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I've been nervous about Skyrim upgrades since December 2023. I'm sure I'm not the only person who tried to play Skyrim after that dreaded unexpected patch day, only to find out every DLL was reporting as out of date or having issues. I remember deleting my game and re-installing it from scratch, then making a 1.6.640 version backup just in case Skyrim attempted to upgrade again. And it did, but I escaped that. I originally wrote this around March 2024 with my original thoughts and experiences below on upgrading to 1.6.1130 but I've made the leap in July 2024 to move to 1.6.1170. My main reason for pausing the upgrade was due to the Untarnished UI for 21:9 resolutions breaking and not having updates to fix the squish at the time as well as some mods only having limited 1.6.1170 support. Now that they have been updated, I've decided to move forward. My thoughts about that experience are archived below under the spoiler tab only for my own reference. This isn't my first rodeo into upgrading Skyrim. I wish I could be confident it would be the last but I doubt that is the situation either. Don't get me wrong: for such an old game, I'm happy that there are some QoL improvements made for it, and it still has such an active and passionate modding community surrounding it that I enjoy playing my (very small) part in. But with upgrades come a number of mods that need adjustments to get them to support a new version for those who upgrade but keep comparability for those who don't for their own reasons. I was one of those who didn't want to move forward on upgrades for wanting to hang on to older mods that don't have full support on upgraded versions, including some of those that don't require a game update but still use older elements such as those that don't use high poly heads or updated body skeletons. Even though those mods were far and few between, they were enough to stop me. But there is also an opportunity to try alternatives or even new mods on an upgrade, and that temptation is what caught me to try this for the third time. My 1.6.640 is now stashed away as Skyrim Archive Edition. I've set up my Mod Organizer with a profile to load this entire install safely without any impact on what I'm going to do next. A complete fresh install for Special Edition, with a copy of my previous mods folder set up for 1.6.1170 profile before going through each one and seeing what needs an update to support the newer version. BRAVE NEW PLUGINS Upgrading has given me the excuse to swap out ENB and use ReShade to take a look at Community Shaders and other effects as an alternative. This has helped with speed on load times, as well as an easier UI for changing shaders on the fly. It also allows me to try alternatives to Schlongs Of Skyrim and use The New Gentleman, and the Highly Improved Male Body Overhaul (HIMBO). While I was worried that this would conflict with Ethereal Elven Overhaul (I got a merge face clipping for two types of heads with some odd texture/shader clipping, and this mod is important for me as my main character is a Bosmer, whom I'm attached to), some load order arrangement seems to have resolved that for now. We'll see how that goes. While I will miss Bjorn and the Morning Wood (I might be able to install that separately, I didn't check), it's time to try something new. I'll add more to this over the course of the journey. PERSONAL NOTES These are mostly for myself, but some of the changes in the mods I used required a couple of edits to mods. I took the liberty of telling my inner voice to hush while I went and took the time to learn the methods of using the more technical tools like xEdit5 and such to better my modding skills/experience. With that in mind, I made some basic notes of what I did in case I have to return to it, but sharing them if, in the instance, someone might learn something from them, so feel free to look at them.

So I tried not to leave it six months for a new update, but I've made some progress since the last time I wrote so I figured I should get some notes down. Also, I think there will need to become a point when I rename this little blog series since I've cemented myself on having fun with modding. Maybe after the next one. I've mostly been digging through mods and support documents for SKSE/SkyUI to start really trying to get my head around the Papyrus language more. I'm pleased to say that it's sinking in, but I'm not at the level to write scripts fully from scratch yet. I'm still picking up what I need from a mod that does it, and adjusting it, as well as using tools to help me understand the coding structure and what's being actioned. But I'm pleased with the progress. GitHub's CoPilot has also been pretty useful in explaining things when I get lost. GIVING THE DRAUGR A NEW SHOUT I was looking around on the Nexus one day and stumbled open a simple mod called SexLab Quick Scene Shout (SLSQS) that added a shout to start a sex scene. I then found another on LoversLab called Combat Sex Shout (CSS) that did the same but gave a chance role to make it interesting. In my play-through, my male character is usually the victim, so I thought about how I could give this shout back to those who are masters of the Dragon tongue—the Draugr. Both mods have very simple scripts, though CSS offers more variety and chance than the first one. So I've torn this one apart to learn its inner workings, reversed it so it's given to the Draugr to use on the player rather than one the player has to use, and added some lore and customization to turn it into a new shout for Draugr to use. This has been a really useful exercise for me as I learn a lot from breaking, fixing, or adjusting mods in this manner. My scripts are filled with notes to myself, but it helps me keep on track to what I've been doing. The name was made with actual words from dragon tongue. I'm very much someone who enjoys trying to make things as lore-fitting as possible. I remembered the dictionary website, so I decided to look it up, and try and find some words that fit how the Draugr fit into the realm. Dominate The Weak seemed fitting. I'd like to maybe release it someday, but right now I've kept it as just a side project for me, and I'll update the blog post to keep track and see how things go. I'm conscious that my free time is limited, and I code and mod more out of a personal hobby, but I could offer limited support with the knowledge that I have. That's my main concern, as I don't want to release something that doesn't fully function, or that I cannot offer even the simplest of support to it. It's a struggle to balance my time, so I need to really make a plan on how I'd do it if I did release it publicly. MARA CALLING I remember when the Isle of Mara came out, and I was extremely impressed with this entire quest that utilized so many different elements in one cell. Animal Mansion had been the same prior, but it didn't release its source scripts at the time so I couldn't really go digging. In Isle of Mara, there is a wealth of information in there, but at the time, I was too overwhelmed to make sense of it. Now, I'm tearing it apart and looking at how things are done so I can implement these into my own mods/quests. I feel it's one of the best ways to learn, breaking down how another mod does it, seeing what parts you need, and then trying to create something similar in my mod, with hit-or-miss success. I get so much from the mistakes, and the triumphs feel rewarding. This has also allowed me to look at fixing one or two issues within Mara that I spotted, things that no longer trigger or work. It's not perfect, but doing this debugging also helps me with my own. It's been fun to delve deep into how scenes are set and what script is triggered by player presence. PERSONAL TWEAKS Over the years, I've touched different mods, from adding fully scripted events to skimpy or revealing armor. In doing so, I've made some personal tweaks, such as taking a revealing armor replacer and making it a standalone or fixing up mods where elements aren't complete. Years ago, I turned SOS - Revealing Armors for Schlongs of Skyrim from a replacer to a standalone armor for personal use, and now, I'm going back in to fix up things such as creating proper ground meshes (the original used the standard outfit, not a thinned version of the revealing ones so hard to tell which was which) and updating keywords and descriptors, as well as the ability to craft. I have plans to consider making it a random piece of equipment that can be worn instead of the default, or putting it in chests, and also looking at doing it for the other pieces of equipment since I only did it for Bandit/Fur and the Iron armor as those were my favorite back in 2015. Image of Spriggan Gauntlets made into a ground object (menu description to be added). Credit to Nalim for original model and Ghuarok for the male port. I also updated Spriggan Armor by Nalim - For SOS Males, just for fun, as the ground meshes weren't completed, and they had lost their collision so they wouldn't drop to the ground. I actually managed to fiddle my way through NifScope and add the collision just by breaking down what I saw and making some logical guessing (I couldn't find any clear guide online, but if there is one, drop a comment with the link if you can). I don't use the armor very much. I just thought it was cool that it was available for makes and was impressed with the work that went to make it, but it will be useful if I ever want to make revealing SOS armor in the future to look at how it was done as well. I might reach out to the mod authors (Nalim and Ghuarok) and see if I can post the updated SE version with the additional elements. These may seem small, but I need to remind myself that progress is progress, or I'll get swallowed by my swirling thoughts that enough isn't enough. I remind myself of the progress I've made, and as I work on bigger mods and ideas, these little things will really come to shine when I need them. I think that's it for now. I've downloaded OSTIM Standalone to play with, got some suggestions on how to enhance the male underwear additions in RUMP, and a script for a quests line to become a beastmaster. I have lots of ideas; just need to find more time. Until the next update, happy gaming!

It's been a while since I last updated. I wanted to post this back around August 2023, but I've been busy, so it's rather delayed. Since then, Skyrim has updated–twice–and I have upgraded my system. It was a good time to upgrade as I made a fresh install on SSE and downgrade to 1.6.640 to get everything to work. I got frustrated as DLLs were at different versions, Creation Kit was crashing, and over all the game I had made stopped working. But I've learned a lot from this experience and now, back up and running, I'm ready to move on. It's surprising how much I've learned from just playing about, making mistakes, and reviewing the outputs of modding. Some of the mistakes I recall making in my younger years but having done them again, I've been able to rectify them quicker so as not to clog up the mod files with errors. I've learned a bit from searching Google and watching YouTube videos, and I've found some new things to enhance and manage the various forms and options inside my mods, as well as playing about with xEdit5. I've also taken up learning Javascript, so understanding strings and operators has helped me analyze and understand the code in Papyrus better, which has been a massive help! So, with that, let's get into this entry's update! GIVING A VOICE TO THE VOICELESS As mentioned in my previous entry, I've made a mod to add more dialogue to some of the male enemy factions throughout Skyrim. I started playing with ElevenLabs back in August 2023 and really liked the prospect of adding new lines of dialogue, voicing my custom-made follower as well as my player through Dragonborn Voice Over (DBVO). New lines and voice lines have been generated for some of the factions, controlled by a voice list so I can make sure those without a voice aren't trying to speak them and forcing up subtitles (I once had a wolf someone through lines of speech at me in a fight and that was amusing for 2 seconds). I couldn't think of a name, so I just went with Rowdy Faction Comments. Most comments are sexual in nature, but I plan to add some more to extend the lore and the amount of lines actors can have, splitting more into different factions. I probably won't cover every faction or voice type, but most of the ones I hear and like. These comments will range over various stances, such as attacking, blocking, idle, alert, etc. An example would be "Damn... I wish I could get my cock sucked..." It would be spoken as a casual comment on an idle state where there is no threat. I am looking into how I can potentially use SexLab Aroused to enhance this, so they only say it once they reach or over a certain arousal level rather than saying it repetitively by default. I have the code to check, I just need to do some tests to implement it successfully. Another line is "Can't wait to get a piece of that Bosmer ass!" This is said to a wood elf during an attack in an angry tone, which works quite well with the conditions set up. Other lines like this have been added, and while it will take a while to think up other good ones that fit the lore (both sexual and non-sexual), it's fun to add this spice to my gameplay. The best way to describe it is a lighter version of Horrible Harassment. I've become really attached to the term "elf" or "little elf", which is already featured within the game itself, and sometimes feels a little domineering or even disrespectful. I've thrown some extra lines like this to a couple of specific NPCs or to a voice type, that will play throughout my gameplay. It helps build immersion for me. I don't think I'll play as any other character race than a Woodelf, but conditions help stop my follower from potentially triggering anything too! It's also good practice if I build a public mod one day to get used to the conditions, what they do, and the various options that can be used to define triggers for specific events. For my PC character, DBVO, along with mods like Improved Alternate Conversation Camera, make conversation in the game more engaging. Using it to add vanilla lines to base content, then adding it to modded content, such as my custom follower, really adds flavor and allows me to build a unique, personal experience. Player Voice Set has done this, too, so I can trigger more varied PC dialogue on level-ups or trigger when finding a unique location. I'd love to be able to find a way to make it so it's set on conditions where I can make the player recognize things (such as saying, "I hope this dungeon doesn't have one of these mimic-tentacle creatures in it" using EnterLocation threads). I have a guess that mini-quests can do this using the condition to check if a quest is complete, but a more immersive way for it to happen in the background would be ideal. MORNING WOOD GOT STIFFER Sticking to voices, just for fun, I added a whole dialogue to Bjorn LongSowrd of the Morning Wood shop (if you didn't know, this comes from Schlongs of Skyrim mod). I made a custom dialogue branch where he actually explains his potions and what they do in a lore-friendly way. You can get an example below: rydin-sosshopenhancement.mp4 Credit to VectorPlexus, Smurf and b3lisario for the Schlongs of Skyrim mod, and its features, including Bjorn Longsword. I have him giving some comments only in the Morning Wood, and some only in the Sleeping Giant Inn. One condition has him comment "Come sit in my lap, little elf..." but only in the inn and only if he's sitting. Again, conditions are really powerful to ensure you don't just hear the same line anywhere, any time, and can help keep things unique and tidy. I added a couple more when he's outside, or in the presence of another actor, all just to really see how far I could go. It's been fun to give more to this custom NPC. I have been planning a quest where he will give a discount to the player on the elixirs if the ingredients have been brought back as a way to help me learn quest-building. I have no intention of releasing these as they are mostly just for personal enjoyment as I continue to learn inside Creation Kit, but you can imagine if I did make a mod, the type of lengths my silly little self would go. I don't see the mod getting an update anytime soon, but if it does, I'll consider having my own add-on mod. But for now, happy to just edit directly and save. Keeping on the topic of voices, I was able to break down SexLab Extra Voices to learn how to add more voices to the SexLab registry, which allowed me to add a unique one with my custom follower. This means that now, when he moans during sex, he uses the Brute voice, and this helps to continue building that immersion. It was a great exercise to do, and it showed me that I could see the logic in the scripts and put them together with edits. Hopefully, I can use this to continue to build my experience. THE LORE IS IN THE QUEST I've been looking at building quests and had the desire to do it for a while now. In fact, I think it was the Isle of Mara that really piqued my interest. I'm starting out simply right now by doing one for my Rydin Follower mod. I've created the basics to start a force greet and discussion with the player when they are in Riverwood, triggered after the Whiterun quests are completed and you have slain the first dragon. Using this as a lore base, I've built in about word traveling and Rydin needing help, asking you to meet him around the back of the inn. I managed to figure this out, so the next step is actually making the location of the bandit den. I know this will be a lot with building a cave with navmesh and placement of items, but where is the fun if you don't try? I did consider just using another one that was premade, but that wouldn't be challenging—time to learn something new! LEARNING FROM DEBUGGING Speaking of Isle of Mara, I know this mod doesn't currently have an SE port done to it, and I know from reading that people have tried, but I think they've had some issues. The mod can be a bit hit or miss for me, mostly in triggering or alignment, but it is full of a wealth of opportunities to learn from its scripts and mechanics. One thing that stopped triggering for me was the tentacles in the Wizard Crondor's hut, assaulting the three male slaves in the center. But after some playing around, The tentacles obey their master once again! I've managed to make them work again. I'm not sure yet what stopped them from working as everything looks correct, but I assume it may be a slight change in the Estrus mod itself, which I'll have to delve into at another date (not gonna lie, but I wanna make tentacle animations someday). But doing this deep dive into a mod like this yields a lot of learning for me. I learn from seeing it in action and breaking down the code. I learned HTML and CSS that way, so this has been a good experience (and I get to fix up one of the longest male/male-focused mods out there for my own playthrough) REWRITING THE GUIDES I was working on rewriting the SLAL guide as promised, mostly because I need to understand the new options so that I can upgrade and build my own packs, but I've put that on hold while I go back and do some actual animating myself first. There are also so many great animations to choose from and to hook them into my personal mods, so I want to make sure I have them tagged appropriately and save some space by taking out animations that don't appeal or work in a male/male setting. Since I'm going to stick with SE/AE, most of my modding and guides will be upgraded eventually for this, so watch this space! When I get it redone, I'll post it to the original download page. SOMEONE'S IN TROUBLE You may have noticed I picked up my spanking mod again, changing the name to Discipline Born. It's still in very early stages, but all the breakdown and examining of mods I have done has given me that extra insight and allowed me to really start to pick up the coding language and see what's going on. I'm still very much a beginner, but I'm not as overwhelmed as I was in my earlier years, and I have started to really work on enhancing this mod. I have thought about whether I'll release a mod (any mod) I make in the future, simply as I may not have the free time or knowledge to adequately help those with conflict or installation issues (modding is just a hobby I do in my free time) and I'm not sure at this point, but I'll still work on them for fun and update the page with progress. Okay, I think that's it for now. I've likely missed a lot of other things I've done in the last six months, such as editing meshes and textures, but I'll keep those for another update once I have something more substantive. For now, I have an idea for a mod that utilizes the shouts, but I'll keep that under wraps until I have something that works. Thanks for reading!

There are a handful of mods where shouts are used by the player to activate SexLab hooks. But what if we gave that power back to those who mastered the tongue to use on the player? This little mod (inspired by the likes of Combat Sex Shout and Sexlab Quick Scene Shout) empowers the Draugr to use the power of the shout to assault the player character. Taking more inspiration from Combat Sex Shout, it has an MCM to configure the success rate, as well as the type of animations that will play. While much of the imagery on this blog post shows a male/male playthrough, should I release it, I aim for the mod to be for any player type. However, I will need to work through it slowly. The release will depend on the time I can spend providing support to anyone, but equally, I want to keep this very simple like the other mods that inspired it. There is currently no download for this yet as I am still working on the basic functionality. Mod description and support information. Progress updates (last updated 04/03/2024)

This post was originally published in December 2016 and has been rewritten. One of the greatest tools I have personally used during my decade in playing and modding Skyrim is Mod Organizer. There are a couple of competitors, but I have found that Mod Organizer has become my go-to support for building my various playthroughs with acutely defined mod lists to make each new game slightly different. With this in mind, when I first wrote this blog post in 2016, I was still very fresh into that journey. I still had the habit of downloading everything and scanning over a mod’s requirement list without really considering the order of mods. I had come from Nexus Mod Manager (now replaced with Vortex Mod Manager), which, at the time, meant installing mods directly into the Data folder. This meant paying attention to the order of installs, something my over-excited and inpatient undiagnosed ADHD brain was unable to manage well at the time. Welcome Crash-To-Desktop, abbreviated to CTD—my old friend. Countless hours of installing, updating, removing, and re-ordering have brought me to be confident in using Mod Organizer today. Along that journey, I developed my own techniques and learned my way around the tool. I learned a lot from the Gopher video series on YouTube, while GamerPoets has a relatively simple video on getting started with the basics. But during my time, there were a couple of little tricks that I picked up, and knowing some of these may just help you, even when you are trying to fight against the rush to just get everything installed and get up and running. To help with your modding journey in the long run, here are some of my learns during my time that I want to share, as they might just help you. While this article primarily focuses on Skyrim, the same concepts can apply to other games in the Bethesda family. MAKE BASE PROFILES There’s always a mod that requires a new game in order to work, or you discover a trove of mods that could make a great new playthrough on a new character. Or maybe you just want to start from scratch? Such mods like Alternative Start – Live Another Life offers a quick way to skip the open sequence of Skyrim. With various add-ons to give you a plethora of options on how to start your adventure, it saves a lot of time when you want to get straight into a new game. But what about your mod list? In the days of upscaled textures, improved meshes, and redesigned visuals, setting up a new game could also include setting up a new mod list and ticking all of the appropriate mods to start out with. Having a base profile of mods that you will use every time you start is a great way to speed up that process. How to build this will highly depend on your play style and your favorite mods that you may have. Do you always play the same race or gender? Do you always start with the same scenario from Alternative Start? Do you prefer to start from a different location to the game’s default? Do you ignore the main quest altogether, or do at least the Helgen quest for the handful of mods that require you to be past this part in order to use them? These are things I consider when I make a base profile. I usually set mine up with mesh and texture upgrades, location improvements, and lightweight mods such as armor or weapon additions. I tend to leave script mods out due to the nature of how they implement themselves into the game unless they are particularly lightweight or complete. For example, I will load up SkyUI and RaceMenu as I prefer these interfaces, and these mods are mostly complete or have minimal updates and are quite lightweight. Patches are also a good idea to have in base profiles. While it’s useful to have a base profile, it’s still good to check those mods for updates through the updater in Mod Organizer before using them. LOAD HEAVY MODS IN SMALL CELLS This is more for Legacy Skyrim than the Special/Anniversary editions, but it is an option if you feel your system struggles with mods. Even though Special/Anniversary editions of Skyrim are a lot more stable, loading the mods in small cells will allow you to safely check out and test out any changes or updates. While 1.6.x hasn’t given me any problems, I find it handy to do from time to time, particularly if I’m looking at installing or updating a couple of script-heavy mods at once. KEEP A PERSONAL EDITS MOD Mods are becoming more intuitive. A lot of them now offer us ways to randomize or customize our games a lot more than we could previously, and with this comes an increased opportunity for users to tweak mods to their own preferences. But what is the best way to manage this? First, I’ll share what I recommend you not to do, and that is store your customizations directly in the mod that you are making tweaks to. Adding a customer body texture that you’ve worked on and made some edits to your liking—that’s great! But what if that mod comes to update, and you accidentally hit Replace, and the entire mod is replaced with a new instance leaving your custom texture gone, and you didn’t set for an auto-backup? Obviously, I hope that you created another back of your texture somewhere else, but we are looking worst possible scenario, and mistakes can happen. Backups are always encouraged, but there is another way to avoid this type of issue, and that is to create a personal mod that is to keep a personal edits mod. This is essentially creating a mod that sits at the bottom of your priority list and holds all your personal edits inside. Mod Organizer’s function to have a priority mod order means that adding this to the bottom of your mod list (but still having the correct Data structure inside) means that these files will always overwrite anything in the mod that is higher on the order list. And, if you install an update, your edits will not be touched (but still keep a backup, just in case). It would be handy to make a note of what edits you made to what mods, and this takes us nicely into the next tip! USE THE NOTES SYSTEM When you download a mod from the Nexus, it typically comes with all the metadata. Description, version number, link to to mod page, and other pieces of information to create a clean trail back should you need to check for any updates, changes, or instructions. This is particularly handy to have, but it only works on an information basis. It’s not unique to you and your setup, and this is where notes will come in handy. What if you need a certain version to run on your game version (1.5.x versus 1.6.x for example), or you have a certain version download that has features a new version has removed, but you want to keep the old version? It can become quite complicated over time to remember all these changes to the point that you accidentally download and overwrite a previous file, and suddenly, you lose those features, or your game starts to crash. The same applies to mods that you download which are not Nexus-based. These mods likely won’t have descriptions, version numbers, or other details and leave you more at risk of slipping up. While I encourage at least updating the version number and a link to the download page, we all know that mods can be more complex than this. Adding a note on a mod about your personal setup (or profile, if you have multiple) and needs to get your game to work can be a lifesaver. It serves as a reminder of what you may or may not want to download, what version you need, and if you really need to upgrade or stick with what you have. Unless you play every day and you have memorized your complete mod order and all appropriate mod version numbers, it’s likely that you may forget during breaks (I certainly have) and come back to just update everything to new versions without thinking twice. Simple notes are best, something that just keeps you right in times when you need that little nudge on what you did before. It’s important to note that notes are saved inside the INI files that Mod Organizer creates. If you install a new mod and use the Replace option, or if your mod has an INI file as an option and you use the Replace or Merge options, or even replace the whole folder, you will lose your notes. A way around this is to install your updated mod with a new name (I append my new update mods with the version number when installing to compare changes) and move your notes over to the new version before deleting the old one. - - - I hope that some of these suggestions are helpful and put a good case forward for you to consider. Not all of these will work for you, but the important thing is to find a system that works for you. Modding, even as an end-user adding these custom creations into your game, can be a lot of work. With a little forward planning, you can reduce the time spent raiding support posts on the mod and hunting Reddit threads looking for the answer and get you back up and running with less hassle than necessary.

So I have been wanting to do a spanking mod for Skyrim for quite some time now. I started trying to make one in 2018, but I was too overwhelmed at the time to figure out scripting so I abandoned it. I had a whole idea of how to implement such a theme into the world, but it felt too complex for me back then. Now, I've come to breathe a second life into it and see how far I can get. I can't promise anything at this early stage, which is why this post will mostly be for updating from afar on progress until I'm comfortable at having a beta product available. As I continue to plan and build this out, I will update this page where I can, and I am happy to hear comments and suggestions. Obviously, we can see what can and cannot be added. It will be slow going as I am not master scripter, but I am aiming at slowly learning my way as I work my through. As I go I hope to be able to show progress shots and information as well as updates on what I plan to do next. Let's see what I can do with this. I should also point out that regardless of the screenshots and textures used this is not a gay mod. It will be open to all users of different game set-up and preferences. As I have started to work on this again, I have cleared out old information and will update it with a roadmap in due course. This is more of a passion project that I will work on as I learn more about modding and scripting. Mod description and support information. Screenshots and textures: Potential Ideas: Progress Report: Change Log: -

LAST UPDATED: 28 February 2024 - updated a couple of links for SE/AE and added Practical Defeat. There are posts that appear in the forum commonly asking for gay mods or mods with male/male content for Skyrim. These requests are normally due to the lack of research or understanding of the vast amount of content that LoversLab and other modding sites have to offer for players who are looking for male/male-themed content. So today, I bring you a guide on the content available and how to get started. FIRST THINGS FIRST! Before you get started, there are a few important things you must remember when reading this guide: THIS IS ONLY A REFERENCE GUIDE - I will list a number of different mods and types of content that you can use and how they can be added to a male/male play-through. It is ultimately your decision on what content you wish to use in your loadout. THESE ARE NOT MY RECOMMENDATIONS - My play style will be different from yours. I am not into giving recommendations. I highly encourage you to make your own decisions by utilizing the list below and trying the mods out yourself. READ THE INSTRUCTIONS OF EVERY MOD - You will need to read through the download and support pages of each mod to use them. I cannot stress how important this is. Failure to read them may break your game or mods not working correctly. I learned the hard way, and I encourage you, if you want to be serious about this, to make the time to read and learn. It's not complicated but it requires attention. THE BASICS OF MODDING Before you start your journey into adding mods to your games you need to understand some of the basics. This will help you as you venture forth. THERE IS A LIMIT - There is a general limit of 255 different plugins (ESP and ESM files). It is said that going over this can cause Skyrim to show more glitches and bugs. USE A MOD ORGANISER - The best way to add and remove mods is with a mod organizer. Modding manually can become problematic when files depend on each other. LEGACY OR SPECIAL EDITION - Be aware of mods that are compatible with Legacy Edition (32-bit) or Special/Anniversary Edition (64-bit) versions of Skyrim and know which version you have. For more reading, here are some good guides on the internet that will give you the basics: BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO MODDING SKYRIM - a visual video guide by Gopher that covers a lot of modding topics, including ModOrganizer (recommended organizer) and FNIS (required for animations). They might look like long videos, but they show you step-by-step what to do and what to look out for to help you understand how modding programs and tools work. r/SKYRIMMODS BEGINNER'S GUIDE - A text guide from Reddit that covers both Legacy and SSE editions of Skyrim. r/SKYRIMMODS ABSOLUTE BEGINNER'S GUIDE - An alternative guide written by conspiringdawg which breaks down the workings of mods. There are more guides out there if you need something more specific. Simply use your search engine for more results. Now before I start to list some mods, I want to take a moment once again to remind you that it is really imperative that you read the instructions for installing these mods. Installing them in the incorrect order or without other required mods can result in them not working and will get frustrating. I will also admit that following the steps can also sometimes result in things not working and this is equally as disappointing. Every person's load order is different and modding is not perfect. You might need to install one mod before another or change the order you have your mods in. ModOrganizer and LOOT will help with this so do take some time to read and understand more about them. Each mod will also have its benefits and limitations. Understanding what these are will help you with your choices in what to install/activate and what not to do. Pay attention to these benefits and limitations to enhance your experience. Now, onto the mods! MOD CATALOGUE Below is the catalog of mods that can be used for male/male content. I have not listed every mod as I am either still working on this extensive list or I have never played or used them. I have listed their pros ( + ) and cons ( - ), but understand these are my own personal opinions on them, and it will be down to your own choices and decisions as to what works for you. They are not all from Loverslab and will be from other sources. I have included links where possible and also if the links are to Legacy Edition or Special Edition/Anniversary Edition (SE/AE). I have also listed a couple of Next Generation (NG) mods where applicable, but make sure you read up on your options before you decide which one to go with. Again, these are not my recommendations. This is an alphabetical list for ease and my own opinions are only my own. Each and every mod author has worked hard on the content they create and we each should remember that it's their choice on what they wish to create and respect their work. ESTRUS FOR SKYRIM < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] > ISLE OF MARA < LE: [link] SE/AE: N/A > PRACTICAL DEFEAT < LE: N/A SE/AE: [link] > REVEALING ARMOR < LE & SE: see individual links > SCHLONGS OF SKYRIM < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] > SEXLAB ANIMATION LOADER < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] > SEXLAB AROUSED < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] NG: [link]> SEXLAB DEFEAT < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] > SEXLAB FRAMEWORK < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] > SEXLAB RANDOM SEX < LE: [link] SE/AE: [link] >

I have been playing around with making screenshots and videos lately, mostly jsut for my own entertainment. I was looking over some of my screenshots and videos from past and the facial expressions were a bit, well... bland. They work good for SexLab but when you see the same ones expression over and over it can be repeatative. I've played with the MFG Console mod in the past and made screenshots using poser mods and that was all good and fun. I installed the Main Menu Wallpaper Randomizer mod a while back and have my my own wallpapers for my game as well as using some screenshots for roleplaying profiles. I've now started to upgrade them by editing the facial expressions and making more wallpapers. Another thing I've started looking at is adding more expressions into the SexLab Framework. I haven't looked at trying this before but while looking for a cum/enjoyment bar (which sadly I did not find) I saw the expressions editor and had a better look at it instead of my normal browising past it. I decided to play about with these settings a bit to make some more expressions to use in my game, inportantly looking at adding more victim and agreesive expressions. As I made them, I started writing down the setting for each one so that I wouldn't forgot them, which then brings me to this post. I thought a little master list with expressions and screenshots might help other players get some good expressions that work from them. So here I am ready to share my experiments. PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL EXAMPLES AND MFG SHOTS WILL MOSTLY INCLUDE MALE ON MALE ACTORS AND SOMETIMES MALE CREATURES MAY BE INVOLVED. IF THIS IS NOT YOUR THING PLEASE DO NOT CONTINUE. STILL A WORK IN PROGRESS. • The Novice The Novice was meant to be for a character who is still new to penetrative sex. The expression used is disgust to show that the character may not entirely be enjoying the scene, maybe due to not being used to the feeling or it only being their first few times being penetrated. The eyes are closed using the modifier (hint: don’t make the setting 100 as their eyes lids can overlap) and their mouth is opened slightly using the phoneme Eee option to make it look like their teeth are gritted. Examples: Settings used: mfg expression 6 100 mfg modifier 0 80 mfg modifier 1 80 mfg phoneme 5 50 • The Spanker The Spanker is as the title suggests, it is fir a character in the role of being the disciplinarian in a spanking scene. Using the anger expression and the Dst option to open his month and bare is teeth a bit, but not too much. I haven't been able to get a gritted teeth look just yet. The angry expression works well to make the character fit the role. Examples: Settings used: mfg expression 0 100 mfg phoneme 4 40 mfg phoneme 5 40 • The Spankee The Spankee is the opposite to the Spanker where it is the character in the receiving position. The purpose is for the character to look like they are struggling and the pain for the spanking is affecting them. Against using Dst to open the mouth only a little while closing the character's eyes and narrowing their brow, it looks like they are trying their best not to let the spanking get to them. Examples: Settings used: mfg modifier 0 100 mfg modifier 1 100 mfg modifier 2 50 mfg modifier 3 50 mfg phoneme 4 40 I hope you will find some of these useful for screenshots or videos. I will add a guide at somepoint to go with the Expression Editor in Sexlab so people can utilize these. -

So, sometimes I like to write some fiction. I've seen a few people on here write there own stories based on their characters and adventurers. So I thought about doing mine. It's mostly a little but of smut with a very, very basic plot to make it work and have some sense of meaning to it. Rydin is the charcater I made in the game when I very first start modding, hence the username for the site. He has since become a custom follower home I tweak about adding dialogues and scripts to make him fully interactable. Auveren is actually this follower that I have come to make my main character now and has opened my eyes to the appreciation of elfs (as long as they look like tis guy, haha). So I decide to write a fiction about them surrounding my favorite kink; spanking. It's not the best of pieces as it's just short and simple but I figured I'd post it here incase anyone appreciates it. **PLEASE NOTE THIS IS A MALE/MALE FICTION WHICH FEATURES SPANKING. PLEASE DO NOT CONTINUE IF YOU ARE NOT INTERESTED IN THIS TYPE OR SET UP. COMMENTS ARE MODERATED AND WILL BE REPORTED IF NEEDED.** Title: Pentaar Faal Feyfahliil Zeymahzin Fandom: The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim Pairing: Rydin/Auveren Rating: R Summary: Being the Dragonborn is demanding enough without your companion screwing up along the way. Disclaimer: Certain aspects are created by me, and some are copyright to Bethesda. Author’s Note: Yup, the title is written in Dragon tongue. It says “Punish the Bosmer Companion”. It’s not all official dragontongue; some of it is created based on other words. Can be found on the Thuum website. Seemed fighting since the main character is my dovahkiin and the other character is a wood elf follower based on a follower created on Nexus whom I adore. Comments and feedback welcome. - “Do you ever listen to me?” The statement was followed by a heavy apologetic sigh, filling the small inn room quickly. The wood elf hung his head in shame as the question rattled around in his thoughts. He always followed the orders what the Dragonborn gave. Most of the time. Sometimes. “I do, I just... I just saw an opening and thought I’d take it,” he finally responded, looking back at the Breton stood staring at him with disappointment and frustration. “Rydin, you know I didn’t do it on purpose. I-“ “We could have lost our lives.” Rydin abruptly interrupted. “And it’s not the first time you have put us in danger like this.” They had been out on an errand requested by one of the towns folk of Markarth to locate a missing caravan that had been headed for Rorikstead when they ran into trouble. A band of bandits had ambushed them, forcing them to take shelter in a nearby rocky cavern. It was at that point when they had discovered the bloody remains of the travelers they had been sent to search for did they realize it was a trap. As the bandits forced them back deeper into the cave, the sounds of lurking beasts became louder. The bandits gambled with the chance that those trapped in the cave would come running out to surrender unless they were foolish enough to take the chance with whatever was lurking in the depths. And that’s the chance that his companion took. The wood elf had decided against Rydin’s own commands that luring whatever was dwelling in the cave’s darkest corners would be the best chance of them to escape. If they brought up what the bandits hoped would scare them out with them, then it could throw them off, giving them an advantage and allowing them to escape. For Rydin however, this was too risky. “It wasn’t like we had much choice!” Auveren responded as he ran his hand gently over his upper right arm, the stinging reminder of the shivblade that had pierced through his skin as he had tackled one of the bandits as he made for his escape. He was lucky there was no serious damage but Rydin had to support him some of the way to the village which didn’t make things any better. “I did what I had to do.” The Breton sighed and folded his arms in disappointment. Whereas he appreciated Auveren’s reasoning, the main issue was his lack of communication or consideration to the situation. He had been left completely in the dark of the plan with the fool-hardy Elf taking it on himself to execute his own plan with no discussion to what was best. It was brash, reckless and he needed to get this through to the young man. “We need to sort this out once and for all,” the warrior finally spoke, picking up a wooden chair from the corner of the room. He moved it towards the center of the small rented room, placing it down so it faced Auveren. He then proceeded to sit down and look up to the Wood Elf. “You lack discipline and respect and you need to learn that.” “What are you saying?” Auveren objected. “You know I have the upmost respect for you!” he added, challenging the comment. The Dragonborn disagreed. “Come here.” Auveren was confused by the command, but he did as he was told and approached where the Breton male sat. Without warning, he felt a firm tug against his left arm, pulling him forward. The Dragonborn’s hands caught him but moved his fall into a position where he ended up being hauled over the older man’s lap. He felt his body being placed into position as the other male shifted beneath him, pulling the Wood Elf’s body to where he wanted it to be. With both hands placed on the cold stone floor to balance him, Auveren waited for the next move. Shifting till he was comfortable Rydin took a look down at the younger Bosmer now laying across his lap. He was only clad in a pair of fur trousers with a thin dark-cotton undershirt, the rest of his armor piled on top of the bed he had chosen to sleep in. He took his right hand a gentle placed it a top of Auveren's buttocks, a few gentle taps to indicate he was preparing. He was sure the Bosmer knew what was about to happen next. With little warning, he lifted his hand into the air and brought it crashing back down with a firm first strike to center of his companion's backside. It wouldn't do much damage itself due to the layers of clothing, but the surprise from the strike was enough for the young male laying over his lap to jerk forward slightly, a surprised cry exiting his mouth. "Rydin," Auveren exhaled, slightly flustered and embarrassed. "I'm sorry for what happened but-" Another firm smack to his buttocks interrupted the young elf's pleading, another one following in quick succession before a firm steady pace was formed. "You didn't listen. You don't follow orders," Rydin barked as he continued his strikes against the padded garments protecting the elf's rear. "By the Nine is it that hard to listen once in a while?" He wasn't objective to Auveren's help and support but it was the way the archer went about it. He was just a hired hand at the end of the day even though Auveren had choose to stick around to help rather than for the coin. He could dismiss the younger man back to the Bannered Mare Inn or where ever and find a new companion, but Rydin felt this was more appropriate and in the end, would only suit to benefit Auveren if he saw it like he did. After about forty-odd firm smacks had been delivered, Rydin started to pull at the ties and straps on Auveren’s fur armor. At this point the younger male objected and begged that he reconsider but Rydin only reminded the elf the reason he was here I the first place. "I get it, I really do. I messed up. I promise it won't happen again," Auveren pleaded as he felt the fur clothing being removed from his legs and dropping off, exposing the bare scarred skin beneath with only his cloth underwear to protect his backside. But he quickly found out this offered very little protection against the raining strikes of the Dragonborn's bare hand. His fists tightened and his buttocks clenched as he tried to wriggle free from the other man's grip. "St-stop," he pleaded through gritted teeth, his pleas falling on deaf ears as Rydin continued his disciplinary act unflinched by Auveren's cries. - "What you think’s going on in there?" a traveling merchant spoke up, his eyes looking over at the short hallway leading to one of the rented rooms. The sound of the routine strikes and the voice of someone pleading was just loud enough to hear over the crackling fire and the singing bard in the corner, entertaining other travelers and guests at Frostfruit Inn. "Sounds like that milk drinker Bosmer is getting a hiding," pipped up Erik as he poured himself a tankard of mead. "They came in a bit beaten up. Some ambush gone wrong or somethin'," he added. "Probably some hired sellsword needing his arse brayed for not following commands." There was a short silence as both the traveler and Erik listened gain to the sounds coming from the rented room. Erik shrugged as he took a swig from the tankard. "Probably deserves it." - "Please, enough. I've learnt my lesson," Auveren panted, his eyes shot with panic as he felt Rydin's hand slip under the cloth hem of his underwear in preparation to remove them. He had tried to break free and use one of his free hands to block the hiding against his backside but Rydin had grabbed this arm and now had it pinned against the small of Auveren's back, restraining him. "We are not done," Rydin said firmly as he yanked at the material covering the bare skin of the Wood elf's bottom, exposing the dark red flush against the dark tanned skin. He stroked and smoothed the warm skin for a moment, patting it as a signal he was ready to begin again. "But when we are you will wish you followed orders." Lifting his arm back, slightly cupped he brought the first strike down on the bare bottom. It made a louder clap than before as there was no material blocking his hand against the skin of Auveren's backside and he felt the younger male jerk slightly in his lap at the strike. A small whimper was heard as he delivered the next smack until he started to rain them in rhythmic succession. “Ah…. agh… no more… ugh, pl-please Rydin… ow, I’m… ahh… I’m begging you!” Auveren kicked his legs and fought against the arm that pinned him down to no avail, trying desperately to get free or to at least make some of the slaps against his reddened backside miss their target. The rounded flesh stung and each thrash from the Breton’s hand against the warmed skin only made it worse. But Rydin only responded by holding him firmer, sending more precise and stricter wallops against his rear. It was getting too much for the young Bosmer as he started to submit, his body weakening from all the struggling and retaliation. A few tears started to well in his eyes as the burning discomfort in his rump was getting too much. Rydin didn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon, as he had let Auveren’s arm go and now had a firm grasp around the young man’s waist as he thrashed him with more slaps. Eventually, the strikes started to slow as the final dozen were delivered a bit more firmer and harder, signalling the end of the disciplining act. Auveren lay panting over the Dragonborn’s lap, sniffling and wiping tears from his eyes with the back of his hand while Rydin gently stroked his glowing cheeks, trying to soothe them for the male. “I hope we don’t have to repeat this anytime soon.” the older male spoke authoritatively as he helped the young man back to his feet “It won’t,” was Auveren’s response as his hands went straight for his buttocks, rubbing his worn hands across the warm hot skin to soothe them more. “I’m sorry.” “What’s done is done. I suggest we get some rest before we try and pick up their trail tomorrow,” the seasoned adventurer responded, referring to the bandits that had ambushed them. Auveren gave a small nod in agreement before he got himself ready for sleep. He wouldn’t be sleeping on his back tonight, he knew that for sure. - The two adventurers packed up their equipment ready for another day on the read. The sun was just peeking over the horizon but they had a long day ahead and an early start was what they needed. Rydin had been out in the main hall purchasing a few supplies before returning to the room and handing Auveren some food for breakfast. “Eat up. We’ll be leaving shortly. Just got to go and see one of the traders before we head out,” the older man informed. As instructed, Auveren tucked into the meal as Rydin left the room again and headed outside, leaving the inn altogether. Auveren chomped on the bread he was given while double checking his equipment again, not noticing the figure that approached the room. “Sounded like you got some hiding yesterday.” Auveren froze in his tracks, his face instantly turning red at the spoken words. “You-you heard?” the elf stuttered, not daring to look round at the figure standing at the door. “I hear a lot of things. But nothing like that, lad.” Auveren turned to be greeted by a smirking Nord, arms crossed leaning against the door frame. The young elf couldn’t keep eye contact, shying his gave away, humiliated that the man had overheard what had happened. If he had heard, who else had? “Erik, get yer lazy arse back to work!” Without another word, the Nord turned and head back down to the main hall leaving Auveren still glued to his spot. He knew he would have to pass the Nord and perhaps other folk who were visiting the inn, some who may have overheard. With that thought, he grabbed everything he could carry and made a straight bee line for the exit. “Hey, watch it!” he heard one of the wenches yell as he bumped into them on the way past, throwing the door open only to bump into Rydin. “Wow,” the Breton exhaled as he grabbed Auveren by his shoulders. “We in a rush now?” “Let’s just go,” Auveren said, again too embarrassed to look Rydin in the eye. “I’ve overstayed my welcome and I just want to get back on the road.” Rydin was already equipped and ready to leave and has no reason to go back into the inn and humiliate Auveren anymore. And Rydin could tell the young elf was abashed by what had happened the night before. “Okay. We’ll head back towards the ambush site. See if we can pick up any trail,” Rydin said as he placed a hand on the small male’s shoulder, trying to comfort him. “Just do as I say this time,” he said with a friendly but firm tone. “I will.” - And that's it! I might write some more in the future. Spanking is kind of my fetish but I can write other stuff. Let's see what I come up with. Thanks for reading! -

I can tell that I'm back into modding full-time. I spent two hours one night trying to enhance Player Voice Sets for myself and add more dialogue lines and discovered that the MaleEvenToned voice I use for my Woodelf, his voice lines for this mod actually go onto the mods folder for MaleElfHaughty. I spent a lot of time delving through scripts (and making a couple of personal tweaks) to get the ability to add more lines in this using conditions. So with that, here's an update on my modding journey! THE FILTHIEST COMPANION My personal follower mod is coming along. I have renamed and vamped up my scripts, cleaned up the naming conventions, added more notes, and basically trying to help myself more in my journey. Notes have become imperative to my learning, and while I may look at different scripts on different mods, these notes help me pick up where I left up and quickly identify what part of the code does what. Bit risky having so much skin showing! I've also been playing around with conditions, setting up voice lines where my follower might warn there's a Draugr crypt nearby, or make comments on my character's armor they have equipped (particularly if it's revealing and the follower is just looking at my Bosmer's ass all day). I've built a few options in, some neutral, some sexual (we are on LoversLab!) with timers so I don't see them constantly, but all in good fun. This has really allowed me to customize the follower beyond the "I need to trade with you" options. I'm exploring the possibility of adding branches that lead to options for sexual encounters, but I'll wait to see how that goes. I have the ideas, so I'll just need to see if the theory works. One of my struggles was to get keywords that were unique to play on certain armors that were revealing without requiring them to be masters. There are a lot of options when it comes to revealing armor, and I wanted Rydin to make a quip or two when seeing my character in such gear, particularly when sneaking (I may add an arousal check to it to enhance it further). I reached out to the forum and I got some awesome responses (again, thank you) and I opted to use Keyword Item Distributor (KID) which suited my needs the most. It took a couple of tinkering to get the code right, but now, I can add the keyword to gears in these other mods without making them masters, which allows me to be a little more creative and specific in targeting when using conditions. Feels like a bit of a level-up! GIVING THE HERO A VOICE As mentioned, I have made some personal edits to Player Voice Sets to give my player character more voice lines. This came on the back learning conditions and detection lines, which I thought would work with this mod too. After a few hours of dissecting the code and the mod on Creation Kit, I managed to crack it and started to add more lines and triggers. My personal goal for this is to add more battle lines, lines for being close to defeat, and lines where you have been defeated and before a defeat mod would take over. This will help to enhance immersion and give more flavor to these mods I play, something that I have yearned for since I first started learning how to mod. I am excited to see what I come up with! SHAMEFUL BANDITS EVERYWHERE With all of this in mind, I did consider a public mod, one where perhaps enemy factions like bandits in camp may threaten or harass the player more, maybe even making sexual threats. I also considered that perhaps they could entice the player for "fun" and potentially reward them with some gold at the end for their "time". It's an idea, and I think it could be done, but I need to learn a little more about scripting events before this could happen. Right now, all I have is some personal detection calls, making some of the threats more sexual in nature, and see how this pans out as I play. LEGACY EDITION FAVORITES If you played LE before moving to SE/AE, then you will like to have some favorite mods that you want to bring over. For me, that was Dangerous Nights and Random Sex. While luckily, I found both have ports for SE/AE, it seems that Dangerous Sex is the only one working. I haven't been able to get Random Sex to trigger (using the NG version) so I've put that on hold for now. Dangerous Nights works mostly as is (I tried it once and my follower was stuck in the laying down position with I was assaulted by bandits and didn't even get up when they were done), so I took a dive into its files to take a look and see if I could clean up the MCM menu and if I could add voices to the voice lines through adding the files in my own mod data folder. It looks doable for a part, but for some dialogues, there seems to be a missing path linked to the custom QuestAliases. I'll need to take a better look. Abducted at the start of the Isle of Mara I also installed Isle of Mara (even though it has no up-to-date SE/AE port) to look at the source scripts and see what it's doing in the game. Isle of Mara was a bit cheesy in my opinion, but I liked what it could do, and it was a great inspiration back in my early days. I remember the source scripts weren't supplied in earlier versions, and I couldn't figure out what was done and how, but now that they are and I have a better knowledge of the code, I might be able to dissect it and make a question script for my follower, and any of the other silly quest ideas I've had in the past. Taking a look through the source scripts, I've made a couple of notes on some of the elements that interest me into making a quest in my follower mod to help me dissect and learn. It doesn't look complicated at first glance, but this mod is very script heavy and well-made, so I'll need to dive into every aspect of it. I did think there was a lot going on in one cell, which could cause problems, so if I did make something, one of the things I've noted is to keep it light and make sure that scripts have a clear endpoint if a player leaves the area. Its implementation of animations to run on their own accord was what interested me, as well as the forced control of the player and its use of conditionals to really add flavor. I also noticed it had SEQ files, and I'll need to learn about these to up my quest design. BACK TO ROOTS To leave the post with some good news, I have been able to get my tools for animating back to work again. I have all my files from when I stopped in 2016 still saved, but the knowledge is gone, so I'll need to go back through all sources and relearn the process. I'd like to make some new animations and update old ones, but I'll need some time before I can do that. Just watch this space! Thanks all for now. If you got this far, thanks for reading!

I've made this page a space for me to work on a custom follower. While I will share the progress, I will not be releasing this mod publicly as it's more of a personal passion project to help me learn Creation Kit and modding/scripting. Feel free to ignore this if you see it in your updates. I will expand this over time as I progress it. And before you ask, no it's not based on how I look, haha! ABOUT I've seen a number of custom followers around, along with a couple of guides on how to make them. I originally started with a Breton player and a Woodelf follower that I got from the Nexus, but I decided to switch them around as the dynamic felt better. And so, this started my quest to turn my original player character into a custom follower using dialogue trees and scripts to activate specific events that link into the SexLab Framework and other quest mods in the game. FEATURES This mod has the following features: fully integrated follower using the MaleBrute voice additional lines created to activate SexLab events utilization of SexLab Aroused Redux to generate random events based on arousal levels custom voice lines for both dialogue and sex/moans PLANNED I plan on adding some of the following elements: follower demands for compensation through payment of sex for carrying items with a possible result in assault if the follower's needs are not met follower to gain a buff when needs are satisfied with potential debuff when not met event commentary based on the arousal of the character's Armor (or lack of!) lead-in events to add random encounters an MCM menu to control elements of the follower a full quest line to accompany the follower DIALOGUE One of the perks of having a custom follower is the ability to add new dialogue trees for interactions between player and follower. I have built these to give Rydin a personality beyond the standard voice lines in the game, but also to spice up the available options. I have listed them below under the spoiler cut. FAQ - Will you be releasing this follower publicly? No. This is just a project for me to work on share the progress with friends and people I know. At this time, I have no plans to release him. - Will you make a public follower in the future with these features? Maybe. Depends on demand, time, and resources. CHANGE LOG update 29/02/2024 - version 0.5a ------------------------------------ • updated follower quest line with additional fully voiced lines • built a custom bandit hideout as part of the quest line, complete with NPCs and scenes • updated the outcomes for Rydin's request to trade, offering further varied responses depending on arousal

It's been a long time since I last modded for Skyrim. I've mostly been playing elsewhere in other games, modding them here and there, fumbling my way through a minefield of letters and numbers that fit together to make cool things happen. But a recent delve into coding brought me back here, to a game that I love (and truthfully, have never finished), Skyrim. I started modding it around 2014 and quit in 2016 after I lost access to being able to animate. I could never figure out scripting and while I had ideas, I had no way to write them. I learned to mod mostly through breaking down PSC files and looking at logic and a big bunch of it was trial and error, and I think I managed to make do, considering I stumbled through making a mod that hooked animations into the SexLab Framework before it the main Framework was updated. But stress and poor mental health really hit hard around that time, and it became a struggle to keep up with. For the last year, I've played about with the idea of getting back into modding and building my perfect setup. I still have my LE set up for Skyrim, as messy and unstable as it is, and I liked throwing it open every now and then. But I decided to finally dip my toe into SSE and AE editions of the game and thus, set up a new mod build from scratch. Somehow, I always made it out in my head that it would be too complex to start again and shunned the idea. Though now, I've learned that's not true. As some of you may have guessed from my blog and past mods, I have a male character and I am male/male orientated in my setup, so I do gravitate mostly to mods and animations that have catered towards gender-neutral or LGBTQ+ friendly. So I thought, what about keeping a journal of my progress? If anything, it would be good for me to look back over my own journey of how much I've done and how far I've come. It might not really serve to help anyone except myself and no one might care to read it, but it's a space for me to reflect, make notes, and maybe if things get messed up, something for me to look back on and figure out solutions. So here I go. Off back into the world of modding for Skyrim! MY FAVORITE WOOD ELF I will not lie. I'm not the biggest fan of the elf looks (I was gutted when I played ESO on console and couldn't make the hottest Bosmer). So the first thing I set out is to make sure I get my favorite preset back from the Nexus along with the Ethereal Elven Overhaul. It changes the aesthetics slightly but remains lore-adherent. I've used Race-Based Textures (though I am interested in looking at Every Bodies Different in the future) and mixed my textures between BNP Male Skin and AW Mosaic Skin. I know in my LE edition, I played about with textures to get the type of body hair I wanted, and I made adjustments to make nipples appear in the right place on skeletons, but I was still very fresh-faced. I had mismatched feet that were broken and I could never resolve or be happy with them as I wanted the particular skin for the chest—thank god for the Strip Options in SexLab! But these new options have such vivid detail that is visually appealing so I'm good to go. Showing off the cute elf! I've geared him in some revealing fur armor taken from the Revealing Armors for Schlongs of Skyrim mod. This mod is more a replacer and replaces all actors wearing the gear into the revealing version, but I made a personal mod to add them as single standalone gear sets to wear for my character only, porting it to AE for my game (which I'm happy to finally learn that it's dead simple to do). I need to work on some ground objects for them, make stronger versions (since I wanna keep wearing them), and learn more about armor leveling/scaling (if any) so it's a good little piece to play about with. A WORLD OF STUNNING VISION In LE, I opted for the Grim and Somber ENB. I particularly liked this for its dark and moody tones it brought to the game, particularly in dungeons. But this time, I've gone to look at something different and opted for Ruby ENB. It's preset to complement Natural and Atmospheric Tamriel and LUX to give a very fantasy but realistic in its visuals. My LE save was on a weaker system that couldn't handle the graphical power brought by upgraded textures, but this system has got me pushing the boat out a bit more. I haven't upgraded many textures apart from the ones required and recommended with the ENB, such as adding Embers and LUX, and the skin textures. The game looks pretty stunning as is in the AE edition (as seen from the screenshot above) but I'll be looking around to see if anything needs enhancing further. I did spot a missing texture in a dungeon, so will need to figure out if it's a mod doing it, or just good old game devs missing a spot. NEW GAME, NEW MODS, NEW SCENARIOS If there is one thing I have come to love about the modding community, it's the ability to play through various different scenarios with different mods and load-outs. I have a couple of characters that I've saved the models from LE so I can look at making them in AE, and the growth of the modding community bringing new and creative stories through adult gameplay is something I really enjoy. I mean, this is a roleplaying game after all! I've played the hero in trouble to the bandit leader being turned upon, and I'm always thinking about what's next on the horizon. Good old Bleak Falls Barrow. I think I've done this first quest a hundred times. When I was setting my game up, I spotted Practical Defeat as a newly uploaded mod in the forum homepage so I decided to take a look into this one. Immediately I was grateful to read that it was written with a player/character of any gender in mind. Acheron also looks to be a good death-alternative mod, having personally played about with these types of mods in my LE setup. While still in its early stages, I've given it a play though and, while I've run into a few bumps with it failing to create a scene, it may be the hard requirement on an older mod causing conflicts or I haven't quite figured out how to set the scenes up. But I look forward to exploring its features as it grows. That's just one new mod I've tried. I've loaded in a bunch of old faves and upgraded one or two to be AE-compliant but I don't want to just bore you with my full mod list, ahha. RETURNING TO ROOTS The last thing that I was working on was a personal follower mod, one with dialogue trees linked to SexLab Aroused to trigger different responses depending on the follower's arousal. It was very basic and even now, as I look over it, I cringe at my writing. I have grown so much in eight years. But this is going to form part of my own person modding project to learn to script and is included in my plan to build my perfect list. Making a personal SLAL pack (or coding it directly to SexLab's registry) along with tags that will help me code it into this follower, this project is surely going to take a while, but I know I will learn a lot from it with the right animations and the right alignments. I#ve just been able to successfully voice one line for him, so my weekend will be filled making some more lines! Setting up the facility to compile scripts though was probably a little more painful than I'd like. I mostly use Mod Organizer 2 (MO2), so gathering the scripts to place them in the game directory was a little tedious, considering one or two were on GitHub (SkyUI and a script from Precision) and I had to hunt around for another. But I ran it, tested it, and it's all up and running. I felt a little giddy that I'm excited to get back into this! That's really it for now. In the last few days, I've mostly set myself up ready to both play a new game as well as enhance it through tweaks and updates. It's been fun trying out a new mod and breaking down some older mods to get a look at their raw coding. Hopefully, I'll make some progress and share some more updates with everyone soon. If read this far, thanks for sticking around.