269 replies to this topic

[Ascension64]

"Minor Error: Cannot BG1 & Winrar install paths". For some of you, the toolbox will prompt you that it cannot find the proper directories even if they are in fact correct. This is because the toolbox does a quick check that the paths are valid including a BGMain.exe file in your BG1 directory. For some reason, you may not have this file. Solution~ Create a blank text file and rename it as BGMain.exe in your BG1 directory to by-pass the check before performing the installation (see image below). Thanks to Nazar, Sadun & Jakar for reporting this.

Someone needs to confirm, but I believe BGMain.exe doesn't exist on a BG:The Original Saga installation, and only on a 5+1CD BG:TotSC installation.

[bigmoshi]

Yeps I'll be, I'm doing BGcity area now. Was trying to figure out the GreyClan last night. Looks fun

Not having much joy with the download of 'The Black Rose Market Prices' mod. I keep getting a damaged file through the link posted, and can't find it anywhere else. This leads to the SMM automation process farting, and the whole thing stops dead at that point.
Any other link to download this mod?

Hi it acts up with some browser cookies I think.

Try this http://www.fastshare...rket_Prices.rar or
use the old link on mozilla or opera.

pm me if you need more help.

[bigmoshi]

Hi, try to clear your brower cache, and use the link from Mod Links v121. If you really still can't, register your name in this forum and send me a PM or add me to msn. I'll help you resolve it. Thanks.

regards

Edited by bigmoshi, 02 January 2008 - 11:48 PM.

[CrowLord]

Nuts- still no joy. The download begins, but it claims completion after downloading only 4KB instead of 4+ MB

I had that problem as well. When I clicked on it to download, Free Download Manager popped up so I downloaded it through that. But then it said the file was only 4kb, so I deleted it and downloaded it using the Firefox downloader

That worked fine for me

[bigmoshi]

Hope you enjoy it as much as I am now. You'll realise soon what amazing things those modding gurus did over the past decade on those mods!

[Nazar]

GM, BigMoshi, I have gone back through your install and all I can say is wow....how nice to hit install and walk away from the cpu. I play at work....don't report me...lol....and I had got thru the interactive part of your installer and went home. When I came back to work it was waiting for "Romance Cheats" inputs and after that all went smooth. Very nice not to have to be chained to the cpu hitiing buttons. I am very eager to try it all out and report anything buggy to you so we can have a stable mega install.

On that note just a few things I noticed:
-When GUI was installing it loaded Orig SOA/TOB gui with TS fonts then imediatley uninstalled them without any inputs from me. Should I reinstall the GUI?
-Could not find HELMSUN.itm when making manual corrections for bugs, but copied it over to the overide anyways. All's well?
-Also when the install was almost complete it switch over to a C/Windows/system32/cmd window and report a lot of "cant find file" statements. I noticed that it was cleaning up files at the same time, so I figured it was supposed to be like that, but thought I would mention it.

Thanks a ton for all your work....you have made it much easier for the community at large....to all those out there still trying to get your installs to work. I would strongly reccomend the "Moshi Way"!!!!

Regards Nazar

Also....I am moving SMMback-up, Mod source, Mod post install and MegaMoshi to other side of my partioned drive to free up space...is that ok?

Edited by Nazar, 03 January 2008 - 05:19 AM.

[bigmoshi]

Hey Nazar! Glad it helped Ok, do report bugs & I'll try to fix them and share it around as patches. Thx!

-When GUI was installing it loaded Orig SOA/TOB gui with TS fonts then imediatley uninstalled them without any inputs from me. Should I reinstall the GUI?

Nopes, thats ok.

-Could not find HELMSUN.itm when making manual corrections for bugs, but copied it over to the overide anyways. All's well?

Yeps thats fine. Your backup plan for this file is to just delete it from override, and the game will use the one that is biffed up inside TS-ITM.bif.

-Also when the install was almost complete it switch over to a C/Windows/system32/cmd window and report a lot of "cant find file" statements. I noticed that it was cleaning up files at the same time, so I figured it was supposed to be like that, but thought I would mention it.

Yeps, I just got lazy to add checks so I took advantage of windows because it can't delete if the file isn't there anyway . Anyway, I did a more elegant approach in my new version that is not released yet, so you don't get to see those nice little "can't find file" statements.

Also....I am moving SMMback-up, Mod source, Mod post install and MegaMoshi to other side of my partioned drive to free up space...is that ok?

Thats fine, cos the game doesn't use them. The most important ones are SMM-Backup.zip & MOD_SOURCE. Please keep them. For MOD_POSTINSTALL & SMM-Patch, its recommended to keep them all until you finish your game!

[Nazar]

Ok sounds good, I am just finishing defraging the partion and then I should be good to go.

For the manual patching of the five files I just saved the originals from the override to a dif. folder and then copied and pasted into the overide with the new ones. Then hit yes for overwriting the 4 files that were present. that was good? or should I have deleted then copied! Thanks again for all your work and I will keep you updated on how it is going.

Regards, Nazar

[Nazar]

Maybe another suggestion worth adding to auto install is an automatic uninstall of BG1 or a choice to uninstall there by clearing a lot more space up!

[bigmoshi]

Ok sounds good, I am just finishing defraging the partion and then I should be good to go.

For the manual patching of the five files I just saved the originals from the override to a dif. folder and then copied and pasted into the overide with the new ones. Then hit yes for overwriting the 4 files that were present. that was good? or should I have deleted then copied! Thanks again for all your work and I will keep you updated on how it is going.

Sure that looks okay. Have fun

[bigmoshi]

Maybe another suggestion worth adding to auto install is an automatic uninstall of BG1 or a choice to uninstall there by clearing a lot more space up!

That can be done. I think an option will be better cos some of those modders like to install & uninstall stuff so maybe it be better to leave it there by default. Thanks for the suggestion!

[mentat72]

Hi, can anyone tell me if the contents of the override folder can be biffed following the full install of the SMM, and how to do it?

BTW - Thank you for an excellent piece of work that you have all helped put together.

[bigmoshi]

Hi mentat72,

About biffing, here's a pretty good round out from berelinde. See here for the actual thread: http://forums.gibber...s...11904&st=0#

I have read about some people with overfull overrides biffing to increase performance, but I can't offer any advice there. You might actually have some luck going somewhere where extremely full overrides are commonplace, i.e. Mega-Mods Help at SHS, and running a search on biffing. Please note that this not always a good idea, however some folks who routinely use mammoth installations seem to find it helpful.

You certainly sound like you know what you're talking about, so it's possible that you can sort out your own batch files. I'm not that savvy, so I'd want to look at an example. Also, since you run on a Mac, I'm not sure you can run a BAT file. But you probably know about Mac alternatives.

Having done so myself just now, I've got a couple things for you to look at.
Here is the first. Please pay careful attention to CamDawg's advice on the subject.

Erebusant has something to say about those question marks. Read carefully. Something might have gone awry. I don't know much (read "anything") about Macs, but I do know that file structure changes that result in ????? are not promising. It seems to mean that you installed a new version of something that was trying to uninstall the old version and that the files didn't match up, so it didn't know what to do. In other words, you'll have remnants of an old installation lingering, and your dialog.tlk is almost certainly messed up. If it were me, I would follow erebusant's advice here, or start over, uninstalling the game and simply deleting the entire game folder, which will probably take about as long.

And after about half an hour searching, serious paydirt. Read every post in that thread, and follow the links.

In short, yes biffing is supposed to be a process that is independent of the mod-installations, so you can use it in practically any installation. As for the biffing commands to use, that one you'll need to figure out a bit. I've not done it for SMM because gaming is priority for me. I'm prefer playing not modding

In principle, however, it seems better to leave biffing to the expert modders of specific large mods like TDD etc. If you notice most of the mega-mods already have biffed up files. If you check your <data> directory, you'll see biff files starting with TDD, SOS, ROT etc.

From a technical side, if I understand the logic behind it, it seems to me that biffing is really most useful in reducing the clutter in your override directory. Speed improvements may be limited because the same number of memory params/variables still have to be loaded in the game with/without biffing, and the same game scripts have to run. I suppose any speed improvs really occurs during loading of saved games / map transitions cos the windows file alloc table (FAT) is accessed during that time. Having more files = searching through a longer index list to get the files you need, eg maps/cre/dlg etc. which can perhaps affect a good second or so depending on your computer stats.

Hope that helps!

[taltos]

bigmoshi

Great work on this install package. I just stumbled on this yesterday after having been away for a long time and have been gathering mods for the install. I looked through the documentation but I did not see if you can still add other mods. Can I still add an npc mod at the end or can they be installed first if possible (eg Tashia, Fade)? Sorry if this has been answered somewhere else.

Thanks in advance.

Edited by taltos, 05 January 2008 - 07:24 PM.

[Kulyok]

Hey,

It depends on the NPC mod. With the exception of Edwin Romance you can install NPC mods in the end normally. This should work for Fade, Amber, Kivan, Xan, Kelsey, Keto and so on.

You should be aware, though, that there are mods that should be installed DEAD LAST(like Virtue), and there are mods that are *recommended* to be installed among the last(Crossmod Banter pack, because you won't get crossmod banters if you install it before NPC mods).

Usually, and I strongly recommend it, it is better to read the mod's readme, because the author usually knows better.

[bigmoshi]

Hello taltos!

Honestly, I haven't experimented with those NPC mods enough to give you proper advice. But if I had to choose now, it makes good sense to install those NPC mods at the end as Kulyok says. So, if anything fails, you can just uninstall that NPC mod using weidu (rather than reinstalling everything from scratch ) Note: Whether your saved-games still work after that is hard to say.

Next, you'll have to do some homework reading up on those npc mods and their bug threads before installation. And, you need to be prepared to tweak scripts using NearInfinity etc.

Now, if you have more time to spare, you can also customise your smm-config.xml to reorder the installation of some of your npc mods which cannot be installed at the end, eg the Edwin Romance that Kulyok mentioned. If you are interested, just pm me and i'll send you an example. The reason is just that I'm trying not to open another avenue for customisation yet which may confuse more general players

Hopefully that answers your queries!