RUGNAROK
This mod is an overhaul and expansion of the rugs of Skyrim. Now every rug has a matching normal map, and every rug mesh has a different rug texture set. 2K & 1K versions available.
RUGNAROK is my attempt to do for rugs what my PELTAPALOOZA mod did for pelts. Rugs aren’t merely clutter items in Skyrim, despite their classification. They also serve as artwork in the game, and in some locations such as Dragonsreach, they have a very large visual presence. The vanilla rug textures are not only low-res, but they are poorly designed. The fringed rugs actually use a separate set of rug textures just for the fringe. This is not only a waste of VRAM, but a poor solution, since the fringe only occupies a small part of the original textures.
UPDATE: Version 1.6 is a minor revision to correct one rug mesh which had the wrong normal map texture assigned to it. That is the only change.
Fortunately, raiserfx already addressed this issue with his excellent and immensely popular Detailed Rugs mod. He replaced the secondary rug textures with a new and more detailed fringe texture, as well as revising the meshes to use the new fringes. It’s a much better solution than what Bethesda came up with. It seemed obvious that any new overhaul should incorporate raiserfx’s quality fixes. I’m was pleased that he graciously granted me permission to use his fringes and mesh edits for this mod.
With RUGNAROK, I wanted to go beyond the default rug textures. While some of the Bethesda rug designs were OK to begin with, there was no point in duplicating what raiserfx did with Detailed Rugs. He created a truly hi-res lore-friendly retexture of the vanilla rug designs. I wanted to go further with a redesign of the rugs. Many of the vanilla rugs never appealed to me from a design standpoint. Not only were many of the designs uninteresting, but there was no overall design esthetic that I could discern. While I could well imagine that a number of the rugs might be imported, and not of Nord design, I still thought that most of them would be. And if they were of Nord design, they should have some shared motifs. That’s what I endeavored to do.
The rugs of Dragonsreach looked too bland and washed out, so I gave them a bolder and more defined pattern. I used this design motif in various forms across many of the rug designs to tie them together stylistically. The original Bethesda rugs repeated designs, with plain and fringed versions of the same rug. This was a waste to me, as there are 8 standard rug designs in the common clutter section, but 15 meshes. There are also 2 round rug designs, but 4 round rug meshes. They also had many of the rugs sharing the same normal map, so there’s no real depth to the details of the textures. With this mod, I expanded the rug designs, so there are now individual designs for the different meshes. There are also specific designs for Whiterun (Dragonsreach, Jorvaskr, and the tavern rugs) and Windhelm’s unique blue carpet. Also included are retextures for the Nordic ruins rug (and banner) and the Dwarven ruins rug (and banner). There are three color versions of the fringe texture, to better match the different rug color schemes.
I could go into a long(er)winded explanation for the changes I made to the rug designs, but I’ll just mention a couple, and let the screenshots speak for themselves. The Companions of Jorrvaskr wear the wolf armor which alludes to their werewolf heritage, but nothing else of their decoration hints at this. I changed the Jorrvaskr rug to also feature the wolf motif. The standard round rugs look like doormats, but they’re also used by the Khajiit caravan leaders. It seemed incongruous to me that a warm weather species like the Khajiit would sit out in the frigid Skyrim climate on a oversized doormat. I changed the design to be a suitably warm patchwork fur rug. There are two versions of the round fur rug.
I won’t bore you any longer, but I hope people enjoy the designs of RUGNAROK and the greater diversity it brings to the rugs of Skyrim. 2K and 1K versions are available, so download whichever version suits your setup.
