Mod Organizer forgot all information about its Fallout 4 setup

[merusalem]

TLDR: MO2 lost all information about all installed mods for FO4.

 

My questions are:

- Is there any way to recover the lost MO2 mod configuration information?

- If I decide to start over again, with another fresh FO4 GOTY and MO2 installation, is there any way I can make sure to manually save MO2's mod configuration, so that in case the mod information loss happens again, I can restore the old information?

 

TLDR recap of what happened:

 

My journey with MO2 and FO3:

1. Fresh FO3 installation.

2. Fresh MO2 installation.

3. Installed one or two mods.

4. Game kept going back to wrong resolution again and again.

5. MO2 lost all information on installed mods.

6. I gave up and uninstalled both programs.

 

My journey with MO2 and FO4:

1. Fresh FO4 GOTY installation.

2. Fresh MO2 installation.

3. Installed one or two mods.

4. Game runs fine, with the mods.

5. Installed a dozen more mods.

6. Game runs fine, with the mods.

7. I realize that there is a new version of MO2 available, and install it.

8. Game runs fine, with the mods.

9. MO2 tells me twice again that there is a new version available, and I install them.

10. MO2 no longer shows anything in the mods list, other than the game's standard esm files. It still remembers, though, that I started the game through F4SE.

 

 

Extended version of what happened:

 

I have been trying Mod Organizer 2 for about a week now, first for Fallout 3, then for Fallout 4.

 

My experience with the combination of Fallout 3 and MO2 was that I spent around ten hours over two calendar days with configuring MO2 and Fallout 3 and understanding how MO2 ticks (the game kept going back to wrong resolution settings). I gave up on trying to play FO3 after MO2 forgot about all installed mods. I thought to my self "Well, maybe the FO3 code base is just too old to configure it in a reliable way", and uninstalled FO3 and MO2.

 

Then I re-installed MO2 and uninstalled and re-installed Fallout 4 GOTY.

 

I configured MO2 for the fresh FO4 installation and added a few mods, one by one, so that I would realize when anything went wrong in the game. All was fine.

 

I realized yesterday that MO2 showed that a MO2 update was available, and the update went all right. Cool. The game played fine.

 

Today I start MO2 for FO4 and I realize that MO2 forgot everything about all mods I installed. MO2 remembers that I used F4SE to start the game, but there is no longer a list of mods; only the esm files of the FO4 GOTY edition show in the list.

 

I literally just shut down my PC yesterday and rebooted today. Yesterday I could play FO4 just fine, and everything looked OK in MO2, today MO2 knows nothing more about any installed mods.

 

I remember from yesterday that MO2 showed that an update was available, so I clicked the top right UPDATE button. It installed just fine, and the game ran fine.

 

Today MO2 showed again that an update was available, so I updated again. Then it showed the availability of an update for the third time, and again the MO2 update went fine. "? -> About" now shows MO2 2.1.5. (Sorry, I had not checked MO2's version earlier today or yesterday.)

 

The caveat:

 

Only the list of esm files shows up, none of the installed mods.

 

My questions are:

- Is there any way to recover the lost MO2 mod configuration information?

- If I decide to start over again, with another fresh FO4 GOTY and MO2 installation, is there any way I can make sure to manually save MO2's mod configuration, so that in case the mod information loss happens a third time, I can restore the old information?

 

Thanks a lot!

 

To recap:

 

My journey with MO2 and FO3:

1. Fresh FO3 installation.

2. Fresh MO2 installation.

3. Installed one or two mods.

4. Game kept going back to wrong resolution again and again.

5. MO2 lost all information on installed mods

6. I give up and uninstall both programs.

 

My journey with MO2 and FO4:

1. Fresh FO4 GOTY installation.

2. Fresh MO2 installation.

3. Installed one or two mods.

4. Game runs fine, with the mods.

5. Installed a dozen more mods.

6. Game runs fine, with the mods.

7. I realize that there is a new version of MO2 available, and install it.

8. Game runs fine, with the mods.

9. MO2 tells me twice again that there is a new version available, and I install them.

10. MO2 no longer shows anything in the mods list, other than the game's standard esm files. It still remembers, though, that I started the game through F4SE.

Edited September 8, 2018 by merusalem

[merusalem]

In case this is important:

The game can no longer load any savegames that used the mods. MO2 starts f4se_loader.exe, then FO4 starts.

On trying to load the last savegame, FO4 reports that all installed mods are missing.

[GSDFan]

Sounds like either a Windows UAC problem or an Antivirus program interfering with some MO files.

 

Where is MO installed?
Did you install MO as a Global instance and Portable instance?

 

 

[merusalem]

After a bit of reading on the Interwebs, a bit of soulsearching and a look into MO2's settings:

 

During the original MO2 installation I changed the location where my FO4 mods are stored. (By default they are stored on C:, which is a small drive on my PC, so I set a directory on a different drive.)

 

I guess MO2's update overwrote its configuration, so I ended up with a "fresh" installation.

 

I searched for any folder on all of my drives called "ModOrganizer", which has a subfolder called "mods", so "somedriveletter:\somepath\ModOrganizer\mods". I found it in two places: on C: (the default folder, empty) and on my E: drive (where the mods folder was full with all my installed mods).

 

So, I went to MO2's "Configure settings and workarounds" (screwdriver & wrench icon) -> tab Paths. There at the top field "Base Directory", I navigated to folder "E:\whereIfoundit\ModOrganizer\theprofilenameIhadchosen". After hitting OK, the mods appeared again in the list.

 

I have not figured out yet how to copy everything to a new profile name, but I take what I can get.

 

I had to tick all checkboxes for the mods (left window), and did a lot of guesswork on the load order (right window).

 

The game did not complain about missing mods and loaded (on the third attempt, the first time I got a black screen, the second time it never finished loading the save game).

 

I can play now, and I knock on wood that my fiddling has not corrupted the savegame.

 

Good luck to anyone running into the same problem!