this is simply a guide for how i install mods and work with certain programs, and how i look at them and their usage. this is not meant to be a replacement for other guides that have been done by people like gopher or gamer poets, instead you should think this guide as as general tips to follow when using certain modding programs

note: further edits to this guide will be made at a later date

mator smash for all intents and purposes is used for conflict resolution and overrides, to put it in simple terms you are basically telling mator smash that you want the settings of one plugin to override the settings of another plugin that has conflicting records between the two plugins.

but how do you do this? it is actually very simple if you follow these steps

1 create a new plugin inside mator smash

2 add the plugins to the new plugin

3 mark the plugin that you want to be overwrote with the smash all setting

4 mark the plugin that is going to be overwriting the other plugin with with smash force all setting


the plugin using the force all setting will overwrite the plugin that has the smash all setting, and the plugin with the smash all setting will have it's records copied  and overwrote by the plugin that is using the force all setting

in practice the smash all setting should only be used on regular mods, and the force all setting should only be used on mod patches.

note that if a  plugin is marked with a bash tag by default then that tag should not be changed to smash all or to force all, otherwise the changes will likely not be applied correctly which will probably lead to some really weird problems

what if i use wrye bash? run wrye bash first and remember to un-tick the leveled list box and make sure that the import boxes are ticked and finish creating your bashed patch as usual.

2 once you have created you bashed patch then you will need to run it through mator smash by marking the bashed patch with the force all setting


here is a easy way to think of xp32 when using fnis or nemesis!


when using xp32 i tend to think of it as a translation layer for meshes and animations with fnis or nemesis acting as the final layer, so when i install these mods in mo2 i generally like to have them in this order going from top to bottom in mo2 with the top having the highest number and the bottom having the lowest number so that the mods having the lowest number load first and the  mods having the highest number load last (hopefully that will clear up some confusion in regards to my other guides on how to use mo2).

the order is as follows


any mod that has meshes

xp32 maximum skeleton

pcea and it's related esp

animation mods

output from running nemesis or fnis

patches that come from using a bashed patch or smashed patch

all other patches should that come from patchers like do dyndolod, skyproc, or a zpatcher should be placed here



when installing mods i generally have a look inside the zip file before installing the mod

the reason is three fold

1 if the mod contains loose files and a esp then i will usually pack the loose files into a bsa either before or after i install the mod

2 i also do this to convert the textures to bc7 if it is a older mod or if the mod author has not stated that the mod's textures were compressed using bc7 (note that this purely for the benefit of performance and reducing file size, simply using bc7 without resizing can reduce the file size by a significant amount).

3 also most mods from skyrim le tend to have tga files that need to be converted before the mod can be used



when installing body mods and body textures i prefer to gather the files into the data folder and then pack them up into a bsa file for easier installation (note i recommend keeping the texture files inside a seperate bsa archive).

if possible any esp's related to the body mods should be merged using zedit, and double check to make sure there are no sub folders that say something like blah.esp if you find any folders that are named in this manner then the name will need to be changed to the new name of the new esp (otherwise the files inside the folder will not get loaded, and this applies to sound scripts and meshes as some of them are named to reference the original esp file and not the new esp file).

this also makes it easier to control your load order usually by marking the new esp with a esm flag using wrye bash, and do not forget that some npc make over files may require the originals as masters if this is the case simply use zedit to change the name of the master file to reference the new esp that has been made.

i would note that hair mods, war paint mods, and armor re-placers should not be merged with your body mod merge, mainly because many of them are marked as master files for other mods and mods like ks hairdos and apachii skyhair are too large to be merged even if the textures are downsized. it is highly recommended that you not merge any mods that fall into any of those three categories