Here's the basic problem. In building my new game I have reached the 254 slot limit, and still have mods I wish to add. One possible solution would be to learn what mods I can safely merge. In my reading on this subject, it seems tweaks qualify as some of the easier and safest. However, my reading also indicates much can go wrong in the hands of a non tech user such as myself.

So...I'm seeking the assistance and advice of the tech savvy and or experienced mergers on the forum.

What specific tweak mods have you merged, and would you please list them?

It occurs to me this post might also serve as a guide to good tweak mods I and others may have overlooked.

I made myself a "Tweaks Collection" .esp for my current game. The tweak mods I merged are: Less Creepy Guild Porters, VagabondAngel's Gold, Slower Run Speed (an older tweak mod of my own), SleepRestAnytime, Chase Camera Mod, No Load, No Psychic Guards, Regrowing Nirnroot, Louder Nirnroot, Timescale, Less Fog Underwater, Less NPC Conversations and Shorter Greet Distance (another personal mod that lowers the chance of NPCs greeting the player as the player passes).

I greatly dislike automation in life as well as in software so I merged these tweaks manually, reproducing by hand the changes made by each mod in my merged .esp.

Here is an edited private message I sent to a fellow forum user posted for others to see (even though normally I'm pretty much a stickler for using he official threads for everything).

Well first this is where I learned about merging:
http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/898653-a-guide-to-merging-with-tesivgecko/
http://www.gamesas.com/?showtopic=1068317
As well as asking a lot of questions of my gurus on this Vorians and Arthmoor.

Basically the idea is to not merge mods that conflict with each other or that need to be separate. You can run conflict filter in TES4edit to see if two (or more) mods conflict - if you see no red then you should be OK. If two mods affect the same cell (internal or worldspace) then it won't work. There may be also issues with mods that have the same scripts but Gecko does offer at least some options with that.

Arthmoor warns a lot about not merging landscape mods (as tempting and as many as they are) due to things at times being permanently stored in the save game file. I'd urge any reading this to read a few UL threads and see how often the request to merge them comes up and their very valid reasons not to.

Other concerns are that mods which are the masters of other mods usually need to be left as they are for them to continue working as masters. Then also be mindful of mods that are updated often as that would mean remerging often. I tend to focus on single purpose mods that are not updated often and touch very little of the worldspace and cells. Think about how annoying it would be to merge houses, move into one with all your stuff, then find a fatal error. Or quest mods where you get done with most of a mod to find a fatal error that occured from merging. The goal is to either merge mods that leave no legacy anyway or mods that you won't update often if at all.

Yes you can merge mods with ini - just make sure to package them too in the final result.

So that leaves mods that don't conflict, mods that are not often updated, and mods that are simpler in their nature. Script run mods some of the best I've found.

I've known others who merge all mods to be merged into one giant mod. I prefer not to merge all into one esp as it makes it harder to track down errors. On the other hand Petrus is way more thorough taking weeks to months to set up a game before he plays, so he knows what he is doing. I like to dive in more so I need to keep the errors to a minimum so I take the theme mods approach and merge mods with the same theme together. Ready? Here goes - these are the current success stories with merging:
UI Mods Merged:
Home Care Mods Merged:Game Tweaks Merged:
Stealth Mods Merged:
I Probably will be doing a magic tweaks, alchemy tweaks, and combat tweaks merger soon too. I've done them in the past but not satisfied.

Dialogues and Messages Merged:

Environment mods Merged:

Now this next set is more difficult to master and some editing was required (but I forgot what on some of them).
Dungeon Mods Merged:SI Dungeon Mods Merged:
Tamriel Houses Merged:SI Houses Merged:With dungeons and houses you've got to make sure that they don't conflict with other mods as well because if anything goes wrong then you are going to have to remove it - and that can mean loss of quests, moving out of a house (I hate moving). The Tamriel Houses mod really is a bit over the top and I had to keep a list of mods it does conflict with - so I recommend only a few. What I look for in houses is Not free, Not bought, but earned.

That is more intermediate stuff. Advanced is actually modding altogether.

Other options to consider.

Merging an esp to its parent esp/esm
Merging esp to esm is possible but tricky. No don't merge to Oblivion.esm. Using Gecko convert the parent to an esm (if it isn't already), then merge to master, The resulting plugin will be an esm so convert back to esp if that is what they both were to start with.

Mod Cleaning
Also a good idea to clean mods before merging and check again after merging.

Setting Merge Priority
Priority means what mod do you want to have priority if they both touch the same thing. Them touching the same thing may be bad for landcapes and cells but not so much game settings. If they do not conflict at all then it is fine to set all to 1.

Load Order
I merge them by theme. So the dungeon mods or house mods will go in that section, Game tweaks loading later, UI and Home care mods earlier. Just look at where the merged mods are in the load order then guesstimate.

Bash Tags
Likewise look at what BOSS says for the individual mods and be wary that adding tags will mean the same for all mods tagged. A few instances I just live without the tag but mostly I avoid merging mods that require a lot of tagging.

Packaging
I'd suggest packing all the resources for the new mod together - including meshes, textures, and mutliple ini if needed. This will eliminate the need for long term watching of what mod resources are installed and in what order. I do not recommend OBMM for this level of complex resource watching. BAIN is best.

That should kick this off to a good start.
Though Pseron is right hand merging is more thorough - if you have the know how.

@ Pseron

Thanx for the response and the tips. You've a couple of tweaks there I'll have to check out. Sure wish I had the skills to hand merge, but just learning the basics of Gecko will be a big step for me.

@ Psymon

I really appreciate the thoroughness and effort put into your response. I have already read both threads you posted although not recently, and will reread them again now.

Being able to see the specific mods you have successfully merged is really helpful.

Using the TES4edit conflict filter is something I know I've read about before, but had forgotten. Thanks for the reminder.

Four of your merges in particular seem most relevant to my game: UI Mods Merged, Game Tweaks Merged, Dialogues and Messages Merged, and Environment mods Merged.

Rather than jumping in right now, I'll reread those threads, get some sleep :sleep2: , and get on the Gecko tomorrow.

Edit. @ those reading the thread.

I'm still interested in hearing about other peoples successful merges, as well as favorite tweak mods whether merged or not.

Hi Psymon,

I'd like to merge MannimarcoRevisited.esp with MannimarcoRevisitedOOO.esp, its compatibility patch.

You warn against merging conflicting mods, and the two are conflicting indeed..

But wouldn't be enough just to set the first one with 1 priority, and the patch with 2?

Sorry if this has been answered before, and thanks!

I would just crack open tes4edit and import the changes over from the OOO patch. Been a while since I looked at the OOO patch but I recall it being pretty simple. My FCOM game has no mage guild extensions, so I won't be needing it.