Okay so how can I make mods? Ive never made one before but I want to learn how. I want to make a few spells and maybe some companion characters and some transformations. How hard is the modding process?
What do I need to do? And how to I put them into the game?

well you'll definetely need the http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/The_Elder_Scrolls_Construction_Set (usually just called the CS)

Also checkout the http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/Main_Page for lots of beginner tips

PS, then say goodbye to you real life as you know it

oh the joys of learning thehttp://www.elderscrolls.com/downloads/updates_utilities.htm. Sit back because good ol' Nolan is here to type up a long guide just to help you starting out. But it's late (or early, depending on how you look at it) and I can't seem to get to sleep, so bare with me if I have bad typing or grammar.

first off, click the link on the word's "construction set". That is the tool you will use to make 99.9% of every Oblivion modification. It'd blow me away if you can use it to make a modification to something else not Oblivion
also, some very, very good tips are located at the http://cs.elderscrolls.com/, which, from this point on out, the "Construction Set" will be refered to as the CS.

after installing it, it should have installed to your Oblivion folder. Launch it from there, and it should pop up pretty fast. now click the folder icon located below the "file" and "edit" buttons to bring up a dialogue box. This box shows all your .esps and .esms in your Oblivion/Data folder.
.ESMs are modifications to Oblivion that are required for other mods to work. I would say about 80% of all mods just require the Oblivion.esm
.ESPs are the normal modification which are the mods dependent on a .esm, which, again, about 80% of those mods only require the main .esm: Oblivion.esm.

To create a new mod, double click on your Oblivion.esm and give the CS a minute to load up all the items you will find in vanilla Oblivion. Vanilla refers to unmoddified Oblivion...how the term came around is beyond me, but just know that term as it is used often.
As you can tell you have a plethora of things to choose from, aside from all the options at the top of the CS. But, before diving into making a mod and learn all the buttons and icons and so forth, take a minute to arrange all your windows to a comfortable position. If you are running 2 monitors, I suggest lengthening both the Object window, and cell view window as long as you can make them - so long as you can still see the tool bar at the top of the CS - and make both of them about the same size as each other, one taking up half the screen, the other taking up the other half. In this case, I usually have the Object Window a little bit wider than the Cell View window, as I find myself using the Object window more often thant the Cell View Window.
Now, resize and reposition your Render window to fit the other monitor. This is a pretty decent set up that I like to use. Of course, if you are using only 1 monitor, I recomend splitting the screen into thirds. One area for the Object Window which should be the largest window. An area for Cell View window, which I position right below the Object window, but squashed down. and lastly, filling up the rest of the space with the Render Window.

Each window has it's own features (obviously) and they are all important to making a mod.
The Object window does just as it says and contains all the items you will find in the game. This is also where you will be able to add your own meshes and textures if you have made and .nif files (with corresponding .dds files). Also in this window you will find your NPCs and creatures. I will go more indepth where you can find those in just a minute, but first let's move on to the Cell View Window.
The cell view window has 3 important sections to it, let's start at the top of it. You can see the words, "World Space" and to the left is a drop down box. This drop down box will show every world space in the Vanilla Game (and also - once you add your own world space, it will be located there too). World Spaces are the different areas in the game. Every different area is split up into small sections called Cells.
I will not explain every world space, however let me cover a few.
By default when opening the CS, you will be on interiors, or, more literally speaking, [space]interiors. Interiors is pretty self explanatory. Every interior - from Aylied ruin to Inn - is located in this World space. Each city in the game is in it's own world space as well (unless you are using the Open Cities mod). As you can see in the drop down box, you will find a world space for every major city, from Anvil to Chorrol. However, since the Imperial City is divided into sections, each section of the Imperial City is a seperate World Space. They will be titled with an abbreviasion of the Imperial City, IC, and then the name of that section. Example: ICmarketdistrict.
Lastly, the most important world space, I find myself in all the time, is the Tamriel World Space. This world space is by far the largest world space in Vanilla, and probably the largest world space ever. This does not just include the Vanilla playing area, but also the lands outside of the boarders - Skyrim, Blackmarsh, Summerset, Morrowind, ect - that are normally not playable in Vanilla. Also, this includes the seemingly endless sea that surrounds Tamriel.
Now don't get hasty and decide to put your new house at God's End of No Where somewhere in Morrowind. These lands have not had a "height map" made of them and so it would look...extremely odd if you put something there. If you want to build a mod in those areas, I recommend looking at http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=27235.

But wait! We aren't done with the Cell View Window yet!
Below the drop down box is your cell picker in that currently selected world space. They are defaulted to arrange by the editor ID (which is the same for every thing including scripts, objects, cells, and so forth), however, you can arrange them by clicking the tabs at the top.
Additionally, you will see on the right side of your cell picker that there is a box filled with objects (if you selected a cell). This box shows the objects that have been placed in that cell. Personally, I never found a use for this information, but it is there, so use it when you need to.

Last in the agenda of windows, is the render window. Not much should be said about this. Its the place where you will see a cell that you have loaded up (by double clicking on that cell). A few hot keys that I find are vital that can only be used in render window: A - automatically brighten the lights to (default) noon in game, or un brighten the lights to about 10PM in game (unless in an interior cell, every will go pitch black). F - this will drop your furrent selected item down until it touches another object or surface. This is useful when making house if you want to place furniture and don't want it to float. Delete - self explanatory. Deletes the selected object. Z,X,Y - moves selected object on that axis by left clicking and dragging the mouse. additionally, you can right click to rotate the object on that axis. it defaults (when not holding down a key) to rotating the object on the Y axis. Ctrl + C - this is a universal (PC) hot key that can also be used in the CS. It copies the selected Objects. Use Ctrl + V to paste them. Left Clicking and dragging will create a selection box. Drag the selection box around the items you want to select.

Boy...we have barely touched on everything. Before beginning your mod, I recommened reading this next section. I don't want to loose your attention, so I am going to skip going over the buttons in the CS and just go to making a mod. (I will come back to the buttons and other important info later.)

Okay, making a mod. Pretty simple. Objects you want in your mod is done by simple clicking on the object in the Object WIndow and dragging it into the render window. move the object around to your liking, and done! Now, say you want to create a new weapon. Let's say, you have a .nif file with corresponding .dds files. So, to create a new weapon you can just click on the + sign for Items, then click on weapons, and right click in the object list and hit new...but let's go an alternative route, since by doing this you will have to set EVERY option.
So, let's say you want your sword to be equivilent of a glass sword. So, you click the + sign for weapons and find "Glass". In the glass list there will be a bunch of options, but scroll down till you find the ID, "WeapGlassLongsword" and double click it to bring up properties. NOW WAIT!!!!
Don't be hasty and change ANYTHING yet. It is a very, very, very - and I cannot stress this enough - VERY good habit to get into the first thing you do when editing a base object is first, EDIT IT'S ID!!! this is very important and I will explain why in just a sec. Change it to something you and anyone else would recognize. I like to use the initials of my mod's name (example: my mod is Camp Simplicity, so all my objects in my mod are named CS[objectname]) while others like to use their name initials. like my name is Nolan Thomas Murillo, so my mod would be NTM[objectname]
Now, in this window for the blade we have lots of input boxes. The ID we already went over, the name is the name that will be shown in game. The type of weapon is...well obvious. This will define the animations for fighting with it plus the stat it will give exp to. the script is a script you would run on this blade. like Dawn/DuskFang you could attach a script to it like that. Enchanting is the enchantment you put on it by using a made enchantment or going to spells/enchantment and making a new one. The Enchment number is how much of a charge it will have, and the "ignores Normal Weapon Resistance" means it will act like a silver/daedric weapon when attacking ghosts.
As you can see with the glass sword, there is already a nif in place for the first button. Here, you would select the button and assign the folder path for the new mesh (.nif) file. Below that is a button. it says .dds...but...this isn't the textures on the sword! This is the button where you would assign the folder path for the menu icon for this object.
Below that are 6 more boxes: Weight is how much it weighs, Value is how much it costs/sells for, Health is the amoutn of times it can be swung before breaking, speed is the reate at which you swing the blade, reach is the reach of the blade (will not modify the mesh of the sword, so if set too high, it will look like an invisible sword), and damage is the amount of damage it will hit. below that is the "quest item" check box. This will make it - obviously - a quest item if you check it.

once done modifying it to your liking, hit okay, when the dialogue box comes up saying: "Old ID: WeapGlassLongsword New ID: [object id]
You have changed the form's editor ID. Create a new form?"
besure - and again - I cannot stress this enough! Be sure to say YES. If you say no, then click yes, this will change every existing glass sword in the game into your new sword.
now with that done you know some basics of using the Constuction Set. oh, and yes, you need to create a new ID for EVERY new object you make in game that modifies the Vanilla Settings for the object - swords, bows, arrows, armor, lights, ect.

I recommend taking the time to play around in the CS and expirament with setting/options and so forth. So long as you don't edit anything vanilla/make duplicates of vanilla objects, I believe you won't be able to break the game to an unfixable state. so anything that you conjure up in the CS - no matter how horrifying or cheat like it is - you can just deactivate your .esp.
Speaking of I should run over how to save your file and load it back up real fast. Saving is easy, click the flop disc icon next to the folder icon. if this is your first time editing on the .esm, a dialogue box will come up where you can save the .esp (defaults to Oblivion/Data) and the name of the .esp. To load the .esp up again for editing, you will no longer need to double click the master file any more. Just scroll down to your .esp and select it, then click the button that says "set active plugin", and this will automatically activate the Oblivion.esm. Be sure to select the "set active plugin" other wise you won't come up with your mod.

now, that you have been edumacated, I will begin the additional stuff and a few more advanced stuff.
okay, because I knew you would be hasty and just want to rush into tackling the CS, I had to jump to editing objects. But now that you are back for more and your have wet your appetite for the CS, I can now continue to explain more on the function you can do outside of the Object Window, Cell View Window, and Render Window.

Not every mod adds pretty new houses or weapons, but some mods add other things. Before we get to that though, let's look at some of these other buttons on the tool bar.
First off if you are ever unsure about what one button does, hover your mouse over the button for a few seconds and below the toolbar a message will display what it is. (be sure to have the seperate windows out of the way so you can read it).
We already covered the folder and the disk icon, so next in the finger icon which is a quick link to your preferences and settings for using the CS. Alternatively to the quick button, you can also select file and go down to Preferences. Next is undo. Though this is a quick button, I find using the universal undo key combination: Ctrl + Z much easier to use. Yes, this combination works here, just like in Photoshop, Microsoft Word, Sony Vegas, and nearly every program available for the PC ( I dunno about MAC...I don't use one).
The next arrow is redo...I never use it, but if you do undo a mistake you realize was not a mistake, using ctrl + Y is better. Next on the list are two very useful tools that are EXPECTIONALLY helpful for editing interiors (houses, caves, ect). That is lock to grid, and lock to angle (respectively going left to right). Lock to grid will lock objects in the world space to a defined grid. Lock to Angle locks object to an angle when being roated. to edit the grid/angle the objects lock to, right click in the gray area of the render window. and select "Render Window Properties". By default it will open up to the lighting. Switch to the "Movement" tab to edit grid spacing and angle alignment.

Starting at the top, I recommend leaving movement speed alone, unless you are moving an object across a large distance (if this is the case, I find ctrl+z, ctrl+v faster). below that is a number that defines grid spacing. I recommend using multiples of 4. I use in multiples of 8 (which 4 is still a multiple of, but 4 is the "half" while you can consider 8 and "whole")
The default grid spacing is the rather large, 72. I find this number to big to handle moving objects around effectively, so I lower it to either 16 or 8, depending on what exactly I am moving around. smaller the number, the less it will feel like there is a grind.
Below that is rotation speed. Leave this alone, it doesn't matter.
Next is the snap to angle value. It is defaulted to 45, and I find this to be pretty appropriate is about 70% of my modding cases. However, if necessary, I would say 10 + (in multiples of 5) is a good value too, depending on how exact you need your object.
Leave the other values alone, as I never found the need to change them.

moving right along, we come to the next button, the World Heightmap Editor...and sadly, I cannot help you on this section, as I have not once in my modding career touched this. so, onto the next is the Landscape editer. This is a important tool if you are creating a new exterior worldspace. This will help you terraform the ground to the shape you like, and also below that are the textures, which you can apply to the ground by right clicking. (obviously, left clicking and dragging will shift the ground up or down).
I am loosing my "explanatory steam" here, so I am just gonna say, figure out the values and so forth on your own. However, let me explain the 2 check boxes.
Flatten vertices is useful creating flat smooth areas with tiny (almost unnoticable) hills. Soften Vertices (I use most) helps create a natural bend in the land by removing the sharp points and rounding them out. only one of these options can be checked on at a time, and both of them use the left-click drag to work.
and I am going to wrap things up here, and I will come back later and continue the lesson.

Why am I doing this? First off: I can't get to sleep, and have nothing better to do. Second, I was in your position once, and all I got was a bunch of CSWiki links and no personal one-on-one teaching. Sadly, I don't think the Wiki's do a good job teaching.

Besides the awesome CS wiki there are also some easy to follow http://www.invision.tesalliance.org/forums/index.php?/forum/12-construction-set-basics/ for beginners at TESAlliance.

Another great tool, especially to pick apart other peoples' mods and get an idea of how everything fits together, is http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=11536.

:P speaking of I have not picked that up since my most recent install of Oblivion...I have been having a friend run all my mods through it for me
thanks for that link for my laziness :hehe: now I don't have to google search it. (even though it would more than likely be the first link)

Can I take someones mod that has spells and alter them? Not to put them up for downloads or to steal them. Just to alter them to my taste? LIke say the mod here http://tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=19641.

Nvm I tried, and it is to complicated for me. I have failed at my greatest dream.

Of course you can adjust them so they fit your taste.
As long as you don't upload it somewhere, nobody can forbid you doing so.
And if something is too complicated, don't give up. It takes some time to learn using the CS.

yep... time... still trudging here with the learning

i tried the edit thing but it gives me an error and shuts down when I try to start it.

you're going to have to be much more specific than that. what does the error say, for instance? what exactly are you trying to edit? are you using the latest version of the CS?

There is a seperate editing tool up there in the links. I downloaded it and just clicked it and it would not start.

okay, brief lesson on some important things.

Whenever you try to load up a .esp, it is going to give you an error report. Just say "Yes To All" because if you say no it will end your "editing session". So, just be sure to click Yes To All. The CS is more buggy than Oblivion and to apease it you must travel through the labyrinth of assorted WTF things and other oddities just to get some functions to work. You will find this happening surprisingly often during your first time using the CS since everything is alien to you.
My best advice is to you, is save often, read all diaglogue boxes, and if in doubt push "no". If pushing no didn't do what you wanted, reload, and do the option you wanted.

Actually...now that I think about it, I can only think of times where saying "yes" will have a positive outcome while saying no can lead to a very dirty mod and potentially game breaking. So...use your common judgement when to say no and when to say yes (as are the facts of life).

You cannot open the CS and expect things handed to you on a silver platter. The CS is a untamable beast, neigh, an unforgivable monster that will wreck your mind into nothing more than a pile of rubble. You will have to spend a long time learning the basics before tackling the extremes. I say start off with making small modifications to areas you see fit. Don't be afraid to reference the wiki's or ask for help in the "Construction Set" forum here on the Official Forums. If you ask there, I just ask you to be patient as it has taken me a day to two days before getting a response.
The are some here who are near capable of taming the ferocious beast that is of the CS, and the knowledge they have of it can be shared to you. As I am right now, though, in no means am I saying I am very capable of using the Construction Set. I have enough knowledge to prevent dirty edits and get by with simple edits that I can quickly and effectively do to my liking...though still every rare once in awhile I come across one of those WTF moments when using the CS. As I stated, just use your better judgement on how to get by some obstacles, use the resources you have, and god, save often! But, on the note of saving, though it is good to save often, try not to save too often, as you might accidentally forget to change an objects ID after changing it's stats and once you hit okay and overwrite the original data, and then save your mod...it's done. Well, fortunately some brilliant minds made TES4edit to help clean up those dirty edits, but again you should be practicing on changing the form ID before doing anything else when editing an object base.

Take time to play around with the CS. Do not do anything ambitious and start a complete conversion or a overhaul mod. Expirment by playing around with each individual element in the CS in small scales. Make a new bow. It doesn't exactly have to use a whole new .nif file, just edit the base of - say - an ebony bow. Change the form ID, give it a unique name, slap it down in some cave or, god forbid the imperial city market district, pick it up and use it.
I often like to make God Weapons as I get sick of having to run through an entire dungeon just for one thing in a deep dark dungeon. So maybe a good idea to start right now is make some items to make things easier when testing a mod.
Ofcourse, you might not be lazy like me and be willing to pop the console open every time there is a locked door. Ofcourse, if I am in a dark dank dungeon, I also just pop in killall and that does the trick

anyways, just have fun with the mods, don't start any grandious project yet. Play around with the CS and get the feel for this beast. Is it scaly and mean? or is it soft and fuzzy?

Come to the CS Basics class on TES Alliance (Link in my sig) I will walk you step by step from installing the CS to releasing your first mod. I have several new students right now, come join in.

Fail. I cant even make a weapon with out some [censored] saying my game is going to crash.