There is a serious Issue for most of the mods that want to rely on assets of The DLCs .

The reason of Creating an ESM mod is mainly because the CK cannot handle large amounts of data for an esp and after reaching over 3.5 gb of ram memory it crashes .

Creating an ESM file with Version control fixes this issue keeping the data memory load lower .

The problem arises when someone wants to include in their mod resources from other DLCS like Dawnguard , Dragonborn etc .

Because so far Version Control doesn't allow toload more than 2 esms as dependencies of your own esm .

This means that the big mods that want to use things from the above mentioned expansions can't do it and are limited to Skyrim and Update esms ....



A solution needs to be taken there as this is refraning many mods from use of the expansions resources because of this issue with the ck ..... mods like mine ( issgard ) or beyond skyrim project surely need the possibility to load those resources .

Some may betempted to go the other way around like Including resources nevertheless in their own esms files but as long as I know this woudl be illegal move ....

So if Bethesda is not going to fix it , some other tool creator perhaps would ?

Why not make esp addons with the DLC content you want to use then merge them in later?

What are you trying to do that maxes out the memory? Only think i can think of is generating something.

well the problem is that if you want to use DLC assets , you may want to implement them into the design of your mod world , perhaps trees, perhaps buildings , perhaps gameplay elements like the Lycantropy tree or perhaps Vampire stuff etc ... those things cannot be just implemented later as add on but need to be at the base of the md you are building.

When you work on an esp , if the mod is little then there is no problem , but when the mod is large , and includes lots of assets , items , pleople , npcs , weapons , etc etc etc .... the file size occupied by the Esp gets huge , especially when you edit cells of your own worldspace , the more you add to the world the more it increases the esp memory usage . the only way to avoid that is to turn the esp into an esm and or merge subsequent esps add on you do into the base esm of your mod ...

The problem so is that since version control cannot handle more than 2 esms ( skyrim and update woudl be the base ones used ) there is no way at the moment to include dependency on DLC mods ...

now even if a tool allows to create a dependency of the esm from the DLCs , the problem is that Version control won't work with the esm anymore ...

The best solution would be an official fix ...

If you include them all as masters before you convert to esm, there's no problem.

what?

After Tesannwyn creates the esp, load it into the CK and select all the esm files that you want as masters. Save the esp and then convert it to an esm. All the master files that you selected will carry over to the esm....or just add them with TesVedit.

and then how do you do to load the esm in version control ? Version control does't load more than 2 esms dependancies for one esm.

I was sure I had done this before, so i tried it again.
Loaded up an old backup of an esp (it already had Skyrim.esp and Update.esp as masters). Set it to active and put a cross at Dawnguard.esm as well (esp now has 3 masters). Loaded up the backup.esp in the CK an saved. Quit the CK.
Re-named backup.esp to Test.esm and loaded up CK. Converted Test.esm (it's still an esp at this stage) to Test.esm (proper master file). Quit CK.
Copied Test.esm to Merging\Data\
Started CK and put a cross at Test.esm (Right hand side shows 3 masters - Skyrim, Update and Dawnguard esm's)
Loaded Test.esm into CK and updated bit arrays for Test.esm.
Selected save and entered Test.esp as the new esp name. Quit CK.
Started CK and selected Test.esp as active (Test.esp now has 4 master files - Skyrim, Update, Dawnguard and Test.esm)
Loaded Test.esp into CK and moved some statics in Test.esm worldspace.
Opened Version Control and merged the changes into Test.esm. (got message - read warning.txt)
Quit CK.
Opened warning.txt - "MASTERFILE: File index 3 is invalid. Clamping to 02. Does a master file depend on more than two masters?"
This doesn't matter 02 is Dawnguard, but I'm not altering anything in Dawnguard.esm. I't's only included so that the mod can use its assets.
Loaded up Test.esp and checked that the statics had been moved and merged correctly. They were.
Test.esm still has 3 masters

What more can I say?

Please take a look at this...

http://www.darkcreations.org/forums/topic/3242-how-to-overcome-the-limitation-of-max-2-esms/page-2#entry138981

Also

Have you actually tried to use dawnguard assets and save them ? As Morcroft pointed out in another thread

OK, so i put some towers from Dawnguard into the Test esm. They show up without any problem, both in the CK and in the game.

I read through the whole post that you mentioned. I think the only time that problems will arise is if you are using more than 1 DLC.
With Dawnguard alone (like I have), there will be no problem. With Dragonborn alone, there will be no problem. If you have both Dawnguard and Dragonborn as masters, then problems could arise.

The way around this is to duplicate any statics that you are going to use and then place the duplicates in your worldspace. The duplicates will have their form IDs changed from 02xxxxxx or 03xxxxxx to 04xxxxxx. This also means that once duplcated into your mod, you can actually remove the master as a dependancy, as it's no longer required. The object is created/stored in your esm with a new ID.

Of course, you still have the problem that folk without the DLC can load the mod, but all the DLC content will not show.

Mot sure if I follow ... But did u load skyrim and dawnguard?

Because I already said it can load only skyrim and one dlc in particular the update one so slots are filled...

So we are back at the beginning I guess...


A bug to be solved somehow?

I loaded Skyrim.esm, Update.esm, Dawnguard.esm, Test.esm and Test.esp.
Skyrim.esm, Update.esm, Dawnguard.esm and Test.esm are all masters to Test.esp
Skyrim.esm, Update.esm and Dawnguard.esm are all masters to Test.esm.

The CK writes an error about 02. The 02 is Dawnguard (00 - Skyrim.esm, 01 - Update.esm)
If I had Dragonborn loaded, it would be 03. However, if I wanted to use Dragonborn statics, they would get saved with an 02 prefix, not 03. This would make the game look in Dawnguard.esm (02) for Dragonborn statics.(03)

The way round this is
1)Once merged, manually change all the Dragonborn assets back to 03 (using TESVedit)...or...
2)Duplicate the Dragonborn statics and place the duplicates in your worldspace. They will now merge with the 04 prefix and do not rely on Dragonborn being a master, so you can remove it from the masters list.

how can you remove if many opbjects requre multiple links to other stats windows? just hink of armors , they ahve several windows links ... or properties like Lycantropy tree ...

I said you "can" remove it from the master list. I didn't say you "have to" remove it.
If the statics are duplicated, the duplicates are then part of your mod. They are not tied to Dragonborn in any way, shape or form, although they still need the Dragonborn.bsa to be installed.

The original statics remain part of Dragonborn.esm, not the duplicates.
Your (duplicated) statics will have an ID 04xxxxxx the identical Dragonborn statics will have the ID 03xxxxxx

Here's an example.
I place a Dragonborn (03) static in my worldspace. It has the ID 03111111. If I save and merge, the ID will get capped at 02. The static will now be saved as 02111111. The game will read the ID (02111111) and look in Dawnguard (02) for 02111111, which may or may not exist. This will result in either the wrong static being displayed, or, most likely a crash.

on the other hand,

If I duplicate a Dragonborn (03) static and place the duplicate it in my worldspace, the duplicate will have the ID 04111111. If I save and merge, the static will now be saved as 04111111. The game will read the ID (04111111) and look in MyMod.esm (04) for 04111111, which does exist. This will result in the static being displayed.

I don't think I can explain it any simpler than that.

Like TamboO said, duplicate the records you need from DLCs in your plugin.
Want to use that new static object from Dragonborn? Create a new one, and point it to the mesh from Dragonborn. Repeat for all the records you need, the easiest way is to "Copy as new" in TES5Edit. Statics, armors, weathers, imagespaces, just everything can be duplicated in your own plugin.
That way your plugin will be implicitly dependent on DLCs requiring their assets (models, textures, sounds) but not explicitly as a master files. Unless you need to put something in Dragonborn or Dawnguard worldspaces, add dialogs to their NPCs or similar stuff, there is no point in having them as masters at all.