I hate it when, partway through a fantasy series, the characters start skipping back and forth between locations that used to take three episodes and multiple frostbitten limbs to bridge. Game of Thrones, The Rings of Power, they all do it. And I get it, because I too cannot resist the temptation of fast travel. We already did the ‘it’s hard to get from this place to that place’ subplot. Why do it again?
It damages the illusion a little though, doesn’t it? The more the rules of the world are bent, the less weight the whole story seems to have. Some people hated the long boat rides in The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker. I loved ’em. I used to try to walk across all of EverQuest with low level characters for fun. But like fantasy authors who don’t want to describe the same gusty mountain pass for the third time, when I get the option to fast travel in most games, I take it. How can I resist?
One modder has a solution, or at least a sort of nicotine gum for habitual fast-travelers: The Regional Fast Travel mod (opens in new tab) for Skyrim Special Edition.
“Looking for a method to stop you from fast travelling all the time?” asks digitalApple. “This mod will add more rules to fast travel requests.”
Those rules are pretty simple. The mod, which can be customized with an ini file, prohibits fast traveling when:
The last restriction there requires certain quests to be completed before you can fast travel to places such as the College of Winterhold, Sky Haven Temple, or Imperial Military Camp.
Of course, there’s a chance you’ll say “to hell with this” after an hour and uninstall the mod, but I like the idea of it. Efficiency isn’t necessarily more fun, but it’s hard to resist when the option’s there. This is a little hurdle to help keep you honest if, like me, you claim to appreciate the journey as much as the destination.
You can get Regional Fast Travel on NexusMods (opens in new tab), and here’s a list of our other favorite Skyrim mods.
