Being a total horse freak, I was delighted when Oblivion had horses in it, but then was disappointed when some of them were a bit on the purple side! After a steep, and often frustrating learning curve, and getting my head around a different way of working, I made a start on dealing with the purple issue. At first it was just going to be a simple replacer, just simply replacing textures without needing an esp. This would have been a lot of effort and faff unpacking bsa's or editing invalidation txts, so I decided to go down the esp road instead. Cue more frustrations and a temporary shelving of the project (again) until I could figure it out. Doing it this way means I can provide lots of different options. Firstly, I've made the player-owned horses unique, with their own markings and colours. Where the same type of horse is sold in different places, where you purchase the horse from will have a bearing on its colour.

For example: Bruma and Leyawiin both sell paint horses. With this mod, Leywiin's horses are brown and white, from Bruma they are black and white. This only happens for the player.

I've also removed the saddles from the pastured horses, since a horse doesn't wear a saddle 24/7. They are only saddled up for the player and other riders. Unicorn and Shadowmere are unique. Player-owned horses are now marked essential (god mode!) since I hate losing them to the local wildlife!

All saddled horses now also have reins. How Bethesda left out such an important horse steering device, I don't know!

Included are meshes for stallion, mare and gelding for each horse type, so the esp can be tweaked however the player wishes. Please read the readme for instructions on this and changing the horse's name in-game.

This was my first Oblivion mod, started almost before I had the game out of the box. I've learned a lot since then and this has been through several revisions, and may well go through many more, especially now I'm making meshes as well. I have plans for extra horse resource packs with new models and textures. I may also have a go at making foals for wild herds.

Extra Horse Pack 1: Appaloosas
These are various spot patterns as seen in the Appaloosa horse breeds. There are also the very rare brindle pattern included.

Extra Horse Pack 2: Zorses
These are primarily a resource for modders to make use of in their own mods. Due to modding burn-out, I never fully finished them, but I've gathered all my new stuff together and packed it up. It would just be such a shame to forget these meshes and textures and let them gather dust, especially as there are hours and hours of work in them.

Extra Horse Pack 3: Nightmare
This pack turns Shadowmere into a nightmare with flaming mane and tail.

Zorse: A cross between a zebra and horse - various coat patterns are apparent, all with some striping. I did quite a bit of research on these before starting this project. Clydesdale: heavy work-horse, usually solid colours and white, plus roan colours (coloured hair mixed with white hair), also with large areas of white.

All the horses are standing in the test area, Hawkhaven. If you want to take one into the game, ride it then fast travel out and it should go with you. I've done it like this for speed as I want to finish up quickly, and it's mainly to showcase the horses.

Included is an extra alpha'd saddlecloth on the heavy horses. This works well with the saddle I fitted to my Summonable Epona. The heavies have a slightly altered UV map, mostly between the legs.

Please do not upload this file anywhere else.