Striker879

I'm far from being a Wrye Bash expert ... anything I know about it has come from studying the two readmes. I follow it's suggestions for merging and opt out of merging when it indicates could be merged but not tagged to merge (I'm like you, no where near my mod limit). Quite a while back I ran into a sort of similar situation with Alluring Potion Bottles. The menu icons would sometimes revert to vanilla and then later would switch back to the ones from the mod's BSA. I solved it by extracting the problematic menu DDSs from the BSA and putting them in their proper folder paths in my game's Data folder. Never had a problem with them after that. They went missing because of a bad read from the BSA (which was why I asked about defragging ... didn't help in my example but that's the first step for working that sort of problem where the files are there in the BSA but not being read ... or maybe in the Textures folder but not being read correctly). If you know exactly what textures are missing (and it could be a normal map if I remember the error colour codes correctly) you can extract them if they're in a BSA. If it's loose files in the Textures subfolders it's a defrag and I don't know what else could work situation. Use NifSkope to figure out what texture files are the problem.

That would negate one of the benefits of your bashed patch ... taking all those conflicting things from your mods, resolving the conflicts, and then put the resulting conflict resolved result at the end of your load order. Have you tried defragging? - Edit - Similar problem to what you reported on Creature Diversity ... did a save/reload work for that issue as well?

OK so the load order looks better to my unskilled eye. Is there a reason you keep the second ESP of a pair that you only want to use one of (e.g. you still have Summon Oblivion Gate v08c.esp when you are using Summon Oblivion Gate v08d.esp ... don't use it myself but seems pretty obvious you only need one of the two) ? There are some that may be needed for another ESP (e.g. possibly why you'd still need COBL Races.esp even though it's disabled) but in my opinion the cleaner you can keep your Data folder the better. But all that aside, has the new load order changed your original problem?

I see two Scene Roots ... I think that will cause trouble too. I thought I had something on that in my Drakes Tips text file (I keep a text file of DrakeTheDragons answers to posts on various topics) but I can't seem to find it in there now ... could be in another file. May he'll pop in with some advice.

I linked it in my very first post ... but here it is again: BOSS Masterlist for Oblivion

It still has COBL SI.esp before DLCShiveringIsles.esp and to my eye didn't sort a thing. I'd be posting in the BOSS Masterlist thread to see what's up.

What about amulet slot but still rigged to the ears (working above my pay grade again, but I know amulet slot gets used for a lot of stuff other than amulets).

Nothing has changed ... did you download the masterlist from that link and put it in the correct folder before running BOSS from the GUI?

Never touch Oblivion_default.ini ... that's the file that the game uses when it needs to regenerate a new Oblivion.ini (which is located in Users\[username]\Documents\My Games\Oblivion). Just rename the Oblivion.ini found there to Oblivionini.bak and then start the game. It will build a new Oblivion.ini after detecting your hardware, but often it can't recognize hardware that wasn't even dreamed of the last time the game was updated so you'll need to reset your screen resolution etc.

We'll need quite a bit more info to get to the bottom of this. Crashing in modded Oblivion is a fact of life. There are some things that you've been doing (or haven't done) that can make things worse. First what mods have you added to the game besides the UOPs. A complete list really helps, and if you use Wrye Bash a load order from it has lots of extra info about your load order. What sort a saving do you do? Are you a quicksaver or do you use the save from the Esc menu? Do you overwrite saves or save into a new slot each time? Do you have a lot of playing hours on this save or series of save for this character? Are the crashes happening when you approach a certain area or does it happen no matter where you go after loading the save?

Do yourself a favour now and forget that quicksave even exists. It's a known corrupter of save files, and I'll bet was close to the center of what lead to your previous save's problems. Use save from the Esc menu or console named saves (and never overwrite a save).

The solution to your load order BOSS blues ... http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/2392109-boss-masterlist-for-oblivion/?p=21351029 Simply download the masterlist and put the file masterlist.txt in your BOSS\Oblivion folder (and untick the Update Masterlist box in the BOSS GUI).

Use OBSE Tester to confirm that OBSE is working. If OBSE is working then you'll need to track down the culprit for your woes (mod conflict). If OBSE isn't working then one or more of your mods that rely on OBSE are not able to completely do what they are designed to do, and weirdness results. Since I started using OBSE (version 0019b) I've never seen it give any "I'm working" indication (beyond mods that needed it not working that is).

That load order isn't right. At first glance I see COBL SI.esp in slot 07 and DLCShiveringIsles.esp in 1B (my own load order sorted by BOSS has DLCShiveringIsles.esp at 07 and COBL SI.esp at 30). Different load orders but the relative position of those two would still need to be the same ... DLCShiveringIsles.esp above COBL SI.esp. I read something recently about how to get BOSS to update it's masterlist ... could have been on the BOSS Masterlist thread, but it's late here and my brain isn't firing on all eight right now. - Edit - Nah, it wasn't there that had instructions on how to fix the masterlist update problem, but BOSS Masterlist for Oblivion is where I'd start asking around.

So you never said in the OAF mod comments ... did the problem persist after you tried the "coc center" trick?

The instructions for installing OBSE on a Steam Oblivion install are in the file obse_readme.txt along with instructions on starting the game. Double clicking on DLL files isn't one of the steps ... after installing correctly, starting Steam Oblivion in the normal non-OBSE fashion is one of the steps though.

Khajiit Male Body for Oblivion Character Overhaul version 2

Nope ... it will just enable ancient games like Oblivion to play on hardware that wasn't even dreamed of when it was last updated ('06 was the computer gaming equivalent of the dinosaur era ... especially when you look at hardware). - Edit - And by "Nope" I mean yes your DirectX11 will still be there for your newer games ... clarity isn't always my strongest point. BTW, how are you doing on reading the first half of the internet?? I figured noonish my time should be long enough (well to read anything of value anyway).

Here ... I left my Mr Smart*ss hat in last year's snowbank. For characters (both NPCs and player) the current state of the art is undoubtedly Oblivion Character Overhaul v2. It has requirements (Oblivion Script Extender (OBSE) and Blockhead), and they must be installed manually. Yes it still has limitations (sorry no magic bullet for the dreaded neckseam) but it brings the faces of Oblivion into this century. I can't give you any first hand pointers on the game graphics improvements as my hardware isn't quite up to the task (Core2 Duo @ 3.0GHz saddled with only 2GB RAM and GTX275 with only 896 MB VRAM). I believe the newest and the one that pushes the boundaries the farthest is Oblivion Reloaded (it's what I'll be using when I get a more capable machine). Game play-wise I think Maskars Oblivion Overhaul is the way to go. It's totally customizeable using it's different INI files to suit your exact tastes. If you've never played vanilla Oblivion before (on consoles for example) you should play without any overhauls, at least long enough to give yourself a point of reference as a starting point. - Edit - In summary you only need to read half the internet to get started, and in this particular backwater only believe half of what you read (well if I'm the poster anyway).

There are some mods that are far easier to install/uninstall if you use a mod manager like OBMM or Wrye Bash. One is NoMaaM BBB Animation Replacer, but it will only be required if you decide you want bouncing boobs somewhere down the road, and even it is easily installed manually once you know a few things about where the game expects/needs to find certain types of files.

Can't say for certain ... I personally would never use a mod manger of any sort to install something as simple as OCO v2 (despite all the warnings Nuska posted in the OCO v2 mod description). Since my very first couple of mod installs I haven't used OBMM for anything beyond archive invalidation and extracting from BSAs (don't worry about all the jargon ... the first one you'll need to learn, the second only when you start to create your own mods). Installing OCO v2 is as simple as extracting the zipped download to a temporary folder (I called mine OCO_v203). After that you'll find a folder named Data, with sub-folders inside Meshes and Textures. To install manually just right mouse click on the Data folder and select Copy from the right click menu. Now navigate to your game install's Bethesda Softworks\Oblivion folder and right click on the Oblivion folder. Select Paste from the right click menu. You'll get a Windows warning about there is already a folder named Data ... click on Yes to All (don't worry, all you're doing is merging the new content into your already existing folders). Next open the vanilla game Data Files using your non-OBSE launcher and put a tick beside Oblivion_Character_Overhaul.esp and then close the vanilla launcher. Start your game using your OBSE launcher and play. So archive invalidation ... what the heck is that?? In the vanilla game all of it's resources are stored in compressed archives called BSA files (e.g. Oblivion - Meshes.bsa and Oblivion - Textures - Compressed.bsa). Normally the game will use it's resources (meshes, textures etc) from the BSAs and ignore any newer replacements you install (for example HGEC, which replaces the vanilla game female bodies and textures). To get the game to use your new replacements you need a way to "invalidate" the BSA "archives" in favour of any newer replacements. There have been four main methods tried over the years ... the most recent and problem free is called BSA Redirection. It's simple to implement archive invalidation using OBMM. Click on the Utilities button on the right hand side and select Archive Invalidation from the menu. In the Archive Invalidation dialogue select BSA Redirection. If you use the Steam version of the game you'll need to click on Reset BSA Timestamps (Steam in their infinite wisdom changed the dates of all the vanilla game BSA files, thus breaking archive invalidation for all it's users). Then click on Update Now and close OBMM. Job done ... it's a do once and forget about it solution.

Cool. When you see that your Saves folder is getting a bit pudgy (say around 150 to 200 saves) just either delete the older ones (or some of the older ones leaving a few key saves for mod testing etc) or move them to another folder outside of Oblivion\Saves. I find that my menus start getting a bit slower to open if I let my saves accumulate too long.

OK ... the only mod there that will have an ESP to show in Data Files or the left hand pane of OBMM's window is Oblivion Character Overhaul v2. You can't use both HGEC and Roberts female at the same time ... you'll need to pick one. HGEC has by far more available in terms of armor and clothes. A lot will depend on your own taste for body shape and whether or not you plan on playing a female character (all but the replacer kind of HGEC armor/clothes mods aren't distributed to the game's NPCs). Install order is important ... first OBSE, then Blockhead, then HGEC and Roberts male (or Roberts male and Roberts female if that's how you decide to go ... and here I'm talking about the full mods not just the compatibility patches from OCO v2), then OCO v2 and finally the compatibility patches for HGEC/Roberts male/Roberts female as applicable.

Most all of the stickied "This is how you ... " threads are pretty outdated, but you might get something out of them depending on your experience level. If modded the heck out of Skyrim means "I pushed the big green Download with Manager button with wild abandon" you may want to discredit a bit of your "experience" ... the big green button is more curse than savior here in Oblivionville. That you can and are willing to read puts you lightyears ahead of most ... welcome to Oblivion. Most of the best mods will have proper mod descriptions, outlining the mod requirements and install methods. Mod comments are an invaluable source of info on mods. If there have been problems with a mod you'll surely see it mentioned in the mod comments. Granted, many times those "negatives" are a result of people like the big green button crowd who can't or won't read and follow instructions. If you're a reader you'll quickly get a feel for what's underfoot before it smells up your own game. What is an essentail mod? Essential implies such a personal thing ... how can one truly know another's essentials. We do have a list of popular mods, but for me most aren't essential.

Better give us a load list (list the names of your mods, including links to them if you have them).