Questions about modding SSE in 2023

[lordbook]

I have spent the last few years modding SLE and i have thought about making the switch to SSE, have a few questions on how modding works for SSE.

From what i've heard and seen there seems to be a few different versions of SSE with v1.5.97 being the most popular. So basically from what i understand is that you have to get the Unofficial Skyrim Special Edition Downgrade Patcher (best of both) to downgrade from v1.6.640 to v1.5.97, which in turn will downgrade the game version but the game files stay up to date. The thing i'm not certain about or if i'm correct is how modding works from this point onwards. From what i personally understand is that the way you are meant to mod, is that anything SKSE related has to be equal to the SKSE version that you are using which in turn has to be equal to the game version but anything that isn't SKSE related can be used with no issue whatsoever even if it's been updated recently. So say for example i wish to use the racemenu mod, it contains a .dll file and due to that i'd have to get an older version of it that matches the version of SKSE i'm using and if i want to get and use USEEP then using the most recent version would be alright due to it not containing anything SKSE related. However i'm not sure if i understand this correctly or not.

 

The other question i wish to ask is about cleaning the game files. From what i can understand is that there is a debate of whether or not you should clean the game files. I've seen and heard people say that you should clean the game files but on the other hand you shouldn't as there isn't any significant difference/advantage or any at all from what was previously thought.

 

I also forgot to ask that, if i were to leave my game files uncleaned and it turns out that its best to clean them afterall, would it be fine if i were to clean them after i had already modded the game or would there be any issues?

Edited June 21, 2023 by lordbook

[traison]

3 hours ago, lordbook said:

but anything that isn't SKSE related can be used with no issue

 

...unless it contains scripts that invoke methods provided by SKSE plugins. A newer script may expect a newer plugin with a method that does not exist in older versions.

 

3 hours ago, lordbook said:

whether or not you should clean the game files

 

If you know what you're doing with xEdit I wouldn't recommend this. In fact I'm not sure there really is a good reason to do it, other than satisfying some mild OCPD. But whatever you do, do not clean Dragonborn.esm of ITM records, otherwise large parts of the Aprocrypha disappears. I never looked into why that is, it just does it.

 

3 hours ago, lordbook said:

I also forgot to ask that, if i were to leave my game files uncleaned and it turns out that its best to clean them afterall, would it be fine if i were to clean them after i had already modded the game or would there be any issues?

 

Cleaning typically only removes ITM records. ITM = Identical To Master. There's valid reasons for having ITM records, they should not always be removed (see Apocrypha issue above). Removing ITM records mid-playthrough isn't going to change anything, unless the ITM record is loaded after another plugin that changed that record, example:

 

Skyrim.esm defines Record A as { 01 02 03 04 05 }

mymod.esp defines Record A as { 01 02 03 05 06 }

goodmod.esp defines Record A as { 01 02 03 04 05 }

 

goodmod.esp thus contains Record A which is an ITM. If goodmod.esp is cleaned, suddenly Record A will appear to have been changed. This is because the changes made by mymod.esp now provides the most recent version of that record.

 

Edit: Some record types will not care whether they're changed mid-playthrough. But if for instance Record A was to contain a script, I'd imagine that may cause issues. I probably wouldn't go changing quests like this either - what happens if the quest stages change mid-playthrough?

 

Edit again: Everything else you said is OK.

Edited June 21, 2023 by traison

[Just Don't]

I wouldn't recommend downgrading at this point in time really. 1.5.97 is several years old and new mods are supporting it less and less. Meanwhile most mods have been updated, ported or replaced by better alternatives for the current version (1.6.640). Consider that no matter what you do here (downgrade, stay in current version) you'll have to check if the mod has a dll file and if said dll is compatible with your specific version of the game, you're correct on that one. For other mods you're mostly fine, but you'll have to do some tests yourself for other issues/conflicts or potential incompatibilities.

 

Cleaning master files is mostly irrelevant, ITMs at that point in your loadorder (consider all these files are loading near the top of your loadorder) won't have any effect on your other mods. The other thing you do with the automatic cleaning is removing a few test rooms and records which as a player you won't see in any case and undo some deleted references (which shouldn't be used by any sane mods). Additional work for no real gain. If you really want to do it stick to the automated cleaning and do it before you start any save you care about. The problem traison mentions about Apocrypha floor was fixed AFAIK, but who knows if there are other issues related.

[traison]

53 minutes ago, Just Don't said:

The problem traison mentions about Apocrypha floor was fixed AFAIK, but who knows if there are other issues related.

 

Most likely, I tend to not update things unless I have to.

[lordbook]

1 hour ago, Just Don't said:

I wouldn't recommend downgrading at this point in time really. 1.5.97 is several years old and new mods are supporting it less and less. Meanwhile most mods have been updated, ported or replaced by better alternatives for the current version (1.6.640). Consider that no matter what you do here (downgrade, stay in current version) you'll have to check if the mod has a dll file and if said dll is compatible with your specific version of the game, you're correct on that one. For other mods you're mostly fine, but you'll have to do some tests yourself for other issues/conflicts or potential incompatibilities.

I do plan to add NSFW mods which raises the question: Is v1.6.640 good for having nsfw mods as well as physics mods?

 

1 hour ago, Just Don't said:

The problem traison mentions about Apocrypha floor was fixed AFAIK, but who knows if there are other issues related.

I've heard about that and how it got resolved but my gut instinct was and is that its probably better not to clean the master files

[Just Don't]

58 minutes ago, lordbook said:

I do plan to add NSFW mods which raises the question: Is v1.6.640 good for having nsfw mods as well as physics mods?

Both SMP and CBPC work on 1.6.640. Sexlab and any major framework for it work on 1.6.640 too. OStim is also a thing for 1.6.640. The new version of Improved Camera seems promising and near release (I think so at least? you can join the author's discord server for beta access), that's the only thing I'd say 1.6 is lacking in regards to 1.5.97, whereas several recent releases are simply not supporting 1.5. Honestly it's a matter of which mods you want to use, but if you're coming to SE now without any preference or reference of mods to use sticking to 1.6 would save you some time.

[lordbook]

2 hours ago, Just Don't said:

Both SMP and CBPC work on 1.6.640. Sexlab and any major framework for it work on 1.6.640 too. OStim is also a thing for 1.6.640. The new version of Improved Camera seems promising and near release (I think so at least? you can join the author's discord server for beta access), that's the only thing I'd say 1.6 is lacking in regards to 1.5.97, whereas several recent releases are simply not supporting 1.5. Honestly it's a matter of which mods you want to use, but if you're coming to SE now without any preference or reference of mods to use sticking to 1.6 would save you some time.

What about Sexlab animations, do the vast majority of them work on 1.6.640? Also i plan to get SavrenX's SoS mod that came out today but i'm not sure if its compatible with 1.6.640, maybe in time it will be if it isn't

[Just Don't]

2 minutes ago, lordbook said:

What about Sexlab animations, do the vast majority of them work on 1.6.640? Also i plan to get SavrenX's SoS mod that came out today but i'm not sure if its compatible with 1.6.640, maybe in time it will be if it isn't

I thought you had this covered already. If a mod comes with a dll you need to check for version specific compatibility. Animations are mostly hkx and json files, if they were ported or made for SE (any version, as long as it's not a LE file) these will work. No idea about that SOS mod you mention is. But the same concept applies, if there's a dll you have to check for version specific compatibility, if it doesn't and it's not a LE mod, chances are it will work fine. There are entire threads tracking this kind of stuff (blue links in my signature) so you don't have to go looking for clues or ask for each specific mod all over the forum.

[lordbook]

15 hours ago, Just Don't said:

I thought you had this covered already. If a mod comes with a dll you need to check for version specific compatibility. Animations are mostly hkx and json files, if they were ported or made for SE (any version, as long as it's not a LE file) these will work.

What i meant to say was, if the majority of SL animations had been ported from previous SE versions to 1.6.640.

 

15 hours ago, Just Don't said:

There are entire threads tracking this kind of stuff (blue links in my signature) so you don't have to go looking for clues or ask for each specific mod all over the forum.

Thanks for the heads up, i'll make sure to have a look!

 

Also what's the take on LOOT being used to manage load orders on SSE. Like is it recommended still or is it better to manual sort the load order/depends?

[traison]

34 minutes ago, lordbook said:

What i meant to say was, if the majority of SL animations had been ported from previous SE versions to 1.6.640.

 

The "boundaries" shift depending on what we're talking about. Dll files for instance should for the most part be split into LE (maybe pre-LE), SE and AE. LE-SE was an engine swap and SE-AE was a compiler swap. You do obviously still got very picky dlls that only work on specific versions. These include the ones that do bytecode patches and thus expect the executable to be something specific.

 

As for animations, I do not think there was a boundary between SE-AE, but there was one between LE-SE most likely because of the engine swap/update.

 

Plugins work anywhere, pre-LE to AE. The form 43 thing is for the most part arbitrary. A heads-up that there may be other things (other than the plugin) that are incompatible - such as included animations, scripts, ...

 

40 minutes ago, lordbook said:

Also what's the take on LOOT being used to manage load orders on SSE.

 

I do not use it myself. I chose the DIY method: xEdit

[Just Don't]

2 hours ago, lordbook said:

What i meant to say was, if the majority of SL animations had been ported from previous SE versions to 1.6.640.

There is nothing about hkx files that needs to be ported for 1.6.640 or any specific version. Again, the only instances you need to worry about this is if the mod in question has a dll, perhaps scripts if these are written for some specific function or plugin and they're outdated. Any other file type (textures, meshes, plugins, etc.) don't require any special treatment for specific versions.

[lordbook]

23 hours ago, traison said:

I do not use it myself. I chose the DIY method: xEdit

I'm curious as i have never done any sorting this way. Is there an in depth guide for this?

 

22 hours ago, Just Don't said:

There is nothing about hkx files that needs to be ported for 1.6.640 or any specific version.

Neat. One thing that came to mind today with files is that, is it possible to simply copy paste .jslot files in to SKSE from LE to SE?

Since i want to move my racemenu presets over.

[traison]

15 minutes ago, lordbook said:

is it possible to simply copy paste .jslot files in to SKSE from LE to SE?

Since i want to move my racemenu presets over.

 

Stuff like this you have to do yourself. You will get nowhere in modding otherwise. Remember that modding is not the Android Play Store, it's the literal (original) definition of hacking.

 

16 minutes ago, lordbook said:

Is there an in depth guide for this?

 

Most likely but I know of none. Again, going to have start poking around yourself, otherwise you'll be back here in 2 days with a broken loadorder and crashing game. There's a few things you need to know, and it will unlock most aspects of modding Skyrim:

1. You need to know how to get your mod manager to tell you about file conflicts. Not only when installing mods, but at any time. If you ever suspect something is wrong with your skeleton, your mod manager is the one that knows where the related file conflicts are.
2. xEdit is the plugin conflict inspector, just like your mod manager is for file conflicts. You can obviously do other things with xEdit as well but for now, learn how to inspect conflicts between 2 mods. For practice you can pick any mod off the Nexus that changes vanilla aspects of the game (like armor stats) and view it in xEdit to see what it looks like. Learn how to undo or otherwise alter changes made by plugins.
3. NifSkope for nif analysis. Not as essential as the previously mentioned points but still something you will run into eventually. Start for instance by locating where in the NiNode tree you can see which textures are referenced by an armor mesh.
4. BodySlide, FNIS and BSA Explorer (or equivalent) you should be aware of. Probably nothing to "master" here.
5. Creation Kit and script compiling when you got all previous steps covered and want to take the next step.

[lordbook]

24 minutes ago, traison said:

Stuff like this you have to do yourself. You will get nowhere in modding otherwise. Remember that modding is not the Android Play Store, it's the literal (original) definition of hacking.

Basically move .jslot files from LE to SE but use the SE mod equivalent or do .jslot files have to be converted?

 

[traison]

I'd move the jslot from LE, and use the AE (v1.6.640) version of RaceMenu to attempt to load it. If it can't find it, I would assume the directory structure changed and use ProcMon from Sysinternals (Microsoft) to figure out where it expected to find them. If it finds the preset but doesn't load it, I'd save the current face as a preset then open both in notepad++ side-by-side and play spot 5 differences.

 

Like I said, DIY.

Edited June 23, 2023 by traison