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Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 8 2011, 06:45 AM

First off, some useful links and utilities:

http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.php?/forum/25-oblivion-mods/ this is where you'll want to go for all the latest news and updates on the mountains of unofficial content we all take for granted. If I don't have the answer you're looking for, chances are one of the many people here do.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2097 I don't think I need to explain this one.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=20516 this is a well maintained utility that reads the mods you have installed and suggests the best order to load them in to avoid the inevitable conflicts. This is another must-have.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=22368 the Swiss army knife of Oblivion modding, and I swear by it. It's intimidating at first, but surprisingly easy to use once you figure out how it works. Finally, Once you figure out BAIN, you will never need to worry about installation problems again.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=35230 if you are just starting Bash, it can be very easy to get lost in how much it does. This will help you get on the right foot.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=11536 a very important tool. Most of its features don't concern the end user, but its ability to clean up dirty and unneeded edits in a plugin is invaluable.

http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/TES4Edit_Cleaning_Guide at the TESCS Wiki. It contains a comprehensive list of mods that need to be cleaned, mods that are already clean, and mods that should not be cleaned, as well as a comprehensive guide on how to actually do it.

So, it seems I have become "Mr. Modder" around these here parts, so I've decided to open this little thread if you have any questions for me. Questions about making modding easier for yourself, how to use a specific tool, if you've encountered a rather irksome problem and can't figure out what to do about it, or if you want to make your game perform a bit better. I will be the first to admit I'm not a professional modder, as I don't make my own mods. I do have the experience needed to maintain a heavy load order with minimal issues, as well as understanding a few advanced tricks to squeeze every last drop of performance out of the game, so I do know what I'm talking about.

If anyone has any doubts, this is my load order:



So with that, ask away.

Posted by: TheOtherRick Feb 9 2011, 03:54 AM

Thanks for starting this thread TK. You might be sick of me before this is through, but hopefully you won't regret starting it. I just looked at your mod list/load order. WOW! 11 .esm files to start the list. I am not looking to change the game to that extent. However, I am looking to make it more immersive than what I have now. That is the ultimate goal. Of the bold printed utilities that you have listed, I only have OBMM. I have stayed away from Wrye Bash and BAIN, and wasn't aware of BOSS (other than seeing it mentioned in passing). I had not heard of TES4Edit until this post. So, before I (we) embark on this, allow me to post my current mod list/load order -

00-Oblivion.esm
01-Cobl Main.esm
02-Unofficial Oblivion Patch.esp
03-DLCShiveringIsles.esp
04-Unofficial Shivering Isles Patch
05-SM Plugin Refurbish - SI.esp
06-Knights.esp
07-Knights - Unofficial Patch.esp
08-SM Plugin Refurbish - Knights.esp
09-Cobl Glue.esp
10-Cobl Si.esp
11-Cobl Tweaks.esp
12-Salmo the Baker, Cobl.esp
13-Real Hunger, Cobl.esp
14-Living Economy - SI.esp
15-Living Economy - Items.esp
16-Harvest[Flora].esp
17-Harvest[Flora] - Shivering Isles.esp
18-Enhanced Water v2.0 HD.esp
19-AliveWaters.esp
20-AliveWaters - Slaughterfish Addon.esp
21-RealSleepExtended.esp
22-Cyrodiil transportation network.esp
23-za_bankmod.esp
24-kuerteeGoldIsAnInventoryItem.esp
25-Chapel Tithe.esp
26-Cobl Races - Balanced.esp
27-Cobl Races.esp
28-Cobl Races TNR.esp
29-Cobl Races TNR SI.esp
30-Laesea_House_v1.0.esp
31-FormID Finder4.esp

This list is from OBMM. I have OBSE v18 and Pluggy v125. Two OMOD files - DarkUld_DarN_16_OMOD_Version-11280 and Oblivion Graphics Extender. The game runs smoothly. Before I add anything, I would like advice my current list (changes/tweaks). I don't know the code for "show/hide spoiler", so sorry about the post length.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 9 2011, 04:23 AM

The code for spoiler boxes is [*spoiler][*/spoiler] tags (remove the stars).

Now, Load order advice...

Posted by: TheOtherRick Feb 9 2011, 04:51 AM

OK...so Step 1 completed! Thank you for the quick reply. Step 2 is info gathering before making changes, with the following questions...

1) - Is BOSS to be used in lieu of OBMM or in conjunction with it?

2) - Are all of the mods on your list available at TESNexus? (That way I can look them up instead of clogging this thread with questions about them.)

I am going to assume that any mod on your list will will have a dependency list, either in the readme or the mod description.

And yes...the very first thing I do is read and re-read the readmes...The first and cardinal rule of installing mods!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 9 2011, 05:02 AM

1. In conjunction with. Occasionally BOSS will happen across a mod it does not recognize, and you will have to sort it by hand.

2. A great deal of my mods are available on the Nexus. As for dependencies, yes, most mod authors will let you know about them. Just watch out for a few of the mods that are marked ++ or ** in my load order. Most of them are harmless, but there are a few of them (Item Interchange for one) that are not designed to be activated.

Posted by: Acadian Feb 9 2011, 02:37 PM

Wow, TK knows mods, and can cook too!

Thanks for starting this thread. It's so nice to have some 'in house' real expertise here. As you know, I'm hoping this summer to spend some time getting more sophisticated with my mod usage. I'm sure I'l be pestering you lots then!

Posted by: TheOtherRick Feb 9 2011, 03:41 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 8 2011, 10:02 PM)

Posted by: mALX Feb 9 2011, 03:45 PM

Thank you so much for starting this thread TK !!!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 9 2011, 08:57 PM

QUOTE(TheOtherRick @ Feb 9 2011, 07:41 AM)

Posted by: mALX Feb 11 2011, 02:22 PM

When you have just downloaded a mod, unzipped it - do you copy the folders into the Bethesda/Oblivion/Data file? Or do you copy the contents inside the folders into the Bethesda/Oblivion/Data file?



If you are supposed to just copy the folders - and you have (erroneously) copied the (inside contents of the folders) and placed them in the Oblivion Data folder - and now your Oblivion Data folder is a mess of loose files that you can't place what mod they go to - many of which could have been removed by now because you no longer use them ... er ... How do you clean up your Oblivion Data File?

I have TES4Edit, but only mod .ESP's are showing up on it, and these lose items in the Data folder are not showing up as anything on it. - also, I'm really not sure what the H I'm doing with it, not sure what the H I'm supposed to be doing with it.

Since my game crashed, I've been trying to clean out all the mods I wasn't using/clean out all these loose files I don't know what mod they originally belonged to/either keep intact or re-install mods I want to use (install correctly this time)

GAAAAAH!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 11 2011, 05:36 PM

Actually, I do not recommend manual installation, as it tends to be extremely hard to undo those (as you very well have seemed to notice). If you are still relatively inexperienced with BAIN, your best bet would be to use Oblivion Mod Manager's OMOD installer feature. Simple packages are very easy to install via OMOD, you just need to maintain the standard Data format for the game (all folders appear as they would if you were to enter the Data folder: meshes, menus, textures, etc.) as well as the plugin, which does not go in any folder. You then open OBMM, select "Create OMOD," select the folder the mod files are in, and finally click "Create." There you go! One easy to install and uninstall OMOD package!

The downside: larger mods with multiple install options tend to require a custom script in order to install everything properly. I therefore still must recommend you take the time to learn BAIN. Believe it or not, BAIN is actually simpler than OBMM!

As for your data folder, at this point, if it's as much of a mess as you say, take note of all your esp files (if you install the Construction Set, it will mark all your ESMs and ESPs with a handy little swiss army knife icon to make your life easier), and delete anything that is not an ESM, ESP, BSA, TXT, or INI. If you are really uncertain, and you don't have a lot of mods installed, starting over is also a viable option. The base Oblivion data folder contains these files:

Folder: Music
Folder: Shaders
Folder: Textures (it only contains one, TerrainNoise.dds, but you can actually delete this entire folder, because the TerrainNoise texture is also in the BSA)
Folder: Video
Credits.TXT
Oblivion (BSA X 6+ESM)

(DLC if you have them)
DLCBattlehornCastle (BSA+ESP)
DLCFrostcrag (BSA+ESP)
DLCHorseArmor (BSA+ESP)
DLCList.TXT
DLCMehrunesRazor (ESP)
DLCOrrery (BSA+ESP)
DLCShiveringIsles (BSA X 4+ESP)
DLCSpellTomes (ESP)
DLCThievesDen (BSA+ESP)
DLCVileLair (BSA+ESP)
Knights (BSA+ESP)

Posted by: mALX Feb 11 2011, 05:50 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 11 2011, 11:36 AM)

Actually, I do not recommend manual installation, as it tends to be extremely hard to undo those (as you very well have seemed to notice). If you are still relatively inexperienced with BAIN, your best bet would be to use Oblivion Mod Manager's OMOD installer feature. Simple packages are very easy to install via OMOD, you just need to maintain the standard Data format for the game (all folders appear as they would if you were to enter the Data folder: meshes, menus, textures, etc.) as well as the plugin, which does not go in any folder. You then open OBMM, select "Create OMOD," select the folder the mod files are in, and finally click "Create." There you go! One easy to install and uninstall OMOD package!

The downside: larger mods with multiple install options tend to require a custom script in order to install everything properly. I therefore still must recommend you take the time to learn BAIN. Believe it or not, BAIN is actually simpler than OBMM!

As for your data folder, at this point, if it's as much of a mess as you say, take note of all your esp files (if you install the Construction Set, it will mark all your ESMs and ESPs with a handy little swiss army knife icon to make your life easier), and delete anything that is not an ESM, ESP, BSA, TXT, or INI. If you are really uncertain, and you don't have a lot of mods installed, starting over is also a viable option. The base Oblivion data folder contains these files:

Folder: Music
Folder: Shaders
Folder: Textures (it only contains one, TerrainNoise.dds, but you can actually delete this entire folder, because the TerrainNoise texture is also in the BSA)
Folder: Video
Credits.TXT
Oblivion (BSA X 6+ESM)

(DLC if you have them)
DLCBattlehornCastle (BSA+ESP)
DLCFrostcrag (BSA+ESP)
DLCHorseArmor (BSA+ESP)
DLCList.TXT
DLCMehrunesRazor (ESP)
DLCOrrery (BSA+ESP)
DLCShiveringIsles (BSA X 4+ESP)
DLCSpellTomes (ESP)
DLCThievesDen (BSA+ESP)
DLCVileLair (BSA+ESP)
Knights (BSA+ESP)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 11 2011, 06:24 PM

OBMM and OBSE don't touch anything inside the Data folder (well, OBSE sorta does, so if you have an obse folder inside your data folder, leave it alone), so you don't need to worry about messing them up.

BAIN is part of Wrye Bash, it is not a separate download. If you want to know how helpful it is, I am in the middle of a small modding project myself right now (generating landscape LOD for some mod combos) and it is SO helpful to be able to uninstall my texture packs (restoring vanilla textures) in only seconds, and without ever having to worry about messing up another mod in the process.

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 06:46 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 11 2011, 12:24 PM)

OBMM and OBSE don't touch anything inside the Data folder (well, OBSE sorta does, so if you have an obse folder inside your data folder, leave it alone), so you don't need to worry about messing them up.

BAIN is part of Wrye Bash, it is not a separate download. If you want to know how helpful it is, I am in the middle of a small modding project myself right now (generating landscape LOD for some mod combos) and it is SO helpful to be able to uninstall my texture packs (restoring vanilla textures) in only seconds, and without ever having to worry about messing up another mod in the process.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 12 2011, 07:19 PM

Default music tracks:

Battle folder:
-battle_01 thru _08

Dungeon folder
-dungeon_01_v2 thru dungeon_05

Explore
-atmosphere_01 thru _09
-(_02 and _05 do not exist)

Public
-town_01 thru _05

Special:
-tes4title
-success
-death

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 09:32 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 12 2011, 01:19 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 12 2011, 09:40 PM

They should be in the music folder, unless the werewolf mod overwrote them. In which case, the mod was shoddily packaged, as overwriting the default files is a cardinal sin of modding Oblivion.

The music in this game is just a bunch of MP3 files tossed into their various folders, so it should be easy to verify.

If they have gone missing, you'll need to reinstall the game to get them back.

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 10:21 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 12 2011, 03:40 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 12 2011, 10:24 PM

Not sure I follow. Do you have the battle_01 through battle_08 tracks all inside, along with three extras that are titled differently?

If yes, just delete those three extra tracks, leaving only battle_01 through battle_08, and repeat that pattern in the rest of the folders.

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 10:25 PM

Never mind, they are playing their sucky music now. - so do I just move them/delete them? They are def NOT Bethesda music.

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 10:29 PM

Okay, what they have done is number theirs so they are chosen first. It is easy to tell which are their added ones by using your list - Thank You so much !!! You ROCK !!!!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 12 2011, 10:30 PM

Yup, go ahead and let Maxical give 'em an explosion!

Wait...

No, don't do that! you don't know what she'll destroy!

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to put your computer in jeopardy by suggesting that. Yeah, go ahead and delete them if you don't want them.

EDIT: Celebratory 200th post dance is in order here...

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 10:33 PM

Just in case, I am moving them to a folder on my desktop and holding them till I am sure nothing is messed up by the change. If all seems okay - then I will delete them. (and what you were asking in the first post is correct.

The files looked exactly the same, but the numbering was the key. Example:

Public Folder:

town1.mp3 = Other
town_01.mp3 = Bethesda


*

Posted by: mALX Feb 12 2011, 10:48 PM

Next time I am attacked by a mudcrab or am dungeon crawling and hear the familiar TES Jeremy Soule sounds I will think of you and say THANK YOU !!!! WOO HOO !!!!

Posted by: TheOtherRick Feb 18 2011, 02:24 PM

Alright...I have downloaded and briefly scanned over the "Wrye Bash For Dummies" visual tutorial that was posted earlier. The thing still scares the hell out of me. But...I really want some of the mods that require it.

So...here is the first of my Q's regarding safe installation. I don't want to lose anything that I currently have...mods, saves, etc. If I copy the two game folders (the one in c:\games\Oblivion and the one in MyDocs) to a safe back-up location...you see where I am going here. What is the best safest way to get started with this?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 18 2011, 07:40 PM

The "Data" folder provided in Bash will not overwrite any of your mods, so don't worry about losing anything. Speaking of Bash...

*notices 291 is out*

I'm going to need to check out the new installer....

EDIT: Not too much different from last time, but with a pretty nice number of new features. I'm particularly liking the new OBSE plugin installation option.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 18 2011, 07:57 PM

Well I added this mod to my game:
http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2518

and it has optional creatures add-on. I would like to use them but for some reason when I activate that part of the mod and go into the game world the game crashes.

I deactivated almost every other mod I am running and it still crashes.

Any suggestions?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 18 2011, 08:37 PM

That download doesn't provide the extra resources you need to use that portion of the mod. Grab them http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=34830 They've been optimized for improved performance on this download. Make sure to grab the items pack, as well, if you want the extra loot.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 18 2011, 08:43 PM

That would be nice if they had mentioned that. The only thing I saw was the extra file needed for the optional gear add-on. Thanks!

I guess they did at the very bottom. My mistake. Thanks for the help anyways.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 19 2011, 05:46 PM

Well I grabbed the mesh/texture pack and applied the optimized textures you linked. If I apply the creature portion of the mod to the game while I'm inside of a building or something the game crashes as soon as I go into the open world. However if I apply it and load a game that is already in the open world, the game does not crash. What the heck is up with that?

EDIT: did a quick run around and I'm still seeing lots of "WTF?! MESH." Also crashed in like 5 mins. The conflict detector is useless because the mod overwrites its self A LOT when you use the optional files.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 19 2011, 07:36 PM

That's because you didn't set the BSAs up properly. The game cannot use any resources from an Archive unless you do one of two things:

1: Register the BSA in Oblivion.INI

2: Load an ESP with an identical name to the BSA

Note that it has to be an ESP file in order for that to work, not an ESM. Since the optional creatures and items for that mod come in ESM form, your best bet if you want to use it on its own is to do this:

-Open Oblivion.INI (Documents, My Games, Oblivion)
-Find the entry "sArchiveList"
-Scroll to the end add the BSAs to the list, it should look like this:

sArchiveList=ArchiveInvalidationInvalidated!.bsa, Oblivion - Meshes.bsa, (the rest of Oblivion's base resources go here), Oblivion - Misc.bsa, FraNewCrea.bsa, FraNewItems.bsa

If you don't have Archive Invalidation Invalidated, I do recommend you obtain it to fix the archive invalidation bug, but it's not absolutely necessary.

This is also the only mod I recommend toing this for, because there is a 256 character limit to the sArchiveList entry.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 20 2011, 02:21 AM

THANK YOU!!!!

They skimped that Oblivion.ini part in the readme. And I didn't even know it was in the Documents section. I was looking for it in C:\Programs\Bethsoft\Oblivion (when another mod made mention)

What is " Archive Invalidation Invalidated"? I found a text document in C:\Programs\Oblivion called "ArchiveInvalidation"

this is the text in it:

Textures/Armor/ImperialWatch/M/Gauntlet.dds
Textures/Creatures/Zombie/ZombieHair.dds
Textures/Dungeons/AyleidRuins/CPRailing01.dds
Textures/Plants/MiscMoth01.dds
Textures/Weapons/SilverShortSword.dds


Thanks man, you are the ModGod
(just got done reading the latest update in "Madness Helps Me Save Myself" lol)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 20 2011, 02:31 AM

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=10724

It's a form of Archive Invalidation called BSA Redirection, which essentially tricks Oblivion into using its bugged automated Archive Invalidation technique on the wrong BSA, allowing for file dates to properly supersede the archives like they did in Morrowind.

It needs to be first because I noticed that the linked installer actually places the BSA's registration after the Meshes BSA, which is not a good place for it to be. You want for that dummy BSA to be the very first one Oblivion sees. I know this because I am now solely using BSA Redirection myself and have absolutely zero problems with my replacers not showing up. No more archive invalidation hassles for me!

(In case you are wondering, that was my endorsement for using BSA Redirection as your primary Archive Invalidation technique)

Posted by: King Coin Feb 22 2011, 08:56 PM

Ok this isn't a pressing problem, it's just annoying. Some of the mods I have add NPCs to the game. Some of them have extremely weird looking eyes. The textures of the pupil and iris are not in the correct place on the eye. I'll upload a pic if you don't know what I mean. Not all mod added NPCs are affected though. I'm wondering if the Cosmetic Compilation Omod is causing this. I do not want to remove it from my game because my current character relies on this mod.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 22 2011, 09:59 PM

That's why you don't want to mix-and-match eye meshes and textures, it results in the rather classic googly-eyes glitch.

Post your load order so I can see if you have multiple mods installed that provide replacement eye meshes.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 23 2011, 12:23 AM

This is going to be lol. I'm sure I have lots of load order problems

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 23 2011, 01:06 AM

These two mods are what's causing the problem:

7. Cosmetic compilation revived .esp
36. Eyecandy compilation .esp

You're either going to need to drop one of them or merge the changes in Bash's Bashed Patch. I would suggest dropping one, though, because I really don't recommend mixing eye resources. Try and keep only one mod in your load order altering eyes at all times unless they are using a universal eye mesh.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 23 2011, 01:09 AM

thanks.

I'll just deal with it because I don't know how to use Bash

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 23 2011, 01:11 AM

QUOTE(King Coin @ Feb 22 2011, 05:09 PM)

Posted by: King Coin Feb 23 2011, 01:29 AM

Find any other problems with my load order? everything seems to work fine, but something would have to be seriously wrong for me to notice.

EDIT: I didn't know the eyecandy mod changed the eyes. I have no problems with standard NPCs, and the PC, just a few mod added NPCs. I see the mod added ones infrequently enough that I can ignore their Fuglyness.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 23 2011, 01:37 AM

I've provided the link to BOSS (Better Oblivion Sorting Software), a one-click utility which will suggest the optimal load order for you in mere seconds. Download it (it's very tiny and easy to use) and run it. That should get you what you want.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 23 2011, 01:59 AM

That sucker completely changed the load order lol. It's screaming at me to Bash stuff but it works fine without.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 24 2011, 01:12 AM

Quick bulletin on how to improve your game's performance here: today, I wish to discuss water reflections.

The pros? They make your water look nice and purdy.

The cons? It has recently come to the attention of the TES4 modding community that water reflections can provide a huge FPS hit. Here's why:

The water reflection system in this game piggybacks onto the game's Distant LOD system. If an object has a matching _far.NIF mesh (which are the low quality objects you see over long distances in this game) the game also uses that mesh for the water reflection mapping. This means that every _far.NIF mesh that is loaded into the game is being rendered twice (once for Distant LOD, once for reflection map) if you have the water reflections setting turned on.

Now, due to Oblivion's lack of occlusion culling (which is a system that prevents a game engine from rendering objects the player can't see), this means that any exterior cell that has water in it gets a reflection map rendered... even if there's only a small puddle on the ground. Every single object that is Visible When Distant, even those you could not hope to see in that tiny puddle. HEck, there are some cells in the game that have no water in them whatsoever up on ground level... but down below the landscape is a giant sea. Not only can you not even hope to see them in normal gameplay, it's impossible to even reach the water. Even they get reflections rendered!

This is an astoundingly inefficient (and dare I say lazy) method of adding reflections to the game, and many people have reported up to 20 FPS (!!!) gained just by turning reflections off. So, if you are looking to squeeze a bit of extra performance out of your game, consider removing the water reflections. The downside to this is you will lose every reflection, including the sky reflection, so the water will look rather soupy and bland, so it is your decision, and it may not be worth the trouble if you are running a lightly modded game.

Posted by: King Coin Feb 24 2011, 01:24 AM

Nice. I'll consider turning them off, I have had some nasty slow downs.

Posted by: mALX Feb 24 2011, 02:15 AM

Can you turn it off by going to the game menu options? I have noticed my PC game slowed a lot recently before crashing - but so did my PC itself, so not sure if that is a PC issue. It has been acting up since I downloaded the latest drivers from NVidia. (overheating, bluescreening, etc.)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 24 2011, 03:06 AM

In the video settings, the option is Water Reflections.

As for your drivers... you may want to consider re-downloading them or rolling back.

Posted by: mALX Feb 24 2011, 03:34 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 23 2011, 09:06 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 24 2011, 03:57 AM

What card model do you have?

Posted by: mALX Feb 24 2011, 04:13 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 23 2011, 09:57 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Feb 24 2011, 05:02 AM

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp-266.58-whql-driver.html
http://www.nvidia.com/object/win7-winvista-32bit-266.58-whql-driver.html
http://www.nvidia.com/object/win7-winvista-64bit-266.58-whql-driver.html

They all support the 8600GT (I checked).

Posted by: mALX Feb 24 2011, 05:24 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Feb 23 2011, 11:02 PM)

Posted by: Bolzmania Mar 9 2011, 07:01 PM

This a very pointless comment but I also have 8600GT

Posted by: mALX Mar 11 2011, 10:05 PM

I wonder if when you have to do a System Restore if it deletes the downloaded mods that you have on your desktop? I just noticed yesterday that my "Oblivion Werewolf Mod" is missing from my desktop - I would never have deleted that, or my Kawa Khajiit files - but both are gone.

I did delete some plug-ins I wasn't using, and assumed the Kawa had somehow gotten mixed in among them - but now I am wondering if the System Restore did it.


GAAAAAH!!!


** mALX crossing fingers, facing east, kneeling before a graven image of a cow ... **



I guess it doesn't matter how much I wish it, the mods are gone regardless. "The Oblivion Werewolf Mod" is no longer on Nexus, and I couldn't find it by Googling.

Unless something has changed, copies of those files are still in my Data file in the Bethesda folder - but the originals have disappeared from my desktop.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 11 2011, 10:12 PM

Did you try undoing your System Restore? There should be an option available to reverse the restore if you recently performed one.

Posted by: mALX Mar 11 2011, 10:25 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Mar 11 2011, 04:12 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 11 2011, 10:41 PM

System restore only deals with the system files in the Windows folder and the registry. It doesn't touch personal files like word documents or saved emails.

Posted by: mALX Mar 11 2011, 10:56 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Mar 11 2011, 04:41 PM)

Posted by: TheOtherRick Mar 13 2011, 08:36 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Mar 11 2011, 04:41 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 13 2011, 11:39 PM

QUOTE(TheOtherRick @ Mar 13 2011, 01:36 PM)

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Mar 11 2011, 04:41 PM)

System restore only deals with the system files in the Windows folder and the registry. It doesn't touch personal files like word documents or saved emails.

This is one reason why your desktop is a notoriously bad place to save things. I also learned that lesson the hard way. I have all of my original mod downloads saved in a folder called "Oblivion Stuff" in "My Documents", and a shortcut to that folder on my desktop. Might I suggest a similar strategy...

Posted by: mALX Mar 14 2011, 04:13 AM

Ok, I just blue-screened again, and got the info (not sure if it is the same cause or not, but here it is):


PFN_List_Corrupt


0x0000004E (0x00000099, 0x000B7F16, 0x00000002, 0x0003633D)

Posted by: TheOtherRick Mar 14 2011, 04:56 AM

QUOTE(mALX @ Mar 13 2011, 10:13 PM)

Posted by: mALX Mar 14 2011, 05:00 AM

QUOTE(TheOtherRick @ Mar 13 2011, 11:56 PM)

QUOTE(mALX @ Mar 13 2011, 10:13 PM)

Ok, I just blue-screened again, and got the info (not sure if it is the same cause or not, but here it is):


PFN_List_Corrupt


0x0000004E (0x00000099, 0x000B7F16, 0x00000002, 0x0003633D)

After yelling those numbers, I think you're supposed to say, "Hutt...Hutt...HIKE!"

Sorry mALX...I know I shouldn't joke about your troubles...please forgive me.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 14 2011, 05:21 AM

@mALX: I have posted my response to your problems in a new thread http://chorrol.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=4685 This one is getting dragged off-topic.

Posted by: TheOtherRick Mar 17 2011, 10:39 PM

Okay then....new mod question...Is there a Better Bodies mod for Oblivion out there similar to the one made for Morrowind? The vanilla bodies aren't bad, compared to Morrowind, but I was just curious.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 17 2011, 10:50 PM

Plenty. The best IMHO are http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=24078 and http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=14942 I personally only use the former, but that's entirely up to you. EVE also comes with optional compatibility for several larger mods.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 19 2011, 08:16 AM

Quick update from me:

I have recently exorcised a crash from my game. It would occasionally occur if I was doing a lot of scrolling through list menus, and it was not a very pretty crash, either. I needed to restart my computer every time it happened.

The problem? The graphics drivers. Oblivion was not playing nice with them, long story short.

I have addressed this by DOWNgrading my drivers to version 197.45 (from 260.99). The reason for this is because a large number of changes occurred in the core architecture of the drivers when the 200 series first went global, and we all know how sensitive Oblivion is to losing the status quo. I am posting this as a small caution to anyone else here using an nVidia GeForce 8 series card. You may not want to go to the 200 series drivers if Oblivion is your most played game; stick to the 100 series.

Again, this ONLY applies to people who have a 8 series GeForce GPU unless anyone here has a different (9 series or GTX model) card from my own and is experiencing the same thing.

Posted by: TheOtherRick Mar 23 2011, 02:34 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Mar 19 2011, 02:16 AM)

Posted by: mALX Mar 23 2011, 04:38 PM

GAAAAH! I use GE Force NVidia 8600 GT - ... GAAAAAH ...?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 23 2011, 11:16 PM

QUOTE(TheOtherRick @ Mar 17 2011, 03:39 PM)

Posted by: SubRosa Mar 24 2011, 12:16 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Mar 19 2011, 03:16 AM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Mar 24 2011, 09:18 AM

That's one of the downsides of playing a heavily modded game, 'Rosa. You can make the game so much better, but you will see an increase in crashing. I can run for about 1 to 2 hours tops in my games, which is perfectly fine by me.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 10 2011, 10:45 PM

Alright guys, this time I have a question for you.

I am trying to figure out how to handle the lost city of Sutch in my game. As you are well aware, Bethesda originally planned to have ten cities included with Oblivion, but at the last minute, Sutch (the tenth city) was cut out of the game almost completely. The only remnants of the city we see today are a ruined fort which contains an important figure to the DB questline, meaning BethSoft had likely finished the city up to that point when it was decided the city be cut, and an Oblivion Gate with an unmarked quest tied to it (Sutch's old static city gate).

Recently, two potential candidates have come to my attention. The first is this one:

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=37867

The author is well respected by me, as I am using three of his mods at this time (although I will admit I had a hand in the creation of one of them, http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=37903). The idea is simple: bring back the city of Sutch as a full city. Note that this mod is still in beta, however, and I will not be willing to commit myself until a full release occurs.

However, there is another project (still in alpha, though) that aims to recreate Sutch as a small village. Again, the author is well respected by me, and we are on quite good terms over at the BGS modding forum. This is a pretty neat idea, and would help a lot with the ret-con involved with Bethesda's treatment of Sutch over Oblivion's development. This way, if they really did move Sutch to Hammerfell, the mod doesn't clash with the new lore, and it is also perfectly realistic for small hamlets to be named after larger cities.

Thoughts?

Posted by: mALX Apr 10 2011, 10:59 PM

King Coin downloaded one of the Sutch mods and had nothing but trouble from it - but I don't know which one it was. He can tell you better than I can which mod and what went wrong. It was something like "Sutch Rebuilt," or "Sutch Revisited" - some name like that.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 10 2011, 11:18 PM

That's why I'm only interested in the above two.

I am aware of the problems previous Sutch Rebuilt mods have had; the two I have detailed are brand new "reboots" of the idea of bringing Sutch back to the game. Both of the authors are well respected, and both of them have peaked my interest. Problem is, they are not going to be compatible with each other, and even if they were, I would only want to use one.

So what shall it be? City or village?

Posted by: King Coin Apr 11 2011, 02:09 AM

QUOTE(mALX @ Apr 10 2011, 04:59 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 16 2011, 12:30 AM

So I downloaded nearly all the stuff mentioned in the OP.

But now I'm wondering which order I should install first? Wrye or OBMM? And so on? Does it matter?

I didn't install Oblivion in the default location (My Programs); instead I have it installed in My Documents/Oblivion Files (to keep all my TES-related files in one location). It's right below My Games in the My Documents window. I also created a new Library to link to it as Windows Explorer defaults to Libraries when you open it.

It seems like it takes the installers a little longer to find Oblivion, but find it they do.

But I am still having trouble getting the CS to work. I keep getting these error messages on launch:
Unable to load CTL file
Cannot load atmosphere model
Cannot load the stars
Cannot load the clouds

Then it gives me the option to look up problem on the internet and close, or simply close. If I select look up the problem, it spins for a while, then closes without any further messages.

This is driving me nuts!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 16 2011, 01:08 AM

"Unable to load CTL file" errors mean the CS can't find resources it is looking for. If you have a ConstructionSet.ini file, check that the file names listed in the sArchiveList entry match the file names for the base Oblivion resource BSAs. They must also match the same entries in the sArchiveList section in Oblivion.ini, as well.

Also, make sure you have installed the construction set in the same place as Oblivion.

Posted by: SubRosa Apr 16 2011, 03:21 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Apr 15 2011, 08:08 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 16 2011, 03:40 PM

That was the problem - I had the CS in its own subfolder next to the Oblivion.exe. I simply moved the CS.exe and the associated .dll file out of the subfolder and now it runs! The only thing left in the CS subfolder is the ReadMe, which isn't necessary for the program to launch and run. Thanks!

I'm still getting used to the installing and file hierarchy system of Windows. Subtle differences like this is what sets the two apart.

I'm off now to explore the CS and learn what I can do with it. I'll be back with more questions, but for now I'm using the online tutorial at the TES CS wiki.

Thanks to all who have been helping me, both on this thread and on the other!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 16 2011, 07:03 PM

Rider, I'd also recommend you check out http://tesalliance.org/forums/index.php?/forum/81-the-enclave/, as well. They have some excellent lessons on how to use the CS.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 17 2011, 02:38 AM

How does one add shadows? In one tutorial it says to left click in the landscape editor, pick your color, and paint it. But when I left click in the render window, all it does is raise and lower the ground. Right clicking paints the ground texture. How do I activate the terrain editor? The other tutorial wasn't very helpful, either.


Never mind - just figured it out. Hot-key Q will set the mouse to vertex shaders. Onward!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 17 2011, 03:04 AM

You can also just tick the checkbox in the vertex shader area that says "edit colors," too.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 03:41 AM

These are very simple questions with potentially very complex answers.

What is the best way to change the texture (appearance) of hair on an NPC? And can I adjust the shades/colors of the eyes a little from standard? I only want to do this for specific NPC's, can this be done?

Here's what I'm thinking, for example:
Change Martin's eye color from default blue to hazel (custom color).
Add a patch of white hair to Steffan's head.

I want to create a modest plug-in that will recreate the unique conditions of OHDH.

I already learned how to adjust height of specific NPC's from the command console, though I'm thinking doing this through the CS would be safer. Only I can't find a place to adjust height in the CS. And I also learned how to go into the CS and make NPC's essential/nonessential.

I'm looking forward to fixing up Gweden Farm!

Posted by: SubRosa Apr 18 2011, 04:15 AM

The first is very simple. Just open the CS, go to the Object Window -> Actors -> NPC -> (the race of the person you want to edit) -> Sex -> and pick out the person you want. From there go to the Face tab. If you have trouble with the CS crashing (I do on my windows 7 box, but not on my XP box), go to the Face Advanced tab first. Then go to the Face tab and it will not lock up. You can change their eyes, hair color, style, and length there. In the Face Advanced tab you can do all the stuff in the game to change their face.

As far as changing the height of specific NPCs, I believe the only way you can do that through the CS is to create a new race, and make the NPC a member of it. Then you can set the height and weight of the race (and the person). It is not as difficult as it sounds. You can see how to create a new race http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/Creating_a_new_race

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 18 2011, 04:21 AM

I've actually had the idea of making a sort of quest mod in Gweden Farm where you eventually restore it from an old, overgrown, burnt out farm plagued by ne'er-do-wells into a respectable manor, with you at the center...

... but that comes after I've finished with Brina Cross.

The quest I have in mind there picks up where the Anvil Recommendation quest left off. A gang of mages will ransack the town, destroying the market square and making off with many Septims worth of goods, and you will need to track them down and get the goods back.

But first thing's first, I want to get a nice settlement in place first, then I'll think about the quest.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 04:25 AM

QUOTE(SubRosa @ Apr 17 2011, 10:15 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 04:27 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Apr 17 2011, 10:21 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 18 2011, 04:33 AM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Apr 17 2011, 09:25 PM)

Posted by: mALX Apr 18 2011, 04:51 AM

You can change the height of specific NPCs in the CS, just bring up their tab for edit. On the left upper side under their name is their ratio - that is how I made Janus Hassildor a giant vampire. (it says 1.0 on everyone, as a giant he is 1.2).

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 18 2011, 04:54 AM

Just don't get TOO carried away, you can screw up an actor's collision if you are too heavy-handed with the height modifications.

1.2 is perfectly reasonable, though.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 02:20 PM

I only want to modify specific NPC's heights to the next increment (i.e. only slightly taller or shorter than typical for that race/gender). Redguard men are slightly taller than Redguard women, and I wanted to bring Julian up to the males' height. Doing this in the command console works great, and I don't think it messes up her collision data too much. Likewise, for Burd, I'll make him the same height as an Altmer (the next tallest after a Nord). And so on. I won't do anything so drastic with any of them.

So far Laterensis Maro is sticking to his routine in my game. Of course, I've only progressed one game day since changing him from "Imperial Legion Soldier." I haven't changed any of the other generic names yet, because I want to play the game a while and see what happens with Maro. If he sticks, then Marc Atellus with Bucky and Drusus with Mariel are next! However, I'm thinking of taking the base ID's in the CS and making new forms with them, keeping the original scripts and just changing names, maybe heights and eye color, hair, etc.

So my ideas are pretty small in scale. I'm not looking at adding new scripts or quests to the game, just modifying what's already there. It would be nice if I encounter a Legion soldier on the road and I'm able to know which one he is or if he's one I've already met.

According to a source on the TES CS wiki, Texture Replacer and the command-line BSA Unpacker were recommended instead of OBMM and NifSkope. Are the ones you recommended better in any way? Why those two in particular?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 18 2011, 02:29 PM

OBMM's BSA utilities are much easier to use than BSA Commander, and NifSkope is simply a must-have tool for anyone who wishes to perform mesh/texture modifications. NifSkope also allows you to see exactly what you are doing, so you will be able to view how your new texture looks on the mesh. You can't do that with Texture Replacer.

Posted by: mALX Apr 18 2011, 03:36 PM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Apr 18 2011, 09:20 AM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 03:53 PM

@ mALX: I already have the list of scale heights for the command console from somewhere on the UESP wiki. I'm using that and it seems to work well (on Julian that is). She's now eye to eye with Boldon!

I just wonder if it would be more stable in the long run to use the CS instead for renaming generic NPC's, etc. as I just described. I'm not planning to do anything so drastic to most of them, just minor tweaks in appearance here and there.

After the MQ ends though, I might get a little more ambitious with the folks at Cloud Ruler Temple. I've been trying to figure out what happens to them after Martin dies. There goes the entire reason for their existence - to protect the Dragonborn. Without another heir to step into Martin's shoes, what's there for the Blades to do?

That's something I might tackle in the future, but right now I'm focused on modifying pre-existing structures and NPC's in the game. Oh, and maybe add a housecat or two . . .

@TK: I had already downloaded OBMM, but haven't installed it yet. I will do that today and get to know it. I will also look for NifSkope and download that as well. I'm going to see if my Mac application can open DDS files (it's not Photoshop, but is very similar), if not, then I'm in trouble, as I'm running into difficulties installing the DDS plugin into the GIMP I've installed. It's frustrating that the GIMP app might be 64-bit, and the plugin is only 32 bit, but I can't find where to install the 32 bit GIMP. ARGH! Why do Windows programs have to be so Rube Goldbergian!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 18 2011, 08:37 PM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Apr 18 2011, 08:53 AM)

@TK: I had already downloaded OBMM, but haven't installed it yet. I will do that today and get to know it. I will also look for NifSkope and download that as well. I'm going to see if my Mac application can open DDS files (it's not Photoshop, but is very similar), if not, then I'm in trouble, as I'm running into difficulties installing the DDS plugin into the GIMP I've installed. It's frustrating that the GIMP app might be 64-bit, and the plugin is only 32 bit, but I can't find where to install the 32 bit GIMP. ARGH! Why do Windows programs have to be so Rube Goldbergian!

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 08:54 PM

I actually got GIMP to work with .dds files on my Mac Partition (automatically runs in the X11 environment.

The next step is figuring out how to accomplish what I want to do with the file! Not easy, as I've never worked with texture maps before and have no idea how to accomplish things. My experience with layers is very limited. Most of my pixel pushing have been in photographs and in vector-drawn objects.

And NifSkope did not show the file containing the specific hair I wanted to work with (short). So I'm putting this on hold for now.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 18 2011, 09:06 PM

You need to extract the mesh from the BSA first. That's where OBMM comes in. You'll find all the hair meshes under the filepath meshes\characters\hair (there's a lot, and it's probably a generic style, so check the styleX.NIF files first). Each hair has three associated files. The NIF contains the base mesh data, but also note the presence of .EGM and .TRI files with identical names. The .EGM and .TRI extension files contain all the data used by FaceGen for the hair meshes, but you don't need to concern yourself with those if all you want to do is retexture the hair.

I am not skilled at creating diffuse maps, either, so I can't really advise you any further on this. All I can tell you is don't forget to generate those mipmaps!

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 18 2011, 11:55 PM

Okay, now I'm getting very frustrated.

I downloaded a simple mod and added it to the game. It ran with no problems so far. But now I wanted to try something more ambitious - Cobl. So I downloaded that and installed it. For some reason it's not showing up in OBMM (which I really haven't figured out how to use yet), WryeBash, or the Oblivion Launcher data files menu. So now I'm wondering what to do next? I noticed that it installed as several subfolders in my Oblivion Data directory, the one with all the visible mods/patches/esm/esp's. I looked inside the one labeled Cobl Core and went eep! More subfolders! I left it alone and now I'm trying to figure it out. Do I have to move all those files manually? Or will OBMM or Wrye Bash do it for me? I'm not fully clear on what those two programs do for me, though I know they're supposed to make handling multiple mods easier.

Oh, and I saw a couple of smaller mods that require OBSE. If I were to install that, is it another program I need to learn to use? Or will its presence in the Oblivion files be enough to install those interesting mods (one of which is to command/call my horse to follow or stay).

Sorry to be such a complete noob at this, but I'm learning the Windows file hierarchy system at the same time I'm learning the ins and outs of modding/playing mods on Oblivion. Wish I could find a tutorial online that will help me get from installing Oblivion to playing with installed mods without conflicts or crashes. This reminds me of the bad old days of Mac Classic OS (pre OSX) when I had to manage extensions with Conflict Catcher!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 19 2011, 12:13 AM

COBL is an example of a mod that has been packaged as "BAIN-ready." All those sub-folders contain all the various options available for thew mod. Lucky for you, I use it myself, so I'll talk you through it.

A BAIN-ready mod is designed so that you can drop it into the Bash Installers folder It's where Oblivion's base directory is located, but separated, usually XXX/XXX/Bethesda Softworks/Oblivion Mods/Bash Installers. Drop the package in there and BAIN will see it. From there, you will see a list of Sub-packages in the package config. window.

-Tick the checkbox beside "00 Cobl Core," and then a list of ESPs will appear in the ESM/P filter window. Check the ones you want. The only ones you should concern yourself with at this point are Cobl Core, Cobl Glue, Cobl Tweaks, and Cobl SI.

-Balanced Races does not concern you unless you want Cobl Races, and for that you need to download a separate 200Mb cosmetics package.

-If you want to overhaul Salmo the Baker and give him a proper shop, go ahead and add him in as well, but take note that Salmo's plugin has a tendency to cause CTDs, and no one has any good fix on why.

-Ignore the TNR entries.

-Everything else is either obsolete or doesn't concern the lay user.

I would also suggest looking over the BAIN chapter in the Wrye Bash pictorial guide, as it is a very powerful and very useful tool, and every second you spend learning how Bash works is a second well spent.

For OBSE, it's mostly just drop-n-pop. However, you will need to use the special launcher they provide so that OBSE can be injected into Oblivion.EXE. You'll know it's working if you see a black command prompt box appear for a second then vanish before Oblivion starts.

And don't worry too much about getting to the point where you can play with hundreds of plugins installed with few conflicts. We all have to start somewhere. Just take it slow, add one mod at a time for whatever tickles your fancy at the time, play to make sure it's working right before adding another, and always always always ask whatever questions you might have. There is nothing wrong with an inquisitive new modder, it shows us you care about what you are doing to the game.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 19 2011, 12:36 AM

So when I download the install package and save it to my downloads folder (my default behavior), I can just drop that whole thing into the BAIN installers folder without having to "unstuff" it first? I find Stuffit irritating, especially as SmithMicro doesn't want you to download just their Stuffit Expander alone (free) without downloading StuffitDeluxe (paid). It drives me nuts because it doesn't work in the background the way Stuffit Expander does, and I can't remember how I managed to get Expander by itself on the Mac partition that I can do it the same way on the Windows partition.

Since Cobl is BAIN ready, I'm going to try what I just asked! I'll copy it there so I don't mess up the original download.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 19 2011, 12:50 AM

Why not save yourself the trouble and download http://www.7-zip.org/?

And that is correct, BAIN will do all the "un-stuffing" for you.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 19 2011, 08:40 AM

In case anyone is wondering what I'm doing with Brina Cross, http://tesalliance.org/forums/index.php?/gallery/image/14329-welcome-to-brina-cross/

I think I am nearly done with the exteriors now. I've got my market, my farms, and my fancy schmancy street lighting (toggles based on time of day, you know something so exceedingly basic as that). I need to get to work on the interiors now, I've got five new structures to clutter and one in need of a bit of a spruce-up.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 19 2011, 03:07 PM

By the time I got your message about BAIN installation of Cobl, I had already done a manual install of it. Oh boy, never again. I will look to see if BAIN can install the next ones. I did want the races for the new textures, so I installed the races (but not the race balancing thingy yet) and the cosmetics resources file using Wrye Bash. That was a lot easier. Then I went into the game to start playing around with it, and walked into Cloud Ruler Temple Great Hall to see a huge, yellow starburst hovering over one of the tables there. "WTF? I'm missing a mesh???" Ooops, those numerous subfolders I saw in the Core --

So I manually moved the textures and meshes from the Core subfolder into the OB data directory. I haven't gone back into the game yet to see if it worked, since it was so late last night *yawn*. But I hope I did the right thing?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 20 2011, 08:03 AM

Yuppers... you didn't put the meshes folder in the right place.

It gets filed under (route to Oblivion directory)/Oblivion/Data. Same with Textures. any time you have a folder named meshes or textures or sounds or menus, those all go into the Data folder.

Best you learn BAIN quick, though. It can be quite painful managing a full manual install. Don't worry about previous manual installs, though. Just reinstall the mod with BAIN and it will pick up the pieces for you.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 23 2011, 05:21 PM

So far everything is running well.

I did load a mod that caused the game to CTD repeatedly. As others had reported similar problems with it, I uninstalled it, and now the game runs just fine.

Currently this is my load order:
Oblivion.esm
Cobl Main.esm
UOP.esp
DLCSI.esp
USIP.esp
Command Mount.esp
Cobl Glue.esp
Cobl Tweaks.esp
RedBag-Friendly Animals.esp
RedBag-Dangerous Animals.esp
Cobl.Races.esp
OHDHPlay.esp

The last is my own mod that I'm creating in the CS. Every time I change names, NPC heights, etc, it gets saved to this file. So far I haven't run into conflicts, and I'm now at the point in the MQ where the Bruma Gate is about to open and I have to take Burd and two tyros in there.

I let Wrye Bash and BOSS set the load order, and it seems to be running fine.

But now I'm looking at Better Cities versus Open Cities. At this time I'm not terribly interested in OOO or MMM. I am also trying to find a decent saddlebag mod - the one I was using was the one causing the CTD's.

So which is better - Better Cities or Open Cities? ImpREAL City looks interesting too, but seems to be compatible only with Better Cities. I liked the screenshots of Open Cities, though. The cities seemed to blend in more organically with the landscape without the big stone walls.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 23 2011, 07:28 PM

What mod were you having trouble with? Perhaps I could take a look at it?

You mis-heard. ImpeREAL Cities is actually INcompatible with Better Cities... because it's already integrated. Kinda pointless to add a mod you already have, right?

ImpeREAL City is fully compatible with Open Cities. Although I'm not too sure about the Outer Districts, but I don't use that option, as I don't like the idea of the IC being only partially open. Open Cities doesn't touch the IC proper, though, so ImpeREAL City is still very much compatible.

Now, as for your city desires, I will say this: If you want your cities to be more beautiful and artistic, go for Better Cities, but take note that it carries a heavy performance hit in some areas, particularly the Waterfront. If you want immersion while retaining the original style of Oblivion and minimal performance loss, go with Open Cities.

If you choose Open Cities, you then have two further options: do you want to keep the original cities or do you want to have the cities redesigned so that they make more tactical sense (and get rid of the enormous stone walls for several of them)? If you want to keep the cities as they were in Oblivion vanilla, you will want http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16360 If you want to have the cities redesigned to make more logical sense, choose http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=33003

Also, while we are on the subject, let us discuss the castles. There is another mod out there called ImpeREAL Empire - Unique Castles which makes the castles a lot more regal looking and adds many new turrets and windows to them. Again, this mod is already integrated into Better Cities, but if you want Open Cities, http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=37903 specifically for Open Cities users. You will find it is compatible with both the Classic and Reborn versions, as well.

Oh, and for you horsie fans, do not overlook http://www.slofslair.co.uk/index.php?page=modarticle&modarticle/id=5p5k6md28n8 You have no idea how much better she made the horses look from the vanilla models. She even made special versions for the Legion patrols complete with clipped tails!

Please do note that the current version is incompatible with the Official DLC Horse Armor, but you know what, who cares about that? I know I don't.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 23 2011, 08:04 PM

You're right, I had forgotten that BC includes ImpeREAL Cities. But it works with Open Cities, huh? That makes the latter even more appealing to me.

Better Cities is beautiful, and as I don't really expect to be doing much battling in towns once the MQ is finished, the performance hit wouldn't bother me. But I love the idea of the city walls being modified (Bruma gets a wooden palisade! Cheydinhal gets low stone walls that look just like those in my home town! Bravil relies solely on its moats for defense!) and the districts being reorganized.

I may down load both of them and play Open Cities Reborn with Julian, and Better Cities with a different character (obviously not the same world or the same group of mods).

The mod I was having trouble with was MD Saddlebags V3. The saddlebags never showed up in the traders (a recognized problem), the console command recommended by the creator never worked, the patch didn't fix anything, and the game just kept CTD while I was galloping along the road. Since I removed the mod, the CTD hasn't been an issue at all, and I've played about six or eight more hours since then.

Since Julian travels so light, I really don't need the saddlebags. I just thought I would try it out and see how it worked. I'd much rather have Julian get camping gear, especially as she has to camp out in the high Jeralls while she recovers the armor of Tiber Septim. A portable bedroll would be nice to have. I did find a few camping mods, but they are much too fancy for me and Julian. So we use bandit camps instead, after clearing them. Free food, a good fire, cooking gear, and a bed out of the wind. What more could a wandering soldier need? .

I did look at OOO, but decided against it when I read that starting a new game after loading it was strongly recommended. I don't want to restart the MQ. As a matter of fact, for my next character, I would rather skip the whole MQ/dungeon tutorial and have my character start somewhere else, and update the MQ in the background (but not with my PC as the Hero of Kvatch - for me, only Julian of Anvil can have that honor). If I could figure out how to bypass the Prison start, I would then reconsider OOO for a different PC.

I am interested in Slof's horses, and have downloaded them. I had tried out the DLC Horse Armor on the XBox, and hated it. As far as I could tell, it did nothing for the horse's welfare. I also hated the way they looked on the horses, too. So I have not used it on the XBox since, and did not download it for this. So Slof's Horses will be loaded sometime when Julian is on the road to Anvil.

I'm not terribly interested in castles for my PC. I'm sorry but Julian and I are just too blue-collar for the castles, or even the fancy manor homes. I'm already creating an alternative interior for Gweden Farm for Julian when the Sirens are cleared out. I've got the upstairs done, and will be working on the basement next. It's small, cozy, and doesn't need much stuff. My favorite house in the game is Benirus Manor for its aesthetics, but it's just too big for me. And it's not Julian's taste at all.

I am also very interested in Kvatch Rebuilt, as the city plays a huge role in Julian's future beyond the MQ. My only peeve is that the PC becomes the Count/ess, when I firmly believe it should be Savlian Matius who gets to sit in the fancy chair. I'm wondering if that can be modded so the right person (IMO) gets to sit in the right chair.

Posted by: SubRosa Apr 23 2011, 08:23 PM

If you want a bedroll mod, try http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=6430. It is very simple and straight forward. It makes all the bedrolls you find in the world objects you can pick up and carry and put down anywhere you like. It also adds a few for sale by merchants. But it is easier just to walk over to Vilverin and pick one up from the bandits.

You might try http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=3973 for an alternate start. It seems to be the most popular one. Or just start the game from a save at the sewer exit (you did make a save there, before you are asked to confirm your stats?). After that it is simple to just make the Amulet of Kings a non-quest item and put it in the barrel.

If you would like a nice, blue collar home in the Imperial City, try http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=19948. It adds a simple, one-room apartment to the IC Market District. Much nicer than that nasty waterfront shack, and being in the Market District, it is right where all the merchants are that you probably want to trade with anyway.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 23 2011, 09:28 PM

Alternative starts?

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=37382 It is very flexible in the choices you are allowed to make, you can start as an old retired legion soldier (hint hint), or as an immigrant, or as a resident of Cyrodiil, you name it. Without a doubt, http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=11495 is the most popular, however, and I know for a fact you can start as a legion veteran with that one, too.

But it is entirely up to you what you want.

As for OOO, starting a new game is recommended, but not necessary. All you need to do is install the mod, rebuild the Bashed Patch (which since you have COBL, it would be a good idea to have that), and follow these easy steps ingame:

1. Open the console, type coc testinghall.
2. Wait for 24 hours four times.
3. Exit to Hawkhaven and fast-travel back to where you were previously.

What this does is transport you to an isolated cell and allows the game to refresh the spawn points with OOO's new leveled lists. Once you do that, go onwards and enjoy your brave (and dangerous) new world.

By the way, the sole purpose of Unique Castles is to make the city castles look better from the outside. It does nothing apart from adding new turrets and windows. Consider it in the same league as those city mods, it simply makes the world look a bit more believable, that's all.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 24 2011, 02:22 AM

Okay, I think I'm missing a step somewhere . . .

I downloaded Open Cities Reborn and installed it. It shows active in both OBMM and Wrye Bash. Here's the load order as set by BOSS.

Oblivion.esm
Open Cities Resources.esm
Cobl Main.esm
Unofficial Oblivion Patch.esp
DLCShivering Isles.esp
USIP.esp
aaaBorsBedrolls.esp
Command Mount.esp
Cobl Glue.esp
Cobl Tweaks.esp (merged into Bashed Patch)
ImperialCityApartment.esp
ImpeREAL City Unique Districts - All the Districts - Merged.esp
Open Cities Outer Districts.esp
Open Cities Reborn.esp
ImpeREAL Empire - Unique Castles - All the Castles - OCR.esp
RedBag Friendly Animals.esp
RedBag Dangerous Animals.esp (merged into Bashed Patch)
Cobl Races.esp
Bashed Patch 0.esp
OHDHPlay.esp

The problem is when I look down on Bruma from Cloud Ruler Temple, I'm still seeing the stone walls and the vanilla layout. I can see the buildings inside the walls well, and it seems like the north gate is open as well, so it looks like I would expect with Open Cities Classic. But I'm not seeing the castle in the center, nor am I seeing the wooden palisade that is supposed to be there.

What am I missing? I haven't yet gone down to the city.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 24 2011, 03:30 AM

That's because you are still seeing the vanilla LOD visuals for the cities. Oblivion does not actually refer to the actual mesh data for the cells for the Distant LOD, it uses separate files generated per-cell that tell the engine where to put the LOD mesh data, and these need to be updated for such mods as OCR that significantly alter the city layouts. ESPs cannot modify the LOD data for this game, that's the simple truth.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=15781 to regenerate your DistantLOD data in order to see the city walls properly from a distance. It's very easy to use, just drop it into your Oblivion directory, let it run, and it will do everything you need for you.

EDIT: Also, if you want to see the actual city buildings form a distance, you will need http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=20053, as well. It provides LOD mesh data for a good deal of vanilla meshes (the Distant LOD system in this game doesn't even use the same mesh data as the rest of the game, it's really pretty clumsy) so that TES4LODGen can place more VWD visuals every time it updates your D-LOD data. The cities as they are will not actually have any buildings in them, because Bethesda didn't provide proper LOD data for the city buildings (just some haphazardly placed ultra-low-res house meshes for the vanilla game). You can get proper VWD City buildings here, along with a number of other things.

WARNING: The above mod can MURDER performance if you are not careful, so be conservative with it for now.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 24 2011, 07:31 PM

Okay, so I'm following your advice and downloading the two mods and running them.

Question though. How often should I run them? Do I have to do it every time I install a world-altering mod (say I switch from Open Cities/ImpeREAL Empire to Better Cities)? Or more often?

Thanks for answering all my noob questions. And SubRosa, thanks for pointing me to the bedroll mod. I just about jumped up and down in my chair when I got the message "Pick up this bedroll?" in the Cloud Ruler Temple barracks! I said no, because I'm not taking one of those! There's that unmarked bandit camp in the Jeralls on that back road to Cheydinhal that would be handy! Of course there are plenty of other camps on the way as well. I will also check out the apartment mod, though I think Julian will stick with her Waterfront hovel for now.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 24 2011, 09:34 PM

You'll have to re-run it every time you install a new mod; those files it generates are Load Order dependent. Good thing it only takes a couple minutes.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 24 2011, 09:40 PM

It did just fine. Still, it's a bit disconcerting to see the stone walls disappear as I approach Bruma and the palisades appear. But I enjoyed walking through the town with Paint following! And the Mages Guild now has a little garden with plants that are uncommon to the Jeralls. Perfect!

I downloaded RAEVWD as you suggested, but the download seems to be faulty, as it is not showing up anywhere on the computer (though Firefox insists it's there). I will try the download again.

I'm back to work helping Julian guide a couple of tiros through an Oblivion Gate. Huzzah!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 24 2011, 10:26 PM

Erm... you mean you wan LODGen but the stone walls are still visible from the distance? Because that's not right, those walls should be gone and you should be able to see the palisades from a distance, too.

Do you have a DistantLOD folder in your data directory?

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 25 2011, 12:07 AM

Okay, when you say Oblivion directory, do you mean the data folder?

I have LODGen's folder at the same level as the Data folder, and the application outside of LODGen's folder in Oblivion.

I do have DistantLOD folder in my Oblivion Data folder, it contains .cmp files for Anvil Castle Courtyard, Talos Plaza District, Temple District (and Temple District MQ 16 which I assume contains the wrecked Temple), the Arcane University and Skingrad.

Oh, by the way, succeeded in getting those two tiros out alive. Needed to spend a lot of time regenerating magicka so I could heal them. Idiots! Huzzah!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 25 2011, 12:49 AM

First off, Schrodinger's Kitty seems to have fled back to his box. You may need to coax him back out again with some catnip.

EDIT: Never mind, he's come back.

Directories: The Oblivion directory is where the base game files and folders are installed. You will find Oblivion.EXE here, as well as all the .DLL extensions the game uses; OBSE goes here, and the Construction Set EXE goes here, as well.

The Data folder is the folder within the base Oblivion directory that contains all the BSAs, ESM, and ESPs the game uses.

In short, the Oblivion directory I refer to is the Oblivion parent folder (the Data folder is a child of the Oblivion directory).

Now, based on your description, you are missing quite a lot of files. You are missing the CMP file for the Tamriel worldspace, for instance, and you also have no .LOD files (which those contain all the VWD data for each cell in the game).

Try again, but this time make sure you run TES4LODGen from the Oblivion directory. Several of the Oblivion modding tools need to be where the game files are located in order to function. This one is no exception, as it needs to check every ESM and ESP you're loading for the objects occupying the cells and which of them are visible when distant, search the resources you have installed for matching _far.NIFs for the VWD meshes, and write the LOD data so that it all displays properly.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Apr 25 2011, 04:56 PM

Fixed!

I still haven't installed RAEVWD yet. I think I'll play for a while with the new meshes/textures loaded, and see how things play out.

Leyawiin is far more impressive than the vanilla version! The city now fits Count Caro's bloated ego better. And yes, I'm seeing the walls from a distance as they should be.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Apr 25 2011, 08:26 PM

Glad to hear it! Enjoy the game!

Posted by: haute ecole rider May 1 2011, 12:16 AM

This calls for a celebration!

I have modded Gweden Farm (after the completion of the Siren's Deception quest) into Julian's retreat! The door is now unlocked (and owned by Julian), the interior is brighter and cheerier without all the heavy red drapery, she has a spot for her alchemy and a spot for her studying (two actually, one upstairs and one downstairs) and a nice clean bed to sleep in. I left the decor a bit sparse, mainly because I thought Julian would want to fill it up with all her artifacts and such from her quests (such as Thornblade).

The exterior will have a new garden, but I'm leaving that for when she gets done with her University studies and moves back to Anvil for good.

There's still a detail or two to tweak (such as changing the map marker to reflect the change in name).

Julian loves it!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 1 2011, 09:02 AM

Come one, come all!

Come see the new Brina Cross!

Train your eyes downward to find the mystical map, and begin your journey!

Yup, Brina Cross Village is released. The thread and DL link is in the mod announcements thread for those interested.

Posted by: haute ecole rider May 15 2011, 09:15 PM

I have a question:

I've tried changing my PC's face slightly in-game (well into the game) by entering the console and typing showracemenu. I've followed the instructions to leave the race menu open and save from the console, but I get the error message "Can not save game at this time." I'm trying to change the face a little bit without losing the PC's hard earned skillz and experience. What am I doing wrong?

Posted by: SubRosa May 15 2011, 09:33 PM

All I can think is that the console is not open when you are trying to save. The option to save will be greyed out if it is not. But I have never actually seen that error message either.

Are you trying to save by typing save <save game name> at the command console? Or are you doing it by pressing Escape, and going through the normal game menus? I always do it the latter way, and have no problems.

Posted by: haute ecole rider May 15 2011, 09:57 PM

I'm trying to do it by typing save "savegamename" at the command console. With the console still open, I've tried escaping to bring up the typical game menu (with the race menu still open) and the save option is greyed out there as well.

Here's what the UESP wiki says about the showracemenu command in the console:

Posted by: haute ecole rider May 15 2011, 10:06 PM

I just tried it the way you described, and it worked perfectly. I'm now much happier with my PC's face, and will remember to escape and use the game menu to save once I'm at the point where I want to switch up hairstyles.

Thanks!

Posted by: SubRosa May 15 2011, 10:42 PM

The trick to saving from the regular menu is to make all the changes you want, up to the point of clicking on Done. Stop there instead and save your game with the console still open. Then load that save, and you can close the console. It will not alter any of your stats that way.

Posted by: SubRosa May 22 2011, 07:01 PM

I have a scripting issue in Fallout 3. I created a mod to play as a ghoul, and altered the radiation effects so they are positive rather than negative. This way my ghoul gets stronger the more irradiated she becomes. To keep it from being overpowering, I want her to lose rads slowly throughout the day. Otherwise she is just going to max out her radiation level at some point and have a huge permanent bonus.

So I created a script with a timer that will decrease her radiation, plus a quest that starts the game to trigger the script. My problem is the script runs once and ends. I need something that is always running. Or that runs once a day. Or even runs every time the character sleeps (since I sleep once a day, that would do the same thing).

This is my base script, which knocks down her radiation. I do not understand the timer part of it. But I have verified it works.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 22 2011, 07:19 PM

You haven't set your script to loop. Once you hit the third stage, you do not have a block that resets the iStage variable back to 0 so that the script can start over, so the script stops processing there. Try this:

Posted by: SubRosa May 22 2011, 07:33 PM

That did the trick!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v90/subrosa_florens/Computer%20Games/Fallout3087.jpg thanks you from the bottom of her dessicated heart.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 22 2011, 07:44 PM

Lucky for you my recent modding endeavors have taken me into scripting.

About a week ago, I would have been lost.

Posted by: SubRosa May 22 2011, 08:38 PM

I have only done some basic scripting. Mostly to do things like upgrade magic items or spells to better versions at specific levels, in the same way that the Quest Award Leveling mod does. With my Forest Friend mod, I did it to change factions. And for Teresa's night eye goggles, I used a script to turn the night eye effect on and off when she equipped it.

Posted by: King Coin May 23 2011, 01:36 AM

This looks like it could help me with something I was trying to do. Would just simply putting in the loop make it evaluate the code every frame?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 23 2011, 02:10 AM

If it's a gamemode script it will always process every frame.

What are you trying to do?

Posted by: King Coin May 23 2011, 02:58 AM

Play a sound file when a specific button is pressed. I'm not sure what's wrong with it right now but the file doesn't do anything when I press the assigned button.

Posted by: mALX May 23 2011, 04:07 AM

QUOTE(SubRosa @ May 22 2011, 02:33 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 23 2011, 06:30 AM

@King Coin:

Should be easy enough with OBSE at your fingertips:

Posted by: mALX May 23 2011, 07:01 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ May 23 2011, 01:30 AM)

Posted by: King Coin May 23 2011, 07:33 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ May 23 2011, 12:30 AM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 23 2011, 08:23 AM

That tells the game how quickly it should process the script if it's a quest script. These are the exception to the script processing speed rules. Normally a GameMode script will process every frame, but quest scripts a bit different... they default to updating every five seconds.

If you don't put a value in there, the default takes over (probably why your key presses weren't registering, because the script was updating too slowly to catch them). Setting it to 0.001 (100 times per second) will ensure that the script runs every frame, but you can set the value higher if you want.

EDIT: Also, the game does not begin processing quest scripts immediately after launch, there is a bit of a "warm-up" period before the game starts processing quest scripts.

Posted by: King Coin May 23 2011, 03:56 PM

Thanks!

Posted by: King Coin May 23 2011, 05:58 PM

Holy crap the CS keeps dropping my script and quest as if I never save either one of them. I'm going to delete my file and start over.

Posted by: mALX May 26 2011, 04:42 AM

QUOTE(mALX @ May 23 2011, 02:01 AM)

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ May 23 2011, 01:30 AM)

@mALX: Are you trying to do that in-game? If so, I'm not sure about drawing him to sweetrolls at this point, but you can change his name by using the command "setactorfullname mynamehere" in the console with your friendly rodent selected.

The mouse is a mod I DL'd. He only eats healthy food through the journal/menu - I would like to have him eat sweetrolls where you could see him doing it in game - and be drawn to them if they are in a room he enters.

Oh, thanks for the console code - since it is someone's mod, will renaming him through the console mess with his script (as it is now) working properly?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 26 2011, 05:01 AM

Whoops, didn't see your reply.

As for your rat, I'm thinking it might be simpler for you to accomplish things with a "Find" AI package that tasks the rat to look for sweetrolls as he follows you around. This way, if he finds some, he will walk over to the and "eat" them (in reality, he simply puts them in his inventory, but that should do for what you have in mind). No need for fancy scripting, but you will need to do a bit of testing to ensure the package executes the way you want it to.

At the same time, you should probably specify that he only looks while indoors so he doesn't go running off into the wilderness (through the conditions box).

Posted by: mALX May 26 2011, 05:39 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ May 26 2011, 12:01 AM)

Whoops, didn't see your reply.

As for your rat, I'm thinking it might be simpler for you to accomplish things with a "Find" AI package that tasks the rat to look for sweetrolls as he follows you around. This way, if he finds some, he will walk over to the and "eat" them (in reality, he simply puts them in his inventory, but that should do for what you have in mind). No need for fancy scripting, but you will need to do a bit of testing to ensure the package executes the way you want it to.

At the same time, you should probably specify that he only looks while indoors so he doesn't go running off into the wilderness (through the conditions box).

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 26 2011, 05:40 AM

No.

Posted by: mALX May 26 2011, 05:45 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ May 26 2011, 12:40 AM)

Posted by: King Coin May 26 2011, 05:52 AM

something to consider... Will the guards try to kill the mouse when it 'steals' a sweet roll?

Posted by: mALX May 26 2011, 06:06 AM

QUOTE(King Coin @ May 26 2011, 12:52 AM)

Posted by: King Coin May 26 2011, 06:40 AM

QUOTE(mALX @ May 26 2011, 12:06 AM)

Posted by: mALX May 26 2011, 06:49 AM

QUOTE(King Coin @ May 26 2011, 01:40 AM)

QUOTE(mALX @ May 26 2011, 12:06 AM)

I was wondering that myself, may make for some interesting times, ROFL !!!

Someone made a mod that adds cats and mice to the cities. The mice would get into things and the cats would hunt and kill the mice. One of the problems the modder had was the guards killing the cats every time one killed a mouse. They fixed it somehow I believe.

Posted by: King Coin May 26 2011, 07:24 AM

QUOTE(mALX @ May 26 2011, 12:49 AM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 26 2011, 08:35 AM

QUOTE(King Coin @ May 25 2011, 10:52 PM)

Posted by: mALX May 26 2011, 04:59 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ May 26 2011, 03:35 AM)

QUOTE(King Coin @ May 25 2011, 10:52 PM)

something to consider... Will the guards try to kill the mouse when it 'steals' a sweet roll?

If you can adjust the mouse's responsibility in the AI menu for him (hopefully you should), put it above 30 so he won't steal anything. This might make it so he reports crimes (please don't ask how that is possible) but I think you are safe from being reported by your followers.

Then no worries about the guards going AWOL on poor Mickey.

Posted by: King Coin May 27 2011, 03:16 AM

Thanks TK!!! I finally got it working!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyQrieM7tFU

Posted by: Thomas Kaira May 27 2011, 03:22 AM

Good job, KC!

Posted by: King Coin May 28 2011, 01:58 AM

Part of what must have been making this so difficult was that it seems like none of the NumPad buttons work in Oblivion. I tried to assign sounds to them again and it did not work. Then I just changed the scan codes to Y U I O P [ ] H and J and it works perfectly.

When I first started working on the mod, I was ONLY trying to assign to the NumPad.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 14 2011, 02:21 AM

Ok I have another Q for you TK. I have a mod that upgrades the shaders for the landscape and a mod that changes the Nighteye color. When I try to activate those two mods I get this error:
http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/416/20975590.jpg

I've never run into this problem before. It worked just fine on 32 bit Win 7 but not here. I checked the permissions on that folder and I have permission to change anything in there.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 14 2011, 02:56 AM

Hmm... what level of UAC are you using? Or did you turn that off?

Posted by: King Coin Jul 14 2011, 03:01 AM

Whatever the default is... if that's helpful at all.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 14 2011, 03:49 AM

Try turning it off completely. I was having similar permissions issues when installing Wrye Bash on my new build that I solved by turning UAC off.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 14 2011, 03:56 AM

Would it still work if I turned UAC back on after installing?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 14 2011, 04:00 AM

It should.

UAC isn't that helpful anyways, IMHO. Coming off of XP, I didn't really like how intrusive it got at times.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 14 2011, 04:11 AM

I really dislike it, but I do see its use. Thanks for the help. I'll give that a shot.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 14 2011, 06:28 AM

I logged into Admin account and it worked then... but I don't know if the info will be stored in a place where my game can access it on my normal account.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 14 2011, 07:47 AM

Huh.

Did you give your normal account admin. privileges when you set it up?

Posted by: King Coin Jul 14 2011, 03:48 PM

No I didn't.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 18 2011, 07:24 PM

Finally worked on it some more today and found my problem. The file that the mods were trying to change was set as read only for some reason. Unchecking that little box fixed the issues.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 18 2011, 09:58 PM

Okay, I'm considering starting a new game with a different character. That means using different mods in different combinations, etc.

But I don't want to lose Julian's game, either. Is there any way I can archive that game, with all its associated mods (like a list of which mods I used) in a separate place (like on the backup hard drive I have).

Posted by: King Coin Jul 18 2011, 10:53 PM

H.E.R. this topic could be of help:
http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.php?/topic/1211277-is-it-possible-to-have-two-separate-installations-of-oblivion-on-one-computer/

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 19 2011, 12:25 AM

Does that mean I have to install Oblivion all over again to have a separate game? Unlike other games I've played (like Rainbow Six) where I can keep the different campaigns/save games in separate subfolders and just tell the game application which save I want to play? Or even move the save games off to a separate memory card like on XBox? Of course, XBox isn't moddable, so it doesn't matter.

Of course, R6 and other games don't have the modding flexibility that TES IV does, so in a way that makes sense. It just seems like a lot of work just to have two separate characters going on the same game.

And if I do that, what's the best way to manage the two separate folders? I don't want to have to add accounts to my Win7 just to have two separate PC's/mod combinations and worry about permissions and et al.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 19 2011, 12:34 AM

What you could probably do is rename the Oblivion game folder and Oblivion config folder to something like "Julian's game" and reinstall Oblivion from the disc like that. Then when you want to switch between the two, you simply rename the game folder you want to "Oblivion" and rename the matching config folder to "Oblivion" and there you go. Two installations.

I currently have three on my system: one for playing Oblivion, one for modding Oblivion, and one for the total conversion Nehrim.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 19 2011, 12:57 AM

Okay, that sounds more like what I'm looking for. But the mTES4 Manager that KC recommended sounds interesting. Has anyone had any experience with that one?

Looking at my file hierarchy, I have two places for Oblivion: Oblivion Files (installed in Hautee/Libraries/Documents) which contains Oblivion and all the data files, along with TES4LOD, TES CS, OBSE, OBMM, various mods, etc, then I also have one which has my save games in My Games (Hautee/Libraries/Documents/My Games) just named Oblivion. Are these the two folders you are referring to?

Am I to understand that whichever install of Oblivion I play, it will look for data inside the folders named Oblivion (hence the renaming scheme), which means the application must be inside the folder called Oblivion Files and not inside the one named Julian (or whatever name I choose for it)?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 19 2011, 02:07 AM

Correct. The game will check that the EXE is running from the Oblivion folder and search for your configs and savegames in the My Games\Oblivion folder.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 19 2011, 10:22 PM

I already have a clean backup of Oblivion with the installers on a separate hard drive. It already has TES IV Construction Set, Wrye Bash, OBSE, OBMM, BOSS, etc installers in a subfolder. I think I will use that to build a new install (of course, installing from the DVD) with all the mods I want for every game. I am interested in Nehrim, too. The idea of exploring a new world is just too appealing to me. Since I have a 1TB hard drive with W7 on it, there's plenty of room (and the external HD I'm using for backup is plenty big too).

Thanks for the advice, TK. When I'm caught up with this week's coursework, I'll give it a go. Has anyone ever used mTES4 Manager, though?

I'm also thinking of downloading a UI mod. I'm thinking of DarNUI or Dark UI (or maybe both?). Anything I should know about those two? Is there a single file/mod that totally changes the interface elements? Bugs? Conflicts?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 19 2011, 11:19 PM

Choose DarNified UI if you want to preserve the vanilla parchment color scheme of the menus. DarkUI'd DarN is exactly the same mod, but replaces the textures with a dark leather color scheme. Either one or the other, no point in installing both (they're the same mod, only one includes a texture replacer). Both mods are a total overhaul of Oblivion's menus, and include things like merging the character tab and attribute tab, allowing more information to be displayed at one time (particularly with the inventory, where the number of items you can view at once has been increased from five to about 25), a larger map window, more interesting context-specific menus (like armorer or enchantment), and reducing the size of the HUD. You can also customize the HUD any way you want, but those changes will not stick unless you directly edit the HUDMainMenu.xml file DarN UI adds. (under Data\menus\prefabs\DarN)

mTES4 Manager is a nice utility, too. Difficult to set up, but it does make it easier to juggle around multiple installs.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 23 2011, 01:18 AM

Okay, this is turning out to be quite a challenge.I'm trying to build a clean install of Oblivion on my hard drive (I've temporarily moved Julian's game to an external hard drive for the time being). I've installed Wrye Bash, and got it to open, but now I'm trying to get it to recognize BOSS. I have BOSS in the right place (I think - it's in its BOSS folder in Oblivion Files\Oblivion, next to the game .exe. I have Wrye Bash in its Mopy folder alongside BOSS. I had gotten Wrye Bash to launch earlier, but it didn't recognize BOSS, so I quit it and moved BOSS to where I think it should be (compared to the file system on Julian's game files). But now when I try to launch Wrye Bash, I get a failure to launch, and this message in Wrye Bash.exe:

Posted by: King Coin Jul 23 2011, 01:23 AM

This version of Wyre-Bash doesn't work with BOSS. Uninstall BOSS and Wrye-Bash will work.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 23 2011, 01:39 AM

Yup. Bash 293 doesn't like BOSS 1.8. Might want to check the official forums, as I saw an hotfix posted there, but don't remember what it was.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 23 2011, 02:08 AM

The fix doesn't work on the stand alone BOSS. That's the only type of BOSS that I've been able to find however.

My (clunky) work around is just have the BOSS setup sitting on my desktop. It installs quickly and I can have it set the load order. Then I uninstall it again (which is quick too) and then do what I need in Wrye-Bash.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 23 2011, 02:26 AM

Wrye Bash worked fine when the BOSS folder was in a separate place away from the Mopy folder (i.e. not in the same place as the game executable). I moved BOSS out of the Oblivion folder into the parent folder (Oblivion Files) and Wrye Bash runs now.

Until they come out with a fix better than the editing of the python file (which didn't work for me - I have both Python and Standalone versions installed), I'll just use BOSS alone and move it in and out of the Oblivion folder as I need it.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 24 2011, 02:10 AM

I'm interested in getting a second install of Oblivion going too so I went ahead and renamed the Oblivion folder containing the the launcher, data folder, etcetera, and then renamed the Oblivion folder in the My Documents folder. The issue I'm having is when I pop the DVD in the drive and hit the Setup.exe on the DVD, it asks me if I want to remove Oblivion. What am I missing here?

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 24 2011, 02:26 AM

KC, I hope someone answers your question soon.

I've given up on mTES4 - it keeps giving me an error message (denied access to Hautee\Documents\My Music) and then it won't find the clean copy, even though I've tagged it. I've tried dumping the mTES4 files that are created and relaunching it, but still the same thing. I'm running in admin mode, so it shouldn't deny access to anything on my C drive.I tried looking for the answer on the Bethsoft forums, but it keeps telling me to look for an AppData folder on my C drive, and I don't have an AppData folder (and I had it show all hidden files and folders).

So I'm considering cloning the clean install (with a few select mods that I've been using and have pre-installed and cleaned those few dirty mods with TES4Edit). But I'm not sure how to do that. It's got to be more than just copying the Oblivion Files folder in My Documents, right? I don't mind moving/renaming files as long as I can keep each install self-contained (as in Julian's game files and folders are all currently on a separate hard drive and renamed Julian).

Posted by: King Coin Jul 24 2011, 02:35 AM

Hmm...

The only thing I can suggest for you is to check the folder it is trying to edit. I was getting errors like that for another mod (while running in admin mode) and all the problems were because the folder the program was trying to modify was set as read only. It worked as soon as I unchecked that little box.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 24 2011, 07:19 PM

I'm running in admin mode, and I can uncheck the read-only box for the folder. Unfortunately, the change doesn't seem to stick - when I look again under Properties, it is blue (checked) again. It's driving me nuts!

Posted by: King Coin Jul 26 2011, 03:30 AM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Jul 24 2011, 01:19 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 26 2011, 03:30 PM

Oh, geez, KC! It sounds like you and I might be having the same trouble! Is there anything we can do other than waaaait for Microsoft to issue a fix to fix the broken fix?

Now, on to a more mundane question: I'm getting ready to start a new game of Oblvion. I've done a clean install, loaded up the mods I want to use, cleaned up a few dirty ones, and now I have run Wrye Bash to avtivate them, BOSS'ed the load order, and going googly eyed just looking at the list. I am wondering if things look good to more experienced modders, or do I have some fatal flaws in my mod order/list? I think I have all the necessary esm's, but can't shake the feeling that I'm missing something. I've compared them to TK's load list and that of one other modder who does immersive gameplay (aka http://sites.google.com/site/delteslist/home/issue24).

Posted by: King Coin Jul 26 2011, 03:39 PM

Try playing. You'll know if things are wrong if the game crashes

Usually I load everything up in Tes4Edit before playing. That thing will let you know of (some) errors.

And I got the problem I was having somewhat resolved. I went in and manually made the changes that the installer was trying to make.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 26 2011, 05:12 PM

Issues you need to address:

-You are using both MMM Diverse Water Life and OOO Water Fish. Either expect severe slowdowns when you are nearby a water source. You should probably get rid of one, my recommendation is OOO Water Fish, as MMM Diverse Water Life is more performance friendly.

-Speaking of Diverse Water Life, don't be surprised if you notice your fish seem to be drowning. ( )http://www.4shared.com/file/170247452/78b4bf8d/MMMDiverseWaterLifeUpdate.html to keep this from happening.

-Better Cities VWD for IC is mostly designed for LOD generation and works by placing a copy of every IC structure inside the walls into the main worldspace. This can carry a heavy performance hit, so if you end up with low framerates nearby the IC, you may need to lose this one.

-Do not use Natural Weather together with All Natural, it's already integrated. Both of those plugins must be removed.

-You're going to want a Bashed Patch for that load order. It is always preferable to have one if you are using multiple overhauls together.

-You have installed Better Cities UL patches, but have no UL plugins installed. Same for Skingrad Outer District. If any of those patch plugins are mastered to them, your game WILL crash the instant you start it up. And if not, your terrain surrounding the cities will be really messed up.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 26 2011, 07:24 PM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Jul 26 2011, 09:30 AM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 26 2011, 11:32 PM

@KC: let me know how it goes with the read-only bug (and yes, I'd call it a bug!!).

@TK: I knew I was missing something - rather a bunch of somethings! Thanks for the advice. I was planning on building a Bashed Patch, but I wanted to make sure I had everything I needed first.

Looking at your own load order, I see you have All Natural .esp, SI.esp, and Real Lights.esp, so I kept those. That left me with the plug-ins made by Max Tael, which according to BOSS is notorious for causing conflicts and crashes, so it's a good thing I asked first. Will that be okay, then? Only one way to find out!

I will make the other changes you recommended as well. I was intimidated at all the UL mods (oh, where to begin!!) then found the compilation that has all of them packaged as BAIN/OMOD, so I downloaded that one as I like the idea of having all of them in one place, and then I can pick and choose which mods I want from the bundle as I go to install them. I think I will start with the ones in your load order, as that seems like a pretty good bunch to start with. Unfortunately none of them are around Leyawiin yet (where I plan to start the game), but I see they opened up the map around Topal Bay, so maybe sometime in the near future . . .

I also found the UL LODs file and downloaded that one, though I don't know yet if I will need it. But it's ready just in case! Oh, and would the Oblivion Graphics Extender be useful as well?

Will I be able to play sometime tonight? We'll see!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 27 2011, 03:09 AM

Nughtee Hautee's got modding fever! Me like!

Why even bother skimping on the ULs? Put 'em all in! My actual latest load order has them all in there, the only reason I left a couple out was due to bad behavior around the cities... but that was with my old hardware.

Leyawiin's UL counterpart is Blackwood.

The UL LOD files are for if you want the distant landscape to match the up-close visuals. If you're installing them all, choosing these is easy, just pick the ones with the most ULs in the package names.

OBGE is a little more involved than your normal mod to get working, but once you do, you won't regret it. OBGE is worth it just for Liquid Water, IMHO, and you get a number of cool special effects to use, too, like SSAO, Depth of Field, Godrays, and color effects. You will lose anti-aliasing, though (OBGE v3 is incompatible with GPU anti-aliasing). The basic process is this:

Install the OBGE OBSE plugin
Install the Standalone Effects package
Start the game and load a save
Quit the game without crashing

This allows OBGE to save its config file.

By the way, make sure to download http://www.mediafire.com/?y9m2q1zf3m8pnx2 if you plan on using LW, it fixes a lighting bug introduced by the shader. Replace whatever version of that shader file came with LW, delete its brother file (the non HLSL files are compiled versions of the HLSLs), make sure bCompileSources is set to 1 in the OBGE INI, and reload the game. Otherwise, the waves won't display correctly.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 27 2011, 04:28 AM

I already put a lot of the UL mods in. I figured they worked fine on your older machine, they oughta do well on mine.

Here is my new load order:

I did perform the Bashed Patch. It took some trial and error to get the mods the way I wanted them (Cobl races for the extra hair, for example). I was able to start up and am now in Leyawiin, with a young Breton who doesn't yet know what she wants to do with herself.

I am noticing a few things that are probably due to OOO and maybe MMM. I've explored Leyawiin (hey, it's flooded around my house - of course, it's the poor quarter, so the Count isn't interested in draining the area properly). Tallei will have to be careful - she is primarily a healer with little combat skill. I decided to try playing a magic character, so we'll see how things go. I've already noticed fletching and leatherworking shears, so it seems like she might be able to make a living, once I figure out how to use them.

There's a couple of bugs I'm experiencing: one is the game is unable to find OBSE 0.92 (I have the latest installed), I'm not sure why. I'll have to look into that. The other thing is the game keeps crashing on exit and I have to go into Task Manager to end the process that is showing "Windows is checking for a solution to the problem." I did see something somewhere about that, and what needs to be done. But it's late and I'm off to bed, so tomorrow's soon enough!

I'm also thinking about installing the hunger, fatigue and sleep mods to make things more immersive. I've been playing with an awareness of time, but would like to see it have an effect on my PC. I also am wondering how I can alter the timescale to slow things down a bit.

Good night, all. I'm going to have some fun with my new character.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 27 2011, 04:41 AM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Jul 26 2011, 10:28 PM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 27 2011, 06:14 AM

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=24649

With portable bedrolls, too! (This means good-bye to your current portable bedrolls plugin)

Make sure to reduce your timescale! (10:1 should be enough).

Posted by: King Coin Jul 27 2011, 02:26 PM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Jul 26 2011, 05:32 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 31 2011, 04:15 AM

Hey, I can use a little advice, or at least a nudge in the right direction.

I seem to be having trouble building a Bashed Patch. I'm not sure if I'm checking too many options or not. I'm seeing NPC's in Leyawiin walking into walls and buildings, which suggests a problem with the paths. I don't know which of OOO and which of MMM I want to keep for the optimum experience.

Here is my Bashed Patch:


I also have the load order here:


Does anyone see any conflicts here? I've tried searching online for some help, but I guess I'm not looking in the right places.

Thanks!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 31 2011, 05:01 AM

Try reverting to a Python-based Bashed Patch, CBash is still in beta and kinda buggy.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 31 2011, 05:11 PM

Should I keep the same options checked in the Python version as I have in the CBash?

That's one thing I really like about Wrye Bash - it remembers the last settings I used.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Jul 31 2011, 08:23 PM

Okay, I rebuilt the bashed patch as a python-based one - still having issues.

What I'm seeing in the game are missing textures (some foliage in Leyawiin, the polygons are there in various shades of purple but no leaves/branches; skin on Khajiit and Argonian bodies are fluorescent pink instead of the usual colors). I haven't explored more of the city to see what else is wrong. Also the NPC's (the vanilla ones, not the ones added by either OOO or MMM, not sure which) are still having trouble finding their paths. The Countess is stuck walking into a broken wall near the Chapel, and while I'm content to let her keep trying to walk through the wall, I don't like seeing other less deserving NPC's have the same trouble.

So I've printed up my log from BOSS, and had Wrye Bash give me a mod check report. It detected more dirty mods than BOSS did, and I'm wondering if I should go by the WB list and clean those mods (the ones that aren't tagged as intentionally dirty mods by BOSS (i.e. OOO esm and esp, MMM esm and some of its esp's). I still can't shake the feeling that the bashed patch I built has overwritten some essential information.

Can someone please tell me if I'm barking up the right tree, comparing the BOSS log with the bashed patch to see if something got checked off that shouldn't be? And in the case of the dirty mods discrepancies, what should I do about them?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Jul 31 2011, 09:37 PM

Bash can't do anything with the game's resources, so it has nothing to do with your missing textures. I would suggest checking your Archive Invalidation and make sure you have properly set up BSA Redirection, and if you previously performed a BSA Alteration, that you undo it.

To BSA Redirect, you need a BSA Archive containing a single dummy texture file. Stick it into your data folder, open Oblivion.INI, and modify the sArchiveList entry so that it is registered first. So it would look something lke this:

sArchiveList=ArchiveInvalidationInvalidated!.bsa, Oblivion - Meshes.bsa, ...etc.

As for the pathgrids, I am uncertain as to what is causing that at this point, but now we know for certain it's not Bash, because the Python-based patch will not touch the pathgrid records. If this is not a fresh game, consider waiting around somewhere else for a couple days to let the NPC AI get accustomed to their new surroundings.

Posted by: King Coin Jul 31 2011, 11:45 PM

I've noticed odd pathing as well in my game. NPCs just walking into walls and such. I don't know how to fix it either.

I have noticed in Tes4Edit that sometimes in the Bashpatch things just don't get through. I've had to correct things like jewelry to apply to the correct item slot. Same thing with some NPCs having the screwed up eyes. I had to fix that by telling the patch where to get the eye textures.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Aug 1 2011, 01:23 AM

Well, finally got it so the Countess was able to walk home. Sort of. Guess she's confused by the changes in the big city.

What I ended up doing was removing MMM from my install/load, and re-installing it through Wrye Bash (I had installed it through OBMM), then tinkering with the installers. I don't know if that fixed anything but my textures are back and so are the pathings - for the most part. One of the mounted patrols keeps jumping in mid-air for no apparent reason. I guess his Paint horse is a retired Grand Prix hunter/jumper.

I also set BSA Redirection in Wrye Bash (I hope that's what you meant, TK) but it didn't solve the missing textures problem, nor did setting the dummy BSA first. Apparently it was the way the game was unloading the files from the installers if I understand correctly. I didn't think it did once they were installed, but . . .

So far no googly eyes.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Aug 4 2011, 01:30 AM

I thought I'd pop in and let TK and KC know how things are running.

GREAT!

I've played five game days (or was it six?). Other than the CTD's after so much time has passed (typical of heavily modded games - I guess mine qualifies for that now), it's been running just fine. I'm having a blast interacting with the farm animals at the Five Riders Stables (hey, little chick, what are you doing out in the middle of the road?) and the crabby mud crabs (some of which run from me, some ignore me, and some just want to eat me - go figure), and exploring both BetterCities's Leyawiin and the surrounding countryside. And I've finally discovered Blackwood Forest - or rather the large Ayelid ruin in the pool there. I haven't gone into it, just walked around it, since my character is not a fighter.

So, I have a few questions about the Better Cities Leyawiin setup. I found a couple new factions (added by OOO I think, or was it MMM) - the Topal Traders and the Rangers. I already found the bank and know I have to go to the IC to make a deposit there before I can use it. That's something for when Tallei actually has some money to deposit! But I can't figure out if there's any way to interact with those two groups in Leyawiin, or if they're just decoration.

Oh, and I tawt I taw a bunny wabbit! *inactivates Second Sight - detect life spell* I did tee a bunny wabbit!

It's like a whoooole new game!

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Aug 4 2011, 01:54 AM

Ahh, that ruin. If you enter, you might want to prepare to hit some weak points for massive damage.

Just sayin.

As for those two groups, they're mostly for decoration right now, but you should definitely take a look around for the Gold Horse Courier if you want to take on a few odd jobs. You'll find them eventually, as they are the ones you go to for banking business outside the IC.

Right now, I'm mostly waiting for the BBC for OCR patch to get to a decently polished state before I venture back into those things, as I really do like the new city layouts OCR provides.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Aug 16 2011, 02:15 AM

I finally made it up to Bravil and was blown away by the Barrowfields. I will be exploring the region around Bravil soon.

But I'm getting ready to install OBGE, and have a question. Where in the Wrye Bash install order should I place it? I can't find it on your load order that you posted not long ago, so I can't figure it out. Should it go up near the top?

I still have the same load order that I posted before.

Thanks!

Posted by: King Coin Aug 16 2011, 02:20 AM

There is no .ESP for OBGE so load order isn't an issue with it.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Aug 16 2011, 04:02 AM

QUOTE(King Coin @ Aug 15 2011, 07:20 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Aug 21 2011, 07:57 PM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Aug 15 2011, 10:02 PM)

Posted by: King Coin Aug 21 2011, 08:46 PM

Try assigning it to a hotkey. I have the same problems with pose mods.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Aug 21 2011, 09:45 PM

The Shaderlist.txt is in the Shaders folder. This is the preferred method for loading new shaders with OBGEv3. You don't need it for shaders like Liquid Water, which replace one of the default shaders, but for new effect shaders, it is the best method to load them now. The support plugin, as you have witnessed, doesn't work very well anymore.

To activate a shader with the Shaderlist, all you need to do is add the name of the shader along with the file extension to the shaderlist. so if you wanted to install the Godrays shader, for example, you would add Godrays.fx to the shaderlist.

Posted by: King Coin Aug 21 2011, 10:04 PM

Just out of curiosity which ones do you have active?

Posted by: haute ecole rider Aug 21 2011, 10:15 PM

Thanks! I had already found the Shader.txt in the data folder, but it was blank so I thought I was doing something wrong! Turns out I was!

So that's what that whole deal with the popup screens are about.

I'm going to try a couple of them - Depth of Field and Godrays. I'll see if they work.

I'm curious too, which ones do you like to use the most, TK?

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Aug 22 2011, 02:00 AM

Right now, my Oblivion install is using Liquid Water along with the following FX shaders:

Godrays.fx
MDLAA.fx

MDLAA is an anti-aliasing shader, which is necessary due to the need for OBGEv3 to use the depth buffer, rendering GPU anti-aliasing impossible. Nehrim is largely the same but with the addition of CrysisDoF.fx. I don't use SSAO shaders because there is a bug with them in that they display over fog, which is very unrealistic.

Posted by: King Coin Sep 2 2011, 08:50 PM

I tried some of the DoF effects but none of them worked correctly. All it did was make my entire screen uniformly blurry. I wonder if some of my other mods interfere with them.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Sep 2 2011, 11:54 PM

I tried modifying the Shader.list like you recommended and didn't see any differences either. I wonder if I'm doing something wrong?

Posted by: King Coin Sep 3 2011, 12:35 AM

Some of them are very subtle and others I can tell no difference with. Godrays.fx is the only one that I am sure is working 100% correctly.
There was one that had no effect that I could see except my frames per second dropped to 10.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Sep 5 2011, 03:36 PM

Here's something else that's bugging me.

I created a new character, and I can't get the beard effect to go away. Not only that, but all the women NPC's have faint beards. It's annoying, and I can't figure out how to get rid of it.

Here's what I'm talking http://i862.photobucket.com/albums/ab186/hauteecole/Old%20Habits%20Die%20Hard/Oblivion2011-08-2218-40-09-44.jpg.

Posted by: mALX Sep 5 2011, 04:20 PM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Sep 5 2011, 10:36 AM)

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Sep 5 2011, 06:32 PM

FaceGen sucks in this game.

You could try a facial texture replacer like Natural Faces and see if that helps. But that's all that you can really do aside from painstakingly tweaking the beard away in the Race menu.

Posted by: SubRosa Sep 6 2011, 02:48 AM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Sep 5 2011, 10:36 AM)

Posted by: mALX Sep 6 2011, 06:37 AM

*

I can't get this Trap to work, and wondered if anyone had any suggestions. The Trap is as exact a copy as I could make of the TG11 Ultimate Heist "Falling Exit" from Ocato's chambers via the fireplace "Loose Hearthgrate." (my absolute favorite Trap in the entire game).

The only changes: Of course cutting out quest references in the script. Other than that the only change is the landing - the fall lands you in water instead of concrete. (or would if it worked).

The issues: The ChorrolLoadDoorMiddle02 not functioning whatsoever, even when "Auto" is clicked.

The biggest issue is that the PlayerControls become disabled as soon as the Player enters the IDSkyliteTube01. I tried to script "OnActivate EnablePlayerControls - that worked only once, but the Chorrol Load Door didn't - so at this time those are the only two issues I know of.

I made this Trap with the actual materials (copied and pasted) of the original "TG11 Falling Exit" and spent tons of time crawling all over the original to learn how it worked - my PlayerControls never became disabled even when I tried to activate the original with a script, so I can't understand what is causing that (unless it is my script ...urk!).

Anyway, here is my trap and script, if anyone can help me fix this - I'd really appreciate it tons!


http://s434.photobucket.com/albums/qq67/Maxical1/Falling%20Exit%20Trap/


In case you need to reference the original Trap and Script, I have it in a seperate album here:


http://s434.photobucket.com/albums/qq67/Maxical1/Falling%20Exit%20Trap/BethesdasTrap%20I%20Copied%20And%20How%20It%20Works/


Thank you so much in advance for any help you can give me


*

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Sep 6 2011, 07:31 AM

Doors are special cases for onActivate scripts. I would call it an engine bug, because onActivate scripts on doors prevent the doors from functioning like... well, doors. Animated doors don't open and load doors don't teleport. That's what the "activate" function is supposed to do, but I'm not sure if it does this all the time.

What I would suggest is to remove the script from the door entirely and set up a teleport link that puts the player into a trigger zone that activates your script.

If you intend for the player to land in the water, you don't need to do anything fancy with damage calculations. Landing in water cancels all fall damage in this game (not entirely realistic, but that's how it works).

Sample:

Posted by: mALX Sep 6 2011, 06:14 PM

This is a great help, TK !! You ROCK !! I have been considering setting a trigger zone in the area above the ChorrolLoad door to enable PlayerControls and activate the ChorrolLoad door itself so your suggestion confirms it was something I should have done. Thank you so much for this !!

On that (DoOnce) in the script - will that mean I can only use this trap one time (period)? Or will it reset itself so the Player can "ride it" after that?

I'd like for it to be re-usable if possible, but I guess I can load a previous save to re-use it if that can't be done.

Posted by: Thomas Kaira Sep 6 2011, 09:13 PM

You can make the trap re-usable if you want. Check the scripts Bethesda used for their re-usable trigger zones for those, because I'm a bit flaky on those right now.

Posted by: mALX Sep 7 2011, 01:26 AM

QUOTE(Thomas Kaira @ Sep 6 2011, 04:13 PM)

Posted by: Grits Jun 10 2014, 02:57 PM

Well, I’ve had a Wrye Bash disaster. My laptop died unexpectedly (power issue) with everything running, and now WB won’t load. I’ve updated to the newest version from 303 hoping that would fix it, but still no load.

My guess is that there’s some kind of temporary file that did not get deleted because WB never shut down and that’s making it think it’s already running. I get the logo and a quick flash of some kind of text window and then nothing.

I’m searching online for an answer, but I thought I’d post here too in case anyone has an idea.

Posted by: ghastley Jun 10 2014, 04:56 PM

I'd have expected the upgrade to have deleted any temp files the older version might have left around, but the problem could be an .ini file or registry setting with bad window sizing. You may have to uninstall/re-install to clear that sort of thing, as an upgrade tends to preserve your settings, even if they're bad. Back up your Bash Installers files, profiles etc. just in case, but I don't think uninstalling will try and delete those.

Posted by: Grits Jun 10 2014, 06:05 PM

Thank you so much, ghastley! I’ve backed up everything as you suggested and am now working on my “Summon Stones” spell to uninstall and reinstall. Yiiiiikes…

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 15 2014, 11:59 PM

So I finally started messing around with the Construction Kit; it all seems easier than I thought. I hit a wall though.

I want to change an NPC face in one of the mods I've got. So I go into File > Data > Xena Updated (that's the mod). I activate this mod and open it. Now I can see all the zillions of things in the game. Blows my mind

I go to the narrow left-hand screen and click on NPCs. This opens up a huge list of NPCs in the game. I find the one I'm looking for, which is called Gabby Tester. Double-click on that, and *Boom* this opens up a whole bunch of options. It looks like I can change her class, her ability to loot, what spells she has, her Faction....all kinds of things. But I only want to change her face.

There's a tab that says "Face", so obviously I click on that. Then the program crashes. I tried opening up a vanilla NPC; Eugal Belette (just to see if maybe there's some weird mod thing going on) but the CK will crash whenever I try to look up an NPC's face.

Any ideas? I tried looking on the CK wiki, but there's no 'troublehshooting' section. And I don't want to wade through Beth's forums.

EDIT: one more thing: when I open up the Xena mod (activating it) with the CK, a message comes up which says 'Could not find referenced object....' over and over. I guess the program is looking for stuff but cannot find it?

EDIT 2: ha ha never mind. I figured it out. There's an option called 'Face" that has to be checked on before the editor can be used.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 20 2014, 06:11 PM

Hello everyone. I have a question hopefully somebody can answer. What I want to do seems very simple, but I have hit a virtual wall.

All I want to do is apply a magical effect (Sun Damage) to the NPC Vampire Faction in Oblivion. I found the Effect ID over at UESP.net, which is SUDG. I also found the Vampire Faction somewhere in the Construction Kit.

From there, I am lost. I don't see a way to add magical effects to an entire faction. Nor do I see a way to apply this effect to any of the individual NPC types in the Objects window of the CK. Maybe it's not even possible with the CK at all?

I learned about TES4Gecko, which is supposed to "do many things the Construction Kit cannot do" (paraphrase), and I read briefly about Gecko, but I don't see if Gecko can do this either. So the question is, is this even possible (applying a magical effect to an entire faction)? .. If so, which program should I use?

Posted by: ghastley Oct 20 2014, 06:54 PM

You don't want to apply an "effect", because that's just the visual appearance that plays when you are affected as a player. E,g, when you cast a spell, an effect plays, such as a curl of white smoke, at the same time as the spell does its thing, whether it's a buff to the player, or damage to an enemy.

I assume you want the vampires to get damaged by the sun under the same circumstances as the player character. That's typically done by giving them an ability, which is a spell that provides the result. The spell would need to be one that uses a Script effect, so it can be controlled by the location and time of day, i.e. damage if not in an interior cell, and during daylight. You probably can't just copy the same one that applies it to the player, as there are a whole bunch of functions that only apply to the player, and I'd imagine they're used for this.

I also think it's likely that your game won't have many vampires before long, as the AI doesn't have self-preservation built in, and they won't know they need to get inside. They'd probably feel the damage, and try to attack what caused it.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 20 2014, 10:41 PM

Wow, that's helps a lot thanks! Yes, I want the physical effect more than the visual one, although the visual effect would be pretty neat to have. But that would require messing with graphics, right? And I'm not really ready for that yet. I remember reading something about 'time of day', and how different things can be applied in this manner. Anyways, I'll let you know if I figure this out

QUOTE(ghastley @ Oct 20 2014, 01:54 PM)

Posted by: Acadian Oct 20 2014, 10:51 PM

So. . . vampires aren't smart enough to come in out of the rain sun?

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 22 2014, 11:26 PM

I wrote my first script today. I simply followed the instructions in the CS's My First Script tootorial, but put my own little twist on it. My character likes alcohol, so I added messages to her game. Like if she finds a bottle of beer, the on-screen message says "Mmmm beer". If she finds some ale, it says something like "Can't wait to gulp this down." Kinda silly, but this sort of thing actually fits her game.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 25 2014, 03:19 AM

....

Posted by: Grits Oct 25 2014, 03:42 AM

Congrats on your first script! That’s pretty neat that you can weave little thought messages into your character’s game.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 25 2014, 07:58 PM

Ha ha thanks Grits. Yeah, it's just silly little bits of code. I'll never put it up at Nexus or anything like that, but it fits my game.

The dots up above are yet another virtual wall I hit, but then toppled over. All the sudden certain cells were full of WTF? signs. There were about a half-dozen of them in the Count's Arms, a few in the Anvil Fighter's Guild, and even more in a brand new mod I picked up (IMPEReal's Sutch) and they were driving me crazy. I wound up getting FormID Finder, and long story short, figured out that I somehow managed to dissolve all the Cheap Wine in my games. It's because of the scripting mod I just made. Somehow I erased the Cheap Wine image, so instead of Cheap Wine there was WTF? signs Kahreem, if his game was on PC, would have gone crazy

But I figured it out. My motto for 2014 is "I figured it out".

Posted by: Grits Oct 25 2014, 08:08 PM

That is an EXCELLENT motto! So you can imagine my face palm when I discovered that Darnand could not get out the now broken door with his brand new staff. Make something, break something, fix it, new idea... It’s a learning experience!

Posted by: SubRosa Oct 25 2014, 09:25 PM

QUOTE(Renee Gade IV @ Oct 25 2014, 02:58 PM)

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Oct 26 2014, 02:11 AM

"Make something, break something.." Yeah no doubt. I found a really cool-looking Whip mod made by Snusmiriken (I think that's how you spell his name). It looks awesome. Got it into Renee's game and voila, somehow there's no sound if she draws or sheathes her weapon (not the whip, the spear she's been carrying lately, all the sudden it doesn't make any sounds). Arrgh. So I had to manually remove all the Whip files, dangit, most of which are animation files. I'm not sure which one was responsible, and I don't feel like messing with it now.

...but I will figure it out. Maybe it's not meant for Renee's game, but maybe Snaaty's game, which is less heavily-modded. I can totally see my skooma salesman with a whip, you know?

QUOTE(SubRosa @ Oct 25 2014, 04:25 PM)

QUOTE(Renee Gade IV @ Oct 25 2014, 02:58 PM)

and long story short, figured out that I somehow managed to dissolve all the Cheap Wine in my games.

Perhaps this is not such a bad thing for the world?

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Nov 18 2014, 11:35 PM

This is actually a construction set question.

If I want to make a particular chest not respawn anymore, is this possible?

I went into the construction set, found containers, and found chests. There are all sorts of chests listed. Some respawn, some don't. The chest I want to make non-respawnable has the Editor ID 0004e097, if I look at it under the console. But the CS doesn't use Editor IDs. Or does it? .... I don't see them listed, all I see are alphabetic descriptions of chests (Chest-MiddleClass for instance)

Once I can link an Editor ID with one of these chests in the CS, the rest seems easy. Just make that type of chest not respawn. Any ideas?

Posted by: ghastley Nov 19 2014, 02:51 AM

Yes, in theory, but then you'll affect all the chests of that type, which may mean no loot in the next dungeon, because the chests didn't re-fill.

It's better to add a non-respawning chest where you want it in your mod, and then drop the original below the ground to get it out of the way. I wouldn't even do a search and replace to change the chest into yours, as it may be referenced by ID, not name.

Posted by: SubRosa Nov 19 2014, 03:12 AM

By default the CS hides the IDs of everything. It would be too useful if you can see them after all. But you can make them visible in the Object Window. In the right hand pane, look at the top menu bar. At the left it starts with a column named Editor ID, which is really the name of the items. Next you will see two little bars, then a column named Count. There is actually a column in between them. If you double click on the second bar, or just click and hold down on the second one, then drag it over, it will open up the hidden column. This will show you the Form IDs.

I don't think you can search by the Form ID. And trying to go through them manually will probably be a royal pain. It would be easier to go to the Cell View Window, find the cell where the chest is, open that up, and look for the chest that way. What I will typically do is find it that way, then double click on it to open it up. Typically the Reference Editor ID field at the top of the window will be empty. I will give it a unique name, like 0PersephonesTreasureChestRef. Then click on Edit Base. That will bring up the base type of chest the one in the cell was copied from. Now change the ID line at the top of that to something unique as well, like 0PersephonesTreasureChestBase. Then uncheck the Respawns box in that window, and change the contents however you like. Click Ok, and say yes to create a new form. That takes you back to the Cell View, with the first window for the chest is still up (0PersephonesTreasureChestRef). Now click ok there as well. Now that chest will be unique, and non-respawnable.

And a little hint. When naming new objects, always begin the ID name with the number 0 or 1. That way it is always at the top of every list. That makes it easy to find it in the future. I always end the name of objects in the world with 'Ref', as in short for Reference. That helps keep the object that appears in the world separate from the base object it is cloned from.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Nov 20 2014, 02:26 AM

Hey thanks you all. I got it figured. Actually what I realized is I've never used the CS's Cell and Render windows. I had a brainstorm today and remembered that every cell is viewable (with all the objects inside it) in these windows. Found the chest I wanted to change, which is inside one of Lord Drad's Slave Houses, and found a Respawn option we can click on and off.


Is it bad (by the way) if I save this non-respawning chest to a pre-existing mod?

Posted by: SubRosa Nov 20 2014, 03:08 AM

There is nothing really wrong with modding an existing mod. I end up modding at least half the mods I download. Sometimes when you have mods that affect the same thing you have to do that. Like with multiple hair mods. You have to combine them all into a single mod, otherwise the only one that will work is the last one in the mod order.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Nov 21 2014, 12:12 AM

Thanks SR. Wow, we can combine hair?

Posted by: SubRosa Nov 21 2014, 12:39 AM

In Oblivion you have to. It is a long, tedious process. But not really that difficult.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Jan 2 2015, 11:03 PM

What do you do if a mod just flat-out doesn't work? ... And you visit that mod's POSTS page at Nexus (where everybody posts their experiences) and you don't see anybody else having problems? .. Asking questions in that POSTS section would be a waste of time; the mod author seems to have vanished, and I notice people don't really answer posts at Nexus, unless the mod in question is new and / or hot.

The module I'm looking at is called http://www.nexusmods.com/oblivion/mods/2536/?. This mod includes five esps, but I'm only interested in using one of them: Natural Habitats. Natural Habitats.esp adds birds and insects to the gameworld.

I noticed that the first few times I used Natural Habitats it worked fine. Birds were flying everywhere, insects were buzzing. I was in heaven. But it eventually just *stopped*. I deactivated and deleted the mod, reinstalled it, and then it worked again. Eventually stopped again. Deactivated + deleted again. eTc.

Eventually it simply stopped working, period. Doesn't matter if I try using OBMM (there is an Omod version of this mod), installing with Bash, or installing manually. Doesn't matter if I put Habitat at the very bottom of my load order. Oddly the other esp I use from this same mod, Natural Water, works just fine. It's only the Habitat which doesn't work. And I'm not using any of the other mods: not using Natural Weather, Natural Weather HDR, or Natural Flora.

I've tried opening up NH in TES4Edit, but I don't know what it is I'm supposed to be looking for. It's weird how this mod initially worked, but then just stopped, and then stopped for good. Any ideas?

Posted by: ghastley Jan 2 2015, 11:10 PM

Could it be the A-bomb? The critters are animated, so maybe their animations just got stopped.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Jan 2 2015, 11:39 PM

QUOTE(ghastley @ Jan 2 2015, 05:10 PM)

Posted by: SubRosa Jan 2 2015, 11:50 PM

Often the culprit when a mod just stops working is something else is superseding it in the load order. But that cannot be it if you put it last in the list.

That is Max Tael's Natural Environments right? I have it too. Or Natural Habitat. I just looked at it in OBMM, and it comes with 5 .esps:

Natural_Habitat_by_Max_Tael.esp
Natural_Vegetation_by_Max_Tael.esp
Natural_Weather_by_Max_Tael.esp
Natural Environments Unsupported Extras\Brighter_Torches.esp
Natural Environments Unsupported Extras\Natural_Vegetation_200%_by_Max_Tael.esp

I only use Natural_Habitat_by_Max_Tael.esp and Natural_Vegetation_by_Max_Tael.esp. The Weather one was giving me weird weather, like snow in Oblivion, so I turned it off. I just never bothered with the other two .esps.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Jan 3 2015, 01:02 AM

Yes, that's the one, SR. Natural Habitats works for you, eh? Strange. I really want this one in my game, I loved seeing flocks of birds flying overhead, and crows and swallows and buzzing insects (etc.) during the hour which this mod actually worked.

I only use Habitats and Water. I don't use the vegetation one because I've read some funny things about it. And I have All Natural going, which includes Natural Weather (assuming I have NW on), so I don't need to add it again.

Hmm, that actually is a thought. Maybe I will try deactivating Natural Weather in All Natural, and switch this to Enhanced Weather or AWS instead. See if this makes any diff, for whatever reason.

Posted by: Renee Gade IV Jan 3 2015, 09:46 PM

I think I got this figured out. This mod only is supposed to work in certain cells, right? I notice if we're around the Imperial City especially, I see bugs & birds, and when it initially worked that's where we were, around the I.C. area, and as far south as Cropsford.

Which makes me wonder if it's possible to copy / paste some creatures in other cells? Hmm.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Feb 1 2015, 08:35 PM

Nehrim.

Took some doing, but I was able to install it as a separate folder from my Oblivion game (with both Tallei and Julian). So I'm playing it for the third time, and thought I'd try my hand at modding it as I did with Oblivion. I really want to add a "special" horse companion for this character.

However, I'm stuck with trying to launch the CS. AGAIN! It's in the Nehrim folder with the game.exe as well as the ssce5432.dll it needs to run. Yet I keep getting the same error messages as I did when I first started modding Oblivion and didn't have it installed correctly.

Here is a screenshot of my Nehrim folder. http://%5burl=https://flic.kr/p/qJu3Yqhttps://flic.kr/p/qJu3Yq

The error messages I'm getting when I'm trying to start CS are:

Unable to load CTL file
Cannot load atmosphere model
Cannot load the stars
Cannot load the clouds

Then it stalls, and I get the Windows message to close the program as it has stopped responding.

When I look at the Editor Warnings this is what it says:
Unable to load CTL file
Cannot load the atmosphere model.
Cannot load the stars.
Cannot load the clouds.
CreateFile('Data\DEFAULT.esp') in CreateTES failed with error:
The system cannot find the path specified.
Unable to complete operation due to failure removing previous file.
Temp file remains.

I've looked at the CS ini as well as the oblivion ini that's generated by Nehrim to make sure the relevant file paths match. Here's the archive section from the oblivion ini:
[Archive]
SMasterMiscArchiveFileName=Oblivion - Misc.bsa
SMasterVoicesArchiveFileName2=Oblivion - Voices2.bsa
SMasterVoicesArchiveFileName1=Oblivion - Voices1.bsa
SMasterSoundsArchiveFileName=Oblivion - Sounds.bsa
SMasterTexturesArchiveFileName1=Oblivion - Textures - Compressed.bsa
SMasterMeshesArchiveFileName=Oblivion - Meshes.bsa
SInvalidationFile=ArchiveInvalidation.txt
iRetainFilenameOffsetTable=1
iRetainFilenameStringTable=1
iRetainDirectoryStringTable=1
bCheckRuntimeCollisions=0
bInvalidateOlderFiles=1
bUseArchives=1
SArchiveList=ArchiveInvalidationInvalidated!.bsa, Oblivion - Meshes.bsa, Oblivion - Textures - Compressed.bsa, Oblivion - Sounds.bsa, Oblivion - Voices1.bsa, Oblivion - Voices2.bsa, Oblivion - Misc.bsa

And here's the same section in the CS ini:
bInvalidateOlderFiles=1
SMasterMiscArchiveFileName=Oblivion - Misc.bsa
SMasterVoicesArchiveFileName2=Oblivion - Voices2.bsa
SMasterVoicesArchiveFileName1=Oblivion - Voices1.bsa
SMasterSoundsArchiveFileName=Oblivion - Sounds.bsa
SMasterTexturesArchiveFileName1=Oblivion - Textures - Compressed.bsa
SMasterMeshesArchiveFileName=Oblivion - Meshes.bsa
SArchiveList=Oblivion - Meshes.bsa, Oblivion - Textures - Compressed.bsa, Oblivion - Sounds.bsa, Oblivion - Voices1.bsa, Oblivion - Voices2.bsa, Oblivion - Misc.bsa
SInvalidationFile=ArchiveInvalidation.txt
iRetainFilenameOffsetTable=1
iRetainFilenameStringTable=1
iRetainDirectoryStringTable=1
bCheckRuntimeCollisions=0
bUseArchives=1
The italicized section here is added from the oblivion ini file after the initial launch of the CS. Still the same error.

I'm out of ideas at this point. Any help?

Posted by: haute ecole rider Mar 16 2015, 03:48 PM

Hi all,

My build of Oblivion on the new GPU is going well.

However I am noticing something off. I've loaded up Robert's Male and Female body replacers. I'm seeing glowy textures around the eyelids and lips of the female Altmer and Nords. Just those ones. It's like shining a light upwards from below their chins - where there should be shadows, there's light. Also the skirts on the upper class gowns are - umm - a little more revealing than they should be - hips are exposed. I know it's an issue with the Roberts Female body replacer, but I'm trying to figure out what went wrong.

Also the men have tattered robes, and two textures on their legs.

Female was installed manually, Male was installed via Wrye Bash (BAIN version). Both are the latest versions. I might download and install the next older version of the Female, with the foot fix separate, though. (after removing this current version first, of course)

I do believe I have the Hi Res facial texture pack for Roberts Male and Female installed as well.

Posted by: ghastley Mar 16 2015, 04:12 PM

QUOTE(haute ecole rider @ Mar 16 2015, 10:48 AM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Mar 17 2015, 12:56 AM

ghastley, that certainly sounds like the issues I've been seeing.

So any way to fix them? Uninstall and reinstall? I'm new at textures and so am not sure of the best way to get these mods working. I did once before, so I know it's possible!

Posted by: ghastley Mar 17 2015, 04:01 AM

With textures, the install order is as important as the load order, if they're replacement files. Using Wrye Bash can help avoid that issue, but even that's not perfect.

However, if it's missing files, and not an overwrite, then a re-install could help. Again, if you use Wrye Bash to install, it will tell you if a mod's files are missing are overlaid.

The issue with extra pairs of legs won't go away with a re-install. That probably needs CS or NifSkope work, depending on which part is in error. If the legs in the clothing shouldn't be there, you can delete them in NifSkope. If they're meant to replace the character's legs, then the form in CS needs updating to say so.

Posted by: haute ecole rider Mar 18 2015, 04:17 PM

Thanks for the response, ghastley.

Posted by: ghastley Mar 19 2015, 10:12 PM

I don't think the body replacers can be the source of the problems. However, if any other mod replaces the armor/clothing meshes, or the race facial normals, they could introduce your symptoms. Since it worked before, you have good instances of the content, somewhere!

Meshes and textures aren't something that load order fixes, if the mesh or texture gets replaced, it's install order that matters. However, using Wrye Bash shows you where mods conflict, and gives you more control over what pieces get installed. If you get a conflict like this, you can often just re-install the parts that got overlaid.

Posted by: Lopov Apr 23 2015, 07:33 PM

New character, new problems.

I installed the Enhanced Economy in Komotai's game prior to starting it and for some reason it broke all merchants, they were either selling nothing except their unique items or they were selling only a few items, much less than they should. So I uninstalled EE, as instructed but their inventories won't reset. Not even of those merchants that I've never visited. I tried waiting for three days and even more but their inventories never resets. Just to make sure that EE was the culprit mod, I created a new character without EE activated, and their inventories are full as they should be. Unfortunately I don't have a save without this mod for Komo's game and I've been searching for a solution for entire day but nothing worked.

Posted by: ghastley Apr 23 2015, 08:43 PM

I'd suggest re-installing EE and figuring out what ini setting disabled the regular goods. Ole's mods don't usually break that badly, but the initial values for options can be weird sometimes.

I use his Map Marker Overhaul, and when installed I saw no map markers until I changed a range setting so that I didn't have to be standing on one to see it.

Posted by: Renee Jun 4 2015, 12:20 AM

I keep having my game "crash" when I exit Oblivion. In other words, whenever I quit my game, it will go to the CRASH menu. I know there's a way to make this not happen anymore, anybody know how?

Posted by: mALX Jun 4 2015, 12:30 AM

QUOTE(Renee @ Jun 3 2015, 07:20 PM)

Posted by: SubRosa Jun 4 2015, 01:44 AM

Mine did that too. http://www.nexusmods.com/oblivion/mods/22410/ will stop it from happening. It does require OBSE though.

Posted by: Renee Jun 4 2015, 02:01 AM

Ahh, Fast Exit, very very good, SubRosa, I salute you. I knew somebody had invented something for this.

Posted by: Acadian Jun 4 2015, 03:05 AM

I use Fast Exit also, Renee and it works very well for me.

Posted by: Renee Jul 13 2015, 10:57 PM

How would I "color" some clothes? I have a mod-added cuirass in one of my games and it's purple. All I want to do is change its color--make it black. Not seeing how to do this in the Construction Kit, is this possible? ... Or would I need some other program?

Posted by: SubRosa Jul 13 2015, 11:04 PM

You need to find the texture file for the armor. It will be in a *.dds format. Open it with a graphics editor that supports .dds files (not all do). I use http://www.getpaint.net/index.html. Then just change the color and save it.

Posted by: Renee Jul 14 2015, 02:11 AM

QUOTE(SubRosa @ Jul 13 2015, 06:04 PM)

Posted by: ghastley Jul 14 2015, 02:50 AM

Solid purple is the color the game uses when it can't find the texture for the mesh. Usually you have it, but it's in the wrong folder, so it may be just a case of moving it to the right one.

How did you install the mod? Some of the mod managers will show you where they put things.

Posted by: Renee Jul 14 2015, 12:19 PM

QUOTE(ghastley @ Jul 13 2015, 09:50 PM)

Posted by: ghastley Jul 14 2015, 02:08 PM

Unintended purple is a shade you can't miss, which is why it was chosen. Glad you don;t have that issue, as a recolor of a .dds you CAN find is much easier!

Posted by: Renee Jul 14 2015, 11:15 PM

Awesome, thanks again. If I manage to figure out what the heck I'm doing, I'll show you folks a picture of the armor I'm going to color: before and after.

First hurdle: downloading Paint.net. Seems simple enough, right? The page I found had this BIG GREEN BUTTON which said DOWNLOAD NOW!, so of course that's what I did. No. Bad idea. That put a bunch of software on my comp I don't need: some sort of 7zip program, some sort of software protection program. X-\ Don't worry, I already uninstalled all this stuff. So then, I see the actual paint.net download, which isn't as obvious. I start to download it, and I got some weird message about my Internet cutting out. Which it did. I lost my Internet last night, just by coincidence. So I'll have to try again later tonight.

Always fall for that BIG GREEN DOWNLOAD BUTTON though. Gets me every time.

Posted by: Renee Jul 18 2015, 12:07 AM

I am finally looking into this matter with the paint.net. Wow, it's really intricate. I can get in there if I really wanted to, and get very specific about color tones. Sort of like Photoshop. My initial urge was to just change the color purple to black (simple as that) but the truth is, the mod author hand-placed a lot of subtle shades of purple when he or she made this armor set. So my temptation is to also get rather intricate.

Pretty neat stuff.

Posted by: mALX Jul 18 2015, 09:57 PM

QUOTE(Renee @ Jul 17 2015, 07:07 PM)

Posted by: Renee Aug 14 2015, 01:02 AM

I have this really wacky idea. I'm not good enough to implement this idea, but I just want to know if it's possible.

Okay, is it possible to write some scripts that will make our character do something random, if (let's say) 10 minutes go by, and I haven't done anything with him/her? ... So what I mean is.... I'm gaming with my character for an hour, then I take a break. While I take a break, character X is just standing around. After 10 minutes though, now he or she will begin reading a book, without me touching the controls.

Is this possible, or would it screw up the game to try to write scripts like this? It's just that I notice NPCs can have scripts that make them roam around and do other things ...

Posted by: ghastley Aug 14 2015, 01:40 AM

No, in general, the game's not set up to run scripts on the player. There are places in quests, however, where the game will disable the player's controls, but only so that he/she can watch something without interfering.

Skyrim has some possibilities for this, but not Oblivion.

Posted by: Renee Aug 14 2015, 12:33 PM

Ah dang. I knew this must be so though, otherwise somebody would have made a mod for this. Thanks anyway.

Posted by: tegeus-Cromis Aug 25 2015, 12:25 AM

Hmm. You know, I think it might be at least theoretically possible. It is quite true that you cannot run scripts on the PC, but you can run them on NPCs and objects that will affect the PC when the PC performs some act. A common one is to have something happen when the PC goes to sleep, for example.

A trivial one would be a timer script to establish how long the PC has been in one place, then have something happen after n seconds. (I can already imagine a very annoying curse - which can be lifted by a quest, of course - that materialises increasingly nasty creatures. Hey, thanks for the idea...)

So, the issue is, can the PC be compelled to perform an idle animation from a spell cast on them? It is possible to craft a spell to force NPCs to do animations: http://www.nexusmods.com/oblivion/mods/3821/ does this (brilliant stuff, in this case it sets everyone disco dancing...) Probably not, but it's an interesting thought.

Posted by: ghastley Aug 25 2015, 01:16 AM

After writing my first response, I re-considered the sweeping "no", and noted that some mods like Sexlivion, the various pose mods, and See You Sleep do manage to run idle animations on the player. But that may be the limit of what's possible, and each of those starts with a voluntary action by the user. You generally have to cast a spell, or perform some similar in-game interaction to kick them off. I'm not sure if doing nothing for a time counts.

Posted by: tegeus-Cromis Aug 25 2015, 07:35 AM

QUOTE(ghastley @ Aug 25 2015, 01:16 AM)

Posted by: mALX Aug 25 2015, 07:15 PM

QUOTE(ghastley @ Aug 24 2015, 08:16 PM)

Posted by: mALX Aug 25 2015, 09:54 PM

Umpa had a script that made the PC dance when they heard music from his radio, and of course you could change the animations to whatever you wanted to (if you wanted to do something other than dancing), but you would still have to click on the radio yourself.

The problem with that script was that you could not stop yourself from dancing, you were stuck and would either have to exit the game and reload a save before turning on the radio.

I tried to add it to my "Wobbly/Lucky Mudcrab" mod and when my PC couldn't stop dancing I managed to hop (dancing the whole way) to the door and exit the cell; but it wasn't easy and I didn't know for sure if I'd be able to, lol. I immediately went into the CK and disabled that mod script, lol.

Posted by: Renee Aug 26 2015, 02:42 AM

Our pc's do some random things occasionally, right? I notice my current lady has a habit of adjusting her daggar. Isn't that from some script?

I don't have a problem with activating something to make the animation happen, by the way. If I have to have my PC cast a spell, this is okay. The idea is that the PC eventually starts doing something else, other than standing around.

I got this idea from the Actor's Ball mod. That's a good mod if you want some sort of instant action, but it's rather clunky to use, going through all those menus. What we're talking about is something which would wind up feeling more natural.

Posted by: Renee Sep 22 2015, 01:03 AM

So I'm looking at this brand-new mod called http://www.nexusmods.com/oblivion/mods/46420/? and I'm pretty much drooling. That's what I've packed my game with: not more hostile creatures, but more peaceful ones. Problem is there are a couple animals I'm not interested in adding. Am I safe just going into the CS and deleting these altogether?

Posted by: tegeus-Cromis Sep 29 2015, 04:34 PM

QUOTE(Renee @ Sep 22 2015, 01:03 AM)

Posted by: mALX Sep 29 2015, 04:54 PM

QUOTE(Renee @ Sep 21 2015, 08:03 PM)

Posted by: haute ecole rider Sep 29 2015, 05:54 PM

I second mALX's recommendation to use SubRosa's mod if all you want is to make the vanilla animals friendly. It's part of my Oblivion default load order, and I'm so happy with it.

Posted by: Renee Sep 29 2015, 11:26 PM

Why thank you. I do have Witchcraft in Lady Saga's game, and yes, I love it because it does exactly what I've wanted for many years. Saga also can summon bears, which is really fun. I have a list of friendly animals mods in my games so far: MMM's More Peaceful Animals, Redbag Friendly Animals, Gulls & Seagulls, Ducks & Swans, Natural Environments, a few others I'm forgetting. Yeah, I like my game packed with non-hostiles, that's another thing I was really wanting as I gamed on consoles for years.

Posted by: Renee Oct 3 2015, 03:00 AM

I've been waiting for somebody to answer this, when the idea struck me: why not see if there are any video tutorials on You Tube? Duh. Of course there are! I was watching a few last night. Already learned a heck of a lot. It's cool to see what to do, too.

Posted by: mALX Oct 3 2015, 03:11 AM

QUOTE(Renee @ Oct 2 2015, 10:00 PM)

Posted by: Renee Oct 10 2015, 02:38 AM

QUOTE(tegeus-Cromis @ Sep 29 2015, 11:34 AM)

Posted by: Lopov Dec 29 2015, 01:08 PM

Is there any option to "fix" an .esp file so it doesn't get sorted by BOSS / LOOT? For instance, when it comes to Better Cities, BOSS auto sorts it in a wrong way, putting one of the .esps too high and each time I install some new mod and arrange a new load order, this .esp gets moved up, so I have to manually move it all the way down.

Posted by: ghastley Dec 29 2015, 01:38 PM

You can add a user list to override the master list. It's also useful for self-made mods that aren't released and therefore unknown.

Posted by: mALX Dec 29 2015, 03:21 PM

Oh, I was thinking of changing the Better Cities mod that keeps getting thrown back (so it matches the one that is sorting right)?

If I'm not mistaken, I think Boss sorts by date?

Ghastley or SubRosa know this stuff better than I do

Posted by: SubRosa Dec 29 2015, 04:56 PM

I don't know anything about Boss or Loot. I use so many mods I made myself that they are just useless to me. I sort all my mods manually.

Posted by: ghastley Dec 29 2015, 04:58 PM

The game itself loads in date order, so Boss alters the dates to make the order of the mods match its master list. If the BC file gets moved when you run BOSS, maybe you have another mod that is tagged to load after it, but before some other file.

Posted by: Renee Jan 14 2016, 01:09 AM

So here's a weird one. I already fixed my own problem, but I don't know what went wrong in the first place.

Out of the blue, my game started crashing like crazy. Long story short: I figured out that it would only crash if my character was standing close by one of her followers (and facing them). After a bunch of trial and error I remembered I had recently cleaned several CM Partner esps. I was literally out of ideas by this point, okay? So I figured, heck why not? ... Let's re-install CM Partners so those esps are dirty again.

And now everything is fine. XD No more CTDs. I don't understand what just happened though. Why would the dirty versions of these CMP esps work, but the clean ones fail?

Posted by: ghastley Jan 14 2016, 02:55 PM

Usually CTD's happen because the game is trying to use a form that doesn't exist. So they're most likely after a mod has been removed, but something else has picked up a reference to something in the mod and is still using it. E.g. you enchanted an item that was added by a mod, and stored it in a container added by another, ...

Cleaning a mod removes overrides that aren't needed, but if one of them has replaced the missing item, it has kept it in existence, preventing the CTD that was going to happen. So the cleaning lets the CTD deferred from the mod removal happen at last.

tl;dr it wasn't the cleaning that caused the CTD, it was just waiting for a chance to get you.