Alert? The max number on active plugins maybe 254 not 255.

[SilverThorn12345]

The reason I say that it maybe 254 and not 255 is that Loot was showing that when I reached 255 the last plugin on its list showed being deactivated but that Vortex showed it to be active. I discovered it while troubleshooting a problem. The last couple of months I have been experimenting on what can be converted esl and what can not. What can be merged and what can not. Basivaly to see how Much I can stuff in it and still work.

 

Well a long and short of it I found out that the game let me go beyond the 255 limet without even a warning. It went to 260'sh. I first thought that the game had got corrupted after so many mod changes. I've had to restart plays at least 5 times over the last two months. Anyways a couple days it CTD which it does time to time but when I when I went I went back in I had lost all my clothes and weapons with half the construction in Sanctuary was missing. Sense it was late I decided to reload the game. The nest day I checked the saves using Resaver by Mark Fairchild, it is a GREAT program save me a lot of time. Any way it showed that instead of around 255 esp & esm's it showed 4 that's right 4. The esl count was 295 which was right but they were saved which is probably why half my stuff still showed up when I went back in the game.

 

I think I figured out that the game was loading the mods but it would not save anything or half anything that was done in game. You could save and with no problem until you checked the save in ReSave. I duplicated the problem easily after realized what had happened. A couple plugins did not get deleted when I removed them earlier, that's the problems with Vortex not deleting plugins all the time. But it also helped with how it tracks plugins by installation time.

 

I played again with 254 esp & esm and 295 esl with no problem.

 

The Long and short be careful when geting around the max plugins the game may not warn you and you could spend hours in it thinking you saved when you did not.

[HadToRegister]

That's because the count to 255 starts at 0

So it's not 1 - 255

It's 0 - 254

 

I would convert to ESPfe, instead of ESL

Because with ESPfe you get the benefit of not using an ESP slot, PLUS you can sort it, something you can't do with an ESL

[G4M3W1NN3R]

@OP

 

it is 254 ESP or ESM limit because Fallout4.ESM is 1 of them. which absolutely every single ESP and ESM require. without Fallout4.ESM, the game will no longer work, let alone mods or DLC.

So Fallout4.ESM = 1 ESM, you can have 254 more ESP or ESM on top of that, resulting in 255. the game however does not like 255 active ESP or ESM files, 254 Active ESP or ESM files is much better, as such class 254 as the Actual Limit.

the game will work with 255 Active ESP and Or ESM files, but it will indeed be less stable then 254. but it will work.

Heres an Analogy: On a Stereo System you Have Max Volume, now while you can Keep Your System At Max Volume, this will eventually blow up the speakers, pretty quickly, its the same situation as Running the Maximum 255 Active ESP and or ESM files in Fallout 4, it will eventually destroy the game, where as running 254 Active Mods is less likely, just as having the Stereo A notch Below Max Volume, is less likely to blow up the speakers.

[StormWolf01]

ESPfe. This was a new term for me. I had to look that up. So it's a esl file, marked as an esp. No count against mod limit, and will still allow you to organize it in your mod list. Really cool!

The one thing I didn't find.... which one of those in the list, is that, in xedit, when you're saving your new file?

 

Edit- k, I stand corrected. Bad advice removed from post. Thanks Much, Gamewinner.

Edited November 6, 2019 by StormWolf01

[G4M3W1NN3R]

ESPfe. This was a new term for me. I had to look that up. So it's a esl file, marked as an esp. No count against mod limit, and will still allow you to organize it in your mod list. Really cool!

The one thing I didn't find.... which one of those in the list, is that, in xedit, when you're saving your new file?

 

Edit- oops, forgot the second part of my post.

 

To further Gamewinner's analogy, with the stereo speakers.

Throwing in multiple levels of equalizers into your stereo system really doesn't do anything to "Boost" the output, per se. Therefore, it has less chance of causing them blow out. So, if say you are merging/combining your mods, you're basically throwing in an EQ (following the lines of the example given).

 

I haven't done a whole lot of merges yet. Mostly just adding in stuff like DLC when the author doesn't release an all in one. I do remember that Morrowind (Yes, that's the last Beth game I played until my FO4 addiction got started) got kinda touchy if you tried to pack too many merged mods into one .esp file.

Is Fallout 4 like that too?

 

Merging mods is Not Recommended at all, Due to Load Order and Form Ids being the immediate issue, merging can cause a lot of issues, as you are potentially ignoring Load Order Priority and Potentially Creating Conflicts within a Mod Itself, which then makes conflict resolution more complex, depending on how many mods you have merged.

 

Leveled Lists are the only things that should be merged. and the only thing that does that is Wrye Bash, Patch, which is and should always be the very last mod in the load order.

 

when you remove a mod in an active playthrough you mess up the Form Ids and Immediately Changes the Load Order Priority, which is why you run into issues, similar to how removing scripted mods corrupts the saved game, as the game still tries to load the now orphaned script,

 

this is why the game warns you when a mod has been deleted

 

Load Order, and Saved Games are 2 of the most important things to Game Stability. Removing mods means you are messing with load order, which means you create issues with the game. It is never safe to remove any mod regardless of what it does in an active playthrough, whether it is a scripted mod or not (its just considerably more dangerous when the mod is scripted, due to permanent damage).

whatever the mod you removed does, determines how serious the outcome will be.

 

Merging Mods Together is essentially the same as removing mods in an Active Playthrough, due to Messing up the Form Ids, which is what both Merging, and Removing mods in an active playthrough do.

 

Merging Different Types of Mods Together, is also messing with the Load Order, and Potentially Creating Mod Conflicts

 

Merging the Same Types of Mods is less risky, but still capable of causing issues.

 

the Maximum ESP and ESM mod limit, is not the only limitation, this game has many limitations, by merging mods you will start stepping into other limitations territory, which translates to Game Stability.

 

 

Simply put, Merging mods is ignoring the Warning Sign (ESP and ESM Hard Limitation, Load Order, Mod Conflicts), and Stepping into a Mine Field (Game Stability).

[StormWolf01]

Gamewinner- Oh, wow.

Ok, after thinking through the points you've made, I can most definitely see your logic. Especially in consideration in regards to how the game sets ID numbers per the mod's placement in the LO. I appreciate you setting me straight on that, and removed my bad advice from my original (actually....I guess it was my "edited" post, LOL) post.

Again, thank you for the good advice, and again....this is why I'm glad we have you around in our section of the Nexus ;)

[G4M3W1NN3R]

welcome :smile:

 

i have tested massive merge files back in the oldrim days (strictly for testing game stability, to see how much it can truly handle), where i was running 800+ active mods, all merged into a few ESP files, and the while it did work, as i could see every single 1 of those mods ingame, the game was extremely unstable, as i blatantly hit an engine limitation. and as such Fallout 4 and Skyrim SE being slightly better versions of the same old engine, i still cant imagine it will handle mods over 254. which is primarily why i strongly suggest against merging. with the exception of leveled lists, since merging them is actually a very good idea and will defintely help with game stability.

[StormWolf01]

Yeah, it's been over a decade since I've played a Beth game. Way back when the (God, I can't even remember the name now) Morrowind site that Slof was really active on, was the place to go relating to Morrowind mods. It's sad on Beth's part that they haven't updated to a newer, better engine. But, at the same time, most of our tools are still working, or only need slight updates. So that works in everybody's favor. We can still keep modding. (And still keep fixing Beth's bugs!)

Heh, now that I think back on it, I think I made a royal mess of my (MW) game when I tried to merge 3 armor mods together, and a bunch of npc mods together, both in seperate esp files, of course.

I do gotta say tho, in comparison, the old MW GECK was a whooooole lot easier than this new CK. I open it, and that's about as far as I can get. Even watching tutes.

 

Ahhhh, I'm derailing the thread. Apologies OP!

Back on topic, your advice is always well taken Gamewinner.

[niston]

If removal of a scripted mod is 'bad' in fact depends on how the scripts were written. Anything latent running will get baked into the save and may cause hard trouble if the underlying mod is removed. But a skilled coder may actually exploit this behavior to make for example an auto-uninstall script.

[BlazeStryker]

I still recall the chaos of merged mods in my Skyrim builds, so I well feel your pain, 'winner. Thanks for caring about us.