Animal Research: The Insatiable Scholar

[Samsara281]

1 hour ago, kkiiees said:

Did you use MO2 ? if so let the high poly patch overwrite the original Animal Research, or alternatively ( if you want Tirwin's vanilla yellowish skin ) download the vanilla facetint file on the download section

yes I already overwrite it

[eflat01]

On 8/25/2025 at 3:04 PM, chuckdm said:

So...was playing through this last night and have to say very nice, well done guys.  Two things:

• Regarding P+, it is pretty much the new standard for SexLab, so every time I see someone say "P+ is the problem" I can't help but cringe a bit.  You are free to make the mod however you want, but if we're assigning fault here, it lies with you amazing guys, not P+.  If your mod isn't working with P+ in 2025 then it's a "you problem."
• If anyone else is, like me, using P+ and still wants to enjoy this mod, be aware that the link in @killer905's signature that says "Animal Research - All quests list - Click me!" actually includes the quest stages for every quest in the mod, so you can manually advance the quest when it doesn't handle P+ properly.  That wasn't clear to me at first so I'm just mentioning it here for anyone else it may help.

Anyhow, thanks again for the amazing mod.  Sexual content with a lore-friendly story is sadly rare, despite this being a Bethesda game where torture, slavery, and prostitution are canon.  Go figure.

 

@Gristle is correct, Animal Research cannot work with older versions of P+ because some functions which older P+ provide ( their SexLab counterpart) to let a mod know when a sex scene has completed or when an actor is free from a sex scene may not work much the time due the framework has a bug.

 

Now, If you thought about it, there's no point in even providing a function, procedure or object in a framework for other apps to use which does not work. (if you provide it and it does not work it's the framework's bug).

 

The issue explained:

Spoiler

1. The player has dialog with  the Actor (Tirwin or some other)

2. The sexlab calls are made to start the sex

3. Animal Research then waits for the end of sex 

4. Checks that "the actors" are now free and available to interact with (a sexlab call is how a mod would do this, and that's what's buggy in older P+)

5. If the actors are now available to the mod again it moves the quest along  - either force greet, stage etc... whatever it just does something.

 

iow: something like using this function in script code should actually work because the function is suppose to work.

 

   SexLab.TrackActor(Actor01, "Actor01Hook")

 

I'm running 1.6..1170, and I looked at P+ when I started playing Skyrim again last year (heck it had to be at least five to ten years prior I played Skyrim last).

 

Anyway I found a number of issues with the version of P+ posted up here on LL. I saw strange behavior, looked in the source, saw some issues. So, I uninstalled it and went with SexLab. 

 

P+ is suppose to be a framework which does everything SexLab provides - seamlessly as stated, a mod utilizing it should not even care if it's calling P+ or SexLab because P+ should include all of SexLab's functionality (that's all SexLab's set of Functions, procedures and objects by "name" which other mods may use). Older versions of P+ have issues doing the job of replacing SexLab properly - it's buggy but that's to be expected in most newer code-sets.

 

I heard there's a new beta version on Discord which addresses most of the issues. P+ is a work in progress. 

 

The problem: Older versions of P+ have an issue -a bug - it may lose track of npcs/pc in a sex scene and that is not the fault of the mod utilizing the SexlLab/P+ function to initiate the sex scene. Returning an empty array to the mod trying to keep track of npcs or even the animation played. The bug is actually in a piece of C++ code - basically a procedure which mishandles array types incorrectly (least what I saw in the code and last I heard they were addressing this in the latest beta). 

 

imho... if you're on AE use the latest beta of P+ from discord if you wish, if not stick with SexLab. 

Edited August 27, 2025 by eflat01

[eflat01]

3 hours ago, killer905 said:

I have often seen people refer to purple (light) as pink and vice versa. Just a small observation.

 

Yes, to some people pink is purple, people also speak different languages so sometimes pink may be considered among reds, etc... when they put their words into English.

[eflat01]

16 hours ago, unwashed biomass said:

I got a problem. Tirwin stopped following me. It is while doing first book quest. Well lotta happen meantime (dragon, greybeards etc). I've tried everything (dismissing her - she just stands in place not returning to Bannered Mare, resetai, disable/enable). I guess i have to resort to finding save before that happened for now.

 

I'd find a save before hand. I suppose she lost her follow package or just does not know she's a follower at the moment? No telling what else she may not have running. 

[killer905]

No new news at the moment, but I'll leave you with a video where the idea was to use Tiriwn control for one of the tasks. But as you can see, it didn't work very well. It would also have to be a strictly controlled task without fighting or jumping.

 

And yes this was 5 msc ago

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_2amKKF2P8T6UoFq2GgcpefxfN4ceO35/view?usp=sharing

[irocsnibbler]

Hello! I did have the bug where the quest wouldn't start and if I force started it via console commands it wouldn't show quest markers.

 

I got it to work on a new save, and I believe the fault may lie with schlongs of Skyrim. I used the menu to make all women have schlongs, so I think what happened was SoS would edit their character files when I entered the tavern their models got edited to have schlongs and would interrupt the starting dialog

 

Does that make sense at all?

 

Other than that I'm very excited to give this quest a try!

[killer905]

1 hour ago, irocsnibbler said:

Hello! I did have the bug where the quest wouldn't start and if I force started it via console commands it wouldn't show quest markers.

 

I got it to work on a new save, and I believe the fault may lie with schlongs of Skyrim. I used the menu to make all women have schlongs, so I think what happened was SoS would edit their character files when I entered the tavern their models got edited to have schlongs and would interrupt the starting dialog

 

Does that make sense at all?

 

Other than that I'm very excited to give this quest a try!

I don't think SoS for girls could cause the dialogue to break.

 

You described the tavern, so I guess that's the first task. The markers should appear at stage 30 or higher, but if you have a mod that edits the cell (Ilinalta's Deep) where the book is, the quest may not work properly.

 

The quest may also not work properly if an NPC is dead. Aela is in this quest.

 

If nothing is edited and Aela is alive, then something is probably broken since it works fine on New Save.

 

Alternatively, try temporarily disabling SOS for Girls and then enter the inn.

 

Sometimes this bard Mikael can ruin the scene with his dreary singing

[irocsnibbler]

28 minutes ago, killer905 said:

I don't think SoS for girls could cause the dialogue to break.

 

You described the tavern, so I guess that's the first task. The markers should appear at stage 30 or higher, but if you have a mod that edits the cell (Ilinalta's Deep) where the book is, the quest may not work properly.

 

The quest may also not work properly if an NPC is dead. Aela is in this quest.

 

If nothing is edited and Aela is alive, then something is probably broken since it works fine on New Save.

 

Alternatively, try temporarily disabling SOS for Girls and then enter the inn.

 

Sometimes this bard Mikael can ruin the scene with his dreary singing

Indeed it was the bannered mare, sorry! I don't think I have anything that would be editing Ilinaltas deep.

 

For then new save I had not told SoS to assign schlongs to female characters and when I entered the bannered mare they started talking like they're supposed to, and quest markers showed up like they're supposed to as well.

 

When you say sos for girls is that a mod addon for sos or just the probability sliders in sos?

 

I'm going to try loading right before I entered the bannered mare and enable sos on female characters and see if that breaks it, will report back! Might be a while though

[killer905]

24 minutes ago, irocsnibbler said:

Indeed it was the bannered mare, sorry! I don't think I have anything that would be editing Ilinaltas deep.

 

For then new save I had not told SoS to assign schlongs to female characters and when I entered the bannered mare they started talking like they're supposed to, and quest markers showed up like they're supposed to as well.

 

When you say sos for girls is that a mod addon for sos or just the probability sliders in sos?

 

I'm going to try loading right before I entered the bannered mare and enable sos on female characters and see if that breaks it, will report back! Might be a while though

By ‘sos for girls’ I meant the mod that adds female dicks, which you use.

[gerkl]

Where is the book at in the nightcaller temple?

[killer905]

3 hours ago, gerkl said:

Where is the book at in the nightcaller temple?

You don't have to go there, because they should accost you when you try to leave the inn. An NPC named Otto. If this does not happen, talk to him in the inn.

[zh1023700559]

 

Only installing the mod itself, both Naryu and Tirwin are ugly and totally bald. I added the high poly facetint patch, Naryu looks good but Tirwin is partly bald.

 

I gave Tirwin a headgear by NFF, and then take the helmet back, her broken hair became normal. But after a while, it changes back to the broken one.

Edited August 30, 2025 by zh1023700559

[KeplerZeroFive]

Loving the mod so far, but I'm having a troublesome bug during the Castle Volkihar quest (VAR_Castle). I've just recently finished the Dawnguard questline siding with the Dawnguard. When I arrive on the island, I can see the portcullis close in the distance. After I hit the quest marker on the bridge, the quest objective changes to "Try to enter the castle", but the watchman/gate guard doesn't greet me and interacting with him only gives generic dialogue. If I tcl through the portcullis and interact with the door, I just enter Castle Volkihar like normal. 

 

I've noticed that all throughout this quest (and even before starting it) that GetStage VAR_Castle returns 136. SQS VAR_Castle shows that stages 135 and 136 are true before starting the quest, but experimenting with old saves suggests that these are related to if I've started/finished the Dawnguard questline. If I SetStage VAR_Castle 50 after hitting the bridge trigger then the marker moves to the Volkihar Undercroft door around back, but interacting with that door doesn't do anything. If I then SetStage VAR_Castle 80, the marker moves to the Volkihar Catacombs door. Entering it changes the objective to "Find a way up into the castle", but there's no quest marker and interacting with the locked door to the Volkihar Courtyard in the East Tower doesn't do anything.

 

I also noticed that Tirwin hasn't said anything quest-related during this entire quest, and she's normally pretty reactive to what's going on. I'm wondering if there was a trigger somewhere I missed and that all of the voicelines/scripts are backed up because of that.

[YetAnotherOne]

I have a fine working setup, however when adding this mod my game crashes on animation start with trolls, but some other creatures work fine, as far as i understand the crash is related to ni nodes or something.

[killer905]

On 8/30/2025 at 7:56 PM, zh1023700559 said:

 

Only installing the mod itself, both Naryu and Tirwin are ugly and totally bald. I added the high poly facetint patch, Naryu looks good but Tirwin is partly bald.

 

I gave Tirwin a headgear by NFF, and then take the helmet back, her broken hair became normal. But after a while, it changes back to the broken one.

Tirwin has two types of hairstyles: tied up (wig) and loose. Personally, I don't know what could be causing this. Could it be a wrongly installed High Poly patch?

[killer905]

5 hours ago, YetAnotherOne said:

I have a fine working setup, however when adding this mod my game crashes on animation start with trolls, but some other creatures work fine, as far as i understand the crash is related to ni nodes or something.

Just a troll? Hmm, the best idea would be to find another troll and test it on that one (or use the Hentai Creature mod). If the problem persists, it is worth checking whether the problem occurs without the AR mod.

 

At the moment, I think the troll has something broken with NiNode. I think More Nasty Creature?

[Evallyn]

I have a question regarding the Bearly Human quest. I got the book but Freykas dialouge just abruptly ends at "Why would you want to find a werebear?". I should probably add that I am using a New Perspectives start and I never actually started the main Dragonborn questline. I did not want any distractions or scripted events getting in the way. So far it has been smooth sailing up until Skaal village. So I am wondering. Is this part reliant on freeing the Skaal from their Stone? I need to be Dragonborn to do that so that would certainly be a bit of a detour. Would be nice to know.

[killer905]

6 hours ago, KeplerZeroFive said:

Loving the mod so far, but I'm having a troublesome bug during the Castle Volkihar quest (VAR_Castle). I've just recently finished the Dawnguard questline siding with the Dawnguard. When I arrive on the island, I can see the portcullis close in the distance. After I hit the quest marker on the bridge, the quest objective changes to "Try to enter the castle", but the watchman/gate guard doesn't greet me and interacting with him only gives generic dialogue. If I tcl through the portcullis and interact with the door, I just enter Castle Volkihar like normal. 

 

I've noticed that all throughout this quest (and even before starting it) that GetStage VAR_Castle returns 136. SQS VAR_Castle shows that stages 135 and 136 are true before starting the quest, but experimenting with old saves suggests that these are related to if I've started/finished the Dawnguard questline. If I SetStage VAR_Castle 50 after hitting the bridge trigger then the marker moves to the Volkihar Undercroft door around back, but interacting with that door doesn't do anything. If I then SetStage VAR_Castle 80, the marker moves to the Volkihar Catacombs door. Entering it changes the objective to "Find a way up into the castle", but there's no quest marker and interacting with the locked door to the Volkihar Courtyard in the East Tower doesn't do anything.

 

I also noticed that Tirwin hasn't said anything quest-related during this entire quest, and she's normally pretty reactive to what's going on. I'm wondering if there was a trigger somewhere I missed and that all of the voicelines/scripts are backed up because of that.

@Gristle I will probably clarify it further.

 

 

- The gate closes upon arrival on the island, as intended. 
- As they approach the gate, Tirwin should comment that she does not like the look of the castle.
- Upon reaching the gate, the guard should have ForceGreet on PC (it won't do much, as he will not let them in, only informing them that there is a new lord of the castle). NOTE: No matter what, you should not enter through the main gate.

- Tirwin should do ForceGreet on the PC.
- You should now go to the side entrance (it is closed).
- Tirwin should approach the PC and comment, ‘Maybe the other door on the other side is open.’
- The second door should be openable with a lock pick or a key from Draugr.

 

After entering the Volkihar Catacombs, you must find your way to the garden. Just keep going straight ahead, as there is only one path.

Silent Tirwin, it's always a sign that something has gone wrong. In general, you should approach the PC and have ForceGreet on him/her at various stages of the quest or just a simple comment.

 

Try to continue, or start from the save point where Chase's quest ends and play from that point without speeding up the dialogue or running ahead without waiting for poor Tirwin.

[eflat01]

32 minutes ago, killer905 said:

Tirwin has two types of hairstyles: tied up (wig) and loose. Personally, I don't know what could be causing this. Could it be a wrongly installed High Poly patch?

 

On 8/30/2025 at 1:56 PM, zh1023700559 said:

 

Only installing the mod itself, both Naryu and Tirwin are ugly and totally bald. I added the high poly facetint patch, Naryu looks good but Tirwin is partly bald.

 

I gave Tirwin a headgear by NFF, and then take the helmet back, her broken hair became normal. But after a while, it changes back to the broken one.

 

 

Likely the override did not take place correctly... look in load order and the mesh and texture files to match up what files are from what. does seem like a missing mesh.

Edited August 31, 2025 by eflat01

[killer905]

14 minutes ago, Evallyn said:

I have a question regarding the Bearly Human quest. I got the book but Freykas dialouge just abruptly ends at "Why would you want to find a werebear?". I should probably add that I am using a New Perspectives start and I never actually started the main Dragonborn questline. I did not want any distractions or scripted events getting in the way. So far it has been smooth sailing up until Skaal village. So I am wondering. Is this part reliant on freeing the Skaal from their Stone? I need to be Dragonborn to do that so that would certainly be a bit of a detour. Would be nice to know.

It seems to me that the dialogue connection is broken.

Freyka is the person who will guide you if you are not freeing the Skaal from their Stone. Otherwise, you will talk to Fanari Strong-Voice, because she is the leader of the Skaals.

I tested this quest when the PC is not Dragonborn and personally had no problem.

 

setstage VAR_Werebear 50

 

It should help you to continue with the task.

[Gristle]

7 hours ago, KeplerZeroFive said:

After I hit the quest marker on the bridge, the quest objective changes to "Try to enter the castle", but the watchman/gate guard doesn't greet me and interacting with him only gives generic dialogue. If I tcl through the portcullis and interact with the door, I just enter Castle Volkihar like normal. 

I don't know why the watchmen didn't force greet you, but as @killer905 mentioned, you don't enter via the main gate. Like Chasing Echoes you enter by the docks. 

7 hours ago, KeplerZeroFive said:

If I SetStage VAR_Castle 50 after hitting the bridge trigger then the marker moves to the Volkihar Undercroft door around back, but interacting with that door doesn't do anything.

Stage 50 is correct. The Undercroft door is a bit of misdirection. It has been locked (to force you into the new Catacombs). Once the PC approaches it (to discover it's locked), Tirwin should point out the other (new, mod-added) door. This advances the quest to stage 80. However, Tirwin can get stuck on the rocks at the bottom, or sometimes she just takes a long time to get up the stairs. If this happens, you'll have to go to her, or use the Call Tirwin spell to bring her to you.

7 hours ago, KeplerZeroFive said:

If I then SetStage VAR_Castle 80, the marker moves to the Volkihar Catacombs door. Entering it changes the objective to "Find a way up into the castle", but there's no quest marker and interacting with the locked door to the Volkihar Courtyard in the East Tower doesn't do anything.

There is no quest marker, but as @killer905 mentioned, there is only one way through (and you found it). I assume you killed the skeever. That should trigger a Tirwin force greet with a request to search the ruined tower (stage 110). Her force greet might take a couple of seconds. Then, searching up the steps in the ruined tower (and finding nothing), Tirwin will suggest trying another tower.  Only at that point (stage 130), can you exit to the courtyard.

7 hours ago, KeplerZeroFive said:

I also noticed that Tirwin hasn't said anything quest-related during this entire quest, and she's normally pretty reactive to what's going on. I'm wondering if there was a trigger somewhere I missed and that all of the voicelines/scripts are backed up because of that.

Tirwin actually doesn't have many reactive comments in this stretch. Just the "look at this castle" comment outside when approaching, and a "this place smells like death" when entering the catacombs. But each such comment has its own trigger (based on quest stage), so as long as the quest is advancing they should all work.

 

I think the best suggestion is to make sure Tirwin is always close by, or to wait for her if she is lagging behind. She is often the key to advancing stages.

[Gristle]

6 hours ago, YetAnotherOne said:

I have a fine working setup, however when adding this mod my game crashes on animation start with trolls, but some other creatures work fine, as far as i understand the crash is related to ni nodes or something.

Are you sure it works (troll sex) if you remove this mod? This mod uses trolls, but doesn't make any changes to them. Could be an issue with textures or meshes on troll cocks, as opposed to the troll itself. 

[KeplerZeroFive]

15 hours ago, Gristle said:

I don't know why the watchmen didn't force greet you, but as @killer905 mentioned, you don't enter via the main gate. Like Chasing Echoes you enter by the docks. 

Stage 50 is correct. The Undercroft door is a bit of misdirection. It has been locked (to force you into the new Catacombs). Once the PC approaches it (to discover it's locked), Tirwin should point out the other (new, mod-added) door. This advances the quest to stage 80. However, Tirwin can get stuck on the rocks at the bottom, or sometimes she just takes a long time to get up the stairs. If this happens, you'll have to go to her, or use the Call Tirwin spell to bring her to you.

There is no quest marker, but as @killer905 mentioned, there is only one way through (and you found it). I assume you killed the skeever. That should trigger a Tirwin force greet with a request to search the ruined tower (stage 110). Her force greet might take a couple of seconds. Then, searching up the steps in the ruined tower (and finding nothing), Tirwin will suggest trying another tower.  Only at that point (stage 130), can you exit to the courtyard.

Tirwin actually doesn't have many reactive comments in this stretch. Just the "look at this castle" comment outside when approaching, and a "this place smells like death" when entering the catacombs. But each such comment has its own trigger (based on quest stage), so as long as the quest is advancing they should all work.

 

I think the best suggestion is to make sure Tirwin is always close by, or to wait for her if she is lagging behind. She is often the key to advancing stages.

I experimented and dug around some more in xEdit and I think I might have found the issue. There's a trigger (xx03BFE3) in the Volkihar Courtyard that sets the stage of VAR_Castle to 135, it looks like it's used for Tirwin's "What is this place?!" line. However, you can hit this trigger while doing the normal Dawnguard quest Chasing Echoes when you explore the courtyard. If you do so, then it'll cause any of the AI packages or dialogues that rely on GetStage(VAR_Castle) = x to fail for any value of x below 135 (such as Tirwin's ForceGreet packages at the gate or in the first tower), because GetStage returns the highest completed stage, so it thinks we're much further in the quest than we actually are. 

 

My modding experience is limited so I'm not sure what the best solution would be. Would it work to have that trigger start off disabled and then be enabled as part of the quest initialization or in one of the fragments?

 

Also, I may have found a small script bug while I was investigating. Fragment 0 of VAR_QF_VAR_Castle1_07DC0C57 checks if the quest Kindred Judgement has been completed in order to reenable the gate guard and lock the doors. However, the watchman is disabled at the end of Bloodlines - if you try and do this quest between the two, the watchman will still be disabled but won't be reenabled by the script. It might work to have two separate checks, one if Bloodlines is done to reenable the guard and one if Kindred Judgement is done to shut the gates.

[akforeplay]

Right so the party quest is pretty much the poster child of every criticism I gave back a while ago.  Once again the player has zero agency where even if you zero out the quest counter you have to wait for her to slut around some more and at the end your forced to sit around doing nothing for 5 CONSECUTIVE scenes minimum, two of which involve bbc fetishism despite being with a demon(maybe more but I left the moment the opportunity arouse).

 Which blows because this update was going really strong with the player interacting with whats going on until the horse quest where you stand around for 4 scenes but the level of interaction after makes up, even the start of the party you as the player are doing things but then suddenly you get to stand around for like 5 mins if you use the default sexlab scene length settings.  You barely even feel like supporting character in the quest let alone the PC it honestly feels like the PC could be replaced with a generic merc and not much would change.

Maybe the direction the mod is going just isn't for me which is fine, but I figured I'd give my 2 cents on the update for whatever its worth since I really enjoyed the mod up till now.

Edited September 3, 2025 by akforeplay

[gooser]

Using version 0.44, new game, I've had zero mod issues until the quest for the Werebears. In dialog with Freyka, I get as far as 

"Why would you want such a cursed creature?", and then the dialog stops. There are no other options

Is this broken, or have I missed something?