Typically I wish to spend a day messing up Skyrim with a Korean mod that drops a complete modern-day metropolis into it, full with motorbikes that change the horses however nonetheless neigh disconcertingly if you trip them. Perhaps I will check out that banned mod that turns Skyrim into World Conflict 2 subsequent.
However after I return for an extended playthrough, my tastes get way more plain. I do not need dragons that seem like “Macho Man” Randy Savage. I would like dragons that seem like dragons, and a Skyrim that looks like Skyrim—simply tweaked to appear a bit brisker.
“Vanilla Plus” is what Skyrim modders name the varsity of thought the place you discover mods that embrace the unique sport’s higher qualities, somewhat than making an attempt to bend it into one thing utterly totally different. We can’t be changing all of the NPCs with botox perfection right now, nor will we be turning the fight right into a soulslike. Sadly, there is no such thing as a place for Thomas the Tank Engine in a Vanilla Plus loadout.
Step one is graphical, however somewhat than the form of ENB reshade that makes each outside scene an Instagram sundown, I’m going with Neighborhood Shaders. First uploaded in 2023, the work of the Neighborhood Shaders Group offers a basis for graphical enhancements with no efficiency hit—although you may must let the shaders compile in your first load after putting in them.
There is a heap of add-ons linked from the mod’s description web page, and I’m going with Subsurface Scattering to offer everybody extra practical pores and skin, Dynamic Cubemaps for reflections and water, the Gentle Restrict Repair to bypass the arduous restrict of 4 dynamic lights Skyrim usually has, Display-Area Shadows to get hair that casts shadows on faces, and Grass Lighting as a result of it makes the fields look good.
Throw in Auto Parallax and Complicated Parallax Supplies so as to add depth to flat surfaces, and we have got a Skyrim that appears noticeably higher in a side-by-side comparability whereas clearly being the identical sport.
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We’re not fairly carried out with the graphics but, however the last steps are slightly extra elective. Although I do not need to give everybody a glam makeover, I do need Excessive Poly Heads and Hair for All Vanilla NPCs, and since the uniform grottiness of everybody in Skyrim appears a bit a lot at instances, I add Clear Vanilla Our bodies to get rid of that distracting filth.
Lastly, whereas I feel it’s kind of an excessive amount of trouble spending quarter-hour to configure one mod that creates customized Stage of Element fashions (which I might must reconfigure each time I modify my thoughts about what different mods I would like put in) simply to get rid of some pop-in, there’s a lazy shortcut out there. Excellent Terrain LOD will populate these mid-range cells with bushes and grass so they do not seem with alarming suddenness each time I wander throughout the plains close to Whiterun, and it is a one-and-done set up.
Now we’re lastly carried out with the visuals, it is time for fight. Quite than including dodge rolls, digital camera lock-on, and stagger bars, Vanilla Plus means enhancing Skyrim options just like the number of spells your common wizard hanging out at Fellglow Maintain has at their disposal. As a result of the AI defaults to casting no matter does probably the most harm, nonetheless, they hardly ever use them—until we set up NPC Spell Variance. This mod additionally impacts your followers, who ought to now forged therapeutic spells on you and different allies.
Observe that with Precision – Correct Melee Collisions, which allows physics-based hit reactions, a function Bethesda labored on however apparently did not end in time and easily disabled within the sport recordsdata. This mod offers with the bugs and re-enables these hit reactions, that means enemies will react procedurally primarily based on the place they’re struck. It additionally makes melee assaults bodily correct, so it’s going to be simpler to keep away from hitting allies and bystanders, and weapons will clang off partitions if you attempt to swing a greatsword in a tunnel.
One very last thing we need to add is a few quests, as a result of whereas we’re not trying to change your complete story it could be good to shake up a number of the aspect stuff. Fortune’s Tradehouse is a bundle of sidequests primarily based round a brand new location in Markarth that feels probably the most like genuine Skyrim out of any quest mod I’ve performed, whereas Skyrim Prolonged Reduce – Saints and Seducers replaces an underwhelming Creation Membership quest from the Anniversary Version with an homage to Oblivion’s Shivering Isles enlargement, full with a voice actor who does such a very good Sheogorath impression I needed to verify he wasn’t the unique man.
That ought to be sufficient to be getting on with, although I can even add SkyUI and A High quality World Map and Alternate Begin and Dynamic Collision Adjustment as a result of I am unable to assist myself, although the advantage of limiting your self to a particular mod fashion like Vanilla Plus is you’ve got obtained an excuse to cease. The toughest a part of modding is realizing if you’re carried out. After I decide to a Vanilla Plus playthrough it provides me a cause to say, no, truly I needn’t add the Leaps of Religion from Murderer’s Creed this time, and as a substitute I can shut the Nexus Mods tab and really play the sport.
Hopefully, for longer than it took to put in all these mods this time.
