Switching from Vortex to MO2... A short rant.

[DamaLava]

Anyone else go through this?

 

    I haven't picked up modding in a few years and I thought "Well, I have all this free time right now, lets see what Skyrim SE is about." So I browsed around and noticed the shiny new Vortex organizer with it's cute features and fancy design and thought I'd give it a go... Well I've been struggling with it for the past 12 hours, trying to negotiate with it's "intuitive design" to do the most minute things. I was literally at my breaking point half an hour ago and took a "stop being mad" shower when I remembered my good times with Mod Organizer.

 

     I remembered how Mod Organizer would just chill out when I don't know if something was gonna work. We'd both kinda shrug at each other and watch SKSE have a meltdown while rejecting my dumb idea. Everything was open with Mod Organizer, I didn't have to flip back and forth between tabs to see what I'm trying to do. Most importantly though, I remembered how Mod Organizer would just move a thing where I needed it to be without arguing with me about something I told it to do in the past.

 

     It was at this point that working with Vortex is like being in a toxic relationship. The needless fluff to draw you in, the lack of common sense simply for the sake of claiming uniqueness, and the literal arguing over trivial tasks. So I promptly followed shower me's advice, swallowed my pride, and crawled back to Mod Organizer... And I have never felt so warmly welcomed by a program in my life. After installing Mod Organizer 2, as if knowing the abuse Vortex put me through, Mod Organizer 2 had already found most of the mods that I had painstakingly handpicked over the past few hours and presented them to me clear and intuitive manner. I'm so happy right now.

[Mr. Otaku]

I never really used Vortex since i'm too lazy too switch from a stable MO2 build to a mod manager that i don't understand very well, but i guess for the most part it's about what someone's used to. I've seen people say they're perfectly satisfied with Vortex and they find it easy just like i've seen people not like it in the slightest, like you. Best is to check things out and stick with what you find practical to yourself.

 

For me it was the switch from NMM to MO2 that gave me a massive relief. When i first started modding my game i went with NMM because it's got the site's name on it so it must be the best out there. Used it for about 6 months and always had trouble with it, and the fact that it directly edited my game directory was frustrating. MO2 just proved to be better in every way, it tells me more, shows me more and gives easier control over everything. But i've also seen people who do just fine with NMM so like i said, people like different things for different reasons.

[Rex89]

VORTEX - A Beginner's Guide 

[martilo3]

1 hour ago, DamaLava said:

Anyone else go through this?

 

    I haven't picked up modding in a few years and I thought "Well, I have all this free time right now, lets see what Skyrim SE is about." So I browsed around and noticed the shiny new Vortex organizer with it's cute features and fancy design and thought I'd give it a go... Well I've been struggling with it for the past 12 hours, trying to negotiate with it's "intuitive design" to do the most minute things. I was literally at my breaking point half an hour ago and took a "stop being mad" shower when I remembered my good times with Mod Organizer.

 

     I remembered how Mod Organizer would just chill out when I don't know if something was gonna work. We'd both kinda shrug at each other and watch SKSE have a meltdown while rejecting my dumb idea. Everything was open with Mod Organizer, I didn't have to flip back and forth between tabs to see what I'm trying to do. Most importantly though, I remembered how Mod Organizer would just move a thing where I needed it to be without arguing with me about something I told it to do in the past.

 

     It was at this point that working with Vortex is like being in a toxic relationship. The needless fluff to draw you in, the lack of common sense simply for the sake of claiming uniqueness, and the literal arguing over trivial tasks. So I promptly followed shower me's advice, swallowed my pride, and crawled back to Mod Organizer... And I have never felt so warmly welcomed by a program in my life. After installing Mod Organizer 2, as if knowing the abuse Vortex put me through, Mod Organizer 2 had already found most of the mods that I had painstakingly handpicked over the past few hours and presented them to me clear and intuitive manner. I'm so happy right now.

myself im a fan of vortex, i feel its holding my hand, preventing me from doing too stupid mess ups and somehow magically (so far so good i guess) handling my 110 mods to play peacefully together, and doing the behind the scene connection magic to make it all work

 

But damn i had a good laugh from reading your post. 10/10, made my day ^^

Maybe one day il try MO2, so far i haven't had any reasons to, but maybe Vortex will abuse me as well, who knows?

[gregathit]

Just read the skyrim tech support section for a month, you'll despise vortex & NMM.

MO2 is so far beyond them it is beyond description.  There is a definite learning curve, but watching a few youtube vids and you are past that.

[pinky6225]

I found vortex to be fairly straight forward to be honest after deciding to give it a go after re-installing skyrim although the feature i was hoping for (notification of nexus updates for mods) doesnt seem to work that well

 

I was happy enough with NMM (just use to remember what i'd overwriten what with) and its best feature was informing you of updates for nexus mods so you didnt have to try check yourself so was annoying when they discontinued that

[DamaLava]

I 100% respect everyone and their organizers of choice, and I'm glad (and somewhat surprised) to hear that Vortex works well for some of ya. Last night I couldn't not laugh at myself when I realized that my relationship with Vortex was similar to a toxic relationship and felt the overwhelming need to share. Anyway, glad I managed to amuse some of ya :)

 

Also, I'm happy to say that everything has been successfully converted to Mod Organizer 2, and things are running smoothly.

[Grey Cloud]

On 10/20/2020 at 7:58 AM, DamaLava said:

trying to negotiate with it's "intuitive design" to do the most minute things.

 

On 10/20/2020 at 7:58 AM, DamaLava said:

flip back and forth between tabs to see what I'm trying to do.

I've been using Vortex since July and I'm definitely not a fan. If I weren't so lazy I'd go back to NMM.

 

21 hours ago, gregathit said:

Just read the skyrim tech support section for a month, you'll despise vortex & NMM.

Rubbish. There are more posts by MO and MO2 users who don't know how to use those than by NMM or Vortex users. With all the mod managers the posts are user error rather than an actual problem with the mod manager.

It's funny how the same people who tell us how wonderful MO is and how bad Vortex is never mention that Tannin was the chief designer of both.

[Mez558]

1 hour ago, Grey Cloud said:

22 hours ago, gregathit said:

Just read the skyrim tech support section for a month, you'll despise vortex & NMM.

Rubbish. There are more posts by MO and MO2 users who don't know how to use those than by NMM or Vortex users. With all the mod managers the posts are user error rather than an actual problem with the mod manager.

 

 

Agreed, more MO/MO2 users have issues installing mods, going by what I see in the Tech Support section. Of course this possibly due to there being more MO/MO2 users (because we keep telling them to use it over anything else) or because of the, aforementioned, learning curve and that read me files and guides need to be used.

 

The big difference (at least with NMM and the MO style managers) is that if a user catastrophically fucks up with MO his game should not be harmed and relatively easy to recover by just disabling plugins. With NMM they could face having to do a complete reinstall.

(Also, you will hate NMM any time you install a large mod)

[WhatRules]

Sweet story. Maybe one day MO2 will even propose to you and you'll live happily ever after. But if it doesn't you'd have to be the daring gal and take the first step. I'm already married to MO2 and can say that the relationship will only get better when you come to know each other on a different level.

[the_mess]

NMM was okay for me during the F3 days. Then down the line they introduced multiple updates which messed up the mod orders and configs. It was still manageable. But Vortex is terrible imo. It doesn't hold well if you have many mods (100+) per game. At least in my experience. Also I find it slow. It works kinda ok with some games and its completely broken with others. Atm I am using MO2 and I won't be switching back anytime soon.

[gregathit]

6 hours ago, Grey Cloud said:

It's funny how the same people who tell us how wonderful MO is and how bad Vortex is never mention that Tannin was the chief designer of both.

And like most of your drivel comments, this is relevant how?  But hey, keep spewing vomit, it is wonderfully entertaining.  

[Grey Cloud]

20 minutes ago, gregathit said:

And like most of your drivel comments, this is relevant how?

As relevant as your MO mantra about NMM, Vortex and tech support and it had the added bonus of being factually correct.

The fact that you reacted to it also demonstrates its relevance. Mention of the apostate Tannin and the MO evangelicals jump in.

 

Nice insulting language from an admin there. Good to see you are setting the standards.

 ✌️

 

[Swanky]

I've only started using MO in the past year or so. Mostly did my stuff with FOMM / OBMM / WryeBash for FO3, New Vegas and Oblivion and NMM for Skyrim LE. Tried Vortex for FO4 and switched over completely for both FO4 and Skyrim SE. And while it did okay for me it didn't really click. As @Dehaka said it works good for smaller load orders. MO2 has a bit of a learning curve but it's easy to use once you get the hang of it.

I'd probably switch over to MO for Vegas as well if I didn't have to redo a couple dozen personal edits and clean that mess up.

 

The read was kind of amusing (no bashing intended), yet I think that Vortex doesn't deserve all the hate it gets. It works, it's just not as good as MO2.

[gregathit]

7 hours ago, Grey Cloud said:

As relevant as your MO mantra about NMM, Vortex and tech support and it had the added bonus of being factually correct.

As irrelevant you mean.  I thought even someone as limited as you would pick this up, but sadly that doesn't appear to the be the case.  It is irrelevant that Tannin was involved in the same way that the same people who put XP (which most folks liked as an OS) together were the same as the ones that put millennium (which was universally despised) together.  That the same people put both together is irrelevant.  They are PRODUCTS that are VERY different.  Emphasis intended. 

 

I don't know Tannin and thus I'm not inclined to judge him.  He made NMM and likely Vortex with specific parameters in mind and no doubt, with a certain amount of instruction on what he could and could not do.  The two products do work for the nexus users and that is what they were designed for.  MO2 fortunately was far more open in its design and rather than being targeted for a specific subset of users, it was designed for both mod makers and mod users from all sets and sites.  It is a logical progression of products.  NMM led to Vortex and Vortex led to MO and MO led to MO2.  The fact is that MO2 is superior to both NMM and Vortex in every possible way.  There is no one "switching back" to them after they use MO2.  There ARE lots of folks (OP included) who continue to get tired of Vortex and move to MO2.  

 

The rest of what you said is the usual nonsensical mouth vomit canned responses that bears no need to acknowledge, let alone respond to.

[Grey Cloud]

8 hours ago, gregathit said:

As irrelevant you mean.

So even someone as limited as you has picked this up.

[Glaurung26]

I had a similar experience with Vortex. Spent many hours on tutorials and beating my head against the wall. The design philosophy just chafes on me. The most trouble I have with MO is getting Bodyslide and FNIS to output properly and playing cleanup with the overwrite folder. Otherwise pretty straight forward and does everything I need it to.

[Tlam99]

19 minutes ago, Glaurung26 said:

MO is getting Bodyslide and FNIS to output properly and

Just a hint, if you still got problems with it.

The integration is different to normal set as executable.

 needs to be done via Data tab most right window MO and select/set as executable.

 

[Heroine HoneyCrotch]

On 10/21/2020 at 6:25 AM, Mez558 said:

Agreed, more MO/MO2 users have issues installing mods

What?  Are we really talking about MO not liking some rar files?  I cry myself to sleep over it everytime. 

 

2 things that suck about MO. Sometimes,when you have contents in overwrite folder,maybe generated from CK,and you go to put contents into parent mod MO will choke on itself for like 10 seconds,sucks. The other thing is you can't create sound files(voice) in CK when launched through MO. 

[Mez558]

11 minutes ago, Heroine of the Night said:

What?  Are we really talking about MO not liking some rar files?  I cry myself to sleep over it everytime. 

 

 

No, I wasn't actually aware that any version of MO had such an issue.

I was just agreeing with GC about the majority of Tech Support issues coming from MO2 users. But, these are often from people new(ish) to modding and the issue is rarely (like never) the fault of the Mod Manager but the user not understanding it or the Mod(s) they have installed.

 

I'm not able to comment on how well MO2 works or doesn't. I don't use it. I still use NMM as it does what I need it to do. If I ever do a rebuild of my game then I will look at MO2 but for now I see go through that just to change Mod Managers.

 

GC's (and mine to a degree) antipathy toward MO2 comes from a number of posters who have declared anyone that is using anything other MO2 (mainly directed at people still using NMM) a moron for doing so.

[Heroine HoneyCrotch]

16 minutes ago, Mez558 said:

 

No, I wasn't actually aware that any version of MO had such an issue.

I was just agreeing with GC about the majority of Tech Support issues coming from MO2 users. But, these are often from people new(ish) to modding and the issue is rarely (like never) the fault of the Mod Manager but the user not understanding it or the Mod(s) they have installed.

 

I'm not able to comment on how well MO2 works or doesn't. I don't use it. I still use NMM as it does what I need it to do. If I ever do a rebuild of my game then I will look at MO2 but for now I see go through that just to change Mod Managers.

 

GC's (and mine to a degree) antipathy toward MO2 comes from a number of posters who have declared anyone that is using anything other MO2 (mainly directed at people still using NMM) a moron for doing so.

If I had tons of work invested in NMM LO and felt good with it I wouldn't change mod managers neither. I was told MO was better when I started modding but had bigger learning curve(overwrite folder?) so I went with it. For someone who never knew other mod managers I can't relate to learning curve thing,couple gopher/gamer poets videos and everything just worked. 

[worik]

6 hours ago, Heroine of the Night said:

Sometimes,when you have contents in overwrite folder,maybe generated from CK,and you go to put contents into parent mod MO will choke on itself for like 10 seconds,sucks.

I've never noticed that. And I was using MO1 for 5+X years before I switched to MO2

6 hours ago, Heroine of the Night said:

The other thing is you can't create sound files(voice) in CK when launched through MO. 

Again. ? I think I tried that once in 2018 and I can't remember anything special.

Do you know more details?

Would that affect MO2, too?

 

[Heroine HoneyCrotch]

47 minutes ago, worik said:

I've never noticed that.

Lucky Ducky. Mine will choke on itself for x amount of seconds sometimes when transferring files from overwrite to parent mod. It's only sometimes and Im in and out of ck a lot. I dont have much in the "gripe" department when it comes to MO.

 

47 minutes ago, worik said:

Do you know more details?

the .fuz files skyrim uses for sound. I remember having desired sound file and properly placing it where it should be alongside generated lip file I got through ck and I tried in ck to convert the 2 into skyrim .fuz file. Ck wouldn't let me do it launching through MO. The way I tried I had files in data folder that were known to be applicable,felt like it should of worked. Instead of spinning wheels trying to make it work through MO I just quickly launched ck.exe from skyrim folder,already had files in data folder?(1st time should of worked).  

 

 

Would that affect MO2, too?   IDK,maybe

[RitualClarity]

21 hours ago, gregathit said:

As irrelevant you mean.  I thought even someone as limited as you would pick this up, but sadly that doesn't appear to the be the case.  It is irrelevant that Tannin was involved in the same way that the same people who put XP (which most folks liked as an OS) together were the same as the ones that put millennium (which was universally despised) together.  That the same people put both together is irrelevant.  They are PRODUCTS that are VERY different.  Emphasis intended. 

 

I don't know Tannin and thus I'm not inclined to judge him.  He made NMM and likely Vortex with specific parameters in mind and no doubt, with a certain amount of instruction on what he could and could not do.  The two products do work for the nexus users and that is what they were designed for.  MO2 fortunately was far more open in its design and rather than being targeted for a specific subset of users, it was designed for both mod makers and mod users from all sets and sites.  It is a logical progression of products.  NMM led to Vortex and Vortex led to MO and MO led to MO2.  The fact is that MO2 is superior to both NMM and Vortex in every possible way.  There is no one "switching back" to them after they use MO2.  There ARE lots of folks (OP included) who continue to get tired of Vortex and move to MO2.  

 

The rest of what you said is the usual nonsensical mouth vomit canned responses that bears no need to acknowledge, let alone respond to.

I and some others here had direct contact with Tannin early on in MO's development.  I am fairly certain you are correct that he had specific instructions and requirements that were to be completed for the new mod manager to replace NMM. (Vortex )  

 

You are however wrong on the progression of products. MO was well before Tannin started working on Vortex.  IN fact MO was the reason he was asked to work for Nexus and create Vortex (with the rest of the NMM dev team) Vortex is the newest of the mod managers. It has to  also  content as I understand it, with many other games mod requirements (for other Nexus mods downloads and such) than just those that MO2 does. 

 

You are correct that MO2 is vastly superior to Vortex for any of the games it covers. Vortex handles other games that MO2 doesn't. The only reason I can see for someone using Vortex is if they are also desiring to use one manager to manage all their mods and want to mod other non MO2 covered games.  Not that they have to, but that they want to.

[RitualClarity]

9 hours ago, Heroine of the Night said:

What?  Are we really talking about MO not liking some rar files?  I cry myself to sleep over it everytime. 

 

2 things that suck about MO. Sometimes,when you have contents in overwrite folder,maybe generated from CK,and you go to put contents into parent mod MO will choke on itself for like 10 seconds,sucks. The other thing is you can't create sound files(voice) in CK when launched through MO. 

Seriously, why are you doing that with MO active?  Who does that?  Stop.  If you aren't going to use the tools that MO2 provides to create a mod from the overwrite folder... and manually futz with the various files in MOs system,... SHUT DOWN MO, DO YOUR MOVES AND RESTART IT.   No chokes etc. The very fact that you can futz with the data (database) and it not completely loose it's shit is a testimony that MO2 is solid and better. Perhaps better than most any other program much less a mod manager. That it can recover from tomfoolery like that is fucking amazing.