Papyrus best practices regarding mod updates.

[RavnaRiikr]

How do I know if my mod requires a new game/save clear or not? I found several Papyrus references on Nexus, but they barely cover that topic.
AI says following: 

Quote

Change Type                    Safe Mid-Game?  Requires New Game?
Script logic fix                           ✅                   ❌
New script or quest                   ✅                  ❌
Removing/renaming scripts       ❌                 ✅
Editing script properties           ⚠️ Maybe       ✅ Best
Removing quests or aliases      ❌                 ✅
Removing placed references     ❌                 ✅
Compacting FormIDs                 ❌                 ✅

But I won't trust that blindly. Is there more information about it?
Also, can I avoid the papyrus problems by developing an SKSE plugin instead of using papyrus scripts?

[Gristle]

16 hours ago, RavnaRiikr said:

How do I know if my mod requires a new game/save clear or not? I found several Papyrus references on Nexus, but they barely cover that topic.
AI says following: 

But I won't trust that blindly. Is there more information about it?
Also, can I avoid the papyrus problems by developing an SKSE plugin instead of using papyrus scripts?

While making mods (and changing them 100 times in the process), I just keep updating and playing my mods on my existing (playtesting) saves. Any problems become apparent.

 

[RavnaRiikr]

3 hours ago, Gristle said:

While making mods (and changing them 100 times in the process), I just keep updating and playing my mods on my existing (playtesting) saves. Any problems become apparent.

 

But then how can I be sure that it is not a bug in papyrus but a save compatibility issue?

[alex77r4]

On 9/7/2025 at 2:14 AM, RavnaRiikr said:

How do I know if my mod requires a new game/save clear or not?

 

The answer is different depending if we talk about a user playing your mod or if we talk about you, as developer, while develop your mod.

 

A normal user practically never need a New Game to play a mod. Only some specific mods require a New Game to play it, like USLEEP/USEEP or Ordinator, because change scripts from the base game that are executed or initialized only one time, when we click New Game. I talk about a lot of quest in the base game that are marked as Start New Game Enabled. That quest are inside Skyrim.esm and, when a mod want change something related to one of that quests, the only way is Start a New Game. In all others situations the New Game is not required.

 

A normal user can practically add and remove any mod from the load order in any moment without any problem because the game is prepared for make that. Only some bad developed mods have problems when we change the load order and that is a exclusive problem of that mods.

 

If have some dude take a look to Frostfall guide, one of the most old, big and complex mod developed for Skyrim Legendary. Say that require a New Game? NO.

 

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But the things change while you develop your mod because you have the Creation Kit open and you constantly change properties and scripts and you need test the changes. But the Skyrim save game store a gigantic amount of things like properties values, active scripts, quest status, equipped items... Every time the game is saved all that are stored inside the saved game.

 

If you save your game while develop and make changes on properties or scripts when you load the save game, maybe, the game not accept the changes because the data that come from the save game overwrite yours changes. That can give you a gigantic amount of problems while developing until you learn this:

Never save your game while you are developing and always delete any auto save created by the game. Always start yours test from a secure clear point.

 

Additionally, when you go to publish a new version of your mod, alert yours users to not have equipped, in use, any of yours devices. Always recommend remove, un-equip, all the devices before update the mod.

Edited September 8, 2025 by alex77r4