Skyrim Special Edition

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opusGlass

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opusGlass

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About this mod

This mod remodels Karstaag, restoring him to his former glory in the Morrowind: Bloodmoon DLC.

No longer will the five-eyed king of the Rieklings, one of the strongest enemies in Skyrim, be an invisible copy of the generic frost giant!

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Permissions and credits
Translations
  • Italian
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"Arak. Ayrag ga. Garag."
-Karstaag, 4th era year 201


This mod remodels Karstaag, restoring him to his former glory in the Morrowind: Bloodmoon DLC.

He was once the five-eyed King of Rieklings, revered by the Skaal for his great power, but also respected and living alongside them peacefully. That changed when he was captured by Hircine to participate in his Hunt, dying at the hands of the Nerevarine. Now, more than 200 years later, he is resurrected by the Last Dragonborn, and turns out to be one of the greatest foes (and allies) he has ever encountered.

But wait. Now you're wondering where his fifth eye went. You held his skull 5 minutes ago, it clearly had five eye sockets. And what about that cone-head? And the skulls on his loincloth? Now that you think about it, this just looks like a regular Frost Giant with an invisibility effect.

That's because it is.
...well, it was! With this mod, Karstaag is once again the great and unique king that he should be.


Features:
  • A new model to restore Karstaag's TES3: Bloodmoon appearance
  • A new model for Karstaag's Skull
  • (Optional) Reduce the invisibility effect to make the new model more visible (thanks to fadingsignal for his help with this!)
  • (Optional) Remove the 3-time summon limit for Karstaag and replace it with a balanced once-per-week limit






Technical:

Install: Use a mod manager and choose your options, then enable the plugin if you installed one. 
If you're using the infinite summons option but you've already used the Summon Karstaag power before installing, see the FAQ for additional instructions.
(If you don't use a mod manager, copy the Meshes folder into your Data directory, and optionally copy the contents of one of the Plugin versions too.)

Requirements: Dragonborn (of course).

Uninstall is completely safe if you don't use a plugin. If you do use a plugin, it's still relatively safe -- you might get one orphaned script (ogkr_DelayNextKarstaagSummon) but it doesn't contain any loops or anything.

Compatiblity: Very compatible, though you might get minor conflicts if you have mods that edit Karstaag.




Design Decisions
Spoiler:  
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Despite the many visible differences, Karstaag is still supposed to be a Frost Giant, so I've modified the vanilla Frost Giant model for him. I tried to keep Skyrim's best features and combine them with the cool/notable features from Bloodmoon:
-A fifth eye
-An elongated head
-Curved horns
-Skulls on loincloth
-A stronger, stockier build
-Longer claws
-More "intelligent" looking eyes
-A lengthy moustache, though it's not very noticeable
-I cleaned up some loose fur polygons.

I think the other differences (such as not having stubby legs) are attributable to new improved graphics.

I was originally working on custom texture to make him look more unique, but during testing I noticed that the texture was almost completely hidden by magic effects (even after reducing the transparency effect). So I abandoned that front -- it isn't worth the effort, and plus it greatly reduces the file size.

I might also add a custom weapon for him in the future.




FAQs
Spoiler:  
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I summoned Karstaag before installing this mod, and now I have no Summon Karstaag power! This is because the vanilla game removes the spell from your character after using it 3 times. It will happen even if you only used the spell once before installing my mod. If you're using the infinite summons option, here is a simple fix to get that spell back:
(1) Open the console with the ~ key
(2) Type this: help "Summon Karstaag"
(3) Find the first line starting with "SPEL", it should be the 6th result listed. Check the hex code listed there. It will be xx024812, but those first two numbers vary based on your load order.
(4) Type this, replacing the xx with the appropriate numbers: player.addspell xx024812
All done!

Why is there a 7-day cooldown when I use the infinite summons option? Balance. Karstaag is perhaps the single strongest enemy in all of Skyrim, and without a doubt the strongest summon. Allowing you to summon him every day would make gameplay pointless. No enemy could ever pose a threat to you again.




Credits
Thanks to fadingsignal for helping me with the optional transparency reduction plugin!





Also available on Legendary Edition!