Modding to the point where it's practically unplayable....

[Megatarius]

No, I'm not complaining or asking how to do something. :wink: Actually, this is meant in good spirits. I thought I'd just put that out there, because it's not always clear with text how people mean things. Hell, it's not always clear with me in real life how I mean things...

 

 

I am not known for my patience. As such, I'm a terrible troubleshooter/problem solver. Modding this game has been such a huge test of patience for me sometimes. I have just reinstalled with FCOM, Better Cities, and hosts of other mods. I have over 150 mods in my load order. I recently added a huge beyond the borders expansion. I get crash after crash after crash. Bugs after bugs. I use Windom Earls', but the 800 lbs beast that is my game is far too much man for that, I'm afraid. I will sometimes hear that satisfying windows chime sound in game and laugh. Sometimes.

 

 

This is a typical example of what happens when I play the game:

 

1. I realize I forgot to install the eyelashes for Vanilla Races mod, so I do that.

2. My custom race .esp that fixes a few things like names and eye colors conflicts with the eyelashes mod. Some races have them, others don't. I'm willing to let this slide.

3. I look at a character whose race does have eyelashes. She has them. Good.

4. I look at another character who's race name was changed by my .esp. Dark Elves --> Dunmer, etc. She is still Dunmer, and she has blue eyes. Good.

5. But her pants are gone!!!! WTF???? Not a missing mesh, just naked.

6. I quit the game and fire up nifskope. Sure enough, the mesh is referencing a texture I forgot to install. I do that.

7. I go back into the game to look at the character, but when I load the file, the intro music is still playing!!!! WTF????!!!!!

8. I use Better Music System, and sometimes this happens. I load up another character to force a music change. It changes.

9. Then I load up the Dunmer character and the game crashes.

10. I repeat steps 7-9, and the same thing happens!!!

11. I load up a third character, then that one, and it's fine. It seems that her file crashes if loaded after a file that is inside. She's outside, so I just have to load a different file that's also outside first.

12. Finally, she loads up, and the pants look normal.

 

So yeah, that's usually what happens when I play this game. :wacko: It's probably not as complicated as I'm making it out to be...

 

 

Anybody else have similar experiences/bug frustration?

 

Anybody else just sit down, load up a character, and start playing? Maybe there's a few crashes here and there but nothing big?

 

 

I suppose it's the game's way of punishing me for so vocally not liking it's vanilla form. :whistling:

[razorpony]

The one good thing about not having high speed internet is that I can't download as many huge complex mods like FCOM so i think my game stays cleaner. :) That being said, I figure I spend an even ammount of time playing, modding, and posting. When I DO want to play though, it works fine. I have a few hair mods, couple of new races, some eyes, lot of textures and items ( UL and realswords compilations for example). Now that I've gotten things set up how I like them I'm picky about what else to install. I really don't want to screw anything up. I mostly just work on my own mods and playtest in game.

 

I'm assuming you need to use utilities such as WryeBash and OBMM, do these not help with the integration at all?

 

-Razorpony

[bben46]

Read the line under my sig. It's there for a reason. And No, I didn't just add it. It's been there fro a very long time.

[Netwit2008]

I have done my share of mod trouble shooting, but it's not my favorite thing to do, since like you, I have little patience for it. However, the times I've had to, I look at it as a challenge, like a chess move, or figuring out how to get out of a trap unhurt, lol So I spend most of my time looking for mods, playing the game and taking screenshots. I spend a bit of time here on the forums talking about it.

 

I'm supposed to be learning how to mod, but I play too much to get as much done as I should. I do a lot of the item ideas and writing the books, quest line etc. My buddy mostly does the CS work, but I think he wants me to get on the ball since he wrote a tutorial for me to learn to put clutter in what he mods, :P

 

I think I've been blessed to actually have as few problems as I do with so many mods installed. I followed as closely as I could, the advice given to me by the guy with no title, lol :wink: Bben actually helped me install my first mod. Then Dezdimona had a good tips list for load order that I also followed. That being said, I now have like 166 mods running that give me CTD if I play too long in one sitting. I can sit for 12 hours and play if nothing else is pressing with work or life. I've just learned to REALLY watch load order and hit quicksave often, lol

 

I'm a modaholic. I look for mods daily. BUT I don't have big overhaul mods like FCOM, MMM or OOO. I do use OBMM, but not BAIN or Wryebash. This seems to work for me, so it stays fun. I haven't even finished the main quest or entered Shivering Isles and I still have plenty to do. :)

[Vagrant0]

This is why it's typically a good idea to decide before you start a character what body/face/hair/race/leveling/settings/overhaul/large-terrain mods you want to have installed from the start. Before doing anything particularly important (like the beginning of the game), cheat your way out of the tutorial and double check to ensure things are working right and look the way you want them. If not, either adjust your load order, or change what you have installed/active. Once you've settled on a good basic mod setup, start a new game, and make atleast 3-4 saves before adding any new mods to the game.

 

Before adding any new mods, make sure you have a manual save in a place which is not being affected by that mod (not an autosave or quicksave). The new mods to be added should also be minor in nature and limited to either adding new items, new spells, new areas, or other things which are mostly self-contained and don't change any fundamental part of the game. Always make sure your game is still working right before saving with any of these mods active. NEVER save over a previous savedgame.

 

If you want to add anything more major to the game, the sad truth is that in nearly all cases, you're best off starting over. from a new base as any major change is likely to create problems.

[David Brasher]

I spend too much time modding. I wish I could just relax and play and have a good time, but I find myself getting a little bored. It seems like modding is more engaging to me right now than playing. It sucks me right in and the hours fly past at an unbelievable speed.

[bamspeedy]

I spent about a year or so not playing Oblivion and then when I went to play it again I started to download all my favorite mods that I remembered and the tools again.

 

And this is an example of the last month for me:

 

Downloaded the unofficial patches and other mods I remember I used. Start up the game.

See the crappy inventory and map screens.

-Go get a UI mod.

 

Start the game and then realize I can't salvage Captain Renault's armor.

-Make a mod where the tutorial blades equipment is 'playable' (and can salvage arena equipment, palace guard equipment and other stuff).

 

Start a new game, take Renault's armor then see the pitiful default bodies/underwear.

-Go get body replacer/underwear.

 

Install a bunch of animation mods. Get this annoying bug where in first person view sometimes when walking/running, I will suddenly be looking straight up in the air and spinning in circles (or looking at my feet). Figure that one of the animation mods is doing it, so I de-activate them all and it still isn't fixed.

-Re-install the whole game (uninstall and then manual deletion of all oblivion directories for anything left over) and the problem still happens. I now guess that it must be a mouse problem (the mouse is getting a bit old, and I seem to remember a similar problem years ago which was fixed when I bought a new mouse).

 

Start a new game, get to where the first herbs are that you can get, then remember about 'auto-harvest'

-Go get herbalism mod.

 

Get out of the tutorial dungeon, remember how crappy trying to see in the water is.

-Go get Clear Water mod.

 

Remember about harvest container mod, but thought I could go without it with this install. Harvest the clams outside the tutorial dungeon, and annoyed that they don't dissappear when harvested.

-Go get Harvest Container mod.

 

Download a bunch of other mods and install them, then realize/remember that I didn't like some of them for whatever reason.

-Uninstall the mod(s) and start over.

 

Get to the market district and realize how bland the clothes on females are (doesn't help much to have a body replacer if they still look the same when wearing clothes).

-Go get stock clothing/armor replacer.

 

Can't get clothes to appear, so I use ArchiveInvalidation on OBMM, but not sure which setting I'm suppose to use, and end up having NO textures! Finally find the right setting and get the textures to appear....except for some reason shields aren't appearing!

-Re-install the whole game when I can't figure out how to get shields to appear.

 

Kick myself when I realize that the shields don't appear equipped if you don't also have a weapon equipped......

 

Finally try Tes4Edit, so I cleaned all the DLCs and mods, and not liking all the red conflicts I see, I start making all my mods 100% compatible (most of these conflicts are very minor, but I wanted to 'fix' them anyways.)

-Read that it isn't a good idea to alter the DLCs and since I was getting this annoying 'thumping' sound I figured it was because I editted the DLCs.

 

Re-install the whole game (and DLCs, and mods, etc.).

-Find out the 'thumping' sound was from the new version of Companion Share and Recruit when I happened to accidently stumble upon the sound fix for it (I knew the old version was trouble-free, so I wrongly assumed the new version would be too).

 

But I think I finally got things where I want them. I have 54 .esms and .esps (and 3 OMODS) with no red conflicts, except for one between knights and battlehorn (just a test cell, so nothing to worry about). So after a month of downloading, tweaking, playing the tutorial, re-installing, etc. I am ready for some serious playing again....

[WaLkAwaY]

@OP: Are leveling this question at actual modders or people that just dld mods?

[xxXEvandarXxx]

I've never had much problems like that, but there's other things stopping me from playing.

Here's what happens when I play the game.

1. Start the game and play for 10-30 minutes.
   
2. Notice something that could use some tweaking.
   
3. Try not to think about it and focus on playing the game instead.
   
4. Exit the game and fix it anyway.
   
5. Repeat.
   

[LHammonds]

You're talking about the Construction Set as the game right? I play all the time!