Just For Fun / Skyrim Recommended Mods

As with any game made by Bethesda Softworks, modding is an integral part of the complete experience of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and thus we present to you the troper-approved list of the best mods for the game to enhance your experience in Skyrim.

If you wish to add to the list, kindly sign your name. Comments on mods are also welcome.

Essentials

These mods are practically required for every installation of Skyrim, to the point that we believe that Bethesda should simply package these mods along with new copies of the game.

• SkyUI by SkyUI Team
  • Signed by arcanephoenix
  • Skyrim's UI was obviously designed with consoles in mind; this changes the inventory and magic menu to a format that is easier to access using a keyboard and mouse.
    • Even if you use a Gamepad/Controller, this is still highly recommended. It adds some very useful stuff to the UI, such as 'Read/Unread' markers for books, organizing the quick-select menu and even a mod controller that lets you change the settings on compatible mods without leaving the game.
    • And of course the most useful thing for efficient looters, the weight/value ratio, so you don't have to calculate it in your head
  • Requires SKSE^note Skyrim Script Extender, not to be confused with Skyrim Special Edition (which is also required for around 70% of the mods here anyway).
  • Links: Here for the original, here for Special Edition

• The Unofficial Patches by Unofficial Patch Project Team
  • Signed by arcanephoenix
  • Skyrim in general is a buggy game on the best of days, and some of these can be quite game breaking, or extremely jarring and irritating to 100+ hour players. These patches try to ensure as much as possible that your game will run smoothly. Formerly came in separate mods for vanilla and each DLC, but were later packaged into a single Legendary Edition patch for easier maintenance.
  • Links:
    • Original: Steam, Nexus.
    • Special Edition: Nexus link
    • Pre-Anniversary Edition patch.
    • Anniversary Edition patch without Creation Club.

• Mod Organizer
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • An alternative to the Nexus Mod Manager that is only slightly harder to use. The big difference with Mod Organizer is that it doesn't touch your Skyrim data files, but instead builds a "virtual" data directory whenever you launch the game - no more reinstalling Skyrim to try and fix something. You can also save different arrangements of mods under different profiles and filter your saved games so they won't show up under profiles other than what they were running under. And yes, it includes LOOT to help with load order issues.
  • Nexus link

• Skyrim Total Enhancement Project (STEP) by TheCompiler and numerous other contributors
  • Signed by thekeyofe
  • From the STEP wiki: "STEP is a collaborative project with input from the modding community, technical volunteers, and project administrators. The goal is to provide tested and validated methods for establishing and maintaining an enhanced modded Skyrim. Thus, the Guide provides detailed, well-tested build instructions for a solid modding template. New modders can follow STEP explicitly, or more experienced modders may use it as general guide."
  • It's basically a list of over 200 mods which have been tested and proven to work together and provide a stable "enhanced vanilla" Skyrim for both experienced modders and those new to modding to build from. It provides step by step instructions on installing said mods. The full list of mods include SkyUI, SKSE, The Unofficial Patches, and a few other mods listed elsewhere on this very page.
  • STEP Wiki Main Page

• Quests Are In Skyrim by SarthesArai
  • Signed by TheAmazingBlachman
  • It is a minor mod, really, but it is absolutely essential if you play with any mods that add new lands. Due to the way Skyrim's radiant quest system is set up, any location in the game can be a potential target for a radiant quest, even if it makes no logical sense whatsoever that Skyrim-centric organsiations like the Thieves Guild or the Companions would have any interest in these places. This mod prevents this from happening, plain and simple.
  • Links:
    • Special Edition Nexus
    • Legendary Edition Nexus

• Unofficial Downgrade Patcher by halgari
  • Signed by Loekman3
  • With each new patch released by Bethseda, a lot of game mods will become broken, particularly those that are entirely reliant on the Script Extender as mentioned above, therefore this patch will revert your game to the older more stable version that allows you to play without worrying which mods will be broken with each subsequent patch.
  • Links:
    • Nexus

Graphics

Mods that make the game look even better.

• Better Dynamic Snow by SparrowPrince and Brumbek
  • Signed by Accela
  • An overhaul to the snow textures from the game that makes the snow on objects actually look like snow instead of a flat white blob.
  • Link

• Realistic Lighting Overhaul by the Realistic Lighting Team
  • Signed by Accela
  • A lighting overhaul mod that is both easy on performance and creates a more... um... realistic atmosphere for the game. The lighting in Dragonsreach and the Blue Palace are particularly nice.
  • Link

• Static Mesh Improvement Mod by Brumbek
  • Signed by Accela
  • This is more about the little things. Other mods may focus on lighting or grass or water, but this seeks to improve the often-pixellated and blocky everyday objects that litter the game. Now all those potatoes you hoard will look delicious!
    • If you're using this with the above Realistic Lighting Overhaul, I highly recommend doing a manual installation and paying attention to the warnings for the various mesh options. Even on a high-end system, going all-out on things like the 3D chandelier chains and farm fences can cause serious framerate issues and crashes in certain places. - Tacitus
  • Link

• W.A.T.E.R. by SparrowPrince
  • Signed by Accela
  • This mod completely overhauls the water effects and appearance, including adding waves to the coastline and flow physics in rivers. Much more realistic and very beautiful.
  • Note that realistic flow physics were implemented by Bethesda in Skyrim Special Edition.
  • Link

• I Can't Believe Its Not ENB by ElSopa
  • Signed by Zmanwarrior
  • An alternative to ENBs that is far less taxing on low-end PCs, at the expense of a couple features such as Depth of Field.
  • Link

• Imaginator by MyGoodEye and Gopher
  • Edit settings like Brightness, Saturation, Contrast, Bloom and so on without (more or less) taxing your machine. Make Skyrim look great without an ENB to eat performance.
  • Imaginator at nexusmods

• A Quality World Map
  • Signed by Elle
  • Adds proper road outlines to the world map. Comes in a few different versions, some of which include other handy features like hold borders.
  • Link: A Quality World Map
  • As an alternative you can use the great paper map mod, with roads and place names. Link: Paper Map at nexusmods
    • But a warning, it seems kind of screwy if it isn't last or near to last in the load order

Character Appearance

This includes tattoos, warpaints, hairstyles, face morphs, and other alterations and additions to the people living in Skyrim.

• Battle Hardened Warpaints by Diethardt and netherwalk
  • Signed by Accela
  • This is a collection of amazing warpaints that go a long way towards making your character look that much more unique and badass.
  • Requires SKSE.
  • Recommended for easier use: RaceMenu
  • Link

• ApachiiSkyHair by Apachii
  • Signed by arcanephoenix
  • Adds a lot of great hairstyles for humans and elves (including orcs).
  • Recommended for easier use: RaceMenu
  • Link: here

• RaceMenu
  • Signed by Accela
  • This allows much greater customization of your character's appearance, including non-default hair and eye coloring, tattoos or warpaint, and height adjustments.
  • Requires SKSE.
  • Link

• RS Children Overhaul by Ranaline (converted to SE by Azrael_wtf)
  • Signed by BossKey
  • The identical-looking, unexpressive children in the base game are, to put it bluntly, creepy as balls. This mod overhauls their looks, making them all distinct, memorable, and much more natural-looking, and also gives a number of them their own unique outfits to fit their background. Whether you're interacting with your adopted son/daughter or just playing tag, you'll be dealing with actual kids rather than unsettling clones.
  • Link: Original, Special Edition

Character Creation

Instead of modifying your appearance, these mods give you more options when creating a new character.

• Live Another Life
  • Signed by Elle
  • Lets you play out alternate starting scenarios besides the cart ride to Helgen, such as starting as an army recruit, thief or shipwrecked traveler. Most useful to those who have already played through the game at least once.
  • Links:
    • Skyrim Nexus
    • Steam Workshop

• Random Alternate Start
  • Signed by Meyers07
  • A more lighter (and thus causes less potential conflict) alternate start mod than Live Another Life, this only have you determine your starting equipment after character customization, after that, you'll sent into a random area of the vast wilderness of Skyrim. The main quest is started by travelling (or fast travelling) to Helgen.
  • Links:
    • Skyrim Nexus

• Character Creation Overhaul - Races - Classes - Skills by Syclonix
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Gives you a wealth of skill customization options immediately after you create your character, allowing you to recreate Oblivion's class system or build your own. Perfect for RPers or anyone who doesn't want their experienced thief or soldier to suck for the first three hours of gameplay.
  • Nexus link

• Disparity - Classic Classes - Greater Racial Diversity by Kryptopyr
  • Signed by Thunderchin
  • This mod changes the Standing Stones and starting bonuses to be more like the Oblivion class system, while still incorporating Skyrim's native level-with-use system. The crux of this mod, however, is the application of real-world logic to your character's race, gender, and physical stature. The heights, weights, and physical strengths will vary by these criteria, so that diminutive female Breton mage won't punch or sword with the same damage as the ripped male Nord, nor will she have the same chance at intimidating anyone. Finally, the once-daily racial abilities have been replaced with passives that autocast when certain conditions are met. For example, your Redguard character will Adrenaline Rush once their health has been reduced to 25% or less, and your Argonian has a static health-regen buff.
  • Disparity at Skyrim Nexus

Armor

For when you're tired of the old default armors and want your characters to have some sweet new duds.

• Immersive Armors by Hothtrooper 44
  • Signed by Accela
  • A massive compilation of well-crafted, lore-friendly armors that look fantastic and go a long way to making your characters and the NPCs more unique. A small sample of some of the armours available:
    • Paladin Armour - You the "Knight In Shining Armour" type? Try this set of shiny, rounded armour for a mighty, fight-ey, smit-ey hero that Skyrim can be proud of. Ebony equivalent stats and available with the Ebony smithing perk.
    • Viking Chainmail - Want something that's stylish and practical but also somewhat more realistic? You can try this authentic Norse chainmail byrnie. Comes with a Viking themed shield and a number of Viking helmet options, and in both Light and Heavy varieties. Heavy set is Ebony equivalent and Light is Glass equivalent, and require respective smithing perks.
    • Akaviri Samurai - Miss the old Blades armour, or just fancy something more Eastern themed? Look no further than this traditional set of Akaviri armour. Equivalent to the Blades armour and requires the Steel smithing perk to craft.
    • Dragonhide Robes - Prefer slinging spells to swinging steel? Jealous of all your warrior and rogue friends with their fancy Dragonbone armours? Don't fret. Has Light and Heavy armour sets which both require Dragon smithing, or a "cloth" set for those who prefer the mage armour skills.
    • Warchief Armour - This rugged barbarian-themed armour fits beautifully into Skyrim's aesthetic and would look especially great on your Nord or Orc warrior. Dragon equivalent stats and requires the Orcish smithing perk.
    • Baratheon Armour - Enjoy this stunning armour worn by Robert Baratheon when he slew Rhaegar Targaryen. Not entirely lore friendly for obvious reasons but still a nice set and a must for any Game of Thrones fan. Appropriately looks great with Nivea's "Winter is Coming" cloaks. Steel stats and crafting requirements.
    • Barbarian Armor - A set of light armor. The boots, gauntlets, and helmet are cosmetically identical to their counterpart in the Vanilla Iron Armor set (the chest slot is a barechested variant of the Iron Armor): wearing them with the Studded Leather Armor from Vanilla allows to reproduce the iconic Dragonborn outfit from the official artworks, but with a functional character build.
  • Link

• Cloaks of Skyrim by Noodles
  • Signed by Accela
  • Like the title says, this mod adds nearly 100 cloaks of hide, linen, and burlap to use for your character and that can also be worn by NPCs. They can both be crafted and found in the world.
  • Link

• Winter is Coming - Cloaks by Nivea
  • Similar to Cloaks of Skyrim, but with a different style. These cloaks and hoods are big furry things crafted from pelts that look warm enough to stand even the blizzards of Winterhold. Great for immersion and style.
  • Link

• Dwemer Goggles and Scouter by volvaga0
  • Signed by Anthurak
  • Adds these craftable items to the game (unlocked after a brief quest in Markarth). These things have several extremely useful (but not Game Breaking) abilities such as Detect Life (which even which ones are hostile), Night Eye others. If that seems too broken, there's an option for an 'Oil System' that makes them require a steady supply of Dwarven Oil in order to function. Lore friendly, and extremely useful.
  • Link

• Clothing and Smithing Pack by ThirteenOranges
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Now you can craft or purchase some outfits otherwise unavailable to non-master pickpockets, such as jarls' clothes, the Psijic Order's robes, or Penitus Occulatus armor, as well as unenchanted variants of things like Thieves' Guild armor. Perfect for roleplayers or enchanters out for a new look.
  • Steam Workshop link

• Bandolier: Bags and Pouches by Cyrax
  • Signed by disgruntledviewer
  • Adds a variety of craftable bandoliers, vial holders, spellbook casings, and belt pouches large and small. Come available in brown, dark and pale colours, as well as Dark Brotherhood variants made available for crafting once you join up. Crafted at any leather tanning rack.
  • Steam Workshop link: here

• Warmonger Armory by Batmanna
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Adds nine new armors to the game, including a sneaky Rogue Thief set, Alik'r-worthy Sand Assassin armor, and craftable Televanni robes for both apprentices and masters (with some skill at Enchanting). On top of that, the mod adds variety to enemy spellcasters by giving bandit mages and rogue necromancers more clothing colors and enchantments, and allows you to hook a Dragon Priest mask on your belt, granting you its enchantments without having to wear the ugly thing.
  • Nexus link

• zzjay's Wardrobe by zzjay
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Adds three sets of highly-customizable light armor for female characters: some ranger-y Huntress Armor, corset-y Pirate Armor, and an evidently very lightweight suit of Plate Armor. Rather than single outfits, these come in components - different-colored tunics, sleeves, leggings and boots - that allow you to really customize your look. Easy on the eyes but still lore-friendly and not embarrassingly skimpy (unless you forget to put leggings on under your tunic). Intended for UNP body types.
  • Nexus link

• Skyforge Steel Armors by FourthRulerEntity
  • Signed by DarthWalrus
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin. Armor made of Skyforge steel, basically the same as the regular skyforge steel weapons. More a Fridge Logic fixer than anything else. The Armor in question is roughly analogous to Dwarven armor in stats, but lighter.
  • Nexus link

• Tribunal Robes and Masks by Zairaam and Natterforme
  • Signed by Zero Dozer
  • For those who are fans of Morrowind, it gives you cool nice sets of Tribunal Robes in four colors, with Battle Ballgown variants for females, as well as Light and Heavy Armor versions, as strong as Malachite or Ebony armors. It also gives some very needed utility for those Linen Wraps that clutter the Nordic Tombs around Skyrim.
  • Nexus link, Special Edition Version

• Konahriik's Accoutrements by Edhelsereg
  • Signed by Roark Tenjouin
  • Have you ever wondered why Miraak is the only Dragon Priest to have his own set of robes, gloves, and boots? This mod rectifies that problem by making it so that all Dragon Priests have a full set of armor, even Vahlok (who doesn't even get a mask in the vanilla game). The catch, however, is that when you first obtain said armor, it's cursed, and you can't wear it until you purify it with a new spell called Abjuration, either by using rare scrolls that can also be crafted from Dragon Priest Ashes and Dragon Hide^note new crafting materials found on Dragon Priests and created from Dragon Scales/Heart Scales respectively, or by learning it from a new Elder Scroll, Warlord. It also features a quest that will allow you to access a special forge that lets you upgrade the existing robes into armored versions, as well as craft unenchanted ones from the various metals so you can enchant them and create your own Dragon Priest Masks of your choice, and ends with the acquisition of the new Elder Scroll. It also buffs some of the Dragon Priests to make their fights more challenging.
  • Nexus Link, [[https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/22206 Special Edition Version

Weapons

For when you just don't have enough pointy objects with which to kill things.

• Immersive Weapons by Hothtrooper 44, Ironman 5000, and Eckss
  • Signed by Accela
  • A huge collection of well-designed and lore-friendly weapons ranging from swords to hammers to axes. Like the Immersive Armors mod from the same team, they seek to fit in with Skyrim's visual design while adding a much greater variety.
  • Link

• Stronger Daedric Artifacts by Bebop0398
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • This mod gives some beefy buffs to the game's legendary artifacts, as well as infinite charges for their enchantments. Perfect if you've ever felt underwhelmed by a daedric quest reward.
  • Nexus link

• Two-Handed Dawnbreaker by gaijune
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • This mod adds a Dawnbreaker greatsword next to Meridia's statue, so your two-handed warrior won't miss out on the undead-blasting goodness. Technically this would allow players to grab the sword without completing that infamously difficult boss fight at the end of the daedric quest, but that would be cheating...
  • Nexus link

• Daedric Dawnbreaker by jhelzei
  • Signed by Zero Dozer
  • This mod gives the Dawnbreaker the respect it deserves: it gives the weapon a slew of improved cool effects while elevating it to Daedric gear-level. A nice touch for those who felt quite underwhelmed by the reward for traversing Meridia's temple, or those who are only interested on the Dawnbreaker rather than all Daedric artifacts.
  • Nexus link, Special Edition version

• Project Flintlock Rifle by Ghosu
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • If you're tired of getting medieval on your enemies, get Renaissance on them instead. This mod adds a long-ranged flintlock, short-ranged blunderbuss, and even a medieval grenade launcher to the game, which operate more or less like crossbows. With the ammo add-on you can also craft a huge variety of rounds for these weapons, from silver bullets to alchemical rounds to buckshot. It's also recommended that you use the second optional file to remove an NPC camp from near Whiterun, which can conflict with other mods.
  • Nexus link

• Convenient Crossbows by Kevin Kidder
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Some act of espionage has distributed schematics for the Dawnguard's signature ranged weapon, and now crossbows can be found in the hands of soldiers, guards and bandits across Skyrim. Fortunately your character got their own copy, and can now craft regular or Dwarven crossbows and bolts at any smithy.
  • Nexus link

• Legendary Skyrim Crossbows by Kelsenellenelvian
  • Signed by Zero Dozer
  • This mod here gives Crossbows the treatment Dawnguard refused to give. It nerfs the two vanilla Crossbows, in exchange for allowing you to forge Crossbows from all materials and even more, and all weapons are beautifully modeled at that. Not only that, you will now get new arrows and bolts, some of them with variable functions, and enemies and NPCs around Skyrim will now have access to the same weapons as you do. It's a must have for Crossbow lovers.
  • Nexus link, Special Edition version

• Unique Uniques by InsanitySorrow
  • Signed by Trogdor7620
  • This mod changes the appearance of one-of-a-kind weapons, giving them their own unique flair. For example, Kahvozein's Fang looks like a Dragon Priest dagger. Unique Uniques changes that appearance to this.◊ If you're disappointed that these weapons look like a run-of-the-mill weapon, this is a mod for you.
  • Nexus link

Combat

These alter Skyrim's combat system, often aiming to make fights more realistic, challenging, intuitive or rewarding, or add more diversity to the enemies you'll be fighting.

• The Way of the Dovahkiin: Ultimate Deadly Encounters by Tonycubed2 and DiscipleDarkfriend
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • A mod that dramatically amps up the game's difficulty as well as greatly increasing replayability by putting you in constant danger through random encounters. Whether you're in the wilderness or a dungeon, in a city or even sleeping in an inn, there's danger waiting around every corner. This mod adds random boss-like encounters, expands the number of enemies you fight, sends assassins to hunt you down in cities and towns, and can even throw certain high-powered bosses at you under specific conditions. It also offers extensive customization options, so if you don't like the idea of worrying about assassins coming after you when you sleep or a badass boss showing up out of the blue, you can disable that. Or if you like the idea of getting swarmed by hordes of draugr, bandits, werewolf hunters, vampires, vampire hunters, and worse, you can crank the difficulty up even further.
  • Link

• Organized Bandits In Skyrim by Indigoblade
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • A mod that turns your regular packs of typical fur-clad, generically-killable bandits into distinct and memorable types of criminals, murderers, marauders, and other assorted baddies. While some bandits remain the familiar vanilla enemies, now there are a wide range of distinct types of bandits, ranging from drug-addled fiends to psychotic mages to stealthy assassins to renegade Stormcloak and Imperial soldiers. Also adds unique "bounty" bandits who are very powerful and dangerous foes. Perfect for making your general bandit encounters far more interesting.
  • Link.

• Heart Breaker - A Killmove Mod by Reko
  • Signed by Zero Dozer
  • So, do you feel like Skyrim just isn't violent enough? Have decapitations lost its fun to you? Do you want to go all out on brutality against your enemies? This mod makes it a possibility. It allows the Dragonborn to plain rip his/her enemies' hearts and take them for him/herself, just by using an animation from the Dragonborn DLC. There's a customization menu for it and, in the case a menu isn't available, a book in Farengar's room to allow you to configure the mod.
    • And, to be fair, it is recommended to address a problem in Skyrim: the sheer scarcity of Human Hearts. Not only required for some of the most powerful alchemical concoctions in the vanilla game, but quite a lot of mods, especially the more profane-inclined ones out there, require a sizable number of them, but offer no means for harvesting. Heart Breaker solves this by pointing to the elephant in the room: "How about the player's own swath across Tamriel as a source?" Plus there's the fact that your character does so in the best Temple Of Doom style, so hey, what's not to love! ~BillyMT
  • Nexus link, Special Edition version

Magic

These are changes to the magic system of Skyrim, whether in the form of new spells, scaling overhauls, or new perks.

• Apocalypse - Magic of Skyrim by Enai Siaion
  • Signed by Accela
  • The most endorsed magic mod, this adds 140 new spells to the game that are designed to be both well-balanced and greatly expand a mage's repertoire.
  • Link

• Midas Magic Evolved by darealslenderman
  • Signed by FM Phoenix Hawk
  • Fans of the Midas Magic mod from Oblivion will like this one. It beings 250 spells from the original Midas Magic mod to Skyrim. There are a few that don't work well, but they are working on the mod. Interfaces with other spell mods, but does have some conflicts with mods that change the skill trees, but documentation for how to get around that exists. Overall a good mod for those who want to add even more spells to their mage character.
  • Link

• Better Magic by Kevin Kiddler
  • Signed by Slouch
  • Rather than adding new spells, this mod focuses on adding much-needed balance to existing magic. It also fixes several bugs and generally makes magic more convenient and fun to use.
  • Link

Followers

These add more people to join you on your journey and makes changes to the companion/follower system.

• Ultimate Follower Overhaul by Original, fLokii, and Vamyan
  • Signed by Accela
  • A huge overhaul to the follower system, this mod allows to have more than one companion at a time, customize their fighting style, train them in new skills, and much more. Recommended for anyone who doesn't like to wander Skyrim alone.
  • Link
    • (It's important to note that UFO has not been updated in some time and is considered to be extremely buggy. AFT is preferred.)

• Amazing Follower Tweaks by Dheuster
  • Signed by FM Phoenix Hawk
  • An alternate to UFO, and still being worked on, AFT gives you many options for followers, including telling them how to conduct themselves in combat, what outfits to wear depending on where you are (Home, Cities or Standard), allows you to teach them spells and when to use them, and even control the follower's level up. Fully compatible with many mods that modify follower behavior or equipment.
  • Link

• Follower Trap Safety by Alek
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • If you get a single followers mod, pick this one, it keeps your companions or summoned critters from setting off tripwires or pressure plates. In fact, even if you get the above Ultimate Follower Overhaul, you should probably get this one too.
  • Nexus link to Special Edition
  • Nexus link to Legacy Edition

• Convenient Horses by Mitchalek
  • Signed by MadCat221
  • This mod centers around making the horses more convenient. Quick dismounting, harvesting alchemy ingredients, sifting through containers or dead NPCs, or talking to live NPCs from horseback, saddle bag storage, alternative saddles and barding, companion horses, horse horn/whistling, and on and on. Comes with a SkyUI Mod Config Menu as well.
  • Link

• Familiar Faces by Verteiron
  • Signed by Omega77
  • Bring your characters together at last! Visit the Shrine of Heroes, where you can meet your Dragonborn from past play-throughs, create a monument to their achievements, and even bring them to your world as faithful allies... or worthy opponents! Familiar Faces allows you to create persistent copies of your character that exist independently of saved games. You can then visit those characters from any of your saved games; send them into the world to interact with, recruit as followers, marry or kill.
  • Link

• Inigo by Gary "SmartBlueCat" Hesketh
  • Signed by taikowolf
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Want a companion with snark, skill, and a lot of genuine personality? Check out Inigo, a Khajiit locked up in Riften for doing a crime he cannot forgive himself for: killing you. Or, at least, he thinks it's you. Inigo is one of the better mod-made companions around, being a match for Serana in terms of character, having a whole host (read: thousands) of well written and voiced lines, and even lampshading on any lines he repeats (he was addicted to Skooma back in the day). He's so well made he comes with his own questline, several books detailing his history (with art) and a freaking multiple choice adventure book you can read with him.
  • Nexus link to Special Edition
  • Nexus link to Legacy Edition

• My Home is Your Home by Volek
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Maybe your house is feeling empty, maybe you don't like having to go all over Skyrim when you want to swap out a follower for another, or maybe you're a vampire who wants to stash some bloodbags in your hideouts. Whatever the reason, this mod allows you to tell your companion that the area you're in is their new home, so whenever you dismiss them they'll go where you want them. You can even designate a sleeping space for them or tell them to stand guard overnight.
  • Nexus link

• The Bijin Series by rxkx22
  • Signed by adz_fh
  • Okay, let's face it, many Skyrim gamers felt tired of looking at their vanilla female NPCs/followers/companions/spouse's "stunted" appearance by present day graphic standards. To negate that, this mod changes the appearance of roughly more than 25 vanilla women NPCs in the game, about half of them are followers. See as fan-favorites like Lydia, Jordis the-Sword-Maiden, and Serana (including her mother Valerica!) change into the beauty they were meant to be. Non-follower NPCs are also beautified, and some of them even loosely resembled Hollywood stars, like Aela the Huntress becoming similar to Anna Kendrick and Delphine looked more like a younger version Joan Allen, her voice actor. To put it short. this mod plans to make the women of Skyrim as bijin as they intended to be. YMMV, may not be for everyone.
  • Nexus link ^note  the link goes to the Bijin Wives page, but the mod author also included links to other Bijin mods section.

• Lucien by Joseph "Treacleman" Russell
  • Signed by TheAmazingBlachman
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Much like Inigo, Luicen is amongst one of the more fully realized mod-companions with plenty of personality. Lucien Flavius as a person is an Adorkable (but still somewhat snarky) Imperial scholar, with a well-written backstory, and fits very organically into the world. He is prone to share his knowledge of history and culture of the places him and the player visits, comment on certain quests with his own delightfully nerdy interjections, and can even hold quite amusing Bioware RPG-esque conversations with other companions (stuff like him getting low-key creeped out by Lydia's stoic demeanor is especially something to behold). But what makes Lucien stand a bit more out, is that this capability extends to quite a few quests and companions added by mods, making Lucien especially interesting if you have some of the more popular quest and companion mods (his nerdy interactions with the though and grumpy Hoth, adds a lot to both characters), as he lends quite a bit of verisimilitude to them by the fact that he is aware of their existence. Another thing that makes Lucien interesting is that he — due to his academic background — starts out as a Non-Action Guy, who can barley hold a sword, but as the player spend enough time with him, he will ask the player to him teach how to be better at fighting, which gives the player the opportunity to give him some Character Development and mould him into formidable fighter or mage. Lucien can also read certain books if the player hands them to him. On top of that, he also comes with a personal quest of sorts, which unlocks once he have come to trust the player a good deal, which will take him and the player to an unique Dwemer dungeon designed by Darkend creator JKrojmal. Finally, being a morally-upstanding Imperial citizen, Lucien will of course have his own opinion on certain things, and he will not like it if the player joins the Thieves Guild, the Stormcloacks, or the Dark Brotherhood, and will also protest against more morally dubious decisions.
    
    The mod is still under active development, so many of the before mentioned features are prone to be expanded upon as new versions of the mod is completed.
  • Nexus link to Special Edition
  • Nexus link to Legacy Edition

• Arissa the Wandering Rogue by Chesko and Nikkita
  • Signed by Yukianesa
  • What wandering hero would refuse to have this charming and beautiful Imperial thief for a travelling companion across the land of Skyrim? You meet Arissa in the Dead Man's Drink in Falkreath. Arissa has over 600 lines of original dialogue provided by the very talented Nikkita and regularly comments on your surroundings, situation and equipment, but lines are eventually disabled to avoid repetition. She is a skillful archer and knife-fighter who prefers lighter armour and levels with the player (her level is uncapped). She also has a Regard system, starting out as cold and distant to the Dragonborn and gradually warming to them and revealing more about herself as they spend time together: Regard can be gained through feats of heroism like defeating difficult opponents, winning brawls, performing successful sneak attacks and certain quest decisions; she loses Regard for acts of cold-blooded murder and intimidation, cannibalism and being hit. Arissa even has her own personal quest which becomes available once you have won her friendship. Arissa's profession as a thief is more than an Informed Attribute: who knows what mischief she'll get up to if you leave her to her own devices in a city at night? She may even give you a cut of what she takes...
  • Nexus Link

Gameplay

These make changes to other game mechanics that don't fit under any of the above categories.

• Perks Unbound by Iriodus
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Never waste a level-up on a perk you don't want. With some logical exceptions, as long as you meet the skill prerequisite, you can take any perk regardless of how you've filled out the rest of the constellation. As a bonus, an optional add-on lets you apply those armor set bonus perks when you go bare-headed, because after all Helmets Are Hardly Heroic.
  • Nexus link

• Timing Is Everything - Quest Delay and Timing Control by kryptopyr
  • Signed by MissMokushiroku
  • Allows you to alter the level requirements for many quests, including Daedric quests and DLC, as well as some other related variables. Now nothing (except your own skill) can stop you from going after Daedric artifacts at level 1!
  • Link

• The Paarthurnax Dilemma by Arthmoor
  • Signed by MadCat221
  • Do you dislike how the Paarthurnax quest given to you by the Blades is resolved? You either kill him or the quest sits forever in your journal and the Blades never accept you again. With this mod, you have the option to verbally browbeat the Blades into submission and remind them just who you are, and they serve you, not the other way around. Alternately, if you opt to kill Paarthurnax, he will now have a few dragon disciples who are kinda new to this pacifism thing and aren't as willing yet to roll over and die. Lastly, there may be a third method to deal with the Blades for the more bloodlusting...
    • There are some ingrained lore-in-game truth of this which makes the choice to spare Paarthurnax more satisfying and adds Fridge Brilliance: the in-game history indicates that both Reman Cyrodill and Tiber Septim also had forbidden the Blades (and their predecessor the Akaviri Dragonguard) to kill Paarthurnax, because, just like the Last Dragonborn, they are able to study the Thu'um with his help. History Repeats, to put it simply. - adz_fh
  • Link

• Frostfall - Hypothermia Camping Survival by Chesko
  • Signed by disgruntledviewer
  • This critically acclaimed mod adds a cold weather survival element to Skyrim - the weather itself will take it's toll on the Dragonborn, slowly weakening your body and eventually snuffing out your life. If you stay outside for too long, you will die. If you are caught in a severe storm or a blizzard and cannot quickly set up camp or find shelter, you will die. If you plummet into icy water and cannot find respite to dry off and get warm, you will die. Craftable campfires, cloaks and tents will be useful aids for your survival, but your greatest armour against the bitter elements will be cunning and resourcefulness. Stay dry. Stay warm. Stay alive.
  • Link

• JK Crafting Breakdown - Junk Melting Smelting by JediaKyrol
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Lets you recycle stuff at smelters or tanning racks, and by "stuff" I mean "damn near everything." Crappy iron bandit gear, dungeon clutter, you name it, you can probably break it down into some ingots, leather or other crafting goods. And yes, the mod is smart enough to work on items added through Immersive Weapons and similar add-ons.
  • Nexus Link

• Cutting Room Floor by Arthmoor
  • Signed by MissMokushiroku
  • A mod that restores a lot of cut and Dummied Out content, including several unused quests.
  • Link

• Wearable Lanterns at Skyrim by Chesko
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • If you downloaded any of those realistic lighting mods, you'll quickly learn that dungeons are dark now. But rather than using a torch like a primitive or some magic light like an elf, why not craft yourself a travel lantern instead? You can set it to either be held up like a torch, or hook it to your belt for some hands-free lighting that the mod maker admits was inspired by The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. You can even add a hotkey for quick activation, tweak just how bright the lantern is, or set an option to consume lamp oil while active.
  • Nexus Link

• Khajiit Caravan Tracker by LeannLeann
  • Signed by Stealth
  • Tired of not being able to keep tabs on the Khajiit caravans when you need to unload some jewels with no questions asked? Download this mod, then find the caravans to enable a tracker in the quest menu. As long as you've found Ri'saad, Ahkari, and Ma'dran, you can keep tabs on them without having to waste time and effort either waiting in one place for them or tracking them down. Quite handy for players who rely on the Khajiit caravans to fence goods.
  • Steam Workshop Link

• Long Lost Smelters of Skyrim by Hyralux
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • You can probably guess what this mod does - now every major hold, and even some towns, have fully-equipped smithies and smelters. It makes you really wonder what the developers were thinking when they didn't include these things in Skyrim's most important cities.
  • Nexus Link

• Individualized Shout Cooldowns by ShadauxCat
  • Signed by BossKey
  • Let's face it - the cooldown between Shouts can put a real damper on the fun of being the Dragonborn. This mod fixes that by giving each shout its own independent cooldown, allowing you to Shout to your heart's content while not being as game-breaking as simply removing the cooldown completely. As an added bonus, it's also fully compatible with other Shout mods due to not modifying the Shouts themselves.
  • Nexus Link

• A Matter of Time by SkyAmigo
  • Signed by Crino37
  • Adds a in-game clock and callendar interface to the top left of the screen, matching the game aesthetics. Useful to track the time and day without having to hit TAB everytime. Can also be configured to display the current season and moon phase in the game.
  • Link

• Skyrim XP by einsobl (Original) and strudovuckos (Redone)
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • Skyrim XP allows the player to gain experience points in a traditional RPG fashion that can then be spent on buying perk points or upgrading skills. This allows a player to gain additional perk points (very useful for perk overhauls like Ordinator) as well as develop skills that may be ignored (i.e. a warrior leveling pickpocketing) or are hard to develop if you haven't been using them much (i.e. level-dependent illusion magic). Since you gain experience through simply completing quests, looting, stealing, defeating enemies, creating items, finding locations, and so on, it also rewards playstyles that don't grant as much experience, such as mages who use staves, multi-follower parties (follower kills grant XP), or pacifists. This gives a player a lot more leeway in their builds and playstyles, especially unconventional ones. It's recommended that you either set the XP gain lower or use something like the Skyrim Community Uncapper to adjust normal experience gain to compensate for the speed at which the player will be leveling with SXP installed. The classic version is very streamlined and simple, while the Redone version offers much more precise control over specific XP gain, while also being much more complex.
    • Since things which add XP include eating food, discovering map markers, reading books, and learning spells, using Skyrim XP along mods which add new content related to those elements or "realistic needs" mods (those who require to regularly eat-drink-sleep) may result in higher XP gain (and thus, faster levelling) than intended.
  • Classic Version Link and Redone Version Link

• The Message Board by MannyGT
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • Adds Witcher-style notice boards to every vanilla town and city in Skyrim, containing both generic, radiant quests and various messages posted by townsfolk. Quests include missions to hunt dragons and bandits, rescue kidnapped citizens, or collect pelts or retrieve items, as well as more. Note that because it uses a radiant system, and because not all quests are limited to the hold the notice was posted in, you might get asked to rescue a citizen on the far side of Skyrim, or be told to kill an undead boss in Solsthiem or another land added by a mod. You can configure how much each quest pays, both in terms of flat payout and a multiplier based on level.
  • Link

• Missives by IronDuck33
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • Another Witcher-style radiant quest board, Missives adds localized jobs available on a large message board in major cities. Unlike The Notice Board, quest rewards are not configurable but are always localized to the hold your pick them up in, and also reset every few days, giving the player more control over the quests being offered.
  • Link

• Ordinator - Perks of Skyrim by Enai Siaion
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Ordinator is a complete overhaul of the perks sytem, now offering more than 400 perks. Several perks rework how vanilla skills (some vanilla perks have their skill level modified and/or their stats altered) and perks work and/or add new features, thus allowing to create viable builds for new playstyles. Ordinator only changes the standard perk trees, and then should be compatible with most mods (including overhauls of the werewolf and vampire lord perk trees), as long as they don't touch the 18 standard skills perks. Notable features from the reworked perks include (non-exhaustive list):
    • Spellcasting: The skills no longer have a set of "Novice/Apprentice/Adept/Expert/Master spells consume half mana" and static stats occasionally benefitting from another perk, but a single perk (it is the first of the tree and has two levels) which decreases mana consumption of all spells of the magic school while allowing their efficiency to scale with the skill level.
    • Enchanting: A full branch is devoted to using magic staves.
    • Heavy Armor: Not wearing a helmet provides the bonus from being fully clad in armor anyway, while the worn armor pieces provide higher protection. Helmets Are Hardly Heroic, indeed. The Light Armor skill has a similar perk.
    • Lockpicking: A branch of the tree is devoted to using bear traps.
    • One-Handed: A branch of the tree is fully devoted to dagger proficiency, another gives berserker effects to dual-wielding combat. Power attack benefit from bonus damages scaled on the amount of stamina (this feature also exists for the Two-Handed skill).
    • Pickpocket: Following your target while remaining undetected increases the odd of success when stealing from them.
    • Sneak: One perk grants an ability similar to the detect-life spell. A branch of the tree reworks backstab mechanics and their results, making those attacks much less overpowered^note initially +100 percent damages for a sneak attack with any weapon, then fully researched: +100 percent additional damages for one-handed attacks or +25 percent additional damages for other weapons, then sneak attacks with daggers receive a damage bonus percent scaled with the sneak skill and a +50 percent damages if the target is hit in the back.
    • Smithing: You can craft and deploy Dwemer turrets. A single crafting equipment (grindstone or workbench) can be upgraded to be more efficient in upgrading your gear. You can specialize in a type of equipment (one-handed, two-handed, archery, light armor, or heavy armor) and benefit from bonuses to upgrade them, which grants additional defensive buffs against enemies using items of your specialization.
    • Speech: There are Thu’um related perks, as well as the ability to perform for various effects (including performing during combat).
  • Link

Sacrosanct - Vampires of Skyrim by Enai Siaion

• Signed by Arachnos
• A mod that gives a lot of new abilities for both the regular vampire and the Vampire Lord.
  • You can drain people to death to permanently increase your stats and to gain access to an all-new branch of Destruction magic, Hemomancy.
  • Vampirism still progresses in four stages, but they are more fleshed out than before. Early stages focus on the vampire's charisma and seduction powers, while at later stages the vampire becomes deadlier in combat but loses the ability to feed without Draining the victim to death. At stage four, the vampire becomes hostile to everyone and cannot heal in any way aside from drain spells. Vampires also gain a bunch of other powers, like stopping the time of the day for a few minutes or gaining unbreakable invisibility, and unique racial abilities. Feeding on powerful individuals also gives permanent abilities, culminating in becoming a Daywalking Vampire.
  • Vampire Lords now have 31 available perks and can grow to become far stronger than in the base game. These perks also include enhancers for the regular vampire, not just the Lord form.
  • Many of the new spells and abilities are rather spectacular and gruesome to behold, with effects like tearing victims apart from the inside, exploding their bodies for area damage, growing spikes from their blood, and so on.
• Link

• Winstad Mine by Skvindt
  • Signed by Trogdor7620
  • Turn a bandit camp into a lucrative venture with this mod. Once you clear out the residing bandits in a camp a stones throw away from Windstad Manor, you can salvage the gear they left behind, and hire workers to dig for ores, which you can either use for crafting, or sell for profit. Initially, you can only mine basic ores like iron and corundum, but you have the option to dig deeper and unearth more valuable ores, like orichalcum, ebony and malachite. If you load up on so much ore that you overencumber yourself, don't fret; the mine has a fast travel mechanic, letting you move from the mine to ore storage without hassle. Additionally, you can choose how much each deposit yields, and purchase Hearthfire materials, along with sawn logs. Basically, you can make your own little community that earns you a heap of gold a while you adventure across Skyrim. It's a Game-Breaker, yes, but it saves having to hunt for ore deposits.
  • Nexus link

• College Visitor Pass by Jokiros
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • Instead of being forced to join Winterhold College to enter the place, you can be allowed inside as a guest after donating money to Faralda; of course, some features (skill training) are disabled until you get proper membership. You can later join the faction by talking to Faralda again. This mod offers a more RP choice, since you no longer are forced to join a mage guild to advance the game.
    • May conflict with mods which alter Faralda and/or the whole Winterhold College.
  • Link

• Tempered Ironwork by Ltparsons
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • A mod which alters smithing and smelting. It includes several features in separate plugins:
    • The main file gives its name to the whole mod. It allows to fully temper various items (leather armor set, fur armor set, Daedric artifacts, guards armors and shields, Wuuthrad, iron armor set and weapons, etc.) which could only be partially improved in the unmodded game, making Daedric artifacts and low tier gear more useful. Fully tempering the items requires the Steel Smithing perk (renamed "Basic Smithing" in the mod). It also works with leather, iron, etc. items added by mods.
    • The "Prospect" optional plugin changes the name of a few material to something more realistic or coherent. "Corundum" becomes "Copper", "Malachite" becomes "Meteorite Glass", "Moonstone Ore" becomes "Raw Moonstone".
    • The "Resmelt" optional plugin adds and changes a few smelting recipe. Iron ingots now requires two iron ore nuggets instead of a single one, steel ingots are crafted from iron ingots and charcoal instead of the bizarre "iron + corundum" recipe from the unmodded game, charcoal can be crafted from firewood at the smelter, and you can smelt 100 septims to obtain a gold ingot.^note While it makes crafting more realistic, this plugin may be considered as a borderline cheat mod from a gameplay perspective: replacing corundum by charcoal to craft steel means "replacing an exhaustable (albeit common and respawnable) resource by an unlimited, free resource" (charcoal from firewood), the ability to smelt 100 septims into a gold ingot results in free money and free smithing training if your Speech skill is high enough (merchants will eventually buy two gold rings or one gold necklace for more money than what you spent to get the ingot), and iron ore is so cheap and ubiquitous that needing two nuggets instead of a single one doesn't really make up for the other features.
  • Link

• Wintersun - Faiths of Skyrim by EnaiSiaion
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • A mod which adds religion as a gameplay element, as well as new roleplay elements (adds a ton of new deities from various Tamriel civilizations). The player can choose a single deity among many of them, and worship it to gain various advantages, depending of the god. The initially worshipped god is chosen when leaving Helgen's Keep among a list of available deity (depending on the Dragonborn's race), then you can change at will by activating their altar (all shrines of the Divine and Daedra shrines/altars/statues/etc. from Vanilla work, and the mod adds shrines to the other gods as well; someof the Vanilla's altar effects have been changed), though it resets the god's favour. Ways of increasing favour include meditation (a new ability in the Powers menu), praying at the god's altar, or performing actions (or avoid to perform some actions, which decrease favour). Favour also continuously decreases each day, and the deity abandons you if favour reach 0. The mere act of choosing a deity to worship grants a buff which power scales with the favour; once favour is at least at 100 (you become "devotee"), you gain a special ability, which sometimes consumes favour when activated or requires a meditation session to be used again. Favour is capped at 200. In term of lore, the deity available for worship are the Nine Divines, the Daedric Princes, the Elven Ancestors, the Yokudan Pantheon (Redguards), the Khajiiti Pantheon, and a few other who doesn't fit any of those categories (Mannimarco, Shor, Sithis...)
    • When worshipping one of the Nine Divines, favour is gained quicker by meditation that it is lost through daily decay, making favour gain easy (albeit somewhat slow), and gaining a bounty results in favour's loss (lots favour is proportional to bounty's amount), but beside this, their effects, worshipping methods, and occasional taboos are varied. For instance, worshipping Arkay gives a health regen's buff scaled with the favour, and corpses of defeated humanoid foes are randomly elected to be "blessed" by the player character (performing this ritual grants additional favour and turns the corpse to ashes, making them unable to be raised by nearby necromancers); at devotee's level, an Arkay's worshipper is resurrected at full health when taking lethal damage (costs 15% favour and requires meditation to be usable again). Summoning undead reduces Arkay's favour by 40% and becoming a full vampire results in the Dragonborn being abandonned by Arkay.
    • Daedra worshipping is very different, mechanically speaking. Being able to worship them at all usually requires to complete their quest (or to read a specific books related to said Daedra), and the favour's daily decay is faster than meditation's gain, forcing the player character to regularly perform actions to please them, and some of them are detrimental. For instance, Molag Bal's favour raises faster if the Dragonborn is a vampire but curing their vampirism causes instant death (it balances a very powerful devotee ability allowing to immediately banish an enemy in combat), the most efficient ways to gain Sanguine's favour are to earn bounties and escape jail, Peryite's favour doesn't decrease daily and doesn't increase while meditating but is earned when catching diseases and attempting to cure them results in him abandonning the Dragonborn, etc. In short, Daedra's worshipping can be a Self-Imposed Challenge, thoughthe difficuly of some others (Meridia, Malacath, etc.) mostly comes from the favour's daily decay rather than the actions that must be done to gain favour.
    • The other deities work mostly like the Nine Divines (meditation grants more favour than the natural daily decay, except for Mannimarco and the Old Ways), except they don't care about your criminal activities, and some of them are unavailable at the start of the game regardless of your race.
  • Requires Dawnguard and Dragonborn.
  • Link: Legacy version here, Special Edition version: here.

• Dragon's Blood by icechambers (LE version)/Phaser Rave (SE version)
  • Signed by Vanshira
  • Quite simply, this mod causes every dragon you slay to drop one bottle of Dragon's Blood along with its other regular loot. Drinking it grants the Dragonborn their choice of five permanent points to Health, Magicka, or Stamina, or a perk point. It's an easy and immersive way to gain perk points, especially at higher levels where leveling up is hard and slaying dragons is easy - and, on the tiny off chance you actually run out of perks to spend points on, it's still useful for the Health/Magicka/Stamina bonuses.
  • Link: Legacy version, SE version (not a port but a recreation)

• Summermyst: Enchantments of Skyrim by Enai Siaion
  • Signed by Vanshira
  • Adds a boatload of new enchantments to the game, ranging from new versions of existing enchantments (Fire Damage Lingering ignites opponents for a certain amount of damage per second until combat ends) to the extremely original (Insult does magicka damage and changes the target's name to "Peasant", "Imbecile", or something equally flattering). There's an enchantment to reduce the Stamina cost of power attacks, an enchantment to recharge your equipped enchanted weapons, enchantments to invoke Fear, Frenzy, or Calm in surrounding enemies, and an enchantment that lets you travel back in time four seconds. There are enchantments to automatically give you free gold, free filled soul gems, and free enchanted weapons or armor. And this isn't remotely a comprehensive list. These enchantments are worked into the vanilla lists, and so can be bought, looted, and disenchanted just like any vanilla item. There's even a feature to cap spell cost reductions or certain skill fortifications to keep you from getting too overpowered.
  • Link: Legacy version, SE version

• Skyrim Together by Skyrim Together Dev Team
  • Signed by BossKey
  • Probably the largest-scale and most user-friendly multiplayer Skyrim mod out there, Skyrim Together adds hop-in, hop-out multi-player functionality to the game, letting you adventure alongside fellow Dragonborn. Furthermore, the mod is incredibly easy to use: just run the game from its launcher, load up a game, press a couple of keys, and go into one of the dedicated servers. Is there anything else that really needs to be said?
  • Github link (SE only)

• Requiem - The Roleplaying Overhaul by The Requiem Dungeon Masters
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Requiem aims to "[turn] Skyrim into a better roleplaying experience by making game more immersive, semi-realistic and coherent, with the tend to find a compromiss between old school mechanics and more modern approaches." Requiem completely overhauls the game's mechanics, items, skills, stats, spells, enemies... It makes several important changes to Vanilla:
    • The most notable change is the removal of Level Scaling. Every dungeon and encounter has a static level. Don't even think about venturing in Bleak Falls Barrow right after fleeing Helgen. At start, you'll be barely strong enough to fight the pack of wolves living near Riverwood on your own.
    • Requiem still has the Vanilla levelling system, but with a major tweak: turning a skill legendary will reset the perks, but the legendary remains at 100. Requiem has a hard level cap. On the other hand, you start with 3 free perk points.
    • In general, skill level alone is almost worthless unless you also buy the related perks.
    • No natural health regen (unless you take a level 50 Alchemy perk), magicka and stamina still replenish slowly on their own. Healing, magicka, and stamina potions no longer make you instantly regain the relevant attribute, but work over time. Sleep and level ups no longer replenish attributes. Beside potions and Restoration magic, an important way to regain health is to craft or buy health poultices and use them, they grant a weak yet long lasting health regeneration effect as long as you're not in combat.
    • You start without knowing any spell. Spell tomes are expensive and spell consumes a high magicka amount without the relevant perks For instance, with starting skill levels and no perks, the Requiem equivalent of the Healing spell you start with in Vanilla costs more that 1500 Septims, and costs a bit more than 50 magicka. Armor weight grants a debuff which increase spells' magicka cost, and heavy armor makes spellcasting very impractical (again, there are perks which mitigates this effect).
    • The movement speed depends from a combination of several factors. The maximum speed is calculated from value of full health and stamina, but a debuff is received is health or stamina are less than half of their maximum. The weight of worn armor is also taken in account, there are perks (in both armor skill) which reduce this speed debuff. Also, the total weight of the inventory's content counts as well to calculate your speed, even if you're not over-encumbered.
    • Speaking of movement speed, running now consumes a tiny amount of stamina. Standard attacks consume stamina too.
    • Gold, lockpicks, and arrows have a weight.
    • The Light Armor skill has been renamed "Evasion". It works with both light armors and non-armored clothing, and also includes dodging perks.
    • Tempering requires to take a Smithing perk related to the item's material. Crafting equipement requires to carry a book. Crafting jewelry or construction materials require to have a perk, too.
    • The level of the Lockpicking skill determines which locks you'll be able to pick, and several of the related perks decrease the skill level needed to pick higher level locks. Note that, if playing a race without an affinity with the skill, you'll start with 5 in Lockpicking and you won't be able to pick Novice locks until you buy the first Lockpicking perk. Also, you only earn Lockpicking experience after successfully opening a lock and broken lockpicks no longer count.
    • Drawing a bow is slow and archery's range depends on Archery's level. On the other hand, bows' damage is high, and range combat is the bane of mages and light armor-clad fighters.
    • One half of the speech tree is related to barter and trade. The other half is related to Thu'um's use.
    • Undead and vampires are much tougher than in Vanilla, unless you use silver weapons against them.
    • No fast travel. Save money to buy a horse.
    • Food regains a low amount of stamina and alcohol gives a buff to maximum health.
  • Warning:
    • Most of the features mentioned above make Requiem Early Game Hell incarnate, which is why the mod may not be for everyone. On the other side of the matter, its absence of Level Scaling also results in some content becoming too easy once the player character's level is high enough.
    • While Requiem requires Dragonborn to functions, it only overhauls Skyrim, Dawnguard, and Heartfire, while leaving Solstheim's content untouched; the installer indeed has an option to completely disable Solstheim and the Dragonborn plot. Note there is an unofficial submod to port Requiem inside Dragonborn.
    • Requiem is a complete overhaul which conflicts with a lot of other mods. While some unrelated mods have compatibility patches to work along Requiem, it's safe to assume that every mod touching skills, perks, NPCs and enemies, spells, or item stats will conflict with Requiem without an up-to-date compatibility patch.
  • Requirements: The three official DLCs, as well as SkyUi and the Legendary version of the Unofficial Patch.
  • Links: Oldrim Nexus (there's no official port for SE)

New Content

Mods that provide additional quests and areas to explore.

• The Second Great War by Reath 1
  • Signed by Yukianesa
  • So you have won the civil war for either side and defeated Alduin for all time, but a greater evil still remains. The Empire is weaker than ever and Skyrim is still battered and bloody from the war, and the Dominion are not ones to allow a good crisis to go to waste. The dreaded Second Great War is here. Thalmor armies bolstered by Bosmer and Khajiit auxiliaries will seize Markarth and Riften and push into Skyrim, and Altmer guards will patrol the cities and countryside. There are new missions, events and random encounters - fugitive Talos worshippers evading capture, Talos statues like the one in Whiterun will be torn down, Thalmor patrols and Nord rebels will skirmish in the roads, and you will be asked to take part in various missions involving prisoner rescue, assassination and more. This dynamic campaign offers four possible endings depending on the side you choose to support (Imperials/Stormcloaks or Dominion) and whether they are victorious or defeated. Which side are you on?
  • Links: Oldrim version, SE version

• Blood of the Nord by someguy2000
  • Signed by Yukianesa
  • A nice alternative to the above Second Great War mod, Blood of the Nord is a medium-sized, high-challenge and fully voice-acted questline that explores the aftermath of a Stormcloak victory in the civil war. Tasked by Hrolf Witch-Slayer in Castle Dour to help the victorious seperatists to reassert control over a Skyrim devastated and politically divided, the Dragonborn will be thrust into a world of shifting alliances and unclear ethical dilemnas where their choices can have unforeseen consequences. The Stormcloaks know war with the Dominion is looming, so Skyrim needs all hands on deck. They won the war, now can they keep the peace? The questline is about two hours long and features several new dungeons and worldspaces, and you even get a new weapon out of the deal too.
  • Requires downloading the Someguy Series quest mods, link accessible from Someguy's Nexus page. There is no known conflict with any mod that affects the civil war questline (as the questline is finished) nor the Second Great War mod, but for obvious reasons you will want to run through this mod first.
  • Links: Oldrim version, SE version

• Beyond Skyrim: Bruma by Beyond Skyrim
  • Signed by Melancholeric
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Travel beyond the borders of Skyrim, and visit Bruma, the northmost county in Cyrodiil. Discover what has become of the city's residents since the events of Oblivion in all-new adventures and storylines. Plunge into the depths of ancient Ayleid ruins. Explore an expansive region larger and denser than the Dragonborn DLC and rediscover Frostcrag Spire, Cloud Ruler Temple, Frostfire Glade along with many other legendary locations. In Beyond Skyrim: Bruma, the choices — and their consequences — are yours alone. Are you prepared?
    
    And remember, this only a small preview of what the full version of Beyond Skyrim's Cyrodiil mod will one day offer.
  • Skyrim Nexus link: Legacy version here, Special Edition version: here

• Beyond Skyrim: Wares of Tamriel by Beyond Skyrim
  • Signed by TheAmazingBlachman
  • Has its own work page here.
  • The full release of any of the Beyond Skyrim projects are probably at least a couple of years out at the time of this writing, but luckily the group has put out a minor project to tease some of the bigger stuff they are working on. The merchant Cardana Pallo has docked in Dawnstar after traveling around the various ports of Tamriel and has collected many items for you to buy. In addition, she has plently of facts and rumors to share about the places she has been. The developers have stated that they are planning to continuously going to update the mod, as more content for the different projects are finished, so make sure to keep an eye on it.
  • Skyrim Nexus link: Legacy version here, Special Edition version: here

• Beyond Skyrim in Skyrim by Pierre Despereaux
  • Signed by TheAmazingBlachman
  • A minor mod that takes the content released by the Beyond Skyrim teams so far, and integrates it into the base game. This means that people visiting from Cyrodiil will actually wear clothes and wield weapons from that area, and some wares from the other provinces of Tamriel will pop up in certain merchants' inventory. Pretty great for immersion.
  • Skyrim Nexus link: Special Edition version: here

• Falskaar by AlexanderJVelicky
  • Signed by arcanephoenix
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Falskaar adds a whole new world to Skyrim, a la Solstheim in Dragonborn. Created by Velicky as a proof of his skill in game design, it adds 20-30 hours of new content to the game, fully voiced.
  • Skyrim Nexus link: Legacy version: here, Special Edition version: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/2057/ here]]

• Moonpath to Elsweyr by muppetpuppet
  • Signed by disgruntledviewer
  • Pay a visit to the Khajiit homeland of Elsweyr! Overthrow Thalmor occupation! Pit your strength and skill against an insidious Sload overlord! Liberate an island from pirates! Survive against Elsweyr's jungles and badlands teeming with dangerous and untamed beasts, including hyenas, siligondors, raptors, giant spiders, theriums and more! Will you travel the Moonpath to Elsweyr? Features full voice acting and bespoke assets. Lore friendly.
  • Skyrim Nexus link: Legacy version [[http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/9782/? here]], Special Edition version here.
  • Steam Workshop link: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=10738
  • YouTube trailer

• Undeath by Antioch 08
  • Signed by Zmanwarrior
  • A quest in which the Dragonborn must stop an ambitious necromancer from transforming in to an immortal, undead Lich. Will you halt the ritual and bury the secret of Undeath forever... or uncover it for yourself instead?
  • Link

• Helgen Reborn by Mike Hancho
  • Signed by Trogdor7620
  • After Helgen is razed to the ground by Alduin in the game's intro, a few days later, bandits occupy the ruins, and nothing else happens in the vanilla game. With Helgen Reborn, a noble hears of your survival, and seeks you out, so that he can communicate with the leader of the bandits, who is an old friend. What follows is a chance to return Helgen to it's former glory, and includes a home for the player.
  • [[https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/35841/? Nexus link]]

• Return to Helgen by Giskaard
  • Signed by asaqe3
  • For those who wants a civil war story that has the authentic feel of serving the Empire in the beginning as it unravels to be part of another one of the many games played between the Divines and Daedra, return to Helgen offers a nice alternative to Helgen reborn for those who prefers a more roleplay inspired experienced.
  • Link

• Immersive College of Winterhold by Grantyboy050
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • An enormous expansion and overhaul to the College of Winterhold that makes the place feel like a proper magical university. Gain experience in magical and non-magical skills by attending the faculty's lessons and studying all the material in the college. Harvest rare alchemical ingredients from the college's greenhouses. Use soul gems and a collection of teleportation spheres to instantly travel to and from Skyrim's major cities. Uncover more of the Winterhold's dark history, complete with a lengthy dungeon crawl under the Midden that will pit you against unique enemies. Become the Archmage and inherit improved quarters, featuring a scrying bowl, scripted crafting stations, treasure vault, and access to a private mountain retreat. Or decide that maybe the post should go to someone who's been at the college for more than a month and nominate Tolfdir for Archmage.
  • Nexus link

• Conan Hyborian Age by PROMETHEUS_ts
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • Has its own work page here.
  • The mod consists in a quest (starting when you read a book in the Grey-Mane's house) which focuses on the exploration a the Hyborian Mound, a new large dungeon, in order to find weapons forged in an ancient metal; completing the quest (1-2 hours to explore the dungeon) unlocks new crafting recipes. The mod is basically a Conan the Barbarian (1982) homage, with items (including the iconic Loincloth and the Atlantean sword) and characters from the film, new loadings screens inspired by the film (pictures and quotes), and a fully voiced Conan as a NPC. According to its creator, the mod's premise is to introduce items from Conan the Barbarian into Skyrim in the most lore-friendly way possible, using the Conan setting as a distant past to Tamriel.
  • Nexus Link

• Relics of Hyrule - A DLC Scale Zelda Mod by JKalenad
  • Signed by RPD490
  • Has its own work page here.
  • A DLC sized mod that adds weapons, equipment, enemies, new locations and lore from the famous Legend of Zelda series to the world of Tamriel. The mod aims to connect the lore of the Zelda series to the Elder Scrolls in the most lore-friendly way possible. Seek out the lost artifacts of Hyrule's history, and seek out the ultimate relic that will have you traveling all across Skyrim and Solstheim to find the lost shards and fragments of said relic, and discover the tragic story about the once glorious kingdom that was once Hyrule, and how it fell.
  • JKalenad has since released the mod for Special Edition, and is updated in tandem with the original version.
  • Nexus Link
  • Special Edition Nexus Link

• Legacy of the Dragonborn (Dragonborn Gallery) by icecreamassassin
  • Signed by Tropers/{Amuro NT 1}}
  • Has its own work page here.
  • If you ever wanted to create a real testament to your achievements throughout Skyrim, this is the mod for you. Legacy adds the Dragonborn Gallery, a museum dedicated to the Player Character, to the city of Solitude. The museum has space for over 2,000 unique displays, ranging from weapons and armor to art to Daedric artifacts to nature exhibits. Become an official relic hunter for the museum, found an Explorer's Guild to excavate ancient ruins, and delve deeper into the treasures and lore of Tamriel. There are a few quests, including an endgame quest that adds the coolest armor set ever (in this troper's opinion, at least) to Skyrim. Legacy boasts full support for dozens of other mods (including many listed on this very page), adding displays for the artifacts you receive from them. This mod is held in very high esteem, referred to by many as the mod if you want to get back into Skyrim.
    • Related is Lost Legacy of the Nine by JCBQ, which introduces the Knights of the Nine from Oblivion in a lore-friendly and immersive way, as well as seeking to better explain why so many powerful artifacts seem to be congregating in Skyrim. (Listed here rather than on its own because it's a deliberate expansion to Legacy.)
  • Nexus Link

• The Forgotten City by TheModernStoryteller
  • Signed by GoombasAreGods
  • Has its own work page here.
  • The Forgotten City adds a fully voiced new questline involving a unique underground city, with a deep, well-written story, plenty of interesting NPCs with their own quests to offer, a custom orchestral soundtrack, interesting puzzles, and several different endings. It's the only mod to win a national Writers' Guild award for its script, and it won a number of accolades from mod review sites for its design.
  • For Skyrim
  • For Skyrim Special Edition

• Here There Be Monsters by Araanim
  • Signed by Vanshira
  • Already defeated Alduin, Miraak, and Lord Harkon, been named Listener of the Dark Brotherhood, Guildmaster of the Thieves' Guild, Harbinger of the Companions, Archmage of the College of Winterhold, Thane of all nine holds, and reunited the Empire/secured Skyrim's independence? In search of new challenges, new fully-voiced followers, new custom armor and weapons, and a "Detect Life" lover's dream come true? Suddenly, traumatized survivors and horror-struck ship's captains appear in port cities throughout Skyrim and send you on a quest to find and slay the most terrifying monsters of the Sea of Ghosts, drawn from multiple real-world cultures and well-integrated into game lore. But is your monster-slaying crusade making Skyrim safer, or putting it in greater danger than before? And what is "That is not dead which can eternal lie" supposed to mean...?
  • Here There Be Monsters
  • Here There Be Monsters: Call of Cthulhu (requires Dawnguard, Dragonborn, and the original Here There Be Monsters)
  • Here There Be Monsters: Signe of Cipactli (requires Dawnguard, Dragonborn, and the original Here There Be Monsters)

• VIGILANT by Vicn and VIGILANT Voiced: English Translation by Aelarr
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • A truly massive quest mod spanning four lengthy chapters that delves deep into Elder Scrolls lore. The player starts off joining the Vigilants of Stendarr and hunting vampires and daedra and witches across Skyrim, but a sit progresses they get wrapped up in a vast and terrifying plot involving Molag Bal, Sheogorath, Jyggalag, and the history of the Empire itself. Includes a combination of intricate story, superb horror, a massive set of environments to explore, multiple endings, and paths for both good and evil characters to take, along with titanic boss battles against a wide range of enemies, including foes such as Umaril the Unfeathered, Molag Bal, and Jyggalag within the realms of Oblivion. Broadly considered one of the largest and best quest mods added for Skyrim to date.
  • Main Mod Link and Voiced English Translation Link

• Blackland by BlackRL
  • Signed by adz_fh
  • A mod that adds island-sized area called Blackland, with its own new unique locations, dungeons, and NPCs. Take part in the island's village life by helping the locals to solve their problems, with new spells and powers, new mini games to keep the replay value, as well as easter eggs and secrets found throughout the island. It also includes survival mode, with degrading equipment and needs mechanic similar to the iNeed mod below. An ambitious project, to be sure, which will add more hours to your probably hundreds of playtime.
  • Nexus Link

• Darkend by JKrojmal
  • Signed by adz_fh
  • Inspired by the Dark Souls series, Darkend brings player to travel to the new island of Phalos, explore detailed environments, fight new enemies and discover an Ancient set of weapons of incredible power. No quest, no holding hand, this mod is designed with solo-character playing experience in mind. May cause lags on lower-end systems due to its impressive graphics demand.
  • Nexus Link

• Project AHO by Haem Projects
  • Signed by SigrunNaryon
  • Project AHO takes you to the secret House Telvanni settlement of Sadrith Kegran, located in a dwemer ruin beneath Skyrim. Kidnapped and sold as a slave, through several non-linear main quests and side quests, you eventually gain the trust of the settlement's over 20 voiced NPCs. Travel to over 40 locations, listen to specially composed music, discover new weapons, armors and spells, and discover dark secrets hidden beneath the roots of the Prime Mushroom Tel and. Also features two new followers and two new players houses.
  • Nexus Link

Player Housing

Mods that give the Dragonborn more options when resting between adventures.

• Breezehome FullyUpgradable by Sku11M0neky
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Render Hearthfire obsolete - this mod adds a fully voice-acted NPC in the Bannered Mare who will further upgrade Breezehome (for a fee, of course) to a home fit for the Dragonborn, adding tons of storage options, a better-arranged first and second floor, and an extensive basement with room for all your crafting needs. And yes, he will lampshade that you're buying a forge when there's one literally ten paces out your front door. Other perks include scripted storage containers that automatically take your crafting ingredients, scripted crafting stations that automatically access said containers, a Dwemer hot tub, a scavenger hunt for altars to the Nine Divines hidden across Skyrim, and even a secret passage to the outskirts of Whiterun.
  • Nexus Link

• Riverside Lodge by Lupus
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • This mod adds a frankly beautiful player home between Riverwood and Whiterun, right on the waterfalls near the Honningbrew Meadery. It's no sprawling mansion, but is fully-stocked with a dining area, smithing room, enchantment and alchemy stations, and two extra beds, not to mention a patio and sauna outside. You can even customize whether you want extra bookshelves or display mannequins, or switch between a children's bedroom and follower's quarters. Several containers are also scripted to automatically store certain materials, though unlike the above mod you won't automatically access them if you get on the forge or alchemy table. All you need to get the key is pick the lock of a treasure chest out front.
  • Nexus link

• Airship - Dev Aveza by Deapri
  • Signed by Flightsim777
  • Introduces a fully flyable airship to Skyrim, complete with an interior including a bed, crafting amenities, storage, etc.., Fun mod for those who want a home they can fly.
  • Link.

• Skyhammer Hold - Enter the Barbarian by TheGreenLion
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • Adds a new house named "Skyhammer Hold" in the plain between Whiterun and Rorikstead. Heavily inspired by Jorrvaskr, Skyhammer Hold has been created to be the ideal house for a Barbarian Hero. It is initially locked, the house's keys being looted on the corpse of the unique dragon which guards the building. The place includes features like lots of storages, a bedroom, a room for children, all the crafting stations, a garden to grow plants, a kitchen, a shrine, and three new companions. The companions are the initial inhabitants of Skyhammer Hold and can initially be found in a small camp on the wastern shore of Lake Ilinalta. They also act as merchants and one of them, Dain the Bold, is a kind of steward since he allows to upgrade the estate, notably by hiring two bards, a shaman, eight archers, and buying various new features (mannequins, display cases...).
  • Here's a few additional important informations about the mod:
    • Since it's an unofficial house added by a mod, Skyhammer Hold whole potential won't be usable without a few third party mods to allow spouse, children, and followers to inhabite the place (the description states it's supposed to be a cheftain's house, and it indeed includes barracks with beds)^note without such mods, the three new followers will go back to their campsite if dismissed, despite them being the original inhabitants of the place.
    • This house may not please every player, since some of its features are Game Breakers: you can grow about twenty plants who respawn every few days (invaluable for alchemy), you have all the crafting facilities available in the same area, all three companions are also merchants which starting money pool is 5000 septims (and that's before you get the perks allowing them to buy any kind of object and acting as fences), the two bards and the shamans are also merchants with the same features, and the shrine grants a unique blessing consisting in 100 percent higher regen rate for all three states for a duration of 24 hours and isn't considered by the game to be a proper divine shrine (yes, you can have this buff and a buff from a divine shrine in the same time).
  • Link (requires Hearthfire).

• The Shrouded Lair - A Vampire Home by mrstiffy & The Shrouded Lair Expansion by chrishpz
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • Adds a new house for vampire players. The entrance is located behing the waterfall next to Falkreath, and becomes accessible once you defeat the vampires waiting in the entrance room. The place looks creepy, with low light, ghost merchants, a blood fountain, etc. The main room is based on Sovnegarde hall's layout.
  • The whole place contains plenty of containers. The main room contains a throne, merchants and bookcases; it also leads to a jail (contains vampire cattle), an enchanting room, a smithing room (includes a merchant and all the crafting facilities), the player character's chamber (coffin and bookshelves which display the books), a garden (includes an alchemy lab and a geode ore vein), an armory, and a tower to house followers (includes a bar). A spell tome to learn how to teleport to the Shrouded Lair can be found near the throne.
  • The expansion mod fixes some pathfinding issues and adds new cattle in the main room, weapon plaques, trainers, and an object granting the Lover Stone buff in the garden.
  • Link to the main file and to the expansion (requires Dawnguard).

• Haven Bag by Caithe and Haishao & Haven Bag Campsite by MadModderJess
  • Signed by BillyMT
  • Inspired by the eponymous item from Wakfu, this is probably one of the humblest housings available. It's hard to even call it a "house" at all, mainly because it's a Bag of Holding instead. One with enough Hammerspace for the player themselves to live inside!
  • This mod tries its best to be as small and unobtrusive as possible. Aside from spawning the bag in the player's inventory from the start, all it adds is a small live-space with a few safe containers, a bed (owned by the player), crafting stations, a few coins scattered around the floor, an Elven Dagger and a Silver Sword for free, some ingots, and a crate worth of "genuine" Falmer Blood Elixir.
    • It should be noted that the size and simplicity of this mod is notable enough that it can be used as-is even on Enderal, with only one or two problems. The Campsite version of the mod was made as an alternative to address those.
  • The highlight from this mod is Exactly What It Says on the Tin, a portable hideout that you can access from the inventory, anywhere, anytime. What better way to quench your dovah soul's thirst for making your Dragon Hoard than to carry it with you at all times?
  • Due to the nature of this hideout, only the player can get in and out of it. Followers will remain where they were when the Dragonborn first entered the Haven Bag, as if they were there all along. Unintended, but otherwise justifiable.
  • Original link and Campsite version link

• Sjel Blad Castle by soulbladex
  • Signed by nick98
  • Quite possibly the biggest, baddest add-on house mod for Skyrim, Sjel Blad Castle has it all and then some. There are your usual amenities like a forge, an armory, a trophy room and a vault, but there are also so many other features that you won't need any other housing mod. There is an in-house teleportation system to quickly go from a room to another; a special storage that is accessible in any point of the house; a sparring pit that puts Jorrvaskr's training grounds to shame; over 20 different followers to choose from, each with their set of skills; a sanctuary for alchemy and enchanting; a hub where you can quick travel to all of the major cities in Skyrim; a living zoo with all kinds of wildlife and creatures that can also become your followers; and even a room where you can alter your character's appearance and stats. Not only that, the forge is connected to a small cave where you can mine all kinds of ore. The author of the mod did warn that some of these features are obviously unbalanced and overpowered, so use them with caution. More rooms will be added in future updates, so be on the lookout.
  • Link: Legacy Edition, Special Edition

Immersion

Mods that help Skyrim feel more like a real place, and really draw you into the world of the Elder Scrolls.

• Lore-Based Loading Screens by Chesko
  • Signed by MissMokushiroku
  • Adds a ton of new loading screen blurbs based on Elder Scrolls lore, including quotes from in-game books and the past games in the series.
  • Link

• Interesting NPCs by Kris Takahashi
  • Signed by arcanephoenix
  • Has its own work page here.
  • Skyrim is rather notorious for having hundreds of characters share the same five voice actors, making interaction with many of them very same-y. This mod adds many new NPCs, complete with good voice acting, all over Skyrim. Some quests have also been added, many quite well-written.
  • Link: here. Also, go to their website to get patches required for Hearhfire and Dawnguard.

• Lanterns of Skyrim - All in One by MannyGT
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • A compilation of previous mods that added lanterns around Skyrim's villages, bridges and roads. Not a huge deal unless you're using one of those "enhanced darkness" mods, but a nice touch all the same.
  • Nexus link

• Sounds of Skyrim by Cliffworms
  • Signed by MissMokushiroku
  • A set of three mods which add immersive sounds to Skyrim: the Civilization pack adds sounds to towns and cities, the Wilds pack adds sounds to the wild, and the Dungeons pack adds sounds to caves, mines, ruins, etc. A lot of detail has been put into the sounds and where you'll hear them; for example, certain animals can only be heard in certain regions (e.g., hawks in the Reach), caves with undead and Falmer have their own sound set, and you can hear wind or animals indoors if you're standing near a window. If for whatever reason you don't like some of the sounds, the mods also allow you to choose which sound sets to activate.
    • A suggestion: always opt to disable the soundset for Undead areas, some of its ghostly moans and wails are more Narm than spooky. - Tacitus
  • Links: Civilization, The Dungeons, The Wilds

• Guard Dialogue Overhaul by Eckss
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • The guards' schizophrenic shift between respect and dismissal is quite memetic, not to mention annoying. This mod fixes that. Guards are still dismissive of you at lower levels, but as you improve your skills their dialogue permanently changes to respect you. As you progress through the guilds, they'll treat you properly, so no more wondering if you fetch the Companions' mead when you become Harbinger. Also unlocks some previously unavailable dialogue and increases the likelihood of using rarer dialogue options.
  • Link.

• Realistic Needs and Diseases by Perseid9
  • Signed by Crino37.
  • Adds hunger, thirst and tiredness to the game, creating a more survivalist atmosphere, which makes foods, beverages and inns more useful game elements than just something for roleplay. Also makes alcoholic beverages cause drunkness and diseases to progress more dangerously if they aren't treated, along with other features. Can be combined to other mods, such as Water Fonts of Skyrim.
  • Link

• iNeed - Food, Water, and Sleep by isoku
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • A lightweight, low-script needs mod that trades complexity and realistic needs for streamlining and functionality. Rather than adjusting all the foods and drinks across Skyrim, iNeed focuses on compatibility within the existing food and drink system, along with adding systems for waterskins, wells, and acquiring water from snow drifts. Includes some more complex options if you want to use them, such as dangerous diseases, follower needs, vampire and cannibal feeding, automatic food consumption, setting harvests to be valued (so you have to pay for them or steal them) and a simple functionality to include other mods' foods and drinks into the game system. Virtually everything is customizable, so it is very easy to tailor to your playstyle and adjust to enable or disable various features.
  • Link

• Vitality Mode - Basic Needs - Eat Drink and Sleep by Narue
  • Signed by Infitroper
  • A lightweight needs mod that aims to give you a reason to eat, drink, and sleep without turning it into a survival minigame. The mod tracks your hunger, thirst, and fatigue as you travel across Skyrim. Maintaining your needs thoroughly will provide you with benefits, while neglecting your needs will result in similar penalties and eventually death. However, you'd have to deliberately neglect your needs to reach that point and can easily get by through simple common sense.
  • Link

• DLC Intergration by Dillonn 241
  • Signed by Antronach
  • A simple mod that takes the things introduced in the DLCs into the rest of the game, including the other DLCs as well. You'll start to see more people use crossbows, ovens in high brow places, and some of the alchemical ingredients from the DLCs elsewhere.
  • Link.

• Human Serana by redscissors3
  • Signed by Psychopompos007
  • In the unmodded game, once Serana is convinced to renounce to her vampire status, the only change is that she no longer can turn the Dragonborn into a vampire lord and create Bloodcursed Elven Arrows; she still looks and behaves exactly the same way, which can be immersion breaking. With this mod, once she no longer is a vampire, Serana stops having red glowing eyes, stops complaining about the sun, stops wearing a hood when she is outside during the day, and stops using a vampiric drain spell during combat. To balance this loss of abilities, it also boosts her mana and improves a bit her proficiency in Destruction and Conjuring.
  • Link

Just For Fun

These mods are a bit silly.

• Posh Mudcrabs by Maniczombie
  • Signd by Rytex
  • Mudcrabs are an irritating enemy. Almost as irritating as the Skyrim guards' Arrow to the Knee line. However, we are not recognizing their true nature. This skin replaces the default, unappreciated Mudcrab skin with the skin of a mudcrab gentleman, wearing a top hat and a monocle.
    • This would be listed under essential, because why shouldn't you have this mod?, but for TV Tropes sorting rules, it goes here.
  • Link.

• Divine Punishment for Mentions of Arrows in the Knee by toaDime
  • Signed by Tacitus
  • Enough of that Discredited Meme - now when a guard says that stupid phrase they get a Bolt of Divine Retribution. Incidentally a handy way to get hold guards' shields to decorate player housing.
  • Nexus link

• High King of Skyrim by Solarcow
  • Signed by Zaptech
  • Tired of not getting the respect a legendary hero of Skyrim deserves? With this mod, you can settle the issue of who rules Skyrim by taking the throne yourself! Comes complete with a huge range of perks, including a fully functional castle, the power to conscript and train anyone to be a follower, order the imprisonment, death, or enslavement of anyone (including essential NPCs), build your own royal army, and even wage war on the Thalmor.
  • Link

• Uncle Sheogorath's Really Helpful Hints and Tips by Tumbleworld
  • Signed by Rytex
  • Replaces the hints and tips of the loading screens with, essentially, things the Daedric Prince of Madness would say about the world. Some of the hints are surprisingly helpful, though.
  • Link
  • Dragonborn
  • Dawnguard
  • Hearthfire
  • Frostfall
  • Climates of Tamriel
  • Jaysus Weapon Mod
  • Phenderix Spells Mod

• Macho Dragons by FancyPantz
  • Signed by BreadLeader
  • Replaces dragons with Randy Savage. For when your game just isn't macho enough.
  • Link

• Amorous Adventures by CE 0
  • Signed by adz_fh
  • Has its own work page here.
  • When one lover is not enough, this mod allows the Dragonborn to have multiple lovers at once. There are more than 30 NPCs that can be wooed, with each person has different quest that follows their original, vanilla quest. It was written using vanilla assets in mind, with fully-voiced lines (by using vanilla voices to boot), making it realistic and seems like the romance is already there in the beginning. Comes with two flavors: a clean version that does a Fade to Black as the couple embraces, and a more hardcore version that doesn't, instead proceeding to animations from the author's sex mod. Watch as the Dragonborn becomes a Chivalrous Pervert like a fellow draconic Casanova, Hyoudou Issei, with Serana as the Skyrim version of Rias Gremory. A fitting complementary to the Bijin mod above.
  • Nexus link.

• Aesthetic Elisif by Qxd
  • Signed by RoarkTenjouin
  • One of the more notable NPCs the above-mentioned Bijin mods don't touch upon is Jarl Elisif the Fair. To quote the mod's author: "Have you ever laughed at Bethesda for creating a thing called 'Elisif the Fair' that couldn't be further away from that name? Well, with this mod those hilarious days are over, sorry. If you decide to download it anyways this is what you get: This mod is a standalone replacer (which means that all neccessary resources are included) for Jarl Elisif of Solitude. Since according to the lore she is supposed to be a young and gorgeous noble, the aim of this mod is to present something more fitting while hopefully staying natural.". A good compliment to the Bijin mods if one plans on using the above-mentioned Amorous Adventures mod, given that Elisif is one of the romances for that quest who isn't touched by the Bijin mods.
  • Nexus link^note unfortunately only available for SE at the moment, although given that it only changes how Elisif looks, it should work for vanilla Skyrim
  • The statement that the Bijin series does not include a replacer for Elisif is only partially true. The author of the Bijin series has made a follower character named Toccata and included a replacer to have her face applied to Elisif if one wishes to continue using his series.

• Overlord - Become an Evil Lich by mrx16
  • Signed by nick98
  • If you're a fan of the Overlord (2012) light novel series, then this is the mod for you. This mod contains everything you need to turn the Dragonborn into Ainz Ooal Gown himself: a new playable race - the skeletal Lich, with its own set of visuals, perks and stats; 132 new spells; 21 new perks; 5 new summonable monsters; the Great Tomb of Nazarick as a visitable location; the Ring and Staff of Ainz; 3 new followers - including an armored Albedo; and new armor sets. Complement this mod with Jinxxed0's follower mods based on this series, and you're all set to invade Skyrim under the banner of the Sorcerer Kingdom.
  • Link: Special Edition (sadly, this mod is only available for the Special Edition)

• Super Skyrim Brothers by clintmich
  • Signed by RoarkTenjouin
  • Adds a Super Mario Bros themed world to the world of Skyrim, accessible by dreaming in a house in Dawnstar, which asks the question of "What if Super Mario Bros was converted into Skyrim?" and then answers it. Collect coins and use them to earn furniture/clothing, or if you don't want to bring anything back with you, convert it into gold.
  • Nexus links here^note regular edition and here^note special edition.