This may be a stupid question, and maybe I am misunderstanding something, but as I understand it, after every single update you have to go through your mods folder to check for updates. The only way I know how to do this is to individually go to each item's website and see if the creator has mentioned that it is updated. For this reason, I only use a few mods, and I skip out on tons that I really want, not to mention the cc. But I see people mentioning all the time having hundreds or even thousands of cc items! How are you making sure your stuff if good? Am I unaware of a simple solution? I find keeping up on just the small pile I have tedious when EA has an update every few weeks. Plus so many creators just say, "mod/cc is up to date." Up to date when? Which date? When was that posted? :#

Well, first, CC that is just plain old CC almost never needs to be updated unless the game makes a change to the asset type. So generally CC is not something that has to be worried about updating. I keep all my CC organized by type of CC so that if that kind of change is made, I can easily just move all of that type out of my game (or do a batch fix with Sims 4 Studio when applicable).As for mods, those also don't generally need to be updated "every game update". But it is something that needs to be paid attention to. I use hundreds (literally over 400) individual mod package files in my game, but worrying about "updates" and troubleshooting problems is something that takes only about an hour after each game update, following the below general principles.To facilitate easy updating, what I do is I keep all my mods separated into folders with the name of what modder made the mod and have bookmarks in my browser for the main update page of each of those modders. That way when troubleshooting problems, I can quickly narrow it down to which modder has a mod that 'needs' an update and quickly check their web site. It also lets me just move that one folder out, temporaly, while waiting for said updates.I also follow a general rule of not using any mod that is likely to need updates often. Examples of this would be some of the cooking/baking related mods that directly override the functions on stoves and refrigerators in order to do what they do. Those end up needing to be updated every single time the game adds new recipes...which is far too often for my tastes. The good news is that there are generally modders that provide similiar mods without doing that kind of override. If a mod that I use breaks on a game update several updates in a row, I generally remove the mod entirely and just won't use it anymore, ever, flagging it as more trouble than it's worth. I also have, over the years, made a mental list of which modders do that the most, and don't use any of their mods. While at the same time, I have a mental list of which modders do a great job of making their mods small, modular, and who update quickly when needed. I favor their mods.The community also provides a lot of assistance, such as the thread here in this section of the forum that provides information on what mods are broken and what (and when) mods get updated after a game patch. @Luthienrising maintains these threads currently, and deserves a freaking trophy from the community for just how helpful those threads are.And I guess the last thing that, imo, is helpful is having some understanding of basic modding oneself. Knowing how to open a mod and look specifically at what it is doing means that 1. If needed, I can provide my own 'update' of a mod in the short term until the actual modder fixes it and 2. I have a better idea of what the mod all 'touches' so that when I do have a problem in my game, it's easier to quickly make a mental short list of which mods are most likely to be causing the problem based on that knowledge and reading the patch notes."Chaotic_Moira;d-998837" wrote:I find keeping up on just the small pile I have tedious when EA has an update every few weeks. Plus so many creators just say, "mod/cc is up to date." Up to date when? Which date? When was that posted? :# Regarding this question, it's the internet, generally posts like that have a date on them. And most modders also specify specifically which patch version number they are referring to.

Thanks for the callout, @Stormkeep ! And for your support for people in my threads :) I'd add a few more notes. One, if you use 18+ mods (plus a few modders that for other reasons aren't in my Forums coverage), you need to follow lists off these Forums to get info about them. Two, organize your mods by creator to help you keep track. You can pull a creator's whole folder back into your Mods folder when they clear their mods, for example. Three, have an alternative no-mods, no-CC save for when you still want to play but you have mod/CC issues to figure out or there was a really big patch and you're in the "modders still checking their stuff" time, which can be a good week or two overall.Four, follow elsewhere if that's where you are. If you're mainly an email person, follow Patreons to get update news sent to your email inbox. Lots of active modders these days have a Discord server for support and announcements, and those can push notifications. Those two are my faves because info gets pushed out to you. If you're more a Discord person than a Forum type, you can get general update feeds there two; lots of servers pick up the mod update feed from Deaderpool or Sims After Dark, and some pick up the CC update feed from Creator Musings (which is otherwise a forum for creators supporting each other). Five, start out slow. You don't have to have all the things just because someone made another cool one. Pick up the ones that relate to your gameplay as it is now, plus bugfix mods that fix things you're likely to encounter. The fewer mods you have, the less you need to keep track of. Six, when you can't figure out what's broke and have tried everything, including a proper 50-50 with deleting localthumbcache every time, take advantage of the amazing bots and knowledgeable Simmers on Discord over at Deaderpool and Sims After Dark. They can use your error files to help you solve what's broken for you, if it's a mod problem not a game problem.

"userafw;c-18090215" wrote: ... core script mods like MCCC and Kawaii Stacie slice of life because they make major changes to the interactions in the game. These are 99 percent likely to require updating with every patch, and removal has worse consequences than any other mod type. You also should never use more than one core mod ever, or they will conflict. How do you know if a mod is a "Core Script Mod?"I use MCCC, why would removing it have consequences? I actually just took it out to check out EA's Sp, but I assume all that would happen is the functions it provided are gone.

@Chaotic_Moira, "core" mods had a specific meaning in TS3 that doesn't apply in TS4. Based on his last sentence, It appears that @userafw isn't aware of that.As for MCCC, it is perfectly safe to remove it at any time and it won't damage your save game.That said, doing so can have some devastating consequences depending on the MCCC settings that you use. For example, if you have lifespans extended with MCCC, then a TON of sims will age up immediately on loading a save after removing it. And if you had extended the elder life stage, a ton of elders will instantly die as a result.By comparison, the MCCC equivalent for TS3 was indeed a core mod, and if you removed it, your save would be badly corrupted and become unplayable. The reason mods were called "core" mods in TS3 is because they replaced the core file of the game. That's also why you could not use more than one at time. That's not a thing for TS4.

I don't know if this is helpful advice, but I use a spreadsheet to track my mods. The columns are as follows:- Name of Mod- Version- Creator- Status (Updated, Outdated, Unsupported)- Last Updated (This is the time I last updated the mod, not the last time a modder pushed an update out. This distinction is important as I don't immediately update my game, so sometimes I'm running a mod that's not the newest version.)- Link to page where the mod is hostedThen, every patch/update, I use the MCCC Discord server & Luthienrising's forum threads to check on the mods that I have & see if they've been updated/which mods have become obsolete. This entire process takes me at least an hour or so but I never update my game right away after patches/updates so I can take my time.

How do you update 100s of Mods and CC?

47 Replies

JaggidEdje
4 years ago
Well, first, CC that is just plain old CC almost never needs to be updated unless the game makes a change to the asset type. So generally CC is not something that has to be worried about updating. I keep all my CC organized by type of CC so that if that kind of change is made, I can easily just move all of that type out of my game (or do a batch fix with Sims 4 Studio when applicable).

As for mods, those also don't generally need to be updated "every game update". But it is something that needs to be paid attention to.

I use hundreds (literally over 400) individual mod package files in my game, but worrying about "updates" and troubleshooting problems is something that takes only about an hour after each game update, following the below general principles.

To facilitate easy updating, what I do is I keep all my mods separated into folders with the name of what modder made the mod and have bookmarks in my browser for the main update page of each of those modders. That way when troubleshooting problems, I can quickly narrow it down to which modder has a mod that 'needs' an update and quickly check their web site. It also lets me just move that one folder out, temporaly, while waiting for said updates.

I also follow a general rule of not using any mod that is likely to need updates often.
Examples of this would be some of the cooking/baking related mods that directly override the functions on stoves and refrigerators in order to do what they do. Those end up needing to be updated every single time the game adds new recipes...which is far too often for my tastes.
The good news is that there are generally modders that provide similiar mods without doing that kind of override.

If a mod that I use breaks on a game update several updates in a row, I generally remove the mod entirely and just won't use it anymore, ever, flagging it as more trouble than it's worth.
I also have, over the years, made a mental list of which modders do that the most, and don't use any of their mods. While at the same time, I have a mental list of which modders do a great job of making their mods small, modular, and who update quickly when needed. I favor their mods.

The community also provides a lot of assistance, such as the thread here in this section of the forum that provides information on what mods are broken and what (and when) mods get updated after a game patch. @Luthienrising maintains these threads currently, and deserves a freaking trophy from the community for just how helpful those threads are.

And I guess the last thing that, imo, is helpful is having some understanding of basic modding oneself. Knowing how to open a mod and look specifically at what it is doing means that 1. If needed, I can provide my own 'update' of a mod in the short term until the actual modder fixes it and 2. I have a better idea of what the mod all 'touches' so that when I do have a problem in my game, it's easier to quickly make a mental short list of which mods are most likely to be causing the problem based on that knowledge and reading the patch notes.

"Chaotic_Moira;d-998837" wrote:
I find keeping up on just the small pile I have tedious when EA has an update every few weeks. Plus so many creators just say, "mod/cc is up to date." Up to date when? Which date? When was that posted? :#

Regarding this question, it's the internet, generally posts like that have a date on them. And most modders also specify specifically which patch version number they are referring to.
luthienrising
Hero+
4 years ago
Thanks for the callout, @Stormkeep ! And for your support for people in my threads :)

I'd add a few more notes.

One, if you use 18+ mods (plus a few modders that for other reasons aren't in my Forums coverage), you need to follow lists off these Forums to get info about them.

Two, organize your mods by creator to help you keep track. You can pull a creator's whole folder back into your Mods folder when they clear their mods, for example.

Three, have an alternative no-mods, no-CC save for when you still want to play but you have mod/CC issues to figure out or there was a really big patch and you're in the "modders still checking their stuff" time, which can be a good week or two overall.

Four, follow elsewhere if that's where you are. If you're mainly an email person, follow Patreons to get update news sent to your email inbox. Lots of active modders these days have a Discord server for support and announcements, and those can push notifications. Those two are my faves because info gets pushed out to you. If you're more a Discord person than a Forum type, you can get general update feeds there two; lots of servers pick up the mod update feed from Deaderpool or Sims After Dark, and some pick up the CC update feed from Creator Musings (which is otherwise a forum for creators supporting each other).

Five, start out slow. You don't have to have all the things just because someone made another cool one. Pick up the ones that relate to your gameplay as it is now, plus bugfix mods that fix things you're likely to encounter. The fewer mods you have, the less you need to keep track of.

Six, when you can't figure out what's broke and have tried everything, including a proper 50-50 with deleting localthumbcache every time, take advantage of the amazing bots and knowledgeable Simmers on Discord over at Deaderpool and Sims After Dark. They can use your error files to help you solve what's broken for you, if it's a mod problem not a game problem.
ChaoticMoira
Seasoned Ace
4 years ago
@Stormkeep I can't believe you can go through that much that quickly! Wow! It takes me over an hour and I have about 15 to 20 mods. I obviously do it wrong, lol.

I also don't understand well enough how they work to feel confidant in knowing what might break, so I never know which updates I need to worry about.. and I am always afraid that if I have a broken mod in my game that I don't know about, play without problems (not realizing anything is broken), and I save with the broken mod in the game, then my save file will be ruined. I don't even know if that is how it happens, I have just read about so many people having broken games due to outdated mods that I assume this is what happens. Am I misunderstanding it? I wouldn't worry as much if I didn't think my whole save file was going to be ruined.

I do check for the posting date, but I think some modders probably don't have the time to go to each mod page and say a mod is up to date if they didn't need to change it, so then it will have a really old date. A good example of this is TwistedMexi's Expandable BuildBuy. It says it is updated to Spa Day. Now he is pretty active, and a modder I trust, so I downloaded it assuming he just didn't see a need to say it is current as perhaps he has not needed to make changes since then. But I see a lot of mods listed like this.

I do try to stick with Modders that I see staying active. And I recently did the thing you mentioned and bookmarked all the mods that are in my game. I do keep them organized as well. I thought cc was less of a concern but being unsure I kept looking at it too, and I had to go look up the batch fixing thing. That is interesting. Thanks for mentioning it. I do have Sims4 Studio, but I only use it to edit cc for my game, I didn't know about the batch fix thing at all.

@luthienrising thank you sooo much for the update threads. I only found out about that last month and it was helpful. There was a few mods I wanted and saw on the list that they are broken. I only have one game save. Every house I play is in the same file and I rotate houses. I don't even know what I would do with a whole new game, lol. When updates hit I usually just build stuff in a new game while I wait. I am not on discord or twitter, but it seems like both are used often by modders, so I may have to sign up just for updates I guess. My email is a swamp so...

I am actually pretty chill with mods, I don't go crazy wanting all the new things and I avoid big override mods. I just really hate certain things in the game that I know mods can fix, and those are what I focus on. Things like how fast or slow something goes, or how annoyingly often sims will do certain things. I could probably have 50 mods making these little adjustments if I wasn't always stressed about updates.
Simsilikesims
4 years ago
As a general rule, object mods, that is mods affecting only one object in build buy, are less likely to get broken with patches, and will not mess up your game save if they are removed when the game is not running, like cc furnishing and doors they simply disappear from any lot they were used on. I have lots of these like functional fruit bowl, functional shower supplies, and functional sunblock lotion, including an option for vampire protection.

Trait mods and career mods are more risky, but I have not had issues that would corrupt a save enough to break the game or prevent loading of the save file. Sims with custom careers simply become unemployed if something happens to a career mod.

I avoid core script mods like MCCC and Kawaii Stacie slice of life because they make major changes to the interactions in the game. These are 99 percent likely to require updating with every patch, and removal has worse consequences than any other mod type. You also should never use more than one core mod ever, or they will conflict.

Finally, there is the 50/50 method that involves moving out half of your mods folder to a different folder. Repeat until the game loads correctly. If the game does load, immediately use the Save As button to copy and save your game to a new slot. However, it is best to back up your mods and your tray folders to another location by manually copying and pasting the folder
PhilxSims
New Veteran
4 years ago
"userafw;c-18090215" wrote:
functional sunblock lotion, including an option for vampire protection.

Sorry to go off topic slightly, but can you post a link? I found one by kuttoe and one by Ilex but the descriptions didn't seem to mention vampire protection.
ChaoticMoira
Seasoned Ace
4 years ago
"userafw;c-18090215" wrote:
... core script mods like MCCC and Kawaii Stacie slice of life because they make major changes to the interactions in the game. These are 99 percent likely to require updating with every patch, and removal has worse consequences than any other mod type. You also should never use more than one core mod ever, or they will conflict.

How do you know if a mod is a "Core Script Mod?"
I use MCCC, why would removing it have consequences? I actually just took it out to check out EA's Sp, but I assume all that would happen is the functions it provided are gone.
JaggidEdje
4 years ago
@Chaotic_Moira, "core" mods had a specific meaning in TS3 that doesn't apply in TS4. Based on his last sentence, It appears that @userafw isn't aware of that.

As for MCCC, it is perfectly safe to remove it at any time and it won't damage your save game.

That said, doing so can have some devastating consequences depending on the MCCC settings that you use. For example, if you have lifespans extended with MCCC, then a TON of sims will age up immediately on loading a save after removing it. And if you had extended the elder life stage, a ton of elders will instantly die as a result.

By comparison, the MCCC equivalent for TS3 was indeed a core mod, and if you removed it, your save would be badly corrupted and become unplayable. The reason mods were called "core" mods in TS3 is because they replaced the core file of the game. That's also why you could not use more than one at time.
That's not a thing for TS4.
effiejae
Seasoned Hotshot
4 years ago
I don't know if this is helpful advice, but I use a spreadsheet to track my mods. The columns are as follows:

- Name of Mod
- Version
- Creator
- Status (Updated, Outdated, Unsupported)
- Last Updated (This is the time I last updated the mod, not the last time a modder pushed an update out. This distinction is important as I don't immediately update my game, so sometimes I'm running a mod that's not the newest version.)
- Link to page where the mod is hosted

Then, every patch/update, I use the MCCC Discord server & Luthienrising's forum threads to check on the mods that I have & see if they've been updated/which mods have become obsolete. This entire process takes me at least an hour or so but I never update my game right away after patches/updates so I can take my time.
VWoodsong
Seasoned Ace
4 years ago
"naeshelle;c-18090783" wrote:
I don't know if this is helpful advice, but I use a spreadsheet to track my mods. The columns are as follows:

- Name of Mod
- Version
- Creator
- Status (Updated, Outdated, Unsupported)
- Last Updated (This is the time I last updated the mod, not the last time a modder pushed an update out. This distinction is important as I don't immediately update my game, so sometimes I'm running a mod that's not the newest version.)
- Link to page where the mod is hosted

Then, every patch/update, I use the MCCC Discord server & Luthienrising's forum threads to check on the mods that I have & see if they've been updated/which mods have become obsolete. This entire process takes me at least an hour or so but I never update my game right away after patches/updates so I can take my time.

This sounds much like my own process, minus the spreadsheet. I never update immediately after patches or other updates drop, either, and likewise I can take my time with everything. :)

Also I want to add my own to the other grateful shoutouts to @luthienrising for her invaluable threads. :heart:
ChaoticMoira
Seasoned Ace
4 years ago
"Stormkeep;c-18090710" wrote:
@Chaotic_Moira, "core" mods had a specific meaning in TS3 that doesn't apply in TS4. Based on his last sentence, It appears that @userafw isn't aware of that.

As for MCCC, it is perfectly safe to remove it at any time and it won't damage your save game.

That said, doing so can have some devastating consequences depending on the MCCC settings that you use. For example, if you have lifespans extended with MCCC, then a TON of sims will age up immediately on loading a save after removing it. And if you had extended the elder life stage, a ton of elders will instantly die as a result.

Ahhhhh how interesting... I did use NRAAS Master Controller for Sims 3, which is what I assume you are talking about... Although I think there was another one that I remember some people seemed to have issues with which I didn't use... maybe that was why.. hmm

I didn't even think of the age thing.. Interesting.. Now I am just wondering what else in there might have similar affects.. I think only used it for cheats and SP though, so it should be fine.

"naeshelle;c-18090783" wrote:
I don't know if this is helpful advice, but I use a spreadsheet to track my mods....

My husband loves making spreadsheets! Maybe I will try this. It would be helpful to look at a list that just says what it is, so I am not trying to work it out..