Combining parallax landscape mods into one?

[Brambleshire]

Hello friends! I know this ones a doozy, so I will totally understand if its too much to bother with. However if anyone does, I will be deeply grateful.

Something I've been working on is putting together the most ultimate and beautiful parallaxed landscapes. There are several mods/authors that have some amazing work, such as Skurkbro, Pfuscher, Skyland, and Atlantean. However each one of these has some amazing areas, and other areas that are quite bothersome. Skurkbros has an amazing Marshland, but lackluster Rift. Meanwhile Skyland has an amazing Rift, and lackluster marshland. I will here on refer to each as the "parallax mod" and the "texture mod". Atlantean looks 90% wonderful, but the riverbank and oceanshore texture is awful and ruins the whole thing. They say that its best to stick to one landscape texture mod for a consistent look, but some of them have extremely jarring choices of textures right next to each other (atlantean, which is otherwise good). Therefore I've been trying to find away I can use elements of each authors collection into a combined landscape. I've tried a few things, however the depth of my knowledge is holding me back.

I think in order to do this I need to first better understand how parallax works. If anyone knows any good resources, ie forum convos, youtube videos, etc. Please let me know. I've spent days on this but haven't found anything that doesn't just scratch the basic surface. Here are some of the gaps in my knowledge:
 

1.  Why do some parallax landscape authors have seperate mods or files? Skurkbros has "SRP Landscapes 2K - Complex Terrain Parallax" AND "Additional Landscape Parallax" as 2 files in the same mod. Skyland has "Skyland - A Landscape Texture Overhaul 2k" AND "Skyland Landscapes Parallax" as 2 separate mods entirely. But Atlantean just has 1 file with a single dependency. This non-standardized approach is causing me to be confused what each is used for. My guess for now, is that one file is just flat landscape textures, while the other adds parallax. And atlantean just combined it all into one. Is this correct?
    
2. I am further confused when I examine the contents of the files. For example Skurkbros "SRP Landscapes" has many of the same .dds files as Skurks "Complex Terrain Parallax". Meanwhile some authors have .nifs in the meshes folder, while others dont, and some dont have a mesh folder at all. And thats not all, for some reason theres a mesh folder in both the parallax mod and texture mod, which seams counterintuitive.
    
3. Someone told me that no special cases = diffuse, _n = normal, _p = parallax, _em = emissive and _para = Multilayer Parallax underlying texture. What do this terms actually mean and how do they interact with another? Why do some textures have several types, while others only have 2? Which ones the height map? Which one is a simple 2D texture, and which gives it the parallax effect? Why do meshes have to do with it and why do some have meshes and others do not? These answers are surprisingly hard to find on the general internet. 
    
4. Most of the landscape mods have an effects folder which includes projecteddiffuse.dds and projectednormal.dds. What do these do? If I'm combining textures from different mods, which ones do I use? What affect will it have?

I initially had a good amount of success by making two empty mods, I have one for the parallax mod files, and one for the texture mod files. Say I want the fallforestleaves01 from Skyland, I copy and paste everything related to fallforestleaves01 from Skyland and paste it in the exact same path as from actual Skyland. If it came from "Skyland Landscapes Parallax" I paste it into my parallax mod. If it came from "Skyland - A Landscape Texture Overhaul" I paste it into my textures mod. Just by following this simple pattern, I had initial success getting the the rift of skyland, the marshes and ice of skurkbros, the pine forests of Atlantean, the snow of 202X, with skurkbros filling out most of the rest. I had about 90% of what I wanted, except the volcanic textures were all super spikey in that bad parallax typical way. As I was tinkering trying to figure that out, I somehow just made things worse and worse. To where now I have white empty textures for all my snow. And if I try to use the Landscape texture identification mod, the entire world is white and blank. I haven't been removing anything, just disabling and enabling different mods. I'm about to start over as I've really gotten myself in a knot. Phew...

Edit: Well I did figure out the blank white landscape was because I forgot to disable some patches from "Parallax Mesh Patch Collection." So thats good!

Edited March 20 by Brambleshire

[Brambleshire]

So I've successfully been able to build myself a custom set of landscape parallax textures EXCEPT one particular texture. Thats volcanicdirt01. No matter whos textures I use for volcanicdirt01, it is spikey as if its missing the parallax texture but its not. All the dds's are there, but no matter what I do or what textures I put there, volcanicdirt01 remains spikey.

[ButchDiavolo]

5 hours ago, Brambleshire said:

So I've successfully been able to build myself a custom set of landscape parallax textures EXCEPT one particular texture. Thats volcanicdirt01. No matter whos textures I use for volcanicdirt01, it is spikey as if its missing the parallax texture but its not. All the dds's are there, but no matter what I do or what textures I put there, volcanicdirt01 remains spikey.

Hi Brambleshire.

It is indeed quite difficult to find good basic information about the whole parallax process. I have a tiny bit of knowledge about it, that I soft of picked up by reading between the lines so to speak. First of all there are 2 kinds of parallax: the "Old" way and the newer Multilayered/ Complex parallax. It is important to check which kind mods use, because they work very different. To explain the difference a bit, let's start with the textures.

Lets start with the easy one: almost every modder has their own snow textures. The projecteddiffuse.dds and projectednormal.dds are used specifically for snow. They are included in the mod, to make sure snow is created the way they envisioned it.

The "Old" version uses _p.dds texture files to achieve the parallax effect. This is a special dds-file that has the height information on it (= the parallax effect). So for older parallax mods, you will see a ton of _p.dds files. Sometimes they also uses _para.dds files, but you rarely see those. Diffuse is a layer in .dds files. _em.dds is a glow/ light effect like enb light. There are lot of versions of dds files, which all have specific functions

The new Multilayer or Complex parallax works through effects of your ENB or Community Shaders. This works by using the fact that .dds-files have several layers (hence multilayered). In this case it uses the _n.dds files by adding height information to one of the layers. So there is no more need for separate _p.dds files. Occasionally you will still see _p or _para.dds files included. No idea why though. In the case of complex parallax, you have to activate the relevant settings in enb.series. (see under spoiler)

Spoiler

EnableComplexGrass=true
EnableComplexGrassCollisions=true
EnableTerrainParallax=false <-- this is the "old" style
EnableComplexParallax=true
EnableComplexParallaxShadow=true
EnableComplexParallaxShadows=true
EnableComplexTerrainParallax=true
EnableComplexTerrainParallaxShadows=true
EnableTerrainBlending=true <-- can cause bad looking edge in landscapes
EnableComplexMaterial=true
EnableDynamicCubemap=true <-- optional, can be very overpowering

Without those options activated, you won't get parallax. No idea how that works. I just consider it magic.

The other half of parallax is the meshes. The meshes have to be activated for parallax. The textures are like the clothes of the meshes. If they are missing, you usually get a purple mesh (a naked mesh). When you see that, you know a texture is missing. The parallax "tag" on a mesh will tell the mesh to also expect a parallax texture. If a parallax texture is missing, you generally don't notice immediately. You just won't get the effect. That is what I basically understand about how parallax works. But I could be completely wrong of course.

As for the spiky texture: this is a case of the added height information being too strong. It means that you do have a parallax texture on a parallax mesh, but the settings are off. This is most likely caused by using an "old style" on a complex style mesh. I looked in my loadorder, but I couldn't find volcanicdirt01. I did find several volcanictundradirt01, so if you mean that, it is included in all parallax texture landscape mods. In MO2 under the Data tab above the right column, you can copy and paste the file name and MO2 will show you if you have it and if you do, if the name is red, it means several mods have this file. The name in red is the version being used by the game. when you hover over the name, you will see which other mods have that file. You can hide the file that is not working in the mod currently used. The game will then use the next mod.

Your first question: if we take the example of Skyland, Skyland - A Landscape Texture Overhaul 2k, this mod has textures and a few meshes, but this is not a parallax enabled mod. Skyland Landscapes Parallax is the mod that adds the parallax enabled textures and meshes to the Texture Overhaul. Skyland was originally released in 2016, before complex parallax became available, so the second mod could be seen as a parallax patch. Atlantean on the other hand only has 1 mod, because it combines textures and meshes in one mod. The mods from Skurkbro come in an AIO (all in one), but he also has the separate mods, for people who want just one or two of his mods. Pfuscher's 202X is again an AIO mod, but split in to several parts, because it is too big for Pfuscher to upload it in one mod. So there are many reasons why there can be more than one version of a mod. And ALWAYS check if a parallax mod is old style or complex style.

I have to go run some errands, but I will get back to you on how to merge/ blend different mods. I hope this information (wall of text) is helpful to you.

[ButchDiavolo]

18 hours ago, Brambleshire said:

I initially had a good amount of success by making two empty mods, I have one for the parallax mod files, and one for the texture mod files. Say I want the fallforestleaves01 from Skyland, I copy and paste everything related to fallforestleaves01 from Skyland and paste it in the exact same path as from actual Skyland. If it came from "Skyland Landscapes Parallax" I paste it into my parallax mod. If it came from "Skyland - A Landscape Texture Overhaul" I paste it into my textures mod. Just by following this simple pattern, I had initial success getting the the rift of skyland, the marshes and ice of skurkbros, the pine forests of Atlantean, the snow of 202X, with skurkbros filling out most of the rest. I had about 90% of what I wanted, except the volcanic textures were all super spikey in that bad parallax typical way. As I was tinkering trying to figure that out, I somehow just made things worse and worse. To where now I have white empty textures for all my snow. And if I try to use the Landscape texture identification mod, the entire world is white and blank. I haven't been removing anything, just disabling and enabling different mods. I'm about to start over as I've really gotten myself in a knot. Phew...

Edit: Well I did figure out the blank white landscape was because I forgot to disable some patches from "Parallax Mesh Patch Collection." So thats good!

I am ba-hack! *cracks knuckles for the next chapter*

The way you are trying to mix the mods is.. how do I say this politely... flawed.

But first a warning about Parallax Mesh Patch Collection Main mod! This mod is old and flawed. It WILL cause crashes. You can still use it if you disable/ delete a number of files: (under spoiler). You can use the parallax patches for Enhanced Vanilla Trees, but then also download this fix, or you will get errors in TexGen and Dyndolod.

Spoiler

\meshes\clutter\signage\whiterun\signwrbanneredmare01.nif
\meshes\dbm resources\architecture\newmuseum\dbmgallerycentralfloor.nif
\meshes\dlc01\architecture\snowelfruins\dlc01sebf_blastroofremain.nif
\meshes\dlc01\dungeons\castle\animated\cascoffinpuzzle\cascoffinpuzzle01.nif
\meshes\dlc01\effects\dlc1columnhavokexplosion.nif
\meshes\dlc01\effects\dlc1snowelfflathavokexplosion.nif
\meshes\dlc02\dungeons\apocrypha\animated\forbiddenbook\apoforbiddenbook01.nif
\meshes\dlc02\dungeons\nordic\dlc2norenchanteddias02\dlc2norenchanteddias02.nif
\meshes\dungeons\imperial\customfx\cg01destroyedbridge.nif
\meshes\dungeons\imperial\customfx\impforthallcollapsefx01.nif
\meshes\dungeons\nordic\secretpass\animated\rmsmdoor02\norsecrmsmdoorsm02.nif
\meshes\effects\dragoncrash\fxdragoncrashfurrow01.nif
\meshes\effects\mgmagicfirepillarmidden01.nif
\meshes\magic\fxtimerift.nif
\meshes\traps\dwefirepillar\trapdwefirepillar01.nif
\meshes\traps\swingingblade\trapbladeswinging01dustfx.nif

Better still is to just not use it at all. There are other and newer ways to get the same spread of parallax enabled meshes.

So, back to combining mods. The way you are doing it will increase the risk of missing something, which will cause visual weirdness. Best is to install the mods you want and sort them in order of preference. Over the years I have come up with a system, that prevents errors. I am not claiming it is thé way to deal with parallax, but it works for me. I haven't had parallax errors in years. I will post my version below.

So the Diavolo™ method is as follows:

1. 1. Follow the STEP System Set Up and SkyrimSE guides first! This will give you a sturdy and stable basis to build on. The SE Guide is in a bit of flux after the surprise Bethesda update. It is still accurate for Skyrim version 1.6.640. If you use 1.6.1130 or 1.6.1170, you can still follow the guide, but be extra careful which version of mods you download. Make sure they are for the correct version of Skyrim! Don't run xLODGEN, TexGen and DynDOLOD yet, because we are adding things!!
2. Once you have a stable installation of Skyrim, you can start adding mods to it. Make a new separator and call it something like "Parallax".  Place at the end of the LEFT column, but above any output files (i.e. SKSE Output, FNIS Output, etc). This is where you will put all the parallax mods (obviously). You have to place them last on the left, because the mods here will need to overwrite everything.
3. Start downloading and installing parallax mods, including parallax versions of STEP guide mods. (Enhanced Vanilla Trees, Shaders of Solstheim, Simplicity of Snow if you use it, High Hrothgar fixed). Re-install Embers XD this time enabling the "parallax" tick box. Don't move Embers XD to the parallax section though. Embers will get overwritten by a ton of mods, which is ok.
4. Before doing anything else, Download Lux. Run the Fomod and pick any patches you need for your mod list. When done, open the mod and DELETE all the plugin files, leaving just the meshes and textures folder. These files will act as a replacement for the Parallax Mesh Patch Collection. Since Lux is a lightening mod, the meshes will also cut down on light flicker as an added bonus. Place Lux either last in the Lighting & Weather section, or first in the Parallax section.
5. Next you will have to sort the parallax mods on your personal preference, starting with the AIO mods. i.e. if you prefer the look (as a whole) of Pfuscher's 202x over Skurkbro, move Skurkbro ABOVE 202x, so 202x takes precedence. If you prefer Skurkbro, put 202x above Skurkbro. So the top 3 parallax mods are Lux, 202x and Skurbro. Lux should always be first, the other two are sorted to your preference. These 3 mods are the basis for the parallax part. Together they cover pretty much every mesh and texture.
6. Following the top3, first sort your city/ architecture mods to preference, then trees, mountains and landscapes. Just to be sure: the last mod in a "section" should be the one you prefer or plan to use the most resources from. So least favorite will be overwritten by the ones following. Last of all should be Shaders of Skyrim and Simplicity of Snow (if you use it). The two mods use the previously mentioned projecteddiffuse texture to make sure ash and snow look good.
7. Once you are happy with the loadorder, you have to start weeding the mods. I will use Skurkbro and Skyland as an example. You mentioned you prefer Skurkbro's marshland over Skyland's. So you open Skyland in MO2 and go to the conflicts Tab. Here you will see all detected conflicts between files. in this screen you go find all the Skyland marsh textures (and meshes if applicable). When you find them, right mouse click on them and select "Hide". This will remove Skyland's marshes. Open Skurbro and double check that you got all the marshlands from other mods. If another mod overwrites Skurkbro's marsh, go to that mod and repeat the process of hiding the files in that mod. Do this until Skurkbro's marsh wins, aka no losers to other mods, only winners and no conflicts. And you repeat this process until you are happy with the winners (your preferred mods).
8. Go in game and have a good look around in game, checking if everything turned out like you expected. Make a list of mistakes, errors, wrong textures if you find them, then go back to the mods in MO2 and correct those errors. You may have to unhide textures or meshes to get them back. Do this until you are happy with the results.
9. NOW you can run xLodGen, TexGen and DynDOLOD. You will most likely still get at least one error (in duplicate if I remember correctly) in Dyndolod about a missing parallax texture. I can't remember which mesh it is, but the summary will mention it. To fix it, copy the name of the nif and paste it into MO2's data tab. When it is found, open the mesh with Nifskope. When it is shown (purple), click anywhere on the model in the right screen (it will turn green). This will show a list of thingiemabobs (BSTriShape), click the arrow to open further, keep opening until you see BSShaderTextureSet. Find the missing texture mentioned (woodtrimedge_p I think), double click on the name to select it and just delete that, leaving it empty. It will be in that list twice in two separate BSTrishape fold-outs. Remember to save the NIF! Once that is done, you don't have to re-run the LodGens.
10. You are now ready to enjoy the game.

Again, this is the way how I do it. You are of course free to mod however you want. I am just sharing it, because I have never had problems with Parallax and maybe it is helpful to you as well.

 

[Brambleshire]

Yooo! Butchdiavolo this is great thank you!!! This is extremely helpful and easy to understand! Welcome to the school house kids!

3 hours ago, ButchDiavolo said:

The projecteddiffuse.dds and projectednormal.dds are used specifically for snow

Any guess as to why a mod wouldn't have it? Pfuschers 202X doesnt have these, even tho it does have snow textures, one of the better looking ones in fact, and the snow option I'm going with for now lol.

 

3 hours ago, ButchDiavolo said:

Diffuse is a layer in .dds files. _em.dds is a glow/ light

So diffuse is the light effect. What is alpha, and what is normals? I see those terms being used a lot, but people assume everyone else already knows what that means exactly.

And as for meshes, meshes are optional right? Up to the taste of the mod creator? Is that why not all landscape mods include meshes but some do?

I just got a notification that you replied again, so Im going to see what you said before continuing.

[ButchDiavolo]

32 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

Yooo! Butchdiavolo this is great thank you!!! This is extremely helpful and easy to understand! Welcome to the school house kids!

Any guess as to why a mod wouldn't have it? Pfuschers 202X doesnt have these, even tho it does have snow textures, one of the better looking ones in fact, and the snow option I'm going with for now lol.

 

So diffuse is the light effect. What is alpha, and what is normals? I see those terms being used a lot, but people assume everyone else already knows what that means exactly.

And as for meshes, meshes are optional right? Up to the taste of the mod creator? Is that why not all landscape mods include meshes but some do?

I just got a notification that you replied again, so Im going to see what you said before continuing.

Bring a snack and a drink for the reply. And maybe a blanket for a nap in between.

About the projected things: "normal" Skyrim uses a single-pass snow shader, so it doesn't need something like the projected files. Most (if not all) parallax mods use multi-pass snow shaders, so they add the projected-files to make sure snow creation goes well, across all used layers. At least, that is my theory. And I am sticking to it, dammit. Maybe Skyrim 202x doesn't use the multi-pass shaders? Btw, snow shaders are apparently different from snow textures. Who knew?

And no, diffuse is not the light effect. The light/ glow effect comes from the _em version. I presume em= emit.

I looked up normal map, because I wasn't sure what it is. And now my head hurts... Here is the wikipedia explanation of it. In short it apparently deal with "bumpiness".

Alpha mapping regulates how see-through a texture is. I just found an entry on texture mapping on Wikipedia. That should explain a bit about the many different ways and uses, and formats of texture files. Basically more than one kind of texture can be plonked on a mesh.

[Brambleshire]

14 minutes ago, ButchDiavolo said:

Parallax Mesh Patch Collection

Yes! I actually implemented this because I saw you talking about it to someone else in another thread! I even followed the deleting files tutorial. (In all my google and stepforum searches, your posts come up a lot!) But I'm glad to hear that you dont really needed, because I don't understand what it actually does, and mods I don't understand make me very anxious. So I'll happily remove it.

 

13 minutes ago, ButchDiavolo said:

the Diavolo method

Step 4: I have done steps 1-3 already. Except I have not done STEP in totality. Where things get tricky with the STEP compatibility patch I have foregone it for now to make my own choices in those areas going forward, such as with lighting mods. [This is actually my second attempt at a build. My first one hit an unsolvable problem, so I decided to start over.] 4. I'm suprised to see you say add lighting here, but I trust you to the death. The Lux you link to is for interiors, is this your intention? Since you disable all the plugins, your not actually using it for lighting. Does that mean you use other mods for your lighting?

Intermediate Question: So before I proceed with the next question, I want to tell you about this because its a large part of why I started doing this in the first place. With nearly every landscape texture mod, there is always 1 or 2 textures somewhere that is spikey. Example: I have all other parallax mods removed or disabled. PURE Skurkbro installation. Instructions followed to the T. In skurkbros case its Fallforestgrass01 and volcanictundradirt01. Likewise with 202x and with skyland i think it was Dirt02. Even if I wanted to use a 1 mod landscape I can't because there's always that one or two spots that are spikey. (I haven't been able to get responses from the authors). The only exception is Atlantean, which has a couple critical texutures that are just awful. Anyways.. to the actual question: Do you have any insight on why almost every mod has at least 1 or 2 spikey textures like how I've described?

Step 5: So. This is the tricky part I think. I'm going to start over following your method but hear me out. What I've been doing so far has gotten me 95% of the way. I created my own mod where I copy and pasted all the things I want from the 4 forementioned mods. I have skyland for the rift, skurks for the marsh and oceanshore and rivers, 202x for snow, skurks for the rest. All of this looks great EXCEPT the dastarldly volcanictundradirt01 which is a spikey carpet. When I examine it in M02, no other mods are touching it and no files are missing. So what do I do? I decide to use atlantean since thats the only mod that has a flawless -and non spikey- volcanic area. But when I try that, ITS SPIKEY TOO. Ok so then I assume it needs the esp and other random files that come with antlantean in order to work, so I leave atlantean as its own mod with my custom mod overwriting the areas I want overwritten. SO. You would think that my custom landscape mod would simply overwrite atlantean. No. Even tho MO2 tells me that Atlantean is being overwritten, all of the landscape textures display atlantean textures. So then I hide all the unwanted atlantean textures. All of skyrim still shows atlantean. Ok, so then I delete the unwanted atlantean textures. All of Skyrim is STILL displaying entirelyatlantean textures!!! Even the ones I deleted!  .  .  pause . . Now before I started this method, I was doing one similar to yours, where I was sorting the landscape mods and hiding what I didnt' want, but I ran into the same problems where hiding or even deleting textures seemed to accomplish nothing. Now finally the question: How did you avoid this obstacle in your method? Because if your sorting more than one texture mod, and hiding files, it seems like you may encounter the same obstacle.

Phew what an ordeal. I've spent literal days just on landscape textures lmao. Thanks again Diavolo for sharing your wisdom. I will ensure I pass it on where I can. And thanks for the DYNDOLOD tip, your no doubt saving me hours of work figuring that one out!

P.S. Are you named after the charachter from JoJos Bizarre Adventure?

[ButchDiavolo]

12 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

Step 4: I have done steps 1-3 already. Except I have not done STEP in totality. Where things get tricky with the STEP compatibility patch I have foregone it for now to make my own choices in those areas going forward, such as with lighting mods. [This is actually my second attempt at a build. My first one hit an unsolvable problem, so I decided to start over.] 4. I'm suprised to see you say add lighting here, but I trust you to the death. The Lux you link to is for interiors, is this your intention? Since you disable all the plugins, your not actually using it for lighting. Does that mean you use other mods for your lighting?

The "problem" with adding mods to a pure STEP install, is that the patches will most likely no longer work/ conflict. Going beyond STEP, you are basically going to have to deal with problems by yourself. But you can always ask on the forums.

About step 4: trusting someone to death is never advisable I am by no means an expert on anything. I just take note of what works and what not. Learning from disasters if you will. So many disasters *sigh* I think I am on Skyrim build 50-something now. And I again have a big problem...

As for Lux, I am using Lux in the same way as the STEP guide uses ELFX: just for the meshes (and few textures). The problem with using parallax is that using a mod like ELFX can/ will cause light flickering. Lux is aimed at parallax now AND has "divided" meshes, which will cut down enormously on this flickering. So I use only the meshes. I delete the plugins, because I don't want the "look" of Lux. For lighting itself, I am currently using Skyrim is Luminous (SiL) and Enhanced Dynamic Lighting (which is made to compliment SiL). Both mods are very new, but they look good to me.

27 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

Intermediate Question: So before I proceed with the next question, I want to tell you about this because its a large part of why I started doing this in the first place. With nearly every landscape texture mod, there is always 1 or 2 textures somewhere that is spikey. Example: I have all other parallax mods removed or disabled. PURE Skurkbro installation. Instructions followed to the T. In skurkbros case its Fallforestgrass01 and volcanictundradirt01. Likewise with 202x and with skyland i think it was Dirt02. Even if I wanted to use a 1 mod landscape I can't because there's always that one or two spots that are spikey. (I haven't been able to get responses from the authors). The only exception is Atlantean, which has a couple critical texutures that are just awful. Anyways.. to the actual question: Do you have any insight on why almost every mod has at least 1 or 2 spikey textures like how I've described?
 

Well, in the case of Skurkbro, I know he was totally burned out after making his overhaul. He took a looooong break, maybe even still on break. I am sure he just missed a few textures and didn't update them to the new parallax. As I said in the previous post, using old parallax textures on new parallax meshes will cause the spiky thing. This is because the old parallax used different height settings in the textures, so it looks either molten, glistening or spiky. I think all the other landscape mods/ modders are similar. They have to change so many things to make it work with parallax, that they lose sight of what they changed. And then burn out and need a break. And then either forget or lost interest in the mod.

57 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

 

Step 5: So. This is the tricky part I think. I'm going to start over following your method but hear me out. What I've been doing so far has gotten me 95% of the way. I created my own mod where I copy and pasted all the things I want from the 4 forementioned mods. I have skyland for the rift, skurks for the marsh and oceanshore and rivers, 202x for snow, skurks for the rest. All of this looks great EXCEPT the dastarldly volcanictundradirt01 which is a spikey carpet. When I examine it in M02, no other mods are touching it and no files are missing. So what do I do? I decide to use atlantean since thats the only mod that has a flawless -and non spikey- volcanic area. But when I try that, ITS SPIKEY TOO. Ok so then I assume it needs the esp and other random files that come with antlantean in order to work, so I leave atlantean as its own mod with my custom mod overwriting the areas I want overwritten. SO. You would think that my custom landscape mod would simply overwrite atlantean. No. Even tho MO2 tells me that Atlantean is being overwritten, all of the landscape textures display atlantean textures. So then I hide all the unwanted atlantean textures. All of skyrim still shows atlantean. Ok, so then I delete the unwanted atlantean textures. All of Skyrim is STILL displaying entirelyatlantean textures!!! Even the ones I deleted!  .  .  pause . . Now before I started this method, I was doing one similar to yours, where I was sorting the landscape mods and hiding what I didnt' want, but I ran into the same problems where hiding or even deleting textures seemed to accomplish nothing. Now finally the question: How did you avoid this obstacle in your method? Because if your sorting more than one texture mod, and hiding files, it seems like you may encounter the same obstacle.

*chuckles about the Atlantean becoming spikey* Well... welcome to modding! sometimes mysterious things happen and who knows why?

The way I fix problems like that, by using a backup landscape mod. I use Majestic Landscapes combined with Majestic Landscape addons and tweaks. I have installed them in the general "Foundation" section, so they get overwritten by everything, except things that are missing or flawed. Then I hide the flawed textures/ meshes, so that Majestic takes over. That fixes the spikey problem for me.

I overcame the obstacle by making sure only the mod I wanted is registering in MO2. If you have a large(ish) mod list, textures and meshes are overwritten by many mods, sometimes even ones you wouldn't expect. So I go by the Data tab in MO2. That shows you everything you need to know really. You then work back across all the mods, until the file name is displayed in white and not red, which means that no other mods alter that file. Another way to get an oversight of what is overwriting what, is double-clicking on the mod you want the file to come from, and going to the conflicts tab. This will also show you the over-writers. If the file you want to see is shown in either the winning or no conflict part, then it should show up. If it is overwritten by another mod(s), you can see which mods are involved. You then trace back all those mods and hide their version, until your preferred version wins. Oh, and a pro-tip: Don't forget to refresh the MO mod-list after hiding or unhiding files! if you don't refresh, it will still show the old situation. And if you go into the game without refreshing MO, it might even load the old situation. So when ever you chance something, always press the F5 key to refresh. I even press F5 now before going in game, even if I haven't changed anything.

Wow. Another book there. I hope this helps you get the Skyrim you want. It is a lot of work, but in the end it is worth it.

Oh. I don't know what JoJos Bizarre Adventure is. So no, I am not named after that. It is just a name I made up years ago, when I wanted a change from my usual cow-based names (vachnic, LaVache, BodaciousBovine etc.) You can still see those old names floating around the internet. i.e. vachnic is still my name on the Nexus.

[Brambleshire]

4 hours ago, ButchDiavolo said:

Lux

I started to inquire more deeply about why lighting meshes have anything to do with meshes and parallax, but im going to chalk it up to magic like we did with the deep levels of how parallax really works jaja.

 

4 hours ago, ButchDiavolo said:

sometimes mysterious things happen and who knows why?

First of all thankyou for making me realize that refreshing MO2 is a thing. Who knows how many problems that caused over the past few months of tinkering? 

WELP. I have been already checking the data tab and the conflict tab. Lets look at fallforestgrass01 and the other fallforest___ textures for the rift. I want to use the skyland textures for the rift because they look the best. So I have copied and pasted all of the files from the corresponding skyland mods into my own, preserving the file paths and everything. When I test my custom mod by itself, it works fine. The Rift looks beautiful. However, recall I have volcanic tundra to address. I need Atlantean to do that. Putting Atlantean files in my custom mod resulted in spiky volcanic tundra, but it works fine as its own mod.

So Now I have Atlantean as its own mod covering the volcanic area (+ the reach and dirt01) with my custom mod covering the rest. I have confirmed with the conflict panel and data tab that my custom mod is winning and nothing is overwriting it in turn but Fallforestgrass01 still shows the atlantean texture in game. I hide fallforestgrass01 from atlantean and it still shows in game. I delete fallforestgrass01 from atlantean and it still shows up in game, overwriting my fallforestgrass01!!! From what I know this should not be possible! Is there something about Atlantean that makes it where its all or nothing? Am I overlooking something? I also refreshed and doublechecked that my custom mod had the skyland version of fallforestgrass01 and not the atlantean one. I'm about to start over with my parallax section again.

Thanks again Diavolo, your the best! 
It just so happens that theres a villian named Diavolo in this crazy anime!

EDIT: I'm going to the author of Atlantean to ask for their opinion on overwriting some of the landscapes from their mod. They seem to still be active...

EDIT EDIT: If this doesn't work, I might just go give up on this and go full Atlantean, as its the only landscape parallax mod I've found that works on its own in every type of landscape texture.

Edited March 20 by Brambleshire

[ButchDiavolo]

7 minutes ago, Brambleshire said:

I started to inquire more deeply about why lighting meshes have anything to do with meshes and parallax, but im going to chalk it up to magic like we did with the deep levels of how parallax really works jaja.

Many lighting effects are actually meshes and textures, as are for example mists etc. As such the lighting effects will interact with the meshes around them, making it look like they are illuminated. If they are not fine tuned however, they will cause mesh flickering. This means, among other things, that one part of a mesh is lit but another part of the same mesh is not. Giving odd effects and actual flickering. A recent development to prevent this flickering, is dividing up the meshes in separate parts, while still remaining one mesh (more magic). This is what Lux does. So by using the Lux meshes, you can use any lighting mod and it will not cause visual oddities. And Lux is fully parallax enabled.

That whole Atlantean situation sounds odd. If you hid the textures, it should be impossible to show in the game, as you say. Unless it is saved into the save game somehow.

Ah OK. I just went to look at the contents of Atlantean. I see it also includes lodgen files. It could be that the textures that keep appearing are also included in that. Try disabling the "Green tundra landscape LOD" folder and see if it still shows up. In fact, you don't really need those files, because you will be running xlodgen etc. yourself at the end. When you try to disable that LOD folder, it could be that MO gives an error message and you can't hide it. That means the filename would become too long. in that case try hiding the folder under the main lod folder and so on, until you are able to hide them. Then go in-game to check if they are gone then. *crosses fingers* Even if they are still there, you should consider deleting that whole LOD folder, because you don't need it. Some mod creators add those files for people who don't want to use Dyndolod etc. then it is just install and forget.

And yes, another option is to ask the Atlantean mod creator for advice. They created it, so they should know what could be causing it.

If/ when you find out, please let me (us) know, because the answer could help others. And well, I am just curious now

[Brambleshire]

19 minutes ago, ButchDiavolo said:

disabling the "Green tundra landscape LOD"

YES. That was it!!! All the textures from my "custom" mod are showing through!!! Halelujah! I was wondering what that dam "Tamriel" folder was for, and why it was full of a billion files named after cells... Hell yea Diavolo thank you! And what is working looks AWESOME. As I'm going around inspecting I just stop and stare at some of the scenes it looks so dam good. However! My volcanictundradirt01 is still spikey. It looks as designed when Atlantean is by itself, but as soon as I introduce my other mod it goes spikey. This dam volcano dirt has been vexxing me for several days now. I'm going to edit my question to the author.

Also my Dirt02, Pineforest02, and snowrocks01 suddenly went spikey, but I think I can fix those quickly.

[ButchDiavolo]

1 hour ago, Brambleshire said:

YES. That was it!!! All the textures from my "custom" mod are showing through!!! Halelujah! I was wondering what that dam "Tamriel" folder was for, and why it was full of a billion files named after cells... Hell yea Diavolo thank you! And what is working looks AWESOME. As I'm going around inspecting I just stop and stare at some of the scenes it looks so dam good. However! My volcanictundradirt01 is still spikey. It looks as designed when Atlantean is by itself, but as soon as I introduce my other mod it goes spikey. This dam volcano dirt has been vexxing me for several days now. I'm going to edit my question to the author.

Also my Dirt02, Pineforest02, and snowrocks01 suddenly went spikey, but I think I can fix those quickly.

I am so glad that was the solution. if you have any other mods that comes with pre-rendered lodgen folders, just delete those as you don't need them. You will be making your own lodgen based on your loadorder. However, DON'T remove folders named DynDOLOD\lod which contain meshes which end with xxxpassthru_lod.nif. Those are the files that Dyndolod needs to create your lodgen.

In the mean time, enjoy your Skyrim.

[Brambleshire]

I finally found the answer to the spikey volcano dirt! It was a conflict between the atlantean .esp and skurkbros .esp. I don't know why they have .esp's or what they do, but they both had effects on the landscape textures in question. I also don't understand why they didn't show up in the conflicts panel or data tap as touching those textures. But oh well, they did. So I made my own patch in xEdit so that each .esp only applies to the areas that I want them to. I'm too tired and frustrated to be all that excited, but at least im moving on to the next stage of my build! 

Time to spend a few days deciding what dungeon, mountain, and architecture textures to use....

[ButchDiavolo]

3 hours ago, Brambleshire said:

I finally found the answer to the spikey volcano dirt! It was a conflict between the atlantean .esp and skurkbros .esp. I don't know why they have .esp's or what they do, but they both had effects on the landscape textures in question. I also don't understand why they didn't show up in the conflicts panel or data tap as touching those textures. But oh well, they did. So I made my own patch in xEdit so that each .esp only applies to the areas that I want them to. I'm too tired and frustrated to be all that excited, but at least im moving on to the next stage of my build! 

Time to spend a few days deciding what dungeon, mountain, and architecture textures to use....

Ah! Yes sometimes textures or meshes are hardcoded in plugins, I forgot about. Mainly because  most texture/mesh mods don't have plugins. And the problem is not spotted, because MO2 can't read the content/ coding in a plugin file. Which makes it very difficult to trouble shoot, because the reference in the plugin remains, even if you hide/ delete the texture/mesh. Fun huh?

As far as other mods go, check out ERM- Enhance Rocks and Mountains (mountain meshes) and Tomato's Mountains 4K 8K (textures). ERM combined with Tomato's Slate version is my favorite mountain retexture. It looks so different from the norm.

For Architecture, you could check out Riton's overhauls. And check out Yuril's Fyxes, most are tiny fixes but they make a heck of a difference. a MUST have is Yurils Fyx High Hrothgar Step Collisions. You can actually walk/run/skip/ crawl up the 10,000steps now without getting stuck! And my personal favorite Whiterun overhaul: Illustrious Whiterun by winedave. If nothing else, you should at least get his wood addition. His wood textures are amazing.

Of course this is just optional. I am sure you can find what you are looking for by yourself. Just some examples of what is out there, but old and new.