Pirates of Skyrim is featured on Bethesda's Blog. Read the interview here: Pirates of Skyrim - Interview with Mod Author BigBizkit (me) Pirates of Skyrim is featured on GEMS: Gameplay Enhancement Mods for Skyrim Pirates of Skyrim is endorsed by famous mod author Elianora as one of the best mods in the history of ever.
Thank You to Donors!
It wasn't allowed before but now it is so I would like to thank all the insanely kind people who actually deemed me worthy of donating money to me for my work!
List of Donors (chronological order):
Nolan Sean Jacob Ken TD Daniel Jacob (same as above so double thank you!) Brian Alexander GSK Enterprises Robert Jean-Luc Brian
FAQ for blind people
There is a more comprehensive FAQ in the description but here are a few questions people ask nonetheless.
Q: How do I get a crew / I can't make my follower join the crew why?
A: In order for NPCs to join the crew, they need to be followers and ON/IN the ship AND/OR have a crew journal in their inventory. This means giving them a crew journal (inventory / console / reverse pickpocket) is the fix if some follower mod screws up the dialogue. You can theoretically make ANY NPC a crew member by giving them a crew journal. That is not advised for important NPCs like Ulfric etc. YOU WILL ALSO NEED TO PURCHASE THE CREW'S QUARTERS UPGRADE.
Q: I can't sail to Raven Rock, why?
A: In order to be able to sail to Raven Rock (Solstheim) you need to a) Have been there before and initiated the whole Dragonborn quest thing b) Talk to the Captain who brought you there and convince him to give you the route c) If the dialogue with the captain won't show up type "set 0ShipEnableDragonborn to 1" in the console d) You can now sail to Raven Rock via the wheel/outside map
This does actually not work in the Non-general Stores version.
Asking a last time to the OP, will you give me permission to port and clean the file? PMs have been ignored, and I am trying to be cool, but people are asking. I see someone stepped up and did a port. I have not looked at it yet, but it might be absolutely fine. That said, when I ported, I found that many things had to be changed, cleaned, and dug into a little as conflicts were happening. I would love to spend a few days doing this port justice so an official nod would be appreciated.
Edit: Well nevermind, I see you had that mod pulled.
Rights to port:
You must have permission from the rights holder.
You must adhere to the terms set by the rights holder.
You must credit the rights holder and any other parties involved.
You must own a legal copy of the game(s) the assets are ported to and from.
Your usage of the assets may not be for commercial purposes.
Your usage of the assets may not reflect negatively on the rights holder.
Your usage of the assets may not result in infringing, threatening, libelous, obscene, or otherwise unlawful or tortious material (as determined by the rights holder).
Your usage of the assets may not be presented as being endorsed or supported by the rights holder unless otherwise specified by the rights holder.
Your usage of the assets may not challenge the copyright of the rights holder.
The bottom line is are the right copyrighted and protected by rights? As a staff member that also brings up conflict of interest. For years people have asked to port this. I personally have been ignored while trying to be amicable. I do not seek money for this but to share it as it is a really incredible mod.
You could use it in part - less than 20%, I believe, and be within the copyright laws. With only that small amount, it's essentially a new piece of copyrighted work.
Or the mod author could give his consent to me to port it considering everyone asking. I have pm'd him many times without him even reading it. So far any ports are being pulled because of him I assume. He made this amazing mod, but he also involved other people and their assets. At this point let someone that knows how to port the mod over.
I will do it, just give the official nod BigBizkit to carry the torch. You have not looked at even one pm I sent to you despite you recently posting saying that you check all the time. For years I have asked as people hit my inbox asking to do it. So bs aside, can I have your permission officially here to do this?
So the mod author appeared out of nowhere to complain that someone uploaded without permission but cant bring himself to port it... wow... great guy...
Especially considering that porting mods is not that complicated. I ported Blood of the Nords by myself in 15 minutes. So I don't understand why author hasent ported yet for so many years... But complains that someone else has done it.
No kidding. I reached out multiple times to BigBizkit and was ignored. I had people asking me repeatedly to port the mod but I did not out of respect. I left a very detailed guide in the forums here so people could do it themselves. So I get another request, decide to come and ask again and surprise, here is the mod author replying to what? Complaining that someone else did it.
@BigBizkit if you regularly check your pms then you most assuredly regularly ignored my polite pms. Thanks.
If only you were as fast to port this as you were to shut down those who did.
Did the original author object to an SSE port? They gave explicit permission for this mod to fork, did they indicate a clause that it ceased to extend to future updates? It is amusing to me that originally you were given permission to do what others could/would not and yet you will not extend that same courtesy.
The spirit of modding is not to horde our IP but to share both our creations an our excitement of having made something really cool, to let anything violate that is an unfortunate and discouraging shift in this community.
Firstly, biggie I apologize for harassing you about releasing SE, I am also grateful for the opportunity to try and make up for it by trying to get others to stop pestering you as I did.
Here is a few excerpts from a message BigBiz sent me: "I understand it might be frustrating for you, but please consider my perspective. I need to clarify that I have permission from all the authors whose work i am using in my mod before I can release a port. Being employed by Nexus Mods means I need to make doubly sure that everything is in order. That being said, I am planning to release my port in January, provided I hear back from some of the other authors."
please note this is not a direct quote, it is heavily edited for privacy and respect to bigbiz. But it gets the message across.
In short: He has a port with fixes/updates but is reliant upon permission from other mod authors before he can release it.
So there are loopholes he could use... He could simply optimize the textures and leave em as an optional download here on the LE page... it's that simple and it would alleviate ALL of his permissions issues since he only has permission to release his mod for LE... But I can't keep advocating for this, the nexus mods start salivating everytime I type something and biggie probably is about to ban me for all my posts about this /s SO CAN WE PLEASE STOP THIS THREAD it's getting old.
I've been doing a ton of modding lately, I'm an author. I've had the pleasure of using and working with most ALL of the assets used in the making of this mod. With the exception of the "scarlet" (the ship you use) everything Biggie used was open perms pretty much. If he swapped out the ship (it's just a retextured Katariah model btw) He'd have ZERO permissions issues to my awareness.
But as for myself, I'm making my own (LORE FRIENDLY) Pirate mod complete with 7 different factions. Here's a quick little teaser Picture and some details I wrote up literally because of everyone on this thread's wanting of a new Pirate mod. If anyone has any ideas thoughts or comments about what you would like to see/do in the pirate mod that I am developing, I'd LOVE to hear from you!!!!!
A note to BigBiz - My dude, we love your work! Bring me on as co-author with you and I can help get this moved over to SE I'll help with perms or replacing assets that we can't get perms for. If you take a look at my Paint it Blackreach mod you'll see I'm decently capable of creating some insane eye candy. We can combine our forces and make your masterpiece even better or I can keep developing my own Version without your support. Either way, I do appreciate the hard work and creativity you put into your Pirates mod. It's the best mod I've ever played, ever. It's why I and many other's don't want this mod to die away. It's also the mod that made you famous enough to get a job with nexus. I'm sure you, like I myself would, want to show the community your gratitude for them getting you your current job by releasing this on SE, you've voiced as much to me in that one message you sent me over 2 years ago when you said it was a few months away from release... Anyways amigo, I get it if you are too busy I do, which is why I want to help you steer this mod over to SE.
WITHOUT FURTHER ADO here is the link to the Teaser Picture of one of the stormcloak ships I'm designing for MY pirate mod.
honestly dont believe hes the real MA none of the 51 files are anything like this mod at this point im going to try to learn how to port and if i can figure it out ill publish under the pretense that the MA can ask me to take it down if they pm me under the account the original was published under
What are the rules on this sort of thing because I have been porting over mods for myself both from Steam Workshop and here and this was one of them. I want to share it but I also want to follow the rules on this and honor the original mod author for their hardwork.
That being said life happens and Nexus really needs to allow mods to be redone or used if the mod author has not been active with the mod in a long period of time or even logged in. If someone knows of the rules for this I will happily start porting over mods and share them.
For this one anyone can do it but be very careful as a misstep in the process will absolutely result in at best messed up textures namely on The Cardinal as the mod author here tweaked them for this mod.
Instructions NOTE: I AM NOT GIVING THIS METHOD OUT SO YOU CAN PROFIT OFF ANOTHER PERSONS HARD WORK, IT IS MEANT ONLY FOR YOUR PERSONAL USE. 1. Make a folder to work within to make the process easier, I can make a video on this if anyone ask (meaning the entire port procedure as well as Steam Workshop) 2. Unpack the file from a manual download here into the folder 3. Use BSA Browser to extract all folders from the .bsa file into the folder 4. Delete the .bsa (you should have the folders from the .bsa now as well as the .esp in type 43 format) 5. Download the patches and overwrite any folders needed (like the patch that has only a scripts folder), there are .esp files below to replace the original if you want to use them for the Optional components. 6. Use Nif Optimizer (found here on Nexus) and target the folder you made, run it with stock options selected. You can scan it first, often you will find missing mipmaps but you need to still hit optimize. Do not skip this step or you invite issues with meshes and/or texturess. 7. Configure Cathedral Asset Optimizer (here on nexus) and you guessed it, target that folder. Here are the settings I use going along the tabs midway down when you run the app (I am not saying I am right on the money here but I have done dozens of conversion now without a single issue):
BSA: Create BSA , Delete Backups, Delete Source Files, Allow Compression Meshes: Necessary optimization, Resave Meshes Textures: Necessary optimization, Compress Textures, Generate mipmaps Animations: Necessary optimization 8. Run Cathedral Asset Optimizer and it will spit out a new .bsa file (usually the name is off, I suggest renaming just the title field to say PiratesofSkyrim or the like and rename the .esp file to match which are about to do) 9. Copy the .esp from Step#2 into your Skyrim SSE data folder. You are doing this so the Creation Kit can see the file, make sure you download the Creation kit if you do not have it of course. It is free and is listed as 'Software' in your personal Library and an easy way to see it is to type just SK into the search field and it should pop up. 10. Open you main install folder and find the CreationKit.ini, open it with Notepad++ (just an app you should have anyways and makes things a LOT easier) and look under the first section [General] for bAllowMultipleMasterLoads=1 . If it is not there place it there, if it is 0 change it to 1 and save. You need to do this because Bethesda in their 'it just works' mentality decided you should only be able to load a single master for a file, and this one requires at least 2 if I remember correctly. Some files will require all the base masters (i.e. Skyrim.esm, Update.esm, Dawnguard.esm, Hearthfire.esm, and Dragonborn.esm) 11. Open the CreationKit from your Steam launcher or within the base install folder of your SSE installation, take something for a headache and a shot of something to dull the tedium, and click 'Open'. Scroll down till you find the .esp you put in the folder (it is usually at the end). Double click to tick it and then select the option to set it to active (you will see it change status to active). Make note of the Masters it needs ( right panel when the file is still selected in that same dialogue box) and scroll back up to the top of the list and double click the ones that were listed in the right panel when you had the .esp selected. Click ok. 12. Take another shot because CK likes to complain at you if not set right. Just keep hitting Yes to all as you question the meaning of life and wonder at why it takes a million years to load everything when Oldrim took 1-2 seconds. 13. Once you see the final list of a million 'errors' you are good and should see the name of the .esp listed up top on the top border of CK inself, close the error window, then find something in the file tree that is associated with the file (i.e. say the mod is Immersive Weapons you would search for entries it changes or adds) then double click the entry to open it and then click 'Ok' right away again (this tricks the CK into thinking you changed a value) but make sure you see a '*' appear by the name of the .esp because if not you will not be saving it to SSE type 44, once you get that asterisk you are good and then simply click save. Wait until you see the bottom border of the CK say the file is saved and thank Tod for the extra error list thrown at you shortly thereafter. You now have changed that .esp from type 43 (Skyim LE or 'Oldrim' to type 44 or the new version of Skyrim). 14. Go back into your data folder and cut/copy/move that .esp and go to where you abandoned that .bsa from earlier. Explain to Bethesda .bsa protection services that you were only visiting and utter the pass phrase 'it just works'. Reunite the two and rejoice, you are nearly done. 15. Select the .bsa and .esp (I keep the names the same for them both, if not change them to) and archive it back up with WinRar or the like, I also name the archive the same to keep everything in a proper OCD format. 16. You now have an archive updated, optimized, and ready for installation with a mod manager of your choice ready for SSE.
Have a cold one, you deserve it and throw the bottle at a picture of Tod Howard for making so many idiotic changes to the game and for monetizing mods like a real winner. Pray to the gaming gods that he does not screw Starfield up, drink some coffee for me because I am half asleep as I type this.
Tired and just had surgery but I will throw one together, it will be a longer one as I just make videos to help people. Once I am done I will update the post. Quick note, I did test this mod a bit but it is a rather complex mod and sometimes things get a bit mucked up when you convert over to SE. There is a lot you can do to mitigate that risk as much as you can but sometimes parts of the mod will simply bug out, not work, or worse off maybe cause issues.
That being said it is somewhat not too bad and you can apply the method to anything that is an LE mod to SE.
just as an FYI for anyone trying to get a special edition version of this mod, it works okay in special edition if you EXTRACT THE BSA FILES and delete them afterwards
the new way ba2 files are packed makes SE unable to access these older BSA files and when it tries it prevents skyrim form starting up entirely!
there are some texture issues but overall its playable until a new release of the mod comes out
Give Feedback
2370 comments
Pirates of Skyrim is featured on Bethesda's Blog. Read the interview here: Pirates of Skyrim - Interview with Mod Author BigBizkit (me)
Pirates of Skyrim is featured on GEMS: Gameplay Enhancement Mods for Skyrim
Pirates of Skyrim is endorsed by famous mod author Elianora as one of the best mods in the history of ever.
Thank You to Donors!
It wasn't allowed before but now it is so I would like to thank all the insanely kind people who actually deemed me worthy of donating money to me for my work!
List of Donors (chronological order):
Nolan
Sean
Jacob
Ken
TD
Daniel
Jacob (same as above so double thank you!)
Brian
Alexander
GSK Enterprises
Robert
Jean-Luc
Brian
FAQ for blind people
There is a more comprehensive FAQ in the description but here are a few questions people ask nonetheless.
Q: How do I get a crew / I can't make my follower join the crew why?
A: In order for NPCs to join the crew, they need to be followers and ON/IN the ship AND/OR have a crew journal in their inventory. This means giving them a crew journal (inventory / console / reverse pickpocket) is the fix if some follower mod screws up the dialogue. You can theoretically make ANY NPC a crew member by giving them a crew journal. That is not advised for important NPCs like Ulfric etc. YOU WILL ALSO NEED TO PURCHASE THE CREW'S QUARTERS UPGRADE.
Q: I can't sail to Raven Rock, why?
A: In order to be able to sail to Raven Rock (Solstheim) you need to
a) Have been there before and initiated the whole Dragonborn quest thing
b) Talk to the Captain who brought you there and convince him to give you the route
c) If the dialogue with the captain won't show up type "set 0ShipEnableDragonborn to 1" in the console
d) You can now sail to Raven Rock via the wheel/outside map
This does actually not work in the Non-general Stores version.
Edit: Well nevermind, I see you had that mod pulled.
Rights to port:
The bottom line is are the right copyrighted and protected by rights? As a staff member that also brings up conflict of interest. For years people have asked to port this. I personally have been ignored while trying to be amicable. I do not seek money for this but to share it as it is a really incredible mod.
I will do it, just give the official nod BigBizkit to carry the torch. You have not looked at even one pm I sent to you despite you recently posting saying that you check all the time. For years I have asked as people hit my inbox asking to do it. So bs aside, can I have your permission officially here to do this?
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/53405
The only person I gave permission to incorporate my mod in something they're working on is theblackpixel.
I ported Blood of the Nords by myself in 15 minutes.
So I don't understand why author hasent ported yet for so many years...
But complains that someone else has done it.
@BigBizkit if you regularly check your pms then you most assuredly regularly ignored my polite pms. Thanks.
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/105542
Did the original author object to an SSE port? They gave explicit permission for this mod to fork, did they indicate a clause that it ceased to extend to future updates? It is amusing to me that originally you were given permission to do what others could/would not and yet you will not extend that same courtesy.
The spirit of modding is not to horde our IP but to share both our creations an our excitement of having made something really cool, to let anything violate that is an unfortunate and discouraging shift in this community.
Firstly, biggie I apologize for harassing you about releasing SE, I am also grateful for the opportunity to try and make up for it by trying to get others to stop pestering you as I did.
Here is a few excerpts from a message BigBiz sent me:
"I understand it might be frustrating for you, but please consider my perspective.
I need to clarify that I have permission from all the authors whose work i am using in my mod before I can release a port. Being employed by Nexus Mods means I need to make doubly sure that everything is in order.
That being said, I am planning to release my port in January, provided I hear back from some of the other authors."
please note this is not a direct quote, it is heavily edited for privacy and respect to bigbiz. But it gets the message across.
In short: He has a port with fixes/updates but is reliant upon permission from other mod authors before he can release it.
SO CAN WE PLEASE STOP THIS THREAD it's getting old.
But as for myself, I'm making my own (LORE FRIENDLY) Pirate mod complete with 7 different factions.
Here's a quick little teaser Picture and some details I wrote up literally because of everyone on this thread's wanting of a new Pirate mod.
If anyone has any ideas thoughts or comments about what you would like to see/do in the pirate mod that I am developing, I'd LOVE to hear from you!!!!!
A note to BigBiz - My dude, we love your work! Bring me on as co-author with you and I can help get this moved over to SE I'll help with perms or replacing assets that we can't get perms for. If you take a look at my Paint it Blackreach mod you'll see I'm decently capable of creating some insane eye candy. We can combine our forces and make your masterpiece even better or I can keep developing my own Version without your support. Either way, I do appreciate the hard work and creativity you put into your Pirates mod. It's the best mod I've ever played, ever. It's why I and many other's don't want this mod to die away. It's also the mod that made you famous enough to get a job with nexus. I'm sure you, like I myself would, want to show the community your gratitude for them getting you your current job by releasing this on SE, you've voiced as much to me in that one message you sent me over 2 years ago when you said it was a few months away from release... Anyways amigo, I get it if you are too busy I do, which is why I want to help you steer this mod over to SE.
WITHOUT FURTHER ADO here is the link to the Teaser Picture of one of the stormcloak ships I'm designing for MY pirate mod.
That being said life happens and Nexus really needs to allow mods to be redone or used if the mod author has not been active with the mod in a long period of time or even logged in. If someone knows of the rules for this I will happily start porting over mods and share them.
For this one anyone can do it but be very careful as a misstep in the process will absolutely result in at best messed up textures namely on The Cardinal as the mod author here tweaked them for this mod.
Instructions
NOTE: I AM NOT GIVING THIS METHOD OUT SO YOU CAN PROFIT OFF ANOTHER PERSONS HARD WORK, IT IS MEANT ONLY FOR YOUR PERSONAL USE.
1. Make a folder to work within to make the process easier, I can make a video on this if anyone ask (meaning the entire port procedure as well as Steam Workshop)
2. Unpack the file from a manual download here into the folder
3. Use BSA Browser to extract all folders from the .bsa file into the folder
4. Delete the .bsa (you should have the folders from the .bsa now as well as the .esp in type 43 format)
5. Download the patches and overwrite any folders needed (like the patch that has only a scripts folder), there are .esp files below to replace the original if you want to use them for the Optional components.
6. Use Nif Optimizer (found here on Nexus) and target the folder you made, run it with stock options selected. You can scan it first, often you will find missing mipmaps but you need to still hit optimize. Do not skip this step or you invite issues with meshes and/or texturess.
7. Configure Cathedral Asset Optimizer (here on nexus) and you guessed it, target that folder. Here are the settings I use going along the tabs midway down when you run the app (I am not saying I am right on the money here but I have done dozens of conversion now without a single issue):
BSA: Create BSA , Delete Backups, Delete Source Files, Allow Compression
Meshes: Necessary optimization, Resave Meshes
Textures: Necessary optimization, Compress Textures, Generate mipmaps
Animations: Necessary optimization
8. Run Cathedral Asset Optimizer and it will spit out a new .bsa file (usually the name is off, I suggest renaming just the title field to say PiratesofSkyrim or the like and rename the .esp file to match which are about to do)
9. Copy the .esp from Step#2 into your Skyrim SSE data folder. You are doing this so the Creation Kit can see the file, make sure you download the Creation kit if you do not have it of course. It is free and is listed as 'Software' in your personal Library and an easy way to see it is to type just SK into the search field and it should pop up.
10. Open you main install folder and find the CreationKit.ini, open it with Notepad++ (just an app you should have anyways and makes things a LOT easier) and look under the first section [General] for bAllowMultipleMasterLoads=1 . If it is not there place it there, if it is 0 change it to 1 and save. You need to do this because Bethesda in their 'it just works' mentality decided you should only be able to load a single master for a file, and this one requires at least 2 if I remember correctly. Some files will require all the base masters (i.e. Skyrim.esm, Update.esm, Dawnguard.esm, Hearthfire.esm, and Dragonborn.esm)
11. Open the CreationKit from your Steam launcher or within the base install folder of your SSE installation, take something for a headache and a shot of something to dull the tedium, and click 'Open'. Scroll down till you find the .esp you put in the folder (it is usually at the end). Double click to tick it and then select the option to set it to active (you will see it change status to active). Make note of the Masters it needs ( right panel when the file is still selected in that same dialogue box) and scroll back up to the top of the list and double click the ones that were listed in the right panel when you had the .esp selected. Click ok.
12. Take another shot because CK likes to complain at you if not set right. Just keep hitting Yes to all as you question the meaning of life and wonder at why it takes a million years to load everything when Oldrim took 1-2 seconds.
13. Once you see the final list of a million 'errors' you are good and should see the name of the .esp listed up top on the top border of CK inself, close the error window, then find something in the file tree that is associated with the file (i.e. say the mod is Immersive Weapons you would search for entries it changes or adds) then double click the entry to open it and then click 'Ok' right away again (this tricks the CK into thinking you changed a value) but make sure you see a '*' appear by the name of the .esp because if not you will not be saving it to SSE type 44, once you get that asterisk you are good and then simply click save. Wait until you see the bottom border of the CK say the file is saved and thank Tod for the extra error list thrown at you shortly thereafter. You now have changed that .esp from type 43 (Skyim LE or 'Oldrim' to type 44 or the new version of Skyrim).
14. Go back into your data folder and cut/copy/move that .esp and go to where you abandoned that .bsa from earlier. Explain to Bethesda .bsa protection services that you were only visiting and utter the pass phrase 'it just works'. Reunite the two and rejoice, you are nearly done.
15. Select the .bsa and .esp (I keep the names the same for them both, if not change them to) and archive it back up with WinRar or the like, I also name the archive the same to keep everything in a proper OCD format.
16. You now have an archive updated, optimized, and ready for installation with a mod manager of your choice ready for SSE.
Have a cold one, you deserve it and throw the bottle at a picture of Tod Howard for making so many idiotic changes to the game and for monetizing mods like a real winner. Pray to the gaming gods that he does not screw Starfield up, drink some coffee for me because I am half asleep as I type this.
Happy gaming!
That being said it is somewhat not too bad and you can apply the method to anything that is an LE mod to SE.
the new way ba2 files are packed makes SE unable to access these older BSA files and when it tries it prevents skyrim form starting up entirely!
there are some texture issues but overall its playable until a new release of the mod comes out
Anybody else? What should I do about this? Is Project Flintlock just incompatible altogether or is there something I can do here?