[x_JeNnY_x]

Yup, disabling AV Prep fixed it! Looks like Bethesda really doesn't like it :<

[Teghan Harris]

Ah, I didn't notice before, but you're installing AV with Prepping on an already existing game, no?
This will cause all sort of bugs in the same way installing an older AV on an already existing savegame would... as it's essentially making EVERYTHING in the game a variant (of one).

AV Prepping does NOT allow you to install AV on an existing savegame. You still have to start a new game with prepping.
However, once that's done you're free to add/remove AV packages without consequence (in theory), while earlier AV versions without prepping would result in sliders if you added/removed packages. This is what AV Prepping was made for; it was not made to allow you to install AV on an existing savegame.

[Angela]

So, I hate bat files
http://www.mediafire.com/?uymz4vqyegei6kn

• Replaced the "AV Starter.bat" functionality with a GUI option to set the allocated memory for AV.
  
• Logs will now be separated into sizable chunks rather than one gigantic asynchronous log.
  
• Added a "Minimize Patch" option that will do extra work to shave off most unnecessary duplicates and save patch space.

Decided to finally sit down and figure out how to allocate myself more memory without requiring bat files. Those silly things just make things way too complicated.
I personally have issues when allocating myself more than 1.5GB using the new system even though I have 2.5-3 available, but that's WAY more than AV will ever need anyway, so I'm not too worried.

1.3 -> 1.3.1 should be a safe upgrade. No new games or clean saves required.

[Gwen]

Hi Lev!

Just fyi, the 1.3.0 hung up on me, too, and I was going to try the bat edit, but then you offered the much better GUI solution and it worked fine.

One more thing about my current testing that I have done the past two days. I'll post this on ASIS, too, for Pluto.

I was curious about the earlier discussion between Pluto, myself, and some others regarding load order for the patchers. I had suggested to BOSS team to place AV at the very end as per the literal meaning of your ReadMe. Also, it seemed more logical to me so that ASIS could do Increased Spawns and then AV could process those from ASIS. Pluto pointed out, though, that Automatic Spells would not include anything from AV with this order.

The conclusion of the discussion was to leave the BOSS order as is (they have changed it so AV loads last) and to establish a standard whenever AV and the various patchers become more public (e.g., Nexus and other sites). However, since I love anolysis, I was curious and wanted to try it out with both orders.

My normal order was AV last after ASIS. That has worked fine for me, and it worked fine with a new play test.

However, after I switched the orders and rebuilt the patchers as well as Bashed Patch, etc, I wound up being unable to even get to Riverwood. The game continually crashed when Ralof and I met the wolf pack on the way there. I have the various wildlife mods installed, of course, but I had them installed with the other load order for the patchers, too, and it worked fine.

There are new updates for several mods I use and I was very tired of attempting to get the game to continue, so I finally gave up. I'm not sure if you have any ideas but I wanted to let you know what happened, at least.

I am restarting with the new 1.3.1 AV and 1.6 ASIS as well as the various mod updates. I'm also going back to my original load order with AV last after ASIS, since that worked fine. I'll let you know if anything odd happens.

[Lucie H]

So it seems I have to finally post here and stop lurking since my problems don't seem to fix themselves.

First off thank you for this wonderful modding gem Leviathan1753!

Now onwards to the bad news. I'm having this very weird bug that whenever I use AV I get discolored heads on bandits, guards and the like.
Seems to affect every randomly generated NPC. The moment I disable the created esp the problem vanishes even on already spawned NPCs while
AV was active.
First I thought it was due to some faulty packages I converted myself but I tried with only the new Bellyache Packages you kindly provided but to no avail.
I really don't know what seems to be the cause because I used AV previously and never had any trouble of that kind. I followed my usual process
in building the package. First I generated a Bashed Patch with neither AV nor ASIS present, than I created the ASIS.esp and afterwards the AV.esp.
That's also the order in witch they are loaded which is managed by BOSS anyway. Leaving ASIS out of the mix doesn't change anything as I expected.
I just don't get it. It worked flawlessly on previous versions (well at least 1.1.3) and since then I didn't make too drastic changes to the mods I use.

I still think this comes down to either User error or something incompatible in my rather large modlist.
That said I get absolutly no errors while creating the files whatsoever and AV works fine since I'm getting lots of different variants.
Just the random NPCs always have discolored heads. If I load a savegame that had AV not present prior I even don't get any guards at all,
just their weapons stuck on the ground where they should be standing.

Anybody here similar experiences or able to share some insight on what could be the problem?

[NAtIVe GOddess]

Ah... it's the NPC's not loading facial data. It's a bug with any duplicate NPC's, done in the CK or otherwise. Which is weird, as the NPC's are duplicated on a byte-by-byte basis. You can find it listed on the CK buglist in the CK forums.

That'll either have to have some fix for it built into skyproc, or humanoids will have to be excluded. Of course, there's the off chance that Bethesda may fix it.. but I'm not certain on that.

[Latino HeaT]

New version 1.3.1, working perfect now! No more being stuck at 10%! Cheers!

Either I missed your response, Lev, or you didn't respond. So I'll ask again: What am I supposed to put the Outfits of Giants in? "Outfits" folder in Giants? So i'll have "Skin" and "Outfits"?

Oh, and the old bug is back. Duplicate EID.

Spoiler

{	"Type" : "NPC",		"Target_FormIDs" :	[		["023AAA","Skyrim.esm"],   //EncFrostbiteSpider				["041FB4","Skyrim.esm"],   //EncFrostbiteSpiderLarge		["0424F5","Skyrim.esm"],   //EncFrostbiteSpiderLargeAmbush				["023AAB","Skyrim.esm"],   //EncFrostbiteSpiderGiant		["02A1DC","Skyrim.esm"],   //EncFrostbiteSpiderGiantAmbush		["08C40B","Skyrim.esm"],   //dunHarmugstahlEncFrostbiteSpider		["08E4FC","Skyrim.esm"],   //dunHarmugstahlEncFrostbiteSpiderCage				["048D67","Skyrim.esm"],   //dunHonningbrewMeaderyEncFrostbiteSpider		["048D64","Skyrim.esm"],   //dunHonningbrewMeaderyEncFrostbiteSpiderLarge				["08327D","Skyrim.esm"],   //dunChillwind_EncFrostbiteSpiderAmbush				["073989","Skyrim.esm"]	//dunFellglow_WarlockPet			],		"Apply_To_Similar" : true	}

When I remove

["023AAB","Skyrim.esm"], //EncFrostbiteSpiderGiant
["02A1DC","Skyrim.esm"], //EncFrostbiteSpiderGiantAmbush

it works perfect, otherwise there's an EDID duplicate error: http://i.imgur.com/32gEx.png

Debug: http://snipurl.com/234v6d6 / http://pastebin.com/y14VAmyT

[Alexandra Louise Taylor]

Yeah I'm well aware of the discoloration due to edited NPCs via CK. I was under the impression AV doesn't touch humanoids (yet)? Did that change in 1.3 due to including Vanilla as a variant or the AV prep thing?

That would imply everybody would have this issue, yet nobody posted, or am I misunderstaning something?

[Kerri Lee]

knoobald,
It's a catch 22 (33 ) atm. The bug is probably humanoid NPCs being duplicated for AV Prepping (making them "variants of one", which requires 1 duplication). I can exclude humanoids from AV Prepping (and AV in general) for now as they're bugging out... but then later on when bethesda fixes them they won't be AV prepped and people will have to start new games with AV in order to support humanoid variants.

I suppose that's the best option for now.

@sounaipr
Yeah it was a while back.

@Multiplication package structure -> Variant Groups
You can find a similar structure existing in the Bellyache's werewolves where two groups are being multiplied together.
You'll see a skin folder (with 7 variants) and an eyes folder (with 20 variants)
Each skin is paired with each eye for a total of 7 * 20 = 140 variants

You can do the same structure for giants with their clothes. It doesn't matter what you name the folder, only that it's separate from the skin group.

As a side note, since the eyes * skins of werewolves creates an enormous 140 variants that would overwhelm another package's 5ish variants (if they just did 5 skin variants), it will automatically have its probability reduced.
So for the case of werewolves the average group size is (7 + 20) / 2 = 13.5 = 14, so the 140 variants the setup creates will have 1/14 the normal probabilty -> an overall probabilty of 10 "normal" variants.

[Liii BLATES]

Thanks for the clarification. I'd certainly like an exclusion for the time being, since its kind of immersion breaking to strip down 15 bandits and all have color mismatches.
Having to start a new savegame would not be an issue in my case since i do that fairly often anyway but that's only me and may not be the case for most people.
Anyway thanks for your continuous effort

[Robert Jr]

Actually, I was planning to patch, but I realized the current system can support blocking normal humanoids.

Open up "Files/Blocklist.txt" and make it look similar to this:

==ARMO BLOCKS==  //FormIDs000D64Skyrim.esm //SkinNaked069CE3Skyrim.esm //SkinNakedBeast==EDID BLOCKS==  //Strings case insensitiveAudioTemplate

This will block all normal humanoids from being prepped, as they use those two skins.
Rerun the patcher and the humanoids should be back to normal and un-prepped.
I need to rework the block system to be more streamlined sometime, but that should do the trick for now. 8)

I'll include that updated blocklist in the next patch.

Looking at the total list (7 - Prep and add Originals.txt) of prepped NPCs/Creatures w/o the normal humanoids present is actually pretty small. 8(
...or maybe I'm just used to my Oblivion FCOM/WAC dream. Someone needs to go model crazy and make some new baddies to fight! XD

I'm hoping the eventual texture + model + stat variant system will provide a really easy way to integrate "new but similar" creatures. Like my earlier example where a boar creature could be introduced "technically" as a deer variant by making a variant with a boar texture + model + name/stats + (maybe AI?) in its spec file, so it would almost be a boar in every aspect that mattered, and would automatically spawn in the same areas that deer would normally spawn without any CK tinkering. Same could go for introducing falmer pets or many other "new but similar" creatures that you wanted to spawn in the same places as an existing NPC... rather than trudging through the CK and adding your new creature to every LList in the game and releasing an .esp patch that would need to made compatible with other mods, etc, etc... *shudder*.
The AV route wouldn't work 100% of the time over the normal CK methods, but might be a nice route for certain new NPCs.

[Rusty Billiot]

Quick Update on my new CTDs:

Now I am CTD regardless of load order/creation of patches when Ralof and I fight the wolf pack on the way to Riverwood. I can't even work on my own mod! I've started checking mods one by one to try to find the problem. I already informed Pluto by PM, too. It can't be the new ASIS and AV either because it started happening with the prior versions, too.

(sigh)

[RAww DInsaww]

Are you using a new save with AV Prep enabled or disabled? I had that on an existing file because I had AV Prep checked on an existing save file with cells already visited, so that anytime I crossed into a cell I was in before I get CTDs. I change out characters once a month so it didn't bothered me to restart, but just a heads up on AV Prep setting (it's On by default).

Heck I'm running SkyTEST, Real Wildlife, Skyrim Monster Mod, with Automatic Variants patching through them all. Kudos to you Leviathan, I'm surprised everything's running smoothly with all 3 plus AV enabled (I had Slaughterfish turning into multi-colored Snow Bears at one point but that was a user error).

Although maybe have AV Prep disabled on default instead of turned On? Most people are patching existing save files and getting CTDs like me earlier because of it.

Also about updating. If I download a new addition of say SkyTEST, so I want to repatch, do I delete the old AV.esp file or should I leave it and let it auto-update with the new AV.esp when it's done? Because I got a CTD when I thought deleting the old AV.esp was better and I think that was a mistake because I might have lost all the AV Prep records with it and I had to restart a new save.

[Damned_Queen]

Thanks 8)

@AV Prep off
I'd like to keep it on because
1) Run-of-the-mill "I didn't RTFM" people should have it active when they install AV.. and turning it off would mean they wouldn't.
2) People shouldn't be installing AV on existing savegames from the start, so I'm not to worried about them running into "worse" problems while trying. XD

http://afterimagemetal.com/AutoVar/Automatic%20Variants%20Readme.html#eraseesp

[Melissa De Thomasis]

I had a question Levi. When using ASIS 1.6 with this, since he added the new potions list to Skyproc it locks up if your mod is installed first (gets stuck at Importing Automatic Varients LVLN'. Other than deleting the ESP entirely everytime we build a new ASIS patch, is there an easier way to avoid that little hiccup?

Edit: Nevermind, my stupid error. Disabling it on the mod list did the trick (hopefully).

[BaNK.RoLL]

Yeah, multiple skyproc repatchings get a little sticky. The first skyproc patcher you rebuild you DON'T want the 2nd's OLD patch to be integrated, but on the 2nd patch you DO want the NEW 1st patch to be integrated.

In general, when rebuilding multiple skyproc patches, you should

• Disable all skyproc-made .esps
  
• Rerun the first patcher
  
• Enable that first patcher's .esp
  
• Go to step 2 and repeat for the 2nd skyproc patcher

Thus, you disable all the .esps and re-enable each patch as you make it so the next can read it in.

Pluto, Dres, and I are working on a sort of "SkyProc Itunes" app that would chain multiple repatchings together for you without needing to manually run through all the gritty details. Until then, if you're using ASIS + AV + any other skyproc mod, you'll have to do this little dance to properly rebuild.

[Janine Rose]

Yeah, I have not started my new game yet, so I have been deleting ESP's (I didn't know disabling them stopped that little hiccup until my last attempt too build). So I will do that. For now I have been doing ASIS -> AV -> Custom AI

[YO MAma]

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't delete them, just disable them for repatching.
You want them existing still for http://afterimagemetal.com/AutoVar/Automatic%20Variants%20Readme.html#eraseesp.

There's really no benefical reason to delete an old skyproc patch, only dangers of losing "consistency".

[Kayleigh Mcneil]

Are you using a new save with AV Prep enabled or disabled? I had that on an existing file because I had AV Prep checked on an existing save file with cells already visited, so that anytime I crossed into a cell I was in before I get CTDs. I change out characters once a month so it didn't bothered me to restart, but just a heads up on AV Prep setting (it's On by default).

Heck I'm running SkyTEST, Real Wildlife, Skyrim Monster Mod, with Automatic Variants patching through them all. Kudos to you Leviathan, I'm surprised everything's running smoothly with all 3 plus AV enabled (I had Slaughterfish turning into multi-colored Snow Bears at one point but that was a user error).

Although maybe have AV Prep disabled on default instead of turned On? Most people are patching existing save files and getting CTDs like me earlier because of it.

Also about updating. If I download a new addition of say SkyTEST, so I want to repatch, do I delete the old AV.esp file or should I leave it and let it auto-update with the new AV.esp when it's done? Because I got a CTD when I thought deleting the old AV.esp was better and I think that was a mistake because I might have lost all the AV Prep records with it and I had to restart a new save.

No, I had all four creature mods working with AV and ASIS (and PISE, for that matter), but then they decided to not work (severely!).

It isn't really AV or ASIS, anyway, as I checked that, too.

Here's what seems to be the issue (so far). This is for Lev and Pluto, too, just so they are aware.

Evidently, there is some type of potential conflict between Real Wildlife - Skyrim and SkyMoMod. It's important to keep in mind that I was originally using these two, AV, ASIS, plus Skyrim Creatures Alive and SkyTest - Realistic Animals and Predators, all with no problems together in the load list. However, suddenly something happened (probably some type of randomization of internals such as leveled lists, or random interactions of that type of element) and the CTDs were a result. It was always with the wolf pack when Ralof and I were on the way down to Riverwood, but the specifics would vary to some extent. Sometimes (most often) it would CTD when I tried to check a carcass. Sometimes it would CTD when I tried to open the menu to drink water in the river (I use IMCN). Other times it would CTD while I was trying to run around to get to the wolf carcasses after the fight.

My testing eventually (after two days... grr....) led me to deactivate both RWS and SkyMoMod, but leave SCA and SkyTest - RAP active, as well as all the other mods I have been using/testing (but I did deactivate PISE on Pluto's statement that ASIS includes most of the stuff from it now). I just did this test and finally got down to Riverwood again after successfully completing the wold pack fight, including looting the 5 or 6 carcasses afterwards.

Nedius has a note on the RWS page at Nexus that mentions some conflict with "Hunter.esp of Monster Mod" (I have no idea if this is supposed to mean SkyMoMod or not as there is no Hunter.esp for SkyMoMod, nor have I heard/read it referred to as simply "Monster Mod").

I may try to add SkyTest - RAP back sometime when I have time, but right now I don't and I need to do final stuff for my doctoral course as well as prepare for dissertation work, a conference, and my fellowship work. In addition, I need to work on my Hatsune Miku mod so that I can actually get it released, but the constant CTDs were stopping me from even continuing to work on it at all (can't very well work on it if I cannot get into the game, after all).


Oh! I did notice a couple of other things I wanted to mention.

AV lists WATER.esp and portal2mod.esp as masters, so evidently it is pulling something from them, but I have no idea what it might be or if they should be skipped. I hope we don't wind up with multple Space Cores floating around!

ASIS also lists portal2mod.esp as a master, but not WATER, and again I don't know if this is okay or not, or what it might be accessing.

[Timara White]

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't delete them, just disable them for repatching.
You want them existing still for http://afterimagemetal.com/AutoVar/Automatic%20Variants%20Readme.html#eraseesp.

There's really no benefical reason to delete an old skyproc patch, only dangers of losing "consistency".

Hey Lev, wouldn't you want to delete them for a completely new game, just like when you first started using them and you didn't have any patchers? What if you're using totally different mods, newer patchers, or even newer official files? This would be to make sure that any save games afterwards are completely "fresh" so to speak, and you don't care about prior saves due to the changes you are implementing in your game play.

[+++CAZZY]

WATER once had custom NPCs in there although the latest revision of it removed them. Might be some residual NPC data or something left in the mod?

I'm using IMNC as well, and using Real Wildlife 1.341 NO_FOOD.esp for compatibility. The thing is that SkyTEST and Real Wildlife mod authors worked for compatibility between the two mods, but ONLY with the latest SkyTEST and 1.34+ Real Wildlife. If you're using IMNC, the only two versions of Real Wildlife - Skyrim you can use is the No_Food 1.341 version or the the old 1.33 IMNC compatible one.

If you are using the old 1.33 with SkyTEST, there will be conflicts and this was warned on the SkyTEST thread. I'm not sure which version you're using for Real Wildlife though (1.341 still isn't IMNC compatible, so don't use the main file if you are).

SCA hasn't been updated since 10th Feb and it looks like it overlaps with SkyTEST. I would suggest not using SCA if you're already using SkyTEST, since it's the most likely to be unstable and unupdated.

Not sure what else to troubleshoot. When combining creature mods it's really more of a 'cross fingers and smash them together' situation, even after using a Bashed Patch to merge their levelled lists. I can only confirm that using SkyMoMod, latest SkyTEST, and whichever version of 1.341 Real Wildlife is compatible and seemingly stable after running it myself with AV.esp as well. I'm however not using ASIS.

[Milad Hajipour]

@W.A.T.E.R
Well, WATER has a troll record in it, OpticRWTDeadTroll, and AV did what it does and made it a variant (or prepped it). Hehe

EDIT:
I just downloaded WATER just now and had the troll integrated. It still has residual records.

@A new esp for new game
It makes sense that you would think deleting the old esp would "do good" for a new game with new/different mods.. but in reality rebuilding the new fresh patch WITH the old patch will do just as good of a job.
AV -always- makes a fresh patch every time it's run.. with or without an old patch present. So it's safe on a new game with new mods even if an old patch was present. Why?

It's hard to explain without getting into gritty details, so I will:

The only difference is that normally when AV is run with no old patch present, it hands out its FormIDs at random. If you delete the old patch, it just hands things out at random again. This usually doesn't matter, UNLESS you have a savegame pointing to those records already. In that case, you don't want the formIDs handed out at random when you rebuild the patch.. you want them to be the same so the savegame points to the right records, no?

Now if you think about it, if you start a new save with new/changed mods, having the old patch present just means the new patch will have the old patch's FormID assignments, but that has no bearing on the "stability" or "freshness" of that new patch for the new setup, since AV would've handed those out at random anyway if you were to delete the old patch.

Hopefully that made sense? XD
Bottom line is, no.. there really is NO beneficial reason to delete the old patch. In the case of starting a new game with new mods it doesn't actually matter if you do or don't, but it definitely isn't beneficial/better to do so.
Keeping the old patch ONLY has benefits for existing games, but no downsides in any situation unless there is duplicate EDIDs (but SkyProc explicitly stops any mod from being exported that has those, so that's not possible).

@SkyTEST + Real Wildlife incompatibilities
A bit off topic of AV here, but whatever, hehe. There's got to be a way to make them compatible.
Of course, if they both modify deer, then one will win out.. but I see no reason that they should crash, even in the worst of "incompatibility'" situations. The worst I could see is that one wins out over the other and replaces the other's creatures/LList changes. Is there some reason for extreme instability that I'm not aware of?

If it's just LList changes, Bash should be able to merge the LLists okay (I would think), and just pick one deer record to win out stat-wise. Where do the CTDs and bugs come in?
Perhaps no one knows, but I was just curious as I was trying to think of a solution.

How reliable is Wrye's LList bashing, btw? I remember in my Oblivion days it wasn't 100% satisfactory for me (which was actually one of the reasons I started making DLL way back when). Are all "parties" of both mods making it to the final LLists?

[Jarrett Willis]

My project concerning creating examples and ports for AV is being put on HOLD. I hate this because when I start something I want to see it through.

Reason: My future mother in law had a severe stroke on wednesday and is in the hospital. Left side nearly totally paralyzed, can't speak. The stroke was probably caused by her bad heart condition. In the past month she had (again) a heartattack and was three weeks hospitalized. Heart capacity now reduced to 15%. Things look BAD. Basically most of the time is spent in the hospital or helping out my girlfriend, Father in law, and organizing things for the future....

Once again I am in a Skyrim free (7 yr old) laptop situation with a 5 Kbyte connection. Will try to follow this thread as it is a VERY VERY welcome distraction. This explains my need to ventilate relatively often brainstorms/suggestions posts in the past month. Distraction is good. Remark: Had already really searched the Nexus for usable mods. I go for quantity and not for mods I personally like. I wanted to leave it up to the AV users to customize Skyrim to their liking. Thats the philosophy of AV and Leviathan1753 I think. Found lots and lots of mods. From the top of my mind. 22+ mods. Free to use mods 8+. Granted permission by author 8-9. Awaiting response 7-8. Negative responses ZERO. Even a few offered help with regard to texturing (had a few ideas for test textures)

Its not that I'm looking for pity or sympathie, thats not who I am. You don't even have to react to this post. I just wanted to clarify why I probably won't be able to do much (if at all) with the planned project. Because I think one has to do what one promises and/or says. Ah well, such is life......

[Prue]

@wolverine:

Hang in there!

I think that it's always good to communicate with others in a community if possible. Otherwise, people wonder what happened.

WATER once had custom NPCs in there although the latest revision of it removed them. Might be some residual NPC data or something left in the mod?

I'm using IMNC as well, and using Real Wildlife 1.341 NO_FOOD.esp for compatibility. The thing is that SkyTEST and Real Wildlife mod authors worked for compatibility between the two mods, but ONLY with the latest SkyTEST and 1.34+ Real Wildlife. If you're using IMNC, the only two versions of Real Wildlife - Skyrim you can use is the No_Food 1.341 version or the the old 1.33 IMNC compatible one.

If you are using the old 1.33 with SkyTEST, there will be conflicts and this was warned on the SkyTEST thread. I'm not sure which version you're using for Real Wildlife though (1.341 still isn't IMNC compatible, so don't use the main file if you are).

SCA hasn't been updated since 10th Feb and it looks like it overlaps with SkyTEST. I would suggest not using SCA if you're already using SkyTEST, since it's the most likely to be unstable and unupdated.

Not sure what else to troubleshoot. When combining creature mods it's really more of a 'cross fingers and smash them together' situation, even after using a Bashed Patch to merge their levelled lists. I can only confirm that using SkyMoMod, latest SkyTEST, and whichever version of 1.341 Real Wildlife is compatible and seemingly stable after running it myself with AV.esp as well. I'm however not using ASIS.

Lev (and maybe other), please bear with me as I think that this does somewhat relate to AV, actually.

First, thanks for the info about WATER. Hopefully, OpticShooter will be able to remove the residuals. And also about the old/new patch. I understand, but I have a habit of clearing everything. I restart constantly because I love anolysis and character development.

Now, what Elementroar mentions is why I spent two full days trying to figure out what the heck happened. What I am saying is that Elementroar's list (i.e., SkyMoMod, RWS, and SkyTest - RAP) is NOT compatible any longer for me even though it was up until a couple of days ago, at least not the first two together. I love anolysis, and I am extremely good at it (not trying to brag, but that's just where my skills lie ). That's why I did so well during my Y2K work, for example. Really, though, I was running all four mods together with no problems. Flipping the order of creating ASIS and AV started the problems. I tried flipping back (fresh start and patch creation, of course) and still no go. I upgraded to the recent releases, still no go. Yep, tried with No Food versions of RWS (note that either version worked previously, though, no problems). Started testing mod by mod... found the problem, at least initially. I hope to eventually test by adding one then the other back into the mix.

SCA is by Corepc, one of the most experienced creature modders we have, if not THE most experienced (think MMM for FO3). Regardless of what the date is on Nexus, he is still working on SCA and he still posts here fairly often. I read a post that he is near releasing version 0.30 (he tends to be more careful about his releases than some modders). It really doesn't overlap with SkyTest though, because SkyTest is focused on wildlife behavior and AI, while SCA is focused on leveled list adjustment. If anything, SCA overlaps more with RWS, but the two authors simply have a different view of spawning.

SkyMoMod was mentioned as having problems with RWS, or at least alluded to, even though I had them both working together originally (plus working together with the other two, as I said). Also, SkyMoMod is going off in really strange directions with what it seems to be trying to do (e.g., not lore friendly or even Skyrim-friendly, in some cases). It's also jumping releases very rapidly (3 to 4 to 5 in a matter of a month or so). Of all four mods, this is the one that I would suspect as being least stable, by far, simply based on the evolution, size, and progression. I really do think it is the main culprit, but I have yet to determine it for sure.

Now, regarding Lev's observations about SkyTest - RAP and RWS, the simple merging worked fine previously, as I said. My demos for my Vocaloid Hatsune Miku mod were made previously, in fact, and all four mods were active in the plays that you see in the demos. You can even see the dead Triceratops from SkyMoMod at the very beginning because I had just killed it prior to starting the demo recording.

Is Wrye Bash messing up? Could be, at least in its present state. I was always happy with it before, but I am not so sure about reliability anymore (although I still think it's the best tool we have by far and wish NMM and its predecessors would go away ).

Here is an idea. This is what I think MIGHT have happened, generally speaking, and why it relates to AV (or might, anyway). Lev (and anyone else) can offer input, of course, and tell me that I am way off base.

RWS is actually doing much more than it really should, in my view. Nedius started it in order to introduce variants of wildlife (advlt, juvenile, etc plus babies, small creatures, etc) as well as include lore-related diseases of all types. It did this very well, actually. However, he has also added a lot of animal body parts and continues to add more, including new ingredients (for those who eat meat, I guess... I don't, though ). He's keeping an eye on AV, too, but he wants to have different visuals for groups of wildlife (e.g., female wolves look one way, male wolves look one way, etc) rather than simply having everything randomized. I even suggested to him that some type of ini might be possible to achieve this via AV (eventually, of course, not right now). I really think that he should consider splitting the idea of ingredients and body parts into a separate mod dependent on the main mod, even make the main mod an ESM and be done with it. He has it started that way already with the ESM but still has an ESP for other stuff, too, so maybe he could just separate them for better compatibility.

When I tried to create the ASIS and AV patches by doing AV first and having ASIS access it afterwards, I think that the whole combination may have created situations that cause the CTDs (well, really, that's what happened, one way or another). For example, what if AV accessed stuff in RWS, including various body parts/ingredients that are specific to RWS "hard-coded" variants, but then tried to put something else into the carcass? Or vice versa for RWS body parts in a vanilla carcass? Or what about certain other possible results such as duplicating variants? Or perhaps ASIS wound up conflicting due to spawn points (RWS adds spawn points for its variants, too)? Or what about the various small animals, prey etc? Also, he alters AI and behavior, so perhaps something is being accessed related to that and then conflicts arise?

This makes it sound like I am pointing at RWS, but that's not actually the case. Instead, let's recall that SkyMoMod is mentioned (sort of) as having some type of compatibility issue with RWS, an issue that Nedius hadn't been able to track down. Also, SkyMoMod winds up getting tagged by Bash for merging + leveled list (ADR). Since AV (and ASIS of course) access the Bashed Patch, anything that the patch has pulled in from SkyMoMod that might be the cause of the conflict with RWS would be accessed, and might even wind up replicated via random assignment, right?

If this is true, could this happen in other cases? That is, is it possible that AV (or ASIS) might wind up replicating errors in mods, or certain things that cause conflicts with other mods but that have not been tracked down, but the replication simply makes worse (for anyone who happens to get it, that is, such as lucky me )?

[Bek Rideout]

I dunno if it's intended or not:

But you got to re-patch AV.esp every time you disable or enable a new/old mod.

Example: I downloaded the newest Warzone - Civil War mod. Set everything up as usual, and got CTD on startup. Then I disabled av.esp, and it worked. So I concluded I had to re-patch AV.esp, I mean it makes sense of course in hindsight. After a re-patch with the new mod, it works.