How does "script merger" work?

[topeira]

How does "script merger" work?

pardon my noobish question about script merger but im not sure how it works:
lets say i have 2 mods - i will call them "mod A" and "mod B" and i activate them using NMM and them use script merger to merge the two.

1) after i merge them, do i get a third mod folder called "mod A+B"?

2) if i wish to edit these mods that i merged do i edit the files in "mod A" and "mod B" or do i edit the folder "mod A+B"? also how do i know what files to look for in whatever folder i need to be looking for it?...

3) if indeed the script merger creates a third folder with mods A and B combined, than what happens to mods A and B? do their folders or mods get ignored? should i use NMM and disable mod A and mod B because the game is running the mods from "mod A+B"?

thanks for any help

 

[Wasteland_Ghost]

The "mod" created by ScriptMerger has highest priority (because TW3 loads in ASCII order). It "hides" similar files from other mods. When updating some mod to a new version or editing its files, you need to delete corresponding merges and re-merge again.

 

[Gerchan]

Which is why I have seperate folder to which I extract mods I want, then copy this mods folder to witcher folder, execute merging, and if there is some new mod, I just add it to my seperate mod folder, delete mods folder from witcher folder and copy mods from my seperate folder a do the merging again. That's my way to always be sure that there is no merging problem.

 

[Brogan80]

Yup, Script merger is super effective.

Just put it on your desktop and set the appropriate location, then run it. Any merges it creates are now basically 'overrides'. Next, you run the game, the RED engine will compile (hopefully without issue), and you're good to go.

Very simple to use once you see it in action.

 

[Wasteland_Ghost]

Which is why I have seperate folder to which I extract mods I want, then copy this mods folder to witcher folder, execute merging, and if there is some new mod, I just add it to my seperate mod folder, delete mods folder from witcher folder and copy mods from my seperate folder a do the merging again. That's my way to always be sure that there is no merging problem.

Wow, so complicated.

The more complicated is the process, the more chances are you'd make a mistake while doing it. ScriptMerger won't touch any of the original files, it works only with separate merged files it creates. Use ScriptMerger's interface to remove old merges, update and merge again and you'll be OK.

 

[topeira]

thanks for the help guys.

so what i understood, in my own words, is that SM takes MOD A and MOD B and creates a third folder which is MOD A+B that contains the conflicted files merged and ignores MOD A and MOD B, even though they are still there.
am i right?

1) if i need to edit a mod, do i edit the WS files in the merged folder MOD A+B or in the mod's original folder inside /mods/MOD A?

2) what happens if i uninstall/disable/delete MOD B, for example, using NMM? does the mod remain active since the game reads it from MOD A+B and not MOD B anyways?

3) do i have to run script merger every time i install or UNINSTALL a mod?

 

[Alastre]

A few questions for you guys...I've used some mods so far, most of them estetics, like geralt pale skin, witcher eyes, armours sets etc...by the way some Others changes gameplay stuff...like the one to prevent geralt to unleash sword in front of enemy automatically...then i decided to add a few other mods and realize a few were in conflict between them and I used script merger to see if i could do anything...so i realized I've got a huuuuuge amount of confilcts that couldn't be solvable (reds one)...but the funny thing is that a few of them (especially armours skins and geralt pale skin\eyes) doesn't prevent the game to runs and worsk perfectly with both mods active...is that normal? I mean, should i mind about those conflicts if game runs fine and I see the graphic mods? Last question...one new mod i had (can't remember which one) was in conflict with the automatic sword extract but was in blue so i tried to merge scripts and the program gave me the message 6 conflicts were solved. So I run the game but now in front of enemy Geralt extract the sword automatically like in the vanilla game...where am I wrong? Thank you in advance!

 

[Richiesname]

That's incorrect, Toeira. I think I know what you mean.

You have mods A and B. Mod A has scripts 1, 2, and 3. Mod B has scripts 2, 5, and 6. (All scripts are from the same game, so if two mods both modify one or more of the same script files, these are the only files Script Merger worries about and looks at. If the version of script 2 that both A and B have is easy to merge (does not contain edits on the same line), then it merges them automatically. If it does, then a Kdif window will pop up and you can manually do it yourself. (It's less intimidating than it looks, I promise. And if it happens, post here and I'll let you know how to do it.)

It then takes only script 2 out of mods A and B, and creates a new mod with highest priority. This mod contains your newly merged script file. You still need A and B for everything else they provide, though, since a lot of mods are more than just one script.

If you uninstall a mod, make sure to unmerge the files first. The new script merger is wonderfully versatile in that it lets us do just that.

And you don't have to run script merger with every install or uninstall. Only with specific mods. These are the 'script' mods, as opposed to mods that edit textures, basically. (Script merger even has an xml merging function, if you have mods conflicting that modify xml files and not scripts. Xml files are basically the files that tell the game things like which meshes and textures to load, what stats a given item has, etc. So you'd have to run it when installing any script-based or xml-based mods.)

Uninstalling is a little different. The mod names/script files they alter of all your merged files will be in your script merger window. Simply unmerge them before you uninstall.

 

[Brogan80]

1) if i need to edit a mod, do i edit the WS files in the merged folder MOD A+B or in the mod's original folder inside /mods/MOD A?

If you need to edit a mod, you'll be editing one of the mods own config files, not the script file. For example, Friendly HUD - you can configure a ton of different settings, but the file in which the install instructions tell you to edit is a specific config file used by the mod itself, not the script that the game will be looking at. Let Script Merger take care of them, if there's any conflict.

2) what happens if i uninstall/disable/delete MOD B, for example, using NMM? does the mod remain active since the game reads it from MOD A+B and not MOD B anyways?

3) do i have to run script merger every time i install or UNINSTALL a mod?

All you need to remember is which mods required Script Merger. If you want to delete a mod that had no conflicts, just delete it. However, if you want to remove, for example, KNG's Critical Slo-Mo Combat but you were also using No Automatic Camera Centering, you would have had to use Script Merger to merge them upon install, since both use 'r4player.ws'. So you run Script Merger, select that specifc merger (it lists them), and click Delete Selected Merge.
Then you can freely remove the file from Mods folder.