I've started to play Skyrim quite a few times in the past, but never got to finish the main story arch or any of the DLCs. I always begin installing mods and tweaking things and soon the game becomes 'modding Skyrim' instead of playing it.

In a few weeks I'll have some spare time to play again, so I'd like to set up a Skyrim install with a somewhat minimal amount of mods. I was hoping I could get some advice on how to proceed. I've made a list of things I'd like to mod, just need to fill a few blanks. I imagine the definition of 'minimal' will change depending on the person, but I hope you get my meaning.

I figured I'd start with the patches:

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/19/? by Arthmoor.

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/23906/? by Arthmoor (maybe not strictly a patch, but I consider it so).

I like challenging combat, so one or two combat-challenge mods:

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/34215 by erkeil.

- Other NPCs combat mod?

I'm not entirely happy with vanilla class balance, so I'd like to add something that gives more options to how classes play. I prefer to stay within the vanilla scope, but I enjoy new perks, spells and so on. There are a few interesting class rebalance mods:

- Something for regular sword-play?

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/28418/? by kryptopyr (stealth and rogue abilities).

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/13166/? by DamarStiehl, possibly along with http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/16225/? by EnaiSiaion (spell-casting).

I'm not much of an artisan, but perhaps I should consider a crafting rebalance mod:

- Something that improves the trees or may add a few useful recipes.

Then to meet requirements and final touches:

- http://skse.silverlock.org/ by the SKSE team.

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/3863//? by schlangster, Mardoxx and T3T, perhaps along with a http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/4862//? by favmenumodder, type of mod.

- http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/1175//? by Elys (one PT is all I can hope for, and this will allow me to try things).

- Tons of textures at some point. I'm not concerned about that since I can add and remove them at my leisure.

- I suppose I'll add a lighting overhaul mod to the mix too, for better lurking. But I'm staying away from ENB because I can literally spend weeks tweaking it, and I'd like to play Skyrim not ENB.

Is there anything you would change or add?

I'll be using a mod manager or my preference, along with Wrye Bash for bashed patch. I feel somewhat confortable using TES5Edit if needed, but I'd prefer not to spend much time fixing conflicts if possible.

Thanks in advance.

kryptopyr has a few more useful mods, especially the crafting fixes.

immersive creatures are pretty much all skyrim-like additions, and you can turn everything off. and his version of random encounters makes the game awesome. other than that i'd only suggest some of the awesome and mostly lore friendly quest and dungeon plugins, not sure if you need them for doing mq stuff.

for combat i guess duel does the most without you noticing it changing your game a lot.

skyui just added it's own favourites stuff.