DROPPED Better Beast Races (by Xenius)

[Spiffyman]

Discussion thread:

Better Beast Races by Xenius

Wiki Link

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The STEP guide gives a nice mod for the main human bodies (XCE) but that mod doesn't touch Argonians and Khajiit (both of which I play as!). I'd like to propose that STEP consider Better Beast Races v2 to improve the Argonians.

I loved the way the argonians looked in Skyrim. Best of any of the games in my opinion. However, BBR gives a more subdued slimy feel to their skin, which I believe is an improvement.

[Vond]

I hate Skyrims (and Oblivions) version of Argonians :( But yeah I use both of these and it's an improvement on the original for sure even though it doesn't fix the issue with argonians (which is that they're made much more "humanoid")

[frihyland]

better beast races was in STEP a few releases back, it got cut in the move to 2.0 and I'm not sure why. You link goes to more snow btw, here is the actual link Better Beast Races v2, coverkhajiits is a stretch for vanilla.

[Spiffyman]

whaaa? How did I end up with the link to More Snow?? Anyway, I agree vond with the more 'humanoid' look. I dislike that as well. I was actually refering to the slimy look and feel about them... For the actual bodies, I'd love a mod that changes their legs to be more like the Morrowind style legs (extra joint in it).

 

I fixed the link, thanks frihyland.

 

May I ask why Coverkhajiit is a stretch? It just makes better looking face textures for Khajiit, nothing else....

[JudgmentJay]

Bumping this. I found CoverKhajiits a few days ago and finally tried it out. I was going to make a post, but I found this thread. I think it's a pretty big improvement...

 

Post-STEP:

 

CoverKhajiits:

[Farlo]

Bumping this. I found CoverKhajiits a few days ago and finally tried it out. I was going to make a post, but I found this thread. I think it's a pretty big improvement...

 

Post-STEP:

 

CoverKhajiits:

Pretty good, thanks for bumping this back up :)

[frihyland]

At some point we will look at body and face mods for a pack but there is just so much to do that is more pressing, not this year I'm afraid. Besides the good stuff hasn't been done yet :P

[Neovalen]

I've been using CoverKhajiits for quite some time, it makes the furry critters so much more lifelike. It almost looks like real fur. Should have been that way from the start.

 

As for Argonians... yeah I don't care for them as much anymore. They almost seem like an "inconvenience" for modders, someone needs to take a good hard look at them.

Unfortunately adding joints and such isn't easy as they share the skeleton with Khajiits.

[skwareballz]

Mr. Lenski's work is top notch, and Coverkhajiits deserves consideration for it high quality work. Covereyes is really good too, it you want some awesome eyes.

[TheCompiler]

I think both will be included in the next step release. But be warned, STEP doesn't focus on character eye-candy, it just features baseline improvements, nothing more sophisticated, there are tons of body mods out there and i'm simply scared of looking at them ;P

[Valamyr]

Oh, I thought body mods would be part of the baseline improvements considering how much better they make the vanilla visuals. This being said, I agree its immensely difficult to decide whats better. UNP vs CBBE vs WhoKnowsWhat will surely be a battle for the ages, even before we factor in the variances allowed by each.

[Neovalen]

The "mainstream"(read:supported) female bodies appear to be CBBEv3, UNP, UNP-Blessed. The other female bodies have little support as far as I know (or at least I haven't seem them).

The only available male bodies are Better Males using either Sundracon or FavoredSoul meshes.

 

The main thing to look out for when using a new body is neck seam issues. UNP/UNPB share the same neck seam and CBBE has it's own neck seam. All custom bodies seem to be incompatible with XCE(the current STEP recommendation) and you need to use the other available packs which have compatibility patches.

 

It would definitely be an undertaking for whoever takes up the mantle. Personally I follow all these mods already because I use them in my own game.

[frihyland]

The main issue is that only XCE is compatible with vanilla armors and clothes, the others require armor and clothes mods to work. We also don't support mods that are NSFW. When someone comes out with unique models for each race (and sex, age) then I will begin to be interested in this category.

[LeetMiniWheat]

Coverkhajiits is pretty nice, I've been using it for weeks. I found it from PL's list of skyrim mods, who is a very talented modder (her DA:O mod collection was amazing too).

 

Also, to clear something up with armors and clothing, it's not that they strictly aren't compatible, it's just that you won't get the proper body mesh so your body size will revert to the vanilla curves and stuff. But there's many mods that replace all the vanilla armors with proper proportions. I've been using UNP with a ton of armor replacers.

[skwareballz]

UNP vanilla armors covers all the armors and is supported often, plus it includes an option for vanilla underwear replacer, the problem is that UNP hasn't been supported in months.

 

The only reason I really use UNP is All in One Face is only compatible with UNP or CBBE and I think it is the best face mod, very realistic and it doesn't change all the elves faces into human looking faces with elf ears like many other face mods.

 

Anywho, since XCE is still the STEP recommended mod, Xenius has already released a Dawnguard mod for the Vamps. I'll have time to see if it can be recommended for a Dawnguard pack tomorrow, unless someone does it first.