Vortex and MO2 seem to not be working right still on STL (latest)

[GenghisSwan10]

Hi all. Took a little break from both MO2 and Vortex because they were not working two weeks ago and were quite honestly trying my patience lol.

Came back today to find out that I still can’t deploy mods in Vortex. Whenever I try to change the destination/directory (I think that’s what it’s called) by pressing the “suggest” then “apply” buttons, it says it doesn’t have access to the “Z” drive (wherever that is). When I try to give it access by pressing the button, nothing happens. (This was for both FO4 and 2077)

Then with MO2 I would install mods, enable them, then they’d crash the game in the case of 2077. Sometimes it’ll even freeze up on me, and I can’t even close the window without closing the game and STL.

In all honesty I probably should’ve just installed them through GitHub or on Nexus instead of going through STL, if even that would’ve worked. Ah well. If anyone has the same issues or solutions let me know ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[frostworx]

In all honesty I'm pretty confident that this is user misconfiguration. if you want to blame STL without even trying top help with a proper issue, you probably really "should’ve just installed them through GitHub or on Nexus instead of going through STL"

[sonic2kk]

Came back today to find out that I still can’t deploy mods in Vortex.

See #555.

Then with MO2 I would install mods, enable them, then they’d crash the game in the case of 2077. Sometimes it’ll even freeze up on me, and I can’t even close the window without closing the game and STL.

Mod compatibility on Linux is not guaranteed, also MO2 only has basic support for Cyberpunk 2077, as per:

With basic support you should expect MO2 simply placing files from inside mods into a specific folder virtually. Mo2 will only show conflicts between files if the files actually overlap, many games use different folders for each mod, which means that no conflicts will show up in mo2. Also in some games that require files to be placed on top level of the game folder, mO2 might have problems virtualizing dll files and executables due to limitations of the VFS.

So the mods may not be compatible with MO2, may not be compatible with Linux, a combination of both, or potential user error. See especially the last sentence from the MO2 documentation.

There is currently ongoing work around MO2. There is some work going on externally around Vortex support. Please be patient in waiting for these fixes. SteamTinkerLaunch is an open source project developed with no affiliation to Valve, Steam or any specific users. Its features come from the creator, Frostworx, and other contributors (like myself) in their space time. Yes, it sucks that Vortex currently isn't working, but there is an ongoing effort to improve Vortex support on Linux as a whole.

In all honesty I probably should’ve just installed them through GitHub or on Nexus instead of going through STL

I'm not sure how this would resolve your issue. Vortex and community installers for it on Linux are currently undergoing changes to improve support. As far as I know the user in #555 with a working installer seems far more technical than STL's frontend, and I'm not sure what you mean by "Installing through GitHub" but in all likelihood Vortex and your mods won't just magically work by installing Vortex from GitHub if that's what you mean.

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I think the hostility or apparent presence thereof here might spring from a potential misunderstanding of how this project and many others work, as well as how GitHub issues work.

This issue tracker is for reporting bugs, absolutely - But users are expected to submit more, where possible, than just "This still isn't working". There were no logs attached in your issue, you didn't use the bug report issue template, and by the looks of it you didn't look for currently open issues (#555 is pinned).

I think also there is a misunderstanding in the tone of each persons message. No need for anyone to start being defensive 🙂

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Took a little break from both MO2 and Vortex because they were not working two weeks ago and were quite honestly trying my patience lol.

Welcome to PC gaming, Windows or Linux. Especially if you want to get into modding, this is the norm. There can be so many things that can go wrong with modding particularly when you're not using the Steam Workshop which only a relative handful of games support (sadly). Community modding for games that weren't designed with modders in mind can be tricky, combine this with trying to do this on a niche gaming handheld that uses a compatibility layer to unofficially run software, and you should be expecting to run into issues and spend time resolving them.

In this case, there is probably no real resolution. Vortex issues are currently being discussed and tracked, MO2 should work but your specific mod(s) might not work correctly. The Vortex issue is likely fixable and there is work pending according to the last comment on the tracker, but from what you have described I would say your MO2 issues are not specific to STL or even Linux - Those mods might just not work with MO2.

It sucks that the mods aren't working, and Vortex not deploying them is an issue that will likely be resolved soon. @frostworx you might be able to add more here than I can, but the deployment issue should be fixed pending some of the script changes discussed in the last few comments in #555 right? In other words, Vortex is most likely fixable, the work is just pending.

Either way though, this is how PC gaming is. I can't tell you how many times I've stayed awake until the sun came up trying to figure out why my Fallout mods were broken - On Windows! In my experience MO2 on Linux with STL works great for the games I've used it with (Bethesda games, and I'm not alone) and only requires very minimal extra effort compared to Windows almost entirely to do with knowing how to set up paths (where STL does a lot of the legwork here for you). But MO2 may not support every game perfectly. MO2 may not support every game perfectly on Linux! I doubt any Linux support issues would be specific to STL unless a user is able to confirm a game and mod working with MO2 installed externally to STL, and installed with STL, and provide detailed logging and explanation so we can verify that it is indeed whatever STL is doing (or more than likely, configuring) is set wrong.

If you didn't know, STL just installs and attempts to configure MO2 for you. It doesn't do anything fancier than that really, it's not like we're modifying MO2 or using an older version, we take the latest release from GitHub (I wrote the patch to ensure that last month!) and STL attempts to configure MO2 to detect existing games, and some other sauce. So I don't know if there's anything that would cause Cyberpunk 2077 to not work that is exclusive to STL. Actually, my money would be on MO2 just not supporting certain types of Cyberpunk 2077 mods, or imo less likely, those mods don't work with MO2 on Linux (never experienced this before and I've used a lot of whacky Skyrim mods that I expected to not work, like lighting mods etc).

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Modding is hard work, and STL is a community project that gets its features from volunteers and from the voluntary time of the maintainer. No one here is paid for their work, bugs are fixed when we know how to fix them and when someone contributes the fix. That can take a lot longer than just a few weeks. A bit of prior research before opening this issue should've given you a hint that Vortex may have issues at the moment.

If you really need your mods to work I recommend trying to find a way to manually install them. Most mods can be installed manually.

[frostworx]

Thanks for your diplomacy, @sonic2kk
I'm more than tired of answering incomplete non-issues (especially if people have been told multiple times before in different ways to append logs and open clear issues)
Also it should be pretty obvious after looking at the open issues for 5 seconds that there are already open and active MO2/Vortex issues. shouldn't be too much requested to read those before opening another "issue" without content.

Vortex actually does work from my point of view (apart from activating auto-detected games automatically in vortex)
still waiting for any user feedback for #555 (comment)

edit: oh, waiting for two weeks "patiently" for others improving your "problem" without even trying to help and then opening a new non-issue IS rude

[Retrograde-i486]

Completely agree Frostworx, I always just wonder why people even want to use Vortex when MO2 works just as well. If you're going through the effort to mod on Linux just take the 10 minutes and learn MO2. Hell, there's a ton of tutorials on youtube that'll help.

That being said, maybe the problem lies with people wanting to click links on the nexus and have them auto download with their organizer of choice. I've never done that, even back in the Windows days. I always just manually downloaded the zip from Nexus, then pressed CTRL+M to add the mod (or go to File--> Install Mod in MO2) and installed it that way. Sure it took awhile for 183 mods but shrug it works.

[frostworx]

Thank you very much for backing, @Retrograde-i486! ❤

[frostworx]

I wasn’t even being rude on here but you decided to be unnecessarily hostile.

https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamTinkerLaunch/comments/xxry7p/vortex_and_mo2_still_broken_cannot_deploy_mods_at/

https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamTinkerLaunch/comments/xl3h2d/comment/irdlzrh/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

doesn't look like any misunderstanding from my side this time.

no need to waste any more time here. 👋

[sonic2kk]

For downloading mods (maybe unrelated to this issue) I had a bunch of problems with this on Windows 10 back in the really old Nexus Mod Manager days, and I have always been in the habit of manually downloading mods.

And when mod managers don't work, manual installation is always possible. It makes uninstallation harder but there are still mods that require manual installation. It's rare that a mod manager is required, but this can happen. Usually though you can drag the files in the relevant directories and where necessary on Wine, set the DLL overrides yourself.

Having said all that, if there are still issues with Vortex:

Came back today to find out that I still can’t deploy mods in Vortex. Whenever I try to change the destination/directory (I think that’s what it’s called) by pressing the “suggest” then “apply” buttons, it says it doesn’t have access to the “Z” drive (wherever that is). When I try to give it access by pressing the button, nothing happens. (This was for both FO4 and 2077)

A similar issue was reported in #611. Btw, @GenghisSwan10, the Z:\ drive in Wine represents your entire filesystem on Steam Deck, and the C:\ drive is actually the prefix that Vortex runs in. This is the behaviour of Wine, I'd recommend getting familiar with Wine (probably best on a desktop) before delving too deeply into mods.

I wonder if Vortex is messing up folder permissions. In #611 I thought it might've been NTFS related but maybe not. If anyone is willing to test and familiar with Vortex please do, I'm not too familiar but I might give it a try later and dig into the file permissions.

[sonic2kk]

Wow, the reply to the other user is someone having issues with Flatpak Steam, which MO2 seems to struggle with as per #540. If anyone here has Reddit it could be more helpful to point that user in the direction of thet issue.

I don't understand the hostility and entitled attitude. Reporting bugs is important and good provided they are detailed, but this is a community project. It's disappointing when things aren't fixed but such is software development. Things take time to fix and no user is entitled to have an issue fixed, especially when they don't try to help themselves first.

Yeah, I'm sorry OP but this kind of entitled attitude doesn't help anyone. Feel free to dig into it on your own and if you find a solution feel free to report back.

[frostworx]

thanks mate! I'll point the other guy to #540
(wise decision to not use reddit btw working on it)

edit: done
I'm close before closing the reddit sub (again) because almost nobody tries to help each other there. Genereally I think it is better for the peace of mind to avoid reddit completely.

[sonic2kk]

Fix your damn launcher and stop patting yourself on the back

Given the number of users of STL and people who use it, I'm gonna say STL does work. I would recommend learning how to use it before criticizing it simply because you can't understand how to use it, and without actually trying to help yourself.

[frostworx]

Thanks mate, but I strongly suggest not to waste time on such valuable community members