This is to try and unify several discussions and to reinforce the point that Psymon made.

Morrowind modders have never really liked compilations of things. Maybe because if you can make a mod you also spend days adding mods to your game (or not doing so, because you are too busy modding )

However, if you look at things from the POV of a new user, modding Morrowind is scary. Really scary. Mod packs are great. You can say "Download this, and it will make the game look pretty". It may not be exactly how the user wants it, but it will be pretty good. All well and good, however one day the user may come and think. Ok. Mod pack is cool but I want to use this mod. Suddenly he/she is immersed in a new and complex world of adding mods that weren't spesifically cleaned, might not work together and now the user has doubling everywhere and his game is unsable. So he looks for tools and things don't look great. You need to patch your exe. 4gb support, code patch, exeopt. So many tools, so many that you only know about if you spend to long hanging around here (If you are reading this, that probably means you).

So the new user downloaded these mods, but they are dirty. Ok, so how does he/she clean them? Well... you could use... um... http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1184424-q-cleaning-mods-with-tespcd/. Nothing is great and easy to use at the moment. Merging... http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1177482-best-practices-for-making-merged-objects/ issues.

My proposal would be working towards a base set of tools that just work. They are easy to use and you don't have to read the readme to use the basic tool operation. If the tool uses a command line interface, we should have a gui wrapper for it. Preferably one, easy to use program would merge a set of tools to allow someone to do the basics easily. eg: Open unified tool -> Press button -> Boom. Objects merged.

In my option, as a todo tools wise:

• tes3cmd needs a few bugs squishing
  
• we need a merge objects program that works 100% (even if it doesn't merge everything. Merging 80% of things 100% of the time is better than 90% of things 90% of the time). It may just be esper may need a few fixes.
  
• Mash needs improving. (The UI is imho not intuitive)

Wrye Mash could be used to unify the tool chain, but it needs to be simpler to use. Case in point, if you have altered your load order, by default you probably want to sync the changes to the save, why isn't there an easy way to do this. Even if just when you quit mash it applies changes. Also in my opinion the interface should be changed have icons for the simple tasks. (Sorting with Mlox, Cleaning everything). The right click on headings to get menus may also have to go because it doesn't conform a any GUI standard that I know of. It is just strange and unintuitive.

Also, some things are confusing and could do with some interface improvements to make it less so. WTF does an orange mod mean. How do I fix it? Why do I have to look this up in the manual. Why isn't there a fix all issues button?

A integrated exe patcher wizard is anther idea. Many people will be unaware of being able to do so, hence they end up with a more buggy Morrowind (There are a lot of patches to apply now).

In conclusion, in my opinion:

• There is a need for a better set of tools
  
• There is a need for a unified "do everything" tool, even if the "do everything" is just the simple things that 99% of people do.
  
• Wrye Mash needs some UI improvements, but it could become this tool.

Your thoughts on the subject?

I share your concerns!

Installing a mod is complicated. FWIW I commonly go through these steps:
1. Download a mod
2. Extract it and normalize directory structure
3. Run Ordenador to convert textures to DXT3 / DXT1a / DXT1
4. Double-check Ordenador DXT1a mipmaps to make sure the smaller mipmaps don't have border problems. Note: if there is a BSA I might extract it, run it through Ordenador, and repack it.
5. Copy the esp's and esm's to Data Files just so I can run tes3cmd clean --replace
6. Double check Wrye Mash for header dependency mismatch
7. 7z-up the extracted mod
8. Check the newly created installer in Wrye Mash for conflicts; sometimes this means using a DDS viewer to see what the right ordering for the new mod is
9. Rename the installer with an numeric prefix (like 042) to help it go in the right order in Wrye Mash
10. Install and activate the mod in Wrye Mash
11. Check if I need to run BSAReg
12. Run mlox
13. Run Wrye Mash and shut off Creatures.esp and some other mods. The do TESTOOL merge objects. Then re-enable the mods that I had disabled.
14. Run tes3cmd multipatch
15. Run MGE XE distant land generation (if needed)

The worst probelm is if I run into a 255 mod limit. I'm probably at 300+ esms/esps right now, having merged several times. For me the most helpful thing would be a feature that takes all of your esm's/esp's and shoves them into one giant esm. The point is to be able to get around the 255 mod limitation. Right now I have to manually merge things with TESCS which usually works (not always - sometimes tes3cmd won't accept the result unless I had the master esm's loaded while combining), I have to go through mlox_base and come up with my own mlox_user changes. It's a hassle if I want to change just one component of a mod I've already combined.

Ha, I just had this today with merging objects with TESTool.

It told me this:
"Some information has been lost during merging due to a conflict
Result is identical to the last loaded object"

But ingame it was correct.
Pretty annoying.

I think this is a fantastic idea. I consider myself fairly experienced when it comes to mods, but I've never even used the "Merged Objects" feature that any tool has to offer! And as a result I'm probably missing out on what some of my installed mods are supposed to do.

And yes, I use Wrye Mash, but I didn't for a very long time because it was so tricky to install and it took a lot of time to get used to using it. It is rather unituitive, as you said.

And despite the fact that my computer probably can't handle it anyway, I have been put off using MGE and any EXE optimisers just because I figured it would probably be a rather complicated process to get them all to work on top of the MCP.

All of the problems you mentioned are very, very true, for new and experienced players alike.

With an "all in one tool" and an "all in one guide" all being considered (and perhaps a new crowd of people being brought in through Skyrim), Morrowind modding could reach a new peak!

Absolutely brilliant idea. I know Ronin49's been talking about something similar for years I just worry about the people who could actually do this. There's you, of course, and then John.Moonsugar (who hasn't been on the boards since mid-March) and Era Scarecrow (last signed on a couple of days ago). And that's all I can think of.

I'd love to help out but when it comes to coding I wouldn't know one end of an IDE from another :ahhh:

As to the list of things that need doing I'd agree with them.

To me Wrye Mash seems to be a sensible host to which other programs can be attached, like remoras. I've never investigated the Installers tab but I'd have thought a "novice" mode could be something that could be added. So, on start up it'd review the Mods tab and synchronise headers etc. as need be (i.e. turn all checkboxes green) and then the Saves tab and synchronise those with the currently selected mod list (checkboxes purple) and then run a Repair All. Novice mode would need to be togglable (later the UI could be changed to how FPS Optimiser does things: hiding tabs and/or controls until someone enables the Advanced mode)

As to some of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystery_meat_navigation UI elements in Mash a short term fix could be context-sensitive tooltips (if Python / wxWidgets supports them) which could extract some information from the readme on a mouseover event. Alternatively, a legend pane could be added somewhere for each tab, simple graphics and text explaining things like the checkboxes and highlighting.

Any program used as the framework for others (Mash in this discussion) would need (maybe?) some kind of way of updating the constituent tools. I'm particularly thinking of mlox here, John's been talking about an auto-updater for the rule base but it's not there yet.

Would users download the framework tool and be expected to grab the others themselves or would everything be packaged together? The latter would be easier and ideal but would lead to problems with maintainability. Again, I'm mainly thinking of mlox here.

Might have some more thoughts later, getting late here now. Work tomorrow
This'll be something like Mod A changes a NPC's head, Mod B changes the NPC's head and adds a script. TESTool can't resolve the conflict of the two head changes and so spits out the error, what's in Mod B is what ends up in Merged Objects.esp

At least what I think it is, been a while since I looked in detail at that. Best thing is to check TESTool.log, I'm pretty sure you can search for that text and then look at the original objects and the resultant merged object.

The things that cause me headaches are like... I have "Passive Healthy Wildlife". which changes many creatures in the game, I have Hellhouse C which changes almost every vanilla creature by adding an ittem to the creatures which is needed for the mod. Then I have NoM which has changed many creatures in the game so that various meats are available.

Try merging those three, and see what you get, eh?

the last time I used MLOX, my game ended up so screwed up it was really unplayable. I know, that's heresy of the worst sort, but MLOX doesn't have info on all mods, and definitely not the mods I personally wrote and never released.

I've never managed to make Wrye Mash work... I have a non-standard install, and every time I tried to get it working, it just became a nightmare. to be fair, I haven't tried in about 2 years, so it's no doubt easier by now, but I haven't really felt the need was worth the effort.

That leaves me with a basic set of tools:
Reorder mods
Enchanted Editor
nifskope
niftexturestripper
bsa browser
a few lesser tools that I use rarely.

I would love a dependable tool that would combine at least some of those functions.without major issues.

Bummer If there is / was anything you realised could be added or changed to mlox's rules then please post in the thread http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1167004-relz-mlox-a-tool-for-anolyzing-and-sorting-your-load-order and I'll see if I can add them in. As you say, it doesn't have info on all mods...

I can't change the code but I can add to the mod information

Interesing idea, I know one thing, its darn complicated getting everything to work together let alone the mods themselves.
I know one thing that drives me crazy, using wrye mash with that dumb english L looking symbol that whats his name insists on using. It chokes on that and I cant clean my saves because of it. So, I just leave that mod out.

As for MLOX, that has caused problems for me as well, it needs some updating so it only moves mods that are needed. What I currently see it do is moving entire chunks of my mod list, even mods which dont need moving. This ends up causing problems so I cant really have it sort my list without careful checking to make sure nothing screws up.

As for merging, there is that one program that was being worked on, the Smartmerger thats supposed to be rather good, although I havent used it.

A tool I think would be very very useful is a program made specifically for editing UV maps. It would color code the different parts so you could see them clearly, mabe even split and combine mesh parts based on combining or splitting the UV map, etc. Just various things that would allow easy editing of UVs so you dont need any programs like blender, 3ds max, etc to do it. Nifskope is not the greatest when it comes to UV editing.

Try the http://www.fliggerty.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=53&t=3646. I could never get the python one working either.


Is that Lexa's Dwemer Alchemy?

A one size all tool would be great - have been hoping MCP could have merged with Mash to give a single exe to do everything

I wouldn't want one to change textures though - I can understand why some want to do that - but i'm happy with TGA's and BMP's in my game thanks.

I don't think this will fix the compilation bug - we live in the instant gratification age where people think microwaves take too long.

Compilation packs meet the needs of those who just want plug and play

However it is my belief that compilation packs can inspire those who enjoy the game to try and add new mods themselves anyway

I have often lamented in various threads the fact that Morrowind's tools are almost across the board in alpha or beta status. Either almost there (or not quite) or not very intuitive. Mash is a good example of a good tool that's a little intimidating. Tes3cmd is an awesome tool but the lack of GUI is an automatic no deal for most new users and/or non-computer savy folk. When you stop and think about it, even as an experienced mod user there are so many things to remember and do to get a decent mod load. Alot of that is due to having to wrestle with partially completed or buggy tools (the CS doesn't the matter either with its tendency to throw in "free" unwanted extras).

It would be cool if Tesfaith could get a bugfix/upgrade too (at least for making island mods compatible).

I don't think it would make much sense to initially concentrate on things like the fairly advanced method that Blouge mentioned. Much of that isn't required to get the game + mods working. People also mentioned tools like nifskope/bsa browser/enchanted editor. Those are basically tools for modders and if you are modding the game you should be better able to cope with having 20+ tools installed for all the advanced things you want to do. Also regarding editing UV maps, there is a tool for that and it is called Blender .

Regarding Mash UI, tool tips are a good idea. I was also thinking of doing maybe something like Photoshop does to tell you what it is possible to do when you have something selected in the toolbar at the bottom. So say you have a mod selected, you could have the bar display "Use Ctrl + Up or Ctrl + Down to move mods". :shrug:

Regarding automated tool updating, if for each tool there was a set download location and a set place to get version information it shouldn't be too hard. I think that updating is a very good point, but should be secondary and there may be issues. If the interface for tes3cmd changes and the update is automatically downloaded it breaks for everyone. It may be better to write a self updating Wrye Mash. One issue I can see in including tools is that the archive size would be huge. Like 20mb+. Actually maybe not. Ignore that point for now.

I like the idea of a novice mode/advanced mode but imho it would be better to try and have both at the same time, so that you get the power of Mash seamlessly, but only if you need to.

Indeed.

I don't know if merging the MCP into it would be a good idea if it's still updated fairly regularly, but having a one-for-everything tool for everything else would be great.

First reaction: Oh Cool!

Second reaction after some reflection: Sometimes I doth protest too much.

This is true - just as the regulars on the Oblivion mods forums. I can whine a bit. I admit it. The other side of the coin is that no I do not have to self install all options in all available overhauls, mod categories, and 10 different texture variations to swap out with BAIN. I find modding the games as much fun (sometimes more fun) than playing them. So 'Hi my name is Psymon and I'm a mod addict.'

Now a few responses (since I was cited in the OP) - Yacoby - oh venerable one who has been here for quite a while ... I'm not sure an all inclusive exe is ideal. Don't get me wrong - I've never been part of mod tool development, I dropped out of computer science and instead went on to be a psychologist, and while I've made a few personal mods (do house mods count) - I've not yet released a mod. Some call me an advanced mod user - maybe that fits, but take that into consideration when reading this.

The issue I see with an all inclusive approach is it is a hella lot of work for one person to do. If you had a team of people all dedicated then I'd think it possible, but it sounds like a formula for burnout and undo stress and taking on an immense workload. And for what - whining mod users?

My laments with Morrowind is that the tutorials seem (and this isn't true for all of them) outdated, the tools seem unfinished or abandoned, and often the standards for how mods are authored seem primitive compared to Oblivion and later games (again that could be an ignorant statement).

What is happening in the last year or so with Wrye Bash since wrye let it be open source is amazing. People show up do work take off and with 5 or so people doing that - requests are slowly processed and a good deal gets addressed. I'm not seeing that kind of interest with Morrowind.

All the steps that Blouge describes are similar to what needs to be done with an Oblivion mod as well:
1. download mod.
2. Extract it and make friendly directories.
3. Clean the plugins.
4. Run the meshes through PyFFI.
5. Repackage and re7zip.
6. Install with BAIN.
Then after installed in load order:
7. Run BOSS (like mlox).
8. Bash patch (including examining the extensive setting choices and checking on bash tags settings).
9. Run TES4LODGEN (distant land).
And other steps to add if other fixes or issues arise. If you use overhauls, city, or landscape mods then expect half your load order to be patches.

In short it is no picnic with Oblivion either and there certainly is no big red shiny fix-it button. I count a minimum of 4 tools being used (but as many more could be used depending on needs). It could just be my position on the learning curve but the tools seem more developed with Oblivion and there is a general consensus in the available tutorials about what to do.

Also I'm sorry if I gave the impression that I didn't know how to update saves with Wrye Mash - I did - I just thought for a second you didn't. I actually really like all the Wrye tools (mash, bash, flash) - I like the interface and the use of context menus. It is great and seems very functional to me. I don't see it as mystery meat navigation.

What I think could be done though is integrating more fixes and Wrye Bash features into Wrye Mash and polishing up tes3cmd more (as you say). If Mash had the ability to merge objects effectively then that would be great and maybe even someday something that could be integrated in with merging lists (in one esp).

I'm not 100% sure (and could be way off in my assumption) but I think Valda addressed FormID merging some with http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1102449-relz-garybash-thread-2/. The info in deflist tags and all is not in the readme - here is http://i361.photobucket.com/albums/oo54/psymon11b/FormIDMerging.jpg showing the choice in bashing process. Could be a start - or worth looking at. but then again FormID lists likely not the same at all.

Then maybe mash tags. But for things like (leave deactivated when merging objects or leave deactivated when generating distant land, etc). Whatever though - likely I will be there to at least test and suggest (if welcome). That is the best I can offer. All the feature of Bash started small and people just keep shining them. You guys blow me away with what you create - thanks for hearing my complaints. Just want to be realistic too.

Anyway that is my 2 septims - for whatever they are worth.

[edit]
Wrye Bash has drag and drop sorting of esp and BAIN packages. If I think of a few more features that Morrowind could benefit from I'll post them.

I do like the idea of a fix saves button - but not one that fixed all the saves. I like knowing what a save had as a master - that could be valuable debugging info. I think that RMWChaos is addressing updating mod masters - so if that gets integrated too.

When I say merge into I sort of mean "have a wrapper for". As in, if you want to use a newer version, ideally you would just be able to go to mopy/tools and drop the new version onto the old one and then it would "just work" in Mash.

Psymon:
It isn't that much work to be honest. For example, take tes3cmd. It is 6000 lines of Perl. The integration into Mash? 300 or so. This thread isn't so much a "I will do all this" but rather I would like it if we worked towards this.

What I proposed would be a good idea is to try and get a core set of utilities to a high standard and write some interfaces in Mash. Of the tools I would want to integrate, of course some of them need some fixes, but then if the developer isn't around, I would take a look and see what I can do. However I have a short attention span and I imagine soon I will find something else pretty to occupy me (Haskell calls to me ). It may turn out that none of this comes to be.

I think Oblivion is far better than Morrowind as a lot of the ground work was done much faster. There was a core idea of what needed to happen and the newever things that differed from Morrowind happened much faster. There is also a bit more of a open source culture there which Morrowind initially lacked (TesTool, Morrowind Enhanced, et al). This hindered the development of tools when developers leave.

Part of the slowness of development with Mash was why I wanted to (and will) try and make a core or Wryes code that is game independent. This will mean that Mash should get some features even when no active development occurs. Hopefully it should soon become very trivial to move features from Bash to Mash.

I didn't know exactly how to do it until I looked

The interface of Mash works and is fine once you know how to use it. To a new user it is scary and I think there are improvements that I think could be made.

Much of what I wrote is very much "If I had all the time in the world and a decent attention span".

I'd like to hesitantly volunteer to at least try and help, if it's needed / wanted. I'm currently studying computer science, and I've got a long summer coming up... what better way to spend it than to learn a new programming language and work on a great new tool for Morrowind? :biggrin:

> the tools seem more developed with Oblivion and there is a general consensus in the available tutorials about what to do

Not if you are trying to install FCOM Convergence. :ahhh:

I too have a short attention span or more appropiately a split attention span. I had at one time elaborately mapped out a program for cleaning and merging mods (going as far as using a hex-editor to anolyze the file format) but I haven't had the time to learn python yet. On top of that I have recently become very interested in graphic design kind of things and have been doing a texture overhaul for another game. So I feel the pain there. But if any of this inspires someone to try and make a new program or address this problem, then this whole discussion is worth it.

On Morrowind vs Oblivion, I think a major factor in the speed of development between the two was the file format. When Morrowind was released it was a new and fairly cryptic data structure and people were slow anolyze it and make programs for it. The few early programs (TEStool, TESAME) were valiant efforts to create tools based on that limited knowledge. Most of this occured during Morrowind's heyday when it was the most popular. Unfortunately, most the the current knowledge we have came later when the community shrank and there was less interest. On top of that, the tool that existed were quasi-workable so the impetus to create new tools wasn't as high. Now, where Oblivion came about it had two things going for it: 1) It's file structure is a modified version of Morrowinds and people were already familiar with how the basic concept worked and 2) it was by far much more popular and thus attracted more people and had a bigger pool of talent to create tools.

The great thing is that Morrowind'ers are quite a "dedicated" lot and we eventually find a way. So as they say in Chinese " 加油" (JIAYOU- go for it )

"User" here! :brokencomputer:

Oh when i first discovered Oblivion mods and started digging into it here...OMG!!!! It was SOOO intimidating. Now im going back and modding Morrowind, but for crying out loud...for months it seemed like my hobby was tinkering with mods installation. It took several weeks before I got the courage to try Wrye. It still is mostly a mystery to me, and I use it for a few basic functions. There are some tools mentioned here i do not use at all.

I got into Morrowind starting with the Graphics and Sound Overhaul...and thought that it would be enough for me. Yea right. Now i got over 150 mods, and for the most part i've ironed out the wrinkles. Still CTD a lot...but ive come to expect that with my heavily modded Bethesda games. But it is sooo not an easy journey to undertake. Most gamers I know would not go to the lengths i have to add mods into their game....and most non-gamers would think me insane.

I hear you. It took me years to figure out how to use most of the major tools, and as a couple of people have said before, I still only use only Wrye Mash's most basic features. That's all fine and good for me now, but it's hard to realistically tell someone new to a game this old that they're going to have to do the same thing, more or less. I am in complete agreement with Yacoby... understanding exactly how hard it would be to do. Still, if there was an "all in one" tool that even just did the basics in a comparatively easy and intuitive way, I think it would be tremendous, for both vetren and new mod users alike.

Edit: typos

A one in all tool would be cool, not just for the new users but for the ancient ones who are getting so long in the tooth they've actually forgotten how to do a lot of stuff. Yeah I'm speaking from personal experience. Plus, I can archive mods ad nasium but when it comes to finding documentation on older tools and/or remembering how to use them, things get harder and harder as the forums shift again and again to accommodate newer games and older "essential" threads are lost. So getting everything together, in one tool, which can have a consolidated set of directions and help - would be ideal over the long haul.

Yep. Plus one to Yacoby's statements from another semi-oldtimer who builds one massive Morrowind installation every couple of years, and has to re-learn a lot of things each time. I can manage, but repeatedly re-learning several tools several times is neither comfortable nor efficient, and it definitely scares away potential players who don't already know that the effort is worth it.

If my mod anolysis skills are deemed helpful, I may be able to contribute ... no promises though, I have no idea how much spare time I'll have in the near future.