Understanding LOD

LOD stands for Level Of Detail - a system used to represent distant objects with simplified meshes and textures to improve performance. In Bethesda games, LOD primarily refers to Cell LOD, which represents whole "chunks" of land in the distance.

Cell LOD is divided into three main categories:

1. Object LOD - Simplified versions of buildings, rocks, and other static objects. Has only one quality level and generates relatively quickly.
2. Terrain LOD - Represents the terrain of cell groups, with multiple quality levels that change based on distance (LOD4 4x4, LOD8 8x8, etc.). Takes the longest to generate due to its complexity.
3. Tree LOD - 2D planes representing vegetation.

Why Generate Custom LOD?

The vanilla game's LOD is pre-generated and static, which means it can't reflect changes made by mods to terrain or objects. Custom LOD generation creates meshes that match your modded game, providing:

• Increased visual consistency between nearby and distant objects.
• More objects visible in the distance.
• LOD textures that match your installed texture mods.
• Improved quality over the low-detail vanilla LOD.
• Filled gaps where objects previously appeared out of nowhere during cell transitions.

LOD Comparison

Drag the slider handle to compare how the game looks with generated LOD. Use the dropdown to select different comparison sets.

Creating a Separator in MO2

1. Right-click the empty space in the left pane of MO2 and select Create separator.
2. Name the separator LOD.

Installing LOD Resources

Install in the following order:

1. A Clear Map of Skyrim and Other Worlds
   • Main Files - A Clear Map of Skyrim and Other Worlds FOMOD
   • You will be prompted with a FOMOD installer:
     1. DynDOLOD 3
     2. With DynDOLOD LOD32
     3. Remove or keep clouds based on your preference
     4. Install

   After installing ACMoS, you should move its plugin right above Weather of World.esp. This way, Weather of the World will overwrite ACMoS and the map will look better.

2. DynDOLOD Resources SE 3
   • Main Files - DynDOLOD Resources SE 3.00
   • You will be prompted with a FOMOD installer:
     1. Next
     2. Solitude Occlusion Planes
     3. High Hrothgar Windows Glow
     4. DLC2 Vvardenfell 3D Plume
     5. Desync Birds of Prey
     6. Install
3. DynDOLOD DLL NG
   • Main Files - 1 - DynDOLOD DLL NG and Scripts 3.00
4. Far Object LOD Improvement Project SSE
   • Main Files - Far Object LOD Improvement Project SSE
5. Majestic Landscapes
   • Update Files - Noise DDS
6. A Dragonborn's Fate Resources
   • Main Files - DBF LOD Guide - Whiter Snow LOD Material

Cleaning Plugins

In order to prevent the bug where LOD fails to unload (shown in this video) DynDOLOD's large refs bugs workarounds are needed, which in turn require cleaning any plugin containing deleted references - in DBF, that only includes the base game and DLC plugins, but in a custom list there may be more.

Cleaning Setup

1. In MO2, click the tiny wrench icon at the top, next to the mod counter, then click Create empty mod.
2. Title the mod Cleaned Plugins
3. Navigate to your game's Data folder, and copy the following plugins:
   • Update.esm
   • Dawnguard.esm
   • Hearthfires.esm
   • Dragonborn.esm
   • ccBGSSSE001-Fish.esm
   • ccQDRSSE001-SurvivalMode.esl
   • ccBGSSSE025-AdvDSGS.esm
4. Paste them to the Cleaned Plugins mod you just created (right-click on the mod and select Open in Explorer).
5. Press F5 while you are on MO2 without any menu open, then make sure the new mod is enabled by ticking its checkbox.

Running QAC

1. Download the latest xEdit release from the xEdit Discord server, in the xedit-builds channel.
2. Extract the archive and place the files inside a folder of your choosing (do not use a UAC protected folder or the game folder).
3. Add xEdit to MO2's executables list by pressing CTRL + E and then clicking Add from file..., then point it to xEdit.exe.
4. In the Arguments box in the right pane, enter -SSE -QAC
5. Close the Modify Executables menu and run xEdit from the drop-down.
6. When prompted with the plugin selection screen, click on Update.esm.
7. When complete, you should see Quick Clean mode finished at the bottom of the log, you can close the program.
8. Now do the exact same thing for the rest of the plugins listed before.

Pre-Generated LOD

If you use a DBFE modlist with no changes to textures or the game world, you can skip manual LOD generation by using these files. The Object LOD file also includes Tree LOD, while the other only contains Terrain LOD to reduce bandwith required for upload and download.

Simply install it as a normal mod in MO2 and put it under the resources listed in the previous section (which you still need), then set up the load order as follows:

• DynDOLOD.esm should be the last ESM plugin (written in bold).
• DynDOLOD.esp and then Occlusion.esp should be at the bottom.

xLODGen

xLODGen is an xEdit-based tool that allows you to generate LOD meshes for your game. Similarly to xEdit, it has a single executable that can be be turned into a game specific version by adding arguments.

1. Download, install, and enable SSE Terrain Tamriel Extend, then place its plugin at the top of your load order (right below _ResourcePack.esl).

2. Download, install, and enable DBF LOD Guide - Temp Snow Replacement.
3. Download the latest xLODGen from here.
4. Once the download has finished, extract the contents of the archive anywhere outside of the default Windows folders.
5. In MO2, select the button at the top of MO2 to open the executables menu.
6. Click the + at the top of the window and the select Add from file...
7. From the pop-up, navigate to where xLODGen is installed and select xLODGenx64.exe.
8. In the Arguments box in the right pane, enter -SSE -O:"C:\Output"

This argument will send the LOD output to a folder called Output on your C drive (the drive Windows is installed on).
You can change this path if you would prefer the files to be generated elsewhere (do not use a UAC protected folder or the game folder).

Make sure that the output folder is empty before generating LOD.

9. Close the Modify Executables menu and run xLODGen from the drop-down.
10. In the right pane, check only Terrain LOD.
11. Copy all settings from the image below:


Object and Tree LOD will be done with DynDOLOD, xLODGen is only used for Terrain LOD.

12. Then click Settings for to select the next LOD level (LOD 8), and copy these settings for each of them:
• LOD 8:

• LOD 16:

• LOD 32:


Technical Details



Landscape Settings

• Protect borders: Prevents ugly terrain drops at the cell borders.
• Size: As a result of using mipmaps, the benefit of high terrain LOD resolutions will be miniscule, 512 on LOD4 and 256 on the next levels will suffice.
• Bake normal-maps: Roughens the terrain LOD textures to match the actual terrain's normal map.
• Mipmap: Mipmapping textures prevents pixel crawling artifacts at a minor VRAM and storage utilization cost. Skyrim's terrain LOD uses mipmaps only on LOD4 diffuse textures.
• Quality: This controls the amount of detail in the LOD's geometry. Lower values have more detail and have a minor performance cost because of the amount of triangles in the mesh.
• Optimize Unseen: Reduces the amount of triangles of geometry below a configurable height, this is meant to optimize unseen areas underwater. Setting this to 550 for LOD32 gets rid of the map's spiky terrain. Other values may work, 550 is known to be good.

---

Snow Fix

A common issue when regenerating terrain LOD32, is snow being too green and/or grey. This is due to the vanilla snow textures not being bright enough. This guides solves the problem by loading a temporary replacement for a few snow textures. This, coupled with a whiter LOD snow shader, should result in a map with the same terrain colors as vanilla, while improving detail.

All LOD levels are generated at once! You don't have to do anything besides configuring every level!
This is not something that you pick and choose - those are not quality "settings", just how the game works.

13. Click Generate.
14. When complete, the log will stop and at the end you will see a message saying "LOD generation done", you can now close the program.
15. Disable xLODGen Resource - SSE Terrain Tamriel and DBF LOD Guide - Temp Snow Replacement in Mod Organizer 2.

Installing the LOD

1. In MO2, click the tiny wrench icon at the top, next to the mod counter, then click Create empty mod.
2. Title the mod Terrain LOD
3. Navigate to where the LOD files were generated and select both the textures and meshes folders.
4. Cut them to the Terrain LOD mod you just created (right-click on the mod and select Open in Explorer).
5. Press F5 while you are on MO2 without any menu open, then make sure the new mod is enabled by ticking its checkbox.

Generating Paths

1. Download ACMOS Road Generator
2. Once the download has finished, extract the contents of the archive.
3. Run ACMOS Road Generator.exe.
4. In Mod Organizer 2, right-click on your Terrain LOD mod and select Open in Explorer.
5. From from newly opened window, copy the file path.
6. Click Browse... next to Path to LOD, then paste the path you just copied.
7. Click the Generate button.
8. Click Yes at the Overwrite LOD textures prompt.
9. Once the process is complete, click No at the Zip? prompt.
10. When complete, you should get an All Done prompt, press OK and close the program.

Packing Terrain LOD

This step is not necessary, but will reduce loading time of LOD assets by the game by packing them into optimized archive files (BSAs). This translates to less stuttering when entering new areas.

1. Download Cathedral Assets Optimizer.
2. Once the download has finished, extract the contents of the archive.
3. Run Cathedral_Assets_Optimizer.exe.
4. Tick the Create BSA box.
5. In Mod Organizer 2, right-click on your Terrain LOD mod and select Open in Explorer.
6. From from newly opened window, copy the file path, then paste it into CAO (right below the profile drop-down).
7. Click the Run button.
8. Once the process is complete, you will see a message saying Done at the bottom.
9. If everything was done correctly, the Terrain LOD folder should have BSA files and the relative plugin for loading them.
10. Click F5 while you are on MO2 without any menu open, and make sure the aforemention plugin is enabled in your load order.

TexGen

1. Download the latest DynDOLOD 3 Alpha.
2. Once the download has finished, extract the contents of the archive to any location of your choice (do not use a UAC protected folder or the game folder).
3. In MO2, select the button at the top of MO2 to open the executables menu.
4. Click the + at the top of the window and the select Add from file...
5. From the pop-up, navigate to where TexGen is installed and select TexGenx64.exe.
6. In the Arguments box in the right pane, enter -SSE
7. Close the Modify Executables menu and run TexGen from the drop-down.
8. Enable HD Tree.

8. Click Start.
9. When complete, you will see a message saying "TexGen completed successfully", click Zip and Exit.
10. Install the TexGen output by clicking the button at the top of MO2.
11. From the new window, navigate to the DynDOLOD folder you installed in step 2, then double-click TexGen_Output.zip and install it.

DynDOLOD

1. Open the folder where you extracted DynDOLOD, then open Edit Scripts\DynDOLOD\DynDOLOD_SSE.ini
2. Change only the following options:
• Set Expert to 1 (line 11).
• Set Level32 to 1 (line 45).
3. In MO2, select the button at the top of MO2 to open the executables menu.
4. Click the + at the top of the window and the select Add from file...
5. From the pop-up, navigate to where TexGen is installed and select DynDOLODx64.exe.
6. In the Arguments box in the right pane, enter -SSE
7. Close the Modify Executables menu and run DynDOLOD from the drop-down.
8. Configure DynDOLOD with the following settings:

• In the top-left corner, right-click the list of worldspaces and Select all.
• Select the High preset.
• Enable Candles and FXGlow.
• In the Mesh and Reference rules list, scroll to the bottom and double click on tree.
• Set its LOD options to:
  • LOD4: Level0
  • LOD8: Billboard4
  • LOD16: Billboard4
  • LOD32: Billboard6
• Still in the list, double click \ and set its LOD32 to Level0.
• Copy these options:

9. Click OK.
10. When complete, you will see a message saying "DynDOLOD completed successfully", click Zip and Exit.
11. Install the DynDOLOD output by clicking the button at the top of MO2.
12. From the new window, navigate to the DynDOLOD folder you installed in step 2, then double-click DynDOLOD_Output.zip and install it.
13. Set up the load order as follows:
    • DynDOLOD.esm should be the last ESM plugin (written in bold).
    • DynDOLOD.esp and then Occlusion.esp should be at the bottom.