gurugeorge

If you're going to play around with LL mods, Mod Organizer just makes life soooo much easier.  It has its own complications, but you get to know them pretty quickly, and it's hard to REALLY screw things up in the way it's easy to do with manual or NMM installation (unless you obsessively document what you're doing).   And the great thing about Mod Organizer, the really great thing, the thing that makes it the most genius piece of software related to TES modding EVER, is that you can be faffing about with weird and wonderful mods to your heart's content one minute, even completely breaking the game, and then the next minute at the click of a button, be back continuing your "serious" game of Skyrim.   No more "hell, I've screwed this up so bad I can't even play the damn game any more".   That, alone, is pure gold.

Just discovered a recently-uploaded Version 1.02 of this on a Russian site.  It has a tbbp version option built in, plus animations, for both nude and lingerie.  No idea if it's a further worked-on version of the original or just some kind of repackaging though.

  I wouldn't worry, TESO will be f2p at some point, it's almost guaranteed.    It seems publishers have cottoned onto market segmentation with MMOs.  Some people will be happy to pay a sub when a game launches to get that "clean", shop-free feeling of playing an MMO for a while, then a whole bunch of people will be willing to try it out for free and keep the population lively, and a whole other bunch will be willing to pay for fluff at any time, or pay to win later on in the game's life.    It seems to be the way MMOs go these days.   BTW, TESO isn't all that bad, and while the base game has a certain minimalism that might or might not be appealing, there are plenty of mods now that enable you to tweak it (to the extent an MMO can be tweaked) to suit yourself.   Many of the stories in TESO are actually quite good, some fully as "dark" as standard TES stuff, and you can have a lot of fun with the game on a first playthrough while it's fresh.  It's also very soloable, you don't have to team up to do any content if you don't want to.  (Which I actually find a downside of modern MMOs - I prefer either the old skool "so hard you HAVE to team up" approach, or the "casual = quicky, easy PUG-ing" approach of City of Heroes, which, sadly, no other MMOs tried, they all went "casual = solo".)  

Re. the Profile naming thing, I tend to think of Profiles as "worlds" according to "dominant" mods, rather than tie them to characters per se.  So I have something like "STEP Core + hardcore realism + Sexlab + Lovers Comfort", or "STEP Extended + Requiem", things like that (where I know that "hardcore realism" means my favourite set of realism mods, eg. Frostfall, RND, etc.).  (I do find the STEP setups very good and stable bases for further experimentation, so I always have a clean STEP Core and STEP Extended as separate Profiles to copy from.)   That's for general messing about (and I'm always messing about trying things, seeing what goes well with what, etc.).   Then very occasionally if I make a character I love rp-ing particularly and am getting a good long game with, in a "world" that suits it, I'll copy its Profile and name it after the character and tie its saves to the Profile and just leave that Profile alone.  That tends to happen at some point usually when I'm bored with tweaking and just want to play the game (it's kind of the "reward" for all the messing around - a good, long, stable game I can settle into, full of rich, fun content ).   There are always little corners of MO that you can discover though.  For instance, the other day, I discovered that launching the standard Skyrim Launcher from within a given Profile in MO tweaks the .ini files (re. the standard Launcher options) just for that Profile.  I had no idea, I had thought the Launcher just always set the .ini files in My Documents, so never used it, and did all .ini tweaks for a Profile manually! Doh!

  Yeah that's what I meant, I don't do it for every mod, it's not necessary - I meant those types of mods (especially the ones that come with FOMODs) that have several options that might change depending on other mods in the Profile.   But as you say, that can sometimes be done with an extra named patch on top too.   I hear what you're saying about it taking a few "tries" with MO till you get your MO (snicker) right.  MO is so powerful it's tempting to go to town when you first use it, and then you forget little things and get into knots (although on a much higher level than you'd have gotten into knots with just NMM and one setup).  It does have a bit of a learning curve and does require some care and attention, but you are rewarded with all that incredible power that's light years beyond any other method.   But I find in general that careful mod naming (so you keep track of what's different with mod X across Profiles) and proper use of Overwrite (i.e. making separate named mods from it from Bashed patch, Skyproc patchers and FNIS output, any time something changes) keeps things humming along nicely  

I generally find it's best practice, with the kinds of mods that have many options, to install separate named versions of mods for each profile, e.g. supposing I've got Profile X, then if I have Mod A, I'll install a version of mod A for Profile X, call it "A for X", then if I want the same mod in Profile Y, I'll install another version and call it "A for Y".    That way, with proper management of Overwrite (i.e. after any mod change, ALWAYS run through LOOT - Wrye Bash - Skyproc patchers - FNIS, in that order, and with the relevant mods and .esps in that order last, in both mod list and .esp list, every time a mod is changed and put the stuff that goes into Overwrite from each pass with each of these into a separate mod relating to that Profile - e.g. "FNIS Output for X") everything goes very smoothly and I can have wildly different profiles (e.g. one with Requiem stuff, another with just STEP Core stuff plus Sexlab stuff, or whatever, any combination really) and flip between them at leisure.  The main thing is not to have stuff in Overwrite that's appropriate for one Profile being active in another Profile, that's the one thing that can re-introduce the kinds of puzzlement that's common when you're just using NMM and one setup but messing around with mods.   It's a bit of effort and being systematic, but that bit of effort repays you with truly extraordinary power and ease of use to experiment and have extremely different kinds of playstyles and games and move between them easily and without problems.   The only downside really is that all those duplicates of mods can lead to a huge MO mods folder (getting into 100 or more Gigs), but with modern hard drives (SSDs too) and large amounts of space, it's not really that big of a problem, and the benefit is far less headaches.

  Hey Dmitri, did you ever get round to making a UNP version?

I've recently gotten back into Skyrim, and after modding up my usual STEP Core, and starting to experiment with some mods on top of that, I decided I was so sick of the usual starting stuff I decided to try Skyrim Unbound out. (I'd used Alternate Start before, so thought I'd try this "other" alt start mod).    My intention was only to just get into the game to test things, but the start I got was so engaging I'm actually playing the character now   It's actually a rather awesome mod, and brings you into the game in a more inviting way than LAL, I think.  The good thing being that you can customize your person beforehand.  Re. what to wear, weapons, etc., you can have that random or you can tailor it quite carefully, so you aren't forced to start in a set way equipment-wise.  This helps you think about your character, so that when you get to character creation, something's already forming in your mind.   Same with starting location and situation - you can have it random or tailor it how you like.  Generally the options between random and starting as you want are well done, nothing OP, but you aren't forced to start out as a meaningless schlub if you don't want to.    

Just came across this on Nexus, thought Dream Girl fans might be interested if they don't know about it already:-    Conversion by dTd of Chronotrigger77's set for Dream Girl, all up to date and snazzy for XPMSE with TBBP/HDT.   What with that and the vanilla conversions (Petrovich's own linked at the Dream Girl Nexus site, and dTd's conversion of the remaining vanilla), plus the 3-d labia and pubes by GECK.O here, my Skyrim life is now complete   (Well, almost - I'd loooove for Petrovich to do a "slightly blessed" version with a tad bigger bazoomies, but not pneumatic, rather natural big heavy hangers.)   And there's also no longer any excuse for the rest of you not to try out this stunning beauty, with her natural-looking anims and remarkably un-weird stance and shoulders

  Definitely get MO, it will change your modding life.  If you like playing around with mods, and especially if you want to be able to experiment with LL-type mods, without breaking your game, without even the least possibility of breaking your game.  I cannot recommend it highly enough.     Imagine this typical scenario: you've got a great game of Skyrim going, then you decide to mess around wtih some mods.  You break the game, tie yourself in knots trying to solve the problem, and worst of all - you can't bloody play Skyrim.  You can't pick up where you left off.  You're stuck.  If it's bad enough, you have to just clean the slate again and reinstall, meanwhile having lost the momentum both of modding and of playing the damn game.   With MO, all that is a thing of the past.  With MO, you have unlimited "virtual installs", so you can have your pristine game of Skyrim, with your favourite, hand-picked mods to give you the experience Bethesda wanted you to have, only better, tweaked to your personal tastes (I recommend S.T.E.P. for this), and have that be totally untouched, un-messed around with, by whatever modding experiments you are doing in other MO "virtual installs".  You can totally break the game in one virtual install, and at the click of a button, be playing your pristine game of Skyrim again.    It's a genius piece of software, it really is.   I should add that, having such power, MO does have its own pitfalls, and it's possible to get in knots with it as well (especially when you get to FNIS and Skyproc patches and the like), but on another level.  Start slowly with a simple few installs (make sure one is "vanilla"), keep one for your ongoing game and favourite/stable mods, and as many as you like for messing around, and eventually you'll learn the ins and outs.