Fixpack and Ascension?

[Guest Guest_Ithildur_*]

I keep finding posts at various sites that indicate Ascension may overwrite things that are addressed by Fixpack if installed after Fixpack; is this true of even the weidu version of Ascension? I know about the infamous missing carriage return in the stats.ids that ships with Ascension (wondering why that's still not fixed after all this time) which can cause problems with other mods; not sure if that's part of the issue or not.

 

I was 99% sure that when I installed Ascension a few years ago people were adamantly telling me this, and as a result I installed weidu Ascension before Fixpack, the only mod that I did so (I do not use any non weidu mods); is this still the case?

[coaster]

The one time I installed Ascension before Fixpack a lot of dialogue in Chateau Irenicus turned to garbage. I don't know if it was specifically due to the interaction of these two mods, or my other mods (I had quite a few installed). I've never noticed a problem with a Fixpack first-Ascension second install - although there might be bugs which I just haven't observed.

[Ithildur]

Alright, I'm going to try Ascension after Fixpack then. It's possible that when I installed it the other way around several years ago it was a non weidu version of Ascension which made it necessary to do it that way.

 

I realize this is not a Fixpack issue so much as Ascension's issue, but has the missing carriage return issue been addressed btw? I remember vaguely from a couple years ago that a lot of people's installs were apparently getting thrown off by other mods making amendments to the stats.ids file and getting screwed up because of Ascension throwing in it's version of stats.ids with that missing carriage return at the top.

 

On a related note, I wonder if the weidu-ization of Ascension now means that the 'Tougher' components can be installed/uninstalled late in the order of mods without messing up or causing conflicts with other weidu mods including Fixpack, as long as they are mods that don't introduce a lot of radical changes...

[coaster]

AFAIK even Weidu Ascension is pretty old and unfortunately therefore overwrites files rather than patching them, despite being Weidu-ised. This means that files which are altered by other mods which are also altered by Ascension will have those changes overwritten. So it is sensible to keep it early on in your installation order (it is always immediately after Fixpack in my order) if you are installing multiple mods.

 

Ascension also uses a pretty old version of "Detectable Spells/effects" which will also overwrite newer versions (such as in the Rogue Rebalancing mod, or Sword Coast Strategems II). Again, this means that Ascension should go earlier so that the outdated version of detectable spells Ascension uses is superceded by the newer versions in RR or SCSII.

 

I would also mention in passing that apart from upgrading the AI of Ascension enemies a bit, SCSII also includes a few bugfixes for Ascension so it might be worth considering installing it too (eg. I always used to get a game-crashing bug with Improved Yaga-Shura in Ascension which SCSII has now fixed).

[Azazello]

coaster, I just finished an install with Ascension before Fixpack [see 'Style: miniMegaInstall-g3Fixpack'], and am willing to bet a chocolate bar that it had nothing to do with your Hotel Irenicus dialogue mix-up.

 

"Ascension-before-Fixpack" is being documented in the thread: Ascension: List of confirmed bugs

[coaster]

You would probably win your chocolate bar - but I have to say it was the only time that problem showed up, and it was the only time I played with the Ascension-before-Fixpack setup (the list of my other mods tends to remain fairly stable). I will stick with Ascension-after on my own install for now because I'm stubborn

[Azazello]

I will stick with Ascension-after on my own install for now because I'm stubborn

Stubborn is not always a bad thing.

 

If Ascension doesn't interfere with the mods you use, there's no reason not to put it after fixpack. Now with the bug thread, players can determine what those mods are.