Some OBMM basics

[huxleykrcc]

I've been playing about with some mods, but I am a bit confused about the use of the Oblivion mod manager, and I can't get a good answer from the web (the homepage always returns a 404). Do all mods, even very simple ones, appear in the manager? If so, how do I get them to do so? I've been trying to decipher the instructions about .omod files, but I need a little assistance.

 

The one I'm specifically having trouble with is the "beaming sunglare" mod, from the hall of fame in the Elder Scrolls Planet mod directory. I can't get it to install, and in any case, will a mod this straightforward appear in obmm? Beaming sunglare is just two texture (one for both kinds of lighting) files that the readme instructs one to "extract into the Oblivion data directory." Should I be doing something with obmm (I did use it for archive invalidation; those instructions are in the readme as well), or is this kind of mod too simple?

 

My main question is the one posed in the topic subhead, but any knowledge to help this struggling n00b would be much appreciated.

[InAComaDial999]

An OMOD is an archive that has been packaged in a format that OBMM recognizes. OMODs may or may not have ESP files, that depends on the type of mod that it is.

 

OBMM will show all mods that have an ESP file in the left side panel. It will show all OMODs in the right side panel. If you manually install a mod that is not an OMOD and that has no ESP file, that will not appear in the mod lists. Beaming Sunglare is such a mod: it is just a texture replacer, with no .esp file. So it won't show up in the two panels on the OBMM main screen.

 

Beaming Sunglare has no .esp, it is only textures. To install it, just drag the "textures" folder from the archive, into the "Data" folder in your Oblivion directory. Then, use the OBMM archive invalidation utility to ensure that the mod actually takes effect.

 

Note that if you want, you can turn the Beaming Sunglare mod into an OMOD and install it that way. Click the "Create" button on the main screen, and use the "add archive" feature and select the Beaming Sunglare zip file. That will make an OMOD out of the archive, and it will appear in the right-hand panel of OBMM. You will then need to Activate the OMOD by selecting it and clicking "Activate". You will then need to run the archive invalidation utility as above.

 

The advantage of making an OMOD out of it is that OBMM will know about the files that are part of the mod, and will remove those files if you "deactivate" the OMOD. If you choose to install it manually instead, you would need to manually remove the files if you decide to get rid of the mod.

[huxleykrcc]

Thanks much. That cleared a lot of things up.

 

While I have you here, I was curious--specific to the sunglare mod, there is a folder already in the data folder called "textures," at least in my version of Oblivion (I'm running windows 7; pain in the ass OS that it is); it contains a file called "terrainnoise." In any case, obviously one can't have two folders of the same name within the same folder. Do I need to rename one, or does the mod folder go into a different folder within the the data directory?

[InAComaDial999]

Thanks much. That cleared a lot of things up.

 

While I have you here, I was curious--specific to the sunglare mod, there is a folder already in the data folder called "textures," at least in my version of Oblivion (I'm running windows 7; pain in the ass OS that it is); it contains a file called "terrainnoise." In any case, obviously one can't have two folders of the same name within the same folder. Do I need to rename one, or does the mod folder go into a different folder within the the data directory?

 

Neither. If you drag the "textures" folder from the archive and into the data folder, Windows will warn you that there is already a "textures" folder in there, and ask whether you wanto merge the two together. You want to answer "yes".