Recommended Installation Order for Mods?

[cmaesing]

I have been playing F3 GOTY (UK dvd version) for a long time - vanilla and with mods.

 

Recently bought new hardware, and after a few days got F3 running stable on W7 (vanilla).

 

Remembering how much I enjoyed many of the mods under my old hardware, I started re-installing most of them. This caused the standard CTDs, crashes upon start up - which were all resolved using the various methods explained in the forum here (and on some other sites).

 

Even with the mods, I kinda had a stable F3 running. However, there still are some areas that will cause an immediate CTD (e.g. north west of vault 101; when walking from the Temple to Canterbury Commons).

 

Having checked my load order via all the tools out there, it seems the load order itself is fine. But when checking my mods via the FO3Edit, many of them show one or the other conflict / error.

 

My question (only referring to the major mods out there like MMM, EVE, the unofficial patch 1.8, DC Interiors, Street Lights etc - not the many minor ones):

 

Does the order of installation make any difference? My guess is that yes, since often you are asked if you want to replace certain files of Mod 1 with files from Mod 2.

 

But is there any recommended installation order for these major mods?

 

...

 

Thanks for any advice on this. I'm currently experiencing again lots of CTDs, and would so much like to get F3 fixed. My idea is to reinstall all mods - am just not sure about the order.

[M48A5]

I saw in another thread that you have used LOOT to set your load order. LOOT does not work well with Fallout3. It will usually jumble your load order and at times make the game CTD during the loading sequence.

Use BOSS for Fallout 3 and leave LOOT for the newer games.

 

Having a conflict in FO3Edit is not a bad thing. There are a lot of conflicts when you start adding mods to the game. The ones to watch for are the ones with a red background. An explanation of the various colors used for the background and lettering is found in the right panel of FO3Edit under the "Information" tab.

Edited May 12, 2015 by M48A5

[cmaesing]

Thanks for the quick reply!

 

Let me re-evaluate my load order via BOSS, then have another look at it via FO3Edit. I did have a look at a FO3Edit pdf guide, but didn't have the time to deep dive into it. Have almost no experience with FO3Edit (except for creating a merged patch, which unfortunately did not resolve my CTDs).

[cmaesing]

Brief update:

 

Had a look at what FO3Edit tells me upon loading all of my mods in the "messages" tab on the right hand side:

 

1.) No "error" messages.

 

2.) For "Arefu Expanded" (latest version), a couple of messages of this sort: <Note: [NAVM:00990960] was injected into Fallout3.esm>.

 

3.) Again for "Arefu Expanded", this message: <Note: [NAVM:00990970] (for [CELL:00000FC1] (in Wasteland "Wasteland" [WRLD:0000003C] at -11,6)) was injected into Fallout3.esm>

 

 

I do have a few mods showing up in a red font colour, though (i.e. that are returned when I filter for 'conflict' or 'critical conflict' overall status). Interestingly enough, 2 of these are Fallout3.esm and BrokenSteel.esm ... The others are:

- Arefu Expanded

- DC Interiors Combo Edition

- BoS Patrols

- Firefly Ranch

- DC Street - BS

- Alpha C.E.v. (don't even remember which mod this is)

- Broadway Cinema

- Pre-War Shelter

 

Until and including Firefly Ranch, I'd like to get these mods to work. But that'll require some more reading of the FO3 Edit pdf guide 1st.

[BlackRampage]

Ignore the injection messages.

 

And ignore the color of records of you don't know exactly what you're looking at. it's misconception that a red conflict is somehow bad and should be avoided or "fixed". (not saying it's never a bad thing, but that's a whole other level)

All you need for a "yellow" conflict is a single plugin that changes even a single record. All you need for a red conflict is adding another plugin that makes a different change to the same record. That's it.

 

What's truly important about records in Fo3Edit is knowing exactly what they change and why. Don't have an answer to either of those questions? Then stay away from it.

The colors are just there to help detect conflicts. Fo3Edit is first and foremost a conflict detection utility. What it's not is an automated tool that can magically fix your load order for you, let alone determine for you what change is "bad" and what's not. You'll still have to use your head.

 

You don't need to read that Fo3Edit training guide to install a couple of mods btw. Well, maybe when/if you want to a create merged patch after you've installed them. Guess it wouldn't hurt to read it anyway though.