Expanding Skyrim - An extremely ambitious endeavor

[Trykz]

So......

 

curiosity got the better of me. So I had a look at that "New World" resource. I was quite impressed. It seems he actually thought of everything. It appears to be fully navmeshed, which was easily discernible by letting wolves chase me all over the map 

 

The only things I could find wrong, was a single tree about 3 feet above the ground after over an hour of running around, and the map is rotated wrong (the coldest region was due west of the stable you teleport to, rather than situated in the north). However, I'm pretty sure I can rotate the entire continent by simply rotating the north marker. I found tons of usable locations, that would make more than adequate homelands for all my current race mods, as well as some new ones I have in mind.

 

After a few alterations, I'm pretty sure I can duplicate and rotate the entire continent to make multiple new lands. The detail is quite impressive. I found what appeared to be sandy beaches on the ocean to the south, lush forests and mountain ranges to the east (including a HUGE forested area perfect for my Spriggan race  ), lakes, ponds, rivers, and streams galore, and another ocean in the northernmost area of the map (and either would be perfect for boat transportation to and from Skyrim, AND any other lands I can create from this).

 

I can also easily add my races to this in addon ESPs, just as I'm doing with the Amazons race (in fact, I may move them here  )

 

Best of all is I saw no noticeable performance hit.

 

I'll definitely making a LOT of use out of this......

 

Thank you blabba for bringing it to my attention 

 

Trykz

[Guest]

I can offer nothing more than encouragement Trykz. But I've used your race mod so I'm confident whatever you come up with will be inventive.

 

See, now this is why I love this place so.  I think it's funny but kind of tragic too when I see comments over on Nexus like "oh no, I'd never go to that site, they're all pervs!". They have no idea how much general creative energy there is here, how transparent and co-operative it is. Poor blind moralizing fools that they are. 

 

Best worst kept secret, LL. 

 

[Trykz]

After looking into the New World resource a bit more last night, I found a few other things that will need to be fixed. Nothing major, mainly minor "annoyances" I'd prefer not exist (such as missing collision in a few mountain "wall boundary" areas).

 

Otherwise, I've converted the ESM back to ESP so I can make the edits I need.

 

For the most part, these edits will consist of adding structures for homesteads, towns, cities, a centrally located, hard connection point to Tamriel, etc....... Once completed, I'll be converting it back to ESM format so I can add my race specific NPCs to the areas I choose for them in the form of add-on ESPs. I've deviated a bit from lore and named it "Atmora". Think of it more in Skyrim era terms, and what "could be" in the current era. Once converted, this ESM WILL NOT change.

 

The mod already consists of a Japanese themed homestead I'm planning for a new race to occupy   (I was thinking of getting rid of it, then an idea for a new race mod popped in there, as usual  ). It allegedly contains a castle, but I've yet to find it (I suspect it was removed before conversion to ESM).

 

Needless to say, I have WEEKS (if not months) of work semi-planned out ahead of me 

 

Trykz

[Trykz]

After messing around with this in the CK, and converting it to ESM, I managed to change a few things and add a new teleport spell directly inside one of the Japanese homestead's buildings on a fresh ESP. I was thinking of putting a new race at the location, but figured it would better serve as an alternate start location once I have everything set up as I want it. Perhaps with a few NPCs, merchants, horses, and an inn. I "could" still use it as a new race home location, and make it's faction neutral to the other races around the continent.

 

There's a statue at this location also, which I'm thinking could be used to trigger the main quest at the appropriate stage, while also teleporting the player to the LAL camping start location. Although this method would require a Skyrim.ini edit, ANY race could start at this location without touching the LAL quest scripts. Ideally, I would like to set up an alternate start scenario right from the LAL starting cell, but alas, my Papyrus skills are the suck and I'd end up blowing up everything  . If someone more experienced with the LAL scripts could build me something generic to use instead, I'd greatly appreciate it.

 

Looking at the map in game is also quite deceiving. The continent is actually MUCH bigger than the map displays. It's easily as big as Skyrim. At the least. The base continent consists entirely of nothing but Wilderness cells. Hundreds of them, filled with trees and other flora, critters, bears, wolves, and at least one skeleton (that I found  ). At the center of the continent is a stable with horses to exploring purposes. I'll be removing this after I get the alt start set up, but will be leaving one horse for the player to temporarily use at the new start location (will always return to this location automatically once dismounted).

 

Well, back to the CK......

 

Trykz

[Monsto Brukes]

 

[...] But the problem with collaborative works, is that something inevitably breaks down not in the project, but in the collaboration. Which effectively slows the project immensely, if not stopping it entirely.

 

[...] Also, passing around an editable master is generally a bad idea. Primarily because one bad edit by one author, carries the high potential for screwing up another author's work, days, weeks, or even months down the road. It's not a practice I would even consider to be honest.

 

 

This is what source management is for. Github, BitBucket, et.al. are built for this kind of collaborative project. 

 

Basically, it help multiple authors to work concurrently. If people were working on separate areas of the main continent (meaning there wouldn't be overlapping changes) then you would likely not have ANY problems. If 7 people start working on the same dungeon, it may start to cause issues. Even so, you merge, and test. If the testing fails. or there's problems, individual make changes, then you merge again, and you test. Tedius, to be sure, but if you can't get it working, and heres' the beauty, you can 'roll back' to a working version and restart from there. 

 

And while an SCM (source code manager) may not be a perfect solution, it beats copying files by hand and keeping manual notes.

 

These aren't hard tools to use, but they do require a bit of knowledge... I could help (=

[Monsto Brukes]

i ran around this continent a while. . .  prob an hr or 2. Here's my thoughts:

 

• It's hard to get a sense of scale because the overhead continent map is severely restricted. the viewable overhead map is probably 1/9th the area of the graphic map. need to be able to zoom in on your position in at least a minor way.
• There are large clusters of inaccessible mountains. So while the entire area may compete with vanilla, a significant portion of it is just plain unavailable. Overall I'd say it's probably 60-75% the size of Vanilla.
• There seems to be lots of little nooks and crannies created specifically for dungeons, caves, camps, towns, etc. Whatever the author did he was clearly having fun with it!
• Not a lot of detail vegetation. If you're building a "world" then that's good. if you're looking for a world, that's bad. 

 

Let me know if you want a writer.

[Trykz]

i ran around this continent a while. . .  prob an hr or 2. Here's my thoughts:

 

• It's hard to get a sense of scale because the overhead continent map is severely restricted. the viewable overhead map is probably 1/9th the area of the graphic map. need to be able to zoom in on your position in at least a minor way.
• There are large clusters of inaccessible mountains. So while the entire area may compete with vanilla, a significant portion of it is just plain unavailable. Overall I'd say it's probably 60-75% the size of Vanilla.
• There seems to be lots of little nooks and crannies created specifically for dungeons, caves, camps, towns, etc. Whatever the author did he was clearly having fun with it!
• Not a lot of detail vegetation. If you're building a "world" then that's good. if you're looking for a world, that's bad. 

 

Let me know if you want a writer.

 

As of now, my plan is to use this as a new homeland for my custom races. In that regard, I found it quite suitable.

 

Looking at the author's Nexus posts, it would seem that he wanted to build a new continent using some custom assets (which he included, but are unused) and expand upon it from there. In the BSA I found a castle and other structures, market architecture, even various gallows (including one with a male victim hanging from the noose LOL). There's tons of neat stuff packed in there. And I'm still looking through it.

 

At this time I have no real plan for encounter zones such as caves and dungeons. I have a ton of work ahead of me just getting things like towns, villages, camps, cities, etc., set up for my custom races to use. The hardest part (for me anyway), is devising a method for new characters to start here, and then move seamlessly into Skyrim proper for the main questlines.

 

As I mentioned in my earlier post, I could really use someone knowledgeable with Papyrus to work an add-on into LAL (similar to how LADL was set up using the collar). That would be the ideal scenario. Start in the LAL cell, then choose the new continent as the new location to start from. I may crack LADL open and have a look at how it was tied in, but looking at scripts is like trying to reading an alien language for me 

 

Trykz

[blabba]

Personally, I think between all the amazing new land stuff on the nexus page, you could probably kit bash them together to make some incredible new land resource that includes things like floating islands (niflheim) and lush forests, and islands a new detailed resource could probably be made to house all your awesome races from all the multiple WIP new lands that have been more or less abandoned.

 

I really want to see you succeed in your endeavor, but I'm really afraid of you kind of falling into the trap that all those new land WIP mods in nexus end up.

 

The greatest thing about your custom races that I loved was your attention to details.

 

My own (inexperienced and never having done massive ck edits) suggestions:

1. Just make a good land that is big enough for you and has the option to be later expanded for you if more new races are introduced/made. And link it via 1 path to Skyrim (maybe make it out to be some sort of 'dreamscape' if you want to make some lore or something out of it.) And if needed, link further lands from the dreamscape instead of from skyrim directly.

2. Don't bother with the multiple lands and trying to expand skyrim out in all directions, you might get into compatibility issues with other new land up&comers like Beyond Skyrim Project, Skyblivion and Skywind.

3. Reason I give point 2, is because this will allow you to give more attention to a somewhat better detailed land that is unique and refreshing, without thinking 'Well crap I gotta do this 3 more times'. You shouldn't need to add things unnecessarily especially since their are already multiple teams of modders kind of planning to do the same things as you.

 

The reason why I say detail is important is because, the more popular this mod = the more help and mods made to be compatible with this mod.

Between a pretty good base new land, and just adding your awesome races into it. I can already see new & existing modders trying to make new quests and whatnot for this awesome project without worrying too much about lore,races and the other sort of 'baggage'.

 

Also floating island home for your epic valkyrie race = EPIC win and might just get me motivated to lean some ck to make a quest or something (among my own many other things I want to learn xD)

 

edit: sorry for wall of text I couldn't come up with a more concise way to describe my ideas/suggestions.

[Trykz]

My own (inexperienced and never having done massive ck edits) suggestions:

1. Just make a good land that is big enough for you and has the option to be later expanded for you if more new races are introduced/made. And link it via 1 path to Skyrim (maybe make it out to be some sort of 'dreamscape' if you want to make some lore or something out of it.) And if needed, link further lands from the dreamscape instead of from skyrim directly.

2. Don't bother with the multiple lands and trying to expand skyrim out in all directions, you might get into compatibility issues with other new land up&comers like Beyond Skyrim Project, Skyblivion and Skywind.

3. Reason I give point 2, is because this will allow you to give more attention to a somewhat better detailed land that is unique and refreshing, without thinking 'Well crap I gotta do this 3 more times'. You shouldn't need to add things unnecessarily especially since their are already multiple teams of modders kind of planning to do the same things as you.

 

Point one is exactly my intention. Now that I have this resource set up as I want it and converted back to ESM, I can start working on the plugins for it.

 

Basically, I intend to add my race mod ESMs by using it as a dependency for their base plugin ESPs (which I always hang onto after converting them to ESM). Once each race is added, I merely have to reconvert them to ESM and re-release the new ESM as an elective download for those who want to utilize the new area. For instance:

 

Lets say you want to create a new Moonshadow Elf. Using one ESM or the other will determine which version of the mod you start the game in. In the vanilla version, things remain as they are now. In the addon version, you start on the new continent, where you can explore and visit the other races that inhabit it. The patched ESMs should replace the original without any issues to existing characters, and each will be a separate mod that's standalone from my other race mods.

 

I think I also may have found a workaround for the MQ issue. If I can figure out how to trigger the right LAL quest stage, I can start the MQ from LAL's autosave point immediately "after" you would have made a choice at the statue in the cell. Essentially sending you to the destroyed Helgen to find the adventurer's journal without actually starting in the cell or using the cell's statue. My plan is to use my own statue trigger to set the stage right after character creation (or whenever you feel like it).

 

If I remember correctly, LAL also has (had?) an MQ "autostart glitch" where if you start somewhere other than the cell, the LAL quest will trigger automatically upon arriving at a certain distance from Helgen. I may test that theory by starting a new character using the old bandit start method of modifying the Skyrim.ini temporarily.

 

In any event, most of the hard stuff was already done (building the races). And I can start adding them to the new continent at my leisure 

 

And this is my hobby. It's what I most enjoy using my free time for. So I don't think I'll be going anywhere anytime soon 

 

Trykz

[Trykz]

So it's 1 something in the AM, and I just closed the CK

for the night. I got a pretty decent start on the first

town which will host my Amazons race......

 

it's a large harbor in the utmost North with plenty of coastal

space, AND a river inlet, perfect for a lumber mill:

 

 

At the edge of the coast is a ship which

I'm debating using as a teleport marker landing

that only this race can use, connected to another

ship docked in the harbor at Solitude. We'll see.

 

While testing things out and grabbing a few screens,

I also stumbled across this location along the northern coast:

 

 

I'm thinking this would make a great hunter or bandit camp 

 

I'll grab a few more screens in the morning

before I get started with the CK again

 

Trykz

[Trykz]

So Harbor Town's base architecture is almost finished,

with just the general goods store and blacksmith left

to do. I also need to clutter things up a bit, with things like

a chopping block, some barrels, maybe a garden, etc.

 

The town gate

 

So this is what they do with men who get hand

happy with the women of town, or just troublemakers

in general:

 

 

And some random night shots:

 

 

Here you can see the ship that I mentioned

earlier docked in the harbor:

 

 

I should be able to start on NPCs around mid-week.....

 

Trykz

[Monsto Brukes]

excellent start would you mind posting some birds eye view shots?

 

I know exactly the area that you're talking about. . . I've considered using it as base for RTS Skyrim or Tundra Defense. It's an excellent area. Only thing it needs is detail geometry... rocks, boulders, outcroppings, etc.

 

Anyway, here's a couple thoughts

1. Riften docks has some awesome custom dock pieces. It could allow you to have multiple parts of town connect to the docks which makes for more interesting play.
2. the guardbuilding over the road... while it may not fit with surrounding buildings, it'd look better to have it square with the road.

I realize that you're probably 5% into this town. However, I don't want to think "oh I'm sure he's going to change that" and then it becomes too late to change things because of the surrounding complexity. 

 

Here's a funny thought: Are you going to have a race of Bitch Men that are the women, and the Ams be the men? So the Ams will work the forge and the mill and the woodpile while the bitchmen shop at market stalls, tend the gardens and cook. I wonder how many players would catch that subtlty.