The Skyrim Mod Forge is back, bringing you some of the best mods produced by the modding community dedicated to improving The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Today marks a small change for this column, as from now on it will appear every Thursday and not every Wednesday as it did before.

We're already in sight of the end of January, and we’re all still waiting to see if Bethesda will really keep its promise of releasing the Creation Kit (that will increase the modding potential of the game exponentially) this month as they promised in their latest blog post. In the meanwhile the community is still using whatever it can to improve the game over the original. There already are nearly 7500 mods available for download, and that’s just counting the ones that I could personally find.

The purpose of this column is to help those that may be a little disoriented with the size and scope of what the Skyrim modding community offers. You’ll find here on DualShockers every Thursday.

But, as every week, it’s time to let the mods do the talking, so without further ado, head past the cut for this week’s highlights.

 Black and Gold Elven Equipment with Masked Helmet

In last week's episode I expressed my displeasure with the yellow default elven armor, and introduced an alternative that happened to fit my taste. A couple readers told me over twitter that, while the yellow armor is awful, changing it with something even brighter might not be the most appropriate way to solve the issue, at least not for everyone. Can't argue with that, so here's a second alternative by Shodan44 that not only looks much better than the original, but it's also lore-appropriate, as it follows the black and golden color scheme of the Thalmor robes.

It looks great and quite imposing, especially due to the addition of a rather handy facemask. You can check it out here.

Hvergelmir's Armor Retexture - HAR

Normally I don't cover mods that aren't in a quite advanced state, but this one by Hvergelmir is just too good to pass. At the moment it includes just an extremely well done retexture of the iron armor and the banded iron armor (shields included) , but the plan is to cover every armor in the game with time. The level of detail is simply amazing, so I definitely encourage you to give it a try, especially if you're one of those players that love walking around wearing low level armor to increase the challenge. In addition to that the Nexus Mod Manager will keep you updated when the author will upload new versions.

You can download it here, and a separate version with just the shields here.

Witchplate

This mod by Telthalion is rather simple, but it's evidence that it doesn't take a degree in Moddology (yes, I just made the word up) to create your own mods. The author simply took the models of some pieces of armor included in the game, modified them a bit, added some decorative runes in a very tasteful way, and there you have a new set of armor that works very well for the spellsword types among us.

You can check it out here, and maybe be inspired to do your own mods as well.

Full armor set bat files

Many would call this mod by jojo4u a cheat, but it's very useful in a lot of circumstances. Basically it adds a set of easy commands that you can type in the console to receive a full set of a certain kind of armor. Want Iron armor? Just type "bat ironf" and you'll get it without having to look for the IDs of the single items on the internet. The same goes with the rest of the vanilla armor sets. It's definitely good if you need to take some screenshots and you need a particular armor for them, or to test retexture and replacer mods. You can find it here alongside with the command list.

Soul Gems Differ - Full and Empty

I always found the fact that soul gems have the same color whether they're full or empty and whatever class they belong to a bit underwhelming and counterintuitive. Luckily this mod by Utopolyst fixes the issue, and it does that in a very elegant way.  It provides a lot of texture, color and even glow options and, thanks to an easy to use installer, it lets you chose what options to apply to what gems, creating your own color scheme. Just beautiful. You can download it here. No more drab soul gems, from now on.

Disease Descriptions

This lovely little mod by Funsize replaces the statistical descriptions of the diseases you can contract in the game with a more "immersion friendly" version taken from the beloved The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, it may just be fluff, but it's also a must have for the fans of the lore and the nostalgic among us. I installed it and never went back. You can do it too after downloading it here.

Better Circlets HQ

This mod by Yuril improves the look of the vanilla circlets tenfold. Not only the textures are much higher in resolution and detail, but a decorative motif has also been added, giving the boring vanilla circlets a more elegant and interesting look. They're jewelry after all. You can download it here. On a side note, I really need to retexture that table in Proudspire Manor. Come on Bethesda. That's just nasty...

LOTR - Glamdring

Last week I shown you Narsil and Anduril by Isilmeriel, but looks like he wasn't nearly done. This week he gave us Glamdring and boy, does it looks good! The sword comes in three stunning versions (ancient, regular and polished), that can be upgraded realistically at the forge. It also includes a highly detailed scabbard to complete the set. If you love swords and/or the Lord of The Rings, this is another must have. You can download it here. That’s it for this episode. I hope you found something useful to improve your game. As usual remember that full and exclusive credit for the mods listed above goes to their talented authors. Do come back next week (on Thursday)  for more mods at the Skyrim Mod Forge. Read More Episodes of The Skyrim Mod ForgeEpisode Zero – Baby StepsEpisode 1 – Large Address, Steady Growth and LipsEpisode 2 – Mod Managing, Beauty and DragonsEpisode 3 - More Beauty, Divorce and Small DetailsEpisode 4 – Even More Beauty, Fashion and a Better HUDEpisode 5 – Hair, Flora and Weapons from MorrowindEpisode 6 – Handsome Men, More Hair and Armor From The Witcher 2Episode 7 – Swords, Ice, Spells, Fashion and Realistic LightThe Skyrim Mod Forge – Episode 8 – Cats, Shouts, Hideouts and Swords from LOTREpisode 10 – Rainbow Colors, Weapons, Armor and Witcher GearEpisode 11 – Companions, Pretty Faces and More from The Witcher 2Episode 12 – Houses, Lovely Hairstyles and Riding Like a BossEpisode 13 – Lovely Hair, Armor from The Witcher 2 and Hundreds of Books.