I will probably not work too much on this mod for a while, I wish to focus my efforts on a team project, like Beyond Skyrim, to gain some team experience. I will write a main quest sometime in the future! I also started to study for Mechanical Engineering this year, so I'm also preoccupied with that.
If you have found any issues / bugs or have suggestions, then please let me know!
Hey, I also noticed the "West Guard Tower South" has a roof exit, but not a hatch door to get back in! :o Also, I spotted a depreciated asset on the upper floor of the Hlaalu Council Manor. Still loving the mod!
I took a screenie but I'm not sure how to post it in comments. It's just a large red technical box on a floating shelf on the uppermost room of the Hlaalu Council Manor that says "Asset Depreciated." I think this usually happens when a mod is dependent on an .esm mod that is then edited, but ABE is not dependent on any such mod, aside from those of the original game, so I'm not sure what the cause for this might be. A conflict on my end, perhaps? Though I've never seen this before.
Edit: The objects in question are books. Some, but not all of the ones on that floating shelf.
For my own playthough, yes. There tends to be a lot of NPCs around the canal area, so I'm looking to remove some of them to see if it'll improve my FPS at all.
I really like the idea of the mod, but I wonder if there could be a lite version, with only balmora focused, leaving hla oad alone.
Lore wise hla oad is a very small and sleepy place, was wondering if nuking in EE the hla oad edits will make this mod work? or your quests tie in to the new hla oad? I also see a lot of changes that are bit too dramatic or extensive, making Balmora much more complex than even Vivec itself. A very interesting approach.
A Epic Balmora like mod would be great as well, with just cosmetic buildings, removing the quests/npcs/extra scripts and modified cells to hla oad and the couple ancestral tombs + the new dwemer tower you added, something more vanilla lore friendly perhaps? Just a suggestion :)
Was looking for a nice replacement to Epic Balmora Redux, yours seems to fit the bill if properly trimmed.
Cheers!
Edit: The mod is performance heavy, but actually gorgeous! ... Amazing for scenic shots, but it makes my lappy go into helicopter mode haha, so yeah, a lite version would be great but I know how modding is, I might start making the edits myself hehe. I see it clashes with Aru signs, as it seems they are integrated already here, also clashes with other mods I have , even some of my own (which I try to keep vanilla friendly as possible) , but thats normal for such a big endeavor as this mod is. Quite nice mod, should be an esm by itself rather than an esp due to how complex it is. Excellent work! :D
Edit 2: What I find incredible for this mod is the way you managed to set up the buildings alongside the mountains, super smooth and quite good looking, the corridors flow naturally. I will start nuking cell edits in Hla Oad and perhaps your npcs/quests and see if a lite mod is more workable, I have enough npcs already as background figures with MCA and Animated Morrowind, if I make this work I can perhaps pop them around the now cosmetic city with some tweaks. Lots of good stuff here!
Edit 3: It is doable yep, nuked several cells , npcs, items, scripts, dialogue, containers ... managed to nuke one or two that I should not as it destroyed access to the upper sections, but it is pretty much doable, and is much lighter to load. If you have the time, as you know which cells correspond to what, a lite redux version of your mod would be amazing, some of us just want to feel a bigger balmora without the added clutter of extra cells , npcs, quest and dialogue. I also saw you touched some tombs as well, though I really like the scope of the mod, it is a bit too big a change (and very heavy on some computers) . Again, I really love what you did here! You can see the work just by looking at all of the entries, npcs , scripts, items and the 120+ new cells/cell changes. It is a great work, but again, if you do just a dummy building balmora, for those of us that just like a small cosmetic enhancement I would love it.
Thank you for the mod, it shows how far you can stretch this wonderful game after such a long time still! :)
Thank you for the feedback, glad you're enjoying the mod! You're not the first to mention a lite version, I will have to work on that sometime in the future, I am quite busy with college right now! The dwemer tower and corresponding quest can easily be deleted, making a more vanilla friendly version.
Thanks man that's awesome to hear! I wish to do this to every town as well but it takes a lot of time :D Maybe I'll try to make a group project sometime in the future.
This is my favorite Balmora overhaul mod, and I've tried out some really good ones.
I was wondering if it might be possible to work a patch for Graht Morrowind Trees? I am very fond of it and I feel like a lot of others are as well. The problem, obviously, lies with the expansion of Hla Oad; one of the trees blocks a shack and dock.
I have a suggestion regarding your mod. It is visually nice and it has great questlines. However its weak point is performance. Firstly I thought that the problem is my old PC. But even after upgrade I suffer significant FPS hit in Balmora, especially in southern part of the city, near the river. I am playing with 90+ mods and many retextures, other cities are heavy-modded as well. But performance near southern river gate is 10-15 or even 20 fps worse than performance in Vivec with open plazas and so on.
So, my suggestion is making an optional "Light" version of the mod, where decorative NPCs (i.e. NPCs that dont take part in any quests) and a lot of small clutter on Balmora streets are removed. I believe that this would give a lot of additional fps and help people whose configuration is not perfect.
Thank you for the suggestion, I am quite aware of the problem. I don't think that removing the non quest npc's will make a lot of difference, they barely have any scripts running on them. I think the problem in general is simply the large amount of NPC's and buildings. You can see most of these when you're standing at the river, that's why the FPS drop is so large there.
ABE will run at 60 fps with a low or no mod-list but the more you add the more frames it will eat away, especially at the river.
But I can definitely look into making a light version of the mod, I would probably have to remove a lot of NPC's and maybe even some buildings.
Also I don't know if you're using OpenMW but this will also help with the framerate
I have read that on classic engine, a lot of small objects causes significantly stronger performance hit, than few large ones. There was a test that transforming kelp from "usual" object into MGE grass improves performance. So, try removing small decorative things, it will very likely help.
As for npcs - I think it depends on body/face/cloth retextures. If you have hi-res replacers like MacKom heads, Hi-res retextures of Better Clothes and so on, each npc becomes a performance factor. I tested this aspect personally by creating a large army of followers. With no mod-list it makes very few difference but with my current mod-list tricks like this cost a lot of fps.
Yes, I know that OpenMW is better in handling mods like ABE, but I am actively using MWSE, so OpenMW is not an option until it will have full integration of lua:(
interesting stuff, when I make a low performance version I'll definitely remove some of the smaller clutter. Maybe I should do this as well for the regular version.
Looks like a great mod. However I wish it was compatible with BCOM using the Waterworks option as I think the river shown in the images is really bland and boring. I do like how you added so many more buildings and made it a mega-town. Before BCOM, I used to use Balmora Expansion Improved.
maybe I can work something out one day, or make the river more interesting myself. But Waterworks makes a lot of edits at the river and this makes it difficult to become compatible.
Main Quest Overhaul is totally incompatible as it alters the world space around the hills behind Caius' house. TBH, I'd rather do without MQO as this mod is one of my favourites! Thanks for all your hard work. BTW, "Balnora guard" is spelled wrong in Turaelas Manor within this incompatible section mentioned! It's nothing really. Thought you might want to change it if you get round to making changes in the future!
Glad you like my mod so much! Thanks for notifying me about MQO, I will add this mod to the list of incompatible mods. I fixed the guard name typo's, but don't know when I will update the mod again.
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I also started to study for Mechanical Engineering this year, so I'm also preoccupied with that.
If you have found any issues / bugs or have suggestions, then please let me know!
Also, I spotted a depreciated asset on the upper floor of the Hlaalu Council Manor.
Still loving the mod!
Edit: The objects in question are books. Some, but not all of the ones on that floating shelf.
Lore wise hla oad is a very small and sleepy place, was wondering if nuking in EE the hla oad edits will make this mod work? or your quests tie in to the new hla oad? I also see a lot of changes that are bit too dramatic or extensive, making Balmora much more complex than even Vivec itself. A very interesting approach.
A Epic Balmora like mod would be great as well, with just cosmetic buildings, removing the quests/npcs/extra scripts and modified cells to hla oad and the couple ancestral tombs + the new dwemer tower you added, something more vanilla lore friendly perhaps? Just a suggestion :)
Was looking for a nice replacement to Epic Balmora Redux, yours seems to fit the bill if properly trimmed.
Cheers!
Edit: The mod is performance heavy, but actually gorgeous! ... Amazing for scenic shots, but it makes my lappy go into helicopter mode haha, so yeah, a lite version would be great but I know how modding is, I might start making the edits myself hehe. I see it clashes with Aru signs, as it seems they are integrated already here, also clashes with other mods I have , even some of my own (which I try to keep vanilla friendly as possible) , but thats normal for such a big endeavor as this mod is. Quite nice mod, should be an esm by itself rather than an esp due to how complex it is. Excellent work! :D
Edit 2: What I find incredible for this mod is the way you managed to set up the buildings alongside the mountains, super smooth and quite good looking, the corridors flow naturally. I will start nuking cell edits in Hla Oad and perhaps your npcs/quests and see if a lite mod is more workable, I have enough npcs already as background figures with MCA and Animated Morrowind, if I make this work I can perhaps pop them around the now cosmetic city with some tweaks. Lots of good stuff here!
Edit 3: It is doable yep, nuked several cells , npcs, items, scripts, dialogue, containers ... managed to nuke one or two that I should not as it destroyed access to the upper sections, but it is pretty much doable, and is much lighter to load. If you have the time, as you know which cells correspond to what, a lite redux version of your mod would be amazing, some of us just want to feel a bigger balmora without the added clutter of extra cells , npcs, quest and dialogue. I also saw you touched some tombs as well, though I really like the scope of the mod, it is a bit too big a change (and very heavy on some computers) . Again, I really love what you did here! You can see the work just by looking at all of the entries, npcs , scripts, items and the 120+ new cells/cell changes. It is a great work, but again, if you do just a dummy building balmora, for those of us that just like a small cosmetic enhancement I would love it.
Thank you for the mod, it shows how far you can stretch this wonderful game after such a long time still! :)
You're not the first to mention a lite version, I will have to work on that sometime in the future, I am quite busy with college right now!
The dwemer tower and corresponding quest can easily be deleted, making a more vanilla friendly version.
I was wondering if it might be possible to work a patch for Graht Morrowind Trees? I am very fond of it and I feel like a lot of others are as well. The problem, obviously, lies with the expansion of Hla Oad; one of the trees blocks a shack and dock.
So, my suggestion is making an optional "Light" version of the mod, where decorative NPCs (i.e. NPCs that dont take part in any quests) and a lot of small clutter on Balmora streets are removed. I believe that this would give a lot of additional fps and help people whose configuration is not perfect.
ABE will run at 60 fps with a low or no mod-list but the more you add the more frames it will eat away, especially at the river.
But I can definitely look into making a light version of the mod, I would probably have to remove a lot of NPC's and maybe even some buildings.
Also I don't know if you're using OpenMW but this will also help with the framerate
As for npcs - I think it depends on body/face/cloth retextures. If you have hi-res replacers like MacKom heads, Hi-res retextures of Better Clothes and so on, each npc becomes a performance factor. I tested this aspect personally by creating a large army of followers. With no mod-list it makes very few difference but with my current mod-list tricks like this cost a lot of fps.
Yes, I know that OpenMW is better in handling mods like ABE, but I am actively using MWSE, so OpenMW is not an option until it will have full integration of lua:(
Main Quest Overhaul is totally incompatible as it alters the world space around the hills behind Caius' house. TBH, I'd rather do without MQO as this mod is one of my favourites! Thanks for all your hard work. BTW, "Balnora guard" is spelled wrong in Turaelas Manor within this incompatible section mentioned! It's nothing really. Thought you might want to change it if you get round to making changes in the future!
I've been using both mods in my playthrough and I haven't had any issues after that.