mod selction for skyrim

[norseamd]

is there some way i can upload pictures to anandtech? then i can show you a picture of my nexus mod manager mod setup

 

[blastingcap]

I used the STEP Mod.

It took several hours to download and install everything. Then I played the game for a couple days without realizing I had to enable to mods in the mod manager. Whoops.

Honestly the time I sunk into installing the mods is the only reason I'm still playing. I find the game to be insufferably boring and aimless. I pre-ordered the game, and tried to play it on 3 separate occasions but gave up due to boredom. I'm just now at 18 total hours, like I said, due to some bad sunk cost logic from the mod installation. I try to force myself to play an hour a day or so. I'm a pure mage, and I get wrecked by pretty much everything all the time.

I started off as an archer/mage and had a tough time at first, but it got really easy really fast. My advice is to use short bursts of Flames with both hands (like .000000001 second long bursts of Flames, one right after the other like a machine gun) and don't be afraid to use healing potions and hire a follower to take damage for you. Do NOT use flames/frost/sparks continuously as that does less damage. Short bursts means you get bonus damage each time you hit with a burst (if they are on fire already, hit them with fire, does more damage).

The real turning point with Mage is if you get a decent Conjuration spell (keep summoning them ahead of any battle, let your magicka regenerate for a few seconds outside of combat since magicka regen is so much faster outside of combat, then move in for the kill) or dual-handed Impact with second-level destruction spells. In fact, the game is pretty much broken, it's so easy, once you get dual-handed Impact with lightning bolt, ice spike, or fire bolt as you stagger ANYTHING each time you hit. Just wear as much magicka boosting/regenerating stuff as you can and put points into magicka and have your followers/conjured stuff take damage for you.

 

[Cerb]

is there some way i can upload pictures to anandtech? then i can show you a picture of my nexus mod manager mod setup

No, but you can link to upload sites, of which imgur is a good one, IMO.

 

[norseamd]

No, but you can link to upload sites, of which imgur is a good one, IMO.

not using a image hosting site right now. sucks that to post an image you have to have it at an url already. with the way i worded that i thought somebody might not get what i meant.

 

[norseamd]

I started off as an archer/mage and had a tough time at first, but it got really easy really fast. My advice is to use short bursts of Flames with both hands (like .000000001 second long bursts of Flames, one right after the other like a machine gun) and don't be afraid to use healing potions and hire a follower to take damage for you. Do NOT use flames/frost/sparks continuously as that does less damage. Short bursts means you get bonus damage each time you hit with a burst (if they are on fire already, hit them with fire, does more damage). The real turning point with Mage is if you get a decent Conjuration spell (keep summoning them ahead of any battle, let your magicka regenerate for a few seconds outside of combat since magicka regen is so much faster outside of combat, then move in for the kill) or dual-handed Impact with second-level destruction spells. In fact, the game is pretty much broken, it's so easy, once you get dual-handed Impact with lightning bolt, ice spike, or fire bolt as you stagger ANYTHING each time you hit. Just wear as much magicka boosting/regenerating stuff as you can and put points into magicka and have your followers/conjured stuff take damage for you.

not sure how the step mod plays. requiem is fairly hard. getting out of helgen is a real pain. all it takes is 2 or 3 hits and you are dead. archers will one shot kill you. of course this is because imperial soldiers have decent equipment. once you get to riverwood the game changes a bit but not completely. some bandits have hide armor and a single weapon and no shield. these are easily dealt with especially since they will run if they feel like it. bows are incredably powerful in this game if you can hit what you aim at. but other bandits still have the heavy armor and full weapons and shields. have not attacked them yet. several mudcrabs and some wolves brought me down to low health twice. had to use several healing potions. also you can not craft at the forge or make potions at first. and to learn how to craft at the forge you also need a book. which costs money. several hundred gold in fact. the merchant system in this is harder also. a ring that enchants your spell skill is cheaper than vanilla. but some things like books and soul gems are really expensive. also you start with no spells. with frostfall and rnd installed it is a lot different than vanilla.

 

[DominionSeraph]

any good dragon mods?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8IKykVvNUs

 

[norseamd]

thankyou for showing me that video. that video was better than another tes5edit video i found in the tes5edit guide.

was playing and gerdur was sleeping off to the side of the bed. it seems the 3d space she was using was shifted to the right from the actual bed. was planning on running the tes5edit in the next day or two but i decided to do it now. downloaded the file. ran it. at first i did not know what to do and loaded all the files. i filtered the update esm with all my other load files loaded into tes5edit. but because of all the info and colors i decided not to do anything. after watching your video everything made much more sense. i did the edits for every official file that boss said to do.

these were

update.esm
dawnguard.esm
hearthfires.esm
dragonborn.esm

however when starting the game again the game loaded and the sound played. but there was a black screen. i reloaded the official files by checking the integrity of the game cache on steam. but the problem still did not go away. not sure what to do now. might try unloading the mods from nexus mod manager before trying to uninstall skyrim and then reinstall it. hopefully i will not have to do that.

 

[blastingcap]

not sure how the step mod plays. requiem is fairly hard. getting out of helgen is a real pain. all it takes is 2 or 3 hits and you are dead. archers will one shot kill you. of course this is because imperial soldiers have decent equipment. once you get to riverwood the game changes a bit but not completely. some bandits have hide armor and a single weapon and no shield. these are easily dealt with especially since they will run if they feel like it. bows are incredably powerful in this game if you can hit what you aim at. but other bandits still have the heavy armor and full weapons and shields. have not attacked them yet. several mudcrabs and some wolves brought me down to low health twice. had to use several healing potions. also you can not craft at the forge or make potions at first. and to learn how to craft at the forge you also need a book. which costs money. several hundred gold in fact. the merchant system in this is harder also. a ring that enchants your spell skill is cheaper than vanilla. but some things like books and soul gems are really expensive. also you start with no spells. with frostfall and rnd installed it is a lot different than vanilla.

Sounds like a bad mod imho. If I'm going to go through that kind of pain it's gonna be for a multiplayer pain where I am crossing swords (or whatever) with real humans, not some sadistic mod on a 1-player game.

 

[norseamd]

so about 2 minutes after i made my last comment i loaded up nexus mod manager and was about to start uninstalling mods. but just see what boss thought of any mod files i decided to run boss. boss did not recognize skyrim. had a 2 second mental flip inside. within 5 seconds i decided to uninstall skyrim and then reinstall it. has now completed.

should i run tes5edit before installing mods or should i skip it.

also i unsubscribed to the two remaining mods from the steam workshop.

is there a way to reinstall skyrim without having to download it again

 

[Cerb]

is there a way to reinstall skyrim without having to download it again

Not sure. The DLCs and official HD texture pack are just loose non-DRMed files, though, so if you haven't removed the local stuff, yet, you can back up those ESPs and BSAs, and save at least some time.

 

[norseamd]

where at?

another thing is that i was wondering if the fact that i did not go into the steamapps folder and delete the skyrim after uninstalling it might mean that files would still be there and that it might matter. after going into the skyrim folder all the mod files are still there.

what should i do?

 

[Cerb]

Steam\Steamapps\common\Skrim\Data

 

[norseamd]

should i back up the whole folder. when i went in there that was where all the mod files were. there are some files in a tes5edit back up folder

 

[runzwithsizorz]

should i run tes5edit before installing mods or should i skip it.

1. Trs5edit should be placed in your Skyrim data folder
2. Run it as Gopher's video says to clean up stuff in Skyrim and DLC's

Unfortunately, I am not that familiar with Steam reinstalll...maybe someone else can help there. The only game I ever installed directly from Steam was Skyrim (ironically) and I have not had to mess around with re-installing. However, I am installing mods with Nexus AND Gopher's videos for everything.

The Wife

 

[Cerb]

Then I guess all of the original game was remvoed, if there's no Skyrim - ***.bsa, Dawnguard.esm and .bsa, Hearthfires.esm and .bsa, etc.. On my initial backup copy, FI, using dir /B *.esm *.bsa yields:

Dawnguard.esm
Dragonborn.esm
HearthFires.esm
Skyrim.esm
Update.esm
Dawnguard.bsa
Dragonborn.bsa
HearthFires.bsa
HighResTexturePack01.bsa
HighResTexturePack02.bsa
HighResTexturePack03.bsa
Skyrim - Animations.bsa
Skyrim - Interface.bsa
Skyrim - Meshes.bsa
Skyrim - Misc.bsa
Skyrim - Shaders.bsa
Skyrim - Sounds.bsa
Skyrim - Textures.bsa
Skyrim - Voices.bsa
Skyrim - VoicesExtra.bsa
Update.bsa

 

[norseamd]

have all those files in both their bsa and esp formats. you have all files except the high res texture esa files. the skyrim bsa were the only files that were not noticable official files or mod files so i was thinking about backing those up with the other official files. there is no skyrim bsa file

 

[norseamd]

so this is interesting. boss still will not recognize my skyrim installation. but nexus does and all the mods are installed and probably in the same installation order that boss put them in. the game now loads again as well. not sure what i am going to do for now. might play for a while and then clean this mess up.

 

[Cerb]

They're ESPs, not ESMs, it looks like. I've got a Skyrim - Animations, Interface, Meshes, Misc, Shaders, Sounds, Textures, Voices, and VoicesExtra as BSAs.

 

[runzwithsizorz]

I'm glad your game is working. Hopefully without stutters. Modding is fun, but there is absolutely a learning curve.

 

[runzwithsizorz]

boss still will not recognize my skyrim installation.

Make sure you have checked "Run as administrator" in game, boss, nexus et al. Windows 7 security idiocy requires this.

 

[norseamd]

how do you refill bottles with water in frostfall

 

[Cerb]

I'm pretty sure that's Realistic Needs and Diseases. I'm not 100% sure how, because I still haven't crafted a waterskin, and have managed to get by drinking natural running water only, and alcoholic drinks, so far. Snow has been much more of a problem for me than thirst and hunger. Allegedly, you should be able to click the water bottle in your inventory, when wading in rivers, though.

 

[norseamd]

probably rnd. how do you drink natural running water. have empty alcohol bottles that say stand in water to refill but they do not refill whether you just stand in water or click the empty bottle to do so.

 

[norseamd]

http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/819532-realistic-needs-and-diseases/page-195

maybe right here

 

[crownjules]

A couple of things to note that I don't think have been mentioned yet:

1) Don't uninstall mods and continue to play a save game that was using them. The saves will continue to reference changes those mods make which will inevitably lead to the game crashing. This generally doesn't apply to simple texture/mesh mods.

2) Try to minimize the amount of mods with scripts that run in the background. Things like Frostfall, RN&Ds, Requiem, SkyRe, Immersive Creatures, etc are constantly running checks on the game state as you play. This leads to greater instability in the game which can mean crashes.