pack A Real Explorer's Guide to Skyrim

[thaiusmle]

Any recommendations on esp(s) from this pack that can be merged using - Merge plugins with TES5Edit? Thanks.

[TheBloke]

@TheBloke: First of all, welcome to the STEP forums, and thank you for your feedback.Concerning Dawn of Whiterun, I just removed it from the guide because too many people were complaining about the performance drop, and I was seeing my FPS drop from 60 to 30 (Not using any ENB, in case you're wondering) so I had to stop using it, and I can't exactly go around telling people to use a mod when I was forced to stop using it (since I wouldn't be able to spot any incompatibilities or small issues)Concerning LOOT, I tried to get on that bandwagon when it was just released as a beta, but everyone was asking for BUM rules, so I just caved in and went with that after all

 Thanks a lot for the welcome!  Glad to be here. Re Dawn of Whiterun:  OK thanks for clarifying; I can quite understand that you couldn't include a mod you don't use yourself.  I wonder if perhaps it might be helpful to some users to include a note, along the lines of "Dawn of Whiterun is recommended by many users, but some have performance issues so it's not included.  The reader might want to try it out, but will need to do any conflict management themselves" ? When I read these guides I often find myself wondering "why was such-and-such mod not included?"  If I use that mod myself already, it then makes me worried that there's some massive compatibility problem that lead to it not being included and which is going to break my game eventually :)  I realise of course that there's vastly more mods not included than included, and you couldn't possibly mention them all.  But for a major mod such as this, and one where you've used 2/3 of the series but not the third, perhaps it would be helpful?  (Like the way you included Fight Against the Thalmor 2, but crossed out and with a note as to why it wasn't included.) Also, I have to ask - what's wrong with 30 FPS? :)  Can you actively tell a difference between 60 and 30 FPS?  I guess you must be able to, and maybe it's just me who can't!  I always figure that if it's >=24 FPS then it's the same or better than any movie or TV show.  But then I just learnt that people are now buying 144khz monitors and playing games at 120+ FPS and apparently "can't go back" after having experienced them, so maybe it's just me and my poor vision or something :) Great to hear there's no issues with LOOT, thanks!

[TheBloke]

I have one more question regarding compatibility.  Immersive College of Winterhold, and specifically its NPC module.  Your guide states:

 

Special Instructions: ERSO NPCs, Requiem, Skyre, and Skyrim Unleashed users should use not use the "CWI Improved NPCs" option, unless they're willing to resolve NPC records conflicts by themselves.

I use SkyRe. The CWI mod page says specifically that SkyRe is supported. Based on your warning, I took a look at CWINPCImprovements.esp in TES5Edit, and it has only a few records: all NPC records, one record for each of the College NPCs. In those records, it modifies their abilities, in particular adding/changing their spells and perks. These are all changes relative to Skyrim.esm and USKP.esp; there's no conflicts with any other mod I have.

 

Could you explain briefly why that might conflict with SkyRe? Obviously they won't be using any new SkyRe perks or magic. But surely adding/changing vanilla magic/perk records won't mess up SkyRe - most of the rest of the game uses those vanilla records, and SkyRe doesn't contain records to change every (or indeed, any) vanilla NPC.

 

SkyRe changes a few NPC types, like Bandit, but no named NPCs. So by definition they all remain however vanilla, or subsequent mods, configured them - no different, it seems to me, then what you get with CWINPC? So I'm not seeing what problem it might cause or what sort of manual NPC record conflict fixing I might need to do?

 

Maybe the point was that, because the edits are relative to vanilla, they might not have the full intended effect in a SkyRe setup? i.e. NPCs who were meant to be super powered might be less so in SkyRe unless they were given SkyRe-modified spells/perks? In which case I wouldn't be worried myself, because even if they're not as uber as they're meant to be, they're still going to be much better than without CWINPC.

 

Quite possibly I'm missing something? And apologies for what has turned into a long question; I'm still learning how Skyrim records all fit together, so I'm not yet quite sure that I'm understanding everything correctly or am able to judge conflicts accurately on my own!

 

Thanks again!

[yic17]

Hello. Can I use Ebonvale with REGS? I am seeing some conflict with ETaC - Complete and REGS - Cities in TES5 Edit. Can someone tell me if those are major conflicts that will cause the game to break or if they're small conflicts that won't really be a problem? Thanks.

[Kuldebar]

yic17, on 23 May 2014 - 1:16 PM, said:

Hello. Can I use Ebonvale with REGS? I am seeing some conflict with ETaC - Complete and REGS - Cities in TES5 Edit. Can someone tell me if those are major conflicts that will cause the game to break or if they're small conflicts that won't really be a problem? Thanks.

Pretty sure it conflicts with ETaC. Ebonvale is a nice mod, I have used  it before in my pre-ETaC days but it sits rather close to Riverwood and that doesn't seem right to me. I much prefer Aurora Village by Scarla because it adds a very lore friendly village to a location that really needs it.

 

Honestly, I suspect with REGs you won't miss Ebonvale.

Edited May 23, 2014 by Kuldebar

[yic17]

Okay, thanks. =3

[CJ2311]

Maybe the point was that, because the edits are relative to vanilla, they might not have the full intended effect in a SkyRe setup? i.e. NPCs who were meant to be super powered might be less so in SkyRe unless they were given SkyRe-modified spells/perks? In which case I wouldn't be worried myself, because even if they're not as uber as they're meant to be, they're still going to be much better than without CWINPC.

Actually, in the case of SkyRe, I'm more worried that the increased health, stamina and magicka pools that CWI NPC improvements offers to the mages might actually turn the college into a camp of overpowered people (AFAIK, health is the best attribute when using SkyRe due to the mod being so reliant on armor.

 

 

 

Hello. Can I use Ebonvale with REGS? I am seeing some conflict with ETaC - Complete and REGS - Cities in TES5 Edit. Can someone tell me if those are major conflicts that will cause the game to break or if they're small conflicts that won't really be a problem? Thanks.

Load ebonvale after both mods and it should work. Worse case scenario is that followers will act a bit dumb for a couple seconds when trying to cross the border between riverwood and ebonvale.

 

Well, actually the worst that could happen would be a CTD, but that would only happen if Ebonvale has deleted navmeshes, which I doubt.

 

EDIT: I'd tend to agree with Kuldebar though about the fact that Ebonvale might be overkill with REGS (your GPU might not appreciate the combination of ETaC and Ebonvale either)

Also concerning Aurora Village, please keep in mind that it is sadly not compatible with the Moon and Star quest mod.

Edited May 23, 2014 by CJ2311

[Searcher7]

Have almost got the perfect Skyrim going (actually, I don't NEED what I haven't installed yet), thanks to the tireless efforts of CJ, et al. I don't know how you keep up with it all. STEP core and REGS for looks and exploration, some immersion and lighting stuff, and now some VEGA additions for challenge. Its really nice to get my $#&! whipped while out adventuring and be able to come back to an interesting and lively town where just licking my wounds could turn into a new adventure.

[Kuldebar]

Some relevant Ebonvale posts:

 

One final point (that might simply be a personal issue) is that I got many crashes in the Ebonvale/Riverwood area when I had the Riverwood module of Expanded Towns and Cities installed. I'm not sure if this was a conflict or simply me having too many mods installed but I thought you should know.

 

Hm, I'm using ETaC and Ebonvale with no obvious issues, Try changing your load order that may help you. I have ETaC - Villages Complete.esp loaded after Ebonvale.esp

 

For people having crash issues, I suggest to you (and the author) to clean the mod with TES5Edit, there are several deleted references which can often lead to crashes, sadly there are also 16 deleted navmeshes which I currently don't know how to easily restore on the user end. There are also a few stray edits which should be harmless but may interfere with other mods. This will likely help people who use mods that alter Riverwood or the areas around Ebonvale more than others, I use Expanded Towns and Villages and Ebonvale is relatively stable (but I have a ton of other mods which could also be causing CTDs so, hard to say either way)

 

 

 

 

EDIT: I'd tend to agree with Kuldebar though about the fact that Ebonvale might be overkill with REGS (your GPU might not appreciate the combination of ETaC and Ebonvale either)

Also concerning Aurora Village, please keep in mind that it is sadly not compatible with the Moon and Star quest mod.

I've never forgiven you for that. :p

[phryxolydian]

Also concerning Aurora Village, please keep in mind that it is sadly not compatible with the Moon and Star quest mod.

This is turning out to be quite an awesome mod, not only is Little Vivec really beautiful but more importantly, the quest so far is lots of fun! Bug free, too. :)

[CJ2311]

Have almost got the perfect Skyrim going (actually, I don't NEED what I haven't installed yet), thanks to the tireless efforts of CJ, et al. I don't know how you keep up with it all. STEP core and REGS for looks and exploration, some immersion and lighting stuff, and now some VEGA additions for challenge. Its really nice to get my $#&! whipped while out adventuring and be able to come back to an interesting and lively town where just licking my wounds could turn into a new adventure.

VEGA is outdated and has been abandoned AFAIK, I'd recommend checking the Modular Morrowloot Overhaul instead.

 

 

 

I've never forgiven you for that. :p

I've not forgiven myself for that either, but honestly it was 2 (voiced) quest mods vs a settlement (however nice it may be)... :/

 

 

 

This is turning out to be quite an awesome mod, not only is Little Vivec really beautiful but more importantly, the quest so far is lots of fun! Bug free, too. :)

Glad to hear you're enjoying it, I wasn't able to since i had to breeze through it to check for problems, and spoiled half of it by looking at the scripts when patching it for BFT. *sigh*

[statmonster]

Any thoughts on the new ETaC 11.0 update?

 

To answer my own question I saw the REGS guide has already been updated.  Sweet!  So (since no good deed ever goes unpunished), some different questions...

 

What do people generally think of the new ETaC textures for:

• Falkreath,
• Dawnstar, and
• Winterhold?

If I use SRLE I assume I should:

• not use the Better Fast Travel Patch (as I already use Touring Carriages rather than this)
• use the ELFX patch in ETaC (w/ exteriors) patches
• not use the lanterns of Skyrim patch, no?

Edited May 23, 2014 by statmonster

[Kuldebar]

Falkreath is no longer implemented in the latest version. I absolutely love the tarnished green, in fact I miss it not being there more than the added buildings, etc.

 

I like the Winterhold textures, in my opinion most of that is "newish" construction unlike other areas.

 

Dawnstar, I reverted to vanilla because I use some really good vanilla replacer textures and the ETaC ones are a little too "clean".

[CJ2311]

I personally like the winterhold and falkreath textures but I'm not fond of the doors on the Dawnstar ones.

 

Concerning SR:LE:

- Touring Carriages MIGHT conflict with some REGS mods (killing NPCs and getting stuck on some obstacles).

- ELFX is compatible with ETaC, but I'd only use the interiors module if I were you, because the exteriors one will still conflict with other mods.

- If you're set on using ELFX Exteriors, then yeah, don't install LoS (as per the guide instructions).

[statmonster]

Falkreath is no longer implemented in the latest version. I absolutely love the tarnished green, in fact I miss it not being there more than the added buildings, etc.

I think it's back on today's version (11) - no?

 

Thanks CJ.  Very nice work!

Edited May 23, 2014 by statmonster