A few tips from the focus group

[LishNivis]

Is there any way with vortex to make shortcuts load a specific profile? I got characters that use different mods so I made a profile for vortex in each. However atm I need to manually switch between them. Is there a way to add a command in the shortcut so it auto loads that profile like it is possible with ModOrganizer?

[sopmac45]

 

 

 

I mean, Vortex literally has an optional Advanced tab for more experienced users, so why not just put manual mod ordering behind that? Mod Organizer made managing hundreds of mesh and texture mods a breeze, instead of having to uninstall and reinstall everything in order, you could just drag the items into any order you pleased.

 

You don't have to install or uninstall things to get them in the right order, as you can resolve conflicts in Vortex, turn on the dependancy column in the mod display, and click the red lightning bolt beside the mod and you will get this

 

 

 

So my question with this is, how do you do this with say mod a which is at the top of the load order, and mod b which is in the middle and mod c which is at the end. c depends on b which depends on a. when you have 200+ mods and it wont allow you to scroll up or down when you are trying to link dependencies this is an issue.

 

My next question is what about merge patches or bash patches? How does one keep those at the bottom of the load order? Do you make it depend on every mod either (merge patch) every mod that the merge covers (think VIS patches all combined into 1 merged VIS patch) or on the other hand with a bash patch it would cover every mod in your list, do you then make it dependent on every mod in the list? and if so please tell me how to scroll and do so? (Edit: So possible way to fix these both, under the plugins tab there is a priority column, however the numbering there makes no mathematical sense as -110 would not be above -120 if you are going from what appears to be a range of -127 to 127. Global and local priority im not sure about which is which but they have differing effects on the load order. So in theory for say my esm's that loot and vortex refuse to put at the top under the actual game files, I could presumably set the priority to such a level that they are forced to that position. Same with ESL's and same with things like merge patches and bash patches, and a few mods that for reasons cause issues if they are not last in the load order. More experimenting and learning)

 

I honestly love Vortex and what it can and will do for modding. We all know BGS games are a bit special when it comes to modding them. Thank you to those who have worked so hard on this, and to those who have been putting out info like the above quoted to help those of us just getting in on the alpha.

 

 

 

How would I know which mod should goes first and/or last / middle ? Why, in the first place should I be dealing with dependencies/priorities when there should be something that we click and let Vortex to sort our load order accordingly without any fuss so we can start playing ?

 

I understand there are a lot of players with experience and those dependencies tabs are going to be their new toy ... good for them ... but again, for the vast majority of players this is very confusing. I am sorry if I am a pain by asking this over and over, but not one has given to me a solid answer about how to make Vortex do all the sorting automatically.

[HellKnightX88]

How would I know which mod should goes first and/or last / middle ? Why, in the first place should I be dealing with dependencies/priorities when there should be something that we click and let Vortex to sort our load order accordingly without any fuss so we can start playing ?

 

I understand there are a lot of players with experience and those dependencies tabs are going to be their new toy ... good for them ... but again, for the vast majority of players this is very confusing. I am sorry if I am a pain by asking this over and over, but not one has given to me a solid answer about how to make Vortex do all the sorting automatically.

 

Because there are too many variables and unsurprisingly Vortex (or any other mod manager) can't read your mind. It doesn't know what you want to do.

 

Lets say you have a mod that changes the meshes and the textures of a bunch of vanilla armors. Then you have another one that only edits the textures of said armors (not meshes) but it also includes retextures of weapons as well. But you want to use both, you like the texture edits and you like the new meshes. But you have to decide which conflicting textures you want to load up in your game: for you it might be something as easy as looking at the screenshots and picking the mod with the better looking textures according to your preference. Vortex can't do that, it can't look at the two mods and say "the user will prefer this one." Neither can you rely on other people to make a masterlist of sorts for asset conflicts. Because sometimes it's not based on an objectie decision (mod A must absolutely have its scripts overwriting mod B scripts otherwse it will break horribly), sometimes it's down to user preference.

 

Modding has gotten way easier over the years, I remember setting up FCOM back in the day for Oblivion. Now that was intimidating, even with the guides people made. But even with all these tools that make a mod user's life easier you're still required to gain some insight on how modding works, something you will gain with experience. I always tell this to people starting out with modding: go slow, read the readmes, if you're unsure then ask and get ready to break your game. Think of it this way: we didn't have BOSS or LOOT, we had to read readmes and set up load orders manually. And it wasn't uncommon for a new user to break their game that way.

 

There's no magical do-it-all button, you'll have to put in some effort yourself.

[kamikatze13]

 

I remember setting up FCOM back in the day for Oblivion.

 

Thanks for the trip down the memory lane.

 

BTT: }{ellKnight covered the issue pretty well: there's only so much automation possible and often manual control is even preferrable. Acquiring knowledge is a vital part of modding, no tool can automate that. My general rule-of-thumb is you'll end up spending more time on modding and modding-related activities than on actually playing ;)

[krepperk]

Ok totally moron question here but this

:

means that Realistc water two loads BEFORE Majestic Mountains, right? RIGHT?!

Sorry but I just have to be 100% sure before I continue.

[simsrw73]

Ok totally moron question here but this

:

means that Realistc water two loads BEFORE Majestic Mountains, right? RIGHT?!

Sorry but I just have to be 100% sure before I continue.

 

 

Basically. It means that when deployed (when mods are installed in to the data directory), RWT will install first, and MM will install next, overwriting any conflicting files. The 3 files that are shown in conflict will be won by MM. Remember to redeploy after setting MOD rules.

[krepperk]

Nice, thanks. I've been doing this a few years so I know how these conflicts work but I just had to be sure that I understood what they meant. I kind of feel like it could have been clearer though, like if RWT was on the left side and MM on the right with the list in between, then there wouldn't be any hesitation to the meaning of it.

[amullinix]

Ok totally moron question here but this

:

means that Realistc water two loads BEFORE Majestic Mountains, right? RIGHT?!

Sorry but I just have to be 100% sure before I continue.

For the love of... finally. Thank you for asking. Ive been looking for how the logic is handled for over an hour. This really needs to be specifically stated somewhere. Unless it is. In which case... Im dumb. Still. Thank you.

[fchopin]

Are we able to add a source address or must it be from Nexus Mods?

Edited March 1, 2018 by fchopin

[Olivir2019]

As of now, only Nexus Mods in Source are supported. In future, I would suspect more sources in Vortex - probably it is extension-based.