FCOM for Skyrim?
The mod was revolutionary and took years of development to get it to it's present status. And the tools to do so were available early for Oblivion.
And don't forget that FCOM is only a series of patches that make several game overhauls work together without confict.
ATM we don't even have one successful or bug free overhaul mod.
Never mind the bugs in the CK. Quite simply the tools just aren't available to make a mod of this scale for Skyrim.
A fully functioning equivalent of Wrye Bash and others is a must before it could even be considered.
Continuing development difficulties and unfortunate circumstance makes it appear that Wrye Smash has been almost abandoned by it's keepers.

It appears the quality of the mods is getting better. Skyrim has just hit a new high: http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=17545

Epic...

This made my day. I'm laughin tears. Most hilarious mod since fish slab in Oblivion.

That... is one of the best joke mods I've ever seen. Looks pretty painful, though.

I meant a Java version of TES5EDIT.

Now THAT was freaking hilarious! Thanks for posting. On the other hand, the lack of the type of mods that I use is quite evident in my load order. Most of what is out there is either too lore breaking, unbalanced or just plain old stupid for me to download. Basically, all I run right now is below. Notice the lack of “overhaul” mods, stupid doe-eyed, elf-eared alternate race mods, skimpy armor, DD briast size mods, nvde body mods, and anything else that does not feel like it is in the vanilla game.

SkyUI
Better Road Map
Official Hi-Res Textures
UFO
Distant Terrain mod
Container Categories
Balok’s housing tweaks (Proudspire manor-unreleased & Breezehome-released)
Balok’s Greymoor Cottage (unreleased personal mod)
3rd era weapons
jasus swords

This.

"Great" mods for Oblivion & Fallout 3 didn't just pop up right away, either.


It's easy to make skimpy armor, overpowered weapons, and houses-made-from-standard-modules. The big stuff takes time. And learning/making the tools.

To be sure, the mod landscape and its tools haven't yet matured to the degree that Oblivion or Morrowind has. That's to be expected. And to be sure, the navmesh bug remains a serious issue that's blocking whole categories of mods from being widely worked on and accepted by players. That's less expected. But I don't understand the constant refrain that there are nothing but skimpy armor mods. There are good hypothermia mods, there are good basic needs mods, there are good crafting mods, there are several quality mods that add to the wildlife, there are good mods that enhance spawns and enemy AI, there are several good follower overhauls, there are mods to make NPCs more interesting a la Morrowind's LGNPC project, there are mods that improve melee combat, there are mods that add missing spells and rebalance magic, there are mods that make the economy more complex, etc.

To say there are no good gameplay mods can only discourage the modders who have been working long and hard to produce just these sorts of mods, and who have produced impressive results already while teaching themselves the intricacies of a new scripting language and new mod-making paradigms. Modders of course must ultimately work for themselves and their own satisfaction, but it would still be nice if the community did not discount their efforts quite so blithely. That, more than anything, is what may put the community at risk.

I really hope that my mod and other large mods that come out this fall can liven up the modding scene. :/

I was under the impression Skyrim Nexus alone was already well on its way on surpassing Oblivion Nexus in terms of total content and downloads.

I also get the feeling Skyrim won't end up with as many significant total overhaul experiences like OOO or MMM, but rather more smaller-scale projects which makes modded Skyrim more modular in nature.

Like true. Skyrim doesn't really need a massive all-encompasing overhaul because Bethesda largely took care of all that in the vanilla game. So yes, smaller more focused mods will be the norm this time around. Apparently that's a lot like how it was with Morrowind. Not a bad thing by any stretch, and certainly a viable enough type of mod to make things interesting, but the long term health of things is questionable as long as the navmesh bug remains.

Speaking of massive overhauls, there is atleast one out already at this time, that is updated very frequently and works well for the most part. Still issues to sort out etc, but considering the sheer size of it that's understandable, and it's still in beta-phase. Not quite the size of some of Oblivion's overhauls yet, but still does well.. a lot. http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/downloads/file.php?id=9286 SkyRe - Skyrim Redone for those interested (No, I have no part whatsoever in this project so just plugging it for him )

Agreed on all points. I prefer a more gently modded experience in general because I personally don't have a ton of stuff that that I really think needs "fixing". Many mods I've seen go WAY too far in my opinion. For example, I wouldn't necessarily mind something that tweaks crafting or whatever, but to totally overhaul the system is not needed as I feel it's fine as it is. There are parts of other mods that I would probably try out if they were modular, and you could pick and choose what you want to try out. But there is so much other unrelated crap in them and I don't want that junk messing up my game so I don't download them.

If more gameplay type mods were more modular where I and other potential users had the ability to pick and choose what they want, I might try more. I know I'm probably in the distinct minority, but I agree there's a TON of stuff I really like in the vanilla game, so I don't personally feel the need for a lot of gameplay overhauls.

Feature creep is a terrible thing that many modders seem unable to break free of.

Guilty as charged! Though I do try and keep my feature creep relevant to the intent of the mod and not trailing off into something entirely different

Besides, feature creep is how some of us are learning the stuff we'll need for the bigger mods later.

I don't even bother playing with mods with Skyrim. I prefer the vanilla game. Unofficial Skyrim Patch is the only external file loaded, EVER; has been for many months.

This. I was fairly prolific producing resources for OB. Haven't been inclined with SR and even if/when tools are available I'm not sure that will change.

Skrim modding is not dying out, it is just having a "slower" start.

It seems many are wanting things that took years to do on MW and OB to be done in the CK merely months into Skyrim, and that is not feasible, especially with the CK bugs. Really, I think people have forgotton how the modding community of both Morrowind and Oblivion started out. Morrowind's "golden age" of modding did not happen months after release, it took years. As for Oblivion, it too took time for the "good stuff" to be released. Skyrim is the same way (a shocker, I know...).

Granted, Skyrim has to contend with more creation[kit] bugs than MW and OB, so that just slowed things down. Once bugs (like the navmesh one) are fixed, and Dawnguard is released, many people will come back/resume working. BUT it will still take quite some time for the "golden age" of Skyrim modding to happen.

I miss the modeling that you did.

One little thing. Do any of you know why Beth never made a CK for the Xbox or PS3? They were going to but both Microsoft and Sony ordered them to stop immediately!

Source?

False. Bethesda has always said that the CK is PC-only. Todd made a couple of wishful comments about getting mods on consoles, but that's not the same as getting the CK there.

http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Creation_Kit

"Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 will not have the Creation Kit. During Bethesda's attempt to create one for these consoles, Microsoft and Sony interceded and asked them to desist."

Sorry but the Wiki page doesn't seem to have a source for that statement. Have you got another?

I did sort of infer from some comments from a Valve dude that they're working on increasing the 100 mb limit,, but its a big job as the server architecture is sort of not up for the job..

So that would be one hurdle removed.. I'm really struggling to keep the moonpath under 100 mb.. now all the creature textures are 1K instead of 2K , had to learn the FUZ thing from scratch to get the compression to work.
Also its true doing a big mod in the CK for skyrim,, you'r busier fixing bugs or struggling against the editor itself than creating the mod..
For me for instance i can't get the batched lip generator to work, (can get all the other batched stuff to work but not that) so it takes me 30 minutes to re-lip a new quest..

Also the limitations seem worst.. The moonpath is 95 mb or something, but it turned into a decent sized mod, with about 11-12 different area's , with about 3 totally new creatures (new meshes, textures skeletons etc, and over 130 voice lines with audio) And due to its size, (i'm guessing its preloaded when running skyrim) it takes a significant size of the mod "budget" and takes it into loading issues for many users. Causing the dreaded missing area's of vanilla skyrim bug..

Now I have no clue how beth precaches or preloads their ESM and esp files.. But it seems if whatever arbitrery load value is filled up, it should either prevent load, give a warning, or just load .. but not simply load everything,but nothing completely.. (which causes big pieces of the world and npcs to be "invisible"i.e. not loaded"

Don't get me wrong the CK is epic, but it does take a looot of hours to get something good to work.. So yeh that's why you see a dropoff,.. On the other hand the dragon carriage you can drive and stuff, that's way more advanced , just like the dragon flying mods.. Authors are really pumping out more quality mods.. Albeit smaller. Its strange my dinky moonpath which is just a giant dungeon in a sens,, is seen as one of the biggest questmods in area size, whereas if you compare it to deserts of aquina its positively tiny..

So that's changed, I would have excpected a few more ambitious landscape mods;.. But its probably coming..