I’ve been using ModOrganizer2 via SteamTinkerLaunch, but the performance is not great.
I haven’t tried tweaking anything to get it better, mostly because I don’t know where to start.
Does anyone have advice on modding Skyrim (especially with SKSE) on Linux effectively?
I have just recently reinstalled and remodded skyrim with MO2! I chose MO2 specifically because it has a linux version which I downloaded off the github.
I have found that MO2 has a lot of functionality built in that just isn’t well explained in the tutorial. and it can be quite daunting to start.
For one, you don’t have to worry about skse. it comes with that when you choose Skyrim as the instance of MO2 you want to make. MO2 will then launch every time you launch Skyrim. And once it launches, you have all the options!
From MO2, you can choose to run different versions of skyrim. it can run the vanilla PC launcher for you if you want to manually set your graphics settings.
It can launch directly with SKSE, which is what you’ll need for most mods. (if you’re playing modded skyrim, you’ll likely be launching from here most times unless there’s specific settings in the basic launcher you want to change)
It also comes with LOOT (which is a load order optimizer) already preinstalled. You just have to click the button to have it sort your load order for you. The load order is usually decent enough for most modlists (depending on size) but there are many guides to load orders for skyrim if you’re interested in changing things around to be better optimized for your needs.
my advice is honestly sit down and take some time to kinda go over where everything is. Before MO2 I was a vortex person. I am considering never going back.
if you have any specific questions, I can maybe try to help.
I have done things to this game that morals prohibit.
Like copying a whole Skyrim main folder modded with Nexus Mod Manager from a laptop to a steam deck and “managing” this with MO2. Bonus obscenity: couldn’t run the new Skyrim version instalmed on Steam Deck with the old SKSE from the laptop install, so I had to update SKSE, break compatibility with the load order, and then manualy find which of the mods to update for it to run. Do note that I have 250 mods and an historic 70+ level build on this instance.
I guess what I am saying is “you can go pretty wild with this”. Start anywhere, end up anywhere, mod the shit out if it.
I would advise on following one of the “FULL OVERHAUL NOTHING UNTOUCHED” modding guide, just because why not. Most of them have some form of attention to performance that will help with your issue.
I followed lexy’s : https://lexyslotd.com/
May I ask what kind of performance problem you have on what hardware ?
It started with me manually downloading a mod and shoving the files into the Steam game directly.
Then I installed the windows version of Nexus Mods Manager using Wine and pointed it to the Skyrim in Linux Steam that runs as a Flatpak.
Yes, it is a dumb hack. But it works.
I used mo2 from this installer https://github.com/rockerbacon/modorganizer2-linux-installer.
Both on Nvidia and AMD it’s been great. Older version had a bit laggy mo2, but now that is gone. Only issue I have is that ModOrganizer itself needs to be installed to main drive, otherwise it wouldn’t work, but maybe it’s also fixed now.
I use it for Starfield at the moment and it works okay. There’s definitely some caveats though and it’s still something that might require some tinkering / fixing. That said, the last time I tried Skyrim on Linux it also ran atrociously bad, the framerate was just not what I’d expect from my system and way worse than what I had on Windows with my previous system (which was much worse in). Similar experience when I tried Fallout NV. The performance dipped down into the low two digits and I didn’t even really went into modding all sorts of stuff into either of them.
Starfield runs much better but I suspect it might still perform better in Windows. Not sure what it is but it seems that gamebryo just does not run well under Linux, or rather even worse than under Windows.
Maybe I try NV again at some point since I kinda want to play it before season 2 of the TV show. It’s been a while since I tried so maybe there had been some fixes & improvements since then and I’ve seen some engine optimization mod too.
I’d still hope for a native mod manager for Linux though. R2Modman is kinda decent but does not support Bethesda games.
perforöance is worsr thsm I would lşke aswell but it “works” modded fallout 4 works better
