The OFFICIAL Anandtech Forums TeS V: Skyrim Thread

[Atomic Playboy]

What area of the game do you notice the biggest change - or the best looking area or textures? Could you post a screen shot if you have the time?

If you use all the optional mods as well, TPC changes virtually everything, and it's all an improvement over Vanilla. But in my mind, the biggest changes are to the ground and the tree trunks. After I got everything installed, I got my ass killed by a dragon because I was staring at the ground marveling at the texture detail. I've got a few shots up right now which show off some texture detail, I have a ton more which I haven't uploaded yet. But here's a taste:

 

[Rhezuss]

Ok, here's some screenshots I took quickly a few minutes ago.
FYI, here's my settings and mods installed:

SETTINGS: 1920x1080, Ultra settings, 2xAA, 16xAF, FXAA enabled.
PLUGINS: Dawnguard, Official High Res Texture DLC, W.A.T.E.R., Realistic Lighting with Customization (VISION setting), Torches for Realistic Lighting, Glorious Grass.
MODS: Texture PAck Combiner (HD2K, SRO and SHD + Optional Better Dynamic Snow, Enhanced Distant Terrain, HQ Milky Way Galaxy 4K, Lush Grass, Ruins Clutter Improvement, SMIM, Vurts Flora Overhaul)

Here are the screenshots (interior and exterior):

And now, those annoying pebbles...

I'll try disabling Glorious Grasses to see if they disappear and how much less awesome the grass will look. If the trade off is acceptable sadly i'm gonna ditch GG...

EDIT: You were right Atomic, it was Glorious Grasses...but I think i'll leave it on, grass look so much better with it.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

I don't seem to remember having that many scattered rock piles with Glorious Grasses; that's definitely distracting. Is that up at Bleak Falls Barrow?

 

[QuantumPion]

So Dawnguard is on sale today for 30% off...is it worth it at $14?

 

[Rhezuss]

I don't seem to remember having that many scattered rock piles with Glorious Grasses; that's definitely distracting. Is that up at Bleak Falls Barrow?

Yep it is and with the setting sun they are all pinky like this...

 

[Face2Face]

So Dawnguard is on sale today for 30% off...is it worth it at $14?

You bet your ass it is. Go buy it!!

 

[Face2Face]

Wow! Guys those screen shots looks incredible. Pretty sure with my Steam installed mods it doesn't look this good.

What is this setting all about? Realistic Lighting with Customization (VISION setting)

The first screen shot of your character in Riverwood looks amazing..

Playboy, the tree trunks do look incredible. It almost looks like you are running an ENB? Can you list your mods as well. This is convincing me to ditch the steam mods

 

[Face2Face]

Is it just me or is this game the best you ever played? I purchased Oblivion and played it for awhile, but I could never really get into it. Skyrim is a different animal. In my game I already have 150 hrs of play time and I still enjoying playing every minute of it and can't wait to play it more. I don't play everyday, I may go a couple weeks without playing because of my busy schedule. Maybe that helps it last longer? Anyway - some of my friends give me weird looks when I tell them it's my favorite video game.... I am not crazy right?

 

[lkailburn]

Playboy - the shot of the water channel running through the stone work looks amazing! so many tiny details! can't wait for my new card to show up

-Luke

 

[Face2Face]

Playboy - the shot of the water channel running through the stone work looks amazing! so many tiny details! can't wait for my new card to show up

-Luke

You are getting the 7870 right? The 2GB of ram should help you quite a bit. I had a 7850 and noticed a big difference coming from a 6870 1GB card. Even now with my steam mods, and I play at 1080 8XAA and 16AF ultra I get memory usage it upwards of 1800-1900 MB's.

 

[lkailburn]

You are getting the 7870 right? The 2GB of ram should help you quite a bit. I had a 7850 and noticed a big difference coming from a 6870 1GB card. Even now with my steam mods, and I play at 1080 8XAA and 16AF ultra I get memory usage it upwards of 1800-1900 MB's.

Yep! the HIS IceQ that was in the hot deals section. I'm not a hardcore gamer so the rest of my system is still a bit dated. Hopefully it's all good enough to see full(or close) potential of the new card.

-Luke

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Playboy, the tree trunks do look incredible. It almost looks like you are running an ENB? Can you list your mods as well. This is convincing me to ditch the steam mods

I am indeed using an ENB. Those shots are all taken running the ForceWithin ENB Config. I'm thinking of upgrading to a 0.119 ENB config, but I haven't had time to bother with trying to port one over from 0.117, when a few good ones came out (like Opethfeldt which I'm keen to try thanks to screenshots like these by Unreal). I'll post a list of mods I use later on today; there are quite a few, although thanks to TPC, a lot of them are now covered by following the instructions on the Texture Pack Combiner.

 

[Face2Face]

I am indeed using an ENB. Those shots are all taken running the ForceWithin ENB Config. I'm thinking of upgrading to a 0.119 ENB config, but I haven't had time to bother with trying to port one over from 0.117, when a few good ones came out (like Opethfeldt which I'm keen to try thanks to screenshots like these by Unreal). I'll post a list of mods I use later on today; there are quite a few, although thanks to TPC, a lot of them are now covered by following the instructions on the Texture Pack Combiner.

No need to list all of your mods - You said this a page back.

It really improves the landscape textures throughout the entire world. I went ahead and did every optional mod as well (except for the Milky Way Galaxy, Lush Trees, Lush Grass or the Parallax mods),

Why didn't you use Lush Trees? I know why you didn't use lush grass, but any reason for no tree hugging?

 

[lkailburn]

Hey when you guys say to install the TPC on a clean install of skyrim, are you also talking about starting a brand new game rather than carrying over a save?

-Luke

 

[Rhezuss]

Hey when you guys say to install the TPC on a clean install of skyrim, are you also talking about starting a brand new game rather than carrying over a save?

-Luke

It's more about deleting Skyrim and reinstalling it. It's to make sure no traces of old mods that could cause conflicts and bugs are still there.

I think you could continue a previous game though...

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Hey when you guys say to install the TPC on a clean install of skyrim, are you also talking about starting a brand new game rather than carrying over a save?

-Luke

You can continue a previous game. TPC is only textures, with some minor esp files included if you use some of the optional mods. The biggest issue you'll have when attempting to load old saves is if they are expecting esp mods to be active that you no longer have installed (things that alter gameplay functions, houses, followers, npcs, perks, skill trees, events, all that sort of stuff, not textures), or if you change your uGrid settings (the game has trouble loading a save file that has a different ugridstoload peramater set; you need to follow a process to clear out the world cells loaded in order to proceed). Now, granted, it is certainly easier to simply start a new game after a fresh install so you don't have to worry about whether you'll have incompatibilities with new mods, but TPC shouldn't affect any of that stuff.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Why didn't you use Lush Trees? I know why you didn't use lush grass, but any reason for no tree hugging?

Honestly, I'm starting to question that decision. It seemed to me that it made trees too "full" looking and I was concerned that additional branches would push my VRAM past the playable limit (I'm already at a point where fast traveling between several locations with different foliage will cause slowdowns to the point I need to save and restart). But I think I'll give it a try and see what I think about it. The more I see it, the more I think I'd like it.

 

[Face2Face]

All of my mods are showing up as plugins when I installed the manager. These are the mods I installed through Steam. Do I need to delete these?

 

[murphy55d]

For those of you who play with a companion...who do you like to use? I just bought Dawnguard after forgetting about Skyrim for awhile, started a new character. Plan on making him mostly a two handed weapon guy, with some ability in archery. Who would compliment him? Right now just have Lydia, who do you guys like?

 

[Atomic Playboy]

All of my mods are showing up as plugins when I installed the manager. These are the mods I installed through Steam. Do I need to delete these?

Ideally, yes. When it comes to texture mods, it's usually preferable to download the loose files versions and use a mod installer to install them. This way, if you want to install a large texture pack, but overwrite a couple of the textures or meshes with a different pack, you have that ability. With esp files, you load every texture from a texture pack, and then any textures loaded later automatically overwrite everything from the earlier mod. It looks like things on the Workshop are all coming through as ESPs, which are easier to manage, but since a mod manager like NMM does all the work for you already, it actually ends up making it more inconvenient for you.

I'd recommend deleting the ESPs of texture packs and getting the individual packs as "loose files" versions on Skyrim Nexus. You'll find that a number of them are actually used in TPC (like Better Dynamic Snow, SMIM, Lush Trees, Lush Grass, Better Embers, HD Plants and Herbs, etc.), and it's better to install them all that way so they don't keep trying to overwrite one another. I'd also go as far as to say that if a mod is available on both Skyrim Nexus and the Workshop, get the Skyrim Nexus version, since NMM will let you know when that mod gets an update, and if it's just loose files, you won't have to mess with ESPs and load order.

Speaking of which, texture mods with an ESP component usually can be pretty early in the load order. Certain mods should be at the end; Water, Water - Get Wet, Dangerous Monsters, Birds, etc. Things that modify world cells and behavior of NPCs should be at the end of the load order since loading other things after them may cause conflicts. When in doubt, use the mod author's recommendation.

 

[Agent11]

A good enb preset makes a lot of difference.

I find that project reality, real rain, lightning during thunder storms and WATER are good mods for atmospheric eye candy.

Get yourself BOSS, gives helpful information and auto sorts load order. Can save you lots of time trouble shooting conflicts.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

For those of you who play with a companion...who do you like to use? I just bought Dawnguard after forgetting about Skyrim for awhile, started a new character. Plan on making him mostly a two handed weapon guy, with some ability in archery. Who would compliment him? Right now just have Lydia, who do you guys like?

Depends on the situation. If I'm a spellcaster, I don't want a melee companion who will run in front of my spells and end up dying because they stood in the way of my stream of deadly fire. If I'm an archer, a melee companion is useful for drawing enemies away and giving me an opportunity to shoot them from afar. For a melee character, you could pair up with an archer to add some range, but I find companions are best when they can act as tanks and get enemies to ignore you. To that end, Lydia actually is decent for a good share of the game. Aela is good if you want range, J'Zargo is good if you're looking for a battlemage. If you're worried about killing them, just focus on leveling Conjuration and use Storm Atronachs or Dremora Lords.

Granted, on most of my playthroughs, I ignore companions completely, since they just get in the way. They're better as pack mules than anything else.

 

[Face2Face]

Crap.. Was I supposed to download all of the additional files with the TPC manually? I downloaded all of them with the Nexus Mod Manager....

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Crap.. Was I supposed to download all of the additional files with the TPC manually? I downloaded all of them with the Nexus Mod Manager....

Yeah, you need to get them manually. Not sure if the compressed files will show up somewhere in the NMM directory; might be worth looking there first.

 

[dennilfloss]

A good enb preset makes a lot of difference.

I find that project reality, real rain, lightning during thunder storms and WATER are good mods for atmospheric eye candy.

Get yourself BOSS, gives helpful information and auto sorts load order. Can save you lots of time trouble shooting conflicts.

I got my game set for always sunny. It's gray & raining outside enough this fall.