TETHER - Hand-Holding for Followers

[KEI997]

12 hours ago, Dorabella said:

Isn't your PC attractive enough? 🤣

 

I did what the post said. I hooked the follower (Lydia) she didn't move , so I let go, moved a few meters away, and tried again: she's hooked and following me.

I suppose the real cause of the bug is a single animation package . OAR , It says that the animations ( for female character/female follower)are missing

I tried pasting the animations into Data\meshes\Actors\Character\animations\OpenAnimationReplacer\TETHER_run\FollowerFemale , and into Data\meshes\Actors\Character\animations\OpenAnimationReplacer\TETHER_run\PlayerFemale , Result: OAR confirms the animations; the follower moves immediately

 

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I agree that it's not the best method, but it might still help solve the problem.

No, the missing animations actually aren't the issue here. The animation data included in this mod is purely cosmetic.

This mod joins the hands together using Skyrim's Havok constraint feature. It sets the character's body as an active ragdoll and uses procedural animation to bind the arms, so you should still be able to walk while holding hands even without OAR.

The reason I provided the OAR folders in the first place is that holding hands with standard locomotion animations causes the arm to stretch way back in a painful-looking way, so I made custom animations just for male characters for now (the female ones will come later!). If the folder is empty, it should simply play vanilla or whatever custom sheathed movement animations you have installed.

As for the legs acting strange on stairs or slopes, that might be an issue with my animation rig. I'll look into it!

[KEI997]

On 8/13/2026 at 11:40 AM, MadMansGun said:

i hate that i will never learn how to do this level of black magic modding.

I deleted the image files. Since this is my first time using LL, I'm still not really familiar with the basic usage and site etiquette, so sorry about that!
I'd really appreciate it if you could keep letting me know if anything else comes up in the future.

[MadMansGun]

?????

were you trying to reply to someone else?

[KEI997]

Ah, my bad! I meant to click reply, but I accidentally quoted instead.
I was indeed trying to respond to you earlier, though. Since your post mentioned(https://www.loverslab.com/attachments/) and said "the less crap eating up server space the better," I went ahead and deleted the raccoon images and other files I had attached.

[sleepysaria]

Incredible!

[Ryo95]

I've been waiting for this for so long! But for now, I get a CTD if I change location while holding hands. I'll wait till it's more stable.

[Bluegunk]

I so want this mod to work in my game...

 

But the follower remains stuck to the spot, and may also start running on the spot, or keeping her back to the player. After which the follower is bugged.

 

Kei997 - have you any ideas I could try? What sort of thing could conflict with your Tether?  

 

 

Hopes for the future:

• When stopping with hand-held partner, after a few seconds a kiss or hug idle
• Walk arm about each other
• 🙃

Edited August 14 by Bluegunk

[Dorabella]

5 hours ago, KEI997 said:

No, the missing animations actually aren't the issue here. The animation data included in this mod is purely cosmetic.

It works anyway. There's just one detail that might be causing the problem where the follower sometimes doesn't move. In my opinion, the follower should turn toward the PC, but that doesn't happen instead, the follower takes the first few steps backward.

 

5 hours ago, KEI997 said:

As for the legs acting strange on stairs or slopes, that might be an issue with my animation rig. I'll look into it!

After walking for a while, your walking speed slows down significantly. Possible cause: custom walk/run animations? (GSLALAnim)

 

Still, you've done a great job . 

 

30 minutes ago, Ryo95 said:

I've been waiting for this for so long! But for now, I get a CTD if I change location while holding hands. I'll wait till it's more stable.

This also happens if you trigger a Sexlab animation while holding hands. For now, just let go of the follower to avoid the CTD.

 

22 minutes ago, Bluegunk said:

have you any ideas I could try? What sort of thing could conflict with your Tether?

We could try adding animations in all directions, but since they aren't included in the DLL, I don't know if it will work.

 

[Bluegunk]

Oh! It's started working for me! Well that's great!  😃

 

However, use of Tether seems to leave some kind of trace on the follower. The Hug Animation may glitch with the Hug-Death glitch afterwards.  

Perhaps the follower isn't being fully cleared of the Tether on end of the hand-hold?

 

Edited August 14 by Bluegunk

[TheStranger]

Absolutely disgusting! What's next? IK head pats?

 

...

 

On a more serious note: Great job! This is really cool. I've been thinking about how this would be a logical "next step", seeing that other mods have handled things like leashes and advanced IK alignments of characters. Seems like it may need some polish, but it is a cute and fun mod. Glad someone finally made it.

[sofzx]

16 hours ago, TheStranger said:

Absolutely disgusting! What's next? IK head pats?

 

...

 

On a more serious note: Great job! This is really cool. I've been thinking about how this would be a logical "next step", seeing that other mods have handled things like leashes and advanced IK alignments of characters. Seems like it may need some polish, but it is a cute and fun mod. Glad someone finally made it.

we need head pats fr 

[shrtjsrtj]

13 minutes ago, sofzx said:

we need head pats fr 

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/130131?tab=description

 

It's from Billyy's SLAL Animation and Sub Lola also uses them, they're Sexlab animations though so they can take forever to start with vanilla Sexlab.

[Miaa11]

I laughed when i clicked to follow this mod 😅 Amaizing idea btw,thank you!

[FromWhomst]

I can see a great quest mod potential featuring a scene where you have to drag someone through burning hellscape

[Halleck2]

Thanks for the mod.  Any chance of a walking side-by-side animation?   For extra disgustingness.

[Bluegunk]

It would be interesting to see if Tether will work with Followers as Companions.  Unfortunately, that mod creates an ocean of script stacks. So it's not one I can recommend (unless someone fixes it).  I can't fix it, because I don't understand how scripts work.

[Neyri LL]

Could something similar be used to create more accurate naked-cover animations that accurately cover the body, rather than relying on a body preset that matches the animation?

[Bluegunk]

Thanks for the update!  This generally works very well apart from a little line dancing at the start... lol.

 



 

Edited August 15 by Bluegunk

[gibgame]

OAR says the tether plugin is missing when I boot up the game. Any suggestions?

[KEI997]

On 8/13/2026 at 3:43 PM, beeltwowa said:

I'm back- cute and kino, I can see this being a perma in my loadlist- though I have an issue where both PC and Follower stare upwards, the weapon on may back also follows that direction and ends up impaling my PC lol- maybe an issue with the the idle/walk/run animations I use? The only gripe I really have is with the Follower pushing you to get back to their positions- if possible maybe disable follower-player collisions when tethered... Also that pointer thing that guy said if true.

 

10 hours ago, Bluegunk said:

Thanks for the update!  This generally works very well apart from a little line dancing at the start... lol.

 

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I recommend using this alongside mods like "I'm Walkin' Here" that shrink follower collision to prevent bumping into each other.

[KEI997]

On 8/14/2026 at 6:22 PM, Ryo95 said:

I've been waiting for this for so long! But for now, I get a CTD if I change location while holding hands. I'll wait till it's more stable.

I'd like to clarify whether "change location" means changing cells or fast traveling, though in my own setup, fast traveling while holding hands didn't cause a CTD.
But assuming you mean fast travel, I'm considering updating it so that the tether releases whenever you open the map or menu.

[noconoco]

This is a really wonderful mod. I’ve been having a lot of fun with it while also testing it out.

There’s just one thing I’m having a little trouble with, so I’d appreciate some advice. I believe I’ve finished most of the adjustments, but the follower holding hands with the player still moves a little jerkily, possibly because their walking speeds are not quite synchronized.

I’m not sure whether the follower is slowing down after catching up with the player, or speeding up to catch up with them. Either way, it looks like the follower is constantly making small speed adjustments, which makes their movement appear somewhat stuttery.

In this situation, which MCM settings should I focus on adjusting? Are there any particular values that I should fine-tune to synchronize the movement?

For reference, I’ve set the player and follower to have the same height.

I also use Conditional Expressions Extended to control the facial expressions of both the player and the follower. The player’s facial expressions continue to change normally while holding hands, but the follower’s expression becomes fixed at whatever expression they had immediately before holding hands, and does not change while they are holding hands.

Is this the intended behavior, or is there a setting that I may have overlooked?

[KEI997]

1 hour ago, noconoco said:

moves a little jerkily,

It would help me understand the situation much better if you could show me a video along with your mod list.

Are you perhaps not using a mod that disables follower collision, like "I'm Walkin' Here"?
My guess at the moment is that TETHER pulls the follower close to the player to hold hands -> they get pushed back by Skyrim's vanilla follower collision -> repeat. I feel like something like that might be happening.
 

1 hour ago, noconoco said:

but the follower’s expression becomes fixed

I honestly have no idea.

[noconoco]

4時間前、KEI997はこう言いました。

もし可能であれば、MODリストと一緒に動画を見せていただけると、状況をよりよく理解できます。

」のような、フォロワーの衝突判定を無効にするMODを使用していませんか もしかして、「 I'm Walkin' Here ？
現時点での私の推測では、TETHERがフォロワーをプレイヤーの近くに引き寄せて手を繋ごうとする→スカイリムのデフォルトのフォロワー衝突判定によって押し戻される→これを繰り返す、という流れではないでしょうか。おそらく、そのようなことが起こっているのではないかと思います。
 

正直言って、全く分かりません。

Thank you for your reply.

I’m not using any mods like I’m Walkin’ Here.

As for the follower’s facial expressions, it’s not really something that bothers me too much either. I’ll try a few more things on my end, and if I find anything that improves the situation, I’ll get back to you again.

[sofzx]

Pretty cool mod, sadly the havok gets a little crazy.