Fallout 4 Load Order Help please?

[centralia1990]

Hello, I'm somewhat new-ish to this site but I really need some help with my Fallout 4 Mods Load Order please. I have spent the last 6 days rearranging, sorting, re-reading, uninstalling, reinstalling, testing, and researching mods and Load Order advice forums, threads, etc and still can't quite get my Load Order in a proper setup. I have even tried arranging it using the Master Framework method setup and still seems to be having issues. The mods all seem to work and there seems to be no big conflicts and I've followed all the instructions from the mod authors that I could see, but items don't seem to be loading up properly in-game. Maybe I have a mod that is no longer needed or maybe something was missed in the installation somehow? Please, would anyone be willing to help me figure out my Load Order and my in-game Load Order? Once I get a reply, I will be more than happy to post my current Load Orders from MO2 and the in-game Load Order.

[G4M3W1NN3R]

their is not a Definite Proper Load Order, due to the fact their is currently 30k mods for fallout 4 hosted on this site alone, and we have a maximum limit of 254 mods per person (with regards to Game's Hard Mod Limit). so unless you have the exact same mod setup as someone else, that has a successful load order, their is really no viable answer. not too mention it sounds like you are doing everything right already.

 

with that said, what is easier to help with will be problems themselves.

 

as such, can you be more specific with this statement: "but items don't seem to be loading up properly in-game"

what items, and where exactly is this noticeable, ie Workshop, Workbenches, Pip-Boy, landscape, textures etc etc. your statement is incredibly brief, as such it is not enough information to offer a solution.

their is no definite answer to modding, modding is a game in itself, which comes with both a massive Price/Reward Attached to it which are both Equally balanced. reward being you can greatly improve your game, the price is you have to know exactly what you are doing, and understand exactly how mods work, how they interact with each other, and the limitations of modding, as well as the limitations of the Game itself.

Modding is a game that you will never master, regardless of how much experience you have, you just become much better at it, and to me that is the beauty of it, because it is a constant enjoyable (can also be very frustrating at times) learning experience.

the biggest thing that will help with Modding, will be Fo4Edit, which we use for conflict resolution. as Mod Conflicts are 1 of the highest possible causes for modding based issues, the other will be Saved Games based issues, which is almost always going to be Script Related.

to prepare for a modded game, the first thing we would do is load all of our mods into Fo4Edit, and check every record until we find Red Text/Red Background, this indicates a mod conflict, we can then click on that record, and find out exactly what mods are conflicting with each other, its a long process (based on how many mods you have) but is the highest possible way of having a successful mod setup. providing you take the nessarary steps to eliminate the conflict. and then rinse and repeat until all records are now green.

Note (Fo4Edit): Red Text / Red Background = Mod Conflict (this must be resolved, else these will be why your game is Crashing and or having other issues)

mod conflicts, however is not simple, as they can cause all sorts of issues, from mod overrides which will nullify the mod it is overriding, this is a minor conflict and does not really cause any damage to the game, to the more serious conflicts, which result in CTDs, Game Freezes etc etc.

3 Tools of the Trade for Modding:

1. Fo4Edit: https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/2737 <-- Absolutely Essential

2: Wrye Bash https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/20032 <-- Essential - (it is a Mod Organizer, but for those of us who use either NMM, M02 or Vortex, will not be using Wrye Base for its Mod Management, but rather we use this Program For its Ability to Merge Leveled Lists, which is incredibly important, and will prevent issues in itself)

3. LOOT (Load Order Optimization Tool): https://loot.github.io <-- its primary use is not as reliable on fallout 4 as it once was on Skyrim LE (Load Order Sorting), but thats not what this tool would be used for in Fallout 4, it is used for quickly checking mod conflicts, with that said i do not use it personally, as i have a lot of Experience in modding bethesda games, and know exactly what to do if i run into an issue, i also know automated solutions are unrealiable, and i prefer to do everything manually, as doing stuff manually has a much higher success rate, plus you also get the added benefit of learning.

with that said LOOT is worth using for those that are new to modding, you can use it to sort your load order if you want, but just bare in mind what i have stated above.

[centralia1990]

Thank you for responding. Sorry, I kept the post brief to even see if anyone would respond to it. From my experience, anytime I posted a more thorough post I never got a response and was told by many people too simplify the first post I make because it can cause a lot of people to not want to read everything so they'll just ignore it and move on.

 

The issues lie with just a few mod's items not showing up in the Workshop in-game menu and some textures such as skin/textural replacers are not appearing properly. The female's bodies have a weird foamy texture so I'm assuming that maybe there is something overwriting the skin texture file? I have been thinking though that maybe I should remove those mods and just not bother with some of them. I was just hoping to try and add a little realism into the game.

 

I have 185 mods currently, which most are of Workshop items (furniture, structure building, decor, things like that), and I have already removed a number of mods that actually had conflicts. So the game doesn't crash or corrupt anymore, which is great, and there are no visible conflicts registering that I can see in my Load Order. I've tried dozens of mod setups suggested and recommended by dozens of players and there still seems to be an issue which seems to be more of a Load Order nature, at least that's what I have seen many players say.

 

I was using LOOT for a while when I was using Vortex but I discontinued using Vortex and LOOT because it began to scramble my Load Order and Plugins resulting in my game crashing off and on randomly, and wasn't indicating conflicts were present when they were. After a day of researching, it was claimed by a lot people that LOOT and Vortex were not recommended if you have more than 30 or 40 mods because there's a chance that they could miss downloading the mods' full files, plugins could disappear, not run properly, or not indicate conflicts properly, etc. The general consensus from a lot of people basically was if you have more than 30 or 40 mods, use MO2 because it supposedly is more reliable and is modeled better than Vortex and the original LOOT so I decided to begin using MO2 thereafter.

 

After moving to MO2 I found that several of the mods I had had conflicts and were the cause of the game crashing. So I removed all the stated conflicting mods and the crashes didn't occur anymore, however, some of the Workshop Items are not appearing in the Workshop and the game seems to run a bit sluggish than before. For about half a day I read many different forums, sites, recommendations, youtube videos, etc about these issues and tried all of the suggestions the people said, but it still hasn't worked. At this point, 6 days had passed. Then I found a link to Master Framework setup and figured I could give it a try so I uninstalled Fallout 4 and all my mods and reinstalled them one at a time while reading all the descriptions, changelogs, files, everything using the Master Framework layout as a general guide. After all of this, the game runs smoother and seems good but some items seem to still not show up in the Workshop Menu. I did some deeper research and found some conversations that said if your game is running smoothly but items are missing or textures seem off then it most likely could be a Load Order issue as the mods may not be getting loaded correctly because they are not in the right location. So I moved around some mods and was able to get a couple mods working again but still have a few that aren't showing in-game.

 

I'll check out that FO4Edit, thank you. I have used mods in other games without any issues but this is a different engine and type of game from those others so it could be that my thinking of a mod's type from prior games is causing me to place some of the mods in the wrong place or category and maybe that's why not all of them are showing in-game? The games I have played with mods before didn't require any specific Load Orders but I've always tried to set them categorically and keep them organized.

 

I have also tried researching about the MO2 Load Order and the in-game Load Order, to see if both need to be sorted, and all that I have been able to find is that all the .esm files need to be at the top of in-game Load Order, then the .esl files after the .esm files, then the .esp files after the .esl files and the only time you place one or more .esl or .esp files elsewhere in the Load Order is when the author specifically states where to place it. Is this true?

 

I do apologize with the confusion and I admit I never was super great with understanding coding, programming, file placements, technical data information, etc but I've always tried to be as careful as possible with mods and their setups. My roommate is better with some of that and has tried helping me with this for the past 6 days but still doesn't know how to setup the Load Orders either. The game and all the mods have been uninstalled and reinstalled over half a dozen times in the last 6 days too and I'm hoping it doesn't have to happen again lol.

 

When my roommate gets home from work tonight I'll ask them about the texture mods, whether to remove those or not just to rid of some of the hassle and drama with it. Just seems to complicated and requires too many other mods just to get the texture and physics etc to work.

Edited November 1, 2019 by centralia1990

[G4M3W1NN3R]

bethesda games is definitely a whole different ball game when it comes to modding

 

with that said, list your mods, so i can get a good idea on how your game is setup, so i will be able to see your load order, and to see if their is any immediate issues. as well as offer suggestions

[StormWolf01]

Heya Centralia. Welcome to the world of Frustration 4 errrr...I mean....Fallout 4.

I say that because yes, some of the modding aspects and playing with mods aspects for this particular monster of Bethesda's, is just downright overly complicated, frustrating and sometimes just doesn't work.

Then we have the tools that we have for making our mods work, that sometimes, just makes things worse.

 

I don't think that either Gamewinner or myself, would argue that once you know what you're doing, you're better off doing your installs manually whenever possible. Removing them, a lot of times you can do it manually as the preferred method, but you really need to read the directions in the mod page to know if there's things in the game that you need to do first.

 

It's a complictated game, and it doesn't like to do what it's supposed to. Hence the reason why Bethesda has the reputation of "We release broken, buggy games and let our fans fix them."

 

Ok, so this is kinda obvious, but I do have to ask. The stuff that isn't showing up. There's two types of work benches for weapons. There's the weaponSMITH work bench, and the Weapon Workbench. Guns don't show up on the Weapon workbench. You have to manually go in, and build a weaponsmith workbench, and then craft the weapon from there. IF it's a mod that uses the weaponsmith bench to create it. You have to build the bench from the crafting menu of the settlement workbench.

Are you building that workbench?

Other weapons craft from the chemistry station, not a weaponsmith bench. Have you tried looking for them there?

 

Also, not all items are made to appear from the bench. Either because the modder doesn't want to add AWKR to their mod, or they simply don't know how to add them to a bench. OR they choose to force us to go thru a quest, in order to get said item.

 

A list of the mods that "aren't working" along with your load order, would greatly help ;)

[centralia1990]

Heya Centralia. Welcome to the world of Frustration 4 errrr...I mean....Fallout 4.

I say that because yes, some of the modding aspects and playing with mods aspects for this particular monster of Bethesda's, is just downright overly complicated, frustrating and sometimes just doesn't work.

Then we have the tools that we have for making our mods work, that sometimes, just makes things worse.

 

I don't think that either Gamewinner or myself, would argue that once you know what you're doing, you're better off doing your installs manually whenever possible. Removing them, a lot of times you can do it manually as the preferred method, but you really need to read the directions in the mod page to know if there's things in the game that you need to do first.

 

It's a complictated game, and it doesn't like to do what it's supposed to. Hence the reason why Bethesda has the reputation of "We release broken, buggy games and let our fans fix them."

 

Ok, so this is kinda obvious, but I do have to ask. The stuff that isn't showing up. There's two types of work benches for weapons. There's the weaponSMITH work bench, and the Weapon Workbench. Guns don't show up on the Weapon workbench. You have to manually go in, and build a weaponsmith workbench, and then craft the weapon from there. IF it's a mod that uses the weaponsmith bench to create it. You have to build the bench from the crafting menu of the settlement workbench.

Are you building that workbench?

Other weapons craft from the chemistry station, not a weaponsmith bench. Have you tried looking for them there?

 

Also, not all items are made to appear from the bench. Either because the modder doesn't want to add AWKR to their mod, or they simply don't know how to add them to a bench. OR they choose to force us to go thru a quest, in order to get said item.

 

A list of the mods that "aren't working" along with your load order, would greatly help :wink:

Thank you for the response. Yeah I've heard about Bethesda's reputation lol. It wasn't armor or weapons disappearing, it was mainly some of the furniture, decor, miscellany items in Build Mode. However, I was able to resolve that issue now and all items show in the Build Mode menus. I have deleted a few more mods because they were too much of a hassle and frankly, I really wasn't interested in them that much. The only issue remaining now is that some of the mod's effects don't seem to be loading properly in the game. For one example, I use Wastelander's Cookbook and I selected the option of the "Light" version during installation to remove the radiation from the cooked foods but the food still comes out with radiation in it. I understand that mod hasn't been updated in quite some time but I never had an issue with it with Vortex. Almost all of my mods I never had an issue with on Vortex until I attempted to add animation mods in, which turned into a c**pshow, so I swithed over to MO2. From days of researching, many players recommended using MO2 so I switched. I gave up on the animations now though and removed them and did the whole procedures of uninstalling and reinstalling everything.

 

Now with what information I found over the last several days, it was highly suggested that it could be a Load Order issue where mods or mod's effects are not fully loading in which could cause some mods to not fully function. I've tried many different Load Order methods, including my own methods, but my Load Order seems kind of messed up and I'm not sure if the mods are in the right places. I followed all the instructions for each of the mods and downloaded the patches etc that they require but I'm not sure if they are all set properly in the Load Order. I also am not sure about the In-game Load Order. Does the In-game Load Order need to be sorted as well or do I need to sort my Plugins in MO2 myself without using its auto-sort button?

 

I have taken screenshots of my MO2 Load Order. From what I can see there isn't any visible warnings of conflicts. The only thing that is showing in the Notifications is Overwrites detected.

 

I do have some mods on Bethesda.net in the In-game Load Order but only 1 of them shows in the MO2 menu.

 

I do apologize for this as I'm ignorant with technical matters and never have been good with them. I've read and watched many tutorials of "How to..." over the years and never am able to remember half of it. Probably have a learning disability of some kind.

[centralia1990]

bethesda games is definitely a whole different ball game when it comes to modding

 

with that said, list your mods, so i can get a good idea on how your game is setup, so i will be able to see your load order, and to see if their is any immediate issues. as well as offer suggestionIt

Okay thank you. This is my Load Order in MO2. I gave all of the mods the names of what their Mod Home Pages are and the Patches share the same names as their original Patch File's names to make it easier too keep track of.

[centralia1990]

Load Order image #1

Edited November 4, 2019 by centralia1990

[centralia1990]

#2

Edited November 4, 2019 by centralia1990

[centralia1990]

#3

Edited November 4, 2019 by centralia1990