CK is removing objects from mymod.esp after updating CK - Not selecting/finding parent masters?

[Gilibran]

Pretty new to CK as far as actual modding goes, i did use it and FO4edit to search for item id's but nothing more really.

 

But after some trial and error with transfer settlement and running into some issues with imported settlements i decided to rebuild the settlement in the CK. Followed the tutorials around for editing and building and started on my mod.

 

It was all going fine, everything turns up ingame when testing untill i needed to add a script. At that point i found out i had a old version of the CK which did not have the scripts installed so i got the missing parent message when i wanted to add a new script. After some searching i found that the scripts were missing from the folders. After some more searching the solution was to update the CK to the latest version which did include all the scripts.

 

So i updated the CK unpacked the scripts and then was able to add new scripts. Problem solved so i thought.

 

After working on it last evening saving and testing it with the script ingame all was fine. However today i wanted to continu work and loaded the esp but the CK gave the message it could not find referenced objects so deleted them.

 

After giving ok to all these messages i go to my cell only to find it completely empty and none of the objects i placed were there!?

 

Quit the CK without saving, restarted again, made sure all the files were checked, but the same problem, all the objects i added from other mods were gone?

 

I did have a backup of the esp from just before i updated the CK, i put that back in the data folder replacing the esp i saved in the updated CK and it loads just fine without removing any object warnings.

 

So bassically i can load the pre update esp just fine but if i make any changes and save it, the next time i want to open it everything is deleted because it cannot find the objects.

 

 

Before i started with the mod i did some research and reading up on the CK, if i want to use objects from other mods i found out the hard way you need to set them with a ESM flag in FO4edit instead of simply selecting them as esp. The CK can only save objects from masterfiles. So i did that and it worked fine in the old CK version i had. Remove the flags before testing ingame and add them again when working on the mod in the CK.

 

 

When i load the pre update esp set as active file the data tab shows all the files i use and set with the esm flag as parent masters, after saving and loading again it only shows files that are true esm's, Fo4 the dlc's and homemaker.esm, not the esp ones that i set the esm flags for anymore under parent masters? and thus gives the warning it cannot find objects and removes them...

 

I get a few warnings when loading i do not know what to do with yet, but they are the same as the ones i got with the older version CK so probably need fixing but unrelated:

 

1

 

MASTERFILE Combined Ref Key Errors found for cells. check editorwarnings.txt

 

2

 

MASTERFILE File mymod.esp contains forms which generated warnings on load check editorwarnings.txt for current warnings

 

 

The warning file is to big, here are the different types of warnings i see related to the cell i'm editing:

 

MASTERFILE: *** Cell SunshineTidingsExt (0000DEED) combined data is owned by file SunshineTidingBase.esp due to ref defaultLightWarm01 (1301F5AF)

MASTERFILE: LCTN 'SunshineTidingsCoopLocation' (00024FAD) Parent space 'Commonwealth' (0000003C) for ref 'XMarkerHeading' (0005BC51) currently has the ref under a different cell key.

MASTERFILE: LCTN 'SunshineTidingsCoopLocation' (00024FAD) Special Ref 'WorkshopArtillery' (1301AAD1) is not in the Special Ref data.

MASTERFILE: LCTN 'SunshineTidingsCoopLocation' (00024FAD) Warnings were encountered validating unloaded ref data for Location 'SunshineTidingsCoopLocation' (00024FAD).

MASTERFILE: File 'SunshineTidingBase.esp' contains forms which generated warnings on load. Check the EditorWarnings.txt file for <CURRENT> warnings.

 

 

 

What could be going on, at this point i cannot continu the mod without starting all over again in the updated CK. Do i need to save the old version esp in another way (how because there is no save as), update it to the new version before saving (again how would i do that)? do i need more ini edits? the only one i did was the select multiple master one?

 

I have searched all morning now, including Skyrim CK since there is still not a lot of info on the FO4 CK. it's a specific problem and i'm unable to find any answers or direction to start looking for a solution. I usually am able to find the answer but this one has come up with nothing!?

[JonathanOstrus]

If I follow your problem in that it is this:

 

When loading a plug in that uses ESP masters (with the esm header) upon saving they are stripped therefore corrupting the plug in?

 

That is solely caused by the latest FO4 CK when they added the esl support. It no longer checks the headers to validate if it is a master. It only looks at the file extension. So if the master isn't esm or esl then the CK will strip it out.

 

You can still use an older CK exe and work with those, you just won't be able to make esls that way.

[Gilibran]

thank you very much,

 

That sounds to be exactly what's happening, i hope i can still recover the old CK.exe :-( or find one somewhere else.

 

I'll update as soon as i tried this

 

 

ty

[Gilibran]

Yup, that solved it, i had an old exe and the ini's in a backup, replaced the updated CK files with the old ones and verything is back to working

[JonathanOstrus]

Yup, that solved it, i had an old exe and the ini's in a backup, replaced the updated CK files with the old ones and verything is back to working

 

Glad to hear. You can actually use the same ini's for all versions. You can even have all of them installed at the same time. When I first installed CK I then made a copy of the exe in the same folder and renamed it with the version number in the file name. Then each time it updated I did the same. Then whenever (rarely until recently) I needed to launch an older version I had it ready to go and just run it instead.

 

Like this

[ablindm4n]

Another method is to make a copy of the .esp you are using as a master and change the extension and flag to .esm. That way you can use CK as normal and just use FO4edit to change the master from .esm to .esp after you've finished in CK.