The Gray Cowl of Nocturnal
This is my last fatigue about Skyrim Modding and I’ve done it very… Big!
Will you be worthy for the Gray Cowl of Nocturnal? We’ll see!
* INTRODUCTION *
This is my last fatigue about Skyrim Modding and I’ve done it very… Big!
Will you be worthy for the Gray Cowl of Nocturnal? We’ll see!
* THE STORY *
For a long time no one claimed the Gray Cowl of Nocturnal. The last one was the Champion of Cyrodiil at the ending days of the Third Era. But what happened after the Oblivion Crisis? Where is the Gray Cowl now? You’re a thief and during stealing and pickpocketing items around the world, a vision appears in front of you. The Gray Cowl is calling. The big journey has started… Where will you go now? Many places are awaiting you. Legendary places, mysterious places, ancient places that needs to be cleaned up from the sands of time. The Gray Cowl wants you.
* TO-DO BEFORE INSTALLING MY MOD (A MUST READ PART) *
The first rule of a good player of modded games is: Make a new save game before installing a new mod. Do it or blame yourself if something went broke.
This mod has something of “to assume” that must be considered during the gameplay. The first and important one is: Dismiss all your followers, because some places are designed for the player only. I’ve not scripted anything about automatic follower dismission, because many of you uses a modded follower system. I strongly recommend to dismiss them, because you can have unexpected glitches like disappearing followers, re-appearing and maybe forever disappearing. By the way, in the middle of the journey, you’ll realize that there is a way to recruit again your followers. My suggestion is to do first, the main quest, alone. All the other misc quests, can be done with followers, if you want.
Another “to assume” thing, is that you already know that you’re the Dragonborn. I’ve not added any start condition to the quest trigger, because many of you don’t play the main quest of Skyrim.
* RECOMMENDED LEVEL AND SKILLS *
I recommend you to be at least level 15 (Level 10 is the minimum required to trigger the quest. Level 30-35 is perfect to play), and also to have good skill points and perks for sneaking (most important) and pickpocketing (this, can be “tweaked” during gameplay, if you have a good eye). Some bosses are tough, especially those who are related to side quests. My mod can be finished with a barbarian class too, if you want, but thieves/assassins will be fully satisfied at this mod.
* HOW BIG IS THIS MOD? *
It’s big enough, you can consider this mod as a DLC-sized one. Gameplay time will be between 8-10 and more hours, depending on your class, style of gameplay, etc. Again, i must say, the thieves/assassins will fully enjoy this mod. There are some famous places to visit, two lands, including an island in Coldharbour realm, and a hidden and isolated area of Hammerfell.
* HOW TO START THE QUEST? *
You really need to know how to start? Really? Ok… Just steal or pickpocket any item.
* IS THIS MOD LORE-FRIENDLY? *
That’s a good question. I’ll say YES and NO. As many of you already know, the Champion of Cyrodiil, during the game of Oblivion, became Sheogorath. The original ending scene of this mod, was planned in a different way, to match the Lore. But i had to change it, all, due to i have been waiting for nothing, during almost two months, because the voice actor guy, that was supposed to be Sheogorath, didn’t send me the voice files. I was really bored, so the ending will be a bit odd for “lore purists”. In short: I’m assuming that you have to NOT consider the Shivering Isles DLC of Oblivion. Maybe, one day, i will release a “Director’s Cut Edition” of this mod, but don’t ask for any ETA neither for any possible further release of it. I’m really sorry (and i feel sad also). Despite of all these things, let’s enjoy the mod!
From v2.0 the mod is finally Lore-Friendly. You have to play the mod ’till the end and you’ll see yourself.
* TECHNICAL INFOS *
This mod contains many, many, many new assets like new meshes, new sounds, new textures and new voices. You’ll see new dungeons, new houses and new landscapes. All of these 3D assets are made by myself, except for a few things that i will credit to the authors, in the next lines below.
This mod is released as ESM. I will appreciate (and i wish too) that other modders, would want to mod my mod, by adding new stuff, like new dungeons, new quests, etc.
The load order is not really important, just put it after your last Official DLC (after Dragonborn, for example), and the Unofficial Patches (not so necessary).
This mod does NOT require any Official DLC, SKSE, SkyUI, neither any other. Although is compatible with them. Just needs an updated version of Skyrim (the last 1.9.32.0.8).
* UNINSTALLATION *
UNSUPPORTED. This mod is too big to be uninstalled without issues. You may use the Save game script cleaner tool to clear your savegame but I don’t give any support for this.
* COMPATIBILITY? *
This mod should be compatible with everything, except with mods that edits the same cells at the Skyrim worldspace.
Please don’t make the classic question “Is this mod compatible with… ?”. Check the compatibility with your favourite mods by yourself. If some of your preferred mods requires patches, then ask to the authors of this mods. I’ll not make any patches for any other mods.
* KNOWN ISSUES *
As far as we’ve tested, my mod doesn’t contains any sort of issues. Everything is *new*, including light templates and image spaces. This includes new climates and weathers too.
Some dungeons are intentionally dark to see, especially one of them, that is in a “pitch-black” illumination. If you have any ENB configuration that makes darker the interior cells, then, it will cause your screen turns to black, and you won’t see anything. Just disable your ENB temporarily, if this happens. Also, some interior cells have the skybox enabled and, again, some ENB configurations will make the visuals looks too dark, so disable ENB once more.
