[LE] Set up for making mods?

[greyday01]

How do you set up things for working with the Creation Kit? What I did was in my Data folder I unzipped scripts and also both the meshes and textures from the BSAs. Otherwise I couldn't script or see the textures on my meshes. Then I used MO for gaming so my Data folder only had vanilla items and my stuff. That made it easy to find the things I was working on. I open the CK directly not through MO and ran Syrim directly for testing my mod. Is there a better way to go about it? The thing is I was thinking about going to vortex instead of MO and wondering if having my Data folder full of stuff from other mods would complicate things? There doesn't seem to be any tutorials about best working set ups for modding so I would welcome opinions and advice.

[davethepak]

Interesting question - and makes me wonder if there is indeed a much better way.

 

I have a folder with links for easy navigation, and launch the creation kit directly from the skyrim folder, and xedit.

 

Other than that, similar to your method. I do backup my esp's after major changes, but I am sure there are better ways to do this.

[agerweb]

I work with the CK as you do and yes having you data directory cluttered up with other mods and any of their loose files is not a good idea. Either stick to an organiser that sets up a virtual folder elsewhere (like MO) or (if you have that luxury) use a different machine for modding.

 

I also have seperate folders elsewhere for all my mods where I keep the resources used for that mod as I go along in a copy of the structure in the data folder (ie meshes, tecture, scripts etc). It makes it much easier when you want to distribute as well as that final test to check you are actually including all the resolurces you have used.

 

That folder will also have backups of the esp eg:

 

MyMod.esp (the latest)

MyMod16Apr.esp

MyMod10Apr.esp

etc

[greyday01]

If you wanted to use vortex or NMM could you have two copies of Data, rename one DataPlaying and one dataMyMod and switch back and forth by removing the ending of the one you were working or playing with? You would have to be careful of which you were using but that might work. It would be an extra step if you wanted to go from modding to playing so I don't know if that would be better. Two computers would be best but I don't have money or space for two.

[Levionte]

 

If you wanted to use vortex or NMM could you have two copies of Data, rename one DataPlaying and one dataMyMod and switch back and forth by removing the ending of the one you were working or playing with? You would have to be careful of which you were using but that might work. It would be an extra step if you wanted to go from modding to playing so I don't know if that would be better. Two computers would be best but I don't have money or space for two.

 

 

In my experience, that type of method works fine in the very beginning but quickly outgrows your folder. As soon as you make your second mod, then you're working around your first assets - which isn't so bad. But then you make a mod that requires the MCM, or script extender, or FNIS, or bodyslide, etc., and now you have to put those in there in order to test properly. Now you're working around those, and you need to test if you conflict with another mod, so you drop that in there, too. It very quickly grows into a mess unless you're extremely diligent in your organization, at which point you're wasting a lot of time screwing with your folders. You're probably better off just packing and unpacking your mod into a zip archive to install through your mod manager over and over, but that gets really old. When I tweak a texture, I need to see it in action to know if I like it. It's not uncommon to tweak it 10-20 times in a couple minutes, which is a lot of packing and unpacking.

 

Honestly, while the MO vs Nexus mod-manager debate has been argued ad nauseam and largely comes down to personal preference, I've found the benefits of having your assets isolated in their own folder, which you can test directly without having to pack it into any kind of archive, invaluable when it comes to mod creation. This is especially true when you start making more complicated mods that require files to be in separate folders all over the data folder. Before I switched to MO, trying to find all my mod assets to package them was something I actually dreaded, and almost always forgot something like a random texture I put in a different place, or one of the scripts which just go in a folder with every single script you have installed.

 

I'm not saying an MO setup is perfect either. You have to jump through some hoops to get your scripts to compile, generate .lip files, broken preview in Nifskope, etc.. There are definitely some glaring issues. But once you get a system for working around those problems, I find the drawbacks to be less burdensome than the alternatives.