.esp vs .esm

[Dandys]

Hi,

 

I'm having a problem with my mod New Vegas Replayability by Dandys (http://newvegasnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=37252) (Version 0.200 is the broken one, not 0.210, 0.210 I made an .esp so people can use it but still I want to make the mod an .esm some day!)

 

I want to convert it into an .esm, but every time I try to do so the game crashes when I start a new game.

 

All I was doing was going into FOMM, "open in TESSnip" "Spells" "Make ESM"

 

Is there something I'm doing wrong?

 

If not is there someone who can look into it for me (maybe even test it out/look in GECK) and see what is wrong with it?

 

Any help would be tremendous thanks.

 

Also a smaller issue - the hair on NPCs looks kind of messed up, is there something I should do to fix this? The hair clips into some NPCs heads (not new NPCs, old ones who are not edited visually and did not used to have this problem).

Edited October 17, 2011 by Dandys

[clintster74]

There are two time were it is better to have a .ESM rather than a .ESP

 

1.If you have new NPC’s in your game and they are other than Caucasian. Lets lay you have a female African American and she is in a skimpy out fit her head will be black but her body will be white the only way to fix it is to make your mod a .ESM

 

2.If you want your mod to work as a master for other mods. Caliber is a good example it is a .ESM master with all the custom ammos modder A is making custom weapon and ammo, modder b is making a custom weapon and it is going to use the same ammo if they load caliber along with FNV all the custom ammo from caliber is loaded in to GECK and they can pick their ammo from caliber. That way if a player wants want’s to use both weapons the weapons will use the same ammo form caliber with no conflict or need to carry two ammos of the same caliber but from two deferent mods. The mod now becomes dependent on the caliber mod. Just like if you use assets form a DLC.

 

Other than that it is better to have a .ESP so you can adjust it in load order

[rickerhk]

Also if you add new cells and navmeshing. Navmesh is buggy if the plugin is not a esm.

[Quetzlsacatanango]

Maybe the better question is "in what circumstance is it better to use an esp than an esm?"

It doesn't really seem like there's much advantage to using esp at this point, and lots of advantages.

[Dandys]

What's this thing with non-persistent reference edits not applying in .esms though?

[Ghogiel]

I think if you have created custom creatures with new skeletons, afaik ragdolldata entries doesn't like esps. I some how managed to get the data into an esp once, there is a really specific way to go about it, and there is no way to copy the records with say FO3Edit out of that plugin into another esp. So if you cock up, you have to restart adding the creature. Judging from the GECK wiki, which says something like ragdolldata is not saved in esps, I guess esm is the way to go for any animators having issues. If I were to do it all again I would have esm'ed from page one.

[Quetzlsacatanango]

What's this thing with non-persistent reference edits not applying in .esms though?

 

http://www.thenexusforums.com/index.php?/topic/380171-esm-v-esp-whats-the-real-story/

 

I think this is what we know about it.

[Dandys]

Thanks everyone, so far it seems like using .esm for new content, especially in-game, is a good idea, Edited December 2, 2011 by Dandys

[Cyberlazy]

I like to put my override records in an ESP, they load later and the load order is configurable.

I put new records into ESM's, they can then be used by other ESP's, and load order on new records rarely depends on other mods.

[Rocketlombax]

Okay one last question -

 

I have this bug in my mod where most of the NPCs have their hair messed up because it clips into their heads. I made the mod an .esm and it did not solve this problem. Is there some kind of GECK thing I need to do to fix this?

 

It's kind of unrelated but an answer would be great.

 

 

For that problem the hairstyles that were used for that mod need to be packed into a .BSA file for them to work properly. It works as long as you do it right.