How to add a container to world and merge mods?

[TLF853]

i want to merge 15 mods together, housekeeping as i have around 200 mods, these are all clothing and weapon mods, then i want to put all new items in a safe outside vault 101, can someone help me out? or post link/s to relevant tutorial/s?

[vforvic]

There are several ways/programs to merge mods. I personally use FO3Plugin and it does a decent job of merging weapon and clothing mods. I normally only merge weapon or clothing mods together as 2 groups and do not mix them together. It just seems to make it easier to look inside with FO3Edit or the GECK if needed after the merge. In your particular case you can probably just make 1 single group merge.

Just use FO3Plugin to open a mod you want to merge. I would pick the largest. On the File menu you will see an option that says Merge Plugins. Just pick from the list and it makes the merge automatically. You can use the standard Hold SHIFT or CTRL to pick multiples if you feel comfortable doing multiples are once. Then just say File - Save As to save the merged work as a new esp such as Merged Weapons or whatever. Then go out and test in the game or use FO3Edit to give it a check.

 

To add the items to a new container fire up the GECK and say File - Data and pick your new merged esp and set it as Active. You do not have to worry about any other esp or esm files. The GECK automatically open any required Master files such as Fallout3.esm.

Look under World Objects - Container and open GenericSafe01.

First thing is to rename this safe to something else so you do not overwrite existing game data. Name it something like TLFvault101Safe or whatever. Most modder's prefix their item names with a common type such as Bob or Zena or in your case maybe TLF. It makes it easier to find all your custom stuff in the GECK or FO3edit and keeps you from accidentally overwriting game data. I know some people do AAA or 1111 or generic stuff like that, but I do not recommend this at all. It can just lead to overall headaches later for yourself or other modder's. Imagine if you were working at merging 4 different 10mm Weapon mods and they all named their custom pistol zzzWeap10mmPistol in the GECK. It is just an issue waiting to happen.

Delete the items currently in the Safe's Item List or change them to your items.

When you are done adding items and click OK it will ask you if you want to Create a new Form and you say Yes.

Now in the Cell View Window pick Wasteland at the top and then from the list below find Vault101Exterior.

Double-Click on an item on the right to open the Vault101Exterior cell in the Render Window. There are two reasons I normally pick an item on the right side instead of the cell name on the left. First it can get you closer to where you want to be in the cell to start if you know generally where you want to place an item in a cell. For example if I wanted to place the safe right at the Vault 101 Cave Door I could double-click Vault101CaveDoorExterior and it would take me right to the area I need. The second reason is in some cells double-clicking the cell name will take you to a blank area in the cell. This is because you are being taken to the center of the cell, but all the items might be located some other location in the cell far from that spot. This is normally only an issue in interior cells.

Now just find a spot you want to put your new safe.

Then in the Object Window find your new safe and drag and drop it into the Render Window. You are probably going to have to use your mouse to drag and move it where you want exactly. You can hit F to drop the safe to the ground. You can also double-click the safe in the Render Window to use the 3D Data tab to fine tune the position and rotation if needed. In the Render Window you can use standard CTRL Z to undo your work if needed.

 

When done just say save. Make sure to check your new merged esp in FOMM or NMM or whatever you use and uncheck all the files that were merged. Run the game to see how it all worked.

[TLF853]

one mod adds three rooms and a vendor to the game, and clothes and other objects

another adds a vender with clothes

and a bunch others add containers in various places

some use existing containers

one just adds a skeleton with added gun and ammo lying next to it

14 are just esp files, one is an esp and bsa

 

would this still work?

 

could i get items in my safe to respawn? except a select few?

 

also with npcs stealing from safes, how would i stop it with this safe? i have ties that bind mod installed and Amanda just loves raiding safes.

 

one esp has a warning in FoMM saying that its header marks it as an esm file, and won't load in FO3Plugin, how do i fix this?

 

how do i copy all the mods data, such as textures? so i can make a copy for safe keeping?

Edited October 23, 2014 by TLF853

[vforvic]

Honestly you can merge just about anything and it will work...or it may not. I have merged some pretty complex mods and things worked fine most of the time. I usually do spend some time looking them over and cleaning them up if needed with FO3edit before the merge. Here is the thing about the bsa. As long as the bsa has the same name as your final merged esp name then it should be fine.

 

As long as you click the "Respawns" box in the Geck then things should respawn. This will set everything to respawn though. You might be able to have a part of the Quest script run that uses additem to add things to the container that you do not want to respawn. Something like below. Now I am not sure what happens at the 3 day respawn though. Your added item might despawn, but I just don't know for sure.

short addonce

Begin GameMode
   if addonce == 0
       SecureSafeREF.additem youritem 1
  set addonce to 1
End

To keep thefts from happening you might just set the "Ignored By Sandbox" or "No AI Acquire" or both. Depending on how you have things designed you can have it locked with a key on top that the Player can use, but NPC's will not...at least not until the player unlocks it. You might even set the ownership to the Player. These are all just suggestions that may or may not work.

 

The ESP with the ESM Header is usually no problem Most programs use the Header information to determine how to handle it anyway. You can use FO3Plugin to change it to a ESP Header though for editing. You just open the file by itself and under Edit say Toggle Master and Save. This will change the Header information to say ESP.

 

Backing up all the stuff is tedious when you are pulling form multiple locations. This is why it is always good to have your own directory structure under meshes and textures and maybe sounds. So in your case you would have /meshes/TLF and textures/TFL and then you could just setup sub-directories to organize below that point. Then for backups you could just zip up your TFL directories.