Z folder or Mods folder?

[Vacillator]

Hi all, new to CMRT and starting to grab all of the excellent mods to this fantastic game.  A question - a lot of instructions say to put the mods in a Z folder.  In my game folder I don't have a Z folder (I think I'm supposed to create it) but I do already have a MODS folder here:

Battlefront\Combat Mission\Red Thunder\User Data\Mods

Should I be using this folder or making a new Z folder?  I have tried a couple like JuJu's UI in the MODS folder and they seem to work, just wanted to amke sure I'm not missing something.

[akd]

Use the MODS folder.

[Vacillator]

Thanks akd, thought so as it seemed to work.  Did this change recently then as I keep reading about a Z folder?

[JM Stuff]

I think,... but not sure, a Mod Folder will be more useful for Mod Taged, and the Z folder with mods untaged, to my knowledge, the last place reading from the game is always the Z or ZZ or ZZZ folder and of course all mods included in this folder and showing in the game.

Can somebody's make a touch of details that I forgot... !! ??

[akd]

54 minutes ago, Vacilllator said:

Thanks akd, thought so as it seemed to work.  Did this change recently then as I keep reading about a Z folder?

Before they setup game for new OS to use documents folder for saves, etc., creating a "Z" folder in the data folder was the way to use mod files and make sure they load after stock data files.  MODS folder works the same and uses the same rule (MODS overwrites data and folders within MODS overwrite each other in alpha-numeric order).

[Aquila-SmartWargames]

Z folder still works across all CM2 games.

Use what is more confortable for you either documents mods folder or the game install data/z folder which might have to be created. There is no difference when it comes to modtags.

Documents folder might have the advantage that several local users can keep different modding setups without requiring manual copy/paste. Never tested it but should work in theory.

I only use z folders as I prefer to keep mods in the install folder and not everyone wants to keep several GB of mods on the system partition.

Edited June 16, 2020 by Aquila-SmartWargames

[Vacillator]

8 minutes ago, Aquila-SmartWargames said:

I only use z folders as I prefer to keep mods in the install folder and not everyone wants to keep several GB of mods on the system partition.

Yes I had thought of this as my SSD is rather limited, it's a good point you make.

[Vacillator]

37 minutes ago, akd said:

(MODS overwrites data and folders within MODS overwrite each other in alpha-numeric order).

Thinking about this now (brain ticking over slowly). 

1. Does a tagged mod over-ride this, assuming I have it and a lot of other mods in my MODS folder? 

2. Is a mod which may be tagged by some scenarios/campaigns still loaded by un-tagged scenarios/campaigns based on the above alpha-numeric logic?

3. Should I stop asking questions and just try it ?

[Aquila-SmartWargames]

Tagged mods are only activated when the specific tag is used by the scenario/campaign and AFAIK tagged mods are overwriting every non-tagged mod.

Edited June 16, 2020 by Aquila-SmartWargames

[Vacillator]

Just to report back here, I had all my mods in the MODS folder and that was working fine (but taking a lot of space on my C drive as I added more mods, as Aquila-SmartWargames said earlier).  I therefore moved them all to a newly created Data/Z folder (in my installation folder on the D drive) and I can confirm that that also worked fine.  Seemed to take longer to load first time, but after that it seemed to be back to normal so the end result is good.

[MikeyD]

Quote

1. Does a tagged mod over-ride this, assuming I have it and a lot of other mods in my MODS folder? 

if you have a new Panther mod in a Z folder and run the vehicle over muddy ground the game's default 'muddy' tagged art will over-write it (usually tracks, but sometimes wheels and even lower hull). So you should make sure your mods have all the proper tagged versions included to over-write the default art. Same applies to 'snow' taged bits and pieces too.

[Vacillator]

12 hours ago, MikeyD said:

if you have a new Panther mod in a Z folder and run the vehicle over muddy ground the game's default 'muddy' tagged art will over-write it (usually tracks, but sometimes wheels and even lower hull). So you should make sure your mods have all the proper tagged versions included to over-write the default art. Same applies to 'snow' taged bits and pieces too.

This is way more complicated than i first thought, but in a good way

[A Canadian Cat]

The reason you see so much mention of z folder is because the original installs of the games did not create a Mods folder. The game loads mods by file name last found first. So, in the old world if you are installing a mod and you just placed it in the data folder it might or might not be found first or last. I honestly don't remember the rules about how the .brz files are ordered. At any rate to avoid that we were instructed to create a z folder under the data folder an put out mods there.

Now that the installs create a Mods folder the need for a z folder is lessened. But the rules still apply so if you have more than one mod that have an overlap in what files they mod the one you put in a folder further down the alphabet wins for those overlapping files.

The other thing to keep in mind is that the mods in the location D:\<user>\Documents\Battlefront\Combat Mission\<Game>\User Data\Mods are shared across all versions. Many of you don't really care but a few of us who play a lot of PBEM games have more than one version of some games installs. Until recently I still had a CMFB 2.01 game going and for a while in the version 3 days I had a 1.11 version game going - the guy I was playing with was strapped for cash. Anyway if you are one of those lucky few who play with more then one version then you can take advantage of the fact that the old folder C:\<Install Path>\<Game>\Data folder still takes mods.

There are a few mods (Vin's animated text mod) that are version specific. Also sometimes a model is tweaked to fix something and older texture mods don't work property. In those cases you can install them in a z folder under the Data folder of your install and those version specific mods will work too - but just for that version of the game.

[MikeyD]

Me, I have an old overstuffed C drive and all my CM game folder on my peripheral F drive. If I use the official mods folder I'm adding files to a drive with no storage space left. If I instead make my own Z folder the mods are going onto the peripheral. In most circumstances it wouldn't make much different but my mods folder can get HUGE, virtually all of the terrain art, buildings and vehicles if I'm doing 'official' work. My poor old C drive would never be able to hold all the art.

[Vacillator]

1 hour ago, MikeyD said:

Me, I have an old overstuffed C drive and all my CM game folder on my peripheral F drive. If I use the official mods folder I'm adding files to a drive with no storage space left. If I instead make my own Z folder the mods are going onto the peripheral. In most circumstances it wouldn't make much different but my mods folder can get HUGE, virtually all of the terrain art, buildings and vehicles if I'm doing 'official' work. My poor old C drive would never be able to hold all the art.

+1 to this, I have gone the same way.

[mjkerner]

Been doing that for a while as well. All CMx2 games, modules and packs, including CMA, with brzs exploded and all scenarios, maps and mods, etc.   I just checked and my external drive is at 579 GB!