"Invalid group rules" Bell Icon Error Message... just go away please (Image inside)

[ThelebKaarna]

Top-right corner of Vortex 'Bell Icon' error message: "Invalid group rules"... which has two options to click-on: "More" & "Fix".

 

Clicking "More" gives THIS MESSAGE.

 

While I do "Set Rules" in Vortex to manipulate my load order, I also assign many of my plugins to different "Groups" for the same purpose.

 

The last time I had this "Invalid group rules" message appear, I regrettably clicked "Fix"... which completely wiped-out all my "Groups" and set most all my plugins back to their default "Default" designation *Grrr, anger*

 

I do NOT want to repeat that catastrophe, just want the message to go away. Unfortunately, there's not a "Dismiss" option.

 

Thoughts?

 

Thanks.

 

-Theleb

 

 

[HadToRegister]

Well if you don't want to use the "FIX" option, then just go to your PLUGINS tab, and see which Plugins are assigned to the groups listed in the pop up, and remove them from the group.

Also, you shouldn't be micromanaging your plugins so much that you have a ton of plugins assigned to groups.
Let the built in LOOT do that.

I have 192 active plugins in Skyrim SE, and I have ONE of them assigned to a group

In Fallout 3, 122 active plugins, ZERO assigned to a group

Fallout 4, I have 122 active plugins and 13 assigned to groupps

[ThelebKaarna]

I use LOOT externally to double-check for errors (picks-up on an occasional error Vortex's built-in LOOT misses), then run LOOT from within Vortex to sort my LO (so the "Rules" I've set are applied). I do this every time I install a new plugin.

 

Unfortunately for me LOOT improperly places several of my plugins in the incorrect order, so I'm forced to do it manually (well over a dozen easily).

 

I'm curious, what's the point of us Vortex end-users being allowed the option to assign and "Manage groups" if Vortex is just going to report it as an error when we do so? I know Mod Authors and LOOT masterlist updaters assign most groups on the front end so they'll sort properly, but many slip through and must be manually sorted by the mod user.

 

I appreciate the functionality of "Setting rules" for LO management, and how it 'locks-in' a plugin's position in relation to another plugin, but really, when you have over a dozen plugins requiring manual placement, this method just becomes impractical.

 

Since we can't click-and-drag a plugin by hand (which is good and bad), "Groups" is my personal preferred method.

 

Now having said all that, is there anything (beyond a 'personal preference' thing) I'm overlooking? Like any reason using "Groups" is detrimental I'm not aware of?

 

Thanks HTR for responding, always appreciate your comments!

[HadToRegister]

I use LOOT externally to double-check for errors (picks-up on an occasional error Vortex's built-in LOOT misses), then run LOOT from within Vortex to sort my LO (so the "Rules" I've set are applied). I do this every time I install a new plugin.

 

Unfortunately for me LOOT improperly places several of my plugins in the incorrect order, so I'm forced to do it manually (well over a dozen easily).

 

I'm curious, what's the point of us Vortex end-users being allowed the option to assign and "Manage groups" if Vortex is just going to report it as an error when we do so? I know Mod Authors and LOOT masterlist updaters assign most groups on the front end so they'll sort properly, but many slip through and must be manually sorted by the mod user.

 

I appreciate the functionality of "Setting rules" for LO management, and how it 'locks-in' a plugin's position in relation to another plugin, but really, when you have over a dozen plugins requiring manual placement, this method just becomes impractical.

 

Since we can't click-and-drag a plugin by hand (which is good and bad), "Groups" is my personal preferred method.

 

Now having said all that, is there anything (beyond a 'personal preference' thing) I'm overlooking? Like any reason using "Groups" is detrimental I'm not aware of?

 

Thanks HTR for responding, always appreciate your comments!

 

 

You really are over managing your Plugins sort order, you don't need to do that.

You need to stop micromanaging your Plugins, and instead focus on sorting the MODS instead.

 

Stop micromanaging your Plugin order, it's only important for a handful of plugins, unfortunately NMM instills people with an obsession of sorting their PLUGINS when they don't need to.

 

As I said, I have 192 active Plugins, I have ONE in a group, just to put it where it needs to be, ALL the others are where they need to be thanks to Vortex and built in LOOT sorting them for me.

If you're convinced Vortex is sorting the plugins wrong (which uses the SAME sort table as LOOT, then you must be following a guide that INSISTS you must have your plugins sorted a certain way, and I can tell you, do not follow any guides on how your plugins should be sorted and just let Vortex's Loot Sort it and be done with it.

Those guides were written BEFORE Vortex was a thing, and people were using NMM.

 

Those guides no longer apply.

 

Trust Vortex, and stop using Internal and External LOOT on your load order every single time you install a mod, because you're just making it worse on yourself.

What you're doing is playing a game like one of those puzzles where you get everything all sorted, and other pieces are added to the puzzle, and now you re-sort them and undo everything you did.

 

That's too much and you will spend all of your time obsessing and sorting your plugins, and then undoing your Sorting by running LOOT so much

You're running Vortex LOOT, and THEN running External LOOT which is making you chase a never ending goal

 

The problem stems from some mods already having hard-written loot rules to them, so if you also add a group to them, that breaks the hard-written sort rule on the Plugin (you can see those by clicking on that weird Icon in the "Dependencies" column.

Those only become a problem when people insist on forcing their plugin order over Vortex's Loot load order.

[Guest deleted34304850]

I use LOOT externally to double-check for errors (picks-up on an occasional error Vortex's built-in LOOT misses), then run LOOT from within Vortex to sort my LO (so the "Rules" I've set are applied). I do this every time I install a new plugin.

don't do this. really, just don't.

[ThelebKaarna]

"You really are over managing your Plugins sort order, you don't need to do that.

You need to stop micromanaging your Plugins, and instead focus on sorting the MODS instead".

 

I'm unclear on what you mean by "sorting MODS instead". On the 'Mods' tab, I manage file conflicts by allowing mods to overwrite other mods and/or specific files to overwrite specific files. There's no "sorting" functionality that I'm aware of here. Am I mistaken?

 

 

 

"Stop micromanaging your Plugin order, it's only important for a handful of plugins, unfortunately NMM instills people with an obsession of sorting their PLUGINS when they don't need to".

 

I Always try to let LOOT properly sort first, then and only then manually tinker if I have to.I originally used FOMM, then NMM (like 7 years ago), then MO1, and now Vortex. I understand why Vortex's manual sorting isn't set-up like MO's 'click-and-drag' plugin sorting. Seems people unnecessarily obsessed with grouping like-mods together for organizational purposes (like all Player Home mods grouped together, etc), which caused problems.

 

 

 

"As I said, I have 192 active Plugins, I have ONE in a group, just to put it where it needs to be, ALL the others are where they need to be thanks to Vortex and built in LOOT sorting them for me".

 

I'm currently at 299 plugins for SSE (with as many as possible flagged ESL (espfe) to avoid counting towards the 255 plugin limit), 13 of which I've manually sorted. LOOT does work great for me for most of them, I agree.

 

 

"If you're convinced Vortex is sorting the plugins wrong (which uses the SAME sort table as LOOT, then you must be following a guide that INSISTS you must have your plugins sorted a certain way, and I can tell you, do not follow any guides on how your plugins should be sorted and just let Vortex's Loot Sort it and be done with it.

Those guides were written BEFORE Vortex was a thing, and people were using NMM. Those guides no longer apply".

 

I'm not using any "guide". Just manually sorting where I have to based on experimentation. If I don't do this, plugins don't work as intended or are just plain broken.

 

 

 

"Trust Vortex, and stop using Internal and External LOOT on your load order every single time you install a mod, because you're just making it worse on yourself".

 

I'm NOT "using internal and external LOOT on my load order", only "internal" (for sorting). Again, what I said was the ONLY reason I use "external" LOOT is to reveal any potential errors "internal" LOOT misses (and it does, see THIS THREAD).

 

 

 

"What you're doing is playing a game like one of those puzzles where you get everything all sorted, and other pieces are added to the puzzle, and now you re-sort them and undo everything you did".

 

I'm not having to "resort" or "undo" anything. Once I assign a mod to a "group", I'm done. Vortex's internal LOOT sorting takes this 'group assignment' into account and sorts accordingly.

 

 

 

"That's too much and you will spend all of your time obsessing and sorting your plugins, and then undoing your Sorting by running LOOT so much"

 

I'm not having to do that at all. I'm not "obsessing" with sorting. And re-running LOOT isn't "undoing" any of my manual sorting at all. Again, the "groups" assignment locks their relative position in, which running internal LOOT takes into account.

 

 

 

"You're running Vortex LOOT, and THEN running External LOOT which is making you chase a never ending goal"

 

I'm not running Vortex (internal) LOOT and external LOOT together for sorting purposes (see above).

 

 

 

"The problem stems from some mods already having hard-written loot rules to them, so if you also add a group to them, that breaks the hard-written sort rule on the Plugin (you can see those by clicking on that weird Icon in the "Dependencies" column.

Those only become a problem when people insist on forcing their plugin order over Vortex's Loot load order".

 

I would contend it doesn't "break" the rule, just replaces or reassigns it. Also, I DO use "Dependencies". 4 of my 13 manually sorted plugins are handled using Dependencies. And why using "Groups" results in an error message while using "Dependencies" doesn't seems stupid to me, since they're both methods for manually sorting where the end result is ultimately the same (two ways to skin a cat).

 

 

 

I must say your stance on allowing LOOT (mostly) total control over your load order is quite possibly the only time I've encountered this opinion. Most times I read stuff posted like: "people place too much trust in LOOT being able to properly sort their LO", or even the extreme: "LOOT doesn't sort my LO right, I have to do it manually", etc. Even Gopher, as reserved as he is, states to sort with LOOT first, then manually tweak if necessary.

 

I think the problem with LOOT is it's Masterlist doesn't contain data on all the mods out there (not by a long shot!), and as such, all these mods not included in the Masterlist have no sort data assigned to them. This is one example where manually manipulating LO becomes necessary. Another is where the sort data of a plugin, in relation to other plugins' sort data, is out-of-whack, or just plain wrong.

 

 

Final point I would make again is, why would Tannin and the Vortex Team put in place the ability to assign plugins to "Groups", the "Manage Rules" and "Manage Groups" functionalities, and the ability to assign "Dependencies", if they didn't intend for us to use them (within reason) for manual sorting? Seems stupid to me they'd put these functionalities in place, just to have an Error Message pop-up (that you can't dismiss) whenever you use them (or atleast the "Groups" one).

[ThelebKaarna]

 

I use LOOT externally to double-check for errors (picks-up on an occasional error Vortex's built-in LOOT misses), then run LOOT from within Vortex to sort my LO (so the "Rules" I've set are applied). I do this every time I install a new plugin.

don't do this. really, just don't.

 

 

See THIS THREAD (particularly the last few posts) and you may change your opinion on this...

 

From my personal experience, external LOOT (albeit infrequently) catches errors Vortex's internal LOOT misses. Again, I ONLY use external LOOT for this function of double-checking for errors. That's it. I use Vortex's internal LOOT for sorting (so Dependency rules I've set are applied) and for everything else.

[ThelebKaarna]

HEY! What'a ya know? I just launched Vortex and the error message is GONE! Yaaay!

 

I'm guessing it'll likely (annoyingly) appear from time-to-time to remind me I've used it's own "Groups" functionality :huh:

[Guest deleted34304850]

i won't change my stance on using loot externally to vortex because doing so is a fool's errand and simply not the correct thing to do.

[ThelebKaarna]

i won't change my stance on using loot externally to vortex because doing so is a fool's errand and simply not the correct thing to do.

 

Judging by your comment you didn't read my post thoroughly. I'm not "using" LOOT outside of Vortex. I'm simply opening it to double-check for errors Vortex might miss, then closing it. That's it. No harm in that (actually it's proven to be useful). I'm not clicking "sort" in external LOOT, or anything else.

 

And I won't read too much into your "fool's errand" comment. Let's keep it civil.