Installing Separate Instances for Different Games

[SilentConfusion]

I have been using Mod Organizer 2 for my Skyrim Legendary Edition mods for a while now and it works great.  Yesterday, I finally bought Skyrim Special Edition because I wanted to try TechAngel85's SSE Guide and it seems like most of the work on this site is focusing on Special Edition.

 

I followed the installation instructions in TechAngel85's SSE Guide.  Downloaded the latest Mod Organizer 2 file from Nexus.  Have tried with both the Standalone version and the installer version.  The installation goes fine.  I install in my ...steamapps\common\Skyrim Special Edition\Mod Organizer 2.  (My other copy is in ...steamapps\common\Skyrim\Mod Organizer 2.)

 

But when I ask it to launch Mod Organizer 2 at the end of the installation it launches my Skyrim instance instead of Skyrim Special Edition.  TechAngel85's guide says it should open a dialogue to ask if I want to install another instance or portable, but that dialogue doesn't open for me.  Also if I navigate to the Special Edition folder and click the Mod Organizer 2 exe file, it opens the Skyrim version.

 

What am I doing wrong?  Or is it not possible to install instances for different games?  I have searched for the answer to this, but cannot find it.  I'm sure it is something simple, but I have tried various things without success.  If anyone has successfully done this or knows that it isn't possible, help is much appreciated.

[GrantSP]

If you want to install MO2 twice and have it manage just one game for each then you use the "portable" method. This has all the configuration files and folders directly under the main install.

"Instanced" installs are where MO2, the actual programme, is used to manage multiple games, ie. instances, and the configuration files and folders are in %AppData%\local\Mod Organizer\. To create a new instance you select the icon at the far left of the toolbar and a dialogue will ask you to define which game it is for.

 

Additionally the game you are managing needs to launched at least once for it to set the correct registry entries that MO/MO2 uses to know its location.

 

I haven't personally used the guide you are referring to but I will tell you that the MO2 team are leaning toward NOT installing MO2 into a folder under the game you are managing but rather in a separate folder away from it. ie. C:\ModOrganizer or D:\MO2 or similar.

[SilentConfusion]

Thank you for the reply.  I think I read that I should the instanced version if installing for multiple games and misunderstood that to be the option of installing multiple times (once per game).  Now I see how that could be confusing.

[GrantSP]

There is actually some discussion in the MO2 dev team about making this whole process more user-friendly by renaming these options or making the description text clearer.