Dundee Lad

So for the last couple of weeks I’ve been lazing about at home on holiday. To keep myself occupied I decided to give Linux another go, since I’d been hearing it has got so much better for serious gaming. After a lot of fucking about with various distros, I finally settled on RegataOS, which is a Brazilian distro that runs on OpenSUSE. And so far, the biggest criticism I have of it, is that unlike pretty much every other distro out there, this one has no support forum. The only official support seems to be on a fucking Telegram group. Uh, fuck that Russian shitshow. Anyway, the few issues I’ve had with it have been covered elsewhere on the net and all in all, it is running beautifully. So good, in fact, that I’ve hardly spent any time on Windows 11 this past fortnight.

Anyway, more later but for now I just want to point out one important difference between Linux and Windows; in Linux, USB actually works properly! Seriously, on Windows transferring a 2 GB file to a USB3 memory stick takes ages because it averages around 30 to 40 MB/s. That same file, on that same memory stick takes seconds on Linux because it is being transferred at an average of 130 MB/s. Good job, Microsoft.

Slowly but surely I will create a series about using Mod Organizer 2 for all your Fallout and Skyrim modding needs. Slowly. Starting…now.

The first thing you have to do is to always save any mod download in an appropriately named sub-folder/sub-directory. For example, a mod that is a Quest & Adventure should be saved in a folder of that title. Likewise, a bug fix should be in a folder named “Bug Fixes”. Now, this isn’t a hard and fast rule because sometimes you’ll download a mod and decide it needs to go into a differently named folder. Again, an example might be a patch for a custom follower that the creator uploaded to the Patches section of the Nexus but which I would save in the same sub-folder as the main files for the follower, so on my hard-drive that looks likes this: \SkyrimModding\FOLLOWERS & COMPANIONS\Remiel\

Now, this might seem a bit anal retentive and annoying but trust me on this, you do not want to lump every mod in the same folder because six months later you will regret that decision.

So I’m relatively new to Skyrim, having only purchased it 4 years ago, and for the first couple of years I was pretty obsessed with it–as only an ADHDer can be. But then late last year I got bored with it and switched focus to AVNs. I still have a handful of those “games” I’m playing but I’m mostly back to playing Skyrim again. Of course, when I got bored I also got frustrated with the amount of mods and other files I had accumulated, so I did a mass delete of them all. Yeah, that was a mistake. So now I’m having to redownload most of the good mods I originally had, plus some new stuff.

One of the mods I did like and have redownloaded was an odd little follower mod called:

M.E.I. - Maven Elenwen Ingun - Followers & Spouses - Quest Expansion

As you may have guessed from the title, it is a mod that lets you recruit Maven Black-Briar and/or her daughter Ingun and/or Elenwan–yes the very same High Elf bitch trying to kill all the Blades and, by extension, you–into followers, and possibly your spouse. The mod author creates a new backstory for Maven and Elenwan, and you begin to realise they are not as evil as Bethesda would have you believe. It really is one of the most interesting follower/quest mods on the market and the author is still expanding it. However, because it rewrites the scripts for Maven and Ingun it requires a patch for any mod that replaces Maven and Ingun. There are some on the download page, including one for Dibella’s Blessing, which is the female NPC replacer I was once using, and which I may go back to because I really like the depiction of Maven in this one.

Anyway, I’ve also used a couple of other NPC replacers and I’ve made a patch for both of them. The first one is for Courageous Women - High Poly Head Female NPC Overhaul.
The patch isn’t on the Nexus yet but you can download it here: Courageous Women M.E.I. Patch.
I downloaded the 2k AIO loose version, which was second entry under Main Files on the Nexus files page. I can’t imagine it would matter if you chose something else.

The second NPC replacer I tried was NITHI NPC ENHANCEMENT - The Rift I just used the single main file, and didn’t bother with the 2k face tints. My patch can be downloaded here: NITHI The Rift Women M.E.I. Patch.