Skyrim Special Edition

File information

Last updated

Original upload

Created by

Kevkas

Uploaded by

kevkas

Virus scan

Some manually verified files

About this mod

ABT offers lots of customizable options for arrows and bolts in one handy FOMOD installer, pick and install the tweaks you want!

Requirements
Permissions and credits
Translations
  • Russian
  • Portuguese
  • Polish
  • Italian
  • German
  • French
Changelogs
Donations


(if you are looking for the classic Skyrim edition of this mod, grab it here)




ABT is a compilation of different modules that aim to make small modifications to your archery experience. Unlike other mods, ABT is not an overhaul, on the one hand because it is modular so you can pick and install whatever you want (comes with a fancy installer), but on the other hand because I'm not very fond of 'overhauls' in general, ABT aims to sand the rough edges of the vanilla archery experience and tries to enhance it in a few different ways.

Concept:

I really like playing as an archer, but I wasn't satisfied with some aspects regarding arrows specifically. Some mods here did make some improvements that I wanted, but I still wasn't fully satisfied with the experience and always ended up tweaking them, changing them completely, or even making my own mods to change other aspects of the game involving arrows. After Dawnguard came out, crossbow bolts were added to Skyrim, and again I felt the need to change them, so in the end I decided to make this mod to compile all my tweaks.

What was added with the Anniversary Edition that is relevant to ABT?

Even though the AE of Skyrim added a lot of content from the Creation Club to the vanilla game (from now on I will refer to the entire "Skyrim AE + CC content" as 'vanilla'), not all mods add new ammo or modify ammo-related content in the game. The following are the Creation Club mods that are relevant to ABT:

  • Arcane Archer Pack (ccbgssse002-exoticarrows.esl): adds Bone Arrows, Fire Arrows, Ice Arrows, Lightning Arrows, Soul Stealer Arrows crafted from Soul Gem Arrowheads (also added), and Telekinesis Arrows (which are now the most powerful arrows in the game).

  • Rare Curios (ccBGSSSE037-Curios.esl): adds Corkbulb Arrows, Iron Bolts, Silver Bolts, Orcish Bolts, Corkbulb Bolts, and Bonemold Bolts.

  • Saints & Seducers (ccBGSSSE025-AdvDSGS.esm): adds Amber Arrows, Dark Arrows, Golden Arrows, and Madness Arrows.

  • Necromantic Grimoire (ccvsvsse003-necroarts.esl): adds Skeleton Marksman Arrows (used by the Skeleton Marksman you can summon with a new spell, the arrow is not craftable but can be picked up and used by the player)

  • The Cause (ccbgssse067-daedinv.esm): changes some ammo leveled lists.

  • Expanded Crossbow Pack (ccffbsse002-crossbowpack.esl): changes some ammo leveled lists.

This means that you don't need ALL the Creation Club mods active to use all the tweaks in ABT, but you will need most of those I just listed installed and active for the tweaks to work. ABT is modular so you can choose exactly what you want to install, and the installer will tell you which tweak needs which CC mods in order to function just in case. What follows are the different tweaks (modules) that ABT has to offer.






CC mods required: Arcane Archer Pack, Rare Curios, Necromantic Grimoire, and Saints & Seducers.


This tweak makes arrows fly faster, further, and also decreases gravity pull on them. Multiple versions to choose from:

  • +10% faster
  • +25% faster
  • +50% faster
  • +75% faster
  • +100% faster!

Riekling Spears: Note that Riekling Spears gravity has been halved and their range has been doubled, these changes allow them to keep that 'heavy feeling' spears should have when used as arrows. Their speed was still increased to match the rest of the arrows so they will still be harder to dodge.

This 'Faster' tweak (as well as the next one) edits speed and gravity of ammunition, but in order for ammo to fly further and more accurately you will need to make some edits to your Skyrim.ini file (located in your "Documents\My games\Skyrim Special Edition" folder) so that your shots go to your crosshair, increasing the speed of arrows and bolts makes them fly with an offset from vanilla crosshair, these edits will compensate for that. There are also a couple of additional edits you may want to include that improve the aiming experience (backup Skyrim.ini before editing it!!!):

NOTE: If you don't have the [Actor] and [Combat] sections in your Skyrim.ini file, just add them (after [General] section for example).

[Actor]
fVisibleNavmeshMoveDist=12288.0000

[Combat]
fMagnetismStrafeHeadingMult=0.0
fMagnetismLookingMult=0.0
f1PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.7

f3PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.7

The line below [Actor] (fVisibleNavmeshMoveDist) increases the distance ammo can fly, which allows you to hit targets from longer distances (rather than arrows passing through them without causing any damage).

The first two lines below [Combat] (fMagnetism) remove aim assist. If you miss slightly with a shot the game will automatically make it hit anyway. This stops that from happening, so it basically makes aiming a little harder but a bit more realistic as well (aim assist is more noticeable at longer ranges).

The last four lines below [Combat] (ArrowTiltUpAngle for arrows, and BoltTiltUpAngle for bolts) make the dot or crosshair the center when shooting (rather than being slightly above it) so your arrows/bolts will go where you are actually aiming at (keep in mind that gravity still affects shots, so you will still have to compensate when aiming really far). Note that these lines only affect vertical axis behavior (up/down), sadly there are no ini edits for horizontal axis corrections (left/right). The f1P lines are for first person, the f3P lines are for third person. Depending on your resolution settings or if you are using any mods that modify aim assist or combat behavior you may have to use different values, below are some values I have tested at 1920x1080p and 2560x1440p, but you may have to experiment with other numbers if these don't work for you.



(the table for bolts values is below)


If you still can't get your shots to go to the center of the crosshair, check the 'Recommended/Compatible mods' section at the end of the description, and look for the Proper Aiming mod or search for similar mods that do the same.




CC mods required: Rare Curios.


Just like the previous tweak, Faster Bolts Improved increases bolts speed in the same manner, making them fly faster and further as well. Versions available:

  • +10% faster
  • +25% faster
  • +50% faster
  • +75% faster
  • +100% faster!

Remember to add the edits stated above to your Skyrim.ini file. The ones that specifically handle bolts behavior are:

f1PBoltTiltUpAngle=0.7
f3PBoltTiltUpAngle=0.7


If you only install one of the two 'Faster' tweaks, just add the two lines that correspond to the tweak you have installed (the ones for Arrows, or the ones for Bolts).

Here is the table of values I have tested for the different Faster Bolts versions:




If you still can't get bolts to go to the center of the crosshair, check the 'Recommended/Compatible mods' section at the end of the description, and look for the Proper Aiming mod or search for similar mods that do the same. I don't know if it will help with bolts (it seems to only affect arrows) but it can't hurt to try.




CC mods required: Arcane Archer Pack, Rare Curios, Necromantic Grimoire, and Saints & Seducers.


It has always bothered me that some ammo have the same base damage, there is no real sense of item progression (damage or value wise). What is the point of using an Ancient Nord Arrow instead of a Steel Arrow if both deal the same damage? or what is the difference between using Falmer Arrows and Forsworn Arrows? This tweak changes that, it modifies the base damage and gold value of some arrows and bolts. Here are the new ammo progression tables:







Changes marked in red indicate which values have been changed to provide a sense of item progression (some ammo still have duplicate damages mostly due to balancing reasons).

A few aditional changes are also part of this tweak:

  • Bound Arrows damage has been paired up with Dragonbone Arrows damage to provide some sort of 'balance' between pure archers and pure mages, as I think both should be able to deal the same high-level archery damage values coming from different backgrounds (particularly now that 'Arcane Archers' as a concept are part of the vanilla content with the CC mod).
  • Since the Arcane Archer Pack adds another Bound Arrow as well as a new Bone Arrow crafted from Dragon Bones, those two damages have been paired up as well.
  • A description was added to Fire/Ice/Lightning Arrows to indicate they deal extra damage by exploding, for some reason these arrows didn't have this but the exploding bolts did, so now both have that info.
  • A description was added to Corkbulb Arrows/Bolts to indicate they have a 25% chance to paralyze targets, they already had the effect they just didn't include that as part of the description for this ammo.


Versions available:

  • Vanilla Names
  • Renamed Arrows: renames arrows to 'Arrow - (Type)' (for example Arrow - Steel). This version also renames the 'Bound Arrows' added by the Arcane Archer Pack to 'Arrow - Mystic Bound' to differenciate them from the old Bound Arrows (name was chosen because they are called mystic inside the CK), and 'Bone Arrows' are renamed to 'Arrow - Mighty Dragonbone' because they are also crafted using Dragon Bones but deal more damage than vanilla Dragonbone Arrows.




CC mods required (Arrows tweak): Arcane Archer Pack, Rare Curios, Necromantic Grimoire, and Saints & Seducers.
CC mods required (Bolts tweak): Rare Curios.


This is similar to Progressive Damage in that it provides the same sense of item progression by changing damages and gold values, but it also increases damages of arrows and/or bolts (you can increase both, or pick which one to increase). Here are the same ammo progression tables as before but with 100% damage increase as an example (and also showing the 'Renamed' version in this case):







Changes marked in red in this case indicate the Progressive modifications that are still present. 'Exploding' arrow/bolts damages are also increased with this tweak.

Three versions to choose from:

  • +50% Increased Dmg
  • +100% Increased Dmg
  • +150% Increased Dmg

All these version are also available with Vanilla Names, or Renamed (for example: Arrow - Iron, Bolt - Steel).




CC mods required: You can use this tweak with or without Rare Curios.
If you use it with Rare Curios, all your bolts will have deeper impact points. If you use it without it, only Steel and Dwarven bolts will be changed.


This tweak aims to improve the impact point depth of bolts. ABT doesn't aim to be a 'realistic' mod (if you want to learn a bit about realism and archery I wrote a short article with the basics), but in this case I felt this needed to be included, bolts impact points are plain awful in the vanilla game. Traditionaly crossbows, in comparison to bows, have always increased the speed of their ammunitions due to their mechanisms (of course there are a few exceptions, but generally speaking this is true) making bolts impacts stronger at closer ranges. However, what Skyrim shows is a different story when we take a closer look at a dead body with a bolt sticking out of it, or even when you shoot at a wooden door: the tip has barely penetrated and if you compare bolts and arrows side by side, the bolts come out looking a bit out of place.

This tweak replaces bolts meshes with ones that increase the depth of their impacts points, three versions to choose from:

  • +5 Units Deeper
  • +8 Units Deeper
  • +12 Units Deeper

You can see a comparison between their depth in the image above and there are a few screenshots in the Images section.

FIX: As an added bonus, I have included a fix for the dwarven bolts which had a vanilla bug that made them not cast shadows and reflect light properly (it was hardly noticeable in game, but the issue was there). Thanks to Maeldun for pointing me in the right direction on how to fix this myself.




CC mods required: None.


This tweak is based on my old 'Recover Less Arrows' mod. It basically changes the amount of arrows and bolts you can recover from dead bodies, specifically the amount of ammo you had shot at them. Some people requested me to add slightly different versions, so here you go:

  • +10%, +25%, +35%, +50%
  • -10%, -25%, -35%, -50%

Changes also apply to the Hunter's Discipline perk (which allows you to "Recover twice as many arrows from dead bodies") to mantain balance. The intention here is to motivate the player to craft ammo instead of just recovering it back all the time, think of it as 'some arrows/bolts can break during combat'. The following tweaks also offer options to reduce the amount of ammo you can find in loot or buy from merchants to also motivate the player even further to craft ammo.




CC mods required: Rare Curios, The Cause, Saints & Seducers, and Expanded Crossbow Pack.


This tweak modifies the amount of ammo found in loot (dead bodies inventories, chests, etc). This one is different from Recover Ammo in that it doesn't affect the amount you can recover from the shots you had connected, it just changes the leveled item lists that include ammo so that only the target's loot inventory is modified, and also chests loot. You will notice this make a bigger difference in game than Recover Ammo. Keep in mind that chests usually fill themselves when the cell is loaded, so if you install this tweak and test it on a chest that was right in front of you when you saved your game, you probably won't see any difference.

I wanted to give some flexibility to the game in this particular aspect, if you are anything like me you probably like to plan ahead on what resources you will take with you when leaving town so that you don't run out of ammo (or potions for that matter). This also makes the smithing perks more important if you decide to use the harder versions of this tweak that reduce the amount of ammo found in loot (beware of the HARDCORE version). Alternatively, you can just take the opposite approach and choose a version that increases availability (e.g. +100%) if you don't like crafting that much.

Lots of versions to choose from:

  • +25%, +50%, +75%, +100% ammo in loot
  • -25%, -50%, -75% ammo in loot
  • HARDCORE version: reduces the amount of ammo found in loot to a minimum. Low-level ammo (such as Iron Arrows) will still be found regularly in loot to some extent, but high-level ammo will be harder to find, remember to retrieve those missed shots lying on the floor!




CC mods required: Expanded Crossbow Pack.


If Loot Ammo isn't enough for you, maybe this tweak can help. It modifies the amount of ammo being sold by merchants (General traders and Blacksmiths). If you run out of ammo and don't have the raw materials to craft more, you can buy the supplies you need from merchants: making ammo less available will add an extra level of difficulty to your game, making ammo more available will make your life that much easier.

Again, lots of versions to choose from:

  • +25%, +50%, +75%, +100% ammo sold
  • -25%, -50%, -75% ammo sold
  • HARDCORE version: reduces the amount of ammo being sold by merchants (General traders and Blacksmiths) to a minimum. Low-level ammo will still be regularly available to some extent, but high-level ammo will be less frequently offered, I suggest crafting high-level ammo often and saving it for when it is truly needed.

NOTE: This tweak was renamed from 'ABT SE - Merchants Arrows.esp' in v1.0 to 'ABT SE - Merchants Ammo.esp' in v2.0, if you are updating from v1.0 to v2.0 you can either just rename the plugin after installing it so that Skyrim won't complain about the missing 'Merchants Arrows.esp' and use that for the rest of your playthrough, or you can just replace it with the new one (leveled lists from merchants should reset after 2 or 3 in-game days). This tweak doesn't run any scripts or add custom leveled lists so changing to the new plugin shouldn't really matter, but if you feel safer just rename the plugin until you have finished your current playthrough and then switch to the new one for future playthroughs.




CC mods required: Arcane Archer Pack, Rare Curios, and Saints & Seducers.


Creation Club content comes with new recipes for crafting new added ammo but has some inconsistencies with vanilla crafting: some recipes craft 24 arrows while others only craft 10. Additionally, it has always bothered me that vanilla bolt recipes only craft 10 bolts so crossbow-oriented characters always had to craft more ammo than archers. I decided to change some recipes so now everything is more consistent and crafts 24 ammo, whether you prefer using bows, crossbows, or both.




(check the images section or click the image for a bigger resolution table)


Another reason for changing this is because some recipes didn't make much sense to me, for example who would craft 10 Bone Arrows that cost 10 Dragon Bones when you can get 240 vanilla Dragonbone Arrows out of those Dragon Bones? I lowered the requirement to 2 Dragon Bones (plus 5 Bone Meals to compensate) because Bone Arrows deal more damage than vanilla Dragonbone Arrows so keeping their cost a bit higher made sense since they are still more powerful (hence why I renamed Bone Arrows to Mighty Dragonbone Arrows in other tweaks). In general these recipes will cost you less raw materials now (with a few exceptions) but in all cases you get more crafted ammo anyway so value-wise it is still in your favor.

Rebalanced Crafting pairs nicely with the tweaks that reduce the amount of ammo you can find in loot, buy from merchants or recorver from dead bodies, since it motivates the player to craft ammo.

Just like the other tweaks, this one is also optional in the installer.




CC mods required: Arcane Archer Pack, Rare Curios, Necromantic Grimoire, and Saints & Seducers.
ABT tweaks required: two of the sets require a combination of both 'Faster' and 'Progressive' damage tweaks plugins, read below.


The 'Unique Ammo Series' are a set of retextures with the same goal: to improve the colors of the ammo 'feathers' in order to make them look better without straying too far from vanilla textures. Since Skyrim has been out for a very long time, the old vanilla ammo has been retextured to death, so I wanted to do something different: retextures for the new ammo added with the Creation Club. In a few cases I also gave some ammo custom feather textures because they were indistinguishable from each other (for example: all the 'Exploding' variants of Steel/Dwarven bolts).

The retextures offered are divided into 'sets':

  • Arcane Archer Pack (retextures for the Bone, Fire, Ice, Lightning, Soul Gem Arrowheads, Soul Stealer and Telekinesis Arrows)
  • Rare Curios (retextures for the Corkbulb Arrow and Iron, Silver, Orcish, Corkbulb and Bonemold Bolts)
  • Saints & Seducers (retextures for the Amber, Dark, Golden and Madness Arrows) *
  • Necromantic Grimoire (custom model and textures for the Skeleton Marksman Arrow) **
  • Exploding Bolts (retextures for the Steel bolts and all its 'Exploding' variants -Fire/Ice/Shock-, and for Dwarven bolts and all its 'Exploding' variants -Fire/Ice/Shock-, this tweak replaces their meshes to apply the new textures) ***

* Three retextures to choose from for Madness Arrows (see images).
** You will be offered this retexture in the installer if you have selected any of the 'Faster Arrows Improved' tweaks plus any of the 'Progressive Damage' tweaks (with or without 'Increased' damage).
*** You will be offered this retexture in the installer if you have selected any of the 'Faster Bolts Improved' tweaks plus any of the 'Progressive Damage' tweaks (with or without 'Increased' damage).

Due to the modularity nature of ABT I had to find a workaround to offer those last two sets without breaking other stuff in the mod, so those retextures rely on changes made in other tweaks plugins in order to work (which is why they require them). If you install the 'All-in-One' plugin they already come included.

All textures have BC7 compression and are 2K, except Steel/Dwarven bolts which use cleaned and upscaled textures (from 512x512 to 1K, credits to Kartoffels for these), and Dark Arrows (which for some reasons were already 4K in vanilla). You can see screenshots in the images section, these are all optional so you can choose whether to install them or not in the installer.




Lots of people ask me what tweaks I use, given that there are so many choices. These are the tweaks I personally use while playing Skyrim, they don't alter the game too much, they just improve some aspects I felt needed to be changed from my perspective and to fit my playstyle. Inside the installer I provide an option called 'ABT SE - Kevkas All-in-One' which is the plugin I use, it includes the following tweaks.

- My selected tweaks:

  • ABT SE - Progressive Damage (Renamed Arrows) [No Increased Damage]
  • ABT SE - Rebalanced Crafting
  • ABT SE - Faster Arrows Improved (+50%)
  • ABT SE - Faster Bolts Improved (+50%)
  • ABT SE - Recover Ammo (-50%)
  • ABT SE - Loot Ammo (HARDCORE version)
  • ABT SE - Merchants Ammo (HARDCORE version)
  • ABT SE - Deeper Bolts Impacts: +8 Units Deeper
  • ABT SE - Unique Ammo: all the new textures, and the White-Grey-White version for the Madness Arrow.

- My Skyrim.ini settings:

[Actor]
fVisibleNavmeshMoveDist=12288.0000

[Combat]
fMagnetismStrafeHeadingMult=0.0
fMagnetismLookingMult=0.0
f1PArrowTiltUpAngle=0.5
f3PArrowTiltUpAngle=1.0
f1PBoltTiltUpAngle=0.3
f3PBoltTiltUpAngle=0.4


- My Crosshair in-game:

  • None.

Yes, I don't use a crosshair, years ago I followed Ka3m0n's advice and I must say I enjoy playing like this MUCH more:


I HIGHLY RECOMMEND disabling the bow crosshairs entirely using iHUD. You'll find yourself actually practicing with those archery targets and, with practice, you can become a pretty darn good shot. Every time you hit the target (shooting freehand), it's extremely gratifying and a lot more fun than moving virtual reality crosshairs with a mouse and shooting bullseyes at 1000 feet every.....single.....time. (booooring).


Alternatively if you don't want to disable the HUD completely you can use one of these mods for a smaller hud and/or a dot crosshair:





ABT is highly modular, you can install all tweaks or just the ones you want, each one comes in different versions to choose from. SKSE is NOT required for this mod.

Two alternatives, choose one:



1st. Fancy NMM installer! Click the MOD MANAGER DOWNLOAD button. Activate with your mod manager and follow the instructions, the installer will allow you customize which tweaks you want to install, it includes images for everything and has a bit of additional information (I spent a ton of time making it nice and pretty, hope it was worth it). Remember to edit your ini settings!

2nd. Manual installation: for those of you who still like installing things manually (I'm not judging... ok I am, but whatever) just open the file and copy the files you want to use to your Skyrim Special Edition\Data directory. Everything is in its own folder so it should be pretty self explanatory. Then activate the files using your mod mananger, and remember to edit your ini settings.




Use LOOT to sort ABT plugins in your load order.

However, as a general rule all tweaks should be loaded after any mods that edit arrows, bolts, archery, or leveled lists.




The Tutorial in the Files section shows you how to edit custom arrows and bolts added by other mods to make them compatible with my 'Faster Arrows/Bolts Improved' tweaks, which are the ones most likely to cause issues (while playing you will notice right away if a newly added arrow/bolt doesn't fly at the same speed as the edited ones from ABT). It is fairly simple to edit custom ammo speeds, you will probably need to spend 5 maybe 10 minutes learning how to do it the first time, after than you will be able to do it in a couple of minutes next time (particularly if you are familiar with xEdit instead of using the CK).

If you are using mods that edit perks, the 'Recover Ammo' tweak is the only one that edits a perk (Hunter's Discipline), either skip it or place ABT SE - Recover Ammo.esp below/above in the load order to let it win or be replaced (the tweak will still edit a global game setting which is the base recovery chance you have when you don't have that perk active).

'Deeper Bolts' Impacts and 'Unique Ammo Series' are obviously not compatible with other textures and/or meshes that replace the same files.

ABT is fully compatible with USSEP (last checked against v4.2.6a) and with USCCCP (last checked against v6.1).




Arrows don't go to the crosshair (remember to edit your Skyrim.ini file!):

  • Another issue may be crosshair behavior: if you use any Faster tweaks, you will probably need to edit your Skirim.ini file with the entries I mentioned above, but make sure you are editing the correct .ini file! (make a backup before just in case!). If your shots don't go right where you are aiming at, change the values in the TiltUpAngle entries, from 0.7 to other numbers (if you are shooting to high, reduce the numbers, if you are shooting too low, increase them). It may take you some trial and error to find the correct values for your game because it depends on different factors (your resolution, other mods you might be using, etc), but I do encourage you to do it, you probably won't have to change them ever again, and it is worth it. As mentioned before, be aware that there aren't any ini edits for the horizontal axis of the crosshair, so if your arrows are hitting on either side of the center of the crosshair, there's really nothing that can be done (considering this hasn't been reported much, I am inclined to think it probably has to do with other mods that either overhaul archery, combat, the camera position, or even animations).


Last arrow flies shorter:

  • This may or may not happen to some of you (it doesn't seem to happen to everyone): sometimes when you run out of a given type of arrow the last arrow shot from that type (and the next one shot from the next type assigned) will fly shorter that they should. This seems to be an issue related to how the game handles switching/assigning arrows when you run out of a given type so if you encounter this issue there's nothing I can do as it is not caused by ABT.

> Workaround 1: Keeping a good supply of ammo makes the issue less noticeable, and it's usually a good idea to have some ammo stock anyway.

> Workaround 2: When shooting the last arrow of a given type, make your draw last a bit longer (0.5 to 1 seconds longer) and wait roughly the same before reloading. This will allow the last arrow to be shot at the correct speed, and the next one will fly normaly.

From a role-playing perspective, it could mean the player may suddenly panic while running out of arrows, or maybe you can see it as the player changing quivers, which could led to shooting recklessly.


Bound Arrows (regular and mystic) disappear after impacting a surface:

  • This is intended, I'll give you a short explanation and a longer one in case you feel like reading. The short one is that this was needed in order to fix Bound Arrows not applying the Soul Stealer and Oblivion Binding conjuration perks properly, ABT includes a fix for this that is similar to the one included in the Unofficial Skyrim Creation Content Club Patches and the way to fix this makes Bound Arrows disappear after impacting on a surface (trees, walls, floor, etc), the projectile will still be visible if you hit an enemy though, so that behaves normally. Considering that Bound Arrows aren't meant to be retrieved after being shot (vanilla behavior) I consider this minor issue an acceptable tradeoff in order to fix two bugs that Bethesda should have fixed themselves.

Longer Explanation:
In order for the arrow itself to be able to check if the player has the Soul Stealer and the Oblivion Binding perks, it needs to have that logic somewhere. Unfortunately projectiles are just that in game, a simple projectile mesh with some set values as speed and gravity, but without any place to store logic that checks for other stuff. A projectile spawns as soon as you release the shot and continues to exist until it impacts, at that moment it is replaced by an arrow without its trail effect and that is the arrow you actually pick up (the one that gets stuck on a wooden surface for example). None of those game objects have anywhere to store the logic that checks if the player has a perk or not.

The workaround is to give the arrow and Explosion effect, which is what was done for Bound Arrows and Mystic Bound Arrows (they both use the same projectile). The explosion itself has some settings (among them an empty mesh, so you don't see it 'explode', but it still explodes except it doesn't cause explosion damage in this case), the neat thing about explosions is that they can be assigned an enchantment, and enchantments can check for logic (perks in this case).

This means that when it explodes, the enchantment will check if they player has those perks and what bow is equipped, and it will now apply the Soul Stealer and/or Oblivion Binding perks properly, the only downside to this is that the invisible explotion is still an explosion, which means the arrow model that is supposed to spawn and be picked up is destroyed when it impacts surfaces which is why you see them 'disappear' (they can still be seen if they hit enemies though, they will stick out as they normally would).

Reasoning:
The reasoning behind leaving that as an intended change is the fact that Bound Arrows can never be retrieved after being shot (this is vanilla behavior, they can never be picked up because they are not meant to be picked up), and considering that I think having them disappear specifically when they hit surfaces is an acceptable tradeoff to be able to fix two bugs that Bethesda should have fixed in the first place.

This is basically the same approach the USCCCP has for fixing this issue, with the exception that I added some impact data that was missing for the explosion and I also used an explosion that the CC mod already had instead of making a custom one like USCCCP did (which is also fine and works just as well), digging through the Arcane Archer Pack I found there was already an explosion called 'Bound Arrow Explosion', I suspect there was an intention to fix this at one point but they left it bugged because... Bethesda.

As a side note, there was another solution I tried which does spawn the arrows on surfaces after the explosion, but unfortunately it had the side effect of spawning two arrows instead of one on enemy bodies after each shot, which would have been worse as a solution (and confusing as hell).




You have my permission to translate this mod if the translation will be uploaded to the Nexus, just credit me in the description and add a link to this page.

I don't give permission to upload translations to any other websites, don't bother asking.




These are some mods I have used or tested in the past and proved to be useful to me, it's a small list and some are old but they are still worth checking out:

  • Belt-Fastened Quivers: this mod changes the position of the bow and quiver to a more backpack-friendly position. It also includes a new animation for loading the bow, made by Ninivekha.
  • Aim Fix: This mod has plenty of options to tweak through its MCM menu to adjust archery aiming, as well as for spell casting and using staves.
  • Proper Aiming: if you are having trouble with the crosshair, and you've already tried modifying the Skyrim.ini file with no luck, try this mod, some people have reported it works for them (load it after ABT SE plugins). If that doesn't work, I have no idea how to fix the crosshair in your game.
  • Auto Hide Ammo: essential for any archer... heck, for anyone really!




This is a list of things I would like to add in future updates, kind of a "to-do" list of possible features for next versions (no ETA though):

  • Add support for the unique Dwarven Sphere Centurion Arrow found in the Dwemer Museum in Markarth and make it playable
  • Add 'Progressive vs. Damage' tweak (basic idea is: low level arrows do less damage and fly slower, and high level arrows do more damage -increasing exponentially- as well as fly faster)
  • Add different arrows release sounds




  • Zappoo: for letting me dig into his files to learn how to create FOMOD installers back in the day.
  • FordPerfect: for creating Faster Arrows which was one of the first mods I've downloaded from the Nexus.
  • Sunnie and Jet4571: For helping me figure out how leveled item lists work.
  • Ghosu (aka LeckerHamster): for allowing me to use his meshes in the past for the Deeper Bolts Impacts tweak. As of ABT AE v2.0 all meshes edits have been done by me.
  • Maeldun: for pointing me in the right direction to learn how to fix the dwarven bolts meshes.
  • Kartoffels: for providing cleaned and upscaled textures.
  • Jet4571: again, for his "3 Medieval Arrows" mod resource.
  • MissSelfDestruct (@ DeviantArt): for providing the main image for this mod.
  • Cvillarosa (@ DeviantArt): for providing the title's background image for this mod.
  • Flaticon.com: for the free coin and target icons.
  • The following people for letting me use some of their screenshots in the past and/or present: 83Willow, bison1967, deathknowz, glaucus, Lunanella, Midhras, propa, Shunreal, Silvaner, Vi73rion.
  • Last but not least a big thanks to Utopolyst: for helping and giving me a hand when I needed one.