Overhauls the bandits in The Great Forest region, turning them into a real bandit gang.
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Author's instructions
You may not, whatsoever, make modifications to this mod and release it to public under your name. I will not give permission no matter what the case is. If this is found on any website besides the Nexus and the Alliance (unless its under my name), then I will have it removed and your account banned. This will be your only warning.
File credits
To Bethesda for this game, and to the Nexus Staff.
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Ahhh, bandits. The bread and butter enemy of a fantasy/medieval RPG. We have them in Morrowind as named NPCs, we have them in Skyrim as guys who legitimately get more difficult as you level, and we have them in Kingdom Come Deliverance as guys who can spank you at any time. However, one thing RPGs seem to always get wrong about bandits is them being unified under a single banner.
A Clue: That is, realistically, never the case.
So here we are.
For the first installment of the Bandit Gangs series, I decided to overhaul the bandits in The Great Forest region. Turning them into The Great Forest Bandits.
The Great Forest Bandits are a rowdy bunch. A rough gang full of woodsmen, ruffians, poachers, down-on-their-luck magicians, and impoverished mercenaries, all uniting under their own banner and twisted code of ethics. Equipped with hoods and battle axes - or in the magician's case, a war axe and their minds - these boys and girls are nothing if not formidable in the face of lawful adversity, and it is no wonder they all flock to The Great Forest... Plenty of places to hide out there, and lots of ways to ambush unsuspecting prey before vanishing into the growth... Rumor even has it that they've gotten so large and so formidable, they've been making moves on the territory of the Imperial Reserve Bandits... - Your Lore for the Great Forest Bandits
And in case you didn't understand that bit of fanon, the Great Forest Bandits are armed with axes, hoods, and light armor to get around quickly in the Forest. To add insult to injury, they also employ magicians to hurl magic at their prey whilst they run up and chop them to bits. The Bandit Gang's territory extends from Pell's Gate to Bleaker's Way and everything in between, including parts of the Imperial Isles and, of course, the entirety of the Great Forest between Chorrol and the Imperial City.
Dotting the landscape, old generic bandit dungeons have been repurposed as Great Forest Bandit strongholds, with a ringleader commanding each one. A bandit-hunter would do well to locate these strongholds, as at the end - guarded by the Ringleader - are two loot chests with the spoils of banditry inside. Unlike the regular base game, these chests are actually worth looting.
You can also encounter highwaymen, dished out by the larger bandit gang to waylay wayfarers. You can also find small groups of bandits on the roads, ambushing and killing unsuspecting travelers where possible.
It goes without saying as well that these bandits will be hostile to both the generic bandit faction (I made sure to remove any and all references of generic bandit enemies in the Great Forest region, however), and the Marauder faction, which I left alone. The Great Forest Bandits are also hostile to any bandit gang added by any other mod, including future installments of Bandit Gangs
Warning: This mod was tested on NORMAL DIFFICULTY at level 9, and these bandits are nothing to joke about. They are leagues tougher than the generic bandit enemies and should be considered literal threats to your player character and NPCs.
Travelers of Cyrodiil introduce more traveling Imperial Legion Soldiers who will be more than enough to effectively combat the bandit threat, but the latter mod will also make the traveling NPCs in the base game Essential so they do not die. It's your choice to install these, however, and they are in no way essential for the mod to work right.
