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Updates - End of 2020 and Early 2021

Some exciting things happening in the modding community:

This community never ceases to amaze me. I return from a brief hiatus of a few months to a bustling modding scene with new tools, new mods, updated mods, more Wabbajack lists than ever, and so much more! While I hinted at some of these things in the last post, I wanted to look more in depth at some of the new/updated things that all of these amazing people are working on. Without further ado, some of the cooler things that are happening in the world of Skyrim modding:

Wyrmstooth

I think that most everyone that has been modding for even a short period of time has heard of Wyrmstooth and most have probably played it. It was taken off the Nexus by the author, Jonx0r, when he quit modding but was still hosted offsite (and therefore still on many many modlists, my own included). But as of this month, it is back on the Nexus, with an update! This mod adds a new land with one of the longest and most impressive dungeons (in my opinion), with new NPCs, new side quests, and more. I played through this for the first time last spring, with several custom followers (Inigo, Lucien, and Kaidan) and apart from a random crash at one point (that was not repeatable, and honestly could have been caused by any number of other things including a page file limitation), it was a smooth experience that felt vanilla. The bosses were tough but fun with my posse of followers (including those the mercenaries that were part of the mod) and the only real downside is that I had too much loot to carry around with me. There are already so many patches and addons for other mods (most of which “should” work with the updated version, but definitely check on specific ones and check out the changelog on the mod itself). For more info, check out these links:

Capital Expansions

Surjamte is at it again! After expanding Whiterun to be the hold we always wanted it to be, he turned his sights on Windhelm and has astounded us once again. With new landmarks, new NPCs, new quests, and more, this is now truly the City of Kings. To top it all off, Surjamte is working on his update to Riften, with videos on YouTube showcasing some of the work he is doing. For more info, check out these links:

Enigma Series

We’ve changed so much in our modded Skyrim, but I haven’t seen a voice rework mod series like this one that came out in 2020: Satafinix and his Enigma Series. You know the goosebumps you got when Darth Vader or Smaug or Bane or Ultron or fill-in-the-blank villain spoke for the first time? You knew they were someone to fear. You know the goosebumps you got when Alduin or Miraak spoke for the first time? Not quite the same, was it? Well, this mod series updates their voices and brings a whole new level of immersion. I am not exaggerating when I say that just listening to the clips on the mod page gave me goosebumps, so I knew I had to add these to my game. For most of these, Satafinix gives an example of each vanilla voice and the remake so you can really hear the difference before even downloading. The voices that have already been reworked include:

Animation

Vanilla Skyrim animations look…well like they are a decade old, because they are. But the good news, is that there are so many possibilities for animation mods to be created/used using the multitude of frameworks available. The most recent framework sweeping the modding scene is Dynamic Animation Replacer (DAR) by Felisky384, which was first uploaded in March 2020 and already has nearly a hundred mods built upon it. I can’t play without half a dozen of these now. Here is the list of mods that currently require (some as a hard requirement; some as optional) this framework (Note: these are just the ones on the Nexus; there may be others hosted elsewhere):

(SGC) SkySA – Combat Behavior Compulsion        

Akaviri Martial Arts – Oriental Swordsmanship Redux

Animated Armoury – DAR Version – New Weapons with animations          

Armor Traders 2               

Armor Type Specific Animations

Artifact Animation Replacer – Wabbajack              

Attack Animations and Movesets             

Attack Behavior Revamp              

Awakened Warrior Greatsword Animations SE   

Black Flame Friede Dual-Wield Animations SE     

Catwalk animation (SSE dynamic and normal port)

Children won’t use sexy animations

CIWM – Custom Idle WheelMenu SE       

Claw Animations for Animated Armoury – Orakin 2020 Animations

Cold Region Behavior – Beta Test

Combo Animation Framework  

cookeh’s conditional and random animations – CCARA DAR          

Couch Lance – Convenient Horse Add-on              

DAR – Animated Fear (SE Port)   

DAR – Dynamic Swimming           

DAR – Less Creepy Cisero Dance

DAR – Modesty – Cover Yourself

DAR – Onehand Melee Exhaustion           

Dark Knight Greatsword Animations SE 

Diverse Random Normal Attack

Double Bed Spooning – DAR        

Draw 2 – Dual Weapon Equip-Unequip Animations           

Dynamic Animation Replacer – Crawl on all Fours Animation        

Dynamic Animation Replacer – Flying and Hovering          

Dynamic Animation Replacer Multiple Power Attacks Animations

Dynamic Random Female Idles V2

Dynamic Sitting Idles     

Eating Animations and Sounds SE             

Eltmer (Fairy Race) SE    

EVG Animation Variance

EVG Conditional Idles    

Feline Movement Animations for Khajits Only (FMAK) SSE            

Female look out Idle (Normal and Dynamic conversion)

Feral – Claw Unarmed Attacks for Beast Races – Vampires – Werewolves 

First Person Artifact Animation Replacer

First Person Combat Animations Overhaul (superceded)

First Person Combat Animations Overhaul 2.0 -SIZE MATTERS

Genesis AR – Player Animation Rebuild   

Glaive Master Animations SE      

Go To Bed – DAR patch

Hand to Hand Blocking Animation

Injured Animations Dynamic Replacer SE              

Jarl Sitting Animation Replacer – Vanilla – DAR – FNIS – Nemesis

Jump Behavior Overhaul

Kenjutsu Nyumon Animation     

Knockout and Surrender – Non-Lethal Pacifist yielding options

Male Idle Animation (dynamic port)        

Movement Behavior Overhaul

New Weapons Types and Animation Support      

Optimized Animations for First Person Camera mods      

Ostentatious Swordsmen (A SAS style animation pack)

Perks 125 skill lvl

Races Base IA – Improved Core Animation Rebuilder        

Random Diverse empty Dynamic animation block behavior folder. Insert your favourite animations.         

Rolling after landing (Controllable)          

Rugged Blade Warrior (A SAS animation set)

Rumple’s Dual Wield Idle

Sexy Combat Animations (conversion and DAR version) 

Sexy Random Idles (simple and dynamic)              

Sexy Sit Animations (conversion)

Shinobi Combat – Sekiro in Skyrim

SIdeSaddle Combat Animations

Simple Pistol Shooting Animation by Loop(With standalone pistol) – SSE 

Simple Potion Drinking Animation by Loop – SSE

Sit Crosslegged SE           

Sky Idles SE        

Sky Sprint SE      

Skyrim Spear Mechanic and OMEGA Heavy Armory Enchanted patch       

Skyrim Spear Mechanic SE

Smooth Combat – Non Combat Animation System

Smooth Magic Casting Animation             

Smooth Random Blocking Animation      

Spaghetti Western – Western style revolver and rifle in skyrim    

Spice up your Skyrim     

Stances – Dynamic Animation Sets           

Subtle Jump

The old Warrior ( God Of War Inspired Combo Aninmation set )

There Is No Umbra – A floating sword follower

True Spear Combat – DAR            

Unarmed 4-Direcitonal Power Attacks   

Unarmed Block Animation          

Unarmed Body hook Animation

Unique NPC Overhaul – Lydia the Shieldmaiden 

Unique Player Throne Animation              

Weapon buff by Loop – SSE         

Weapon Exhaustion (An Animation Replacer)

Werewolf Howl Adjustment

Synthesis

My folder of tools I use in Mod Organizer is growing more rapidly than I ever thought it would. I started out with LOOT and xEdit, but now have a dozen other tools ready to go for whatever specific need might pop up. A brand-new option was added to my tool bag recently: Synthesis. While I am still learning about how to use this properly, I would be remiss to not add it to this post just because I don’t understand it entirely at this point (and let’s face it, I am far from an expert on most of these tools; you wouldn’t call me to come fix something, but I can putter around in my own home without causing further damage). What is Synthesis (besides a really cool name for a modding tool)? From the ReadMe: Synthesis is “a framework and GUI to construct a single Bethesda game patch from many patcher sources.” It uses the Mutagen framework (“a C# library for analyzing, modifying, and creating Bethesda mods), which is beyond the scope of this post/website, but definitely check it out if you are so inclined (both Synthesis and Mutagen were created by Noggog). So what is Synthesis in terms that a modder like myself will actually understand and be able to use? Let’s take Know Your Enemy as an example. This mod adds a system into Skyrim that alters resistances and weaknesses of enemies/armors to various attacks. A flame spell won’t have the same effect on Ice Atronachs and Flame Atronachs. Arrows won’t have the same effect on leather armor as they will on metal armor. You get the idea. This is a really fun way to change up combat in the game in an intuitive way, which forces the player to use an arsenal of weapons or spells, rather than relying on the same things over and over. But, what happens when you add in other mods that add new enemies or new armor/weapons? Yeah, you all know the answer: you have to patch them. That is where Synthesis comes in to help: there are Know Your Enemy and Know Your Armor Patchers that will patch your load order for this mod with significantly less work than if you had to manually do so. You can do a similar thing with zEdit, but there is a 255 ESP limit. (Trawzified wrote these patchers, as well as others listed below) I look forward to diving more into both Synthesis and Mutagen, but wanted to give a brief overview as they both have a lot of potential. (Also, if anyone more knowledgeable than me sees anything incorrect here, please let me know so that I can fix it!) For more info, check out these links:

Wabbajack

There are more Wabbajack lists than ever, with something for just about everyone. Between lighter options like the Vanilla+ Phoenix Flavour and heavily modded options like Skyrimified, or something in between like Elysium, there are so many directions you can (easily) take your Skyrim game. There are even options for NSFW modlists, or just graphic overhauls, or even the bare minimum bug fixes to start building your own personally curated modlist. There is a new page on the site that goes into more detail, with basic setup instructions and helpful tips, a chart of currently available modlists, and what I’m most excited about: I’m starting a review section as well! I will hopefully do a follow up post within the week with more details on this.

Currently available modlists for Skyrim SE (not including unofficial submissions):

“…but the true joy of exploration is in the discovery, and so I leave the rest to you…”

~An Explorer’s Guide to Skyrim