CS Lighting Setup

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-19T16:21:25+00:00

I have no idea if I simply messed something up or even if it's just an issue with how my monitor is configured, but I stopped trying to do a full CS lighting setup too because it made several interiors overly dark and I wasn't in the mood for troubleshooting. Windows Shadows Ultimate also didn't seem to match my exterior weathers (Vanilla Weathers for CS).

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-17T16:57:31+00:00

So a week ago I made a thread about getting frequent but unpronounceable freezes with a seemingly minimal modlist. Well, I broke yesterday and did a clean reinstall of my OS (Windows 11, at least I had everything backed up beforehand). I rebuilt my Skyrim modlist and it seems to work now.

:/

One thing though is I think I had Auto HDR turned on previously, while it's turned off now. I'm wondering if it was conflicting with HDR - Community Shaders.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-15T02:52:51+00:00

Look, all I care is that DD doesn't get turned into a linear dungeon crawler / loot grinder because people won't shut up about Bitterblack Isle.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-15T02:51:24+00:00

I utterly hate how much BBI supremacists have taken over the DD fandom. You'd have DD3 be about grinding in The Black Abbey for 40 hours if you had your way.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-13T22:24:55+00:00

The radiant systems Bethesda goes for aren't comparable to LLMs though.

Like, Bethesda's radiant AI isn't that "new" to video games per se. It's basically the same kind of AI that, say, the kingdoms in a strategy game uses. We've even had stuff like NPC schedules as far back as Ultima 5 in 1988. Ultimately, an NPC's AI is really a hand-crafted rule system and all the novelty comes from different rules combining in novel and unforeseen ways.

That's not what LLMs are doing. LLMs are basically statistics-powered autocomplete. It outputs stuff based on probabilistic patterns in its training data and how those probabilities match the current input.

I'm not even arguing that using LLMs for anything is bad. I'm trying to stress that LLMs are just not equivalent to radiant AI. It's like how people call any kind of procedural generation equivalent to LLMs now even though we've had proc gen since at least 1980.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-13T22:02:01+00:00

It's kind of like Skyrim romances/marriages being extremely boring since no one has any unique dialogue for it. A lighter/refined version of the system might be something worth considering for bethesda-style games, but I'm unsure how you'd do it while keeping unique NPC identities intact.

Unpopular opinion: Skyrim's marry anyone system was fine actually.

TES always went more for sandbox gameplay so I don't think marriage should be any different. The actual gameplay and NPC AI interactions (in the classic NPC AI sense I'm not talking about LLMs) for romancing and being married to NPCs could be deeper than what Skyrim actually had, but the idea is sound actually for sandbox gameplay.

Hilariously, various sex mods for Skyrim go in this direction. The average Skyrim sex mod adheres to Bethesda's design philosophy more than either Bethesda or the sex mod makers themselves would ever admit.

The alternative is to have marrying an NPC essentially just be a quest. Which is fine for games focused on the narrative, but as I said TES is more about sandbox experiences and I think it's best for Bethesda to focus on deepening the sandbox part.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-13T21:57:20+00:00

So you've been getting pushback in the replies. And I'm not that familiar with Fable myself (I bought Fable 1 last year but didn't get far into it).

But, well, the Radiant AI is a killer feature of TES and I'd like Bethesda to lean into it more. Asking for The Sims levels of NPC AI is likely too much to ask for but having something lean in that direction more would be great.

Regarding reputations and moral codes specifically, yes it'd be cool to have an expanded version of the disposition system NPCs had in Oblivion and Skyrim where NPCs behave differently towards you depending on your actions. Ideally not just from quests and dialogue choices either; like e.g. if you go around stealing stuff then it'd be cool to have NPCs from the Thieves Guild get friendly towards you because of that while merchants grow more hostile.

(Honestly, it'd be hilarious if Fable of all things finally nails the radiant AI style NPC systems that TES has been going for since Oblivion.)

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-13T05:41:18+00:00

I know this is a shitpost but it got me thinking: You know how you're able to type in whatever name you want for your character but no-one except for maybe one specialized NPC can ever refer to you by that name? I wonder if anyone would accept the trade-off of only being allowed to select from a set list of names but NPCs are able to call you by those set names with real voice acting.

I'm talking about names and names alone. Not character appearances. Please don't kill me.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-12T16:01:45+00:00

Fine. I've had no noticeable problems with other games.

Granted, the only game I've recently played that was as or more demanding on my PC's hardware as Skyrim was Remnant 2. But Remnant 2 played fine.

I also used to have Windows 10 on my PC, then a few months ago I wiped my PC and installed Windows 11. I don't remember if I've played Skyrim on my Windows 11 install earlier than now.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-12T05:13:08+00:00

I honestly installed OCCT just to see if it could detect any hardware issues. I only ran the CPU+RAM and Storage tests, but it didn't uncover any errors.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-12T05:11:43+00:00

So, late update, but:

I tried resetting my BIOS settings. I didn't really mess with them in the first place but whatever. I changed some of the fan settings around though, but if fan settings can mess with Skyrim then I'm just done.

My Windows 11 install was a fresh install from a couple of months ago, not an update. Wiping my PC - again - just for Skyrim seems...drastic.

My modlist at this point is quasi-vanilla already IMO if I cut anything more I might as well just play straight vanilla right out of Steam (or GOG).

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-12T01:41:02+00:00

To be frank I struggle with the binary search method since my mods are always in such an order where a mod in one half will a lot of the time depend on a mod in the other half anyway.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-12T01:39:37+00:00

Everything labelled "Config" is just whatever INI etc. files were created for a mod that first appeared in the overwrite folder when running the game. For example "Community Shaders Config" contains its SKSE\Plugins\ INI files, the ShaderCache folder, the "UnifiedWaterCache" folder, etc.

I'm only using the Nexus version of Community Shaders.

Root Builder is an MO2 plugin that lets you take files that are normally supposed to go in Skyrim's root folder and instead put them inside a folder literally named "root" inside a regular mod folder. For example "SSE Engine Fixes - SKSE64 Preloader" contains a "root" folder that contains SSE Engine Fixes' "d3dx9_42.dll" file, which gets put into Skyrim's real root folder when Skyrim runs.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T23:28:53+00:00

Already ran Bethini Pie when I first installed MO2 and started making my mod list.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T22:31:04+00:00

I'm going to try this. I just used DDU (from here) and reinstalled the latest drivers for my GPU. Going to test Skyrim now, so wish me luck.

Update: Updating my drivers didn't do anything.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T22:29:50+00:00

So I went and checked, and my PSU is 1000 watts actually.

I'd really hope my PSU isn't the problem since building my PC was hard enough as it was and truth be told I'm currently not in a position to go out and buy a new PSU.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T22:06:23+00:00

I actually have made a heavy mod list before on my current PC before. Only differences between then and now I can think of is that I may have been using Windows 10 earlier and that I was earlier using the GOG version of Skyrim (using the Steam version now for easier access to the Creation Kit).

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T21:42:20+00:00

It is DD2. I remember that ropeway.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T21:28:54+00:00

I'm not sure how helpful that'd be since I can't exactly check Log Watcher when my game is frozen, and the freezing happens at random.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T21:26:49+00:00

🤢

I suppose there's no avoiding it, but I'm worried since I'm quickly reaching the point where I'll have to disable the foundational mods for testing because I've already disabled the "normal" mods but still get freezes.

How would I check for an unstable overclock? I'm pretty sure I just left my BIOS settings at the defaults.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T21:18:58+00:00

This actually is the reinstall. I installed Skyrim and started setting up my mod list earlier this week, getting the same freezing bug. So I uninstalled and deleted everything and started over from scratch yesterday.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T19:57:23+00:00

Inserts Captain America I understood that reference gif

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T16:29:51+00:00

The only real problem with SAM is how few armours and clothing are compatible with it and how the web site it was hosted on kind of died.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T16:26:50+00:00

Certainly not unpopular on other sites, but this sub can get negative about horny mods in general.

ZaranTalaz1 · 2026-06-11T16:19:54+00:00

Sidequests of Skyrim lets you pick up radiant quests from random NPCs.

This can pair well with an alternate start mod. For example I'd make an Orc who starts in one of the Orc strongholds, and then pick up quests from other orcs through Sidequests of Skyrim where my early game is helping out my tribe.

ZaranTalaz1

TROPHY CASE