K, I'm trying my best to do things properly, but I tend to go on these download crazy binges where I will downloads tons of mods at once, doing my best to read through the descriptions to avoid conflicts, of course a lot of this is difficult to know without playtesting.

So here I am, with literally 200+ archives in Zip, Rar, and 7z, some manual install, some in .omod format, some that are .omod conversion read, and so on..... I have companion mods, game balancing mods, small tweaks, quest mods, housing mods (lots of em), body replacer mods, new items (mostly armors), and lots of other things, pretty much a bit of everything!

I downloaded OBSE (required for the mods), OBMM, and Wrye Bash, but I have no idea how to use those two programs. In the past I simply installed by doing a "structure recreation", where I just unzip EVERYTHING, and then put everything where it's supposed to go as it would be in the data files, then just copy it over.

But then there's other issues, load orders, conflicts, dependencies, and all sorts of things like that so... I am wondering, how do I turn this huge mess of archives and installers into an easier task that I can get into my game without spending days running trial and error with a manual install. Should I create a .omod file for all 200 of these? (granted some of the archives are patches or multiple parts to other mods but there's still LOTS of unique mods here). Also do I clean them with Wrye Bash after finishing with the install and going through OBMM?

I've read some guides for installing mods, but they usually assume you do it one at a time, and aren't trying to throw in this many mods at once.

See this sentence? If you do exactly that and then zip that into an archive for each mod, that's a simple BAIN archive. Drop it in the Bash Installers directory (which will be created by Wrye Bash the first time you activate the Installers tab), and you have a way to install and uninstall that mod completely and cleanly (still a bit of reading to do in the Wrye Bash docs for specifics and good practices, though).

If you were able to create that structure correctly in the past, then you are well set up for creating BAIN archives and making your life a lot simpler.

Add BOSS, and your life gets even simpler.

Add in the fact that many complex mods already come as "BAIN ready archives" (the above structuring is pre-done for you), or OMOD ready archives and you're good to go.

Just remember. Work on one mod at a time, and make a BAIN archive out of each one. Then you can use BAIN to handle the actual installing and uninstalling and have maximum control.

There's a reason those guides tell you to do things one at a time.

I recently updated the mods on my gaming pc so that I could go back to enjoying Oblivion, and where previously was a stable game, merely upgrading old packages, not even anything complicated like FCOM, ended up being a relatively messed up game, with landscape tears all over, and dodgy scripting, etc. This all on a brand new character. The point is that even if you have a stable system, changing even just a small bit of it can result in all sorts of trouble if you don't take enough care, which is what happened in my case, with me missing small but crucial install steps. Take things slowly and you'll be thankful later.

EDIT: I agree with Showler on BAIN. The vast majority of mods are distributed in a form that can be installed straight away in BAIN, making pre-installation preparations almost non-existent, and actual installation and removal a piece of cake.

It'll require a slight tweak, as usually I drop all the mods together, but I can just do one at a time, would it be okay to put more than one ESP in a BAIN? Like if I have a body replacer, and a patch for it, could I put them together instead of doing them separate?

With this method I'm assuming I wouldn't even use OBMM for anything except the .omod files since Wrye would install them for me?

I don't plan on just "dumping them all in", I want to do it right, but I don't want to have to stop and go playtest the game for every single addition I add, I'd rather do (the slightly more complex) it where I have everything installed, then check them (basic stuff like making sure there's no land tears or missing textures or clipping issues). I've already made a list of all the areas that each mod claims to affect so i can go check those areas, and make sure that I'm not experiencing any major conflict problems.

Yes, you can have as many plugins as you like in an archive. Another way to deal with patches is to have an archive for the mod, and another which contains all its patches. I do this with the ULs, so I've got:

Unique Landscapes.7z: contains the various ULs in separate subfolders which are just the download archive names for them.
Unique Landscapes Compatibility Patches.7z: contains the various patches that I need to use my other mods with the ULs, all in separate named subfolders the same way as above.

This means that I don't need to alter the UL package much, which is good since it's pretty big, and changing which patches I've got installed can be done pretty quickly.

As for OBMM, you only really need to use it for mods that are only available as OMODs.

EDIT: Reply to above: Oh, that's ok. I only playtest after everything's installed too. Then if you find a problem, you just deselect stuff until you find the culprit, which is a lot faster.

Multiple ESPs are fine, as you can select which ESPs/ESMs to install when activating the BAIN archive.

Once you get started, you can also make "complex" BAIN archives, which are incredibly flexible. You'll likely end up downloading a couple of "BAIN ready archives" in the complex format so you can study how they are structured.

Aozgolo-

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1084204-bain-mod-installation-projects/.

Check out http://sites.google.com/site/oblivionpoinfo/ too.

Or you include Refscope as part of your arsenal and then you don't need to even leave the game to identify the culprit