N'wahman's Bag of Mods for Lazy SSE Newcomers Who Are Too Intelligent To Fall for Wabbajack Shittery (NBMLSNWATITFWS)
Most modlists are a complete shitfuck re: compatiblity and require you to download and use the modlist author's one patch that has every mod as a master and if you don't adhere 100% to the author's vision everything breaks. This list, assuming you read the fucking descriptions (please read the descriptions) is standalone and completely modular (read: find your own patches :^)
Fixes/requirements:
These will either be required by something you go to download in the future, or are fixes for engine level bugs in Skyrim. I can't think of a good reason not to have any of these.
Address Library for SKSE Plugins
.NET Script Framework
Spell Perk Item Distributor (SPID)
JContainers SE
Scaleform Translation Plus Plus
Classic Sprinting Redone (SKSE64)
SSE Engine Fixes (skse64 plugin)
ENB Helper SE
Essentials Be Gone SKSE Reborn
Mfg Fix
Whose Quest Is It Anyway
Yes Im Sure
SSE FPS Stabilizer
powerofthree's Papyrus Extender
SSE Display Tweaks
Hide Quest Items in Container Menu
Closing Time
Splashes Of Skyrim
ConsoleUtilSSE
Scrambled Bugs
To Your Face SE and VR
powerofthree's Tweaks
Dynamic Volumetric Lighting and Sun Shadows
Animation Limit Crash Fix SSE
SSE Fixes (configuration needed)
FileAccess Interface for Skyrim SE Scripts - FISSES
Enhanced Death Cam
Enhanced Reanimation
Skyrim Priority SE - skse plugin
Face Discoloration Fix
Camera:
SmoothCam - This is on github. It's invaluable. Make sure you get a preset, it's pretty floaty by default.
Improved Camera - SE's skse based gopro-style 'I can see my bones from here' first person camera. Not for everyone, but it's the only good option
Not Really Fixes / Muh Immersion:
Frozen Electrocuted Combustion - It's stable and more or less expands on vanilla. I consider it essential.
Simply Knock SE - This needs a few fixes that are still on the nexus. The fact that this wasn't in vanilla is criminal.
Mum's the Word" - you can sell items up to a certain value that you stole if nobody saw you steal them. decide for yourself if you need it
Time Passes - What it says on the tin. Great for needs mods
Body/ face:
Beasts
Khajiit Overhaul SSE - Mostly fixes the cats.
Flawn's Vanilla Argonians- Mostly fixes the argonians without turning them into plastic like Flawn's Not Vanilla Argonians.
Dread Tentacles- Best argonian hair. Requires SMP. Good luck.
Faces
Textures: If you want vanilla bodies for men, use Northsight Skins. For women, just install CBBE and a texture of your choice, there are no good vanilla textures. Blame the coomers. Your face textures will wildly impact the look of your characters so pick well and pick it first.
A Smile HD - Best so far. Compare the textures to other face mods if you don't believe me.
Authentic Eye - I've tested every eye texture there is, these blow them away. Vampire eyes are subjective, though, and I use vanilla
AOF Vanilla Hair - vanilla hair is the only good hair, cope seethe etc. This is a better texture. Also look into high poly vanilla hair.
SC's Cubemaps - Every mod with cubemaps included uses utter dogshit cube maps from somewhere in Britain with street signs and shit. These are simply better and come in any size you could need.
player extra bright and glowing eyes fix - I use it, you don't have to, there are other eye fixes but they're a pain in the ass. This just works
FK's Diverse Racial Skeletons - I consider this a must. There's a synthesis patcher if you're too lazy to update your race records. Full disclosure, I use Bestial Beast Races for Argonians instead of this specifically (no patching needed, FK points to the default argonian skeleton.)
Gear:
Cathedral Armory - Brings all vanilla armor and weapons more or less up to snuff. Cubemapped metal armors (this makes a huge difference, trust me), reshaped weapons, real bows, etc. If you don't want to add anything, this is literally all you need.
ArteFakes - Makes unique weapons unique. Unlike Unique Uniques, doesn't have models so old they were used in Oblivion. Also has Every Weapon.
Common Clothes And Armors - This stuff is great. Fits into vanilla, huge amount of variety, no compatibility clusterfuck. Don't use Immersive Armors because it's buggy and incompatible and most of the armors are either ugly or broken.
Reforging: Weapons To The Masses - If you can only have one, this is going to do the trick.
Honorable Mentions:
If you want a cool unique sword for your rapemeat character: anything by billyro, basically. Or Loner's Sword.
If you need MOAR WEAPONZ BRO!?!?! than reforging adds: Lore Weapon Expansion or Immersive Weapon Integration. Get the SPID implementation for IWI if you go with it.
Combat:
True Armor - All-in-one armor and enemy balancing via distributed perks. Arrows and swords might bounce off of plate armor, requiring you to use daggers or maces. Regen and other attributes dynamically change based on how many pieces of each armor type you equip. Allows you to set enemy health limiters to remove damage sponginess. Just Works. This is the single most impactful change you can make to skyrim combat and everyone should use it, even if they use the balanced preset like some sort of milkdrinker
zxlice hitstop - does what it says, no scripts, really impactful.
flinching - also non scripted, really satisfying, doesn't break anything I've found. Bit of a PITA to set up but really cool.
blade and blunt - I don't use this, but I use its combat AI and can vouch for the Quality. It's good enough for most people I figure.
true directional movement - Engine level fix that doesn't rely on behavioral hacks to achieve 360 movement. No reason not to use this as you can turn off shit you don't like.
Perks:
Honed Metal - bubububut this isn't a perk mod! So what, you really want to be a smith every playthrough? Smithing sucks and is insanely boring and unimmersive. Just use this unless you really NEED to roleplay as a smith.
Ordinator - gimmicky, bloated, mod author is a nazi, blah blah. Still the best perk mod out there for in depth builds.
Vokrii - Vanilla Pluth. It's actually really good for stealth and warrior trees but the magic isn't quite as wacky as Ordinator, it's just numbers and scaling mostly. Also made by a nazi
Adamant - I don't know anything about this but it's also 'vanilla pluth' and the mod author is a prissy faggot with a discord so it can't possibly offend anyone.
PerMa - If you can get the synthesis patcher (patchus maximus) up and running this is still the GOAT. Completely broken and unmaintained for years now. I also can't get the synthesis patcher up and running myself so good luck.
Alchemy:
Apothecary or SkyToxin - They make poison actually dangerous, which is the only real problem with vanilla.
Magic:
Mysticism - rebalances vanilla spells and adds a few. Decent starting point.
Apocalypse or Tomebound - add a pack of spells to round out the vanilla experience. Lots of patches.
Spellsiphon or Wizard Warrior - make magic actually fun and usable. Pick only one IMO.
Towns:
Cities Of The North and Capital Cities (don't fall for the JK trap)
World:
Any encounter zone mod (arena is good, but these are to taste. Get a Vanilla Style one if you like leveled worlds)
An economy mod - SkyREM - Eve and C.O.I.N. will handle this well enough. One is a perk, one adds currency types.
Carriage and Ferry Travel Overhaul - still the best way to get around, lots of patches, yada yada
Muh imuhshun:
Experience (trust me on this)
Realistic Room Rental Enhanced (Not very compatible. Worth it for me.)
Wintersun
frostfall or sunhelm (don't use iNeed, it still causes crashes and both forks are maintained by russkies)
skyrim reputation
anything by jay serpa
immersive speech dialogues, misc dialogue edits, more dialogue options
organic factions extensions and immersive world encounters (highly recommend)
Muh artifishul difficulty
Spell Research
True Death (the new SPID version)
Dark Corners of Nirn
Follower Death and Injury Chance
Ashes or Respawn
Cobb Encumbrance
Followers
nether's framework, it's available at schaken mods. I don't care if he's g * rman or a p * dophile or a f * rry, the mod is good and doesn't have bugs so just use it
Alt start:
Realm of Lorkhan or Skyrim Unbound Reborn.
Unfucked quests:
At Your Own Pace / Timing is Everything, EBQO, TCIY, the Finding series (fixes dogshit vanilla quests)
NPC appearance:
Either Nordic Faces or Beards of Power + Vahdin. These are good and don't drag you down the high poly rabbit hole.
Graphics:
I have weird tastes and a bunch of custom hacked together shit in my game that nobody should have to suffer through using. For this reason, I recommend you find a modlist whose screenshots you like and install its graphics recommendations, as these rarely require serious patching.