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Dawnguard Sentries

After many days of work I'm proud to bring you all the evolution of Dawnguard Sentries This mod adds Dawnguard vampire hunters as extra guards to all the hold capitals in Skyrim, as well as some towns. In those towns, you'll see Vigilants of Stendarr working with the Sentries. That's an immersion sort of thing to simulate the Dawnguard being a bit short on manpower and the Vigilants wanting to do something after their HQ was burned.

First, yes, DAWNGUARD IS REQUIRED. With the addition of an MCM Menu, now SKSE 1.7.2 and SkyUI 4.1 are also required.

Now also available on the Nexus - And on the Hot Files List 5-23-2015 thru 5-29-2015:
http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/66126/?


So what features does the mod have:

1) Two Dawnguard Sentry guards at every vampire spawn point in hold Capitals. All of them are unique NPCs with distinct faces and a full range of Dawnguard gear. Some even have unique weapons. Some villages are also patrolled by teams of Dawnguard and Vigilants of Stendarr. VIllages covered are Dragon Bridge, Ivarstead, Riverwood, Rorikstead and Shor's Stone.

All Sentries are set up as members of guard factions to make this mod more compatible with When Vampires Attack and Run For Your Lives. This also means they'll assist guards, make arrests AND FIGHT DRAGONS. Sentries are set to react neutrally to player and follower vampires however, meaning player vampires can go into town to sell and do quests, so long as they don't attack anybody or have a bounty. Other NPC vampires will be attacked mercilessly on sight however. :D

Depending on your personal playing style and which side you're playing on the Dawnguard DLC, the Sentries can be set to Essential, making them unkillable, or to respawn only, meaning if they're lost in a vampire attack they'll re-appear after 10 game days.

A note on Riften: I also took into account the Thieves Guild quest in the market and positioned the Dawnguard patrols wide enough from that spot to not impact the quest significantly. All Sentries also should disable during Civil War sieges (vanilla game script) so the fight doesn't become unbalanced

2) Exterior patrols outside the cities of Riften and Solitude. Riften's North gate seems a spot of constant attack spawns for me. Now that spot, and the docks are watched by the Dawnguard, as is the Road just above the Solitude harbor. Mostly for immerison bu they will help with the occasional dragon attack at the Solitude stables.

These particular Sentries can be toggled to Essential or completely disabled in the MCM

3) A roving Dawnguard patrol Between Riften's North Gate and the entrance to Dayspring Canyon. Mostly for immersion. After all, the Dwnguard has to keep it's supply lines open. This patrol does a great job of clearing bandits and wolves from the road. Again they can be set to Essential, Respawn OR toggled completely off if they're too much for you or you're already using Immersive Patrols.

4) Not to play favorites, Castle Volkihar has had a handful of unique Vampire guards protecting the outside of the Castle. Since the mod has all NPCs walking 24/7, these Vampires have a modified version of the Vampire sunlight weakness magic effect. They will be significantly weaker in sunlight, but won't take actual damage from it. Ergo, you have an advantage attacking during the day. These guards are respawn only but can be toggled off

5) Dawnguard recruits. Similar to Castle Volkihar, Fort Dawnguard has it's own security. 10 unique NPC Dawnguard recruits are positioned along Dayspring Canyon standing guard. They're respawn only but can be disabled via the MCM


So there you have it; a lore friendly, non-cheating and extremely customizable way to protect your favorite NPCs from Vampires and Dragons. The 'When Vampires Attack' and 'Run For Your Lives' mods are also recommended and compatible if you want maximum lore friendly protection for your NPCs. The mod was built with the MCM Menu being the only script added to the game also, so it should be very install and compatibility friendly.

The best part is that thanks to the new MCM Menu, you have multiple options on how to configure the number of Dawngaurd Sentries running about and if you want them to be killable or not (via essential state toggle options). Basic protection for the capitals and bigger towns, or max it out, it's all up to you.


Mod Compatibilities:
I've played versions of this mod with over 200 other mods installed. Thanks to the only scripts it uses being the disable during civil war and MCM scripts, it's very friendly to most other mods.

Civil War Overhaul: All Sentries should disable during seiges no matter the city

When Vampires Attack and Run for Your Lives: I use both and they're a great combo with this mod. Put them higher in the load order however to avoid their "run" scripts overriding the Sentries guard factions.

Better Vampires and Better Vampire Lord Transformation: Both work fine with this mod

Immersive Patrols: Haven't used it myself, but my patrol can be disabled if you do so there's no overlap. The two Sentries in Rorikstead can be disabled for the same reason

In short, the only mods that would probably not work are mods that make major changes to the structure of towns so that the mapped patrol routes for the Sentries wouldn't work. Cosmetic town changes are fine though

RECMMENDED:
First, Fus Ra D'oh for silent dialog. VERY few voices work with the Dawnguard dialog factions, so this will let you "hear" more than a huh? from some Dawnguard Sentries. Likewise any mod that improves the Textures on the Dawnguard & Vampire equipment. I personally like EcthelionOTW and MissLexi's (absolutely amazing) EotW DawnguardDLC Textures Remastered:

Nexus Link for EotW Retexture: http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/51947/?

If you use a Sevenbase or UNPB body replacer, I also recommend FastestDogInTheDistrict's Sevenbase armor conversions for the Dawnguard & Vampire Armors:

http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/37946/?

Both look similar to the originals, just better textures and they don't make 7B characters look flat chested. Yes, UNPB bodies are so similar that Fastest Dog's mods have worked fine for me as a replacer.


With all that said, I'd also like to give huge THANK YOUs to everybody who's given me a thumbs up (positive) rating on the mod. I do this for fun and as a learning experience, but the ratings do help give me the motivation to continue.

Likewise huge thanks go out to Crimson Blade, CPU, Aqqh, Enai Siaion, and DarkFox127's YouTube Tutorials for contributing in various ways to my being able to make this mod work.

Crimson Blade, mentioned above, was the author of the original Dawnguard Sentries mod. I took over the mod with his permission after he took a break from the game. While the mod has evolved a good deal since then, ALL credit for the original idea and initial work go to him.


ARMOR IN THE FIRST SCREENSHOT:
Since I've been asked in the past, my character is wearing the Midnight Breed armor. Formerly on the Nexus, it's now found at http://robton.nu/midnight-breed-armor/