best visual mods

[Tacos727]

what do you guys think the best combination of visual mods is? i have to remake my mod list for this game and i was trying to find the best looking ones i can. i finally finished modding skyrim, i might make a thread later on all the mods i think should go into that game. if you have any suggestions on any other fallout mods that seem like must haves go ahead and share those too if you want.

[matt]

Perfect landscape by Pfuscher[www.nexusmods.com]- this would be the obvious choice if you're a fan of Pfuscher's Skyrim mods.
Vivid Fallout - All in One[www.nexusmods.com]- an older collection. Hein84 recently returned to modding Fallout 4 and linked some of his newer work. This is mostly landscapes.
FlaconOil's Complete Retexture Project[www.nexusmods.com]- This is mostly non-landscape stuff, like cars, computer terminals, and settlement objects. It goes along well with the Vivid Fallout AIO or another landscape-only mod.
Fallout 4 HD Overhaul[www.nexusmods.com]- If you like Luxor's style, this is probably mandatory. It's a complete overhaul, and some of the retextures are great. However, I'm not sure I like Luxor's style enough to replace every single texture in the game with his work.
SavrenX's HD mods[www.nexusmods.com]- there isn't an AIO version, so you'd have to download them all one-by-one. These are optimized versions of the HD DLC with assorted fixes applied. The changes are very conservative, so this is a good choice for people who want to retain the vanilla art style.

I personally use SavrenX's HD DLC overhaul because I'm one of those people who like the vanilla art style. I then load Vivid Fallout and FlaconOil's overhaul over that. These are both fairly conservative but include 4k textures. Finally, I installed several of Luxor's retextures I like, and I load them last. However, Luxor deleted most of his individual retextures once he uploaded the AIO, so that would probably be difficult for a new user to do.

ELFX[www.nexusmods.com]- indoor lighting mod.
Darker Nights[www.nexusmods.com]- to go with ELFX.
Ultra Exterior Lighting[www.nexusmods.com]- outdoor lighting because ELFX doesn't touch that.
Fallout 4 Enhanced Color Correction[www.nexusmods.com]- because I decided not to use ENB.
FAR - Faraway Area Reform[www.nexusmods.com] + NeuraLOD[www.nexusmods.com]- more detail distant terrain and upscaled LOD textures.
Valentine REBORN[www.nexusmods.com] + Truly Unique Nick[www.nexusmods.com]- because Nick is one of the best companions.
Vivid Waters[www.nexusmods.com] + WET - Water Enhancement Textures[www.nexusmods.com]- for better water.

Then maybe go through and look for nice creature textures. For example:
Detailed deathclaws[www.nexusmods.com]- for when you want to get up close and pet the deathclaws.
Fallout Texture Overhaul Radscorpions 4K[www.nexusmods.com]- radscorpions need love, too.

I then added a bunch of random 4k textures. Not really sure that I'd recommend doing this if you're using an older card. The game uses 12-16GB VRAM on my system at 3840x2160, but I have VRAM and performance to spare. You might want stuff like The Nuka Project[www.nexusmods.com] or Pipboy UHD[www.nexusmods.com] if you want to fill up your VRAM, too. It's not like it's doing anything useful by sitting there empty and unused, right? Probably not necessary if you're using Luxor's HD pack, though, unless you want to overwrite his stuff.

If you don't want to bother with sifting through all this stuff and resolving conflicts, just install Luxor's pack, I guess.

[Tacos727]

thanks for the detailed response, im going to have to look through that and see which one i like the most. should i download the high resolution texture pack on steam?

[Pat's Cat]

Originally posted by Tacos727:

should i download the high resolution texture pack on steam?

No, Bethesda's texture pack is bloated rubbish (as can be seen when doing a quick search on this forum), you're way better off looking for textures on the Nexus.

[matt]

The HD DLC uses a lot of VRAM and disk space. That's not as big a deal 7 years later, but it's still a big investment. The quality improvement is sometimes a bit subtle, too.

Unless you have a killer gaming PC, SavrenX's overhaul would likely be better. SavrenX touched up the HD DLC, then resized it down to 2k in many cases. That makes it a good base: generally better quality textures than default but fairly lightweight. It leaves lots of VRAM available for extravagant 4k retextures as you find them. Some of the mods on Nexus are more detailed than the HD DLC. Some HD DLC textures are upscaled without improvement.

Luxor's work is mostly his own, but he finished off his texture pack by including some HD DLC textures. You don't need the HD DLC with Luxor's overhaul. It's already in there where appropriate.

[Fanarkle Unkerbean]

Originally posted by matt:

The HD DLC uses a lot of VRAM and disk space. That's not as big a deal 7 years later, but it's still a big investment. The quality improvement is sometimes a bit subtle, too.

Unless you have a killer gaming PC, SavrenX's overhaul would likely be better. SavrenX touched up the HD DLC, then resized it down to 2k in many cases. That makes it a good base: generally better quality textures than default but fairly lightweight. It leaves lots of VRAM available for extravagant 4k retextures as you find them. Some of the mods on Nexus are more detailed than the HD DLC. Some HD DLC textures are upscaled without improvement.

Luxor's work is mostly his own, but he finished off his texture pack by including some HD DLC textures. You don't need the HD DLC with Luxor's overhaul. It's already in there where appropriate.

Thanks for the helpful post! I am wondering why you say ELFX to go with Ultra Exterior Lighting instead of Ultra Interior Lighting from the same creator?

[Tacos727]

this is what my game ended up looking like, i might add more mods later on the next playthrough.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJYZi5fOXEs

the 2nd or 3rd clips will show off most of the environment mods, theres a few different areas but i didn't spend long getting clips.

[07hd82jr]

Originally posted by Tacos727:

what do you guys think the best combination of visual mods is? i have to remake my mod list for this game and i was trying to find the best looking ones i can. i finally finished modding skyrim, i might make a thread later on all the mods i think should go into that game. if you have any suggestions on any other fallout mods that seem like must haves go ahead and share those too if you want.

I have recently ran through all the ends for fallout 4, in my opinion vivid Fallout all in one topped them all. ITS user and Performance friendly, makes Fallout look just as good without any hassle. It's a great mod and I highly recommend it

[07hd82jr]

Originally posted by Tacos727:

what do you guys think the best combination of visual mods is? i have to remake my mod list for this game and i was trying to find the best looking ones i can. i finally finished modding skyrim, i might make a thread later on all the mods i think should go into that game. if you have any suggestions on any other fallout mods that seem like must haves go ahead and share those too if you want.

Vivid Fallout AIO, tops them all,performance and user friendly without all the ENB hassle, it also looked just as good as any enb and I've tried all the top enbs. Unlike Skyrim Fallout is not as stable anyway and is already buggy enough. Stuttering, lighting issues and glitchy textures seem to all need adjustments with enb . Although Enb 5.0 was pretty good. It's just so simple to download Vivid on the Nexus.