These are all fine mods but y’all need some culture

• Unequip Quiver | This irritated me incessantly for years back in the day when I only played on PS3. I am grateful every equip/unequip for this.
• AddItemMenu & AddItemMenu NG | Cheaty mod, but I use it to get mod-added armors immediately. They’re my spiffy clothes, and I want them now.
• TNF Vanilla Homes | Vanilla homes, but upgraded. I have a lot of modded homes ofc, but sometimes I want the classics. It makes them much more luxurious, but not super over the top.
• Thane Weapons Reborn | Becoming Thane and being bestowed with a weapon is always, like, “uhh… thanks…” but this changes that. It is a simple joy every time my characters become Thane somewhere, it’s such a fun RP thing, and having a fancier weapon to use or at least hang on the wall makes me happy.
• Motion Sickness Begone | Not for everyone, but I suffer headaches and this helps so much. It removes the camera head bob.
• No More Radial Blur | For the same reason as the motion sickness mod.
• Encounter Zones Unlocked SE | This makes it so that locations do not get permanently set to the level you were when you first visited. So when going back to a dungeon at a higher level, you’ll get high level enemies/loot this time. It keeps familiar places interesting.

followers can relax

jump behavior overhaul

trueHUD

and some technical mods like Unofficial Patch

Yay a skyrim community! Almost time for my yearly play through! I forget the names of a bunch of them but:

The khajit follower one that comes with quests, forget his name

The summermyst skill tree expansions

The lantern and street light one is cool

The open civil war is kinda fun in a chaotic way

There’s one that does more realistic weather I enjoy.

Sorry I haven’t played in a while, but I’m glad I have another community to join now!

Not a mod but I think SKSE is the most important since you can’t even have SkyUI without it

SkyUI

Open Cities

Alternate Start (there’s multiple different ones)

moreHud

Immersive Patrols

XEdit, it’s not a mod but I think it’s more important than most mods since

• it lets you make a lot of tweaks on your own
• there’s no point in having hundreds of mods if they override each other, so being able to make merged patches is critically important

Immersive Citizens AI Overhaul

I have many more than these, but here are a few.

Sons of Skyrim - Probably the most impressive armor mod I’ve seen. While there are many high quality armor mods, so many feel more appropriate for a fashion show rather than Skyrim. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s nice to have such a quality mod that feels at home in the game. https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/68656

Skyrim Unbound Reborn - I have played the main quest once in my years playing Skyrim and haven’t personally been interested in playing it again. (Save the world hero stories don’t interest me too much) So it’s nice to play as a non Dragonborn. https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/27962

Missives - Since I don’t care much for the main quest mods like this give me more things to do in game. https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/17576

Jayserpa’s Quest Expansions - Having more choices during quests is always great, which I always felt was lacking in vanilla. His other mods are great as well. https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/users/5201727

Expressive Facegen Morphs - I always struggle creating a character I like and this provides more options for RaceMenu. Great mod. https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/35785

Grimacing with pain… I’m going to say that for the purposes of this question, I’m going to skip all the bugfix mods and the staples-of-everything mods like SKSE and SkyUI. I’m also going to skip the enabling mods like OAR and Base Object Swapper, because so much is built on top of them now that they’re requirements.

When I mod Skyrim, once I have the base layer in place, what do I always include even though I don’t need it?

True Directional Movement. This is so good that for me it’s now a base mod. I love that third person mode both feels good and looks good.

High-Poly Head and NPC makeovers using it. Hard to un-see the clonk in the old heads once you see the nicer ones.

QuickLoot. Massive QOL improver.

Any mod that adds cloaks.

ENB Lights. They make the game so pretty.