Recomenadation for Skyrim Skill Uncapper ini

[Kozza]

Do you guys have any recommendations for changes here for leveling skills and leveling in general.
Considering STEP recommends mods that slow down Main quest and Guild quests, I feel like I am leveling too fast.
For example, I am already level 25, and I only did Horn of Jurgen Windcaller main quest, Proving Honor from the Companions, and haven't even started other guilds. I mostly just did quests around Whiterun, and some radiant quests from Companions.
What changes have you made for your playthroughs?

[Mousetick]

I don't use Skyrim Skill Uncapper to configure leveling (I use a combination of other mods instead), and I play with a lot of mod-added content or modded gameplay mechanics on top of the STEP base, so I can only provide general pointers and some subjective thoughts. I don't think some one-size-fits-all advice can be given. It depends on your playstyle and preferences. You'll probably need to experiment and adjust as needed.

You can simply reduce skill XP gain multipliers to slow down skill leveling which in turn proportionally slows down player leveling since the latter is derived from the former.

Or you can reduce skill level to player level multipliers to keep leveling skills at the same pace as vanilla but slow down player leveling. This can result in a relatively highly skilled but lower level player. Consequently there are fewer perk points available compared to vanilla to leverage the relatively high skills. 

Or you can combine the two approaches for a slower overall, but potentially too grindy and restrictive as time goes on, progression. For example, this configuration: Slower Leveling for Skyrim Skill Uncapper which reduces both by 25% (this is not an endorsement or recommendation, but you could take a look at it for inspiration).

Reducing skill level to player level multipliers slows down player leveling more and more as the player level increases, even more so than in vanilla, due to the sharp leveling curve.

Some data points not to be construed as recommendations, based on my personal experience deviating greatly from a standard STEP setup:

• I find the player becomes very powerful at around level 40 and the game starts to progressively become less enjoyable past that level. I try to balance my leveling configuration to reach endgame at about level 60, tweaking along the way if necessary.
• I set all skill XP gain multipliers to 0.5 except Pickpocket and Enchanting, which I don't use much and are already grindy enough in vanilla for my taste, remaining at 1.0. That's very slow and makes the game more challenging for longer.
• I use Leveling Freedom - Configure your XP Curve - Gentler Smoother Steeper or Flat to make the player leveling curve flatter. So while the skill & player level progression is slower, it's smoother and not so grindy at higher levels.

Beware some mods have their own configurable skill XP settings. You'll want to change either their multipliers or Skyrim Skill Uncapper's but not both together to avoid cumulative effects and potential confusion. Change the multiplier of one mod and leave the other at 1.0. From the top of my head:

• CACO provides its own Alchemy skill XP gain multiplier configurable in its MCM.
• CCOR provides its own Smithing skill XP gain settings configurable in its MCM. It also optionally allows gaining skill by using Tanning Rack / Smelter / Mining Deposit which is not normally possible in vanilla. Lastly it allows for using an alternate skill XP formula to prevent XP farming.
• Vokrii grants Smithing skill XP from Mining Deposits. The conflict with CCOR is apparently not addressed by the STEP CCOR Patch in the current guide, so the actual behavior with both installed depends on which version of the mineorescript.pex file wins in the mod manager.

Edit: Vokrii / CCOR conflict is addressed by patch from Kryptopyrs Patch Hub as instructed in the current guide. I missed it while looking in the wrong places.

[Kozza]

Thank you for your pointers.
Of course, I understand that everyone playstyle is different and that everyone has their own subjective opinions about "the best way" to play the game. I would like to hear what other people think, so I can better find what could possibly work with what I have noticed.
Btw, what other mods do you use for balancing leveling?

Without any changes to the INI, in my playthrough I saw some problems (in my opinion):

- lockpicking is leveling way to fast. almost every lock is giving me a skill increase. And you can't really avoid lockpicking in the game. This should be much lower, I think.

- I was gaining light armor levels pretty fast. Vokrii makes it that you gain light armor experience by being in combat while wearing at least 2 Light Armor pieces whether or not you get hit. So maybe I should slow this down a bit. Heavy armor probably has the same problem.

- I was using conjuration only for bound weapons, and I only get experience for it if I summon the weapon in combat. And that makes it pretty slow. Not sure how it works with summoning creatures, since I didn't use those spells.

- I leveled up speech tree very fast by selling loot. I am not sure if installing an economy mod that reduces the price at which you can sell items, would decrease the rate of leveling, or is it based of something else. Otherwise, I would probably slow it down a bit too.

[Mousetick]

I concur with all your observations, however I can't confirm about bound weapons as I never use them. I'm pretty sure magic skills only increase while in combat - that's vanilla behavior not changed by Odin or Vokrii as far as I know. When I use summoning spells with Odin, I can summon a creature by casting the spell before combat but I only gain Conjuration experience while the summoned creature is in combat.

About speech and trading, speech skill increase depends on the base value of the traded items, not on the actual price at which they're sold or bought (which are themselves a function of speech skill). There is already an economy mod in STEP, Trade & Barter, that allows you to configure the bartering parameters, but they make you richer or poorer from trading and don't affect the speech skill gain.

In vanilla, if you trade a stack of identical items, you only get the speech skill XP corresponding to one item. With Bug Fixes SSE (included in STEP), you get the skill XP of one item multiplied by the number of items in the stack (see 'Speech Experience: Item Stacks' configuration setting). That may be a factor.

Vokrii grants speech skill points for shouting, so if you shout a lot that may be another factor.

--

There are several problems with character leveling in Skyrim:

• Player level is a direct function of skill levels.
• All skills contribute equally to player level.
• Skill levels are gained organically by playing the game.
• Some skills can't really be avoided (e.g. Speech or Lockpicking).
• The skill XP -> player XP function is very sharp: it makes the player level up very quickly at low levels and progressively slows down at higher levels, reaching a point where the player needs to grind unused skills to gain enough skill XP to reach the next character level.

Mods I use for balancing leveling:

• Main mod is Experience which tries to solve the above problems by completely decoupling player XP from skill XP (and also reversing the dependency by capping skill levels based on player level). Skill XP is gained as usual, same as vanilla. Player XP is disconnected from skill XP and it is gained by completing objectives and quests, discovering locations, clearing dungeons and killing enemies (all configurable) - similar to traditional RPGs. It can also be optionally gained by increasing skill XP but it's off by default and is pretty much pointless as it would re-create the same problems as in vanilla. The player leveling curve as a function of player XP is unchanged compared to vanilla, i.e. very fast at low levels then progressively slower to become a slog at high levels.
• Experience Multipliers (MCM sliders for each skill) is an MCM UI for configuring skill XP gain multipliers. It provides a simplified and user-friendly configuration, but not as extensive, compared to Skyrim Skill Uncapper. Nerfing or bumping skill leveling is still useful even with the above Experience mod. Skyrim Skill Uncapper can still be used if needed to uncap skills beyond 100 or use some of its other features.
• Leveling Freedom - Configure your XP Curve - Gentler Smoother Steeper or Flat mentioned previously to both lift and flatten the player leveling curve (i.e. more XP needed to level up player at low levels and less drastic speed difference between low and high levels).
• Reading Is Good (SKSE) changes skill books to increase skill XP gain multipliers rather than skill levels. Makes skill books very valuable to counter-balance nerfed skill XP gain multipliers.

Notes:

1. I've used the above mods with the Skyrim SE 1.5.97 runtime. They should all be compatible with the latest Skyrim SE/AE version but I'm not too sure about Reading Is Good.
2. Although all the above mods can be installed/uninstalled mid-game, to make the most of them it's best to use them from the start of a new game and adjust parameters along the way as wished or necessary.
3. The Experience mod is a significant departure from vanilla character leveling mechanic so I'd be hesitant to recommend it unless you are highly bothered by the vanilla problems I listed above and are willing to experience something different. Personally I think it's great and I love it, as do most of its users. I've never had any issue with it, and it works with any content (vanilla, Bethesda Creations or mods). Though it does require some fine-tuning to accommodate each playstyle and the amount of content to be played, because its "out-of-the-box" configuration is balanced for plain SE vanilla content (before AE and without any mod-added content).

[Kozza]

I have looked at the mods you linked, and really like the look of Reading Is Good (SKSE). In the comments there is nothing about it working on the newest patch, but I will check it out. 

If I combine it with settings from Slower Leveling for Skyrim Skill Uncapper or Experience Multipliers (MCM sliders for each skill), do they cancel each other out?

For example: I make it so that leveling skills is 20% slower, but after reading 5 books I get a +20% to leveling speed, so it brings it back to regular leveling speed.
That would slow down the leveling speed at the start of the game, and bring it back up latter after finding the books.

[Mousetick]

First I need to correct something I said earlier about magic skills only increasing while in combat which is patently false. It depends on the type of spell: Offensive/Detrimental or Defensive/Beneficial. For example, Candlelight gives Alteration XP at any time.

2 hours ago, Kozza said:

If I combine it with settings from Slower Leveling for Skyrim Skill Uncapper or Experience Multipliers (MCM sliders for each skill), do they cancel each other out?

For example: I make it so that leveling skills is 20% slower, but after reading 5 books I get a +20% to leveling speed, so it brings it back to regular leveling speed.
That would slow down the leveling speed at the start of the game, and bring it back up latter after finding the books.

Yes, you got it. This works separately for each skill. If you initially nerf all skills speed by 20%, after reading 5 skill books: 2 One-Handed, 1 Restoration, 1 Light Armor and 1 Alchemy, the resulting speeds will be: -12% One-Handed, -16% Restoration, -16% Light Armor, -16% Alchemy and -20% all others.

If there are no complaints about it not working on the newest patch, or users making a tantrum demanding a compatible update, it's a good sign it probably works fine.

 

 

[Kozza]

4 minutes ago, Mousetick said:

Yes, you got it. This works separately for each skill. If you initially nerf all skills speed by 20%, after reading 5 skill books: 2 One-Handed, 1 Restoration, 1 Light Armor and 1 Alchemy, the resulting speeds will be: -12% One-Handed, -16% Restoration, -16% Light Armor, -16% Alchemy and -20% all others.

Just as I thought. That is actually really nice. Before, I was avoiding reading skill-books because I would gain levels too fast, even if it was a useless skill-book for me. 
This actually makes it a bit like real learning.

[Kozza]

34 minutes ago, Mousetick said:

First I need to correct something I said earlier about magic skills only increasing while in combat which is patently false. It depends on the type of spell: Offensive/Detrimental or Defensive/Beneficial. For example, Candlelight gives Alteration XP at any time.

They gain exp if used successfully:

- Offensive spells and targeted spells in general (Destruction spells, Furry, Fear, Calm spells from Illusion, Sun spells from Restoration) - you need to actually hit the target.

- Conjuration - you must summon a bound weapon (and probably other summons) while being in combat, not before you enter combat.

- Buff spells - like Muffle from Illusion, or Candlelight and Oakskin form Alteration give exp at any time, regardless of combat. 

- Healing spells - you need to actually heal yourself or others to gain exp. Casting a healing spell at full HP does nothing.

Edited March 19 by Kozza