Potential new utility for merges and large load orders. Anyone interested?

[HadToRegister]

This looks really interesting - too bad about it not working with NMM though :D I keep hoping Bethesda may in the future remove the darn 256 plugin limit with the switch to x64 now instead of x32... but we'll see.

 

 

If you're playing Skyrim Special Edition, and use Vortex, you can have Vortex convert a LOT of your ESPs to ESLs, I have 386 mods in Skyrim SE right now

[VulcanTourist]

I worked my way up to just shy of 700 mods using Vortex and SSEEdit to lighten things, but then I hit the wall of my abilities. I didn't want to make sacrifices, so I just quit playing. That's why I need this tool fully functional!

 

 

 

This looks really interesting - too bad about it not working with NMM though :D I keep hoping Bethesda may in the future remove the darn 256 plugin limit with the switch to x64 now instead of x32... but we'll see.

That will never happen with TESV, because it doesn't selfishly benefit Bethesda. The ONLY reason they released SSE was to (a) integrate the Creation Club directly into the game and (b) convert the game to a more stable 64-bit platform to support those paid mods. They've already created the FE plugin index space to support more mods; doing the significant rework to fully eliminate the plugin limit doesn't benefit Bethesda because no one would ever buy enough mods from CC to make that limit an issue and they couldn't give a flying f*** about use of mods that didn't benefit them.

Edited August 23, 2021 by VulcanTourist

[primem0ver]

As an FYI,I recently tried to experiment with zMerge again and found what I needed. I am moving the utility from Merge Plugins to zMerge since zMerge now saves information about the mods belonging to a built/planned merge. That was all I needed to do the switch. So zMerge will now be necessary rather than Merge Plugins. This is good news as it is the more up-to-date utility. You will be able to create zMerge sets with my utility in addition to using zMerge itself. zMerge however will be needed to actually do the merge.

[primem0ver]

Just a side note: I am using the utility to build my first SE mod set. (That is how I am testing it and figuring out all the ins and outs). I am building two semi-different mod sets that I plan on using with different characters. One has a size of nearly 1400 mods; the other over 2000. (LOL... hopefully that second won't overwhelm my processing power). I have converted a majority of the ESL capable mods to ESLs and now have over 800 ESLs. I did it slowly, small groups at a time to test for bugs and problems. Adding the total time for 400+ conversions is less that 2 minutes.

[VulcanTourist]

Have you released this publicly anywhere yet? Is it still a WIP per the tag on this thread?

[primem0ver]

It is still a WIP... but I should be releasing it by the end of this month or next. I want to make sure it will actually do what it is meant to do first. As I mentioned in my previous post, I am building my first SE game load order in order to flesh out and test its functionality. I have about 4-5 things left to do. I am guessing each of these tasks will take a week or two; though I believe 1 will be finished by this weekend.

1. Finish its Merge tracking functionality (almost finished).
2. Attempt to create a way to quickly and successfully convert esl mod clusters (convert mods to esls which serve as a master to other mods... the dependencies must also be converted along with the master). The main interface doesn't allow this because of its potential complexity of issues. The necessary functionality is already there but dealing with potential issues is another problem altogether.
3. Clean up annoying non-critical bugs that I have been ignoring in order to get the main functionality done (I miss actually playing Skyrim... lol)
4. (Make it more compatible with Original Skyrim).
5. Build the installer and configuration utility.

Edited September 2, 2021 by primem0ver

[VulcanTourist]

I can't help with the programming or indeed with much of the testing, but if you need "another set of eyes", a computer with a different environment, for a test here and there, I can probably oblige.

 

I am eager to let the finished product loose on my languishing mod list and see what it can do to pull me back under the plugin limit.

[primem0ver]

Update:

Release is taking significantly longer than expected for one simple reason: I have NEVER EVER cleaned mods before except for major errors that didn't allow merges. I suppose I was missing out on the advantages of an important step but zMerge crashes with mods with significant errors unlike Merge Plugins. I am hoping that is a good sign since it is checking for objects that don't exist, hence crashing. However, it made me stop and clean ALL my mods that I could.

 

The benefit of this is that I have added TWO new utilities to help streamline the cleaning process. I hope to post a rough version around thanksgiving. It shortens the process by a significant amount of time. Still... fixing the errors for almost 200 mods that I didn't create has taken me roughly 10-15 hours of my time (which I didn't have a lot of this last month).

 

@VulcanTourist. I am not sure how easy it would be to give you the raw program. I don't have an installer yet (coming....) and the software needs A LOT of path data in order to work properly (which is set by the installer/functionality I haven't added yet). If you can manually put these in yourself, then it might work.

Edited October 17, 2021 by primem0ver

[Deleted120957248User]

I personally only tinkered with Wrye Bash and zEdit. But such a tool would be Godsend.

The time though... To Programm it...Phew. Even a Tutorial Would take a while.

Edited October 17, 2021 by Guest

[VulcanTourist]

@VulcanTourist. I am not sure how easy it would be to give you the raw program. I don't have an installer yet (coming....) and the software needs A LOT of path data in order to work properly (which is set by the installer/functionality I haven't added yet). If you can manually put these in yourself, then it might work.

It's the intention that counts! I can wait... I'll spend the time butting my head against the broken Windows UWP system - did you know that Nvidia Control Panel is now a UWP app? - and the myriad of real-world stuff that doesn't work.