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Posted by: King Coin Feb 14 2012, 05:16 AM

Post your mods, or post your favorite ones here!

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I made Followers can Relax.

This mod adds a command to any companion in the game that lets them chill out and relax instead of standing at attention all the time.

To do this, just talk to your companion and choose the topic "We'll stay here for a while." They will start interacting with the environment (eat, drink, sit, ect). To get them to start following you again, just talk to them and say "Let's go."

It can be DLed at Nexus http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=9504

I plan on doing more with it as I have time to fix things and polish it. One bug that I've noticed in Breezehome is sometimes when Kharjo wanders into the little room in the back with the alchemy station he disappears. I recommend you know your follower's ID so you can console them back in case something like this happens until I figure out what the heck is happening there. Pretty sure that was a different mod and not mine now!

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 14 2012, 07:25 PM

I cannot download anything from TES Nexus right now. Looks like their servers are having a coronary.

Does transitioning to a new zone, or fast traveling make Kharjo reappear? Often that does it when companions get lost.

I am currently working on a pair of mods to disable the main quest. I just finished one that disables it after Before the Storm (when you go to Whiterun and tell Jarl Balgruuf about the dragon attack on Helgen). The problem with this is that it ends with the Jarl standing next to the court wizard, and Irileth walking out to stand by the front gate. I am not sure if they will ever reset from those positions or not.

The other problem is that using this, you can never buy Breezehome or get Lydia as a follower. Right now my workaround for that is to manually type in a console command. For some reason whenever I try putting that command into the Before the Storm quest, it refuses to work.

Next up I am tinkering with a similar mod, that halts the MQ after doing Bleak Halls Barrow for Farengar. My thought with this, is that it could get you the option to buy Breezehome and get Lydia through the normal means. It is difficult, because you do not get Lydia and the option for Breezehome until after you kill your first dragon at the fort. So I have to tweak that quest to keep the dragon and fort scene from ever activating.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 14 2012, 07:52 PM

Aravi was able to leave Kharjo just outside of Jorrvaskr where the companions train and wander around Whiterun. She went inside of The Drunken Huntsman without Kharjo appearing. She went back to Jorrvaskr and he was still hanging around in the training area.

I have not tried leaving Whiterun or fast traveling. Someone commented that they will appear though.

I haven't had much time to play so I haven't personally done much with it yet.

~~~

I would really like to use the mod you described to disable the MQ after giving the claw to Farengar. Would it cause the quest to not function even if you moved beyond that point? I'd like to use it for one character, but not Aravi. Would I have to be very careful about removing the mod each time I load Aravi?

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 14 2012, 08:30 PM

These two mods will have no effect on your game if you have already progressed beyond those particular quests. They will only work with a game where you have not started the quests. Since Aravi has gone beyond those quests, so far as I can tell, you should be able to have it loaded with no effect on her game at all. Because she has already triggered the things that start the dragons spawning, and the civil war (there is a trigger for that in these quests too).

Keep in mind that I have been able to do very little testing, outside of making sure that the quests stop where I want them to and the rest of the MQ does not pick up. So I really do not know if there are any long-term effects they might case with other quests. I kept all the civil war triggers alive and still working, but there could be something else I missed. So really both these are a use at your own risk situation. If you want to be a beta tester, I can email you a copy once the Bleak Falls Barrow mod is done.

I have also been having a weird issue when doing these two mods. Somehow, something else in the game is getting modded, outside of the .esp files I am working on. I have had over half a dozen times where the MQ stops in Before the Storm, after first talking to the Jarl. Even though neither mod was loaded! It just happened to me again with the Bleak Falls Barrow mod, even though the Before the Storm quest is untouched in that .esp!

Looking at the Skyrim.esm in the creation kit showed no changes to it at all, as did the timestamp on the file. But the game had been changed somewhere. The only way I have been able to fix it is by restoring a full backup of my entire Skyrim folder. I have no idea why this is happening, or just what is being edited behind the scenes. It is probably only one or two files, but I have no idea which ones.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 14 2012, 08:41 PM

If you modified scripts (which I bet you have) look in /Data/Scripts. The modified scripts will be there, not included in the .esp (which I think is weird). You need to remove those scripts for the originals to unpack from the BSAs.

That tripped me up too when I was working on my mod.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 14 2012, 09:05 PM

Well that is idiotic! So if you download a mod that has scripting, that means that even after you remove the mod, its scripts are all still working! What genius at Bethesda thought that was brilliant? Probably the same one who thought it would be a great idea to make it impossible for people to fight underwater.

Does this mean I have to include those script files as well as the .esp when I distribute it? Or will the .esp alone generate the script files?

Edit: You have to include the script files, because the mod does not work by copying just the .esp to a fresh install of Skyrim. Furthermore, when I went back and looked at the .esp in the creation kit, all of the changes I had made to the quest had vanished. I suppose they designed it this way to dissuade people from making mods that use scripting?

Posted by: Saquira Feb 14 2012, 11:04 PM

Can I add a request for a mod? I've been looking around for one that adds a single wolf companion to the game, but I've only found a dog replacer, and it doesn't seem that good. I don't have the time at the moment to look through the Creation Kit wiki and learn how to use it, but Gladio would really like to find Ekali again.

So yeah, I need a mod that adds a single wolf companion to the game and doesn't simply replace all dogs. Though a texture different than the one on the standard wolf would be great, it's not important. Don't ask me why it's so important to have a wolf companion in the game, one reason is that I really want to incorporate him in the pictures, but otherwise I don't really know.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 14 2012, 11:36 PM

Well, I had another partial success on the Post Bleak Falls Barrow Disabler. I have the Main Quest cutting off after delivering the dragonstone to Farengar. The only issue I have there is that Delphine won't budge from where she is standing at Farengar's desk afterward.But I do not see that as a showstopper.

Once more, I cannot get the game to automatically make the character a Thane, deliver Lydia, and make Breezehome buyable. Again, a single console command can do this however. So while it is not ideal, it does work.

I do prefer this version over the one that disables the MQ earlier, after Before the Storm. It lets the character do more for the Jarl and Whiterun - thusly earning their keep - before they have the option of becoming a Thane. I suppose one upshot to having to use a console command for the latter is that you could hold off on that until you have done some of the bandit bounty quests for the steward. That would make it seem like you have earned it.

Saquira: A wolf companion is an excellent idea! I am surprised no one has come up with one yet. I have no idea how the companion scripts work. If I did, I would do it for you. But I am afraid I am completely in the dark as well. I might tinker around with it in the next few days, if I get the time though.

Posted by: Acadian Feb 15 2012, 01:05 AM

Congrats on the new mod! I certainly found such a command for followers quite immersively helpful in Oblivion. No one wants to go to bed and have their follower standing there watching them all night.

Daenlin is so funny. As soon as Buffy tells him to just hang out, he immediately takes off his shoes! I suspect that is because we have equipped him with pit boots (zero value). Then he looks for a place to sit down or starts chatting up the ladies.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 15 2012, 04:40 AM

@SubRosa: I have no idea why they decided to make the scripts separate. The only thing I can think of is with their Steam distribution method, every mod is turned into a .BSA.

@Saquira: I'd be willing to look into that too. It doesn't sound too difficult. Are you fine with the dog companion behavior? And I know nothing of texturing.

@Acadian: I bet you are right on the boots. He sounds like quite a character though!

Posted by: Saquira Feb 15 2012, 08:07 AM

Subrosa: I was surprised as well when I didn't find any wolf companion, it does seem like a quite easy thing to do. Compared to other mods anyway.

King Coin: The dog companion behavior is fine. Thank you.

Posted by: mALX Feb 15 2012, 05:08 PM

Mod wish list: Player voice

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 15 2012, 07:15 PM

I did some tinkering on the wolf companion last night had no success. I started with the wolf race, made a new race called wolf companion, then copied over all the entries from the dog companion race - including the script entry. The only things I left from the original wolf race were the models, textures, sounds, and animations. So it would still look and sound like a wolf.

But when I created a new actor and put it in the world, it was invisible. When I could find it, its' name showed up, but I could not interact with it. So it is back to the drawing board. I think I might try again just doing a straight copy of the dog race to start with. Then I'll manually change the models, textures, etc... Maybe doing it that way will work.

Edit: Okay, I did it the other way around, and I have a working companion. But it is a dog at the moment. I have to change the models, textures, etc... now to make it a wolf.

Saquira, was there any particular kind of wolf you wanted from the game? A regular wolf or Ice wolf? Any special color? If I still have 3ds Max around somewhere, I can probably assign a new texture to the mesh.

Edit Again: No luck. Once again, as soon as I change the models and textures, the wolf becomes invisible. I thought that extracting the files from the .bsas would do the trick, but it did not help. The companion script stops working too for some reason. I have no idea what it is doing this.

Posted by: liliandra nadiar Feb 16 2012, 01:58 AM

I'm kind of hoping for a Bound Dagger mod. My Illusionist/Conjurer made very nice work clearing out a bandit cave using Fury, Muffle and Bound Sword. At least until the Boss who was taken out by a good old stream of Frostbite. Though the downside of Bound weapons is I wouldn't be able to take advantage of the Assassin's Blade perk if/when I get it.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 16 2012, 02:05 AM

I made a mod that did work. I noticed that you can reanimate corpses, but you cannot actually summon undead. So I made a mod that lets you summon a skeleton. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v90/subrosa_florens/Skyrim/Skyrim051.jpg. I think I will keep working on this, and make a variety of skeletons, draugr, etc... that you can summon. Of course I will have to make another Witchcraft mod that lets you summon wolves, bears, spriggans, etc...

For some reason I cannot get vendors to sell things I create. I do all the same things you would in Oblivion: create a container, put it in the same cell as the vendor, make it owned by the vendor, etc... But the items never show up in the vendor's stock. I even checked to see that the things I am making have the same keywords as like objects, in case the vendors go by keyword. I also used one of the vendor's containers as a reference, and still no luck. In the most recent case, I copied an existing spell tome to create one for my conjured skeleton, so my version was exactly the same as the things the vendor was selling.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 16 2012, 03:03 AM

I tried the wolf for a little bit, and I got a wolf that was friendly to the player, but I could not get it to be interactive. Clicking on it did nothing. I'll have to fool around with it again at some other time. I suppose I could just try to put a follower AI package on it and see what happens, but I assume you'd like to be able to 'talk' to it. I don't know what I have to do to let you 'click' on it.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 16 2012, 04:11 AM

I was wrong about the wolf mod. The animal companion script was working. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v90/subrosa_florens/Skyrim/Skyrim052.jpg

Posted by: King Coin Feb 16 2012, 04:25 AM

Do you have to make it a 'CompanionRace' to allow interaction? I just copied a wolf and changed it's AI and stats and tried to apply some scripts to it.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 16 2012, 05:13 AM

I copied the DogCompanionRace and made a new WolfCompanionRace. I think you might need a separate race. But I am not positive. All the dogs who are followers are a separate race, so I was just following what Bethesda did.

Then for the actual critter itself I copied the generic dog follower actor to make my actor. Everything worked fine until I changed its race from the DogCompanionRace to my new WolfCompanionRace. Then he turned invisible. Now if I change him to a regular wolf, he turns visible, but the companion script stops working. If I could figure out what is turning him invisible, the problem would be licked.

For the actor (not race) I was using a script called WEDogFollowerScript. It was simple, but worked

Posted by: King Coin Feb 16 2012, 05:19 AM

I saw that invisibly problem when I tried to preview my wolf in the CK. I started with the dog companion race as well.

Posted by: Saquira Feb 16 2012, 05:42 PM

Subrosa: Having taken a closer look at the different wolves, I think the Ice wolf texture wolf be best. But the standard one works just as well, so take whatever works best for you.

Thanks for working on it guys

Posted by: King Coin Feb 16 2012, 05:52 PM

I'd say SubRosa's going to complete the mod before I can.

What is the name of the wolf supposed to be? I just called it Wolf as a place holder name.

EDIT:

Also, I tried my mod out with leaving Kharjo in Whiterun and leaving the town, and then fast traveling. He stayed where he was told to hang around at in both instances.

Posted by: Saquira Feb 16 2012, 07:54 PM

King Coin: The wolfs name is Gladio.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 16 2012, 07:56 PM

Well, I pretty much finished my Undead Summoning mod. I created a Corrupted Shade, Draugr, and Draugr Lord you can summon. There is already a spell to summon a Dragon Priest, so I also made a tome for that as well.

All I have to do now is decide how to put the tomes in the game. Since I cannot get a merchant to sell them I am thinking I can either stick them in a dead body for the player to pick up, or add them to the leveled lists of the vendors. I would prefer you have to buy them, but don't like modding those lists, since it seems likely that other mods will do the same. I would rather avoid possible conflicts if I can.

On a side note, I came across an excellent idea for testing mods. Create a new interior cell that is just a big empty room. The first interior cell in the list is perfect to copy, as it is also for testing. Name it 1Test and put your modded stuff inside. Then start the game, open the console and type in coc 1test. That warps you to your testing room. Try you stuff out in there. That way you will not be making any edits to the world space until you decide exactly when and where you want to.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 16 2012, 08:17 PM

I got it!

The wolf companion that is. I figured out the invisibility problem. In the race entry, you have to set Morph Race and Armor Race to the same race as the original. After that, viola! there it is.

I just tested it and the ai is extremely basic. I guess this is the same as how the dog followers work in the game (I have never tried one, so do not know for certain). The first time you click on the wolf it becomes a follower. There is no on screen message to tell you that, which threw me before (it was working, but I never realized it!). After that the wolf will follow you wherever you go. If you draw a weapon, it will take an attack stance. If you go into combat, it helps. I made the wolf essential, so death will not be an issue.

I did not realize it earlier, but I had King Coin's follower mod on when I was doing some of my earlier testing. That is where that screen capture with the on screen text came from. The good thing about that, is we now know that the two mods work together. In fact, I highly recommend using KC's mod with this one, as it improves your ability to command Gladio.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=9948

Posted by: King Coin Feb 16 2012, 08:52 PM

Good to know on Morph Race and Armor Race.

So what does a wolf do in wander mode?

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 16 2012, 09:14 PM

Not much of anything. They don't seem to come with any AI packages, and I did not think to add any.

Posted by: Saquira Feb 16 2012, 09:20 PM

Thank you! I'll try it out tomorrow, have way to much to do at the moment.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 16 2012, 11:08 PM

I originally didn't intend on letting animals to be put into wander mode, but now that I think of it, my conditions wouldn't exclude animals from that dialog topic. When I update my mod I will make sure it works properly for animals. All I'd have to do is add an AI package to the animal alias.

Perhaps later on I'll make a separate topic for animals so that you don't address them the same way you would a person.

EDIT: Also that bug I mentioned about Kharjo disappearing, I'm pretty sure that was a different mod that was doing that and not mine. Woohoo!

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 17 2012, 01:05 AM

I figured out how to make vendors work. Besides having to assign their container in their faction window, you have to add the JobMerchantFaction to their faction list. Such a great way to over-complicate things.

Does anyone know if there are any mod cleaners out there, like TES4Edit? I copied Farengar to make a new NPC, and now the CK is showing that Farengar was modded. Even though all I did was duplicate him. I tried the Validate Loaded Data option off the File Menu, but that did not do it.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 17 2012, 01:22 AM

There's a program called SkyEdit, but I don't know if it has the function you want.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 17 2012, 01:24 AM

I found a way to do it in the CK. Before you load an .esp, select the plugin, click on details, and you can delete the reference in the list that comes up. It made a copy of Farengar when I started it, but reverted the original Farengar to normal. Then I could delete the the copy normally.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 17 2012, 01:27 AM

Nice. It seems like the best way to find things is to just click on things and see what happens.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 17 2012, 04:27 AM

Bad news. Followers Can Relax is not working with Wolf Companion after all. FCR is on and running, but even after you tell Gladio to wait, he will come running after you once you move far enough away. So while the dialogue options to wait and follow are appearing on screen, they are not really working with animals.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 17 2012, 04:44 AM

Yeah, at first I didn't expect to allow animals to be told to wait so I never added the package to their alias. I didn't realize I didn't restrict the topics to people only however. In the next update I'll include the package for animals (which will be tomorrow or the day after).

If you are impatient, you can do it yourself by opening my mod in the CS and going to the DialogueFollower quest and clicking on aliases. Go to the animal one and add the FollowerWanderPackageA (I think that's what I called it) to its package list and make sure it's at the very top.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 17 2012, 03:27 PM

I can wait. I am not using the wolf companion myself (at least not yet, but he might be perfect for when I eventually play a Bosmer forester).

Do you, or anyone else, want to use my Main Quest Disabler? I am not planning to put it up on TES Nexus any time soon. Not with the things that still need work on it, like figuring out how to make Delphine go away, and triggering Breezehome and Lydia. But it does work for making a dragon-free game. I can email it to anyone who wants. Think of yourselves as beta-testers.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 17 2012, 03:31 PM

Right now I don't have a character set up to use it. Been playing Aravi!

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 17 2012, 05:05 PM

I have some good news about the Main Quest Disabler. I have gotten the scripting working to automatically make you Thane of Whiterun after giving the dragonstone to Farengar. After you talk to Farengar, you will find Lydia waiting for you at the front door of Dragonsreach, and you can buy Breezehome.

The only issue I have left is Delphine refuses to budge from where she is leaning on Farengar's desk. It looks like she will spend the rest of the game there, instead of going back to Riverwood like normal. This means that you cannot rent a room at the Sleeping Giant Inn afterward, since she is the one you rent it from. Is that normal when you do the main quest though? I know Delphine is involved with a lot of the other quests, so I am guessing she never goes back to the inn to rent rooms?

Good news, this is fixed too. Delphine vanishes after you leave the cell. I never tried walking out of Dragonsreach and then back inside before. Renting a room at the inn was fixed when I modded Orgnar's status in the room rental faction from -1 to 0. I am guessing there is supposed to be a script in the MQ somewhere that does that, but I could not find it.

So it looks like the mod is ready for prime time. I'm renaming it to Dragons Disabled. I am going to try making it into a bsa from the CK, and see how that works. I am not sure if I want to post it on TESNexus after that, or if I want to play with it running for a while. Probably the latter. It will help find bugs. Does anyone want to volunteer to be a beta tester? I do not expect it to have any issues. But it would be nice to find out if I am wrong before hundreds of people download it.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 18 2012, 07:48 PM

I've had some success today. I have the new version of the mod created. Instead of using a preexisting quest and alias, I created my own quest and alias.

Now I need to test it with the multiple followers mod that everyone has been asking for compatibility with. With the way I have it set up now, I'm guessing that you will only be able to have one follower in wander mode.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 18 2012, 08:40 PM

I am not sure why, but now Delphine is not leaving Dragonsreach anymore. I am going to have to revisit the quest code again....

OTOH, I started a mod that lets you summon animals. I have wolves, ice wolves, snowy sabre cats, bears, snow bears, and spriggans. I created a test npc to sell the tomes and have that working as well. I am trying to make her a conjuration trainer, but for some reason cannot get that to work.

I also found that long-sleeved fur armor, and made a clothing version of it that you can create from a tanning rack.

While working on the undead and animal summoning mods, I found that the Familiars are seriously nerfed. They have the stats of a basic wolf (i.e. 2nd level creatures), but cost twice the amount of magicka to summon as a Flame Atronach (7th level creatures)! Somebody at Bethesda dramatically screwed up in assigning the cost. So I made a mod that makes them tougher, and reduces the cost to summon them.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 18 2012, 09:00 PM

Ok I finally have it working with the multiple followers mod. I had to go into the 'Details' section of my file and tell it to ignore 'DialogueFollower' quest even though I was not using it.

As I suspected though, you can only tell one follower to relax at a time. I'm going to have to think of a way to get it to work with more than one at a time.

~~~

Can you upload the Familiar mod? I really like that spell, but have not used it because the wolf gets 1-shotted all the time.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 18 2012, 09:23 PM

Done, you can get it http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10293

Posted by: King Coin Feb 18 2012, 09:38 PM

Grabbed it. Thanks.

My mod's been updated on nexus now. I don't know if it works with animals, but I don't see why it wouldn't.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 18 2012, 10:45 PM

I tried the updated Followers Can Relax. Sadly, it still does not work with my Wolf Companion. It gives you the on-screen prompt to talk to Gladio, but no actual dialog options, and nothing happens.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 18 2012, 10:48 PM

Good to know.

I'll make a new alias specifically for animals next.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 20 2012, 12:09 AM

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10463 is now up on Skyrim Nexus. It brings back the good old days when you could just summon the walking dead from thin air, rather than need to corpses already laying around to reanimate. Included are skeletons, corrupted shades, draugr, draugr lords, and dragon priests.

The only issue I had with it is that the dark souls perk will not work with the summoned undead. The other perks do work however. I made a new dual summoning perk called Twin Summons that branches off of necromancy, so the player does not have to take dark souls just to get to the double summons perk.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 21 2012, 07:01 PM

Still working on the nature summoning mod. I now have it working so all of the atronach summoning perks work with the animals as well: Atromancy, Elemental Potency, etc... My question to the audience is would you prefer that, or an entirely new perk tree for animal summons? The downside I see to using the atronach tree is that the names of the perks kills some of the immersion for an animal summoner. The upside is that it has a smaller modding footprint, as it does not touch any of the existing perks. This way my mod should still work with others that alter the Conjuration perks. I am afraid if I create a new tree, then Nature Summoning will not work with other mods that rework magic. Because of that, right now I am leaning toward keeping it the way it is now, using the atromancer perks.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 21 2012, 07:35 PM

Using the atronach perks sounds like the best bet to me. Someone could then apply it to an existing character, and then there will be fewer perks that someone would split their character on. That's just my opinion though.

I haven't been able to work on my mod at all since I put up the last update. People seem to have more problems with the new version of my mod than the old one, which makes no sense to me. I created a new controlling quest that puts a new alias on your NPC follower instead of modifying the standard follower controlling quest. This is my first real mod though, so maybe there's something going on that I don't know about.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 21 2012, 08:37 PM

I was thinking that using the Atromancer perks would also help the player by forcing them to take fewer perks. So I think I will probably keep it this way.

The quests - and especially the scripts - in this game are a lot more complicated then they used to be in Oblivion. I cannot make heads or tails of most of how they work.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 21 2012, 10:39 PM

I decided to upload Nature Summoning. You can get it http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10733. It allows you to summon Wolves, Ice Wolves, Bears, Snow Bears, Snowy Sabre Cats, and Spriggans. With the Elemental Potency perk, you will summon buffed versions of each.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 21 2012, 10:51 PM

Nice. Maybe Aravi will use some of the base level summons.


I THINK I know what I'm doing with the quests and scripting, but it took me a couple of weekends fiddling with things to figure it out. Basically, I found that the Add Property button is the surest way to make sure something gets added into the script and compiled correctly.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 22 2012, 06:38 PM

Has anyone had issues using mods packaged in .bsa files? Every one I try to use causes Skyrim to CTD on startup. That is whether I add the bsa to the .ini file or not. I have not been able to find out a reason why, although I did find http://forums.bethsoft.com/topic/1345724-important-bsas-and-you/ which strongly suggests that you not use the bsa format for mods.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 22 2012, 07:54 PM

I uploaded my Follower mod version 2 to Steam (which always uses BSA format) and nobody has complained yet.

The first version did not work at all I found. I think that was because the game was replacing my modified dialogue script with the default one when the main BSA unpacked.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 23 2012, 12:22 AM

I am not surprised. The .bsas seem to work for most people. I don't know why they always CTD on me. I guess I am going to have to always unpack them and either add them as loose files, or create omods from them.

I just uploaded Animal Friend, which makes regular animals like wolves, bears, sabre cats, etc... friendly to the player. It can be found http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10860. It is really the complement of Nature Summoning, as the two will let you play a witch/druid type character, who is a friend and protector of the animals.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 23 2012, 12:36 AM

How about dragons?

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 23 2012, 01:23 AM

Well, the only one I have ever seen - or will see - rescued me. So I do not see a need to worry about them.

Posted by: liliandra nadiar Feb 23 2012, 01:56 AM

I've got several .bsa packed mods and I haven't had a problem with them. At least not after I stopped using NMM. I did a lot of CTD or loading hangs when I used a mod manager. Just handle things manually now.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 23 2012, 02:22 AM

Maybe it is my mod manager then? I have never used the Nexus Mod Manager. I am old-fashioned, and prefer to do things myself. I am using TES Mod Manager though, basically the latest evolution of OBMM. I really do not want to part with it though. Being able to so easily turn things into omods is just too good to part with. Not to mention changing load orders, and getting the FormID prefixes for mods.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 23 2012, 02:25 AM

I started to use NMM and I've been pretty happy with it. I don't have many mods that use BSAs so I can't really tell if they are interfering or not.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 24 2012, 04:37 AM

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=7245 It gives followers special abilities to make each one unique. Seems to work fine with my mod as well.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 26 2012, 05:19 AM

I found another mod that I really like. It adds sounds of wildlife when you are out in the world. In a forest you hear birds calling and various animals scurrying about. Even bugs. http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10886

Posted by: liliandra nadiar Feb 26 2012, 07:02 AM

Ah yes, been really like that one myself. The sole 'problem' I have with it is that it becomes a bit harder to tell when a wolf spawns near-by or if it's just background sounds.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 26 2012, 07:04 AM

I tried that one and its companion piece for dungeons. I deleted both of them soon after. They just spit out random noises at you, but with no accompanying physical sources, I found it disconcerting. It was especially bad in the dungeons, where you constantly hear hisses and screams, but nothing is there. I rely upon auditory cues to tell me if there is a monster up ahead. But that was just impossible, since I was constantly hearing things that were not there.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 26 2012, 08:08 AM

The dungeon one is a little unusual, I've thought of getting rid of it myself. I really like the wilderness one though. It's all sounds that you don't need a source for. I find it easy to image the birds are in the trees or flying out of sight. I had the wolf problem though. Kharjo didn't.

Posted by: SubRosa Feb 26 2012, 11:46 PM

I am still working on tweaking Nature Summoning. I have added spell vendors to every hold capital. Next I plan to go over the animals you can summon, and remove a few. My plan is to have one critter of each type: wolf, cat, bear, spriggan. Then for the potent versions, use a different skin. So the entry level wolf will be your regular wolf, while the potent version will use the ice wolf skin. I also need to do some work on the stats, as my own play has found them to be a bit overpowered.

In the process of working on the new NPCs, I came across a weird bug. While not game-breaking, it is very immersion-destroying. New NPCs can come out having a different skin color on their face then the rest of their body, completely ignoring what you set their faces too in the CK. That includes ignoring warpaint and the like. There is an obstacle course of things you can do to work around it, but it seems like too much of a pain in the rear to me. http://forums.bethsoft.com/topic/1343692-color-mismatch-facebody/

Posted by: King Coin Mar 4 2012, 04:07 PM

Well I've released the http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=9504 of my mod and I tested it on Gladio and it works on him. This version allows you to put up to 10 followers (in case you are using a multiple followers mod) into wander mode.

EDIT: I put up a new file because I realized that my dialog conditions excluded animals IF you did not already have a humanoid follower. It should be fixed now.

Posted by: SubRosa Mar 4 2012, 08:26 PM

I tried it on Gladio, and see no effect at all. There are no dialogue options. No change at all. Unless I go the first file you uploaded. I will re-download once it lets me.

Posted by: King Coin Mar 4 2012, 08:50 PM

Yeah, I didn't realize there was a counter for followers and a counter for animals. I just removed that condition and just kept CurrentFollowerFaction as a prerequisite.

Posted by: SubRosa Mar 4 2012, 08:59 PM

I was able to download it now, and it works! I'll update the page for Gladio.

Posted by: SubRosa Mar 4 2012, 10:43 PM

I have been working on a mod that adds general stores to the cities that lack them. I now have them in Morthal, Dawnstar, and Winterhold. So that means the capital of every hold has a general trader. Now I am thinking of adding them to the smaller places, like Ivarstead, Shor's Stone, Dragon Bridge etc...

It has been difficult because of the bug that gives new NPCs purple faces. I found that Nord males seem to be immune, so that is what I have made every shopkeeper so far. I also had some strangeness with AI Packages. One fella disappeared from the game until I removed all of his packages - even though they told him to remain in his store. He works fine without them though, so that is how he is currently.

Posted by: King Coin Mar 4 2012, 10:53 PM

That sounds great! Good luck with the NPCs. What a weird bug.

Posted by: SubRosa Mar 6 2012, 07:55 PM

I just released 2.0 of http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10733. This is a big overhaul of the mod. I removed two of the summonings as they felt redundant. Now there are just Wolves, Sabre Cats, Bears, and Spriggans. However, I also added permanent Thrall-versions of each, in addition to the Potent versions you will summon if you have Elemental Potency. I also added spell vendors to the capital of every hold, making it easier then ever to buy the spells. They also have a random chance of having a soul gem for sale, and the Master Trader perk will work with them.

The vendors can be found in the following locations:
Whiterun: Morcant, in the Temple of Kynareth.
Falkreath: Grimassi, in Dead Man's Drink.
Solitude: Penczak, in the Temple of the Divines.
Dawnstar: Blavatskh, in the Windpeak Inn.
Markath: Moura, in the Hag's Cure.
Morthal: Buckland, in Highmoon Hall.
Riften: Cuhulain, in Mistveil Keep.
Windhelm: Valiente, in the New Gnisis Cornerclub.
Winterhold: Starhawk, in the Frozen Hearth.

A cookie for anyone who recognizes where I got the names for the new vendors.



I also discovered while playing yesterday that if you are using the Animal Friend mod, the natural predators will join in fights to help you, if they are close enough. Primrose was mixing it up with some Thalmor, when a wolf suddenly turned up and leant her a helpful fang.

Posted by: King Coin Mar 6 2012, 08:10 PM

Well, there's Morcant that I recognize from your story, some of the other names seem somewhat familiar while others I do not recognize at all.

I suppose I could google but that would be cheating.

What I'm thinking of doing is maybe making more beds for rent in the world. Some small villages don't have an inn, which is fine, but I think there should be someone in the village willing to rent out a small room in their home. Maybe at some of the more isolated mills as will.

Posted by: SubRosa Mar 9 2012, 11:37 PM

I finished the last vendor for my General Stores mod. *Phew* that was a lot of stores. Not to mention a lot of purple faces I had to find ways to make less obvious. But now every town and city has a general store to sell your loots in. It ought to make adventuring a little easier, since you do not have to go trekking as far to find a place to unload all the crap you picked off of dead things. Now you can base yourself in little places like Ivarstead, or Karthwasten. I need to do some testing to be sure the packages are working for all the merchants, then I will put it on the nexus.

Posted by: King Coin Mar 14 2012, 05:45 AM

I just finished a new version of my mod. Vanilla Followers have voiced responses now. That was a lot of work, just to let you know.

Get it on http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=9504 or http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=12466.

Posted by: SubRosa Apr 8 2012, 07:18 PM

There is a new mod out called http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=11135. It fleshes out the quest descriptions, adding directions of who to talk to and where to go. So you do not have to rely upon the quest arrow in your hud. I am downloading it now to try out.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 8 2012, 10:31 PM

Well, since this thread is here, might as well...

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=11919 is my current big project (though currently on hiatus due to scripting limitations that I need SKSE to resolve). The aim is to diversify Skyrim's economy system and eventually allow the economy to react to events in the game. It is definitely NOT finished at this point, and is only at the Proof-of-Concept stage. Use at your own risk.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=12932 was a side project I decided to cobble together while I was waiting for SKSE. It overhauls and re-balances the Standing Stone powers, and now allows you to choose between one of three spells for each Stone. It also allows you to keep multiple abilities, but with certain limitations (based on the series Birthsign lore). I made this mod to make Standing Stones have more meaning to your character and to make them a bit more lore-friendly. This mod I do now consider complete.

I am now working on a third mod which will also be small, but should be quite useful to you. More on that later.

Posted by: King Coin Apr 8 2012, 11:16 PM

Let us know what it is like.


I really like the way this one sounds. I've yet to download it, but it's on my tracking list so I won't forget it.


I've updated my mod. It adds a couple of commands to your followers. They can just relax or gather ingredients from plants for you at this time.

To do this, just talk to your companion and choose the topic "We'll stay here for a while..." A couple of choices will appear. Choose one and they will either start looking for ingredients or just relax.
There is NO time limit for how long you can leave them relaxing or searching for ingredients.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0MWXyXinCY

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 9 2012, 07:29 PM

My latest:

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=14778

It does as it says, you can have your horse tagged with a quest marker so you can easily find it again when you lose it.

Posted by: SubRosa Apr 18 2012, 10:18 PM

I have updated http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=10733 with a fix for the NPC grey face bug. No other real changes though.

Now that this is fixable, I'll be uploading my General Stores mod soon. I just have to fix a weird issue where one of the new NPCs keeps falling through the floor of his smithy...

Posted by: King Coin Jun 2 2012, 05:10 AM

I released Fatigue. It causes your character to start breathing heavy when they lose 70% of their stamina. They continue to breath heavy until their stamina returns to 100%.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RKw3S0a6TE

Get it at http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=18039 or http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=74679532