People in Skyrim Part 1: Population Expansion--Skyrim Anniversary Edition PS5

This is the first video in the "People in Skyrim" series. In this video, we will be looking at mods which add to the population of Skryim.
Special Note: NPC mods are notorious for conflicting with one another, leading to distorted or darkened faces on Playstation. Be extremely careful with mods which affect the same characters. Sometimes you can adjust placement in your load order to compensate, but sometimes there is no solution. If you are willing to accept the distorted faces for the positive aspects of a mod, than it may be less of an issue for you.
As always, please make sure to visit Bethesda.net and read the mod descriptions, as some of these mods have some pretty specific advice about where to place them in your load order, or what other mods they may or may not be compatible with.
0:14 Introduction
0:51 Lightly Populated Settlements
1:15 More People (Playstation)
1:39 Populated Cities Complete (PS4)
1:55 Increased Population Named NPC's
2:17 Populated Skyrim Prison Cells Playstation Edition Presented by Sands of Time
2:36 Argonian Hatchlings--Children of Tamriel (PS4)
2:59 Khajiit Caravan Kittens--Children of Tamriel (PS4)
3:24 Kharo and Skaraar Khajiit Cubs
3:43 Conclusion
Lightly Populated Settlements mods.bethesda....
More People (Playstation) mods.bethesda....
Populated Cities Complete (PS4) mods.bethesda....
Increased Population Named NPC's mods.bethesda....
Populated Skyrim Prison Cells Playstation Edition Presented by Sands of Time mods.bethesda....
Argonian Hatchlings--Children of Tamriel (PS4) mods.bethesda....
Khajiit Caravan Kittens--Children of Tamriel (PS4) mods.bethesda....
Kharo and Skaraar Khajiit Cubs mods.bethesda....

[@teedawg771]

underrated channel, addicted to these videos

[@alduin-x1o]

💪

[@BlanketGamer-fz4gx]

My big problem with some of these mods was that when I attacked them I did not get a bounty. I feel like my actions should have consequences.

[@Lightstrider42]

That's interesting. I would not have thought about that aspect of the mod, it would have slipped under my radar. I wonder how complicated it would be to add the additions to the bounty list?

[@BlanketGamer-fz4gx]

The children beast races with human voices is pretty weird. Good video though

[@Lightstrider42]

The voices are a bit off--putting. It does add a nice touch of realism to see the children, particularly with the caravans which would likely be be families.

[@BlanketGamer-fz4gx]

@@Lightstrider42i completely agree. I may download the mod anyway

[@Lightstrider42]

@@BlanketGamer-fz4gx It's always a balancing act deciding which mods are worth the space when you have only 100 slots.

[@danocon92]

Does it crash less often on ps5 than ps4 with all these mods

[@Lightstrider42]

I imagine it depends on the mods you are installing and the order. I tend to run close to 100 mods, which is the maximum allowed on Playstation. However, my priorities tend to be immersion and environmental mods, and I am careful not to pick ones that conflict with each other. I do have a couple of combat and spell mods, and a dungeon pack or two. I get a crash once in a while, but I quicksave a lot. I do think since Bethesda did that update a while back to address the 0KB issue a lot of people were having that I see many fewer crashes even on PS4.

[@vinceguy1464]

I am trying to decide between Lightly Populated Settlements and Increased Populations Named NPCs. Do you have a preference or opinion between the two. Is one more compatible with other NPC/City Overhaul mods in your experience?

[@Lightstrider42]

I have more experience using Lightly Populated Settlements, which seems to do a good job of adding more people without adding too much strain, but that doesn't mean the other mod might not be just as effective. I simply haven't used it as much. I would not advise using more than one mod to add generic NPC's as it can cause problems. Adding specific NPC's, such as new followers, can often work all right as long as you don't add too many. As far as city overhauls go, I have not noticed a lot of issues with them. City overhauls can be much more of a problem with quest NPC's and named character behavior, as they may try to walk places that don't exist in the overhaul and get stuck in places, or they might seem to be floating in the air.

[@vinceguy1464]

@@Lightstrider42 Thanks! Lightly populated Settlements seems like a great mod overall, I don't see as much about the other once since it's newer.
In general do you use city/town/unique location overhaul mods. I am new to modding on PS5 and those mods look tempting, lot's of folks use them, but they seem really risky when it comes to Quest NPCs like you mention. I don't want to introduce more bugs into the game.

[@Lightstrider42]

@@vinceguy1464The things that are most important to me when adding mods are things that make the world more immersive and add flavor. So I do use quite a few mods for cities and towns and such. Because we are limited to a max of 100 mods on PS5, I try to be efficient in what mods I select. Some cities (i.e. Windhelm) are notoriously difficult to mod, so in some cases it isn't worth the mod space (to me) if it might introduce a bunch of problems and crashes. But in other cases, it's hard to argue with how it can add character to certain locations. It definitely was helpful when there were reviews on Bethesda.net. It helped make decisions about which mods were potentially problematic.

[@vinceguy1464]

@@Lightstrider42 I didn't know about the 100 mod limit, but it makes a lot of sense as to why mod bundles get made. My planned list is around 90 so I am still ok. Do You also use Immersive Citizens? I ask because its such a popular mod listed in LOs but from everything I read it's not supposed to be used with city and town overhaul mods so it feels like I need to make a decision between modding NPC behavior or town appearance.

[@Freeman952]

@@vinceguy1464 Immersive citizens works with most Mods that modify cities. For some Mods, however, you have to place immersive citizens above in the load order for it to work correctly. It works the same way with Mods that modify interiors, like "small modified inn'' or "JK's interior", 2 mods that I highly recommend. JK's interior is really great, unfortunately it causes a problem with the navmesh of the NPCs in whiterun...