Merge the changes from the patch with TES4Edit. Then you do not have to worry about mishaps.

Brain overload, one tool at a time

Any suggestions as to what the something is that DOES the espify?

Wrye Bash. The merged file will turn up blue in Wrye Bash. Right click on it and choose Espify Self.

Genius. I will give this a try. Great thing about the forums is that they are like interactive manuals as long as you ask the right question, which sometimes takes many many posts.

This is all very helpful, thanks for all the replies. Good to know that BC is OK to merge. Is there anything special to do when merging all of the BC plug-ins?

So, ALL of the BC plug-ins can be merged except for the Better Cities - Unique Landscape ****.esp's for each of the surrounding UL's for each city?

Does this include Better Imperial City.esp and Better Cities - COBL.esp ?

P.S. - Anything to do with the various UL patches? I must have about 50 esp's worth of UL compatibility patches. Anything I could do to shorten that list?

EDIT: Also, could the SM Plugin Refurbish (which makes all the DLC's not popup when you start a game, and you have to find something in-game related to the DLC to start the quest) be merged in with the parent DLC? Wrye Bash automatically tagged the one for Knights and VileLair as merge-able but not the others which is odd. Anyone know?

Actually that's not going to work, the patches don't contain strictly edits to existing records. There are also added scripts, references, and quests to handle certain things that you can't simply drag over in tes4edit and be done. It's much easier to use the Gecko method in this case.



Merging those can get ugly, because many have multiple ESPs listed as masters and Gecko is dumb when it comes to combining things like that. You'll often end up with a load loop that things like tes4edit can't handle, and the game sometimes chokes on. Not to mention that UL patches for obvious reasons have landscape and path grid edits that can't be merged.

I know you cannot just drag the edits, but...I guess moving the new references would be kind of complicated, and I thought I added the "if its small" qualifier. Also, BC is mergeable, to a point. I only know that the city ESPs and the separate IC changes can be merged. I cannot say anything about the individual patches for other mods. BC COBL should be all right...I guess... You should really ask in the BC thread for more specifics.

Thanks Arthmoor and TomLong. Originally, I was using the UL Compatibility Patches page to actually FIND house/city mods that were compatible with UL. Turns out doing that took my load order from ~211 to ~285 really quick. I guess the better idea would be to find house/city mods that did not use any cells already used by UL. A much harder feat however, unless it can be found in the comments or description. Wish there was an easier way heh, I keep finding myself modding Oblivion and not actually playing Oblivion.. lol.

I have three more quick questions about these mods, which would free up a good amount of space and it seems to me they would merge fine, but it would be great to have some assurance.

1. CM Partners mod (everyone knows this one, I hope .) I am looking all merging all of the CM Partners.esp's which is just CM Partners.esp, CM Partners NPC.esp, and CM Partners Extra NPC's.esp. Are these three OK to merge together?

2. SM Plugin Refurbish mod (http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=11474) which modifies the DLC's (sort of, all it does is remove the quests popping up each time you start a new game, and you actually have to find something in-game to start the quest.) It includes SM Plugin Refurbish - InsertDLCHere.esp for each DLC. Wrye Bash automatically merges the plug-ins for VileLair and Knights.esp for some odd reason and not the others. Would it be OK to merge these? Would I do a merge to master to merge it with the respective DLC?

3. Sound mods? Atmospheric Oblivion + MIS + some others like Distant Chapel Bells.esp. Can sound mods be merged?

Thanks, freeing up more spots for mods is always nice

There are many mods that do not overlap with the ULs. As far as housing suggestions go, you may want to take a look around http://www.oblivionsrealestate.com/.

1. Definitely

2. You should just grab SM's merged SM Refurbishes plugin if you have all of the DLCs. You can merge SM's plugins together. I don't know about doing a merge to master for those.

Do not confuse actual merging and Bash merging. If you can deactivate mergeable mods in Wrye Bash that is great, but that is not the same thing. You should leave mergeable mods alone unless they fit into one of the groups you are merging. Updating mods merged plugins is impractical to the point where that basically means remerging everything. You should read the Bash ReadMe. The SM Plugins that are not mergeable either contain CELL records and/or new records. Those types of records are not Bash mergeable.

I've been to that site before it is quite cool, unfortunately it doesn't look like it has been updated in quite some time?

2. Is that another mod? I am only able to find the one link I gave to the nexus and that only adds all the DLC plug-ins seperately. Do you have a link to the already merged version?

Maybe I should be linking here instead: http://ljosa.proboards.com/index.cgi. That site has been updated recently because there is winner for a 2009 challenge...

The SM Refurbish download comes with a merged SM Refurbishes plugin.

Well, merged the DLC patches (including knights), then did Espify self in Wrye Bash AND IT WORKED ! Saves me 10 slots! Had to tag the new DLCxxx.esp with the patch tags (they kept their original tags also).

Now I'm down to 237 active esp files. Hopes it makes the game better. Thaks for all the help everyone.

Same here, I didn't add the Bash tags to the new .esp though. Is that necessary?

Thanks for link Tom, didn't know they had forums and I saw the Shadowcrest Vineyard quite some time ago but I hadn't seen any new entries now that is is 5 months into 2010 but I guess that's what the forums are for.

You should add the tags to the new ESP. You want the changes to get imported into the bashed patch properly.

You may want to load the file into TES4EDIT and run Check for Errors. If the file contains scripts Gecko may not have been able to keep track of all the references and you need to edit them manually. Typically the player character, which is Form ID 00000014 gets turned into 01000014 in some scripts and you get errors.

Checked for errors in the merged Knights.esp and they were the same errors I got when checking for errors on the original knights.esp. So I should be OK I think, the merge was fine.

You'd think the UOMP for Knights would fix any errors, so merging the UOMP onto the original plugin would also have the errors fixe, but that would depend on the types of errors...

It is WAY above my pay grade, might as well be written in Latin. But here is the ouput if interested.

NAME - Base -> Found a NULL reference, expected: CREA
Above errors were found in :[ACRE:0000C715] (places NULL - Null Reference [00000000] in GRUP Cell Temporary Children of TonyTest "TonyTestCell" [CELL:00054766])
Above errors were found in :GRUP Cell Temporary Children of TonyTest "TonyTestCell" [CELL:00054766]
Above errors were found in :GRUP Cell Children of TonyTest "TonyTestCell" [CELL:00054766]
Above errors were found in :GRUP Interior Cell Sub-Block 5
Above errors were found in :GRUP Interior Cell Block 8
NAME - Base -> Found a NULL reference, expected: CREA
Above errors were found in :[ACRE:0000C60F] (places NULL - Null Reference [00000000] in GRUP Cell Temporary Children of Testarena [CELL:000250A4])
Above errors were found in :GRUP Cell Temporary Children of Testarena [CELL:000250A4]
Above errors were found in :GRUP Cell Children of Testarena [CELL:000250A4]
Above errors were found in :GRUP Interior Cell Sub-Block 1
Above errors were found in :GRUP Interior Cell Block 6
Above errors were found in :GRUP Top "CELL"
Sound -> [00010B5F]
Above errors were found in :SNAM - Sound
Above errors were found in :Sounds
Weather Classification ->
Above errors were found in ATA -
Above errors were found in :NDSkyBattleWeatherOLD [WTHR:01000FD4]
Sound -> [00010B5F]
Above errors were found in :SNAM - Sound
Above errors were found in :Sounds
Weather Classification ->
Above errors were found in ATA -
Above errors were found in :NDSkyBattleWeatherNEW [WTHR:01000FD3]
Above errors were found in :GRUP Top "WTHR"
Script effect -> [01020AE2]
Above errors were found in :SCIT - Script effect data
Above errors were found in :Script effect
Above errors were found in :Effect
Above errors were found in :Effects
Above errors were found in :NDAbWoodlandGrace "Woodland Grace" [SPEL:01000E04]
Script effect -> [01020AE4]
Above errors were found in :SCIT - Script effect data
Above errors were found in :Script effect
Above errors were found in :Effect
Above errors were found in :Effects
Above errors were found in :NDAbArmorCumulative "Holy Aura" [SPEL:01000E01]
Above errors were found in :GRUP Top "SPEL"
Above errors were found in :[01] Knights.esp

Is that from the Knights plugin? I am surprised it has "could not be resolved" errors. That is often a results of losing track of the master file records (i.e., if you save a plugin with ESP dependency in TESCS.)

Those errors shipped with the original DLC download. Bethesda probably never even noticed them. Also, the UOMP mods all hit final versions before tes4edit was well understood, so I doubt Kivan ever ran a check for errors pass on any of it. The stuff that's being picked up is not something the patch files could fix anyway.

Good to know. At this point only time will tell if all is good.

Can Mart's Monster Mod optional add-ons be merged?

MMM - Extra Wounding.esp
"" - Safer Quest Locations.esp
"" - Dungeons of MMM.esp
"" - Gems & Gem Dust.esp
"" - Hunting & Crafting.esp
"" - Farm Animals.esp
"" - Slof Horses Complete.esp

Thanks

-J

...I would ask that in the MMM thread. MMM gets updated fairly frequently, so that does not seem like a good idea...


Edit: Well, the Bash mergeable add-ons should be safe to merge.

I'll try that.

Thanks for the heads up on the SM Plugin Refurbish merged file. Unfortunately, the Plug-in is orange in Wrye Bash and Oblivion won't start with it enabled. The Orrery and Horse Armor are green but all of the other DLC's including KotN are Orange. I tried pointing to the correct Master in Wrye Bash by selecting the file again but it did not work.

Thanks for the fast replies btw. Any idea how to fix that?

Do not repoint the files, you are messing up references. The masters just need to be sorted. Load the plugin up in TES4Edit, right-click on it, choose "sort masters", and save on exit.