What is the mod limit?

[TexanChiss]

I am sure something like this was posted, but it did not answer the whole question.
What is the mod limit exluding non esp mods "retextures, sound tweaks, other non esps" since many people told me they do not count. I have 173 esp mods in my load order already and I am afraid to add more.

[Sofa]

Only your pc is the limit. As long as it is powerful enough it can run it

[Delta 1038]

256

[Rodso]

i had 300 once

[Sofa]

Messaggio originale di Delta 1038:

256

No, there's no limit, I have over 300 mods on my Skyrim ( I also use the Nexus ) and I can run it just fine and I have only about 3-5 graphical mods.

[TexanChiss]

Thanks for all the answers you guys it was very helpful verses previous posts I have seen.

[Peahatche]

use the skse launcher. it increases the amount of memory skyrim can handle - not needed usually but perfect for lots of mods (less crashes)

[Zukkii]

Messaggio originale di AzKiller13:

Messaggio originale di Delta 1038:

256

No, there's no limit, I have over 300 mods on my Skyrim ( I also use the Nexus ) and I can run it just fine and I have only about 3-5 graphical mods.

You must be confused with merged plugins. The limit is 255, anything surpassing that will crash the game.

@Roman501st
If you managed to reach the limit you can merge plugins. Check Gopher and STEP Wiki on how to do that.

EDIT: Sorry confused myself between plugins and mods. Post is now rendered invalid.

[Sofa]

Messaggio originale di Roman501st:

Thanks for all the answers you guys it was very helpful verses previous posts I have seen.

No problem mate

[KarsaOrlong]

Your esp are plugins, many mods have more than one plugin so the amount of plugins you have will only give you an approx. idea of how many mods you have.

[Carl!!!!]

You can have as many mods as you want, but only 255 active plugins, and those include the DLC. Most retextures don't have an esp/plugin for example. At one point, before I got rid of most of my mods, I was at the maxed 255 active plugins, with over 80 texture mods (that weren't taking up plugin slots. xD

[Incunabulum]

Messaggio originale di AzKiller13:

Messaggio originale di Delta 1038:

256

No, there's no limit, I have over 300 mods on my Skyrim ( I also use the Nexus ) and I can run it just fine and I have only about 3-5 graphical mods.

255 plugins is the limit.

Some mods take up more than one plugin.

You can scavenge plugin slots back if you learn how to use some of the editing tools out there to merge multiple plugins into a single one.

[bobczes]

As for why this is?

All ID referrences in Skyrim are 8-digit hexadecimal codes (0 to F, sixteen digits total), and the first two digits are always reserved for the esp or esm ID. In the case of "Skyrim.esm", the heading will always be "00"; the headings for mods then goes by load order, all the way up to "FF" (which is 255 in hexadecimal digits).

Theoretically you can have more than 255 mods installed, but only 255 may be active (checked on) at once; this is due to the first two digits being determined by the load order. It should be noted that this does not include replacers; some of the most common examplies being model & texture replacements for weapons, armour, and bodies. Anything can be replaced at will without changing the mod count, but any additional features (or removals, tweaks, or anything else for that matter) will require an esp or esm file to be active.


And for the math...
16 * 16 = 256 esp & esm files active at any given time.
256 - 1 (for the base game esm file) = 255 mods active at once.


However, this still leaves room for your PC to hit an operational limit; 255 is the hard cap programmed into the game, but that doesn't mean a combination of fewer mods can still be too much for your system (depends on how much each mod does as well). This is obviously a case-by-case basis, so the best approach here is kinda touchy-feely. If your rig can handle 50 mods before struggle, another PC might be able to break 100 without a stutter; there's no way to find out how much slowdown will happen until you install the mods.

Cribbed from here.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/615805-the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim/63038219

[Incunabulum]

As an example of 'operational limits', FNV has an engine bug that effectively limits you to 139 plugins (and anything above 135 has a good chance of screwing things up) no matter how good your hardware is.

[Factualious]

Messaggio originale di bobczes:

And for the math...
16 * 16 = 256 esp & esm files active at any given time.

nitpicking...

It is actually 2^8, that's 2 to the 8th power - the "2" comes from the base-2 (binary) representation of numbers the computer uses, and the "8" because they are only using 1 byte (8-bits) to set the limit.

"16 * 16 = 256", is mostly just a coincidence. Whoever first wrote it was probably confused by the fact that hexadecimal notation (base-16) is reported by the game when looking up reference IDs - and that takes 2 digits to specify numbers up to 256. To see why this is the wrong way to think of it consider what the situation would be if they'd used octal (base-8) instead of hexadecimal, that would take 3-digits but 8*8*8=512!

[sorry - sometimes I just can't resist the urge, and I'm a little bored right now :P ]

[street sign]

Messaggio originale di AzKiller13:

Messaggio originale di Delta 1038:

256

No, there's no limit, I have over 300 mods on my Skyrim ( I also use the Nexus ) and I can run it just fine and I have only about 3-5 graphical mods.

The Havoc engine that they used to make all their RPGs supports 256 .esps and .esms. If you use the workshop you can bypass that to an extent.