pack A Real Explorer's Guide to Skyrim

[Monkee]

Hi there, I just installed STEP 2.2.9.1 Extended and I'd like to add REGS. If I understand well what I read here and there, it's not compatible anymore, right?

Does anyone has more infos? Is it fixable in some way?

 

Big thanks in advance! 

Edited November 24, 2015 by Monkee

[CJ2311]

Most people will surely have seen it coming by now, but I'm sorry to say that this guide is now officially dead.

There are plenty of reasons behind this, the most important ones being :

- The lack of time/motivation to keep the guide updated (This applies both to Nearox and me, I would assume). As it turned out, uni life in France takes a heavier toll on my free time than I expected.

- The absence of an internet connection which makes it very difficult for me download all those big mods and keep them updated (I'm relying on wifi hotspots atm)

- The final nail in the coffin which was the inclusion of Immersive Citizens in STEP; That mod is virtually incompatible with half of the mods in the guide. patching some of them would in fact be relatively easy, but mods such as ETaC or JK's would take hundreds of hours to patch (and would need updates to these patches every time a mod is updated).

I know that missjennabee has released a patch for IC, but I'm afraid it is nowhere near perfect to say the least (even though I only checked it on Tes5Edit, not in the actual game). It seems to just fix the most blatant issues, which is good for most people but doesn't really hold up to the STEP standards.

 

But ultimately I would like to thank everyone who supported this guide. I've really learned a lot more about modding by creating it, and it enabled me to finally give something back for this great community. I'm really grateful to all the people who participated in this thread.

And I'd like to especially thank Nearox for co-authoring the guide and going through all of those hundreds of mods with me at the start of the project, as well as all the following people (in no particular order) as I consider REGS to be the result of our collective effort :

MonoAccipiter, Gandaganza, Keithinhanoi, Kelmych, Astakos, Malouz, Noobzor, Thernn, TheBloke, & Ogham.

 

That's pretty much all I have to say... D:

If anyone is interested in reviving the guide, I would gladly welcome the offer and even help with theoretical knowledge (especially concerning the process of patching mods/navmeshes)

[obdown666]

Yes, we have seen this coming.  Hopefully someone will simply pick this up and move it to the Nexus and remove the full reliance on STEP, which is a loose coupling anyway.  Don't need to expand it rapidly (there is only so much available ram), just slowly over time and ensure mod changes that impact other mods in the pack are called out and addressed.  This is the heart of my load order and is a massive time saver. 

Thanks for the time and quality put into this.

Bonne Chance.

[TirigonX]

No offense, but I don't agree with your third reason. Imm. Citizens is not incompatible with half of the guide's mods. It's actually only a few. For Cutting Room Floor, Realistic Room Rental and Provincial Courier Service patches are already included in Imm. Cititzen. JK's Cities can be replaced with JK's Cities Lite which is a good idea anyway if you want a good frame rate in cities. And regarding ETAC compatibility someone would really need to pinpoint what exactly the issues are. I've tested the latest version of ETAC and didn't see any oddities. NPCs are using new behaviours, routines and dialogues from Imm. Citizens and also interact with objects added by ETAC.

 

Just wanted to point that out, your other two reasons are more than understandable and I can't blame you at all for this. Real life should always take precedence. Thank you for all the work you've put into this!

[elwaps]

Most people will surely have seen it coming by now, but I'm sorry to say that this guide is now officially dead.

There are plenty of reasons behind this, the most important ones being :

- The lack of time/motivation to keep the guide updated (This applies both to Nearox and me, I would assume). As it turned out, uni life in France takes a heavier toll on my free time than I expected.

- The absence of an internet connection which makes it very difficult for me download all those big mods and keep them updated (I'm relying on wifi hotspots atm)

- The final nail in the coffin which was the inclusion of Immersive Citizens in STEP; That mod is virtually incompatible with half of the mods in the guide. patching some of them would in fact be relatively easy, but mods such as ETaC or JK's would take hundreds of hours to patch (and would need updates to these patches every time a mod is updated).

I know that missjennabee has released a patch for IC, but I'm afraid it is nowhere near perfect to say the least (even though I only checked it on Tes5Edit, not in the actual game). It seems to just fix the most blatant issues, which is good for most people but doesn't really hold up to the STEP standards.

 

But ultimately I would like to thank everyone who supported this guide. I've really learned a lot more about modding by creating it, and it enabled me to finally give something back for this great community. I'm really grateful to all the people who participated in this thread.

And I'd like to especially thank Nearox for co-authoring the guide and going through all of those hundreds of mods with me at the start of the project, as well as all the following people (in no particular order) as I consider REGS to be the result of our collective effort :

MonoAccipiter, Gandaganza, Keithinhanoi, Kelmych, Astakos, Malouz, Noobzor, Thernn, TheBloke, & Ogham.

 

That's pretty much all I have to say... D:

If anyone is interested in reviving the guide, I would gladly welcome the offer and even help with theoretical knowledge (especially concerning the process of patching mods/navmeshes)

Thank you for your time and effort you've put in up to this point, REGS was always a mandatory add-on for my STEP installations, loved it!

As for the first reason, I wish you all the best and a ton of good grades.

 

As for the third reason - although I don't think that will change your mind - I've already used STEP 2.2.9.1 with REGS and a manually added Immersive Citizens. This is what I've experienced after applying all patches and load order recommendations I've found:

- it is rock stable when it comes to CTDs and freezes, everything worked without sending Skyrim to Oblivion even once

- the ETaC patch may not look good in TES5Edit but it appeared to work just fine, at least I never found NPCs doing weird stuff in ETaC areas beyond what you would expect from Vanilla Skyrim

- there were some minor "Where the hell am I?", "How did I get here and what do I do?" and "Huh? That cart wasn't there yesterday, lets try to walk through it" issues in JKs Cities, however, they never broke immersion as they were more rare than you would expect

- I had some NPCs standing instead of walking on the roads, however, all of these issues happened outside of JK and ETaC but on open roads so it was probably another mod I had installed

As far as I understood it with my noob understanding, all one would have to do is completely NavMesh JKs Cities, whatever that would mean in detail.

 

Whatever, looking at your first and second reason, I really hope there'll be someone picking up your awesome work. REGS is too good to be abandoned. Especially looking at the integration of the bigger city/town/building/... overhaults and the quest mods that always seemed a bit broken to me, every second one of the latter ones had to be cleaned in TES5Edit. Without REGS I wouldn't have had any of them in my games.

[elwaps]

Redone everything from scratch using STEP 2.2.9.2, adding REGS 4.0.6 on top. During the installations I tested the game for roughly a dozen hours and didn't have a single CTD or freeze.

 

What I did with REGS was basically

- replacing JK's Major Cities with JK's Cities Lite

- not installing Immersive College of Winterhold (author has set it to hidden)

- going through literally all mods and installing literally all compatibility patches I could find

- not installing the REGS patch for the STEP extended patch

 

What changed from STEP to STEP+REGS?

- performance impact (intro scene) was minimal

- JK's Cities Lite provide a good performance in cities

- Almost no oddities caused by IC vs ETaC/JK, all I could find was a hovering blacksmith in solitude

- ETaC, as usual, eats up fps, but that is known and I would have used ETaC anyway

- I got random stutters, feeling like the game saying "wait for half a second, I'm gonna load something", but they're rare so I can live with them and they tended to go away as soon as I was using an ENB in the past

 

As for the last point (not installing REGS patch for STEP), what would you recommend?

Ignore it as it is totally outdated and probably incompatible with some of the stuff added in STEP 2.2.9.1 and 2?

Or use that USLEEP script that replaces the USKP dependency with USLEEP and use it as it is still essential?

 

Would be cool to get an answer to this from CJ2311 but perhaps someone else is experienced enough to answer instead of him?!

 

Thanks in advance!

 

/edit

For the very first time since beginning the installation of STEP I got a CTD.

New Game > Create Character > Own Property in Whiterun > Leave Breezehome > CTD

 

Could this be connected to the missing patches?

Edited November 30, 2015 by elwaps

[Kelmych]

Most people will surely have seen it coming by now, but I'm sorry to say that this guide is now officially dead.

 

I'm sorry to hear this,  but thanks for all the work you put into creating a great pack. I expect that even with using Immersive Citizens that I'll be able to use many of the mods you selected and tested.

 

The STEP patch hasn't really been needed for a while, by the way, which can be seen by looking at it in TES5Edit. I mentioned it a while ago in this thread.

[whismerhill]

question : does the current REGS patch include changes/patches for Immersive Citizens or not ?

 

thanks.

 

edit: reason I ask is because I'm thinking of removing IC from my load order. I'm pretty much indifferent to that, it's a nice addition but it's not worth compatibility issues in my book

Edited December 11, 2015 by whismerhill

[darkside]

question : does the current REGS patch include changes/patches for Immersive Citizens or not ?

 

thanks.

 

edit: reason I ask is because I'm thinking of removing IC from my load order. I'm pretty much indifferent to that, it's a nice addition but it's not worth compatibility issues in my book

No

[elwaps]

I'm pretty much indifferent to [iC], it's a nice addition but it's not worth compatibility issues in my book

May I ask which incompatibilities you've encountered so far? As for me it only was Riverwood people being somewhat stuck (solved itself after using the ingame wait function and wouldn't have surprised me if it would have been a vanilla "feature") and the Solitude blacksmith using a grinder that wasn't there.

[Bandy]

Apologies, but would like advice as to what are the alternatives if this pack is not being supported any longer? 

What mods from the former REGS pack can be safely and easily included in 2.2.9.2-X ??? 

My system is capable: i7 @ 4.4 GHz, 8 GB 1600 RAM, GTX 980Ti 6 GB,...

 

Not a modder or programmer here, just a player who can follow MO, LOOT, etc... instructions, but editing code for compatibility is not my cuppa.  Thanks for any insight!

Edited February 26, 2016 by Bandy

[Gunkin]

 What mods from the former REGS pack can be safely and easily included in 2.2.9.2-X ??? 

 

 

I'd like to know as well. I'm hoping someone has managed to work something out, and doesn't mind sharing :)

[TechAngel85]

I'm planning on reviving this Pack, just haven't had time to do so yet.

[CJ2311]

What mods from the former REGS pack can be safely and easily included in 2.2.9.2-X ??? 

Skip the Settlements part, the immersive college, the realistic inns by perseid, and Nernie's villages. You MIGHT be able to install ETaC if there is still an immersive citizens patch and that it's been improved. (If it's not been improved you'll get some minor pathing errors)

You might also get some issues with the ORS mods.

 

And don't use the REGS STEP patch since it's out of date, it's not needed anymore regardless.

[afonik]

Skip the Settlements part, the immersive college, the realistic inns by perseid, and Nernie's villages. You MIGHT be able to install ETaC if there is still an immersive citizens patch and that it's been improved. (If it's not been improved you'll get some minor pathing errors)

You might also get some issues with the ORS mods.

 

And don't use the REGS STEP patch since it's out of date, it's not needed anymore regardless.

I know RL keeps you away from REGS but I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you for all your hard work