INI edit to increase the heap size. Sweet!

 

[norseamd]

2. Heap adjustment now comes with SKSE, and just needs an INI edit to increase the heap size. Sweet!

Tell me about this.

 

[Cerb]

Tell me about this.

http://forum.step-project.com/topic/3885-skyrim-memory-patch-30/page-26#entry63742

So, no more need for SSME to run lots of mods, that may cause start-up freezes or CTDs, or freezes or CTDs after playing awhile, due to running out of the default 256MB.

 

[Cerb]

OK, NMM needs to collapse in a void of shitty software design practices. Don't use NMM. It used to just crash a bit, but it's gotten far, far worse, over the last 1-1.5 years, it appears.

Why did most of my directories above those I gave NMM (it was chewing up too much space on my SSD) disappear as it was loading (I noticed music stopping, and...)? Not cool. And, guys, this is why RAID is not a backup. Sadly, this means I lost my Skyrim backups, so I have to re-download a base install. >99% of files went *poof*, with not a single hardware error.

I've been having other minor issues with it, too, but that's the big FU. So, time to move to Wrye Bash + MO, despite the annoying directory virtualization of MO (if only Wrye Bash could do FOMODs natively...).

 

[norseamd]

Lots of mods I am not able to load in Mod Organizer because they do not have some type of title or some other crap. Do you know how I can deal with this and get these mods working?

 

[Cerb]

That's part of what I don't like about it. I wish it had an option to build a Data folder overlay based on current selections (it would take, what, 5-10 min?). AFAIK, you have to manually install SKSE and many added plugins and settings files using it, if they aren't packed in ESM/ESP/BSA (IE, like SkyUI is). I'm still trying to see about skyprocers.

 

[Anomaly1964]

I'm the OP, kind of scared to start it now...

LOL!

 

[Cerb]

Hah. Don't fret. Just get the unofficial patches, SKSE, and SkyUI, then apply others a bit at a time, based on experience w/ vanilla+SkyUI. Stick mostly to mods with high endorsement counts, as it concerns Nexus-hosted ones, and check any STEP or GEMS info. It can get complicated as you need to get many mods working together. I'm trying to get >300 mods, and am very near the 255 plugin limit (there's a reason I left my prior mod setup alone for close to a year and a half!). A lot of it is that you can do that, with only the most minor compatibility issues. But, start with the basics, play some vanilla (or better yet, SkyUI-enhanced vanilla), read the docs as you go, and it'll all be fine. If you like the stock game, "but, <insert issue here>," chances are there's a mod or ten for that, and half of them will be compatible with other mods you may add later .

 

[zinfamous]

Hah. Don't fret. Just get the unofficial patches, SKSE, and SkyUI, then apply others a bit at a time, based on experience w/ vanilla+SkyUI.

this. seriously. just do that and ignore everything else for now.

 

[futurefields]

I'm the OP, kind of scared to start it now...

LOL!

Bro just play the game without mods for your first run through. People act like the game is broken/unplayeable etc etc.. but what you are essentially playing is the same game people played on Xbox 360 and last time I checked that game has a 96 on metacritic... just hook up the gamepad and let 'er rip.

 

[norseamd]

Just get the unofficial patches, SKSE, and SkyUI

This.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Bro just play the game without mods for your first run through. People act like the game is broken/unplayeable etc etc.. but what you are essentially playing is the same game people played on Xbox 360 and last time I checked that game has a 96 on metacritic... just hook up the gamepad and let 'er rip.

For once he actually has a point. You don't 'have' to mod. It's just something to do if you so choose.

 

[Cerb]

Bro just play the game without mods for your first run through.

Or, just play some vanilla. I still haven't played through the game, yet, so that would be many hours unmodded (it took me around 800 logged hours to do so in Fallout 3 (probably >1200, since that's save game time, with no Steam client to give wall time), and I still have not done so w/ Morrowind or Oblivion).

* While smaller in actual space, I never was able to fully explore Morrowind before getting bored again, after hundreds of hours. The Dwemer ruins in Morrowind, and a few family tombs, even w/ no mods, though, were creepier than anything in a non-horror game, and are totally worth going back and playing it for.

 

[tidy]

.

 

[Blue_Max]

As the title says, JUST got Skyrim off STEAM. I keep hearing about mods...

Which ones are a MUST have and how do I apply them?

Thanks!

Very first off, might as well get the Skyrim HD option right off of Steam directly - by far the easiest step up!

...and no gamepads. That's just silly. This isn't the kind of game that benefits from it.

 

[Stringjam]

If there is one essential mod I won't play it without, it's "Wearable Lanterns."

Great if you like to crawl around dark places with a bow.

 

[tidy]

.

 

[WT]

Picked up Skyrim last week and was thoroughly enjoying it .. until .. that damned MAZE !! Shalidor's Maze is one of those things that drives me NUTS !! I watched a few vids, even tried cheating and adding the Staff of Magnus to my inventory, but I can't complete it nor advance the storyline. Ohh how I hate stupid puzzles built into these games.

Now I am remembering why I gave up on Oblivion so many years ago. I have two of the four sigils dealt with, its the third one I can't seem to find.

Hate it .... and I found that I hate vampires too !! Stupid bloodsuckers ...

 

[norseamd]

Actually in what I have done so far in Skyrim I wish that there was more Zelda-like gameplay with puzzles and crap.

 

[zinfamous]

Handicapping yourself with a gamepad is thoroughly unnecessary. It's a first person game, and it doesn't even have any mandatory mouse acceleration. Tooling around with a gamepad in Skyrim is just stupidity.

3rd person game for me, but yeah: wtf would anyone play this with a gamepad?

 

[WT]

Shalidors Maze completed !!! I really did a poor job of analyzing and reading the walkthroughs for this, and in fact it was easier than I thought once I focused on the task at hand. Just finished the Staff of Magnus quest last night - that dungeon crawl took me 3+ hours from start to finish.

I have to say that I was getting used to the interface and then went and added SkyUI to it, and now I had to relearn yet another interface, altho SkyUI is obviously better organized in its layout.

I'm not sure why I passed on Skyrim when it came out - I assume I was hopelessly obsessed with TF2 at the time, but I needed a break from my CoH2 obsession, and Skyrim is turning out to be an excellent choice to use up any extra free time. There is so much to do that I can see how people put 400+ hours into this game.

 

[Nebor]

I'm not sure why I passed on Skyrim when it came out - I assume I was hopelessly obsessed with TF2 at the time, but I needed a break from my CoH2 obsession, and Skyrim is turning out to be an excellent choice to use up any extra free time. There is so much to do that I can see how people put 400+ hours into this game.

I preordered it, played for 30 minutes and gave it up for at least a year. Came back after all the rave reviews, played for a few hours and quit again. Spent 4 hours doing the STEP mod, played for about 20 hours and quit again. It just doesn't grab me for whatever reason.

 

[spacelord]

The essential mods for me were..
SkyrimUI - It made the interface much more enjoyable on a PC.
10X Your Carry Weight - I spend less time juggling all the crap and weapons I pick up... this way I can just horde it and sell it when I get a chance or feel like it. I guess I'm not into the realism thing.. and can spend more time just enjoying the game, instead of leaving behind a cool weapon or other thing.

 

[ronbo613]

I'm the OP, kind of scared to start it now...

LOL!

I know the feeling. I just got Skyrim and like to tinker with stuff so I'm going to try the SkyUI mod and SKSE. I guess the unofficial patches as well and maybe the HD textures?