Skyrim Gear 2: Akavir

The Akavir (elderscolls.wikia) are a lost people of Tamriel. How much of their culture, skills, and weapons might remain is up to the player. There’s a number of Akaviri-related mods to choose from. Previous TES chapters included limited, and generally more powerful, swords such as katanas and dai-katanas. Considering The Blades have discovered ancient artifacts, and Sky Haven Temple, former crafting techniques have been uncovered allowing Esbern and Delphine to maintain gear for new recruits. Why not add more Akaviri style in Skyrim?

hakama

My favorite clothing mod is the lore-friendly “Blades Hakama”. Given its relatively low endoresment count, it could be considered underrated.

The “Blades Hakama” set goes great with Skyrim, and seeing Esbern wear his shihan hakama around Sky Haven Temple is a treat. The hakama looks attractive and comes in topless or regular with boots, gloves, and hat. The mod installs with option for an armor rating (padded) just shy of bandit gear or as no-armor cloth. I chose the cloth option for my mage, Reisha, since her mourner’s dress was getting old. Find the items in Sky Haven, and there’s also story-friendly sack hidden outside Gentle Giant Tavern. The female hakama appears best on a slim or default body. Adding HDT/BBP with BodySlide 2 - Outfit Studio is fairly simple. Esbern will wear his hakama after starting Throat of the World quest.

armor

Improve the appearance of the Blades heavy armor with texture update, “aMidian Blades Armor” by CaBaL, for more resolution and detail. The default download is for 2K textures, or choose 1K for better performance. CaBaL also has other packs available with textures covering many creatures and armors.

blades

Give your Dragonbane and Blades Katana crisper texture, and more color, with “HD Akaviri Katana”. I felt the 2k texture was a bit much, so I reduced it to 1k (as seen in image below) which also fixed a slight hesitation on first equipping the sword.

How about crafting new katana, wakishashi, and tanto to go with that new hakama or armor?

Take a look at “Odems Onihime Katana” for a beautiful, highly detailed sword that’s constructed by assembling parts. The katana is large with the same stats and measurements for 2-hand or 1-hand choices. Wielded with both hands, this sword does less damage than greatswords but is faster. Due to game limitations, if you want to wield as both styles then craft one of each style and switch from the quick menu. I learned of this sword from “Selene Kate” follower mod as she wields a less powerful version. For some players, the amount of collecting ingrediants and number of components to craft might seem excessive, but it’s minor compared to a couple original quests. Crafting quality blades require dedication. Find the craft book at The Gentle Giant in Delphine’s secret room.

Alternatively, your character could take Selene Kate’s secondary high-damage katana from her handbag. (Her default sword is low-damage.) However, Kate’s swords aren’t upgradeable.

Odem’s weapons are very high-resolution models which may be of concern including potential to crash within the crafting menu. Save game before using the forge. The two screen captures below show close-ups of the Onihime in use by Ezekiel.

For Odem’s weapon mods, first install Odems Advanced Craft file from any of Odem’s mods then install the weapon file. Crafting a sword requires creating components marked by step-number to help organization at the forge. The major components include the saya (sheath) broken down into smaller components, the tsuka (handle) created from parts, and the blade. The crafting book lists all ingredients so one may collect during travels.

gear pack

“Blades Samurai Armour and Kimonos” offers new armor options for Blades heavy armor including traditional helmets along with a variety of kimonos with decorative choices for local Skyrim banners. This mod also includes weapons such as naginata, tanto, boken practice sword, new bows, and the sheath a katana and wakishasi on same hip with a daisho. Cloth kimonos crafted at a tanning rack may be armored at a forge by padding with leather. You can also update the texture of the standard Blades armor with choice of new colors by copying and renaming files to appropriate location. Craft books and weapons are located within Sky Haven Temple where one should expect them. Open the lockbox and grab the note to obtain a quest for the special armor.

For me these armors are just a bit too clean, and in certain light parts appear plastic. Although, Kharjo looks happy with his gear. “Blades Samurai Armour and Kimonos” might be nice for picking out parts.

• Blades Hakama by atomec
• aMidian Blades Armor by CaBaL
• HD Akaviri Katana by Ithronyar
• Odems Onihime Katana by Odem
• Blades Samurai Armour and Kimonos by Prime