Returning to Skyrim after several years, I will be playing an immersive game where I *LIVE* the adventure:

I expect to take several months finishing the game, if I ever do. Restarting some weeks later, if I die.

So, it is serious business. Therefore, I wish to ask for advice:

*** What are your suggested house rules & mod selection for such a run?

1. Difficulty level? ("Normal" perhaps? Since dead-is-dead is punishing if you are used to reloading after every stray trap & arrow)

2. Immersion mods: (Frost & Weather & Food mods that are not too punishing)

What are your suggestions?

3. Content & difficulty mods:

- What I need is a mod or mod cocktail wherein:

(i) I cannot break the system, e.g., by over-enchanting & over-smithing

(ii) Magic remains useful, but not overpowered (so, perhaps, a scaling mod for magic damage with skill)

(iii) Dragons are though, special fights (but not hopelessly so)

(iv) (maybe) better scaling of enemies beyond lvls 20-30 AND/OR (maybe) reducing the level scaling AND/OR changes to combat system -- (But not too drastic -- ideally I wanna stray not too far from the original game design.)

Keep in mind that since I intend to be playing a dead-is-dead game over a multiple month run, a combination where I expect to "reload" for a simple mistake is unacceptable. If I die, it should be because I deserved it, not because of bad mod balance.

Thanks in advance for all detailed advice (ideally with mod links) to all the kindred adventurers out there!

For immersion mods the following will do the job for you. Most of those will allow you to suit the levels to what you want.

Frostfall: Will make the cold areas feel cold and you can die due to exposure. Also getting wet is not a good thing and you can die due to swimming in cold water. You can adjust many features of this mod.

Wet and Cold: Adds quite a bit of small features to the game such as seeing your breath when it is cold and having townsfolk wearing gear that is suited for the current weather. There are other great features as well. Works great with Frostfall

Climates of Tamerial: Nice mod for seeing different weathers as well as adjusting the lighting if you want it.

Cloaks of Skyrim and Winter is Coming mods: Both work well together by adding more gear that is suited for the cold Skyrim climate.

A follow up question:

How about good no-fast-travel mods (with more carriage routs maybe) or no compass mods?

iHud is a great mod - disables the compass (but allows you to toggle it on if/when you want), disables crosshairs except when you have a bow or spell equipped or when you hover over something to interact with - there's a lot of little features for customization too.

As for food, I've been using iNeed, and it's doing what's advertised. Eat, drink, sleep - pretty straightforward.