Mod Organizer + Creation kit

[Target1213]

Okay,I need some sense spoken to me. I have been using Mod organizer for about two years now modding Skyrim. I does require some attention to detail but i like it. I find it easy to use once you get it to play well with other tools. Recently I again changed my load order to begin a new play through using new mods for a different game style. I have gray/dark face bug. I opened Creation Kit with Mod Organizer, Activated Skyrim.esm, all DLC's and the mod I believe is the issue, S.O.G.s v6. These are the only things I told the CK to work with. I selected all NPC's and did "Ctl+F4" to export facegen data. As predicted the CK went into it's "working coma" reporting "Not Responding". I then opened window's Resource Monitor to make sure things were still going on. In Resource Monitor I saw the CK reading and writing to EVERY ACTIVATED FILE IN MY GAME LOAD ORDER that dealt with NPC's in any way. Some of those files I had no clue held NPC facegen data. I have been watching a stupentous amount of reading and writing for 6.5 hours now and I am not sure what my game is going to look like now. Any reason The CK is reading from, and writing to files I did not activate in the CK? What the heck is going on? is this normal? *Help*

[IsharaMeradin]

Every mod that edits an NPC's appearance in even the slightest way has face gen data files else it has the 'grey face bug'. However, this does not mean that there will be a mod folder containing face gen data. Face gen data files are stored in a folder that corresponds to the actual plugin that the NPC's original record is contained within. Thus many mods will have face gen data files within a Skyrim or DLC folder instead of their own.

 

Switching gears to how MO operates...

Anything active in the left pane is made available to whatever tools you run. Plugins are the only files you can deactivate on the right pane and hide from third party tools. As a result, if you have a lot of mods active on the left pane and they have files present which correspond to what you are dealing with in a utility, you run the risk of editing the incorrect version of the file.

 

MO's pattern of overwriting files is as follows:

• If there are no existing active instances of this file within the 'mods' folder, save it to the 'overwrite' folder.
• If there is an existing active instance of this file within the 'mods' folder, replace the active instance.
• If there are multiple existing active instances of this file within the 'mods' folder, replace the last loaded instance.

 

As you can see depending upon what mods are active, what files they have, and what you are working with, you could end up editing the wrong versions of a particular file. Usually, this is not a big deal as the last loaded instance is what you want to edit for game-play purposes. But if you intend to swap the order around or need to for some other reason, the edit could end up being 'lost' as its instance could lose priority.

 

In a nutshell, what you experienced is 'normal' behavior for MO. However, in some situations it may be undesired behavior. Workaround when desired is to create a new profile, activate only that which is needed, make the edits and create a new mod from the overwrite folder or copy them to the proper mod folder. Finally, go back to the original profile, ensure everything is properly activated and test it out in game.

 

FYI - selecting all NPCs and exporting face gen data is most likely overkill in any situation. If the offending mod is the last loaded in the CK and edited the NPC, its record will have an * beside it. Selecting just edited records will speed the process up immensely.

[Target1213]

Every mod that edits an NPC's appearance in even the slightest way has face gen data files else it has the 'grey face bug'. However, this does not mean that there will be a mod folder containing face gen data. Face gen data files are stored in a folder that corresponds to the actual plugin that the NPC's original record is contained within. Thus many mods will have face gen data files within a Skyrim or DLC folder instead of their own.

 

Switching gears to how MO operates...

Anything active in the left pane is made available to whatever tools you run. Plugins are the only files you can deactivate on the right pane and hide from third party tools. As a result, if you have a lot of mods active on the left pane and they have files present which correspond to what you are dealing with in a utility, you run the risk of editing the incorrect version of the file.

 

MO's pattern of overwriting files is as follows:

• If there are no existing active instances of this file within the 'mods' folder, save it to the 'overwrite' folder.
• If there is an existing active instance of this file within the 'mods' folder, replace the active instance.
• If there are multiple existing active instances of this file within the 'mods' folder, replace the last loaded instance.

 

As you can see depending upon what mods are active, what files they have, and what you are working with, you could end up editing the wrong versions of a particular file. Usually, this is not a big deal as the last loaded instance is what you want to edit for game-play purposes. But if you intend to swap the order around or need to for some other reason, the edit could end up being 'lost' as its instance could lose priority.

 

In a nutshell, what you experienced is 'normal' behavior for MO. However, in some situations it may be undesired behavior. Workaround when desired is to create a new profile, activate only that which is needed, make the edits and create a new mod from the overwrite folder or copy them to the proper mod folder. Finally, go back to the original profile, ensure everything is properly activated and test it out in game.

 

FYI - selecting all NPCs and exporting face gen data is most likely overkill in any situation. If the offending mod is the last loaded in the CK and edited the NPC, its record will have an * beside it. Selecting just edited records will speed the process up immensely.

I was afraid of that. Thank you for the invaluable information. Two steps back,...three steps forward. Thanks again.

[CobaltBlues]

Is this still an issue for you? Remove the "Start In" text of your Creation Kit shortcut.

[greyday01]

Every mod that edits an NPC's appearance in even the slightest way has face gen data files else it has the 'grey face bug'. However, this does not mean that there will be a mod folder containing face gen data. Face gen data files are stored in a folder that corresponds to the actual plugin that the NPC's original record is contained within. Thus many mods will have face gen data files within a Skyrim or DLC folder instead of their own.

 

Switching gears to how MO operates...

Anything active in the left pane is made available to whatever tools you run. Plugins are the only files you can deactivate on the right pane and hide from third party tools. As a result, if you have a lot of mods active on the left pane and they have files present which correspond to what you are dealing with in a utility, you run the risk of editing the incorrect version of the file.

 

MO's pattern of overwriting files is as follows:

• If there are no existing active instances of this file within the 'mods' folder, save it to the 'overwrite' folder.
• If there is an existing active instance of this file within the 'mods' folder, replace the active instance.
• If there are multiple existing active instances of this file within the 'mods' folder, replace the last loaded instance.

 

As you can see depending upon what mods are active, what files they have, and what you are working with, you could end up editing the wrong versions of a particular file. Usually, this is not a big deal as the last loaded instance is what you want to edit for game-play purposes. But if you intend to swap the order around or need to for some other reason, the edit could end up being 'lost' as its instance could lose priority.

 

In a nutshell, what you experienced is 'normal' behavior for MO. However, in some situations it may be undesired behavior. Workaround when desired is to create a new profile, activate only that which is needed, make the edits and create a new mod from the overwrite folder or copy them to the proper mod folder. Finally, go back to the original profile, ensure everything is properly activated and test it out in game.

 

FYI - selecting all NPCs and exporting face gen data is most likely overkill in any situation. If the offending mod is the last loaded in the CK and edited the NPC, its record will have an * beside it. Selecting just edited records will speed the process up immensely.

 

I read your explanation and it made my brain ache. I'm using MO2 for playing but I just can't get my head around using the creation kit with it. Maybe if there was some video tutorials like the Bethesda series on Creationkit.com to watch I could understand how to use it. Right now I've simply created a mod myself using the CK directly, loaded a mod for editing manually into the data folder or used NMM to load the mod I want to edit or look at. Its not hard to keep files straight with only one mod at a time being worked on it your Data folder and the vanilla stuff all in BSAs. I really do wish someone like Gopher or Darkfox127 would make some youtubes about it though.

[qa1886]

The Start in path should be the game path where SkyrimSE.exe or Tesv.exe is.

[agerweb]

I am sure there are people who run the CK through the MO successfully; but it has always seemed to be an unusually masochistic way of developing a mod. There are many ways for the CK and your Mod to go wrong and if you are using MO to facilitate a development environment (which is not MO's primary aim) then you have just added something else that could be the problem.

 

Give yourself a break from worrying about MO configuration and run the CK manually. I would also recommend testing it manually as well.

[IsharaMeradin]

 

<snip>

 

I read your explanation and it made my brain ache. I'm using MO2 for playing but I just can't get my head around using the creation kit with it. Maybe if there was some video tutorials like the Bethesda series on Creationkit.com to watch I could understand how to use it. Right now I've simply created a mod myself using the CK directly, loaded a mod for editing manually into the data folder or used NMM to load the mod I want to edit or look at. Its not hard to keep files straight with only one mod at a time being worked on it your Data folder and the vanilla stuff all in BSAs. I really do wish someone like Gopher or Darkfox127 would make some youtubes about it though.

 

I have not used MO2. I do not know if it has any of the same behaviors as the original MO or not.

 

If you already have your mods for playing isolated from the data folder with a mod manager, then you can use the Creation Kit directly and know with confidence that your mod files will be the only new files added to the data folder.

 

Only issue then to be concerned about is if you wish to play your modded setup but not have your under construction mod loaded as well. If it is just a plugin, it can be deactivated but if it includes loose files you might have to move your files out to a backup directory.

[RagnarSeptim]

ok i need extreme help and i know this is a necro but i have having a bloody hell of a time with my mod orginizer 2 and creation kit. originally i was having some type of darkface bug in creation kit (picture below)

 

so then I tried making a new profile just for making basic follower mods for CK in MO2. but now every time I click either Preview full or head and then yes to all the CK CTD's I need help as I am trying to get the finishing touches on my follower mod I made done for an update

[RagnarSeptim]

nevermind now it wants to work....i hate my computer....hahaha

 

 

 

 

I spoke to soon now it is back to crashing

Edited November 24, 2019 by Arturios