"Wasteland Modification Survival Guide" for installing mods in

[DavidYokosukaJapan]

Edit: I should have previewed... had to edit typos. Doh! :psyduck:

 

A modder can't spent hours upon hours checking which other mods may or may not conflict with his or her own mod. I also don't see how it's the responsibility of a mod author to make his mod work with just about every single other mod out there. Let alone that it sometimes isn't even possible to do such a thing at all. This is especially true for massive overhaul mods such as FOOK2 and FWE.

I agree that maybe modders don't have the time in the day to do all the checking, but when some modders specifically state "this mod will not work with [name of another mod] I appreciate that because proper guidance has been provided to the modder's target audience: the basic user. And when modders do take the time to make their mod compatible with the "Top 10" I think that they've "above and beyond" in terms of quality.

I say that because (and I may be wrong) when a modder gets enough fame (by basic users downloading and using mods and spreading the word) modders gain the attention of [game company] head hunters and then find employment doing something they actually love. Anyhow, before I get too much off track...

 

That's because you need patches to make them all work together well. Aside from that, you need a pretty decent computer to run those mods. All are quite taxing on your system.

And I haven't even mentioned NMC's texture pack just yet.

I was hoping a dual core AMD, 16GB DDR3, Radeon 5xxx in crossfire would be enough, but maybe it's time I upgrade my CPU. Thank you for the info... it's something for me to try. A bit of focus as it were. Appreciated :thumbsup:

For patches I've tried Remastered (just put them at the end of the load order but I probably need to create a merged patch and pop it into the load order before activating Remastered) ... but I'm fairly positive I'll eventually get it right, because I'm a fairly persistent, jammy git.

 

I know of only one mod that tells you not to use Fo3edit on it, and that mod is Remastered. The Remastered readme will also tell you that you should put Remastered below any and all other mods.

Yup that's right. I had all mods above in the load order, and then in the very bottom inserted Remastered CP esps for all mods I have that they had CPs for. And too make sure, I ran BOSS after to double check.

 

1 thing you should also take into consideration is that many of the mods that tell you to put your merged patch last have been finished long before Remastered even existed. Naturally they will simply tell you to put your merged patch last without making any mention of Remastered.

Besides, it's not the responsibility of the author of any 1 mod to make mention of what other mods recommend.

...

Regardless, the makers of such compatibility patches are usually the ones who are "right". If only because compatibility patches get made after mods are completed, not the other way around.

 

You are the first to clearly state this. From now on I'll be checking the ReadMe dates against others to try to deduce which ones have the most recent (and hopefully accurate) info. I thank you for that!

 

A layman's excuse. If you're unwilling to do some reading and the like then maybe you shouldn't even use mods at all.

Perhaps you are right. Honestly I enjoy reading but it becomes a matter of priority. Long story short is that I have two hours in the day to game and instead of spending that time trying to get the game to work, I'd rather just play the game and actually relax for those two hours. So, maybe I should just stick to FWE only, because that was stable.

 

BlackRampage, your guidance, the info, and opinions are appreciated. Thank you :)

Edited November 15, 2012 by DavidYokosukaJapan

[DavidYokosukaJapan]

Order of installation has no bearing on the stability of the game. Load order and compatibility does. It makes no difference what order the mods are installed, just the order they are loaded in the game. That is where BOSS and compatibilty patches come in. If you don't have the FO3Edit Training Manual, you will be at a loss as to how to use FO3Edit.

Konnichiwa :)

I think that what order mods are installed does have an impact on stability and here's why: some mods overwrite files that other mods have already changed, and the mods that were installed first may become unstable, even with a Merged Patch and proper load order.

For example, installing FWE overwrites weapon files, then installing EVE overwrites those, and then installing RH_Ironsights overwrites those. That could make for some messy coding and definitely, as you and others pointed out, need for compatibility patches. I believe that installing the mods that make the most changes last or near last makes for a more stable experience because of the following.

 

CASE STUDY:

Originally, I installed mods in this order: Fallout Wanderer's Edition, Mart's Mutant Mod , Paradox Ignition's Energy Visuals Enahnced, a weather mod (it was Fellout & Enhanced Weather), RH_Ironsights (PI), and others (BusWorld, DC Interiors).

 

BOSS was used to sort load order. Then FO3Edit's "automatic method" was used to create a Merged Patch which was placed last in the load order.

Running this game resulted in crashes, normally upon Fast Travel or walking through a door that required 'Load' screen, or when walking outside a "long" distance, such as from Megaton to Fort Independence. Basically, when a cell changed the likelyhood of a crash was high: usually every 5 ~ 10 minutes there was a Crash To Desktop.

 

Installed the Fallout Remastered patches next and put them *under* the Merged Patch in the load order, as directed by ReadMe's and Forum advice. Result: no change, CTDs as before.

Next installed the "Blackened" patch under the Remastered esp's ... but no change.. CTD after a few min of gameplay as usual.

 

FALLOUT 3 MOD CRASHING SOLVED

The solution was to uninstall ALL mods in FOMM and then 'delete local content' in Steam's Fallout 3 Properties menu. After that was done, uninstall FOSE and FO3edit. Then delete the Fallout 3 folder. After that, use Steam to reinstall clean.

 

Then I followed these steps:

1) Once Fallout 3 GOTY vanilla was reinstalled, I confirmed it ran ok (playtested about two hours with no CTD), then reinstalled FOSE, and FO3edit.

2) Next, installed the mods in this order: PI EVE, MMM, "other" mods (see above), FWE, PI RH_Ironsights, and then weather mod (this time it's ProjectRealityMk1).

3) Sort with BOSS.

4) Use FO3edit to make the Merged Patch and put it at the end of the load order.

5) Install Fallout Remastered patches' esps after after the merged patch.

6) Install Blackened Patch.

 

Now the game is as stable as 'normal' and with all autosaves enabled. The occasional crash occurs after hours and hours of gameplay ... just like it always has done back when I just played vanilla Steam Fallout 3.

Anyhow, hours and hours of fun in 'highly' modded Fallout 3 between CTD is an acceptable rate. I've gone through about 12 hours of gameplay over the last few days with roughly four crashes and all after a long time of playing.

I believe the key conflicts were either with FWE, EVE, and RH Ironsights, or MMM and FWE. Anyhow, now SOLVED :yes:

 

Another nice thing is that I the old savegames still worked so my Wasteland Explorer motorcycle still had it's sweet blue paint job and the saddlebags still had the 30+ Nuka-Colas, 20 something cameras, and the other 100 LBS of junk I'd collected :thumbsup:

 

Bottom line is that I am very happy that it was a simple process used to get a 'very' modded game running smoothly with very little actual 'work' (Didn't have to edit the Merged Patch for 'deconflicting' or something like that--something I've never done and don't want to do).

 

I have to say I have sincere gratitude for the participants in the Forums here for kindly sharing their knowledge, advice, and providing guidance to a layman like myself. Because of your sharing, I am able to enjoy Fallout 3 with "new vegas style hardcore mode," a vastly expanded variety of creatures inhabiting the Capital Wasteland, being able to actually aim my weapon properly with iron sights, get a thrill out of seeing my target die a "Mortal Kombat-ish" death, and then having to run for shelter when the irradiated rain begins to fall :devil:

Amazing. Simply outstanding :woot: I'll be playing this for the next year or two at least thanks to you modders and those who advised me here in the forums.

Kudos! :biggrin:

 

 

Other minor details:

 

I always use FOMM, and probably always will :thumbsup:

 

I was *so* happy I did not have to use the "manual method" for creating a MergedPatch (for that, please read Miax's Tome of FO3Edit Noir, section 4.7). The automatic method is much faster and requires almost no work. :dance: Work is for Monday thru Friday 8am to 5pm. I can't be bothered to troubleshoot or edit merged patches -- that's for modders. I'm a gamer.:wink:

 

For weather I'm using ProjectRealityMk1 this time even though I think Enhanced Weather's FX are MUCH cooler and Fellout's *dark* nighttime is better. However, ProjectRealityMk1 has a more realistic colour palette and it comes with weather already installed so... less to install, sort, etc. Overall, nice.

Have a nice day :happy:

 

 

[BlackRampage]

Project Reality eh? To be honest I never did bother to make a patch for that mod. Put it's plugin(s) below whichever of the Blackened patches you might be using. Otherwise both Remastered and Blackened will overwrite some of the changes Project Reality is bound to make in most exterior worldspaces.

 

Good to see you finally got it all to work by the way. :thumbsup: