Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

[Ingmar]

Honestly, the game doesn't need mods.

[Stormwaltz]

I could do that, but I was providing Nexus links and trying to describe what each one added. The titles tend to be either so cryptic or so generic it's difficult to tell at a glance what they do. (For example, the "Bring Out Your Dead" mod adds graveyards near towns, and buries local NPCs in them if they're slain.)

[calapine]

I could do that, but I was providing Nexus links and trying to describe what each one added. The titles tend to be either so cryptic or so generic it's difficult to tell at a glance what they do. (For example, the "Bring Out Your Dead" mod adds graveyards near towns, and buries local NPCs in them if they're slain.)

Oh I see. Well, whenever you get to it. I wouldn't want to stress you, I have been told deadlines are a sensitive topic with game developers.

[Sheepherder]

Honestly, the game doesn't need mods.

Lies.  There are a number of items with wrong keywords, which causes jankiness with perks dependent upon item type (smithing, light armour, heavy armour).  I demand the full smithing perk bonus for my unique item sets, dammit!

[Ingmar]

I'm talking about the normal human threshold for 'need', not 'need' in Sheepherder world.

[JWIV]

I got interrupted by something for some reason or another and haven't managed to get back into it.  I'll note that it's also on sale today as part of the Steam Mid-Week madness sale.  Dawnguard is 30%, but enh, fighting vampires sucks ass and I'm not sure I want an entire expansion devoted to that bullshit.

[Maledict]

Honestly, the game doesn't need mods.

I would disagree. At the very least you should take one of the two magic system mods, because as in every game they have ever made the magic system in Skyrim doesn't scale properly at all and without the ability to make your own spells to off-set that problem heavy magic using characters end up substantially weaker than other classes and reduced to spamming spells for impact alone.

There's also a huge ton of mods out there to improve the graphical quality on the PC - I just got back into Skyrim after playing it on the consoles and you can really improve the overall look and feel of the game in a hundred different subtle ways. (As well as the not so subtle like the hi def textures pack Bethesda released).

It is however certainly a hell of a lot more stable and 'stand alone' ish than Oblivion, which was basically fucked without mods.

[Sheepherder]

Dawnguard is 30%, but enh, fighting vampires sucks ass and I'm not sure I want an entire expansion devoted to that bullshit.

There is actually quite a bit more than just vampire slayer quests.

[Rendakor]

Did Hearthfire come out on PC yet?

[calapine]

No.

Will be announced next week, or so goes the rumor.

[Sheepherder]

Just a follow-up to Maledict: I'm doing a mage right now without many magic affecting mods, and goddamn it is painful.  There's too much vital shit locked away in perks and spell tomes for your damage and efficiency not to suck once you start accumulating levels, and you can't really do enchanting cheese until the endgame.

You can, however, completely ignore magic.

Also, I refuse to call it magicka.

[ajax34i]

I like playing mages, but the default amount of mana in the TES games just sucks, IMO.  So I usually cheat (via gear or via console) to give myself about 400, which seems to do the trick.  In Skyrim, though, we can't increase the DPS of spells via making our own, so that sucks.  Only thing I could do, without mods, was to cheese-enchant a set of resists and HP cloth that puts my mage at about 50% everything, but he's still vulnerable to melee attacks.  So that gives me time to cast fire bolt 50 times and whittle enemies to death, as long as I stay out of melee somehow.

EDIT:  Also used the console to set enchanting, smithing, alchemy, and speech to 100.  Didn't want to level up from selling stuff and casually playing with the recipes.

[PalmTrees]

I've been playing a mage and it was weak until I unlocked the stagger when dual cast. After that it was stun-lock enemies and blast them down. Staggers dragons too. Paralyze is a total "I win" button. Pacify is also very useful as crowd control.

I did rush enchanting to 100  so I could get destruction on four pieces. With potions I made them with 29% mana reduction. Currently wearing: destr/alt, destr/rest, destr/ill, destr/magic resist. I rarely use summons or followers, they just get in the way. I'll occasionally bust out dual storm atronachs or daedra just for giggles.

Combined with expert levels in all but destr and a 2 mana/1 hp leveling I have plenty of mana to cast and I'm just squishy enough for things to be dangerous still without being one shot all over the place. Deathlords with ebony bow and arrows still a big danger, but in a fun way.

[Stormwaltz]

I'll just leave a link to this free, player-made mod here: Build Your Own Home

[calapine]

Hearthfire is out!





Positively surprised by the price, 4.99 €. After Dawnguard I expected 10€ or more.

[Meester]

I keep getting confused by people confusing dlc and expansions.

In my view at least for example Oblivion, dlc = horse armour while expansion = shivering isles.

On a mod note I can just barely get open cities working with ugrid despite one or two crashes when approaching a city. The dual parry mod also allows me to level up via blocking as nature attended, yay me!

[Kail]

I keep getting confused by people confusing dlc and expansions.

In my view at least for example Oblivion, dlc = horse armour while expansion = shivering isles.

The line isn't really clear anymore.  The only functional difference is that DLC is downloadable, while an expansion might not be.  Steam, for example, explicitly lists it all content that requires the base game to use as DLC (even content that isn't strictly content for the game, like soundtracks).

[Sheepherder]

I think I probably need some sort of professional help.


...In the meantime, I'll be terrorizing the villagers with a legendary wooden sword.

[calapine]

I keep getting confused by people confusing dlc and expansions.

In my view at least for example Oblivion, dlc = horse armour while expansion = shivering isles.

On a mod note I can just barely get open cities working with ugrid despite one or two crashes when approaching a city. The dual parry mod also allows me to level up via blocking as nature attended, yay me!

I know the difference just fine. Besides Kail is correct about stating its a distinction that gets increasingly blurred or meaningless.
What I meant to say is that Dawnguards price/value ratio is out of whack, whether you want to call it a bare-bone expansion or an overpriced DLC.

---

That aside, after spending a good 2 days finding mods and tuning the game I am clocking at 65 individual .esps and .esms. Some playtesting to see if it's all stable and I am ready to play! Weee! 

[calapine]

I think I probably need some sort of professional help.

Are we talking a shrink or mod-support? In both cases I can help, I am a very good listener!

[Meester]

Expansions in my mind tend to be 1/4 or a half of the original game that they are expanding and tend to be able to be bought in store [old school these days I know].

Downloaded hearthfire, I hope it doesn't crash on me ^-^

[Sheepherder]

The listening sort.  I went from "Wooden sword, neat!" to "Can I stab things with it?" at an alarming speed.

Dawnguard is worth $20 between the vampire/werewolf changes, various dungeons and forgotten vale, the neat new gear, and the boss fights (The twin dragons?  Fuck yes.  More of that please).

[Pezzle]

Will dawnguard vampires be wiping out towns?  I have been waiting to pick up that addition but do not want to break the game. 

[CmdrSlack]

I still haven't finished the main storyline, but downloaded dawnguard.

On a recent fast travel back to Riften (working on the Thieves' Guild stuff), I had to get involved in a vampire attack on the merchants. Fortunately, it was just the butch lady armor vendor, so no big deal.

[Ingmar]

Put me in the Dawnguard being fine for $20 camp. I got a lot of play out of it.

[Sheepherder]

Will dawnguard vampires be wiping out towns?  I have been waiting to pick up that addition but do not want to break the game.

Most of the time they'll focus on you and the guards before they decide to kill random townspeople.

[Rendakor]

I thought the bigger issue was that they could randomly attack towns that you weren't in/near, slaying their occupants without you having a chance to save them.

[Kail]

That would be news to me.  Far as I can tell, they're handled like bandits, in that they only "exist" when you're around.  I haven't heard anything about a script or anything that straight up randomly kills off NPCs in distant towns, that would be a pretty severe dick move.

[Ingmar]

I certainly have never seen anything like that happen.

[Sheepherder]

The Hall of the Vigilant gets wiped out, but it doesn't do anything anyways.

The random attacks only occur near where the player is.

[koro]

Depending on settings, some cells can stay loaded into memory despite the player not being near them, which I assume can lead to the "vampires wiping out places" thing some have experienced.

[Sheepherder]

Depending on settings, some cells can stay loaded into memory despite the player not being near them...

I have never heard of or seen anything that suggests that is happening.  Some references will stay persistent when they're being referred to by a property or function, but the cell itself and everything in it not also affected by the script will unload.

Besides which, the vampire attacks are spawned only when the player approaches a node.

[Pezzle]

Picked up the expansions and installed this yesterday.  Still working on mods and compatibility, but the game is progressing.  Something odd and new happened.  When I got to the first dragon attack and you are ordered to go outside to that keep and defend it, a bunch of stormcloaks came into the hall, killed the generic guards, and ran out.  I saw more of these fights out in the street.  I do not think I have any mods that would cause this to happen, most of mine are new locations or quests.  Is this normal now?

[calapine]

Picked up the expansions and installed this yesterday.  Still working on mods and compatibility, but the game is progressing.  Something odd and new happened.  When I got to the first dragon attack and you are ordered to go outside to that keep and defend it, a bunch of stormcloaks came into the hall, killed the generic guards, and ran out.  I saw more of these fights out in the street.  I do not think I have any mods that would cause this to happen, most of mine are new locations or quests.  Is this normal now?

I just progressed past this part and haven't noticed anything unusual. No civil war fights. (running Dawnguard and Hearthfire)

[Sheepherder]

I've actually seen Stormcloaks take odd detours through Whiterun once before.  I'm guessing it's a navmesh/pathfinding bug.