Right...I uncompress everything. Mostly because I didn't originally know I could keep them compressed though.

I didn't even know you could re-order mods this way until today, so that section really deserves a re-write.

But re-ordering dosen't solve the problem of wanting 1/2 of one mod's textures and 1/2 of the other one. You'd still have to manually trim stuff from the higher-ordered one so that it didn't overwrite what you wanted to keep from the lower order one.

I don't understand how mlox's Load Order control ties into Install Order at all, but you are the second person talking about mlox in relation to Install Order. Is there a feature of mlox I'm missing?

I seem to remember the "Order" header being covered up by the other headers when I first installed the program (its been a while since I did this, so my memory is hazy), and not seeing it until I readjusted the other header sizes. Wondering if perhaps this is why some people miss this feature.


I see your point. The ability to micromanage at this level would really be the icing on the cake.

I cleaned it up quite a bit. You're right about the Order header. I didn't know it was there until earlier this week when I "stumbled" onto it when I resized something. That's what trigger my entire experience! (I've noted that in the text)

It doesn't.

The thing is, I see others in this thread thinking you are talking about install order and load order, even though you've tried to clarify which you're talking about. It seems that "order" usually means "load order" to people.

So I only meant to suggest that if you did want to round the guide out to include both types of ordering, it's pretty simple. However, as install order is often neglected, I can certainly see that you might want to keep the tutorial focused on it alone.

Thanks for putting together the info. It's inspired me to take another look at Wrye Mash. Some of the things you've explained raise questions for me.

How did you get the Installer to use your "Mods" folder? On my pc, it seems hard-wired to open only in the "Installers" folder; I'm using Wrye Mash ver 84 on WinXP, SP 3 btw.

I've started doing sort of what Blouge said - d/l all to a folder, clean, standardize and rezip and move the .zip file to the Installer folder. In Wrye Mash, most of the files display the red square indicating missing files, but most of the time the missing files are the readmes, even though I can find them in the zip file. Where am I going wrong? My archive procedure was to unzip the mod to check what was in it, move the readme to the mod's data folder, click down to the data folder and then use Win XP's zip file function to zip all of the files in that folder into one .zip file. And this also occurs on zipped files prepared by the modder with no changes by me.

I'm still fuzzy on the difference between load order and install order as far as the terms are used. But that can be due to my lack of knowledge about the esm/esp files and associated files that a modder packages to go with them. I had assumed that the majority of the mods out there provide their own textures, meshes and whatnot to be copied (intstalled) into the game's folders and the esm/esp file in part instructs the game to substitute the use of the mods' files for those of the game's files but the mod does not delete the game's files. This makes sense to me because it makes swapping mods in and out easy, though there still would be the case where two or more mods conflict because they all target the same game files; if I understand that process correctly, that is where mlox enters into the discussion about order.

On the other hand, there are mods that overwrite game files; you mention textures as an example. Does Wrye Mash keep track of the files that those mods target for overwriting and make a backup in order to restore them if you decide you want to revert, or is it just reporting that the mod will overwrite such and such file(s). I haven't gotten that far to try, but it sounds great if it does. It seems though like there are other mods that I would consider ill-behaved; they simply overwrite game files and don't back up those files should you want to remove the mod. Does Wrye Mash address that problem?

WRT those pesky executable files, there is one mod I had discovered years ago and continue using called Wilderness Sounds 3.0. Its readme notes that it has merged bcsounds and the master index into it and that it replaces some of the game files. Wrye Mash reports that bcsounds is missing. I tried using the Unextractor utility mentioned in an earlier post without success. Will Wrye Mash still be useable if I go ahead and install the mod?

Would it make sense to use Wrye Mash for complicated (huge) mods and otherwise place those mods that have only an esp file and readme file into the game without using Wrye Mash?

Thanks,

John

It's a good guide - thanks for doing it - personally i still use the old version and create a folder called replacers - dump in all my texture mods and then right click on wrye mash and tick the replacers i want to use - if i don't want them any more i just un-tick them - which seems pretty simple to me

>Does Wrye Mash keep track of the files that those mods target for overwriting and make a backup in order to restore them if you decide you want to revert

Yes, when you uninstall an installer, Wrye Mash will automatically "anneal" the other installers and restore the correct files.

>Would it make sense to use Wrye Mash for complicated (huge) mods and otherwise place those mods that have only an esp file and readme file into the game without using Wrye Mash?

That could work, but why make things more complicated? For example, to remove such a mod, you'd have to remember which files were installed and then somehow check to make sure the files aren't actually overwritten by an Installer before deleting them. Using Installers for everything - even mods with a single esp file - is simpler in the long run.

>In Wrye Mash, most of the files display the red square indicating missing files

Hmm.. that's weird. Most downloaded archives won't work as-is, as most aren't structured correctly for Wrye Mash. It sounds like you are making your archives correctly - you
should not have Data Files directory in your archives, usually it's only txt/esp files and directories like Meshes or Textures. When I copy a new archive into Morrowind\Installers,
I see a pink square in Wrye Mash until I right-click and choose Install. I'm not sure why you are seeing red squares. Also, note that any readme files like txt/rtf/doc/html automatically
get placed in Data Files\Docs when you choose to Install.

> personally i still use the old version and create a folder called replacers

I think the replacers are an obsolete feature. Installers can do anything that replacers can do.

There is a standalone version of Mash, released by a third party last year, that adds the ability to change the installation path of your installers folder.


When BAIN indicates missing files, it means they are missing from the actual game installation folders, not from your .zip/archive file. Its reporting that some files that are in your install package are not where they should be inside your data files folders according to how it thinks the files should be installed. So if BAIN doesn't see the readme in the Docs folder (which is in your Date Files folder) it will count it as not installed. If you right click on the package and choose "Install Missing" it should resolve your problem in these cases. Also, BAIN can detect a readme file most anywhere in a package so normally you don't have to move it when you repackage. Another nice thing it does is rename the readme if its just a generic name like "Readme", adding the mod name to it before sweeping it into the Docs folder.


Sounds like you pretty much have the gist of it.


Just to be clear here - mods can't actually delete game files since game files are safely tucked away in bsa files. But since an installed texture replacer continues to gain preference over the original game file until it is removed from the data files folders, Mash/Bain shines in managing this process, as you indicate. But Wrye Mash doesn't need to actually backup the original files since the original files are never deleted.


I must be luckier than you. Although it sometimes feels that I most often have to repackage a downloaded mod, in actuality, I did a count of over 250 packages on my list and I only had to repackage about 15 - 20 % of them. Most, in my experience, have a structure that BAIN will immediately recognize. And that includes my repackaging to include easy install of optional esps/files etc.

I don't use the Python version, I use the standalone. It allows me to change my directory



The major difference is install order can cause files to never be available to the game engine, even by changing the load order. If you install mod A and then mod B, both of which change the exact same game texture, mod B's texture will forever be used by the engine unless you re-install the textures. But if mod A and B both modified game data, say the price of a sword, switching them around in load order would cause the last of them to load to affect the price.



I'd say if you are going to use Wrye Mash at all, you'd want to commit fully.

The replacers piece still works, but I didn't like it at all. It doesn't solve the install issue when a modder has decided to modify a high level texture (say, imperial housing walls) and include it in his mod for whatever reason. You use your replacer tab to setup your nice texture packs and then you install the mod and never know that you've lost your house texture because the modder did what he did.

Please don't get me wrong - your guide is great - I'm just saying that on the old version replacers was an easy method - I happen to be a bit OCD with textures and use a dds viewer to compare the differnt versions and only keep the ones I want - every mod i get that has textures one of the first things I do is check every texture - but for none OCD people your guide is great


To be honest I'm still holding out for john.moonsugar and Hrnchamd to combine mlox and MCP to create a single use tool for both fixing and managing mods

@Blouge, Eltrane, jaredh - thanks for the feedback, but I'm afraid I'm still fuzzy on other things.

One point of confusion to me remains wrt the mods out there described as replacers, such as for textures and meshes.
For example, the info at PES about Vibrant Morrowind 4.0 warns "This will replace most of your game textures.
Please make a back up copy of your textures folder first". I take it to mean that it will overwrite the game's
files (those in Morrowind\Data Files). And the info about its update "ver 4.0 update" notes that there is no esp.

So I'm still trying to understand if Wrye Mash handles those types of mods. The mod has no esp/esm file and simply
says unpack to Morrowind\Data Files where it will overwrite existing files therefore make a backup of xxxx file or
folder should you want to return the game back to what it was before installing the mod. Those types of mods are
the ones I had in mind when I said ill-behaved.

Btw, the word "installing" in this context seems misleading. Wrt mlox, I don't see that type of mod showing up in
the list it generates, I guess because it does not have an esm/esp file in the "Data Files" folder for either mlox
or the game to recognize. I don't know if it would show up in Wrye Mash's installer screen either; I'll have to
test that. FWIW, I do have a backup copy of the data files folder made immediately after I had installed the game
(GOTY meaning it has the official patches) but once burned, twice shy.

wrt the red squares due to missing files, I say red because that's the color they look like to me but pink is
possible. The Wrye Mash help file talks about one error condition represented by red squares with an X; my files do
not display that type of error. if I understand you'all correctly, the error might be because Wrye Mash expects to
see readme text files in \Data Files\Doc and it doesn't find them there. It certainly didn't occur to me because
nearly all of the mods I've d/l place the readme either in what would be the Morrowind game folder or just as a file
in the "Data Files" folder. Just some more housekeeping to do on that, then.

John

A mod cannot overwrite Morrowind's base textures or meshes, because those are stored only in Morrowind.bsa. What a "replacer" mod does is provide loose files for those things it wants to replace, and the game uses loose files in preference to the .bsa if loose files exist.

The reason such mods warn you to back up your textures folder is that they might overwrite other replacers you have installed. If you were to then decide you liked the old replacer better, you could not go back to it without reinstalling it or reverting to the backup folder. Reverting to plain Morrowind is always easy; just get rid of all those loose textures and meshes, and the game will again read the original files from Morrowind.bsa.

Wrye Mash Installers means you don't have to worry about this, as I will explain:

Let us suppose you have two texture-replacing mods:

• Mod 1: replaces textures A and B
  
• Mod 2: replaces textures B and C

Suppose you use Wrye Mash Installers to install Mod 1. Now your Morrowind uses textures 1A and 1B in place of A and B. If, at this point, you use Wrye Mash Installers to uninstall Mod 1, it deletes textures 1A and 1B, and you are back to default. In game you will see the original Morrowind A and B again, because without any loose textures, the game reads them from Morrowind.bsa.

Suppose, however, you use Wrye Mash Installers to install Mod 1 and then Mod 2. Now your Morrowind uses textures 1A, 2B, and 2C in place of A, B, and C -- since your install order was Mod 1 and then Mod 2, you are using the B texture from Mod 2. Wrye Mash doesn't really make a backup of texture 1B. But -- if you now use Wrye Mash Installers to uninstall Mod 2, and have Auto-Annealing on, Wyre Mash is smart enough to first uninstall the 2B and 2C textures, and then re-install the 1B texture since you still have Mod 1 installed. So it is as if you only ever installed Mod 1. The great thing is that you don't have to remember to re-install texture 1B yourself; it is done automatically.

So basically, Wrye Mash Installers frees you from the worry of having to remember which files went with which mods, and just takes care of all the clean-up for you.



You're right; pure "esp-less" mods don't show up in mlox exactly because they don't have an .esp or .esm. In fact, even mods which have an .esp or .esm installed in your Data Files folder, but which you have not checked off to load in your game, will not show up in mlox.

Think of install to mean "put the files where Morrowind can see them", not necessarily "check off the checkbox for an .esp".

Such mods do show up in Wrye Mash's Installer tab, however. It does not care what is loaded into your game; any mod that you put in the Morrowind/Installers folder (or Mods folder as this tutorial recommends) will show up in the Installers tab.

The \Data Files\Doc folder is a creation by Wrye because originally MW has no special folder for readme files; which is why you'll find modders put the readme in various places. But Wrye Mash does the housekeeping for you in this regard and decides to put any .txt/rtf/html (typical readme formats) it finds in a single place - the \Data Files\Doc folder.

Thanks for everyone's patience responding to my questions, many times which go beyond the scope of this thread Looking at my MW backup folder, I realize I made a very erroneous assumption - that there were texture and mesh files in Data Files\Meshes and \Textures. My apologies, I had assumed that MW placed files in those folders when MW/Trib/BM is isntalled, simply because the folders were there.

In light of this info and that the Wrye Mash Installers tab does not recognize .exe files, would a work around to convert an exe file (those that don't work with the Unextractor utility) into a zip file Wrye Mash could use be to 1. restore MW to its original initial install, 2. run the .exe and 3. then pull together the files installed by that .exe into a folder in order to create a useable zip file? Or is there another way in which those mods packaged using an executable to install them can be incorporated into the functions that the Installers tab provides?

John

Glad its coming together for you. Once you understand the system it all just clicks in place.


1. When you run an .exe it should ask you to choose an install path. Assuming it does, just install it to a folder of your creation seperate from MW. Absolutely no need to restore MW to its original state.
2. Once installed into your custom folder, you can examine the file structure. Tinker as necessary.
3. Zip up the content into an archive.
4. Add archive to your Wrye Installers folder. Install.

Exactly as eltrane suggests. If something comes as an EXE (Better Bodies for example), I force it to uncompress into my installers directory (for me, Morrowind/Mods). Then Wrye can work its magic based on the de-EXEd files.

You have to think of it in terms of layers. The base layer -vanilla Morrowind- is always there. Whenever you put something on top of it, say a texture replacer, it doesn't physically replace any files, but the game will know they are there and use those instead of the original ones. Once you delete some textures of this installed texture replacer, the game will switch back to the base layer. Same goes for meshes and other files in your Data Files folder.

Thanks for the excellent guide by the way, it made me understand Wrye Bash somewhat better and now I've started reorganizing all my installed mods once again.