Understanding Load Order and Priority.

[Blewstar]

I have an old pc that I have made into a temporary lab while parts are being ordered for my laptop (hard drive failed).

 

While waiting I started to make a list of initial mods for textures and then installed them manually. I installed a few then used loot order to sort them. I know loot has a master list that it follows and only as good as the list is updated. I thought this would be a good time to make sure I understand this list and to move the items to correct position.

 

Here is what I have after the DLCs with pressing sort for plugins:

 

Priority numbers

 

1. Unofficial Skyrim Special Edition Patch.esp

2. Majestic Mountains_Landscape.esm

3. Skyui_SE.esp

4. Verdant - A Skyrim Grass Plugin SSE Version.esp

5. SMIM - SE-Merged-All.esp

6. Landscape Fixes For Grass Mods.esp

7. BlendedRoads.esp

8. MajesticMountains.esp

9. MajesticMountains_Moss.esp

10. RealisticWater Two.esp

 

These questions may get a facepalm from some that think it is so easy, but for my mind I need it explained.

 

 

Majestic Mountains (MM) will provide complimentary textures if blended roads is installed. Does this mean that blended roads needs higher number to be loaded first before MM to receive these textures?

 

Looking at load order for MM - 9 and 2 I believe are the additional options where 8 is the main package. 9 and 2 would need to be loaded after 8 ?

 

Verdant Grass seems to be straight forward - 4 should have a higher number than 6..... load the main and then fixes comes after right?

 

How would you set the load order on this?

 

This will help me to know the interaction relationship between the mods. An order in chaos of choices.

 

 

[jones177]

Load order is mainly common sense.

 

You go to an authors page, read it, check the posts then download(Only install after you make a console save).

If there are load order instructions try to follow them.

 

The author of RealisticWater Two asks that it be on the bottom of the load list. Yours is.

The Author Landscape Fixes For Grass Mods wants it below RealisticWater Two. Yours is not.

 

If multiple authors want their mod at the top or bottom of the list that is where common sense comes in.

 

Along with RealisticWater Two I have Bijin Warmaidens on the bottom of my list. In Oldrim Bijin Warmaidens caused brown/gray face on some vanilla NPCs if it was not on the bottom of the list. Since Bijin Warmaidens is about NPCs & RealisticWater Two is about terrain the chances of them conflicting is remote. So as long as they are both on the bottom in no particular order my game is fine.

 

If there are 2 or more of the same type of mods that need to be on the top or bottom you will need to test.

Before installing the mod, load your current save, open the console and do a console save with a name you can remember like conflicttest1. You may need to go back to this save if things go terribly wrong. Open Loot and see what order it puts them in. Do not apply the Loot changes. Do them manually. With these sort of conflicts Loot only has a slightly better chance of getting it right than you do. Loot will also change the rest of your load order that may cause conflicts that were not there before.

I only use Loot as a last resort and I save my previous load order manually before the change.

 

Some mods will not coexist no matter what load order they are in. You may need to uninstall and use the console save.

 

Only game changing mods cause conflicts. Mods like follower, armour, weapon don't unless they have a quest attached. These are in the middle of my load list.

 

Later

[Algabar]

In addition to jones177:

 

There's a difference between load order for plugins and installation order for textures.

The load order of your plugins is sorted by LOOT. The basic rule here is: What comes last in load order overwrites changes (to the same objects, settings and NPCs) made by mods that were loaded before. So basic rule: Load the mod you want to win the conflict LAST.

 

"Last one wins" is also true for installing textures, but they work somewhat differently. A lot of texture replacers don't even have a plugin file (.esp, esm, .esl). Their textures are simply copied to the right location within the game's data folder. Let's assume that a certain stone wall texture in Whiterun is changed by texture mod A. As long as you only got texture mod A installed, the new texture will show. Now you download and install texture mod B, which also contains a new texture for said stone wall. If you install mod B after A, the texture from mod A will simply get overwritten. Result: The texture from mod B will show ingame.

 

Changing the load order of your plugins in LOOT doesn't do anything about this situation. If you want to have full control over textures, you will need a mod manager, that gives you a choice in conflict situations. Currently, there are two mod managers, that allow choices on a "per file" base: Mod Organizer 2 (MO 2) and Vortex. I'd suggest using Vortex, since it is IMHO easier to use - especially for people who are relatively new to modding Skyrim.

[Blewstar]

Thank you to the both of you.... I have a better grasp on my thinking as I was backwards on load order. I went back to Realistic Waters and read the entire thread understanding more as I went. I also saw there is an installation order for SMIM, Majestic Mountains which I am using. I will be setting up a profile and good info on saving before applying. This is why I created a lab for testing.

 

@Jones177 - Edited the thread as a couple more questions came up about best practice of saving before changing or adding mods. Once I load vanilla Skyrim SE on the new hard drive, would you make a copy of the game folder and mygames? Is there any other folder file that needs to be backed up? Perhaps on steam as well? Someone mentioned to play vanilla until you get out of helgen before modding. This would test the game and the mod manager is working.

 

@Algabar I did not know that textures were loaded differently and that did add to the confusion of how to move them to get them in proper order. I have a couple of questions if you or others can answer me. The blended Roads is a texture package for Majestic Mountains. How is this added after Majestic Mountains is installed? This has to be part of Majestic Mountain would this be somehow merged?

 

If I do install textures out of order what is the recommended way of doing it over? Reinstall? or it have it remove from the mod manager? Could this cause crashes if done after a game has been started?

 

I really do appreciate all the help.

Edited October 28, 2018 by Blewstar

[Algabar]

First of all: What mod manager are you using? Would be good to know to understand what you're dealing with,

 

In fact, the questions regarding textures largely depend on your mod manager. If you're using e.g. Vortex, there's no need to reinstall anything. It's only a matter of how you resolve conflicts between different textures for the same objects.

 

In general, I wouldn't worry about installation order of textures too much. It's mainly a visual thing. Worst things that can usually happen with textures are purple objects in the game (which means missing textures) or a visual experience you don't like. Changing textures won't affect your savegames. And "wrong" textures won't crash your game.

[Blewstar]

Using mod manager 2. I did a search and it came up when I started looking into mods for Skyrim SE. It was easier to setup on my other pc from all the time I spent learning. My PC has a GTX 770 GPU and Intel 4770k for CPU so I didn't want to setup all the textures as there would be performance issues. Just wanted to see how they are and start my brain moving. My new drives will be here Tuesday and then will start the tutorials for Vortex same day.

 

I still have weather textures to install. looking at Obsidian, NAT, Dolomite. That reminds me need to look for a tree mod and lighting as well. I want to get all the environmental textures installed then can look at armors, weapons, quest etc.....

 

Anyhow, thanks for your reply.

[jones177]

Thank you to the both of you.... I have a better grasp on my thinking as I was backwards on load order. I went back to Realistic Waters and read the entire thread understanding more as I went. I also saw there is an installation order for SMIM, Majestic Mountains which I am using. I will be setting up a profile and good info on saving before applying. This is why I created a lab for testing.

 

@Jones177 - Edited the thread as a couple more questions came up about best practice of saving before changing or adding mods. Once I load vanilla Skyrim SE on the new hard drive, would you make a copy of the game folder and mygames? Is there any other folder file that needs to be backed up? Perhaps on steam as well? Someone mentioned to play vanilla until you get out of helgen before modding. This would test the game and the mod manager is working.

 

@Algabar I did not know that textures were loaded differently and that did add to the confusion of how to move them to get them in proper order. I have a couple of questions if you or others can answer me. The blended Roads is a texture package for Majestic Mountains. How is this added after Majestic Mountains is installed? This has to be part of Majestic Mountain would this be somehow merged?

 

If I do install textures out of order what is the recommended way of doing it over? Reinstall? or it have it remove from the mod manager? Could this cause crashes if done after a game has been started?

 

I really do appreciate all the help.

 

 

Hi

 

I save the entire game folder. The My Games\Skyrim Special Edition folder that has the save & config files. The AppData\Local\Skyrim Special Edition folder. The Games\Nexus Mod Manager\SkyrimSE folder.

 

That is also what you need to move your game to another computer or after a hardware upgrade.

 

I then install the game from Steam. I install NMM. I then copy the saved files over the installed ones.

 

Once you get a stable game with lots of mods, preserve it.

 

Later