Hi all,

I finally got around to picking up Oblivion and the 2 expansions today. Any essential mods that I need to have on my radar before I start playing?

TIA.

Here's some you might take a look at using.
Bag of Holding (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=861) - a bit of a cheat perhaps :p
Immersive Interface (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=717)
House Map Markers (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=759)
Francesco's leveled creatures/items (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=268)
Open Cities - Complete (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=2050)

Can't remember which weather mod I used at the moment.

Thanks for the recommendations, teekay. Installing several of them now.

Open cities sounds scary ;) First I can imagine there would be a major FPS hit when you start getting close to the cities and second, what a pain it would be if a quest npc decided it was hungry and wanted some tasty venison. I would recomend that you first see how the game performs, if its smooth as glass then go for it ;) .

As an alternative to Tk's suggestion for the UI you should also check out
Darnified UI (http://privat.bluezone.no/darn/oblivion/guide/)

Call Steed (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=9154) this mod lets you call your horse to you and also you can store your loot on the horse.

Alchemy Perks (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=1910)

Quest Award Leveling (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=2119)

I'll have to give Darnified UI some thought, but the rest are downloaded now. Thanks.

I haven't played Oblivion in quite a while so I may be out of touch with what's the latest & greatest among the mods released, but here are some I used when I played it:

Ayleid Meteoric Weapons (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=5521)
Gives you a little more reason to explore all those Ayleid ruins dotting the landscape. You can find some unique Ayleid-styled weapons hidden away in many of them.


Book jackets (http://ninthwavedesigns.typepad.com/guilded_lilies/2006/07/oblivion_book_m.html)
Only cosmetic, but does quite a bit for the mood of the game IMO. Gives every book in the game its own unique cover with the name of the book printed on it. Makes those libraries and book shops look a lot prettier. :)


Guide books (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=3234)
Adds a series of Guide Books you can buy at the book shop in the imperial city that gives you hints where you can find a lot of the skill trainers, Daedric shrines and other points of interest. Helpful if you have a hard time to remember that sort of thing. :)


Quiet feet (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=1999)
If you have an integrated sound card in your computer there is a fair chance your game will slow down considerably when riding a horse or when near four-footed animals due to some weird sound glitch. This mod removes their footstep sound which improved performance dramatically in those instances.



Other than that I'm using a heavily modified version of Francesco's leveled creatures/items mod that tk102 mentioned, the Arachnophobia mod to get rid of the Spider Daedra from the game, Quest Award Leveling.

Most of the other by me considered essential tweaks are handled by a mod I've done myself that adds a new player house and does tons of tweaks to the game, like adding world map markers for all the Doomstones and Wayshrines, increased summon limits, adjusted sneaking and sneak attacks, removing the confirm every time you buy/sell something, a bunch of new spells, items and various bug fixes. And another quick mod that adds a wishing well in one of the Ayleid ruins where you can burn some gold when you have too much of it for a chance of getting... something... depending on your luck. :)

(If you want the ones I've made I think they're still uploaded here (http://www.algonet.se/~stoffe/obhouse.rar) and here (wishing well) (http://www.algonet.se/~stoffe/st_well.zip), though I don't remember if that's the latest versions.)

@T7 -- completely forgot about the Call Steed mod and that was something I used all the time. :) Don't remember there being a big framerate hit, but then again, I was fine running the whole game around 16 fps anyway :p Alchemy perks, yep that one too. :D

@stoffe -- I'll have to grab those mods next time (except Arachnophobia (?) :()

Alienslof's horses (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=699) + compatibility patch (http://www.tessource.net/files/file.php?id=9297) if you use the horse armor official plug-in.

A must have for thief char: Thievery in the Imperial city (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=1368) (best quest mod so far IMHO)


There are also quite a few texture replacers you can chose from: http://devnull.devakm.googlepages.com/obliviontextureoverhaul) (note that Qarls QTP3, while impressive, is a real preformance killer. I tried it once but uninstalled soon after due to this reason and I have a rather high end machine.)

If you decide to use some companion mods or some harvest mods, be careful as some of them can clutter your savegame pretty quickly: http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=633649&hl=)

Also take the time to check this thread (http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=670397) for fixes, compatibility patches and updates for Francesco's mod if you decide to use it.

There are tons of other mods and I could maybe recommend a few more depending on what you like (quests, companions -Ruined Tail's tale is the best companion mod so far IMHO- game tweaks, cities, houses, castles, realism mods). However I mostly use my own custom mods, including a disguise mod that allows me to grab any guard armor and go unnoticed (even in the barracks and castles depending on what kind of armor you grabbed), no matter your bounty (well there's always a slight random chance that they will notice you if you get too close to them or try to talk to them...wearing a guard disguise is now a crime :p ).

I also highly recommend Wrye Bash to you: http://wrye.ufrealms.net/) It's a utility that allows you to do a lot of things such as cleaning your savegame, modifying the load order, exporting/importing faces, merging levelled lists, etc.



And finally, to fine tune your game: http://www.tweakguides.com/Oblivion_1.html)

Other than that I'm using a heavily modified version of Francesco's leveled creatures/items mod that tk102 mentioned, the Arachnophobia mod to get rid of the Spider Daedra from the game, Quest Award Leveling.
God I wish there was an arachnophobia mod for Dark Messiah. I'm not particularly scared of spiders, but... damn. There are hundreds of them in that game.

Yes yes, it's a necro, but since I assume there have been a couple off new mods since 07, I feel it's justified.
Anyways, I'm basically also wondering what mods people recomend, in particular I'd like to know if there is a mod that makes your stat boosts at level up fixed at some value (+5 or + 4) as I find leveling skils to maximize stat boosts a pain.