Converting Pc Mods To The Xbox, Step by Step How too Options

[th3rdeye420]

awesome do you happen to have the humble abode? I love that one

This post has been edited by grifter66: Jul 16 2005, 07:18 PM

[darth_turtur]

awesome do you happen to ahve the humble aboad I love that one

No I don't have that one. These are the house mods that I have:

Palatial Manor - Caldera
DC Mage House - Balmora
Nerevarine Castle - New Landmass, Accessible via boat from Dagon Fel
Hero's House - Between Caldera and Balmora
Gnisis Manor - Gnisis

Also, one more thing...since we are limited with the types of mods that we can use, especially due to our RAM limitation, having more than 3 houses in one town can either cause serious slowdown or even DDE's. Hence, Vivec and Ebonheart are not good places to establish a house mod because they are already too crowded. Just a tip.

Let me know how it works out!

[Renobu]

Hey I'd just like to say another big thanks to grifter66 and everyone thats put so much work into making tutorials available for people like me to follow.

Now onto the problems:

I have hex edited my .xbe, and have better bodies and better heads working (thanks to Nightelf). I have successfully converted a mod that adds some armour and clothes to Caldera (black robe and raven armour if you're interested) and that is working. Using the exact same method of conversion, I tried Anastasio The Greats Hideout (which grifter66 apparently got working). The game loads fine, the modifications to Eldafires house are in place, I found the door but everytime I try to load it (ie go into the hideout itself) I get a DDE.

Here is my method for conversion (it is directly from the How To):
- copy Morrowind.esm to PC
- load the mods .esp into TESDTK
- remove Tribunal and Bloodmoon dependencies
- update to xbox version of morrowind.esm
- ESP - ESM (I have discovered from reading the forums that this step may not be necessary)

Also, all textures, icons etc are in the Data Files in the game directory where they should be, in their correct folders.

Questions:

(1) What is a DDE most likely to mean (ie not missing textures because that just turns things into exclamation marks)?

(2) In my experience there are two types of 'not working' mods: ones that cause a DDE or freeze while the game is loading for the first time; and ones that allow the game to load but cause a DDE or freeze when you interact with the modified part of the game (such as trying to enter the hideout).
When you say you have got a mod working, what exactly do you mean (more precisely, have you fully tested whether the modified parts work, or just got the game to load)?

I suppose that last question was really for grifter66 as he said he got Anastasios working, and I thought I did too before I actually tried entering the hideout.

(3) It seems to me that the 'conversion' process just fixes dependencies, and if there are wrong dependancies in a mod then the game won't load. But what if it does load and other things go wrong during gameplay? Where can we go from there? A rather open ended question that I expect is difficult to answer. Input much appreciated though.

(4) My save game is 152 blocks at present. Will this affect the ability of mods to work or will it just decrease the stability of my game overall?

Finally, thanks to everyone who contributes here, and a definitive list of all tuts and methods of conversion really should be stickied.

This post has been edited by Renobu: Jun 12 2005, 04:50 AM

[Renobu]

Okay, had a random thought to try entering Anastasios after starting a new game. And guess what, it worked. So my mod conversion DID work, its just my monster save that's causing the DDE (or maybe some mods work better when you start a new game anyway).

Strange to think that 1mb of difference in the save file size can make such an impact when there's 64mb to play with...

[darth_turtur]

Strange to think that 1mb of difference in the save file size can make such an impact when there's 64mb to play with...

Well you have to remember that the 1MB encompasses a WHOLE LAUNDRY LIST of items that make up the game save. Try editing your save with Enchanted Editor to trim down the size of the file. It makes a world of difference. The combination of Hex editing Morrowind.xbe and Default.xbe makes the game so much faster to load. Combine that with Enchanted Editor and you've got yourself a game that completely lessens the amount of DDE's that you'll get.

As far as some mods working better at the start of the game, i'd have to say that most of them don't really have anything to do with it. It's just that the system takes much longer to read all the data already in the cache (or the save itself) along with all the other esp's in the data files directory. The longer the time it takes to read data, the higher the probability is to get those dreaded DDE's.

There's a couple of awesome tutorials on editing Default.xbe which will allow you to edit gamesaves and eliminating signature checking.

[Renobu]

Thanks for the input

I've been having fun lately with Enchanted Editor, but slimming down my saves hasn't worked in the most part (I started posting in the Save Hacking thread about this).

I did manage to delete every modified containers entry (except my loot ones of course) but that only shaved about 5 blocks off my save

And the armour dummies in Anastasio's give me a DDE even right at the start of the game with a 896kb save, clear X Y Z and E caches, and only Better Bodies, Better Heads and one tiny suit of armour mod installed. Maybe their scripts are screwy or something, or maybe it was those evil .esm's or .esp's or which ever one is the evil one...didn't you say something about not using .esm's in Better Heads cos it doesn't work well with other mods?

Maybe I should give up on the house mod.....but I reeeeeeeally don't want to...

[darth_turtur]

Thanks for the input 

I've been having fun lately with Enchanted Editor, but slimming down my saves hasn't worked in the most part (I started posting in the Save Hacking thread about this).

I did manage to delete every modified containers entry (except my loot ones of course) but that only shaved about 5 blocks off my save

And the armour dummies in Anastasio's give me a DDE even right at the start of the game with a 896kb save, clear X Y Z and E caches, and only Better Bodies, Better Heads and one tiny suit of armour mod installed. Maybe their scripts are screwy or something, or maybe it was those evil .esm's or .esp's or which ever one is the evil one...didn't you say something about not using .esm's in Better Heads cos it doesn't work well with other mods?

Maybe I should give up on the house mod.....but I reeeeeeeally don't want to...

Actually, esm's are (well for me) more suitable for bigger mods (BH, BB, House mods) because they don't change any cell values other than itself (When it places a house in a certain location).  Esp's are more useful if they only alter minor things like add a daedric sword to an existing merchant or remove the "glowing" effect from Enchanted Items.

A note about Enchanted Editor, most items that you edit are pretty straight forward but there are some that require you to change the value from a different node.  For example, Gold should be edited from the NPC Altered section rather than the NPC Player root.  It's just a way of how EE recalculates the values when you edit the save file.  Another thing that you also want to remember is that when you change any values of armor/weapons, make sure that you unequip it then re-equip it to see the modified values that you've edited.

I did hear a lot of people say that the "slim-fast" save method do not work for them.  I'll be running some tests tonight as I have a 225 Block save that i'll try to trim down using EE.  I'll post any of my findings in the EE Thread.

This post has been edited by darth_turtur: Jun 21 2005, 07:56 PM

[loppol]

sorry dont know if its already answered here.... if i want to add a house or race that has textures and models i only have to touch the .esp file and convert that?

[darth_turtur]

sorry dont know if its already answered here.... if i want to add a house or race that has textures and models i only have to touch the .esp file and convert that?

Yes. Convert the ESP to ESM and from there, move all the files from the zip file to the appropriate folders of your xbox (textures, meshes, icons, etc.)

If you're asking about whether you should move the textures to your xbox, then the answer is also yes.

[beegcheekin]

Hello I am new to converting the files. I got some to work just fine, but I am having a problem with a teleport ring. It requires both the Morrowind.esm and the Tribunal.esm. I have the GotY addition so I have both, but when I converted the mod the ring did not show up. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[darth_turtur]

Hello I am new to converting the files. I got some to work just fine, but I am having a problem with a teleport ring. It requires both the Morrowind.esm and the Tribunal.esm. I have the GotY addition so I have both, but when I converted the mod the ring did not show up. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

When you open the mod, place a checkmark next to the Tribunal.esm box and press the minus (-) button. This applies for all other mods that have what we call "dependencies". In the future, if you see other mods that have either the Bloodmoon.esm or Tribunal.esm box, just check it, press minus and proceed as usual.

Hope this helps!

---Your Friendly Moderator, Darth Turtur---

[Lepain]

You forgot to mention that you need TESDTK to open the mod.

[beegcheekin]

Ok I could not get that particular teleport ring to work so I downloaded the master training teleport ring. The only problem is I do not know how to select more than the first six. The menu does not have the continue option like it does on PC. Any help would be great.

[darth_turtur]

Ok I could not get that particular teleport ring to work so I downloaded the master training teleport ring. The only problem is I do not know how to select more than the first six. The menu does not have the continue option like it does on PC. Any help would be great.

The Trainer Teleport ring uses the available buttons on the xbox. Obviously, since is no available Keyboard-type interface, then you're stuck with those 6 trainers.

There are 3 other mods on Morrowind Summit that tweak the training process. On of them places a "school" that has 4 or 5 master trainers, and 2 others that create an NPC that will train 10 or so skills to 100. Look around in the site to find the ones that you want.

[Kyrin_Rilms]

The Trainer Teleport ring uses the available buttons on the xbox.  Obviously, since is no available Keyboard-type interface, then you're stuck with those 6 trainers.

There are 3 other mods on Morrowind Summit that tweak the training process.  On of them places a "school" that has 4 or 5 master trainers, and 2 others that create an NPC that will train 10 or so skills to 100.  Look around in the site to find the ones that you want.

What about if you had the keyboard peripheral?