Last time I modded Skyrim was on the original one with mod organizer and using the STEP site as a guide.
How much has changed since then? Is STEP still a good resource to get started and is mod organizer 2 still a good go to?
I’ve actually just posted this here in the community, but since it sort of specifically answers your question I’m linking it directly.
If that breaks any sort of rule somebody let me know! I’m a reddit evacuee so I’m still learning the ropes.
MO2 is still the way to go for more control, but vortex isn’t too bad either, it’s just that most people use MO2 at least on the old sub. Mods are mostly preference. Even cleaning the vanilla master plug-ins is debatable. If you have the time, I would experiment with wabbajack lists. If you just want fixes/essentials and want to do everything else yourself, there is Skyrim Modding Essentials by Phoenix.
The Dragonborn’s Fate is a good modding guide. I think The Phoenix Flavour also has a guide, or they used to, but I am not sure if it is still around.
My suggestion is, pick a visual-only wabbajack list (Aurora, or AVO NG, or similar) and join thier discord to answer any questions while adding your own preferred gameplay / follower / other mods. This is how i learned, fwiw (not that i claim to be a modding guru of any sort)
If you haven’t tried wabbajack yet test it out.
I had heard of that. How well does it would if I don’t have a premium Nexus account?
It will direct you to where you can download the mod. Premium isn’t necessary, there’s just some manual clicking involved and will take longer.
A lot longer, I would not recommend doing it with the really large lists. I did it once with a list with over 2500 mods and it took 3 days lol I feel like most peoples time is worth more than that. For the smaller lists like Wildlander is it much more viable. Either way though you will save SO much time compared to following a list manually like Lexy LOTD or Phoenix Flavor.