HomerSlated

Oh wait, so navesh location data is baked into NPC records? Damn. So theroetically, in order to actually navmesh an area from scratch, by deleting the vanillas, you'd need to edit the location records of every NPC that has those references baked in? But by keeping the vanillas, and overlaying them with new ones. NPCs can still follow their "programmed" route, but also wander into the new routes, as per some random factor? Am I making any sense?

Sorry for the late response ... had Real Life® to deal with. Looks like you've created a whole new mod. Great work! One thing I find bizarre, and please excuse my ignorance, but are you saying that you need to keep the original vanilla navmeshes, but essentially just move them out of the way, or else custom navmeshes won't work? So how is the game engine referencing those unused navmeshes? Is it like a cumulative effect? That is strange - not at all what I would have expected, intuitively speaking. Also, interesting that CK path testing doesn't really work. Again, I know basically nothing about this process, but I'm guessing it uses some standard size model for testing, and if there's anything even slightly different about your NPC then it'll get stuck. Anyway, you fixed it! From her Twitter feed, I think Eli is a bit busy atm with BLM protests, so I'm not surprised she hasn't replied. Good luck!

Wow, thanks for looking into this. I didn't mean to dump this on you. I'm patiently examining things at my end, and learning as I go, but you've given me some great pointers. Thanks!

Fixed in commit 4d7138f. Basically Vortex was reading files too quickly (a common problem with multithreading), and so as I suspected the checksums were not being calculated correctly. The fix is simply a sanity check to make sure that files have actually been read before their checksum is calculated, and if not then to try again.

Thanks, I had no idea. I did figure out how to load multiple masters (I got the "CK Fixes" mod), but I didn't realise it wouldn't just automatically load the BSAs and other dependencies.

I'm currently rebuilding my load order, as this is a new (second-hand) PC, so I haven't actually started a playthough yet, I've just been testing, and so every game is a new game and I don't have any save bloat. I hadn't considered the possibility that AI scripts could be so meddlesome that they'd physically block NPCs from following commands, even after they start responding to those commands. That's actually quite depressing. I really wish there was a tool that could lay out the AI packages in some logical visual representation, like a flow chart, that I could follow to determine the outcome, and then delete or modify branches to fix AI conflicts (I have a background in software engineering, but I know nothing at all about Radiant AI). But I have to agree that looks to be the most likely explanation. I've used Eli's Breezehome before, on both Oldrim and SE, where it "just worked", so I know the mod itself is not responsible. I had hoped it was one of the many city overhaul mods that had placed an object or navmesh somewhere it shouldn't have, and I could just remove it, but that now looks unlikely. I naively assumed that CK would load a "load order correct" representation of a cell, so I could visually inspect and delete conflicting meshes, but that doesn't seem to be the case. I can do this with xEdit, but of course without the benefit if any visual feedback. And anyway, that doesn't seem to be the cause. Until a few days ago, I was using the infamously meddlesome Immersive Citizens, but I finally gave up on it because it's just too much work to maintain in a load order, and of course all third party patches are prohibited. IME it requires more than just a Bashed or Smashed patch, it needs fine-grained conflict resolution with xEdit, and hours of work every time you change your load order. The AI stuff I currently have in my load order is: AI OverhaulDouble Beds are for Two PeopleImproved AdoptionsInteresting NPCsNether's Followers FrameworkAlthough I suspect there's more, because I'm constantly surprised to find AI packages in mods that, on the face of it, shouldn't really have anything to do with AI. I know from experience that the above combo has worked in previous load orders, but like I said there could be something else in the current load order that sneaks in some unexpected AI changes. Here's the (current) load order. Unfortunately Vortex still doesn't support exporting the full modlist, so that's just the plugins. I'll keep looking at AI conflicts and see what I come up with. Thanks again.

The output from this is a bit of a mess. It lists the same mods multiple times, e.g.: { "name": "A Quality World Map and Solstheim Map - With Roads", "game": "skyrim", "modId": 4929, "fileId": 1000230583 }, { "name": "A Quality World Map and Solstheim Map - With Roads", "game": "skyrim", "modId": 4929, "fileId": 1000230663 }, { "game": "skyrim" }, { "name": "A Quality World Map and Solstheim Map - With Roads", "game": "skyrim", "modId": 4929, "fileId": 1000230688 }, Note also the spurious entry that is merely ' "game": "skyrim" ' with no other details. The output is littered with them. Then there are many entries like this: { "game": "skyrimse", "modId": "2315" } With no other details. This mod is actually "skyBirds SSE Edition", it is installed and it is active. The output is a largely broken and indiscriminate dump of the entire database, doesn't separate games into unique outputs, and is therefore useless for the purposes of both restore and e.g. modwat.ch publishing. Don't get me wrong, I fully support the development of this plugin, but in its current state it's unusable, and were someone to actually try to use it to backup and restore a load order, it'd actually be dangerous (in the data loss sense). I don't really like messing with database stuff, mostly because I suck at it, but if I have time I'll have a look at it later today.

That's great info, thanks. Here's the exact behaviour I've witnessed. Upon entering the cell, NPCs will walk around freely until they reach the stairs, then will walk past the stairs and begin idling in the kitchen and children's bedroom area. At that point they are unable to make it back to the front of the house, and remain permanently stuck in the kitchen / bedroom. As I use Nether's Followers Framework, I can command an NPC to "get behind me". So by standing just in front of the stairs, looking at an NPC stuck in the kitchen, and commanding them, I can unstick them and teleport them to the front of the house. Unfortunately they just walk straight back into the "prison" I liberated them from. I also use a now deleted mod called "Double Beds are for Two People" by OldMansBeard, where I can command NPCs to "come to bed". Whenever I do that, the NPCs get stuck in a loop, where they desperately try to get to the front of the stairs, but end up going into the cellar instead, coming back out, going back in, over and over. If I repeatedly exit the house, taking my NPCs with me, and go back in, sometimes I get lucky and an NPC will follow me all the way to the foot of the stairs. I go up to the top, look back down, and see the NPC being slowly "pushed" to their right (my left) away from the stairs, like a kind of sideways moonwalk. They then pause, walk on the spot for a bit, then give up and proceed into the kitchen. Once an NPC actually made it onto the stairs, but it was really weird because they didn't walk straight up the middle, they were (again) "pushed" all the way to their right, and had to tip-toe along the extreme right edge (nearest the kitchen) in order to make it. The behaviour is such that, when I loaded this into CK, I seriously expected to find a navmesh hanging in mid-air to the right of the stairs. But no, that's not it at all. Then what you said, and what I've heard in various tutorials about statics, made me think about all that stuff going on next to the wall at the foot of the stairs. There's a table with a shrine, and a whole lot of markers of some kind, but I'm just not experienced enough to understand what they are. They're not navmeshes, and I can't select them, but it's the only thing I can think of that might be pushing everyone away from the stairs.

I just find it suspicious that this is the only spot where the navmesh glitches. It's just a hunch, as I have very limited experience, but maybe this happens when the vertex points are slightly below the surface of the object? Although from the various tutorials I've watched, I've been led to believe this doesn't actually matter. Anyway, when I have the time, I'll go back and try to redo those navmeshes, and see if it makes any difference. I have to say though, that CK is easily the worst UI I've ever used for 3D modelling. I'm not looking forward to the exercise. I feel the pain Eli must've gone through making this.

As someone who does not have a UE4 forum account, and has no interest in ever having one, I would hope that I'm free to continue expressing my opinion on this matter without fear of censorship from Epic and its employees. As to whether or not this qualifies as "stolen", there are already many legal precedents that cover the unauthorised use of designs, most notably the Apple vs. Samsung cases. Of course, in that case, Apple held actual design patents, which is why they were explicitly protected by law, and AFAIK the SkyUI team has no such patents, so strictly as a matter of law this does not qualify as patent infringement. However, not all forms of theft are covered by law, the most prominent example being plagiarism. The fact of plagiarism being theft predates and is orthogonal to the existence of intellectual property law. In other words, describing something as "stolen", even when the law provides no protection against that particular form of theft, would not even remotely qualify as defamation, because no court would ever dispute that the characterisation of plagiarism as theft is both honest and accurate, even if the technicalities of law provide no recourse in such matters. Ultimately plagiarism is indisputably wrong and morally indefensible, so those who commit plagiarism need to be held to account, as do those who ignore or excuse such behaviour. James Moore has clearly plagiarised SkyUI, and Epic is knowingly hosting and profiting from this plagiarised material on its site, then defending it with nugatory threats of censorship and defamation. Even if the law has nothing to say about that, I suspect that Epic's customers and investors might, along with the Press and the general public. This could easily be resolved if Moore simply credited his design to the SkyUI team. Even if he has no intention of ever seeking permission to copy their designs (because unfortunately he is not legally compelled to do so), and has even less interest in sharing the profit he enjoys from their work, at least he would no longer be committing plagiarism.

It seems there's already a bug report on GtiHub.

I can live with FNIS either running or not running on every deployment either way, but clearly this feature is no longer working as intended, and I'd rather fix it than disable it.

There use to be a config file: data\FNIS.ini, where you could add "InstantExecute=1" to make FNIS run and exit non-interactively. I assume this has now been subsumed into Vortex, as I no longer have that file, and yet the behaviour is the same as before.

FNIS is running on every deployment, even when no animation mods have been added or removed. I checked the logs, and Vortex thinks the checksums for animations are different after every deployment, even though nothing pertaining to animations should have changed, and AFAICT nothing is interfering with those files externally, other than FNIS. See the attached logs, where v1 is Vortex removing a mod that contains only textures and no animations, and v2 is Vortex installing that same mod immediately afterwards, with no other activities in between, either in Vortex or external apps. My gut feeling is either the checksums are not being calculated correctly, or FNIS is changing already deployed files even when it's not necessary, and so the checksums are different each time.