Difficulty getting a .esp-less replacer mod to work

[llirium]

I've been having a heck of a time figuring out if OpenMW even parses mods that don't have a .esp file but otherwise have the proper directory structure.

I tried the Bigger Vanilla Font** mod and wasn't able to get OpenMW to make it work or even appear as a distinct mod in the Data Files tab, even when listening to the wiki's Mod Installation page to a tee. Working in Linux, so tried different variations of surrounding the mod path's data= line with double-quotes in openmw.cfg, too.

Is support of .esp-less replacer mods possible as of OpenWM 0.41, or will we have to write our own .esp files or overwrite currently existing files until if/when it's a feature?

**P.S. For the record, I don't need this mod to work anymore, but still have other .esp-less replacers like it. Found this wiki page and someone more talented than me helped me fix the UI's font size and scaling in MyGUI.

[jirka642]

The Mod status page lists it as working under name "Better Dialogue Font". And *.esp-less mods should definitely work, since I have few texture only replacers that work without problem.

Try to use absolute paths not relative. For example use data="/home/username/morrowind/mod1" not data="~/morrowind/mod1" etc.. Some people had problems with this.

If that's not the problem, try to look at logs. They should have line with something like "Adding data directory /home/jirka642/bin/Morrowind/TEXTURE_MESH_REPLACERS/CLOTHES/Better_Clothes".

And if everything fails, you can always post your logs and configs here, since someone might be able to notice a problem you didn't.

[llirium]

Ok, thanks for the help. I'll prepare some other .esp-less mods and check to see what openmw.log looks like after starting up a game file. Have a shared PC, so I'll report back in this thread with the results when able.

[Frik]

Many of the mods I use are .esp-less replacer mods. Just a thought, but you might be running into this issue:

https://bugs.openmw.org/issues/3557#note-7

If you have assets of the same name located in your "data" folder (or sub-folders), those assets will not be replaced by the replacer mods,as the data folder gets inserted at the end (see log).

To avoid this issue, I keep all mods in a separate "mods" folder. The only files in my data folder are .esm & .bsa files for Morrowind/Tribunal/Bloodmoon (and a splash screen image folder).

Left side = folder structure | Right side = openmw.cfg entries (order/stack the replacers in config)
https://postimg.org/image/xbrgsqj8x/

You might also want to check your openmw.log to get a clue as to why the replacer is not working as expected.

[llirium]

It seems like the new .esp-less replacers I tried out are working fine now. No indications of that in the "Data Files" tab, but they're working anyway, that's partly what confused me initially.

The replacers that worked, for the record, are Bottle Replacer, Flask Replacer and Misc Items Replacer, all by Qarl. Haven't tested the non-reflective candlestick holders in the Misc Items Replacer, but all the other items' textures (transparent and otherwise) and reflection maps appear to be in place as I remembered them otherwise.

Not sure what was wrong with the font mods I originally reported on, since they didn't seem to work under the exact same circumstances. I don't really care anymore because I learned how to scale all the game menus and fonts at once, very useful for the couch gaming experience.

Wish I could manipulate the .esp-less mods' originating folders as easily as the .esps in the "Data Files" tab. It would be more convenient to just click-activate/deactivate those mods' folders as well, instead of having to remove the folder's lines out of your openmw.cfg. ^_^;

Now if only someone who knows python and wxpython well would pick up OpenWM again, everyone across Linux, Mac and Win would be set for mod management.

[Frik]

I also play from the couch. Never got "font mods" to work properly so I increased the GUI scaling in settings.cfg:

[GUI]
# Scales GUI window and widget size. (<1.0 is smaller, >1.0 is larger).
scaling factor = 1.2
menu transparency = 0.836984
stretch menu background = true

Then I dropped Pelagiad.ttf into /resources/mygui and modified openmw_font.xml to show the new font and align the text properly (I'm using 1440x900 screen resolution).

Code: Select all

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<MyGUI type="Resource" version="1.1">
    <Resource type="ResourceTrueTypeFont" name="MonoFont">
        <Property key="Source" value="DejaVuLGCSansMono.ttf"/>
        <Property key="Size" value="17"/>
        <Property key="Resolution" value="50"/>
        <Property key="Antialias" value="false"/>
        <Property key="TabWidth" value="8"/>
        <Property key="OffsetHeight" value="0"/>
        <Codes>
            <Code range="33 126"/>
            <Code range="192 382"/>
            <Code range="1025 1105"/>
            <Code range="8470"/>
            <Code hide="128"/>
            <Code hide="1026 1039"/>
            <Code hide="1104"/>
        </Codes>
    </Resource>
    <Resource type="ResourceTrueTypeFont" name="Magic Cards">
        <Property key="Source" value="Pelagiad.ttf"/>
        <Property key="Size" value="35"/>
        <Property key="Resolution" value="44"/>
        <Property key="Antialias" value="false"/>
        <Property key="TabWidth" value="8"/>
        <Property key="OffsetHeight" value="1"/>
        <Codes>
            <Code range="33 126"/>
            <Code range="161"/>
            <Code range="173"/>
            <Code range="180"/>
            <Code range="191 255"/>
            <Code range="260 263"/>
            <Code range="268 271"/>
            <Code range="280 283"/>
            <Code range="305"/>
            <Code range="321 324"/>
            <Code range="327 328"/>
            <Code range="338 339"/>
            <Code range="344 347"/>
            <Code range="352 353"/>
            <Code range="356 357"/>
            <Code range="366 367"/>
            <Code range="377 382"/>
            <Code range="1025"/>
            <Code range="1040 1103"/>
            <Code range="1105"/>
	    <Code range="8208 8212"/>
            <Code range="8216 8217"/>
            <Code range="8220 8221"/>
            <Code range="8228 8230"/>
            <Code hide="208"/>
            <Code hide="215"/>
	    <Code hide="222"/>
            <Code hide="240"/>
            <Code hide="247"/>
            <Code hide="254"/>
        </Codes>
    </Resource>
</MyGUI>

Example: https://postimg.org/image/wfjoiuyf9/

I agree that it would be nice to be able to better manage replacer mods from within the launcher. I think there are a couple of OpenMW mod managers being developed.