The OFFICIAL Anandtech Forums TeS V: Skyrim Thread

[Qbah]

Never noticed those before... Thought it was worth capturing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3IYVssaW4s

That is awesome! It's small things like that which make you appreciate a game even more

Btw. could you list your mods? Those textures look so epic!! Makes me want to drop whatever I'm playing right now (Borderlands2!!) and come back to Skyrim once again... Which I probably will, after I up the IQ Got a new GTX670 graphics card - Ambient Occulsion is so awesome in Skyrim And the game runs now beautifully...

 

[dennilfloss]

Just the Skyrim HD 4096x4096 textures loaded after the two Bethesda HighRes packs. And Better Dynamic Snow.

More examples:

 

[dust]

Just the Skyrim HD 4096x4096 textures loaded after the two Bethesda HighRes packs. And Better Dynamic Snow.
snip..

Just the reason I needed to start another one. Thank you!

 

[Qbah]

Just the Skyrim HD 4096x4096 textures loaded after the two Bethesda HighRes packs. And Better Dynamic Snow.

More examples:

<awesome screenshots>

Thanks a lot!! Just imagine if there was tessellation there... Game would blow my mind then!

 

[you2]

I'm confused; how do you get these textures ? are they auto loaded via steam or do you have to do something manually to tell the game to use them...

Just the Skyrim HD 4096x4096 textures loaded after the two Bethesda HighRes packs. And Better Dynamic Snow.

More examples:

 

[Atomic Playboy]

I'm confused; how do you get these textures ? are they auto loaded via steam or do you have to do something manually to tell the game to use them...

You have to download additional texture packs separately. In Dennil's case, it's the Skyrim HD textures which you can find here (free registration required). Downloading a mod organizer is hugely helpful as it will install everything to the proper place for you automatically: this one is generally preferred since it links to the Skyrim Nexus and lets you know when mods are updated.

I'd also recommend WATER, which replaces all the water in the game with a much nicer water shader. If you start getting into it, you'll find that there are mods that replace basically everything in the game, allowing you to turn it into a fully customizeable experience. It seems the Skyrim Nexus is down at the moment, so I can't find the links to some other great mods, but you should look into SkyUI as well.

Personally, I don't like the look of Skyrim HD; some of the textures look good, but a lot of them change the feel from Vanilla and I find that other texture packs do things better. Someone went through and took the three major high resolution texture packs for Skyrim, along with 40 or so additional packs, compiled the best textures from each and made a batch file/guide for getting them all installed. It's called the Skyrim Texture Pack Combiner, and if you go through the steps to get it all downloaded and installed, it is jaw-droppingly awesome, containing the best elements of all the major texture replacement options that have come out. I can't recommend it enough. It takes a bit of time to set it all up, but it's absolutely worth it.

 

[Rhezuss]

Is this the same HD stuff that Bethesda officially released a while back?

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Is this the same HD stuff that Bethesda officially released a while back?

No, these are community made mods which are generally superior to Bethesda's high res textures. Bethesda's are fine, don't get me wrong, but they just aren't as high resolution, and the fan made ones have been continually updated and improved for the last 11 months since the game came out. Bethesda's HD packs also had a multitude of errors which have been fixed through community mods (such as bright white logs in firepits or missing textures on chopping blocks).

 

[Rhezuss]

No, these are community made mods which are generally superior to Bethesda's high res textures. Bethesda's are fine, don't get me wrong, but they just aren't as high resolution, and the fan made ones have been continually updated and improved for the last 11 months since the game came out. Bethesda's HD packs also had a multitude of errors which have been fixed through community mods (such as bright white logs in firepits or missing textures on chopping blocks).

So the best would be to disable the Beth High Res texture pack and get this HD mod?
Also i'll take a look at the Skyrim Texture Pack Combiner tonight...

Might as well unsubscribe to all the mods I have in Steam Workshop since they're all for better textures and effects and get this one instead.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

So the best would be to disable the Beth High Res texture pack and get this HD mod?
Also i'll take a look at the Skyrim Texture Pack Combiner tonight...

Might as well unsubscribe to all the mods I have in Steam Workshop since they're all for better textures and effects and get this one instead.

Your best bet is to keep the Bethesda High-res texture pack, but just overwrite the various textures you want to replace. The Texture Pack Combiner is all environmental stuff; no weapons, clothing, armor or people. To that end, the Bethesda pack will cover some stuff that isn't in the TPC. You can get additional mods to replace literally everything, but keeping the Bethesda pack installed will make sure there's no situation where you have low-res vanilla textures for anything.

 

[Rhezuss]

Yeah really nice mods that effed my game.

Skyrim can't launch now...

EDIT: Managed to make it work but I have all sorts of texture pop ins and corruption now...

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Yeah really nice mods that effed my game.

Skyrim can't launch now...

EDIT: Managed to make it work but I have all sorts of texture pop ins and corruption now...

If you're making a lot of changes to texture mods, you should start from a clean install to avoid any conflicts from mods you got rid of. You also may need to change how the Bethesda high-res pack textures are loaded. Here's how Xenius describes it from the XCE texture mod:

1. Disable the two .esp files HighResTexturePack01.esp and HighResTexturePack02.esp
2. Go to the Documents\My Games\Skyrim folder and open Skyrim.ini
3. Find the [Archive] section in the .ini file
4. Add the following two entries: HighResTexturePack01.bsa, HighResTexturePack02.bsa
5. Your .ini should look like this
6. Now you should be able to use texture replacements as usual

Also, like I mentioned earler, get a mod manager like Nexus Mod Manager to install everything for you. If something is causing corruption, you can easily disable and delete it without having to manually track down all the various files it changed, or simply change the load order of ESP files so that they don't interfere with each other. Start with a clean install (uninstall through Steam, delete the Skyrim folder, redownload through Steam along with the high res texture packs), then install Nexus Mod Manager and use it to install every mod you use.

I can post a more detailed walkthrough later if you're having issues or people want it.

 

[Rhezuss]

If you're making a lot of changes to texture mods, you should start from a clean install to avoid any conflicts from mods you got rid of. You also may need to change how the Bethesda high-res pack textures are loaded. Here's how Xenius describes it from the XCE texture mod:

1. Disable the two .esp files HighResTexturePack01.esp and HighResTexturePack02.esp
2. Go to the Documents\My Games\Skyrim folder and open Skyrim.ini
3. Find the [Archive] section in the .ini file
4. Add the following two entries: HighResTexturePack01.bsa, HighResTexturePack02.bsa
5. Your .ini should look like this
6. Now you should be able to use texture replacements as usual

Also, like I mentioned earler, get a mod manager like Nexus Mod Manager to install everything for you. If something is causing corruption, you can easily disable and delete it without having to manually track down all the various files it changed, or simply change the load order of ESP files so that they don't interfere with each other. Start with a clean install (uninstall through Steam, delete the Skyrim folder, redownload through Steam along with the high res texture packs), then install Nexus Mod Manager and use it to install every mod you use.

I can post a more detailed walkthrough later if you're having issues or people want it.

Atomic Playboy, thanks a lot for taking the time to post this and help me and surely others, appreciate it a lot.

I just did a clean install and gonna load my game to see if there's any corruption. If not i'll install the other mods.

The problem I have with NMM is it will install everything in the folder you asked it to install the mods. If I take all the mods recommended in the Skyrim Texture Pack Combiner, they all need to be installed in a proper directory...not really convenient.

And NMM doesn't show any mods I install through it, be it HD2K, SHD or SRO...nothing is showing in my data files neither through NMM or the Skyrim launcher...only minor mods like Lush trees/grass, W.A.T.E.R. and the like are showing...

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Atomic Playboy, thanks a lot for taking the time to post this and help me and surely others, appreciate it a lot.

I just did a clean install and gonna load my game to see if there's any corruption. If not i'll install the other mods.

The problem I have with NMM is it will install everything in the folder you asked it to install the mods. If I take all the mods recommended in the Skyrim Texture Pack Combiner, they all need to be installed in a proper directory...not really convenient.

And NMM doesn't show any mods I install through it, be it HD2K, SHD or SRO...nothing is showing in my data files neither through NMM or the Skyrim launcher...only minor mods like Lush trees/grass, W.A.T.E.R. and the like are showing...

NMM will show any mod that you specifically install with NMM. If you install it manually, NMM won't see it outside of ESP files (which are loaded after the game files). So if you use NMM to install your texture packs, you will see them in NMM and have the option to disable them.

As far as Texture Pack Combiner goes, after you run the batch file, you can take the final folder and compress it to a zip file, then install it with NMM under whatever name you want (I called it Texture Pack Combiner so as not to complicate things). It still puts all the textures in the right place, but if I have an issue, I can use NMM to disable or delete the pack without having to manually track down everything.

-EDIT- Here's what my NMM looks like:

A lot of those are texture mods, but because I specifically chose to install them with NMM, they show up and I can disable them as necessary.

 

[Rhezuss]

Damn who would have thought that adding Mods would be that annoying

I'm gonna try the TPC right about now and hope for the best...

 

[dennilfloss]

It's not annoying for me. I keep it simple and install textures manually. I already had the Bethesda HQ packs installed through Workshop. I just downloaded the Skyrim HD files from Nexus and extracted them to a folder. Then copied the Skyrim HD data folder to my Steam Skyrim folder and said yes when asked if I wanted to merge them. Then said to replace the files in the conflict window that pops up. The Skyrim HD files simply overwrote Bethesda's and Skyrim HD doesn't even show in my mod list when I start Skyrim.

 

[Rhezuss]

Ok, I just finished installing the many recommended mods I found here using Nexus Mod Manager and Texture PAck Combiner: HD2K, SHD, SRO and many optionals like Better Dynamic Snow, Enhanced Distant Terrain, HQ Milky Way Galaxy, Lush Grass, Ruins Clutter Improvement, SMIM and W.A.T.E.R. ... and apart from the texture popping I had in the intro gameplay the game is looking freaking gorgeous!

I'm using the official HD texture pack too and didn't installed the optimized one.

Even vanilla I had some texture corruption and popping in the intro part, starting exactly when you get out of the cart until you get out of the cavern after killing the bear. Vanilla and modded the game reacts the same.

I'll wait and see in the other indoor dungeons and environment before comcluding it's only the starter area and if it is i'll be a damn happy gamer.

Thanks all for sharing those infos and tips about modding Skyrim, the game is really beautiful now!

Any more mods you would recommend?

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Any more mods you would recommend?

I'll try and put together a list later this week (don't have time right now). Any of the mods that are in my Nexus Mod Manager screenshot are ones that I'd recommend; all of them are available through Skyrim Nexus (just search for them by name). Other than that, the single biggest difference you'll get in terms of graphics is by using an ENB config. It's a standalone DirectX9 injector that introduces a lot of new features that aren't available in Vanilla Skyrim (depth of field, improved shadow rendering, screen space ambient occlusion, different lighting effects, God rays, fxaa injectors, sharpening, different color palettes, etc.). I personally use the ForceWithin ENB config. I find it the most balanced while also giving a nice improvement in visual fidelity. But it comes at a cost; you'll give up 50% performance or more depending on your rig. There are boatloads of ENB configs out there, so you can find one that suits your style.

 

[dennilfloss]

Rhezuss why HD2k instead of 4k? Your 2GB 6950 should be able to handle the 4k textures.

 

[dennilfloss]

Not too keen on ENB mods as I have bad eyes and need my depth of field to see monsters coming from afar, but I'll give Dragon Warrior a try as it apparently acts like a spell so you can implement changes while in game. I may just want to increase the saturation, although their preset for sky looks awesome if I judge from the pics.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/8707

 

[dennilfloss]

OK, that Dragon Warrior mod works nicely and easily. The spell is in your illusion spells. Just cast it and you get the menu. You have presets for day, dawn, dusk, night, interior and you can edit/disable/enable each and see immediately what it does. I just used this mod to increase saturation, but I set the depth of field change to zero in each preset. Looks like the settings are carried over when you exit the game and start a new one.

You can also disable the mod's effect from that menu to revert to the vanilla look at any time. This one's a keeper for me.

 

[Rhezuss]

Rhezuss why HD2k instead of 4k? Your 2GB 6950 should be able to handle the 4k textures.

Oops that my bad, didn't search that much and took the ones linked in the Nexus Compiler.
I'll go get the 4K ASAP!

EDIT: Don't see any 4K in the Nexus...FYI I installed the Full 1.5 mods, not the Lite ones. It's still called Skyrim HD - 2K Textures...

 

[dennilfloss]

OK. It's called 2k but some of the textures are now 4k. The Full is what I have. You're OK. I also had some 4kx4k real rock textures installed before but they were not really nice-looking (although the geologist I am kept stopping to examine the rocks ).

Gonna enable Dragon Warrior only when I want to take screenshots with various effects as I like the vanilla look anyway. Also when I go from looking at the sun to a shadow, the ocular effect makes it wayyyy darker for a couple of seconds, like real-life eye response and I don't like this when there be monsters lurking. Conversely, when I go from shade to sunshine, I am momentarily blinded. Realistic, yes, but not fun for my taste.

 

[Rhezuss]

OK. It's called 2k but some of the textures are now 4k. The Full is what I have. You're OK. I also had some 4kx4k real rock textures installed before but they were not really nice-looking (although the geologist I am kept stopping to examine the rocks ).

Gonna enable Dragon Warrior only when I want to take screenshots with various effects as I like the vanilla look anyway. Also when I go from looking at the sun to a shadow, the ocular effect makes it wayyyy darker for a couple of seconds, like real-life eye response and I don't like this when there be monsters lurking. Conversely, when I go from shade to sunshine, I am momentarily blinded. Realistic, yes, but not fun for my taste.

Ok i'm relieved now hehehe!
I'm gonna add some other mods I loved that got deleted when I did a fresh install yesterday like Realistic Lighting and other stuff like that. Make dungeons and night darker but daytime, sunglares and general lighting look so much better than the bland vanilla effects.

 

[Face2Face]

Check out my collection if you use steam. If you have Dawnguard you can subscribe to all of them. Great for graphics and game play without ruining the Skyrim experience.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=100426030