BAIN basics: How to use OMODs with BAIN?

[jaime74]

Hi,

 

After months of working with Oblivion Mod Manager (OBMM), I am now trying to start migrating my omods to BAIN slowly.

After reading through the Wrye Bash readmes, I still have some problems with basic understanding. I'll post them here (and add more later, perhaps), because I think that this might be interesting for other BAIM newbies as well:

 

Here they are (to be continued):

- How exactly do I need to "rearrange" an existing mod (either an omod, or a "plain" directory tree) into a BAIN-compatible project or archive? Because I found out that just copying my omod-ready archives into the BAIN Installer folder seems to do it: They are always recognized by BAIN pretty well! So is there anything else I have to do?

- When and for what exactly do I need to create a Bain Conversion File (BCF)? I suppose that this is needed only for specific situations, and not for just installing my omods via BAIN. But for what?

 

Any help will be highly appreciated! I believe that the acceptance of BAIN will rise significantly if such basics are better understandable for greenhorns like me! ;)

 

Thanks in advance,

jaime74

[Smooth613]

Please read over this post first I'm just going to give you an overview of what's possible. Then go back and check out the links for the in-depth information to cover all of the bases.

** At the bottom of this post I have a few screens of my Installation order for visual reference if you need it at any time.

 

Some archives are already BAIN-ready. You'll see numbered folders in the Wrye Bash installers tab for properly setup archives. Such as 00 Core 10 Add ons etc... Just because an archive is recognized doesn't mean it's fully BAIN ready. Proper archives allow total control of the install, instead of installing in bulk. Only a handful of mods are properly archived. AWLS and Better Cities are excellent examples of complex BAIN archives. All Natural is another complex archive, just less complex.

 

A simple BAIN archive is any archive that doesn't have sub directories. All files are at the top level. By top level that means they go directly into the Data folder. Meshes, Textures, Sounds, etc. Simple packages have Black text, Complex have Blue. There are various other colors and such, check the footnote.

 

This thread should answer most if not all of your questions BAIN.

 

This thread will show you many examples of complex BAIN packages.

 

Love me some BAIN. I currently have almost all of my mods in BAIN ready format. It makes installation and removal a breeze. BAIN also allows for much greater customization for overrides. This comes in very handy when you want to mix and match texture packs. Instead of one texture pack, the last installed, dominating any previously installed textures you can pick and choose what will be conflict winners or conflict losers. i.e. Conflict winners is the end result, what you see in game. You also have an installation order much like a load order. You can drag packages around to modify your order. But simply dragging them around doesn't mean the changes immediately take effect. You can have 'Underrides' allowing files lower in order to take precedence over later ordered mods. You have to Anneal the package to correct this, IF you don't want the underride to hold. Anneal: Will "anneal" the selected file(s). This will install any missing files and correct any install order errors (aka "underrides"). Remember it's not necessarily an error, you can choose to underride for various reasons to achieve your desired end result.

 

BAIN also allows you to "rewind" installations. What I mean by this is if you install two mods that share identical files, such as textures or menus, etc.., when you uninstall the conflict winner it will "rewind", making the previously installed conflict loser once again active, instead of just deleting the file and then you have a missing file for what was once the conflict loser. So now you have uninstalled a mod and the other mod sharing that same file space has now been Annealed, put back. So that mod works 100% as it was intended. Again this is great for trying out different texture pack combination. I currently have about 10-12 different texture packs for various in game models and all of them are mixed and matched as I choose. And I can change this with a few clicks in a matter of minutes before loading my game. Want to run QTP3 with one character but use Bomret's and Koldorn's, maybe Amp's Caves for another? No problem. Make a few clicks, change the order around and do some Annealing. BAM. A few minutes later you have a completely different set of textures and you're back in game. Great huh? ;D

 

I've only scratched the surface, well maybe a little more. But the links I provided you are VERY in-depth and do a much better job at explaining this than I can. I just wanted to try and give you an idea of what can be done. I know this all sounds a little complicated but really it's so simple. It's just putting check marks in boxes and clicking Install, Uninstall, Anneal, and a few other options like Install Last. That's a good one. Automatically puts the mod at the very end, overriding any other mod. Then you can drag it in place to group it with other similar mods to keep it organized and the changes are still in effect. I'll link a picture or two so you can see my setup, maybe it will help to visualize it. You'll love BAIN once you get going, it blows OMODs out of the water. I don't know how I got by without it. Go ahead, hop on the bandowagon and get out of the stone age known as OBMM. Well I keep OBMM for one reason, creating and extracting BSAs, that's it. It does this well.

 

**Footnote: I forgot to mention about the various colors associated. THIS LINK covers that.

 

**Oh I almost forgot; To use OMODs it's best just to extract them with OBMM. This puts them in their respective folders; meshes, textures, etc.. Then you can create and name your directories for BAIN structure. So yeah I use OBMM for 2 things, both involve extraction though. :rolleyes:

 

**Here are some pics.

 

Install Order and custom categories on left - General Tab selected on right.

Installers Tab

 

BAIN Complex - DarkUI DarN Extreme selected

BAIN Complex DarKUI

 

Conflicts Tab - Notice Higher and Lower conflicts. Winners and Losers, respectively. Unless Underriden. (Pic Below)

Conflicts Tab

 

Underrides - UOP selected in Installation Order (Left) - Notice one underride. This file is seen in game, the conflict winner, even though it's the first package in the Installation Order. A desired Underride.

Underride Image

 

Right Click Menu - This contains various options for Installation and Removal, Annealing, Create, etc...

Right Click Menu

[jaime74]

You'll love BAIN once you get going, it blows OMODs out of the water. I don't know how I got by without it. Go ahead, hop on the bandowagon and get out of the stone age known as OBMM.

Well, I feel happy!! What a reply... I guess this should go out as a beginners' quickstart guide! Thanks a lot! :thumbsup:

 

In the meantime, I could already figure out some of the basics myself (though I wasn't fast enough to post it): After importing nearly 30 mods into BAIN, experimenting a lot with extracting, repackaging, over- and underriding etc., I really feel like having jumped out of the stone age indeed! It's especially the full-grown handling of texture/meshes overriding that got me. Had I known of this fantastic benefit earlier, then I would have switched to BAIN months ago. Don't know how much time I have spent trying to figure out in vain why my beautiful CSR silver longsword had been reset to its ugly vanilla look for the 100th time after installing some other damn mod update... or how much thoughts I've lost about the question: Are my QTP3 textures still really present, or have I accidentally overwritten them with thousands of low-quality files from other mods without knowing??

 

Now I know that BAIN has the perfect answer for this problem, and I was completely astonished, how easy it is to use once you've understood the basic mechanism. This should be labelled as "Mod Installing Reborn"! ;)

 

In the meantime, I think that I have also understood something about the BCFs. I now use them in the following situation, hoping that this is as intended (although this doesn't matter, because it is a great benefit that way, no matter how it is meant to be used):

1. I have some mod file (let's say, it is an omod file), which obviously doesn't seem to be BAIN-readable (e.g. due to unorthodox directory structure)

2. I convert this omod to an archive in OBMM

3. I copy the archive into BAIN's installation folder

4. I use BAIN to unpack it into a project (it took me several hours to understand from the cryptic Wrye Bash documentation that exactly this was meant by "create a new project")

5. I rearrange the project files by adjusting everything directly in the file system (copying around, renaming, removing unnecessary files etc.)

6. I go back to BAIN and pack the project into an archive again

7. Now (in BAIN) I use the "Conversion >> Create" command on the original archive, then selecting the new archive as the target, thus creating a BCF.

8. To verify my freshly created BCF, I apply it once to the originalarchive to recreate another instance of the newone from it.

9. Now I compare both versions of the new archive. If they're identical, I can delete one of them, and the remaining will be the one to install via BAIN, finally.

10. Now whenever the original mod archive should be updated by the author, I just need to copy it into BAIN's installation dir and reapply the BCF. Thus I have automated my migration process.

 

When I tried this out for the first time, I was overwhelmed when I saw that the BCF creation automatically recognized any changes that I had applied to the project manually (even file removals)! Couldn't believe it! The seems like master-level alteration magic to me! :wink:

 

Thanks for the "deeper" links as well, and also for mentioning Better Cities, All Natural and AWLS: As I am using all three of them, I now know which are the next three mods to migrate from OBMM to BAIN! :woot: :woot: :woot: