Animal Research: The Insatiable Scholar

[sophie01]

13 hours ago, killer905 said:

I think it would be easy to simply add a dialogue like “But I'm a lesbian” in response to the captain. Then you would have the option of having sex with the Dark Elf on the ship. But it would be a QoL thing. 

Would be nice oneday lol

 

On the Volkihar quest it says  "Try to enter the castle." And that I should try the main gate. I have already completed the Volkihar quest line. Harkon is dead, and Valerica is in her study. I completed the quests after Dragons bridge after seeing people saying the quest needed to be complete before. But now when I enter the castle the quest won't progress. I assume I've made a mistake. The only other mods that might conflict with Volkihar is SDA. 

[killer905]

2 hours ago, sophie01 said:

Would be nice oneday lol

 

On the Volkihar quest it says  "Try to enter the castle." And that I should try the main gate. I have already completed the Volkihar quest line. Harkon is dead, and Valerica is in her study. I completed the quests after Dragons bridge after seeing people saying the quest needed to be complete before. But now when I enter the castle the quest won't progress. I assume I've made a mistake. The only other mods that might conflict with Volkihar is SDA. 

When starting Volkihar's quest (Animal Research), the main gate should be closed and there should be a guard there. As a result, you will have to find another entrance, and it will not be the one you go through with Serana (but you have to approach them for Tirwin to comment on it), but a new one on the other side of the port.

[eflat01]

3 hours ago, HalcyonAndOn said:

I've just started using followers again, and remember why I stopped using them entirely in the past. Is there anything that can be done about Tirwin, quite literally, trying to crawl up the player's ass constantly (and not in the sexy way)? Pushing, shoving, it just never ends. Custom followers like Xelzaz, Remiel, Inigo are fine and don't do this. 3DNPC followers that run inside NFF's framework don't do this. Only Tirwin so far (and yes I gave her an NFF ignore token, so the prompt doesn't even show up to import her to the framework).

 

One other minor cleanup item I noticed in xEdit, there's a stray record for Savos Aren in the NPC records for this mod. Doesn't look like it's changed from Vanilla so it's benign, but shouldn't be there.

 

Thanks for the mod

 

Important note : Giving Tirwin greater follow distance could create issues for players when it comes to Animal Research quests because many are based on triggers. Getting too far ahead of her can mess things up, she may not speak or you can't hear her - ex. a stage may not get set due her interaction may be needed to continue.

 

In any case if you really wanted to toy around with that I believe the follow package is VAR_TirwinFollowPC ( is that correct @Gristle? )

 

On a follow package the Min Radius is technically the closest distance before the package stops making a follower chase and the Max Radius the furthest distance before forcing the follower to chase. I think that's base defaults being 200 and 300 - of course we all know in base game, especially when running then stopping a follower may run up our ass. You can try 300 and 400 as a pair or whatever floats your boat to place a further follow distance. (use SSeEdit or CK to make the edit). I have a dog I added in a mod which follows a particular npc at min 256 max 384. 

 

So, above all if you edit this, make sure to be very patience with Tirwin - you'd have to allow her to catch up more often. 

 

As Tirwin may remind us : "Don't leave your little elf girl behind, alone!" or was that "Don't leave your little elf girl's behind alone!" 😁

 

 

Edited February 8 by eflat01

[eflat01]

On 2/6/2026 at 12:48 PM, madlamb said:

there's a modlist i want to install and it needs version 046 of this mod to be installed

Can those things be faked out with changing a file name or link?

[Gristle]

On 2/7/2026 at 7:19 AM, killer905 said:

Vivi in general, no voice lines or specific dialogues? Because she definitely had it in version 51. I haven't had a chance to check Vivi herself (yet) in 52.

+ @Samsara281 I checked my game (with v0.52) and Vivi has voiced dialogue. Does anyone else have this issue?

[Gristle]

On 2/7/2026 at 11:47 AM, pinky6225 said:

Installed the latest version and the dialogue "i wish the construction..." appeared for me and it completed when i selected although Tirwin won't move down into the cell with me, if i use the call Tirwin spell she appears and she does her dialogue and she will change cell back into Lakeview manor but never from Lakeview into her apartment

All stage 100 does is unlock the door. The door is just a normal Skyrim door, set up with the navmesh in Tirwin's study so a follower can use it. I don't know what could interfere with this. Do you have Tirwin in a follower framework?

On 2/7/2026 at 11:47 AM, pinky6225 said:

Tried the Iona quest for Dibella and as i'm using sexlab stories there lot more NPC's there than usual so had to move them away to let Iona/Tirwin get to the right places for there dialogue, after helping Iona though Tirwin gave a dialogue that said i hadn't so i think those dialogues might be connected incorrectly

Thanks. You're correct. I'll fix in the next update.

[pinky6225]

14 minutes ago, Gristle said:

All stage 100 does is unlock the door. The door is just a normal Skyrim door, set up with the navmesh in Tirwin's study so a follower can use it. I don't know what could interfere with this. Do you have Tirwin in a follower framework?

Thanks. You're correct. I'll fix in the next update.

 

I have nethers follower framework installed but she isn't being managed by it as i've just been using the dialogue from this mod to get her to follow, she will follow me elsewhere around skyrim without a problem

[Gristle]

21 hours ago, sophie01 said:

Haven't had chance to try ending the scene as fast as possible yet. I get what you mean and I assume it would be a pain to rewrite any way to detect and enforce a lesbian character for the zero point zero one percent of the mod players. But if I were the PC I'd do anything to avoid it to the point of my own death or killing as many people on the ship. I can't imagine anything worse. Especially a PC as potentially strong and powerful as Skyrim makes the PC.   But fingers crossed for the end scene solution.

This can be addressed in the next update. It's not hard, because the boat scene was already set up for a PC sex scene with Voldsea if the PC is male. Sexlab has a function "IsGay" that can be used. It checks the number of male vs. female partners and if at least 65% are same sex, it sets the IsGay flag. Perhaps this flag can be used for other things too?

[Gristle]

12 hours ago, Maidenslayer said:

After VAR_Lurker stage 70, Chief Mauhulakh's dialog is supposed to start a scene with three orcs, the Dragonborn, Vivienne, and Tirwin.  However, only Vivienne and Tirwin are engaged.  Consequently, stage 80 is not set and there is no dialog options by the Chief or Tirwin to advance the quest.  I ultimately got it going by manually setting stages 80, 90, and 100 to get 150 to trigger.  (Here, the Chief's dialog might be affect by the mod "Bjorn" or perhaps your mod is trying to start a specific animation that I have not installed.)

The Chief's dialogue is available stage 70. The end of his dialogue sets the stage to 80 (for a female PC), which is the stage that starts the three sex scenes.  When all three sex scenes are over, the stage is set to 100. Of course, if the PC's scene doesn't start, the stage will never get to 100. The mod isn't selecting any particular animation here. Assuming your PC is female, it's basically looking for an animation with "MF" and "Aggressive" tags, but without "Bondage" or "Fisting" tags. These should be pretty common.

12 hours ago, Maidenslayer said:

After VAR_TirwinRoom stage 140, the DragonBorn is supposed to visit a general store.  However, I'm not getting any dialog from any store vendors per purchasing things. 

Tirwin's location change script is triggering this, so of course she has to be there. It's just detecting any cell with a LocTypeStore keyword. And then it's looking for an actor in the "JobMerchantFaction".  You can skip the scene with a merchange with setstage VAR_TirwinRoom 160

12 hours ago, Maidenslayer said:

Can you suggest a work-around to avoid subtle conflicts with other mods (perhaps by loading Animal Research early or late, for instance)?

I'm not aware of any such conflicts. Setting this mod to load after other mods may help. But if other mods (with higher quest priority) put actors into scenes or give them other packages, then mod load order won't override this.

[Gristle]

7 hours ago, sophie01 said:

Would be nice oneday lol

 

On the Volkihar quest it says  "Try to enter the castle." And that I should try the main gate. I have already completed the Volkihar quest line. Harkon is dead, and Valerica is in her study. I completed the quests after Dragons bridge after seeing people saying the quest needed to be complete before. But now when I enter the castle the quest won't progress. I assume I've made a mistake. The only other mods that might conflict with Volkihar is SDA. 

When the Castle Volkihar quest in this mod starts, the first stage (10) disables the map markers around the castle. If you have killed Harkon (i.e., completed the main DG quest line), it also re-enables the gate guard and closes the castle main gate. 

 

Is the iron gate closed? Were you able to walk in the front door?  If you're anxious to proceed, you can use setstage VAR_Castle 40, which is the stage after you speak with the gate guard. That should trigger a Tirwin force greet. 

 

Also, the mod's Volkihar quest can be run before or after the Dawnguard main quest, just not during. SDA shouldn't affect anything.

 

[Gristle]

5 hours ago, eflat01 said:

 

Important note : Giving Tirwin greater follow distance could create issues for players when it comes to Animal Research quests because many are based on triggers. Getting too far ahead of her can mess things up, she may not speak or you can't hear her - ex. a stage may not get set due her interaction may be needed to continue.

 

In any case if you really wanted to toy around with that I believe the follow package is VAR_TirwinFollowPC ( is that correct @Gristle? )

 

On a follow package the Min Radius is technically the closest distance before the package stops making a follower chase and the Max Radius the furthest distance before forcing the follower to chase. I think that's base defaults being 200 and 300 - of course we all know in base game, especially when running then stopping a follower may run up our ass. You can try 300 and 400 as a pair or whatever floats your boat to place a further follow distance. (use SSeEdit or CK to make the edit). I have a dog I added in a mod which follows a particular npc at min 256 max 384. 

 

So, above all if you edit this, make sure to be very patience with Tirwin - you'd have to allow her to catch up more often. 

 

As Tirwin may remind us : "Don't leave your little elf girl behind, alone!" or was that "Don't leave your little elf girl's behind alone!" 😁

 

 

+ @HalcyonAndOn It's odd because the standard AI follow package is min 128, max 256, and Tirwin's is 200, 300. Also strange is that Vivi follows much closer, and she has the standard 128/256 package.

 

Actually, Tirwin was at 250 (or 300?)/400 but when Vivi joined the group, it looked so strange that Tirwin was always so far behind Vivi, so I reduced Tirwin's distance to the current 200/300. 

 

I can easily set Tirwin's follow distance back to 250/400, or 300/400. 

 

[eflat01]

1 hour ago, Gristle said:

+ @HalcyonAndOn It's odd because the standard AI follow package is min 128, max 256, and Tirwin's is 200, 300. Also strange is that Vivi follows much closer, and she has the standard 128/256 package.

 

Actually, Tirwin was at 250 (or 300?)/400 but when Vivi joined the group, it looked so strange that Tirwin was always so far behind Vivi, so I reduced Tirwin's distance to the current 200/300. 

 

I can easily set Tirwin's follow distance back to 250/400, or 300/400. 

 

 

Thanks and yes I could never figure out why when multiple followers on the same target always seemed one of them were  following the other .  

[Maidenslayer]

Thanks for responding to my prior questions per Chief Mauhulakh and Purchasing things; however, after multiple attempts to rerun the specific scenes I cannot figure out why these two stages fail to trigger when over 1000 others work fine.

 

I have another question:   I have Iona (the Housecarl) and Tirwin following me.  VAR_IonaQuest stage 10 is set.  What am I supposed to do to advance the quest?  (I have not seen any pop-up messages or quest-specific dialog options.)  Do I have the wrong Iona following me?

 

 

Edited February 9 by Maidenslayer
Clarification

[eflat01]

16 hours ago, Gristle said:

This can be addressed in the next update. It's not hard, because the boat scene was already set up for a PC sex scene with Voldsea if the PC is male. Sexlab has a function "IsGay" that can be used. It checks the number of male vs. female partners and if at least 65% are same sex, it sets the IsGay flag. Perhaps this flag can be used for other things too?

 

It's been a long time since I wrote for sl but yes, I think you can use that function for the test and put it in an OR along with gender test. 

Edited February 9 by eflat01

[Ambustin]

I just finished version 052, and as always, I loved it.

The story is developing, Tirwin is becoming my favorite waifu, and I didn't encounter any major bugs (except for the story with Eorlund, but that wasn't a problem with the mod and it's fixed now).

Spoiler

I did have a problem with the scene in the family mansion with Tirwin's brother. When I followed him to watch the lesbian scene at the end, I couldn't interact with him at all, even when I tried to leave the room and see the dog. I reloaded the save just before that dialogue and was able to continue. I might have missed a super naughty dialogue, but oh well.

 

This mod is definitely in my top 3.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what you have in store for us next!

[Samsara281]

8 hours ago, Gristle said:

+ @Samsara281 I checked my game (with v0.52) and Vivi has voiced dialogue. Does anyone else have this issue?

first I thought it might be cause by me still enable 0.43 high quality voice file. then I disabled it but still has this problem. I don't know any other mods has might be conflict with

[Gristle]

5 hours ago, Maidenslayer said:

I have another question:   I have Iona (the Housecarl) and Tirwin following me.  VAR_IonaQuest stage 10 is set.  What am I supposed to do to advance the quest?  (I have not seen any pop-up messages or quest-specific dialog options.)  Do I have the wrong Iona following me?

My bad. Iona was the name given to one of the three bar maids at the Dremora party. The bar maid Iona is not the housecarl from Riften. It never struck me that the Riften housecarl had the same name. Anyway, the Iona that was at the Dremora party lives in Markarth. If stage 10 is set, she will be in Markarth, working a bit at the stables, praying at the Dibella temple, and hanging out in the Silver Blood Inn a lot and spending the night there. So, send your Iona home and head to Markarth to find the bar maid from the party. Just speak to her to continue the quest.

[Nicoya]

So I just installed this mod and I'm stuck at the wolf at the bandit camp part. There is no key, and no quest marker pointing to anything. I'm wondering if there's a conflict with the Staff of Hasedoki CC content, since it adds a letter to this location?

[Gristle]

1 hour ago, Nicoya said:

So I just installed this mod and I'm stuck at the wolf at the bandit camp part. There is no key, and no quest marker pointing to anything. I'm wondering if there's a conflict with the Staff of Hasedoki CC content, since it adds a letter to this location?

No key in the bandit chest?  Are you running the newest version (0.52)? Can you run "sqv VAR_MainQuest" in the console and post what stage the quest is on?

 

A mod adding a letter to the location shouldn't cause any conflict.

[Donuts4me]

1 hour ago, Gristle said:

No key in the bandit chest?  Are you running the newest version (0.52)? Can you run "sqv VAR_MainQuest" in the console and post what stage the quest is on?

 

A mod adding a letter to the location shouldn't cause any conflict.

 

I tried loading a much older save for the same character I did all my other tests on (which worked fine before) and had the same problem. That character had been to the camp and accessed the chest before. However, the chest did have loot in it. It definitely respawned/refreshed.

 

I did a test with a totally new character that had never been to that camp before and everything worked fine.

 

Maybe prior visits and accessing that chest more than once creates the problem? Not sure why now? When I first tried this mod over a year ago I had already been to this camp before and did not have this problem. Again, same character.

 

Maybe you should place an extra copy of the key somewhere like on a shelf or in the wagon just as a backup? You can disable it once the player has opened the cage.

[killer905]

9 hours ago, Ambustin said:

I just finished version 052, and as always, I loved it.

The story is developing, Tirwin is becoming my favorite waifu, and I didn't encounter any major bugs (except for the story with Eorlund, but that wasn't a problem with the mod and it's fixed now).

  Reveal hidden contents

I did have a problem with the scene in the family mansion with Tirwin's brother. When I followed him to watch the lesbian scene at the end, I couldn't interact with him at all, even when I tried to leave the room and see the dog. I reloaded the save just before that dialogue and was able to continue. I might have missed a super naughty dialogue, but oh well.

 

This mod is definitely in my top 3.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what you have in store for us next!

It should be forcegreet, because when you control Tirwin, you cannot interact normally like a PC can. This means you cannot pick things up, open doors, or start conversations. If you don't have forcegreet, transferring your PC to the Tirwin character should help.

[killer905]

4 hours ago, Gristle said:

My bad. Iona was the name given to one of the three bar maids at the Dremora party. The bar maid Iona is not the housecarl from Riften. It never struck me that the Riften housecarl had the same name. Anyway, the Iona that was at the Dremora party lives in Markarth. If stage 10 is set, she will be in Markarth, working a bit at the stables, praying at the Dibella temple, and hanging out in the Silver Blood Inn a lot and spending the night there. So, send your Iona home and head to Markarth to find the bar maid from the party. Just speak to her to continue the quest.

I thought it was intentional to give her that name... However, there may be many people with the same name in Skyrim.

[yjsp810]

When Kust transforms to werewolf, he turns into a penis. How to fix it?

[sophie01]

20 hours ago, killer905 said:

When starting Volkihar's quest (Animal Research), the main gate should be closed and there should be a guard there. As a result, you will have to find another entrance, and it will not be the one you go through with Serana (but you have to approach them for Tirwin to comment on it), but a new one on the other side of the port.

There isn't a guard also the quest marker is on the main gate. Do I just need to find this new entrance and it'll progress the quest?

 

[sophie01]

16 hours ago, Gristle said:

When the Castle Volkihar quest in this mod starts, the first stage (10) disables the map markers around the castle. If you have killed Harkon (i.e., completed the main DG quest line), it also re-enables the gate guard and closes the castle main gate. 

 

Is the iron gate closed? Were you able to walk in the front door?  If you're anxious to proceed, you can use setstage VAR_Castle 40, which is the stage after you speak with the gate guard. That should trigger a Tirwin force greet. 

 

Also, the mod's Volkihar quest can be run before or after the Dawnguard main quest, just not during. SDA shouldn't affect anything.

 

Thank you for the help

There is no guard and the the main door is unlocked. After dragons bridge I went through all of Serana's quests I think this caused the issue because when I went to Volkihar for the first time with Serana the AR quest continued although Tirwin wasn't with me. Obviously Serana talks to the guard and the castle is unlocked from then on. I assume I can fix it with the setsatge command.  

 

The setstage command worked

 

It's kinda funny that... 

Spoiler

It's possible to sneak past Harkon and make it to Serana but there's no progression with the quest. I guess we have to be caught to continue. For a moment I thought Tirwin would complete the vampire lord quest with the MC not Harkon lol

 

Edited February 9 by sophie01