Remove Unneeded xEdit Arguments

[Omniguous]

the arguments '-iknowwhatimdoing' and '-allowmasterfilesedit' should NOT be entrenched into the STEP guide.

for starters: nothing you do with xEdit actually requires the latter one.

and the first is NOT meant 'simply for disabling a single pop-up': it does much more and the user is /meant/ to -ahem- KNOW WHAT IT IS and WHAT THEY DO. hence, the name.

This applies to SSE, as well.

thanks.

[TechAngel85]

For starters, documentation: https://stepmodifications.org/wiki/Guide:XEdit#Launch_Arguments

I think I originally had some text saying they were optional, but it's been edited so many times, who knows. Do you need them for just the Guide? No, not really. We're not instructing users to do anything that requires them.

Honestly, the concern just sounds like over-zealous caution, but if the staff want to remove the arguments, they can have at it. However, if you don't know what you're doing...learn? There's nothing that you're going to do that isn't fixable. You're not going to learn anything without breaking some things first, but to each their own. 

[z929669]

1 hour ago, Omniguous said:

the arguments '-iknowwhatimdoing' and '-allowmasterfilesedit' should NOT be entrenched into the STEP guide.

for starters: nothing you do with xEdit actually requires the latter one.

and the first is NOT meant 'simply for disabling a single pop-up': it does much more and the user is /meant/ to -ahem- KNOW WHAT IT IS and WHAT THEY DO. hence, the name.

This applies to SSE, as well.

thanks.

I have reported your comment so that TechAngel85 can chime in here. I'm no xEdit guru myself and cannot speak to these switches.

In the meantime, some illumination or a pointer to relevant sources would be much more helpful than a curt statement. There is mention from other non-authoritative sources like this.

Being rid of the 4 sec warning is a boon in and of itself, which seems to be why most people use it and probably why it was added to the guide. I never saw any value in the added barrier.

Indeed, even more official doc doesn't describe the risks. I assume that one could break the plugin or the game and cause undue support queries ... but does the gate REALLY prevent this?

EDIT: sorry, I was composing this as Tech was responding ... obviously, I echo his sentiment.

[Omniguous]

straight from the xEdit discord.

and again: the allowmastersedit has absolutely no reason.
if you want to skip the 4second wait, cool beans.
but nothing in the entire STEP guide, either LE or SSE even REQUIRES that argument to be enabled.

that argument doesnt prevent/allow 'Quick Auto Clean' from cleaning masters.

it is for much more in-depth edits.

[z929669]

8 hours ago, Omniguous said:

straight from the xEdit discord.

and again: the allowmastersedit has absolutely no reason.
if you want to skip the 4second wait, cool beans.
but nothing in the entire STEP guide, either LE or SSE even REQUIRES that argument to be enabled.

that argument doesnt prevent/allow 'Quick Auto Clean' from cleaning masters.

it is for much more in-depth edits.

That's my issue with Discord for content that is static and always applicable (like a manual or instructions). Discord sucks for that, even with pinning. No reason for all users needing to sift through conversations to find what should be in the manual.

OK, I totally see the reasoning for excluding -allowmastersedit in that case but will let @TechAngel85 qualify if there was any historic reason to do so.

-iknowwhatimdoing switch makes sense for us though.

[TechAngel85]

8 hours ago, z929669 said:

OK, I totally see the reasoning for excluding -allowmastersedit in that case but will let @TechAngel85 qualify if there was any historic reason to do so.

There's no reason for the Guide to have it. Most of what I do is to reduce support, in all honestly, and I've seen no additional support from having it in the Guide...so I have no idea why it's such as issue for @Omniguous.  Obviously, I still see no point in dropping it. Removing it really only prevents accidental edits to masters, and again, no additional support has resulted. I've run with it since it was available and will continue to do so on my end. You guys do what you want.

[z929669]

It's not like modding Skyrim is dangerous. We're not teaching people how to disable the safety on a firearm.

If those switches provide more power to the user without creating headaches for others, I am all for it.

[Omniguous]

well, this was posted as 'feedback' so really its just that.

[Darklocq]

I was going to bring this up myself.  I think it's okay to include -IKnowWhatImDoing, but there is absolutely no need to directly edit the game's master files, and it's dangerous to have option on, since it is easy to do so by mistake when it is enabled.  However, the first flag given, -TESV, is not needed either, because you're telling people to call the executable as TESVEdit.exe, not as xEdit.exe.

[z929669]

45 minutes ago, Darklocq said:

I was going to bring this up myself.  I think it's okay to include -IKnowWhatImDoing, but there is absolutely no need to directly edit the game's master files, and it's dangerous to have option on, since it is easy to do so by mistake when it is enabled.  However, the first flag given, -TESV, is not needed either, because you're telling people to call the executable as TESVEdit.exe, not as xEdit.exe.

See previous comments. There is nothing 'dangerous' here. If you disagree, then we need to provide a glaring warning on all modding tools, mods, resources, etc.

"Modding is dangerous to the functionality of your game". ultimately, everything is recoverable, so ... meh.

[Darklocq]

That's a semantic quibble. The point is, STEP does not instruct users to change records in the main game files (other than by TESVEdit's auto-cleaning procedure), so there is no reason or rationale to recommend this option.  It's trivially easy to accidentally change master-file records with that option on, and if you do that you'll have to restore the originals from a backup or by having Steam re-install (which is a different kind of hazard, more so in SSE than SLE since you might get newer SLE files that what you had, and end up with savegames that are no longer usable).  It's what en.Wikipedia would call a WP:BEANS ("Don't stuff beans up your nose") matter, a particularly pernicious form of "instruction creep".  Anyway, as noted the -TESV flag is also pointless to recommend, since we're not starting xEdit in a way that needs it.

[TechAngel85]

I have removed that argument from both Guides since it seems to be a point of controversy. The gamemode arguments are included because we don't know if users are installing fresh or coming from another game. So if a user already has xEdit installed from FO4, they don't need to install it again. They can just launch it using -SSE or -TES5 (not -TESV), then xEdit will load for that game regardless if the EXE is named for FO3Edit, FNVEdit, SSEEdit, etc.

[z929669]

29 minutes ago, TechAngel85 said:

I have removed that argument from both Guides since it seems to be a point of controversy. The gamemode arguments are included because we don't know if users are installing fresh or coming from another game. So if a user already has xEdit installed from FO4, they don't need to install it again. They can just launch it using -SSE or -TES5 (not -TESV), then xEdit will load for that game regardless if the EXE is named for FO3Edit, FNVEdit, SSEEdit, etc.

Absolutely necessary to keep these args for all xEdit apps in all guides. This is how we reuse tool instructions across Bethesda games and is not up for debate for that reason.