Question about merging mods

[TonySSS]

Hello, I want to ask a question regarding merging mods (mainly weapons) in Fallout 4 (already did this thing with New Vegas a few years ago with a program called FNVPlugin which almost worked like a charm except for some mods having missing meshes sadly): I saw a video regarding this on YouTube and in the comments section, one wrote that it's better to extract and merge all of the mods' .ba2 archives into two folders being 'Main' and 'Textures' so that the missing meshes problem wouldn't happen at all, so is it ok if I might follow this method for merging all of my weapons I currently have?

And should I also have to merge all of their .esps into one too? Or it's ok to just create one for every merge I make instead?

 

(I know this one might sound impossible but, can I maybe merge the .ba2 files of standalone weapons and their .esps too inside an already merged mod such as Weaponsmith Extended 2?)

[JimmyRJump]

When using a program like MergePlugins (make sure to check the accompanying video) I found out that extracting the files is needed for the merged plugin to work. So, it could well be a general thing and extracting the files before the actual merge is the way to go about things.

 

Just be careful not to merge too many mods into one plug-in or it won't work at all due to certain limits involving a plug-in.

[TonySSS]

When using a program like MergePlugins (make sure to check the accompanying video) I found out that extracting the files is needed for the merged plugin to work. So, it could well be a general thing and extracting the files before the actual merge is the way to go about things.

 

Just be careful not to merge too many mods into one plug-in or it won't work at all due to certain limits involving a plug-in.

Ok so basically I should first extract all .ba2 files, make those two folders, add all of the files inside them and lastly either zip it with an esp/m merged from all the weapon mods with that program or merge everything together using that program instead IIRC. Please let me know if I said something wrong and correct it if necessary.

 

And can I know how many mods should I approximately merge per plug-in I create?

Edited June 8, 2018 by TonySSS

[Algabar]

 

Ok so basically I should first extract all .ba2 files, make those two folders, add all of the files inside them and lastly either zip it with an esp/m merged from all the weapon mods with that program or merge everything together using that program instead IIRC. Please let me know if I said something wrong and correct it if necessary.

 

And can I know how many mods should I approximately merge per plug-in I create?

 

 

Not sure, if I really understood what you want to do....

 

The correct way would be:

 

1. Copy the whole mods you want to merge to a temporary location somewhere.

2. Extract the BSAs.

3. Delete the .ba2 files.

4. Repack the whole thing (files from unpacked .ba2 archive and .esp/.esm plugin(s)) with 7zip.

5. Install this zipped file as a new mod ("Install from file" or similar option).

6. Sort your load order with LOOT

7. Create your merge with "Merge Plugins".

8. 7zip and install the merge

9. Disable the .esp or .esm files of the merged mods.

 

In general, I wouldn't advice unpacking BSAs just to merge the corresponding mod afterwards. BSAs are there for a reason: They improve performance. It's easier for the game to load e.g. textures from a .ba2 file than from "loose" files. So, BSAs in fact improve performance and reducie both loading times and load stuttering. I try to get everything I can in BSA form, or create BSAs myself. Giving up the performance gain through BSAs just to be able to put a certain mod into a merge isn't really sensible IMHO. Therefore I never unpacked BSAs for merging, instead I only merge plugins, that don't use BSAs.

 

As for the maximum number of mods: It really depends on the size of the mods. To give you a number: I'm rather careful with merging and I have around 20 plugins in merges of armor/clothing or weapon mods.

[TonySSS]

 

 

Ok so basically I should first extract all .ba2 files, make those two folders, add all of the files inside them and lastly either zip it with an esp/m merged from all the weapon mods with that program or merge everything together using that program instead IIRC. Please let me know if I said something wrong and correct it if necessary.

 

And can I know how many mods should I approximately merge per plug-in I create?

 

 

Not sure, if I really understood what you want to do....

 

The correct way would be:

 

1. Copy the whole mods you want to merge to a temporary location somewhere.

2. Extract the BSAs.

3. Delete the .ba2 files.

4. Repack the whole thing (files from unpacked .ba2 archive and .esp/.esm plugin(s)) with 7zip.

5. Install this zipped file as a new mod ("Install from file" or similar option).

6. Sort your load order with LOOT

7. Create your merge with "Merge Plugins".

8. 7zip and install the merge

9. Disable the .esp or .esm files of the merged mods.

 

In general, I wouldn't advice unpacking BSAs just to merge the corresponding mod afterwards. BSAs are there for a reason: They improve performance. It's easier for the game to load e.g. textures from a .ba2 file than from "loose" files. So, BSAs in fact improve performance and reducie both loading times and load stuttering. I try to get everything I can in BSA form, or create BSAs myself. Giving up the performance gain through BSAs just to be able to put a certain mod into a merge isn't really sensible IMHO. Therefore I never unpacked BSAs for merging, instead I only merge plugins, that don't use BSAs.

 

As for the maximum number of mods: It really depends on the size of the mods. To give you a number: I'm rather careful with merging and I have around 20 plugins in merges of armor/clothing or weapon mods.

 

Well actually, I'm unpacking .ba2 files of small standalone weapon mods (which only have Fallout4.esm as their master) instead of BSAs in two folders which are 'Main' (meshes, scripts, sounds and materials) and 'Textures', and want to repack them as the two original .ba2 files again while creating an .esp file with CK, then lastly disable all .esp files of the weapons I will merge. But please let me know if it's a good method of merging mods or not at all since I personally think it might be effective for me since it might fix the missing meshes problem I had with New Vegas a few years ago. (I took this method from a comment of a YouTube video I saw made by Daily Eclectic Gaming regarding merging mods for Fallout 4)

 

And I think that most of the weapons that I will merge are very small in size, so perhaps I think that I could merge almost all of them without any problems at all, who knows?