Skyrim Gear 1: Clothing

The screenshot from Skyrim above shows Reisha (holding her sword improperly) with gear from various mods: “Blades Hakama”, shawl and satchel from “Arise - Chapter 1 - The Black Sacrament”, “Circlet Replacers for Women”, gloves from “Sotteta Necromancer Outfit”, and “Odems Onime Katana”. I share some clothing mod picks in this post, and in the next few posts I’ll cover Akaviri items, light armor, and heavy armor.

If you’ve never installed mods for TES V: Skyrim before, see my first post in this series. I suggest using a mod organizer like NMM since several armor mods listed here support an installer to choose options. If you change your mind about a texture replacer, a mod organizer makes it easier to remove or switch texture files. Some outfits require specific body replacers (CBBE, UNP, etc). See my post on body mods.

Craft books

Several armor mod creators have taken to including a craft book that must be in your character’s inventory in order to craft the armor or components. This helps reduce clutter within the craft menus by simply storing some of the books away at home when not needed.

Custom outfits and Frostfall

Remember that “Frostfall” treats third-party armor and clothing mods as standard gear. If your new armor from a mod has less coverage, to maintain immersion, consider adjusting the exposure protection classification to reduce warmth and coverage. A high-level vampire or mage can wear whatever pleases her. I’m not going to argue facing a fireball, conjured Dremora Lord, or mind-altering illusions.

In “Frostfall” without SkyUI use Inspect Equipment feature to adjust warmth and coverage. With SkyUI, put on the items and see the MCM.

Clothing and accessories

If you’re playing with “Frostfall”, and I highly recommend it, add more cloaks with “Winter is Coming”, or consider “Scarves of Skyrim - Lind’s Version”.

For a more feminine touch with any outfit get “Circlet Replacers for Women” by Elleh.

Much of the clothes in Skyrim appear nearly the same, such as the mourner’s dress is farm clothes colored differently, so some new variety is nice. My favorite clothing mod is “Blades Hakama” for its lore-friendly design and pleasant appearance, and vampire-mage Reisha prefers it even better than her mourner’s dress.

Wear the hakama during combat training, or enchant it for a mage. Comes in topless or regular with hat, gloves, and boots. Install options include padded light-armor or clothing. For “Frostfall” I reduce the exposure and warmth of the topless version. If using body replacer, the female outfit works best with a slim (non-busty) body.

Texture replacer pack, “Rustic Clothing” by Gamwich upgrades clothing with improved appearance of fabric, stains, and all around wear. My vampire wizard, Reisha, loved her mourner’s dress. With “Rustic Clothing” now it’s to die for.

For mages

The Necromancer Robes appeared as though some group of thugs decided to steal a pack of Black Mage Robes and paint sloppy green skulls on them to form a club. Weird. Lind001 (Lind’s Workshop) fixed that with a texture replacer, “Lind’s Necromancer Robes Revamp” which was recently updated with nice improvements and a choice of “Black Phoenix” (black/purple) or “King of Worms” (black/red) variants. I chose the black-and-purple robes.

Much better. Lind also has texture replacers for other robes including “Lind’s Black Robes Revamp” (pictured above on right), “Monk Robes Revamp”, “Lind’s Court Wizard Revamp”, “Lind’s Green Wizard Robes Revamp”, “Lind’s Vaermina Robes Revamp”, and more. If like me, you’re curious where to find green robes, the green robes may be gifted on adopting a child or purchased from that fancy shop in Solitude.

Above, Dexion wears “Lind’s Grey Wizard Robes Revamp”, and that’s Sahar dressed in “Gwelda Dawnguard” light armor.

Check out “Lind’s Standalone Robes Pack 01” containing three outfits in clothing or armored-mage option. These outfits use the standard long robe mesh with texture applied so should work with any body mod. Below is Reisha (CBBE Slim body with OCR BBP robe mesh adjustments) wearing the Royal Warlock outfit and Rigel in the Spell Thief robe.

For dark and sexy, try “Sotteta Necromancer Outfit” by Deserter X.

The craft book location makes sense, but perhaps too easy for low-level characters to obtain considering it offers a powerful option where nearby targets take damage while sneaking along with 25% reduction in conjuration. Crafting an enchanted item at a forge reduces immersion, so I recommend ignoring (or removing) it and use the regular dress to enchant. You could always swap this enchanted dress for regular Boethiah’s armor later on. There’s also a pants mod by Vulpediablos and Monsta 14 for the sorceress prefering pants out there in the cold.

Don’t forget to set the dress to limited exposure protection in “Frostfall.” This outfit needs minor work in Outfit Studio to fit a CBBE Slim female as seen in my screen captures.

Add “Equippable Tomes - Beltworn Books”* to your character for that magic look. Includes unenchanted for pure asthetics, or power-boosting tomes. Optional file for “Campfire” supports placing portable tome creation station anywhere.

For something refreshingly different than the usual dresses and robes, take a look at “Lind’s Marksmage Garb” for women. The details on the belt make this outfit shine, and the trousers look comfortable. Designed for UNP body, I used BodySlide with Outfit Studio to convert the garb to CBBE-Slim with HDT for jiggle. It may less suitable with small-breasts, but works appearing like a half-shirt hangling somewhat loose.

Keep in mind that using multi-piece outfits like “Marksmage Garb” and “Sottetta” only the top automatically removes when putting on a different outfit so it’s possible to accidently wear the bottoms or armlet with another outfit causing clipping.

*“Equippable” is not a word, and may not be the right word. Logic dictates that if an item can’t be equipped (or operated) then it isn’t equipment making “equippable” an unnecessary word. The term, wearable, might be more appropriate. What’s interesting about “equippable” is that it was born out of the problem when computer games limit which items, or equipment, may be equipped by the player’s character. In pen-and-paper RPG, this isn’t a problem. Perhaps someday cRPG will finally become more intuitive allowing all equipment to be handled naturally thus eliminating the need to invent logically unsound words.

Accessories:

• Winter is Coming - Cloaks by Nivea
• Scarves of Skyrim - Lind’s Version by Lind001
• Circlet Replacers for Women by Elleh
• Equippable Tomes - Beltworn Books by Robbie

Robe texture replacers by Lind001 (Lind’s Workshop):

• Lind’s Necromancer Robes Revamp (variants)
• Lind’s Black Robes Revamp
• Lind’s Grey Wizard Robes Revamp
• Lind’s Monk Robes Revamp v2.0b
• Lind’s Court Wizard Revamp
• Lind’s Red Wizard Robes Revamp
• Lind’s Green Wizard Robes Revamp
• Lind’s Vaermina Robes Revamp

Male/Female:

• Blades Hakama by atomec
• Lind’s Standalone Robes Pack 01 by Lind001
• Rustic Clothing by Gamwich (textures only)

Female only:

• Sotetta Necromancer Outfit by Mitosuke and Deserter X
• Lind’s Marksmage Garb by Lind001