Modder's Interview: AlandroSul
How long have you been modding and what was your first complete mod?
Like a lot of people, my first attempts at modding involved making houses for myself. None of them were all that complex, and I didn’t release them. As I recall, my very first attempt was making a Dwemer tower for myself near Dagon Fel (I think I was jealous of Sorkvild and Andre Maul for having cool ruin-homes in the region). My homemade tower was a lot lamer than theirs, and as I recall, it consisted of a single round room bathed in sickly yellow ambient light with some boxes and a bedroll. Pretty standard first-mod fare, I guess!
My first try at a bigger mod was a little later when I made an Ordinator companion character with quests. I wrote a lot of dialogue for that character but ultimately abandoned it due to biting off more than I could chew in the quest department. However, it did teach me how to make followers and use Morrowind’s dialogue system.
That experience was relevant for the first mod I actually released, which was Yashga, a basic follower with a bit of dialogue. I put it together in a week out of a last-minute desire to participate in the 2018 May modding event. At that time, I hadn’t played Morrowind in a while, but I watched your Stone Elf Fighter let’s play and some other Danae videos on YouTube. Those videos drew me back into the game, so I am sorry to say you are partially responsible for my modding career.
How do you approach modding?
For mods focused on gameplay mechanics, I usually get ideas from playing the game. For example, a lingering frustration with being unable to change my hairdo in-game led me to make a bunch of equippable hair helmets. Later, I learned MWSE to do it better for my “Barbershop” mod.
As another example, I often found myself avoiding trainers in-game to make things a little more challenging. This self-imposed rule inspired some of the challenge backgrounds in “The Wretched and the Weird,” my character backgrounds addon.
For my quest/companion mods, I got a lot of inspiration from the pioneer follower mods by Emma and Kateri, as well as non-Morrowind games focusing on in-depth party companions, especially Bioware games.
My workflow can be messy. When writing characters or quests, I often go through a few drafts before settling on a concept I’m happy with. Some ideas from my unfinished Ordinator companion were used in The Strider's Nest, and almost all of The Strider’s Nest characters underwent multiple iterations before reaching their final form. For example, I always planned to include a quixotic knight character, but the original incarnation of Iona was a male knight and youngest son of a Breton noble family. Knowing he stood no chance of inheriting his family’s estate, he ventured into Morrowind to claim his own fief—where his horse was promptly eaten by Ashlanders, leaving him in need of rescue by the player.
Right after finishing that quest, I played a Tamriel Rebuilt quest involving a similar confused knight whose horse was eaten by Ashlanders. I thought, "Darn, we can’t both have knights losing their horses like this—it’d look silly!" In retrospect, it might have been funny if multiple mods featured knights losing their horses. It feels true to Morrowind! But seeing it already done prompted me to rewrite the character (and split the “fish out of water noble” angle into Amelie). Lucan and Andren were originally going to be different races and characters, so everyone went through a few iterations.
What's your favourite thing about modding?
It is very satisfying to create something that makes the game more fun when I play it myself. I’m kind of addicted to air-jumping with Alteration Movement, even though I sometimes fling myself off a cliff and die.
More broadly, it’s amazing how the modding community collectively creates something much greater than the sum of its parts. We all have different interests and ideas, and together we make Morrowind bigger and weirder than anyone could achieve alone.
What's your favourite mod that you've made so far?
The Strider's Nest is my biggest mod, and probably my favorite. Since it’s so large, it provokes mixed feelings: every time I play it, I see dialogue I’d like to edit. It’s still somewhat unfinished, and I’m sure some people find it intolerably "moddy." But it’s still something I’m glad I made.
As for the mod I most enjoy playing (with some recency bias), I’m currently enjoying playing a “wretch” character from my character backgrounds mod. I wasn’t sure how viable it would be when I made it (it sets all your stats to 10 and maxes skills at 15), but I’ve found it surprisingly satisfying to build my character up from such a lowly position.
Are you working on a mod these days?
I recently released a character backgrounds addon for Merlord’s framework, and people have offered a few ideas I’d like to implement. I’ve also been fiddling with The Strider’s Nest again and want to add more content to it.
I am also working on a murder-mystery/"noir" quest mod taking place in a shady underground city beneath Vivec, where you'll get the opportunity to work alongside a hard-boiled detective to investigate various morally questionable underground figures.
How much do you play Morrowind, not counting play testing?
I usually do a big playthrough with a new character once or twice a year, especially after Madness, when there are big new mods to check out. There are so many new mods that I never run out of things to do.
How did you discover Morrowind?
My first experience with Morrowind was as a teenager at a friend’s house, watching them play over their shoulder. My friend wasn’t particularly good at showcasing the game (as I recall, they spent a lot of time trying to punch friendly NPCs to death in Seyda Neen), but I was amazed by how interactive the world was. A game where you can go anywhere and pick up every piece of random clutter! I was fascinated by Morrowind right away.
It took a while before I could play it myself since I didn’t have a PC or Xbox at the time. But it was one of the first games I bought when I saved enough money to get my own computer.
What makes Morrowind special for you?
The fact that it’s as much a “fantasy life simulator” as an RPG is a big part of its appeal to me, especially with the vast suite of immersion mods available. I enjoy just living another life in weird mushroom-elf land, even when I’m not actively fighting Dagoth Ur or completing the main quest. I’ve tried to add to the life-sim elements with mods like Vvardenfell Ablutions, my bathing mod.
I also love how easy it is to make quests and characters in Morrowind. I adore Bethesda’s later games, but I have zero confidence as a voice actor. So I could never make a Skyrim mod with a story unless I told it entirely through notes, which probably wouldn’t feel satisfying. Morrowind is a creative writing platform in a way newer games aren’t, thanks to its dialogue system, and many modders have used it to tell great stories.
What are the mods you simply cannot play without?
I rely heavily on life-sim mods like Ashfall. But without naming a single mod, new quest/content mods are usually what motivate me to play again. I just started a new character to check out Project Cyrodiil , which is fantastic. Content like that almost always draws me back.
Are there any underrated mods that you really enjoy?
South Wall, Den of Iniquity is an older, slightly obscure mod that has endured as one of my favorites. I always play through it on thief characters. It inspired me to make my own somewhat seedy tavern, though The Strider’s Nest lacks dancing Wood Elves in slinky outfits and secret sewer passages, so it’s not quite as seedy.
Do you play other games?
Yes! Some of my favorite games share similarities with Morrowind: open-ended objectives and life-sim elements. I’m a big fan of Crusader Kings 2/3, Stellaris, and Dwarf Fortress. Like Morrowind, they’re most fun when you set your own goals and roleplay your way through the simulation. They’re also heavily moddable, and there’s significant overlap in the player base. Crusader Kings, in particular, has an excellent Elder Scrolls total conversion mod called Elder Kings, which is a fantastic way to experience Tamriel as a king rather than an adventurer.
Do you mod other games?
Not really. I made a couple of portrait mods for Crusader Kings 2, but nothing in-depth.
And by the way, what's the story behind your user name?
Alandro Sul was Nerevar’s shield-companion, but I mainly picked the name because I needed a Twitch username and had recently seen a weird sketch from C0da of Alandro Sul in the modern world of Tomorrowind, wearing a camera around his neck. That strange drawing stuck in my mind, so I used it as my username.
I regret choosing a lore character’s name as my username—it’s confusing—but it’s too late to change now. So I offer my humblest apologies to the real Alandro Sul.