To Enb or not to Enb that is the question

[Darkpig]

I don't know the ins and outs of Enb presets too well. I already have enboost installed so that isn't a problem. What I want to understand are basically two things

1.) will it make my character look more beautiful

and

2.) should I use an Enb to make my Skyrim look darker as opposed to Enhanced Lights and FX or other lighting mods?

 

If so then how should I set it up to reduce my performance impact while keeping either of those two things.

[CookieKookie]

ENB improves the basic overhaul of your game not just character. If you want to use the least performance then there are many ways you can do that.

And ELFX or NLVA drastically improves the shadows when used with a compatible ENB. 

I can tell you the best enb and ways to reduce the impact of it on your PC. Message me your specs and I'll tell you the best preset and settings. ^~^

[53army]

1 hour ago, WHYAMIEVENHER3 said:

ENB improves the basic overhaul of your game not just character. If you want to use the least performance then there are many ways you can do that.

And ELFX or NLVA drastically improves the shadows when used with a compatible ENB. 

I can tell you the best enb and ways to reduce the impact of it on your PC. Message me your specs and I'll tell you the best preset and settings. ^~^

I have a plan to upgrade my vga to rx 570/580, is that enough to run ENB in 1080p 60fps?

[27X]

3 hours ago, Darkpig said:

I don't know the ins and outs of Enb presets too well. I already have enboost installed so that isn't a problem. What I want to understand are basically two things

1.) will it make my character look more beautiful

and

2.) should I use an Enb to make my Skyrim look darker as opposed to Enhanced Lights and FX or other lighting mods?

 

If so then how should I set it up to reduce my performance impact while keeping either of those two things.

1. Yes.

2. There are very very obvious text blocks covering Day, Night and Interior.

3. A good place to start is

 

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/41482

 

or

 

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/66465

 

In addition K enb has a very large batshit amount of annotations in the .series and ini. files, you might wanna read there and this

 

https://wiki.step-project.com/Guide:ENB

 

[Darkpig]

Okay. I tried Dreamer Enb right out of the box and 50+ FramesPS between Riverwood and Whiterun. Last time I started out with Caffeine and it had roughly 45 FramesPS in the LAL location which is kinda silly so that is the last time I start out on the double black diamond. Now I just gotta find which settings decrease lighting during nights and in dungeons.

[Grey Cloud]

Most presets have a list of preferred/recommended/compatible lighting and weather mods.

 

I run Kwanon ENB and have a RX 550. Game looks fantastic and runs to my standards. No idea about FPS as I never, ever bother with them. Kwanon might be a bit too bright if you are looking to darken things.

[Darkpig]

3 hours ago, Grey Cloud said:

Most presets have a list of preferred/recommended/compatible lighting and weather mods.

 

I run Kwanon ENB and have a RX 550. Game looks fantastic and runs to my standards. No idea about FPS as I never, ever bother with them. Kwanon might be a bit too bright if you are looking to darken things.

I guess I became a little nitpicky about my frame rate after playing at 3 Frames Per Second trying to raise oblivion itself. I won't say that I mod Skyrim responsibly but I mod cautiously. I don't mind bright days, I just want darker nights and dungeons. I mean heck, I've been using Soolie's Tropical Skyrim mod so you could say I enjoy a little sunshine.

[tejano2828]

I say yes.

 

I use Rudy ENB because it looks beautiful and I don't get a performance hit with my machine.

 

I will tell you this. Rudy ENB takes up over 2gb of RAM and Skyrim takes up another 1.9 GB of ram and together sometimes it can and usually does go over 4 gb combined.  IF you have a good machine there is no reason why you shouldn't atleast give it a go. There are some great tutorials on Youtube on how to get started.

[Darkpig]

11 hours ago, tejano2828 said:

I say yes.

 

I use Rudy ENB because it looks beautiful and I don't get a performance hit with my machine.

 

I will tell you this. Rudy ENB takes up over 2gb of RAM and Skyrim takes up another 1.9 GB of ram and together sometimes it can and usually does go over 4 gb combined.  IF you have a good machine there is no reason why you shouldn't atleast give it a go. There are some great tutorials on Youtube on how to get started.

My computer is 8 gigs of RAM and around 4000 megabytes of vRAM so I'm pretty sure I have enough Ram. I tried a few and I was still having a performance hit although I'm not sure exactly how much RAM Dreamer ENB takes but it looks nice. That said I run a lot of script heavy mods so that may be part of it. I'll have to experiment with the settings a bit to find the right fit.

[tejano2828]

11 hours ago, Darkpig said:

My computer is 8 gigs of RAM and around 4000 megabytes of vRAM so I'm pretty sure I have enough Ram. I tried a few and I was still having a performance hit although I'm not sure exactly how much RAM Dreamer ENB takes but it looks nice. That said I run a lot of script heavy mods so that may be part of it. I'll have to experiment with the settings a bit to find the right fit.

The scripting will be handled by your CPU so if you have lots of scripts make sure you have a good CPU.

IF you want to optimize your Skyrim I would download Skyrim Performance Monitor on Nexus run Skyrim with that and it will give you a detailed look of how much of everything your are using and what's topping off at 100% it's a good place to start.  Just looked at my task manager while running rudy enb  and it looks like it's using around 3 gb and skyrim around 2gb so I am well over 4gb and that's not even counting the OS.  Good luck. Project enb is also good might want to check that out.  And, before you give up on ENB's you might want to go into the ENB's options and tweak them, some of the options in there will cripple your system no matter what kind of tech you have.  It took me a weekend to get my enb stable enough where I can game.

[phillout]

The biggest problem with ENB (aside from the obvious performance-related one) is that it tends to fiddle with the game lighting a lot. So the way you see dark/lit areas isn't the same as NPC AI does. So you may think of some area being dark while NPC detection AI still considers it to be well-lighten and this affects stealth behavior a lot, especially if you use something like "Realistic AI Detection" , "Stealth Skills Rebalanced" or Requiem that rely heavily on the lighting conditions to check if you are detected by NPCs.

 

[Darkpig]

38 minutes ago, phillout said:

The biggest problem with ENB (aside from the obvious performance-related one) is that it tends to fiddle with the game lighting a lot. So the way you see dark/lit areas isn't the same as NPC AI does. So you may think of some area being dark while NPC detection AI still considers it to be well-lighten and this affects stealth behavior a lot, especially if you use something like "Realistic AI Detection" , "Stealth Skills Rebalanced" or Requiem that rely heavily on the lighting conditions to check if you are detected by NPCs.

 

I have heard that before true. That is one of the reasons why Realistic AI Detection has multiple versions. I think I will keep using the Lights and Fx mod for lighting as it actually changes light sources themselves. A simple enb like dreamer seems to do a good job enhancing my character's appearance so I will be using that as well. The only issue I have is that the nightvision power doesn't light up dark interiors with enb like without it.

[Grey Cloud]

Lots of the creatures in dungeons can see in the dark, e.g. falmer. Lots of others have good hearing. And for all I know they may be able to smell you too. ?

[Darkpig]

3 minutes ago, Grey Cloud said:

Lots of the creatures in dungeons can see in the dark, e.g. falmer. Lots of others have good hearing. And for all I know they may be able to smell you too. ?

Can falmer really see in the dark? I know that they are 90% blind but that 10%...

[Grey Cloud]

1 minute ago, Darkpig said:

Can falmer really see in the dark? I know that they are 90% blind but that 10%...

Alright already. Draugr then. Their eyes are like headlights. Put falmer into the enhanced smell group.  Or. or maybe falmer are only blind in light like moffs. ?

[Darkpig]

On 1/31/2019 at 5:14 PM, Grey Cloud said:

Alright already. Draugr then. Their eyes are like headlights.

Of course. How could you have headlight eyes and not be able to see in the dark. I personally use a mod to disable glowing eyes on the undead because light sensitive eyes don't glow like that in nature. Looking back on it maybe the eyes were meant to give draugr a supernatural glow.?

[phillout]

On 2/1/2019 at 3:02 AM, Grey Cloud said:

Lots of the creatures in dungeons can see in the dark, e.g. falmer. Lots of others have good hearing. And for all I know they may be able to smell you too. ?

Falmers are blind , according to the lore, but have developed extremely sensitive ears.