modding help

[GrimReaperrz]

i want to mod castle almgard http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=14834 and change all guards into vampires from this mod: http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=38781 but whenever i try to save them into a new esp the construction set crashes can someone tell me how to solve this

 

i created a esp from only the oblivion.esm

i tried to open that esp with the vampire mod and the castle mod and put the esp i made on active saved and it crashed

opened castle and vampire mod without anything active saved and it crashed

opened castle and vampire and all my weapon/armor mods put castle active and it worked

 

somehow the castle mods esp wont allowe itself to be saved onto another esp

[David Brasher]

The CS is a very buggy program and seems to be full of gremlins, ghosts, and phantoms. At bottom, I am sure that there is some logical explanation. Something rational and scientific. But we don't have the knowledge and intellect to think at that level. So if you need a working model of how the CS works and explanation of why it does and does not work at various times, it often works just fine to say that the CS is controlled by arcane magics.

 

So the answer becomes, "Do what works."

 

The corollary is that if something does not work, then you should not do it. I have seen many cases where a mod will not save if a certain combination of mods is open in the CS. For this reason you should always attempt a save early on before you really do much work. When the CS crashes, you lose everything you have done since the last successful save.

 

In some cases, the CS will not save an empty mod. In those cases, you can successfully save by making one edit to something first.

 

Various factors make a mod more likely to cause a CS crash on save. These are things like scripts, parented references, large size, quests, dialog, and custom meshes and textures.

 

It is pointless to try to save with no mod active and I am not surprised it crashed. If you are starting a new mod from scratch, you should start it with nothing open except Oblivion.esm and then save it. Then once you have a mod you can open up all those other files you want to copy things from.

 

opened castle and vampire and all my weapon/armor mods put castle active and it worked

 

You stated that this approach worked. Therefore it seems logical for you to use this approach. What is the reason you do not want to use this approach?

 

You do know about mod isolation don't you? Mods cannot see other mods. If you want the castle and the vampires in the same mod, you have to merge the two mods, copy the items you want with new form IDs so that they exist independently in both mods, or create a mastered patch turning .esps into virtual .esms. (Not recommended for new modders.) Mod De-Isolation Tutorial

 

In many cases the CS will not save if a certain mod is open when you make the attempt to save. In that case, you may need a transporter mod or a stripped down mod.

 

For this example, let us suppose that the castle mod will cause the CS to crash if it is open along with almost any other mod when you go to save.

 

TRANSPORTER MOD:

Create an empty new mod. Open it and the castle mod at the same time. Copy the things you want from the castle mod into the new mod. See if you can save without crashing. your new mod is so small and simple that there is a good chance you will be able to save at the same time as the castle mod even though it crashes most everything else. Merge your transporter mod into your real mod, or the vampire mod or the weapon mod, or whatever you want to do with it. It likely will not have the characteristics of the full castle mod and cause a crash.

 

STRIPPED DOWN MOD:

Make a copy of the castle mod. Hack and slash on it. Mod-clean out everything you do not want. There have been times I have modcleaned out 95% of a mod during this step. Be sure to modclean out things like quests, scripts, and items with parents if you don't need them in your mod. Try to merge the stripped down mod with your real mod. It will be so small and simple that it will likely work.

Edited June 10, 2011 by David Brasher

[GrimReaperrz]

thanks a lot

 

if i save it all on the castle mod and i change the name of the esp later on will that be a problem?

 

and i changed this 1 guard into a vampire and as soon as i were to load the room that guard was in my game crashed i was thinking it might be the .nif file cos its default is located at meshes/character/_male/skeleton.nif but there is no file called skeleton.nif in that folder only the upper/lower/feet/hands from HGEC