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**M A G P I E M A N O R

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D E S C R I P T I O N******

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Magpie Manor is a highly detailed, well appointed, luxuriously decorated home - best suited for those of a scholarly persuasion. I began working on it sometime just before the pandemic, and scrapped and started over many times before finally settling on this iteration.

The home was built entirely by hand. What I mean by that is: every beam, wall, floor piece etc. was hand-placed. I did this because I wanted to create a very custom layout; something with lots of nooks and crannies that feels as though it might have been built up over time. It was also important to me that the interior matched the exterior. TARDIS homes drive me crazy, so this is almost exactly a 1:1 of interior vs exterior.

Currently, I consider it unfinished as I have a lot more hopes and plans that unfortunately exceed my current skills (i.e. quests and scripting). I decided to release it now because 1) I might never release it if I wait until I figure out the quests and 2) I’m hopeful someone might want to collaborate who actually knows how to do that stuff, saving me the

banging my head against my desk and wanting to throw my PC out the window

trouble.

In its current state, it’s fully functional as a questless, purchasable home in the main Tamriel worldspace, so I thought folks might enjoy it as is.

DISCLAIMER: The home was built more with form in mind than function. That doesn’t mean it’s not functional, it’s just not optimized for performance, perfect NPC pathing, etc. I also typically play in first person when in interiors, so it was designed with first person navigation in mind. NPCs have difficulty navigating in some areas, so you might see them randomly teleport or other odd behavior. This doesn’t bother me much personally, but wanted to give a heads up in case it does for you.

Essentially, I like small, cramped, cluttered spaces and this home reflects that.

One final note regarding lighting. I started building this long before I understood how lighting works in Skyrim’s engine. Consequently, with the way I designed it, it was nearly impossible to light the place decently without flickering. That’s part of the reason I made most of the lights toggleable - I highly recommend not turning on all the lights at once, or you will likely experience flickering.

The house also uses vanilla lighting templates, so it should be compatible with any lighting mod out there. If you’re a Lux user, I recommend Vanilla Lighting Template Replacer for Lux for the best consistency. Update: There is now a Lux patch provided by Temryuu!

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F E A T U R E S

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• Purchasable using the For Sale sign to the right of the front door (the cost is 30,000 Septims). See the last screenshot for an image of the home’s location.

• All crafting stations (even a spider thing!)

• Enough shelves in the library to hold 560 books. Everything else in the house is static, but I love collecting and displaying books so I chose to have fillable bookshelves.

• Named storage for everything you could need, as well as some generic storage.

• Select linked storage accessible from both interior and exterior for convenience (armor, weapons, ingredients).

• A total of 60(!) available soil plots throughout the greenhouses and gardens.

• A dedicated spare bedroom for one follower, plus a bonus sleeping area for one more.

• A room with two more beds, set up for children by default. If adoption isn’t your thing, use the guest book on the desk downstairs to switch to an additional follower room.

• Seasonal holiday decorations! Check out the boxes in the attic to put up or take down your Saturalia or Witches Festival decor (only the ground floor gets decorated).

• Interactive clickies! Serve a feast, draw a bath, and more.

• Highly detailed alchemy storage system complete with auto-sort features.

• Automatic seasonal changes IF you have Seasons of Skyrim installed. SoS is not a requirement, but your flora will permanently be the summer version if it’s not installed.

• Show your devotion to a specific Divine by building a shrine to them! The stained glass near the shrine will also change to reflect your chosen deity.

• Rumor has it there may be a secret place for…less widely accepted worship. But you’ll have to find it first, and you’ll need to offer something pleasing or interesting enough to draw the attention of a Daedric Prince.

• A secret armory/vault to display and secure your treasures. But you’ll have to find that too. :)

• Playing as a vampire? I’ve got you covered, but it’s yet another secret spot :)

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H O W T O G A I N A C C E S S**

For now, there is no quest to obtain the home. My intent has always been for Magpie Manor to have its own custom worldspace, with a short quest explaining its backstory and allowing you to summon a portal to it. However, I’ve been struggling for a long time to get any of these features working, and I worry I’ll never release this if I wait until I figure it out.

I’m also hoping by releasing this that someone with knowledge of quests, scripting and/or level design might see it and feel inspired to collaborate. If that sounds like you, please get in contact! I would greatly appreciate the help.

All that said, currently the home is purchasable using the "For Sale" sign near the front door. The cost is 30,000 Septims (the same price as Proudspire Manor), which I felt was fair given the amount of features in this home. See the last screenshot for an image of the home’s location. **



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F U R T H E R D E T A I L S & A D D - O N S

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With the main file, you may build a shrine to one of the nine vanilla Divines and to one of the three Reclamations (Mephala, Azura or Boethiah). There is also a patch for Pilgrim which includes shrine options for most of the deities added by that mod.

For the Aedra, you can build a shrine by sacrificing one of their amulets. For the other more benevolent deities, you can see what offerings may be made to win their favor by using the offering bowl.

For the Daedra and other more malevolent deities, the correct offerings are intentionally obfuscated. Perhaps draw on your knowledge of a certain Prince, or simply keep coming back with different items to experiment.

If you can’t figure it out or just want to know right away (boo no fun!), the possible offerings are listed in the spoiler tab below.

Spoiler:

Show

Yes, some of these are harder to obtain/figure out than others. It was difficult to think of enough different items from the vanilla game. If you have suggestions, let me know!

Azura - A filled greater (or larger) soul gem Boethiah - a human heart Mephala - Nightshade and frostbite venom

Clavicus Vile - Dog meat Hermaeus Mora - A copy of the skill book "The Doors of Oblivion" Hircine - A werewolf pelt Malacath - An Orcish greatsword Mehrunes Dagon - A daedra heart Molag Bal - A potion of blood Meridia - Necromancer’s robes Namira - Human flesh Nocturnal - Any potion of invisibility (player-crafted potions do not count) Peryite - Any lingering poison (player-crafted poisons do not count) Sanguine - A bottle of Black-Briar Reserve Sheogorath - A wheel of cheese Sithis - A human skull Vaermina - Sleeping tree sap

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C O M P A T I B I L I T Y**

The following compatibility patches and addons are available:

Pilgrim - A Religion Overhaul - Addon made by me, Optional Files section Lux - Patch by Temryuu, Optional Files section Skald’s Mail - Patch by NanaBeats, Optional Files section Fabled Forests - Patch available in the Fabled Forests Patch Compendium

This is of course *not *compatible with anything that modifies the same area. Here are some mods with conflicts, but there are undoubtedly more:

Aevon Tor Reloaded - Not compatible, modifies the same area Ayleid Haven SE - Not compatible, modifies the same area Gwent Hearth - Not compatible, modifies the same area (though you could use the Falkreath or Whiterun versions) Northern Roads - Will need a patch due to landscape edits Lyssia (fully voiced follower and quest) - User reported that Lyssia’s house location conflicts Stave Church of Skyrim - The Darkshade location conflicts Citizens of Tamriel / ezPG - User reported that these mods add an encounter to the same area and are not compatible Traverse the Ulvenwald - Adds a few trees that clip through parts of the home Arquebus - Get Both Civil War Uniques - User reported some clipping

If you are seeing parts of the home buried under terrain, you likely have another mod that is overwriting this mod’s landscape changes. Try moving Magpie Manor lower in your load order.

IMPORTANT NOTE FOR ENB USERS: If you get water turning black with this mod installed, it’s due to a specific ENB setting. In your enbseries.ini file, under the [WATER] section, set ExpandHDR to false. I have absolutely no clue why my mod interacts with that setting as it doesn’t touch water in any way, but I have found that it does. If anybody knows what might be causing this please let me know. I’d be happy to make changes so that it no longer conflicts.



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** Q & A:**

Q: Does the bed provide the Well-Rested bonus? A: Yep!

Q: Will followers who react to player homes recognize it? A: Yep!

Q: Can I have a spouse and kids live there? A: Yep! Up to two kids with the Hearthfire Multiple Adoptions mod.

Q: Will you add more kid and follower beds? A: It’s not currently part of the plan, sorry. If you are someone with lots of followers and children, I would suggest using this mod as a luxurious country getaway instead of your family home.

Q: ESL flagged? A: Nope! Too many records, sorry.

Q: I don’t use Pilgrim. Can you make a patch for Wintersun? A: I don’t use Wintersun, so no, sorry.

Q: I don’t use any religion overhauls, but I still want a specific shrine for RP purposes. Can you remove the Pilgrim requirement? A: For the existing file, no, Pilgrim is required. If there is demand for a version with non-functional shrines (no blessings granted), I will consider making one.

Q: Is this lore-friendly? A: Yes and no? I mean, nothing in it directly contradicts established lore, but you can probably tell from the screenshots that it doesn’t exactly fit within the game’s setting, and was never intended to. The out-of-place nature of the home would be explained somewhat if I could get the spell and quest stuff working :(

Q: What was the quest going to be? A: I’d rather not spoil everything in case it becomes a reality, but it has to do with a mage who created a spell that manifests the home of their dreams.

Q: The file is too big, I can’t download it! A: Unfortunately there’s not much I can do to help you there. I’m aware that this mod is MASSIVE in terms of assets. Try downloading the mod manually instead of using the "Download with Mod Manager" button if you’re having issues.

Q: This mod tanks my frame rate! A: There are LOT of objects to load in both the interior and exterior, so a performance hit is likely if you have a lower-end PC. I have tried to add occlusion planes where possible to improve this, but there unfortunately isn’t much more I can do on that front. My PC runs it fine, but YMMV.

Q: This mod made my game crash! A: If you think this mod is the culprit, please provide a crash log. Otherwise, I won’t be able to help you.

Q: I found a bug! A: Sorry about that! I did my best to test everything thoroughly, but there are a lot of interactive things (and things in general) in this mod so there’s likely stuff I missed. Please leave a comment providing as much information as you can about the bug, and I will do my best to get it fixed.

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** C R E D I T S

Please refer to the credits tab above.

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** **R E C O M M E N D E D M O D S (TO LOOK LIKE THE SCREENSHOTS):**The below mods will directly affect things you’ll see inside the home:

Skyrim 3D Furniture Vanilla Table Replacers Better Noble Chair Better Chests Rudy HQ - Miscellaneous (pottery) RUGNAROK Book Covers Skyrim (or LOTD which includes it)

Other mods featured in the screenshots (I heartily recommend these too!):

Majestic Landscapes & Mountains Water Mod Forgotten Retex Project Cathedral 3D Plants suite Happy Little Trees Skoglendi Lux Obsidian Weathers & Seasons Ebony ENB for Obsidian

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