Restoration loop mods—do they break the game or just fix vanilla's biggest flaw?

[RiftenWanderer]

I'm planning my first modded playthrough (MO2 on PC), and I keep seeing people mention mods that tweak how Restoration alchemy works. Right now I'm torn between playing vanilla to learn the game "properly" or grabbing something like a perk overhaul that apparently makes Restoration actually matter beyond just healing potions. Does letting yourself use Restoration loops actually trivialize everything, or does vanilla Skyrim just design it so badly that you're missing out if you don't? Trying to figure out if I should start with a balance mod or just accept that I'll be chugging healing potions for 100 hours.

 

[WhiterunModder]

The restoration loop thing is kind of a red herring honestly. Vanilla Skyrim doesn't have a restoration loop problem - it has a game balance problem that loops just expose. You can trivialize everything with smithing, enchanting, and alchemy even without touching restoration. A daedric sword with chaos damage does way more to break the game than any potion ever will.

That said, restoration perks in vanilla are genuinely boring. They're just "potion strength goes up" and that's it. If you grab something like Ordinator (the perk overhaul), restoration actually gets interesting perks that do unique things beyond healing - stuff that makes it feel like a real school of magic. That's worth it imo, not because it "fixes" anything broken, but because it makes the skill tree feel less pointless.

For your first playthrough though? I'd say play vanilla to learn what the base game actually feels like, then mod it up on playthrough two. You'll appreciate what mods change way more that way, and you won't accidentally install something that conflicts with your load order before you even know what load orders are. MO2 is great but it has a learning curve - don't add complexity your first time through.