I completed Skyrim about 6 months after it launched, and haven't played it for around 2 years. I've got the DLC to play through and am frankly overwhelmed by the amount of stuff I have to find out in order to mod and play. I'd really appreciate if I could be given the lowdown on the current state of Skyrim modding, bearing in mind that I want to spend more time playing than modding. So:

Unofficial patches - are they pretty much complete and stable now? Anything I need to note with regard to game stability?

Stuff I didn't like about vanilla and I'd be looking to improve/change:

Perks left me a bit cold and seemed to have a lot of pointless ones/no-brainer ones, so felt they didn't really offer much in the way of genuine choice.

Combat was a bit rubbish - I used the deadly combat mod which I thought improved things a lot. This includes gripes about encounter variety and difficulty.

Quests/NPCs tended to be a bit stilted. Would be open to trying out one or two top recommended quest mods.

Crafting was unbalanced.

Graphics - what's the simplest, most performance friendly thing I can do to improve the look of the game? I'm fine with the official HD mod as far as textures go (unless I really should be told otherwise).

Bearing in mind I don't want to hunt down countless compatability patches, are any overhauls worth looking at or can the above be catered for with a few key mods?

Finally, is there anything I should absolutely be aware of that is not covered by answers to the above? Is there a nice easy guide somewhere I could follow?

Thanks!