Bit of a personal topic for these forums perhaps, but I was wondering: will learning how to mod my game really make me have as much fun as I had in Morrowind? And ofccourse I know its personal preference, but hear me out and if possible give me some advice.

I started with TES in Morrowind and loved that game, played it multiple times a week for more then 1,5 year with barely any mods. Ofcourse this made me very excited to start with oblivion, but for me personally it was a great letdown. I disliked so many things; from the level scaling, the item scaling, the similairity between dungeons, esp. daedra gates, the fast travel, the lack of depth in for example political affairs etc. Ofcourse I did have some fun, but with 1.5 months 1 full MQ character and one somewhere halfway I was done with it.

However now TES 5 has got me all excited again and I was hoping to perhaps get some more out of oblivion with some mods

I installed OOO and it helps but it is far from enough for me to get the game too a place were I can love it like I did MW in the past.

I came looking here for some more add-ons but all this info about conflicts, ways to solve it, wyre bash, etc. has got me reeling. I feel like I need to spend hours and hours of research on this before I can have the game in a state were I can get more enjoyment out of it then what the first two playtroughs already gave me storywise.

As I see it now I would atleast need to install:
- OOO
- MMM
- some form of imrpoved and open cities
- some form of fast travel like the MW system
- if possible more diverse dungeons and more story depth.

But to be honest with the amount of work it seems this is gonna take I am kinda scared it is not even worth the trouble :S. I got my money's worth out of the game storywise, will it really be good enough after all this to get more out of it then just the story?
Modding more then one simple fix in seems like a nightmarishly complicated job at first glance. Hope you guys can give me some opinions on this.

Well, the answer to this question varies from person to person, though for people who end up hanging around these forums much, they've usually come to the "Yes, it's worth it" conclusion.

The first thing I'll tell you is that your list of desired mods isn't actually that complex. I understand that for a complete newcomer, any mod installation, and indeed simply installing a single mod can be a frustratingly complicated task. But, that's learning anything new, right? Installing mods, for the most part, is generally always the same, so once you have that down, it's no longer tricky.

Having reached this level, people tend to start thinking "This isn't so bad! I'm going to download a couple dozen other mods that looked interesting but weren't worth the effort when I thought installing mods was generally overcomplicated." Then you come up against the issue of mod conflicts. X mod and Y mod both change the same thing, so you have to figure out how to decide the mod you want takes precedence. Or, preferably, a way to incorporate both mods changes to that thing. That's what mod management tools such as Oblivion Mod Manager (OBMM) or Wrye Bash are for.

With the list you have, you'd probably have to get to the level of being able to install mods like it's no big deal (and indeed, it soon wouldn't be). Then you'd have to achieve a basic level of mastery with Wrye Bash to make your mods play nice together.

I'd say you'd probably invest 2 - 5 hours in doing that, depending on how tech savvy you already may be. Then you can play your game and never have to think about it again, or maybe you come back to give Oblivion another playthrough with a dozen more mods some day, and with the expertise you acquired previously that's not such a big deal. So you see, it depends.

There's also the issue of Skyrim, if you intend to play that on PC and possibly use mods for it. Chances are mods for Skyrim will be very similar, as mods for Oblivion, installation, and in fact many of the tools available (due to being made by the same people in most cases), are quite similar to Morrowind's.

I tell you what. I came here about a month ago as a complete noob [I barely knew what wrye bash was] and with the amazing help I had from the people in here I now run a rock solid game with 150+ mods. Yes, it's definitely worth the efforth.

My rule about mods is only one new one every few days so that if something starts crashing you know where to look and what to get rid of. Clothing mods are usually stable, its mixing lots of big mods together that cause trouble, so my solution instead of wyre bash is to just try a few big mods by themselves and just pick one you like best. It is definitely an investment of your time to select the right mods for you, but well worth it once you get it set up. I have about 125 mods and it rarely crashes and is well worth the effort.

If you want to just install a couple of mods it won't take a huge investment in time. However, the more mods you add, the more time you need to spend making sure they actually work together - in many cases you need to track down compatibility patches. There is no one central wiki or guide that you're going to be able to use to find all the information in one place, so you need to be good at research. You also need to learn how to use tools like TES4EDIT's conflict detector so you actually understand what mods are doing under the hood and figure out when there are conflicts that could be potentially game breaking.

It's very easy to be overcome by "mod greed" as some here have referred to it. You can easily get to the point you're spending more time tweaking your mod setup than actually playing the game. In short, modding becomes the game.

All that said, if you're willing to put in the time to do it properly you can make Oblivion one of the best gaming experience, if not the best, you've ever played. But be prepared for a long road and a steep learning curve getting there.

MMM+OOO Installation Guide - http://tescosi.com/wiki/Oblivion:MMM%2BOOO_Installation_Guide


Installing improved cities is pretty straight forward. They have great documentation. The other two things you mentioned don't sound like they'll call for much conflict awareness either... You don't have to add 100+ mods to play a modified game.


--Tomlong75210

All the mod recommendations are nice and all but what you need is information on how to use the tools: http://tescosi.com/wiki/Oblivion/Mod_Installation

My take on why Wrye Bash and BAIN are the best options are found in thttp://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1084204-bain-mod-installation-projects/.

Learn the basics of those right off and you will be up to speed pretty quick.

Thanks to you all so far, gess I wil be spending some time learning this stuff then
The guides to these tools will come in handy.

One last question, I would like to install a mod that improves bodys en faces of the NPC's aswell, haven't figured out which one yet. Any recommendations on this part? If I understood all this stuff so far, since changing NPC's appearences alters the same entry (NPC's) as the leveled lists etc. this will take some carefull planning aswell correct?

Body mods all provide meshes and basic textures. There are also mods that add even better textures for bodies but these are generally not distributed with the basic body changes because of file size. These improved textures will also drastically change/improve faces as well. These things don't conflict with anything but similar aesthetic mods- which may include race changing mods that include eyes.

To get more interesting faces, look for a mod that changes/adds races. In order to see the improved textures on new races you must use a texture replacer that includes those races.

Here is a good combo: http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=24078, along with apparel replacers for particular mods you want to use like OOO (search the Nexus), Roberts Male Body (which you must search for... there is a BAIN/OMOD ready archive of version 5 that can be found via Google. File name RobertMale_OMOD_BAIN_v5-25365) and apparel replacers can be found on the Nexus, along with http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=22124. Lots of good info can be found in both the readmes for EVE and RBP re any potential conflicts.

There are certainly other options though...

IMO, the most important- and easiest- step in making sense of applying mods to OB is the become familiar with the file structure of your OB directory, especially \data. Whenever you download a mod, unpack it first and compare it's file structure to that of \data (know that all these folders- \textures, \meshes, \sound, \shaders, etc- are at the same level in \data). <--- edit: using BAIN will compel you to understand this... which is a good thing! Though anyone who has made there own OMODs must know it as well...

:read: and have fun!

modding and installing mods is a good ride, if you ask me.

It's very rewarding and can become a new habit of yours. If you really get into it, just try to actually play the game sometime...

^^