This mod is a lightweight overhaul of the Standing Stones found in Skyrim, heavily inspired by Morrowind and Oblivion.
Permissions and credits
Author's instructions
No assets from other modders are used, all are base game assets. You want to convert this for other games? Go for it. I'd appreciate a heads up so I know its been done. You want to make compatibility patches? Go for it. I'd appreciate a heads up so I can link it. You want to make updates and expansions of it? Go for it. I'd appreciate a heads up so I know its been done. You must give me credit for my work, and link back to this mod. You must permit others to use your work as I have permitted you. You can't sell this mod. You can't include this mod in things you are selling. You can't include this mod in anything you are locking behind a subscription service. You can earn donation points as long as what you make with it is more than a simple re-upload.
File credits
The Bethesda lore writer behind The Firmament: The loading screen texts
Donation Points system
This mod is opted-in to receive Donation Points
Changelogs
Version 1.2
Added Lover's Kiss greater power to the Lover. Paralyzes for 10 seconds.
The Ritual's Blessed Word is now a lesser power with a cost of 40 magicka. It has changed to an aimed single-target projectile. The damage portion has been removed.
Added Mara's Gift greater power to the Ritual. Once per day restores 100 health.
The Lady, Mage, Thief, and Warrior have been rebalanced to provide 5 "complete" levels in their respective focuses. They originally were balanced to provide 50 free points split between skills and attributes, now the Gaurdian Stones have 50 points of attributes and 50 points of skills while the Lady splits its 100 points evenly between the attributes and skills it increases.
The Lady now gives 25 instead of 10 Health, 25 instead of 10 Stamina, 25 instead of 10 Magicka, and 25 instead of 20 Speech.
The Mage now gives 10 Alteration, 10 Conjuration, 10 Destruction, 10 Illusion, and 10 Restoration.
The Thief now gives 50 instead of 20 Stamina, 15 instead of 10 Lockpicking, 15 instead of 10 Pickpocketing, 15 instead of 10 Sneak, and 5 One Handed.
The Warrior now gives 25 instead of 10 Health, 25 instead of 10 Stamina, 15 instead of 10 One Handed, 15 instead of 10 Two Handed, 15 instead of 10 Marksman, and 5 Block.
Altered the Thief's description to refer to "larceny skills" instead of "the Thief's skills" to alleviate any misunderstanding that it should be buffing all of the skills of the vanilla thief archetype.
The Lord's health regeneration has been boosted to 75% faster from 50% faster. Depending on how well the re-introduction of abilities like Lover's Kiss and the Ritual spell set go I might remove the regen and give the Lord its heal over time spell from Oblivion in a later update.
The Apprentice and Atronach have had the extra magicka they grant increased by 50 each. This was done to help keep them competitive with a buffed Mage. The new values of 150 and 200 reflect the magicka intelligence multipliers they granted in Morrowind (x1.5 and x2.0)
The Apprentice now gives 150 instead of 100 Magicka.
The Atronach now gives 200 instead of 150 Magicka.
Modified powerShrineScript to add and remove the new Lover and Ritual abilities. Source file is included under misc downloads.
Updated the Standing Stone activation messages to reflect the new abilities.
Version 1.1
Changed my implementation of The Mage, Warrior, and Thief Stones slightly. There were never any reports of it, but its possible that Hadvar/Ralof would not properly say their line upon choosing a stone and that should be fixed now.
The Serpent Stone has the paralyze effect re-added and its casting sound set to silent.
The Serpent Stone's DoT had its magnitude increased to 4(from 3) and its duration decreased to 23 (from 30). It does roughly the same amount of damage as before (2 points more total damage now), but the damage comes out faster.
Both Serpent effects are now effected by poison resistance.
Updated the Serpent Stone Message
The Lover's ability is renamed to "Her Comfort" instead of "Her Kisses". This may or may not be indicative of a future update having plans for the "Lover's Kiss" ability of old.
The Ritual's ability has been renamed to "Blessed Word" from "Blessed Gift". The 100 restore health effect has been removed from it.
Set every ability that was using a generic stat or attribute fortify/weakness effect to use custom ones made of SotS. This may actually be completely pointless and end up reverted later, don't count it as a real change,
Fixed a typo in the Thief Stone description, it now helps you carry out "illicit activites" instead of "elicit activities".
This mod changes many of Skyrim's Standing Stones with a vision heavily inspired by the birthsigns as they appeared in prior Elder Scrolls games. It isn't a direct recreation of Morrowind, Oblivion, or Skyrim but takes some things from all of them. It takes some liberties with some of the abilities and re-imagines them. I also changed the Standing Stone loading screens to have excerpts from the in-game book "The Firmament" instead of explaining to you what the ability whose description you already read does. I don't think I have much more to say on it then that, or at least nothing that reading the abilities wouldn't demonstrate better.
General Concept: My goal with the Guardian Signs was to help "soften" the edge of the early game. The Warrior helps a player experiment with the different weapon archetypes, the Mage lightens the pressure on the player's Magicka pool, and the Thief helps lessen low stealth skill failures. Ideally they also remain useful options as the game progresses. The Warrior, for example, makes spreading out weapon skills for a "swiss army knife fighter" less costly.
The Warrior
The Warrior is the first Guardian Constellation and he protects his charges during their Seasons. The Warrior's own season is Last Seed when his Strength is needed for the harvest. His Charges are the Lady, the Steed, and the Lord.
The Warrior: Warwyrd : 25 additional Health. 25 additional Stamina. 15 additional points of One Handed, Marksman, and Two Handed. 5 additional points of Block.
Concept: Choosing the Warrior Stone gives you roughly five free levels worth of Health, Stamina, and weapon skills. No matter the sort of weapon a player choosing the Warrior may wish to use, they will receive a bonus for it, which helps to encourage early experimentation. Stamina and Health are generically useful to all warrior-type builds.
Name: The name is the same name as the Warrior's ability in Morrowind.
The Mage
The Mage is a Guardian Constellation whose Season is Rain's Hand when magicka was first used by men. His Charges are the Apprentice, the Golem, and the Ritual.
The Mage: Fay : 50 extra points of Magicka. 10 additional points in every School of Magicka.
Concept: Choosing the Mage Stone gives you roughly five free levels' worth of Magicka and magic skills. This gives a decent enough edge to a mage looking to make use of any school, since Magicka is a generic resource shared by all of them and all of them receive a light skill bonus. In the case of a battle-mage or magic knight the Mage stone provides five free levels of flexibility, permitting the player to invest in health and stamina without having to sacrifice the depth of their magical resources.
Name: The name is the same name as the Mage's ability in Morrowind. It feels kind of weak compared to the others, but I don't have a compelling alternative.
The Thief
The Thief is the last Guardian Constellation, and her Season is the darkest month of Evening Star. Her Charges are the Lover, the Shadow, and the Tower.
The Thief: Destiny's Road : 50 more Stamina. 15 points in Lockpicking, Pickpocket, and Sneak. 5 points in One Handed.
Concept: Choosing the Thief Stone gives you roughly five free levels' worth of Stamina and larceny skills. The common "failure" skills of an early-game thief are given bonuses, which should help make success rates more consistent. This should lead to less time running from the guards or sitting in a jail cell, and more time getting rich. When stealth fails the extra stamina should help give you the speed necessary to stay a good sprint ahead of the law. The One Handed bonus will help the thief a tiny bit out if all else fails and the daggers come out.
Name: The name is taken from Emperor Uriel's quote upon choosing the Thief sign in Oblivion "Today the Thief shall guide your steps on the road to destiny." The Morrowind name was no good for this one, and given my design intent of reducing punishing rng I thought the theme of destiny or fate worked well.
Additional Thoughts: This one is likely the weakest of the Guardian Signs, but the new update's increase of the stamina bonus might change that. Players who reload saves rather than play out failure are likely to see very little benefit from it (though their quickload button might).
The Wanderer
General Concept: Its the snake.
The Serpent
The Serpent wanders about in the sky and has no Season, though its motions are predictable to a degree. No characteristics are common to all who are born under the sign of the Serpent. Those born under this sign are the most blessed and the most cursed.
The Serpent: Viper's Dance : Once per day inflict a paralytic poison on a target that does 4 points of damage for 23 seconds.
Concept: Choosing the Serpent Stone gives you a silent daily power to inflict a poison attack onto an enemy. It takes awhile, but it does an impressive amount of damage in total. After 7 seconds it has done more damage than the vanilla Serpent ability. Unlike vanilla, the poison effect has a silent casting sound, which may widen utility as a stealth tool.
Name: Morrowind's name didn't fit my version of the ability, Uriel had nothing good to say on it, and Oblivion's name of "Serpent Spell" wasn't exactly evocative. Oblivion had a power called "Cobra's Dance" which was a beefier version of Oblivion's Serpent Sign, so I took that and made it a viper instead. Hsssssssssss
Additional Thoughts: The Morrowind version of the Serpent was the primary inspiration here. My version lacks the self-damage component. What I would have liked to do is make Viper's Dance a "free" lesser power with the self-damage acting as its "cost", but I'm not quite sure Skyrim permits adding self-targeted effects to non-self delivery spells.
The Charges
General Concept: While the Guardians were constrained to be more rigid and archetypal, the Charges generally do not follow that mindset. They are varied, but their potential utility is less broad. Whereas pretty much any build vaguely related to a Guardian's focus could make some use of them, that won't necessarily be true for the Charges.
The Lady
The Lady is one of the Warrior's Charges and her Season is Heartfire. Those born under the sign of the Lady are kind and tolerant.
The Lady: Favor and Grace : 25 additional Health, 25 additional Stamina, 25 additional Magicka. 25 point bonus to speech.
Concept: Choosing the Lady Stone gives you a very strong all around attribute bonus and a potent increase to the Speech skill. Regardless of play style, the Lady's attribute bonuses will help a character be better equipped to deal with whatever life(or the game) throws at them. The bonus to Speechcraft lets a starting character handle most earlier speech checks with ease and will help even a later character overcome some of the most difficult ones regardless of their investment into Speech.
Name: The name is taken from the names of the Lady's abilities in Morrowind, "Lady's Favor" and "Lady's Grace", which were then combined.
Additional Thoughts: The Lady has always been a favorite sign of mine from prior games. While it changed notably between Morrowind and Oblivion it remained pretty useful in both, and is generally a decent fit for most kinds of characters. There are better specialist options in both games, but I love generalist builds and there has always been something I thematically like but can't quite put my finger on with the Lady.
The Steed
The Steed is one of the Warrior's Charges, and her Season is Mid Year. Those born under the sign of the Steed are impatient and always hurrying from one place to another.
The Steed: Charioteer : Carry capacity increased by 100 points, armor weighs nothing and doesn't slow you down when worn.
Concept: Choosing the Steed Stone gives you twenty free levels of Carry Weight and makes armor weigh nothing while worn and not slow you. The Steed Stone is a good choice for characters that aren't too excited about worrying about carry weight or want the protection of armor without its penalty to speed. The Steed is about mobility, and more specifically about bypassing/lessening mechanics that restrict mobility.
Name: The name is the same name as the Steed's ability in Morrowind.
Additional Thoughts: You've likely noticed the Steed Stone is exactly the same as vanilla except that I gave it the nice ability name. I think the vanilla Steed Stone does exactly what it needs to do and accurately reflects the intent of its Oblivion and Morrowind incarnations within Skyrim's environment.
The Lord
The Lord's Season is First Seed and he oversees all of Tamriel during the planting. Those born under the sign of the Lord are stronger and healthier than those born under other signs.
The Lord: Kin of the North : Regenerate Health 75% faster, but suffer from 50% weakened fire resistance.
Concept: Choosing the Lord Stone lets you passively regain health at a faster rate, but penalizes this with a weakness to fire. The Lord Stone is a good option for front-line fighters looking to further enhance an already high durability, or for characters focusing on hit and run tactics. It is also generically useful to characters seeking to recover more quickly and with less resources between encounters. The weakness to fire forces the character to vary their tactics when confronted with a foe that they cannot simply endure. Name: The name is taken from the names of the Lord's abilities in Morrowind, "Blood of the North" and "Trollkin", which were then combined. I'm not exactly enamored with the result, but its good enough.
Additional Thoughts: I fear the Lord may be too weak. I am in a hard place with balancing it. Even without regeneration boosts, Skyrim's passive player health regeneration trivializes the need to expend resources to recover health outside of high-burst scenarios. Balancing a stronger Lord health regeneration effect by increasing the severity of the fire weakness is not a satisfying option to me. I don't want to create a binary system where your sole states of existence are either being a completely unstoppable regen tank or getting one shot by a lit match. I foresee a lot of back and forth tweaking with the strength of the Lord's effects.
The Apprentice
The Apprentice's Season is Sun's Height. Those born under the sign of the Apprentice have a special affinity for magick of all kinds, but are more vulnerable to magick as well.
The Apprentice: Elfboon : 150 extra points of Magicka. The Apprentice: Elfbane : Magic Resistance reduced by 100%.
Concept: Choosing the Apprentice Stone gives you fifteen free levels' worth of Magicka, and a severe weakness to magic. The Apprentice Stone is obviously a very strong option for mages of all kinds. Ten levels is a lot of extra space to work with. The drawback to the Apprentice Stone is its severe vulnerability to magic. Most characters choosing the Apprentice will want to find some way of countering this effect.
Name: The names are taken from the Apprentice's ability in Morrowind, "Elfborn" and modified to describe which component of the effect they are referring to.
The Atronach
The Atronach (often called the Golem) is one of the Mage's Charges. Its season is Sun's Dusk. Those born under this sign are natural sorcerers with deep reserves of magicka, but they cannot generate magicka of their own.
The Atronach: Wombburnt : 200 extra points of Magicka. Absorb 50% of the magicka from hostile spells. Magicka does not regenerate.
Concept: Choosing the Atronach Stone gives you twenty(!) free levels' worth of Magicka, a 50% chance of absorbing spells, and renders your Magicka incapable of regeneration. Characters using the Atronach Stone get a lot of Magicka to play around with, but they'll struggle to keep it topped off. Skyrim generally doesn't ask you think very much about maintaining your Health, Stamina, and Magicka resources, everything regenerates quickly. The Atronach works well for hybrid characters who can fall back to other methods of attack if their Magicka runs dry, but it can also be a powerful boon to pure mages who are willing to think about how to overcome the Atronach's limitations.
Name: The name is a slightly altered version of the Atronach's ability from Morrowind.
The Ritual
The Ritual is one of the Mage's Charges and its Season is Morning Star. Those born under this sign have a variety of abilities depending on the aspects of the moons and the Divines.
The Ritual: Blessed Word : Undead up to level 30 flee for 30 seconds. Lesser Power, costs 40 magicka to use. The Ritual: Mara's Gift : Once per day restore 200 points of Health.
Concept: Choosing the Ritual Stone gives you a powerful Turn Undead spell as a Lesser Power and a powerful self-heal as a Greater Power. The Ritual is a powerful tool for anyone fighting against the Undead. Blessed Word is able to be cast hands-free, allowing it to be useful no matter what weapons your build may use. Mara's Gift is a powerful emergency heal, able to help any playstyle get out of a sticky situation.
Name: The names are taken from the names of the Ritual's Abilities in Morrowind and Oblivion "Blessed Word" and "Mara's Gift"
Additional Thoughts: This one is probably going to be the most controversial one in the mod. It is the complete opposite of the vanilla incarnation of the Ritual.
The Lover
The Lover is one of the Thief's Charges and her season is Sun's Dawn. Those born under the sign of the Lover are graceful and passionate.
The Lover: Her Comfort : All skills improve 15% faster. The Lover: Lover's Kiss : Once per day paralyze a target for 10 seconds.
Concept: Choosing the Lover Stone gives you a 15% increase in the rate at which you acquire skills, and access to the Lover's Kiss Greater Power. The Lover is a generalist option. There isn't a character that can't benefit from leveling a bit faster. While Lover's Kiss has a longer duration than the paralyze from the Serpent, the Serpent remains a superior combat option due to its damage over time. It functions primarily as something to add on to Her Comfort rather than a standalone reason to use the Lover.
Name: It's just "Lover's Comfort" but re-worded. "Lover's Kiss" derives from the ability from prior games.
Additional Thoughts: I've returned Lover's Kiss. I'd like to play around with finding a way to implement it as a lesser power that uses stamina to cast, but don't really know how I could do that in a clean way.
The Shadow
The Shadow's Season is Second Seed. The Shadow grants those born under her sign the ability to hide in shadows.
The Shadow: Moonshadow : Invisibility for 60 seconds.
Concept: Choosing the Shadow Stone gives you a silent daily power that lets you become invisible for sixty seconds. The Shadow is a useful choice for a thieves and assassins and helps prevent them from visual detection. It could also serve as a useful tool for those who aren't exactly masters of stealth when the situation calls going undetected. Name: The name is the same name as the Shadow's ability in Morrowind.
Additional Thoughts: Once again, it is mostly unchanged from vanilla. I did set the stealth effect to have a silent casting noise. Like the Steed, I don't really see anything to change. It does what it is supposed to do, and reflects what it was in earlier games.
The Tower
The Tower is one of the Thief's Charges and its Season is Frostfall. Those born under the sign of the Tower have a knack for finding gold and can open locks of all kinds.
The Tower: Wheeling Key : Unlock any Expert level lock once per day.
Concept: Choosing the Tower Stone gives you a silent daily power that lets you open most locks in the game. The Tower is a useful choice for thieves and characters who want to open locks but lack the skills to do so themselves. Most locks in the game can be opened through its use.
Name: Prior games had names like "Tower Key". The Tower is a Wheel on its side.
Additional Thoughts: Also the same as vanilla, didn't even have a noise flag to change. It once again fulfills its niche, reflects its history, etc. Much of the detect item functionality from previous games has vanished in Skyrim, but I'd like to find some way to re-introduce Beggar's Nose.
Some General Thoughts on Design and the Mod
Spoiler:
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The vanilla Guardian Stones are pretty uninteresting. I think my take is still a useful starting boost, but in a way that's more involved with your stats and character than what's basically the Skyrim equivalent of an mmo new-player exp boost. I kept the Lover Stone exp boost because I thematically like the "always feel the Lover's Comfort/never truly alone" sort of thing it had going for it. I tried to avoid and eliminate regeneration boosts. I think they aren't very interesting and are hard to quantify for me from a design perspective. I radically changed the Ritual because of the complete 180 Skyrim made in what it is and cosmologically represents. The mod page for Stones of the Stars has existed since June, but I haven't been comfortable with the idea of uploading it until recently. Its a very different sort of mod from what I usually release, and has a lot more of me put into it, if that makes sense.
FAQ
Q: Is this mod Vanilla+? A: Not in my opinion. It doesn't seek to be much more complex or intricate than vanilla, though I do feel the mod's abilities enable a more "thinking" or character building sort of approach to Standing Stones than vanilla does. But crucially I think Stones of the Stars makes some very radical departures from vanilla in regards to certain abilities, enough so that I would not call it Vanilla+. Or maybe I should call it that anyways, it seemed to be popular label for a bit.
Q: How is this an overhaul? Three of the Stones are the same as vanilla you lazy shit! A: The objective of this mod isn't "make every stone different from vanilla". I don't want to chase change for the sake of change. Stones that I felt reflected their incarnations in earlier games and/or effectively fulfilled their niche have no need for me to change them. And one of those has tweaks to its casting noise flags to better represent a stealth ability.
Q: What the actual fuck did you do to the Ritual Stone? A: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Made it like it was before Skyrim.
Compatibility
This mod is not intended to be used alongside other mods that overhaul Standing Stones. It will be weird if you do that. I don't think it can really conflict with anything outside of that. It doesn't change anything in the game world, just loading screens, the message prompts for selecting the Stone, and the Stone abilities.
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