PSA: Back Up Your SkyrimSE.exe Now

[Calzien]

So as a little reminder to those who may have not been following the Creation Club on Fallout 4, the main game executable is updated whenever the Creation Club is updated with new "offerings". Skyrim SE looks to follow the same rules according to the recent beta over on Steam, meaning this could be your only chance at fully opting out of the Creation Club right now if you aren't interested. What this also means is it'll prevent the current version of SKSE64 from breaking until the team releases a new version. GamerPoets does a pretty good tutorial using the Auto Backup mod for those unsure of how to do so themselves:

 

 

"But how do you know Bethesda will update the .exe file?"

 

Because the beta does. From what I gather the Creation Club works like this, each time a new batch of "creations" are offered the executable is updated to look for the newly added .esl files and if they are present, load them into the game. I can't be sure WHY beyond it could just be so it doesn't count towards the limit. Anyways, if Fallout 4 is any indication of how the Creation Club works it's that whenever they release an update to it you can be sure Skyrim SE's main executable will be updated too. And speaking of which, if you have cleaned your Update.esm expect to do so again as the beta does update this one too.

[Dukoth]

any other files in this update that need to get backed up?

[Calzien]

Far as I can tell, just the executable. It seems it updated all the .esm files for me but that's likely because I cleaned all of them. The only one I can tell that WAS updated is Update.esm as it has a few new keywords for Survival Mode and climates.

[Dukoth]

So... nothing is actually broken? Is it safe to update once skse64 does?

[Zanderat]

Back up these files, as well as the .exe

• SkyrimSE.exe
• Data/Skyrim.esm
• Data/Update.esm
• Data/Skyrim - Shaders.bsa
• Data/Skyrim - Patch.bsa
• Data/Skyrim - Interface.bsa
• Data/Dragonborn.esm
• Data/HearthFires.esm
• Data/Dawnguard.esm

[Arthmoor]

Anyone following advice like this should be prepared to get left behind in a hurry though when mods begin updating to account for base record changes introduced by the patch. SKSE64 was updated within hours of the beta patch going up so that's no longer a concern for people testing it.

[LeddBate]

Thank you, Arthmoor. I'd been on the fence about "shielding" my SE against the upcoming update. You make an excellent point. I'll probably just let it happen now.

 

Mind you, I still HATE the Craptation Club for forcing files onto my drive that I will likely never use. But, in the end I can always simply uninstall and walk away from SE. Like someone else said here in the forums, I've already got over a thousand hours out of this game so it's not like I didn't get my money's worth.

[MayanMisfit]

So is it not possible to just remove the added mod files?

[Arthmoor]

Mind you, I still HATE the Craptation Club for forcing files onto my drive that I will likely never use.

This is stale information the clickbaiters on Youtube have not bothered to correct (gee, wonder why).

 

CC does not download any files to SSE that are not wanted. Nor does Fallout 4 after its last patch.

[LeddBate]

 

Mind you, I still HATE the Craptation Club for forcing files onto my drive that I will likely never use.

This is stale information the clickbaiters on Youtube have not bothered to correct (gee, wonder why).

 

CC does not download any files to SSE that are not wanted. Nor does Fallout 4 after its last patch.

 

 

Whoah, really!? Anyone else told me this, I would ignore them. But you know your $#!%, so I'll take your word on it. And thanks! That's great news. Wish I could give you a second kudo.

 

Yeah, I should of researched this more thoroughly recently. Sorry, been cleaning up after Irma rolled through.

 

EDIT: Okay, here's Bethesda responding to the subject of files being forced onto hard drives in connection with CC.

In particular, the update at the end pretty well spells it out.

Quote:

Why do the Creation Club assets download for everyone? [uPDATED]

This was a requirement for some platforms and how Creation Club needed to work. Most other games that offer similar content do the same. We realize this is a frustration point for players and we are working on a solution to change the way this functions. On the PC, this will not happen with Skyrim Special Edition, and has been patched for future releases on Fallout 4. Unquote.

 

So, unless something changes drastically, that pretty well ends the "OMG, this is gonna clog up my drive!" worry for PC users. But I'll still leave that option in the poll until (and if) Bethesda assures us that console users also won't get the files shoved onto their drive.

 

2nd EDIT: Some of the YouTubers are finally saying something about it. Although I can see your point about calling them "clickbaiters" when I listen to all the snark.

Edited October 1, 2017 by LeddBate