I want to limit smithing so that the skill does not level up so fast. In that regard, I chose to use the HBE (hardcoe and Balanced) mod. However, it doesn't seem to slow down smithing at all. I looked at the Smiting Actor Value with TES5Edit and found three records, one from Skyrim.esm, one from Update.esm and one from HBE. The values were: 160, 1 & 1 respectively.

So HBE did nothing to Smithing that Update didn't already do. The question I have is: If an actor value of 1 for the Smithing Skill Use Multiplier is causing Smithing to level too quickly, what values should I try in an override mod? Should I try 0.25 or the like? It just seems odd that the original number was 160 and changing it to 1 doesn't seem to do much. But then again, maybe the value was never 160 (as I always used Update.esm) and was always 1, so HBE changed nothing and a fraction is in order.

On a related note, with the 'baked' saves, does one always have to start a new game every time they make a change with the CK? It seems unreasonable that one would have to start a new game just to check the outcome of altering the Smithing Skill Mult or anything else.

Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated.