I have close to, if not greater than, 150+ mods at this point but a few do standout as worthy of an install. A few in particular that I like, if only because they allow options other than daedric armour + sword or light armour/archer which remain powerful in vanilla late game (while most other playstyles just don't scale). (One of the worst decisions Beth made with Skyrim was to not have magic scale in damage, meaning base conjuring, destruction and even illusion, fall off FAST at levels higher than 40 or so.) In no particular order:
- Jaysus Swords: The quality of the models in this mod is great, there are some really lovely weapons here. It includes daggers, maces, swords (long and normal), axes and have options to suit many different tastes and character.
- Forgotten Magic: A great magic mod that adds a bunch of new spells in different flavours. The base game has "some" options...fire, ice, lightning, atromancy, necromancy...but Forgotten Magic adds more. There's stuff for elementalists, warlocks, paladins, druids and other magic users with different flavour. It includes an internal advancement mechanic as well that's configurable, but probably the best part about it is that it makes magic "competitive" thru the whole game (unlike vanilla destruction). I had a literal blast with the fire spells from this mod in a recent pyro-mage playthru.
- Better Vampires: Obviously only worthwhile if you plan to go vamp, but recommended if you do. There aren't many vampire games, let alone good ones and vanilla skyrim had the possibility but didn't really do much with it. This mod makes being a vampire mean something and is totally configurable. You can properly be a creature of the night, surviving on blood, prowling shadows, sensing heartbeats of the living, unable to face the Sun's glare. You get cool vampiric powers that synergise with dawnguard brilliantly and are also competitive late game.
- aMidianBorn Enhancements: By now, I think this modder is done, but highly recommend his retextures of just about everything in the game. Having a PC so much more powerful than last gen consoles, this is a great mod to have. Why suffer low-res blurry textures when these mods add so much quality and fidelity.
- Project Parallax: This is one graphic enhancement I would singularly pick out of all the other HD improvements and what not, for how wonderful it is. The effect is subtle, but changes the game world; flat textures suddenly pop out and look much more realistic and immersive. I cannot recommend this mod enough.
- AutoHarvest: After one or two playthrus, searching every chest and picking up loot from the newly deceased becomes a tiresome chore. This removes the chore by automatically picking up loot in your proximity, configured by you. F.ex, mine is set to pick up all alchemy ingredients, enchanted gear, only the top potions/poisons, all gems and gold, unread books and all crafting mats (ingots, leather, etc). The rest, it ignores. It is such a time saver and a sanity saver and I couldn't imagine playing without it...Fallout 4 desperately needs this mod too. I automatically get the loot I want when I'm next to it and the rest it leaves.
- Falskaar: It's as big as DG/DB and very polished. Has a new island to explore and a 10-15 hour story with two new shouts as well.
Some other quick fire ones:
- Marriable Serana: The only companion in the game with any actual personality, and we couldn't marry her. Now we can.
- Werewolf Mastery: If you like the Werewolf idea but not the horrid implementation in vanilla, this is a great mod. It enables changing howls OTF, configurable cooldown (or none at all) and time limits, reverting to human form when you like and has an internal advancement mechanic that makes werewolves competitve thru late game smithed gear with similar attack/defense bonuses, etc.
- Vampire Lord Flys and Collision Fix: The first lets you fly believably in VL form. The second fixes the collision that makes navigating doorways/caves so painful in vanilla DG.
- Wearable lanterns: Have a lantern on your hip with its own hotkey, no need to switch to torches anymore.
- SkyRealism: Time and Travel: If you use Quick Travel this mod makes it so it doesn't take such absurd (in game) times to use it.
- Better MessageBox Controls: Fixes the annoyances of the dialogue interface on PC. It will no longer select the wrong thing and will scroll properly.
- Better Sorting: This makes inventory a lot neater. Rather than having "Petty" and "Grand" Soul gems f.ex, with multiple other items in between, they're now "Soul Gem - Petty" or "Soul Gem - Grand" so all Soul Gems are easier to locate. This goes for potions, ammo, food, ingredients and most usefully, spells.
Everything else is really to taste, those are some of the better mods that I would gladly recommend for their effects on the game. A little plug, but I made some mods that are quite cool too, though are fun extras and not essential. They're all on the Nexus here [http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/users/1892262/?tb=mods&pUp=1]. I scripted a bow that has infinite arrows, a "Chinese Stealth Suit" (similar to the one in FO3) and brought back the Golden Saints which I missed from Morrowind/Oblivion.
