ME3Tweaks Mod Manager 8.1 (Build 128) Changelog

[Mgamerz]

ME3Tweaks Mod Manager 8.1 is a large feature update that contains many new features for both mod developers and users.

See the bottom of this post for the rerelease changelogs.

New Features

ModDesc 8.1 features

• .mem texture files are now supported for installation (currently only through Batch Installer)
  • This is a very complicated system and will take some time to refine. It is being restricted only to batch installer to help ensure proper modding order.
  • This feature is only available for Legendary Edition games

• Headmorph files are now supported for installation. This should greatly ease making a mod that uses both a headmorph and a package file for assets. You can see how to include headmorphs in your mods on the headmorphs documentation page.

  • Choosing a save to install the headmorph into is a very complex system and may have some issues.
  • .me2headmorph/.me3headmorph/.ron files are supported. Installation is done through a command line version of Trilogy Save Editor by Karlitos.
  • This feature is only available for Legendary Edition games
    

• LE1 Coalesced Merge

  • Using the new M3 Coalesced Delta format - M3CD for short - Mod Manager can now edit LE1 Coalesced in a way that works for multiple mods at a time. This feature will replace the basegame Coalesced files for LE1, which means that mods that directly replace this file will not work if you use Mod Manager. As such, you can turn this feature off in the application settings.
  • This system works by shipping a DLC mod with .m3cd files that describe changes to the LE1 Coalesced file. Like plotsync, it will automatically run when necessary and rebuild the Coalesced files. You can ship any amount of .m3cd files in your DLC mod, so you can even use alternates to apply extra changes if necessary - they are applied in-order.

• LE2/LE3 config file patching on install

  • Using the same M3CD system as LE1 coalesced merge, you can install .m3cd files with your DLC folder for LE2 and LE3, to provide alternate versions of your config files. For these games, the merge occurs only once during mod installation, and does not run again unless the mod is reinstalled.
  • This allows you to have a base config file set and then add in changes. Changes are applied in alphabetical order to the DLC.
  • An example use case would be having an option that adds more outfits than the standard set you ship with your mod

• Bink 2205 is now the standard version of bink installed with mods (not the ASI mod loader, but the backing library). This in-place upgrade of the bink dll allows us to encode video with audio and have it work in game. This is done automatically on all mod installs and does not appear to cause issues based on testing.

  • Mods that depend on Bink 2205 to work properly should setrequiresenhancedbink=true under [ModInfo]. This changes the metadata installed with the mod, and is used in diagnostics to perform an additional check for the proper bink dll version.
  • LE1 Diversification Project and ALOV for LE1 will have screeching audio due to how their videos with audio were encoded. These mods will need to be updated to use the new encoder to properly gain audio support.
  • MassEffectModder is already updated to support scanning texturemovies that use this new encoder version
  • If a mod ships with 2205 encoded video, and the original bink dll is installed, the video is simply skipped in game

• Merge mod asset updates can now add new content to files without requiring a reference to an existing export. You can use this for things like adding 2DA tables for EntryMenu in LE1 or things that must be referenced within SFXGame itself which is loaded before DLC mount.

  • The assetupdate entry can now have canmergeasnew set when the moddesc version is 8.1 or higher.

      {
        "entryname": "MGGUI_Option_FOV",
        "assetupdate": {
          "assetname": "MGGameContent_UI.pcc",
          "canmergeasnew": true,
          "entryname": "MGGUI_Option_FOV"
        }
      }
  

Changed features

• moddesc.ini editor now uses dropdowns for selecting image files to show, autopopulating when the dropdown is opened
  
• Diagnostics now includes the install date of a DLC mod to help determine the order that DLC was installed
• When referencing a DLC requirement (anywhere they are used), you now use square brackets [ ] instead of parenthesis ( ) to indicate version numbers. This is to work around an issue with the struct parser that could be dangerous to fix due to how many legacy mods depend on the current implementation. ( ) will still work, but [ ] will be more reliable.
• NexusMods File Search now supports filesystem style wildcards. For example, you can search for *.mem now. This is not regex search.
• Trilogy Save Editor has been added to the tools menu. Legendary Explorer was moved to its proper alphabetical position (it was previously where ME3Explorer would be located).
• Batch Installer now allows you to duplicate an install group
• You can now right click a mod and add starter kit content to its DLC folder when in developer mode. This allows you to add things such as squadmate merge data, startup files, and more
• Added validation of deployed mods, to ensure they can load at least on the same build as what deployed them
• moddesc 8.1 mods will now fail to load if mergemods is specified for basegame, but moddir is not. This clears up some confusing parsing behavior where it looks like it will work, but it won't
• Validation targets for LE can now be texture modded and they will still be usable. OT games still require a un-texture modded target
• Batch Editor: Can now save install groups even if a content mod is unavailable
• Batch Editor: Delete key now removes mods from the list
• Server manifest now pulls every 4 hours instead of only on app restart
• Launch config selector supports double click to select a config
• LE: Start game dropdown now has new option 'Boot into specific save file' which sets the last save for 'resume game' and starts the game
• Mods that don't include package files don't require a backup to deploy. Mods such as merge mods, texture mods, headmorphs for example. This may be expanded upon with a content scan to find audio and texture references, but currently it only checks for package existence at this time

Bugfixes

• Legacy install groups (queue format 1 and 2) can now more properly deserialize if no description was set
• Fix app crash if sourcedirs/destdirs does not match on Custom DLC. These should typically be the same

Bugfix rerelease May 10, 2023

• Implemented Feature Request: Move mods in Batch Queue by X number of spaces instead of one at a time. #361
• Fix texture mod not importing if the file is not in the root of the archive
• Update RUS localization

Bugfix rerelease May 11, 2023

• ITA language re-enabled. Localization will be updated serverside when update to localization is performed
• Fix startup crash if services fail to load when introtutorial is attempted to be accessed on first boot
• Add telemetry tracking for texture and headmorph installs
• On app update, mark a setting that content should be force-refreshed on next check (which will be on reboot). This will only take effect on the next update

Bugfix rerelease June 4, 2023

• ASI manifest properly loads from the cached version in the executable if no online version can be fetched. This fixes issues where some mods don't work if you run mod manager and your first mod install has poor or non-existent internet, as some of the dynamic content (such as the ASI manifest) would not load
• Fix some logging to more accurately reflect the their severity
• ITA localization is disabled - localization was never updated for build 128

Bugfix rerelease June 20, 2023

• A few rare crash conditions were fixed based on telemetry reports
• ITA localization updated and re-enabled