I am extremely proud to say that update 3.0 is now released! This took months of hard work, and although it took longer than planned, I hope you all enjoy it :)
If you're updating from an old version, you will need a new savegame (character). However, if playing for the first time, you can install the mod mid-playthrough.
The mod includes some massive changes, such as a huge overhaul to Lastendell including 5 new quests (such as travelling across multiple realms of Oblivion!) and a newly voiced merchant. It also includes a total revamp of Freywyn Hall (the playable home) into a customisable Hearthfire style house with which no longer requires a side quest to purchase. For a full changelog, please see below:
Spoiler:
Show
Added in 5 new unique side quests to Lastendell which are:
"Closing the Rifts" - A huge quest involving finding 5 portals to Oblivion across Lastendell, entering them into unique realms and completing interesting tasks to close them
"Of Trade and Strife" - Hunt down a Scamp and journey into Oblivion to retrieve a Sigil Stone
"Black Book: Aperture of Nihility" - a black book dungeon with its own unique rewards
"A Stray Wisp" - rescue a wisp trapped in Lastendell and send it home
"Protective Measures" - stop a Daedric ritual threatening Lastendell
Expanded the locations of Lastendell to have more variation including interiors
Added a new mysterious merchant to Lastendell (who I hope you'll love) with his own quest "Of Trade and Strife" and unique new dagger reward
Revamped Freywyn Hall into a Hearthfire-style house with customisable wings and over 250 buildable objects that is no longer locked behind a quest
Added a new spell, “Conjure Dremora Warlock”, which can be purchased from The Tradesman in Lastendell or found hidden in the new realms
Reworked the "Spectral Hunt" quest to involve a more interesting boss fight taking place in a unique realm
Expanded multiple interiors to make them more interesting and unique
Added new model to the Bow of Florin (credits to InsanitySorrow)
Given the assassin from "A dangerous scheme" a new weapon (credits to InsanitySorrow) and armour set (credits to WasBunny)
Improved and expanded lore by rewriting most of the books and a few load screens
Revamped Aryrru exterior
Fixed Aryrru seams
Added more dust and cobwebs to the Ayleid ruins
Added a kinetic resonator puzzle to waterstone cave (solution top L, bottom R, top R, top L)
Added new texture to mudcrabs (credits to Bellyache)
Fixed stuttering and lag (I hope!) due to a faulty esm conversion (I'll still provide esp version) and too much kelp underwater
Added an extra house in Florin (to help with improved performance),
Improved Scholars trial final puzzle (solution silver cup, human skull, firewood, chicken egg)
Moved Elysia's misc quest to the north island to encourage travel there
Reduced volume of courier lines
Tyrek should now return to Midwood Isle when dismissed from another worldspace
The champions should no longer be hit during the trial
Champions trial difficulty modified
Fixed Telani's crown and Valdil's helmet invisibility
Fixed DLC arrows not working in archery tourney
Altered worms in the trees objective markers to be clearer
Now returns a dragon soul if you have already unlocked the word of Steal Soul Essence before being taught it
Nesianna now gets the ruined house after "A dangerous scheme"
Adjusted Lastendell atronach health and damage
Improved sand LOD to be brighter,
Added failsafe to "A business arrangement" to make sure it progresses
Nedhel now gains some stuff over time after completing "A drunken beggar"
Added a few rocks to base of the Nordic towers and lighthouse
fixed VR bug of Lastendell NPCs spawning in random cities (credits to benjapo for spotting this and uploading a fix)
Sadly had to remove aurora from Lastendell sky due to a bug with the soul cairn and apocrypha sky bleeding back into lastendell :(
Huge thanks to CBVoiceover for providing the voice for the merchant, and all the other modders for providing the assets I used (please see the credits section on the main page for a full list).
I'll be uploading to Bethesda net in the next couple of days. I'll also take a look at the patches and make sure they all work properly, as well as come up with a few more.
At the moment I am feeling incredibly burnt out, and think this will be the last update to Midwood Isle. The mod is packed with content and things to do, and I'm really proud of how it turned out. Thank you all for reading, and I hope you enjoy the update!
I enjoyed my surprisingly considerable time with this mod, but it's held back by a lack of creativity. Its ideas are very basic and often derivative of beats from the base game. The main quest centers around a powerful figure who suddenly returns to the realm that can only be defeated by acquiring knowledge of a time-lost dragon shout. The only real difference is that the path through this main quest is significantly less dense and less exciting than Skyrim's. There are no twists, no shocking revelations, no dramatic events. It all plays out in a straightforward manner; go from here to there until the story is over.
Side quests don't fare much better, most of which boil down to standard MMO busywork with little dressing. A local drunk is wasting his life away? Cut him off, beat him up, and then invent non-alcoholic beer. Problem solved. How about a series of tedious fetch quests that lampshades tedious fetch quests that ends...being exactly that? There's no clever twist or biting commentary. It's just a surface-level quest chain that makes fun of itself without saying or doing anything, as if self-awareness is all you need for something bad to be good. Something has been killing innocents at night and leaving behind patches of fur? I wonder what it could be. Go wait here until a werewolf inevitably spawns and kill it. Quest complete. Again, I can't help but draw comparisons to the base game. In that werewolf quest, despite its brevity there are at least some deeper concepts to consider. A man has been transformed against his will into a vicious beast that he can't control, and something terrible happens. You see the effect on the townspeople. You watch them mourn. You hear his plight. You can choose to help him, and then can later choose to kill him. There's none of that here. The quest seems to start with a mystery, but the dialogue makes it so immediately obvious that it's a werewolf that there's nothing to think about. You just go through the motions until you're finally tasked to kill it, and then it's over.
Another quest tasks you with tracking down a stolen breastplate. Turns out it was sold under normal circumstances. When you return to the quest-giver, you're told he was desperate for money, and he requests you get it by any means necessary. But then your reward for the quest is not only the exact amount you just spent on it, meaning he could have bought it back himself at any time, but multiple gemstones as well! So rather than simply buy his armor back, he'd prefer to invent a story about it being stolen so that he could eventually pay twice as much to someone else? I don't get it.
This lack of depth extends to the gameplay as well. The number of dungeons is low, and all of them are extremely linear with no interesting challenges or puzzles to solve, save for a single outlier in Lastendell that at least required me to use my brain for a couple seconds. This problem culminates most severely in the mod's finale boss encounters. The showdown with the main villain does not occur after a grueling battle through his epic fortress, but in the dirt courtyard of the ruins of a small rampart wall casually hanging out on the island you've been on the whole time. There are multiple quests involving legendary outlaw warlords resurfacing, powerful enough to carry out nearly-successful assassination attempts on kings and overwhelming settlements, built up as civilization-ending threats, which are eventually resolved by having you walk into their little cluster of camping tents hanging out in the open and killing everyone like it's business as usual. Everything is just kind of "there." This is especially bad for stealth characters like mine, where I like to pick enemies off one by one, since everyone is sleeping side-by-side (I also experienced an issue where killing anyone would automatically alert everyone even if the kill was totally silent [verified with a weapon I made myself which is explicitly silent]) this means the encounter boils down to playing Whack-A-Mole down a line.
Now that I've complained, let me talk about what I liked. This may be controversial, but the foremost thing I appreciated was the almost entirely flat terrain. Traversal in Skyrim is often very annoying because you're just trying to get where you want to go, and you're constantly blocked by mountains and forced on winding paths around jagged rock formations, cliffs, and rivers. Here, anywhere I want to go is on a straightforward path through a pleasant forest or a serene beach. Having a coast around the perimeter of the island was just icing on the cake, as I'm a huge fan of ocean settings. Add to this the sort of alter-ego of Lastendell along with the Ayleid ruins and pockets of Oblivion and there's some pretty decent environmental variety. I only wish that the design of the underwater Ayleid ruin (Aryrru, if I recall correctly) had taken advantage of its setting. I was really hoping it would be waterlogged and sinking.
Despite the weakness of the story, I did find Tyrek reasonably endearing and I was glad to have him around. However, it's a shame there isn't a real role-play opportunity when you're getting drunk with him. I also experienced a bug where he would walk away and effectively leave my service if I entered sneak while he was following me. I was able to trace the issue back to UFO, and disabling it fixed the problem, but I've never had this problem before so I imagine the core issue is with him.
I also rather liked how the Kings Trial in Lastendell was handled. As soon as I saw the premise, I thought "Oh no, this mod author is going to treat moral dilemmas as if there is only one objectively righteous solution." After answering as honestly as I could and preparing myself for the worst, I was delighted that this not only didn't happen, but there wasn't even so much as a snide comment from an NPC. Granted, I didn't try any additional combinations of choices, but if my initial impression is correct across the board, I must commend you for handling this situation maturely and with a level head. That said, a minor complaint I have with this section is that it's a little awkward that they all take place in basements. It's weird to be talking to the ghosts of ancient kings who proclaim that in order to face the great evil that approaches, I must first pass a trial in their basement that I access via a little hatch door in the middle of the room.
Overall, it seems to me this mod aims for the "wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle" approach, which I'm simply not a fan of. While there is technically quite a large amount of unique rewards to find, they're greatly overshadowed by the dozens of times you go through a dungeon, finish a quest, or slay some epic beast only to be rewarded with a chest of generic random loot (which for me is tantamount to literally nothing since I don't take anything from them). I understand the reality of it, but it was very unfortunate to be so frequently disappointed. It doesn't help that the unique rewards utilize existing models from the base game or other mods (most notably Immersive Weapons, which I already had installed), thus making them less compelling, and similarly disappointing to me.
Again, despite its flaws I did enjoy my time with this and I'll likely keep it around. For those who are just looking for an excuse to continue playing the game, this is a solid mod. There's a lot of content to get through, and it'll keep you busy for quite a while. But for anyone who's looking for something really substantial, there isn't anything here that will impress, whether that be in narrative, gameplay, or visual quality.
Lastly, I'd like to report some technical issues I came across.
Zahkris' sword caused my game to crash when I attempted to dual-wield it. Unfortunately, I didn't write down whether I equipped it in the main or off-hand at the time. It's worth noting I am using Ecotone Dual Sheath, but as far as I recall I've never experienced a crash from a weapon that wasn't patched for it.
During the werewolf phase of the Champions Trial, the entire audience suddenly became hostile to me and I was forced to restart.
The music that plays in Lastendell can become quite tiresome. It's generally not a good idea to loop music in any game unless it's very subtle and ambient because it will eventually wear out its welcome. I appreciate the intention behind it and I do think it's fitting audio, but for an area that is literally the same world map again, complete with numerous side quests, it simply isn't appropriate. There is also a harsh volume drop at the beginning of the loop, and what sounds like some mild volume distortion near the end where I assume it builds back up for the drop. Also potentially worth mentioning is that the white fog effect in Lastendell can sometimes get blindingly bright. I'm using an ENB so I'm sure a lot of that is exacerbated by my own settings, but perhaps something can at least be done about the inconsistency.
During the quest "Stolen Gold," Rhaegar is scripted to execute the bandit. When the scene played for me, he instead froze in place in front of him, and I had to disable/enable him to get the scene to continue. It's entirely possible this was an issue on my end, but I'm mentioning it just in case.
There is a Resist Shock spell tome on the floor in one of the early rooms of Lisindril that cannot be picked up.
There is a chest in a side passage in the second section of Pinefall Cave that's placed backwards.
In the Fragment of Oblivion in the southeast of Lastendell, one of the souls you have to free is being fruitlessly attacked by the local flame brute, to the point that it did not react to my presence at all, even while I was slicing it to death.
In the Way of Suffering, I was repeatedly blasted by a random lightning bolt seemingly coming from somewhere under the map. I'm not certain if this dealt damage to me, and I think it may have been triggered each time I killed an enemy. I'm uncertain because I didn't notice until the final kill in the area, but it didn't continue after that.
In the Distorted Peak, two flame brutes seemingly spawned in odd locations and got stuck.
I'm unsure if it's intentional, but in the various caves around Lastendell there are enemies that spawn in as you progress through the tunnels. I have a maxed out sneak score and 5/5 Stealth, yet every enemy that did this, regardless of type, would instantly detect me as soon as I entered line of sight.
The following is a list of typos I found. There are only a few, as at first I decided I didn't want to bother keeping a record and ignored many of them. Some of the errors are also spoken by the voice actors, so I may not have chosen to do so anyway since the lines were already recorded.
"Letter from Sythin" (to Indreth) has three errors: 1. "within the confounds" should be "confines" 2. "Rilvins death" should be "Rilvin's" 3. "in regards for your request" should be "to your"
The objective for the quest "The Spectral Hunt" tells you to "collect the bears essence"; "bear's" should be possessive, not plural.
During the quest "Lost at Sea," when talking to Nesianna, one of the dialogue options refers to the island as a "desert island" instead of a "deserted island."
Vigilant, Glenmoril, and Unslaad are the obvious recommendations that everyone knows about. Just be prepared for them to not make much sense unless you're extremely familiar with lore. I highly enjoyed them despite only having played Skyrim and Oblivion, as they have great atmosphere, new weapons with unique mechanics, and an engaging enough narrative on the surface. Glenmoril is the best in this regard, but honestly I found Unslaad uncharacteristically short and shallow, especially after how shockingly enormous Glenmoril turned out to be, despite being unfinished.
The Forgotten City would be my next-highest recommendation. I haven't played it in a decade, so I can't sing its praises as confidently as I'd like to, but it's famous for good reason.
Maelstrom and Hel Rising are the best dungeons I've ever seen in this game because they're actually creative and use Skyrim's framework as a tool rather than a blueprint. They aren't hosted here for some reason, but you can easily find them through a quick Google search.
Sirenroot is literally the only other dungeon that competes. It can be frustrating at times and its final encounter is a little weak, but it's unique, beautiful, and high quality. The biggest hurdle with it is that it requires Anniversary Edition assets, so if you're running on an older version like many are (including myself) in order to maintain mod functionality, it's a pain to set up and can cause problems with the Creation Kit.
I had some issues with it, but Clockwork is also worth playing if only for the intro, which is wonderfully scary.
Lastly, I haven't finished it yet, but unless its ending greatly offends me (which is entirely possible; it's already committed a sin I'm still waiting for resolution on), Maids II has been a surprise hit. I saw it mentioned in a Reddit comment somewhere and was desperate enough for something else to play that I decided to give it a chance. It's a lot of talking, and to be brutally honest, its gameplay is rather mundane, but I've never been bored or annoyed for even a moment while playing it because I'm so invested in the story. I'm also a sucker for a good mystery, though. I will admit however that it's been taking a turn into the esoteric and I'm losing my grasp on what's going on and what people are trying to say, but so far I might dare to call it my favorite quest mod. I just hope it doesn't eventually buckle under the weight of all its setup. If something terrible happens that retroactively sours my feelings, I'll try to remember to update this comment.
OMG, you're massively over-critical ... "held back by a lack of creativity" utter nonsense!!! "Its ideas are very basic and often derivative of beats from the base game." So, it fit's the style of the overall game and that's an issue??? The love put into this mod is apparent and a novelette wasn't necessary, have a nice day. geez, lol.
I thought it was a very useful and well-thought out review, Skyrob. It seems quite balanced to me if you read the whole thing through. There may well be a lot of love in the mod, but it doesn't necessarily mean you can gloss over the failings.
I could just as easily dismiss you for being under-critical, and I could back that up with evidence that's a little more compelling than knee-jerk personal emotions.
Derivation does not mean that it "fits (plural, not possessive) the style." It means that it's a rip-off that is inferior to the original. I feel like I sufficiently explained this, but I'm honestly not convinced you read past the first sentence (which you didn't even understand on its own, despite directly quoting it). If the best you can say is that it matches Skyrim, I'm afraid that's not very flattering.
I never said or implied that this mod was made without love or passion, and in fact I both praised it for several things and said that I enjoyed playing it. However, passion in any instance or amount does not negate failure. I wrote my comment for no other reason than because I felt like it and with the vague hope that it would be helpful to the author(s), which is literally the entire purpose of feedback. Calling its length "unnecessary" is comically strange, to say the least, and reflects extremely poorly on you. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that me taking the time and effort to keep track of my thoughts over the course of my playthrough and write them in detail proves I care a lot more about this mod than you do, despite your seemingly unconditional adoration for it.
Well done, very well done on all who worked on this, a lot of love was put into this project and it shows. A lot of the acting hit the mark, some of the others were very close and very forgivable considering the scope of what was made. Does it have glitches? ... yes ... any worse than the game itself? ... heck no!!! It has the usual amount of fetch quests, just do it ... lol ... it fits the game as a whole. It's a very nice jaunt off the usual path ... Kudos to the entire team, thank you!
(way better than Falskarr which is easily 70% broken and then abandoned)
No spideys ... YAY! Very, very good mod, I'm almost done and came here to complement them after leaving a bug report. It's really no buggier than Skyrim itself so, I enjoyed it. Just note the bug report I left, do what I did with the TCL (toggle collision) console command.
The cultist have way too much health around level 50. I am getting by, but everyone else is crawling around on their knees. Also, I can't get rid of that follower guy pushed on me against my will. Why must I babysit him ? I don't like him at all. Had to uninstall the mod eventually.
Hello, I didn't get the key after buying the room. I couldn't find the key. What's the code of the key? Or how to use code to complete miscellaneous tasks entering the new room? Thank you!
Try to get the Add Item Menu mod that lets you directly dive into the assets/items of mods, it's a power you gain in-game that brings up a menu of all your mods, then you can select this mod, it will open an inventory menu, go to the keys section, the key will probably be there. It's a good mod to have in case you encounter any issues with other mods such as quest items not spawning and not knowing the names and/or console commands for said items.
I have already spent a lot of time in Midwood Isle without any problem but since I started the quest A dangerous scheme I frequently get freezes when I exit interiors for the main worldspace or when teleporting even if I disabled the autosaves on travel.
Boat assets appear in Solitude, but quest to enter Midwood Isle doesn't start on pre-existing save even if Way of the Voice requirements met, or requirements disabled with patch, even if quest force-started with console commands. Nothing works. Boat is just there, and NPCs can't be talked to in order to start. Just deleted mod and moved on. Not risking borking up my save.
1480 comments
I am extremely proud to say that update 3.0 is now released!
This took months of hard work, and although it took longer than planned, I hope you all enjoy it :)
If you're updating from an old version, you will need a new savegame (character). However, if playing for the first time, you can install the mod mid-playthrough.
The mod includes some massive changes, such as a huge overhaul to Lastendell including 5 new quests (such as travelling across multiple realms of Oblivion!) and a newly voiced merchant. It also includes a total revamp of Freywyn Hall (the playable home) into a customisable Hearthfire style house with which no longer requires a side quest to purchase.
For a full changelog, please see below:
Huge thanks to CBVoiceover for providing the voice for the merchant, and all the other modders for providing the assets I used (please see the credits section on the main page for a full list).
I'll be uploading to Bethesda net in the next couple of days. I'll also take a look at the patches and make sure they all work properly, as well as come up with a few more.
At the moment I am feeling incredibly burnt out, and think this will be the last update to Midwood Isle. The mod is packed with content and things to do, and I'm really proud of how it turned out.
Thank you all for reading, and I hope you enjoy the update!
Side quests don't fare much better, most of which boil down to standard MMO busywork with little dressing. A local drunk is wasting his life away? Cut him off, beat him up, and then invent non-alcoholic beer. Problem solved. How about a series of tedious fetch quests that lampshades tedious fetch quests that ends...being exactly that? There's no clever twist or biting commentary. It's just a surface-level quest chain that makes fun of itself without saying or doing anything, as if self-awareness is all you need for something bad to be good. Something has been killing innocents at night and leaving behind patches of fur? I wonder what it could be. Go wait here until a werewolf inevitably spawns and kill it. Quest complete. Again, I can't help but draw comparisons to the base game. In that werewolf quest, despite its brevity there are at least some deeper concepts to consider. A man has been transformed against his will into a vicious beast that he can't control, and something terrible happens. You see the effect on the townspeople. You watch them mourn. You hear his plight. You can choose to help him, and then can later choose to kill him. There's none of that here. The quest seems to start with a mystery, but the dialogue makes it so immediately obvious that it's a werewolf that there's nothing to think about. You just go through the motions until you're finally tasked to kill it, and then it's over.
Another quest tasks you with tracking down a stolen breastplate. Turns out it was sold under normal circumstances. When you return to the quest-giver, you're told he was desperate for money, and he requests you get it by any means necessary. But then your reward for the quest is not only the exact amount you just spent on it, meaning he could have bought it back himself at any time, but multiple gemstones as well! So rather than simply buy his armor back, he'd prefer to invent a story about it being stolen so that he could eventually pay twice as much to someone else? I don't get it.
This lack of depth extends to the gameplay as well. The number of dungeons is low, and all of them are extremely linear with no interesting challenges or puzzles to solve, save for a single outlier in Lastendell that at least required me to use my brain for a couple seconds. This problem culminates most severely in the mod's finale boss encounters. The showdown with the main villain does not occur after a grueling battle through his epic fortress, but in the dirt courtyard of the ruins of a small rampart wall casually hanging out on the island you've been on the whole time. There are multiple quests involving legendary outlaw warlords resurfacing, powerful enough to carry out nearly-successful assassination attempts on kings and overwhelming settlements, built up as civilization-ending threats, which are eventually resolved by having you walk into their little cluster of camping tents hanging out in the open and killing everyone like it's business as usual. Everything is just kind of "there." This is especially bad for stealth characters like mine, where I like to pick enemies off one by one, since everyone is sleeping side-by-side (I also experienced an issue where killing anyone would automatically alert everyone even if the kill was totally silent [verified with a weapon I made myself which is explicitly silent]) this means the encounter boils down to playing Whack-A-Mole down a line.
Now that I've complained, let me talk about what I liked. This may be controversial, but the foremost thing I appreciated was the almost entirely flat terrain. Traversal in Skyrim is often very annoying because you're just trying to get where you want to go, and you're constantly blocked by mountains and forced on winding paths around jagged rock formations, cliffs, and rivers. Here, anywhere I want to go is on a straightforward path through a pleasant forest or a serene beach. Having a coast around the perimeter of the island was just icing on the cake, as I'm a huge fan of ocean settings. Add to this the sort of alter-ego of Lastendell along with the Ayleid ruins and pockets of Oblivion and there's some pretty decent environmental variety. I only wish that the design of the underwater Ayleid ruin (Aryrru, if I recall correctly) had taken advantage of its setting. I was really hoping it would be waterlogged and sinking.
Despite the weakness of the story, I did find Tyrek reasonably endearing and I was glad to have him around. However, it's a shame there isn't a real role-play opportunity when you're getting drunk with him. I also experienced a bug where he would walk away and effectively leave my service if I entered sneak while he was following me. I was able to trace the issue back to UFO, and disabling it fixed the problem, but I've never had this problem before so I imagine the core issue is with him.
I also rather liked how the Kings Trial in Lastendell was handled. As soon as I saw the premise, I thought "Oh no, this mod author is going to treat moral dilemmas as if there is only one objectively righteous solution." After answering as honestly as I could and preparing myself for the worst, I was delighted that this not only didn't happen, but there wasn't even so much as a snide comment from an NPC. Granted, I didn't try any additional combinations of choices, but if my initial impression is correct across the board, I must commend you for handling this situation maturely and with a level head. That said, a minor complaint I have with this section is that it's a little awkward that they all take place in basements. It's weird to be talking to the ghosts of ancient kings who proclaim that in order to face the great evil that approaches, I must first pass a trial in their basement that I access via a little hatch door in the middle of the room.
Overall, it seems to me this mod aims for the "wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle" approach, which I'm simply not a fan of. While there is technically quite a large amount of unique rewards to find, they're greatly overshadowed by the dozens of times you go through a dungeon, finish a quest, or slay some epic beast only to be rewarded with a chest of generic random loot (which for me is tantamount to literally nothing since I don't take anything from them). I understand the reality of it, but it was very unfortunate to be so frequently disappointed. It doesn't help that the unique rewards utilize existing models from the base game or other mods (most notably Immersive Weapons, which I already had installed), thus making them less compelling, and similarly disappointing to me.
Again, despite its flaws I did enjoy my time with this and I'll likely keep it around. For those who are just looking for an excuse to continue playing the game, this is a solid mod. There's a lot of content to get through, and it'll keep you busy for quite a while. But for anyone who's looking for something really substantial, there isn't anything here that will impress, whether that be in narrative, gameplay, or visual quality.
Lastly, I'd like to report some technical issues I came across.
Zahkris' sword caused my game to crash when I attempted to dual-wield it. Unfortunately, I didn't write down whether I equipped it in the main or off-hand at the time. It's worth noting I am using Ecotone Dual Sheath, but as far as I recall I've never experienced a crash from a weapon that wasn't patched for it.
During the werewolf phase of the Champions Trial, the entire audience suddenly became hostile to me and I was forced to restart.
The music that plays in Lastendell can become quite tiresome. It's generally not a good idea to loop music in any game unless it's very subtle and ambient because it will eventually wear out its welcome. I appreciate the intention behind it and I do think it's fitting audio, but for an area that is literally the same world map again, complete with numerous side quests, it simply isn't appropriate. There is also a harsh volume drop at the beginning of the loop, and what sounds like some mild volume distortion near the end where I assume it builds back up for the drop. Also potentially worth mentioning is that the white fog effect in Lastendell can sometimes get blindingly bright. I'm using an ENB so I'm sure a lot of that is exacerbated by my own settings, but perhaps something can at least be done about the inconsistency.
During the quest "Stolen Gold," Rhaegar is scripted to execute the bandit. When the scene played for me, he instead froze in place in front of him, and I had to disable/enable him to get the scene to continue. It's entirely possible this was an issue on my end, but I'm mentioning it just in case.
There is a Resist Shock spell tome on the floor in one of the early rooms of Lisindril that cannot be picked up.
There is a chest in a side passage in the second section of Pinefall Cave that's placed backwards.
In the Fragment of Oblivion in the southeast of Lastendell, one of the souls you have to free is being fruitlessly attacked by the local flame brute, to the point that it did not react to my presence at all, even while I was slicing it to death.
In the Way of Suffering, I was repeatedly blasted by a random lightning bolt seemingly coming from somewhere under the map. I'm not certain if this dealt damage to me, and I think it may have been triggered each time I killed an enemy. I'm uncertain because I didn't notice until the final kill in the area, but it didn't continue after that.
In the Distorted Peak, two flame brutes seemingly spawned in odd locations and got stuck.
I'm unsure if it's intentional, but in the various caves around Lastendell there are enemies that spawn in as you progress through the tunnels. I have a maxed out sneak score and 5/5 Stealth, yet every enemy that did this, regardless of type, would instantly detect me as soon as I entered line of sight.
The following is a list of typos I found. There are only a few, as at first I decided I didn't want to bother keeping a record and ignored many of them. Some of the errors are also spoken by the voice actors, so I may not have chosen to do so anyway since the lines were already recorded.
"Letter from Sythin" (to Indreth) has three errors:
1. "within the confounds" should be "confines"
2. "Rilvins death" should be "Rilvin's"
3. "in regards for your request" should be "to your"
The objective for the quest "The Spectral Hunt" tells you to "collect the bears essence"; "bear's" should be possessive, not plural.
During the quest "Lost at Sea," when talking to Nesianna, one of the dialogue options refers to the island as a "desert island" instead of a "deserted island."
Also I remember this strange mod with gears and cogs in an alternate realm but forgot the name.
The Forgotten City would be my next-highest recommendation. I haven't played it in a decade, so I can't sing its praises as confidently as I'd like to, but it's famous for good reason.
Maelstrom and Hel Rising are the best dungeons I've ever seen in this game because they're actually creative and use Skyrim's framework as a tool rather than a blueprint. They aren't hosted here for some reason, but you can easily find them through a quick Google search.
Sirenroot is literally the only other dungeon that competes. It can be frustrating at times and its final encounter is a little weak, but it's unique, beautiful, and high quality. The biggest hurdle with it is that it requires Anniversary Edition assets, so if you're running on an older version like many are (including myself) in order to maintain mod functionality, it's a pain to set up and can cause problems with the Creation Kit.
I had some issues with it, but Clockwork is also worth playing if only for the intro, which is wonderfully scary.
Lastly, I haven't finished it yet, but unless its ending greatly offends me (which is entirely possible; it's already committed a sin I'm still waiting for resolution on), Maids II has been a surprise hit. I saw it mentioned in a Reddit comment somewhere and was desperate enough for something else to play that I decided to give it a chance. It's a lot of talking, and to be brutally honest, its gameplay is rather mundane, but I've never been bored or annoyed for even a moment while playing it because I'm so invested in the story. I'm also a sucker for a good mystery, though. I will admit however that it's been taking a turn into the esoteric and I'm losing my grasp on what's going on and what people are trying to say, but so far I might dare to call it my favorite quest mod. I just hope it doesn't eventually buckle under the weight of all its setup. If something terrible happens that retroactively sours my feelings, I'll try to remember to update this comment.
There may well be a lot of love in the mod, but it doesn't necessarily mean you can gloss over the failings.
Derivation does not mean that it "fits (plural, not possessive) the style." It means that it's a rip-off that is inferior to the original. I feel like I sufficiently explained this, but I'm honestly not convinced you read past the first sentence (which you didn't even understand on its own, despite directly quoting it). If the best you can say is that it matches Skyrim, I'm afraid that's not very flattering.
I never said or implied that this mod was made without love or passion, and in fact I both praised it for several things and said that I enjoyed playing it. However, passion in any instance or amount does not negate failure. I wrote my comment for no other reason than because I felt like it and with the vague hope that it would be helpful to the author(s), which is literally the entire purpose of feedback. Calling its length "unnecessary" is comically strange, to say the least, and reflects extremely poorly on you. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that me taking the time and effort to keep track of my thoughts over the course of my playthrough and write them in detail proves I care a lot more about this mod than you do, despite your seemingly unconditional adoration for it.
(way better than Falskarr which is easily 70% broken and then abandoned)
Congratulations on creating the best quest/land mod!
Am I the only one to have this problem?