getting asterisk on Vault108a

[caramellcube]

Hi all,

Apologies in advance if I'm overlooking something important here or posting in the wrong place, I'm still very noobish on both the geck and these forums, I did a search for this but didn't find anything so here goes.

 

I've started making my own vault, but I just noticed that there is an asterisk after Vault108a, the cell I duplicated to start with, as in the tutorial. It seems like there are 3 doors in that cell that have asterisks, which I take it means they've been changed? I did about a week's worth of work on this before noticing the asterisk, thought at first it might be something recent but it's in the backup files as well. I restarted the geck several times and started from scratch, tried duplicating the cell, renaming, clearing, removing the navmesh, and adding kit pieces, but still ended up with Vault108a*

 

I haven't been able to determine any pattern to when the asterisk shows up, the last time I tried, it was when I added the first kit pieces to the new cell (yes I checked I had the right cell selected and viewing). I can't understand why this is happening, I'm guessing it's something to do with the fact that briefly, there are 2 copies of each door linked to the same references, is this normal? If so I think it might be worth pointing out in the tutorial. I've got some big mods planned, but every time I go into the geck now I worry about changing something accidentally, like locking the door to Vault 101 or something, is there any way around this, or am I just being over cautious?

[Tefnacht]

Hello.

 

I know this is not what you want to hear but here it goes anyway: You're doing something wrong. No idea what. Just ... something.

 

Duplicating a cell and then editing the duplicate does not cause the original to become marked as changed. If that would be the case, someone would have reported that problem years ago, don't you think? :)

 

You must have done something to the original cell. Maybe you moved those doors a tiny little bit by accident while looking at them. Maybe you looked at the doors reference data to learn how they're linked and closed the dialog with “Ok” instead of “Cancel”. Maybe you pressed some hotkey I don't know about. (The GECK render window has so many hotkeys ... I discover new ones every week).

 

In short: I really have no idea what caused your Vault108a cell to get marked as changed. Or why it is just those doors. I can guarantee its not the duplication process.

 

The bad news: Using the GECK you cannot undo this. Once a cell change is committed to the plugin, it is there to stay.

 

The good news: Problems like this can be solved with FO3Edit. Using this priceless utility, you can remove that unwanted changes from your plugin and continue modding on your latest version. Here is how its done:

 

I leave downloading and “installing” the program to you. There isn't much installing to do. Just download, unzip to some folder and run. I don't remember if you have to tell it where your Fallout is located but I don't think so. If you're using Vista, make sure the UAC access rights are set correctly or run it as admin.

 

Okay. Make a backup of your file before proceeding in case something goes wrong.

 

- Launch FO3Edit. The Master/Plugin Selection window will open.

- Rightclick into the window and choose “Select none”. All checkboxes get unchecked.

- Go through the list and locate your plugin file (it is probably at the very bottom). Tick the checkbox besides it and then click “Ok”. FO3Edit will start the loading process.

- Wait.

- Wait some more until the status bar at the bottom reads: “Background loader: finished”.

- In the left list, extend the content tree of your plugin file by clicking the plus besides it. A lot of branches will show up, the number depending on how much different content your file contains. We are only interested in the branch called “Cell”. Locate it and extend it.

- The “Cell” branch contains all the information your plugin has about indoor cells. Cells are organized in Blocks and Sub-Blocks. Keep extending sub branches until you find a entry with the name “Vault108a” in the “Editor ID” column. In this case it should be under: “Block 9” → Sub-Block 2”.

- Once you located the entry for “Vault108a”, rightclick on it and choose “Remove”. A warning will pop up. Select “Yes I'm absolutely sure.” Another warning will pop up and ask you if you really want to permanently delete it. Choose “Yes”.

- The “Vault108a” entry should be gone and your plugins name, “Cell”, “Block 9” and “Sub-Block 2” should be in a bold font now, because they're changed.

- Close FO3Edit. A window will open called “Save changed files:” with just your file in it and a ticked checkbox besides it. That is good. Click “Ok”, FO3Edit will save the changes and close.

- Done.

 

If you load your mod into the GECK now, the asterisk besides “Vault108a” should be gone. Your mod is “clean” again and you can continue your work.

 

Good luck and have fun.

[caramellcube]

Thanks, FO3Edit worked just like you said. Still don't know what exactly happened, I tried it again from scratch with a new .esp file at least 6 times, checking everything, not touching any of the vault108a objects or even rendering the origonal cell, I tried duplicating Vault106a instead, but every time the origonal cell would have something changed, and every time I checked it was doors, I did notice one thing that I always had to do that the tutorial didn't mention, that was to view the copied cell in the render window before removing the navmesh, that seemed to be the only way I could remove it.

 

Anyway, it's not a problem now thanks to your advice, so much appreciated :)