Hey everyone. I played Morrowind obsessively on my Xbox back in the day, and it remains my favorite game of all time. I recently picked up the PC GOTY in anticipation of the new laptop I've ordered, and have been playing vanilla on the old desktop. Still great! After all this excitement generated around the Overhaul, I thought I would try out some mods when the new rig arrives.

Let me just get the hardware out of the way first:
i7-2630QM @ 2.0GHz, 8GB DDR3 RAM, 2GB Radeon 6770m, 7200rpm HDD, 1920x1080 display.

Now, the Overhaul doesn't really seem like it is for me, as I still have yet to play the expansions and am looking for a more "purist" experience to feed that nostalgia. I have done a bit of looking around, and have come up with this list:

Unofficial Patch
Morrowind Code Patch
FPS Optimizer
Mlox

Better Bodies + Clothes
More Better Clothes
Darknut's Better Clothes
Darknut's Creatures (all)
Darknut's Armor
Darknut's Weapons (complete)
SWG's Sky
Better Almalexia
Animated Morrowind 1 & 2 (not Expanded)

Better Dialogue Font
Spewboy's HD Menu
Widescreen Splash Screens


As you can see, I've opted for FPS Optimizer over MGE. I'm not sure how well I'd like the shader effects or huge draw distance. Not to mention the performance hit. I've read people with top-tier desktops hitting 30 FPS in MGE. What do you all think?

Judging from the comparison thread, I wasn't terribly fond of Better Heads. Vvardenfell Visages was better, but there were still some that were too different for me. Is there any less popular replacement that is just a high-res version of vanilla? The same question goes for land textures as well. Visual Pack 3 wasn't too bad, but it still made things look a bit too different for me.

Any other mods or utilities you would recommend to me? Thanks!

To start with I would like to suggest that you should use http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1174576-morrowind-graphics-extender-mge/ instead of FPS Optimizer, because some mods requires MWSE which MGE has an internal MWSE version included. For mods in general this http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1155980-povuholos-tomorrowind-a-mod-recommendations-list-for-today/ is a good source to start with especially the first two posts, but Pluto's mod recommendations is another http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1060141-mod-recommendations-for-new-players/ with good information. :tes:

With MGE you can still use no shaders and have fairly low view distance. My Morrowind doesn't look all taht different form vanilla, no fancy shaders or blooomy stuff, just a bit longer view distance, hi res textures etc.

I'm a fan of the Morrowind FPS Optimizer. MGE has a loyal following, but it can be a large pain to set up properly, doesn't like some video cards at all, and may create visual anomalies.

MWSE is easy to get separately and takes literally less than a minute to set up. It can then by used to launch the main game. Otherwise, it's literally transparent to the user, and provides a good deal of additional functionality.

For the rest, it helps to know what kinds of things you're looking to mods for. Do you want new weapons and armor? Gameplay tweaks? Character homes? Companions for travel? Check out the mod categories at PlanetElderScroll and TES Nexus.

Don't forget http://mw.modhistory.com/ or just use http://search.yacoby.net/ which has these three mod sites covered. :user:

Thanks for the quick replies, everyone!

As far as mods go, I'm mainly looking to keep things as close to vanilla as possible, but as I am playing on a 17" 1080p display, I would like some high-res textures. If I understand Minamir correctly, MGE comes with high-res versions of the vanilla textures? That would be great if so.

Problem with MGE with low view distance is that (at least for me) the fog is gone. So you can see the line where the view distance ends and things just start appearing out of nowhere. Maybe this is an issue on my end, and the fog really should be there, but it bugs me. Also, I would really recommend Alaisiagae's mods. Alaisiagae textrues a few miscelleneous items that most overlook. She (he?) also has some nice balancing mods. Instead of her balance mods, you could use BTB's Game Improvements mod to fully balance the game (or close to it). I know you said vanilla, but I consider balancing mods very important to fix some things Bethesda didn't.

MGE does not change or replace any vanilla files in any way. It's a program, and by running it you can generate distant land, apply shaders, bind keyboard macros and many more. And you do not have to run it every time - once configured, it loads with Morrowind.

Edit: typos

Ah, alright. That's what I thought.

Thank you for the suggestions, everyone! The ES Search was especially useful as I was able to find Slof's Better Beasts, which it seems is no longer hosted on the major sites.

The last major hole I have in what I want is the land textures. Are there any high-res ones that are close to vanilla? I have found Spewboy's Bitter Coast and Hlaalu III which look great. Are there any others? I appreciate all the help!

Connary's texture replacers are amazing and very close to vanilla Morrowind.

Good luck finding them though, I shouldn't mention him or his work but it would be a shame for newcomers/returning players to miss his high quality mods.

^ Why shouldn't you mention him or his work?

A quick search shows that there was a lot of drama surrounding his work. It seems he took down his original files several years ago while he attempted to update and compile them all in one large pack. Meanwhile, other people began redistributing his stuff on other filesharing sites. I'm not sure exactly what happened after that, but it seems he got really upset about not being able to control distribution of his own work, so he left the community.

Fortunately, they are still moderately easy to find. Took me about 15 minutes. You won't find them on the main sites or ES Search, though.

Check out http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1093073-wipz-westlys-head-replacers-still-working-on-a-better-title/. Its not complete but he has made some mini releases with several of the races. Check the first post for some sneaky links (three of them I think). Works great by installing them on top of Vvardenfell Visages.