Skyrim Mod Combiner with SR:LE + Questions

[reddvilzz]

Hi there, so I just started to install everything from SR:LE since my old Skyrim was permanently broken it seems like the game would never play pass 2 minutes it just crashes all over the place.

I'm half way to finish the SR:LE and remembered I used SMC before on my old pack before it is crashing permanently, and I wonder can I use this program perhaps?

And I'm guessing I'll point SMC to read my downloaded folders for the SR:LE and begin combining there, but my question is should I make this a standalone mod and replace everything that SR:LE done at the bottom of my modlist or do I put it the in the same place where SR:LE puts their texture related mods?

 

Just the textures and meshes though, I'll disable the esps since it is managed well by the SR:LE and there is no point having duplicate esps with the same function.

 

And another question not related to this topic though, but I feel I don't want to make separate thread for this.

Since I am new to SR:LE and I've seen the mod list from both SR:LE and SR:LE Extended, there are some of my mods that aren't included in both packs, if I try to add the missing mods what are the suggestions for the mod list and load order perhaps and also about the conflict resolution? Using mod organizer btw

Thank you in advance.

[Nebulous112]

I would not use Skyrim Mod Combiner on SR:LE. SR:LE is already hand-crafted to have the textures you want in the guide. Just follow the install order and instructions. If it tells you to not install a particular texture or mesh, there is a reason.

 

As per the mods you want to add, it depends on what the mods are. If they are just textures, arrange them in the left pane so that the textures you want have higher priority. If the mods have plugins, I suggest you insert them next to similar mods (referencing the SR:LE categories) in the left and right pane, run LOOT, and then check xEdit for conflicts. You may need to create a custom conflict resolution patch. Place this after Neo's patch in the guide.

[reddvilzz]

Ah okay forgot about that. I'll leave SMC be then.

 

Can I use conflict resolution patch based on his guide on SR:LE?

Should I add my extra mods after I finish installing the pack or do I just put it right as I'm going with the pack?

 

Thank you for your response

 

Edit: Almost forgot, some of the texture mods in the pack seems to point around 2k textures, I only have 2GB of VRAM can I in the end maybe reduce it using DDSopt or choose the 1K textures options? Idk if my 2GB of VRAM can handle it though. Like falskaar DDSopt instructions were made to make the resolution into 8192x8192, and I just make it into 1024 or 2048.

Edited June 19, 2016 by reddvilzz

[Nebulous112]

I'm sorry, I'm not sure what you are asking.

 

If you are following the entire SR:LE guide you can use Neovalen's (the SR:LE author's) conflict resolution patch. In the CR subsection there is a download with the premade patch.

 

If you are only using some mods from SR:LE, you will have to make your own patch with the text in the CR subsection. This is not recommended.

 

If you are asking about CR with your added mods that are not in SR:LE, then you will have to make a new patch forwarding which records you think are appropriate. Place this new patch after the SR:LE conflict resolution patch.

 

As for when to install the mods, the when doesn't matter, as long as you do it before the CR section of the guide (and before the patchers like FNIS, Wrye Bash, etc.). The where matters. See my earlier post for advice on where to place these mods.

[reddvilzz]

You're already answering my question :)

 

About the textures related mods if I follow all the instructions I'm guessing I'm gonna need more than 2GB of VRAM? or 2GB of VRAM is enough?

[Nebulous112]

Regarding your edit: Your 2GB of VRAM definitely will not handle it.

 

Install 1k textures instead of 2k where you can. Use the same mods as the guide, but reduce the texture size on any mod you can.

 

Regarding Falskaar...the DDSOpt 8k doesn't mean it is optimized to 8k, it just means there are no artificial size limits placed on it. It is optimized, but optimized based on whatever the original size was, up to 8k. I think the original is 2k.

 

For slightly better compression, follow the guide here instead: https://wiki.step-project.com/Guide:DDSopt/Skyrim#Prepare_Mod_Textures_for_Optimization

 

First scroll up and set up DDSOpt like the top of the guide says. Then follow the steps from the link down.

 

 

Also, use the performance version of Vividian ENB, and don't install the Realistic Waters 2 ENB files (just the main file).

 

Lastly, I would urge you to stop at SR:LE. You simply do not have the hardware to be installing SR:LE Extended on top. You will barely be able to have SR:LE with OK framerates, and that is with following the above suggestions.

 

Anyway, good luck! :-)

[reddvilzz]

Thank you, well maybe I can push it with everything set to 1k textures and using performance version whenever it is possible can't seems to missed out SR:LE Extended that's my main goal for starting SR:LE

But I'll see what I can do to maximize my framerate

 

Thank you for your help :)

[Nebulous112]

Thank you, well maybe I can push it with everything set to 1k textures and using performance version whenever it is possible can't seems to missed out SR:LE Extended that's my main goal for starting SR:LE

But I'll see what I can do to maximize my framerate

 

Thank you for your help :)

No problem. And just to clarify...when I say use 1k wherever you can, I do not mean DDSOpt everything. Not everything can be optimized successfully, and many of the textures in the guide are already optimized by their authors. I meant download versions that are 1k instead of the 2k Neo might recommend. Etc.

 

Happy modding! :-)

[reddvilzz]

Can I use ordenador / optimizer textures perhaps instead of DDSOpt? Since I know ordenator have the options to just reduced the textures without touching the other stuffs.

 

Here is the link for it https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/12801/

 

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[Nebulous112]

I suggest DDSOpt. It is widely regarded as the best texture optimizer for our purposes (optimizing Bethesda textures).

 

And DDSOpt only touches the textures as well. The problem is when you try to optimize textures that are already optimized, you can make them much worse. Some mods have textures that just shouldn't be optimized, period.

 

I am by no means an expert on the subject...for that you want to talk to Kelmych. See this subforum for more details on DDSOpt.

[reddvilzz]

When I opened the link apparently it links me to unofficial skyrim patch?

 

Yeah I heard bad things will happened because of optimizing it twice, maybe I'll do what I can perhaps to gather some information about this before reducing textures

 

Edit: since you mentioned optimizing textures while I mention reducing textures resolution I hope we are on the same page here :), don't want any misunderstanding here

Edited June 19, 2016 by reddvilzz

[Oeolycos]

When I opened the link apparently it links me to unofficial skyrim patch?

 

Yeah I heard bad things will happened because of optimizing it twice, maybe I'll do what I can perhaps to gather some information about this before reducing textures

 

Edit: since you mentioned optimizing textures while I mention reducing textures resolution I hope we are on the same page here :), don't want any misunderstanding here

I also would like to know if it is potentially detrimental to only scale textures, without any compression options selected in the DDSOpt "constraints" tab (all unchecked). I am playing around with batch-scaling the entire Mod Organizer\mods\* directory's normal maps to 1k, without altering compression. Will this (potentially) make the already-optimized-by-author textures look worse? I realize some mods should be excluded (DynDOLOD, Unofficial *, etc.) I will delete them from the batch results afterwards. I am just doing this now and will see for myself but some input would be cool.

[Kelmych]

Can I use ordenador / optimizer textures perhaps instead of DDSOpt? Since I know ordenator have the options to just reduced the textures without touching the other stuffs.

 

Here is the link for it https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/12801/

 

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Yes, but it doesn't work as well as DDSopt. There is a discussion of the differences in the DDSopt guide here. 

[Kelmych]

I also would like to know if it is potentially detrimental to only scale textures, without any compression options selected in the DDSOpt "constraints" tab (all unchecked). I am playing around with batch-scaling the entire Mod Organizer\mods\* directory's normal maps to 1k, without altering compression. Will this (potentially) make the already-optimized-by-author textures look worse? I realize some mods should be excluded (DynDOLOD, Unofficial *, etc.) I will delete them from the batch results afterwards. I am just doing this now and will see for myself but some input would be cool.

Answering several questions:

• Texture size reduction is one aspect of optimizing; size reduction (if done) is achieved during optimization. Optimization does other tasks like improving the mipmaps and fixing the format of textures that don'e seem to be using the most appropriate format.
• You are changing compression if you change the resolution; if you don't want to change the compression at all then set the resolution to a large value. If you mean changing the compression format (DXTx vs. uncompressed) then yes you generally don't want to change the compression format although there are exceptions. If you uncheck all of the texture types then DDSopt does nothing.
• It is generally suggested that you exclude mods where the author has already done a good job of texture optimization. Typically mods in the SR guide that are primarily texture replacers are already high quality, so unless they are quite old mods I wouldn't suggest optimizing these. The best candidates are usually the location or quest mods like Falskaar and Helgen Reborn which are primarily gameplay changing mods.
• The most useful textures for size reduction are exterior normal maps (textures in architecture, terrain, and landscape folders). Again, don't optimize mods like Flora Overhaul since these ar already high quality.
• Care is needed when optimizing body related textures such as facial textures and/or files ending in *.msn.
• Don't optimize vanilla textures along with mod textures; get already created optimized textures or if you want to experiment with different alternatives use the information and tools in the QuickStart guide for Skyrim.
• If you selective about which mods are optimized then a single run over the entire set of mods is practical. Make a new folder somewhere, copy the selected mods from the Mod Organizer mods folder to the new folder, and then optimize them and copy the result back to the mods folder after you are happy with the results. I haven't every had time to check every mod in the SR list, but I'd guess that at most 20-30 might be useful to optimize. It also depends of course on how much VRAM reduction you need. If you do everything it will take a long time and you will likely optimize many textures that don't need it.
• Make sure to configure DDSopt as shown in the main or QuckStart guides. The default settings are not adequate.

[reddvilzz]

I'm curious on what will happened if the optimized textures get resolution reduction and then optimized again. What kind of problem will showing up?

 

Maybe I can make a separate mods for the textures I've reduced the resolution and reoptimized again and override the original one. So if there is some issue I can just delete the reoptimized version.

 

I guess that's the easiest way if you want to reduced all of your mods textures and afraid to messed it up.

 

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