Question regarding FCO / STEP patch

[clairebear]

Prefacing this post by saying, I understand that I'm going against the guide right now, and that this perhaps isn't the place to ask about such things, but I'm fairly inexperienced, and I can't think of or find a better place to ask. Apologies if this seems a bit dumb.

I really dislike how FCO looks. Especially the weird neck seam on female models wearing leather armor (or any armor that shows a little chest). I much prefer the vanilla faces, and I don't mind the vanilla bodies. To that end, I've disabled FCO, and everything that requires FCO to be enabled for the game to start, including but not limited to the STEP patch that is installed at the very end of the guide. I understand that this is inadvisable. I would like to ask two questions about the course of action I've taken.

1.  I'm certain that there is a better way to do this. Would I be able to accomplish such a thing with my limited level of experience?

2. If I'm wrong, and I'm just screwed unless I decide to use FCO, or if there's no way I could do it at my level of skill/experience, what can I expect to go wrong? What am I missing out on?

 

Once again, I understand this is a bit of a stupid post. Any advice is super appreciated, thank you.

[CorneliusC]

I share your dislike of FCO. I am currently playing with 'Character Expansions Revised', which is a more contemporary character overhaul and closer to vanilla.

If you installed the full STEP guide and decided to disable FCO and everything related including the STEP patch, you will have to do your own conflict resolution patch in xEdit to replace the STEP patch. Playing without a conflict resolution patch might still work, but you would have a lot of oddities, small errors or even quests not properly progressing ...

[clairebear]

22 hours ago, CorneliusC said:

If you installed the full STEP guide and decided to disable FCO and everything related including the STEP patch, you will have to do your own conflict resolution patch in xEdit to replace the STEP patch.

I'll give this a shot thank you, also, that's a really cool mod you've recommended.

Edited June 7, 2023 by clairebear