Grimacing with pain... I'm going to say that for the purposes of this question, I'm going to skip all the bugfix mods and the staples-of-everything mods like SKSE and SkyUI. I'm also going to skip the enabling mods like OAR and Base Object Swapper, because so much is built on top of them now that they're requirements.

When I mod Skyrim, once I have the base layer in place, what do I always include even though I don't need it?

True Directional Movement. This is so good that for me it's now a base mod. I love that third person mode both feels good and looks good.

High-Poly Head and NPC makeovers using it. Hard to un-see the clonk in the old heads once you see the nicer ones.

QuickLoot. Massive QOL improver.

Any mod that adds cloaks.

ENB Lights. They make the game so pretty.

Sforzinda's armor and clothing mashup mods are always my first answer to this question, because they are so good. The Nexus has supporting patches, like bodyslide conversions and compatibility tweaks.

My second answer is always high-poly-head, which is a SFW mod on a very NSFW site. But it's such a good visual upgrade!

I'm reversing this! I used Blade & Blunt in my last playthrough, so it's Valhalla this time around. We are overwhelmed with choice right now.

Whichever way you go, definitely check out Precision. This makes any combat overhaul feel tighter with better weapon collision and movement trails. Great stuff.

Synthesis is critical to my load order, and I have no idea how I missed these patchers. TY for linking!

Well, that Reddit post was one heck of a journey.

I end up being pissed off that the mod author is likely using false claims of transphobic harassment to distract from his own commonplace sleazy behavior coming to light.

That sounds like something wasn't right with your SKSE installation. Version mismatch? Files in the wrong places? A conflicting file somewhere?

For help diagnosing crashes, post the crash log in a pastebin or gist! SKSE should write logs if it gets far enough along. And for crash logs from SKSE plugins, use this crashlogger.

I used to steal everything that wasn't nailed down in Elder Scrolls games. Somewhere along the line, I stopped being a pickpocketing klepto and started being a boring paladin, even with the sign of the thief on me. I did a playthrough recently with the goal of getting all the daedric artifacts to get the acheivement, and oh my god, I hated killing Erandur. I will not do that again. It felt awful.

The EasyNPC discord server has a channel for preview requests and a channel full of fulfilled preview requests. This was pure gold! They also have links to all the tools they use for making consistent mostly-automated previews if you want to give it a shot yourself.

IIRC it's linked from the mod page.

I look forward to tools like this putting me out of a job answering questions about crashes :D

Oooooh, interesting point. I need to take a closer look at what AI Overhaul does!

I've never killed Alduin or been to Sovngarde, even though I bought and started playing the game on 11/11/2011. I'm afraid to finish the main quest, in case I never play the game again.

I don't like having followers. I feel guilty when I leave them at home. What if they get bored?

In Morrowind and Oblivion I stole everything that was not nailed down, but this feels wrong in Skyrim so I don't. This is obviously silly.

I have a list of mods I want to build that nobody has done yet, but would enhance my personal immersion. I want to feel like Skyrim is vast and unpopulated, and travel between cities is serious business. I really should build one just to find out how miserable the experience is, even though I know it won't really work. Skyrim's world space is too small to get the effect I want.

A few questions for you, to try to narrow it down: Did ENB write any logs before it crashed? (These would be in the game directory.) Does SKSE log anything or does the launch not reach that stage? Also, what's in your Skyrim directory? This is a slightly silly suggestion, but make sure you're starting with a pristine game dir, with not leftover dlls or loaders from pre-AE versions.

My only complaint about the SPID version of Wet & Cold is that the author also chose to rip out all the AI features, where NPCs come in out of the rain. I recently tried to recreate the full W&C experience with a collection of smaller mods, and I couldn't find anything to recreate that behavior. It's the kind of thing that will make me figure out how to write AI packages some day.

I keep coming back to Elysium Estate as the best home I've tried if I want to adopt the maxed-out number of orphans. This has all the mod cons and the latest version has been around long enough that it's well-patched. Bath, kitchen, basement with enough display space for me, crafting stations in believable places, comfy bedroom, cozy decor!

In the playthrough that I'm going to start any day now I swear I am going the entire opposite direction. I'm installing some small shelters in out of the way places, and probably sticking with Breezehome for a main base. Right now that list is:

• Autumngate
• Izba
• Magnulf's Lake Camp
• Sami Hut

I am still hunting for something in Hjaalmarch and something near Markreath if anybody has a suggestion!

There are some great base-install modlists for both the Vortex (via Nexus Collections) and for Wabbajack (a more fully-featured modlist installer). These modlists will cover the major bug fixes plus the frameworks or extensions used by many other mods.

One modlist for each tool covering what essentials if you want to move on and install some other fun mods of your choice on top:

• Truly Essentials for AE 1.6.640- Nexus.
• Skyrim Modding Essentials - Wabbajack.

If you're modding with Mod Organizer 2, use Wabbajack to install a modlist. If you're using Vortex, install a Nexus collection with it.

I went looking for videos featuring Skoglendi earlier and found this one. Looks great.

Adding: If you don't want to use a tool to install these, they each come with a list of which mods they include, so you can do it all by hand if you want to learn!

I dunno about UniversalHatred, but for me half my modlist is texture mods, some of them tiny mods that just retexture one thing. And a huge percentage of the plugin list is tiny patches that I'll merge before I start my real playthrough with it. So that mod total might not be as heavyweight as you think.

That is great. TY for the pic!

Here are some not-Immersive-Armors armors you can use to spice up that load order:

• Armor Variants Expansion
• anything by Pulcharmsolis
• anything by 4thUnknown
• anything by Fuse00
• anything by Gearshout
• Moon Monk's Robes for the well-dressed Khajiit
• Lunar Guard Armor

And here are some weapons:

• JaySus Swords
• Insanity Sorrow weapons pack
• Silverthorn Weaponry - silver weapons by Billyro
• many things by Billyro
• Sarta - my favorite Billyro sword
• Fenrir Blades - another Billyro creation I love
• Billyro Ultimate Swords Anthology - if you want to say the heck with it, give me all of the swords