NMM first attempt at mods not activating

[SuperAxilla]

Manually installing mods is easy and I can walk you through that, but the issue of downloading the compressed files properly will definitely be a problem. Try this, on the download page click the file name. That will take you to a download page (you might be asked for permission to download this file. Approve that). You will get the standard download pop-ups. After the download is complete open the file and check to see if it came through intact. Once we get a complete file we can work with that.

 

 

Rabbit

Sorry for the delay. I’m getting ready to put the house on the market, so I’ve been running around like a nut. I really appreciate you helping me with this. I’m going to rty to provide as much detailed info as I can with this. If I need to take screen shots, I can do it with a camera. Not sure if downloading FRAPS or the other free one will record outside of gameplay.

 

My Steam files & TES V are under the Program Files (x86) and the NMM is under the Local C.

I did a complete uninstall and reinstall of Skyrim and NMM.

The file under data show folders in the order of: cache, downloads, interface, meshes, Optional, Readme, Strings, textures, Video. Below are blank docs: (type bsa, esp & esm files) castlegrey.bsa, castlegrey.esm, hideout.bsa, hideout.esp, Skyrim –animations.bsa, Skyrim-Interface.bsa, Skyrim-meshes.bsa, Skyrim-Misc.bsa, Skyrim-Shaders.bsa, Skyrim-sounds.bsa, Skyrim-Textures.bsa, Skyrim-voices.bsa, Skyrim-VoicesExtra.bsa, Skyrim.esm, Update.bsa, Update.esm. When I click on the bsa,esp,esm files it pops up “Windows cannot open this file” and the usual “do you want to find a program to open?” The CastleGrey and Hideout are the only steam mods and are working.

I deleted all the NMM Thepal mods, un-installed and re-installed NMM to the default C:/programfiles/NexusModManager. And the default “associate NMM, FOMOD, OMOD, .NXM files & NXM URLs, checked. On setup it installed to default Mod Directory: c:\Games\Skyrim\Mods & Install Info: c:\Games\Skyrim\Install Info.

 

Starting from scratch, I went to the manual download of “Nude females v1-5” Manually downloaded from DC server (closer to me). It downloads as a 7zip. After it downloaded it flashed that “Windows cannot open this file.” the usual prompt. I do have the 7-Zip File manager, though. So I went to my Start menu, pulled that download and pasted it on my desktop. I’m wondering if I should move it into my 7zip file manager icon.

 

When I would download this mod straight to NMM, it would sometimes stall at 70%, and somehow it took a few times showing successfully activated, but wouldn’t show in the NMM plug-ins, or the steam start menu Data file.

 

Alternatively, I tried a comparable manual download to my desktop in case this one does not work. This one came as a compressed zip. A different mod called “Flawless nude Females” by 1b9jOk3. This is on my desktop, and when opened, it shows the files in folders plus a readme.

 

Files:

Base, 5 folders of…well, "adult" options for the install (which I don’t think I should post, but they are there), an “HD” folder and then the “Readme” file.

 

Under the Base file, it opens to Data, then two folders of Meshes & Textures. Meshes opens to characters and Assets and then to 2 ‘femalebody.nif” files. Same with Textures but with three “.nif” files. The “HD” folder opens through the same way, leading to “.dds” files. So, I’m guessing this manual mod download came intact. I think the first mod did as well, but somehow needs to be run through the 7zip manager. I’m not sure. I don't know if I need to extract either one of these from my desktop (for the zipped one) or through the 7zip manager (for the 7zip file). None have been added to NMM yet but it doesn't matter to me as to which of these two I could successfully activate.

[Rabbit1251]

The next time that you're uninstalling and installing Skyrim it is probably a good idea to reinstall your game somewhere outside of Program Files. The reason for this is that the Windows 7 UAC Security Protocols can interfere with the mods trying to modify the protected programs installed there, i.e. mods may not work.

 

You might try telling Windows to show any Hidden Files. That may be why some parts of the files are not showing up. I don't know it's just a thought.

 

On any of your manually downloaded mods open the Nexus Mod Manager, click the 'mods' tab, click that first blue odd shaped button on the left, navigate to where you have the zipped mod residing and open that. That will add it to your mods queue. Click on it to highlight it and click the next blue odd shaped button (it will be the one that just lit up when you highlighted the mod). See if that adds it to your game. This is the method that I use.

 

Or, alternately, open up the compressed mod file and drag and drop the esp, esm, etc. files as well as all of the folders like Textures, Meshes, etc. into your Skyrim data folder. Note that 'nude mods' will frequently contain only texture and mesh folders and may not have an esp file. If it does make sure that you activate it in the Mod Manager. See if they will show up in game then. This is not recommended over the Mod Manager as removing a mod can be a real pain.

 

None of this of course addresses the reason that the Mod Manager is causing you so much grief, but we'll see if we can get you mods to work in spite of that.

 

 

Rabbit

[SuperAxilla]

Well, I made Windows show all hidden files. I tried both of the mods and the same results. Says "Mod successfully activated" but still not in plug-ins or in the game. I did load 5 other various mods straight through NMM and they worked. Albeit, I don't know if they are completely correct. There's the orange triangle beside them and when you click on it, it takes me to a page about reporting bugs and an error message saying that NMM is overwhelmed with reports and cannot do anything. Strangely, the successful mods turned all the female's hair purple like a Final Fantasy character. The pictures shown of the authors mods show entirely different. But the other mods worked, like the "legacy palace" (think that's what it was) It just seems like either these two aren't working.

[Rabbit1251]

I'm sorry to be so long getting back to you, but I've been mulling this over in my mind for a couple of days and, quite frankly, I'm out of ideas. From your description it sounds like the Mod Manager is just not doing it's duty to you. There used to be a page on the Nexus that supported previous version and I would have suggested trying one of those, but I looked and it looks like the page is no longer up. You might just have to do the Manuel Install route for now. Open the file, examine the file structure, and drag and drop the various components into your data folder. Oh, and your purple hair is a missing mesh/textures syndrome (textures, I believe) so that may correct that. There is no problem with mixing mods installed with the Mod Manager that work for you and with manually loaded mods that you have placed there yourself or with the Steam Workshop for that matter. I like to keep copies of all of my mods so that if I wish to remove one I can open the file up and track down the various components from where they were placed in my data folder. It helps. Other than that you might post a thread in the Nexus Mod Manager Open Beta Feedback Forum asking the development boffins about it.

 

Rabbit

[MShoap13]

Nude Females v1.5 is a simple resource replacer and does not include a .esp plugin. Simply placing properly named resources (textures and meshes) into the directory Skyrim is looking for them in should cause the game to override the resources they're meant to replace. The game's original resources are all stored in .bsa archives (with their file structure in-tact) so they won't be present in the basic file structure (\Skyrim\Data\textures\...\).

 

As an example, the mesh for leather boots is named "boots.nif" and located at \Data\*Skyrim - meshes.bsa*\meshes\armor\leather\ inside of the meshes.bsa. If you wanted to replace this mesh with your own customized variant, you'd name your mesh "boots.nif" and place it at \Data\meshes\armor\leather\ in the basic Window's file structure.

 

The first thing I'd recommend trying for your issue regarding replacer resources not working is to open "SkyrimPrefs.ini" located at \My Documents\My Games\Skyrim\ and find the [Launcher] section. look for the following line, and if you do not have it or it says "=0" add it or change it to "=1":

bLoadLooseFiles=1

I've yet to see this actually fix this particular issue for anyone (and I personally don't have that line and my replacers work perfectly on XP x64) but it's still worth your time to rule out before moving on to my next suggestion.

 

If the aforementioned doesn't work, chances are UAC is causing your issue. Here's my general post on Windows UAC:

If you're on Vista/7, Steam (and therefore Skyrim) is installed in the default (C:\Program Files) location, and you're having problems with replacers or simply mods (plugins) not working at all, even though you've activated them in NMM, or mods refusing to deactivate, even though all of their files have been removed, then you most likely have a UAC problem. It is possible to turn off UAC though it's not recommended for the vast majority of Windows users. To get around UAC without turning it completely off you'll need to move Steam to a location UAC does not affect (C:\Games\ is a commonly used location). This will most likely break any 3rd party utilities such as NMM as it will leave old registry keys behind that point to the location you originally installed Skyrim in. If you come across this issue, you'll have to uninstall Skyrim, clean the old registry keys, reboot, then reinstall Skyrim. I personally recommend using Revo Uninstaller as if you uninstall Skyrim through it, it will automatically scan for and ask if you'd like to delete old registry keys. If you're interested in keeping your old mods, config files, and/or saved games, tips found in Bben's Oblivion Reinstall Procedure work for Skyrim as well.

 

As far as having issues with NMM downloads goes, that's an issue that's affected people since NMM was first released for public Beta. It may come and go, it may be persistent, you may only have problems with one particular file. The only advise I can give you here is to make a thread specifically about your issue over in the NMM Beta forums and in the mean-time, download mods manually and then copy and paste them into the directory NMM would've placed them in if it had downloaded them. From there, you should be able to use NMM to install/uninstall/manage your mods.

Edited April 22, 2012 by MShoap13

[SuperAxilla]

I'm sorry to be so long getting back to you, but I've been mulling this over in my mind for a couple of days and, quite frankly, I'm out of ideas. From your description it sounds like the Mod Manager is just not doing it's duty to you. There used to be a page on the Nexus that supported previous version and I would have suggested trying one of those, but I looked and it looks like the page is no longer up. You might just have to do the Manuel Install route for now. Open the file, examine the file structure, and drag and drop the various components into your data folder. Oh, and your purple hair is a missing mesh/textures syndrome (textures, I believe) so that may correct that. There is no problem with mixing mods installed with the Mod Manager that work for you and with manually loaded mods that you have placed there yourself or with the Steam Workshop for that matter. I like to keep copies of all of my mods so that if I wish to remove one I can open the file up and track down the various components from where they were placed in my data folder. It helps. Other than that you might post a thread in the Nexus Mod Manager Open Beta Feedback Forum asking the development boffins about it.

 

Rabbit

 

Not a problem. Thanks for your time and help. I'm guessing it's just something I'll need to manually fix. Kudos+

Thanks Rabbit

[SuperAxilla]

Nude Females v1.5 is a simple resource replacer and does not include a .esp plugin. Simply placing properly named resources (textures and meshes) into the directory Skyrim is looking for them in should cause the game to override the resources they're meant to replace. The game's original resources are all stored in .bsa archives (with their file structure in-tact) so they won't be present in the basic file structure (\Skyrim\Data\textures\...\).

 

As an example, the mesh for leather boots is named "boots.nif" and located at \Data\*Skyrim - meshes.bsa*\meshes\armor\leather\ inside of the meshes.bsa. If you wanted to replace this mesh with your own customized variant, you'd name your mesh "boots.nif" and place it at \Data\meshes\armor\leather\ in the basic Window's file structure.

 

The first thing I'd recommend trying for your issue regarding replacer resources not working is to open "SkyrimPrefs.ini" located at \My Documents\My Games\Skyrim\ and find the [Launcher] section. look for the following line, and if you do not have it or it says "=0" add it or change it to "=1":

bLoadLooseFiles=1

I've yet to see this actually fix this particular issue for anyone (and I personally don't have that line and my replacers work perfectly on XP x64) but it's still worth your time to rule out before moving on to my next suggestion.

 

If the aforementioned doesn't work, chances are UAC is causing your issue. Here's my general post on Windows UAC:

If you're on Vista/7, Steam (and therefore Skyrim) is installed in the default (C:\Program Files) location, and you're having problems with replacers or simply mods (plugins) not working at all, even though you've activated them in NMM, or mods refusing to deactivate, even though all of their files have been removed, then you most likely have a UAC problem. It is possible to turn off UAC though it's not recommended for the vast majority of Windows users. To get around UAC without turning it completely off you'll need to move Steam to a location UAC does not affect (C:\Games\ is a commonly used location). This will most likely break any 3rd party utilities such as NMM as it will leave old registry keys behind that point to the location you originally installed Skyrim in. If you come across this issue, you'll have to uninstall Skyrim, clean the old registry keys, reboot, then reinstall Skyrim. I personally recommend using Revo Uninstaller as if you uninstall Skyrim through it, it will automatically scan for and ask if you'd like to delete old registry keys. If you're interested in keeping your old mods, config files, and/or saved games, tips found in Bben's Oblivion Reinstall Procedure work for Skyrim as well.

 

As far as having issues with NMM downloads goes, that's an issue that's affected people since NMM was first released for public Beta. It may come and go, it may be persistent, you may only have problems with one particular file. The only advise I can give you here is to make a thread specifically about your issue over in the NMM Beta forums and in the mean-time, download mods manually and then copy and paste them into the directory NMM would've placed them in if it had downloaded them. From there, you should be able to use NMM to install/uninstall/manage your mods.

 

Well, I didn't have the bLoad command in the SkyrimPrefs.ini folder. I did add it and it still did the same thing. But, when I move the Steam file into C/Programs, the NMM won't launch. Should I uninstall and re-install both the NMM and the game into the C/program files instead of the default x86 ? Or, I do have an SSD I could put them all on.

[MShoap13]

Anywhere that's not protected by UAC is good. The following locations (and probably more than I have listed here) are protected:

C:\Program Files\

C:\Program Files (x86)\

C:\Windows\

 

It's best to make your own directory from either the root of the drive (C:\*whatever*\) or as you stated, put it on a drive that your OS is not installed on.

[SuperAxilla]

Huh. Well, I've got it in my C/Program Files (x86)\, I wonder if tossing it onto the SSD would change anything. But...., I don't know what's happening, but something must have "broke loose" last night. I got frustrated, naturally, and started to bombard my NMM with mods. Some comparable to the one i was trying to install. Some just wild (as far as adult mods go), and they started to work. I went back and installed the mod. It said successfully activated, but still not in the menu Data file or in the NMM plug-ins, BUT it started to work. Not entirely but enough. It's working only on NPCs added from other mods. It doesn't affect the normal TES V NPCs, but only the ones added through other mods. So something is working. Still, I'm getting a purple hair, although not as bad as before. The colors are are better and different shades of purple. Still it's only affecting NPCs added from any mods. So why this is working, I'm not sure. Somehow it's only affecting added NPC data and not overwriting the native NPC data. That's fine with me. But I don't know why or how it's doing this.