TES5 Edit or Mod Orginizer Misplacing esm files... WHY?!?

[MaxTimber]

Hello STEP team and Comunity .

 

i have fix-able but anoying issue whe cleaning Skirim offical DLC with TES5 Edit.

 

i use mod-orginizer to activate and use TES5 Edit though im not as certan it is the problem.

 

While using TES5 Edit click de-select all,chose the mod to clean, it Registers Everying.

I Click the mod, filter-it, removes from master file and i un-delete the changes.

Close the widow get the pop-up saving the changes and the mod is backed up.

 

when first used it in a long time my Verry basic unmanaged DLC was missing allbut the hi-rz dlc

 

iand wn i checked the overwrite flide the TES4 backups wre there ( no surprise) but what shocked me was a ESM.

 

i think put it back in my skyin data folder. but im nou sure since this contadicts few steps whe followin you directions.

 

If anybody is having the same issue please shre your experince & wisdom so this problem can be addresed one way or another.

Edited May 31, 2015 by MaxTimber

[thommaal]

Mod Organizer is not misplacing the vanilla esms after you've cleaned them with Xedit, it's moving them into the Overwrite folder within the folder structure of Mod Organizer.

1. Why is it doing that?

The Skyrim Data folder is placed beyond the mod folder structure of MO, so there is no pre-defined place where MO could put the esms within its own folder structure - apart from the overwrite folder.

The goal of Mo is to NOT change your vanilla Skyrim game at all, neither its folder structure nor its data. So, it would be quite counter-productive if Mo overwrote your original files in the Skyrim Data folder.

That's why it copies the cleaned and the backup file of the original, untouched esm into "Overwrite".

2. What are you supposed to do about it?

a) Close MO.

b) Create a folder under "Mod Organizer > Mods" to place the cleaned esms there (you can name it whatever you like, "Cleaned Vanilla esms", e.g.)

c) If you created a backup of your original esm (something like "HearthFires.esm.backup.2015_05_31_11_37_42") move it from the MO overwrite folder back to the Data folder of Skyrim. Rename it to "HearthFires.esm".

c) Open MO and place the cleaned esm into the newly created folder within MO's folder structure.

d) Rinse and repeat.

That way, you retain a pristine Skyrim installation, yet use the cleaned files while playing.

 

Added:

Just in case you don't already know it: the Dawnguard.esm must be cleaned a second time to remove all duplicate records.

 

If you placed the once cleaned Dawnguard.esm into a mod folder within MO, Tes5Edit will use that file for the second round, of course, and not touch the original one back in your Skyrim Data folder.

 

Added 2:

 

The "Cleaned Vanilla esms"-folder (or whatever name you consider appropriate) should be the first one after the Non-MO entries within the left window that lists all the available mods in MO.

 

Unless you use optimized vanilla game textures; I'd place them right beneath their Non-Mo counterparts.

 

So, it might look like that:

Edited May 31, 2015 by thommaal

[GrantSP]

There appears to be a slight change to way MO handles the 'vanilla' plugins in the later versions.

In previous versions, those used when the wiki was prepared, the ESMs 'were' in fact updated into the 'Data' folder AND backups were placed into the 'Overwrite' folder. Now it appears the ESMs are edited and MOVED into the 'Overwrite' folder along with their backups. This means you will need to either move them back into the 'Data' folder or create new mods using the method described above. Personally I see no problem with moving them back into the 'Data' folder.

 

Additionally, I believe with later versions of xEdit (TES5Edit), the need to perform the 2nd clean on Dawnguard is not needed anymore.

[DoubleYou]

That behavior seems to be changing back and forth... I used to have instructions to accommodate that.

[GrantSP]

Yeah, it is very confusing. "Which version or MO are you using? Oh... well it will look like this. If another version then it will look like that."

[thommaal]

(..)

 

Additionally, I believe with later versions of xEdit (TES5Edit), the need to perform the 2nd clean on Dawnguard is not needed anymore.

I am currently re-installing Skyrim + mods. I still needed to do it twice with TEs5Edit v3.1.1.

 

That behavior seems to be changing back and forth... I used to have instructions to accommodate that.

Yeah, I was expecting MO to behave differently too, but I hadn't touched MO for almost half a year and wasn't sure if I was remembering the procedure correctly. Anyway, v1.35 and v1.36 move the files the way I described in the previous post.